Category Archives: Food

The Recital Report

A triumph! No screw-ups, secure shifts, solid intonation, some pretty damn fine subtle shaping, and oh look, stable bow weight resulting in nice smooth crescendos! Huzzah! The ensemble pieces were good too. In fact, everyone did very well. And I am very proud of the boy who behaved extremely well, but who, alas, fell asleep right before the Star Wars theme that was the thirteen-year-old’s choice of solo (just past the halfway mark of the recital). He quite enjoyed what he did hear, however. I am told he played air cello and clapped like a mad thing after the duet.

Summer is going to be very long. I will miss cello activites. I have another month of lessons to go and almost six weeks of orchestra, but year-end performances are always tinged with melancholy.

And now, I am going to reward myself with a glass of red wine that I saved from the bottle MLG brought to accompany dinner last night.

Holiday Weekend Roundup

Victoria Day Weekend is generally planting weekend around here. We’re more concerned with getting things into the ground than being able to wear white again without offending traditional fashion rules. It’s generally planting weekend because (a) it’s a long weekend, (b) theoretically it’s warm enough that night frosts are over, and (c) because we say so. And so of course, Saturday it poured rain, and Sunday was rainshowery and overcast and downright cold; both days saw really high winds. And the temperature, flouting Victoria Day decree, went within four degrees of freezing at night and only barely made it to 10 C during the day.

So our original plans for all-out gardening were put on hold and we did small dashes when we could. Saturday morning we went out and picked up fourteen bags of black earth to add to the beds, and four double flats of cosmos for the front garden. The boys put the cosmos in while I hid in a dark bedroom, trying to deal with a migraine. On Sunday HRH went out and got four double flats of pansies to line the front garden and scatter through the back garden. On Monday afternoon we went out and picked up twenty-four tomato seedlings, lots of mixed lettuce greens, and seed packets of green onions, carrots, cucumber, peas, and poppies. The boys planted all of that (except the poppies) while I made dinner. Monday afternoon was really the nicest weather of the entire long weekend, sunny and warm enough to leave off one’s jacket and garden in just a long-sleeved jersey.

That was the gardening component of the weekend. There was, of course, more. Saturday was dubbed the Day Of Baking. I made my first ever batch of homemade ice cream, from the recipe in the most recent issue of Fine Cooking, and froze it in a pan, beating it with a hand-held mixer once an hour. I did that three times, and it ended up beautifully creamy. (The original plan was to finally buy an ice-cream maker, but the only one I found was too expensive. Bah; who needs a machine?) I also baked the most incredibly brownie-like cookies to use in making ice cream sandwiches. The first tray didn’t spread as much as I’d hoped, so I pressed the second batch down to be thinner, and those worked better. I had five egg whites left over, so I made meringues, and if I haven’t said it enough, I love my stand mixer: I set it up to beat the egg whites and sugar and walked away for ten minutes. When I came back it was so think I could spoon some up and throw it on the pan, and it would keep its shape. Incredible! I had to bake them twice, though, because it was so damp on Saturday they kept going sticky. I left them in the cool oven overnight instead of a container, then baked them the second time for three hours at 100 F, to thoroughly dry them. It worked, too; they were light and crunchy all the way through.

Victoria Day itself was a beautiful, sunny day, most welcome after the rainy overcast days of Saturday and Sunday. We visited Ceri and Scott for lunch, and ate delicious gourmet burgers and grilled veggies done on the barbecue. Dessert was sandwiches made from my ice cream and chocolate cookies, with meringues to follow. It was absolutely wonderful. Ceri and Scott also sent us home with a small slide they’d found behind their shed, which fits perfectly within the space on the swingset that used to house the odd glider/seesaw thing we took down. Liam is over the moon.

For those who want to know the outcome of the dramatically bad manuscript evaluation I had to do, I kept slogging and handed something in with a note explaining the drastic shortcomings and the lack of examples that are usually required to demonstrate problems that need to be addressed. (Hard to prove a negative regarding plot or characterization when you can’t find any.) The department got back to me with kudos for handling a hopeless case and said they understood how hard it must have been, and thanked me for sticking to it and for being as encouraging as I had been. Result: warm fuzzy feeling. Go me.

