health nuts like it shriveled?

our town. most of us born and raised here played in the mud, swam in the river, climbed the trees. most of us also tried eating dog food, but that's a different story. this is a place where plenty of people sport infrequently-washed hair, smell like patchouli, eat peanut butter that's just crushed peanuts. no matter where we go and what we become, there's a little breeze of hippie that floats around inside us. i know to eat my vegetables, recycle, and bring my eco bags to the store, but i also drive my car to work, drink unfiltered water, and make pancakes with some white flour.
my friends who have chosen the more conscientious path make a great effort to reduce their "footprint" and have been eating organic for years. their fridges are full of vegetables not wrapped in plastic, which makes them...shriveled. when i think of serious health nuts, i think of shriveled vegetables, things that taste too real (bread so brown it's like gnawing on a tree trunk), not to mention things made of other things: meat made of soy, milk made of rice, crackers made of nuts. it's very confusing. while i absolutely respect the effort and expense for that kind of lifestyle, it doesn't really appeal to me. i prefer moderation: it's easier. but suddenly i'm becoming one of those people. here i sit, a bowl of homemade, organic beet, carrot, potato, raw coconut oil soup and gluten-free toast beside me, looking all wholesome.

the bread is the first gluten-free thing i've intentionally bought. why? because four months ago the choking feeling came back, and recently i realized it could be diet-related. thanks to many nutritionist and health-conscious friends, i've read enough about wheat to finally understand how terrible it is for us. thanks to genetic engineering, we basically have tasty, tasty poison in everything we eat. it's not really a stretch to think that's one reason our culture got all crazy/stupid/fat. sugar is the same. now maybe you're rolling your eyes. but seriously, it was worth a try if the choking feeling went away.

i decided to stop eating wheat, corn, dairy, and eggs as much as possible, in the hopes that i'd discover...something. maybe i'm "intolerant" to one or all of those things. it's likely; i had many food allergies as a child. i got home from work two days after i started my new diet, looked through my pantry, and realized that even though a great deal of my food is organic, almost all of it contains wheat. i was starving; what could i eat!? so i had broccoli and tofu noodles (freak accident that i had those) sauteed together with soy sauce...which contains, you guessed it, wheat! i'd like like some wheat on wheat with wheat sauce, please. i desperately needed to go to the store.

the next morning, after a breakfast of basically tea, i set out hungry for the health food store. my research said coconut oil was indispensable for cooking, and here i hit my first wall...there were like 12 different brands of organic coconut oil. which...? it's not easy to make discerning decisions on low blood sugar. i wafted around the store for two hours reading labels like it was my job and collecting foods that would do no evil. finally i headed home and cooked up a hearty serving of quinoa pasta. it was great; hearty and satisfying. thirty minutes later i felt hungry again. i had missed breakfast and hadn't had much protein all day. i started making dinner.
the day's haul:

ok, i was seriously hungry, but i was also strangely relaxed. i'd been off wheat and most eggs and dairy for three days. usually when i'm hungry, i get crabby and headache-y. instead i felt giggly and very mellow; i felt...high. i don't touch drugs, but the novelty of that feeling was fun. mellow is so far from my usual tense, hyper-aware, high-strung state of being that my mom asked me if i was ok on the phone. i entertained fantasies of a new, relaxed version of myself. it's not quite that easy, but i can say i've been free of the choking feeling since i started this, and that changes everything. you'd be less anxious too if the hand strangling you for four months finally decided to write a novel or learn to juggle instead.

i haven't been gone very long, but it feels like a lifetime, or: half life and full circle.

well hello! no, i haven't abandoned the dear little blog. i will absolutely continue to write, but i've been a bit snowed under. read all about it...
way back in april when i started this post, just as i was enjoying the pattern of my routine settling in and realizing suddenly (with some surprise) that i wasn't unhappy, it all began to change. i knew my long housesitting stint would come to an end, but i was doing a creative job i really enjoyed three days a week (photoshopping) and getting lots of other stuff done on my looong weekends, while half-heartedly looking for other work. i was cooking a lot and getting crafty every night. life was marvelously simple.

the sequined brooches i was making.


my life at the first housesitting house.


playing with hair extensions.


