Monday, August 27, 2012

Brown eggs are local eggs and local eggs are...

I'm about to make a statement I never thought I would make: Local eggs are amazing. Groom came home last night with about half a dozen eggs that he got from a friend who keeps chickens. (I just discovered they came from our friend Kate! Hi Kate!)

Over the years, we've had plenty of friends who have kept chickens and Groom always extols the virtues of local eggs. I, on the other hand, have always made the pickle face whenever the topic has come up.

They're covered in poop. They're covered in hay. Chickens are gross and smelly. People who keep chickens tend to be really smug--sorry, but...come on...it's true. Then I started buying eggs at the farmers market. And, today, I boiled up a couple of those smelly, poopy, hay-covered eggs for lunch and huzzah! I am reborn! I'm a true convert!

squishy pile of delishy
Local eggs have a better, more solid yolk with the most extraordinary orange colors. Local eggs have really viscous whites that taste almost like cheese. And, here's the smug part: Local eggs tend to come from happy chickens who have a pretty nice life, not all caged or boxed up. Did you know "cage-free" chicken doesn't mean anything other than no cages are used? So, the poor bastards can be crated or crowded or just as miserable as the caged chickens without their little beaks. As much as I love the language workaround and the PR spin, that's just annoying. Poor little stinky poopy gross chickens.

For lunch today, I ate two delicious hard-boiled eggs with a little balsamic accompanied by local asparagus that I overcooked so I mixed it all up with local cucumbers and an avocado--all combined into a squishy pile of yummy. My mouth seriously thinks it just had a grilled cheese sandwich. Thanks avocado and local eggs!

Last night for local eats, we went to The Lobster House in Phippsburg where a local singer/songwriter Peter Alexander was playing. I went to his website, thought it sounded like fun--granted, I was halfway through a stiff rum and tonic at the time. The Lobster House is just a little roadside place but I noticed they're positioning themselves as a music spot. I so much wanted it to be like a speakeasy by the river in the 1920s.

Let me set it straight. I'm not a big fan of eating dinner while someone sings into a microphone. I love love love live and local music, but during happy hour and over dinner? I like to chat and hang out with my friends. But if it's original music, I'm more interested. I don't need to hear another cover of Bob Marley's Redemption Song. Last night, however, I was so pleased to hear this guy cover Lead Belly's Where Did You Sleep Last Night, a song commonly associated with Nirvana, that I was reconsidering my thoughts about listening to cover music over dinner. And that's when the singer immediately broke into a rendition of this.

Sooo. I'm back to disliking live cover music while I eat my supper.

But that egg today? That was pretty damn good.


Sunday, August 26, 2012

Potato

I mowed the lawn last night for an hour and a half, came inside, and iced my swollen and very sore ankle. I know. I know. I should have it looked at. I know.

Since we're in a state of flux right now--I'm working a lot and have no car while Groom is working a lot two hours away--last night's dinner was takeout from Shere Punjab that Groom picked up on his way home. And it was delightful. Local eating after a bit of activity is what this is all about. I did take a short walk today, but again I'm wary of further damaging my poor, broken-down ankle. As I watched the cars stream to Popham Beach, I had a terrible thought:

It's getting close to the end of summer. I get more exercise in the winter, ironically, than your average couch potato, so I know I'll soon be in better shape than I am now, but still. It's getting close to the end of summer. I'm headed back to ski country soon.

Groom and I made the conscious decision to move to a ski resort back in 2005/06. At the time, we had rented a house near a mountain and decided from that point forward we would continue with that lifestyle. I don't know. It was like a retirement in a lot of ways. He wanted to fish all summer and I wanted to get out of the career I had created for myself. So we got work at a ski resort, he more aggressively and successfully than I.

When we met, Groom and I were much more active. We used to hike portions (admittedly short portions) of the Appalachian Trail and we spent most of our time outside, doing things outside. I remember for a while thinking we were going to spend our lives whitewater paddling and sailing for a living. I even went so far as to take a course in whitewater paddling--nothing too daunting, enough to make me feel as though someone was under my canoe trying to tip it over, but nowhere near what you see extreme paddlers handling. I was never what you would call "athletic."

I remember being slightly shocked and extremely horrified when, after I met Groom's grandparents--who were yachty and money and scary--Groom's grandmother referred to me as "okay" for him since "she seems very...outdoorsy." The italics here are very much meant to imply judgement. It didn't help that I was from the North Shore while his family was from the South Shore, or the Irish Riviera as some people like to say. His family was "lace curtain Irish," which is an insult in the rough-and-tumble Irish community, but my family? We were shanty Irish disguising ourselves as lace curtain, which is an insult on top of an insult in the rough-and-tumble Irish community. My family was more Southie than Groom's family, but we pretended we weren't because of some underlying...I don't know...guilt? Shame?

I grew up with the sense that we had to keep our heads down as Irish but we had to fight the good fight as people. I was raised to be strong but not proud, to remain independent yet recognize others who needed to be helped. But, proclaiming the merits of being Irish? No. In fact, I remember recommending the book How the Irish Saved Civilization to my dad. His response was, "That's ridiculous."

The book was recommended to me by Groom's father, Groom-in-Law. (Oh, huh. That's a weird title.)

But that's your nutshell, the difference between our families.

I can't believe I went off on another tangent. I'm just trying to say.... When Boyfriend-now-Groom and I were courting, I was way more active. I didn't feel or fear pain as much as I do now. Back then, getting flipped in a boat, gasping for air, and feeling the scrape of branches against my leg didn't bother me. I didn't recognize the difference between immediate pain (tolerable) and healing pain (unbearable). A gash in the arm, in the moment, is easy to handle. A crusted up red and puffy wound the next day is just awful. And you can get a nasty infection too!

Really, the only things I remember now from that whitewater paddling course are A) rely on your J stroke, B) be wary of shifting horizons, and C) never paddle in water that you don't want to swim. Sadly, my little life experiment here is guided by those rules and I still live by that advice: constantly altering my course, getting freaked out by major change, and turning into a fearful little couch potato who doesn't swim. 

