Every Month is March
Mar. 4th, 2021 08:20 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
taz_39Another week at work.
Another weekend spent cooking and cleaning.
Purgatory ain't so bad, I guess.
Jameson has gigs every night this week, or rather rehearsals for a local performance of Sister Act.
I'm excited and happy for him, hoping that this breaks up the covid routine for him a bit and at least gets him out of the house and around some friends.
I've also got to admit, the alone time is nice. A lot of times when we're home together in the evenings, we watch TV together or do a puzzle, but otherwise default to playing on our phones or doing our own solitary activities.
I do enjoy this, but also it's nice to have a little time in the evenings by myself. Not that I do anything different...if anything I just clean extra because I can do it knowing I'm not bothering him, and I watch more anime because that's my thing and not his.
It makes me sad, though. On the circus, we did all kinds of fun stuff together.
I want to take him on a vacation. I want to take him away from all of the craziness, and depression, and sadness that swirl around us.
But I can't. I can't give him what he wants. And that makes me deeply sad.
At some point, something will change. Some element of our lives will shift, and make things better, or worse.
I wonder what that will be, and when it will happen.
In the meantime: purgatory.
So as you can guess, work was work. I worked all week, came home, ate, practiced steno, slept. Wash rinse repeat.
I seem to be making zero progress in steno, and it's depressing.
I could spend hours and hours practicing steno. As it is, I'm doing at least 5-8 hours per week. They want ten, so I really need to fit in more. But even so, I want this to be a job, not my whole goddamned life. Wendesday and/or Thursday are my only days to clean and cook, to garden, to have even a moment to do what I want to do instead of what I have to do. Do I really have to sacrifice that as well?
Trying not to think about it.
I ended the week feeling deeply exhausted and unmotivated. I slept in pretty late on Wednesday morning, finally dragging myself out of bed when it became clear that Jameson was about to get up. I started right away on making a pork shoulder roast because I knew it would take several hours, and it did. It had been curing overnight in salt, sugar, herbs, and spices. I rinsed all that off and roasted it in the oven along with some garlic bulbs, then after it cooled rubbed it down with the soft roasted garlic, honey, and rosemary. Back in the oven for 15 minutes until the coating caramelized.
When it had cooled I sliced it open and stored it in the fridge. Supposedly it's better on the second day. Gonna make some pork broccoli rabe provolone sandwiches with it.
I had hoped to use homemade focaccia for the sandwiches, but it didn't turn out quite right. The half of the dough that I cooked on our dark, old, heavy aluminum pan got crunchy and thin, not very focaccia-like.
The other half of the dough was cooked on a light-colored, lightweight aluminum pan, and it was much fluffier, although still chewier than I'd expected. This was also the half I decorated with "focaccia art". Google it. Can you tell what I was trying to make?
That's right, a Venus flytrap :) The stems are culantro, the "teeth" are bits of chive or dill, the "mouths" are sliced grape tomatoes and red bell pepper. The flies are olives, capers, and red onion. The grass is dill and chive. This was fun to make and took a lot of time, so I'm glad this was the one that ended up baking right. Here is the crumb:
I took to Insta to complain about how it hadn't turned out right, and the actual author of the bread book I'm using wrote to tell me it looks just fine, so I guess I'd better shaddup!
Doing the roast and the focaccia essentially took all day. After that I went straight into dinner prep, making some venison blueberry sausages I'd gotten with a gift card, and some mashed potatoes and blanched green beans to go along. After cleaning up the kitchen I did all of my meal prep for the week as well...I used the herbs and tomatoes left over from the focaccia art to make some flavorful egg white bites.
This means that on Thursday the only cooking I'll have to do is the broccoli rabe for the pork sandwiches, and I guess also toasting the buns in the oven.
The rest of my night was spent getting a buzz over one glass of wine, dusting and straightening up, and watching Beastars until Jameson got back from his rehearsal.
At 2am we were awakened by the power abruptly snapping off. It came back on pretty quickly, so we sleepily got up and went around the house reassuring Alexa and turning off any lights she had switched on, then went back to bed. But a few minutes later it was off again. Half hour later, back on for a few minutes, then off for probably an hour. During that time I couldn't sleep, thinking about how I'd just done all my meal prep and spent an entire day roasting a pork shoulder, worrying that I'd have to throw it all out in the morning. Fortunately the power came back on sometime around 4:30 or 5, and stayed on. Not sure how that affected our food, but I ate an egg bite this morning without heating it and didn't die, so it's probably fine.
