Out with the Old

Three down, two to go.

Closets, this time. I pulled out all the stuff from the built-in shelves (and a couple of the drawers, as well), and I yanked down all the stuff on the shelves in the two clothes closets, plus the stuff that had piled up on the floor of same, and, as I was doing my laundry, I went through shit. I had several realizations along the way. One was just how few clothes I've worn the past two years: I saw items that I haven't worn, or even thought about wearing, for, oh, probably something like that two years. Basically, I've worn chef pants, chef jacket, t-shirt, sleeveless t-shirt or camisoile, and underwear and socks to work. Outside of work, except for the recent job interviews, I've worn jeans, shorts, t-shirts, fleece, a couple of sweaters . . . and not a lot of that stuff, either. (And I don't fit into a number of items at the moment, thanks to the poundage I've managed to add.)

I have a huge wad of workout gear--shorts, compression shorts, yoga tops, sports bras, headbands (actually an old towel cut into strips), and yoga pants--that hasn't seen the light of day since I moved here 18 months ago. And t-shirts--good lord, do I have t-shirts. When one plays a sport, like handball, where t-shirts are what you get for an entry fee for even a local tournament, for example, then one acquires many, many, many t-shirts. This will all be handy for my new exercise program, so I didn't mind finding all that crap and organizing it.

I discovered that I had a ton of stuff that was just plain worn out--hems unraveled, gaping holes, elastic gone, grease or other spots that won't come out--and I threw that stuff out. Yes; really; I did. Okay, some of the t-shirts and such I saved for dust and cleaning rags, but that means I can throw my cleaning rags out as I use them, which rocks. I found a few things I forgot I have--some tights, for example--and that I probably won't use except to wear around the house, but they're in good enough shape so I cannot bring myself to toss them but not in good enough shape to give away.

The whole thing was quite therapeutic. All of the bakery-related stuff has been washed, folded, and stuck in a corner on a high shelf in the back of a closet. A couple of things I washed apparently had so much embedded flour that my winter coat, which was washed with the other flour-laden stuff, has streaks on it. Feh.

I would have been a little embarrassed at the amount of clothing I discovered, given my ranting about Stuff, but (a) nearly everything was purchased on sale (for example, I have two summery bits, a skirt and a pair of capris, that I have never worn, because I got them at the end of this past season, after it had already turned cold; this has the effect of me feeling like I have new clothes next summer without my actually having to go buy new clothes), and (b) a significant chunk is multiple years old. I don't wear stuff that's particularly trendy, so I can wear it for years, and, believe me, I do. That will all be handy if I do get a job in Officeworld, or especially if I end up doing temp work in Officeworld, i.e., I have enough to get by comfortably. I have some L.L. Bean certificates I must use before they expire, but I think I'm going to use them for a new coat--this one, though still hanging in there, is probably eight or nine years old and getting a little worn. This latest washing made it kinda flat, too, and I suspect there's just so much you can do with a coat that old. And maybe one more piece of fleece, if I can find what I want on sale (coats are on sale right now, too). There are one or two other things that I covet, and, if I get a job with a decent paycheck, I may treat myself, but otherwise? Nah.

Also? WAY too much underwear. As you women know, and you men who have lived with women know, women have at least two categories of underwear: stuff you wear when you're menstruating, i.e., it already has some bloodstains on it, or it's old and ratty enough so you don't care if it gets stained, and stuff you wear when you're not. There may be additional categories--I have underwear I used for working out, though it overlapped, pretty much, with category A up there, and there might even be special or lucky underwear of one kind or another, or maybe just favorites in terms of color or fit or whatever. I have way too much in category A, so I'm going to start throwing some of that shit out, too--after I wear it, of course; one does not throw out clean clothing if it can possibly be worn. (And I've already decided that when I finally stop menstruating, I'm going to hold a fucking bonfire and burn the underwear with stains, not least because this whole menopause thing means my cycle is wildly unpredictable and I continue to add items to category A. I've by and large spared you that ranting, but trust me, I could provide you with the full-throated version.)

In any event, I'm glad I did this task today. It took more time and energy than I really intended, but it's not like I had other plans, and now it's done. I even vacuumed the bedroom (which is carpeted). I could well have done other cleaning--like the bathroom, for example--but the virtuousness I would have felt would not have been good for me, so, in the interests of some kind of humility, I didn't scrub the tub or anything like that. I still have two closets of crap through which to wade--the hall closet, which holds coats, the sewing machine, the laundry cart, the stick vacuum cleaner, etc., and the murphy-bed closet in the living room, which holds several tubs of paper, assorted bags, and who knows what other stuff--but those will have to wait.

