Entries in pacific northwest paradise (93)

Wednesday
Dec282011

vacation thus far

Sal @ Lovejoy Bakery, contemplating life, love, and the intricacies of laminated doughsOur WinterFest Vacation crossed the halfway mark a few days ago, which means we have successfully developed amnesia about all things work-related and managed to cram in a buttload of seriously awesome fun in the last week and a half or so: four days at the coast, WITH the cats, and no one ended up in handcuffs or a morgue; homemade gifts completed on time and delivered intact, and eventually gifted successfully; Smiley-Hall Christmas 2012 celebrated in the usual grand and entertaining style, with said homemade gifts exchanged during the festivities; a day of utter slothfulness that involved reading in the library with a cat on each lap and staying in our pajamas all day; full seasons of Dexter, Parks & Rec, and Sherlock (re)watched; and today, a Day of Portland that included Powell's and two(!) bakeries. And there are still four days left!

Powell's a complete madhouse today, by the way. We avoid anything that even hints of shopping in the weeks between Thanksgiving and Christmas, but apparently, a mid-week afternoon three days afterward is still a time to be wary. Holy buckets.

I did, however, come out of there with two new bento boxes, of all things. The "Syrup O'Clock" line is new to me, but clearly adorable. They had locking two tiers that went with each of these designs, as well as a nesting set of square boxes for each, but I managed to resist. I do have some willpower, you know.

These are each 240 mL, which will make them perfect for my "Greek yogurt mixed with fruit" mornings. (The 300 mL sidecars are too large for a portion of yogurt and the 100 mL mini sidecars are too small. These are, therefore, the Goldilocks of my bento box collection.

Monday
Dec122011

seen on a local store sign: mace-free holiday shopping

It's a whirlwind here at Hall House while we power through these last days before our (GLORIOUS) winter vacation begins. The culprits: work, as always, and our usual hectic schedule, piled on with extra-curricular activities. Last weekend, for example, Sal was at the school shooting their new commercial, yet more evidence that I am right and he will be a celebrity chef someday. Right? He would totally blow all those other posers out of the water. Not that he would ever seek the limelight, of course, but with that laugh and that face and that gift for both baking and teaching, the limelight seems to find him regardless.

I've been recovering from an unfortunate tumble down some stairs, which has been a bit of a setback in getting done what needs to get done, but I haven't let it slow me down much. Which is a good thing, because there wasn't much room in our jam-packed schedule for any slowing down. In addition to powering through to vacation, and some important activities, there is also readying ourselves for the Smiley-Hall Family Christmas, an epic annual event that is not for amateurs.

Although we don't technically participate in holiday gift-giving, we do have a gift-giving responsibility as part of the Smiley-Hall Family Christmas. To wit: handmade gifts and stocking stuffers all around. And of course presents for the Fabulous Miss M, because obviously. And as a family, we are seriously badass at the homemade gift thing.

Which meant venturing forth this weekend into the bustling masses at the exact time of year we generally try to avoid them. Thankfully, the local shops -- while bustling -- weren't so teeming with humanity that we were tempted to contemplate homicide. Like the shopping ninjas that we are, we managed to get all of Miss M's gifts*, supplies that we didn't already have on hand for the various planned homemade gifts, stocking stuffers, AND groceries for a kick-ass spaghetti and meatballs dinner Saturday night.

*(Sadly, the WAY AWESOME Grammy and Nonna's Toys, where we have gotten every birthday and Christmas gift for Miss M since she was born, will be closing after the first of the year so that Grammy and Nonna can move nearer to their grandkids. If anyone's interested in taking over a really successful and beloved neighborhood toy store, I'm sure they'd love to hear from you...)

Yesterday was spent in the kitchen, each of us working on some of our homemade gifts. There seriously must be some kind of productivity drug in our water recently, because we are crossing things off our to do lists at a ridiculous pace. NOT COMPLAINING BY THE WAY. This week is going to be insanely challenging due to everything ever landing on this one week on the calendar (NO SERIOUSLY I AM NOT EVEN KIDDING), but if we can actually survive to the end of the week, then it's easy peasy for the rest of 2011.

lunch, pink Natural Lunch:

  • hard boiled eggs
  • broccoli
  • carrots
  • satsuma
  • sunflower seeds

lunch (from last Tuesday), Fit 'n Fresh:

  • red and green leaf lettuce
  • beets, carrots, celery, radishes
  • egg, cashews, apple slices
  • simple vinaigrette of oil and apple balsamic on the side
Monday
Nov212011

st. johns appreciation post

our little market square hosts the St. Johns Farmers' Market until mid-OctoberSeriously, our neighborhood is the greatest. Sometimes I wonder how we got to be so lucky to live here.

We looked at 42 houses before we found The One, and we were looking long and hard at the neighborhood for each, not just the house. Which is to say, we did our legwork, no question. But there was a sizeable amount of luck and faith and hope, involved, too. Driving through the little downtown area of St. Johns then was deceptive -- many storefronts were empty and what was there wasn't promising. The houses ranged from well-kept to rundown. It was the Charlie Brown Christmas tree of Portland.

But there was promise there. The downtown had a community feel despite the vacancies, and it was clear that many people had lived here a long time, and were proud of it. There was a police station and a fire house right there by the bridge, and a post office just a block past that, and a terrific library with original woodwork and stately old fixtures. There were wonderful parks and some great little shops and places to eat (granted, just a few). And then there was the house, and the bridge, and that view.

Saturday, after a trek out to Forest Grove for a vintage crafts fair (that turned out to be less "crafts" and more "stuff"), we stopped in our little downtown to check out a few of the newest shops we hadn't made it to yet. Barrel, a new wine and beer shop, was opening, so of course we had to be there for that. Right next door was Etcetera, a wonderful little home decor shop that will give me another place for gift shopping along with the already fabulous Salty Teacup. And right around the corner (past Grammy and Nonna's Toys, where we're always able to find something just right for the Fabulous Miss M), we had a chance to stop in at Olive and Vine for the first time since they opened. Salts and tea and olive oil and vinegars and spices, oh my.

