Words that are fun to pronounce the British way

Because you can't really pronounce the 'u' in 'honour.'

La-BOR-a-tor-y
Ad-VER-tis-ment
SHED-ule
I-DEAR

Edible complex

I like to keep things simple. Michael likes things with details. This goes even more so for the realm of food. One of our classic exchanges goes along the lines of, 'What's for supper?' 'Oh, you will like this so much! It's so complex!' As far as I am concerned, casseroles and soups are simple and efficient (not to mention cheap). Meals that involve two or more piles on the plate are complex. The more serving dishes I get dirty, the better Michael likes it. It's just one way I show my love to him.

Recently I became inspired by the notion of Olive Garden elegance, and resolved to bake my own crusty artisan bread and set it out with a bowl of olive oil and freshly ground spices at the first opportunity. Last night was the opportune moment, and we dipped our freshly baked artisan bread into the delicately spiced olive oil, only to pause, wrinkle our noses, and say, 'Hmmm, was that the olive oil or the spices?' It had a strong bitter taste, yet the bottle was a new one, expensive-looking, extra virgin, cold pressed, etc. etc. etc. What had gone wrong? Was the bottle old? Had it gone rancid?

Michael hied him ho to the computer to look up information on olive oil, and lo and behold, it was discovered that the bitter taste is the hallmark of pure, quality olive oil. We Americans aren't used to the strong taste, so most of the olive oil served for fresh eating/dipping is lite, watered down with corn or soy oil, to give it a more palatable flavour. What a rip-off! So all that elegant oil at Olive Garden, with freshly cracked black peppercorns, is merely watered down cheap stuff to deceive our ignorant senses! I tried dipping a few more bites of bread, contemplating the high quality and esoteric refinement, and it gradually started to taste a bit better. Now we are in a conundrum. Do we go on buying the cheap stuff, knowing that it's watered down and artificially engineered to pander to the common demand, or do we strive to develop a taste for the good stuff, deliberately cultivating a palate for expensive flavours? Is this merely a reversion to the whole maple syrup dichotomy? Bother. And I was going for the complicated meal, after all.

Bee it ever so bumble, there's no place like comb

We went away for Labour Day weekend. The camp was fun. The drive back was grueling. The return to hearth and home was blissful. The laundry seems unending. The fount of inspiration is now dried up.

Critical mass with disambiguation bonus

While 'critical mass' is first and foremost a scientific term having to do with nuclear fission, I've always used it in the social context, to designate that arrival at a sufficient level of jollification which is achieved by any number of independent factors. In reference to a party, for instance, critical mass would occur with the arrival of whichever guest really kicks things off. It may not be a characteristic specific to that particular guest, but rather an inevitable happening considering the other guests present and that particular concatenation of events. (I've just begun reading the Foundation Trilogy aloud to Michael, so I'm feeling rather psycho-historic, vague, and inevitable these days.)

On a far grander scale, I'm beginning to realise that we are in the process of achieving critical mass within our own family, and it's a thrilling and delightful discovery. For many a day after the arrival of Jane, the avoidance of collapsing into a blue funk of drudgery and boredom was a chief concern, to which end I sought out adequate outside activities sufficient to divert us without running us ragged. The logistical difficulties of pursuing such interests with three children in tow had been a bit of a worry, but I'm finding more and more that Jane and Ella provide their own diversion, both to me and to each other. Their activities are more independent and self-contained than ever, their conversations infinitely more amusing, their intellectual rapport growing ever more engaging. If I go for days without experiencing much adult conversation, as the cliche goes, my psyche hardly suffers anymore, because the precocious child conversation is almost as stimulating. Food, money, and other economic considerations prevent us from dropping out of society altogether, but it's nice to know that we're well on our way to forming what could be, in a pinch, an independent and self-sustaining society for rainy days.

(On a side note, I couldn't remember whether the term 'critical mass' had to do with nuclear fusion or fission, so I popped onto Wikipedia to find out, and found myself on some page describing a cycling movement. The 'critical mass' term that I was after was found on a different page, all such pages tagged with the appellation 'disambiguation.' I love reading interesting articles with lots of hyperlinks, for this led me down a charming rabbit hole of rhetorical metonymy, Naive Bayes Classifiers, and Yarowsky Algorithms. This is as close to mathematics as I get.)

