multipurposegoddess

...continues. As I slowly erode Mt. Laundry (even with the dryer working properly (and hooray for that!) the flickery fluorescents in the garage (where the washer and dryer are) make doing laundry after sunset a dicey proposition. And I'm mostly home when the sun is down. But, hey, a couple of loads a day will make a huge difference, if I can get one started before I leave for work and another right when I get home while it's still light out.

Anyway, the point is, I'm pulling out the summerweight clothes and size 24 clothes as I come across them and putting them in appropriate boxes (which are in different rooms so I hope I won't get them confused, but I'd best bust out the label-maker before too long).

And my Saints play this Thursday, so I don't have to block out football watching time next weekend. Although I'll also need to do some Thanksgivikkuh prep cooking, but dividing my time between the kitchen and the garage/laundry usually works out okay for both. And after Thanksgiving there's three days in a row of not going to work or social obligations (I think, I shold check that at some point). Who knows what I can do with that kind of time!

Oh, man, do I have enough candles to do the freezer vs room-temp storage experiment? I think I cannot do that on top of everything else this year.

I still have 18 custard-based meals in the fridge, so that's six days, and more than a day's worth of commercially-prepared frozen meals in the freezer, and my produce box and eggs come this Tues night/Wed morning. Feeding myself for the next week or so should not be a problem. I'll  have to go grocery shopping at some point for T-day specific ingredients. And gelt, which I couldn't find at Target today. I know Cost Plus will have chocolate coins, I just need to get over there. I'm planning on bring in jelly donuts and chocolate coins for my department next Wednesday, since that evening will be first candle lighting. I don't think I can manage vegan jelly donuts for my parents, but gelt for them, too. I described the Serious Eats Latke-Crusted Fritters to them when we went to the Sing-a-bration yesterday and they are game to try making them. I'll probably do the cranberry center and stuffing layer ahead of time and just do the latke crust and fry at their house. Exciting!

Oh! I had the crazy idea of packing both my gym bags and a yoga bag and stashing them all in the trunk tonight so I would have no excuse to not go to the gym on my way home from work three times. I think I have enough sport's bras and running shoes to fill them all. I certainly have plenty of sweat pants and T-shirts. Let's see if I can make that happen...

Edited to add: forgot that the problem with the one gym bag is that most of teh zippers are frozen. It's so well-laid out with its pockets and compartments, though! Such a shame. Anyway, one bag packed with the goal of getting to the gym tomorrow. The rest of the week will have to take care of itself.

So, I decided to do the good old-fashioned Atkins Induction 14-day eat-exactly-what-the-book-says thing, because that's easy on the brain. But it meant buying a frickin' ton of groceries (I had the foresight to let myself run out of just about everything first, so the last couple of days feeding myself has been more challenging than usual), so I had them delivered, which helped a lot, but just putting all the perishables away has taken me about two hours (to be fair, a good bit of that time was making sure I knew how long I could wait before dividing and freezing the various meats, since I sure as hell don't want to do that today if I don't have to, and some of it was making and eating lunch). And I have the final delivery of Soul Food chickens today - good thing my parents are letting me use some of their freezer space for some of that!

I don't know if I'll get to any of my overdue items today, just keeping up with what's due today on top of this major grocery shop is kind of kicking my ass. But that's okay. It's an extremely flexible plan. And I"m already down to only 242 Past Overdue tasks, so that's a marked improvement for such a short time.

I somewhat randomly decided to make chocolate pots de creme yesterday, mixing and matching the Cook's Illustrated recipe with Ratio creme anglaise/custard advice, and sweetening with Splenda. It ended up looking pretty ganache-like, which I was pretty okay with, but then I woke up in the middle of the night thinking I knew how to fix it and actually got up and tried it. That's kind of odd for me. Now they are actually kind of thin and liquidy, but pretty tasty if a little more bitter than sweet. My Net Diary seems to think they are acceptably low carb, so I'll go ahead and finish eating them over the next few days.

