Alecto's Ophelia

Happy

There's a lot I can't change in this world. I can do a lot of praying and I can have a boat load of faith and I can be intent as hell on a result but I can only change me. I'm working on that. Hard.

On the other hand, here I am again, back a lot sooner than I expected and I've discovered a couple of remarkable (to me) things.

1. I'm strong. As in Seriously, stupendously amazingly strong.
2. I am resilient to the point that I scratch my head sometimes and say, oh really, Alecto? You don't say.
3. I am persistent as all get out (Ok, I knew that).

And I am really, really happy to be here. In this space, with you.

Oh yeah - Bikram Yoga - bring it on, baby!

Yeah, I know, this site's on hiatus and all that but I really do have something relevant to share.

Did something called Bikram Yoga today. 90 minutes in a 105 degree room with relative humidity at or about 40%.

Yikes.

I'm 44 and while not out of shape by any means, not so much your super flexible yoga goddess either.

There were moments when I thought I'd pass out. There were moments when I thought all that stuff I've got would just come pouring out of me in this incredible torrent. There were moments when I just could not believe what it felt like to just lay there and breathe. There were moments when I surprised myself and stepped back up into it again.

And then there was the moment when I tried to get my pants back on.

Pause.

We're in the changing room and it's full of half or totally naked women who have just sweat out sixteen tons of water and what have you. I think I have toweled off and I try to pull on a pair of jeans that are too big for me. I've lost about 10 pounds in the last two weeks.

I cannot get them on. There I stand in my itty bitty thong with my 44 year old ass in what I so dearly wished was a breeze and I'm fucking stuck! Halfway up the thighs.

I look desperately at my WORK friend and make whimpering sounds. She is sympathetic but working out her own modesty (I have 14 years on her for God's sake). The woman next to me says, yeah, I never get how people try to put jeans on after this, it's like when we were little kids after swimming trying to pull our pants back up.

I wondered how I was going to get home.

Lets just say they did finally and I did and next week I'll bring something else to change into.

Bikram Yoga, highly recommend it. Seriously. Not just for laughs anymore.

About those fermented bananas

OK, Cookie Crumb, here it comes:

I have a banana problem. I buy them on sale for .39 per pound and then I let them sit on my dining room table until they're so rotten and fermented they leak onto the glass (if it was a normal wood type table I would put paper down, honest). Once leaking I pick up the whole mess (careful not to disengage from the stem) and throw the entire lot into the freezer and forget about it. This can go on for YEARS before I get around to dealing with them. This year was a little over the top because I feel a bit squirrelly lately and kept buying those .39 per pound bananas and throwing them into the freezer and it was even better when we had more freezer and then that damn half a cow showed up and I had to, um, do something about it.

Before I go any further I should give some credit to the stolen and seriously bastardized recipe:

http://www.epicurious.com/recipes/food/views/Banana-Bread-108415

(That's how it started but you'll notice they don't say jack shit about fermenting and freezing your bananas first which would explain a few things). Anyway:

Fermented banana bread:

1. Buy some bananas. You need about 7 for a full double loaf recipe.
2. Let 'em rot on the counter until the skins threaten to burst and the fruit flies gather.
3. Throw them in the freezer and walk away.
4. When the mood strikes you or the bake sale people come knocking at your door or it's Christmas and your boss happens to like banana bread and has no IDEA it doesn't have to be dry and tasteless or you're just hungry, take 7 frozen bananas out of the freezer and set them on the counter to thaw:
    
5. While your bananas are thawing have a drink. OK, maybe not. Instead throw 3 and 1/4 cups of flour in a bowl along side 2 teaspoons baking soda, half a teaspoon salt and some cinnamon. I like loads, feel free to indulge in anything else that seems nomable. Make sure you mix it up, OK? I'm not going to tell you to sift, I'm going to trust that you realize you need all the powdered parts equally distributed in the flour vehicle.
6. When your bananas have thawed to the soft and won't freeze off your fingers stage, extrude them right into a bowl making sure to squeeze out all the excess banana liquor (yep, it's probably about 150 proof at this point).
   
