Spring break?

I'm on spring break!  Confused?  Did I ever tell you to turn the world upside down and you'd be able to understand NZ's seasons?  Then you will also have to remember that I'm studying through a NZ university.  I'm having a home-vacation where I don't allow myself to feel guilty when I'm not studying, and I do much less study each day than I normally do.  In fact, I did none at all on Tuesday...until the evening.  But I don't have a novel to read so I had to read something before I went to sleep, and it's an interesting book, even if it is for a class - Preparing Teachers for the Changing World.  Very insightful.  

The thing is, I'm so close to finishing, I'm not sure that I need a proper holiday as I will be on an endless, no-end-in-sight holiday soon enough.  Of the type that will not quite kill me.  Or perhaps I'll be able to handle it this time around, we'll see.  

Yesterday I popped some popcorn and dragged Jbird along to the movies to see Hit and Run.  I quite liked the fast cars and the silly jokes.  Next week I want to see The Campaign which I expect to be a true replica of an American Campaign.  I've also been baking, seeing friends for coffee, and if you're looking for me, you'll probably find me on the couch watching telly. 

The sale of a car

My parents have been storing Jbird's Toyota Corolla in their garage since we've been here - we sold my Ford Festiva to my mum before we left.  We used Jbird's Toyota the first summer we went home but didn't want to bother registering it and getting its WoF* the next summer.  My parents were about ready to get their garage back so Jbird's parents tidied it up recently and sold it for a nice little sum.  That was pretty nice of them if you ask me.  Now we're officially car-less.

We're not stuff-less though, we have a lot of stuff.  We have a house full of furniture and items here, and another garage full of items at Jbird's parents place.  Two beds here, two beds there, a viola here, a viola there, a piano here, a grand piano there.  I feel like a double person.  I like all the stuff in NZ more, it has more sentimental value, items from when I was a little girl, all our wedding presents, and my own viola which is special to me.  The stuff here is perfectly comfortable and functional, but I would say it doesn't really tie me here.  I could pack up and leave tomorrow and not be very devastated about leaving most of it behind. When it gets down to it, though, the stuff in NZ is more pretty, but I'm surviving pretty well without it.  Thanks for storing it all, folks.  I'm going to be a happy girl the day we set up a house in NZ. 

*Warrant of Fitness

Strawberry granita

Granita is an icy dessert which has been stirred with a fork while it freezes from Italy.  I did not try granita when I was in Italy back in '05.  I was so fixated with their gelati, I didn't even notice if it was available.  But my ice cream making recipe book tells me it's very popular - so popular that some Italians put it in bread and eat it for breakfast.  I thought I'd take a small hiatus from making summer popsicles and see what the granita fuss is all about.  I had a pound of strawberries in my fridge just waiting for this event.  I added more water because compared to popsicles, granita is very intensely flavoured. Too intense, in my opinion.

1 pound strawberries

3 tablespoons honey (the recipe called for sugar)

1 cup water (or more, you'll have to decide, the recipe calls for a half cup)

A few drops freshly squeezed lemon - I used lime and it was delicious

Slice strawberries and toss with honey, stirring until it starts to dissolve.  Let sit for up to an hour, stirring every so often.

Combine with liquids.  Purée in blender until smooth.  Press through a strainer to remove seeds.  This is optional, but I think it adds a nice smooth texture to your liquid. 

Pour into a dish and place in freezer.  Start checking after the first hour.  Once it begins to freeze around the edges, stir with a fork, breaking up the frozen parts and raking towards centre.  If you leave it too long, leave it out to melt a bit.  Keep stirring until it's all frozen, similar to shaved ice.

Enjoy with ice cream, whipped cream, or alone.

Just get some sleep

I have struggled with insomnia on and off for as long I can remember.  It's only rarely stay-awake-all-night insomnia but I go through phases for several nights in a row where I don't sleep well at the beginning of the night, and then I will wake up with the birds at 4:30 or 5in the morning.  I'm stuck in one of those phases right now, and haven't slept well for the passed three nights.   I often feel very jealous of Jbird who sleeps deeply whenever he wants to and often when he doesn't want to.  I don't know why it happens, I'm barely drinking any alcohol or caffeine, and I don't do anything exciting before I sleep.  With the exception of my Irish band which had me singing this song in my head all night on Friday night.