Saturday, August 25, 2012

I debated not publishing this

I have thought of every excuse not to do the things I need to do today. Can't work on my computer because I'm eating breakfast. Can't work out because I just ate. Can't take a walk because I'm on the phone. Can't mow the lawn because my phone battery is dead and I would have no music. Now I've plugged in my phone and I'm hungry.

Repeat.

Last night, Groom needed a hand moving a boat, so he picked up some sandwiches from Big Top and we had a little dinner at the dock around 9:00. It was a late supper (bad) and I vowed to do right by my health today.

First thing this morning, I ate a small leftover bag of Utz potato chips (bad)--they were staring at me with such evil intent--followed by two pieces of oat toast (not good). Because I couldn't work out on a full stomach, I sat at my computer to work. My phone rang, so I stepped outside to chat--we have no reception in the house--and I had to have gotten in at least a mile's worth of pacing. My phone died and I broke into some leftover cheese with a side of Quadratini hazelnut cookies. If it's from Europe I can eat it, right? I suppose I should have asked this question earlier in this life experiment because I've been sucking back the Nutella. And, yes, I know. Nutella is only part of a nutritious breakfast.

I think European food should be fine. Please don't tell me otherwise or we'll have to revoke my Euroweenie-phile status and then what will I have? Just a bunch of Fox News and a pile of old PJ O'Rourke books that I bought at Wal*Mart.

I'm kidding. I don't shop at Wal*Mart.

Haha. I don't watch Fox Newsertainment either.

Hey, did you hear the Franklin County chamber of commerce is moving into the Wal*Mart in Farmington, Maine? Yes, that's a sure sign we live in a socialist society, just so long as we continue to spell it c-o-r-p-o-r-a-t-o-c-r-a-c-y.

Sorry sorry. My leanings are showing. I want to explain something. I was in the honors program government relations class when I was in high school. It's exactly what you imagine--very Dead Poets Society with a bunch of Mona Lisa Smile and maybe a hint of The Great Debaters, except I went to a very white high school. We had one Japanese exchange student and one student who may have had a bit of a Czechoslovakian heritage?

Our teacher, Mr. K, used to demand we debate everything from the death penalty to abortion and from communism to capitalism--even if we didn't agree with the topic we were debating. I learned from that class, more than anything, to appreciate both sides of an argument. I wanted to go into politics and even joined one of those "go to Washington and see how it all works" study tours. I knew, however, I would never be an effective (read "electable") politician because I want so desperately to understand why my opposition thinks the way it does, and if someone's argument is solid, I might change my mind. I believe in today's parlance, that's defined as "waffling."

Before I misrepresent myself as some great thinker, I should mention a story: One week, this teacher told the class if we wore red to school on Friday, he would give us extra credit. He reminded us every day. Wear something red if you want extra credit. Tell your friends to wear something red. If you don't wear red, you will fail.

Friday rolled around and everyone was wearing red...except me. The lesson for the day was group think. He was trying to teach us about peer pressure, about questioning authority, and about thinking for ourselves. This was during the Cold War before the Berlin Wall had fallen, when Billy Joel was talking about the fire, Phil Collins was lamenting our land of confusion, Sting was all nervous about an unwinnable war, and even Morrisey was afraid of the bomb. Red Friday symbolized Communism and, I would imagine by extension, Soviet Communism. (Red Friday also refers to a strike that led to a nine-month subsidy for British miners in the mid-1920s, but I'm unclear on the impact of that agreement and its implications for a bunch of high-school students in the mid-1980s, so it's more of a digression here.)

At any rate, I got the extra credit for not wearing anything red that day. What I never admitted was, as I got dressed that morning, I had simply forgotten it was Friday.

Anyway, the lesson that really got through to me was the day Mr. K drew a horizontal solid line on the chalkboard with a "D" on the left end, an "R" on the right end, and a circle in the middle. He then asked everyone to pick a side of the line. I stated I was the "big zero in the middle." My classmates wouldn't let me live it down.

My point is this, as silly as my being a zero may seem, you can change my mind about most things political if you debate with facts and intelligence, but certain recent public statements from certain "R" (and third party "L") politicians have made me start to look very closely at what's happening around us. And, the closer I look, the more agitated I become. Enough with the memes about Obama taking 40% of your paycheck to give it to lazy people and the memes about Romney never holding a job. Stop using illegitimate arguments about birth certificates to distract people from legitimate discussions.

Speaking of, I'd like to apologize in advance for some legitimate statements I will probably allow to leak from my legitimate fingers as I continue on this legitimate daily activity blog. But, for now, you'll have to excuse me because my phone is fully charged, my stomach is no longer too full, and though I live with my lawn and I do desperately try to sweet talk my lawn into maintaining itself at a manageable few inches off the ground, it turns out I'm going to have to force that stupid bitch into submission with my mower.

It'll be okay. I'll plant some flowers along the trim to make it all better.

Yikes. This was a Crazy Train rant. And, by the way? Even Ozzy was talking about the unrest in the '80s. It was all around us growing up. You'd think this Gen X'er Heir of the Cold War would be a little more fired up right now instead of only paying attention to my weight and my 401K.

Friday, August 24, 2012

Vacationland

I live in vacationland. It's beautiful here. But, the problem is: Everyone who comes to visit...is on vacation. Don't get me wrong, I appreciate that people vacation in Maine. Both Groom and I receive paychecks from the tourism industry--his checks are largely from the ski industry and the fishing industry while mine come in through the boating industry. I do work at a ski resort, but...well...how do I put this so it doesn't make me seem ungrateful.... let me put it this way... I'm not there for the money.

This week sailed by so I apologize for being silent. I received a very large proofreading job with a quick turnaround. The job required no creative thinking and tapped into the detail-oriented side of my brain--much the way a game of Memory or a jigsaw puzzle works the part of your head that needs to keep the pieces straight. I wasn't in a writing frame of mind.

And that's where I stand. Very little actual physical activity but I have been sticking with local food. I'll mow the lawn this afternoon, but otherwise I'm still squishy and soft with just a hint of strength.

