I hate depression.

I mean, I think that's what's going on, because I can't make my head stop beating myself up, and I feel like I've got nothing to look forward to or anything interesting to say, and food doesn't sound delicious, etc. That, and I've been passive-aggressive and neglectful and flaky in the extreme with regard to one friend and also haven't managed to get my shit together to smog-check my stupid car so I can get my new registration sticker, which is due.

I am trying to get some things working out better in my life, and have actually taken, like, three steps in that direction. Is it cryptic enough to say that I'm working on taking my future more seriously? Also I'm taking pilates at the Campbell community center, which, two classes in, is fucking difficult. That is step 1. Step 2 is that I bought some new athletic shoes, and step 3 will be to start walking to work again in said new shoes. Step 4 is the cryptic thing. Step 5 involves planning some travel, and I'm just feeling that out at the moment. Thinking of maybe Morocco, Spain; somewhere in the Mediterranean; Peru and Ecuador--I don't know. Somewhere that requires me to get shots (which I guess would leave out the European bit).

The things to look forward to include tickets to some cool shows, like Comedy Death Ray at SF Sketchfest on Monday, John Vanderslice at the end of February, and both Ted Leo + Pharmacists and the Mountain Goats in early March. It's an embarrassment of riches, and I can barely get excited. My brain is fucking stupid. It can only think of the annoying things that are happening around me and the things I am doing wrong.

Anyway, the new Blogger shit lets me tag things, whoopdy-do. So here's to tagging.

Hiiiiidey-ho.

driftwood man, originally uploaded by emily ca..

Photos from my new camera (meaning, from my trip home) are now on Flickr. Rejoice, ye masses, and be merry.

Yeah, I fell off the face of the Earth.

I do that periodically.

So I turned 25 a week ago Monday. Kevin was sick with a nasty cold all weekend, so nothing exceptionally fun happened. I had to cancel Friday dinner, but I did bring the curry over to their house on Saturday instead, and we had a nice little dinner. I also baked a ton of cookies AND a gingerbread apple pie.

Sunday, after much ado about Kevin's well-being, we went to Santa Cruz for some low-key family birthday co-celebrating. First up was his mom, where we had the pie, hung out, and exchanged a few gifts. Kevin conspired with his mom and gave me a really sweet Canon PowerShot, dudes! So my poor Panasonic Lumix with the burnt-out LCD backlight has been eclipsed. (I do still want to get that puppy fixed, if the price is right, and possibly pass it along to my mom.) He also gave me a Gorillapod, which is an articulated tripod, and his mom gave me a nice, simple case for the camera. Actually, I think today is her birthday, so happy birthday to Kevin's mom. Next, we went to his dad's for dinner and some more presents. His dad's girlfriend is another December birthday. Dinner was dahl, mixed vegetables, and rice, yum. I can't say no to anything with lentils (provided it's vegetarian). Then the three birthday people blew out candles on a pecan tart and opened more presents. I received a silicon baster (since they knew I didn't have anything to brush, say, butter on bread for cooking) and a 2GB camera memory card. Sweet!

Monday was my actual birthday and of course I had to work. In order to avoid having cake and candles and singing, I brought in a big tray of my delicious, vegan, homemade cookies (and some of the really awesome Thai sweet and spicy nuts) for everyone and told HR not to make a thing of it. My boss took me out to lunch, my choice, so I chose Rico's for being one of two restaurants we both actually like. (Even for my birthday, it wouldn't be nice to drag my boss to a Middle Eastern or Thai restaurant when I know she'd order the blandest thing and have to pick half of the accoutrements off, anyway. That's just sad.) After work, with Kevin still sick, the Editor and his fiancee took me out for dinner -- I'm a cheap date, I just wanted falafel and a lemonade at Yiassoo -- and a movie, so we all finally saw For Your Consideration. It sucked about as much as all the reviewers said, but as Christopher Guest fans, we felt content having seen it at all.

