It is a crazy time.  Anyone else having trouble concentrating on basic tasks?  For instance, my urogynecologist told me I should do Kegel exercises while I brush my teeth, and my dental hygienist told me I really should be brushing my teeth for 3 minutes at a time because I have plaque, and trying to do both these things at once (Kegel exercises plus dental thoroughness) was already a strain on my limited powers of concentration even before Trump got elected.  Now you can just forget about any of these things getting done right, because with my mouth full of toothpaste I am thinking about the electoral college and casual racism and Syria.  Wait, I forgot to squeeze!  

You'd think that, with all these things on our collective minds, it would make it easier to write, but instead it makes it harder.  The sheer volume of thought and emotion and alarming information slamming in from the public sphere, in conjunction with whatever we've got going on privately, is a lot to sift through.  I am watching friends tune in and out again.  In, because there is the illusion that maybe vigilance will keep us safe.  Out, because they are swiftly overwhelmed by what feels sometimes like a cloud of flying shrapnel.  It is unclear what we can do to save ourselves when the answer seems to be, always, "everything."

​So intimidating; thankfully there are tens of millions of us.

Meanwhile, while apparently not one of those tens of millions are looking, somebody sneaks into the public park and cuts down the old-growth cedar tree you loved.

On Monday night, I went to a thing.  It was called "Breaking Bread Together," or rather we called it that, having just invented it.  Basically, it was an activist potluck.  Because it was held in somebody's living room, it was limited to a group of 18 people-- the first 18 to show enthusiasm, not the most important 18 people in my very activist town, although there was a city councilman there in regular-guy mode.  We brought soup and bread and vegetables and cookies and cakes.  Two different people brought roasted cauliflower with pomegranate seeds.  There weren't enough dishes to have both a bowl and a plate, or both a fork and a spoon, so I filled my little soup bowl repeatedly with different things and ate brussels sprouts and roasted cauliflower hungrily with my spoon.  We sat on chairs or on the floor, in a wide circle around this guy's living room coffee table, and formally introduced ourselves one at a time, and talked about what was important to us and how we were feeling that night, Dec. 19, the day the electors voted for Donald Trump as President of the United States.  We also tried to put together some kind of loose viral model for a series of similar dinners to be held by all of us, and others we would invite and recruit, all over our community.​

On a Tuesday evening, my husband and I went out to Capital Fringe to see my stepson's girlfriend perform in Over Her Dead Body, an 80-minute theater piece composed of bluegrass murder ballads, with full bluegrass band and five top-notch singers (including my stepson's girlfriend, who has a beautiful, deep, North Carolina voice-- and somewhat macabre sensibility-- perfectly suited for the material).  I would have loved this even if a family member were not performing.  I would have seen it again.  (But it is sold out.)  I hope they are able to take this show further than Capital Fringe, because it is wonderful.  Review here.  (Update: Over Her Dead Body won Best Overall show according to the audience awards, and is moving on to the Millenium Stage at the Kennedy Center!  See video here.)

After the show (which, due to tight Fringe scheduling, was at 6:30 pm), husband and I were trudging back up Florida Ave., to the nearest Metro station which is over a mile away, and wishing we would encounter something for dinner.  It was still light, the most amazing huge orange sun setting over the city street.  Only a single restaurant offered itself, but its board outside proclaimed $2.75 tacos, so I convinced my husband it was a good idea.  It was.  The Far East Taco Grille.  Far East?  Tacos?  Maybe just because it was on the east side of the city?

Nope.  In some ways these are conventional tacos: you choose flour or corn tortilla, several types of salsa are available.  But the fillings are things like Korean short rib, spicy pork, tofu.  Topping styles include a kimchi version.  Clearly this is a Korean-fusion joint, just like where I work, only so different.  Better.   Though the menu is more limited and it is just counter service.  I order two tacos: flour tortilla, short rib, "#15 sauce," banh mi-style toppings.  Short ribs cost $0.25 more each for tacos, so this meal cost $6 altogether, and it is perfect.  So, so good.  The short ribs are tender and delicious (better than those at our restaurant, maybe even better than the ones Scarlet made for me), the #15 sauce (whatever the hell that means) is a sweet and spicy Asian-influenced sauce, I suspect involving gochujang, and the banh mi toppings are pickly, spicy, sweet.  Total flavor bomb.  I think it would be overwhelming to eat more than two.  My husband ordered more conservatively, as he always does: spicy pork in a rice bowl with their simplest topping option of lettuce, cheese, and lime crema.  He said it was very good too.  In total we paid $20 (including a tip, which would be optional here) for one of the best meals I've had in a while.  I have no idea how they can make any money at all, charging $3 for tacos containing a substantial amount of expensive short rib, but GO THERE while it lasts.

Next day.  I've finally had time to organize my recipes and do a more extensive shopping trip at the Whole Foods, so (after a long, busy day at work) I have three dishes planned to cook this evening.  One is my second effort from Mridula Baljekar's Best-Ever Curry Cookbook, the Tandoori Chicken.  This time I buy the appropriate amount of chicken, and actually look up the spices involved in tandoori masala.  So I believe myself to have followed the directions fairly well.  I did blend my own tandoori masala out of spices I already possessed, instead of buying a prefab paste, so it's possible I missed out on some ingredients that might have been present in the paste... sugar, perhaps?  Because my chicken tasted nothing like what you get in an Indian restaurant.  (Perhaps it is just more authentically North Indian, as it appears in that section of the book.)

​Anyway, I managed to skin my whole chicken myself (with painful slowness, using kitchen scissors), a feat that used to be quite ordinary for home cooks, but of which I now feel inordinately proud.  It marinated for two hours in yogurt mixed with the tandoori spices, then roasted at a high temperature (475 degrees) for about 30 minutes.  Simple enough, except the chicken was not done after 30 minutes.  It looked  quite done on the outside, but close to the bone it was still soft and pink.  Returned to the oven and eaten after 15 more minutes, the cook on the chicken was still only barely adequate.  Another 10 minutes would have been better.

While the chicken was marinating, I made the Buttery Cayenne Pecans from the October 2015 issue of Bon Appetit.  These were a simple matter of melting butter, stirring in Worcestershire sauce and spices, tossing with the pecans, and roasting.  Kind of like the chicken, actually.  But more successful.  The one problem did not lie with the recipe: the pecans themselves were not very good.  I bought them in a package from Whole Foods, and they had the bitter aftertaste and discomfiting mouthfeel of unripe fruit.  The flavor was worse when raw, but they retained some of their bitterness even after roasting. 