Both of us now laden with shopping bags in each hand, we didn't dare cross the street to St. John's Booksellers, since we can never get out of that place without at least one book apiece (and our tottering to-read pile is already borderline hazardous). We had our options of Thai Cottage for dinner, or Anna Banana's, or James John Cafe, or Girasole, or John Street Cafe, or Signal Station Pizza, or could have bought ingredients to make it ourselves at Proper Eats Market. Afterward, we could've caught the latest release at the St. Johns Cinema (for less than one of of those big movie houses, and the option for pizza and beer to boot!), or a summer release for half the price at St. Johns Pub. Cakes and cookies from Tulip Pastry, cat food and litter from Tres Bone, bikes and supplies from Weir Cyclery, photography-anything from Blue Moon Camera, clothes for Sal at The Man's Shop...all of these and more are just blocks from our house in our neighborhood's little downtown.

From haircuts to freshly roasted coffee beans, our neighborhood has it all, and as we headed home, I had to pinch myself yet again at how lucky we are to live here.

lunch, Ms. Bento:

  • roasted butternut squash soup
  • broccoli and hard boiled egg
  • carrots and celery (with the leaves left on)
  • Starkcrimson pear with cashews as gap fillers

breakfast/snack, cute animals sidecar:

  • Starkcrimson pear
  • kiwi
  • walnuts
Monday
Nov142011

the fires of autumn are beacons homeward

our front Japanese maple is called "Firestorm", which has burgundy leaves that turn bright red in fall, then dark purple before falling off; it was a housewarming gift for Sal from my momWe planted this tree almost 10 years ago and every year, I forget just how gorgeous it turns in fall, and have to take seventy gazillion pictures of it, vainly trying to capture the degree of the red, a bright fire on an otherwise very gray day.

I always underestimate how long fall lasts here, and that the leaves stay on well into November, and how positively gargantuan some of the leaves are. I sent a collection of leaves to my grandmother one year, to share my Pacific Northwest autumn with her, and I collected two dozen different leaves without walking more than a block. The largest, from an old maple in the neighbor's yard, wouldn't even fit in a manila envelope without trimming the ends.

We had a day of errands Saturday, amidst wind and downpour, ending with a stop at New Seasons and bags of groceries to be hauled out of the car and up the stairs. (Douchebag developer, miraculously, finished up early and we've been able to park in front of the house again.*) In the midst of helping with the bags and being pelted with rain, I had to stop to take this picture of a rose petal amongst the yellow and brown. I know Sal must've wondered what the hell, and probably cursed me under his breath, but sometimes you've just got to stop and observe those little moments when they present themselves.

breakfast/snack, cute animals sidecar:

lunch, Ms. Bento:

  • Another delicious soup that makes autumn kind of the best season ever. Broccoli cheese soup, to be exact, and holy deliciousness, Batman, it is simply divine.
  • more broccoli
  • not-at-all-hard boiled egg
  • carrot sticks
  • kiwi

*After all my pissing and moaning, you'd think I'd feel bad for complaining so much when they finished up a week early. Not really, but I do feel bad about complaining when I found out that the cross street that borders the property on the other side, which also has to undergo street improvements for the development, is going to be out of commission until February.

Monday
Nov072011

i don't mean to brag, but

We are sometimes the recipients of genuinely ridiculously awesome bounty. Part of that is a function of living where we live, and part is just plain good fortune.

Case in point: one of Sal's (former?) students recently went clamming with her family, which yielded an impressive haul of razor clams. The irony is that she doesn't like clams, just digging for them. So Sal was the recipient of an entire bag of freshly dug razor clams, all cleaned and shelled.

Thanks to her generosity, I enjoyed the most damn fine clam chowder for dinner last night that I have ever eaten in my entire life. Said chowder also included some of the smoked bacon that I mentioned last week that one of the other instructors at OCI smoked and cured with a class. He cut it up small and sauteed it with onion and celery, and combined with the magic of potatoes and cream and fresh thyme from the garden and, oh yes, and veritable mountain of fresh razor clams, and you have heaven in a pot, my friends.

lunch, Ms. Bento:

  • the aforementioned clam chowder, which is somehow even better the second day
  • carrot sticks and peas
  • herb and cheese bagel
  • Honeycrisp apple with cashews as gap fillers
Thursday
Nov032011

the poor object to being governed badly...

...the rich object to being governed at all. -- G.K. Chesterton

For anyone in the Portland area considering participating in Bank Transfer Day and/or the Move Your Money project, I can highly recommend Unitus Community Credit Union as a terrific local option for banking.

We made the switch several years ago when we were fed up with US Bank (NEVER AGAIN) and big corporate banks generally, and have regretted only that we didn't do it sooner. They offered an eco-friendly discount on our loan when we bought the Prius and have a loan program for purchasing a bike (including accessories) for people trying to switch over to bike commuting, which we also took advantage of. They even have their own smartphone app!

And if you're looking beyond just making your banking local, check out Localvesting (hat tip to our neighbor, Grant). I haven't read the book yet but the Resources page has a handy list of links to help you get started.

Lastly, because I'm feeling even more populist than usual lately: before Occupy Wall Street, before the French Revolution, there was the Peasant's Revolt.

lunch, blue bunny & moons

  • rice casserole (brown rice, broccoli, Italian sweet pepper, mushroom broth, herbs)
  • steamed broccoli
  • chicken breast and carrot slices
  • carrot sticks and kiwi berries
  • dark chocolate-covered raisins
  • apple slices with cashews as gap fillers
Tuesday
Oct252011

apples, pears, and a recipe from chef salvatore

Part 2 about our weekend, continuing from yesterday... And yes, there is a recipe from Sal at the bottom of this post.

We waved goodbye to Sister and Guy Sunday morning, then Sal headed off to the school to prepare for a cooking demonstration at the Portland Nursery Apple (and Pear) Tasting. You may remember from last year's post that this event is like a birthday party for autumn, and I really have no better way to describe it.

I arrived at the festival just in time to watch Sal set up for his demonstration. It's held in a busy area of the festival where there are vendors selling gourmet homemade caramels and other delectables that make your mouth water, and where you will be amazed at how many people will line up for a free taste of freshly brewed hard cider. The demonstrations are an informal setup with hay bales for seating, which means there may or may not be anyone sitting there to watch when you start. I'll admit I was a little worried that he wouldn't have anyone sitting down to watch and was tempted to go round people up to ensure he had an audience. He'd stayed late Friday night making 80 samples of the pear coffee cake with streusel he was demonstrating, and I didn't want him to be up there all alone. "People, there's a real live chef over there making a fantastic dessert and handing out free samples! Come, come see the magic happen! He's even sharing the recipe he invented! This will be the best thing you eat all day, I promise!"