Tuesday I lucked out with another birthday lunch, this time courtesy of one of my coworkers, from Just Laziz, a really cool Lebanese bakery that specializes in phenomenal manakeesh (like pizza, Middle Eastern-style) and where my coworkers are obsessed with the baba ganoush. In the evening, Kevin's dad was in town, so we took him to our favorite Thai restaurant. He was suitably impressed. We also found Kevin a suit at Burlington Coat Factory so he could attend my company's Christmas party in something other than holey slacks. But that's another goddamn story and I'm going in chronological order. Anyway.

Wednesday I wanted to kill my boyfriend because he had buyer's remorse and wanted to beg off the fancy dinner, and I let him do it. So after work I went and finally saw Borat and was generally in a bad mood despite that. Also I had to cook for my company's potluck lunch the next day -- the Ethiopian spiced lentil dish I think I've linked to in a previous post.

Thursday was the company potluck. It was really a fantastic spread this year. A lot of home cooking, excellent home cooking. My lentils were awesome, of course, but another coworker friend (the one who likes coming to the Campbell farmers' market) made butternut squash penne and cheese, which was amazing. The gift exchange had a number of hilarious moments. My secret santa recipient really enjoyed her favorite bottle of wine and selection of four dark chocolate bars, and I was given a pair of Century movie ticket gift certificates and $10 for La Pizzeria, yum! In the evening I watched the 1-hour The Office and pondered the similarities between Michael Scott and our own CEO. You know, your typical "water cooler"-type viewing.

Friday I was totally coming down with Kevin's nasty cold. I had a half day of work and spent most of the afternoon napping, then preparing for the party. The party was good, but afterwards, I went to bed and practically did not get up for the rest of the weekend. The cold was just that bad. I did have to cat-sit, but Kevin had to cover for me on Sunday.

This week has been just plain work and avoiding doing the dishes due to stubborness and laziness. I'm leaving for Portland/Seaside/Seattle on Saturday afternoon. Christmas shopping is pretty much done. Just have to pack now.

Happy birthday to Kevin! And also more food.

Today is Kevin's birthday! He is 111 years old.

I have been cooking-obsessed this week. It's awesome. On Sunday, I made the quinoa and black-eyed pea croquettes from Vegan with a Vengeance again, this time with the accompanying mushroom sauce. These turned out really well (as opposed to last time, when they were dry and not all that flavorful), probably in part because I actually had more of the correct ingredients this time and in part because half the quinoa allotment was actually bulghur. I also make Sicilian-style broccoli from The Mediterranean Vegan Kitchen, which is pan-steamed with red pepper flakes, garlic, and crushed capers, and a nice side of barley and wild rice pilaf. Monday night featured some lightly creative reworking of the previous night's meal, mostly in the form of the mushroom sauce over whote wheat rotini, which was a nice combination.

Tuesday I felt ambitious and made the Lebanese stuffed swiss chard that was abandoned from my Thanksgiving menu due to its complexity. It was the right decision, but damn, the dish was tasty. Like a more tender dolma with fresher, brighter flavors, surrounded by a nice broth. For protein, I accompanied it with a simple lentil soup (green lentils, browned onion, cumin).

Last night I tested this Ethiopian lentil stew recipe with a few minor adjustments -- I used red lentils and cooked them with the sauce, and instead of 10 plum tomatoes and tomato paste, I used a big can of whole fire-roasted tomatoes, both liquid and fruit, chopping the tomatoes before adding them. It turned out pretty well indeed, so I think it will be my office potluck contribution next week. But I am not so ambitious as to make injera; no, I stuck with a simple polenta (made according to Cook's Illustrated). The potluckers will get basmati rice, though. Polenta is a pain in the ass and doesn't really travel well.