I have some techniques that I do to help me sleep.  I try to lay really still,  listening to my breathing, or to Jbird's breathing, and try to get in a slow rhythm.  I try to stretch every muscle in my body, individually*.  I never get very far with that one before I forget what I'm doing.  I try to think of all the people I love and pray for them. Before I got married, I would play a quiet CD and the music distracted me from my thoughts.  Last night I put some lavender essential oil drops on my pillow and had some rescue remedy. Tonight I'm going to drink some chamomile tea before I go to sleep.  The girls I babysit for tell me warm milk helps too so perhaps I'll try that tomorrow night.  Do you have any suggestions?

*at high school I was in a psychology class and our teacher did some meditation with us.  I don't know what it had to do with psychology but he instructed us through this while some relaxing music played.

A clip from home

I have been indulging in some homesickness, phone calls from two lovely sisters will do that to me.  I'm glad we didn't go home this summer for loads of reasons.  We needed to have a summer and we definitely got one of those this year.  But I am also sad to miss out on my usual NZ injection, where my Kiwi Bank gets all filled up.  Sisters are something I'll never be able to find here.  

Doctor Baby Bev* put me onto a youtube clip which didn't help my homesickness.  Those ever so funny, home grown comedians from Flight of the Conchords wrote a song and did a skit for the Red Nose charity in NZ.  I wish they'd make another season of their show.  The song has the usual smattering of celebrity singers which just seems to make their earnestness even funnier.  Can you imagine Bret's raps sung be actual hip hop artists?  Now you don't need to.  In addition there are some interviews the guys did with some school children to get their lyrics which made me miss teaching in NZ.  The accents kill me.  I shed a few tears after talking to my sisters and a few more after watching this video.

*she's the youngest of us four, a doctor, and 'Bev' is a twisting of her name.

On handing in some work, being a klutz, and motivation

I'm handing in an essay today.  There was a point when I was proof reading this essay that I was in tears because I thought my writing was so awful.  My encouraging husband told me it's because my writing has improved a lot but so have my expectations.  My feelings of frustration come because I want my writing to be better than it is, but he tells me it's already better than other things I've recently written.  Good teaching on his part, teachers have to be motivators. This is an example of wanting to be able to do something straight away, wanting to avoid the inevitable klutziness of developing a new skill.  My lecturer had me read something about that just this week.  It seems obvious, right?  Yet if we don't have motivation, good guidance, or know how to progress, we reject these feelings of klutziness and give up.  

Back to the essay: I finished it last week but a wise sage (a.k.a.: Jbird) once said to me when I suggested I might hand something in early: Annabel, think of it as a piece of art, keep working on it for as much time as you have because it will never be perfect.  He then went on a spiel about his piano playing.  He does like to preach and he says some pretty good stuff.  Unfortunately, I'm not always patient enough to listen.  So I've read and reread this tedious piece of work for the last few days and today is 'D' day.  It's a funny journey.  Now that I'm handing it in, I'm less sure than ever that I'm on the right track.  It seems that my writing has been whittled down to the simplest terms and I've begun to wonder whether it has enough depth.  I probably know it too well. 

Only three more of these to go and I'm done with this degree.  Hooray!

Free play

I often babysit a two year old and a five year old girl while their parents are out of town.  I took them to the park yesterday after school. There were a lot of other kids there of all different ages so I was watching careful to make sure my little ones were safe.  At the same time, I was conscious of trying to allow them to socialise naturally with the other kids.  It was a terrifying experience.  It started out fine, playing on the playground, mostly sticking together.  Up and down the slide.  A little bit frustrating when Miss Two Year Old couldn't get up the steep slide, but okay with a little bit of help from me.  They were soon trying to play with the other kids.  Before I knew it, there were at least ten of them all congregating together where the other mums and sitters couldn't see.  I guess my teaching has trained me to step in when I have a problem with something.  Like sticks and stones.  Rather, these were big sticks and big stones.  I only lasted about two minutes before: it's time to go girls! No.  Yup, time to go, come on. As I scooped down to pick up Miss Two Year Old, I teachered it up: Are you guys being careful?  Those sticks and stones could really hurt somebody, be careful with them. I wasn't all that teachery because I would've separated the children from the weapons.  I've learnt you only have so much authority out of school grounds.  I was secretly glad I wasn't on duty at school and could take my charges and drive away.  

I got out my fiddle

I'm playing music again! And it's really fun.  Jbird and I enjoy preparing music together and we have a wedding to play all the way in October.  I've started rehearsing us this early because I have to find the music for it.  With no piano and no second viola, we're trying to put together violin/viola duets.  A small detail is that it's outdoors and we have no mics.  I've done this plenty of times with a full string quartet but it's a bit daunting with just two instruments.  It's always fun to play with Jbird, he's very loving and humble about it.

I was also contacted through an ad on craigslist* by a high whistler.  What is the high whistle, I hear you ask.  I've always called it the Irish tin whistle.    It's not tin and costs more than the $6 I spent on some for my music room back when I had a job.  He has one for just about every key.  When I got back from Romp, the bluegrass festival we went to, in June I was really excited to start playing some fiddle and then it kind of all fell into place.  We have had two rehearsals and Jbird tells me we sound very Irish.  I keep trying to introduce bluegrass into the mix, but he's played in a couple of Irish bands and his instrument is heard with Irish tunes more.  I don't hate it though.  I'm just saying, I'm aiming for bluegrass.  Last week we had Irish beer so it felt more like a party than a rehearsal.  This week we'll be joined by a folkalist - a folk singer - AND a guitarist.  Thus we have a band.  Jbird plays too, except he feels strange on the piano.  So we're looking for a bodhrán drum** and a melodica. 

*craigslist: for all those Kiwis who don't use it, it's an online classifieds

** bodhrán drum: an Irish drum

Vege oil and bridges

When we lived in Baltimore, we had friends who would occasionally lend us their 1980s Mercedes Benz when we were going on a holiday.  It had been converted to also run on vegetable oil but we used it on diesel as the vege oil was a big job to get and clean.  My dad's friend happened to have a retreat on the Chesapeake Bay so when my parents visited, we borrowed the car for a weekend retreat.  Baltimore is on the Chesapeake but it's a huge bay and their retreat was several hours drive away.  The retreat itself was a very nice place to stay.  The house was huge and it was right on the bay.  There were loads of wild birds to spot, swamp grasses, and a hot tub.  When we were there alone, Jbird and I took the opportunity to visit Ocean City.  It is very similar to L.A., except it that it's on the east coast. 

On the way to the retreat with my folks, we'd had trouble putting diesel into the car because we couldn't find the switch to pop open the gas tank cover.  It had taken a long time, and we'd tried every single switch we could find until we finally realised it didn't have one, you could just open it if the car was unlocked.  We'd filled up on diesel and made our merry way. On the drive itself, there's a really cool big bridge that we have to drive across at one point.  Jbird always tries to make me take photos which I find a bit annoying because I want to look at the bridge too and I know the photos will never be similar to what we see, our camera is spectacularly sub-par.

After a lovely weekend of food, wine, books, boats, birds, and hot tubs, we were ready to head back to Baltimore.  The couple we were staying with drove off to catch their grandbaby before it left New Jersey just before we did. We waved them off, got in the Mercedes, and tried to go.  But it wouldn't start.  So we let it sit a bit and tried again.  It still wouldn't go.  Dad and Jbird got under the hood to try to puzzle it out but nothing seemed wrong.  We gave it another try and it started.  Everyone was glad.  That would've been a dumb end to the weekend, we had no idea who could've helped us at that point.

