Watching "Diners, Drive-ins, and Dives" is making me want to road-trip and try all these places.

I just got totally confused by the fact that we're also talking salad in Bitches. But then I scrolled back and remembered that discussion started with arugula as liberal shibboleth. I love us.

Just catching up on all the food talk. I'm kind of meh on most veggies, but I will admit, I'm so looking forward to our local Farmer's Market opening up in a couple of weeks. I can't wait to see all the great, fresh things we can get.

I like veggies fine. I wish I could get better veggie dishes at fast food places, but...yeah. Seems unlikely they're about to start serving nom-licious roasted brussels sprouts or whatever. Not fast to make, even if I can pop them in my mouth fast! But I'm very much of the "things I make need to be fast to make, and keep a long time in the pantry/fridge/freezer" and ...fresh veggies are not that (and frozen veggies mostly don't taste nearly as good). So...yeah. I don't eat nearly as many as I want/should.

I like kale with soy sauce and garlic. I have Brenda's blog open to read in another window momentarily.

I performed in the show last night and there was hardly any audience, which was sad, but it went well, and the producer liked it and asked us to perform in her show in May, yay!

Went to Home Depot and spent $150 on painting supplies. AND went to the other paint store and spent $90 on the actual color of paint I had to buy. Geez (and that's AFTER the nice lady gave me a $50 discount!! It first came up as $140 and I kinda gulped, and she was like "Hmm. Do you...have AAA?" and I was like "No..." and she said "...hmm....we'll put you down as a contractor...")

And then I managed to make it to the last of the four classes at the weekend's Hoedown (tonight is the big "ball"). I slept in and skipped most of them, I was too tired, and obviously had the show and didn't go to last night's dancing! I got a call while I was getting the paint, saying "We have your badge, you did know it was this weekend, right?"

Oh, and the keys I had made at Home Depot don't actually work. GRR.

We're just now getting the good strawberries and tomatoes in this area.

Opted for a shirmp parm sammich over pizza.

My tiny local old-skool NY pizzeria guy uses fresh shrimp he breads himself. Once my dinner was a little under-done, but that's a small price to pay for shrimp that isn't overcooked.

Rice Krispies:

Reason #4276 I love living here: We spent the majority of the day in Redmond at the Digipen Institute where the kids participated in a preview for a summer camp. At the end of the afternoon, it was decided, Nate's going to be doing Robotics and Abby's going to be doing Game Design and how freakin' cool is THAT? I love that she was one of maybe four girls in a group of thirty or so and she didn't even notice-- except to flirt with the boy sitting next to her.

Another boy admired her game background design.

Heaven help the game industry.

Freshly picked sweet corn is a miracle of yum.

We live for corn season. There's nothing like sweet corn on the cob with butter and salt. NOM.

Deb Grabien also introduced me to my favorite veg dish -- roasted asparagus and mushrooms, twenty minutes in a hot oven tossed with olive oil and sea salt. I could eat it every day.

My big downfall is that I really don't love carrots. They have to be cooked in way that masks the carrot flavor, or are paired with another veg. I like them raw only nominally more than cooked. Not a fan of yams or squash other than yellow summer, either.

We got lucky with the kids -- they like salad and green beans and broccoli and corn, which amazes me (the broccoli especially).

My meals pretty much revolve around veggies. Ok, my dinners. I don't do breakfast, and lunch is usually half a tortilla with hummus, some sandwich meat and cheese. And lots of fruit. Lots and lots of fruit. I like a good hunk of meat from time to time, but it's got to be that: good. I can easily go without in things like my (daily) salad habit, but I put in chicken for the protein factor.

Like Brenda, if I have crackers and cheese in the house, I will nibble at them unendingly. So I try to not have them. Except TJ's everything crackers are pure crack, I tell you. I usually allow a box every other trip or so.

In unsurprising news, I have a fridge full of spinach that I could literally eat plain straight out of the bag. And strawberries. And little banana bread from Moveable feast. And a couple empanadas: one bbq, one black bean.

After hauling myself to the FM for the above, I did my long swim, went out for a pedicure and to pick up something for the party, went to the party, came home, vacuumed and mopped the first floor and now I am daid. I need to replace the mop head, it self destructed just as I finished up. I still need to grocery shop, do the second floor, target (I need to reverse that order, hmm,) make another dress or shoe shopping attempt, swim and, if it is dry enough, do some yard work. Had a nice window of gorgeous weather to do it this morning, but I had other things that could only get done then. Sigh.

Oh my god, fresh sweet corn! It is yummy, and a memory in my mouth of childhood. Weirdly, it actually tasted pretty good raw!

Now I am longing to somehow move to the country, grow my own food, and never have to work for "the man" again.