listening after dark

"Spiffing timepieces for low price"

So said the subject line of a spam e-mail received today. Sounds British. At work I get German spam. I kind of wish I knew German.

Today I managed to bike to work, home for lunch, then to rock climbing after work and home again, getting rained on only a little, and all without getting hit by lightning. All is well.

Climbing is getting easier each week, and my forearms are kind of huge (for me). Wes said I looked like Popeye (maybe a little facetiously). I like the muscles.

We went camping one night this weekend, got far too much sun but no sunburns, didn't catch any fish, played with our buddy Stanley, ate huge pork chops and smelled a lot of cow pies. Why is it that Wyoming's beautiful and rugged parts are always liberally sprinkled with cattle dung?

Two more days of work until I leave for Montreal! I'm not at all looking forward to flying, but the destination will be worth it. I have too many lists in preparation. Wes makes fun of my lists because there are always a few little notes on my kitchen table. But then he saw my Montreal list. I can't help it if being organized—which I enjoy—means writing everything down so I don't forget.

And how about a few photos depicting some of the silly fun I've been having lately:

Crazy Adventures

This week my family brought to my attention some people who are undertaking pretty cool adventures:

• Dan, Alison, Sonia and Gus at Shut Up and Pedal! are biking across the U.S. as a family. The kids aren't even that old, so it's pretty impressive.

• Zac Sunderland just began a round-the-world solo boat trip. He's 16. If he finishes it in the next year, he'll set a world record for the youngest person to sail alone around the world.

Also, my friend Lisa is currently in Ghana, and a former Santa Fe co-worker has been traveling around South America for several months.

All this just makes me want to go somewhere. So it's a good thing I depart for Montreal in just 11 days. It's not a sea cruise or a bike expedition, but it will include family, so it will definitely be good enough for now.

Fairly new concepts we haven't figured out, Part II: Retirement

Recently, I began to think of retirement because of a survey my office is collecting about workplace satisfaction and retirement plans among Wyoming state workers. I could put more time and research into this, but I'll just wing it: How long have people been looking forward to retirement as a paid vacation? I imagine it hasn't been very long. Probably as long as we've been dating and using electric lights.

Did my great-grandparents think of retirement as an earned retreat from routine, as a reason to buy a Winnebago and drive to Arizona every winter? Well, no. My great-grandparents were immigrants working on a farm in North Dakota, or Europeans still living in the old country, hoping to get to America. Probably the only idea they had of retirement was when they were too old to work, they might be lucky and spend a few peaceful years being cared for by their younger family members.

So what is this sense of entitlement surrounding retirement? I don't think it's going to play out very well in the coming years. With all the boomers cresting the senior years together, we're not going to have enough people working to replace them. They're healthier than any retirees before them, and a lot of them will probably keep working—to prevent boredom, to afford the basic stuffs of life or for lack of other idea.

I'm only 25 and I have a current retirement account as well as a 401k from a previous job. Yet who knows what the nation will be like by the time I reach retirement age—which may well be 75 by then. We'll all be eating pureéd steel and sleeping in pods. We'll be living in outer space. Who knows. Maybe we'll have totally decimated the environment by then and retirement will be furthest from my thoughts.

Fairly new concepts we haven't figured out, Part I: Dating

With the drip-drop of May rain outside my window and choral music on the radio, I can think of complex things...

A couple weeks ago I was talking with a friend about dating, and how neither of us have ever dated, in the usual sense of the word. She had the same boyfriend through high school and college, and I've only had a boyfriend for three years. Neither of us have been on casual dates or dated multiple people around the same time. Perhaps we draw our conclusions about dating from the wrong sources—movies, television, popular culture—or perhaps our college life was too small to give us much of a picture of dating life. Regardless, we don't get it.

