![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
Jul. 23rd, 2006 08:10 am
it is so, so hot
It's only 8AM, and I woke up at 7AM because of the heat. Every year, around this point, I start cursing the fact that no one in the Bay Area bothers to install air conditioning, because people think, "Oh, well, it's just a few days a year." It's not. This weather has been scorching for the past couple of weeks, especially on the peninsula. I'm not even staying in my apartment because it's so stuffy.
Today I'm going to attempt to make ratatouille, which is also the name of the next Pixar movie. I'm going to make it with the giant zucchini from my mom's garden, and will be heading out to the farmer's market soon. I love going to the farmers' markets, and I always try to check them out wherever I am. I've noticed, though, that no one has as good a selection as we do here. ^_^ My mom's garden, though, yields the best stuff. One of the reasons my parents bought the house in Oakland was because the back yard was huge. The previous owners grew grapes, which I think were used for making wine - my parents said they weren't good for eating. We used to have a pomegranate tree, but my dad chopped that down. My dad chopped down the apple tree, too, even though we ate from that a lot. For a while my mom took really good care of it - my mom would leave our leftovers around the tree, and it would decompose (I doubt she knows what "proper" composting is), and we'd have the juiciest apples every spring. After a while, though, she got tired of it. Now my mom grows green beans, zucchini, green onions, and other vegetables that I don't know the name for in English. Last year she had the best tomatoes, but I don't think she had any this year.
I just renewed my subscription to Fine Cooking magazine. Sure, it's expensive, but I've gotten so much out of every issue, and I learn so much from it, that I think it's worth the cost. It's only recently that I've been able to switch my thinking from "this is fricking expensive" to "hmm, how much will I get out of this?" in order to justify my consumption. It's still messing with my head, because for so long cost was the number one factor in what I decided to get. Like, I freaked when Mark decided to buy his big-screen TV. And a surround sound system on top of that. Even though it's not my purchase, and even though Mark did tons of research for months to find the best product, all I could see was that is was a lot of $$$$ going away. In the end, though, I have to say that I LOVE his TV, and it's something we use almost every day, and now I think it's mostly paid for itself.
Today I'm going to attempt to make ratatouille, which is also the name of the next Pixar movie. I'm going to make it with the giant zucchini from my mom's garden, and will be heading out to the farmer's market soon. I love going to the farmers' markets, and I always try to check them out wherever I am. I've noticed, though, that no one has as good a selection as we do here. ^_^ My mom's garden, though, yields the best stuff. One of the reasons my parents bought the house in Oakland was because the back yard was huge. The previous owners grew grapes, which I think were used for making wine - my parents said they weren't good for eating. We used to have a pomegranate tree, but my dad chopped that down. My dad chopped down the apple tree, too, even though we ate from that a lot. For a while my mom took really good care of it - my mom would leave our leftovers around the tree, and it would decompose (I doubt she knows what "proper" composting is), and we'd have the juiciest apples every spring. After a while, though, she got tired of it. Now my mom grows green beans, zucchini, green onions, and other vegetables that I don't know the name for in English. Last year she had the best tomatoes, but I don't think she had any this year.
I just renewed my subscription to Fine Cooking magazine. Sure, it's expensive, but I've gotten so much out of every issue, and I learn so much from it, that I think it's worth the cost. It's only recently that I've been able to switch my thinking from "this is fricking expensive" to "hmm, how much will I get out of this?" in order to justify my consumption. It's still messing with my head, because for so long cost was the number one factor in what I decided to get. Like, I freaked when Mark decided to buy his big-screen TV. And a surround sound system on top of that. Even though it's not my purchase, and even though Mark did tons of research for months to find the best product, all I could see was that is was a lot of $$$$ going away. In the end, though, I have to say that I LOVE his TV, and it's something we use almost every day, and now I think it's mostly paid for itself.
Tags: