Salvaging a Cooking Mistake

It was, oh, 1970 perhaps. I was poor. I was hungry. AND, I had friends visiting, including handsome auburn-haired Jimmie. I wanted something for all of us to eat. I boiled water and added the only package of noodles in the house, drained the noodles when they were done, and stirred in some melted butter. So far, excellent. Then I went to add a little garlic powder -- and the lid came off the jar. In dumped WAY too much garlic. I scooped out some, but a lot was still in the dish. There were no more noodles. What to DO????? I tasted the dish, and it had so much garlic in it, it was bitter.

I searched the kitchen, found a block of mozzarella cheese and a big can of whole tomatoes, maybe 24 ounces. I drained can of tomatoes, added them, stirred everything up, grated a whole lot of cheese on top, and put the dish briefly into the oven. Success!!!

"What do you call this dish?" Jimmie asked. I confessed the dish didn't have a name. "Glop!" Jimmie pronounced, and I still call it that.

(Now I make the dish on purpose. Often I include hamburger meat crumbled up in the frying pan, cooked, and drained before adding to the noodles.)

I'm cooking up some today, for my quilting group; the weather is grumpy-looking and grey, and this will be just the dish to sustain us on a cool evening.

-- Rachel Holmen

Food for Colder Weather

I had an old family favorite meal today for lunch:  Campbell's tomato soup made with milk, with Cheerios in it.  (Plain, old fashioned Cheerios, not the sugar-coated ones.)  Good on a chilly day. -- Rachel

Bridge Open Again

They did manage to get the bridge open again -- and some idiot promptly earned himself a Darwin Award by taking the new curve too fast and driving over the rail. For a day or two afterwards, other drives actually slowed down for the curve, but by now, two whole weeks later, most drivers take the curves too fast.

SG Gate info on the fatality: link

-- Rachel Holmen

Bay Bridge Broken Again - Oct 27, 2009

I took the 108 bus from work to the TransBay Terminal, and there was my J bus. The driver opened the door for me, but a dispatcher waved me away. "The Bridge is closed," he said. Luckily, I had a BART ticket, so I took that home, but it was pretty crowded, and with one extremely quick stop at a grocery store for frozen veggies, I got home just before 10 pm. The word I'd heard in the bus terminal was: closed for 24 hours. What SFGate is now saying is, Closed Indefinitely.

I'm not a big fan of BART, either. TOOOOO noisy to hear my audio books; in fact, I'm surprised there hasn't been a class action lawsuit about deafness among the ridership.

-- Rachel Holmen

Home-made cards

My talented friend Keli made me these cards, on what looks like hand-made paper. If you're interested, contact me (reh at sff dot net) and I'll put you in touch with her. She is a wizard at birthday cards, and could probably come up with designs appropriate for other occasions as well. (And if you know great sources for rubber stamps, I'll forward that information to her as well. My favorite store, in Petaluma, seems to have disappeared.) -- Rachel Holmen

Another cat lost to me

My gray cat, Pearl Too, died two weeks ago today, leaving me once again sad and angry because, as another cat-loving friend reminded me, Pearl forgot the part in her contract about living forever to be my companion. Some cats have a lot of personality, do silly things you can retell to your friends. Pearl wasn't much like that, although of course she did have her moments. But mostly, she just wanted to be wherever I was, watch whatever I was doing, and if possible sit in my lap and purr. So she leaves a big hole in my life, especially when I'm home in the evenings. (And those darn grocery stores. Do you know, they have PET FOOD aisles, just to taunt me?)

This is What Real Baby Carrots Look Like

My friend Amy grows carrots, under something called Reemay; boy, they are tasty. Those things you buy as baby carrots? I hear they are actually broken chunks of big carrots, shaved round by machine, stored in bleach prior to sale. -- Rachel Holmen

Massively Ambitious: Bay Bridge renovations

Next weekend, the Bay Bridge across San Francisco Bay will be closed. For some info about what's being done, see baybridgeinfo.org. You'll be able to see what's happening on Google Earth, even follow the action on Twitter.

-- Rachel Holmen

Phil Marsh and the Freight coffee house, and further ramblings

I ran into my old friend Earl Crabb on Saturday night at the Phil Marsh show at the "old" Freight, the very last Satuday night they'll be at that venue, now that they're moving into their new building downtown at the end of the month. I think about ten people in the audience were under 55, and they were probably children and grandchildren of the old regulars, and there were about a hundred of us. We sang a hymn (not "angel band" but another fine old bluegrassy song with good harmony possibilities) in memory of Mike Seeger, who died this weekend, and Phil sang a lot of great old George Jones songs, stuff from the Royal Calypso Orchestra, and a lovesong with clever, tightly-packed lyrics about a long distance call, Tokyo to Tulsa, between ichiban number one cowboy and Su Li Su. (Special thanks to Gary Salzman for the calypso, and to Laurie Cohen for sonorous cello backup which particularly pleased my cello-playing seatmate, Carla de Haas.)