About fifteen minutes into the trip, Jbird mentioned it felt like we were running out of diesel.  It was a bit hard to know.  With all the different gauges for vege oil, heat, and diesel on this ancient beast, we weren't sure which was which (and if any) worked, and what they were for.  But it felt to him, as he pressed on the accelerator, like we didn't have much gas.  So as we drove we started looking out for petrol stations.  We'd just passed through strip-mall heaven* few miles back and there just weren't any more stations.  It started to feel more and more empty and wouldn't you know it, we were just driving onto that terrific bridge I mentioned.  We completely ran out two thirds of the way up the bridge.  At this point, I start trying to get hold of the owners of the car but wouldn't you know it, I could not find any signal while we were on the bridge.  Jbird somehow gets the car to the top of the bridge.  Don't ask me how.  And he coasts all the way to the bottom. It was amazing, you can imagine we were all panicking on the way up it.  As we coast down the bridge, I manage to get hold of the wife and then the husband calls so I have one of them on hold and then we all hang up and it's all really confusing.  After the bridge - which has a magical view with the water glistening all around and really showing itself off - Jbird pulls over to the side of the road and within seconds both a tow truck and a cop car pull up behind us.  He goes to talk to them while I try to sort out who I'm talking to on the phone.  I eventually get the husband, who knows the mechanics of the machine, and he tells me to use vege oil and get it to a gas station.  The thing is, he says, the car doesn't normally start on vege, it needs to warm up, but we're probably warm enough now.  I ask him where the switch is and he says there should be one that when I press will look really red.  Well, to our surprise, it already looks red!  It turns out that the car had been running on vege all the way from Baltimore, and we have an entire tank of diesel left.  That was why the car hadn't started well earlier, the tank wasn't warm enough yet.  I race back to Jbird and his group of helpful men and blurt out "It's alright, the car was running on vege, we have diesel in the tank."  The men kind of stare at me blankly.  They're not expecting my thick Kiwi accent and probably have no idea what I just said, particularly with that term 'vege' which probably comes out like 'vige'.  But that's just an aside. The car runs smoothly all the way home and we've seen the best of the Chesapeake Bay. 

*strip-mall heaven - a nice term for all the millions of Macca D.s, Starbucks, and gas stations that congregate over blocks and blocks in many place in the States.  It only becomes heaven if you stop at a DQ (Dairy Queen) for  a blizzard.  Otherwise it's incredibly ugly.

Hacker hack hack

We had our gmail account hacked recently, they also tried hacking Jbird's fb account and our ebay account.  I don't know what all else.  It's a frightening experience, to be locked out of your email account and told you will receive a verification sms to a phone number ending in digits that you are not familiar with.  Thankfully, I found out just twenty minutes after it happened and was able to have gmail revert the verification sms back to our phone number (the previous one attached to the account).  It's definitely time to change our passwords.  We've also had credit card fraud before.  I couldn't believe it when I saw someone was buying CDs and other items from somewhere in Switzerland.  How does this happen? Do you have any further tips for internet security? 

Boysenberries and chocolate in an icecream

I found a new favourite ice cream this week: boysenberries and chocolate.  I'm not one to measure quantities when I make ice cream.  My basic philosophy is: if you have enough cream or whole milk and it tastes good, it should freeze well. I imagine every ice cream maker will be different, mine is quite small, but I'll give you my approximate measurements.  It's a lovely recipe to make, I dipped my finger in multiple times along the way.

1 cup of full cream

2 tablespoons cocoa powder

sugar to taste (um....I used 3/4 of a 1/2 cup = 3/8 of a cup)

2 cups boysenberries (frozen or fresh)

1. Combine the first three ingredients and whisk together (this p.art is fun because the mixture gets lovely and thick like custard)

2. bring to a rolling boil, whisking often (actually, I used a wooden spoon)

3. take off heat, add boysenberries, let sit (I enjoyed giving them a mush into the custard)

4. blend until smooth

5. I pushed it through a sieve and it came out beautifully smooth, but you don't have to.  If you don't mind seeds.

6. Put in icecream maker and freeze as directed

Hopeful fall planting

It's that time in the summer season when gardeners prepare their soil for the fall planting.  Last week I thought it was ludicrous that fall should be coming, it was still uncomfortably hot, but our temperature has dropped to such a pleasant warmth that I can now believe it will get cooler.  I've also heard about the cherry blossoms, lambs, and daffodils making an appearance south in NZ this week so fall coming here really must be true.  