​The third recipe was intended as the final Pie-of-the-Month for my husband, and was from this month's Bon Appetit via The Bitten Word.  The Bitten Word guys had made this Blueberry and Corn Crisp, and concluded that it had potential, even though it seemed not to have enough corn in it, and the topping did not brown well.  They discussed the desirability of trying it again with double the corn, and a blast of higher-temperature baking in hopes of achieving a true "crisp."  So I made the recipe myself, incorporating these tweaks.  Nope.  Before baking, I had a full 1-inch (or deeper!) layer of corn-y crumbs on top of the blueberries.  During baking, almost this entire layer sank into the bubbling berries, leaving only a little topping peeking out.  Even that didn't brown much.  So, to the extent that there was any perceptible crumb topping at all, it was mushy and dissolved in your mouth (and not in a good way).  Definitely not "crisp."  The corn kernels (whose quantity I had doubled) simply dropped out of the topping and mixed with the blueberries, creating a somewhat odd fruit filling instead of a cornbread-y crumb.  Your experience will probably not differ, as other Bitten Word commenters seemed unhappy too.  It was not inedible, but I can confidently fail to recommend this recipe.

​All in all, it was a disappointing dinner.  The pecans were all right.

Breakfast: on a non-ordinary day, I have an ordinary breakfast.  Water with lime, black coffee, smoothie made from almond milk, honey yogurt, hemp protein powder, avocado, strawberries, and lots of swiss chard, because the latter is starting to wilt badly and I am going away for three days.

Then we drive to Pennyworth Lock and start our hike.  The bulk of our experience is detailed at that other link.  I'd intended to write up a food diary of the hike as well-- even kept notes in my little red notebook, about what we ate and under what circumstances-- but when I got home I found those notes interested me very little.  First of all, how much can you write about trail mix and crackers?  Secondly, and more important, I was ready to end the daily food diary.  It has been an interesting experiment and writing exercise, but is immensely time-consuming and requires an attention to minutiae that eventually becomes wearying.  I also feel that the world now knows enough about exactly what I eat on a daily basis.  (I would still like to know more about what OTHERS eat on a daily basis.  But we'll save that for another post.)

I reserve the right to continue writing about things I eat... just not everything, not right now.  Ironically, I have had less time lately to cook, due in part to all the incessant chronicling.  Also, less time to walk, and less time to write my murder mystery.  All things that are important.  Perhaps as important as eating.

Nevertheless, stay tuned, I shall continue to afflict you with this and that.

​June 27
An early, before-work breakfast: water with lime, coffee with half and half, smoothie made from vanilla almond coconut milk, honey yogurt, peanut butter, hemp protein powder, peach, strawberries, blueberries, frozen mango, and kale.  This one is not sweet at all, whereas yesterday's was almost cloying.  The main difference seems to be the banana.  Maybe I should start going with half a banana?

At work, all I have is a cup of decaf coffee, black.

When I get home about 2:30, I have a wonderfully wholesome lunch.  Leftover leek soup garnished with some creme fraiche, snipped tarragon and chives; a bowl of mixed raspberries, blueberries, and cherries; and some raw carrots and peppers.  I feel so virtuous.  I also have a cup of regular black coffee, and afterwards another cup of decaf with half and half. 

Shopping (Co-op): can of coconut milk, organic 1% lactose-free milk, half & half, organic lemon juice, quart of plain yogurt, cat treats, unsweetened almond milk, raw goat cheddar, seitan, 2 cans of pinto beans, a cantaloupe, 2 packages small corn tortillas, dried currants, coffee, 4 ears corn, 6 individual Brown Cow yogurts (assorted flavors), strawberries, cilantro, 4 limes, bananas, 4 avocados.  $91.

Dinner is slightly less virtuous, but still fruit-and-vegetable-centric, which is the way I like best to cook.  I roast some mixed root vegetables (the rest of the CSA beets, two farmer's market potatoes, an onion, some farmer's market carrots) with fresh marjoram; also make an apple-and-fennel salad with a lemon-mustard dressing.  My kid has long hated fennel, but recently expressed a desire to try it again.  So I bought fennel at the farmer's market (as well as the Gold Rush apples).  It turns out that, while they still do not love fennel, they no longer hate it.  They eat some; in particular, they seem to find the bulb more edible than the fronds, which of course it is.  So, a pretty good foray.  As an "entree," I just melt some goat cheddar onto slices of whole wheat bread, also from the farmer's market.

​I think I am mighty lucky to have a child who volunteers, of their own free will, to experiment with foods they dislike.  Next thing you know, they'll be eating cucumber.
 
June 28
Breakfast: lemon water, black coffee, smoothie made from vanilla almond coconut milk, honey yogurt, hemp protein powder, canned coconut milk, banana, cantaloupe, and swiss chard.  I totally forgot about my half-a-banana plan that I made yesterday.  Afterwards, I had some decaf with half & half.

At noontime, after my kid and I take a test-run with our new backpacks, another cup of regular coffee with half and half, followed by lunch.  Lunch is a bowl of mixed strawberries, blueberries, cherries, and cantaloupe; some raw carrot and pepper; and half a peanut butter-and-blueberry jam sandwich on whole wheat farmer's market bread.  Actually, the blueberries, cherries, carrot and pepper are from the farmer's market too.  I am eating like a queen.

​After lunch, I do some housecleaning, and don't go out until late afternoon to make a quick trip to REI.  I don't have the chance to have my usual mid-afternoon cup of decaf, and for that reason, or some other reason, I become ravenous while I am out.  There isn't an opportunity for food and drink until about 6 pm, when I stop at a bakery near home to buy the decaf coffee.  Of course, I feel I need some sort of snack, and end up buying a mushroom & cheese turnover.  In retrospect, I can see how a series of poor decisions led to my basically buying dinner an hour before cooking a second dinner at home.  The turnover isn't even very good, but I eat it because I paid for it.

Second dinner at home is vegan, because my kid's girlfriend is staying for supper.  I've had tacos on the brain ever since we had the worst tacos ever in small-town Virginia.  Tonight I put out some local corn tortillas that are not really very good (made in Virginia!  Coincidence?), pinto beans, sauteed seitan (both this and the beans flavored with chili and lime), avocado, tomato, shredded cabbage, onion, cilantro, corn sliced off the cob, green salsa, and bottled hot sauce.  Tacos are always fun, but they are more fun when your tortillas don't disintegrate into bits the minute you try and pick them up.  I have two tacos with kid and girlfriend, and then another one with my husband when he finally arrives home from work at about 9:45 pm.  Also a glass of sherry, which I do not quite finish.

