Day 76 of out captivity: Big bag o’ cheese

Sorry it’s been a few days...I keep hoping others in the house will chime in and do some of these.  There have been things going on:  the kid’s last week of high school classes (complete with pulling an all-nighter to finish one last project), the arrival of Chad’s inexpensive bandsaw, the misbehavior and deconstruction of the espresso machine, the continued 4am yowlfest  saga of Bobber vs the neighbor cat Stripo, and more.  Maybe you will hear more about those later as the stories develop.

For now, the joy of the week was that my long-standing favorite cheese/vegetable/weird-fancy-food market The Milk Pail, which closed up shop about a year ago, has resuscitated itself as a pop-up market in these pandemic times.  You put in an online order on Tuesday for either a small bag, a large bag, or a specialty bag, and the they give you a time slot to pick things up at a tent outside a small warehouse in an obscure industrial pocket of Mountain View on the weekend.  This week’s specialty bag was a festival of cheeses with accompaniments, so that was what I picked.

This afternoon, I drove over at my assigned time with my order number taped to the window, got in line, and picked up the bag of yum.

Whereas I would have picked out a weirder set of cheeses If left to my own devices, what we got promises to be good, and I am happy to see them back in business.  And now I have my source for good vanilla and frozen chocolate croissant dough again!

Day 71 of our captivity: Back yard holiday

Today we pretended to be on vacation.  Given that it was over 90, I decided to make dinner outside.  I had a plethora of high-end ingredients on hand, so we decided to pretend we were vacationing in France.

Fancy organic chicken butterflied and cooked on the grill sandwiched between two cast iron skillets with herbs de Provence—sort of a riff on “chicken cooked under a brick”.  It was beautiful...and yummy.

The rendered chicken fat was then deglazed and distributed between the two pans so I could cook the chard+leeks from the veg box and the lightly floured model mushrooms from the farmer’s market.

I sliced up some leftover olive sourdough, made a green salad, and served it all up with a bottle of rose.  Instant backyard vacation.

Day 70 of our captivity: Car wash

Kid complained that car was dirty.  Mom said “ Ok, you can wash the car”.  I’m sure this is an example of parenting brilliance, empowering kid to solve complaint.

Kid washed car.  Yay kid!  Upon parental inspection, one parent said “Oooooh shiny!”.  Other parent said “But water spots!  It wasn’t lovingly dried off with a chamois.”  First parent cluelessly responded with honest “Who dries off their car in any way other than driving around the block???” reaction.

We have different strategies.  Either way, we are grateful that good kid washed the car.

Day 69 of our captivity: Cracks in the captivity

This morning, we took a small step towards emerging from our isolation.  Nothing major, nothing unwise, nothing unallowed.  But new for us.  And sort of nice.

I woke up early and bugged Chad to take a walk with me.  So far that is pretty much the new normal. Today, however, we walked *to* somewhere.  The espresso machine at home is having emotional problems, having cracked from the strain of so much extra use over the last couple of months, and while we have other ways of making coffee substances at home, I thought it would be nice to walk to downtown and get coffee.

It was lovely and quiet out.  When we got to the coffee shop we found that they had a table set up at the door for online orders only, so I downloaded the app, made an order, and 8 minutes later the fancy coffee magically appeared.  Next time, I will know the drill and make the order a couple of blocks before we get there.  There was a good spot outside in the downtown plaza to sit and sip.

As we drank our coffee, it occurred to me that it was farmers market day, so we wandered down Murphy to see how they were managing that, and to our surprise and delight, it was calm, well-laid out and not at all busy at the early hour that we were there.  The organizers have spread everything out over a much larger area than normal, everyone was masked,  and individual booths have figured out ways to minimize and or eliminate contact.  We bought some berries and fancy mushrooms, and walked back home, savoring the happy discovery.  It may just have to become a new habit!

Day 68 of our captivity: Sign

Kiddo got to swing by the high school this afternoon after finishing the online AP Statistics test to pick up the somewhat unnecessary cap and gown that was ordered last fall.  On getting there, however, there was great joy derived from the surprise that the PTSA was giving out yard signs for all the graduating seniors.  Apparently kid had been harboring secret jealousy of all the kids from other schools whose yard signs we have been seeing while out on bike rides.

Day 66 of our captivity: Big Basin

Chad and I had the chance to get out for a good ride this afternoon:  up, over the ridge through the soggy fog, down the other side, around 236 through Big Basin, back up the absurdly-steep-full-of-bike-eating-potholes China Grade, and back up and over now-sunny highway 9 to home.  Several observations:
1) The weather forecast always underestimates the magnitude of the soggy fog.  Trees make their own rain in the soggy fog.  Your bike shorts can be soaked through in the soggy fog, all while the forecast blithely says 70 degrees and sunny.
2) The road through Big Basin is always amazing, but often full of park traffic.  When the park is closed, all that is left is the amazing — an undulating twisty road weaving  through the giant redwoods.  It is a real pleasure to ride.
3) China Grade is as steep and potholed as I remembered.  I always think “The pavement must not be as bad as I remember”, and then it is.  The woods are still gorgeous though, and we like riding on roads that it feels like time forgot.
4) There are too many cars driving too fast on 9.  More than usual for a normal weekday.  Not that anything is normal at the moment.
5) 60 miles on a bike with 6500 feet of climbing followed by a large burger and a margarita makes for a fine day!

Day 65 of our captivity: Free doughnuts

The kid pointed out that today Krispy Kreme was giving out free doughnuts to graduating seniors who showed up to get them, so we drove over to Mountain Viee early and the kid got in line wearing “Class of 2020” regalia.  After a brief wait, the treats were procured.  I cracked up when we opened the box.

Class of 2200.  Hmmm.  That is going to be a long time...

We fixed it, and then promptly ate a couple.  These things are truly sugar bombs.

Day 64 of our captivity: Slight relaxation in sight

A few more businesses around here will be able to open for curbside pickup starting on Friday.  Not enough to feel normal, but probably enough to make the traffic increase.  I can already hear more cars on the nearby streets.  Alas, it will still be quite some time before schools are opened, much less fun activities like inviting friends over for dinner, using the climbing gym or singing with other people.

Day 63 of our captivity: leftover casserole

Tuna noodle casserole was on the menu tonight.  For any normal person, this is straightforward:  dump tuna, noodles, and cream of mushroom soup in a dish and bake.  However, as you well know, we are not normal.  The complicating factors this time (which are normal for us) were:

1) no canned soup in the house

2) leftovers I wanted to use up

You see where this is going...

I ended up making an enriched white sauce to use up the old separated container of cream that emerged from the back of the fridge, and then mixing in a glop of leftover pesto.  After that, I added two cans of tuna, leftover cabbage+spinach, and a jar of marinated artichoke hearts.  For the starch, rather than cooking pasta I threw in leftover millet that had been cooked in duck stock with onion/carrot/celery, and the topped the whole thing with breadcrumbs made out of a stale heel of sourdough.

Way better than “normal” casserole.  Even the teenager concurred :)