And Then It Was January

Oh how fleet the wings of time grow in the winter...which sounds like Wordsworth, but isn't.  November and December passed Fuschia and I by with a random assortment of relative-oriented activity, an unprecedented indulgence in seasonal consumerism and that nasty little Christmas Day virus that my sister, Typhoid Eeyore, managed to gift the fam with.

Already 3/4 of the way into January 2012 and I can't stop writing 2011 on everything.  Occasionally I regress and write 2009 or 1993. Clearly, the Buddhist ideas about being here now are almost impossible for me to experience.  What is happening here and now in the tiny metropolis of Louisville: we're experiencing a winter unlike any I've seen.  Rain, snow flurries, freezing temps, tornadoes, thunderstorms, highs in the 60s, lows in the teens....we've got it all covered.  What I'd  like to see is some deep powder so we can do some old fashioned, death-defying sledding off the side of the Cherokee Park golf course.  That's what winter should be all about:  potential head trauma, a frostbitten ass and good friends. 

Fushia and I've managed to squeeze in a little adventure over the past few weeks and as usual it's food-centric.  One of the first things we did this year was get back into the swing of dumpster diving.  Technically it was the last thing we did in 2011 since we pulled 30 bouquets of fresh flowers out of the local trendy grocery dumpster just 15 minutes til midnight on Dec 31.  Hauling our bounty back to the apartment,  I was skeptical that we would find any use for them, but Fuschia proved me wrong.  She got right to work arranging artful, dramatic and a few cottagey buckets of blooms to brighten up the house.

A few days later, in a fit of inspiration, I woke up early on a Saturday and set about channeling Julia Child or, at the very least, Rachael Ray,  into a gourmet breakfast for 2.  After ODing on Top Chef and Chopped over the holidays I really felt the need to flex my culinary muscles.  Twenty minutes later saw hand cut sweet potato fries roasting in the oven, French toast browning in a pan, and me leaping and laughing while deglazing bananas in bourbon and brown sugar.  On a technical note, don't leap with a pan that's on fire.  Even Chef Falkner can't do that and neither should you.

 I wanted pictures before the plate was mostly empty, but sadly neither Fuschia nor I could resist chowing down.  Glad though I am to please us with a tasty breakfast, my favorite compliment was from Oberon.  After trying a small bite, he stood at attention for 25 minutes hoping to score just a tad more.  That's dedication.

We've got a new project in the works in our kitchen and for once it's not edible.  We're learning to make soap and other assorted bath products.  I'm so stoked to be expanding our homesteading skill set!  Now we basically just need a farm and we're good to go.