Thursday Up/Down, Finally

Festival of Lights at Moody Gardens, Galveston, TX.  (2011)

I have missed writing the occasional Thursday Up/Down post, so this week I’m bringing it back!  Of course, today is Friday, so I’m a day late.  But I jotted down the inspiration for today’s post yesterday (with a few add-ins today), so we can say this post was hatched on a Thursday.  Yesterday was a really nice day.

On the Up side of things we have:

* Crisp fall weather and a glorious morning bike ride.  (Well, one crisp fall morning.  This morning we were back to balmy November weather.)

* My grant-writing is going well.  This one has been pretty exhausting, but my fingers are crossed that the hardest revisions/rewrites are behind me.

* Speaking of grant-writing, I spent a delightful hour at the wine bar, drinking a very interesting Merlot and editing my grant.  And friends, let me tell you: my grant sounded awesome.  This is the protocol I will now follow every time I need to edit for content.

* After an hour of editing, friends joined me and we had an evening of wine and gourmet food-truck food.  Delicious!

* Oranges are coming into season.  I bought a big bag of cuties and have been eating them all week.

* Buying presents for other people.  When it comes to gifts, I’m equal opportunity: I like to give and receive.  The holiday season is always a time of brainstorming for gift ideas and enjoying the generosity.

*Gabrielle Bernstein’s TED talk.  This talk was fabulous and exactly what I needed to hear this week.  You all know that 2012 has been a hard year for me—I won’t reiterate that here.  Listening to Gabrielle talk about letting go and forgiveness made me realize that it’s time to begin letting go of 2012.  I have spent much of the year dwelling in the past and worrying about the future, and I’m ready to let all that go.  Out with the sadness, in with the joy!

* And finally, I have nothing for the Down side of things!  Happy weekend, all.

so u want 2 txt me?

I hate texting.

There, I said it.  Let me say it again, for good measure: I HATE TEXTING!

My friends everywhere are probably booing and hissing at this, unless I’ve already told them about my intense dislike for texting.  Perhaps you are also booing and hissing?  I know, I know: I’m probably in the minority here.  But let me explain.

I see texting as extremely functional but lacking in civility or politeness.  Or at least that seems to be the case with the texts that I receive.  Texting is useful for quick bites of information: “Be there in 10 minutes.”  “Brunch at 11?”  “What’s your address?”  Texting can be efficient, and I recognize its utility.  But what texting fails to do for me is to foster a sense of connection.  Here’s why.

* People rarely use greetings in a text.  I wish they would say hello.  Instead, it’s usually straight to business, which speaks to my point above about quick bites of info.

* People whom I barely know assume texting is okay.  IT IS NOT OKAY.  If I’ve called you once, do not be so sure that I’ve stored you in my address book and thus know if it’s you who has texted me.  When I get a text from an unfamiliar number that says, “At HEB.  Need anything?” I assume it was sent to the wrong number.  Because who texts me from the grocery store?  Nobody, that’s who.

* People use texting to ask me out or even to ask for sex.  I know that the medium is not the message, but seriously: if we barely know each other, texting is not the way to my heart.  Texting is the coward’s way of asking.  I feel really strongly about this issue.  If someone is going to ask me out, I prefer that they do it in real time, either in person or over the phone.  I think that conversations in real time facilitate intimacy and honesty—I like the dance of words and feelings that flutter back and forth in a delicate or racy conversation.  Compared to how rich the exchange can feel in real time, texting just falls flat.

But here I’ll admit that e-mail can also be a great medium for intimate conversations.  I think I still prefer to be asked out in real time, but at least e-mail is conducive to long letters.  And you know me: I’m anything but concise most of the time.  It’s part of my charm, right?  Also, I love romantic letters.

* Most texts are not written in plain English.  They use all these cloying abbreviations, like “u” for “you.”  I hate that.  I probably do it sometimes, but still, I hate it.

* People use texting as a way to avoid having conversations in real time.  I think this relates to my point above about dating, but it also applies to friends.  I think we should ask ourselves why we’re comfortable texting but not making a telephone call.  What’s the relationship you are fostering by texting instead of calling?  If you’re sending these texts to me, the message I’m getting is that you don’t want to talk to me.  In which case, I start to wonder if we’re really friends.

