Trifle for breakfast

Monday, 3rd, no I guess 4th, week of safer at home. It didn’t feel much like a Monday. I was late getting out for my walk – I didn’t leave the house till after 8:00 a.m. – but I was still able to walk right down the middle of N. Allen St. at 8:30 am., with no cars and no traffic.

When I got home I ate trifle for breakfast.

Then to work. I’m not very motivated today but somehow I just don’t care.

I quit at about 3:30 and vacuumed the upstairs. I decided to pay our cleaners to stay away until May. They come every other week, so it’s 2 more times.

The big crazy news from the outside world is the on-again, off-again Wisconsin election, a.k.a. blatant voter suppression by the Republican controlled legislature, the WI Supreme Court, and even the US Supreme Court.

Duffy said it best.

As final insult to injury, they even took away the extension that had been granted on getting absentee ballots in.

We ate pork chops marinated in home-made hoisin sauce and colcannon-style mashed potatoes. Basically this recipe for the chops. I’d made the hoisin before but used it for vegetable stir fries, not meat. I was out of tahini so I used some almost out of date almond butter from Rachael’s stash. I’ll buy her more when she can finally come back to Madison. They’re doing the Dane County Farmers Market as a drive through, where you pre-order from the farmer, and then drive through and they put it in your car. Touchless. Anyways, we got pork last week. The mashed colcannon potatoes were like this, but I didn’t have leeks or scallions, and used the last spoonful of those caramelized onions, and the hoisin was super garlicky so I left out the garlic. And I also opted to put all the cabbage in at once and simmer in the milk and cream and get nice and soft, rather than adding half of it at the end and stay crunchy. Really good but really messed up the stove.

We pre-ordered from another farmer doing delivery, Matt Smith, who I always get my Thanksgiving turkey from, and on Tuesday he dropped off eggs, spinach, and turkey chorizo to the cooler on my front porch. For dinner I made soup with white beans that I’d cooked in vegetable broth I’d made from the leftover muammara (roasted red pepper spread) after the cookie party, and the chorizo and spinach and carrots.

Before dinner I swept and mopped my kitchen floor.

What’d we do over the weekend? Lets see if I can remember.

Friday we had a family zoom happy hour, which was great fun, even though I inadvertently embarrassed Mark by revealing too much about his morning routine, which I only did because I’m sorta charmed by the fact that’s it’s similar to my mother’s, who lived in the upstairs apartment before he did. They both do/did their morning chores in the same, ahem, “outfit”. And then woke up the next day embarrassed myself, or maybe just hungover.

Saturday and Sunday I made masks.

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Saturday morning was grey and I felt pretty grey, too. Probably slightly hungover. Took a walk, and saw these things.

We had leftover pasta for dinner and watched a movie I had wanted to see at TIFF a few years back, Planetarium. It had Lily Rose Depp and Natalie Portman, as sisters who were mystics in pre-WWII Germany. It was a little too understated and had more subtitles than I expected.

Sunday was the better day. Mark and I took a long walk together and had egg sandwiches for breakfast on the last two biscuits I’d made for the chicken pot pie. And trifle for dinner.

And now it’s back to Wednesday. I keep not getting quite as much done as I think should, working at home. We supported the local economy. Wore our masks to the grocery, went to the Farmers Market drive thru for potatoes, carrots, [more] spinach, and lettuce, ordered a contact-less delivery pizza, that we ate with a big salad. The grocery store was not so fun – I felt like I had to get in and out as fast as possible, and forgot a few things. If I do any food shopping next week I think I’ll go to the co-op.

And damn – I forgot I had a ticket to listen to Robyn Hitchcock from his living room in Nashville. This was to be the all Dylan show. Shucks. We keep hearing about new stuff to listen to, from musicians where ever they are. Saturday I listened to a bit of Jorma, live from Fur Peace Ranch. Sea Child, In the Kingdom, Good Shepherd. All the hits.

Of course there’s the big show, with Sir Paul and Lady Gaga in a few weeks, One World Together at Home, and this weekend this concert, People Supporting Artists, with Roseanne Cash headlining caught my eye, or ear I guess I should say.

Halfway through week 4 of lockdown.