Bookmark

Yesterday I was given this rather nice bookmark by a Christian family we know:



Isn't that nice? It's actually metal, rather than the typical flimsy cardboard. And it's got a quote from "Prufrock" on it! How cool is that?

According to them, they saw it in a store and said "That would be perfect for Clumsy! It's all about coffee and T. S. Eliot!"

I'm touched.

Happy Thanksgiving!

I made some rhubarb pies (with rhubarb I bought for $2.89 a pound !?!) to celebrate Canadian Thanksgiving tomorrow. To all my Canadian friends: Happy Thanksgiving!


We've been trying to clear out our house to match the unreasonable expectations of the realtor. That is, we're trying to make it look like Ken and Barbie live in our house, rather than five real people. We rented a spot in one of those storage places, and started putting stuff in there today. We're also throwing out a lot of dreck.

So far the kids have been real troupers. We'll see how long that lasts.


Speaking of the kids, they asked me to bury a robin they found in the back yard. I was going out there to get a shovel and perform the grim task, when the youngest shouted "Wait! Wait! I need to get a hat with a veil to lift up!" After they got their hats, I was allowed to perform the funeral.

They all declined to say a few words over the grave, but they were stylin' in their funeral hats.


In final news, the drought here has caused a lot of cracked mortar and even cracked bricks in the houses in our area. As the clay continues to dry out, it shrinks; and all the brick houses are settling into it. The most common advice is "don't worry about it, rain will fix it;" which is probably true. But it doesn't show well in the meantime, and it could potentially cost some money to "fix" the foundations (which will presumably become "unfixed" when the drought breaks). Hopefully the ugly cracks won't be deal-breakers on getting our house sold. If they are a problem, we might be able to get them "fixed", but it could cost a few thousand dollars. We'd appreciate everyone's prayers.

Such is life

I've half-written some posts here and on my other blog. That is to say, I've been wanting to contribute more to the online conversation I've been having with family and friends for the last 10 or 11 months. But honestly, I've very little to say, and what I want to say I'm having trouble saying.

This might be what's commonly referred to as "writer's block."

Work is keeping me occupied: not "busy" so much as "unavailable." We're trying to sell our house, and that has brought a huge list of new tasks, as well as some serious excitement. Additionally, I've reconnected with several friends (some of whom I taught in high school) over the last few weeks. So not only do I have less time, but it's divided into many more, smaller parts.

I've not even really been cooking over the last week or so, which is almost depressing.

One annoyance is the weather in Charlotte. It's been the worst drought anyone can remember, and it shows no signs of breaking. It's October, and the weather is still in the 80s (that's 30s to you Canadians). They're predicting a tough winter, but so far autumn is just a cooler summer. And the drought is wreaking havoc with everything around here.

So life's too full. Work will reach a fever pitch on November 3 and stay that way for the whole month. I'll be working 12 hours a day, 7 days a week for the month except Thanksgiving weekend (the fourth weekend in November for all my Canadian friends).

But we all have our trials...

Gulp!

Well, I just finished renewing my Green Card online. So after a $370 filing fee and 20 minutes of my life, plus several minutes' re-reading my application to make sure it is all accurate; I'm now on my way to being allowed to live here after February 2008.

So I had posted about whether I should stay in the USA or come home: renewing my Green Card is essentially option #3: make up my mind later. Actually, option #3 is a good one for an international family.

So long as I have a Green Card, I can leave the USA for a given amount of time without losing it (somewhere between 6 months and a year). So this way, we can cross the border and give Canada a try for a few months. After a few months there, my American wife and I can decide what to do next.

If Ames decides she can't stand Canada, then I will probably get a US citizenship. But by renewing my Green Card, I've given us a chance to spend a little more time on the decision.

Still, $370 is a pretty hefty filing fee.

Something fishy

Well, Alaskan wild-caught salmon was on sale this week in Charlotte, so we bought some. Of course, the only way to cook salmon is on the grill:



So I took the salmon, put some coarse salt, black pepper, a little garlic, and some dill mixture on it, then threw it on the grill.