I needn't have worried. The elderly lady who wandered up while he was getting his trays set up was soon joined by a few couples standing at the back of the seating area, arms crossed, and then familes, and then some older gentlemen, and within two or three minutes all the hay bales were packed and there was a genuine crowd watching him talk about pears and the wonders of cardamom and the amazing alchemy that transforms heavy cream when you whip it very patiently.

Sal @ last year's demonstrationHe's so, so good at what he does and I never fail to be impressed every time I watch him at work, sharing his passion in his charming, inviting style, easygoing and welcoming to people that might be intimidated by talking to a real live pastry chef. Somehow, he managed to field questions despite the background noise, cut d'Anjou pears into perfectly even slices with a knife sharp enough to amputate fingers, and talk about the differences between pastry flour and cake flour, all while turning cream, sugar, vanilla, and spices into a beautiful cinnamon creme chantilly (a flavored type of French whipped cream). And then proceed to pipe it out into a decorative dollop on 80 samples right there with everyone watching.

The samples disappeared in minutes. As did the 50 copies of the recipe he had out for people to take. Several people came back two, three, four times. A few brought back companions standing in other lines saying, "OMG YOU HAVE TO TRY THIS." Many people said they don't really care for coffee cake, but this was amazing and did it really count as coffee cake because it was delicious and how was that possible? Many more asked where he taught and did they have a restaurant and was dessert served there? Were his desserts served there? I even talked to one lady and told her all about the school and the restaurant and how she totally needed to go there, like, nowish.

(And so now your mouth is watering, and you're wondering if it's really that good, so we have supplied you with the recipe at the bottom of this post for that coffee cake that transformed a random group of strangers into fawning gourmands in five minutes flat.)

(see all the pictures from last year's festival here)

Culinary awesomeness now complete, we made our way to the "Buy the Bag" part of the festival, where you walk amongst ginormous bins of apples and pears of a million different varieties you didn't even know existed, filling a bag (or more likely, bags) with as many apples and pears as you think you can possibly eat and it's all the same price, $0.99/lb. There are pears that are good for poaching and for baking and for sauteing, and apples that are best for pies and others that hold up well paired with meat and still others that store for a really long time, and many varieties of both that are perfect just for eating no matter whether you prefer juicy, tart, sweet, firm, crisp, mellow, flavorful, or any combination of all of those qualities and more.

And you will buy half a dozen a dozen dozens many pounds of both apples and pears and decide to skip dinner altogether so you can just gorge on apples and pears, which will sound like a mighty fine idea until about 2 AM, when the stomache to end all stomaches has you sitting upright in bed and second guessing whether the apples and pears were really that good. They were, but you might possibly be a bit more judicious about how many you eat in a single sitting next time. Which totally didn't happen to us, I'm just saying, you know, it could possibly happen to some hypothetical people who were a bit caught up in all the apple and pear excitement of the moment and let their gluttony get the best of them.

lunch, Lunchbot Duo:

  • smoked sausages
  • corn on the cob
  • steamed broccoli
  • Yukon gold potato (so sweet and buttery it needs no butter or salt)
  • Starkcrimson pear
  • yogurt-covered pretzels
  • dark chocolate-covered raisins

 

Chef Salvatore's Spiced Pear Coffee Cake with Pecan Streusel
Yield: 1 ea. filled coffeecake

6 oz.        Butter
7 1/2 oz.  Sugar
1/2 tsp.    Salt

3 ea.        Eggs
2 tsp.       Vanilla Extract

8 oz.        Pastry Flour    
3/4 tsp.    Baking Soda    
3/4 tsp.    Baking Powder
1/2 tsp.    Cardamom, ground
1 tsp.       Cinnamon, ground

1 1/2 C    Sour Cream

1 ea.        Ripe pear, cored and sliced into ½-inch sections

Cream butter, sugar and salt until light and fluffy. Add eggs and vanilla in small portions, scraping between additions. Sift dry ingredients together and add to mixture in three additions with the sour cream in two.

Spray and flour a bundt cake pan. Spread half of the batter into the pan, arrange sliced pears. Next, spread about 1/2 C of streusel (see below) on top of the fruit. Spread the remaining batter on top, then a final 1/2 C of streusel on top. Bake at 350 degrees. Check at 45 minutes with a skewer. When the skewer comes out clean, cool and depan.

Pecan Streusel
Yield: approx. 1 Cup

2 oz.        Pecans, chopped
1 1/2 oz.  AP Flour
2 oz.        Brown Sugar
1oz.         Butter, melted
1/4 tsp.   Cinnamon, ground

Mix ingredients together lightly, breaking it up with your fingers to make a coarse meal.

Thursday
Oct202011

hollywood comes to p-town

Great setting for an urban fantasy based on Grimm's fairy tales or GREAT setting for an urban fantasy based on Grimm's fairy tales?I'm sure everyone's seen the previews for the new NBC show, Grimm, that's premiering in a couple of weeks. What you may or may not know is that it's filmed here in Portland*. And in fact is set in Portland (unlike Leverage, for which Portland serves as a stand-in for Boston).

They were filming just down the street earlier this week, which meant film equipment and vehicles everywhere and streets blocked off and people standing around on the sidewalk in costumes and makeup that make you nearly wreck the car when you do a double-take. Which totally didn't happen to me on my way to work Monday morning.

*Our particular corner of Portland seems to be very popular with film crews. A few years ago, we came home to a flyer on our door that a movie would be shooting in the neighborhood and the street would be blocked off for film equipment and actors' trailers. Leverage films up here pretty regularly, too. And it seemed like St. Johns featured at least once in every episode of Portlandia last season. CLEARLY HOLLYWOOD RECOGNIZES HOW AWESOME WE ARE.