7. Here comes the magic part. I discovered this the first time I made brownies 30 years ago (omg) when I was working my way through the Joy of Cooking and followed my first not in a box brownie recipe (I want you to know I was TWO at the time and very precocious)and got to the egg and sugar part. See, if you beat the bejesus out of eggs and sugar this really amazing base forms that you can mix some kind of flavor (chocolate, fermented bananas, citron vodka, whatever), add in some flour and a rising agent, bake a bit and wallah! True moist, tastiness. Noms. You get my point. Anyway, take four eggs from four different chickens (OK fine, if you don't have chickens in your backyard use what you can get your hands on although I strongly suggest fresh and untouched by government hands):
    
   Throw these eggs in a standing mixer with two cups of sugar and set to high. Come back ten minutes later (you don't need the stand mixer, you can use a hand mixer but you can't walk away or you can use a whisk and then you REALLY can't walk away unless you can get the dog or kid or husband to do it). When you see magic:
    
   
8. You should add 1 cup of veggie oil, the bananas, 1/4 cup sour cream or whatever, two teaspoons vanilla or half the bottle if you really like vanilla (I do) and mix it up a bit more.
9. In the mean time, please make some bread for tomorrow so the kid has something to eat for breakfast:
    
10. Mix the dry ingredients with the wet stuff and divide into two buttered and floured loaf pans. Pop into a preheated 350 oven and walk away for another 60 minutes. You'll know when they're done when the knife you stick in the middle comes out hot but still sticky. Not cold and sticky, not hot and dry (in which case throw it the hell out and start over). Also, you'll notice I make no mention of nuts. This is really nomable banana bread. Why hose it up with nuts?
11. While you're waiting go to the monster dog rally and see if your oldest (still at home) can still dance around the kitchen with the ten week old beast which has (finally thank you god) figured out how to go up and down stairs.
     
12. When the bread is done let it sit for a minute or two in it's pan (really, JUST a minute or two, don't over cook it now, you're so close) and then turn it out onto the wires:
     
13. Package and sell at the election day bake sale. Or just eat it and don't answer the phone next time.

(Screw the fired nanny. I don't even want to talk about that little piece of Euro Trash. We're all doing much better now, thank you very much.)

Close the what?!

Two nights ago at dinner Little Girl asked how the eggs were getting out of the chickens. Being too tired to remember the word vent or even have the foresight to not answer at all I said,

"The eggs come out of the egg hole." 

This was, apparently, uproariously funny. I went to bed.

Yesterday NoMans was working from home. He was standing on the second story porch overlooking the chicken pen where Little girl sat with a chicken in her lap, chicken tush pointed slightly up.

She looked up at him and said,

"NoMans, how do I close the egg hole?"

He stood speechless until he realized she meant the small doors in the side of the chicken coop.

I am braver than I used to be, and quite possibly the root of all evil

And older too.

Crowd behavior is funny. I wrote a piece awhile back on commuter traffic, the unspoken rules and regulations of any particular stretch of frequently traveled road and the punishment meted out for rule infringement.  Trains are the same way and it only took me this long to work it out.

The trains are getting crowded again ('again' you say? Yes, again. It was bad and then it got better because so many of us feel entitled to park our BMWs on I95 and crawl slowly into whatever city we happen to call a workplace). This is a good sign; means less cars on the road in theory.

We feel we are entitled to space and have developed a series of subtle and not so subtle maneuvers designed to insure that space. These maneuvers are hardly new but for awhile things were so bad that the bad manners went away out of desperation. And then we parked our cars on the freeway and the bad manners came back. There once was a guy (probably more than one guy) who devoted an entire blog to documenting passenger atrocities on the Metro North line. You can find him here if you're so inclined, although he hasn't posted since January 18, 2006, which saddens me because he wrote some great stuff.

On the other hand I do understand the natural inclination to have that lovely three feet of personal space but I'm not so willing to be rude to get it. I will, however, be rude as hell to get a seat (within reason, of course, always within reason. Um, my reason).