At around 9:00, while waiting for my husband to get home, my kid and I drive through the rain to pick up our CSA box.  We run up the sidewalk to the house where it is delivered, getting soaked with huge drops of rain, and thunder crashing around us.  In the box: big green cabbage, 3 big white onions, 2 heads garlic, 4 cucumbers, 3 summer squash, carrots, leeks... and eggs!  Exciting!  Says farmer Mike about these eggs: "Eggs always start out mostly on the small side then increase in size as the hens gain experience." 
 
June 29
A work day.  Breakfast: water with lime, black coffee, smoothie made from almond milk, honey yogurt, peanut butter, hemp protein powder, banana, strawberries, cantaloupe, and swiss chard.

I didn't quite finish my coffee at home, so I have another cup of black coffee at work, followed by a cup of decaf with half and half.  By the time I finish that, it is almost time to go home (I don't have a lot of time to stand around and drink!)  At home, I have another cup of regular coffee with half and half, and lunch consisting of a leftover taco from last night, with all the fixings except beans, corn and cabbage (those are already gone); raw sliced cucumber and summer squash from the CSA; and a dish of mixed cantaloupe and cherries.  Oh, and one little hard-boiled egg, but the CSA eggs are too fresh: I can't peel it without taking most of the white away with the shell.

​After lunch, another cup of decaf with half and half.

About 4:30, I've recovered from work and go to Safeway to buy food for our hike, as well as supplies for my husband to use while we're gone.  Shopping: Pirate Booty (requested by kid), Wheaties, 2 cans cat food, 3 bags beef jerky, hot cocoa packets, big jug white vinegar, marshmallows, jar of Hershey's chocolate spread, graham crackers, Ritz crackers, Brookside dark chocolate clusters, 2 shrimp-flavored Cup-O-Noodles, 2 rolls paper towels, toilet paper, lactose-free milk, frozen pizza, Amy's frozen lasagna, free-range eggs, 2 cigarette lighters, mini hand sanitizer, rosemary bakery bread, Applegate bacon, nova salmon, bananas, Bing cherries, green grapes, shelled pistachios, Caesar Snapeas, 3 kinds of trail mix, organic baby carrots, strawberries, banana chips, dried apricots, dried broad beans, wasabi chick peas, 2 bags dried banana snacks.  $162.

Dinner is a quick affair, conducted in the midst of elaborately packing our gear for tomorrow.  2 little fried eggs each from the CSA farm, really good Applegate bacon, Safeway bakery rosemary sea salt toast with butter, a little mixed fruit (blueberries and apple from the farmer's market, plus strawberries).

I don't finish all my packing and prep-- plus quickly finishing this post-- until 11:30 at night, by which point I am hungry again, so I go to the kitchen and scarf down a leftover strip of bacon and half a glass of the fairly drinkable honey yogurt from the farmer's market.  That'll hold me.  However, even though it is already late, I have trouble sleeping.  I really wanted a good night's sleep before our hike, but instead I probably get a little over five hours, not nearly enough for me.  Midnight finds me in the kitchen again, yelling at my husband about waking me up by turning the light on and then drinking straight out of the milk carton, which I have forbidden him to do.  My finest moments occur at times like these.

​June 23
Breakfast: lemon water, coffee, smoothie made from cashew milk, coconut water, plain nonfat yogurt, canned coconut milk, hemp protein powder, strawberries, and banana.  This was fairly light and I am hungry again fast.  Another cup of decaf afterwards.  A slow morning-- I am planning on going, by myself, to a couple of documentaries at the AFI DOCS film festival today.

At the first movie (Obit), I drink a cup of coffee.  Usually the theater coffee is stale and muddy, but apparently it is better at 11:30 in the morning than it is at night.  Then, in the 45 minutes or so between films, I walk one door down the street to Panera and grab some lunch: a roasted turkey and caramelized kale panini and an apple.  I did not end up being excited about the panini.  It was okay, but I would not get it again.  Then back to the theater (the exact same theater, same row, even) to see Under the Sun.  I buy a box of peanut M&Ms and eat them while I watch a travesty unfold onscreen.  The official description from the American Film Institute reads: "Given permission by the authorities to film a Pyongyang family, Russian filmmaker Vitaly Mansky soon realized that his government minders were turning his documentary into a highly manipulated fiction. Mansky left the camera running between takes to capture them staging scenes. This controversial, award-winning film is a chilling glimpse behind North Korea's propaganda curtain."  The film has really turned into a fascinating documentary about the making of propaganda, as well as the soul-deadening effects on the general populace of being forced to live a false public life, full of simulated emotion.

At home afterwards, another cup of decaf while I struggle to get some work done.  This proves unsuccessful; for the second time today, my web editor crashes, and I lose my unsaved work. 

Dinner is late, because my husband has to go to a meeting.  When he gets home, we have one of those catch-all type dinners: CSA vegetables (beets, the "tronchuda," broccoli) served over rice with a fried egg on top, and a little fruit on the side (honeydew and raspberries).  Sometimes you just have to eat food, in its mostly-unadorned state.  Oh, and a glass of sherry.

Before bed, I have a little dish of Cascadian Farm oats-and-honey granola with milk.  I have the munchies, I guess; craving something sweet or crunchy or both.
 
June 24
Breakfast: lemon water, coffee.  My husband ate the remaining bananas in the night and I find there isn't much to put in this morning's smoothie.  Smoothie ends up being made of coconut water, almond-coconut milk, whole milk, plain nonfat yogurt, peanut butter, hemp protein powder, and frozen mango.  But it is more liquid-y than I'd like-- needs more fruit, and I need to buy some greens.  I miss the greens; the depth of flavor is not the same without them.  Afterwards I have another cup of decaf and start a new book.

At noontime, after yoga, another cup of regular coffee while I try again to settle down to work.  Today I will be more diligent about saving my work constantly.  This helps.  After a while, I have a working lunch too: leftover leek soup from Wednesday night (I like it better cold!), leftover farm vegetables from last night, mixed peanuts and raisins.  And another cup of decaf mid-afternoon.