I know it's monumentally uncool to be all, "HOLY GEEWILLIKERS THEY'RE FILMING ONE OF THOSE TELEVISION THINGMAJIGS RIGHT HERE IN OUR TOWN" about the whole affair, but, you know, we Portlanders are dorks like that. Sure, our little town has recently acquired an impressive film & TV resume, but we're not yet so used to it that we've developed a blase' attitude about it. Except for the hipsters, of course, since they are, by definition, too cool for school and never get enthused about anything, unless it's ironically and could be put on a t-shirt.

The show does sound pretty cool; we'll see if it actually is or not. NBC doesn't exactly have a good track record with fantasy/sci-fi type shows. But I suspect we'll be too occupied with spotting familiar landmarks to notice.

lunch, Bento Colors purple:

  • herb roasted turkey and cheese wraps
  • celery sticks and corn, with carrot cutouts for garnish
  • red d'anjou pear slices and dark chocolate raisins
Monday
Oct172011

father-daughter time

a peek of sunlight on a hidden watterfall and pool at the Japanese GardenMy dad was here for a few days last week for a short but very nice visit. He and Mo are staying at Heceta Head this month doing tours of the lighthouse there, so he came up to spend a few days.

We had such a nice time! He arrived with spectacular timing, just as I was driving up to the house on Tuesday (I went into the office for a few hours for an important meeting) and got a chance to see Sal for a bit before he had to head to work. We visited while running some errands -- which included a salt cellar refill at The Meadow, eliciting the comment, "Who knew there were so many kinds of salt?"...hee! -- and stopped for lunch at Little Big Burger, where he got to try the oh-so-delicious fries with truffle oil.

We celebrated his birthday belatedly with dinner at the school (Dad got to have ling cod for the first time), finally rolling out of there (almost literally) stuffed and pleasantly sleepy. I inflicted our new memory foam mattress topper on him that night, as well. I'd bought it with the intention to make the guest bed a bit more luxurious, but didn't get it ordered enough in advance to give it a chance to air out the vile chemically smell that the manufacturer assured me would dissipate in 24 to 72 hours. Thankfully, a combination of good food, poor olefactory function, and sheer exhaustion made the smell absolutely unnoticeable for Dad, and he reported a very good night's sleep the next morning. So, score!

We spent Wednesday at the Japanese Garden, something I'd wanted to share with him for some time, so I was glad to cross it off the list at last. You know, I've been there many times, at different times of the year, and there really isn't a bad time to visit. And the rain we'd had the day before held off all day, making for a pleasant meander through the different paths and hideaways.

Father-daughter bentos! Mine is in the Lunchbot Duo, his is in the French bistro two-tier. Leftovers, mostly, although we did do molded eggs. Unfortunately, I didn't boil them along enough so they were a bit mangled and too soft to hold the mold shapes.We ate a late lunch nearby at the Rose Garden. Lunch was the bentos we'd packed earlier, comprised of random leftovers -- though you know the magic of bento turns random leftovers into lunchtime largesse. Yes, Dad very gamely agreed to try his hand at packing a bento. No, I did not twist his arm, shut up. (His folly, you see, was expressing interest in my bento lunches after seeing pictures posted here. Everyone else knows not to do this, lest they be cornered with a a show-and-tell of all my bento gear, but he hasn't had an opportunity to learn that so he was like the crippled wildebeast on the veldt that all the other wildebeasts leave behind when the lions show up. He didn't stand a chance, really.)

He was a good sport about staying up way past his usual bed time to see Sal when he got home, and we talked each other's legs off about everything from politics to publishing, grandkids and grandcats, and everything in between. Always hard to say goodbye, but we were sure grateful to get to spend some time together.

lunch, black strawberry:

  • lemon-herb roasted chicken, risotto with mushrooms and bacon
  • green salad (romaine, mushrooms, tomato, olives, cheese, ham) with balsamic dressing on the side
  • yogurt-covered pretzels
  • dried mango
  • dark chocolate
  • dried cherries
  • orange juice in the drink bottle because I have been sick as a dog with a head cold since Thursday night, and I am mainlining Vitamin C liek whoa
Monday
Oct102011

every day of autumn is a horn of plenty

Sally and I had the bestest, bestest weekend together.

A few months ago, Sal had been asked to judge a wedding cake competition at the annual bridal show, which is a pretty big deal for him and for the school. And it helps with his professional credits. The competition was Saturday afternoon.

Unfortunately, that was also the day I was planning to attend Wordstock, which included some events I thought he'd enjoy, as well. But! In the kind of happy happenstance that hardly ever happens to us, both events were held at the Convention Center, which meant we could have our cake and eat it, too. *rimshot*

Yes, I've been waiting all weekend to make that joke.

Anyhoodle, we had a great, jam-packed day of books and authors and writing workshops alongside cakes and frosting and bridezillas-to-be wearing WAY too much fake tan. Good times! And it happened to be a glorious autumn day after a week of chill and gray, so we skipped out on the latter events I'd put on my Wordstock schedule to have a big and very late lunch at Widmer before heading home to enjoy the rest of the late afternoon/evening.

Gray and drizzly and foggy Sunday, which made it perfect for sleeping in. after a lazy start, we grabbed books and notebooks/sketchbooks and braved the traffic back up from the marathon to check out Arbor Lodge, the new coffee shop across from New Seasons. One hot chocolate and two coffees later, we walked over to New Seasons for some dinner groceries. Then spent the rest of the afternoon comfortably ensconced at home with the clouds hanging low in the hills across the river all day, Sal cooking and chopping away in the kitchen while I spent a bit of time writing until dinner was ready. Fabulous dinner while we finished off disks four and five of S3 Fringe (one more disk to go!), then a bit more writing for me while Sal concocted a mighty big batch of sauerkraut.

Seriously, who could ask for more?

lunch, Bento Colors purple:

  • lemon & herb roasted chicken
  • green beans and caramelized onions
  • mushroom and bacon risotto
  • fresh pineapple
  • dark chocolate-covered raisins

Whew! Can you tell that we feasted for Sunday night dinner?

Friday
Sep302011

it's a beautiful day in the neighborhood

We seriously live in the best neighborhood in the universe.

