A Rising Crisis

For dinner we had barbequed spare ribs and curly fries.  I watched the Pioneer Woman make curly fries using her spiralizer and it looked so easy I decided to try it.

First, I could not find the blade I had used the first time (the spiralizer comes with five blades) and so I used a different one which gave me a long spiral which was about 1/2 in width and flat.  Then I tried the only other blade I could find and it gave me more real looking spirals, but they were about 1/16" thick and it was worse than trying to deep fry Angel Hair pasta.

But the potato flavor was there (and this morning Walt found the other 3 blades, so I will try again).

The reason for mentioning this is that I had to heat a deep pan of oil to cook them and when I was finished -- what do you do with all that oil?  So I decided to make donuts.  Now, I've been wanting to make apple cider donuts since we went to Apple Hill and I found a good recipe.  I even bought the proper donut pans to bake them in.  But those are baked and I wanted to make yeasty fried donuts.

I set the alarm to get up at 5, but when 4:45 rolled around I decided I could wait until 6.  At 6 I got up and got my bread maker out (I had to put it away ever since the Instant Pot arrived) and got all of the ingredients except the yeast in the pot.  Then I went to the fridge and looked for the yeast.  No yeast.  I could have sworn I bought yeast, but I guess not.  So by 6:30, I was at the store buying yeast. 

 

Got that added to the bread maker and then noticed an unopened jar of yeast on the counter, where I'd put it after I bought it a few weeks ago.  Now I'm definitely set up for yeast!

Something was wrong with the bread maker.  I could get it to turn on, but not to set for the "dough" cycle, so I set the timer on the stove to remember to remove it before it started baking.

In spite of everything, they turned out fine and I decided to just make sugar donuts since glaze is too sweet for me these days.  I was a little heavy handed on the sugar on some of the donuts but they were delicious.

 

In the late morning I went off to Cindy's office to get a small cavity filled.  I actually like it when I 

have dental work to be done because then Cindy and I have an hour to chat, which we don't have when the hygienist cleans my teeth.  We had a nice visit and I'm all filled up for the next four months.

In the evening we were going to see Book of Mormon but we stopped at DeVere's pub in downtown Davis first.  Our friend Nancianne was having her head shaved for the seventh year in a row to raise money for children's cancer research.

 

All three of these women were having their heads shaved for the 7th year and there was a short ceremony thanking them for their donations, making them "Knights of the Bald Table."

a bit of fluff...

 

When that was done off we went to Sacramento for another uproarious production of Book of Mormon.  We were home to have Jeopardy and ice cream.  I realized that the only things I'd eaten all day were donuts and ice cream!

These mid-week openings are hell for me because it means the review must be in the newspaper mailbox first thing in the morning, so I will be up until 2:30 or 3 finishing it.

Old Baldy Again

Today our friend Nancianne Pfister had her head shaved for the third time, for the fund raiser to make money to fight childhood cancer.  We met her at DeVeer's Irish pub and I took a before picture.

We met two friends of hers inside the restaurant and we all had lunch.  She had a bowl of lamb-vegetable soup there earlier in the week and when she complained that it wasn't on today's menu, the chef quickly made some, just enough to serve all five of us.  It was, indeed, very good.

After lunch, it was time to sign in...

...and then present herself for the shearing.

In this, her third year, Nancianne has acquired a group of admirers who stood around and cheered for her.  She gave them all a jaunty wave.

Then the work began in earnest.

When it was over, organizers came up to thank her for coming and to shake her hand.  You could see from the way people looked at her (and the cheers from the crowd watching the shearing) that everybody loved her.

Time for one more wave at the cheering crowd...

And then to head home for another year, leaving behind a pile of grey hair...

This event kind of snuck up on me this time, and I never got any pre-even publicity on Facebook or in this journal so she had only raised $200 of the $300 goal she had set for herself (her first year, she raised >$1,000 without knowing I had put a plea on Facebook!).  If you feel you would like to make a donation to help end children's cancer, here is a page where you can donate to Nancianne's shearing. "Sadly, childhood cancer research is extremely underfunded, so every dollar makes a difference to these children who need your help," Nancianne says in her statement on her fundraising page.

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Walt and I went to see Chekhov's The Three Sisters tonight and, ever the picture of grace and refinement, I took a spectacular fall trying to climb up to the third level of tonight's theater. Gonna be interesting to see how my knee feels tomorrow.

Evil Costco

I couldn't figure out why I was so groggy while watching Jeopardy until I remembered that I had almost no sleep last night, unable to fall asleep until after 5 a.m., and then getting up at 7.  Normally I would have taken a nap, but it just never occurred to me.  Walt asked if I thought it was because of Peggy's letter...and yeah, I guess so.  Probably also why I'm up at 2:30 a.m. this morning writing this journal entry!  I went to sleep promptly at 10 p.m. last night and was wide awake at 1:15.  I hope that I will put myself to sleep writing this (so you can see how exciting an entry you are in for!).  I'm sure this will pass quickly.  I am really not feeling all that upset any more, but I guess my brain hasn't figured that out yet.

I took a run to Costco in the late morning.  We have one of, if not "the" largest Costcos in the countries, opening just a few miles from here a couple of years ago.  That monolith to excess!  I got used to buying in bulk when the kids were all home and it seems pretty ridiculous to continue doing it when there are just two of us, but old habits die hard. 