Friday night the Editor and his fiancee are coming over for dinner, hooray! So you know I'm going to be a menu-planning freak about it. Real Vegetarian Thai had a "winter menu" suggestion that sounded ideal, considering I already bought some of the main ingredients at the farmers' market. It's a Burmese-style red curry (no coconut milk) with ginger, yams, and button mushrooms with a side of vegetables (in this case, I think red cabbage and orange cauliflower) sauteed in vegetarian "oyster" (a.k.a. shiitake mushroom) sauce and garlic, brown jasmine rice, and sweet and spicy nuts for dessert. I think I'll also make a very simple tofu and greens soup. The curry has to be made the night before (with curry paste I made last night) to let the flavors fully develop.

It's 8 a.m. and I am writing about food. Good lord.

Speaking of, time to go make breakfast. What says "happy birthday, now seriously, get up and go to work before noon" more than a hot bowl of dubiously prepared amaranth porridge, sliced apple, and spearmint tea?

Farmers' market haul and ideas.

I don't always go shopping with a particular recipe in mind. Especially at the farmers' market, I prefer to see what looks good and what has a good price. Most things I get are organic unless otherwise noted (*); then they're said to be no-spray. Kevin requested avocados, but creepy avocado guy wasn't there this week, so that's too bad.

This week, it was:
-Butter lettuce, $1/head
-Dinosaur kale, $1.25/bunch
-Cilantro and Italian parsley, each $1/bunch
-Sweet potatoes, $2/lb (I'm not actually sure if that's the real price)
-Broccoli and orange cauliflower, $1.50/pound
-Beefsteak tomatoes, $2/pound
-Yellow and red onions, $2/pound
-Button mushrooms, $3/pound
-Granny smith apples, $1/pound*
-Meyer lemons, $2/pound* (and yes, I could just get these from Kevin's mom, but we haven't been down there in awhile)

Now I just have to figure out what I want to do with all of it.

Well, I plan on making a gingerbread apple pie with half of the four pounds of apples I bought. I could even make another batch of those apple crumb cake muffins that turned out so well. Tomatoes and onions are infinitely useful in myriad recipes, so that's easy. There are quite a few potentially new and interesting ways to use sweet potatoes, as well as a few old hat recipes that stood up to scrutiny. I like to make salads to bring to work, so there goes the butter lettuce; mushrooms come in handy often enough. I can pretty much always find some use for good greens (the dinosaur kale) and broccoli, and cauliflower is perfect in Indian-type foods. Plus I still have a little red cabbage left from last week. I was hoping to find organic russet potatoes, but had no such luck, so another trip to Whole Foods may be in my future should I want to do something potatoey.

Addtionally, I've been working on holiday cookies. There are three packets of dough in my freezer now, and one batch of test cookies on my stovetop. The test cookies were a Lebanese recipe involving fine semolina (instead of flour), rose water and orange blossom water, and pistachios. They are basically a butter cookie with a very different texture. I think they're interesting. The doughs are for ginger cookies (I like to put a spicy candied pecan on top), chocolate raspberry thumbprints, and lemon-orange butter cookies.

I'm also the sicko who finished ordering Christmas presents by the end of November this year, though. Don't mind me.

I did promise cooking obsession, didn't I?

Because I wouldn't want to disappoint, at least not right away.

Tonight I felt a little creative. Like I have probably mentioned before, it's my experience that Kevin likes the stuff I cook more often when I don't use a recipe, so I'm trying to do more of that. It requires more creativity, regardless, so it's a little more fun sometimes.

I was cooking some chickpeas, anyway, so I went ahead and made a simple (if underseasoned) basmati rice pilaf with vegetable broth, shallots, and garlic, with chickpeas, ground coriander, and ground ginger added towards the end of cooking. I served it with a sprinkling of lightly chopped cilantro and sour heirloom tomato wedges all around, salted. I'd definitely add more of a kick to this if I made it again--cayenne, more coriander, perhaps more ginger, perhaps some cumin. Cumin is my spice crutch, though, so I'm trying to experiment.

As a side dish, I made a dish with red cabbage and shredded carrot. First I fried about a half teaspoon of fennel seeds in a splash of olive oil, then I added the carrot and cabbage and turned the heat up high and tossed it all around until the cabbage seemed just barely cooked, then turned off the heat and added about a tablespoon of apple cider vinegar, which sizzled in the hot pan. To this I added more cilantro and about two tablespoons of toasted and chopped pistachios. This dish turned out really well; both Kevin and I enjoyed it.