But then, does anyone really understand the concept of dating? As I understand it, the casual dating scene has only been around for a few decades. We're not that far from courtship, arranged marriages and the separation of the sexes. And this is not one of those technological creations that evolves faster than we can follow. It's a relational concept, one that seems to be based on cultural assumptions. One, that there is a never-ending supply of people to date. Two, that dating for the sake of dating is a worthwhile endeavor. Three, that a few evenings with a stranger are all it takes to find love. Four, that one can move from relationship to relationship without much emotional strain or damage. Five, that the laws of chance will kick in at some point to bring that singular, perfect person across one's path. I could go on.

I never really wanted to date. Never really met anyone I wanted to date. Now that I'm with someone (did we ever date if we drifted from friendship into relationship?), I realize even more that dating in my high school and college years might have changed a lot of things about me. And I like who I am now. And I'm glad I avoided a lot of awkward conversations and unpleasant resolutions. Perhaps, though, I'm only speaking as an observer. Like I said, I know little about dating. I just wonder if we don't give it more credit than it's due. Maybe those with more personal experience have comments?

Getting out of town, mmmmeat pie, hi house

There's been lots of communicating going on lately: phone calls, hanging out with some new friends, planning a trip to Colorado for a weekend with some college friends (leaving tomorrow morning! yay!). I haven't spent much time on my computer at home...I've been getting plenty of that at work.

When I am on the computer, it seems like I'm always looking up something relating to vehicles. I did some test drives last weekend and learned a few good things:
• The Honda Fit is not for me.
• The Toyota Matrix is a little better.
• I really just love my Subaru.

So when Elmer starts to sound worse, I'll probably look for a used Impreza or Legacy wagon. Why not stick with what works, eh? (Except for my sickening engine...which most sources say is unusual for my not-quite-150k miles.)

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Last night I made a meat pie. I had no idea it was so easy. And I must forever from now on use butter in my pastry crusts. Whyever was I using Crisco when butter makes it so much flakier and tastier?

After having leftover meat pie for lunch (which maybe tasted even better after a night in the fridge), I probably shouldn't have had that huge burger and beer for dinner...even though I only finished about half of each. These days I'm not able to eat as much as I used to. I can definitely tell my metabolism is slowing down. I also think having a desk job these past four years has really put a kink in my preferred routines. When I'm busy doing things at home or elsewhere, I don't really think about food until I'm hungry. But when I'm sitting at a desk all day, it's much easier to snack or think of snacking. If I didn't walk to work and get that hour of exercise every weekday, I would be having an even harder time.

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My mom sent me this cool photo of their house from above (click for a larger pop-up). It's the orangey one in the middle with the white trim, just to the right of the steeple. I forget how lush Walla Walla can be in the spring and summer. We moved there directly from Olympia, so it seemed like a desert. But now, after living in New Mexico and Wyoming, even eastern Washington seems verdant.

9 p.m., 62 degrees

I think spring might have finally arrived. Yesterday it was in the 60s and today was nearly 70. We spent a while at the park yesterday, flying kites and throwing a frisbee. There were people everywhere, playing like they'd been in hibernation for months (they have). Wes broke his kite and I lost mine to some power lines, and we both have sore arms from frisbee, but it was a wonderful afternoon. (I wish I had pictures. There were also the college-age kids who had a hula hoop, a guitar, a harmonica and very white winter legs.) Then, to make the day even better, we watched the first two (original) Star Wars movies and ate jalapeño poppers and shrimp. Did you know that cocktail sauce is ridiculously easy to make and tastes way better than the stuff in a jar? See the (sort of) recipe below.

[I have public radio jazz playing in the kitchen, and I just heard "fell down the stairs and died." Who fell and died, I do not know, but there you have it.]

This weekend has also been spent catching up with friends. I've probably been on the phone close to five hours since Friday night. I forget how much I miss girl talk and reminiscing about old times. Sounds like I need to do some serious traveling/visiting soon. Good thing I have a girls weekend planned for the end of April—Boulder, here I come!

