I know. I'm sorry. November is such a crazy month, with the holidays coming up and all that entails. We are having the usual family group for Thanksgiving, minus Jill and John since she can't get the time off. They will be missed. But things have got to get done for that. I really need to get the Halloween decorations put away and at least some Christmas up. There are those who are coming who are disappointed if I don't. Not sure why, as they don't really change much year to year.

And, for the second year in a row, I lost my sanity- or what little of it I have left!- and decided to do NaNoWriMo again. 50,000 words in 30 days. It's going ok, really, but I have to keep going or it won't get done. And, for some reason, I decided to blog it this year. In a separate blog, so as not to bore anyone. So I have that to update as well. I must be nuts! LOL

My piano teacher canceled our lesson this week. She may have H1N1. Swell. Probably got it from the kids at school. Makes me glad I don't interact with people all that much these days. I don't get sick, or rarely anyway. And I'd like to keep it that way!

I got some book recommendations today. Hoping to go look for some next week. Not that I need more books or anything. I still have over a shelf full to get through, but can you really have too many? I think not.

End of the day. Time for a little relaxing. I'll be back. Soon. Promise.

Wow. Seems like it was just summer- or what we had of a summer! But the leaves have changed color, there is a bite in the air and we've had snow! Ok, nothing that stayed on the ground, but there was white stuff falling from the sky.

Chili season has wrapped up for another year. As always, Worlds was fun. Charleston, WV this year. A first for the East. Weather was, well, fall in the East. Friday, the 9th, was humid and gray, then humid and sunny, then humid and gray, then.... You get the picture. The BaldMan cooked in the Last Chance competition then. Rain was forecast, and it held off until the last cook brought their chili to the judging tent. Then the skies let go with sheets and torrents! And a few minutes later, the wind started. We were all soaked, holding on to canopies for dear life and just trying to keep things from blowing away. A few canopies went over, some lost their covers, but I don't think any real damage was done. Our booth decorations were completely soaked. I had cats all over the hotel room, drying out! Most people took it in stride and just dealt with it. One of the scorekeepers posted a video on Facebook of the judges tent. You can see several people on each pole of the big party type tent, holding them down, and the top is just undulating with the wind. We had dinner that night with friends who were in the tent and they said they really don't know what would have happened if that big tent had gone over and taken all the chili with it! It ended in time for the winning announcements. Unfortunately, the BaldMan was not one of the ten who advanced to the finals on Sunday.

Saturday morning, the 10th, was better. The rain had stopped. It was Salsa and Chile Verde time. We were both happy with our Salsas, and I honestly cooked the best damn pot of Verde I ever have. But neither of us made finals in either category. I got 1 point for my Salsa and 0 for my Verde. Disappointing, but not unusual. Lots of good cooks at Worlds.

Sunday, the 11th, neither one of us was cooking. It was fun in a way, because we didn't have to do all that set up and cooking and tearing down, but it was also a disappointing feeling not cooking. We did sign up to judge, and I got picked to judge the Finals table!! Wow! I didn't expect that. It was the hardest thing I've done. I've judged at Worlds before on preliminary tables, but this was far more intense. 28 chilis on the table, and 27 of them were excellent. One was just too far over the line of sweet and was (from talking to them after) eliminated by most of the judges right away. Not only were the rest of them good- which you would expect since all of those cooks were winners at some point during the season- but those of us judging that table were picking the Worlds Champion, who not only gets that title and bragging rights for a year, but the $25,000 prize, as well! Big responsibility and everyone judging took it seriously. BTW, it is blind judging- we have no idea whose chili we are tasting. No one does, until the results are tabulated. Each cook gets a team number, which is written on the bottom of the cup you turn in. The cups are placed on the tables randomly, without anyone looking at the bottom at all, and then the Chief Judge can go around and rearrange cups, as well. A number from 1 to however many cups there are is then written on the side of each cup, and that's the number you write on your judging sheet for 1st, 2nd, and 3rd place picks. Votes are counted (1st= 3 pts, 2nd= 2, 3rd= 1), ties, if any, are broken and only after the results are complete do the scorekeepers lift the cups and match team numbers and names to the winning places. The cup I placed first ended up winning 2nd place, so that's not bad.