I am on week five, I think, of people on vacation calling me up and asking me why I'm not joining them for dinner or meeting them at the beach. It kills me. If I take a day off from work, I have to make it up that evening or the next day. If I take a week off from work, I lose a week's pay. Sometimes, I get an accidental vacation, which is nice, but the weeks following that vacation, I'm living on ramen noodles. (Well, that's an exaggeration, but you know what I mean.) In short, I live project to project, not day to day, so my happy hour comes at odd times, not necessarily at 5:00 on Friday.

I did take a break this week. I won't say it was a forced break, but it was a break I wouldn't have taken had it not been my friend's birthday and had she not asked if she could just come over and spend the night. As a freelance editor, writer, proofreader, and copy writer, my time is weird. People have this idea that freelancer's can come and go as they please, and it's true for the most part. But, my evenings are spent working and my weekends are eaten up by deadlines.


this
Tuesday night, my friend came up for dinner (cod that Groom had caught off the mouth of the Kennebec) and, over supper, Groom and Friend discussed going out in the boat all morning on Wednesday. I'll admit I was envious, but I needed to get some work done. At around noon on Wednesday, however, Groom texted me. "Wanna go for a boat ride?"

became this
My immediate answer was no. No. No nonononononononoooooo.....

Fuck it. Yes.

While Groom chatted with Friend about how tide and current manipulate the water and as he handed the helm over to her (she was charmingly nervous), I slid back on the bow of the boat and looked up at the sky. I was looking for faces in the clouds (that sounds like a terrible metaphor; I was literally trying to make out faces in the clouds)--something I used to do when I was a kid. I would lean back on the lawn and stare at the clouds while my mother sat inside at the kitchen table drinking coffee and chatting with her mother or sometimes the local priest. This past Wednesday, as I looked for those faces, my mind went completely blank for the first time in a long time. It was like someone pulled the plug.

vacation
Even though a Tuesday night of dinner and drinks followed by a Wednesday relaxing on the water had been my gift to Friend for her 40th birthday, I feel like I should be thanking her. She has been on the road a lot working on a project that, I discovered this week, she has been working on for over two years, and she needed to be with family and friends--the kinds of family and friends who know you, who can almost read your mind, and for whom you do not need to force charm or humor or insight. The kinds of friends you don't need to explore anymore; you already know them.

I didn't realize how much I needed the same thing.

Speaking of friends, you should totally check out her blog and her travels at Are You Really My Friend? The Facebook Portrait Project, in which she is setting out to take portraits of all her Facebook friends. What started out as a fun little way to travel around and take her friends' portraits has become a journey into virtual friends' homes, a journey of exploring the lives of acquaintances, a journey of self discovery, and a journey to define the true nature of friendship. For me as a writer, that journey takes a backseat to the images--even though I do enjoy the natural light and the poses that people choose--I find the stories most interesting.

Ugh. God. I am so sorry I wrote "journey" that many times, but I don't know another way to say it. I'll admit my post here about "real" friends seems like a commentary on her vision, and I guess in some ways it is. I see nothing wrong with exploring other people's worlds as a way to remind yourself that you still always have friends at home.

This is how I get when I'm wiped out. It's a little much, right? Just check out the blog.

Oh, and you know how I wrote, "I slid back on the bow..." and "I would lean back on the lawn..." up above? That's because I'm way too lazy to look up whether it should be "lay" or "lie," so I wrote around it.

Cheers.

Monday, August 20, 2012

It was bluefish

yummy!
Groom came home last night after asking me to flip his gross scaly fish in its marinade (Hunh. That sounds kinda dirty.) and cooked up a bluefish he had caught in the Kennebec River. He doesn't update his Maine Saltwater Fishing Reports blog as prolifically as I update my Maine Weak Girl Tries To Get Strong blog, but I'm hopeful he writes about the experience soon. He was pretty happy about catching his supper.

I don't eat bluefish. I never have. I caught a bluefish from the beach about ten...no...fifteeeeen.... about 20 years ago in Nantucket and it was both horrifying and disgusting. I was with Boyfriend who became Groom's family and their rule was "you catch it, you clean it." I have been a staunch supporter of catch-and-release ever since.

Saturday night, Groom cleaned his bluefish and put it on a platter with some soy, wine, ginger, garlic, and a little cumin to rest overnight. He grilled it last night (Sunday night) alongside some potatoes, red and yellow peppers, tomatoes, and asparagus from Blackie's in Auburn.

As it turns out, I like bluefish.





Ghost

"Nothing tastes as good as skinny feels." --Kate Moss

I call bullshit. This morning, I realized I need to do laundry because I have nothing to wear. Yes, the closets are full and the bureau is full, but most of those clothes are items I can't really wear anymore. As Death Cab for Cutie sings, "My old clothes don't fit like they once did/So they hang like ghosts of the people I have been."

On a whim, I pulled on a T-shirt from many years back. It's a boob shirt--not the cleavage kind but the clingy kind. I'm wearing it now. I don't envision myself leaving the house with it on, but I'm certainly happy with a little bit of fat shaved off my sides right now. And, I was psyched when I put it on and saw that it wasn't entirely offensive.

But, am I as happy as I am when I have a glass of wine with Groom at  Trattoria Athena and dive into my first bite of delicious Spezzatino di Vitello in Umido coi? And am I as happy as I am when I tear a hunk of baguette from Standard Bakery and smear it with stinky stinky stinky rind cheese from Hahn's End as I sit with friends and watch the boats sail by Bug Light? Hell no.

Many of my favorite memories and stories revolve around food or the dinner table--or at a bar, if I'm going to be honest. Most of my childhood was spent under the dining room table hiding from the cacophony of a large extroverted family and most of my 20s were spent under a table as well, primarily from sipping too much tequila to hide from the person I was so I could eventually become the person I am.

One of the ghosts of the people I have been came back to haunt me recently. I have this someone from before Boyfriend who became Groom Extraordinaire. I was in a terrible relationship. It started frenzied and obsessively; it continued frantically and desperately; and it ended violently. I was lucky, in that I didn't need him to love me as much as he wanted me to love him. I have spent the better part of 25 years successfully avoiding this man because I've had zero desire to see him and I don't want to be reminded of who I was. Much of the tequila in my 20s was dedicated to this memory, or at the very least obliterating those memories from my brain. I was never so lucky.