I really had a tough time dealing with this. As an author, I know what it’s like to get an editorial letter. Even though these evaluations are anonymous, I felt like I was slaughtering this author’s hopes and dreams. A couple of writer friends, one of whom also copyedits, pointed out that part of a writer’s job is receiving criticism and applying it to improve the product, just as part of the editor’s responsibility is to critique in order to elicit a stronger product. Neither are enjoyable one hundred percent of the time, but we both have to perform our duties to the best of our abilities. We owe it to ourselves, to one another, and to the product. While I wasn’t functioning as a traditional editor in this instance, I was responsible to pointing out weaknesses and errors in order to ascertain what level of editing was required to bring it to publishable standard. And when I have to say that the writing is of such a low quality that I can’t find the story the author is trying to tell, well, I get downright miserable, because that’s not news I ever want to have to tell someone.

Let’s see, what else? I finished reading Catherynne Valente’s Palimpsest; a most beautifully written book. And I finally began The Children’s Book, the new book by A.S. Byatt. I hadn’t known a new one was out until I saw it on the new release shelf at the library two weeks ago. It’s gorgeous; I will own it. Possibly even in hardcover. And HRH and I finally saw the fourth Indiana Jones movie, which was not as abysmal as the world said it was when it came out. Yes, it was flawed, and yes, there were things I would have changed about it, but it wasn’t the travesty we’d been led to believe it was.

Right; on to the day. I have a new freelance assignment, and there is cello in my future, both practise and a duet lesson tonight. Recital on Sunday! Five days!

Mysteries

Why is my copy of The Mystery of Edwin Drood not shelved with my other Dickens novels?

And why are there still no potato chips in this house?

LATER: The day has gone from “Why are no potato chips?” to “Why is there no red wine in the house?” Yes, it’s that kind of working day.

A Happy Friday

Well, I’ve done as much as I can on the ms.; I’m waiting for answers and edits back from two of the four people I queried, due back next Monday, and then it’s back to the publisher. In celebration, I poured myself one of the new Alexander Keith Premium Whites that Ceri and Scott sent home with HRH after he helped set up their new dining table and chairs, and sat down to play half an hour of Metallica. Let me tell you, the #cello 4 line of the Apocalyptica arrangement of “Nothing Else Matters” is what it’s all about. Seriously. Celebrate those ringing tones! Sure, it’s shades of “this is all I do” and the stereotypical arpeggios played by basslines… but in 3/4 time, when you know it’s what drives the song that you’re hearing in your head at the same time, and those ringing tones echoing and lingering even when you’re playing two notes later? Beautiful.

Hmm. This beer is much… milder than I expected. Very light. Possibly too light for my mood. Oh well.

The cello lesson yesterday was all right. I suspect that I jinxed things by pointing out to the online cello community that I’d had a streak of really terrific lessons and theorizing that I’d passed the plateau I’d been struggling to move beyond. My bow hand is creeping back into bad habits and my bow arm is creeping back into wrist-led territory. Well, ten years of bad habits aren’t going to vanish overnight. I think I really prefer Saturday morning lessons; I’m much more relaxed, I’m not rushed because I have to go somewhere else next, and I’m not tired from working. I take what I can get, though. Anyway, by the time I picked the boy up and got home, I had a really bad stomachache for some reason and ended up not eating dinner, which was annoying because I’d been craving spaghetti for two weeks and had finally picked up the ingredients that morning.

I remedied the no-food thing by making a poached then shredded lemon-herb chicken breast with baby lettuces and freshly-grated Parmesan in a wrap for brunch today. Dear gods, so good.

And now, I am decamping to the living room to read, and taking the vase of tulips I cut from the side garden with me. I hope everyone’s having a wonderful Beltane.