To be fair, and perhaps to end on a more positive note, I’ll say it again: texting has its utility.  My sister-in-law, who has two little kids, has an easier time sending a text than finding the quiet to make a phone call.  I get that.  Texting is very, very useful in loud places or anywhere you simply can’t make a phone call.  And my niece has recently discovered texting with a passion and sends me the most adorable texts with long strings of “xoxoxoxoxo.”  It is too cute.

You should know, if you send me texts and I send you a text back, it is a nod to how much I like you.  I think as a medium of communication, I will never love texting the way I love e-mail, phone calls, or an in-person conversation.  But I tolerate it, and I refuse to answer texts as I see fit.   

The Best Dating Advice You’ll Ever Hear?

From an informal survey (N = 2)*, it seems that I may be in the minority when I say that every guy I’ve dated has been a good person.  My first love A, the sweetly dorky K, and Matt—they all treated me with kindness and respect.  I feel lucky to have had such good experiences with men.  I think it may be true that a lot of women have had too many bad experiences, and that makes me sad.  Now, don’t get me wrong: I have had a few dates with duds, mostly men who creeped me out because they slipped past my creep radar.  But once I’ve labeled a guy “creep,” it’s hard for him to win my favor again.  I just…can’t.

Which brings me to my question: how does a woman find and identify men who are worth dating?  I recently gave up on the on-line dating scene, at least for now.  It just seemed like a waste of time, though I did make a new friend right before I quit.  The reason that on-line dating is unlikely to work for me is that I feel too much pressure to decide, right away, how I feel about someone.  My heart doesn’t work like that, and I just have to accept the truth.  I’m slow to warm up to a new person; I need time to get to know them outside of the context of dating.  Men who are willing to be my friend for a while, men who are willing to engage in some emotional intimacy without the promise of sex—these are the men who will win my trust.  I think trust is essential for physical intimacy.

My secret to dating only good men is to be very, very patient and to be satisfied being alone.  I am far too lazy to date someone for the sake of dating.  My new standard for what counts as a good date is to ask myself, Would I rather be here with this man or at home, reading a book?  When I realized that dating Matt is like dating a library, it all made sense.  I love the library.  I will always be attracted to people who can teach me things.

I’d like to share another quote from Breaking Apart by Wendy Swallow.  This one is about dating, and it’s worth remembering.

  “[Jamie and I have] been best friends since eighth grade, but never a couple, never in love with each other.  I tell him about my worst dates, the dance, then about my list.  I ask if he thinks it’s crazy to have such a list, if he thinks it’s my standards that are making it so hard to find someone I like.

‘I’ve dated so many people I’ve gotten it down to a system by now,’ he says.  ‘There are five questions that seem to matter, and I can tell by how they answer them if I want to go out with them again.  First, do they like their parents?  Second, do they like their job?  Third, have they had their heart broken?  Fourth, do they have friends?  And last, do they believe they will have to work at a relationship?  If they can say yes to all of those, then I’m going to be more interested.’”

What do you think?  I may be biased here, because that’s a test I would pass with flying colors.  Though I do think most people’s relationships with their parents are more complicated than a simple “like” conveys…

* Har har!  I love a good data joke.

Into the Calm

Today I turned 31.

And you know what?  It was just fine.  Even though there is only one peanut butter bar left, which means I’ll have to bake more tomorrow.  This birthday, which I was anticipating with so much dread, turned out to be a sweetly calm day of grant-revising, light shopping, a pasta dinner (with soysage! and leftover pasta made by a friend! and a delightful salad of shaved fennel and orange slices!), and after-dinner coffee with two friends.  There were dozens (dozens!) of Facebook messages, a few phone calls, some groovy birthday gifts, a walk and a bike ride in the sunshine, and dare I say it?  Contentment.  I was content today.

I had been dreading today because I thought it would send me into a mope spiral over how terrible #30 turned out to be.  In case you’ve forgotten, let me recap the last year of my life for you: two grants rejected, the end of a cherished romance, and the death of one brother.  Despite all that, I think I have maintained my sense of self, and at the center of that is hope.  I am not my losses.  I am what remains when those losses have been turned into something more permanent: compassion, knowledge, wisdom, flexibility.  I will not look back on this year fondly, but I will carry inside of me the hard-won prizes from a year that threatened to take everything away from me.  And I mean everything.