Just got back a little while ago from the neighborhood emergency planning meeting (also the monthly neighborhood potluck). Neighbors got together at the main gathering spot on our street* this evening for a presentation from a local emergency preparedness expert (also a neighbor). His presentation was all about why it's practical to be prepared, but he also gave us tremendous information about easy measures we can take and available resources we can use. (Tip: a lot of the materials we received tonight, which really are super informative, were apparently made available via Homeland Security funding. Which means it's likely that a lot of other communities have similiar departments and resources to offer.)

*[Two of our neighbors have built a wonderful community space on the lower part of their property. On the far end, there's a fire pit with earthen seats all the way around, and an astounding view of the bridge, river, and Forest Park. There's a covered stage for neighborhood concerts (we have lots of talented musicians) and lots of room either for seating or dancing or both. And there's an ingenious outdoor kitchen that makes hosting the neighborhood potlucks easy, but also makes it possible to have monthly "classes", where everyone learns the fine arts of food preparation and preservation. Pickling, fermenting, brewing, canning...Sal's even on deck to teach everyone how to make rustic breads.]

The idea isn't to be scared or paranoid, but to make smart, reasonable preparations for all kinds of emergencies. Not just the big stuff, like earthquakes, but also more frequent, less catastrophic things like extended power outages. Practical ideas, like stocking an emergency kit for home and car, learning how to turn off utilities to prevent gas leaks and fires, and alternative communications when cell phones and computers (or electricity, period) aren't working. (Tip: cell phones will almost always go down in an emergency to leave the lines open for emergency personnel communications, but texting will usually still be available. The City of Portland has a really cool site at www.publicalerts.org where you can put in your info and be notified via the method of your choice if there's an emergency in your area.)

Our neighborhood plans for this to be the first in a series. The first goal is for each of our households to do the things we need to prepare. Once we've started working on that, our next goal will be how our neighborhood can be a self-sufficient community in the event of emergency or disaster. Building an "asset map" (what skills and resources are available in our neighborhood, which is useful even when there's not an emergency); designating responsibilities (people to go around to each house to make sure gas valves are turned off, for example, in the event of an earthquake to prevent secondary fires, or people who will check on elderly or disabled neighbors); basic first-aid and triage education (so we can start caring for each other in the event emergency personnel are too overwhelmed or unable to reach us right away); central meeting places (to do head counts and situation reassessment, and for allocating resources).

After that, we'll be moving on to expanding the idea further into our community, so other neighborhoods in the area can do what we're doing and provide support to each other in times of need. Because (as I learned tonight) there are 300 police officers and 160 firefighters and 22 ambulance crews for the entire city of Portland, a population of 500,000 people. In the event of a city- or region-wide emergency, they'll be doing the heroic work, but the very best thing _we_ can do for ourselves and for them is to take care of each other. (The presentation materials we received tonight advised that we should plan to be on our own for the first 72 hours, so to have plans in place that could take care of everything through that time, if not longer.)

I just love our neighborhood so much! We are a community of progressives and activists and naturalists and urban farmers and dreamers and artists and craftspeople and teachers. We are rich in talents and skills and knowledge and education and passion. We all love our little corner of the world, and we are building a village together.

Monday
Sep192011

summer begins to have the look, peruser of enchanting book

Fall is definitely here. It's my favorite season, all bright, crisp days and cool, clear nights. Or gray and rainy like it was this weekend. I love everything about it, from the smell and feel of the air to the turning leaves to the heavy sweaters and abundance of produce and craving for hearty comfort foods. And, joy of joys, Honeycrisp apples!

We were fortunate to not have a whole lot on the docket at Hall House, which meant that I could spend most of the day curled up in the library with a new book, and fall asleep in my chair for an impromptu afternoon nap. It also meant time to get laundry done without it feeling like a chore (folding while watching movies), and to stay on top of the dishes (always a challenge without a dishwasher), and to write for a good long stretch of time while Sal helped a friend harvest their hops (and coming home with a nice bounty as a result). It was the best sort of weekend, a combination of productive and leisurely, cozy and restful and restorative.

With such weather that makes a person crave hearty comfort foods, it's little wonder that Sunday night dinner would be something thick and creamy and served with crusty artisan bread and likely to put a person to sleep after two overflowing bowls full. Which we totally didn't have. We also totally didn't follow that with a slice of opera cake and a dollop of malted chocolate ice cream. We're all about moderation here at Hall House.

breakfast, cute animals sidecar:

  • oatmeal with raisins and maple syrup
  • Honeycrisp apple slices

 

lunch, Ms. Bento:

  • potato soup (potatoes, spaetzle, corn, celery, dill)
  • peas and carrots
  • Honeycrisp apple half
  • opera cake

 

title taken from The Complete Poems of Emily Dickenson, "Part Five: The Single Hound, LXV"

Saturday
Sep172011

and if i pretend her house is my house, well, that would be understandable

Forest Park, along the Leif Erikson TrailThe Book Fairy (who takes many forms, but in this case looks like Sal) heard my fervent prayers and delivered my most recent book wish: Wildwood.

I have been waiting for this book for, literally, months. It just came out a couple of weeks ago, but it's gotten a lot of pre-publication buzz (and has already been optioned by Laika). I, of course, first learned about it on the The Decemberists' mailing list.

It's written by, if you didn't know, Colin Meloy and his wife, Carson Ellis. (Yes, that Colin Meloy and that Carson Ellis.) About a wild forest and a little girl and magical adventures, starting right here in St. Johns and then across the river in Forest Park, written by the lead singer and songwriter of my favorite band ever ever ever, who is a former English major and who happens to live just across the river from me, and who has a deep seated love for fantastical tales with a healthy dose of darkness and girls who are the heroes of their own stories, and seriously, SRSLY! This book could not have been more written for me if it had a main character with my name who has a penchant for eating M&M's in multiples of five.

It's a gray and rainy day, with mist drifting low in the forest across the river that's the setting of this little tale, and Sal has returned from the German food cart with a generous slice of streudel. I think there's just enough milk in the fridge for a big mug of hot chocolate, and the kitties are particularly snuggly today.

So you'll have to excuse me today while I disappear to my cozy little library in the other room and lose myself in a book.