Someday in the future I might have a working digital camera. If I had one now, I would've posted pictures, because these dishes looked very pretty. Especially the cabbage.

I'm thinking tomorrow I'll do a (purple!) cauliflower and potato dry fry with cumin seeds and cilantro, backed up with simple channa masala (hey, I cooked a lot of chickpeas) and plain basmati rice.

The farmers' market is still selling me fresh and beautiful organic tomatoes for $2 a pound. The next time someone gives me shit about living in California, at least I'll have a good answer.

As requested, some recipes.

Or more accurately, where to get some recipes, because they're copyrighted or whatever and I liked the cookbooks.

Lebanese Cuisine by Anissa Helou was the source of my fish recipe (p. 109-110). The recipe calls for one 3 lb. fish, scaled and gutted, but we used about 3.5 lb. of tilapia filets, halved and rolled up, stuffed, and tied with twine. I haven't made a ton of things out of this book, but it does serve as a pretty good reference for what flavors belong in this type of cooking without reading too obscure.

Vegan with a Vengeance by Isa Chandra Moskowitz is the source for my sweet potato pie with maple nut topping (p. 234-235). If you like vegan comfort food, I can't recommend this book enough, although oddly my actually vegan boyfriend hasn't been too impressed with the things I've made with this book. Too bad; I am! He did cop to liking the pie, at least. He is human, after all.

High-Flavor, Low-Fat Vegetarian Cooking by Steven Raichlen has the recipe for the Armenian pomegranate pate (p. 6). I've only made one or two other things from this book, but it has lovely, glossy pictures and somewhat inspiring recipes that, apparently, I never have all the ingredients to make. It's a little odd that way. Also, the dude who wrote this has a barbecue cooking show on PBS.

Invitation to Mediterranean Cooking by Claudia Roden has a couple minor recipes used in my Thanksgiving dinner (eggplant puree, traditional variation, p. 30; bulghur pilaf with raisins and pine nuts, p. 84) as well as a broad overview of recipes from several Mediterranean countries (not just European).

The Mediterranean Vegan Kitchen by Donna Klein is a vegan cookbook with a commendable goal: to avoid using substitutions to make something vegan, but still having a recipe based in reality/tradition. Want to make pesto without the cheese? Some people couldn't afford cheese, so they did without. I really like this cookbook, the type of cuisine it focuses on, and its attitude, so even when I don't really like a recipe, I still keep it in mind. It's definitely not gathering dust. This was the source for mashed potatoes (though I added about six cloves of raw garlic to the cooked product), butternut squash gratin, and pesto-stuffed mushroom caps.

Today I cooked without the aid of cookbooks, using up some of my Thanksgiving herb leftovers to make a basil-mint hummus (omit garlic and olive oil; add tons of fresh basil and about 6-8 sprigs of mint) and items freshly acquired at the farmers' market to make potato-leek soup with ground coriander for a most excellent kick. I also had tea with homemade mixed nut scones (Vengeance, above) and raspberry preserves for breakfast.

Also? I suggest adding fresh orange zest, dried cranberries, and a dash of cinnamon to your pancakes.

The obsessive cooking phase is back in effect, guys. At least for now.

Your daily dose of mapley goodness.

would you like some nuts with that pie?, originally uploaded by emily ca..

The pie. The dinner. The legend.

Okay, no legend. But it was tasty and my mom has a little photographic evidence to that end.

Here's how it went.

So yesterday we cooked and ate mass quantities and had even more leftovers. It was pretty awesome.