Six years ago today

(We actually found we had no digital pics of the day itself, so this was staged two weeks later. But you get the idea.)

A Quick Succession of Busy Nothings

Look! She's smiling!

As Katy neared two months, I almost canceled her check-up. I wanted to delay her shots a bit (I managed to buy both Jane and Ella an extra month), I wanted to stall her records on the growth chart to keep the doctor from marking her as FTT, and I absolutely detest going to any appointments with three young children in tow. There is invariably a wait that leaves me fuming and muttering about how the airlines can get away with overbooking because they're prepared to offer you some compensation if you get bumped, but I have yet to receive any sort of gratuity from a professional office to make amends for having wasted my time as a result of their greedy presumption. And even though our pediatrician's office has a sick and well waiting room, I just know there are germs lurking on every surface in the consultation rooms. I hate getting sick.

So I was fully prepared to chuck the whole thing, but then I read Dr. Sears' The Vaccine Book, which made such reasonable good sense that I resolved to follow his alternative vaccine schedule. Thus, Katy received the DTaP shot and the rotavirus dose. She didn't even have a fever following, and the ironic thing is that her spit-ups, which before were rather explosive and excessive, have pretty much stopped. I'm sure there's no connection, but I thought it a funny side effect for a weakened live-action virus that is supposed to cause vomiting.

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We harvested all of one tomato, one yellow squash, and one picking of green beans from our garden. It is unfortunate that the only good fenced spot is also in the shadiest part of the backyard. Rabbits chewed up most of the green bean plants before I figured out that the culprits were not bugs, but I did have a small triumph: I saved a few of the bean pods, dried them out, and planted the seeds again in hopes of a second harvest. We shall see if our survivalist skills ever pan out.



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Thanks to this lovely post, on a lovely, lovely site that I love to read whenever I am hungry, or at any other time, I have two mason jars of vanilla extract brewing in the back of my pantry. It was quite the quest to find the alcohol, as grocery stores aren't allowed to sell anything other than beer or wine (???) and package stores are illegal in all but three cities in our county. Also, people under 21 are not allowed into said rare packages stores, so I was limited to hunting for vodka, brandy, or rum on the weekends. At last I emerged with a bottle of rum (what a pity they don't sell that at CVS), and ordered 25 vanilla beans from Madagascar, with 10 from Tahiti thrown in for good measure. I intend to buy some brandy as well, stew each variety of vanilla beans in a bottle of that, and compare the final products. Possibly I will give away tiny extract bottles for Christmas presents, or I may just use it all up in baking, dispensing with the nasty imitation vanilla once and for all.

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Speaking of blogs that I love to read, this gem makes for great late-night giggles over ice cream or Special K bars. Just priceless.

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Jane: Oh! Katy scratched me!
Me: Well, hardly.
Jane: No, she was gentle.

(Yeah, I had to think about it, too.)

When France sneezes, all Europe catches cold

I've never been to France - other than the airport during a layover - but I did see the key of the Bastille, hanging on the wall at Mt. Vernon. Also at Mt. Vernon is a fine marble mantelpiece, sent over the ocean by some European dignitary. Legend has it that the ship on which this mantelpiece came was attacked by pirates, who, when they heard that it was destined as a gift for George Washington, left it alone of all the spoil, so great was their respect for him.

Some top French Revolutionary books to read:

Scaramouche
A Tale of Two Cities
Les Miserables (of course the revolution depicted in the story is not the Revolution, but there are ample flashbacks)
The Scarlet Pimpernel

Food, etc.

Very soon I am going to work up an informative post full of links to my favourite things, as I'm certain everyone will be equally dazzled by all things that strike my fancy. Meantime I'll contemplate the ten free pints of Starbucks ice cream I picked up today, marvel at the fact that each miniscule pint contains 880 calories, pause to note the fact that I still haven't learned how to spell minuscule, and nod my head in wry chagrin at the fact that I can easily down two such pints in a day. Or, to quote Pippin, 'It comes in pints? I'm getting one!'

