Well, it's not going to kill you

How many men does it take to barbeque chicken?

Last night it took 3, sometimes 4.  It was hysterical to watch them, a bunch of little boys playing with fire and barbeque tools.  As Bev said, we should get this on video.  We told them Bobby Flay would be proud.

Last night we hosted FWF.  It a fit a genius I mentioned bbq chicken as a main dish the other night.  Chase volunteered to bbq as he had not bbq'd for 2 entire weeks!  Chase and his bbq are as one.  Turns out Rob and his bbq are one as well.  Larry has decided he may become one with our bbq.

We have a virtually unused bbq as we bought it the year before I was diagnosed because I like, ok love barbequed food, and decided it was time to learn the finer points of grilling.  However when the next bbq season rolled around I was busy having surgery and chemo.  Food of any type was not top most on my mind.

So yesterday Larry moved the que from the spot where it had been, um, abandoned 3 years ago.  Opened it up, cleaned the grills, got a new propane tank and voila it lit on the first try!

Last night we had lovely chicken marinated in soy and beer, grilled to perfection.  We ate outside because the weather has been miserably hot but as luck would have it yesterday was breathtakingly beautiful, well mostly beautiful because the temps were only in the 80's as opposed to the 100's it's been running but we still have lots of smoke from the fires farther north.

We ate, drank and were merry long after darkness fell.  It was one of those beautiful nights that make you realize how much you treasure life and your friends.

And I will be talking about breast cancer again

just not for a few days.  My mind and stress level needs a break.  It's not good to have cancer on the mind 24/7 it makes you a warped human being so I'm staying away from Dr. Google for a time.  Don't worry it's not as if I woke up this morning saying "oh I'll never worry about my breast cancer returning again"  It's more like I woke up this morning after such a lovely evening last night and my mind did not immediately look at my breasts and say "you really CAN tell a difference"

So I'll regale you with our dinner at The Farmhouse Inn.   Oh my goodness!  The menu changes daily.  And the wine list - wow, just wow - 20 pages of wonderful wine selections.  We (well actually me) decided on a lovely Neil Ellis Sauvignon Blanc from South Africa.  I chose it for 2 reasons 1) it was realitively inexpensive at $38 a bottle and 2) I've heard that South Africa is an up and coming wine making country. 

 And when I say relatively I mean they had another Sauvignon Blanc for $100.  Their most expensive bottle was $550.  Yes $550 a a 750ml bottle of wine.  French naturally.  Pomerol, Chateau Lafleur, Bordeaux, France 1998.  A merlot no less, the world's most whimpy wine.

LR and I both had cold spring pea soup, yum while Gary had a radichhio salad.  I opted for the pork tenderloin, LR halibut and Gary lamb.  I wish I had thought to bring the menu home as these "descriptions" do not BEGIN to do the meal justice.  For dessert we shared a cheese plate and I had a glass of Niepoort tawny port. Then back we went to Gary's house for decaf, biscotti and more talk.  We covered the family, news, politics, the envirnoment AND religion.  Also books, many, many books because all 3 of us are big readers.  Gary used to be the Director of  the Summer Sessions program at UCB (the dean of summer sessions as it were) so he always has finds to tell us about.  We also planned out next big dinner outing with friend Judah (the ULTIMATE FOODIE) to Chez Panisse in Berkeley.  We're doing it in September as a reward for us having lived through a month with a 16 year old and Gary living through 3 weeks of his grandchildren (13, 12 & & 7) 2 of those weeks without their mother.

In weather related news

It is 7 pm here in sunny Healdsburg and a mere 94 degrees. I still have a load of laundry to do because I need a dress to wear to an "affair" tomorrow.  At least it's drip dry so no dryer involved.

 After we got home from the farmers market this morning we all headed into the bedroom because that's were the air conditioner lives.  LR and I read.  The dog slept.  The cats slept/talked/moaned/wanted in/wanted out/wanted back in.  Rinse and repeat.

I've decided to invent a cat door opener.  It works like this cat walks to door, cat yells at door, door opens, cat walks through, door shuts, cat yells at door, door opens, cat walks through, door shuts, repeat as necessary.  Our cats never quietly walk up to us and say hello could you please open the door to let me out and then as soon as you've shut the door will you open it so I can come back in thank you very much.  No, each of them stands at the door and cusses like a sailor in the sure belief that this will get the door to do their bidding.  And you know what, eventually the door DOES do their bidding with a little help from some one with thumbs.

The 'affair' tomorrow is the Pinot Family Reunion.  It's an expensive fundraiser for the Breast Care Center, but an oh so lovely one.  At $80 a ticket it features high end Pinot Noirs along with appetizers, upscale personages and lots of schmoozing.  LR and I get in free in return for volunteering for a couple of hours.  Nice work if you can get it.  It's just the whole dress part that I'm not looking forward to.  Well actually not the dress part as I live in cotton sundresses in the summer it's the fancy dress part. However I draw the line at pantyhose.

The week that was

It finally finished yesterday with a Father's Day party that was thankfully just down the road.  From that party I received the following assignments - call the Healdsburg Fire Department to get our water tender repaired.  The tax assessment for what was to be Dry Creek Volunteer Fire Department goes to Healdsburg.  So the question is what are they doing with that money?  And remind neighbor Roberta to contact her neighbors to see if they're interested in forming a group to apply for the Sudden Oak Death fire protection grant.

