Beach Companion

I moved from my spot at the shoreline and into the sand dunes to get away from the breeze that kept blowing the pages of the book I was reading only to be constantly and happily distracted by the activity of this Ghost Crab.


And this the marsh I bike pass to and from the beach. Every time I go by here, alone or not, I say, "I want to go kayaking in the marshes."

Dreams Do Come True

I spent most of the day reading Milan Kundera and George Singleton and thinking about the chores I should have been doing, like cleaning the front porch. I weighed the merits of just leaving the dust and spider webs along with the good sense of saving the fifteen dollars or so I would likely spend for pumpkins, and for now I am thinking about just hunting down some plastic spiders to toss into the webs with the current eight-legged residents and calling it decorated. Of course, we all know I won't be able to forego the pumpkin carving. We hiked to a florist to buy a pumpkin and I made Thomas haul a giant fifty pound gourd back to our apartment when we lived in Brno; it's clear that I am incapable of living without carving a jack-o-lantern for Halloween.
This past weekend was fall break for Thomas and Bram, so we headed south to celebrate Columbus Day with my parents. I'm sorry that I don't have any interesting descriptions of the rituals and activities about tradtional celebrations for this holiday. Like a lot of our government holidays, Columbus Day has become just another excuse for merchants to have sales and for the residents of the most wasteful country in the world to spend money that many of us don't really have on things we don't really need. But I digress.
So, we drove (sigh) the five and half hours to the beach. Along the way, we were treated to fields of cultivated wildflowers in the medians and along the sides of the highway. We owe this unexpected beauty to Lady Bird Johnson, First Lady of Democratic President Lyndon Johnson.
So, it was most satisfying to see such useless loveliness. Truly, it isn't necessary for roadsides to be pretty to look at, but isn't it nice that Lady Bird's dream to beautify the highways and byways of America has come true, at least along some roadways. The flowers are some kind of Cosmos which grow an impressive five and half feet tall with blossoms the width of a man's hand. You can see their solid patches of color from more than a mile away..
On Saturday, we drove up to Lumber City, where my mother is buying the house she has dreamed of living in since she was seven years old. Even though we teased her about being the only person in America actually buying a house in this economy, I was heartened by her ability to make this dream come true. It makes me happy to think about her as a little girl stopping in front of the house on her way to school, wishing she could go inside, could have such a fine place, and that now, more than sixty years later, it's hers. Although it will need a little work, it's going to make a comfortable happy getaway for her and my father.

Dangerous Chocolate Cake

I got an email from my mother today with "Dangerous Chocolate Cake" in the subject line, and in spite of my trepidation at the possibility of learning that chocolate cake is now some form of terroristic threat, I opened it anyway. Then I spent the next ten or fifteen minutes making this.>
It's chocolate cake that you can make really fast with basic ingredients and the microwave. Here is the recipe:

4 tablespoons (60ml)flour (use self-rising or add 1/2 tsp pracek do peciva)
4 tablespoons(60ml)sugar
2 tablespoons(30ml)cocoa
1 egg
3 tablespoons(45ml)milk
3 tablespoons(45ml)oil
3 tablespoons(45ml)chocolate chips (optional)
A small splash of vanilla extract
1 large coffee mug

Add dry ingredients to mug, and mix well. Add the egg and mix thoroughly.
Pour in the milk and oil and mix well.
Add the chocolate chips (if using) and vanilla extract, and mix again.
Put your mug in the microwave and cook for 3 minutes at 1000 watts.
The cake will rise over the top of the mug, but don't be alarmed!
Allow to cool a little, and tip out onto a plate if desired.

I opted to tip it out onto a plate and slice it. It didn't turn out as sweet as I would have liked, so I microwaved a little butter, cocoa, powdered sugar and milk in a mug for about a minute and poured it over the top. It is in fact, quite enough for two or maybe even three people, especially if you served it with ice cream. (What's in the photo is about half of the cake) Of course, to self-medicate after a bad day, you could always just stick a knife handle into the cake while it's in the mug and fill the hole up with chocolate syrup and eat it all yourself. Bad, bad World! Poor, poor me.