I saw him walking down the street about two weeks ago. And, just the other day, I very nearly walked directly into him. I still don't want to see him and I definitely don't want him to see me.

My reason has always been that I don't want another episode with him; I don't want any of that drama; I don't want to be that little 20-year-old girl curled up in the bedroom hiding from this weird, image-conscious, insecure man who fully subscribed to Groucho Marx's "I don't want to belong to any club that would accept people like me as a member"  and who berated and belittled anyone who would try to accept him.

The other day, the truth came out. When I saw him, my first thought wasn't, "Oh, look. There's someone I vaguely remember from my past." And, although objectionable since it's been over two decades, my first thought wasn't an angry, "Forget you."

My first sad little thought was, "I don't want him to see me so fat."

Sunday, August 19, 2012

No pain, no....

My frigging ankle is killing me. I just don't get it. I know I make jokes all the time about being a big fatass, but I'm not this morbidly obese woman who can't climb out of my chair. I'm relatively active and I move around. I look at this guy (keep the tissues close--this video is amazing) and I feel like a big fat whiner. I'm sure the gentleman in the video I just linked was far more careful about what he consumed and it's likely he kept to a strict schedule, but still. Come on.

I took a walk--a leisurely walk at that--with my brother Paul yesterday. Maybe four miles? And, bam. Today, my ankle is swollen and sore. I was feeling good about things, too. I woke up yesterday after our epic journey in the kayaks and felt no pain or stiffness in my back, shoulders, or arms. I have one blister on my thumb. Just that one little war wound. And, I suppose I should confess, my abs are a little tight. But, hey. I don't mind it one bit. True, I was looking forward to having all my muscles seize up so I could make a few "you bought your tickets yet?" jokes with super flexed and hardass arms, but whatever.

With no pain, I thought, okay. Maybe this eating locally and getting exercise routine is actually making me stronger. Maybe it's working! Who knew?!

Nope. I'm still a sucky fatass with a bum ankle and a screwed up IT band. I'm just frustrated and I'll be in better spirits tomorrow, but I can't figure out how some people can do it and I can't. Don't get me wrong; I understand I lack real discipline and I certainly don't regret walking for an hour or so yesterday. In fact, it was really nice and sometimes a nice walk allows you to stop for a nice view. I'd have more regrets if I hadn't walked, swollen ankle or not. We walked over a stream that we normally canoe...


And then we saw a mutant caterpillar...



And then a mama turkey wandered by with her chick and then, as we cut through someone's yard, I nearly walked into an inchworm swinging from a tree--why do they do that?


And finally we saw some crazy gross mushrooms....



preferred this
but did this
Anyway, today, brother and I piled ourselves into a canoe with dog and went for a quick 45-minute paddle. I would have preferred a nap in the shade after eating a double cheeseburger from Larson's Lunchbox to curb the lingering bellyache I was battling after basically drinking my dinner last night, but no. I had to do something active. For the record, the cheeseburger was unbelievably delicious.

higgledy-piggledy boats in Scotty River
Back to last night. Brother, Stepmother, and I drove into town looking for WiFi and, yet again, we were foiled. So, like any good soldiers, we forged ahead and drank Manhattans at King Eider's Pub instead. To soak up some of the bourbon I was about to pour down my gullet, I ordered a lentil cake served with a red wine reduction that made me about as happy as I can be. Holy crap was it good. After we had worn out our welcome at King Eider's, we stumbled over to Schooner Landing because I saw a flyer stating it was "hip hop" night. Wasn't gonna miss that.

No luck. But the Pemaquid Ale was delicious.

Tonight, Groom is threatening to cook some weird scaly fish I saw marinating in the fridge. I'm a little grossed out, but we'll see. Maybe it'll be delicious. It's certainly local, since I suspect he caught it himself. I just don't know what it is and it's sitting on a platter all...slimy looking. Ew.

I think it might be bluefish.



Friday, August 17, 2012

Family intervention

My nephew has the energy of a hummingbird. He never stops moving and, come to think of it, I've never actually seen him sleep. So, when he announced, "I'm really tired," I knew we were in trouble.

Today, after a long discussion about what we should do with our day, like maybe sitting on the dock in the sun with a good book (please), my sister and my brother and I (reluctantly) decided today would be a day of activity, especially since I've fallen off the exercise wagon a bit.

My sister and her husband packed up for a hike along Dodge Point while brother Paul and I stuffed ourselves into a couple of kayaks with niece and nephew. We were paddling up the lake and against the current, and although the breeze was fresh, the paddling was nice. Frankly, I prefer a bit of tension on the paddle when I'm in a kayak--I like that little struggle as opposed to calm waters where the paddle can go all higgledy-piggledy. (When I mentioned this at dinner tonight, Groom said quietly into his beer, "You prefer a struggle with everything you do." Oh, we have fun, don't we?)

We were goofing and jousting and pushing and splashing and laughing and paddling. Nephew would paddle out and come back, circle around us, and splash us with the portable bilge pump. My brother steadied both niece's and nephew's crafts with his paddle as they jumped into the water and climbed back up for more padding. It was pure delight.

Then both my brother and I noticed that we could see the end of the lake. A goal! Let's do it!

Niece didn't want to so, of course, we behaved as responsible adults and turned around.

Haha. No we didn't. We hauled her kayak onto a rock near the shore and planted her next to it. "Wait here. We'll be back in 15 minutes," we said.

We three remaining soldiers struggled against the current with that stupid bit of tall light-green marshy grass at the end of the lake just taunting us; it wasn't getting any closer but...still...it was so close.

Eventually we made it to the end, which wasn't nearly as awesome as I had hoped and I actually caught myself thinking "goals are dumb." We turned around to pick up niece who was easily half a mile away now. She announced that we had been gone 40 minutes. To prove it, she showed me her watch, which proved nothing except that I had no right to debate with her since I was 100% without a watch.

We still had a little less than three miles to go before we would be back at my sister's camp.

Things were now starting to suck. The crouton and banana I had eaten for breakfast four hours earlier were no longer sustaining me, and my nephew declared his exhaustion for, I imagine, the first time in his life. Brother and I tethered the kids to our kayaks and dragged them back, all the while talking about what we would eat if we could have anything in the world because that's what people do when they're in life or death situations, right? They talk about the luxuries they enjoyed before their current tragedies. My nephew chose venison.