I've heard people say they don't like to grill fish, because it sticks to the grill. Let me give you a hint: fish sticks to your grill because you're not getting the grill hot enough.

I cook on cast iron; both my grills have cast iron cooking surfaces, and I would have to seriously question buying a grill that has anything other than cast iron for its food grates. Porcelain's a fad, stainless is flashy, but real, serious grilling requires cast iron. If I can cook fish on cast iron without having it all stick, then we know for a fact that fish is not doomed to sticking, just because it's cooked on a grill.

So here's how you cook fish on the grill.

First, get the grill hot. I know, you're not cooking steak; and the very fact that you are planning on cooking the fish a little lower indicates you've learned something. But you need to understand this: regardless of how hot you intend to cook something on a grill, you almost always need to get the food grate really hot. So when I cook something like chicken or fish on the grill, I get the grates hot first, then I lower the grill temperature when I put the food on.

If you have fish with skin on it, put it on flesh-side down. I do this before I turn down the heat. The idea is to sear the flesh on one side while the grill is hot.

If you try to turn the fish before it's seared, it will stick, and you'll end up with a piece of torn-up fish and really messy grates. So don't turn it too soon. How can you tell when the fish is ready to turn? It lets go of the grates. Let me re-iterate that. When you first put fish on hot grates, it will stick. If you leave it a few minutes, it'll sear through and release the grates, at that point, it comes cleanly off the grates and you can turn it. If your fish sticks to the grill, it's because you tried to turn it too soon, or else you didn't get the grill hot enough before you put the fish on it. This is the same principle for steak. As Smoky Hale says "When a steak meets the proper grill, they seize each other with the intensity of a pair of newlyweds. At the proper time, they will turn loose."



Once the fish is ready to turn, you can gently flip it over, reduce the heat, and cook it slowly, skin-side-down. At this point, I put a little butter or margerine on it, just to keep it from drying out.

I should probably admit I like sashimi, so I may like my fish a little less well-done than a lot of people. But it's a mistake to over-cook your fish. It dries out faster than you'd think.

If you cook the fish flesh-side-down first, then you get nice grill marks on the flesh side of the fish.


Notice that dill mixture's still a little green. You're not trying to blacken salmon, just get some nice char marks on it. I obviously turned one piece a little too soon, and didn't get quite the char marks on all three pieces that I wanted.

I like to eat salmon with red wine, but ABC ("Anything But Chardonnay") is fine. Tonight I drank a nice Zinfandel with my fish.


One thing about salmon, we never have leftovers out our house.

Canadian Geography Lesson

Anticipation

Well, we're getting more and more excited about the prospect of leaving Charlotte.

We still need to finish painting the house. Actually, the house has been painted, but the woodshop and deck haven't. We need to slap some paint on there before we list the house. Of course, the brutally hot weather for the last several weeks has kept us from moving forward with painting. At these temperatures, paint just bubbles off the wood.

In the interim, I need to put down quarter-round on the baseboards of the wall. When we ripped up the carpet to expose the hardwood floors, we never put the quarter-round down to finish the job. So today I'll go off to Lowe's and get some of that. Hopefully we'll make some real progress on that today.

It is my sincere desire to move back to Canada by the end of 2008. The biggest obstacle is selling our house, and that is dependent on getting the painting, etc. done so we can list it. Hopefully we'll be listed in the next few weeks.

In my little fantasy world, we'll be leaving North Carolina immediately after Thanksgiving of 2008 (that's the end of November for all our Canadian friends). When we moved back to NC from Michigan, we arrived right around Christmas. It was a good time to be homeless: the end of the year is a good transition time for jobs, tax-wise; and the holidays are a good time to have some chaos. If there is a good time for chaos.

Well, I'm just fantasizing now.

I know some of my Canadian friends would wonder at my desire to come home: you want to come back here? Yeah. I came to the USA for what was supposed to be a two-year stint, and it's stretched to 13. The USA is a good place, but I never intended the move to be permanent. Maybe we'll spend 6 weeks in Canada and decide we can't stand another 6. Maybe not. But one way or another, I really want to head back and give it a try.