Misfits, clean rug, and Suits

Yesterday's box arrived short of a couple of items. They'd notified me as usual, but they don't know for sure till the packing starts, if they'll come up short, so no time to change my order. 

It's one of the features of opportunistic marketing, the advantage being great prices and good quality in what you do get. I've seen people complaining that they can't set up a regular unchanging order with misfits. The whooshing sound is the point flying over their heads.

Missing are the apples and Swiss chard. I'll live.

I've ordered  bread, very unusual for me, because I've been unable to get whole wheat flour for weeks, and wonder if it's a distant result of Ukrainian supplies being throttled by Russia, affecting worldwide distribution. We have plenty of US grain production but I  wonder about the mechanism of supply.  

I'll resume home baked bread when I get whole wheat flour again, but meanwhile there's whole wheat pita and these multigrain loaves. They're a bit sweet for my taste, but, again, I'll live.

And yesterday I wondered what on earth there was to eat in the house, like not a thing to wear, and cooked this cod, tomatoes, with yellow potatoes, heavily seasoned with salt, black pepper and berbere. Cod can take it.

Note the plates in the background. This is three meals.

I expect this has some fancy recipe name, and would like to know if you know of it. It was fast food, and very good, too. 

Pro tip: I often add a sprig of herb, here Italian basil, or curry leaves, Thai basil, thyme, when you see pictures. It's not just for a photo shoot. It makes a delicate flavor as you eat the food, you can smell it, and it gets into the taste without actually eating the herb.  Same with floating a sprig in hot soup. This is handy when you're catering for people who don't like that flavor, just leave it off their  helping.

Speaking of herbs, friend Michael the Artist Handyman, across the street, is also a great cook, lucky wife comes home to marvellous dinners, anyway he's coming over today to get supplies of herbs from the patio, between rain showers. 

I'm going to confer with him about the idea of sage and celery soup. Chances are he's made it. I know he's fried sage leaves crisp then added them like croutons to soup. I haven't tried this yet.

Yesterday I washed and rinsed and blocked the little rug and it's drying on a towel up in the loft.

Then I'll stitch on the backing and veeolia! ready for cold weather.

Suits has been my evening viewing, just a couple of episodes at a time. I think what appeals to me, aside from the amazing clothes and shoes (Jessica in court with those  iconic red soles), is the intelligence. 

They reframe circumstances brilliantly, when all is lost, it isn't.  As in: this isn't a personal betrayal, it's a contract issue. I love that and could have used it effectively in a number of past situations.  It might be just as well I didn't know it at the time, come to think of it.

We haven't had a puzzle in a while, largely because Haggard Hawks has gone over to Word of the Day, interesting, but maybe not wanting to compete with his puzzle book. But here's a recent one, which I  don't think I've posted. 

Funny clues only, please, no answers. Blogistas have the best funny clues.

Happy day, everyone

Let's hope justice finally gets rolling down, thanks to Fani Willis, civic hero, and, of course, a black woman. It's always a brilliant black woman who saves the day.

Warm days, fish, punctuality and Misfits

Yesterday was so warm that my library discussion group met outdoors under the trees. It's mainly old people, retired, because it meets mid-afternoon on  a weekday. 

Once again it reminded me of a quotation from a Miss Marple episode.  Two lawyers are talking abut her appointment with them, and one comments she's elderly, so she'll be prompt.  And again, by start time, every seat is occupied.  It's a lively and interesting, very  opinionated,  group, hospitable to new members like me.

Lunch yesterday was that lovely ginger scallion sauce over cod poached in milk, with steamed chard and carrots

That really powers you up for action 

And once home in the afternoon, the first day warm enough to sit out and read and smell the spice bush.

I'm currently doing a load of laundry using ivy leaf soap, and I'll report back on the results.

And the Misfits box arrived

The pita bread, blueberries and spinach are a favorite breakfast. And the ground turkey will join the pasta to become spag and mb. The shrimp will be cooked very simply, with rice and maybe that ginger scallion sauce.  It's all there. Apples for midmorning snacks.Many plans. 

Happy day everyone, enjoy your day, what are you reading? I've tried and rejected a couple of books recently, no need to review when I don't think they need more oxygen. 

