Peek-a-boo

I was on my way from Hobby Lobby to Kroger today when my mobile buzzed.

"Hello?" I said after pressing my speaker phone button.

"Hi, honey," my husband said. "I'm on my way home from work. Where are you?"

"I'm headed over to the Cross Street Kroger."

"Well, I'm on Scatterfield getting ready to turn right on Eighth Street, so I'll be home in a few minutes."

Nonplussed, I looked around me. I was on Scatterfield at the Eighth Street intersection. And there he was in his familiar Chevy Blazer, phone pressed to his head.

"Hi!" I sang. "Look across the street."

I saw his head turn and I waved. "Well, hey there," he replied, laughing. "Good to see ya!"

"You too! I'll be home in twenty minutes."

"Okay...whoops, hey, my light just turned green. Love ya."

It's funny how, when you see someone who is as familiar to you as your own hand in an unexpected place, they look somehow different and you think with some sense of amazement, "That's MY HUSBAND." Or wife, sister, son, granny or whoever. It was a funny little incident that made me smile today.

Human nature [mine specifically]

If I were, say, in a parking lot. And there was someone backing out of a parking space who did so in a manner that struck me as being boneheaded -- just shooting straight back with only a minimal fuss regarding mirrors, pedestrians, stray shopping carts and, incidentally, MY CAR -- I would say something like, "Geez, you ridiculous turd! SLOW DOWN and take a look around, how's about?"

But if there was another person who, while I was waiting to park in the space his or her car was currently occupying, s-l-o-w-l-y unloaded the groceries, climbed carefully into the car, laboriously fastened the seat belt, turned on the car and then checked every mirror twice," I would respond by muttering, "Yes, I've got ALL DAY to sit here waiting for you. Please take your time. Check your phone messages! Find another radio station! Take a look at your teeth in the vanity mirror! I've nothing urgent going on and it's SO MUCH FUN sitting here in this parking lot waiting on you to LEAVE, I'm just nearly beside myself with excitement."

I simply cannot be pleased. I don't think this speaks well for my character.

NUNDAY: The hour of mercy

With so much crazy going on in the world right now, I wanted to take a moment to thank all the cloistered sisters -- mostly Poor Clares and Carmelites here in the United States, with a few Passionists, Redemptorists, Benedictines and Dominicans gathered into the mix -- for their vocation of prayer for the world. Matins, Lauds, Prime, Terce, Sext, None, Vespers and Compline, the good sisters are on their knees in their chapels, praying for us all.

If you want to pray too, check out Breviary.com for the Ordinary of the Divine Office by clicking here.

If you are in need of prayer, you can call the Carmelites in Terre Haute, Indiana and the nuns, who pray a minimum of six hours a day, will put you and your intentions on their prayer list. You can call their prayer line 24/7/365 and the number is 812-299-1410 or you can write to them the old-fashioned way at Carmelite Monastery, 19 Allendale, Terre Haute, Indiana 47802-4751.

The unbearable brightness of seeing

I've been invited, on Facebook, to participate in something called "Earth Hour," an event of which I was previously unaware. And it's a good thing, as it turns out, because there's nothing like happenings like Earth Hour to exasperate the living [deleted to spare my mother's feelings] out of me and undo all the good that's being done in me by the application of greater amounts of prayer during Lent and some pre-menopause vitamins my husband picked up for me at GNC.

Earth Hour, which will happen tomorrow, March 26 at 8:30 p.m., is the time when we are all to shut off the lights in our houses to "take a stand against climate change." (See the Earth Hour website by clicking here.) According to the website, this is more than just fumbling around in the dark for sixty minutes and whacking your ankle against the coffee table, it is "all about giving people a voice and working together to create a better future for our planet."

I am not sure how shutting off the lights in the house for an hour is supposed to give people a voice, although I can see that there might be a bunch of voices lifted up yelling, "Oh, $#&@!" as they hurt themselves in the dark. Apparently, this is about "sustainability issues," and stopping "the degradation of the Earth's natural environment" and also, loftily, "building a future where people live in harmony with nature."

What a load of crap.

People do not live in harmony with nature because nature, my Earth Hour friends, is the boss. Ask the people of Japan. Their country ran right up against nature in that earthquake and the following tsunami and there is nothing harmonious AT ALL about that mess. Their lights have been turned off for them and it is absolutely nothing that they wanted to happen.

