making groceries

 It's Friday and work is over and I did some grocery shopping so I''m quite proud of myself.  Milk for yogurt, ground beef for sukuma wiki (that perennial kale in my garden is looking so good and tastes sweet), and some chips because I just love chips and I think I'll make nachos to use up some beans.  I've got plenty of pepper jack cheese, black beans, salsa, pickled peppers.  Sounds like some good meals to me.  Other things I'll cook: green beans sauteed with ground turkey, and cauliflower.  I might roast it to eat as a side to the green beans, but I also might make curry with pressed tofu.  Can't decide.  Breakfast today was lentils (the best that's turned out), lunch was zucchini pancakes and tomato-cucumber bulgur.  All this produce from my garden, it's amazing.  

My neighbor frantically called this morning to say that a water main had broken in front of my house.  Well, as frantic as I've ever seen him.  He looks like such a stoner/bureaucrat.  I rushed home and quickly identified the leak as coming from his property, not mine.  Not sure how he missed it but it worked out ok.  The water company came and fixed it pretty quickly, relatively speaking.  Regularly grateful for functioning public services like this, even if the guys were dicks when I tried to ask questions.  They did sweep up after the sidewalk flooding which was nice.  And because of this flooding, I saw that my dog has been trying to tunnel under my fence.  I've filled the space up a couple of times and thought she was giving up, but just the opposite.  It's behind a dogwood in my backyard so I can't see her back there digging.  She's not actually trying to get out or she would have long ago - I think she's just shoving her face under there to freak people and dogs out.  She's such a ridiculous asshat.  But now I have it firmly blocked off with logs and wire fence.  

Still thinking about going back to school.  Not sure how I can swing it financially, but I just don't know how I can keep up with this job.  Though, end of day was nice - I had a big block of time to process a big project, and then I had a successful email exchange with someone who has been problematic, and a call from someone who said "We think this, but our high-up manager said to ask you what you think."  And I think it's funny that the high-up manager does this, because I do it to her.  I greatly respect her, have never disagreed with her since the very beginning (when she was late to a meeting and upset that I wasn't discussing things we'd already discussed and thought I was interrupting her).  Some of her staff does not like me, but she keeps them in line.  And so I told this person three down the line from her, that I agree with whatever she says.  "Go ask your mother," essentially. 

Going back to school would mean leaving my house more days (though for shorter time), a lot more biking and walking.  I'm honestly kind of afraid of being able to do it, but I think I can and it would do me a lot of good.  and I'm under no illusion that academia is any kind of solid plan anymore - this is just to transition with the dog.  No, in fact, I bicycle regularly past my old professor's house that I saw listed for sale; I was obsessed with her.  Can't believe we got back in touch, see her on Facebook, she posted photos of us many years ago.  Her life has been a struggle in many ways.  No ivory tower for her. 

LOL, she used to see me biking past her place and thought, "Oh, she must live near her."  I was stalking her.  And she's so clueless she didn't think about how I kept biking past her place when she moved across town.  

**

Yay for Saturday mornings, I'm feeling inspired.  Have the frozen pears simmering to make and can sauce.  I really need to work through my freezer and not keep things in there too long as the freezer burn is real.   I'll turn that off and go haul a big pile of woodchips.  It would be amazing to finish that today but don't want to overdo it.  Mostly I need to get them off the street and into my yard, but I also need to do some distribution.  I need to pick tomatoes, something I hate doing because of my allergy.  And if the woodchips don't kill me, I'll turn to a bed to empty it - I need to harvest the turnips and carrots, then haul the soil to a new bed (with better sunlight) to plant garlic.  That will probably not be done today but it's on the list.  I need to hang laundry out to dry, clean the house, harvest dry beans.  All the things.  This is why I don't make time for things like hiking - I get tired out with all the things I do.  

Also want to take time to seriously look at applying for school as that application is due in a few months and there are steps to take.  Including a personal essay of interest.  I'm sort of all over the place so need to start refining my thoughts.  I can't imagine they won't accept me but it could happen.   

It's only a year away but it's still really speculative, and I need to run scenarios about how I can make it work financially.  The house is really the big issue.  And tied to that, the dog's mortality since I promised her she wouldn't have to move again.  She's been such a good sport with all our huge moves thousands of miles but we're both tired.  She's also annoyed with me for sitting here drinking coffee instead of starting the day, so she wins, off I go. 

*

Oof, I did not finish the street mulch, though not much is left.  I'm just worn out after hauling 15 large wheelbarrow loads.  I wanted to push through, but no.  But it's still a bit overcast and not too hot so once I rest and maybe lunch I should be able to do some harvesting to get that garden bed ready to be moved.  The air is so still that it always feels weird to me, and it feels warmer than it is because of zero breeze.  

Peeling all those little tomatoes was a ton of work, but that salsa is very tasty and I don't regret it.  and so I'll probably do it again next year, though I keep trying to convince myself to stop planting tomatoes.  

Feeling a bit sluggish today but got off the couch to process all the hot peppers, so glad I did.  My jalapenos are tiny which is super annoying - must be the type of start I got.  This is my best pepper year here.  The poblanos still await roasting before skinning and canning.  We'll see how that goes and how tasty they are.  I think I'll do them in half pints.   

**

Scale says up again, 0.4 pounds.  I did eat a medium size bag of chips over two or three days so I guess that's not too surprising.  I guess.   