Appetizers
pomegranate and walnut pate - this was pretty interesting. My mom and sister were pretty fond of it; Kevin thought it was weird.
hummus - I can make awesome hummus in my sleep, so whatever.
caponata or eggplant salad
pita bread

Main Course
baked fish with coriander and nut stuffing, Lebanese-style - this was SUPER CRAZY DELICIOUS. We ended up using tilapia filets and wrapping them around a wad of stuffing, tying it with string, then baking it upright with a little white wine in the bottom of the pan. An unqualified success.
vegan option, at Kevin's discretion - he didn't opt for anything in particular, so he got tomatoes with some of the stuffing for the fish (the stuffing itself was vegan).

Sides
fennel, orange, and arugula salad - looked amazing; tasted okay. No one really said anything about it, but if it at least made a nice visual impression, I'm happy.
stuffed swiss chard leaves* - the recipe was deemed too complicated and the item unnecessary.
broiled mushrooms with pesto* - quite lovely, if simple.
Italian-style brown rice salad - no one from my house/family liked this, but Kevin's dad did, so I sent all the leftovers with him, even though they were going up to Yosemite today. I suggested they mix in some chicken or tuna and maybe yogurt or mayo and it would probably be good in a pita or sandwich, but overall, the flavors just didn't do it for me, anyway.
garlic mashed potatoes (just garlic, olive oil, and potatoes) - I probably should have made these the day-of instead of making them on Tuesday and reheating them, but I think they present good reworking opportunities. The reheating really dried them out, though.
provencal butternut squash gratin - completely delicious. Not overseasoned and a very melt-in-your-mouth texture.
spinach sauteed with pine nuts and raisins*
bulghur pilaf with pine nuts and raisins* - bland, but tasty. People like bulghur; it's a nice little grain. Kevin picked out the raisins, but otherwise called this dish his favorite. (The other ingredients were toasted pine nuts and vegetable broth. Thanks.)
challah a la Margot - one vegan and one non-vegan loaf. She shaped the non-vegan loaf into an absolutely adorable fish that rose and almost stopped looking like a fish, so she brushed it with some blue, red, and brown egg wash, which made it look hilariously Easter-y. The vegan loaf was formed into a fabulous turkey (the only turkey at dinner) for irony's sake and it was delicious.

Dessert
sweet potato pie with lots of nuts - PHENOMENAL. I halved the sugar called for in the filling recipe, but otherwise followed directions and it came out BEAUTIFUL. So much good sweet potato, maple, and nut flavors with a lovely, nutty, graham cracker crust.
pear and cranberry tort (or other basically fruity dessert)* - Kevin requested simple cut fruit, so that's what we had -- pineapple, mango, oranges, apples, and kiwi. I think only the oranges, pineapple, and mango got served, though.
something very, very chocolatey*

Also, Kevin's dad brought a "rainbow yam" dish with a sauce that -- as I recall -- was made with mango, vanilla, and rum, among possibly other things and was quite tasty as well.

Overall, it was a success. Hooray! Today we are thinking of going to a movie or two or three and looking at mattresses while avoiding Black Friday sales of HORROR.

They're not literally his children.

Dude, tonight's Veronica Mars had an A-plot that straight-up mimicked The Big Lebowski. My favorite TV show paying homage to my favorite movie? Fucking killer! I was dorking the hell out.

Speaking of dorking out, I am really obsessed with my Thanksgiving menu this week. I cannot shut up. Also, my house is still not clean and that is freaking me out. My mom is coming in tomorrow at noon and will be home without me all afternoon. Ack ack ack ack. Hopefully Kevin will forego sleep in pursuit of my sanity, heh. (It's all his stuff, pretty much. There will be some picking up in the living room that I can do, and general neatening up of the place, but the piles... those are his. I can't touch them.) Anyway, a lot of stuff is made or just needs some finishing touches and reheating, so the cooking portion, at least, shouldn't be a huge stressor. Plus it all looks pretty tasty!

Happy unturkey day!

Birthdays: Are they at all exciting?

I am turning 25 in less than a month. Kevin will turn 26 a few days before me. We're settled on "doing something" to celebrate our respective agings, but most likely that would involve a dinner or two out and me concocting something delicious and vegan. Should we attempt to do anything more interesting? We're not really party people and good luck convincing him to go out of town for anything. Hah.

