Random ramblings, and a teaser

Braves swept the Chicago Cubs in the three game series that ended this afternoon. Excellent pitching by the Cub's starting pitcher, a really tall, kinda sexy fella who's name is hard to pronounce (spelled Samardzija)   but who only lasted into the 6th inning. Things got better for the Braves after he burned out.

The game ended with the Cubs having 1 run, the Braves 5. Boo yah! Samardzija seemed to get really angry in the 6th inning when his pitching deteriorated. I don't know what's up with that. Yeah, he's sexy, but that anger isn't. (Do a Google image search of Jeff Samardzija for more pics of the sexy giant.) 

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Another thought about my father: the man bought 48 pairs of black socks the week before he went into the hospital. He was obviously planning to come back home.

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The trolls go back to school tomorrow. Spring break is over! Yes, I'm excited. Spring break is a trial run for summer vacation, though. In a few short weeks school will be over for the year and these young'uns will be home pretty much all the time, unless we can find a way for them to be otherwise occupied. Jobs would be good, though at 15 years old there are limited employment options for them. We shall see. Until then, I'm going to enjoy the hours they are in school.

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This week will be a good opportunity to do more sewing. I finished up one skirt and made a complete other skirt before the Delaware blogger gathering. Yay me. There's a dress pattern I've had in mind for a couple of years that I'd like to complete before I head back to Florida. I have had the fabric for it since, I don't know, 2010 maybe? But I need to make a sample from plain muslin first to adjust it for proper fit. I'd like to wear the dress at the Life Celebration party. Also, I got a haircut yesterday. I had the gal leave it a little bit longer than I'd prefer because I have to look like the daughter of the deceased in two weeks (two weeks from today, actually) and not like some hillbilly power dyke (no offense intended) in town for a rumble.

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I started this in the middle of the afternoon. It's 10:00 pm now and we haven't gotten as far as I intended. But of course now I can't remember what else I was going to say.

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I'm trying to cook more healthy meals these days, and eat less of the unhealthy stuff. I've found a great blog to help me out. It's Victor's husband's food blog, The Food You Choose. Tonight I made tilapia with greens and noodles. Except that I had flounder instead of the tilapia I thought was in the freezer, and I didn't make any noodles or rice or other starch to go with it. It was pretty good. I used bok choi and purple cabbage and  a little bit of shredded carrot for the veggies. It was colorful, pretty, and tasty. Superman liked it. None of the children would taste it. They are trolls.

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I have increased my beer consumption a bit, which is not helping the weight reduction. I blame the children. Mostly. The teenagers have been so damned frustrating today I'm about to wring their little necks. So tonight I'm drinking beer to numb the discouragement and resentment I feel concerning those trolls. They are trolls.

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Here's the tease: we have a new puppy. I haven't got pictures yet and I want to give him his own blog post for a proper introduction. Stay tuned. Perhaps tomorrow while those teenagers are at school I can get down to the business of  chronicling the introduction of a dog to the Java household.

You are what you eat

... or so they say.

I am trying to develop better eating habits. I have a thing for sweets, especially baked goods. These things are not very good for me. For the last month or so I've eliminated red meat from my diet, concentrating on fish and poultry instead. Actually, for the past year or two (or maybe longer) I have cut back on how much meat I eat. I'm eating even less meat now.

And I'm trying to add more vegetables to my diet. The problem is that I don't like vegetables. It's really hard to be a vegetarian if you don't like vegetables. Sometimes I'll have a 12 oz. can of V-8. That's two servings of veggies! If it's nice and cold I can swig it down so fast I almost don't taste it. If my taste buds are used to lots of sweets, like they have been, then veggies are a hard sell. I know that if I cut out the sugar, then other stuff will taste good. Haven't been totally successful with that yet.

This morning I went to the local farmer's market, opened on Wednesdays and Saturdays near our neighborhood. I bought three tomatoes, a small yellow squash, small zucchini squash, string beans, and a pint of blueberries. Then I went to the grocery for bagged lettuces, strawberries, carrots, and dairy products. Here's my plan: cut the squash into small pieces and saute them with onion and mushrooms. Add that to a can of spaghetti sauce and any other left-over red sauce we happen to have in the 'fridge, and it's the sauce for lasagna. I got ricotta, mozzarella, and "Italian blend" cheeses at the grocery, and some large pasta shells as well. So I might do stuffed shells, or if we have lasagna noodles (and I think we do) I'll slap together a lasagna. My kids are particularly fond of lasagna, and if I hide the squash in it, they probably won't notice. We'll have salad also, and both of these young'uns kinda like salad. 


Superman is out of town for a few days. He's gone up to visit Light in Pennsylvania. He's driving back on July 4th. I hope that, being the actual holiday, the traffic won't be too bad on the 4th. He'll be home for a couple of days before I leave him again. I'm taking Sproing to Florida to visit my family for a week, then we're driving up to Pennsylvania to see Light. The darling Light has volunteered to keep Sproing for a couple of weeks. So I'll leave him there and come back home. Superman will drive back up there at the end of July to help Light move into new digs, and to bring Sproing back to SC. It's a travel-heavy month, July. I'm glad gas prices are down, and hope they stay low. 


And yes it is hot here, but no hotter than most of the rest of this half of the U.S. I got out early this morning to do my shopping before it got too terrible. It was about 80 deg. when I went to the farmer's market. They're predicting 106 or 107, depending on the source of predictions, for today. Yesterday's high was 106. I'm staying inside as much as possible. One good thing, though; the humidity isn't terribly high. So it's hot, but it's sort of a dryer heat, at least for these parts. Of course I don't like it and want to move north to avoid this foolishness. I'm going to try not to complain too much about the heat this summer. Wish me luck. Oh, I'll hate it just as much, but I'm trying not to dwell on it in print (here and on Facebork).