Sunday:

I’m still here! Busy busy busy. I got a weekend job at Honey Brook Organic Farm! Yay! I can’t wait. I feel like a college kid who just scored a great summer internship (which is really a better comparison…). So it’s going to be a hectic summer once that starts. But things are happening. It’s about time. I’ll be helping the people who come to pick up their CSA shares. I suppose I could buy into their CSA too, if it’s not too late?

I’ve also started to zero in on what exactly I might study if I were to go to grad school. Getting a master’s in food systems is an idea I’ve been musing on for a few years now. My interests with regard to food have always been kind of wide ranging, but I’m starting to pick up some patterns and recurring themes, and that’s reassuring and makes me think the whole grad school thing could be a good idea. If, at this age, I were to go back to school, I’d have to be laser focused on getting what I want out of it.

One thing that is probably not going to happen this summer is moving. Due to circumstances beyond my control and beyond the purview of this blog, that will be delayed at least a few months.  That’s probably good. The last time we moved in August I almost died of heatstroke.

Today is Mother’s Day. I am roasting a chicken from Hillacres Pride, and making mashed potatoes, roasted asparagus, and a dijonnaise sauce for the chicken. I was at the Sunday farmers market and MOM’s this morning picking up these things as well as others. I really, really enjoyed my time alone at both markets (neither was crowded), and I was all fueled up because my dear little family brought me iced coffee and a bagel in bed. I had made a menu for this coming week and shopped accordingly.

My shopping has been greatly influenced lately by reading Real Food, Fake Food. For instance I was careful to search out the authentic Parmigiano-Reggiano at MOM’s, looking for the PDO seal. The PDO does not f— around. It’s not so much that I care if I eat inauthentic food. It’s that I hate to pay high prices for impostor crap. And that seems to happen often. “If it’s expensive it must be the real deal” does not apply. The book is a huge downer, honestly, but I’m glad to have read it. I was looking at a local restaurant’s menu and realized all their yummy-sounding dishes with truffle in them must have the weird artificial truffle flavor the book talked about. On a related note, I wanted to order fair trade coffee online and eventually ended up reading about how all flavored coffee is no bueno. Flavoring the beans involves some questionable processing. So, no more French vanilla for me. I settled on this and I hope it’s good. Black River Roasters is in northern NJ. I’m sure there are hyperlocal options, I just need to investigate them more.

Next on the reading list is Badditives. All roads lead to the same place — cooking using simple ingredients at home. It’s too late for me, I’m quite sure I’m chock full of Badditives. But someone must think of the children.

According to Gemma’s “all about my mom” paper, my favorite thing to do is doing the dishes, and the thing that I’m best at is folding clothes. So in that case I’m having the best weekend ever! Did she miss last weekend where I mowed the lawn and weed whacked for the first time and thoroughly enjoyed myself! (seriously)

Tuesday:

Last night I made “good” chicken nuggets for the kids (Applegate brand), and a salad for me with farmers’ market/MOM’s fixings. I made a parmesan Parmigiano-Reggiano-peppercorn ranch dressing. Delicious! None of the weird aftertaste of a storebought dressing.

The oppressive heat is making me not want to cook today.

Looking at my photo roll, I am reminded that I made pulled pork and homemade sweet potato fries a few weeks ago. (According to Gemma’s list, sweet potatoes are my favorite food.) Mmmm, that was good. I know I did some chicken breast in the Crock Pot too. Must remember to make good use of it this summer.

Small wins:

• Got a random $13 check in the mail
• Hubs fixed the power cord on this laptop (it wouldn’t always charge), so it’s much easier to deal with now.
• As alluded to above, we discontinued our lawn service and are going to do it ourselves now.
• The electric/gas bill went back to normal ($76!).
• My mom and sister gave me some of their old work clothes to wear to work.
• My lettuce and arugula seeds sprouted, and I ate a lot of the arugula that is already fully grown.
• I found all this milk chocolate bark on clearance at Acme, for like $1 a bag. I’ve also been getting some free items at Acme lately thanks to the Monopoly game.

I just want the end of school to get here already so I can start going to the pool. Pool day, all day, every day (well, after 1 pm, Monday through Friday). Aidan is graduating 5th grade this year! Hard to believe.  I am so very excited for him to move on to middle school.