Spice Rack Woes

In my never-ending endeavor to cook the perfect meal--I attempt a new recipe at least every two years--it occurred to me that the reason so many of my offerings are not the high-quality caliber I desire is most likely due to no fault of my own. Rather, my sadly outdated spice rack is doing me in.

I think we may still own spices purchased around the time we were married. The trouble is, I can't tell those spices from more recently purchased ones. I can't go by how much has been used. I currently have one unopened bottle of white pepper and another sealed container of orange peel. Both are technically "new" in the sense they are still cellophane wrapped.  But can anything sitting on our shelf for five  to eight years really be considered "new?" Yet I hesitate to throw them out. If I do, you just know a great recipe calling for orange peel will show up tomorrow.

But I should probably ditch them. I'm not one of those people who can taste a recipe and say, "Oh, I need to add a dash of this or that."  I have no sense of spices. In fact, the only spice we use with any regularity is chili powder. We put it on everything. Our motto is, "Anything tastes good hot." And also, "Anything Dena cooks tastes better when masked by copious amounts of chili powder." But beyond that, we rarely use spices.

Or, rarely used to. I in fact have cooked quite a few meals this year and have been dusting cobwebs off spice jars and using the ingredients. This does not make me happy, however, as I'm convinced the herbs have lost their potency and I might as well be throwing cut grass in the pot.

I want new spices. Pretty matching bottles lined up in alphabetical order in my cabinet.  The fact that the price of purchasing a full new complement of household spices comes in just under the sticker price for a 2008 Porsche deters me but a little.  Well, kind of. Does anyone else besides me go into sticker shock over the price of spices? And WHY do they sell spices in such huge jars when most recipes call for 1/8 teaspoon of a spice? Spices ought to be packaged in itty-bitty envelopes and sold at the checkout counter next to mints and gum.

Meanwhile, watch out cooking world. I'm saving my pennies for some coriander. There'll be no stopping me then.

Valentine's Day Massacre Marathon

Hearts and flowers are for wimps.  I'm participating in the Valentine's Day Massacre Marathon Relay. Teams up to four members will participate in a 26.2 mile relay. Each team member will run a 1.6 mile loop around a local park, then wait for other team members to run their loops. I'm not sure how I'll do with all the stops and starts; seems I'd prefer to just run my 6+ miles and be done with it. But I've never tried it this way and it might be fun.

I am on a SuperGeezer team! This means the combined age of my team is over 200 years. We've got a 61 and 62 year old, a 44 year-old, and practically fresh-from-the-womb little 37 year-old me. I'm also the only female on the team.

The 44-year old is by far the fastest of all of us. By coincidence, he's also the doctor who'll be giving me my physical. I called yesterday and scheduled the complete physical, including blood work, for late February. So I'll actually be meeting this man for the first time at the race. I can see the introduction now: "Hi, I'm Dena. I'll be sitting semi-naked in your office about 9 days from now. Pleasure." I mean, really, what is the etiquette???

Meanwhile, I've got a 15-mile road race the last weekend in January that I am sooooo not ready for. I haven't run over 8 miles in one setting since my marathon. And this is a hilly course. Then the weekend after that I'm participating in the Uwharrie 8-mile trail race. It's short, but brutal. The first mile and a half is straight up and I've heard it only gets worse from there. Back in October when I signed up for it, it sounded fun. Now I just think I'm stupid. But I'm going out there this Sunday with some friends for a practice run so I can see what I've gotten myself into.

Computer Cleaning

As if it weren't enough to keep up with the house, yard, pets, body, and inner spiritual state, now we must add "purging old computer documents" to our never ending to-do lists.

I spent almost two hours yesterday going through my Favorites folder on the Internet. You know, that folder that you save a website to because you think that you will someday return to it. Not so much. I couldn't remember what half the sites were so I had to click on the link to go to the site so I could decided if it was worth saving or deleting. I ended up being pretty hard core , deleting  3/4ths of the sites I'd saved. I treated the sites like the clothes in the back of my closet. If I haven't worn them in over two years, I'm not going to miss them when they're gone.