Maybe some day I will contradict myself and look back on #30 with something like sweet sadness for all the pain that it brought.  It brought good things, too, but right now I feel too raw to make myself sift through the year for those gems.  I just want to quietly slide into a new year of my life and hope that it will be better than the last.  I keep thinking of that Counting Crows’ song “A Long December” and the opening lines:

A long December and there’s reason to believe

Maybe this year will be better than the last.

Indeed.  Maybe this year will be better than the last.  I have to at least believe it’s a possibility.  Right now, perched on the edge of #31, it is.

Pre-Thanksgiving Plotting

Like much of America, I’m busy plotting for Thanksgiving.  This week, it’s all about Thursday, the eating and lazing about and merrymaking.  But before that, it’s all about the cooking.

I’m having Thanksgiving lunch with three friends of mine, and I think the number of dishes we’re making outnumbers us by at least 3:1.  For my part, I’m making these peanut butter bars.  They aren’t very Thanksgiving in theme, but they do remind me of my family, whom I will not see for another month.  I’m also making a smoky pumpkin quiche, and here’s where the story gets crazy.  Perfectionist that I am (sometimes), I am consulting three different texts to put together a savory pumpkin quiche.  You might recall I made a quiche two years ago for Thanksgiving, and I think it’s a great vegetarian option.  This year, I’m going to riff on that recipe, but the filling will combine caramelized onions and some savory, Frenchy seasonings with a rich custard made with pumpkin puree.  The pumpkin is inspired by an old Vegetarian Times recipe.  For the crust, I’m using Melissa Clark’s Perfect Pie Crust from In the Kitchen with a Good Appetite, and all I have to say is, Wow!  That’s a lot of butter for one pie crust.  Ten tablespoons for a single nine-inch pie crust is impressive.

This week, in the spirit of the holiday, I am reminding myself that despite what has been a legitimately terrible year, I still have much for which to be grateful.  Family and friends with whom to share my holidays, a healthy body, a well-nurtured mind, a bike, some running shoes, money in the bank, two blogs, kind readers, a collection of thoughtfully curated kitchen gear, and the inner strength that comes from surviving the year from hell.  I’ve been feeling a lot of sadness in the weeks leading up to this one, with Thanksgiving on Thursday and my 31st birthday on Saturday.  But I think maybe, just maybe, the sadness is starting to give way to something more like a quiet contentment.  It’s been a year of lessons and gifts, as Colleen Patrick-Goudreau might say.  Lessons in love and letting go, gifts of compassion and gentleness.  I won’t say that I’m grateful for 2012 (because it sucked), but I am grateful that I’m here, and so are you.

Happy Thanksgiving, my dears.

Kitchen Must-Haves? Part Three

You can find Part One here and Part Two here.

 

Onto the final nine items on the list!  I find this part particularly fun because it includes the baking items.  A sweet tooth has to be well-equipped for making homemade goodies.  As usual, items I own are in bold.

17)  Kitchen tongs.  Yes!  Tongs are so useful that once you buy a pair, you won’t know how you lived without them.  I’ve been known to give kitchen tongs as a gift, too—it’s one of those small touches that makes kitchen life easier and more fun.

18)  Cutting-edge peeler.  Hmm.  This one is interesting: a peeler with a ring band that fits in the palm of your hand.  I can see the utility in this one.

19)  Hand-held juice press.  Oh, I think this is so pretty!  I have a countertop juice press—just a simple plastic number—but I really like these hand-held presses.  Is it excessive to own two juice presses?  Because I’m tempted to add this one to my wish list.

20)  Salad spinner.  I really should own one of these.  I have bought one as a present, but my current method for drying greens is kitchen towels, which is tedious and not nearly as fun as a salad spinner.

21)  Old-school hand mixer.  Yes!  Years ago, a friend of mine from grad school kindly donated her old hand mixer to me.  To be honest, I don’t use it that much because I don’t do a lot of fancy baking that involves whipping cream or beating egg whites.  Still, it’s nice to have around on the rare occasions when I do need a mixer besides my forearms.