He Doesn’t Even Particularly Like Ketchup

(Background: There is homemade macaroni and cheese baking in the oven. Apologies in advance to anyone who enjoys ketchup with their mac and cheese, or with anything else; you’re welcome to it, but the idea of consuming it on anything other than fries or burgers and hot dogs ourselves makes us shudder.)

    SPARKY: [on his way to the bathroom] You know what I love?

    MAMA: [from her office] What?

    SPARKY: Macaroni and cheeeeeese.

    MAMA: Good, ’cause that’s what we’re having for dinner.

    SPARKY: [in bathroom] You know what else I love?

    MAMA: What?

    SPARKY: Ketchup!

    [There is a pause.]

    HRH: [from the living room] No. Oh, no.

    MAMA: You do know that those things don’t go together, right?

    SPARKY: Why not?

    HRH: Because you’re not. that. person.

    SPARKY: [gaily] You’re right! I’m not! Hahahahaha!

And he proceeded to laugh loudly as if he’d set the whole thing up, and it sounded like he was the laugh track for a bad sitcom. We laughed so hard we cried in our respective rooms.

But the really weird thing? He doesn’t particularly like ketchup.

Weekend Roundup

Good morning, Internets. It was a busy weekend.

Friday afternoon: Finish printing the ms. and start reading through it with a pen in hand. It does not suck as much as I’d feared. I suspect I’ll throw out about fifteen pages, or at least fit the info in elsewhere (probably in dialogue with someone). It’s the kind of thing that was necessary for me to write to understand where things were coming from, but not necessary for the reader.

Friday night: Awesome cello lesson. I’m getting it.

Saturday morning: HRH dismantles the upper bunk of the boy’s bed (AKA the tree fort, where a lot of the boy’s playthings are stored) in preparation for a new shelving/storage system to be put at the foot of his bed. Then, IKEA! As soon as the store opens, when there is still parking by the door and almost no one inside. The boy requests the ball room, and we sign him in for the first time and head off to reconnoitre on our own, feeling vaguely like we’re skipping school or something like that. The shelving unit and bins we are here to pick up are actually in stock. We collect the boy, who has a bump on his head from running into someone round the corner of the play structure. He has a mild breakdown when he is informed that it’s time to go. (Sign of Things Having Gone Well: floods of tears when it’s over.) Off to Best Buy so HRH can pick up yet another cell phone and a copy of 101 Dalmatians on DVD. We stop by the bookstore and buy two books for the boy, then bring home hot dogs and fries to eat while we watch the film.

Saturday afternoon: I stumble to the bedroom with a suspiciously threatening pain in my head, and nap after taking some headache candy. The boy does not nap, although HRH convinces him to have quiet time in his room for an hour or so. I take more headache candy. When the edge of what has revealed itself to be a migraine has been taken off, we head out to our goddaughter’s seventh birthday party, which she has planned as a singalong for family. With the help of a glass of wine, I enjoy myself more than I’d cautiously expected to. The boy makes new friends with the children of an old friend of mine (we are all touched when the two youngest hug gently before leaving). This old friend, another scion of an ex-pat UK family, gives me a roll of Polos and a Cadbury Flake, making me squeal.

Saturday night: Major discovery! I can eat the Cadbury Flake without having an allergic reaction to the chocolate! This further confirms my suspicion that the sensitivity responds to the proportion of cocoa solids to butter/cream/other stuff. Alas, dark chocolate; I loved you well, but circumstances force me to turn to milk chocolate for comfort and indulgence.

Sunday morning: HRH and the boy assemble the shelving system and slide the bins into it. It’s terrific. We watch 101 Dalmatians for the second time in less than 24 hours. Good thing it’s still among my top three favourite Disney films today, and was my very favourite while growing up. HRH heads out to do a landscaping consultation for Ceri and Scott, and the boy and I go along to make use of the play structure. There is soccer and much swinging and sliding and finding of bugs and playing a new game called “the running around the trees game.” (I told you, my almost-four year old is terribly original when it comes to naming things.) The boy learns the valuable lesson of the necessity of holding on to the chains of a swing while you’re at the apex of your arc.