It's past time to head out to walk the dog, was just waiting for a bit more clearance (don't like driving in fog), and did a few tasks.  Sorted through all the containers Dear Friend brought, connected with lids so they're easy to fill with food to share.  Juice all the pieces of limes she left behind - she just kept putting a half or less in plastic sandwich bags rather than using the ones in the holder as I guess she didn't see it.  The fridge was pretty stuffed full.  It's emptying now.  Still need to deal with that cauliflower she got and intended to roast - not sure if I want to curry it with tofu and garbanzos as a meal instead of just roasted as a side.  Probably a good idea to make it a meal.  It's probably not something I'll want to eat more than twice, and I can share the rest thanks to all the takeaway containers I've got restocked.  I do get really frustrated at the littering that people do on my property often with food from the community refrigerator, and every time I get annoyed I'm less likely to share.  I've never seen the food that I've shared be wasted, but plenty of other tasted and tossed (or dropped, or who knows what).  Also assholes like leaving empty milk containers and orange peels scattered over my property for me to have to pick up.  Not ok.  PUT. IT. IN. THE. TRASH. CAN. BESIDE. THE. FRIDGE.  We do have neighborhood heroes who do regular pickups of litter, but they are usually on the other side of the street, so it is mostly left to me.  Which super annoys me, especially since it's on the side so I don't go there unless there's a reason.  I dont' want the reason to be to pick up people's trash after I've helped feed them.  

ANYWAY.

The dog is wired to roll on her walk and she's not wrong, so off we go.   

**

Was digging around more to prepare a grad school application and saw that a professor with similar research interests has spots for grad students in her lab.  Great, I thought.  While I can teach well, I"m not really vibing with that, so I'm thinking more of a research grad employment option.  

But then I thought, wait, that would be mean being in the lab like 19 hours per week working.  That's 2.5 days.  Plus at least two full days in classes.  That's ... that's kind of a lot.  Part of quitting and going back to school is taking time to rest and recover.  On the other hand, that's just during the school terms - there are lots of vacation breaks throughout and between the terms, so really, that's what I'm missing, the opportunity to recover.  I was long a teacher and had summer breaks to recover, plus some other breaks.  That's a more reasonable schedule for me than this relentless job now.  Even if I take time off, it means I come back to working 10+ hour days just to catch up - that's just with only taking four days off!  It's insane.  So ... it does still seem like school would be more reasonable.  I think.  Obviously still thinking.  Plus it's not the 8-5 that kills me, it's that it's so grueling and not limited to just those hours.  I've never had a hard time working before, i like work.  It's just this work that's so awful.

OK, have the peppers roasted and canning.  Not sure if I'll do that again - it seems a lot of work for not much product and I'm afraid they'll just be mush because it's pressure canning after roasting.  Getting the peels off my poblanos was tough, much easier off the anaheim I bought.  Perhaps my poblanos don't really need it.  I will keep on freezing the rest and see.  

It does seem like there's freezer burn on food and some off taste so I'm going to get more diligent about packaging.  

Oof, I'm getting way too fancy prepping for tomorrow's dinner.  Tonight's turned out great so I'm doing prep.  Clean, break up the cauliflower, dry, put it in a bowl.  Now I'm baking the tofu after pressing and seasoning it, and making crunchy garbanzos.  Tomorrow I'll cook the purple barley and make the curry with coconut milk, cauliflower, seasonings, and zucchini if I've got some (gave it all away today when a friend stopped by), and I'll add in the baked tofu.  I'll cook the vegetables lightly because I do not like them mushy, and add hopefully crunchy garbanzos on top or at least they won't be mushy.  

I just don't like mushy food.  Want a bit of texture.  Anyway, I probably won't like all this too much and will end up giving it away, but that's ok.  I'm using up what I already have, which is a goal now.  Don't know if this is realistic but I'd like to go through everything in my cupboards and fridge and freezer that is due to expire by the end of this year or which I put up over a year ago.   I will likely make some odd things.  I did organize my freezer today and found some peas I'd tried to save but I know a lot of them are starchy so the lot went into the compost bin.  

Everything in my freezer is something I made except for butter and pitas (which I'll have to stop buying since they started adding sugar).  I have zero pre-packaged food, just a lot of things like frozen berries and vegetables.  I work so hard to eat well and it does definitely help with pain and brain fog, but it's still discouraging to be gaining weight when my focus is always on vegetables.  I've greatly reduced my use of oil, cut back on grains.  But still.   Every splurge leads to an increase.  It's not sustainable for me to always stay so strict, it sucks.  

Got focused on food rotation and ... yeah.  Quite a few things to share - they're not bad but I'm clearly not using them quickly (sugar free ketchup, mustard, sambal oelek, lime juice, etc. etc. etc.).   And things moved to the bottom shelf to use up soon, like artichoke hearts.  And the cupboard is abundant - I finally used up all the hemp hearts that I had in my sourdough and was kind of bummed that I don't have more, but I could use chia seeds instead and I have a ton of them to use up.  The chia seed "pudding" that I make messes with my gut but I'll bet some seeds in the bread will be a good thing.  

**

I know that I am cushioned from reality because I earn a high salary (relatively speaking), and because of how I build a life (bike to work instead of drive so fill the gas tank less than once a month; cook all from scratch, etc.), but the soaring prices on essentials is overwhelming many.  And I cannot help but think back to a photo I saw in an 8th grade history textbook, of a woman taking a wheelbarrow of currency just to buy a loaf of bread in Germany after the first world war.  (It just struck me how ethnocentric "world war" is.)  I fear we're reaching the tipping point for many and i am not convinced that things will get better before they get much worse.  

This situation is dire, frankly.