Wake up brain, it's time to wriiiiiite!

Garlic naan bread with cream cheese, sliced raw jalapenos and ground black pepper.

Combining the above spicy breakfast with a strong cup of Roo's French Roast, I'm fueled to punch out my daily word quota in record time.

And then I'll collapse with caffeine tremors and a capsicum burned tongue!

Shaun Tan

The NY Times has their special Children's Books section in the book review today! And one of the books they review is a book I love: Tales From Outer Suburbia by Shaun Tan. I just searched my blog and realized that I never mentioned it when I read it (a serious memory lapse on my part). Personally, I wouldn't classify it as a children's book, though my girl critter did like it a lot (her favorite story was "Eric" about a wee creature who comes to a family as their foreign exchange student--it is full of whimsy and light).

My favorite story in Tales is called "Grandpa's Story." I'd love to get it in stand-alone booklet form to give to people on their wedding day or anniversary: in it a pair of newlyweds embark on a surreal journey that best exemplifies the potential challenges and joys of the marriage endeavor. It is sweet and sad and hopeful and beautiful all at once.

I think of Tales as illustrated stories for everyone. Tan's previous book, The Arrival was a wordless moving meditation on immigration and cultural adaptation. Sure, kids who can't read could understand it, but that doesn't mean that it was intended for the pre-literate. In Tan's work images are just as communicative as words, and carry a poignancy and impress the mind in a distinct and powerful way. (I have always been biased towards words; my sister is very visually inclined). I find Tales particularly lovely because it contains both!

Wow.

It kinda works.

I'm 6 days into NaNoWriMo and I've added 12,199 words to my manuscript. If I can keep up the pace then I think I'll have a complete first draft done by the end of the month.

It helped that for the first two days I was under the mistaken idea that I had to generate 7000 words a day. I have no idea where I came up with that number--maybe I read it on the blog of someone who knew they could only write two or three days per week and thus set themselves an insane daily word goal? I mean, I'm not that bad at math (50,000 words divided by 30 days makes 1666 words per day)! But the goof up turned out to be kind of useful since for the first couple of days I really cranked out the prose (and ate a lot of the kids' Halloween candy). I didn't make 7000 either day, but wrote about 8000 words in two days. That got me ahead of the curve so that, when the critters had the day off school on Tuesday, I had enough of a buffer to skip a day and didn't have to feel guilty about wanting to park them in front of crap videos for hours on end.

And since my initial burst, I've found that writing 1500 words per day isn't that hard. No, they aren't the best words I've ever written, but some of them are decent and others hold the germ of a good chapter. The important thing is that I'm getting the damn plot cranked out and not getting all OCD and revising the first 50 pages over and over again.

I needed something to slap me out of the pattern I'd fallen into and it looks like NaNo was just the thing.

Throwing down the gauntlet

I've signed up and I'm going to do it: the National Novel Writing Month challenge!

After reading Stephanie Perkins' particularly compelling recruitment post, I decided this might just be what I need to get that completed draft cranked out before the end of the year.

It's tempting to procrastinate and write a long meditative post about what I hope will come out of the experience, but the clock is ticking and I have 6,387 more words to spit out today!  Wish me luck!

CSA reflections

I picked up my last Tantre Farm share this past Wednesday (sorry, no photo--I had a sick kid this week and obtaining the share was challenge enough). I thought it would be appropriate to reflect a little on the CSA experience.

Question: Was it worth it economically?
Answer: Yes, for the full 20 week summer share. No, for the 3 week autumn share. I learned a little something about my cooking moods and temperament by signing up for both the summer and fall extension. We saved a LOT of money over the summer by ordering virtually no carry out. It works out that each week's share is $30 and that is at least how much we'd spend on one Chinese or Middle Eastern carry out meal. My grocery bills for the summer were pretty low, more than a $30 reduction. And we ate more healthy and tasty meals with much less meat. The autumn share suffered both from the vegetable selection (hard squash and loads of brassica are ok, but didn't really get my creativity going) and from my own increase in rigidity

Q: Was it stressfull having to deal with all that produce at once?
A: Sometimes. Though I did learn that when the greens threatened to overwhelm me, I could always blanch and freeze them. It did take a significant amount of time planning meals so that the produce would be used in the right order (carrots can wait until the following Monday, spinach must be used pretty quickly), but I did enjoy that part, particularly prowling about for new recipes which were worthy of the vegetables.

Q: Discover any new likes or dislikes?
A: Turnips! Oh my lord do I love fresh turnips now. I had bought grocery store turnips before and liked them well enough but the small, fresh tender ones we got in the farm share were transformative. Brian and I would fork-battle for the last one. I also loved the black-veined peppermint--it made the best tea ever. The only thing I disliked was the kohlrabi bulb (the greens were just like kale so I was fine with those): however I prepared it I would think that another vegetable would be better. Roasted? Prefer potatoes or parsnips. In stir fry? Harmless but just filler. Raw shredded? Prefer cabbage. True, I didn't try it pickled. Maybe next summer that'll convince me of its worth.

