They're bringing my grandmother's dining room table, which means we'll finally have a dining room table. Which means we can finally start entertaining!
In other news, it's really cold. I'm glad this is my last week commuting into Boston. On Monday, my new job starts, and I'll be driving instead of taking the train/walking. Tonight, I pick up a treadmill so that I still get my exercise. Christmas shopping is done, and now I can concentrate on planning for our big upcoming annual holiday road trip...
Thursday, December 9, 2010
Monday, December 6, 2010
CSA madness
Well, isn't this exciting! I was afraid that in the move from SoCal to Boston, my CSA days were over. (At least until the summer.) Happily, I was wrong!
For those that don't know, CSA stands for community-supported agriculture. Typically you pay a flat fee upfront, for x number of shares over some time period. Usually you can specify large or small box, weekly or biweekly, where you'd like to pick it up, then on your set day you go pick up a box of fresh fruits and veggies. In Cali, I was paying $177 for 12 weeks of small biweekly shares; meaning I was paying $29.50 per box for six boxes of fresh fruits and veggies, year-round. They were grown locally, meaning my food dollars were supporting local farms and farmers, and my produce was usually organic and pesticide-free.
Well! Upon settling in here in Massachusetts, I promptly checked out the CSA options, figuring I'd be out of luck until at least spring. Turns out I am now the proud member of both a fish CSA and a winter veggie CSA.
A fish CSA (CSF?) delivers several pounds of fresh-caught, local fish, either whole or in fillets. What fish you get depends on what they catch. Naturally I signed right up (whole, biweekly), since fresh seafood is one of the primary advantages Boston has over San Diego--oddly enough. Thanks to my new friends at Cape Ann Fresh Catch! ($120 for 12 weeks; so $20 for each biweekly delivery, or $10 per week. That's a deal in my book!)
My first delivery was three big fresh flounder. When I say whole, I mean whole. They were so fresh they hadn't been gutted or scaled. So I had a project ahead of me when I got them home.
Here's what I learned:
1. Lock the cats up first. (I didn't.)
2. You can't freeze whole fish with the guts still inside. You have to clean them first.
3. I didn't bother to descale them.
4. Flounder guts are not actually in the middle. They're off to one side, immediately under the head. Basically their guts live in their chin.
5. My super-sharp professional knives weren't up to the task of cutting through fish scales and skin, which is actually very tough. What did work: my super-heavy-duty professional kitchen scissors. (Also called kitchen shears.)
6. Between my impromptu biology lesson ("Where are the guts?...What are THOSE? Oh, lungs.") and figuring out that scissors worked better than the knives, it was not a pretty or clean butchering process. Just as well I didn't take any pictures.
7. Fish decapitation is very easy with good scissors.
So, in summation: with whole fish, first cut off the head. Find and remove internal organs. Snip off fins/gills if necessary (not necessary with flounder).
It's also best if you clean fish the night before trash day, so that fish remains can go immediately outside, and not stink up your house any more than it already is.
So in addition to my new fish CSA, I'm in a new veggie CSA, as well. If you're in the Boston area, check out Enterprise Produce. Because it's winter in Massachusetts, it's a six-month time commitment, with a box of stuff every week. Sometimes it's what you would expect from winter in Massachusetts--my first box had kale, potatoes, carrots, buttercup squash, turnips, and Napa cabbage. But they subcontract out to other CSA farms on the East Coast, meaning I also got a bag of mesclun greens, a box of cherry tomatoes, fresh green peppers, and a huge grapefruit. It was a pretty decent haul.
Based on that first box, I'm optimistic about the next six months. It was $700 for six months; between that and the fish CSA, the only grocery shopping I'll be doing in the next six months will be to replenish the pantry. That's $115 a month for fruits and veggies, another $40 a month in fish; that's $145 a month to feed two people. Not bad at all.
By summer I'm hoping to have laid in my own garden here, thus negating the need to join a CSA. It'll be my first garden; stay tuned!