Then since I had indulged it, my Type A personality really kicked in and I created little folders for the remaining links with titles such as "Grammar & Reference" and "Marketing Tips" and "Cool Writing Stuff! Metaphors, Idioms, Exercises." But I have to say, I swelled with pride this morning when I clicked on my Favorites icon and found such a tidy domestic scene in place.

Now my Word documents beckon to me and they will not be so easily tamed. You try being a writer and having 10 versions of what is essentially the same document saved on both your computer and laptop and figure out which versions are okay to dump and which you might want to keep because there happens to be a beautiful turn of phrase buried in there. I'm stringent on getting rid of most clutter in life but my writing leaves me flummoxed. What if I delete something I need later?

Which, btw, is turning into a huge problem as I'm spending the first months of this new year doing many many many writing exercises, both on my laptop and in handwritten journals. I'm stuck on what to do with my output. The writings aren't really part of anything like a novel or article; they're just exercises. But... sometimes unexpected ideas are birthed from the nothingness of such writings. Do I save them? If so, where? I picture some giant jumbled folder that I'll avoid looking at because it's such a mess of scraps of paper and hard-to-decipher scribbles. Right now my method is to leave the writing scattered on the guest bed (the cats like to sleep on them, so at least my work is serving a higher purpose) or saved in random folders on my computer.

However, now that the urge to purge has hit, there's no going back. I foresee long hours in front of a computer screen facing. me. Let me know if you have any organizational suggestions. I know several of my regular blog readers (and you know who you are) share my anal-retentive qualities. Let's put them to work.

Quick Check-in On New Year Resolutions

How's everyone doing with those resolutions? Weight sliding off? Relationships healthy? Houses gleaming? Quality time indulged in with kids/spouse/pets each and every day? And best of all, nothing riles you because you are zen and one with the universe? 

Yeah, me neither. But slow progress is being made. Here's a quick check on how those resolutions are holding up.

1. Keep alive the Christmas fish. Check. The fish are alive and well and we love our little guys. Best of all, no smell. Only one more week until we can add more fish. Can you sense the excitement?
2. Maintain a 25-mile/week running base until summer training begins. I'm close. I'm averaging closer to 21 miles but I've got races at the end of the month so I'm motivated to up the miles.
3. Yoga and weight train. I'm all over this one. Yoga 3x/week and I'm doing 8-minutes in the morning weight training which so far is working well.
4. Clean the house weekly, together. Umm...next resolution, please.
5. Dena in charge of finances. That's right, I rule. I'm freaking out at how fast money goes out the door. I think I liked it better when I wasn't paying attention. But I already have a much stronger grasp of our household budget. More to come.
6. Get a physical. It's only been 15 years since my last one. I have a doctor's name to call this week for an appointment.
7. One hour of TV per day in January. So far, so good. I'm inundated with books and haven't missed time spent loafing in front of the boob-tube.
8. Meditate 5x/week. Sigh. This has been on my resolution list for the past 8 years. I think I've sat down for 3 sessions so far this year. But I haven't given up hope on this one just yet...
9. Read local paper. I'm doing more of this. I'm not doing it daily but also don't know that I WANT to do it daily. Right now I'm aiming for about every second day.
10. 2 "new" things each month with Blair. We've got this month's scheduled. A Paula Poundstone concert and a friend of mine who is a comedian is performing in town this weekend and we're going to see her. Apparently we need the laughs.
11. Exhibit more patience. This is the goal Blair asked me to work on. When I asked for an example, he said: "When we go to Wal-mart and there's a line, a lot of times you roll your eyes and huff and look annoyed. Maybe just work on calming down a little in those situations." Okay, fine. But I had to point out that I am NOT upset that there is a line. Lines happen. What I'm huffing about is the person who has decided to hold an in-depth conversation with the cashier who they apparently haven't seen in a month, forgetting to pull out their wallet to pay while where is a line 10 deep behind them. Or--my favorite--watching the cashier whose register locked up simply abandon all hope and just stand there and stare at the machine in the hopes that it may come back to life. How about calling a manager or someone? But no... she just stands there. That's where I lose my patience. But no more. I'm on a nice campaign. Stand back and watch the sugar drip off me.

I've got a few more private/professional goals that are coming along nicely as well. All in all, 2008 has held good things thus far. Hope it's the same for all of you.