Here are the most obvious:

1. Sitting in a 2 seater on the outside leaving the inside seat empty.
2. Sitting in a 2 seater with your bag on the empty seat.
3. Sitting in both seats of a 2 seater (requires talent and balance but can be done, I've seen it).
4. Sitting on the outside of a 3 seater.
5. Sitting in a 4 seater with your feet on the seat across.
6. Sitting in a 4 seater on the inside seat with your feet across diagonally to the outside seat across.
7. Sitting in the middle of a 3 seater with bags on either side (the most heinous of all acts to date).
8. Sitting in the middle of a 3 seater passed out with your head between your legs (NOBODY is going to sit next to that)
9. Sitting anywhere and spewing vomit.
10. Dousing oneself in rancid perfume (just plain smelling bad would be preferable).

I could go on but 10 will suffice.

Little Alecto would not have approached any of those situations. Little Alecto would have chosen the outside of a 3 seater or just one of a 2 seater or just stood for however long it took to get to her destination (by the way, Little Alecto NEVER had any such qualms about the NYC subways, not sure what that's all about). Little Alecto would have been far more concerned with offending the offensive to even consider.

Little Alecto grew up. Or something.

I take great joy in selecting a seat. Isn't that awful? I work very hard to select a seat from the greediest SOB on the car I happen to step into. This morning was almost funny. Nomans and I took the train in together (at some point I'll probably get around to explaining that) and he, being the romantic that he is, wanted to sit together. Funny, I think, really, you can't do that on this train. The best you can hope for is two outer seat 2s one in front and one in back. I head for a pair of those and he points to a line backer in a suit sitting on the outside of a 3 seater with his 'stuff' on the middle seat. I walk up to him and say "I'll be needing those two seats." I should probably have said "We'll be needing those two seats" but I'm not sure he would have noticed or been willing to respond. He lifted his considerable and muscular bulk from the seat to let me in leaving his 'stuff' on the middle seat. "No" I said, "we'll be needing both of those.

He was nearly apoplectic. I stared him down. Probably Nomans was doing the same behind me; I didn't bother looking. He removed his 'stuff' and we sat down. He sulked through two more stops until he got off. I wished he'd been stuck with us for hours.

This evening I got on the Danbury line in Stamford heading for home and the train was more crowded than usual and there was a man guilty of performing sin #7 which I had yet to encounter, though I'd heard plenty about the audacity that leads weaselly little people to take the lion's share of the space while old ladies and pregnant people pass out between cars. OK, I exaggerate. But still.

I should mention that there were empty seats behind him.

I have no mercy.

I stood at the edge of the seat (he wouldn't look at me, that's how this works) and said without an excuse me or by your leave, "I need one of those seats". My tone clearly indicated that I was not moving.

He looked up, gathered his things and moved to the window seat leaving his 'stuff' securely filling the middle seat. I stuffed my backpack between my legs and pulled out my book (I'm re-reading _Still Life With Woodpecker_ at the moment) and proceeded to ignore him.

Once into South Norwalk the train empties greatly and there were many seats completely empty around us.

I did not move.

Small, unhappy grunts emanated from the window seat to my right but I would not meet his eye or turn my head or acknowledge that there was anyone on this train but me.

I read my book. I laughed out loud (who doesn't when reading TR?). I stayed there until thirty seconds from my stop and giggled all the way to the door.

I am 44. I ought to know better but I'd rather not. I'm having way too much fun. Next week I tackle the middle seats.

An itty bitty sea change...

I simply cannot take it anymore. This commute, it's killing me. It's killing me, my car, the air, the ground, the atmosphere on Earth, the atmosphere on Pluto (my ASS it's not a planet, somebody will change our collective mind again next year), my kids, your kids, my water supply, and your water supply; just to name a few. There are no easy alternatives within the generally accepted box. I live in a landlocked town in a very privileged part of the country where public transportation isn't even a thought unless you commute into NYC and then only if you're within walking distance or a subway stop (read no more than two blocks) of Grand Central. Everybody else I know still drives, that's why it's so god awful in there still. I even know people who live in the city and drive their car (EVERY DAY) from 22nd St up to, oh, maybe 56th or something like that. It can take over an hour and she's nuttier than a fruit cake (did I just use my out loud voice again?). But I digress.

