Walking before the rain, AnneTyler and garlic bread

Yesterday I walked during a brief sunny interval between rainstorms, starting with a look at my own front yard. Here's why I love sedum. The rosettes have been growing under the old foliage.

And this is one of those runner plants I like, which some people think is a weed to be pulled,  which will have yellow flowers soon, getting under way.  Name escapes me.

further afield, nature's abstract expression 

The very first daffodils I've seen in bloom, miniatures

Then another clump, full size ones

The pale gold of beech leaves stays all winter, floating in clouds

Then home again, I found a really good audio book to knit by. I feel an affinity with almost all of Anne  Tyler, her characters'  missed connections, the East Coastness.  Her dialog is pitch perfect.

Happy day, everyone, raining today, Tuesday knitting group ifn the creek don't get up, with the current endless rain. 

Meanwhile, I made some instant garlic bread to go with anything -- slice of multigrain, butter, minced garlic, crumbled parmesan, toasted.  Could be cut into croutons for soup or salad. Or just picked up and eaten.

Current concurrent reading and soup, Islamic art

 I usually have several books going at a time, aside from audiobooks, and this week it's Tidelands, which is slow but inexorable, and very good,  and 

This is the "classic affluent unqualified lady gets to be a publisher almost by accident", the story of the haphazard boy's clubby upper class world of English publishing.  

Except that she found she was a great editor, as her stable of writers attest. And this, I've just started it, is nonfiction about her life ss sn editor who turns out also to be an engaging writer. 

Then I just downloaded

On being alerted of its existence by Steve.

So between knitting and studying my Arabic, I'll be reading. Also enjoying soup.

This turned out to be celery, broccoli, spinach and yellow potato. Green powerhouse.

Today's art is Islamic illustration and miniature painting

Speaking of things Arabic, I was looking yesterday at pictures of young East End of London school children yesterday.  

I found that when one, in the little bio each eight year old child gave, mentioned her sister, I could have written her name. This is exactly why I'm learning this stuff, just to enlarge my ability.

Got to go, Arabic lesson calls.

Happy day everyone, learn something, it's always fun. Or don't, on the grounds, as Bertie Wooster would say, that you're full up!

Quesadilla, Monday what's that? Tuesday it's lunch

So, Monday I'm playing with tortillas, and notice the name quesadilla on my YouTube research into this important subject, and figured cheese must be involved, judging from the name, but I didn't know what it was exactly.

Further study revealed it was something I'd seen but never identified, in restaurants.  And that you can put other stuff in as well as cheese.  So here's Tuesday's lunch, thawed tortilla, sharp cheddar grated, and lovely portabella mushrooms cooked in butter and oil till all the liquid is absorbed. All fried together till the tortilla, one side cooked fast, turned over, additions heaped on, then lid on the pan, cooked till the cheese melted, just a couple of minutes. It was great. And my experiment about freezing the tortillas worked fine.  They're a little smaller than they were supposed to be, so a little thicker, but nothing to fuss about.

  

The miracle of the internet...I realize this is hilarious to people whose knowledge of Mexican and TexMex is so much greater than mine. Bear with me, this bit of NJ isn't a Mexican food region.  More Indian and Thai, really, aside from the traditional Italian.

And I just finished reading yet another Maisie Dobbs, well, rereading really, but it's good enough for a second run.  This one was very moving, and I remember my mother telling stories of things like this happening at home at the outbreak of World War One.  She was about nineteen at that time, so remembered it very clearly.  I won't say more, because that will interfere with the mystery, and it's a really good narrative, definitely worth reading.  She also takes time to describe food, they're always stopping off in little teashops for Eccles cakes, and clothes, great detail on current fashions and how Maisie isn't much of a fashion dresser, but needs to look smart for business purposes.  She wears her cloches all the time, and even, shock, horror, gets her long hair BOBBED!  Scandalous.

My mother used to tell me that she, in her twenties when the short hair came into style, so much easier to care for, had her long hair bobbed.  At that time, the boast was that your hair was so long that you could sit on it. Not sure why you'd want to, but anyway, she bobbed hers.  And my father came home from work and nearly collapsed with shock.  Lizzie, your HAIR!  But I guess he learned to live with it.

I used to wonder about those long hair stories, until my Aunt Kitty, one of mom's older sisters, showed me her special dressing table box which held a ringlet of her hair, which she proudly used to say was auburn.  Looked brown to me.  Anyway, it really was long.  I guess she could have sat on it, if necessary!  And it was a long ringlet, not unlike my own before I'd got my hair cut as a kid.  Her dressing table had a cheval set -- a crocheted set of pieces to set your stuff on.  Ring stand, brush and comb, powder bowl with lid.  She'd been born in about the early 1890's, so she'd kept on with the fashon from them.

And Anne Tyler never fails.  I think I may have read this long ago, since it came out a few years ago, but it's worth reading again, if that's the case, and I'm reading it.  So much of my reading nowadays is electronic, I bless the libraries who made apps like Libby, on which I'm acquiring these, available.  It's much more laborious to get physical books now, what with curbside arrangements and appointments and that's okay, and you can't stay and browse, all the furniture rearranged to discourage hanging out.  And the hours are very limited, so this is a good alternative.

This is a really weird premise, where a widower's wife comes back to him a year after her sudden death in an accident, and walks about, exactly as in life, chatting with him, and visible to everyone, and  unnerving everyone but him, since he decides oh well, go with it, I was missing her too much to pass this up. That's as a far as I've got to date, but I'm definitely putting time aside for this today.

My spinning and plying stint is done, meaning my arms are telling me to quit for the day, though my spirit is saying, oh, don't listen to them.  But I know tomorrow will be less fun if I don't stop now.