Our pioneer ancestors here in the United States lived much closer to nature than we do. Here in Indiana, my forebears and their neighbors didn't have electricity. They didn't have running water. They didn't have indoor plumbing. And you know what? Their entire EXISTENCE was about keeping nature at bay, conquering it. Can you imagine what a relief and a joy it was to those people to spend years clearing their land, eventually building barns and replacing their log cabins with real houses? Can you imagine how exciting it was to have "the electric," as my great-grandparents called it, run to those houses? How amazing it was to have water, both cold and hot, running in sinks in the kitchen and the bathroom? How amazing it was to have a coal furnace that kept everyone warm?

We are soft, now. We've lived so long with those amenities that we've forgotten how lucky we are to have them. We've lived so long with them that we -- or at least some of us -- have the gall to scorn them. I think the biggest irony is that this Earth Hour palaver has been spread largely through the internet. Which operates ON ELECTRICITY, with desk top models that are plugged into wall outlets and laptop batteries that are charged and why does this fact seem to have escaped so many?

And why don't those same people understand that the constant drive of civilization has been to be in harmony with nature by protecting ourselves from it? Nature is red in tooth in claw not only in wildlife; it's also pretty down and dirty environmentally, as in the aforementioned Japan. I wonder if any of these folks who plan to turn their lights off at 8:30 tomorrow suffered through Katrina, when the whole push was to put as much of a halt to Mother Nature's gallop as they could after the terrible flooding. People needed food to eat that was unspoiled. They needed potable water. They needed toilets and beds and places to wash themselves and their clothes.

Three of those things I mentioned depend largely on electricity. Efficient cooking, bathing and washing can be accomplished through solar power, I suppose, but when the need is urgent, there's nothing like a big old generator to get things done. You can drink warm water out of bottles. And unless you have one of those adjustable beds or an electric blanket, the place where you sleep is electricity-free.

But then you have to think about the people who are served by electricity in ways beyond the normal scope of most people's lives. What about the people who are on dialysis machines? Ventilors? What about babies in NICU in their incubators? What about the people who need radiation treatments and MRIs and CAT scans and surgery? Do you want a surgeon to take out your gall bladder by candlelight? No? Can't blame you. Neither do I. Thank goodness we have all this EVIL electricity to keep all those things going so that people don't have to die at birth, like they did in generations past because we didn't have the technology to hook a baby up to an electric heart monitor. Thank goodness our life expectancy isn't 40 years old, which was the average life span for a man in 1900. You can get treatments for your cancer or your failing kidneys and any number of other ailments that used to kill people by the dozens. Thanks to electricity.

The last thing that strikes me as being so bogus about Earth Hour is this: We're all being called to turn off our lights at 8:30 tomorrow evening. Just the lights. No one is being asked to unplug the computer or the television, the washer and dryer, the refrigerator. Please tell me - what good does this do? Yes, yes, "raise awareness," blah blah blah. Big flippin' deal. This serves no purpose whatsoever, unless it might actually wake some people up so that they can see how fortunate we are to live now, in this time and place. With electricity and the technology that's been brought into being through it. And Nature, kept at bay, so that we can enjoy this easy life we've been given in civilization.

FRENCH FRIDAYS WITH DORIE: Beggar's Linguine

I had to make the executive decision (as CEO of the kitchen here at the home place) to skip over the scallops with caramel-orange sauce that were the actual French Fridays with Dorie recipe for this week because I knew that I'd be the only one willing to eat them and fresh scallops are too expensive just for a private little lunch dish for me, so I backtracked two weeks to make the Beggar's Linguine on pages 370 and 371 of the Around My French Table cookbook by Dorie Greenspan.

This recipe is a real oddball, which is not something you immediately sense when you read the title. Because what could be more innocent and bland than linguine, pictured there above in the strainer in my kitchen sink? Well, you're about to find out, my dears.

Beggar's Linguine is a really simple, peasanty sort of food. So simple and peasanty, in fact, that my immediate reaction upon reading the recipe was "Oh, HELLS to the no." Because the sauce that covers the pasta is as buttery and rich as could possibly be desired, but the flavors that mingle in all that butter are as follows: Mission figs. Pistachios. Raisins. Almonds. Orange zest. All of which you can see in the picture above, sitting there on my cutting board and waiting to be stirred into the melted, foaming butter on the stove.