For those that don't know, CSA stands for community-supported agriculture. Typically you pay a flat fee upfront, for x number of shares over some time period. Usually you can specify large or small box, weekly or biweekly, where you'd like to pick it up, then on your set day you go pick up a box of fresh fruits and veggies. In Cali, I was paying $177 for 12 weeks of small biweekly shares; meaning I was paying $29.50 per box for six boxes of fresh fruits and veggies, year-round. They were grown locally, meaning my food dollars were supporting local farms and farmers, and my produce was usually organic and pesticide-free.
Well! Upon settling in here in Massachusetts, I promptly checked out the CSA options, figuring I'd be out of luck until at least spring. Turns out I am now the proud member of both a fish CSA and a winter veggie CSA.
A fish CSA (CSF?) delivers several pounds of fresh-caught, local fish, either whole or in fillets. What fish you get depends on what they catch. Naturally I signed right up (whole, biweekly), since fresh seafood is one of the primary advantages Boston has over San Diego--oddly enough. Thanks to my new friends at Cape Ann Fresh Catch! ($120 for 12 weeks; so $20 for each biweekly delivery, or $10 per week. That's a deal in my book!)
My first delivery was three big fresh flounder. When I say whole, I mean whole. They were so fresh they hadn't been gutted or scaled. So I had a project ahead of me when I got them home.
Here's what I learned:
1. Lock the cats up first. (I didn't.)
2. You can't freeze whole fish with the guts still inside. You have to clean them first.
3. I didn't bother to descale them.
4. Flounder guts are not actually in the middle. They're off to one side, immediately under the head. Basically their guts live in their chin.
5. My super-sharp professional knives weren't up to the task of cutting through fish scales and skin, which is actually very tough. What did work: my super-heavy-duty professional kitchen scissors. (Also called kitchen shears.)
6. Between my impromptu biology lesson ("Where are the guts?...What are THOSE? Oh, lungs.") and figuring out that scissors worked better than the knives, it was not a pretty or clean butchering process. Just as well I didn't take any pictures.
7. Fish decapitation is very easy with good scissors.
So, in summation: with whole fish, first cut off the head. Find and remove internal organs. Snip off fins/gills if necessary (not necessary with flounder).
It's also best if you clean fish the night before trash day, so that fish remains can go immediately outside, and not stink up your house any more than it already is.
So in addition to my new fish CSA, I'm in a new veggie CSA, as well. If you're in the Boston area, check out Enterprise Produce. Because it's winter in Massachusetts, it's a six-month time commitment, with a box of stuff every week. Sometimes it's what you would expect from winter in Massachusetts--my first box had kale, potatoes, carrots, buttercup squash, turnips, and Napa cabbage. But they subcontract out to other CSA farms on the East Coast, meaning I also got a bag of mesclun greens, a box of cherry tomatoes, fresh green peppers, and a huge grapefruit. It was a pretty decent haul.
Based on that first box, I'm optimistic about the next six months. It was $700 for six months; between that and the fish CSA, the only grocery shopping I'll be doing in the next six months will be to replenish the pantry. That's $115 a month for fruits and veggies, another $40 a month in fish; that's $145 a month to feed two people. Not bad at all.
By summer I'm hoping to have laid in my own garden here, thus negating the need to join a CSA. It'll be my first garden; stay tuned!
Sunday, December 5, 2010
Why must I always trip and fall at the fancy parties?
Last night DH and I went to a party at his boss's house. His boss is a former baseball star-turned game company founder, and it's obvious where all that baseball money went. He has a ginormous house (complete with enclosed indoor hot tub, private screening room, and 11-car garage), and as you might expect, the party was all-out. Open bar, catered meal, DJ, a party bus to shuttle people to and from their cars, and a bottle of wine for everyone to take home.
It would have been a great night, did I not trip on the front stairs and go sprawling over his front hallway, spilling two vodka tonics everywhere. I didn't even have the handy excuse of being drunk. No, I was just clumsy and bit it, and lots of people saw. I was so ashamed I spent the rest of the night playing bar trivia. (Yes, he had a bar trivia machine at his bar.)
Now my foot hurts, and I can't decide if it's because I hurt it in the fall somehow or if all my shame is just manifesting itself there.
It would have been a great night, did I not trip on the front stairs and go sprawling over his front hallway, spilling two vodka tonics everywhere. I didn't even have the handy excuse of being drunk. No, I was just clumsy and bit it, and lots of people saw. I was so ashamed I spent the rest of the night playing bar trivia. (Yes, he had a bar trivia machine at his bar.)