Phil was part of the Cleanliness and Godliness Skiffle Band, which was the first act at the Freight a zillion years ago. The band had a reunion I had to miss recently since I was out of town, so I was tickled to get a second chance this summer to see Phil.

And seeing Earl reminded me that when he and I had been dating (and he lived in Palo Alto), we used my house to host a HUGE party late one Saturday night, for the Cleanliness and Godliness band, the Mark Spoelstra band Jade Flute (now there was another man I had a crush on, Mark Spoelstra), and the visiting-from-Cambridge Jim Kweskin Jug Band. Geoff Muldaur and I compared notes and he claimed me as his "soul sister" since we get the same awful nervous rash on our hands sometimes. Tall fiddler Richard Greene was amused that I was both a singer and a seamstress. (I had started a small career, first with sunbonnets and then with men's shirts, sellling them in local boutiques.) I remember moving Maria Muldaur's fur coat into a closet since people were stepping on it, the party was so crowded; she'd taken it off and set it in a corner. The party didn't even start till about 1 am since all the bands had played gigs that night; and Country Joe and the Fish were invited but they were in Seattle, so they phoned in and said hello to everybody. But in the way of things, the bands remember Earl, and not me; and in justice, I have to say that Earl has made a serious avocation of taking photos at folk venues over the years, while I'm just a paying member of the audience. But I do pay, since I think it's important to support live music, not get by on the freebie guest list at the door even when I do know the singers.

The Freight got its name from its FIRST location, when they took over a bulding on San Pablo Avenue. Too broke to put up a new sign, they just added the words "coffee house" to the sign left there by the previous busines -- Freight and Salvage.


However, that venue held only about 78 people according to the fire marshall, and it's hard to make a go of a business that can't hold a lucrative capacity crowd when that crowd wants to show up. So they moved a few blocks away, just off San Pablo, and slowly fixed up the much-larger building they now had. (But the ladies' room still only held two stalls, leading to LONG lines during intermissions, and the green room was pretty small and there was no room for a kitchen, just a fridge and a counter for selling drinks and snacks.) The sound was okay as long as you didn't sit next to one of the walls, and the chairs were a ragtag collection, most of them not TOO uncomfortable, but that was about the best you could say about them. (Generously, you could bring in your own folding chair and use it, and people often did.)

The new venue promises to be so stunningly perfect and large, I wonder if all of us old folkies will be scared away! But opening night is sold out, a good sign. If I think I'll be in town, I'm gonna FINALLY see Rambling Jack Elliott in live performance. (He owes me; I bought a ticket to see him at the Jabberwock once, and he forgot the gig and, sometime after the show was scheduled to start, was located still in Los Angeles, 400 miles away.)


Oh, and there's a JABBERWOCK memory website now on the web, started by a friend of Earl's named Corry. Lemee see if I can post the link. I'm going to dig through old posters, scan them, and email 'em to the site. Here we go: http://www.chickenonaunicycle.com, chicken on a unicycle dot com. Corry said that Bill Ellert has died (I did see Bill at some folk event at the big auditorium on the Berkeley High campus about five years ago, and turned down a chance to go with him to the after-party because, as I told him, I'd enjoyed the concert but was afraid that the party would be full of drunk and stoned musicians, whose behavior would probably just tarnish my memories of them), so I'm glad I did get to see him a few years back.

-- Rachel

Braiding Trick from a Friend

I was showing my Kumihimo marudai to my old friend Kitty Crowe when I saw her on the bus. Well, she'd clearly done more with this craft than I have yet! When I mentioned that I had trouble keeping track of where I'd stopped and where I would need to begin again, she said:

If you are working a 2-step move, do the first step, then stop. You'll always know where to begin again.

-- Rachel

Spelling?

Seen at the Dublin BART Station yesterday. -- Rachel Holmen

Rainbow Braid

I stumbled onto a misplaced ball of string -- hemp, actually -- dyed in many colors, set down by mistake in the yarn section at a local craft store; I think I'll make a friendship bracelet. The hemp is surprisingly soft. The navy is crochet cotton, size 3, doubled.

