I ate tofu

Due to the heat, I had a couple recipes I wanted to try involving spring (or summer) rolls, rice paper, rice paper salad wrapper, Vietnamese salad wrappers, or whatever one wants to call them. The supermarket that changed owners used to sell them, but the new owner doesn't. I tried a couple of the new stores and a different chain. No luck. The Asian food store very near me went out of business half a year ago. I finally went to one near where I used to live (amazingly it was still there), and I found the rice paper.

I made a shrimp summer roll when Mr. K and N were at camp, and yesterday I made one called tofu apple spring rolls. I have some left, and I ate two for breakfast this morning. I baked the tofu the night before, when it wasn't quite so hot, and assembled the rolls the next day. Tofu has an icky texture, but mixed with all the stuff in the spring roll, I really can't tell. I wouldn't say it's the best food ever, but it is certainly okay. I'm using half the amount of tofu the recipe calls for because I found using the whole piece a bit large to wrap up.

http://www.chow.com/recipes/13484-vegan-tofu-apple-spring-rolls

Here is the recipe if anyone is interested. As I said, it was okay. I didn't completely follow the recipe. I used finely shredded regular cabbage since the grocery store I went to had a poor selection of Asian produce. I could only find a limp bok choi there. I used orange juice from a carton. I used Jif peanut butter. I'm sure natural would have been better, but that's not what I have.

I'm still a little skittish about tofu. Spring rolls are very nice, though, in this heat. Thankfully we are in the lower 90s today. I'm sure I will be playing around more with the rice paper and different stuffings.

Mr. T is alive and well!

Fred and Mr. T dropped by for a quick visit this afternoon. Mr. T has been at the motel that rents by the week, and he needs to find another place to go with running water and electricity. He doesn't want to live in the shed again if he can help it. He is hoping Mr. K will help him move once he finds somewhere to go.

I am glad he is okay. I figured he was but that he had fallen in love with cable TV and running water and the heat wave hasn't broken. Yup, that was it. The place he's staying is really too expensive for him.

So hot I swim

Mr. K and I took the kids swimming tonight and last night. Before last night, he'd never been to the pool with us because he hates the water more than I do. I hate being cold, which is one of the reasons I hate to swim. We hit 105 °F today and yesterday so I wasn't cold. It was so hot I couldn't think of anything else to do. Pretty much the pool was empty a good bit of the time both evenings. For some reason no one else wanted to use the pool. Both nights the lifeguards were delighted when we left because they could close down. The water was almost too warm (hard to believe). It felt really good, and I swam, floated, dove, and treaded water most of the time. Mr. K let K attach herself to him so I didn't have to worry about her.

K's one of the reasons I hate to go to the pool. She doesn't swim a stroke so I have to be within arms reach of her and alert every moment she's in the big pool. Mr. K didn't seem to have any desire to swim, dive, or play in the deep end. He said something about he hasn't swum in years and never was much of a swimmer. I guess he doesn't find it fun to float around.

I called what I think is Mr. T's cell phone, and I left him a birthday message. I don't know when/if he'll be back to get his stuff from the shed if his renting a room works out, but I told him to stop by. The heat is "breaking" for the next couple days. Instead of upper 90s and low to mid 100s, we're getting a high in the lower 90s. It's sad to say that a high of 92 °F is a break in the heat wave.

No theme

Brilly, that was me that you found on Facebook. I made an account in order to see my friend Laura's snow pictures after a big storm in Baltimore this winter. One day I decided to look up my college roommate, Angela.

That's about all I know how to do with it. I haven't had a lot of interest in it, and I dislike the way it looks on the page; I do not find it intuitive; I find it too busy and cluttered. Maybe someday I'll work out what to do with it, except I'm not sure I want the whole world to know my business.

Mr. T still isn't back. His birthday is tomorrow and I'll leave him a voicemail message (unless he answers his phone). His friend Fred stopped by on Wednesday and said he was still at the motel that rents by the week, but that he would be looking into moving into a room somewhere. I hope that works out for him because people really should live in houses and not sheds that don't have electricity, heating, cooling, and running water. We were over 100 °F again today. This heatwave just doesn't let up. I can see why Mr. T hasn't left the motel.

N and Mr. K spent the first part of the week at Cub Adventure camp. They left last Sunday and got back Wednesday morning. J spent a couple days at Girl Scout horseback riding camp. She left Wednesday afternoon and got back on Friday morning.

I've been busy. We've spent a lot of time at the pool. I've started posting a couple times but I've been interrupted before I could do a post. It's happening again right now; N and J want to be tucked in for bed.

Gold and the radio

I have noticed that FM radio stations are full of advertisements offering to buy people's old gold jewelry that they no longer want or wear.

On the AM talk radio station to which I listen, the gold advertisements are to buy gold, particularly coinage.

I'm working on what that says about AM and FM radio listeners. Whatever it means, I listen to both so I must be some sort of hybrid.