The most interesting meta-type thing about this exercise was seeing what I had bought in the past eighteen months--socks and underwear and sleeveless t-shirts and camisoles, mostly, with some fleece and capris thrown in for good measure. The only thing in that listing that has become unnecessary by virtue of quitting the bakery is the camisoles, which are all white or off-white cotton, and which I got for cheap ($6 apiece) at Maggie's Organic online--but, if I get the least bit motivated, I could tie-dye them, and then I'd have a bunch more colorful underthings to wear. Notably, I did not buy officewear or office-type shoes; though I did buy some shoes, they were mostly for work or were rugged and sturdy.

Okay, I can hear the couch calling me . . . let's hope I can find something on television today, mm'kay?

Liberation Ontology (or: No Mas)

Perhaps the pastry deities decided to reward me today: the plain croissants were stunningly beautiful. Seriously; they were gorgeous, and I couldn't help but be a little proud. On the other hand, there were no customers today, which meant that the croissants remained unpurchased. On the other other hand, that meant I liberated about a dozen of them before I left (plus two chocolate, because Friend particularly likes those)--in plain view, in front of Bossman's dad, who heartily agreed that they were too pretty to be sacrificed for bread pudding or the garbage--and brought them home and lovingly wrapped each one in plastic and froze them all. Friend will get a serious bonus.

I slogged through the last day, doing my usual stuff. In another nice touch, today's dough (and lamination thereof) was also quite pretty, so the good stuff, from my hands, at least, will last a week or so. They'll run short of almond, most likely, but everything else should hold out until Bossman returns, unless the night guys put out too many. The only real differences were that I did the monkey buns today, in order to reduce the scrap to nearly nothing (today's scrap went in the freezer) and to make sure there are monkey buns for orders this week, and I made the much-anticipated pan of lasagna, which made everybody happy, especially since I sent home the leftovers with Artie and Phil, both of whom love lasagna. The guys were quite touching--they all went out their way to shake my hand (or, in the case of Johnnie and Bardo the dishwasher and Bossman's dad, give me a big hug), wish me luck, et cetera. (When Brad left, people were practically shooing him out the door.) It's sort of interesting how deeply I managed to become embedded in a place where I've only worked for two years, and it's encouraging, too.

Now before you guys get all "Well of COURSE, because you're so superduperwonderful, Narya!" I must tell you that, for the first 18 years of my life, I was a serious social outcast. The other kids made fun of me all through grade school and high school--in large part for being smart, and the red hair didn't help--and, along the way, at least two different friends just stopped talking to me. Suddenly I was, for reasons that were completely opaque to me, no longer their friends. (This was in high school, mind you, not grade school.) I suspect my lack of sufficient coolness suddenly became too overwhelming, and it was easier to just drop me, but it was not fun, I assure you. I wasn't a quiet outcast, however, and, perhaps partly because of that, even the kids who mocked me were a little . . . afraid of me, perhaps? I couldn't tell you why that was so, or even IF it was so, to be honest, but that's my sense of it, then and now. Needless to say, I did not have a boyfriend (though I did discover sex, and figured out how to get some without bothering with a boyfriend).

In some ways, all of that was liberating. I realized, early on, that I was never going to be Pretty. (I know that I am, even now, not without my attractions, but no one would ever call me pretty in any conventional sense.) I also realized that I was smart (and my sense of that has changed over time), and I realized that a boyfriend, in the usual late-teen sense of the word, was not an option for me. When you know the conventional, expected paths are not really open to you, then you can either keep trudging along, hoping that maybe things will magically change, or you can just go ahead and forge a path that makes sense to you. I picked B. We could argue about how much sense any 17-year-old really has, and I could tell you (and have told you, at the other blog) about the ways class influences what one thinks one's options are (and makes other options utterly invisible, and, thus, unattainable), but knowing I didn't fit in the usual categories--not only didn't fit, but couldn't even fake fitting, or fit sometimes--meant I just shrugged. Did I wish I fit better? Of course I did. But if wishes were fishes . . .

Thus, I am still, all these years later, a little amazed that I manage to fit so well in the places where I do that. And the environments in which I have managed to do that vary rather considerably, which is also gratifying. And, hell, this time I even managed to do it across a language barrier, so what the hell.