The reason I mentioned land locked in the last paragraph was for want of a better word. We use land locked around here to indicate 'not on the coast' which also means 'not on the Metro North line' but that also extends, in railroad terms, to 'not on a Metro North spur'. I don't live on a spur. Nobody in Weston lives on a spur and if you want a parking space in Westport or Wilton you kinda have to blow someone. Big time. And maybe that's not even enough. To get to Stamford from any other station is pointless. It would be just as many miles.

So here's what I found that's been right under my nose and the nose of just about everybody else because it's NOT a very useful spur if you want to make it all the way into NYC in a reasonable amount of time. But it is a useful spur if you only want to go to Stamford and you don't necessarily need to make your commute any shorter. I found a train station with 104 parking spaces that are owned by the state. This means there's no charge and it's first come, first served. This is positively antediluvian in this part of the country. I about wet my pants when I worked that one out (I promised my husband I'd stop saying that other thing I used to say when I got really excited) and started stalking the station. Best I can tell, even if you can't get a space you can probably manage to park on the grass somewhere and nobody's going to do a damn thing about it.

I live 5.5 miles from the station. I can't walk that, hell, I can't even reasonably bike it at this point in my life (because I am NOT BIKING 5.5 MILES STRAIGHT UP HILL AT THE END OF THE DAY with a computer and lunch box (bet you didn't know I got to lug a lunch box around too)on my back). And panty hose. Lets not forget about the freaking panty hose. In any case, I can drive it. It's 11 miles per day instead of 42 miles per day and it pretty much guarantees a major road rage reduction. Oh but I do so wish I had a horse. A horse that wouldn't mind being tied up all day at this station:

That's really it. And I'm thinking that if I start making some noise that maybe we can work out some kind of car pooling shuttle arrangement like we've got on the back end in Stamford (although I'm happier walking the four blocks).

This isn't a complete answer and it sure as hell isn't paradise but it's a good step in the right direction. It will make my commute just a tiny bit longer but it will give me that small piece of mind called 33 - 40 minutes each way on the train where I do not burn up ridiculous amounts of fossil fuel and I do nothing but contemplate the state of my navel, or one of the eight books I'm reading, or my knitting, or my crop rotation and expansion for next year... and when I come home I am fully prepared to engage with my itty bitty farm and my family and my ridiculous dog (not that I wasn't anyway, but oh I think it will be so much easier without having come out of 60 minutes of hell).

Here's what I'm giving up:

• The freedom to come and go as I please
• The ability to work late if I have to or go to doctor's appointments or otherwise during the day

Um, those two bullets might have been the same thing and I never did go out much anyway. So net gain? Pretty close to 75%. There's still the fact that the car is moving with just me in it and the fact that I'm still away from the itty bitty farm five days a week but I can work with that. For now.

Choir Fest '08

I hate Choir Fest. I hate it so much I spend the entire year looking forward to hating it. Here is why I hate Choir Fest (you knew I would tell you, right?):

The parents, siblings and possible grandparents of 139 students are crammed into the old middle school gymnasium along with said 139 students. Parents, sibs, and grandparents are herded up into the antiquated bleachers that were constructed at the turn of the century (I'm making this part up) for midgets (this part is true, I'm sure of it). By the time we are all packed in together, knees jammed into backs, hips and shoulders disjointing in the heat the farting starts. The farting doesn't start until it gets really hot either and then it just hangs there, stagnant and deadly and you pray you don't pass out and fall forward into the beehive hairdo in front of you. Or maybe you should, it might be more comfortable and she looks sturdy enough to withstand it.

Choir Fest is kind of like the rainbow bridge. Not like when animals die but when brownies turn into girl scouts and there's this cute little ceremony where they walk over a decorated bridge and are greeted by their sisters in fascism (did I just use my out loud voice again?). In any event, this is the High Schools way of making sure the enrollment doesn't drop off when those eighth graders move on up and music stops being compulsory. So they do it in the middle school to make the middle school students feel something or other (I have no idea what because those 40 year old squishy seats in the High School Theater/Auditorium are LOVELY and the acoustics are just fine) and we all suffer. Also, it is purgatorial in it's length.

