Harmony Annotations

I wondered if you might enjoy a few recent snapshots of household activities. I'll begin with cooking because pride goeth before a fall.

This khaki-colored mystery is really a platter of stuffed grape leaves that took all of one hot afternoon to make. First, I cut sheaves of grapevine. Then I stripped the leaves from the vine and fed the leftovers to the goat. Then I washed, scalded, and cooled the leaves. Then I picked a bundle of mint, dill, and green onions. Then I washed and chopped the greens and lightly heated them in olive oil. Then I mixed the herbs into leftover basmati rice and some soaked and drained bulgur wheat. Then I added lemon juice and salt and pepper. Then I made Paul come out of his room and help me fill the leaves. And voila. As accompaniment, I mixed up some yogurt with a tablespoon of tahini. There were no leftovers.

This is a strawberry-rhubarb pie with a walnut-crumb topping. I invented this recipe as a way to circumvent the irritating juiciness of rhubarb without turning the filling texture into paste. The result was beautiful but ineffective. The pie was as annoyingly juicy as ever. However, the crispy walnuts were good.

This not very well composed photograph demonstrates my compact herb-drying facilities: a string, some clothespins, and a narrow wall. The short stuff is thyme. The long stuff is peppermint.

And here is Horrible, disguised as Good Little Ben, sitting sweetly on Paul's lap.

And here is Horrible showing his true colors. As you can see, after wantonly confiscating my chair, he decided to eat me. However, at this time he is still too small to swallow me in one gulp, and I tend to notice when he starts trying to gnaw the flesh from my bones. So I am still alive.