Baptism of Jesus

All right, here we go.  

Nothing so stimulating as getting up to write the sermon at seven in the morning -- that would be, SUNDAY morning.  Just a little more of the Evel Knievel atmosphere about this than I quite like, but it's done, it'll preach...

And I've responded to that by concocting the ham/onion/jalapeno two-egg omelette, with home-made tomato ketchup on the side, and 1.5 home-made lattes, and a palmful of rattly pills -- time to find a clean black shirt and be gone.

No printer in this house -- at least, no printer that is on speaking terms with the laptop -- so the sermon is in longhand scribbles for a change.

Away we go.  Weather not too fierce for once.  Church, and a brief meeting, and then home and another clutter-clearing task for the afternoon, I think.

Green lights, everybody.

Productive Tuesday!

and the evening and the morning were the SECOND day.

Arranged to meet a good friend for breakfast this morning and after pursuing breakfast around Prairie Metropolis for an hour we gave up and came back to Tether's End and made do with what was on hand here...and conversed for the rest of the morning, which was delightful.

Lots of chores yet to do this evening, the couch ate me this afternoon while my attention was diverted. It's in cahoots with the cat. She got up and sat on me, most unfairly, and gave off sleep-waves all afternoon.

I have embarked on a Daring New Project -- I am reading the Bible. According to the tiny-print tables and charts in the front of the Canadian Book of Common Prayer, 1959 edition. Fortunately, I have a couple of those nice little bookmark magnifiers as supplied by the Canadian Bible Society. Timing the Evening Prayer stint is trickier than timing Morning Prayer (of course). So I have at hand my white leatherette zippered-up KJV that my aunt and uncle gave me for my 15th birthday (about the time of my confirmation -- first time around!), and the white leather BCP with hymn book that my soon-to-be in-laws gave me for my confirmation (SECOND time around!) when I was 21... and I think I am going to enjoy this. Just reading it for nourishment, not for study, not for sermonizing, just reading, laying one piece alongside another and watching for sparks to fly.

Because I am thinking it is about time for my personal theology to undergo spring cleaning and/or extensive renovations. Along with my abode and my own somewhat road-weary personal chassis!

This evening: laundry; and correspondence; kitchen-tidying; journal-time; and perhaps one other small, discrete, do-able tidying project somewhere in the house. Supper's over; time to get at it.

the whole thing about... breakfast.

or maybe that should be "breakfaft," this season.

Interesting times, exploring the ins and outs of catering-for-ONE (plus, of course, Nefertiti the Wonder Cat) these days. And something of a revelation to realize I probably won't have to buy twenty pounds of any edible thing, all at one time, ever again.

I have been having some fun with breakfast, for sure. One of my semi-sordid Thrifty Tricks is to hit the Clearance Meat Bin at the local kind-of-wholesale place. (This is where I also regularly buy a kilo of fresh spinach!) Sometimes the Clearance Meat is bologna, or pepperoni, or otherwise only quasi-edible. But sometimes it is ham -- usually ham that has been unevenly or crookedly sliced. About two dollars the pound. It's vacuum-packed, in sturdy packaging, and freezes well.

The latest batch, upon opening, turned out to be what I call "McDonald's ham" -- ie the small slices just right to fit in an English Muffin. So I've been frying up 3 - 4 of these little slices at a time, teasing them around in the iron frying pan just until they caramelize a bit. This morning I thought they needed something more. So I nuked about a tablespoonful of big black raisins in a half-cup of orange juice, and de-glazed the pan with that, letting it cook down a bit. Ham with raisin sauce, hoo boy, some good.

My other recent purchase -- initially for specific recipes -- has been fresh jalapenos. Is there anything quite so cute and alluring as a fresh jalapeno, especially in a great big bin with a whole lot of others? "Here I am, and I am so plump, and sleek, and shiny, and green, and cheerful..."

This morning I thought I had better do something with the current jalapeno-in-residence before it got all wrinkly and reproachful. So I minced up about 1/3 of it, very carefully washing hands etc. afterward -- and I minced up about 1/3 of a small yellow onion, and most of a stalk of celery, and sizzled it all around in the omelet pan for a bit, and then made a 2 egg omelet (with a slug of coffee cream, 11%, in it)...dumped the mixed veggies into the midst of the eggs, folded it up, over and out alongside the orange-raisin ham (on a nice piece of brown toast to soak up the sauce).

And a glass of orange juice, and a big homemade skim milk latte.

I wouldn't say that the jalapeno made the omelet "hot" exactly -- more just kind of gently "incandescent."

I'm thinking if I can (and I do) chop up sweet bell peppers of various colours and freeze them as is, without blanching etc., I could probably do the same with jalapenos?

It was a great breakfast. But I don't think it constituted "fafting," exactly, by any definition I can retrieve. Sigh.

And on we go.