as order falls towards chaos, so does life fall away from simplicity. i started having an ongoing choking/pressure sensation--understandably distressing. i wondered if it was just stress, so i went for a hard run which usually forces my muscles to relax and always leaves me physically "new." this time the choking feeling still hounded me, which was compounded by my distress: pounding heart, tightness in my stomach and chest, anxiety. i just didn't know if i was psyching myself into it or not, but eventually decided to go to the doctor. he listened very carefully and was reassuring; we did a few tests and tried a medication for acid reflux. while the sensation got better somewhat, it still comes and goes.
in the midst of this haze, i found out i'd be losing my job because the place i worked was going out of business. terribly sad all around, and terribly sad for me because it was one of the very few jobs (or only one?) i've had that was creatively fulfilling. that did nothing to ease my hair-trigger panic. as i fumbled around in my brain trying to figure out what kind of work i should try to find, another amazing housesitting job dropped in my lap. sigh of relief. at least i wouldn't be in dire straits for money and a place to live.
the strawbale country house was like a two-month retreat. it smelled like desert sage constantly (perhaps due to the fact that i was conceived less than a mile from there, sage smells like home); Chama the dog was a sweet, smart, comforting companion (this from an unrelenting 'cat person'); and i had ample time, space, and friendship (hi Miki!) to deal with the job transition. mom and her brand new back injury could visit me without too much trouble, and (shh, don't tell) i had all my earthly possessions in the spare room. not typical housesitter behavior, but i didn't want to put it back in storage again after just finally getting it all cleaned up again.

the beautiful house


Cham-ster


breakfast overlooking the river


the Great Book-Airing of '11



my earthly possessions had increased quite a bit because the incredibly generous owner of the previous house basically gave me all the furniture that was left there: a comfy bed and sofa, dresser, and kitchen table! he also hired me to paint the entire interior of that house to prepare it for selling. i enlisted the help of my friend candace, and we worked our asses off trying to finish that job. it was epic, but i was proud of the job we did. white hydrangea, i love you, but i don't want to see you again for a long time.
after that, i found a temporary summer job doing merchandising for a greenhouse that ships plants to Home Depot. that means i was at Home Depot, but i didn't work for Home Depot. it was wonderful to arrange flowers in the hot sun for 6 hours, but my job mainly consisted of telling people i didn't work for Home Depot and didn't know how many cubic feet the 50 pound bags of mulch covered, etc. i knew it was going to get brutal as the summer heated up, but because we had an incredibly slow spring, i was only getting one day of work a week and couldn't plan another job around that, so when i found a job perfectly suited to me a month later, with a subtle look, i exited.
i returned to the fold of crema hounds; i re-became a barista. i'm the manager of the drive-thru satellite of a coffee shop where i worked seven years ago, yeah! actually, it's been really fun doing something that doesn't require bleeding in the brain to come up with some activity that jaded 5-year-old japanese children will want to do. bonus! the customers have been great, and it's super interesting interacting with people in their cars because they pull up a bubble of their space next to a bubble of mine: they listen to music, talk to their friends, pet their dogs, smoke, eat, etc. i like seeing a little section of every person's life.
the shop:


i work the place alone; with two windows for cars and a third for walk-ups, it gets hairy sometimes, and i love it. i fly around stirring espresso into chocolate, toasting bagels, blending smoothies, heating burritos, and chatting with everyone i can. the day flies by, and by the end, i actually feel like i've accomplished a lot. i hope it lasts, because it feels like exactly what i need right now.
i found this new job a week or two before i had to leave the 2nd housesitting gig, but i didn't really have a place to go. my mom's next door neighbors offered to let me housesit for 10 days, but there was no way i could put alll my stuff in their house, so what should i do with it? answer: take it back to the first house! all freshly painted and uninhabited, the owner agreed to let me keep my stuff in the garage for a few weeks until i found a place to live. so i started a new job, was living out of boxes next door to my mom (hilarious), and then two weeks later, i moved in with my mom...for four days. after which i moved again, to my final resting place: my current apartment. i should note, i didn't move alone. my mom was out of commission with her now well-worn back injury, so an old friend named alex helped me move three times in three weeks. do they make IOUs that big? (more on alex later.)
when i saw the crapholes some people in this town are trying to rent for more than i paid in a big-city suburb in japan, i was scandalized. get real, or get real estate, i should say. slumlords have apparently united, so i was thrilled to find a spacious one bedroom with a beautiful view and all but the electricity included. honestly, my first thought was, "i could have a kotatsu in here!" and i will! the building is amazingly quiet (yay for living near old people!), but apparently half the people also smoke (quietly), so there is secondhand smoke in my apartment almost every hour of the day. ick. but tonight, for some reason, there is only the smell of rain-washed night air, so i'm happy. after 6 months of living half a life in other people's spaces, it has been wonderful to finally unfold.

the view.


my kotatsu-ready living room.


the morning view.

caramel-sensei visits d-town, the food tour

my friend kara came for a visit--we met in japan and lived in the same small town for two years. she took a break from her crazy law school schedule to eat the eats (priorities!) and see the sights of my hometown. our first night was ernie's treat--dinner at Ken and Sue's.

team kumano reunited!


birthday cake martini; i'm not complainin'


speaking of birthday cake: starbuck's birthday cake pop. yes, i was having a little cake obsession.


the next morning i made raspberry scones with orange glaze...for which i didn't have any powdered sugar, so i just used regular sugar. it was...crunchy.


we stopped by the rocky mountain chocolate factory for their irresistable caramel apples and sat in the sun to devour them. you like my squinty eyes?