​June 20
Back to our usual sorts of breakfast.  Lemon water, coffee, smoothie made from coconut water, vanilla yogurt, hemp protein powder, almond butter, frozen peaches, frozen strawberries, and iceberg lettuce.  Not my favorite (too much iciness between the fruit and the lettuce), but my husband especially liked it.  He is reporting feeling a post-smoothie queasiness that could be about blood sugar.  I am responding by cutting back the sweetness in our morning smoothies-- no more lemonade and fruit juice bases for a while.  My kid, on the other hand, will be disappointed.  They were guzzling juice as fast as I could bring it into the house.

Later in the morning, we practiced setting up our new tent and using the new campstove.

Morning shopping (Co-op): organic lactose-free 2% milk, coconut water, peanut butter, 2 fresh mozzarella balls, organic cashew milk, organic flour tortillas, Cascadian Farms Ancient Grains cereal, pepperjack cheese, honeydew melon, organic portabello mushroom spaghetti sauce, 2 boneless pork chops, green salsa, can coconut milk, large can black beans, bananas, cilantro, 3 roma tomatoes, raspberries, strawberries.  $64.

Just before lunchtime, I go to the mall to try on a few more backpacks and shop for clothes.  While there, I take a lunch break at the Panera in the mall.  Coffee is my number one priority, but I also want a sandwich.  Somehow I am seduced by their limited-edition Lobster Roll, with a $17 price tag (at least I pay cash for it).  Is it worth it?  Well, if you are measuring purely in terms of quantity of lobster, it probably is.  There is a TON of lobster, giant chunks, in my roll, and little filler in the form of mayo or lettuce.  Lovers of lobster rolls may be satisfied.  Do I derive twice the pleasure from it as I would from a normal sandwich, for instance the roast turkey and caramelized kale panini I was considering?  Doubtful.  I have an apple on the side.  A $20 lunch, for myself only, at the mall.  What kind of self-indulgence is this?  But I read my hard-boiled Scottish crime novel and drink my coffee and am reasonably happy.

At home again after buying an excess of cardigans at H&M, it is time for some decaf and settling down to work with my laptop.

Dinnertime finds me trying to make a decent soft taco, in order to erase the memory of Saturday night's Mexican Fiasco.  I chop up some boneless pork chops and marinate them briefly in hot sauce and spices, then brown the meat with some onions.  Season (similarly) and heat some canned black beans.  The kid does not eat pork.  Other fixings: chopped tomatoes, shredded iceberg lettuce, grated pepperjack cheese, chopped cilantro, green salsa, bottled hot sauce.  Some warm flour tortillas, build-your-own.  This simple dinner, in its infinite variety, is always much appreciated by my family.  On this particular occasion, I didn't go to a lot of effort; there are fancier versions.  Even this basic and relatively boring version was so much better than what we had at that restaurant. 
I will note again that one Google review calls Jalisco Mexican restaurant in New Market "the best darn food, probably, in this part of rural Virginia."
​
Oh, and I had a glass of red wine with dinner.  Now that bottle is finally gone.

​June 21
Same old, same old breakfast.  Lemon water, coffee, smoothie.  The smoothie is good, uncomplicated, like a Slimfast breakfast drink.  Coconut water, cashew milk, vanilla yogurt, hemp protein powder, canned coconut milk, banana, strawberries.  Maybe it doesn't sound uncomplicated.  But it is.  Also, the lack of greens make it an actual pale pink instead of army green or mud-brown.  I don't get a chance to finish my coffee before I have to go out.

Back midmorning, I have some decaf, then some more regular, and then some more regular again around lunchtime.  After which I have lunch.  Lunch is leftover pasta from last Thursday night with a tiny bit of grated parmesan (kid has used most of it, left the rind in the fridge); also, a slice of stale whole wheat bakery toast with butter and lingonberry jam. 

​Midafternoon, I cannot handle any more coffee, so I have a cup of Pero with half and half, try to do some planning for our backpacking trip while listening to hail and thunder outside.

As dinnertime approaches, and especially after a late afternoon yoga class, I am really hungry-- have a few salted cashews, scarf down some honeydew melon while I am slicing it for dinner, drink a glass of white wine.  Dinner itself is spaghetti again: sauce from the jar, but lots of fresh basil and sliced fresh mozzarella dress it up a little bit.  Honeydew melon on the side, which I realize does not match at all.  Just trying to feed my family; but there's been too much pasta lately.  Our carb intake is through the roof.

In the evening, we walk over to the neighbor's to pick up our CSA box.  It is a really good one this time! Giant leeks (see photo), tiny cabbages (see other photo), a few giant leaves of something I cannot identify (farmer says it is "tronchuda" or "Portuguese cabbage."  Most vendors seem to refer to this as a variety of kale, but to me it looked somewhere between Swiss chard and collards), marjoram, broccoli, kohlrabi, beets, radishes, 4 gorgeous red onions, garlic.  I miss the strawberries but they cannot last forever.

​June 22
Work day, typical breakfast.  Lemon water, coffee, smoothie made from cashew milk, plain nonfat yogurt, hemp protein powder, peanut butter, strawberries, and honeydew melon.

I have a cup of decaf coffee at work, but it takes me the entire shift to finish it; too busy.  So, when I get home at 2:45, I have a lot of catching up to do.  Coffee, a Q ginger soda, lunch consisting of leftover spaghetti from last night, 6 saltine crackers, about 3 cashews.  Yep, we need to find something besides carbs to eat.  While having lunch, I look up leek soup recipes online.  Preferably ones that use up a TON of leeks.  I choose this one. 

Still in workplace recovery mode, I have another cup of decaf, black this time, because we are out of half and half and I haven't been to the store yet.

Shopping (Co-op): organic whole milk, golden raisins, decaf coffee, organic frozen mangos, creme fraiche, sponges, half & half, carton of almond coconut milk, 3 rolls toilet paper, organic spinach, bananas, raw peanuts, pull-apart challah rolls, white cage-free eggs, fresh tarragon, 2 lemons.  $64.

For dinner, I have to do something about these outrageous leeks that came into our lives last night. The leek soup recipe I chose off the internet is pretty plain, really-- lots of leeks softened in butter, thickened with rice (instead of potato), a lot of raw spinach blended in at the end, with a garnish of creme fraiche and tarragon (no chives were available at my local store).  I don't bother to strain the soup to eliminate all spinach bits.  Neither do many of the commenters on the original recipe.  We are sane people with lives.