Still doing swimming lessons

This is our last week of swimming lessons. It is still making me very tired since we have to leave for the pool at 7:45 a.m., and I have to have everyone and everything ready for by then.

N can "swim" the length of the pool, and J almost can. They still have done no stroke work so it's sort of a glorified dog paddle that they are using, but it works.

K can jump in if her instructor is there to catch her. I think that's about it. This is the first time she's ever had lessons. Last year she was old enough but wasn't potty trained.

We got more rain last night. It sounded like quite a thunder storm that ripped through. We got an inch of rain.

I've discovered if we get watering restrictions, I'll probably be aware of it by listening to the radio. The only problem would be if I didn't drive around in my car since that's where I'm the most likely to listen to the radio.

Pond again

This one is nice, too.

Pond

I've went to the pond down the road and took some pictures. This one is nice.

Our neighbor

A few weeks ago (I think--it was right after we got back from the Chesapeake Bay), when the weather got so very hot, Mr. T decided to stay at a motel for two nights, until his friend with whom we had visited at the beach came back from the beach. He figured he could move in with his friend until the heat broke, as he had done during the very cold weather this winter. A couple days later, I get a message from Mr. T on my voice mail telling me he'd had a change of plans, and that he was now staying for a week at a place that rented by the week.

We had a few days of cool-off, when the high only got to the 80s, and then it ended and we were back to the 90s and 100s. Mr. T wasn't around for our Independence Day bonfire. It was noticeably lame without his drunken presence, I was surprised to note. No one was there to yell, "The Yankees are coming!!!" each time someone in the neighborhood set off some fireworks (Civil War humor).

Anyway, I haven't heard from him and the heat hasn't broken, so I assume he's still staying at a motel or else is staying with his friend. I figure we'll try to track him down when this heat finally stays broken for more than a couple days, unless he turns up on his own before then.

N's solar cooker

This is a picture of N's solar oven. He made and designed it himself. In our hottest weather (which has been pretty hot), we can only get it to 145 °F. I made one with two layers of boxes and newspaper insulation between them. I followed someone else's instructions, but I used much smaller boxes since I did not have any as large as it called for. The best I could do was get mine to 162 °F. Supposedly they can boil water, so I'm thinking the extra size must matter, or else I did something else wrong when following directions.

It rained!

Things were getting pretty bad around my yard. Anything I wasn't keeping watered was looking like this droopy sunflower or worse. Friday afternoon, a raincloud formed right over us (I was watching the radar), and we got poured on for a while. It was only half an inch of rain, but it was enough to keep me from needing to water for at least a few days. If the temperatures would stay down, it would be longer before I need to water.

Anyway, I was so excited to see rain after going without it for so long, that I took pictures.

New Lamp

Here's my "new" lamp from the thrift store. It was $13. I think the shade is crooked in the picture. Crooked lamp shades and crooked pictures are not uncommon in my house, especially since I had kids.

The lamp is quite heavy, quite sturdy, and was priced right. I am hoping it will last for many years to come, unlike cheap lamps that I occasionally get from Target.

Lamp N broke

This is the lamp my son broke yesterday. I am not happy. My mom got it from a friend's garage sale for me. While it was certainly out-of-style, it was a good-quality lamp--better than anything I get at Target. Style generally isn't important to me. I've looked on-line at the prices of lamps, and I've concluded I should look at thrift shops for a used lamp of better quality than I can afford new. Those cheap lamps don't last long.

Happy Independence Day!

It's been a long day. Mr. K hasn't done much with the kids; he spend the morning extracting honey and the afternoon cleaning it up. He didn't even have time to help me barbecue some steaks, chicken, and hot dogs. It is very hard to watch the grill and do the rest of the stuff in the kitchen.

The kids begged to go to the pool, so I took them there for a little bit after dinner. I hate it there, but they love it so much. We'll probably stop by the pool most days this coming week for about half an hour. The heat this week will be tremendous. Our heatwave is back, and no rain is in sight. I might even go into the pool, too, if it is 101 °F.

We were supposed to have a bonfire this evening, but Mr. K didn't think the Edwards pie we ate for dessert had dairy in it, even though I offered to check. He didn't take his Lactaid, so now he's spending the evening in the bathroom. Apparently it did have dairy.

I don't like bonfires in the heat, and it takes so long to put out the fire. It won't even be dark until nine, and we have to get up early tomorrow. Without Mr. K's help, I have no interest in having a bonfire. J cried about it and thinks her dad ate dairy on purpose just to get out of having a bonfire. I truly doubt that. I'd rather do a bonfire than spend the evening running to the bathroom and having stomach cramps.

The kids are having their swimming lessons starting tomorrow morning (which is why we have to get up early). They begin at 8:10 a.m. I think we'll leave before Mr. K gets up for work. We were supposed to get them two weeks ago, but I was able to move them when the kids got badly sunburned at the beach and would have missed the first week.

I harvested some tomatoes, cucumbers, eggplants, and peppers in the past couple days. I am still eating the produce faster than it is growing, but that could easily change in the next week or so.