Now my foot hurts, and I can't decide if it's because I hurt it in the fall somehow or if all my shame is just manifesting itself there.
Friday, December 3, 2010
Got the travel bug again
So I guess it's a good thing we're getting ready to embark on our semi-annual 24-hour-drive to Missouri, huh? I'm sure if you ask me how I feel about road trips the day after that, you'll get slapped. But right now, my wanderlust is itching again.
I think a lot of it has to do with winter. It's dark so early here, and it's getting cold (below freezing at night, every night), and the knowledge that I have another four months of this (at least) ahead of me makes me want to stab myself in the eye. That, coupled with the knowledge that there are far sunnier, warmer places in the world, makes me spend my days researching travel deals.
Also, my stepson will be staying with us for a six-week block of time this summer, and I'd dearly love to do some traveling with him. Yesterday I had a whole slew of ideas for road trips (the best of which was to hit the Icefields Parkway in Canada before full immersion in British Columbia's wineries), but alas, there's only so much travel you can accomplish when you only get two weeks of vacation a year. So I suspect any road trips this summer will consist largely of visits between family members.
The good news is that the five-year outlook is very good for travel opportunities.
The bad news is we're not there yet.
Le sigh.
(However, I'm going to start putting together a list of ideas for extended road trips for when that five-year plan coelesces. So far:
1. Across Canada.
2. Around Australia.
3. Up the Continental Divide to Alaska, and then Alaska.)
I think a lot of it has to do with winter. It's dark so early here, and it's getting cold (below freezing at night, every night), and the knowledge that I have another four months of this (at least) ahead of me makes me want to stab myself in the eye. That, coupled with the knowledge that there are far sunnier, warmer places in the world, makes me spend my days researching travel deals.
Also, my stepson will be staying with us for a six-week block of time this summer, and I'd dearly love to do some traveling with him. Yesterday I had a whole slew of ideas for road trips (the best of which was to hit the Icefields Parkway in Canada before full immersion in British Columbia's wineries), but alas, there's only so much travel you can accomplish when you only get two weeks of vacation a year. So I suspect any road trips this summer will consist largely of visits between family members.
The good news is that the five-year outlook is very good for travel opportunities.
The bad news is we're not there yet.
Le sigh.
(However, I'm going to start putting together a list of ideas for extended road trips for when that five-year plan coelesces. So far:
1. Across Canada.
2. Around Australia.
3. Up the Continental Divide to Alaska, and then Alaska.)
Wednesday, December 1, 2010
Saturday, November 27, 2010
A new job for real, and another new car!
Happy belated Thanksgiving, everyone! I made a lovely intimate dinner last night, and while the pie was a failure (don't put blackstrap molasses and dark corn syrup into the same pecan pie), the rest of it was delish.
But I know you don't want to hear about that. You want to hear about the new job! Well, a couple of weeks ago, MIT informed me that they were opening my position up to other applicants. Which, as you might imagine, distressed me. I was temp-to-perm, but I was assured at the beginning that was "merely a formality." So the fact that I was going to have to apply for my own job, again, did not give me a warm fuzzy feeling about my job security.
Fortunately, a microchip company that I'd interviewed with weeks ago came to the rescue. They called me back in for a final round of interviews, and on Wednesday, offered me the job! So: a real job (not temping), making more money, with great benefits, and I'd get paid vacation for Christmas (instead of unpaid, since I was hourly at MIT). Plus the company is in the next town over, meaning my commute would shrink to 5 miles.
The downside? We'd have to buy another car.
While there's a wealth of public transportation options into Boston, there are none--NONE--between suburbs around Boston. Not even a bus. And while I could bike 5 miles in the summer, I certainly can't in the winter. So, I crunched the numbers. And while I hate having to spend the money on a second car, at least we can technically afford it (though I'd much rather be able to walk, and spend all that money on something more useful).
Well, you know my feelings about the 'burbs. I'll spare you the rant about lack of public transportation options that my husband got. We went car shopping yesterday, and came home with a new Prius. At 51 mpg, my hubby will be taking the Prius on his long commute, and I'll use our current car for the 5 mile-commute. Meaning our gas bill will stay about the same, even with an additional car.