We drove home in one shot on Monday, the 12th. Left WV about 8:30 or so, and got home about 10:30 at night. One stop for coffee, a lunch break which was a bit longer, and a quick stop for a sandwich for dinner. We did the drive down in two parts. Left on the 6th after the BaldMan got home from work and drove to Edison, NJ, then continued to WV on the 7th. Took Thursday, the 8th as a sightseeing/nice vacation dinner day. All in all a good trip.

The next weekend was the Hudson Valley Regional Cook Off in Kingston, NY. It's always the week after Worlds and is the first NorthEast qualifier for the new season. No wins, but the BaldMan took 2nd place in Salsa. Now we get to rest until February!

This was from the BBC's 2007 Comic Relief show. David Tennant and Catherine Tate (Donna on Dr. Who) in a skit where Tate is playing her popular schoolgirl character, Lauren Cooper from The Catherine Tate Show. I was quite amused. They play well off of each other. And it still freaks me out a bit when Tennant speaks in his natural voice (he is Scots) and not the Dr. Who accent!

Murphy and I, that is. On October 3rd, we are doing a walk-a-thon for the Humane Society of Greater Nashua, NH. And we need your help. A few facts:

The Greater Nashua Humane Society has been in existence for 109 years! That's a lot of years helping homeless, abandoned, abused and neglected animals.

June was the highest intake month ever for the Nashua shelter. 389 pets came in during the month.

Intake is up 86% over last year. Adoptions are up, but only by 23%.

The shelter is dedicated to finding permanent homes for all the animals they take in, but while they do reside at the shelter or in foster homes, they ensure food, water, toys, a warm bed and medical care for all. But it costs a lot to provide that- it cost $2, 192 each and every day to keep the shelter running. Because they receive no city, state or federal grants, no United Way funds and no funding from National Animal Welfare organizations, the Humane Society for Greater Nashua relies solely on community-wide support, our fund raising endeavors, bequeaths, general donations and in-kind gifts. Their website is http://www.hsfn.org, and the Annual Report is available there.

And that is where you come in. I'm asking all my animal loving friends to sponsor Murphy and I when we participate in the Walk-a-thon. No amount is too small, and all the volunteer, shelter workers and especially the pets appreciate it so very much. I know things are tough right now, and many people don't have a lot of extra. But that's part of the reason shelters like the Nashua Humane Society are so overburdened. Please consider helping.

I would appreciate receiving your sponsor money by the end of this month, so I can get the paperwork filled out and tally the donations. Cash, check or Paypal to mkropp@thirtytwopaws.com are all fine. Just let me know it's for the Humane Society Walk-a-thon, and give me your name and address (required for the paperwork).

I thank you for reading this and considering helping.

P.S. There will be pictures after the event. ;)

We had some pumpkin ravioli filling in the freezer. It was made last year sometime, when we made some ravioli, and we froze the extra. Today, I made more ravioli. I use Mario Batali's pasta dough recipe- 3 1/2 cups of flour and 5 eggs. I also use my wonderful Kitchen Aid mixer to do a lot of the kneading. With my tendonitis, I can't knead that stiff a dough for 10 minutes. I hand knead for that last 2 or 3 minutes. By that time, the mixer is just pushing the dough up against the sides of the bowl, anyway, and not really kneading anymore. And you really do have to work it some by hand to get the right smooth texture. I do have the pasta roller attachment for the mixer, as well, and that makes rolling the dough a snap. Now.

I used to fight with pasta dough all the time- it wouldn't roll smoothly, it tore and came out unevenly. But then I decided to just let the dough be itself and not try to force it to do things my way. And resting it for a full 30 minutes after kneading and before rolling is critical. Making pasta is not something you do on a moment's notice. It's time consuming, but so, so worth it!