​Along with the soup, I make a slaw out of some of the other CSA vegetables: a tiny cabbage head, shredded, with grated radish and kohlrabi.  The dressing is my standard slaw dressing: olive oil, apple cider vinegar, a little mayonnaise, honey, salt and pepper.
​
Neither of these swell items has much in the way of calories, so we also have some challah rolls with butter.  And I have a glass of sherry.  And another half a challah roll with butter just before bed.

June 17
The first day of our mini-break!  We have an ordinary breakfast: lemon water, coffee, smoothie.  After getting kid squared away and packing ourselves, more decaf coffee for the road.  And off in the direction of Shenandoah National Park.

We arrive at lunchtime, too early to stop into our hotel room.  So we scout out the small town of Luray, VA for someplace to eat, and end up at what is clearly the town's trendy hotspot: a combination coffeehouse/restaurant called "The Gathering Grounds."  All small-town coffee-houses are required to make some kind of pun on the word "grounds."  The clientele is an odd mix of student-types with laptops and elderly couples having a staid sandwich.  Everyone is white, though, which is something that, after some years living just outside of DC, we now notice and remark upon.  A sea of whiteness-- which I got used to after some years living in Montana-- now makes me feel uncomfortable, as though something potentially sinister were going on.  We order coffee and chicken salad sandwiches; I have potato chips.  The food is fine, the coffee terrible, even though it is most likely the best coffee in town. 

We take a pleasant afternoon stroll along Luray's outstanding riverside walkways-- huge investments have been made here in green space and beautification, despite the tiny size of the town.  There are more murals here in a small radius than practically anywhere else I have ever been.  There are lots of ducks and other waterfowl-- a least bittern is there, and a black-crowned night heron, and a duck that I try and try to identify, but which does not seem to exist.  Finally this helps (thanks, Cornell).  Some kind of mallard-y hybrid, I reckon.  And yet it looked like a totally plausible wild duck.

​When 4:00 rolls around, we go check out our cabin, which I can whole-heartedly recommend.  For $95/night, there is a medium-sized bedroom (decorated with artificial flowers and teddy bears by someone's great-grandma, but no matter), a large bathroom with skylight, a small hallway/closet area with full-sized coffee pot, refrigerator, and real mugs... and not one, but two porches!-- a sunny front porch looking out on the parking lot (the only place where the wifi works well), and a lovely shaded back porch facing a burbling stream and, on the other side of the stream, forest.  We buy coffees (decaf for me) in the hotel restaurant, and spend some time resting, hanging out on the back porch, enjoying the set-up.  I mentioned, when I reserved the cabin, that we were celebrating our 5th anniversary, and the staff have left us an assortment of tiny "gift shop"-type gifts, including a Virginia shot glass decorated all over with little hearts.

We are not ready for dinner until what turns out to be late for Luray-- on a Friday night, lots of places seem to close at 8:00, or even earlier.  We end up at a place called "Mok-N-She's" (a pun, I guess?) whose crowded parking lot makes it look popular, and general festooning with American flags strikes us as potentially alarming.  However, Mok-N-She's turns out to be friendly, tasty, and cheap.  We both eat BBQ sandwiches, topped with coleslaw, and french fries, and enjoy the heck out of them.  From here on out, every restaurant meal we eat in the Luray area costs precisely $19-and-change (plus tip) for two people.  (Hip "Gathering Grounds" cost us a few dollars more.)  There is an artificial flower on the table in an American-flag pattern, and an artificial Christmas tree behind me covered in American-flag ornaments.  My husband keeps mentioning, hopefully, that Flag Day just passed, but these things look like permanent fixtures to me.

Home to bed, all full of middle-American fried food and charm.
 
June 18
We sleep in a little, drink hotel-coffeemaker coffee on our back porch in the dappled morning sunshine.  It is lovely.  It's around 10:30 before we mosey on over to the hotel restaurant for some breakfast.  We're kind of overwhelmed by yesterday's consumption of heavy food, so we have breakfasts on the lighter side: for me, 2 eggs, toast (homemade!), a fruit cup, decaf coffee.  Then we have the restaurant ladies pack up some bag lunches for the road, and head into Shenandoah NP. 

​Driving, beautiful overlooks and vistas, a brief stroll here and there, a cup of good coffee-- at last!-- from the Park concession at Skyland.  We eat our lunches late, around 3:00, sitting on boulders near the Crescent Rock Overlook.  Mine is a turkey sandwich-- made from real, thick-sliced roast turkey, with lettuce and tomato, but unfortunately NOT on homemade bread this time but some kind of supermarket white bread that gums up and sticks to my teeth.  Little sandwich baggie of ripple chips.  An orange that turns out to be secretly rotten.  An apple-cinnamon Nutrigrain bar (my mom would be so pleased).  When we ordered our lunches, which had been billed as "sandwich, chips, fruit and drink," the waitress said in a worried voice, "I'm not sure if we have any candy bars left."  We quickly assured her that it was ok, we didn't need any candy bars!  But apparently these Nutrigrain bars were offered as a substitute.  I hadn't been planning on eating mine, but when my orange was bad I needed something as solace.

​After lunch, a wander around Big Meadows, then back towards our cabin for a rest before dinner.  We hang out on the porch, read, fall asleep.  Concerned that everything will be closing again, I wake my husband a little after 7 to go forage for dinner.  This time we drive to the next town, New Market, another 14 miles away, scout out all the nearby restaurants, and choose-- my husband chooses, I'll put the responsibility on him-- the Jalisco Mexican restaurant, which also has the advantage of being open until a sophisticated 10:30 on this Saturday night.  As it turns out, my city-boy husband has never in his life been to a small-town Mexican restaurant and doesn't know the risks; but, in his defense, the place does appear to be run by genuine Hispanic people.  There's a big free basket of standard fried tortilla chips, salsa that seems unusually mild, and the odd addition of a little dish of coleslaw to dip your chips into.  Nothing unpleasant, even though the idea of coleslaw with chips is an unusual one.  I add some habanero sauce to the slaw, and that improves the situation.  My husband orders a burrito platter (one chicken and one beef burrito), and I order soft tacos with carne asada.  The tacos are served (strangely, I think) with a choice of either lettuce and cheese or cilantro and onion.  Why not all of the above?  But I choose cilantro and onion, and my waitress nods approval, telling me "they're good that way" in a tone that suggests few people are so in-the-know.  Then she proceeds to deliver tacos with lettuce and cheese instead, with an impassive expression that suggests there is no point in complaining.  The "carne asada" seems entirely unseasoned, except for salt.  There is no flavor whatsoever.  I load them up with some more salsa (from the chips) and some habanero sauce (I don't typically use habanero sauce, but it wasn't very spicy either).  These tacos are one of the blandest things I have ever eaten.