It's a lot zippier than I thought it would be. And very space-age. And you can actually fit four full-size adults in it. We may actually take it on our long-haul Christmas travels this year, to save on gas. When we pick it up on Tuesday, I'll post pictures. And I'm hoping to start the new job in a week or so; I'll keep you updated on that, as well.
Otherwise: finishing up Christmas shopping, and eagerly awaiting the arrival of my parents, with more furniture, in a couple of weeks.
But I know you don't want to hear about that. You want to hear about the new job! Well, a couple of weeks ago, MIT informed me that they were opening my position up to other applicants. Which, as you might imagine, distressed me. I was temp-to-perm, but I was assured at the beginning that was "merely a formality." So the fact that I was going to have to apply for my own job, again, did not give me a warm fuzzy feeling about my job security.
Fortunately, a microchip company that I'd interviewed with weeks ago came to the rescue. They called me back in for a final round of interviews, and on Wednesday, offered me the job! So: a real job (not temping), making more money, with great benefits, and I'd get paid vacation for Christmas (instead of unpaid, since I was hourly at MIT). Plus the company is in the next town over, meaning my commute would shrink to 5 miles.
The downside? We'd have to buy another car.
While there's a wealth of public transportation options into Boston, there are none--NONE--between suburbs around Boston. Not even a bus. And while I could bike 5 miles in the summer, I certainly can't in the winter. So, I crunched the numbers. And while I hate having to spend the money on a second car, at least we can technically afford it (though I'd much rather be able to walk, and spend all that money on something more useful).
Well, you know my feelings about the 'burbs. I'll spare you the rant about lack of public transportation options that my husband got. We went car shopping yesterday, and came home with a new Prius. At 51 mpg, my hubby will be taking the Prius on his long commute, and I'll use our current car for the 5 mile-commute. Meaning our gas bill will stay about the same, even with an additional car.
It's a lot zippier than I thought it would be. And very space-age. And you can actually fit four full-size adults in it. We may actually take it on our long-haul Christmas travels this year, to save on gas. When we pick it up on Tuesday, I'll post pictures. And I'm hoping to start the new job in a week or so; I'll keep you updated on that, as well.
Otherwise: finishing up Christmas shopping, and eagerly awaiting the arrival of my parents, with more furniture, in a couple of weeks.
Tuesday, November 23, 2010
Almost Thanksgiving, with no travel plans
This will be the first Thanksgiving in at least...four years that I didn't have hot and exciting travel plans. Last year, it was Joshua Tree/Yosemite/Big Sur. Year before that, Buenos Aires. Year before that, Rome. This year, we were originally planning to visit my sister in New Orleans. But due to move/new house/new jobs/not enough money or vacation time to make it happen, well, we'll have to wait until Christmas to see my new niece.
I'm definitely sad we won't be seeing my sister, and a little sad we won't be travelling anywhere, thereby breaking my streak. I will admit I'm looking forward to a long weekend. I'd be looking forward to it a lot more, if I were actually getting paid for it. The downside of highly paid-hourly temp work is unpaid holidays.
We've finished cleaning up the yard, and the house is in at least passable shape at this point. We put up the Christmas tree this weekend (my very first adult Christmas tree!!!!) and lit a (rather smoky) fire in our new fireplace. I'm pulling together an intimate Thanksgiving menu for two that we'll probably have on Friday, as we've been invited to a work thing/party on Thursday. Details later.
I'm definitely sad we won't be seeing my sister, and a little sad we won't be travelling anywhere, thereby breaking my streak. I will admit I'm looking forward to a long weekend. I'd be looking forward to it a lot more, if I were actually getting paid for it. The downside of highly paid-hourly temp work is unpaid holidays.
We've finished cleaning up the yard, and the house is in at least passable shape at this point. We put up the Christmas tree this weekend (my very first adult Christmas tree!!!!) and lit a (rather smoky) fire in our new fireplace. I'm pulling together an intimate Thanksgiving menu for two that we'll probably have on Friday, as we've been invited to a work thing/party on Thursday. Details later.
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