I planted coriander, dill, and a variety of lettuce seeds and am looking forward to fresh greens in my salad again.  I laid two plots, one covered in plastic acting as a green house, the other in all day sun.  I'm waiting hopefully for my melons to grow into a more significant size but they don't seem to want to.  I also saw my first bean on the vine, and I harvest a few tomatoes everyday.  We had a home grown pizza tonight with the main toppings from the garden - sweet pepper, tomato, and courgette.  Topped with fresh herbs, marjoram, thyme, and basil.  A little taste of success: it's enough to start making plans for the garden for another year.
 

The Short Maturen Wedding

Jbird has made a little video of the wedding in Michigan.  I don't want to post it publicly for their privacy but if I haven't sent you a copy and you'd like to see it, please let me know so that I can email you the link.

I'm listening to you

I want to become a better listener.  I want to be able to really hear what someone else is saying, without needing to offer advice or an anecdote from my own life.  Teaching put me in the habit of telling others where to next.  But why is my advice better than their own?  I want to learn to help others think about where to next without telling them what I think they ought to do to get there.  I think this involves more listening, perhaps some asking of questions, and less telling.  I'll need to bite my tongue and think before I speak.  Maybe I will get better at it with age and wisdom.

Gullible or...

There is a man that has knocked on our door twice selling a magnificent cleaning product.  Maybe its' magnificent, he wasn't very convincing.  It supposedly removes ink from cloth, he showed me himself, but I can't be sure that was a true ink pen he used.  He's really pathetic, I even wonder if he's homeless.  I can tell he's been told 'no thanks' many times by the way he turns to leave after every few words.  

The first time it was easy, I had students arriving and I could say "sorry, I'm busy" and close the door.  But the second time I was stuck.  He remembered me as the music teacher, his daughter even plays viola*.  I also happened to have stain remover on my grocery list.  Lastly, his product has only a small number of ingredients in it, one of them being citrus.  They were all the criteria I had in my head, I had no excuses.  The only issue is his product was rather pricey, although it's meant to be concentrate.  Jbird says he's a great sales man.  I say we don't give enough money away to people in need.  I'd much rather pay this sad man than one standing at the lights with a sign.  Anyway, I really do need a stain remover, I'm sick of not quite being able to get stains out of clothes with my baking soda recipe.  I hope he uses the money well.

*I didn't tell him that I play the viola before he told me that, I promise. 

A view of home

I watched a couple of these NZ ads.  They're narrated by our local cult celebrity, and I thought they were nice enough to share.  They're not based on exact truth.  Helicopter rides are not an every day affair, and we don't all live in the South Island (in fact, I think only 1/4 of our population does) surrounded by those gorgeous mountains.  We'd like to, but it would be pricey (to pay for the helicopter rides) and cold (to live that far south).  It doesn't really matter where you are in NZ, the scenery is always very pretty.  Not like here in the States: once you're on a highway, that's basically all you'll see.  Concrete.  And the tips of dry corn or another unknown crop.  I guess that's a fair description of the midwest.  Though I know there is other scenery to behold, our travels just haven't taken us there yet.  Anyway, in my opinion, NZ is always a good view.  I don't think that's the tinted glasses of the homesick speaking either.

User Pays

This is the only NZ replay I have been able to find from the Olympics.  The only one.  Just in case you don't bother to check it, it's an iphone video of a t.v. screen of NZ winning a gold in rowing.  I viewed exactly 6 minutes of the opening ceremony.  The US and NZ has cut me off.  And I feel mad about it.  NBC has the rights.  I don't have a t.v. and won't subscribe to NBC online.    Even if I chose to pay to watch it here, it would all be US centric.  I'm not that interested in the US's kabillion medals.  Or listening to them pat themselves on the backs. 