That's why you only see comments on books I think are worth my limited remaining lifespan. 

New clothes for old and Misfits box

Today, before I got up, I was thinking about what to wear, fancied the jacket I'd altered from a sweatshirt, then realized I'd cut it months ago, but not finished the fronts.

So a search for some form of edging ensued, I found this, which a knitting friend tells me is blanket edging satin, works fine for my purpose.

So breakfast was about stitching.

I found I didn't like the top corners of the fronts, so I altered them to work this way, and I like it fine now.

Wore it to my knitting group this afternoon, in fact. I'll see, after I wear it a time or two, if I want to remove the cuffs and edge the sleeves, too, with a narrow band of ribbon.

This is a different project from the denim vest and sashiko stitching, which was yesterday's adventure.

Here's the back (the front will be occupied by pockets with sparkle, no need for more) and the French curves I used to draw around. The pen marks will vanish with heat.

Then I stitched around the shapes, white several-ply thread on the faded denim. It looks subtle and as if it's always been there. I like this effect.

And I really loved working with a hoop again. It's been a while. When I put in the lining, I may run white topstitching in sashiko around the perimeter.  

Food happened, too, fish and chips! 

Cod baked in seasoned panko, roast yellow potato fries, vinegar on. As soon as the curry leaves touched the hot food, the scent was amazing. I also had an amazing burst of energy after this meal. In fact I attribute the sashiko stitching to it.

Today I had another section of cod for lunch, chunked and added to a bowl of curried cauliflower soup, turning it into kind of fish stew, and very good it was.

When I got home from knitting group, fun as always, after returning the orchid to next door and pruning the massive fiddle leaf fig, which was brushing the ceiling, while I was there, my Misfits box arrived.

Just as well, since several items, the salad, blueberries and chocolate chips, were part of the supper I'd planned. To be exact, tuna and chickpea and green salad, heavy fish motif around here, then blueberries and chocolate chips over plain yogurt.

I hope to finish that second sock this weekend, do the finishing, then mail off the current four pairs to Knitting Ministry HQ.

Many marches tomorrow to protest the danger to Roe v Wade. My state has declared we will not work with any demands from non abortion states to penalize anyone coming here from out of state for health care. No extradition, no penalty, no putting people in danger. 

It's ridiculous that a person can be a full citizen in one state and a deprived felon in another for the same actions. People who say the states should decide don't grasp the principle of human rights. Your rights shouldn't depend on your address.

 Fight on, be like Ukraine! Happy day, too. We can do both.

Boxing Day

One of my aunts, born in the 1890s, used to refer to all Christmas presents as Christmas boxes. They didn't have to be in a box. In fact a bonus in the pay would be a Christmas box. And Boxing Day was when an employer would hand them over. 

So here's Maggie Rudy's take on the Christmas box sweater,  knitted by grandma, with plenty of room for growth, tried on with dismay by the little mouse, while mom cautions him to say nowt, because she understands.

And today being a wonderful mild sunny day, walking happened. So did Christmas boxes from nature.

Here's one, a silver dime on a gold beech leaf

And here are favorite scenes, shadows falling on beech trees, that grey silk trunk like a drawing surface

This beauty appreciation is all very well, but first the inner woman was attended to.

The Christmas Eve cod steak was as good as I'd hoped - very. Lovely flakes, just baked enough. Cayenne pepper. Bed of spinach, carrots and scallions. Buttered boiled Yukon gold potatoes.  

Years since I had decent cod. Locally, in the northeast US,  the fish preferences of the population are more exotic than the north Atlantic fish I grew up on, in northeastern Yorkshire, cod, herring, haddock, skate. They're pretty rare.  

But Misfits market has added in cold pack ordering which makes fish and meat possible in the Misfits box in addition to produce. This is my first trial of the fish option, expensive and worth it. 

Then today came the planned cod cakes. Flaked cod, left from Christmas Eve, mixed with several veggies, Old Bay seasoning, egg beaten in, Panko breading, baked.

Fancy bit of Thai basil, growing in a pot in the kitchen, glass of ginger ale 

Dessert was German tiny cookies and a drop of eggnog.