When he's older, I'm going to insist he put a dollar in the douche tin for that. Venison? He couldn't say "french fries"? Or "ice cream"? He had to choose venison? Show off.

Of course, we made it back to camp in one piece and my sister greeted us at the dock with mini turkey sandwiches and a bag of potato chips. I have never loved a woman more in my life.

This evening, as brother and I celebrated our survival over a couple tall cold ones, I suggested that perhaps I didn't need to exercise tomorrow after today's two-and-a-half hour epic journey. He didn't even skip a beat.

"Yes you do."

I have never hated a man more in my life.

Stupid human tricks and algebra

s'mores
I'm not sure why I continue to post when I continue to fall off the exercise wagon. I suppose it's to hold myself accountable. Again, I did nothing but exercise my typing fingers, parts of my brain, and every muscle in my drinking arm. I know it's summer and I know everyone is on vacation, but I really have to stop using it as an excuse to be lazy.

Last night, dinner with family at sister's camp with s'mores (nothing local about it) that the kids were psyched to make and the adults were not as enthusiastic about eating. Frankly, the majority of the marshmallows ended up on the ground, which is just plain gross.

what a bunch of fatties
And since I'm talking about gross, I guess I could mention my brother and both my sisters compared our stupid human tricks from when we were kids. (Sadly, one brother was missing from the dinner because he's in South Carolina, no doubt drinking sweet tea as I type this.) In the photo here, from the left, we have 1) able to flip her tongue over and then stick her tongue out of her mouth so it looks like a flat taco; 2) able to pull his skin a clear three inches from his neck; 3) able to squish nose flat and fold ear in on itself because there is no cartilage; 4) able to wiggle ears at amazing clip. I'd like to mention, this photo is weird. My sister at the left of the group is a size eight and that isn't a full couch. But, lordy, we do look like a big blob of fatties, don't we?

Today, I tried to do a bit of work but I didn't even succeed at that. I had a very unreliable Internet connection so wiggly ear sister and I went into town to use the Internet at the Skidompha Library but it was closed. (In the interest of being honest, I mention the library because I love to use the word "Skidompha.") We went to the Maine Coast Bookshop where we couldn't find seating so we walked across the street to Damariscotta River Grill (thinking we'd have a cocktail and maybe some Internet) but they didn't offer Internet, so we went back to the book store where all the tables had miraculously cleared out but, as we discovered after ordering our coffee, the tables had cleared because the Internet was down. So, we chucked it all and walked over to King Eider's Pub for a martini. I'm done picking fights with the cosmos.

But exercise? No. I did not walk. I did not run. I did not kick.

Sorry, that's a private joke that I should probably share. I have a friend who is a remarkably beautiful skier. When we were in college, she decided she might want to learn how to snowboard but she wasn't sure how to go about it, so the conversation turned to the whole "goofy foot" discussion about whether she should face downhill with her left foot or her right foot. She didn't know which. So, someone asked her which foot she kicks with. Her answer: "I...don't."

She doesn't walk. She doesn't run. She doesn't kick.

pretty christmas cove
I did have a chance to exercise my brain this evening because I borrowed my brother's car, which he apparently purchased directly from Germany because everything is in kilometers. I did some online conversion and discovered that 55 mph = 88 kmph and 25 mph = 40 kmph. I felt pretty comfortable driving down Route 1 on a busy Thursday night in August when the road is crawling with cops looking for any excuse to pull over an out-of-state vehicle until I hit a 35 mph zone. Okay. If 55 is 88 and 25 is 40, then 35 must be....x equals... drop...the...y....? What.....? It was the mental equivalent of running a 10K. I can't even do it now with pencil and paper. And there's talk of removing algebra from school curriculum. Bah.

Lunch today was Coveside in Christmas Cove. New owners--the same guy who owns Newcastle Public House--and you know what? Best frigging Bloody Mary with the best frigging BLT ever. No lie. Dinner tonight with the family was old-school beef, butter, and potatoes--and more than one joke about traveling back in time to the 1950s--and I have no idea whether anything was local. I'm on a slippery slope of negligence here.

Otherwise, I have little to report other than an ever expanding waistline and a cushier tush.

Wednesday, August 15, 2012

Nostalgia

Here's where I stand: I haven't gotten any activity into my day yet unless you count a walk to the store for some coffee because we don't have any in the house. But, the store is 1/4 of a mile away, maaaaaaybe 1/3 of a mile. It did serve to get the blood moving, but it didn't exactly make me feel like I could climb a mountain.

The exact moment we realized we were missing a place setting
lobster, meat, corn
For local food yesterday and last night, my sister and family drove over to pick me up for a quick beer at Anna's Water's Edge, which looks directly at Malaga Island, and then to Damariscotta for a giant lobster feed with sisters, brothers-in-law, nephew, nieces, stepmother, stepmother's friends, uncle, and aunt who we don't refer to as "aunt" for some unknown reason. In all, 12 people, 8 lobsters, a dozen ears of corn, and a flank steak. I have no idea where the steak came from, but the lobster was purchased at Muscongas Bay Lobster and the corn came courtesy of Clark's Farm, or so I have been told.

Clark was a big name when we were summering on Biscay Pond. The Clark family owned Clark's Spa--now King Eider's Pub--in downtown Damariscotta. As kids, we would make a trek to town and while our mom shopped at Reny's, my brother Pete and I would walk over to Clark's Spa to look for the newest issue of Mad Magazine. The shop had a screen door that slammed when you walked in and creaky thin-slatted wooden floors and the entire place smelled like a chocolate newspaper. I'm hopeful it's the same family that owns Clark's Farm, but I don't know.

Aside: R.H. Reny lived really close to our camp--back when our hoity-toity lake house was still a camp--and my teenaged sisters would cut through his apple orchard to go see some fellas at Pemaquid Campground. Rumor had it, Mr. Reny would shoot rock salt at anyone who trespassed, but the little file man in my head cannot seem to retrieve one single memory of that actually happening. The story smacks of the "sick balls" fable from Stand By Me.