22)  Stainless steel mixing bowls.  I have just one, a huge one, that you can see in the photo up there.  I think it’s good to have at least one stainless steel bowl for beating egg whites and general mixing purposes.  It also makes a great salad bowl when I’m making a huge salad to feed a crowd.

23)  Kitchen scale.  I wouldn’t mind having a kitchen scale, especially since I’m in love with rachel eats, and since Rachel is English, she’s always using metric units in her recipes.

24)  Silicone baking mat.  Yes, this one is nice to have around.  It’s not essential because parchment paper does the same thing, but I love the look of cookies baking on a Silpat.

25)  Commercial rimmed baking sheets.  Yes!  This is another one that I never realized I couldn’t live without until I owned one.  My kitchen fairy bought me one of these years ago, and I absolutely love cooking and baking with it.  I passed on the love by buying several for my sister-in-law’s kitchen, and I think the sheets get a lot of love over there too.  (Mine are Wearever baking sheets from Target.  This pan from Amazon looks identical to mine, if you are curious.)

PS  I hope you don’t think I posted this series of Kitchen Must-Haves so I could get all link-happy on you.  I am genuinely curious about what gear people consider essential in their kitchens and found it fun to think about my own kitchen in the same light.  I am sort of obsessed with reading people’s lists for pantry staples, kitchen supplies, favorite tools, and whatnot.  You can rest assured that I received exactly zero dollars in compensation for this post!  I do it all for the love…and the cookies.

Speaking of…

It’s almost time for holiday baking: Raspberry Chocolate Thumbprints. 

Easy-peasy, vegan, and so yummy.

Happy baking!

Kitchen Must-Haves? Part Two

You can find Part One here.

 

Onto the next eight items!  Items I own are bolded, and you can see that I own exactly one item on this part of the list.  I must cook on stones over an open fire or this is more of a foodie wish list than a set of essentials.  What do you think?

9)  Flexible knife block.  This is a neat idea: a knife “box” filled with slender rods rather than fixed cut positions in a block.  As the article suggests, it’s good for mix-and-match knife collections, which certainly describes mine.  But I have a wooden knife block that works for me.

10)  Ceramic chef’s knife.  This one actually frightens me.  Years ago, Matt was given a ceramic knife as a gift, and while washing it, he dropped it and chipped it badly.  Matt is way less klutzy than I am, so I can only imagine what sort of bodily damage I would do to myself with a ceramic knife.  I’ll pass on this one.

11)  High-powered blender.  Think Vitamix here.  While I know there are people out there who would rescue their Vitamix if the house was on fire, I just don’t need a high-powered blender.  My mother gave me her blender, and I still love and use it frequently.  It was a wedding present, and it’s been going strong for 42 years.  Isn’t that awesome?

I think the Vitamix is great for people who make their own nut butters and flours and for people like my brother who make shakes daily using a pound of frozen fruit.  Maybe some day I’ll buy one too, but right now it never even crosses my mind as something I want. 

12)  Food processor.  YES!  I use my food processor frequently, for sauces, pie dough, and cookie dough truffles.

13)  Electric grinder.  This one’s for spices.  I have the old-school tools for grinding spices: mortar and pestle.  I can definitely see the utility of having an electric spice grinder, though.  This one might go on my wish list…

14)  Immersion blender.  Meh.  I can certainly understand the appeal of an immersion blender, but I’m beginning to think I’m a bit averse to more stuff in my kitchen.  Since I already have a traditional, upright blender, I’ve never really felt drawn to buy a second blender.

15)  Zester/grater—more specifically, a Microplane.  Oh, I really want one of these.  This one is definitely going on my wish list for Christmas.  To make matters even more dire, the “fine grate” side of my box grater doesn’t even work any more, so I’ve started “grating” my citrus zest with a knife.  It’s tedious work, but sometimes I find it weirdly pleasurable in that meticulous kind of way.

16)  Mini colander.  Sure, I own a mini colander.  It’s called my hands.  Actually, I can totally see the utility of this one and daydream of visiting Target’s kitchen section to pick out a new colander or two.