Portobellos and a wee kitchen table

I'm slowwwwwwwly cleaning up my room today, so I can throw out my falling apart book shelves and move in some wood ones (mostly inherited from my bro when he moved.)

I haven't been cooking much because, with all the moving around of furniture, my kitchen was messy. But I now make it the priority room to clean and fix up, so that I can sustain myself while doing other activities. ;-) Today I made pancakes, portobello hamburgers, and prepped a bunch of rhubarb to make dessert tomorrow.

A friend once made grilled portobellos and they were SO good, that I was excited to see a recipe for them in my latest cookbook splurge: Get It Ripe by Jai Steele. I even found wee portobellos that would fit nicely in hamburger buns.

The big trick, though, was my determination to use my indoor grill. Mother bought this for us I think around our wedding, since grilling was a Fine Tradition on that side of the family. (My grandfather was a great cook in general, including the barbie, and I remember one summer visiting my mother where all we ate was boston broils on the BBQ.)

I took the grill out to use once, when I first got it, and was overwhelmed by the directions. It's FULL of warnings. Don't do this! Wash it like this! Do this the first time! Most alarming was the message that it was going to smoke for the first 15 minutes, the first time it was used. wtf! That's the one that threw me off all this time. I don't have anywhere to cook on my balcony, and I didn't want a smoke filled home!

Anyway, I decided it's time to try out the barb, since I'm all about The Cooking. I read the instructions about 5 times through. Washed all the parts and carefully dried it. Found that I could stand it evenly on my stove--where there's an oven fan in case of smoking. I got the big fan and pointed it into the kitchen, towards the open balcony door. All Ready.

And then there was pretty much no smoke. So the spell has been broken and I can use the barb. I've discovered that the main thing needed for using appliances is convenience--if they're set out in convenient places, I'll use them. I just reorganized my kitchen so that I have two long shelves with all my appliances neatly set out.

Anyway... here are my photos from The Big Barb Attempt! After 11 years, finally christened. And I must say the burgers were great--better than any vegan burger recipes I've tried making, which always fall apart.

Fernando is now about to try them. I haven't informed them that they're made of portobellos, which I kept hidden all day while they were marinating. He hates mushrooms. I'm hoping to fool him. ...I'm back. Didn't fool him. Out for mushroom burgers, though he was a good sport. I made him a fruit smoothie as recompense.

We also took this little kitchen table from my brother. I was dithering over whether to take it, but with a jolly table cloth and my old chairs (which I painted and upholstered a long time ago, and I love them) it's been a great addition to the kitchen.
[That damn kid is pointing his laser pointer into our apt again. If only he'd shine it towards the floor so Haley could chase it.]

A lovely day and obedience to authority

Loo loo loo... sitting on my balcony which at this time of day is shaded. There's a cool breeze. A cat to my right, a cat to my left. Reading the health articles in nyt.com... ahh...

Mind you, I'm reading about the Milgram electric shock experiments--weee. Here's an interesting slideshow of photos from the experiments, which I'd never seen. The article--about how people are still studying the experiments today--is here.

Randomness from the Meowee East

If cats had their way, they would spend their entire lives up in the air. Maybe that's what they're shouting at the birds from the window each morning. "Take me with you!"


Sherry asleep with his head against the water bowl. He would occasionally lean in and take a drink.

Empty chairs and empty tables (as they say in Les Miz) (except it's not cause everyone died from fighting in a revolution)

Well yesterday Fernando and I (mostly the brave Fernando) finished clearing out Pablo's apartment. Some things he ran out of time to take out, or that we'd decided to keep. (I even exchanged his kitchen sink plug for the one in our apt, that's always been broken. A scavenger til the end!)

It sort of depressed both of us being over there. I think for Fernando it was more a mourning of the passage of the marriage--he hates to see people break up. For me, it was a bit broader... just 11 years of shared history. It's very strange to go through a place that's all empty, when you have memories if New Years, or movie watching, or standing in doorways having long conversations, or playing pop bottle with dear departed Bantha Rottweiler, and of just hanging with Pablo and Delyriam and Tonga. That's basically a 3rd of my life! I don't like the idea of someone else living there--I will give Rude Stares when the new renters move in.

Here is our last look at 108

The last time fiddling with that fracking lock.
(Okay won't miss that.)

Entering the empty abode.

Well empty except for a microwave we left, and a wine glass peeking out.

No embellishments to liven up the 70s yellow (which I guess should be coming back in style any time now.)

A lone hanger.

Fernando looks for the occupants, but they are gone... gone...

But he consoles himself with Warcraft on his new
(from Pablo) desktop.

illustrated edition

I was too tired yesterday to upload the pics from my day.

Here's the village.


Here's the last thing Pablo had the most trouble parting with. He collected these in childhood, never used them, kept them as a nice little collection. (I forget where they were from. 7 11?)

His favourite.

Here Fernando and Pablo remove the last big piece of furniture, the ole couch. Why don't they make couches to fit through doors? Or doors that expand when people move crap!
Here Pablo pulls a Gookie while scrubbing down the white board. That board hung in their apartment for as long as I can remember, with every conceivable phone number, written in different colours, at angles, in corners, jammed up against each other. The last evidence of the Old Life.

And here he is throwing it away. Most of the stuff piled in front of the skip were P's -- whenever there's something we think someone might want to take, we leave it in front of the skip, not in. Already people have taken away, among other things, a TV, a Godzilla doll, a doggy cookie jar; and of this lot, everything's been taken except the couch, which is all in pieces anyway (Fernando kept the cushions) and the chest of drawers. We're all so hard up on this block, it's not hard to give your things away.
And this pic just because it's cute. Sherry sitting on his favourite bench, pulled up to the dishwasher to eat.

Alone again... naturally?

Haven't been online today or yesterday. Brother Pablo is moving to Vancouver (in about an hour). Fernando and I are taking some of his things (lots of book shelves, some other stuff) so that fact finally spurred me to do The Great Apartment Reorg that's been due for a long while. I still have a lot to do, but most of the major pieces are in place.

Taking down all my books, throwing out my olllld shelves that are falling apart, replacing them, and replacing the books will be the longo part. Though always kind of fun. What book lover doesn't revel in her own books? But luckily I got rid of a LOT of them last summer and this year.

Anyway, Fernando's been helping me, which only happens about once in 5 years because it's all very traumatic for him. Luckily I'd gone to the Pointe Claire village and done a bunch of shopping, so we had grapes and cherries to keep our sugar levels up.

We helped Pablo bring all kinds of stuff down to the garbage, and then I made vegan chocolate milk shakes.

*

We just saw Pablo off to the taxi. It was very strange and sad. I'm used to saying goodbye to people because I've moved a lot in life, so I'll adapt... but goodbyes are sad all the same. Now there's no friendly neighbour down the hall, just me and Fernando and the kitties.

I told Sherry to stop playing with Nombly's tail.

So he chose to nap on it instead.