Archive: August 2007

This weekend, new neighbors are moving in to the house next door. JG and I didn’t really get to know the family who is moving away very well, so we hope that we have opportunities to talk with the new couple this time around and I’m a little bit nervous but mostly excited at the prospect of meeting them. I hear that they’re a young, engaged couple and the girl is a teacher, so that all sounds good. It’s kind of like the first day of school; I just want them to like us (and Ted).

I decided to earn some points in neighborly welcome by baking a batch of cookies, but not just ordinary cookies. I made the Big and Chewy Chocolate Chip Cookies from the America’s Test Kitchen cookbook. The end product ends up exactly as the recipe promises and the cookies always get rave reviews. They’re like cookie hamburgers — as big as my hand, soft and chewy, at least half an inch thick with craggy, cracked tops, and they have the exact right ratio of cookie to chips. I bagged up a dozen of these bad boys and gussied them up into a cute welcome package that’s now lying in wait for the sight of a moving truck. At the end of a long day of carrying stuff, I’m hard-pressed to think of something I’d appreciate more than a dozen giant cookies. Am I right?

Of course, it would not be completely honest to give the impression that I did all of this just for the new arrivals, who were more of a handy excuse. What can I say — the recipe makes 20 cookies, but who can eat that many? We kept the, um, ugly ones.

(Recipe after the jump)

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Today marks a whole month since we brought Ted home! I can’t believe it’s only been that long. Not that having Ted has been an ordeal, but it’s certainly been a learning experience.

This past weekend, we instituted a new regime of puppy training. That is, we have seen the light that is Cesar Millan, also known as the Dog Whisperer. As part of our dog owner education, JG picked up several dog training books and one of them was Cesar’s Way. He approached the whole behaviorism idea skeptically, wrinkling his nose at mentions of positive energy and asserting oneself as the pack leader. However, before he reached the end of the book, JG began to preach the gospel of Cesar and we started Ted on the path to enlightenment, or daily walks, whichever came first.

See, when JG or I would take Ted out for a walk, Ted would strain against his leash, whining pitifully. JG warned me not to drag him; I was supposed to put tension on the leash and he would ultimately give up. Well, apparently, Ted didn’t get that memo because he never gave up. We couldn’t even get him out of the driveway. The curious thing was that Ted would only come with us if both JG and I came on the walk. I guess it was sort of sweet that he wanted us all to be together or something, but it was highly inconvenient for our schedules. If JG and I were going to be any sort of alpha dogs in our house, it was time to break that habit, but we didn’t know how to get around Ted’s reticence.

Enter the Dog Whisperer. JG saw an episode about dogs that had trouble taking walks and – lo and behold – Cesar dragged them until they figured out that it was easier to walk quietly along with him. It was a revelation. Over the weekend, we went for three walks a day, separately, tugging Ted along and keeping up a brisk pace. “It’s all business,” I murmured to myself, “No coddling. He has to learn his place in the pack.” Oh, it was hard. I worried about how my neighbors would view me as I pulled along our adorable white puppy despite the fact that he clearly strained against me. JG told me to just smile and call out, “We’re still training him!” as I dragged Ted out of sight as quickly as possible. Needless to say, I was not so much reassured by the escape plan.

Eventually, much to my relief, Ted caught on. He still hops and bites a little, but as soon as I tug at the leash and start up my quick walking pace, he jumps on for the ride. Ted has come so far that he withstood our recent run of wet weather, which provided us with plenty of pathetic wet-puppy faces and a couple of funny towel-drying episodes that were cute but made for blurry pictures. As if taking walks weren’t enough, Ted has even learned to sit for his treats. Amazing! I’m really impressed with what has transpired over the past month, mostly because I’ve managed to avoid being an enormous obstacle to his progress.

Where’s my treat?

Tune in to Roosday-Tuesday and Wednesday-Bensday for the other two-thirds of the doggie cuteness trifecta!

We’ve had a couple of rainy days right in a row in our neck of the woods. It’s the kind of weather that makes me dash from house to car to office to car to house, ducking my head under the flimsy jacket more appropriate for a climate-controlled work environment. The drops slip down my neck and send chills down my back; my toes are chilly under the cold breath of the defroster. I want to curl up in comfy clothes, under a fuzzy blanket, with a mug of tea in hand. Most of all, I yearn for heavy, stick-to-your ribs food.