I had a pretty chill day of responding to emails from friends and family, admiring my sister's pregnancy photos and my other sister's baby photos, doing laundry, hitting the grocery for hoagie rolls for the sandwiches, weeding, repotting the roselle, and practicing steno. See, still no time to actually relax, always something to do.
I did enjoy checking on my garden. It was exciting to realize that almost all of my perennials survived the winter and are coming back this year! I was relieved to see new growth on the vanilla, right below where the previous new growth had gotten frostburned off.
Probably the most exciting plant right now is my passionfruit vine. Last year it only had three flowers, and all three of those bore fruit. This year there are more flower buds than I can count! I wonder if I'll be able to get fruit again. I hope so!
You might remember that last week my adorable little butterwort was making an adorable little flower. Well it finally bloomed this week, and it's, you guessed it: adorable.
The sundew, which has been pleased with it's environment, has produced numerous little copies of itself. I'd share a picture but I haven't separated the babies out yet. Anyone want a sundew?
The chia pet has sprouted but only near the bottom, which makes it look like it has a mullet, lol.
By the time 4pm rolled around, honestly, I was tired. I think we both got zero sleep last night. Before beginning on dinner prep, I made an executive decision to skip steno class this evening. Skipping ANY preplanned event is a really difficult choice for me and not something I take lightly. For example, the ONLY time I have ever called in absent to work over my three-year work history was in 2019 when I got into a serious car accident. It makes me feel incredibly guilty to "call out" for any reason other than an emergency, and even then I feel bad.
But the thing is, I badly need to sleep. I've probably detailed my schedule here before, but to recap I go to bed between 11-12 every night, get up at 5:30am every morning for work, don't get home from work until 5:30pm, spend the next hour and a half eating dinner and prepping lunch and clothes for the next day, grabbing about 30 minutes of "down time", then I go straight into steno practice from 7pm to 9pm, then give myself a whole honking hour to wind down with reading or tv or whatever (do I need to give that hour up too?), then to bed around 10-10:30pm where we fall asleep between 11-12, wake up at 5:30am, every day, all week. This means that the only two days where I get more than 5 or 6 hours of sleep are Wednesday and Thursday, and I just lost one of those days, in a month were I will not be able to take extra time off if I need to.
So here I am making excuses and feeling guilty about skipping a steno class so I can go to sleep at 9pm tonight.
What makes it worse is that our teacher is not happy with our progress. But I don't think me stumbling through the class and not remembering anything is very productive. I would much rather get the sleep and make up the class tomorrow during my two hours of steno practice time, with a lot more ability to focus and do a good job. Am I wrong for doing this? Do I need to suck it up?
Thinking these thoughts, I started prepping dinner. It was easy tonight thanks to spending all day yesterday cooking the pork shoulder. Another thing that makes me feel guilty, taking the time to cook and prep meals when I could just order fast food and practice steno. But again, that's literally what I do ALL WEEK. The only days that I cook extensively and clean extensively are my weekends, and even then I still have steno class on one of my weekend nights. Is it bad of me to insist on setting aside one full day of my week to actually cook real meals, and learn to make bread, and garden?
The truth is, if I die tomorrow, I'd much rather die having taken a few moments to do something I enjoy.
I guess that answers that question. But it doesn't make me feel any less guilty.
Anyway, broccoli rabe. It was easy enough to cook, but like an idiot I put all of the sliced pork in the oven to warm up when obviously we're not going to eat three pounds of pork shoulder in one night. See what happens when you're tired? You do stupid shit.
Regardless, it just means the pork will be kinda overcooked for the rest of the week. Whatever.
The sweet-and-salty-and-garlicky pork topped with tangy and slightly spicy broccoli rabe, and some melty provolone cheese, and the toasted hoagie roll, was very good! The only things I'd change: I'd not overcook the pork, and I'd cut the broccoli rabe down more because it's stringy and hard to chew when it's in full stem mode. Jameson seemed to enjoy it a lot, so I'll work on improving this recipe.
Shortly after that Jameson left for rehearsal, and I cleaned up, got a shower, and wrote this blog instead of going to steno class. As I finish up, it's 8pm, so I can enjoy a whole hour of letting my mind relax so I can fall asleep at nine. Thank God. This was a good decision after all, even if it makes me feel bad.