Edited to add: OMG this day! I head out to get the chicken delivery about quarter to five, the Toyota won't start. Fine, I can always take the Volvo. Except that won't start either, in a slightly different way that makes me think if I can hook the batteries together with jumper cables maybe one of them will start. They're parked side by side in the driveway, but the batteries are on opposite sides of the engine compartments and the cables won't reach. Of course. So, I call the farm and ask if they can hold my chickens to tomorrow, which they are agreeable about, and figure out how I can take the (infrequent and slow) bus to an auto parts place and buy a battery or a charger or something, I don't know. Fortunately, as I'm leaving my favorite neighbor M pulls up and asks what's wrong, she saw I had the hoods up, and I explain and she not only offers me a jump, she calls her husband to come help my push the Toyota out of the driveway so the battery is reachable. I need to get them some kind of thank you gift, they are awesome. I call the farm and tell them I'm coming, drive out there, leave the engine running while we load up the chickens, come back to the house and get the chickens into the kitchen with the engine still running, and then go drive around some more in the hopes that I can get the battery charge up. We'll see how it is tomorrow. I suspect that one of the accessories that was plugged into a cigarette lighter was draining a little too much power with the engine on - I haven't been driving at all much lately, so it would have had some time to work with. I really hope that's it. The battery is about two years old, which doesn't seem like time for a new battery, and everything got completely checked out by a shop that specializes in the electric system, so I think they would have caught anything more esoteric.

In better news, all the chickens fit in my freezer and fridge, hooray! Even the liver, which I forgot I was getting. I have so much food right now. But I haven't had dinner yet. Cooking time!

More editing for further update: another neighbor just knocked on my door to tell me he'd turned off the inside light in my car. I have no idea why it was on, but I've been only driving during the day for I don't know how long (just because that's my schedule these days, I'm extremely diurnal), so it's probably been on a long time. That would explain the dead battery! And it was still on when he turned it off for me, so hopefully that won't be a problem anymore.

 The plan was, if I could start off the week disciplined and focused and productive, I could carry on like that and get tons done. And I did pretty well yesterday - started doing housework before breakfast, got the lawn mowed and all the dishes washed even the things that are too big to fit in the dishwasher or the sink and therefore often languish on the counter for an unconscionably long time, various little things that always need doing but slip through the cracks, etc. I did run out of steam in the afternoon, but that seemed acceptable.

Today I've gotten virtually nothing done. I spent a bunch of time taking apart the Wii and deciding that I needed to order another part for it, so that's not even a completed task. And that's about it. Meh.

Will try to get back on track tomorrow.

Edited to add: OK, I did also make my first attempt at a deconstructed matzo ball soup soufflé, and I am pretty pleased.( Image behind tag )Needs more tinkering, but proof of concept is quite tasty!

Also, I expect to clear my todo list of everything that was due today, so that's not nothing.

So, I'm almost out of food, which is nice. I found a lone baby potato in the canister I thought was empty, so I'm boiling it with the radishes I haven't known what to do with and calling that a side dish for the rest of the gefilte fish I opened last night. After that, I think I'm free to indulge in take-out while I really, truly, I mean it this time deep clean the kitchen. Although I should bake some bread and make some dumplings and maybe try pickling eggs. But not until, like, Thursday, so maybe I can get a lot done meanwhile? Stranger things have happened.

I am finding it impossible to do laundry. It just needs to be sorted and shoved into the machines, it should be doable, and yet I find myself actually considering the possibility of just buying new clothes instead. What is that about? Whatever it is, I need to get over it.

And oh god the lawn needs mowing! Crap, I should do that tomorrow if it's not raining. And call Vernon, see what's what with the bees, I haven't heard from him in over a week, hopefully that is just because it's been raining. That's enough, brain, no more coming up with stuff that needs to be done.

So, I reached the milestone of getting my meditation time up to 10 minutes per session this week, which inspired me to try to do ten minutes of whatever needs doing (oh, there is so much to choose from) out of every hour while I am awake. It's working out all right, I suppose. I now some people can do five minutes worth of whatever, but that is too short oa burst of productivity to justify overcoming my inertia, apparently.

I tend to putter about aimlessly for several hours after I wake up, maybe doing stuff that needs doing, maybe not. And I keep running into conundrums - do I count that ten minutes of meditation as work time? Making lunch, does that count? I can argue both sides and haven't decided on a consistent approach. But I am less apt to feel like I have let the whole day get away without accomplishing anything (which has sometimes been because I have actually accomplished nothing, and sometimes because I have forgotten what I did actually accomplish...), so that's an improvement.