I also used the scraps to cut some ragged, uneven and not very pretty wide noodles. After the second time through the roller, the dough is really starting to get too dry to work up pretty. But I didn't want to waste the pieces I had left, since there was a significant amount. I just put it through the roller to thin it out as well as possible and cut it into strips. They will be nice with a simple sauce, or even just buttered.

A couple pictures:

The pasta looks almost orange because of the beautiful color of the yolks of the fresh eggs we have been getting.







I made 6 dozen ravioli. Some will become dinner tonight with some mussels, and the rest will be frozen for future enjoyment.

Continuing our effort to try to use as little commercially processed food as possible, I've been experimenting with canning. Just water bath stuff, but at least it's something. And nothing fancy, so far, either. Some bread and butter pickles, pickle relish, giardiniera (Italian style pickled veggies), and dill pickles. I made test batches of all of them. The relish needs some work. Can't use the food processor. It chops far too finely. Next try will be the meat grinder. I think that should work. The bread and butter pickles are pretty good, as was the giardiniera, so I've "put up" a few pints of those. The dill pickle try seems like it is going to work nicely, too.

Making pickles is about the easiest thing in the world, and you don't have to put them in the canner unless you want to make a bunch and keep them for a long time. A small batch will last a good amount of time in the fridge. Cucumbers, water, vinegar, sugar for the sweet ones, spices and herbs, and that's about it. The key to keeping crispness without using alum (or pickling lime) is to cut the veggies, salt liberally and let sit for an hour. Then rinse well, put them in ice water and let sit for another hour. Drain and continue with the recipe. Even the really thin sliced bread and butter pickles are staying nice and crisp. They are really good on sandwiches. And the bonus with those is you get nice slices of pickled onion, as well.

And I've got a bucket of sauerkraut fermenting, also. I think it is going to be less harsh than the stuff you buy at the supermarket, and that will mean I will most likely enjoy it more. I never was a big fan of sauerkraut because of that strong taste. Again, simple- cabbage, salt and water. Combine, weight it to keep the cabbage submerged and let it sit for 2 weeks. (Thank you, Michael Ruhlman- the recipe is the one in Charcuterie)

A few pictures:

Bread and butter pickles:




Giardiniera:




Dill pickles:

We decided to put in a vegetable garden this year. We haven't done that in many years, but we want to try and use as much fresh, not commercially processed stuff as possible. So we bought a two level raised bed from Gardener's Supply in Burlington, VT. (http://www.gardeners.com/Two-Tier-Raised-Bed/VegetableGardening_RaisedBeds,36-389,default,cp.html) It's actually rather nice, and we think we are going to put in a second this year. I planted a whole bunch of stuff: lettuces, beans, carrots, beets, tomatoes, peppers, radishes, maybe a few more things. It hasn't been the greatest thing going, for sure. Between the damp, chilly, rainy weather this Spring and Summer started with, and the massive invasion of slugs, and just the fact that I haven't done this in a long time, we haven't gotten tremendous production. The tomatoes and peppers just sat there, shivering, for weeks. They are finally catching up. The tomato plants are good size now, and have a bunch of tomatoes starting to grow. The peppers are still smallish, but we should get peppers. The small hot pepper we put in has a lot of peppers on it. It was supposed to be a "red chile pepper," but it looks more like they will be purple now that they are starting to ripen. I've pulled a few carrots, and have more planted. I'm also planting the second round of some of the veggies.

The one thing that did extremely well was the rat's tail radishes. It's an old fashioned variety of radish that puts out edible seed pods rather than eating the roots like you do with a globe radish. They grew like crazy! The first round was getting too leggy and the pods were getting too large and woody, so I pulled them and planted a second round. We've used them in salads and I pickled some. (http://www.kitchengardeners.org/rat-tailed_radish.html)

I've gotten another copy of the Postage Stamp Garden book. I had one, but have no idea where it ended up. I'm planning on using a lot of the ideas from that next year. We also started composting kitchen waste and should have a nice amount of that to use, as well. So, just hoping next year is an improvement.