Since I'm on this nostalgia kick, I'll mention I ended up monopolizing the dinner conversation last night by asking questions about our family tree. My dad's brother was there and he had plenty of information about my dad's side of the family. I'd had a couple margaritas (not local) and my wine glass was never empty though I'm certain I was drinking from it, so my memory is slightly hazy. In short, my great grandparents met while my great grandmother Bridget was working as a housekeeper and my great grandfather was a butler in the Boston area. Bridget was from Ireland and at some point in her life returned to the homeland only to grab passage back to the Americas a few years later.

I think.

The other thing I gleaned is that almost everyone in my ancestry is named either Ralph or Mary. And, I (Sarah Ann) am named after two girls (Sarah and Ann) who died in infancy. So, I have that going for me. Which is nice.

Brother Paul is headed this way, so even though I aspire to get in some form of activity, I may not. If only our kayaks had drink holders.

Tuesday, August 14, 2012

Quickie

Just a quick post here. My sister(s) is/are coming to pick me up later this afternoon to bring me back to the family lake house (that sounds so pretentious) for dinner tonight with my uncle and his wife who have driven up from Massachusetts. I'm not sure why my entire family refers to my uncle's wife as "his wife" rather than "aunt," but that's how it goes. I suppose it's similar to how Groom's niece and nephew don't really call me "aunt" either. At this point in time, it would be weird.

We're picking up a bunch of lobsters in Muscongus Bay and bringing them back to the house for a big feast tonight. The trip to pick up lobsters always includes a cocktail and a cup of chowder at Anchor Inn--something we used to try to keep secret from my dad when he was alive, but he figured it out pretty quickly when the kids would argue about who got to pick up the lobsters until eventually we would all pile in the clown car and return two hours later a little bit gigglier than when we left.

This is the same man who always knew when my older sisters had parties and actually discovered a buried cooler filled with empties while "walking the property" after he had been gone for a few days. Who "walks the property"? At any rate, he knew.

For the record, I had only one party when I was a teenager. My older sister told me to blame the cat for any damage in the house. As it turns out, a cat might tear up the waterbed, but it probably wouldn't rip a door off its hinges, smear the wooden floors in beer, trash the kitchen, and leave bottle caps in the bathroom so I was busted. My dad never really said anything, but each morning, I would find another piece of damaging evidence placed on the kitchen table: a half-empty wine cooler, a boy's sneaker, a crushed beer can, a cigarette butt.... It was torture.

And, for the record, unless he comes back from the grave to tell me otherwise, I'm pretty sure I'm still officially grounded.

crazy girls
I never made it onto the elliptical last night because we were running late for dinner--we met up with family at The Contented Sole in Pemaquid where the kids could run around and the adults could gaze at the pretty sunset while sucking back some rum--but I got my 20 minutes in today. I hope to get some paddling in later this afternoon as well, but when my sister(s) arrive, there's a good chance we'll sneak off for a beer or two. What's the verdict on getting exercise after a couple tall cold ones?

Monday, August 6, 2012

Challenge!

Ah ha! New challenge. It's a little difficult for me to get daily activity into my schedule when we have a house full of family. What a surprise.

I used to go jogging early in the morning when we had company--just a quick sneak in and out the front door while people were showering or drinking their coffee in the kitchen. These days, because I'm still not in jogging condition, I'm not sure what to do.

The elliptical is directly off the dining room and right underneath the laundry room, or this week, underneath "a spare bedroom," so I can A) wake people up in the morning, B) keep people awake during nap time, or C) suffer the humiliation of people hearing or worse seeing me on the elliptical all sweaty and making weird exercise faces, which I imagine is very similar to guitar face, which is very similar to sex face.

Today, our plans include boating, fish sandwich, more boating, strolling through town, nap, martini, and ribeye with a side of baked beans. So, unless I decide to pop into a lingerie shop to try on some Spanx, which is akin to shoving an oversized sleeping bag into a baby stuff sack, I'm a little out of luck. My sister, who is a runner and a healthy eater and has legs that allow her to wear short skirts well into her 40s without a single person doing the "oh nooooo" face behind her back, overheard me and my other sister laughing about Spanx at my brother's wedding last year. My thin sister, after a moment of listening to us make jokes about stuffing 80 pounds of sausage into six inches of casing, asked in all earnestness and without judgement, "Wouldn't it just be easier to work out?"

Back to today.... My sister-in-law has been lobbying for a hike into Sprague Pond, so I might get behind her efforts to head over there if we have time between nap and martini. In fact, now that I think of it, I think that's what I'll do. Wish me luck.

Sunday, August 5, 2012

Quick entry

loaded up, ready to go
Groom's family is here so I want to be brief--there's a martini to drink and stinky cheese to eat and lobster to consume. But, I want to report that I got my daily activity regardless. Groom picked up some kayaks from the LL Bean use room because you can do that when you're an employee. They had stand-up paddleboards (SUP) there as well, but they were signed out. We hung around the loading area like a couple of small-town thugs hoping the people who had reserved them wouldn't show up, but no luck. After a brief conversation about maybe buying a SUP that ended with, "We should probably get me a car first," we piled a bunch of the kayaks in the back of the truck and carried on.

The point being, my activity today was a paddle around Small Point in a little tub of a kayak. But, I was with Peter's niece who preferred talking over paddling, so we really sort of floated around Small Point rather than paddled around it. I don't mind. Frankly, I'd prefer to spend and hour chatting with this girl than spend 15 minutes huffing and puffing against the waves.

So, I added 40 minutes of lawn mowing to my day.

And now I'm icing my ankle. Dammit. But, I hear the ice trays getting emptied into cocktail shakers, so I must be off.


Friday, August 3, 2012

Crazy person

I walked around the house so very smug with myself last night, that I have to mention it today. I actually thought with pleasure, "Wow. I can't believe this is my life."

late dinner
The circumstances that led me to that sentiment are incredibly silly. I had made a late dinner (spanakopita with spinach from Shaw's and phyllo from god knows where, but everything else was local, including the accompanying super spicy arugula). Groom was in bed after spending the evening prepping for a fishing trip and I was putting things away, wiping down the counters, listening to the dishwasher. I poured myself a glass of wine and headed toward the living room. But, what made me get so smug is this: When I opened the cabinet, there was a clean wine glass in there. When I looked for a bottle of wine, I found one. And, when I tried to decide where to sit with my wine, I had plenty of really nice spots to choose from (sentence ending with a preposition, I don't care).