Public notice: Please stop getting engaged, everyone.

I can't take it anymore. I have reached my quota of engaged/married friends. I am crying uncle. Just hold off a few years. You can wait. Really!

Stop being so goddamn happy with each other and doing all those things people do. Stop wanting to spend your lives together. I mean, it's sweet and all, really, but there is just too much of it.

Just stop with the happy-making, people. Please.

Love, your freaked-out friend,

Emily

Thanksgiving-planning freak.

That's me for the next couple weeks. My main obstacle right now is getting all the crap that should be in the garage out of the kitchen. Then we can figure out where a table with seating for eight will fit in our house.

Of course, that hasn't stopped me from jumping the obsessive planning gun, and I already know how the table will be set (I bought eight plates in a nice slate blue, $2 apiece, as well as simple cloth napkins, also cheap) and what the menu is. Hell, I already made a shopping list, divided by part of the store (as my mother once taught me). Next Sunday I'll get up, get everything I can from the farmers' market (including possibly some flowers for the table--maybe a small white orchid, or a nice bouquet of cut flowers that might last a few days), then hit up Whole Foods and Trader Joe's for the rest. I still need to plan which days I'll do prep work for which food items. My mom is flying in around lunchtime the day before Thanksgiving and I will also have to set aside a project or two for her in the afternoon. My sister will take Caltrain down that night and possibly whip up a batch or two of her wonderful challah.

You must know by now that I relish a challenge for menu-planning (if not necessarily cooking technique itself), so I think my Thanksgiving menus have gotten weirder every year. This year, I'm going Mediterranean/Middle Eastern, and it's almost 100% vegan and should be pretty crazy healthy. Here's what I have planned for this year:


Appetizers
pomegranate and walnut pate
hummus
caponata or eggplant salad
pita bread

Main Course
baked fish with coriander and nut stuffing, Lebanese-style
vegan option, at Kevin's discretion

Sides
fennel, orange, and arugula salad
stuffed swiss chard leaves*
broiled mushrooms with pesto*
Italian-style brown rice salad
garlic mashed potatoes (just garlic, olive oil, and potatoes)
provencal butternut squash gratin
spinach sauteed with pine nuts and raisins*
bulghur pilaf with pine nuts and raisins*
challah a la Margot

Dessert
sweet potato pie with lots of nuts
pear and cranberry tort (or other basically fruity dessert)*
something very, very chocolatey*


* = the maybes. I'd prefer to narrow it down to five sides and two desserts, but we'll see.

I am suddenly out a lot more money.

But not nearly as much as I could have been.

In between actual project work today (which was light), I was researching tires. It was down to two options. A would cost me $308 (including installation, taxes, and fees), is a model recommended by Consumer Reports, and could be installed at a shop less than a mile from my house as soon as tomorrow. B would cost me $285 *on sale* (including installation, taxes, and fees), is a model that seems pretty good judging by general comments on the internet (it wasn't reviewed by CR), and had a much better treadwear rating than A. I went with B, which is through Costco.com, and I have to await their call--within 5 to 10 business days--to see when these suckers can get put on my car.

I also checked out some Honda parts sites and found out that my side view mirror is listed at $179, but at least one site had it for $134. But that's just the part, and I have no idea where I could get it installed and how much labor would cost. I also don't know if I ripped up other things besides the mirror part that I can buy. If I were a little more car-savvy, I'd have half a mind to attempt to install the thing myself, but it involves wires and bodywork and thus is scary.

Anyway, I think $500+ of car work is quite enough for one month.

I should call my mom and make sure she didn't drown now. I'm feeling guilty enough about the car things; I shouldn't have to feel like I have ignored her and the fact that she hasn't been on the internet for a few days and it's OMG raining like fucking biblical floods up there.

Now there are only three things obviously wrong with my car.

The scrapey brakes and desperately-needing-changing oil problems have been eliminated from the competition. Hooray for these dudes. It wasn't quite as painful on my pocketbook as I'd anticipated, either, which was a bonus.

