Did Stuff Today--How Novel!

Despite a completely random but slowly healing shoulder injury--I just woke up one morning with sharp shooting pain eminating from my shoulderblade, cramping my neck and making my arm feel tingly--I actually did stuff today. It was a remarkably full day for once.

As my usual reruns of Roseanne were ending, Christine called and wanted to hang out. And me, being otherwise unoccupied, was more than happy to do so. So she came over and we started a gave of Trivial Pursuit Pop Culture--with DVD pie questions!!! At some point, Chris needed a ride somewhere, so we stopped the game and gave him a lift, then went to Trader Joe's and Whole Foods so I could do my usual shopping. Christine has this funny way of imitating the beep of the scanner at grocery checkouts; I think she's done it for awhile, but I was just noticing it today. Very funny.

We came back to the house, made delicious mac and cheese with peas and sauteed a whole bunch of fresh spinach as a side. Completely fabulous, lazy lunch, because I didn't have the energy to prepare Indian-style food. I did later write out the basic process and necessary components as per her request, but that takes a lot less energy.

Then I barely kicked her butt at the Trivial Pursuit game. My winning question was about Martin Short playing Charles Grodin's annoying son in the movie "Clifford," which I actually saw. This was after probably a half dozen questions where I could only stare blankly at the screen as an admission of defeat. Christine could have gotten just as lucky.

Almost as soon as she left, Kevin and I decided to attempt to find a beach at Discovery Park again, so I headed to Ballard to pick him up and go to Magnolia for some walkin'. It was a pretty long walk, and I was pretty wussy at first, but it got better. I wanted to remove my boobs for most of it, not to mention insta-heal my shoulder/neck/whatever crap.

I have been meaning to try an Indian-style coconut curry recipe since trying a similar dish at Spice Rack last week, but I was missing the curry leaves. This was the impetus for our impromptu visit to Uwajimaya for assorted sundries and a split tofu bahn mi. Kevin discovered his idea of the Best Drink Ever: aloe vera juice with real lychee. He claims that the presence of aloe vera is nigh undetectable, but the lychee is pulpy and delicious to him. I still think I'll pass.

Of course, at this point, I felt totally dead and had no interest in attempting to make the no doubt prep-intensive curry, so we just had pizza. My pizza toppings included olive oil, garlic, spinach, the Mediterranean blend of cheeses from Trader Joe's, sundried tomatoes, zucchini, and artichoke hearts. His? Sundried tomatoes, zucchini, artichoke hearts, a thick saucy mash of fire-roasted tomatoes and cannelini beans, and--this is where it gets weird--bamboo shoots and a blend of dried herbs including mint. He claims this was good. I sort of wish he'd go back to his "weird" berry pizza toppings.

Yeah, so. Not a whole hell of a lot else going on. Still perusing job listings, still feeling depressed and disappointed and blah. It's sort of hard to have that as a starting point when you have to write convincing cover letters touting your skills. "Selling yourself" isn't something I'm particularly adept at in the first place, so throw depression in there and it's no good.

If you pray, or just think good thoughts about others who may be strangers, please keep the proverbial light on for some friends of a dear friend, whose newborn daughter was hospitalized for thus far unexplained nastiness. And for the dear friend, who probably needs a few good thoughts of her own lately.