Meanwhile, we will enjoy what we do get!

When Krysta came up with Will on Wednesday, she brought us a bag of fresh, organic produce. One of the customers at the bakery/cafe where she works gave her a whole bunch and she couldn't use it all, so she brought some to us. There's a lot- onions, potatoes, carrots, lettuce, cabbage, zucchini and summer squash. Actually, more than we need, as well, but it's fresh and free, so I'm not arguing!

But that still leaves us with figuring out what to do with it. I decided I wanted to do something with some of the carrots. But, what? Carrot cake? No, too much sweet, and for once, I didn't feel like making dessert. Carrot bread? Hmm, most recipes are more like zucchini bread and are also sweet. Then I thought: "I'll bet you could put carrots in more savory, yeast bread and it would be good!" Did a little Googling and headed to the kitchen. This is the result:







I just made a single, small loaf, as it was an experiment. I used shredded carrots, some toasted sunflower seeds, and a touch of lightly sauteed scallion in addition to the usual flour, salt, yeast and water. A bit of butter and sugar rounded out the recipe. It's very light and springy, with a nice, soft texture from the butter. The taste is a bit nutty and just slightly sweet, thanks to the carrots and seeds. It does not really taste overly much like carrot. There' just a hint. And it has a light orange-y color that doesn't really show well in the pictures.

I thought it turned out pretty well for an off-the-cuff recipe.

I went to see it last night with Stephanie. We went to see it at Chunky's in Nashua, NH. Cheap admission-> $5. Of course, they expect to make their money off the food, but still, not bad. (If you don't know the Chunky's concept, they set up the theaters with long tables, big leather chairs from limousines, and a full menu. http://www.chunkys.com/) We did have dinner there, but, heck, ya gotta eat, right?

The movie: (No real spoilers here, just general comments. But if you don't want to know anything, stop reading now.)

It wasn't bad. Not great, but not bad. They left out a lot, and rearranged things a little, but the essence of the story was there. And most of the picky stuff I noticed wasn't until later. And, for me, that's the thing that makes or breaks an adaptation film. If it captures the essential basics of the story and never makes me stop actively watching to say: "What the hell?!?!?" it's pretty much a successful film.

Yeah, a few scenes were out of order or not the way they actually happened in the book, but they were acceptable. The final battle was quite extensively toned down, to the point that it almost didn't work for me. It made the whole think look far too easy. I don't know whether that was done because of the younger children that may be in the audience or whether it was a time thing (the movie was 2 1/2 hours). If the former, I think that a mistake. The books certainly got darker and less suited to young children as they went along, anyway, so to "water down" the big ending for that reason was silly. There was a lot of information and planning on the part of Harry and the rest of the opposition to Voldemort that was just not even touched on, but there again, it would have added a lot of time and non-action scenes. There was maybe a bit too much emphasis on the budding teenager romance thing and too little on the Voldemort story. All in all, it was worth seeing. I enjoyed it.

It will be interesting to see what they do with the two Deadly Hallows films.

Tuxedo (aka Dougie), semi-long hair classic tuxedo, April, 1994- July, 2009. A real sweetheart, and my baby! We've had Dougie since he was 8 weeks old. He's the one who would follow me all over the house, jump up behind me on my desk chair and put his little head on my shoulder, crawl up on our laps on the sofa and head rub under our chins, and curl up next to me on the sofa. I couldn't sit on the sofa for two minutes without him being right there. He had something pretty nasty growing up inside his nose. The vet thinks it was nasal adenocarcinoma. Steroids kept it under control for a while, but they stopped working this week. He couldn't breathe, hadn't eaten in days and last night, started sneezing blood. I just couldn't put him through any more. It was hard- really, really hard. I'm still in tears.