Another weekend spent cooking and cleaning.
Purgatory ain't so bad, I guess.
Jameson has gigs every night this week, or rather rehearsals for a local performance of Sister Act.
I'm excited and happy for him, hoping that this breaks up the covid routine for him a bit and at least gets him out of the house and around some friends.
I've also got to admit, the alone time is nice. A lot of times when we're home together in the evenings, we watch TV together or do a puzzle, but otherwise default to playing on our phones or doing our own solitary activities.
I do enjoy this, but also it's nice to have a little time in the evenings by myself. Not that I do anything different...if anything I just clean extra because I can do it knowing I'm not bothering him, and I watch more anime because that's my thing and not his.
It makes me sad, though. On the circus, we did all kinds of fun stuff together.
I want to take him on a vacation. I want to take him away from all of the craziness, and depression, and sadness that swirl around us.
But I can't. I can't give him what he wants. And that makes me deeply sad.
At some point, something will change. Some element of our lives will shift, and make things better, or worse.
I wonder what that will be, and when it will happen.
In the meantime: purgatory.
So as you can guess, work was work. I worked all week, came home, ate, practiced steno, slept. Wash rinse repeat.
I seem to be making zero progress in steno, and it's depressing.
I could spend hours and hours practicing steno. As it is, I'm doing at least 5-8 hours per week. They want ten, so I really need to fit in more. But even so, I want this to be a job, not my whole goddamned life. Wendesday and/or Thursday are my only days to clean and cook, to garden, to have even a moment to do what I want to do instead of what I have to do. Do I really have to sacrifice that as well?
Trying not to think about it.
I ended the week feeling deeply exhausted and unmotivated. I slept in pretty late on Wednesday morning, finally dragging myself out of bed when it became clear that Jameson was about to get up. I started right away on making a pork shoulder roast because I knew it would take several hours, and it did. It had been curing overnight in salt, sugar, herbs, and spices. I rinsed all that off and roasted it in the oven along with some garlic bulbs, then after it cooled rubbed it down with the soft roasted garlic, honey, and rosemary. Back in the oven for 15 minutes until the coating caramelized.
When it had cooled I sliced it open and stored it in the fridge. Supposedly it's better on the second day. Gonna make some pork broccoli rabe provolone sandwiches with it.
I had hoped to use homemade focaccia for the sandwiches, but it didn't turn out quite right. The half of the dough that I cooked on our dark, old, heavy aluminum pan got crunchy and thin, not very focaccia-like.
The other half of the dough was cooked on a light-colored, lightweight aluminum pan, and it was much fluffier, although still chewier than I'd expected. This was also the half I decorated with "focaccia art". Google it. Can you tell what I was trying to make?
That's right, a Venus flytrap :) The stems are culantro, the "teeth" are bits of chive or dill, the "mouths" are sliced grape tomatoes and red bell pepper. The flies are olives, capers, and red onion. The grass is dill and chive. This was fun to make and took a lot of time, so I'm glad this was the one that ended up baking right. Here is the crumb:
I took to Insta to complain about how it hadn't turned out right, and the actual author of the bread book I'm using wrote to tell me it looks just fine, so I guess I'd better shaddup!
Doing the roast and the focaccia essentially took all day. After that I went straight into dinner prep, making some venison blueberry sausages I'd gotten with a gift card, and some mashed potatoes and blanched green beans to go along. After cleaning up the kitchen I did all of my meal prep for the week as well...I used the herbs and tomatoes left over from the focaccia art to make some flavorful egg white bites.
This means that on Thursday the only cooking I'll have to do is the broccoli rabe for the pork sandwiches, and I guess also toasting the buns in the oven.
The rest of my night was spent getting a buzz over one glass of wine, dusting and straightening up, and watching Beastars until Jameson got back from his rehearsal.
At 2am we were awakened by the power abruptly snapping off. It came back on pretty quickly, so we sleepily got up and went around the house reassuring Alexa and turning off any lights she had switched on, then went back to bed. But a few minutes later it was off again. Half hour later, back on for a few minutes, then off for probably an hour. During that time I couldn't sleep, thinking about how I'd just done all my meal prep and spent an entire day roasting a pork shoulder, worrying that I'd have to throw it all out in the morning. Fortunately the power came back on sometime around 4:30 or 5, and stayed on. Not sure how that affected our food, but I ate an egg bite this morning without heating it and didn't die, so it's probably fine.