I know it’s still summer and the food is light! and refreshing! But, you know, that’s not really my thing. (It doesn’t help that summer is my least favorite season, by far, and I starting longing for fall as soon as July 4th passes.) I just don’t go for the gazpachos and fruity salads and icy drinks. My favorite summer foods are the filling-est ones: corn on the cob, burgers, barbecue chicken, and pasta salad. I love the bounty of fresh fruit, but I like feeling full, too. I find that I’m hungrier more often these days, but handfuls of grapes only do so much.

And I miss using my oven. I can’t blame JG for grilling as much as possible during the summer to keep the heat outside and it makes perfect sense. It means that our household casserole count is much lower and my guilty love of leftovers goes unfulfilled. I miss the smells most of all. Other than charcoal, summer food leaves much to be desired in the smell category, in my opinion. Where’s the smell of chicken pot pie? What about macaroni and cheese? What about chili? Oh, how I long for thee.

This week, when JG and I discussed the meal plan, all I could think about were my beloved comfort foods. Luckily, I can indulge because the weather is so much cooler right now. Yesterday, I made a baked ziti, shepherd’s pie is up for tomorrow, a zucchini-mushroom casserole is on for Thursday, and I’ll make a tuna noodle casserole over the weekend. This carb-binge comes before I head out next week for a few days in San Francisco, where I swear they make everything into a salad.

Thank you, rainy weather. Thank you.

#69

When I was seven years old, I received a diary for Christmas, even though I’m pretty sure my Christmas list called for “dairy.” It was a pink hardcover volume with a Mary Engelbreit illustration on the front and a lock between the two covers. I kept the key in my pencil cup because, duh, who would look there for the key to my top-secret diary? My first entry detailed that Christmas morning: what gifts I received (including “this diary,” as though it weren’t self-evident), what we ate, and descriptions of every gift we were bringing to my grandmother’s house that evening. I felt the need to include explanations of everybody in my family in parenthetical references, which was an odd practice in the context of my surreptitious key concealment. Despite my best intentions, I had a hard time writing in the book because of its construction. I’d lie on my stomach in my day bed, writing earnestly, but in one wrong move, one side of the book would whip up and slap me in the cheek. I also struggled with the idea that I was writing a letter to some nebulous person. Who was Diary, exactly? And why did she care about what was going on with me? Diary was a she, of course. It was a pink journal, after all.

- - -

I went to camp for the first time when I was eight years old and I was so excited. A whole week to go swimming and make funky crafts? Yes, please! Although I had no traces of homesickness, my mom sent along a care package with my ride. The brown-paper-wrapped shoebox contained small gifts like a flashlight, pictures of the family, and best of all, a small, spiral-bound journal. On it, a sticky note read, “Just so you don’t forget to tell us anything.” That week, I used a mechanical pencil to scrawl out breathless narratives about how camp was “soooooooooo fun,” I would be best friends with my bunkmates forEVER, and I never wanted to go home, ever. From that week on, I eschewed the “Dear Diary” format.

- - -

In high school, I developed a habit of acquiring gel pens of all shades of the rainbow and I resolved not to use the same color two days in a row, resulting in a rather blinding display when I looked back for some cringe-worthy reading. The same thoughts always emerged: I can’t believe I liked that boy. Those girls are still that mean. I’m so glad I went to school out of state. Over the years, a blank book was always a safe gift for me, but I was picky. I always accepted blank books for various purposes, but for writing, I needed a spiral binding, lines on both sides of the paper, and a size somewhere between a half-sheet and a school notebook. In ten years, between that week of summer camp and high school graduation, I had filled up a journal every other month. My bookshelves were filled with books crowded with tiny cursive handwriting in fluorescent colors, detailing how deep and sensitive I was.

Going back and reading about my adolescent drama wasn’t exactly nostalgic for me; it was akin to looking at an album of gawky, fashionless, glasses-filled self-portraits. Even so, I kept the books until I came home to clear out my bedroom because I was moving into my first apartment. Moving between dorm rooms for four years had made me a frugal packer and I knew that the time had come. After flipping through the pages and sighing, I loaded all of the books into a box destined for the trash. Trash is such a harsh word; it’s not quite what I meant at the time, nor now. The real purpose and benefit of the journals was to help me process what I was experiencing, not to preserve it like a personal museum. That purpose has been fulfilled and I no longer needed to hold on to the physical books. In a way, I’m proud of the “body of work” I created at such a young age; what it lacked in panache it made up for in quantity and heart. That’s worth something, I think.

#92

Sunday Scribblings #73: Dear Diary