But, with anything good, there's always a cost. I woke up this morning to a nasty headache (no, it isn't a result of drinking too much wine) and intense cramps in my calves from not stretching last night after 30 minutes on the elliptical. And, okay, this is gross, so you can skip the next few words...I'll wait for you to adjust your eyes to the next paragraph...I have a blocked salivary gland or something and now there's a lump in the side of my face. A lump in the side of my face.

As I rolled over in bed this morning, I actually thought with disgust, "Wow. I can't believe this is my life."

See. Saw. Chee. Chaw. And we are back to the middle.

But, this morning, I remembered why I was so happy last night. Except for a two-year period when I lived in domestic bliss with a roommate who nested so thoroughly, she stitched me directly into the comfortable walls of our apartment, I was the kind of feral person who never really had a place to live. I mean, I had apartments and roommates and such, but I had a very difficult time moving into a place. I've had apartments all over Portland, but I never really lived anywhere. It is a fact I paid rent on an apartment for a solid year and I never once--not once--set foot in the place. I lived, for the most part, out of a van or I would sleep on people's couches.

So, on the off chance I was home, there was nothing, ever, in my cabinets, fridge, and cupboards.

I remember, in my late 20s, I accepted a job on Maine's midcoast. Groom (at the time "Boyfriend") was working almost four hours away and I had no roommate. I was forced to set up house on my own. I failed miserably. I moved there in January and I had no shovel so, first major storm, I was outside with a dustpan sort of hustling snow out of the way.

I never mowed the lawn. I lived there for three years...four years?...and I never mowed the lawn. After about a year, Boyfriend, who was visiting for the weekend, stopped a guy with a mower in the back of his truck and asked him if he would please come to my house.

And, again, here come's something gross, so if you don't want to know, I'll wait for a moment for your eyes to adjust to the next paragraph.... I didn't take my trash to the dump. Not once in four years.

I was like a crazy person. I even had a cat.

While I was living there, I did try to make some friends. At one point, I found myself sipping wine with a woman who was about my age--wine from her fridge in glasses she pulled from her cabinet--and she asked whether I was hungry. I supposed I was.

All she did was saute some zucchini, but I watched with fascination. She used utensils from her drawers and supplies from her pantry. My drawers held a tape measure, a rusty pair of scissors, two or three plastic sporks, some salt/pepper packets, and random bits of string. I missed the domesticity class entirely.

I bring this all up because I reached into the fridge to pull out some Piggy wheatberry bread for toast this morning and then grabbed the butter dish to add a little butter. I put everything on a plate I had taken from the cabinet before helping myself to a cloth napkin from the shelf. I thought, these are simple things, but I really appreciate all these simple things. I have food in my kitchen and I have things in my cabinets and the lawn is mowed. It only took me 40 years (and a stable fella) to figure this shit out, but it's nice to have a home.

For what it's worth, I never did become friends with zucchini lady. When you get down to it, I was never going to get all that close with a woman who sipped wine in her living room and whipped up a zucchini as a snack as opposed to heading into a local bar to drink PBR and munch on zucchini the cook fried up as a pub special.

Thursday, August 2, 2012

Heart attack

I said yesterday that I would talk about this wellness test I took in order to get a discount on health insurance and I considered blowing it off like Arrested Development always blew off their "On the next Arrested Development" segments by never, ever addressing anything they mentioned in their epilogue from the previous episode.

God I miss that show.

But, I want to brag. Evidently, I'm 94% healthy, according to a completely arbitrary insurance quiz that relies 100% on my honesty. Not incidentally, my scores were low on the things I already know I need to improve, like my blood pressure, my alcohol consumption, my eating habits, and my weight. And, it indicated that I really should have my cholesterol and blood sugar checked. And maybe consider a mammogram. Well, duh. I'm over 40.

This reminds me, of course, of the other night. I had terrible, terrible heartburn all day long. It was the worst! I took some Prevacid (we have it on hand for our dog who suffers from acid reflux...yeah... I know...) and that didn't help it one bit. Then, as I was making dinner, I got this terrible pain in my right arm. It hurt so much, I simply hugged it against my body and stood still. Jesus. Wow. It was like my arm was breaking from shoulder to wrist.

Naturally, I put dinner on hold and hopped on the great Interwebs. A Google search on "pain in right arm" brought me here:

I was thinking my search would lead me to a carpal tunnel page or talk about not eating enough kale or something. But, heart attack??! Whaaat??

You want to know another symptom? Heartburn.

Mm-hm.

So, at that point, I was staring at the computer, clicking all these testimonials about women in their early 40s suffered heart attacks that started with heartburn, pain in their right arms, upper back pain (uh, yeah...check!), weird heart palpitations (uh huh), and extreme fatigue (totally).

Groom walked into my office, looked at my face, and slowly sat down. Not a word.

I stated in no uncertain terms that I thought I might be having a heart attack. He waited a beat before saying in his insanely calm and reasonable voice.

"Would you like me to call 911?"

"Nooo....."

"Should we get in the truck and drive to the hospital?"

"Nooo...."

"Want me to make some dinner?"

"Yeaaa....."

The next morning, which was yesterday morning, he announced with pure delight that it looked as though I had made it through the night without any 1am visits to the emergency room! Look at that!

That's when he told me what he thought was really happening. We had sausage with dinner the other night and I had some of the leftover sausage for lunch. Heartburn.

I worked my arms on the elliptical and probably pulled a muscle or pinched a nerve. Pain in right arm. Pain in upper back.

This next one is a bit harder to explain, so bear with me. We're having our kitchen remodeled and the amazing Nate Schrock just removed an entire wall from our house. The project is well underway and we can see some real changes. This means it is going to happen. My philosophy in life includes a belief that nothing great comes without great cost and if I look forward to something it will probably never happen. In the case of the kitchen, since it's clearly going to happen, that means something bad will probably happen to me to A) force me to pay a great cost for something so awesome or B) make it so I never see the kitchen come to fruition. When I stood in the middle of the kitchen, my heart started pounding. I was having a good, old-fashioned panic attack.