Thursday was a busy, messy day and Friday was equally so and hot besides.  A trip to Target, Costco, Trader Joe's.  Then home to make a salad for FWF.  A wonderful Asian Pear and Avocado Salad with Garam Masala Syrup.  OUTSTANDING.

Saturday was up early, out of the house sort of early so we could get some papers notarized.  The papers we tried to get notarized earlier in the week.  We couldn't again.  Then heading down to Gilroy for Eric's party.  I must remember to write about Eric in the next couple of days, he was 18 on June 8 and didn't get his birthday tribute.  Then back home Saturday night because we had a party to go to yesterday.

Then up today, laundry for a couple of hours until it got to hot to run the dryer.  Some slash and burn cooking and a semi cleaning of the kitchen because the new dishwasher is being installed this afternoon.  The slash and burn cooking because Chase is helping Larry install the dishwasher and as thanks I'm cooking dinner.  So Bev, Chase, Larry and I will have a cozy dinner with a cheese course first.  Bacco Shrimp (recipe from Bacco Restaurant in New Orleans) and coleslaw.  Then Vanilla Ice Cream with spiced rum butterscotch sauce.

I think I might actually get to do one of my favorite things tomorrow which is lay in bed and read for a couple of hours after I wake up.  Joy!

Then I will resume my rant about politics, healthcare, stupid people, you know the usual.

Bye.

We did something fun today.

We went to a place called Dinner my Way and made ourselves some entrees.  They provide everything, you just scoop, measure, etc. and place in the the appropriate container (mostly zip-lock bags).  Everything is portioned correctly, the ingredients are organic and prechopped.  What's not to like?

The main ingredients are frozen you once you've assembled an entree they have freezers on-site to keep your bags cold.  We then tossed them in the cooler we had brought, whisked them home (well Sonoma County's version of whisk) and put them in the freezer.  Voila at least 12 meals in the freezer.

The company executive chef is Lisa Hemingway, no not that Hemingway.  She was a local and very talented chef here in Sonoma Co for years.  She had her own restaurant for a long time and people were sad to see it go.

The menu changes every month with chicken, pork, beef and seafood selections.  As we eat lots of chicken we came home with lots of chicken.  Lemon & dill, satay, quesadillas, enchilada stack and raspberry-chipoltle.  Yum.

I'm glad I'm not the only one

That feels as if she's totally changed because of cancer.  Thanks Nikki.

I was trying to explain to a friend last night that I was angry all the time about having breast cancer.  She asked why and I really couldn't offer a good explanation - just that I am.  I think part of it is I was too frightened at the time to be angry and it's now caught up with me.  I know part of it is the anger about having chemo.  Putting all those horrible chemicals in my body so I could make it better, how ironic!

So here I sit with my anger, not seething today, and a slight headache because I partied too, too much last night.  But oh it was fun.  Fine Wine Friday Saturday night.  We hosted so we even have a clean house.  I did have to re-vacuum where my beloved had vacuumed because my idea of clean is actually removing the visible dog hair from the rug while his is to apparently wave the wand over the rug and declare the dog hair immovable.  I can laugh at that today, yesterday I was ready to kill him.

Food, glorious food

Roasted veggies, almost any veggies.  Asparagus, broccoli and green beans are especially good.  Toss them with a bit of olive oil, salt and pepper. Put them in the oven at 400.  Cook for 8 to 10 minutes and voila!  DaVero Estate Meyer Lemon olive oil is a winner.

Waffles.  We decided to buy a new waffle iron after visiting a small cafe in Roseville and having wonderful Belgian waffles for breakfast.  Cooking.com has this one on sale.  Note: if you register at ebates.com you can get a rebate of 6%.  I almost always cruise by ebates to see if they have what I'm looking for.  So far I've received $1, 043.64 in rebates.

Our first try was spicy ricotta waffles.  Oh my goodness!  They were wonderful, we had them with chicken thighs that I sprinkled with cinnamon, chili, garlic and onion powders then grilled.  Add some roasted broccoli and you're in business. 

Tonight it's a steak recipe I got when we had dinner at the Inn of the Anasazi years ago.  The steak is flavored with coriander, chili, cinnamon and garlic.  It's served with white cheddar mashed potatoes with chipotle.   I'm including roasted asparagus. Yum.

We're now doing a good job of getting veggies in our diet so it's on to fruit smoothies to include more fruit.  I decided dieting isn't all that bad.  Since losing weight is one of the best ways to reduce the chance of cancer coming back I'm working on it.

The state of ...

the breast - swollen and tender yet again.  Got to make an appointment with the lympodema specialist

the mind - surprisingly good.  I've let go of the election until we have a candidate, the war because until we get a Democrat in the White House nothing will change, anger and depression left on their own.

the body - well we talked about that a couple of days ago

the feet - recovering.  I wore new shoes last week for a day before I decided they really were a 1/2 size too small then wore a different pair of shoes 3 days in a row because they were on only other shoes I'd packed.  Poor, poor feet.

the refrigerator - filled with disgustingly healthy food.    We actually had a complete meal last night.  Petrale sole, roasted potatoes and roasted asparagus.  Yea asparagus season!  Yea petrale sole season.  LR could eat it every night.