I had a pretty chill day of responding to emails from friends and family, admiring my sister's pregnancy photos and my other sister's baby photos, doing laundry, hitting the grocery for hoagie rolls for the sandwiches, weeding, repotting the roselle, and practicing steno. See, still no time to actually relax, always something to do.
I did enjoy checking on my garden. It was exciting to realize that almost all of my perennials survived the winter and are coming back this year! I was relieved to see new growth on the vanilla, right below where the previous new growth had gotten frostburned off.
Probably the most exciting plant right now is my passionfruit vine. Last year it only had three flowers, and all three of those bore fruit. This year there are more flower buds than I can count! I wonder if I'll be able to get fruit again. I hope so!
You might remember that last week my adorable little butterwort was making an adorable little flower. Well it finally bloomed this week, and it's, you guessed it: adorable.
The sundew, which has been pleased with it's environment, has produced numerous little copies of itself. I'd share a picture but I haven't separated the babies out yet. Anyone want a sundew?
The chia pet has sprouted but only near the bottom, which makes it look like it has a mullet, lol.
By the time 4pm rolled around, honestly, I was tired. I think we both got zero sleep last night. Before beginning on dinner prep, I made an executive decision to skip steno class this evening. Skipping ANY preplanned event is a really difficult choice for me and not something I take lightly. For example, the ONLY time I have ever called in absent to work over my three-year work history was in 2019 when I got into a serious car accident. It makes me feel incredibly guilty to "call out" for any reason other than an emergency, and even then I feel bad.
But the thing is, I badly need to sleep. I've probably detailed my schedule here before, but to recap I go to bed between 11-12 every night, get up at 5:30am every morning for work, don't get home from work until 5:30pm, spend the next hour and a half eating dinner and prepping lunch and clothes for the next day, grabbing about 30 minutes of "down time", then I go straight into steno practice from 7pm to 9pm, then give myself a whole honking hour to wind down with reading or tv or whatever (do I need to give that hour up too?), then to bed around 10-10:30pm where we fall asleep between 11-12, wake up at 5:30am, every day, all week. This means that the only two days where I get more than 5 or 6 hours of sleep are Wednesday and Thursday, and I just lost one of those days, in a month were I will not be able to take extra time off if I need to.
So here I am making excuses and feeling guilty about skipping a steno class so I can go to sleep at 9pm tonight.
What makes it worse is that our teacher is not happy with our progress. But I don't think me stumbling through the class and not remembering anything is very productive. I would much rather get the sleep and make up the class tomorrow during my two hours of steno practice time, with a lot more ability to focus and do a good job. Am I wrong for doing this? Do I need to suck it up?
Thinking these thoughts, I started prepping dinner. It was easy tonight thanks to spending all day yesterday cooking the pork shoulder. Another thing that makes me feel guilty, taking the time to cook and prep meals when I could just order fast food and practice steno. But again, that's literally what I do ALL WEEK. The only days that I cook extensively and clean extensively are my weekends, and even then I still have steno class on one of my weekend nights. Is it bad of me to insist on setting aside one full day of my week to actually cook real meals, and learn to make bread, and garden?
The truth is, if I die tomorrow, I'd much rather die having taken a few moments to do something I enjoy.
I guess that answers that question. But it doesn't make me feel any less guilty.
Anyway, broccoli rabe. It was easy enough to cook, but like an idiot I put all of the sliced pork in the oven to warm up when obviously we're not going to eat three pounds of pork shoulder in one night. See what happens when you're tired? You do stupid shit.
Regardless, it just means the pork will be kinda overcooked for the rest of the week. Whatever.
The sweet-and-salty-and-garlicky pork topped with tangy and slightly spicy broccoli rabe, and some melty provolone cheese, and the toasted hoagie roll, was very good! The only things I'd change: I'd not overcook the pork, and I'd cut the broccoli rabe down more because it's stringy and hard to chew when it's in full stem mode. Jameson seemed to enjoy it a lot, so I'll work on improving this recipe.
Shortly after that Jameson left for rehearsal, and I cleaned up, got a shower, and wrote this blog instead of going to steno class. As I finish up, it's 8pm, so I can enjoy a whole hour of letting my mind relax so I can fall asleep at nine. Thank God. This was a good decision after all, even if it makes me feel bad.