This thing starts at 7:30 and you might get out by 9:15 if you're lucky and it's Friday night and all most of you want to do is get home and commence with the Friday night drinking. As it is no longer politically correct to consume any form of adult beverage prior to any school sanctioned event no matter what time or day of the week, there have been no cocktails either and you can see a fair number of the congregation sweat. Toxicity is not fun.

There are 8, count 'em, 8 different choral ensembles. We have the 8th Grade Chorus, the Jr. Chamber Singers, the Women's Choir, the Concert Choir, the WesTones, the Chamber Singers, Women's A Cappella and the Bittersweet Harmonies. Cletus, by the way, is in two of these so there's no release in sight. There are, on the program, 22 pieces to be gotten through. I mention this because our choir directors have been known to mix things up a bit and add a song or two in between. Everyone in the bleachers counts the songs down. Everyone breathes a small sigh of relief as we pass the mid point. Some of the larger men use the mid point as the breaking point and bolt for the hall, sweat stained shirts billowing in the imaginary breeze.

It isn't that the music isn't beautiful. It is. These children are talented, devoted and well led. It is the conditions in which we sweat, wriggle, and smell. There are high points, like when the Jr. Chamber Singers sang Adiemus and there was this one tall voice in the second row that brought the house down and all you could think was, 7th grade, she's in 7th grade, will she make the Chamber Singers before my kid is off the circuit 'cause God I do want to hear her again. And it isn't as if your kid isn't spending more than her fair of time belting her lungs out. This is all good. This is the stuff that dreams are spun of, this is the reason for being. Except somebody just let out another of those silent but deadly things and good lord! is that woman really breathing into her handbag? Why yes she is.

And then it happens. All 139 of them, less the 4 who have become the band called The Fireflies, take the makeshift stage and the anticipatory hush washes over the bleachers creating that single moment of stillness when you can almost hear your heartbeat because you know that what is about to happen will never be recreated but will happen again and again, year in and year out and you know, right then, that you will cry when it is over and wish for one more chance to sit in the middle school bleachers.

This year it was Let it Be. I don't remember last year because that's the day Cletus left her father but the year before was Bohemian Rhapsody. I remember that I cried during Bohemian Rhapsody, that I could not believe what I was hearing and seeing. I remember wondering how they'd got all those kids to sound that way together in just three short hours (the only time they'd been together as a complete group). Last night I positively wailed. I clutched my gut and let the tears wash over my tired face and I let the music lift me up and carry me to heaven.

I can feel it in my middle, even now.

Sweet Sunday

It's been awhile since we had Sunday around here. Wait, Sunday always happens, right? Maybe I should call up Tom Robbins and ask his opinion about time (I'm working my way through all of his books again; it's been long enough and it's time).

So given tradition, especially if you're new here, I should explain what you see in the picture. Or you can leave it all up to imagination except in my case, I might be more fun.

First there's the back brace. Isn't it cute? My sixteen year old daughter says I look 'smexy' in it. Smexy? Well all righty then. Smexy it is. I have the brace on because of what I and that dog were doing with that mammoth pile of dirt yesterday. OK, NoMans helped too (a lot) but he doesn't seem to be suffering. The dog will tell you he's suffering if he knows what's good for him (loyalty in a dog is everything). Anyway, I'm wearing the brace over a camisole that I wore under a rather bulky sweater when I went to be fitted at Ye Olde Surgical Supply Store and Apothecary that opened up just for me because my pharmacist knows that pharmacist and I looked darn well pathetic when I walked into my pharmacy this morning under the delusion that they might have a brace to fit me (not being a surgical supply store or anything of the kind). The brace is helping me. A lot. Notice the smile.