Finally, Groom pointed out, it's very possible the martini and copious amounts of wine on Monday night maybe...jusssssst maaaaybe....caused me to wake up with a hangover, which can lead to heartburn, heart palpitations, and...wait for it...extreme fatigue.

I almost want to have a heart attack to prove him wrong.

To update you on my local food/activity progress: 20 minutes on elliptical yesterday followed by dinner at Seagrass Bistro where I shared a yummy chocolate tart with my Two Salty Dogs Pet Outfitters friend. Breakfast this morning was a bagel I found in the back of the fridge followed by a tofu scramble for lunch. It's my first homemade tofu scramble. Why aren't we doing this more often?? A little olive oil (including a splash of that mushroom-infused oil), some green onion, a bit of garlic, tofu, a dash of curry, a few leftover chopped herbs from the garden, a dite of turmeric for color (which, I now know from experience, will dye your counters orange if you're not careful), some leftover broccoli, and a little shredded romano. It was delightful.

After 30 minutes on the elliptical this afternoon, I'm making spanakopita for supper tonight (with spinach Groom will buy, I hope, from a farm and not at Shaw's or whatever). I'm really craving the greens: kale, spinach, collard greens, chard.... I wonder if that means I'm having a heart attack.

Wednesday, August 1, 2012

Food

I know I talk about food way more than I talk about my daily activity, but how often do you want to hear about my elliptical machine? Maybe I'll start each blog entry like Bridget Jones's Diary with a list of things...

Okay. I'll start that today.

8/1/12
Number of minutes of exercise: 0
Type of exercise: N/A
Amount of water I drank: half a pint
Non-local or non-traceable items I've consumed: 0

That's no fun. See, I plan to get on the elliptical this afternoon before heading out to a dinner meeting. I haven't had any water because I've been working outside since my cell phone doesn't get reception inside the house and every time I fill my glass of water, a bug drops into it.

Every. Single. Time.

I hate nature.

By the way, did you click what I linked to Bridget Jones's Diary--I just linked it there again. Those reviewers are insufferable and I think I might be Bridget Jones. Which means I married Colin Firth. Which means I married Mr. Darcy, and if you'll allow me, that makes me Elizabeth Bennet, who has a delightful rack in PBS' version of Pride & Prejudice. None of this makes me unhappy. See? Classic literature is fun!

For local fixings last night, Groom and I cooked up some haddock from Gilmore's in Bath--the same family runs Holbrooks in Cundy's Harbor. Holbrooks is a great example of what a small community can do to save its working waterfront. And, Cundy's Harbor is also home to the best lobsters on the Maine coast. I don't know why. It just is.

Side note: We almost named our dog "Cundy" after Cundy's Harbor. If you have the mind of an eighth-grade boy, you know why I fought against Cundy. Click that at your own risk. It's sort of like Santorum. (Thank you, Dan Savage.) If you know, you know. If you don't know.... you might want to keep it that way.

So, instead, we named him "Heebie," after a local character in Cundy's Harbor.

Mm. We didn't know. But, I contend it's still better than Cundy.

Dinner: Broiled haddock (local) with herbs from our garden, roasted potatoes and string beans from a new farmstand in Bath--the name of which completely escapes me, but I do remember they take cash only.

I added some wild mushroom- and sage-infused olive oil from Eventide to the potatoes. And then (don't tell groom), I spritzed them with some truffle oil that I bought at Campo de' Fiori in Rome last summer. (Oh my god I am such a douche for including that detail, but it's better than saying "truffle oil I bought the last time I was in Italy..." even though it is technically true.)

Reminds me of a great response I heard once to the question: "Have you read The Iliad?"

"Not in English."

Technically true. How you want to infer that information is entirely up to you and I take no responsibility for it. And people wonder why I love working in PR.

Where was I? Oh, dinner last night. Delicious. Oatmeal this morning with some maple syrup from a friend's tap and then fish tacos for lunch with arugula (or "rocket" if we were in Italy) accompanied by last night's leftover potatoes made into a potato salad with last night's leftover herbs that had been saved in olive oil. I added a hard-boiled egg to the mix and I had a sudden flashback; I know for sure I saw dreamlike wavy lines pass in front of my face.

I was thinking about how long I should boil the eggs and it dawned on me that I eat my eggs over easy so why would I be completely grossed out by a slightly runny hard-boiled egg? And BAM! I remembered that I used to eat soft-boiled eggs with my dad when I was a kid. He'd put the egg in that little holder and hand me a teaspoon. Tap...tap...tap...tap.... carefully peel the shell, clean out the egg in the top of the shell, crank some salt and pepper on the body of the egg, and carefully carve out the white and yellow innards.

It was something we did while we were at the summer cottage (or camp, if you will, and I believe you should) on Biscay Pond. It was one of those old camps with cracks in the pine walls and no insulation and spiders everywhere and you could hear the acorns fall out of the trees, land on the roof, and roll down the side of the house. Everything smelled like pine needles and we had to sweep out the remnants of kid play twice a day.  The mattresses were musty and the bedframes were rusty. No TV, but we had bookcases built into the walls from floor to ceiling. And we had every kind of book, from Heidi to Superstitions of the Ancient World and from The Riverside Shakespeare to the Bible to the Complete Works of Ernest Hemingway. I can't find the Superstitions book online now, but the binding had an image of a giant eyeball that would stare at you as you crossed the room.

All this from eating an egg with lunch. Off to the elliptical before my meeting--this meeting is about something local, too. I'm helping the owners of Two Salty Dogs Pet Outfitters at the Maine Boats, Homes and Harbors Show. Two Salty Dogs is the exclusive retailer for Crooked Doghouses (made in Maine by the nationally acclaimed Kids Crooked Houses), so we're representing the whole shebang at the show.

Tomorrow we can talk about how I had to take a wellness exam today for our health insurance and how I now want to drink a bottle of gin and smoke a pack of cigarettes.