slowly she turned

Living the Slow life in North Carolina

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  • Ahh, the last two days have been perfect. Mother Nature was nice enough to give me two wonderful days of art-making and fun before my day of FEAR tomorrow.

    Susanne just brought by the batch of paper that I made yesterday with her help. Weekend after next we plan to make some iris/cattail paper. We’re going to try to get as much paper made as possible before cold weather since she can’t run her beater when it’s cold. Then I’ll have lots of paper to bind into books this winter!

    Last night I was feeling great so Sandy and I did what is becoming a Sunday night ritual for us – we ate at Fishbones. However, eating did set my teeth off hurting again so I had to take some pain medicine. Today I have only taken ibuprofen and sudafed pe. I’m supposed to take two Valium before I go to sleep tonight. Man, I hate this. It’s not just the feeling of not being alert. It’s also that my mother used to have to give me Valium to take me to the dentist when I was little. I feel like an eight-year-old.

    I won’t be surprised if I end up not having to have the root canal. This thing really seems to have responded to the antibiotics and I suspect that the sinus/migraine headaches have made me clench my teeth and everything spiraled downward from there. But I may be wrong.

    ANYway, I spent all day today in the gazebo painting papers and book covers, listening to soft music, and communing with the birds and squirrels. It was the day I’ve been meaning to have for weeks now, and something would always get in the way. This was my day to do exactly what I wanted to do and I did it.

  • Sunday sweep with a seafood recipe

    Breaking in the new camera

    Yesterday went fairly well; although I couldn’t find the energy to make paper, I got a lot of other things done.

    The fabulous Zha K and I did a massive Greensboro Curb Farmer’s M arket trip. The seafood guy was there with sea scallops and large shrimp that he brought up from Harker’s Island. We bought a pound each and split them. When I cleaned the shrimp I found that they still had the heads on and so I ended up with very little shrimp, and that was disappointing. The scallops were wonderful though. Here’s what I did with them:

    Marinate 1 pound of cleaned and dressed shrimp and scallops for at least an hour ( I marinated them for about 3 hours):

    1/4 c olive oil
    1/4 c lime juice
    About 3 large minced cloves of garlic

    Preheat oven to 450. Put the seafood in an oiled baking pan. Pour over marinade. Add fresh shredded parsley and basil, crumbled feta cheese, shredded parmigiano cheese and fresh ground pepper to taste. Bake for 5-7 minutes, until shrimp is pink. (You’ll notice that the marinade partially “cooks” the seafood.)

    I usually serve this over pasta, but I didn’t last night. I use this basic marinade for all seafood, usually adding some hot pepper flakes and varying the herbs according to what I have in the garden. If I have fresh dill, that’s a plus.

    We also had fresh corn on the cob and field peas and butterbeans. I bought 12 ears of corn, that same bicolor corn that was so good earlier this summer. I shucked it and cooked a few ears but I need to blanch the rest and cut it off the cob and freeze it today, along with the butterbeans and field peas that I just finished shelling.

    Other farmers’ market buys: hamburger, milk, eggplants, red and yellow peppers, sweet onions, eggs, potatoes.

    The buzz at the market is that the ownership and management is changing from Greensboro Parks and Recreation to the Department of Agriculture. No one yet knows what the implications of this change will be. There sure has been a lot of hoo-ha between the vendors who want to resell and the farmers who want a level playing field for selling their own produce. I’m on the farmers’ side, myself. If I want to buy from a reseller, I can go to any number of grocery stores in this area and find almost anything I want.

    We hung out in the gazebo for a little while, where I am writing this right now, and then completed our shopping at Deep Roots Market. I heated up some fresh tomato sauce over cheese grits from yesterday for lunch, and man, was that good. But then I wore myself out and napped through the afternoon. Susanne was kind enough to come pick up my corn shucks and abaca and she will have the pulp beaten and ready for me to make paper over there today.

    My lettuce and mustard seeds are beginning to germinate. That is going to be a very pretty bed if the rabbits and squirrels will leave it halfway alone.

    By the way, I’ve been able to go longer and longer without pain medication and I feel pretty doggone good today. I even ate cereal on both sides of my mouth. I slept the whole night through last night.

  • Papermaking in Susanne’s studio

    It’s not often that I get photos of me, so here I am in all my glory. Susanne’s daughter Sophie helped me break in the new camera. Susanne’s husband John fed me scuppernong grapes from their vines.

    The paper is made of corn shucks and abaca fiber.

  • Saturday morning coffee pot post

    Let’s see if I can get in a quick SAMCPP before the fabulous Zha K whisks my dopey ass away to the farmers market in the next hour.