-- Rachel Holmen

John Whitmarsh and the wall

John Whitmarsh has a studio near my office, so I often walk past it on my way to lunch, or as I come in around 8 am. I've long admired his old red pickup. Last year he shingled the wall next to his parking lot with painted cardboard; eventually it got soggy and he took it down. This week, he had something new up.

Here's his explanation, on a small card mounted on the same wall.



-- Rachel Holmen

My first share-able Kumihimo (braiding) video tutorial

Feedback is solicited. Would you be able to figure out how to make this braid, from this video? (It is assumed that you have a slotted card -- called a marudai -- and some appropriate string/yarn/thread/fiber.) As an example, you could start with four 2-yard lengths of nylon cord. Take all four strands together, thread on a paperclip or splitring or fixed ring, move the ring to the center, and tie an overhand knot. Put the knot and ring at the center of the marudai, and spread out the strands as shown.

I have no idea why the last frame looks so odd, with yellow and aqua echoes of the main image -- that's not in my original file -- but the rest of it seems okay.

I'll be happy to email either the GIF or the MOV version on request. Email reh at sff dot net.

-- Rachel Holmen

See you at the Alameda County Fair

I had hoped to enter several items; only one got finished to my satisfaction, an owl toy based on a pattern designed by Dianna LaFerry. Here's the owl toy, not yet stuffed, pinned up to the design wall at the Cotton Patch in Lafayette.

The fair runs July 1 to 19 in Pleasanton -- take 680 to Bernal, turn right under the freeway at the bottom of the offramp (you will then be driving sorta east), and follow signs to the fair.
-- Rachel Holmen

Tosca at Giants Stadium (WIllie Mays Field)

Free wifi at AT&T ballpark!!!

I'm waiting for the opera to start, sitting next to my new friend Mary who has shared her French fries with me. The sun is still up, but we can clearly see the Diamondvision screen, and Hoyt and Diane (somewhere above my head, I believe) have come onscreen and said hello to the audience.

Here's a photo of the screen, and another of the crowd which is HUGE. I'm lucky I found an actual chair to sit in.

-- Rachel Holmen

Sue Fox Open House

Sue Fox, a member of three quilt guilds -- East Bay Heritage Quilters in Kensington, California (near Berkeley), the San Francisco Quilt Guild, and a guild in Maine -- decided to hold a series of open houses during May.  Here are three quilts I liked, photographed the first weekend.   -- Rachel Holmen   Posted via email.

Machine Quilting Lessons

After attending several of Sue Fox's open houses, I got interested in having her teach me how to use her long-arm quilting machine. This is the kind of machine which sits on a table approximately 12 feet long (no, that's not a typo), and is about as related to a home sewing machine as a semi-trailer-truck is to a VW Beetle.

I had a long lesson today; how to put my quilt onto the framework of rollers which enable to work to be done; how to clean, oil, and thread the machine; how to set and use the two sewing modes -- automatic or stitch-regulated, and manual or completely free-motion; how to evaluate the thread tension; how to complete a piece. Her instructions were patient and thorough, but this was no dull lesson -- her enthusiasm for quilting, and for teaching, shone through the day. I'm not sure I'm ready to exhibit what I did, but I'll be back soon for more practice, and in between she encouraged me to draw large unbroken-line doodles on a newsprint pad for practice.

She has a new blog, so check it out: Fox Dreams Quilts at Blogspot dot Com.

-- Rachel Holmen

Succulents (Gardening) and Quilt Design (Needlework)

I recently attended a workshop on raising succulents at a local nursery I like,
Westbrae, and wished that some of my quilting friends were also in attendance. The speaker, who said he'd come to gardening from a design background, talked a lot about color, texture, density, scale (size), and how these elements need to be balanced to create a wonderful garden, from small bowlful of plants to an entire wall. He generously passed around books from his personal library, and if you only check out one book after reading this post, locate a copy of The Jewelbox Garden by Thomas Hobbs, and drink in the photos. Amazon has a few copies of the trade paperback left, for around $17 plus shipping.

-- Rachel Holmen

(The photo I've posted with this entry is one I've shown before -- which I took myself, but it's indicative of the kinds of photos you'll see in the Hobbs book.)

Bike to Work Day is coming up!

May 14 is Bike To Work Day. I had hoped to *own* another bicycle by then, but it's not to be. And since I'll be heading directly to the airport from my office, I will be sticking to mass transit, not pedal power.

Here's my favorite past poster for Bike To Work Day, from 2005.


-- Rachel Holmen