Okaaaay. So is this a main course or some weird little dessert featuring noodles? I was confused and had a moment of wondering if Dorie was TOYING WITH US ALL. I mean, last week it was those sweet/salty cook....er, crackers? Who knows what they were, other than good? And now she's asking me to make a pasta dish with dried fruit and nuts?

Kayte offered reassurance -- she said she liked it and would definitely make it again, so I put my head down and forged onward.

Honestly, this picture doesn't do the Beggar's Linguine justice. I tried to make all the fruit and nuts come to the top of the bowl, but I kept spilling heavily buttered linguine onto the counter, so I gave it up and hoped for the best with some parsley and the orange zest. It really is an attractive-looking dish.

The girls and I ate it for lunch yesterday and agreed that there were things we did like about it -- the butter, the parmesan, the linguine, the pistachios -- and there were things we didn't like, namely, the figs. Aisling thought the figs were too sweet, Meelyn thought they were too chewy. I thought they were all right and I didn't hate them.

We also felt that it was hard to eat. You want to twirl that linguine on your fork, but then you can't get all those small pieces of fig, almond, pistachio and raisin on there too. It was a dish that made you work for your meal, so maybe you....wouldn't be a beggar anymore and could move on to something more upscale, like a nice vodka sauce?

This was a good recipe and I'm really glad we tried it. The girls said it wasn't something they'd ever request again, but they thought it was interesting and a fun lunch. Would I make it again? Well, I think yes, on the whole. For one thing, it's a meatless meal that would be a good lunch on Fridays during Lent. For another thing, it's totally different than everything else we eat, which, to be honest, runs a lot to tacos and chili in a never-ending cycle: sometimes even the Meal Matrix can't save you from yourself. So I'm thinking that this week was also a success. Thank you, Dorie!

FISH ON FRIDAY: The Tuna Casserole Project

This week's revolting casserole might as well have saved the money on that flat-leaf parsley garnish because did you ever see the likes of a plate of linguini covered with TUNA GRAVY? No, I thought not. You want the recipe? I'm not going to help you with a link because, really, you need to think this over before you click, for about six or seven months at least. Google "Tuna Gravy" and you'll find a number of recipes at Cooks.com, one that will even allow you to add "canned peas (optional)."

I just called my husband over to take a peek at the image and he peered at it, frowned, looked a little closer and then said in an offended voice, "Why would you make me look at something like that?"

Because misery loves company, baby.

Please feel free to call me honey

I went to Aldi today to do the weekly food shopping and I went alone for once. I usually take at least one of the girls with me because Aldi is one of those bag-and-tote-it-yerself places and it's always nice to have an extra set of hands when you're sacking it all up and stowing it away in the car. But today I was on my own, which means I am free to enter into conversations with total strangers, a character trait which the girls discourage, my mother completely understands and my brother finds utterly reprehensible.

"I suppose you're one of those people who talks to people in line at Disney World and the movie theater and in the waiting area of the Outback," he said superciliously.

"Oh, yes," I replied. "I am particularly friendly at the Outback because I'm usually working on a Foster's draft."

I wasn't drinking a beer at Aldi when I was standing in line with my shopping cart full of groceries, but I struck up a little conversation with the elderly man behind me who was holding a gallon of milk in each hand.

"Why don't you go in line ahead of me?" I asked. "Your hands are going to get really cold standing there holding that milk and I've got an awful lot of stuff in this cart."

"Why thanks!" he said, smiling and nodding his head affably. "My hands were already kind of cold and I'd just got to the line."

He went up ahead of me and we chatted about the deliciousness of the Aldi brand green tea as compared to the way more expensive Bigelow and Lipton brands. When he was ready to leave, he turned and called out, "Thanks again, ma'am!"

It was kind of odd being called "ma'am" by someone who was clearly old enough to be my grandpa, but I smiled and said, "You're welcome."

Evidently it struck him the same way because he went toward the automatic doors, but paused and turned back around. "Ordinarily, I would have called you honey," he said apologetically, "but my granddaughters tell me I'm not supposed to do that anymore."

The cashier and I both giggled. "You can call me honey anytime you want to, honey," I said generously.

"Me, too," offered the cashier.

"Aw, it's just a good old world, isn't it?" he asked engagingly, and left with his milk.

NUNDAY: How to have fun during Lent

These sisters chose to work a picture puzzle during their recreation time on Ash Wednesday and it looks like the postulant in the foreground just got caught hiding about five of the thousand pieces up her sleeve.

It is COMING. It CANNOT BE STOPPED.