Meanwhile, my husband, who is really not very picky about food quality, seems stunned by his burritos.  One is full of unseasoned shredded chicken and nothing else (except for the lettuce, cheese, sauce, and sour cream on the outside).  The other is filled with some kind of oily ground beef.  Much worse than my meal, but I feel his pain: I have eaten burritos like this before, in other small towns, in other times.  To some extent, it is a matter of local taste rather than restaurant quality; for instance, the most recent Yelp review of this restaurant reads "My friend, Brad, and I stopped at this place on our way through to town. I had probably one of the best burritos in my life."  Unless this review is intended as some kind of sick joke, I have to conclude that some people like this kind of aggressively bland cuisine.  The check comes to $19.

I promise to make it up to my husband by taking him to the outdoor frozen custard place we saw on our way into New Market.  There is a long line.  The people in front of us have a couple of restless kids and are controlling them by grabbing arms and twisting.  The vehicles in the parking lot are all massive.  Everybody is ordering elaborate, often colorful menu items, many of which I cannot identify.  Eventually we get our plain old custards-- a small vanilla cone for me, the plainest there is.  Then we sit on a reeking bench outside a cigarette store that's closed for the night, and eat them.  It is nice.  But we are eager to go back to Luray.  New Market just doesn't have the same friendly vibe.
 
June 19
Sunday morning; we're going home today.  We have last coffees on our sylvan back porch.  Late in the morning, one more stop at the Brookside hotel restaurant.  We both have ham-and-egg scrambles (they also contain potatoes) with biscuits on the side.  I have butter and honey on my biscuits.  More coffee.  Check: $19.

We are sad to leave the Brookside.  While we are checking out, the owner asks us whether we have seen any bears wandering around behind the cabins.  We haven't.

I have planned a long, meandering drive home, because I like that sort of thing.  When we get back, my stepson will be coming for dinner in honor of Father's Day.  So we stop at a farm stand, not far from Point of Rocks, MD, to pick up a few veggies.  I buy sugar snap peas, a tomato, a red pepper, broccoli, and an entire large basil plant.  We also buy a pie for dessert: apple walnut.  Total cost $31.

Dinner is to be simple, given that we're coming home at 4:30, having a guest at 6:00.  I roast a few vegetables for better flavor-- broccoli, red pepper, tomato-- then saute these with garlic, onion, sugar snap peas, and lots of fresh basil.  At the same time cook spaghetti noodles.  Combine all together with tons of shredded parmesan.  Voila, balanced meal.  Also a side salad of mixed lettuces, cilantro, and tomato, with a balsamic vinaigrette.  Glass of white wine.  Plus a Q ginger soda before dinner.  Also, apple walnut pie, which is surprisingly good (you never know with "homemade" pies), and decaf coffee.

June 14
Breakfast: lemon water, coffee, smoothie made from limeade, ricotta cheese, hemp protein powder, blueberries, frozen peaches, frozen strawberries, and kale.  This tastes good when I first try it, but once it sits around a while the texture becomes lumpy.  I think the limeade curdled the ricotta.  Fortunately, I bought my husband some nice big stainless steel straws for our our anniversary ("silverware" being one of the traditional 5th anniversary gifts), and these make it easier to ignore the texture of our smoothies.

Mid-morning, I am in Silver Spring and have half an hour to kill before picking my kid up early from school, after a morning exam.  The most convenient spot to buy a coffee near my parked car is the Tastee Diner, so I do something I don't normally do these days: go in and take a table by myself.  For $3.98 (plus tip), I have a decaf coffee and "a biscuit" (but, when it arrives, it is two biscuits), with butter and jam.  Quite a deal.  I read a book.  It is fun.

We get home about 10:30.  A slow morning.  After finally showering, I have another cup of coffee around noon and get to writing.  Lunch after that: a leftover chicken leg, an attempt to reproduce the British "bacon roll" with soft white bakery toast, butter, and leftover cooked bacon from last night, and leftover asparagus.  This was a lot of heavy food and the whole "bacon roll" thing just didn't taste quite right.  It is no wonder that the scale says I have gained 5 lbs. since last Thursday.  While this seems physically impossible, there is no doubt that I have been doing my best.

Afternoon shopping (Co-op) [note that this trip is when I found the "Man of God" LED clip-on light]: raspberry lemonade, organic pear juice, can cat food, organic roasted cashews, 3 rolls toilet paper, bananas, strawberries, fresh sage, swiss chard, 2 local peaches, 2 avocados.  $38.  I feel vaguely queasy from my lunch.

​After shopping, I put the chickpeas on to cook for Madhur Jaffrey's Swiss Chard with Tomatoes and Chickpeas, and turn my attention to other matters until they are done, 2 and a half hours later.  At a more reasonable dinnertime, I prep the rest of the vegetables for this dish and stick a couple of red peppers in the oven to roast.  As Jaffrey suggests, we eat the chard dish with a crusty wheat bread, two kinds of Italian cheese (an aged piave and a fresh asiago), and roasted red peppers.  This is a pleasant meal; the bread-and-cheese board on the table is always popular when it appears at my house.  I don't do it that often because, in order to control portion size, I tend to plate my family's meals in the kitchen.  (This works well for us, except the part where kid tends to waste about 1/3 of the food on their plate.  However, they do this even when they have served themselves.)  I like the chard, especially the prep tip that suggests slicing the pretty red stems fairly small and cooking them along with the leaves.  It's striking how much this adds to the visual attractiveness of the dish.  I have also discovered, as I noted in a previous post, that I greatly prefer the texture of these long-cooked greens recipes when the pot is not covered.  It requires adding some extra water, but the final texture is much less gelatinous.

​Have I forgotten to mention that I've been drinking a glass of wine most nights with dinner, or after dinner, for the past week or so?  I have leftover bottles of both red and white wine open (as well as sherry.  How long does sherry keep?  Anecdotal answers range from one week to forever (I think the people who said "forever" might have been my parents).  Tonight I have white wine.
​
Also, the last two mint chocolates.  And I am hungry again before bed, so have a little more bread and cheese.
 
