Pumpkin Fever!

Maybe that's going a little overboard, but these titles, you know? Coming up with a good thing to have in bold, large type at the beginning of every entry is a lot of pressure.

Josie left this morning for L.A. We had fun, though we didn't make it up to San Francisco. She decided the $10+ required for transportation and fun wasn't worth the pain of not being able to walk very well in a city where one really needs to walk, so we hung out around here.

Well, first we checked out an Ethiopian place in San Jose. It was pretty good. Then we went to Safeway and got $5 in Halloween candy and saw some of those annoying noisemaker stuffed animal toy things they sell around this holiday. Some played "Monster Mash." Others, terrifyingly enough, played "Hooked on a Feeling." *shudder*

Then, I don't remember exactly why, we detoured into Campbell to go to Whole Foods. I got a cooking pumpkin and replenished my whole wheat pastry flour and evaporated cane juice (sugar) supplies, which were running low. They are both necessary for pancakes and cookies, and god knows what I'd do without those.

My mom and I are discussing cooking now. Again. As always. She sent me to a recipe for Indian-style aromatic vegetables (how authentic they can be coming from Parade magazine, I wonder, but they sound tasty) and I'm thinking it sounds like an awesome way to have our mixed vegetable dish at Thanksgiving.

My sister is going to veer away from the nasty canned cranberry sauce for the first time ever and make her own fresh cranberry sauce, perhaps spiked with pomegranates. Because Margot and I are obsessed with pomegranates. In fact, I have two pomegranates to bring her from the market down here, where they cost just $1 a pound.

I know. We overplan. But food is important and delicious. We get excited. It's a bonding thing.

Paul, don't worry, we'll still have mashed potatoes and some kind of meat just for you. And bread. And pumpkin pie.

Anyway, Josie and I did Halloween suburb-style: watching movies and waiting for trick-or-treaters. We doled out the two bags of candy by 7:30 and turned off the porch light. We watched all of the horrible (or just horrifying?) Mariah Carey vehicle, Glitter, made some Thai yellow curry with pumpkin and tofu, which turned out well, and popped in Firestarter. We only got partway through when 9 o'clock rolled around and we both wanted to watch Desperate Housewives, like the TV-addicted, unemployed dorks we are. (For the record, however, Josie is much less dorky than me, and probably infinitely more employable.)

Speaking of the pumpkin curry, though, were I to make it again, I'd make butternut squash curry instead. The texture would be preferable.

Anyway, the job search continues this week, and I owe a lot of people cheery e-mails. And, in case the entire universe didn't already remind you, if you're a registered U.S. voter and you didn't already do it, please vote tomorrow. (Subtext: Please vote for Kerry. And Washington voters: Please vote Murray for Senate and Gregoire for Governor. Not that I wear my political leanings on my sleeve or anything.)