To round off the strange assortment of details in this post, here are a few...recipes.

Oh, and...

My parents are safely home, after surviving the turkey, stuffing, mashed taters, gravy, four pies, morning walks in 16 degree weather, not much wind (!!), sunshine, sleeping on my futon, creaky floors, snowy roads and more.

It's snowing today and I'm delighted to be wearing pajamas and slipper boots, drinking tea, listening to my favorite NPR weekend shows (Car Talk and Wait Wait, Don't Tell Me are like Saturday morning cartoons for me) and getting ready to make pear cranberry pie.

Winter is beginning...I think

Nearly 70 degrees today, gloriously sunny, perfect kite weather. However, there is a 100 percent chance of snow tomorrow, with a high of 33. The weather guessers usually aren't that adamant. My parents have made it to Bozeman so far, where it's already snowing. Here's hoping the roads are clear enough for a safe drive tomorrow.

I'm beginning to understand the weather patterns in Casper. "Windy" usually means at least 30 or 40 mph, whereas "breezy" encompasses the teens and 20s. When it's especially windy, it's usually warmer, because the strong winds come from the southwest. When it's calm, it's usually colder. Word is, after it snows, it just blows away. Along with everything else. For a week I've been tracking the progress of a pair of black, silly-printed boxers as I walk past on my way to work. They've moved half a block so far. The pair of pants I spotted last week, several blocks away, have disappeared completely.

Perhaps it wasn't the best idea to begin baking tonight. Now I have to live with the aroma of pecan pie all evening. As well as baked yams for the pie I'll make tomorrow evening. But when Thursday arrives and there are five pies to choose from, I think I'll be OK with the situation. Oh pie. I could sing in praise of pie.

The parents are coming! The parents are coming!

I'm getting pretty excited now. My parents haven't been to Casper yet, and they're coming for a few days around Thanksgiving. I have plans to bake many pies and show them all the sights...um, I'll let you know if I find any. We'll probably play a lot of cards and just yak and walk and maybe they'll finish scraping the paint out of my bathtub. That would be nice. No, really, I won't make them work. Except to help me wash dishes. They can definitely help out with those.

Thanksgiving has always been more of a family holiday for us than Christmas. We've never been huge on the presents, but we really like food and time to hang out, play games and talk (when I was a kid, I thought the grown-ups were sooo boring because all they did was sit around and talk talk talk). I've only spent two Thanksgivings away from my family: In 2002, I was in England with the BIST group from Whitworth; in 2005, I was on my road trip and spent the holiday with Julie's family in California.

All I've been thinking about for days is food. Pie, stuffing, other family favorites. I want to make tomato soup because I've been telling them about my new recipe for weeks; this morning I made a holiday favorite since 2005, peanut butter pieces (see recipe below). We first tasted them at a heating company in College Place and managed to get the recipe that day. They're terribly unhealthy and addictive, so beware! This time I made a 1/4 batch because that's all the peanut butter I had, and it still filled an 8x8 pan.

And, as promised to Josh, in exchange for his potato bread recipe, I'll also share the tomato soup recipe.

Has anyone else ever listened to Jimi Hendrix while flossing their teeth and contemplating a sock monkey?

Not very likely. Almost better than fresh corn on the cob is flossing one's teeth immediately afterward. I used to rarely floss my teeth, but for about a year I've done it every night, sometimes more often. Now it's fun. Huh.

A list of other current favorites, both having and not having to do with waning summer:

• Cool mornings and evenings.

• My new, first-ever grown-up bed. I want to sleep allll the time.

• Refilling Wes' gravity-powered knee cooling device (kinda like this) with water and ice while he recovers from minor knee surgery.

• Eating German chocolate cake for breakfast.

• Getting discounts from Verizon for being a Wyoming state employee. (New plan, new phone, same number, for those who call me.)

• Pretty things.

• Wood floors and dust bunnies.