No NZ site will allow me to view olympic replays.  I don't really know who they're trying to protect and with our increased global worldliness, I'm not used to being left in the dark.  I read the NZ paper each morning and have mostly  been able to follow how we're doing, but it's getting harder to keep up.  And I want the darn replay!

I happen to be proud of my little country claiming victories.  What's the point of the Olympics anyway, except to promote nationalistic pride? And if I am feeling frustrated, I'm less likely to try to 'participate'.  I'm more likely to start cutting the ties.  

And that's my rant.  Mostly.

The wounded became the nurse

At the end of a supremely fun weekend of many happy moments, Jbird heard one of his best mates was passing through Bloomington and they decided to meet at a bar.  As I like to prepare myself for the week ahead on Sunday nights, I declined the extended invitation.  I knew Jbird wanted me to come too, but I wanted him to enjoy this short visit with a friend he hadn't seen for a long time, without me holding him back.  I definitely don't like a late night on a Sunday.  Jbird, however, is on summer vacation so it was kind of perfect for him.  About an hour after he left, I realised I needed to meet this guy, I'd heard so much about him, so I decided to join them.  Jbird wasn't picking up his phone - which is pretty standard fare for both of us - so I tried biking to his favourite local bar, hoping to find them there but they weren't.  An hour later he arrived home to pick up some liquor and try to convince me to come to a new friend's house for cards and drinks, and to meet the old friend.  After some discussion we decided I'd drive and he'd bike so that we could leave at different times.  I tell you all of this to give some necessary detail, but also to let it be known that I can be spontaneous, even though I don't always choose to be.

We went, they drank a lot, we played cards.  I felt happy to have some new friends.  At around midnight, I said my good nights in a weird "alright, I'll see you around", kind of way. I guess it was late, they were drunk, I was sober, and there was a cat that I was allergic to: I was ready to go.  I shook Jbird's hand - it was a joke, you had to be there - and told him to bike home carefully. At the time everybody was acting like it was time to call it a night, Jbird was even on his bike when I left, saying his own farewells.  

When I got into bed later, I felt a little bit worried about Jbird so I tried calling him.  And texting.  Not that I really think he'd answer if anything was wrong, I just wanted to know that he was okay.  When there was no response, I decided his phone was probably in the car but I was too tired to get it to find his friend's phone number and call him instead.  I figured he was probably alright, I was just being a worry wart, and I fell asleep.

Four hours later, Jbird climbs into bed.  We talk briefly about the night, how much fun he'd had, he was sorry he didn't come home when I did, and I start to drift off to sleep again.  But he's breathing funny.  Then he asks me to turn off the fan, he had an accident and the air hurts.  After my earlier worry, I panic a little bit: Are you okay? Did a car hit you? Can I put something on it?  It turns out that on his way home he rode into a land island at high speed when he was checking behind him for cars and flew off his bike.  He takes a pain killer and we decide a little bit of wizard ointment will help his grazes.  For some reason, I cannot deal with dressing the grazes.  They're not really awful, I've seen worse, but it's like my body goes into shock. The combination of the worry and then something actually happening has sent me over the edge.  The room is too hot and I can't breathe so I fuss around getting the AC working and then put my head between my knees, apologising all the time to my wounded soldier because I can't help him when he needs me.  

Eventually we both lie down on the bed, talking, and the next thing I know someone's shaking me "I've got you, I've got you, it's okay." but I can't work out who this person is, he looks so strange. I feel as though I've been dreaming and for some reason I'm on the floor. There's a weird buzzing in the room and I can't hear properly.  I'd fainted and fallen off the bed.  Slowly my wits come back but the sensation won't pass.  The room is spinning all around and I have a terrible ache in my stomach.  So I crawl to the loo, unsure which end will explode first.  Oddly, I don't throw up but I have diarrhoea.  I had always thought this kind of a situation would call for throwing up rather than the other.   