These Starbucks pints were not the Facebook one, but represent another threshold crossed in my never-ending quest for bargains: for the first time ever (and, I hope, the last) I bought coupons off of Ebay. Including postage, the coupons ended up costing me $0.15 each, and when I actually purchased the ice cream, I turned a $0.20 profit on each one, so it all worked out. I was trying to describe the scenario to Michael, and he finally told me, 'I should be fascinated by all these numbers, but every time you launch into the details, my eyes glaze over.' Very odd, yes, as he's usually the one fond of numbers and math and details and I'm usually the one content not to balance the checkbook, but perhaps my passion for ice cream gave me an unwarranted interest in the case. I should know by now not to bother playing the Guess-how-much-I-paid-for-this game with him, as he simply ends all such conversations with the standard 'You're a marvel, Babe,' whether the outcome be zero or not. Today the score was $4.44, for which we acquired:

10 pints of Starbucks ice cream
2 boxes of whole wheat pasta
2 boxes of Kashi waffles
6 tubs of Smart Balance Butter Blend (good for cooking, not baking, and NOT for fresh eating)
6 half gallons of Smart Balance milk

I still haven't managed to get out of paying sales tax.

Speaking of food and money, I've undergone yet another epiphany about budgeting. For a very long time, my goal was to find the optimal balance between low cost and high quality, and in our carefully scripted budget, the household costs were the ones over which I wielded the greatest power, and in which I consequently found the greatest pleasure reducing. For yea these many years of marriage (71 months today!) we lived simply, spent cautiously, and saved wisely, only to see our nest egg crash and dwindle away to a mere shadow of its former glory (HA!) this past year, just like everyone else's. So now we're in the same boat as everyone else, except that all that time they were eating out and splurging on organic food (or junk food, which is also fun, in its own way) and living in gorgeous houses and going on exotic vacations and watching all the latest movies, while we plodded along like the tortoise, and yet somehow slow and steady has NOT won us the race!! The injustice and the outrage of it all baffles me immensely. The smugness and self-righteousness of the prodigal son's older brother resonates never so clearly with me as at times like these.

Yet I wouldn't trade the last years of prudence for profligacy, because I choose to believe that living as we did was a good discipline for us: I don't want a ridiculously oversized house; we don't need any more Stuff; the skills of living on less will stand us in good stead; etc. etc. etc. So in the end, we made the right choice. But going forward, I am totally disillusioned about saving money and feeling completely cynical about the whole greenback economy. I am not going out and hoarding gold, and I don't want to go off and spend money on frivolous Stuff just to beat out inflation.

The only two meaningful options left in which to invest my money, therefore, are 1) charity (eternal significance) and 2) food. Good quality food will affect our health, improve our morale, and establish sound family traditions. I love the toast - in It's A Wonderful Life - that Mary Bailey gives to the Martinis at their house-warming: something about bread, so that they will never suffer hunger, and wine, for the sake of joyfulness, or some such. We've spent several years dining on bread and water, so to speak, and now it's time to bring on the wine.

(I've told Michael about my changed way of thinking several times now, and he expressed great interest at seeing me turn spendthrift. We shall see how it goes.)

Free Starbucks ice cream!

I am very remiss about keeping up on Facebook, but it's done me a good turn today in the form of free ice cream. You can have some, too! Just sign up here.

Details, which you can read about when you click on the link, but here you go anyway, include the fact that they only give away 800 per hour, so you'd do best to hover at the top of the hour; there is a limit of one request per Facebook account; and there is a limit of one coupon per household. Clever, aren't they. So you'd do best to 'share' the ice cream to your address, like the selfish doctor in Mafia, rather than send a coupon to an actual friend.

Overheard this week

Jane: Ella, we're going to do the fireworks!
Ella: No, I don't want to eat that!

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Jane (leading a pretend puppy): See my puppy, Mama?
Me: No, and I don't hear anything, either.
Jane (making loud panting noises): Now do you hear it panting?

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Ella (on seeing me heading off to the nursery, baby and boppy in tow): Is Katy going to bite you now, Mama?

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Jane: What is a leech, Mama?
Me: Well, what do you think it is?
Jane: It's a line.
Me: Well, sort of. I guess it is long and thin.... (There followed a very long and detailed explanation of leeches, their habitat, and their medical history.) What made you think about a leech?
Jane: I wanted to tie one on my dog to keep him from getting away.
Me: Oh!

One month old

Moving on

Yesterday's post was hard to write for a very long time, because it was difficult to strike the right balance between solemnity and cheerfulness. Write too darkly and it sounds hopeless, and might even seem like fishing for sympathy; write too optimistically and it sounds superficial. So I waited until the right opportunity came to craft the perfect post, and it never happened. At last I decided to just write it out, so I could get back to posting already.