Also, see the dried roses above the sink? The first batch were from my husband. He bought them at the supermarket on the way to pick me up from the hospital on Valentine's day. There were actually two bunches which is why there are two colors in that group. Next are some pink roses. My mother sent those. She never sends flowers, it's just not her style. But she loves me and it was the only thing she could think to do in the moment. And you know what? Because of all that, they were perfect. The next three bunches I bought myself from Whole Foods Market on the way back from group one week at a time. I hung them when they got old because I loved the colors in the window. And to remind myself that I matter. That last batch is half a string of smoked garlic. It was imported from somewhere and I bought it without thinking. I am ashamed but keep it there as a reminder that fuel don't come cheap. Sometimes I use it but I want it to last. Mostly I use the garlic that comes out of New York State. Pretty soon I'll have my own.

Now back to what I'm doing. I made two batches of Sunday sauce today. The first is with meat and the second without. The first is in the process of becoming Lasagna which is Tuesday's dinner and the second will cover some frozen meatballs I made months ago that will be for Thursday. The fish is farm raised Tilapia and I'm not sure (still working my way though The Omnivore's Dilemma) exactly how I feel about that. It's going to marinate in some olive oil, the juice of two lemons, pepper, cilantro purloined from some of my healthier seedlings and a good amount of garlic. Trust me, it can handle the garlic. It can also handle cheese which just boggles my mind. We will also be having a chicken from which I will make the stock which will feed the next batch of Sunday sauce and so on and so on. I'm using canned tomatoes now too. I gave up. Better to buy the organic canned then the organic hothouse. I don't know why I think that but there you go.

I laid out the plans for my garden today. I am so excited I could just about throw my back out again thinking about it. I have never given myself permission to use this much of the lawn. Back yard? What back yard? Never mind the deer, I'm putting up those rather unattractive U-posts and hooking up some seven foot (he - the hot guy at the lumber yard - SWEARS to the seven feet - and I did have to ask him - 'does that work if you have a gun or if you do not have a gun because I live in Weston and if I shoot the critters I'm going to have some 'splaining to do') anti critter mesh (replaced chicken wire apparently and will also support my cukes, peas and morning glory). Hows that for some parentheticals?

Which leads me to the next nanny. Holy cow am I ever excited! She looks like Barbie (I will probably forgive her) but her biggest concerns were about the food (mom bakes all the bread and they don't buy processed anything and she's a bit concerned about peak oil) and being a member of the family, i.e., cooking, chores, fitting in and all that. I about creamed my jeans and you'll all pardon my momentary lapse. Especially if you've followed the last year.

God is Good. Amen. May we all move on now.

Happy Sunday all - back brace aside, I'm having a happy day.

Love, Alecto

My Lunacy, let me showz it to U...

First, here is the current state of my seedlings. Aren't they sweet?

Second, here is what twelve cubic yards of top soil dumped at the top of my garden look like:

And here is me at the height of my lunacy (me and my trusty sidekick, Homer D. Dog):

And here is me, 30 minutes later, flat on my back staring up at the sun (OK, that would be the sun because I could hardly turn the camera on myself at that point now could I? And besides, my trusty sidekick was busy slobbering all over my face to be sure I was still breathing) (I'm sorry, you were right, Mom, I should have procured the back brace prior to moving the dirt):

The Lumberjack Song

OK, here's the story. Sometime in the late summer or early fall of 2005 Jeffrey and I worked together with RW at my (I write 'my' because I don't believe RW is quite through with the startup world, masochist that he is) last startup. We worked very closely with a help desk and a bunch of developers based out of Tel Aviv. In this video we are singing the Lumberjack song for our friend Yoni, to make him smile. Our friend Eyal was stateside with us and it's his webcam on his monitor we're singing into.

And before anyone gets all excited, I already know I won't be having a singing career and probably should never inflict myself on anyone outside the shower ever again. I did this for love and it took a lot to record it and a lot more to post it. Jeffrey had a fabulous second career as an amateur actor and did quite a bit of singing. I had the opportunity to see him play Noah in local production of a musical called Two by Two which just wreaked havoc with everything I thought I already knew about the guy.

He looks great here, by the way. He was sick then but it gradually got so much worse I'd almost forgotten this when. This when is a beautiful time and space.