June 15
A regular work day.  Breakfast: lemon water, coffee, smoothie made from raspberry lemonade, plain Greek yogurt, hemp protein powder, almond butter, blueberries, banana, and CSA lettuce.  I had another cup of decaf coffee (lightened with heavy cream of late, as I finish up the cream from the cheesecake) before work, and another one once I got to work.  I was hungry.

Lunch when I got home at 2:45 was regular coffee, the last leftover chicken leg from Friday night, and leftover asparagus.  Then I had to rush back out again in order to take my kid to a brief doctor's appointment.  Home again 4:45, more decaf coffee, reading, a very short nap, housework.

I started dinner about 6:30-- a use-up-what-you-have-in-the-house sort of affair.  We had an egg scramble with CSA kohlrabi and garlic scapes, cilantro and the last of the fresh asiago cheese; also fruit salad made with blueberries, strawberries, raspberries and the first good peaches of the year; and white bakery toast with cream cheese and the blackberry jam we bought at the beach.  Also I had a glass of red wine.

​June 16
No work today; my last day at home before my husband and I go on a three-day weekend trip to Shenandoah National Park.  We've been looking forward to it.  But I have lots to do today.  I have the usual breakfast, unusually early (husband woke up at 5:15 for some reason): lemon water, coffee, smoothie made from pear juice, hemp protein powder, avocado, banana, blueberries, strawberries, and CSA red lettuce.  This was a particularly pleasant one.  Nothing weird.

After showering and dressing, another cup of decaf while I get to work on my computer.  That's the last of the heavy cream; kind of a relief. 

By lunchtime, my kid is home from their last final exam (goodbye, 9th grade!) and I have a couple of errands to do in town, so we go out for lunch at our local Thai restaurant, eat outside at a table on the sidewalk.  Kid orders up a storm, and I have a garden roll (fresh veggies and rice noodles wrapped in rice paper, peanut dipping sauce), an eel-and-avocado sushi roll, and a pomegranate lemonade, of which I drink half (kid finishes it).  Somehow we manage to spend $46 on lunch.  And it wasn't because of me, just saying.

When we get home, I have coffee, and in the afternoon, there is another cup of decaf, of course.  I can't say what I was doing; husband and I are going away for a long weekend tomorrow, and this day is a blur in retrospect.  Always so much to do to get ready.

Shopping (Co-op): toothpaste, pantiliners, quart of Brown Cow plain fat-free yogurt, 4-pack of Q ginger ale, hair de-frizzer, quart of Brown Cow vanilla yogurt, Knudsen "Mega-Antioxidant" juice, bottle of Pinot Grigio, coconut water, organic fusilli pasta, goat cheese, 2 packages organic spaghetti, 2 individual cups lactose-free plain yogurt, baking soda, multigrain English muffins, coffee, 2 lemons, shredded parmesan.  $80.

For dinner, I fix some fusilli pasta with sauce made from things I need to get rid of: canned plum tomatoes, fresh sage, fresh tomatoes, garlic scapes, red wine.  We sprinkle some goat cheese on top, but this turns out to be a mistake, because the goat cheese tastes slightly rancid.  Goddamn co-op, which is terrible about keeping on top of product freshness.  I paid like $6.50 for that cheese.  Side salad of mixed lettuces, cilantro, strawberries, balsamic vinaigrette.  Glass of white wine.

​June 12
I woke up early in the morning and hence seemed to be one of the first among my acquaintance to hear this bad news.  So, like some significant subset of America probably, I cried over my morning coffee.  And the day never really recovered; basically we refreshed news pages all day, interrupted the news-refreshing briefly to go out for an unusually late brunch, took an early evening nap, had supper, watched the Tonys.  There was a morning smoothie, then more coffee (decaf and then regular again).  No coffee tasted good to me today.  Brunch consisted of a bagel platter with cream cheese, smoked salmon, tomato, and red onion, and a couple of slices of cucumber and an olive.  I ordered a side of bacon, but it was so huge (6 slices?) that I didn't finish it.  I think I ate 2 slices.  I also ate a few of my husband's french fries.

At home, more decaf.  Still yucky.  At some point I ate one of the mint chocolate truffles my husband bought me for our anniversary.  At dinnertime we ate light.  I made Madhur Jaffrey's  Young Swiss Chard with Sesame Seeds, some plain white basmati rice, and stir-fried tofu.  I liked the treatment of the chard: the way the leaves are left whole, parboiled, then dressed with sauce, gave the vegetable some remaining heft and structure instead of cooking down to a concentrated mush like so many of Jaffrey's other greens recipes.  Therefore a couple of ordinary-sized bunches of chard can actually serve several people as a proper side dish.

​So, we watched the Tonys, stayed up late, celebrated Hamilton, went to bed finally a little before midnight.  And could not, could not, could not sleep.  First it was my husband who was up, then I was, then both of us for a long time, then him, then me again.  The only part of the night where anybody got more than a half hour of consecutive sleep was between 4-5:45 am.  Terrible.  And, when I am awake in the middle of the night, I get hungry.  I had a few cashews, a couple of handfuls of raspberries.  None of this helped.  Finally I ate my leftover fancy rockfish dish from Republic, cold straight out of the box, in the kitchen in the dark at 3:30 am.  But I salted it first and it tasted better than it did in the restaurant.  Then I finally fell asleep on the couch.

Note: I have an Internet friend who, as the tragedies piled up over the months of June and July, kept taking to Facebook to plead with people, "Everybody please stop posting about what they ate today and DO something"-- she felt that somehow the continuing presence of these everyday or frivolous topics demonstrated that nobody else cared about the giant clusterfuck that is the human race right now.  While I can sympathize with her desperation (and she wasn't even addressing me-- I don't post about what I eat on Facebook), I disagree on principle.  People, even in times of chaos or despair, or perhaps especially then, need to be sustained by the everyday.  Having brunch with my husband, watching an awards show with my teenager, cooking swiss chard in a new way, all gave me (us) the grounding in love and hope that we needed to get through this sad day.  Those were not ALL we did-- we talked with others about violence, LGBT rights, and gun control-- my LGBT child went off with their girlfriend to the DC Pride festival, refusing to feel fearful-- but, ultimately, most of these tragedies are beyond our direct control.  Continuing to live our mundane lives parallel to our own and others' pain is not only permissible, but necessary.