Now what is left, in order of priority to fix it:

1. New tires (dude said "before it gets rainy") on a budget of less than $300.

2. Replace right side view mirror that I awesomely smashed off in my old apartment parking spot, which supposedly costs something like $200 to fix at a dealer, and bleh.

3. Fix dents and scraping in left rear doors from another parking incident, circa 2002. This one had an estimated repair cost of around $1,200 at the time; might be worse now, who the hell knows. All I know is this has absolutely zero effect on my driving and thus is an extremely low priority. As in, it may never get fixed.

Other things in the coming months I will be spending money on:

Thanksgiving -- food and possibly some decoration/table setting business. We have plates, but the ones that match with a total of 8 (at least, I hope) are plain white Corelle, which bores me to tears. Blue plates? Something pretty? Who me, spend money on useless crap?

Christmas/birthdays -- you know, presents. I don't actually buy for a large number of people, but I want to get nice things. I don't even know what to give people this year.

Shoes -- assuming my fucking ankle heals properly, I need better walking shoes so I can continue with the walking thing. Good shoes aren't really cheap, and I might end up going through multiple pairs in the search for perfection. Phooey.

Anyway, listmania is now over, because my wallet is crying and I have to go comfort it. Also because I am hungry.

Hooray for America.

I voted on a bunch of crap I honestly didn't care about and a handful of things I did. I voted mostly Dem, one Republican (insurance commissioner), and one Peace and Freedom party or whatever (I hate the Governator, but I'm no fan of Angelides--why the fuck can't the Dems get their shit together and run people I am not so loathe to vote for that I vote third party?). I voted against pretty much all the propositions and for some bond measures. (How the fuck does the parental notification for minor's abortion keep ending up on the ballot? Easiest "no" ever.)

Though I'm registered as a permanent absentee voter and never actually got confirmation that my address was changed (I should be within all the same precints, however), I voted at my local polling place, which happens to be two doors down from me in a neighbor's living room. I never received my absentee ballot or a paper voter's guide, anyway. They started out the day with four machines, but were down to three when we arrived at 7 p.m. and were running out of paper (some kind of stopgap solution to the paperless ballot/Diebold problem, I suppose) in one or two more. The line was crawling. One of the election officials (who might also be one of said neighbors) said we could vote on the sample ballots. All the voter guides with sample ballots they had available were of the bilingual persuasion, and they ran out of "official" envelopes.

So my vote was cast on a Vietnamese ballot and shoved into a blank envelope marked "provisional" in ballpoint pen by another election official.

Anyway, fuck this useless shit, I'm going to flop on the couch and watch the CW all night.

Just visiting!

new and improved inmate visitation, originally uploaded by emily ca..

So your loved one is doing the jailhouse rock. Will be for the next 15 to 25 years. Visiting them is a difficult time for all concerned... but not anymore! Now you can schedule your trip to prison online! No more tearful phone conversations with the prison administration; your hardened criminal or wrongfully convicted spouse, parent, significant other, child, or best friend is just a few mouse clicks away.

More about not walking.

This week has been fucking ridiculous. I'm glad it's over, except it isn't really, because my ankle is still unhappy and I can walk only at a snail's pace, followed by plenty of elevation and icing. And yes, I've been doing all I can tolerate doing to take care of it all week, including religious and proper use of an ace bandage. The swelling is going down and it isn't super hurty or anything, but I can't move it a lot and there is a lot of soreness.

As a result of my awesomely purple injury (no, really, the bruise is spectacular!), I've been begging rides off a barely-awake Kevin in the mornings and a speed demon boss in the evenings. Well, I got rides from the boss until we were halfway to my house last night, which is exactly when her 15-year-old Civic hatchback lost power steering and failed to restart after she maneuvered it into a nearby parking lot. The aroma of burning plastic was everywhere, but there was no evidence of leaking or other obvious trouble. As soon as it was determined that we weren't going anywhere without rescue (in the form of her boyfriend), it started raining. Hard. And I was only wearing a sock on one foot. Well, a sock and a bandage.