These may be daffodils. Or maybe tulips. For all I know, they could be flesh-eating plants from the Little Nursery of Horrors - I don't know which flowers are what kind until they're blooming and sometimes not even then. All I do know is that these are GREEN and they're poking THROUGH THE SOIL and they aren't frozen stiff or buried in snow, so that can mean only one thing: The television programming is, like, all basketball, all the time.

You thought I was going to say "Spring has sprung" didn't you?

Sorry.

FRENCH FRIDAYS WITH DORIE: Salted Butter Break-Ups (Broyé)

Kayte, Katie and I have been really inconsistent in our posting of recipes made with the internet cooking group French Fridays with Dorie, which uses Dorie's lovely book Around My French Table and I am very relieved that FFw/D is not one of the more uptight cooking groups on the internet where if you fail to post a recipe on the assigned date, the other members of the group hunt you down and beat you with their spatulas. This week, however, we were all at the top of our game and made these weird little....cookies? Crackers? I don't think we've figured out exactly what they are yet; Dorie calls them "Salted Butter Break-Aways," but in France, they're called broyés, which means "crushed" or "crumbled."

This was one of the easiest recipes I've made so far -- uhhm, not that I've made that many from this cookbook -- but since it was a simple matter of flour, sugar, butter and sea salt, it was kind of hard to find a reason not to. So I did, and they're a very unusual....cracker? Cookie?....anyway, nothing like anything I've ever eaten before.

The recipe sounded as if they'd be something like a Lantz Captain's Wafer, you know, those little rectangular butter crackers that you can get in individual cellophane wrappers at salad bars? Or like a Keebler Club cracker: crunchy, slightly sweet, slightly salty. As it turns out, the broyés are not really like either of those things. For one thing, they're not as crackery, being crumbly yet more pliable and less dry than what we Americans think of as a cracker. Secondly, with two-thirds of a cup of sugar, they're much sweeter than any cracker we commonly eat, but with one teaspoon of coarse sea salt, they're much saltier than any cookie found on the aisle of any grocery store you care to name. In short, these coo-...er, ...cra-...whatever they are, simply can't be defined in terms of American tastes.

They are good, though! You mix up the dough in the food processor as you'd do for a pastry, shape it into a flattish square and then chill it for an hour. At the end of that time period, you roll it out into a nice, flat sheet, score it prettily with fork tines (my favorite part) and paint it with a glaze made of egg yolk. Yes, that's right: egg yolk. Not egg white, which is the most commonly used glaze ever if you want to give your food a nice shine. Yolk.

I am not much of an egg person, have I ever mentioned that? Especially the yolks.

When you bake the broyés or break-ups or whatever you want to call them, they're supposed to come out crispy on the edges and firm-with-a-spring in the center, which is how mine came out. To serve, you just....break off a piece, whatever size you'd care to eat. Which is kind of fun. I liked all those funny, misshapen pieces and broke up the entire thing so that it would be easier to store.

I found that broyés go deliciously well with, say, a slice of Swiss cheese. Maybe a nice, sharp Cheddar? I didn't have any of that, nor did I have any Gouda, but both seem like they'd pair up very amicably. I also pictured some sweet grapes or a sliced apple and a glass of moscato; in short, the makings for a very nice little picnic at the park on a day in the spring, just you and your bien-aimé, who would probably eat, lean back on one elbow and then say, "That was nice, but how's about we pack all this up and go get a real lunch?"

If I were to do these crookies -- that's the only way I can think of to describe them -- again, and I probably will because they were good, I'd use only half the sugar (or maybe even less than that) and a little more salt, just a pinch. And I would definitely glaze them, but only with white of egg because yolks are just so yucky.

All in all, a success!

FISH ON FRIDAY: The Tuna Casserole Project

Here is this week's offering, shown to you because? At your Catholic high school? The cafeteria ladies hate you.

20th Anniversary approaching!

I just got a telephone call from my husband, who said, "You know, with our twentieth anniversary coming up in June, I thought it would be nice if we did something special, so I made hotel reservations in downtown Indy and got us a table at Ruth's Chris Steak House. How's that sound?"

How does that sound? Does this man know me or what? Downtown in Indianapolis with the Indiana Historical Society and the Indiana State Museum and noon Mass at beautiful Old St. John's and the Indianapolis Museum of Art just a short jaunt away, PLUS STEAK??!!

I am already packing my bags.