My mind imposes random statues of limitations on reasonableness, as it were, of response, and when I am in danger of running them out, my thought process tends to paralyse. So I put off writing thank-you notes until I can do it justice, and the longer I wait, the more spectacular the card has to be to make up for its tardiness. In the same way, the longer I let this blog lapse, the more impressive I feel that the eventual posts have to be, or else I shall just have to stop blogging altogether. But I don't want to do that, as how else can I dispense cute baby pictures and Focht family clevernesses to the adoring masses?

Yes, we've been going through a lot of late. But life moves on. Baby pictures to follow.

Sunlight and shadows

The lack of posting recently hasn't been due to the hectic schedule that comes with a newborn (as babies go, this one is the easiest yet), but due more to heavy-heartedness and lack of motivation to spout cheery little updates. In the midst of our rejoicing over the arrival of Katy came the news that Michael's boss had died in a car crash, leaving behind a wife and child. This was devastating on a personal front, of course, as I couldn't help identifying with his widow and thinking how easily any of our lives could be changed in a heartbeat. Also it's been pretty hard on Michael and his whole team at work, who were very close to Sean and had been really inspired and motivated by his leadership. He had only been there a few months, but had already been promoted from the director of IT to the Executive level and had revolutionised the work environment.

The wake and the memorial service were incredibly challenging and yet very inspiring. One close friend of Sean's referred to the 'tragic car crash,' and added that he refused to call it an accident, since all our days are ordained by God and that somehow, though we don't see why, God planned for this to happen. It's easy to agree with this on an intellectual level, but still hard to accept in real life. Sean had only been a Christian for eight years, but accomplished so much for God in that short time. One thing I was very impressed with during the testimonial time was how very intentional he was in every aspect of life. I tend to drift, and I felt very convicted that I should be pursuing excellence in my relationships.

We are moving through the grief process and getting to that point where we acknowledge that it's okay to laugh again. Michael is still picking up the pieces at work. There's a lot to mull over, but I'm definitely left with a sobering reminder of the fragility of our lives. And impressed with a renewed gratitude that, so far, God has spared us from any heavy burdens.

Sunday's child

Expectant prayer

(No, this post is not about the impending baby. Although we could pray about that too.)

Jane's prayer life has really taken off recently, and it's been an inspiration to me so see how sweetly and simply she prays for everything. At first, once we began encouraging her to pray out loud, her prayers were cute and adorable, as well as insightful glimpses into what she thought was important. Her stream-of-consciousness style prayers ran something like this:

'Thank you, God, for the house that we live in, and the food that we eat, and the beds that we sleep in, and the toys that we play with, and that we could eat all the ice cream, and thank you for the clothes that we wear, and that Ella and I can play, and thank you for class...'

On one occasion, when supper was a bit rushed, I sat down and started the meal while Michael prepared to mow the lawn. I asked Jane to pray for the food, and she began: 'Thank you, God, for the food for us to eat, and thank you for helping us to eat...' At one point, Michael, not knowing we were in the middle of praying, called out from the other room with a question, and without skipping a beat, Jane went on, '...and for Papa to stop talking...'

Now she prays for specific requests, but the manner in which she asks, nothing wavering, illustrates so perfectly the faith of a child. She always starts by thanking God for answering the request. 'Thank you, God, for Mama to feel better...Thank you, God, for it to stop raining...Thank you, God, for Baby to be healthy...' Her sweet faith and confidence is an encouragement to me.

Six years ago today

That was the best early birthday present ever.

Then, a few years later, Jane was the best late birthday present ever.

I think I'd be hard pressed to find a stretch of the year out of which I couldn't eke a few happy memories.

Easter photos

Easter egg hunt

On Saturday we went to an Easter festival hosted by a local church (our church's bash was considerably farther away, and also did not feature a free hot dog lunch). Jane was thrilled to dance with a giant bunny.
























Both girls enjoyed the petting zoo.

Beware already

And here's an old but clever little jingle for National Pi Day:

Tangent, secant, cosine, sine;
Three point one four one five nine

Guess who's two??

Two years ago today Ella joined our family.



One year ago she was full of mirth and mischief (but, alas, still short on hair).

















Today she is full of fun, energy, sweetness, and joy. Happy birthday to our Ella Bella!