Speaking of potatoes, which we were back there, 

here are Yukon gold potatoes, planted as peelings, growing like maniacs in a pot in the living room. Bringing the outdoors indoors. I did get a couple of accidental potatoes in a pot upstairs, so we'll see if these deliberate ones work out.

Not long before I can go on a witch hazel blossom hunt. Even before snowdrops.

It's all go!

Merry Eve. Or TGIF. Your choice.

Christmas Eve here, solo day, lovely. Aside from laying the table for tomorrow's dinner, finding the serving spoons, little containers for condiments, it's a day of loafing.

Lunch baked cod steak, first in years, on a bed of spinach and scallions, buttered Yukon gold potatoes. Simple, good.

Then the annual viewing of

Favorite, well, only, really, Christmas movie for me.

So happy day, everyone! 

Christmas Eve Eve

Today's Christmas prep consists of taking the apricot sauce out of the freezer for Christmas dinner, and some of the cod out for Christmas Eve dinner. That's it.

I'm reading a couple of interesting books, both nonfiction, this one about how birds acquired their names. The title refers to a bird an ornithologist named for his ornithologist wife!  

The prose is very readable, even the introduction is interesting, but the font is holding me up, a bit small. 

Bird names originate all over, often the folk names which preceded the official ornithologist ones still hanging on despite all efforts to insist on the correct taxonomy. Some, such as goose, are so old we don't know the origin, other than speculating it's Indo-European, very old. 

And then the pilgrims arriving in New England, with no knowiedge at all, naming birds because they reminded them of European species. 

Hence the burly American robin, a completely different species from the tiny European robin redbreast. If you love this kind of thing you'll love this book.

And here's another lovely thoughtful one, part sewing instructions, part memoir, part illness journey, part musing on body image, arranged by season.. 

The photography, much of it her own,  is wonderful, pictures of projects and tools and fabrics, worth seeing even if you don't sew and really don't want to. She also has some intriguing thoughts about the therapeutic value of making in general, sewing in particular.

Behind Sanae Ishida, waiting in the wings,  is the  2022  Making calendar she illustrated, which is how I found her, a gift from dear C. 

You'll see more of it when the New Year gets here.  It's a series of animals and their arts, one each per month, lovely illustrations. 

I seem to have picked up Handsome Partner's Scottish New Year inhibition against studying the calendar before the New Year comes in!  

The number of Scottish traditions he followed.. he also had a wicked sense of humor, and it wouldn't surprise me if he made some of them up. 

His lifelong sorrow was that, as a redhead,  he couldn't first-foot our house -- be the first person over the threshold after midnight, bringing fuel (lump of coal) and food (bread or cake) and good cheer (Scotch), to be greeted with a kiss by the woman of the house. 

That's because only a dark haired male can do it. Our dark haired son was the official first footer, once he was old enough to stay awake.

Back to the present and the passage of time. I've been gradually moving spent flowers from the birthday bouquet, most of which is still going strong, either to press or to add to the dried flowers.

I have a little group of air plant, statice, and spent roses, the last from the bouquet, and yesterday I was just moving another rose into the arrangement when it exploded, making a lovely still life on the hearth, thereby illustrating exactly what I was doing.

Collaborative art.

And yesterday,  friend/ artist/contractor Mike, who designed and installed my mantelpiece and my library table as well as my deck and various great things around here, stopped over for a visit.

Bringing his homemade peppermint chocolate bark for Christmas. He's a great cook, baker and candy maker and we had a good catch-up before he, wife Dana and dogs, drive to Florida to spend Christmas with their Disney employee daughter.  

He gave me an animal update too. I knew their old Jack Russell died last year aged 19, leaving the middle aged Westie alone. So they now have a whirling dervish puppy of a Cavalier King Charles terrier, black and tan, who is leading them all a merry dance. His wife has been wanting a CKC for years. 

Brief health update around here: new med added in to address the blood pressure issue. So I got all my errands done, since I start on it today, and need to observe how I handle it. Hoping for no drama. No driving, just in case.

It's a good feeling to be all caught up, cleaners here last week, laundry done, food organized,  few cards mailed, just take walks and generally loaf about now. Wheeee!!