Monday
Sep122011

it's just a flesh wound

I took Friday off and headed to the coast to get away from the mid-90s that've plagued us for the last several days. (Seriously, we have had some cracked out weather this year.  Highest temps of the year in September? And we still never hit triple digits, which we usually do at least once or twice. I should be thankful that at least it didn't approach 100....) Just me, some good music, a few snacks, a book, and the open road.

Heading west was the right idea. It was 25 to 30 degrees cooler in Astoria, with a heavy fog bank sitting just a few miles offshore all day and all of Cape Disappointment enveloped in mist. I opted to head to the other side of mouth of the Columbia at Fort Stevens, all around the Jetty Lagoon and up to the observation tower at the South Jetty. (Where I could see across to the river and the North Head lighthouse where we were just a couple of weeks ago.)

see more pics here

While I was on my little Kerouac-esque sojourn, I made the mistake of checking G+ and saw that Sal had posted a pic of an injury sustained while he was test riding a new bike. Beneath the pic of his hand, all scraped and bloodied, he added the note, "Honey, I'm okay :-)". Which are usually the words that precede "I'm at the emergency room". He wasn't, thankfully, but I still worried about him all the way home.

My suspicion that he was hurt worse than the pic showed was confirmed later that night, when he arrived home from work limping. The hand was the least of his injuries -- he'd landed on his knee, which was now swollen and bruised, and sprained his ankle. And then spent the night on his feet on a concrete floor, with neither injuries bandaged.

So we've spent the weekend keeping everything iced, compressed, and elevated as much as possible. Of course, he's an irascible patient, stubbornly insisting on getting up to do things instead of letting me do them for him, and arguing every time I tell him to sit still. Guy, Sister, and the Fabulous Miss M were here to visit for the weekend, and nothing was going to stop him from playing at the park with Miss M, not even a moderate injury. He seems genuinely surprised to find out he's both mortal and destructible, and it's seriously the Knights of Ni all up in here.

lunch, Laptop Lunch:

  • enchiladas
  • salad (romaine, tomatoes, carrots, celery) with dressing in the condiment cup
  • red grapes
  • berry swirl cheesecake that Sal made and that I am officially in love with
Tuesday
Sep062011

the root of the wind is water

reblogged on tumblr, taken from this comic on funnyjunk.com -- life at Hall House in a simple two-panel comic

The only good thing about coming back to work after a three day weekend is that it makes a four day work week.

Ahem. I may be having trouble shifting gears from "leisure" mode to "work" mode.

We spent part of yesterday at Kelley Point Park, then took a late afternoon drive so I could show Sal my secret getaway. (Some Friday afternoons if the weather's nice, I grab a book, maybe toss a few things in a bento box, and hop in the car for a bit of a drive to my secret getaway, where I can watch boats pass by and read my book and officially start the weekend.)

We sat for a bit in silence, watching the boats and taking in the view, and I closed my eyes to breathe in that scent of the water on the wind. I said, almost to myself, "I've come to realize how much I need to be near water."

He laughed and shook his head. "Duh. Took you long enough. Aquarius."

"Shut up, you don't know me." I laughed and bumped him with my shoulder. "How long have you known?"

"Pretty much since we first started dating. And then when we moved here, and the ocean...you know how you are."

I smiled and nodded. Yes, I know how I am. I appreciate that he knows, too. To him, I said, "Is there anything you need to be near?"

"You," he said without skipping a beat, and I fell in love with him all over again.

lunch, bento colors purple

  • Thai peanut chicken skewers
  • jasmine rice
  • caprese salad
  • carrots
  • wax beans
  • grapes and just bit of lemon cheesecake

Today's lunch courtesy of the veritable cornucopia on our table for dinner last night, thanks to the delivery of our produce bin and lots of yummy odds and ends in the fridge that added up to a bit of a feast. We grilled some skewers and corn in husks, I put together a green salad, cooked up some rice, and, along with the caprese salad leftover from Saturday and the lemon cheesecake Sal brought home from work Friday night, we ate like kings. Damn hell ass kings.

 

title taken from The Complete Poems of Emily Dickinson, "Part V: The Single Hound, #51"

Thursday
Sep012011

post-it perfectionist

North Head Lighthouse @ Cape DisappointmentOn the advice of a friend, I assigned myself the task last week of letting myself make mistakes.

I mean, obviously I make mistakes all the time, because I'm A) human, and B) not perfect. Duh. I am biologically wired, however, to try to be perfect at everything, and only years and years of tamping down that dictatorial little personality streak like a 1980s South American despot has made it possible for me to be okay with just being okay. Hooray for maturity!

However. When I am under a lot of pressure and facing mounting tasks with unforgiving deadlines and high expectations, my inner dictator seizes the opportunity for a military coup of the State of Brittney. I'm in the midst of just that sort of period at the moment, in which work and website business pressures are combining to make me twitch a bit with the effort not to Be The Best At Everything by trying to accomplish all my responsibilities at once. Hence the advice of a friend for a little radical reverse psychology, to not just not be perfect, but to actually let the mistakes happen.

She may secretly be trying to kill me.

Last week, I was at the office late, trying to get out the door but with three separate piles that each needed to go to three separate people, and three separate post-its to be written. It's a good thing I was in the office alone, because as I was rewriting each of those notes, I had to bust out laughing at myself. Yes, you read that right:  I was rewriting post-its. As in, I had done a first draft, edited for mistakes and clarity, then rewritten them so that they would read well and fit nicely on the selected post-it size.

I, um, may have some work to do on this not-being-a-perfectionist thing.

(Yeah, the picture above has nothing to do with anything, I just love it. The pics from our daytrip to Cape Disappointment are posted, by the way, as promised.)

breakfast, Lunchbot Pico:

  • oatmeal (with butter & maple syrup in the condiment containers), not yet cooked
  • raisins, to mix in the oatmeal
  • peach slices

lunch, Lunchbot Duo:

  • Sal's Amazingly Wondrous Wings (the very last of the batch made on Saturday)
  • wee potatoes
  • celery sticks
  • carrot sticks
  • tomato
  • dark chocolate and dried cherries
Tuesday
Aug302011

daytrippin' at cape disappointment

overlook @ Beard's HollowAnother weekend and we decided it was time for another daytrip. So Sunday, we got up earlier than usual and headed west to Cape Disappointment.