    Last night I finally dealt with the pile of tomatoes that were beginning to rot on the counter. Good heirloom tomatoes do not sit patiently for weeks. They are full of life and passion, and if not engaged, will go on to their destiny without you. I cut away the bad parts on a few, peeled and cored them, chopped them and put them on the lowest simmer overnight. Still they are not cooked down as much as I wanted so I turned up the heat a little this morning.

    I don’t have the energy, time, or amount to justify canning these, so I’m considering making a big batch of meat sauce and freezing it in portions. What makes me nervous about this is the loud clicking noise that the refrigerator is making. I’m not sure how old it is, but it has to be at least 10 years old, probably a good bit older. I want to replace it with an Energy Star once it goes down, but I’d hoped that it might wait a few more months. The last time I filled a fridge with frozen tomato sauce it died so by doing this, will I call for its demise? Am I tempting Fate? After all, I don’t really know how the appliance karma thing works.

    Early in the afternoon, I’m going to Susanne’s to beat more corn shuck pulp for papermaking today and tomorrow. I’m planning to take the Alaska book with me to work on. I have a great idea of sculpting the front of the book to look like a glacier. We’ll see how it goes. If I mess up really bad, I have another book of the same size that I can start over with and reap the knowledge of my mistakes.

    Had another governor’s school dream last night. This is a recurring dream that has changed to become a craft/art school experience, but it is still called Governor’s School in my dream and I’m always astounded that I’m allowed to go back every year. These dreams are usually a much happier experience than Governor’s School actually was for me. Not that Governor’s School wasn’t an amazing experience for me, intellectually and romantically, but I was 17 and spent the first half of it being soundly rejected by a bunch of theatre pricks. The last half was great once I picked myself up from having my ego bludgeoned.

    Gotta go, the fabulous Zha K is here.

  • Okay, I’m going to update about the dental saga, then I’m going to try not to say another word about it until next Tuesday night.

    Dr. Applebaum is a young, pretty, sweet endodontist. Considering what a weepy wimp I was, she had incredible patience and compassion, along with her assistant who patted my hand and kept me supplied with dry tissues.

    She couldn’t tell definitely from the tests whether I need a root canal, partly because I have a big crown on the tooth in question and partly because I took a pain pill a couple of hours before my appointment. She said that the crown was really worn out from my grinding anyway and needed to be replaced, and it would be a very difficult root canal to drill through it. So we decided that she would numb me up, pull off the crown, do the root canal if needed, and pop the crown back on temporarily until I could get a new crown.

    The problem was that she couldn’t get the crown off. Also that I cried and shook and wept uncontrollably at times. And this was AFTER I took the Xanax. I bit a hole in my freakin lip.

    So next Tuesday morning, I’m going back to my dentist who is going to remove this crown and make me a temporary crown, and that afternoon I’ll go back to Dr. Applebaum who will evaluate it again and do a root canal if I need it. And she says that it will be a long one if we do it.

    She is suspicious that part of the reason I am in so much pain is a sinus infection, so she put me on antibiotics and told me that I could add 600 mg of ibuprofen to my hydrocodone every four hours instead of six. She gave me a prescription for Valium to use the night before and day of the procedures and another script of Vicodin to get me through the weekend.

    So, thank God, at least she is very serious about keeping my pain tolerable while we figure this thing out. I had a feeling that it would be complicated. I usually hate taking drugs of any kind, but honey, I’ll take what I can get after the last few days. Getting some decent sleep will help with the hysteria, too.

    I will be making paper this weekend and I’m playing with the new camera, so I won’t bore you with my dental problems any more, unless I change my mind! HA!

  • I may have been mistaken when I assumed that this wasn’t a dental problem. I have an appointment with a root canal specialist tomorrow, and a bottle of hydrocodone. Which has made a dent in the pain but I can honestly say that I am looking forward to a possible root canal, or any damn thing to put an end to this misery.

    I’m glad I bought the high end dental insurance.

    I ate a whole pot of cheese grits late this afternoon.

    Now I am going to feed the cats and settle down in bed with Hulu on the laptop.

  • Mixed bag today. A little work, pain, a little work, pain, class, home, nap, a little clean-up, a visit from Charlie.

    Whose website is in need of updating, and I’ve convinced him to let me update it, revamp it, and he’s going to blog the current stuff. In exchange for honey and a few items of produce that I don’t grow.

    We had a nice visit because it has been a long time since we’ve talked. He looked at the garden that he inspired and guided, and my studio, and my books, and some photos from Alaska. Sounds like he might be at Spannocchia at the same time as Susanne and I next summer, but we might just miss each other. I have two muses now. Charlie and Susanne. He’s such a great guy.