Sunday afternoon: The boy naps for just under two hours. Wiktory! He heads out to help HRH in the garden, expanding the vegetable plot, turning compost into the soil, watering the plants, and so forth. I head out for my monthly group cello lesson where we work on ensemble pieces for the upcoming recital. For some reason I can’t get comfortable with the length of my endpin or the angle of my cello. I blow stupidly easy shifts when I’m playing solo (naturally). Moral of the story: Revisit your ensemble pieces regularly, even if the last time you played them they were easy and note-perfect.

Sunday evening: Dinner is leftover roast beef (yes, the mystery roast was beef, and oh ye gods it was tender and delicious), sliced and stir-fried with mushrooms, done in a cream mushroom gravy, served over wild rice. (“Oh-oh, this rice is bad,” says the boy, picking out the black ones. We reassure him that it’s not, that it’s special rice. He nibbles it and says, “Oh, yes! It is good!”) The beef is just as delicious the second time. And there’s enough for one more meal, too.

I woke up a lot last night. Not the best night of sleep.

Today: More editing, and finally doing the last bit of hunting for exchange rates that I need to finish up the taxes.

In Which She Natters About Cello Stuff, With A Side Of Diary

It’s confirmed: we’re trying out a third conductor tonight! And I am very happy because there was a bit of kerfuffle about memberships dues not covering what this conductor requested as his fee, but the majority of members were okay with paying a supplement to obtain his services for this concert. If we decide he’s the one for us then membership fees will go up, and I’m perfectly fine with that; we pay a ridiculously low fee as it is, and more than doubling it only brings us to ten dollars per month the orchestra plays each year. If he’s as good as his reputation suggests he is, we’d be getting a real deal. Also, audiences would increase because of his affiliation with other musical events and organisations, and our recruiting of new members would also increase. There’s a lot of potential here.

Apparently we are playing Schubert’s third symphony as the main course for the July concert. So naturally, while looking for audio reference, I discovered that I own only the first, second, and fourth symphonies. I went away and thought about it for a while, then remembered that I’d bought a full six-symphony set the last time we did a Schubert symphony (the fifth?), because the set was less expensive than a single CD with the fifth on it. I had to hunt it out, though. It wasn’t with my other Schubert CDs. I blame the boy, who used to pull CDs out and then reshelve them in interesting new places. I checked my records and apparently I’ve played Schubert’s third before. I have no memory of it, but then, it was in 2003, which was six years ago. However I played it then, chances are rather good that I’ll play it much better now.

I am so very excited to be working with this conductor.

I dragged myself out of the maudlin cold-heavy apathy yesterday to go down town for a meeting about this meditation recording gig. I now have the equipment and some reference DVDs to inspire my delivery of the script. It was a beautiful sunny day, and I came home in a better mood than I’d left, and feeling much healthier, too. I practised not once but twice, the second time with a strict metronome set at ruthless performance speed. I uploaded vacation photos. I opened windows (HRH took the plastic off the front living room Wall of Glass, huzzah!). I made a delicious pot of chicken cacciatore (for some reason, there are never any leftovers). And I set up the breadmaker to start its thing at three in the morning so we’d all have fresh bread at breakfast (because I forgot to make it the regular way yesterday and there wasn’t enough time for me to make it last night before I passed out).

Today: Recording, laundry, celloing, doing something with the shoulder roast that’s defrosting. I can’t even remember if it’s beef or pork (it’s from the organic farmers, so doesn’t have a label beyond ‘shoulder roast’), although I suspect it is pork.

And shh, don’t make any sudden moves: I’ve actually been starting to think about Orchestrated with more interest again. The month away from it killed my momentum. I’m not sure whether to print the first draft out and read it while making notes longhand, or just go back to the beginning of the file and start work. I may just print out the first two chapters, as those are the ones that need the most rearranging.