In lesser crimes against my well-being, the backlight on my camera's LCD apparently burned out, so that thing is useless. It's no longer under warranty, of course.

And I finally got myself to call the mechanic I've been meaning to take my scrapey brake-addled car to for weeks, only to learn that they're closed until Monday.

So I'm a gimp with no ride. Also, no food.

About walking.

I can't do it right now. No, seriously. I was probably 10 minutes away from work this morning when I tripped on the sidewalk and fell face down, spraining my ankle in the process.

Fuck.

Kevin is taking care of me, but I'm completely useless and occasionally in an assload of pain. This is so great. Every time I try to do something good for myself...

Hugs as a bartering strategy and other tales of late October.

I've been in a bad-ish mood for the past couple weeks and not really feeling up to writing anything that wasn't whining about my lot in life (which would have consisted of things like, wah, why can't my boyfriend and I want to eat sushi at the same time, and stupid Oktoberfest meant the farmers' market was stupid cancelled, waaaah, although at the time these things felt like the weight of the world). But a few things are going on that may be noteworthy.

One: I have been walking to work. I walked on a Friday and continued walking every day last week. It takes about a half hour and I get very sweaty and upon returning home all I want to do is collapse, but I think it's good for me. The reasons for this can include my need to exercise and my hatred of driving, and that's all well and good, but they also include my reluctance to take my car to a mechanic to get the brakes or whatever it is that's making a scraping sound while the car is in motion fixed. (Mom, if you ask me about this, I swear I will stick my fingers in my ears and hum loudly and off-key like a five-year old. It WILL get taken care of, okay? I feel shitty enough about it without having to discuss it.)

Really, the best part of walking is that I am way less angry at stuff. Driving makes me an angerball, as even in my 10-minute commute I see no fewer than two traffic infractions that make me want to kill/flip off/honk/scream, so I get to work, teeth gnashing, snarling about some idiot who ran a yellow light or took too long to make a U-turn.

Two: I have been being a little better about actually cooking for myself. We went through a spat of eating out almost exclusively, and we both decided that was Bad, and I think my credit card statements are thus far a little less intimidating as a result. (Second note to mom: My finances are in perfectly fine shape.) The farmers' market is basically the highlight of my weekend, including today, when a friend from work also came to the Campbell market and we goaded each other into buying lots of things we probably didn't need. I usually don't take samples if I'm there on my own, because although I realize sampling does not imply intent to purchase, I feel like it should in my stupid little head, and so I try to avoid trying things that look delicious but are things I am highly unlikely to actually spend money on. Like toffee and cheese and cookies. I did give in today and try some cheese that is organic and locally produced, and ended up buying some spiced white cheddar that made me want to sing.

There's a dude who sells juice, mediocre guacamole, and organic avocados at one end of the market, and he's a little overly flirtatious. I asked him if his smaller 'cados were 4 for $5, and he took the sign away and said, "No, for you, they're 6 for $5." I bought the half dozen, and later brought my coworker by, warning her that he was a little on the creepy side. What followed was more flirtation in which he implied that he changed the price based on my negotiation skills that involved a hug. Which...they did not. But this gave my coworker an in to wrangle 4 for $2 out of him--via the hug negotiation tactic.

The bad thing that happened (or didn't, really) was that I have been wanting to get a pet, specifically a bunny, and I took Kevin to a house rabbit adoption fair last weekend to see how he'd react to the fluffbutts. There was one there who took a shine to him, sitting calmly on his lap for an hour and eating hay out of his hand (it sniffed me and stretched up to my shoulder, then got bored and hopped back to him), but after we left, he told me he was having an allergic reaction to it--itchy eyes, the whole bit. I'm allergic, too, truth be told, but I'm happily medicated and it isn't bad enough to bother me. Anyway, the no-bunny scenario has me pretty bummed out overall.

I'm sure there's more going on, but whatever.