i feel fine

I feel fine in lots of ways today! I'm finally, finally, finally over the plague I had. I went to the doctor on Thursday, and he thought I may have mono, and sent me for blood tests and ordered me to do nothing but "Eat and use the bathroom. Seriously, NOTHING else." So, I took off work on Friday, and laid around for a few days, and then I felt better when I woke up on Sunday, and now feel like a new lady. Phew!

As an aside, Metro Family Practice is pretty awesome. I saw a doctor who's not my regular (who's awesome), and he was really great. Seriously, some of the best doctor's visits I've had in years have been at this place. It's like they actually listen and actually care. If you're in Pittsburgh, and looking for a good PCP, check out this place.

I also feel fine because it is now tomato and corn season!!! There's really nothing better. They're delicious even completely unadorned, and perfect for eating on summer days when it is Hot As Hell and you Do Not Feel Like Being In a Hot Kitchen. Yum.

I had some of the best corn I've ever tasted last night via pal Lisa. She sent an email this morning telling us about this place based in the Strip that is a "virtual farmers market" where you can order local and non-local, and even do a CSA, all through their site, and schedule a pick-up either in the Strip or at another location in the area. They're called Good Apples, and I think I'll swing by there after work and pick up a dozen ears of that corn (on their site they say it's from local farm Yarnick's (in Indiana, PA). A dozen is only $5! Worth its weight in gold, I tell ya!

I've been immersed in reading (like, actually reading the entire thing) Deborah Madison's cooking bible Vegetarian Cooking For Everyone. I've been checking out cookbooks from the library constantly, but want to buy the ones that I feel I'll use all the time. This is one of those. It's chock full of billions of recipes and technique tips, and is broken down by ingredient--which E-Dawg pointed out is perfect for figuring out what to make with your CSA stuff. A few people have mentioned not liking her tone/style, but I don't mind it one bit. I kinda like a bossy lady.

Speaking of CSAs, our box last week contained these delights:
-free range eggs
-an italian herb mix
-green beans
-carrots
-black raspberries
-zucchini
-green bibb lettuce
-beets with greens
-cilantro
-new potatoes
-cucumbers
-Hungarian hot wax peppers

And, tomorrow we're getting:
-green beans
-basil
-blueberries
-Methley plums
-salad mix
-onions
-cucumbers
-cilantro
-zucchini
-sweet corn

I cannot wait!!!

I also cannot wait because my friend Alex is visiting tomorrow from Poland. It's been a while since I've seen her, and I can't wait to catch up, hear about her globe-trotting adventures and introduce her to Barbara and our new house (which is looking totally adorable, by the way!).

I also feel fine because I was asked to contribute my photo and a quote from and link to my blog from this outfit called We Feel Fine for their upcoming book. They're a site that "harvests human feelings" from weblogs. Every few minutes they search on "i feel" and "i am feeling" to see what the people out on the interwebs are emoting about. It's pretty interesting, and I feel excited (I'm in the "Excited" section) that they decided to include me. Also, I feel special. It's nice to feel special.

And, just for kicks, and for your viewing pleasure, here's a pic of our Libing Room (half library/half living room). It's that green fantastic?


And, here's a picture of me with the gal that makes it feel like home:

back in action!

Woah. It's been some week. Delirious highs, staggering lows. And, I'm serious about the delirium. I was dog-sick all week. I was off Thursday all day from work, and took off early Tuesday, Wednesday and Friday. Phew! I'm still coughy and a bit tired, but I'm starting to be able to breathe through my nose and move around without getting dizzy and sweaty again. That is progress.

Also, I went car-shopping again today, and I'm cautiously optimistic that I may've found a car. I'll give details when/if it actually materializes. But, today I looked at cars being sold by individuals instead of dealers, and it couldn't have been a more different experience than the one I had last weekend. These people were nice, helpful and genuine. What a refreshing change!

And, then I came back home to find a box sitting on my steps. It was from my friend Alex, and contained one of these:


If you don't know what that is, it's an XO laptop. You've probably heard something about this program over the past couple of years on NPR, the news, and the like. The mission of One Laptop per Child (OLPC) is to give children in the developing world laptops to give them educational opportunities they may never otherwise have. A quote from their site is "to help make education for the world’s children a priority, not a privilege." It's pretty amazing. And, they're currently running a promotion that if you donate the XO laptop, then you can also receive one for "the child in your life". I am the child in Alex's life. And, I'm so, so grateful that I am! This little machine is totally amazing. Alex is totally amazing. She's at it again, being generous and doing good deeds, all the way from Poland. (Annnnd, after some, uh, to-be-unnamed slacker never got a care package in the mail to her. d'oh.) You can find out more about this amazing organization, including donation information, here.

So, yeah. It's been an action-packed week. I also paid a visit to Hoi Polloi a couple days ago, paid up from the dine-n-dash incident (my not-so-secret shame), got some delicious cream-of-mushroom soup, a grilled cheese and some hot tea. And, some fantastic service from Hoi Polloi fella, Daniel.

And, the queer book club had our holiday meeting and gifty book exchange meet-up extravaganza this week, too. We'd read Kate Bornstein's Gender Outlaw, and had a great discussion (seriously, the best/most literary book club I've ever been involved with), exchanged our book-gifts, and picked our next selection--Claire Messud's The Emperor's Children. It sounds like a good one. (If you're interested in joining the book club, send me an email and/or post a comment with how to email you).

Peeps, life is good. Sometimes I forget that, and often I lose focus, but I do believe it. I'm lucky to have wonderful friends, a fantastic family, a good job, and now all the little things are starting to fall into place. I'm looking over the last year, and see that I made some significant progress, had some setbacks, learned a lot and am grateful for it all. Sometimes I get to feeling really low and small and frustrated and embarassed at feeling that I've fallen behind my peers in this ol' game of life. But, it's all interesting, it's all, ultimately, good. And, I'm trying, really trying, to opt for personal growth as I can. I want to recommit to the commitment I made to myself at the start of 2007. I'll post more about this soon. I'm still pondering. But, the overall feeling is that, indeed, life is good.

small gestures that mean so much!

I'm posting twice today because I just received a package. Actually, yesterday I got a notice from UPS at my house that they'd tried to deliver a package from Amazon that required a signature. I couldn't figure out what I was getting from Amazon since I'd declared a moratorium on Amazon buying. Could it be that they'd noticed my lack of activity and were trying to lure me back? Was it something I'd pre-ordered ages ago and forgotten about? What could it be?

So, I called UPS, and they wouldn't deliver without a signature, so I re-routed it to my work address, and just got back from my lunchtime jaunt with Dolce (the new dog-sit dog) to find an Amazon box on my desk. And, guess what I opened it to find? My very own copy of Eric Gower's The Breakaway Cook! I hadn't ordered it, so I scanned the paperwork, and discovered that it had been sent by my lovely friend Alex (posts as "a" sometimes in the comments)! She just moved to Poland last week, and yet she found time to read my blog where I whined about needing this cookbook and having to give it back to the library and order me up a copy! So sweet!

Alex, you totally made my day! I'm am so cooking you a multi-course meal from this very cookbook when you're back in the U.S.S.R., I mean good ol' U.S.A.!