Such a misleading name! It's a gorgeous state park, covering a fairly sizeable area of the southwestern tip of Washington, which makes it a great place to spend a whole day. There are two lighthouses -- each accessible only by a half mile hike -- and trails and beach fronts and overlooks and even a Lewis & Clark Interpretive Center. Even if you didn't set foot out of your vehicle (which would be a shame), the drive alone is beautiful.

I packed us each a bento, which we got to enjoy high atop a cliff overlooking the Pacific. That is something I will never tire of, being able to eat my lunch right there, watching the ocean. The ocean, you guys! That will never stop being amazing to me.

We had to leave earlier than we would've liked to get back in time for our neighborhood potluck (so fun!), but I there might have to be a weekend in Astoria in our near future so we can spend more of the day there.

(more pictures of our trip to come when I get a chance to upload them)

 

Sunday's picnic, Sal -- blue bunny & moons:

  • Mediterranean grilled chicken
  • orzo salad (orzo, tomatoes, kalamata olives, feta, mint)
  • celery and carrot sticks
  • apple slices and honey peanut butter for dipping

Sunday's picnic, Brittney -- black strawberry:

  • Mediterranean grilled chicken
  • tabbouleh
  • celery and carrot ticks
  • apple slices and honey peanut butter for dipping

today's breakfast, matryoshka:

  • mini blueberry pancakes
  • peach slices

today's lunch, French bistro:

  • Mediterranean grilled chicken
  • tabbouleh
  • celery and carrot sticks
  • peach and apricots slices
Thursday
Aug252011

sure of you

I have a lifelong friend. Literally, lifelong. As in, the only people who have known me longer are my family.

I first met her in kindergarten. She has only a vague recollection of knowing each other then, but I remember our first meeting very clearly, in the basement playground (where we were sent for recess when the weather was too bad to be let outside). We became the sort of best friends that can only happen in kindergarten, which is to say playing together at recess, except when we didn't.

I moved to a different school at the end of that year, the first of what would be several moves to several different schools. She moved, too, so that we were ships in the night until we finally crossed paths again in fifth grade when we both landed at the same school for the first semester. Then it was another move for me, and another move back, ensuring that in the seven years of elementary school, we never had a complete school year together.

The summer before our freshman year, the year when it really, really helps to have a familiar face amongst the scary crowds of upperclassman, she moved far, far away, all the way to the other side of the state. Somehow, we managed to maintain our friendship with only letters and the occasional visit when she was in town. Other friendships fell away and new ones started up, and we weren't always so consistent in our correspondence, but by some divine blessing, we stayed in touch.

The same summer I happened to be working as a nanny, she moved to the same town where I was working. We were the only people our age we knew there, and by then we had the benefits of drivers' licenses and actual things to do, which meant a summer of adventures and hilarity, the kind of inside jokes that become a secret language. But the summer ended, and I had to leave her behind to a new school for her senior year, and I have rarely felt so badly for leaving someone behind as I did then.

In the years that followed, we had years together and years apart. We went to the same college and she helped me get a job where she worked. I later had a chance to return the favor. We commiserated over classes and relationships and job woes and all the other travails of being in those difficult stages of adulthood when you still feel like life is just going to pass you by.

But life most definitely did not pass us by.  Marriages, houses, careers, families.... And always, the constant move, from this apartment to that one, this college town to that one, this state to that one. Moving has been a constant for us both, but throughout it all, this friendship has been the constant, the important thing that remained no matter where we were in relation to each other or anything else.

Earlier this week, her daughter started kindergarten. A difficult time for any parent, yet my friend has steered through this transition with the wise and gentle grace that makes her such an inspiration. As we talked about it recently, we both laughed and marveled at how long our friendship has lasted, despite everything. She said that despite all the bittersweetness of sending her beloved daughter off for the first day of school, one of the thoughts that consoled her was that perhaps her own daughter would be meeting her lifelong friend. She could not, she said, hope for anything more blessed than that.

A few days ago, a care package arrived on my doorstep. Inside, there were all the necessary tools of the first day of kindergarten: markers and crayons, colored pencils and watercolors, glue in my favorite color and a pretty notebook with page after page of tantalizing lined paper just begging for my most innermost thoughts to fill them up.

"Happy Friend-iversary!" the card said. Signed, my lifelong friend.

 

Piglet sidled up to Pooh from behind.
"Pooh!" he whispered.
"Yes Piglet?"
"Nothing" said Piglet, taking Pooh's paw. I just wanted to be sure of you."
                    -- A. A. Milne, The House at Pooh Corner

 

___________________________________________________________

lunch, Lunchbot Duo:

  • sausages
  • cucumbers
  • green beans
  • tomato
  • apricot
  • pluot slices
  • Babybel cheese
  • cashews and dried cherries
Monday
Aug152011

whose slender roots entwine altars that piety neglects

Oh the adventures we have had! So many to tell you!

Like Wednesday night's neighborhood game night, hosted at our house. Or Friday night catching up and watching stuff with ProcrastiGirl. And yesterday, Sal rode in the Bridge Pedal, which is a bike ride that covers 35 miles and ten of the city bridges (including the St. Johns Bridge). (Which means Sal logged almost 55 miles, since it was 9+ miles to the starting point and then the same distance home.) And afterward, we did up a big ol' batch of stir fry on the patio, because life is ridiculously good.

Saturday, while we took our time over the brunch Sal made, talking about what to do with the day, we decided we were long overdue for a driveabout. We were getting a late start, so we needed a closer destination than, say, the coast. We decided on Vernonia, since we haven't explored much of the Coast Range that lies between Hwy 26 and Hwy 30.

We often pack a picnic for a driveabout, but didn't have much in the fridge that wouldn't take some prep time, so we decided instead just to grab a few snacks and our water bottles and go. Daylight was burning, after all. (You'll note I didn't say "sunlight", as it was overcast almost all day. But still temperate and nice, so no complaints here.)

Vernonia is situated in a little valley in the forested hills of the Coast Range. (Which sort of makes it a mountain town if you consider the Coast Range mountains. We don't, but the rest of Oregon does, so.) We took the Scappoose-Vernonia Highway from Hwy 30, a two-lane highway winding through deep, dark (I mean dark) forest and up and over the hills/mountains.

the Nehalem River at Hawkins ParkIt's a nice little town, a bit bigger than I imagined, with a slightly-larger-than-a-pond lake at one end and the perennially-flooding Nehalem River running through the middle. We stopped at Hawkins Park, which sits right alongside the river. They've built an ingenious little dam there to create a nice swimming hole (in lieu of a city pool, presumably), complete with a concrete embankment so you don't have to walk in dirt to get to the water, a ladder over the side down into the deep end, a wooden lifeguard stand, and a charming bank of lockers. They even used a water diversion to one side to create a wading pool for little ones. It wasn't warm enough to draw swimmers while we there, not even brave ones, but it wasn't hard to imagine what it must be like on hot summer days.

Setting for a creepy horror flick? Do we commit the mortal sin of slasher films and go investigate the creepy abandoned building? Yes, yes we do.We headed to the lake next, where there's a nice paved walking path that skirts the perimeter. About a quarter of the way around, there's an abandoned building off the path about a hundred feet. According to the placard on the walking path, it's an old fuel house for a now vanished cedar mill. (The "lake", as it turns out, is the old mill pond.)  It stored cedar chips to stoke the mill furnaces. It now has trees growing inside it. I love the poetry of that. Of course we had to look inside. And if I had woken up that morning with the intent to have an adventure, I couldn't have planned a more perfect discovery of treasure.

inside, a marvelous surpriseThe interior was like something out of a story. All four concrete walls completely intact, seven trees growing around the interior's perimeter, with sword ferns and bracken ferns and vine maples spreading out in the corners. The walls are decorated with colorful graffiti in more imaginative style than mere tagging, collectively creating the effect of a mural. And every sound echoes so that you speak softly and sparingly. A row of concrete platforms running down the center look like old stone seats from some ancient pagan ritual site, one that's so old that no one knows for certain just who built it or what they built it for, and combined with the simple peaked roof gables and the light slanting in through the trees, it has the look of a cathedral.

We still had some time before we needed to head home, so instead of our snacks, I suggested the restaurant that had caught my eye as we drove through town. It was really the word "brewery" that caught my eye, because Sal loves few things more than trying a new beer in a new town wherever we go, and I have had long experience looking for the signs of such things.

The Blue House Cafe, Espresso Bar, & Brewery, as it turns out, was just as much of a treasure as the mill ruin had been.The interior is charmingly decorated, all yellow and cobalt blue, with delightful touches here and there (like the beaded curtain made of wine corks and the blue painted nail heads throughout) and an ingenious outdoor seating area. It's a quaint restaurant serving time-tested family recipies and run by people who obviously care very much about what they do.

Their menu is largely Mediterranean and everything sounded wonderful, although that's one of the toughest cuisines for me personally since there are usually several key ingredients I just can eat. (Feta, kalamata olives, lamb, gorgonzola, pepperoncinis...I could go on, but it's just depressing.) Which means scanning for something innocuous or that doesn't have too many ingredients to ask them to hold, all the while wishing I could eat more than my frustrating palate allows.

We settled on the zataar flatbread, one with feta (for him), one without (for me). No idea what zataar was, but it was an adventure and that means you have to try things without knowing everything that's in them. He ordered their porter, I ordered a lemonade. Sal said the beer was decent, though nothing to write home about. The lemonade looked more like iced tea when it came, but I wasn't feeling particularly picky so I took a sip anyway. It was indeed iced tea, but so good I was glad for the accidental mix-up. It was infused with fresh mint and sweetened with brown sugar, so it had a delicious, crisp summery flavor that was most refreshing.

PLEASE SAL FIGURE OUT HOW TO MAKE THIS FOR ME I WILL LOVE YOU FOREVER AND EVER AMENOur order arrived and with the first bite, I was in love. The flatbread was handmade and still warm, the zataar (a blend made of thyme, sumac, sea salt, and sesame seeds all ground together very finely) was mixed with olive oil and spread on the toasted flatbread, then topped with fresh tomato, cucumber, and onion. It was, in a word, heavenly. It may possibly have supplanted bruschetta as my favorite summertime treat. I'm still thinking about that meal two days later, and thinking a day trip to Vernonia may just have to be on our regular excursion list from now on.

You always take a chance on a driveabout that your search for adventure will end up being an uneventful day's drive in the car to nowhere in particular. You'll take your chances with the doubtful looking roadside cafe and it'll turn into a bust as often as naught. You'll point to a place on the map and arrive to find nothing much of interest. You'll have car trouble that is funny in retrospect, but anything but enjoyable at the time.

Still, even the least eventful driveabouts have their special moments: the hilarity that becomes a future in-joke, the music that imprints the moment just so, the odd sign or bizarre sight that makes you both go, "Did you just see...?" If they didn't, we wouldn't keep taking them. But every once in awhile, the search for a bit of adventure will turn up a little bit of mystery and a little bit of magic alongside those memories, and then you're hooked for life.

see the full set of pictures here

lunch, Paris slimline:

  • stir fry (chicken, collard greens, baby bok choi, green beans, onion, garlic, broccoli, and a special sauce blend) with jasmine rice and crushed cashews for garnish
  • cucumbers and carrots in rice wine vinegar
  • a few bites of zucchini-sweet potato bread, courtesy of the neighbor who brought it for game night lst week
  • blueberries (from our bushes!) and cherries

 

title taken from "Among the Ruins of a Convent in the Apennines" by William Wordsworth

Thursday
Jul282011

the meaning of community

I joined some neighbors last night for the bi-weekly neighborhood Game Night that started up recently. It was a great way to get to know everyone better and try out some new games.

We played Settlers of Catan, which was way, way fun. It seemed a little daunting at first, but was easy enough to pick up.  But still challenging (in a good way) to master, requiring strategy and adaptation. The best kind of game, really, because it keeps you coming back for more.

These are the kinds of things that make our neighborhood so amazing and special, and we feel tremendously fortunate that we landed where we did. I had such a great time and I'm looking forward to the next one. So much, in fact, that I volunteered to host the next one....

lunch, origami squares:

  • salmon cake
  • wee baked potato
  • carrot sticks (more under the salmon and potato)
  • cucumber slices (more under the fruit and raisins)
  • cherries and blueberries
  • dark chocolate covered raisins