Making Masa Ball Soup today because I had most of the ingredients at hand and chicken soup + chiles sounds like the best possible thing to eat when my sinuses are acting up. I discovered that queso anejo is also called queso cotija (or they are similar, at least) and that is readily available at my local supermarket, so this batch will be slightly more true to the recipe (iirc, I substituted romano before). Although I am using a slicing tomato rather than a plum tomato, and I forgot to set one aside when I roasted all my tomatoes this morning, so it will be pre-roasted, but it's hard to imagine that that would have an ill effect on the soup. I also have the ingredients for Mendocino chicken salad and spaghetti sauce, but, at the moment, no appetite, so we'll see how that goes. The fridge, she is very full, it is slightly alarming.

Edited to add: roasting purple bell peppers deprives them of their color. Disappointing.

All that stuff I was gonna do yesterday? Yeah, nsm. I got as far as getting dressed and putting on shoes and got hit with a wave of overwhelming tiredness. I tried to push through, but 'overwhelming' was not just an intensifier there, I was in fact overwhelmed and went back to bed for an hour or two.

I did get outside to sit in the sun and make some vitamin D, and sit in the shade and watch the mockingbird claim his territory from atop the telephone pole in the corner of my yard, which is one of my favorite things. There was a bee trying to steal nectar from the hummingbird feeder, so I got to see how hummingbirds react to that - not as aggressively as I would have guessed! They do feed at the same flowers, though I haven't seen them buzzing around one plant at the same time.

I managed not fall behind on my daily stuff, and fed the bees - they are officially working on over half the frames in the second hive body, so I should probably get a super or two soon. And I spotted a worm in Worm Farm #2, so they aren't all dead out there. Not a lot of feedback from the worms, getting an occasional glimpse is good.

If I can get through the whole week without falling behind, that'll be a huge win, really, so I am not too bothered by not getting far with the 'extra' stuff I'm trying to take on. I don't know, the last couple of days I have wanted a lot of sleep, it almost seems like I need more dreaming time than that I need the rest. Hopefully I'll catch up on whatever it is soon.

And got to Petco today, so the cats have been appeased. Tomorrow will have to do for lawn mowing and grocery shopping, and I keep forgetting that I still need to get that long overdue smog check done. At least the late fees can't get any higher.

I have nothing on my To Do list to be done yesterday! I got it ll done, yay me!

I have the usual largish amount of things meant to be done in the last week and the last month, though. And one thing dropped off Due in the Last Month and disappeared into Due in the Last 3 Months, which I was hoping to avoid. But still!

(posting here recurs on my To Do List every day, btw)

For my benefit:( what needs doing before I leave for Vegas... )

Am I doing any of those things right now? Of course not.

I keep feeling like I'm not accomplishing anything today because I decided not to really try to do too much. In reality, I have

1. Made myself a quiche and actually followed the recipe properly for the first time ever - I usually have tried to cut the number of eggs and improvised ways to make up for their loss with varying results. Actual quiche was pretty delicious, even if I am terrible at prebaking pastry shells.
2. Which means I have followed my ridiculous breakfast cycle plan for over a week successfully. Which means I've eaten breakfast every day for over a week. Nice.
3. Shaped my challah dough into 6 knots and one little loaf. To be baked once they have the day to rise, pretty much. Or parbaked and frozen, in the case of the knots.
4. Got a chicken in the oven.
5. Washed all the dishes. For the first time in I don't even know how long, every dish/pot/pan/etc/ is either clean and put away, actively in use, on the drying rack, or in the dishwasher (which is running). Woo!
6. In seven  more pages, including ads, I will be all caught up on my Entertainment Weeklys, ignoring the ones that got misplaced and therefore remain unread. I don't know why I am compelled to read these things cover to cover whether I am interested in the contents or not, but I am and it weighs on me when I have unread issues lying around.

Not bad. And I may yet do more today, who knows?

I'm so Arthur Dent-ish lately. I wear my bathrobe a lot. Having a lot of trouble with my lifestyle. Can't get the hang of Thursdays.

Haven't mastered sandwich making completely, yet. Something to work on.

Speaking of things to work on, here's an update on how my To Do list is going:

• Lawn: still not mown or edged or anything. Maybe tomorrow.
• Birdseed: purchased, but still in car, not in feeders
• Laundry remains problematic. I need to put the clean stuff away, but that might require moving seasonal clothing and H's dresser is taunting me a little bit. The longer I stay in my bathrobe, the less this is an issue, though.
• Got up at 6:30 today, which is earlier than yesterday. I may work my way up (down?) to getting up when the light comes on. Spent my "extra" morning time catching up on my RSS feed, which feels like accomplishing nothing, but does actually need doing or it will keep me from doing something more critical later. At least, this is what I tell myself.