​June 13
Oh, we are so tired this morning.  After my lemon water and getting my kid off to school, I go back to sleep for 45 minutes.  Then get back up as late as I can get away with, fix my coffee and breakfast (no smoothie this morning, my husband has a doctor's appointment and has to fast until then).  Breakfast is a leftover chicken leg, the remaining bacon from brunch yesterday at the Parkway Deli, and leftover vegetables from Friday night.  I am not very hungry but I have to go to work this morning, need the energy.  My energy is bolstered by a surprise piece of insane luck-- new Hamilton tickets have been released overnight, and I find three orchestra tickets for next January 27 at a reasonable price: $350 apiece.  That's still expensive, of course, but nothing like what people are generally paying for Hamilton right now.

Work ends up being exhausting-- only time for one cup of decaf coffee, quite early in the morning before it gets busy.  Then things go crazy and I am lucky to remember to drink water.

Back at home, I catch up on coffee-- regular and decaf, which I am drinking with heavy cream right now, left over from making cheesecake-- and eat lunch even though I don't feel hungry.  I have some leftover corned beef my husband pulled out of his overstuffed omelet on Sunday, on an English muffin with some melted swiss cheese.  Also leftover hash browns we brought home from the restaurant.  Nothing productive is going to get done on this day.  In the early evening, I take a nap again.  Then get up and make dinner: the BLTs with Runny Egg from Smitten Kitchen, along with some steamed CSA asparagus with a quick Asian-style dressing, and little cups of mixed berries.  The BLTs with egg are really truly great and I would be excited about them if I were actually hungry.  The white bakery bread with mayonnaise is a special treat, the bacon high-quality, the tomatoes pretty good actually, and the eggs-- though not strictly runny-- are a perfect over-medium-well, the kind of soft-but-not-liquid egg so many of us are striving for.  My kid complains that the iceberg lettuce, which I bought for the occasion, is "really bitter."  I don't understand this-- iceberg lettuce doesn't have much flavor at all, right?-- but respect their preference for better lettuce, I guess.

Another mint chocolate.  Dishes, walk, bed.  I worry that we won't be able to fall asleep again, but then we do.

Our wedding anniversary.  But I have to work first.  I start off the morning with the usual: lemon water, coffee, smoothie.  I try putting the leftover ricotta cheese in the smoothie.  It is pretty good and I would never guess the secret ingredient.

I'm dreading going to work this morning because the air conditioning has been out and it is forecast to get up to 95 degrees today.  But it turns out that workmen are installing new air conditioning units when I arrive.  They work great!  My whole attitude is altered, and the day becomes much more pleasant, despite various other sorts of mishaps.  I also consume a couple of cups of coffee (1 decaf, 1 regular), as well as odds and ends of leftover drinks (a little banana milkshake, a little pineapple-mango-kale juice), and eat a sandwich as I make my way home on foot after 3:30: grilled cheddar cheese with bulgogi and tomato on sourdough bread.  I should have had something lighter, as I know we are going out for a nice anniversary dinner tonight.  Mistake.

At home, I have a cup of decaf coffee and decompress, change, go over to the Co-op for provisions, and then ultimately fall asleep next to my husband. 

Shopping (Co-op): toilet cleaner, limeade, organic whole milk, lactose-free 2% milk, half & half, 2 containers raspberries, organic raw cashews, organic dried mulberries.  $33.

We wake back up a little after seven, and dress for dinner, even though I am still not all that hungry.  Dumbass.  Anyhow.  It is after eight by the time we get seated, so that helps a little.  We are at Republic, which I still think of as a "new" restaurant, even though by now it has probably been there for a couple of years.  It is pricey, and from the outside I thought it would be rather trendy and intimidating, so this is our first visit, even though it is actually across the street from my own restaurant and I vaguely know several of the employees as my customers.  (Can't Republic make breakfast sandwiches for its own staff?  Apparently not.)  Inside, I discover that it is not remotely intimidating.  Young people going out on a Saturday night mix with elderly folks wearing preppy golf clothes and middle-aged Takoma Park hippies in ugly cotton tunics and Tevas.  The dining room already looks somewhat chaotic and worn.  The service... well, our service is excellent.  But it is also bizarrely personalized.  Our server turns out to be a guy who used to work at my restaurant as a dishwasher.  He treats my husband and I like royalty.  Maybe he treats everyone like that, I don't know.  But then the bartender comes over and personally greets us, chit-chats a bit.  At the end, we find our dessert and coffees have been comped, no reason except that we are being welcomed as fellow local restaurant staff, I guess.  I never would have expected to get the VIP treatment here, just because I sell these people a few breakfast sandwiches (double bacon, avocado, egg and cheese, always).  So I come away with the impression that Republic takes its role as a community member much more seriously than I realized.  Points for that.

​Now to the food: I started with a "Localist" cocktail, which was a fancied-up gin drink, with local honey and lemon and a candied grapefruit garnish.  The garnish was fantastic.  Delicious candy!  The drink: fine.  We had a little bit of bread and olive oil, no biggie; I could have skipped this but my husband wanted it.  As an appetizer, we shared a small portion of the seemingly-modest dish most raved about by Yelpers: their Ancient Grains salad.  There was a lot going on in this dish, from feta to mint to dill to pomegranate seeds to fried shallots to god-knows-what-else.  It was a mouth party, though a somewhat confusing one.  Did I like it?  Sure.  Would I order it again?  Probably not, unless somebody else really wanted it.  To the entree.  I ordered rockfish atop a bed of mixed-something-or-other.  According to the menu, the little grains were actually small herb dumplings-- I would have had trouble identifying these-- and there were some minced vegetables in there-- perhaps some squash?  It tasted good, but was short on salt (ironically, since a common theme in reviews is that this restaurant oversalts everything), and salt was not available on the table because surely all food came out seasoned EXACTLY RIGHT.  I think this represents a bit of hubris on the part of a restaurant.  Tastes vary and chefs are not perfectly consistent. Anyway.  I saved half of this to take home, because I was full and because I could salt it there.

For dessert, I ordered an americano and we shared a piece of carrot-parsnip cake with dulce de leche ice cream.  The cake was good-- I couldn't really tell it from plain old carrot cake-- but the ice cream was to-die-for.  Next time I might just order that.  And I don't eat ice cream very often.  The decaf americano was also very, very good.  My husband had plain decaf coffee and he said that he couldn't even tell it was decaf, which is very high praise coming from him.  All in all we had a nice time-- though it was too noisy to talk much-- and spent quite a bit of money, by coincidence almost exactly the amount I earned during the day.

Did I mention that they were so, so nice to us?