    Now, pain. Icepack, and hopefully, sleep.

  • Back Forty update

    I planted the fertile crescent nearest the back steps with a variety of lettuce and mild mustard greens this afternoon. First I weeded and broke up the top inch of soil with a garden rake. Then I shoveled a thin layer of compost from the compost bin over that, and half a bag of commercial topsoil over that. (I’m trying to build up this bed.) Then I sprinkled all of these seeds over the area, raked lightly, and watered from the rain barrel.

    Lettuce:
    Buttercrunch Bibb
    Black-seeded Simpson
    Red Sails
    Rouge De Hiver
    Red Oakleaf
    Oakleaf

    Mustards:
    Tatsoi
    Red Russian kale
    Mizuna
    Spring Raab
    Scarlet Ohno
    and whatever else is in “Morton Mild Mix” by High Mowing Seeds.

    I already have Tuscan kale and one lonely Golden Chard so I’m set for greens this winter. There is a lot of broccoli in the garden but it is not heading very well. I harvested just a tiny bit that I put into a squash casserole. I’ll probably plant turnips, carrots, and radishes in the next week or so.

  • Oh lord. Ow, ow, ow. Moan.

    I tempted Fate by writing about my healing from agoraphobia earlier this week, because my anxiety disorder decided to remind me that it is still here, and THAT part of my problem is unmedicated except for the occasional Xanax.

    Yesterday I was all fired up to get as much as I could done off my to-do list so that I could concentrate on being creative today. One of the things that I did that I didn’t have on my list was to visit Laura on her small farm outside Kernersville and give her some fleece that one of my readers had generously given to me, but I wasn’t using. While I was there, I suddenly got a bad toothache, ironically five minutes after mentioning a stressful situation that was making me clinch my teeth badly. It was as if I called it to me.

    I drove home in howling pain, mouth open, teeth apart. But I managed to get rid of it with a couple of ibuprofen. Sandy took me out to Fishbones for Smithwick’s and seafood, and I forgot about my toothache and was happy with my day.

    Then I woke up at 3 a.m. with the whole side of my head furiously aching, radiating out from my teeth to my jaw, behind my ears, eyes, and cheekbones. A migraine kicked in. I took two more ibuprofen, then two generic Excedrin migraine. I wrapped a flexible ice pack in a washcloth and applied that to my temple for the next three hours. I’m still hurting, but it is tolerable now.

    Holy moly. I’ve been to the dentist about this twice. It is not a dental problem. It is pure and simple anxiety. And my anxiety can be kicked off by happiness as well as bad stress. I hope that today is not going to be a wash for my creative plans, but I might have to let everything go.

    I have a jury summons tomorrow in High Point. Won’t that be so much more fun if I’m awake all night and in pain in the morning.

  • Saturday morning coffee pot post

    This coffee pot post will be a planning post, as I’ve done enough navel-gazing this week online and it is time for some action at Chez O’Neill.

    Things I need to do this weekend:
    -Weed whack the yard before the neighbs complain to the city.
    -Cook some dishes for the week ahead – maybe eggplant/tomato, goat cheese combo? Chicken and tomato sauce and pasta to satisfy Sandy. Black beans and rice.
    -Drug store: pick up prescription and decongestant.
    -Vet this morning: No delay on this, must do first thing. Revolution for the kitties.
    -Freeze field peas and butterbeans.
    -Plant lettuce, carrots, other fall/winter veggies.
    -Get handmade paper swap ready to mail.

    I’m not going to the farmers market because I simply don’t have the money. Payday is Monday, so I’ll do a big trip next Saturday. Fortunately, I have a freezer full of food!

    And that’s another purchase that I am considering. I have an old dorm-sized refrigerator in my studio, but what I really need is a small freezer, both for the overflow of summer bounty and storing paper pulp.

    I have been spending SO MUCH MONEY lately. My new camera came by Fed Ex yesterday. It looks awesome. Add learning to use my new digital SLR camera to the list. It is a Canon Rebel XS. I bought it for $495 from buydig.com, with free shipping and a 2 GB card. I decided that it was pointless to buy it from Office Depot, since their price was over $100 more, making the gift card that I got in exchange for my defective camera virtually worthless. I’ll need an SLR when I take photography, maybe next semester.

    I will probably use the gift card toward a new laptop sometime in the next few months. This one is wearing down fast. It doesn’t have enough memory to do much, the CD/DVD drive is shot, and the battery is dead. I don’t really mind the slowness, and I can probably fix the drive, but the many messages that I get about “not enough memory” are beginning to bug me. Ah, well, it was the right price. My husband bought it for $60 from a co-worker.

    Okay, cup is empty, time to go.