And he was the only one of the cats who would play with Will:



"We who choose to surround ourselves with lives even more temporary than our own, live within a fragile circle; easily and often breached. Unable to accept its awful gaps, we would still live no other way. We cherish memory as the only certain immortality, never fully understanding the necessary plan." ~ Irving Townsend

Good-bye, Dougie. I love you, and I miss you

I had to say good bye to Max the One-Eyed Wonder Cat yesterday. (He was the one in the post a few weeks back that had cancer in his throat.) The tumor was starting to affect his breathing. Not all the time, but I couldn't let him go till he was really struggling. Funny thing was, he was still eating like a horse! He had a good last day, I think. Yummy canned food, he sat in his favorite window in the sun and watched the birdies, napped on the sofa and had a long, drooling cuddle with me. (Yeah, he was a major league drooler, but yesterday, I didn't care.) When we got to the vet's, and she heard him breathing, she said, "This has to happen." Yeah, I know. It was still so very hard to make that phone call. And it pays to be a long time customer. They fit me in between appointments in the afternoon so I could stay with him. He was about 14, and we'd had him for maybe 12 of those years. It's hard to lose a long time friend.




OTOH, the pathology on the dog's surgery was good. Did I mention the dog's surgery? Oh, well, two weeks ago, on Wednesday, Murphy and I were out for our daily walk. It's warmer now, so he's panting a lot. I looked down and said, "What the heck is wrong with your tong... Oh, that's NOT your tongue!" Got home, sat him down and pried open the mouth. One good thing, that dog will let you do just about anything without issue. There was a big, bright pink growth under his tongue. Not normal. Called the vet, they got us in on Friday, and she said (I knew this) it was going to have to go. From what she could tell, there was no infiltration in the bone of the jaw, nor anything in the throat, and his lymph nodes were not inflamed. All good, because some mouth tumors in dogs are very, very bad news. She did the surgery and I picked him up later that afternoon.

{Side note: Labrador Retriever on anesthesia is pretty comical. I mean, I felt sorry for him, but he looked like a drunken sailor coming down the hall at the vet's. I had to boost him up into the car, and help him get onto the seat. I had the van, but would he lay on the floor where he'd not have to climb? Uh, no.}

But the lab report said it was a benign granuloma, which from what our vet tech daughter says, is not uncommon in dogs who like bones and sticks. We think what happened is that at some point, when he crunched a bone to nothing, as he is wont to do, some shards of bone got lodged in the soft tissue under the tongue. They would not work out by themselves, so the body formed the mass of immune cells around it. He's all recovered now. I do have to check his mouth every few weeks to make sure nothing else is happening. One more thing to go along with checking between his toes for allergic reactions, the ears for infections.... Good thing he's a good and patient dog!

All in all, it's been a long couple weeks. Two friends lost, Murphy in surgery, and then Max. I'm emotionally wrung out right now. I would like an up period, now, please. Or at least a neutral stretch.

We are off in a few minutes to go to the Connecticut Hospice in Branford, to see a good friend who is rapidly losing a battle with lung cancer. He's one of our chili cook family, and the nicest guy you would ever want to meet. He is, at this stage, not going to be with us long. In many ways, I don't want to go, but I know I would be more upset if I don't.

I cannot imagine what his family is going thru.

My heart is very heavy today.

I should have posted this Friday, but the lawn service guys cut our phone cable with the trimmer when they were here, so I had no phone and no internet till the nice Fairpoint man came and fixed it yesterday!

Anyway, I got these pretty flowers delivered from Steph:




Mini roses and daisies with a big happy balloon!

Thanks, Steph!

Yesterday afternoon, there was a knock on the door. I answerd it and a very nice man gave me a bag with a box of this inside:




From Kryss, Kleber and Will. Mmmm. Happy Mommy!

Perhaps. I'm going to try a holistic, alternative treatment for Max. Basically, it's an herbal supplement that MAY help. I did some investigating, and this is one of the supplements that appears to possibly help, in many cases. There's a lot of crap out there, of course, and you do have to sort thru the bogus nonsense, but this company (and one other, tho their stuff is currently out of stock, so...) seem legit.

http://www.nativeremedies.com/petalive/

I'm putting him on their C-Caps. They have a whole bunch of herbs that I know from my own interest in herbal therapies and such can be beneficial. Whether they have the tumor shrinking effect that some of their customers claim remains to be seen. The company itself says they make no cancer cure claims for it, but that clinical trials are encouraging. I figure, at this point, it can't hurt. I mean, not only can I not afford the radiation and/or chemo that are traditional treatments, but this carcinoma doesn't generally respond to radiation, and the chemo- well, at Max's age, that probably would be worse on him than the cancer. Worst case, I'm out a few bucks. Best case- well, we can only hope. I just think it's worth a try.

Crazy? Probably. But Max is worth a little crazy.

I just took Max, our 14 year-old orange and white tabby to the vet. He's been losing weight lately. It wasn't good news. He has a very aggressive carcinoma in his throat. It's partially blocking the throat, and since he has no teeth left, he has not been able to eat the dry food well. The tumor is just visible if you pry his mouth open. And is invading the soft palate, and is into the lymph nodes, as well. Prognosis in bad- maybe a few months before he can't eat at all. We went through this with another cat, many years ago.

Max was a rescued feral cat, who was living in a shopping cart in the lot of an abandoned building. He was trapped and pulled from there because some half-brained kids shot out one of his eyes with a bb gun. He recovered from that fine, tho he did lose the eye. He also has a kink in his tail, a broken toe so that he can't retract that claw, and his ears are all notched. But he's lived here, as a pampered, indoor cat for many years. And despite all he's been thru, he is a complete sweetheart! Loves to be petted and fussed over, will drool all over you in pure happiness, and is just a nice cat.

I'm sitting here, teary-eyed. I'm going to miss him.

Have been busily working on getting the garden set up. The raised bed frames came last week. I ordered them on Wednesday, and they were at the door on Thursday AM. Granted, they were only coming from VT, but I did not expect one day service. Nice surprise.
(Gardener's Supply Company, http://www.gardeners.com)

We set them up on Sunday and filled them with soil, humus and manure. Really nice set up. It's 4x8, and divided in half with one half 6" deep, the other 12". Also came with the poles and stuff for a hoop frame, so we can put netting over it later if need be, and next year, I will be able to start cool weather stuff much earlier, as we will be able to put plastic over it and make a cold frame. It will be intensive raised bed gardening, so we plan to pack a whole lot of stuff into it.

I have lettuces, spinach, collards, beets and carrots planted out there now. More greens started indoors, as well as cucumbers, tomatoes and peppers. Onion sets will go out soon, as will beans. Now, if the stuff would just GROW! I'm impatient- I want my nice, fresh veggies now!!

The daffodil bulbs that I bought late last year, and then lost and didn't get planted started to sprout in the bag (after I found them!). So I put them into planters. One is near the pond, the other on the front porch. The pond set is blooming and the other is not far behind. Will get those planted in the fall.

Also took the hardier pond plants out of the basement and put them in a tub of water outside to take advantage of the warm sun during the day. They still get covered at night, and the lily is still in the basement. But all are showing green, so that is a good thing. I got the patch for the pond liner, and I can see the tears, so I just need to get out there, drain most of the water, clean it up and put the patch on. Then the filter can go back online and the netting can come off. Hardy plants (reeds and pickerel rushes) will go in then. Don't know what I'm going to add this year. Maybe some mini cattails and canna. We'll see.

Meanwhile, clean up of the rest of the yard has slowed down. We had a string of rainy days here. I really need to start working on the front again. I want to pretty much pull out all the foundation plantings and start over. Only one side this year, I think. And the areas around the veggie garden where the day lilies are need some work, too. It will keep me busy!

A couple pics from the Frozen North (which is thawing nicely now):

(With apologies to those on Facebook who may see these same pics twice. They're pretty! LOL)

For those unsure if Spring is Springing, these are swelling buds on the forsythia bush. There is also just a hint of yellow visible now:



And look what bloomed in the front yard!