It's Jbird who brings me a bowl, water, then chilled water, and finally ice wrapped in a tea towel.   Later when I'm shivering in bed he turns the AC and fan off telling me I'll be okay, and he'll put it back on if I need it.  How pathetic, my husband falls off his bike and it's me who needs the nursing.  The next morning there's blood on the sheets from his wounds and I feel as though I've been hit by a bus - most likely more for the lack of sleep than anything else.  He sleeps on and off all day and I manage to dress his wounds without fainting again.  I think we'll be okay.

tea towel - kitchen towel

loo - toilet/bathroom, obviously

land island - raise curb in the middle of the road. What do Americans call that?   

wizards ointment - an amazing herbal remedy for open wounds found in NZ

Local Carny

When we first arrived in America, we went to the Maryland State Fair with our buddy Alana.  I had been surprised to see they had 'circus freaks' on show for fair tokens.  I'd thought they were an 1800s kind of thing.  One of the highlights at that fair was a squealer race, racing piglets on their own miniature race track.  We enjoyed wandering through the produce, flower, pie, and jam competitions, and tasting local honey.  Funnel cakes and candy floss, face painting and corn dogs.  We were new to America and looking for the American experience.  And we got it.  Not that these things aren't available elsewhere in the world. They are.  But this was all done with an American accent.

Jbird spontaneously took me on a surprise date to the Monroe County Fair this weekend.  I have been feeling stuck inside with my books all week and it was time we made use of the car we've been lent, it was a treat.  We went on the ferris wheel and the tornado for a dollar a piece.  We had pineapple whip and country style lemonade (aka: cordial).  We sat and people watched, spotting cowboy boots and screaming toddlers, as well as Miss Monroe County Fair stuffing her face with fair food.  Everybody was stuffing their face with fair food.  Then we finished the night off at the derby.  What more fun could you ask for than watching beat up old cars purposefully ram into each other until they can't move any more?  It was loud, adrenaline fuelled, and exhilarating.

Lego wire

I tried wading my way through The Wire while we were living in Baltimore but by season three, I couldn't take any more senseless violence.  The show provided fun shots of that city we had grown to love, though it was a little disturbing that it was 'based on truth'.  And a good reminder not to go out alone at night.  Did you watch it?  If you did, you might like this lego version which shows all five seasons in five minutes.  It's pretty neat. 

A visiting kiwi

We had a kiwi guest last week stop by for lunch.  She's originally Argentinian but I knew her as a little, little girl in Auckland when she was BFFs with my mum and we'd see her all the time.  It turns out her mother was a professor at IU and her brother's still here.  She visited him here just last year but we didn't know of her Bloomington connection and she thought we were still in Baltimore.  At the time, I noticed on that-social-networking-site-which-shall-not-be-named that she was at Indianapolis Airport.  I commented on her post, asking why she was there and telling her where we were.  Turns out she had been in Bloomington for two weeks and was on her way home.  What a surprise.  

Her sister-in-law passed away unexpectedly last week so she is here again to help her brother and attend the funeral.  She made sure to include us in her visit this time.  It felt so strange, and so normal, to have her over being all kiwi-like.  The world feels really rather small at a time like that.  It's a fun kind of story to tell.

Gingerbread deliciousness

In my opinion, ginger works extremely well in sweet treats, ginger crunch and and gingerbread men are up there in my top-twenty treats to bake.  This year I have also been baking this ginger bread recipe which has a yummy chocolate icing*.  The combination of spices in the cake batter and melted chocolate and whole cream in the icing are decadent.  The only change I made was halving the icing recipe as I didn't have time to pipe decorations and I didn't have crystallized ginger.  This left more than enough icing on top.  My in-laws would disagree, but I think crystallized ginger has a funny texture and flavour, and I wouldn't have used it even if it had managed to sneak itself into our pantry.  The cake held its own without.

*icing: glaze