Q: What about the control issue?
A: My summer self found getting the box a thrill. I looked forward to seeing what would be in there and letting it challenge me preparation-wise. As I mentioned before, my autumn self found it tiring.

Q: What about variety?
A: Tantre is very good at balancing the week's share so that there is variety from week to week (different varieties of potatoes, onions, greens, herbs each week). I think it would have grown tiresome if every week the same curly kale was there. There isn't a big difference between the three kinds of kale that I received but enough so that it didn't feel monotonous. There weren't very many times that I wandered through the market looking at the offerings from other farmers and wishing that something else had been included in my share box.

Q: Wishes?
A: I wish there had been more garlic in the shares and some green zucchini. I know summer squash is almost identical in flavor, but I missed getting the green torpedoes. I also could have eaten turnips every week, but I know that not everyone feels that way.

Q: Knowing what you know, what will you plant in your garden next year?
A: Absolutely NO potatoes or basil! (Folks warned me of those bounties and they were right). I'll plant tomatoes--definitely green zebras and romas, my own turnips (since I can't get enough), leeks, and peas.

Q: What about the critters?
A: Sigh. The farm share did not magically transform my kids into vegetable lovers, but I'd say they are marginally more tolerant of different produce. In order to get their weekly allowance, they had to try one new thing from the farm share box and even though this was often accompanied by squinched up faces and minor gagging, they did it. And didn't die.

Any questions you have about the CSA experience?

Batty

I'm a little amazed, but my latest attempt with my sewing machine did not leave me batty or swearing a blue streak (unlike, dare I remind you, last time). The girl critter wanted to be a bat for Halloween and no, she would not be satisfied with a purchased bat superhero costume--she is into animals, not superheros. So it was time to drag that crafty side of myself out of hibernation.

First we assembled materials:
Some black satin that was on sale at Joann's, a McCall's #3329 pattern to crib the bat hood and smock (the pattern is for a superhero jumpsuit) that was on sale for 99 cents, and a black umbrella from the dollar store.

The hood and the sleeve caps were a little fiddly, but luckily a costume that has to hold together for three events (Halloween concert at Hill, school party on Friday and Saturday trick or treating) can have plenty of wrinkles and fraying edges and still look ok.

I contemplated leaving some of the wire frame on the umbrella to look like wing-bones, but then realized the kid would probably impale herself or one of her friends. So off they came! It looks good enough to me, and, despite her very serious visage in the photo below, the girl critter is happily flapping around the house.

After my encounter with a real bat in the house this summer, I just have to resist the temptation to reach for a tennis racket and take a swing.

Oktober-FEAST

Thanks to Sarah's efforts (and willingness to have a crowd of drunken revelers in her home) we did it--we had our Oktoberfest/feast!

Yes, one must wear silly hats or little-lederhosen outfits. Funny how only Brian and I remembered that rule...My photos have some major gaps in them--primarily of the stuff I brought (German soft pretzels, braised cabbage with bacon and apples, green salad and sauerkraut) which I blame on the stuff that my Brian brought: BEER! The Dark Father in particular packed a punch, though there was also his Belgian White and hefeweizen to choose from.  I'll have to make the pretzels again because they were terrific and a recipe worth sharing here. Next time I promise I won't have a beer until after I take a picture of them.

Brian P made and grilled a copious quantity of sausages:

There's smoked, bratwurst and a fennel-heavy Italian sausage (because, as Sarah said, "It doesn't matter if it isn't German: women love fennel!")

Here's a glimpse of a partial plate of plenty (missing the braised cabbage; the pretzels were long gone by this time):

Meg's spaetzel, made moments before serving, Sarah's wild mushroom rice cakes (for the vegetarians among us, though there were plenty for the rest of us to try), a selection of Brian's sausages with sauerkraut, and my big green salad with honey mustard vinaigrette.


We discovered that Dark Father goes really well with dessert:

Meagan's German chocolate cake and Deb's chocolate ginger cake were great accompaniments to the dark-sweet beer.

The gathering fulfilled my revelry quota for the month. Now I can crawl back into my reclusive autumnal hole and wait for the next book-group feast to lure me out.