My plan had been to do my shopping at Costco this week, instead of the regular supermarket, but we were running out of some essential things on Sunday...and one thing you don't want to do, if you don't absolutely have to, is go to Costco on the weekend, when everyone who works is there and it is a madhouse.  So I went off to the local supermarket to buy "a few" things, intending to fill in where necessary, with a run to Costco.  (A good idea...when I got to check out yesterday, I was the only person in line!  That certainly would never have happened on a weekend day!)

Only my "few" supermarket purchases came to more than $150 so I decided to do the Costco run a bit later in the month, but I had specifically not purchased things that I knew I could get cheaper at Costco, like peanut butter, the special dog treats that I give our dogs, which I have not seen elsewhere, and the "puddle pads" that Polly is very good about peeing on, though relieving herself outside seems abhorrent to her.

Walt suggested I could just buy a few things.  And I really had all good intentions, but I am powerless over the lure of Costco.  I was doing well with just the few things I needed until I hit the meat aisle and saw the prices for the things I buy regularly.  Everything was much less than in the supermarket, but of course you have to buy in gargantuan sizes.  Thus I bought 8 pork chops, 8 lbs of ground beef, and a 5 lb lamb roast, which was easily half the price of anything I'd seen in the supermarket and will feed us for several days.

Though my cart was not heaping, as it usually is, everything I bought cost a bit and when I checked out, I had spent >$160.  I'd better not need to go to the store for at least a month, after paying $300 for groceries for two of us in the past two days!

I also stopped at nearby Michael's craft shop, intending, again, to just get a couple of things.  I needed extra strong glue sticks and some double stick tape.  I did get away for under $60, but just barely.  For someone who is not really "crafty," I certainly seem to be enticed by many things in a craft store.   My "composition journal" is coming along nicely, now nearly 70 pages long.   I love the spread I did for the Lamplighters.   

 I'm now working on pages to explain Cousins Day and include the rules to "65."

In the late afternoon, Walt and I went to visit our friend, about whom I wrote when we went to watch her having her head shaved as a fundraiser for the Baldrick Foundation's fund raiser to raise funds to fight children's cancer.

She had called me a couple of days ago to say that while doing a favor for friends (picking up mail while they were out of town for a couple of days), she fell down their stairs on leaving the house and had broken her hip and her shoulder.   She was calling from the hospital and said she would be moved to a convalescent hospital in a couple of days.

Poor lady!  My heart went out to her!  She's 78 and a professor at a community college in Sacramento.  I didn't know how long this accident was going to put her out of commission.

We visited with her for about 45 minutes, though she was flying high on pain meds and fading in and out of sleep. They were also polishing the floor right outside of her room and since she spoke so softly it was almost impossible to understand her.

Having recently been in the market for Senior Living places, I found the convalescent hospital, though a very nice one, very depressing, with that familiar smell of urine and disinfectant, and the people in wheelchairs in the hall with blank expressions on their faces.  I remember all that from my visits to my cousin Kathy, when she was dying.

As we left the place, I said a prayer that my mother would die in Covell Gardens and not reach that end stage where she needs to be moved into a place like this.  I think about things like that a lot these days, I discover!

Well, it's now after 3 a.m. and I think I'll give sleep another try and see if I'm successful this time. The dogs hate nights like this because they don't know where to sleep!

Bald as a Billiard Ball

14 March 2013

It was that time again.  Time for St. Baldrick's Foundation to have its annual fund-raiser for children's cancer research.  Our friend Nancianne had her head shaved last year at this time and we went down to support her, take pictures, and take her to dinner.

We had such fun and Nancianne seemed to enjoy having us there so much that we decided to do it again this year.  A couple of other people said they were going to come, but weren't able to be there, so it was just us again.

This is a real feel good event.  It is held at DeVere's Irish pub.  Last year they shaved people under a tent on the sidewalk in front of the pub; this year they were off to the side, with the registration table on the sidewalk.

St. Baldrick, I learned today, is the oldest foundation raising money for children's cancer research.  Most of its fund raising comes about at head-shaving events like this.  They've been at it since 1999 and have raised over $118 million, with shaves taking place in all 50 states and 28 countries world-wide.

I had to take her photo before the shaving started, of course.

Nancianne is a professor at American River College, and possibly not your typical shavee (she hates that term, which she insists is not a real word to be found in any dictionary!), but she always sees at least one of her students at the event (a guy who works for the pub).  I thought this guy was one of her students, since he greeted her so warmly.

But he was just another guy there for the shaving.  It's amazing how quickly you can shave a head!

When it was all over, there was a round of applause from all the beauticians and other baldees in the area (as well as spectators like Walt and me)

Last year DeVere's gave the shavees (sorry, Nancianne) a free drink when it was all over but they didn't do it this time.  So we bought Nancianne's drink as well as her dinner.

We lucked out because a bunch of guys from a bagpipe group in a nearby town had been shaved, so some of their friends were there to seranade them.

And you know how much I enjoy a good bagpipe!

The atmosphere in DeVere's was festive and it was fun being there surrounded by all those bald people.  Really a fun evening and I'm glad we were there to share it with Nancianne.

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No new Nana update.  She's still hanging in there...and I now have her web site on my cell phone so I can check it when I'm out!!