mine was snickers.


we did a lot of knitting, some tv watching, hot springs soaking, and japanese crosswording. 99% of my contributions were food-related...guiltily, i changed "ume" to "hime."


the last day we had tempura bento.




so soon we had to say goodbye, but i enjoyed myself completely! thanks so much for the fun times, miss kara.

adventures in housesitting: in the belly of the solar beast

i woke to four fox-colored paws landing on the the bed. Chama the Mystery Alert Dog was determined to wake me up. i sat up, blearily ordering her to get down, but after a few seconds i realized the house was abuzz with electronic beeps and chirps. this week i moved into a new housesitting place--a solar house in the country with little more than the river and sagebrush for neighbors. according to my mobile phone, it was 1:30 a.m., and the whole house was without power.
the moon was bright, so i crept downstairs with my heart pounding at the strangeness of it all and found my flashlight. slowly i slipped in every room searching for a fuse box or some other magic reset button. no luck. the chirping continued. in exasperation, i tried calling the mobile number of the house's owner, but it was off--big surprise in the middle of the night. cringing, i dialed the number of a friend who lives down the same dirt road and thankfully she answered. i asked if she knew where the fuse box was, but she didn't. she informed me sleepily that her power was also out, which was actually a relief...it wasn't a fluke i needed to figure out. there are no lights visible from the house, so i wouldn't have known otherwise. i tracked down all the beeping appliances--crabby surge protectors and cordless phones frantic at being unable to communicate with their cradles--and unplugged them, called the electric company to alert them of the outage, and went back to bed.
just as the adrenaline was finally fading and i was drifting off, Chama the M.A.D. landed on the bed again. what now!? the power was back on (!) so i plugged everything in again and rolled back into the covers. i knew what came next was inevitable, though: an hour later the electric company called to let me know the power was back on! sigh. after waking up once more when Chama yipped in her sleep, i finally dragged myself out of bed to get ready for work. good morning, Monday. :)

daifuku diva

after figuring out that i could make the mochi for japanese sweets pretty easily, without the ordeal of pounding it as you do regular mochi, i got the right flour and picked up a can of white beans to make shiro koshian from the recipe i found online. red and white bean pastes have a mild, sweet, earthy flavor; they don't really taste like beans.
first i undressed the white kidneys and smashed 'em through a metal sieve with some water.


i poured the white sludge onto a kitchen towel and squeezed all the water out.


the resulting product looked like i thought it should, so i added the sugar syrup and cooked it until the texture seemed about right.


next i made the gyuhi (soft mochi); with this recipe it couldn't be easier. you dissolve sugar and water into your rice flour, nuke it, and stir until it takes on that unique soft, warm, skin-like texture.

my materials: the middle bag is katakuriko...potato starch to dust the outside so they won't stick, and below that is some ready-made smooth red bean paste called koshian. lumpy bean paste is called tsubuan.


i patted my white bean paste around some strawberries (should have done that before i made the gyuhi) and stretched little lumps of the dough over them. then i was free to stuff myself.

strawberries in shiro koshian.


chestnuts in red koshian.


the finished ichigo (strawberry) and kuri (chestnut) daifuku.


the white bean paste would have been much better if i had actually blended it in a blender and used fresh-cooked beans, but it wasn't too bad.

YUM.

overcome run

in the spirit of my birthday theme (more you, less me), i was inspired to do a 5k fundraiser in support of a local woman who has cancer. the day before the run, though, my motivation was flagging. as is typical, my neurotic mind was too focused on the details surrounding the event instead of the reason i wanted to do it. i'd have to get up early...what if i couldn't find parking? should i carry water and my inhaler? i'd never done a public run before, and i don't enjoy running outside. it seems trivial, i know, but these are the kinds of thoughts that often go through my head when i'm considering something. but...i figured there was no better time to take a step towards living for others, so i put aside those issues and went for it! it felt great!
my goal was to run the whole 5K without stopping, which i did in 31 minutes. my real victory was just deciding to run at all.

happy birthday to me! i'm 11 + 22 + 33

32 is apparently a happy number in mathematics, so hopefully this will be a happy year for me too. it was a quiet birthday, but it was enjoyable...maybe especially because no one even attempted to sing me the birthday song. mom made dinner for me at my house, so when i came home from work it was ready.


she had decorated with balloons and streamers and laid my mail and presents out beautifully.


she even poked fun at my ocd-level paranoia about the hanta virus with a toy mouse.


dessert was coconut cream pie with allll the candles.


the next night ernie treated me to delicious sushi, the best of which was this refreshing salmon and lemon roll.


mochi ice cream doesn't have room for 32 candles.


thanks to mom and ernie's birthday gifts, i got to order from my favorite online japanese grocery again!


the next night a few friends came over for board games, my favorite, and thus ended the birthday week.