Tantre farm share, Fall Extension, week 2

Bottom row (left to right): red onions, Easter egg radishes, spicy greens, arugula, wee red peppers, garlic, hot peppers
Middle row: kohlrabi, sweet potatoes and yams, salad greens, fingerling potatoes, delicata squash
Top row: shell beans, carrots, some sort of Asian greens, huge cabbage, huge bunch of kale

Next week is the last week for my Tantre farm share (since I chose to do the 3 week extension) and that's a good thing, because for the first time, when I picked up my box yesterday and unpacked the contents, I felt tired. No thrill of excitement when I saw all the pretty vegetables, just a weariness that I'd have to do something with all of them.

I think my burn out has to do with my non-summer cooking habits and moods. I tend to get a wee bit reclusive in the darker months and I think that my flexibility suffers as well. In the summertime, I'm game to try anything--why not? The sun is shining! The world is beautiful! I can do anything (within reason and only in the kitchen)! But my autumnal self really wants what she wants and this week I want to make roasted cauliflower with tahini sauce this week. While there are a ton of brassicas in this week's share, there isn't any cauliflower. And that is making me feel a bit cranky.

So this week's recipes and plan may not be terribly inspired. I'm going to make and freeze some stuff so we have a stash of things to pull out on those evenings when I'm on the run. And since Sarah is hosting an Oktoberfest party this weekend, I'll use up a significant amount of the above by pushing my produce on other people.

• kale and apple soup (to be frozen)
  
• kale and potato gratin (there's A LOT of kale) served with turkey burgers
  
• EZ part (i.e. make other people eat the stuff)--the cabbage will get sauteed with apples and caraway seeds for the Oktoberfest party. (I'll also be bringing a salad with the arugula, salad greens, carrots, red peppers, radishes and red onions, some of my homemade sauerkraut and lots of pretzel dough so people can shape and bake their own pretzels.)
• Shelling beans will be sauteed with garlic and olive oil and served as a side with homemade mac and cheese (with some of last week's pureed squash sneaked into the cheese sauce).
  
• Marinated, pan fried tofu slabs with stir fried Asian greens with garlic, and some brown rice.
  
• I'm going to shove the rest of the potatoes, the sweet potatoes, yams and winter squash in a dark cupboard and ignore them for a week or so.
• I'll slice and freeze the jalapeno peppers. They'll be good for Indian cooking this winter where the texture isn't as essential.
  
• Anyone want a kohlrabi? I can leave it on a doorstep if you live nearby...or we can play kohlrabi catch if you're passing by in your car (if I can whack a bat out of my bedroom window with a tennis racket, I should be able to pitch this into the open window of a slow moving car.)
  

In which the word "fuck-wit" is exemplified

Sigh.

I am a fuck-wit.

If you don't know what a fuck-wit is, come on over and have a look.

I still can't figure out how I wound up with the only copy of my work-in-progress novel being a version from September 22nd. Somehow all the work I'd done and all the versions saved since then went into the trash and, being a little compulsive (as fuck-wits are) I emptied the trash. Bye bye 3+ weeks of work!

Thank god for Mac Time Machine. It saved my ass, though only after a great deal of psychic pain and self-flagellation and the waste of a good writing day (or, if not a writing day, a good day to go for a walk--sun shining! leaves changing color!) But the fuck-wit was inside grinding her molars down into stumps.

About the only thing I feel proud of today is the fact that I have not turned to the gin (yet). Later, once small people have been toted to piano lessons and other forms of cultural enrichment, I, the fuck-wit, have a date with the gin bottle in the freezer.

Tantre farm share, Fall extension, week 1

Bottom row (left to right): big chunk of a massive winter squash, spicy salad mix, turnip greens (and a few wee turnips attached, 1 qt beans, Brussels sprouts, big bunch of parsley
Middle row: beets, onions, purplish broccoli, red peppers, purple potatoes
Top row: Easter egg radishes, bag of spinach, bag of baby greens, Italian kale, carrots, russet potatoes

• I still have some eggplant and red peppers leftover from last week which, when combined with this weeks' red peppers and onions will become roasted red pepper and eggplant soup. With a salad of spicy greens and Zingerman's farm bread (on sale this month) it should make a comforting meal now that the weather is cold.
• The broccoli will go into broccoli cheese soup--I might freeze this if we are all souped out from the previous soup.
  
• Spanikopita with radish greens, turnip greens, and spinach will make good use of those greens, served with a salad of baby lettuce, parsley and roasted beets.
• The kids will get homemade pizza while Brian and I have calzones with turkey Italian sausage, feta, kale and roasted red peppers.
  
• The radishes were a bit strong when eaten raw last week so this week we'll be eating them cooked--braised radishes to be more specific, served with mashed russet potatoes, roasted Brussels sprouts, and pork chops.
• The green beans look a little tough, so they'll get slow cooked with a slice of bacon and onions and served with hot sauce.
• I'm going to steam the big hunk of winter squash and puree it; I'll freeze some and use some in pumpkin turkey chili.