Shortest Day

Mac set me straight, I just didn't know the dates, that we had already started gaining light in the morning, we start gaining evening minutes 1/4, though they are ever slanted and feeble. I got the house so warm, that after I cleaned up, I had to take a nap, and when I woke up to pee, the house was still warm, despite the fact that it hadn't been above freezing for days. They had spray olive oil at Big Lots and it was cheap, so I bought a couple of cans, hold that thought; I found a nice broiler pan in the dumpster at the college, and I had cut out the bottom, to make a sheet pan, hammered over the edges, and though I'm not a tinker, it was nice work. I had talked, several times, with Linda, about baking kale chips. It all came together. The pan is now cured a lustrous black, and when I'm cranking the cookstove, the oven is very hot. Kale, some sea salt, a twist of black pepper, and a light spray of olive oil. I move my reading matter over to the island, so I can monitor things, eat cheese and olives, and kale chips. I favor those olives stuffed with anchovies and ripe cheeses, but it's the kale chips that put this over the top. Reread Girty before I give it back to B. A very fine book. Rain moves in again and the day grays down, even the crows have holed up, wherever it is they do that. I thought about going to town, for a little conversation, but after the rain set in I elected to stay home and read. Let the fire go out, because it warmed to over 50 degrees, which will be the low tonight, and over 60 tomorrow. Unreal. I might go to town tomorrow, to see the new exhibit at the museum, and I do need a few things. Almost out of kitchen matches, which happens to me every couple of years, three boxes of kitchen matches last a long time; and I need to get another log of cheese because the bread surfeit consumed a lot of cheese. And I might as well pick up the makings for a pot of something. Lamb stew maybe, or a small roast I could turn into a stew. Rain into the dark and I never do get outside, never say a word to anyone, think that, maybe, if I do get to town, I might make a seafood stew, because I can't do that if I'm trapped on the ridge. Thorne has a very interesting chapter about the West Coast take on fish stew and I lean toward that approach. Fast and carefree. I make a very good version of this, with whatever is locally available, crawdads and catfish, perch and crappie; a little olive oil, a can of roasted tomatoes. I feel like such an idiot, a friend was visiting, and I was cutting an onion from the leg of a pantyhose. He wondered why I didn't just tie them off, with a strip of cloth, and reuse the panty hose. So elegant I was dumbfounded. I told him I had been too dumb to see that. Clearly, I had assumed too much. Keep it simple.