I kept thinking I'd think of something useful, or fun, or . . . something to do tonight. Maybe I'd do laundry, including washing my coat and fleece and every other thing that has flour in all its crevices, a kind of mikvah for my clothes? Maybe I'd take myself out to dinner? Maybe I'd find something good on television? Or watch one of my new Netflix movies ("Spellbound" and "Nobody's Fool")? But not, apparently. I did sort my laundry, but it remains piled on the floor of my bedroom, where it will stay until tomorrow morning, when it will be joined briefly by the sheets and towels and then taken to the laundry room. Thanks to last night's giant wad of burger and today's lasagna, I really didn't feel like going out tonight; I did open a bottle of wine, but most of that will go in the fridge. And there's bupkis on television. I suppose I could put the football game on, but I only want to watch if the Patriots are going to lose, and we all know that if I turn the television on, the Patriots will win. (That's my super power: I can change the outcome of a sporting event by watching it.) And I haven't decided whether to take those movies with me so I can watch them on my laptop on the train. (One of tomorrow's tasks is to make a list of what I'm taking and start to figure out in what I'm going to put it all; it's the first trip I've taken without access to Chuck's rolling suitcases.)

So, yeah, I'm now officially unemployed. I won't truly panic until I return from the east coast, but there will be episodes of uncertainty, as well as a certain amount of joy that I don't have to get up a the asscrack of dawn. I'm looking forward to that part, I gotta say.

One More Saturday Night

Given the weirdness that is my life, this was not the strangest evening I've ever spent, but it wasn't in the list of what I'd call normal, either. That is, I had dinner with Chuck. No CS, just Chuck. We'd originally talked about the three of us getting together tonight or tomorrow night, but then Chuck's mom went into the hospital last Sunday and has been there since, so he was heading back to her place tonight, but without CS. I said, hey, the dinner offer for tonight still holds, if that's not too weird for you, and he took me up on it, so that's what we did. It was actually kind of nice to just . . . talk. Like two normal(ish) people who know each other very well, who even like each other, but without the editing required when a kid is present. And it seemed kind of fitting, somehow, that the night before my last day at the bakery should be shared a little with him. We talked about his mom, and my mom, and the bakery, and what I'm going to do next, and his girlfriend, and his therapy, and his son, and our lives. (He never, ever, ever asks about Friend, and I would avoid the questions if he did, so, on some level, he doesn't really know what's going on in that area of my life. And I prefer that.) We even had a Touching Moment: after we were married, I'd come home and say, "Hello, husband." And he'd reply, "Hello, wife." It was a sign of our affection for each other, and it was nice. Near the end of dinner, I looked at him and said, "Hey, ex-husband." And he replied, "Hey, ex-wife." What else is there to say?

Meanwhile, the outpouring at the bakery has been a little astonishing, as well as heartwarming. Bossman left town today for a trip to Florida, so we'll have to save our real goodbyes for when I come to pick up my last check, but he wants to make sure he can still email me with Excel questions. I had long conversations today with two of the women (one a senior in high school, the other in her 30s or 40s) who work in the front, and the older one actually went out and got me some lottery tickets (for luck), which I thought was quite sweet. (And, yes, three of them were actually winners.) I don't think people realize I've only been there for two years--I've apparently achieved the (perhaps dubious) status of "fixture" in a relatively short period of time. And, yes, I am making lasagna tomorrow for the boys. I told Phil and Johnnie and Artie not to bring lunch tomorrow, and I had the other Artie's son (who works in the store these days) translate to Leo for me.

I've also been doing little goodbyes in my head--many of them on the order of "good riddance." Yesterday I made my last almond and mini chocolate croissants ("don't have to make almond filling any more"). Today I made my last chocolate and my last ham and cheese and my last mini raisin croissants. (After I finished fighting with the slicer for the ham and cheese, I told Bossman, "I hope you have as much fun with that slicer as I have had." He said, oh, I won't need to use that one, we're getting a new one--which is sort of true, if his guy can find and rebuild one for him soon--so I just reiterated my wish for him.) I made my last batch of croissant dough, too. And mostly what I feel is relief. It has all become such a grind, as I've narrated endlessly to you guys, that I just don't want to do it any longer. If I have to do more low-paid shit work to make ends meet, so be it, but surely I can find something that does not involve lugging a 50-pound sack of flour on my shoulder up a flight of stairs (did THAT for the last time today, too). And, on the other hand, if i do end up doing this work again, I've become good at it. You never know when the ability to type, or the ability to recalculate a formula using baker's percentages, may come in handy.

Two, Please

In case I didn't make it clear, the rabbit was quite tasty--all the steps are definitely worth it, as you end up with a rich-tasting, flavorful stew. In addition to the pancetta, you also use a cup or so of madeira (in which I soak the cherries for an hour), a cup and a half of red wine (though you could use white, I think), and a cup and a half of chicken broth (I used a cup and stretched it with water). You reduce these liquids at various points in the process, which obviously thickens the mix, and the flour in which the meat is dusted before searing adds some thickening as well. It's also good with chicken, and I don't know why you couldn't use it with, say, pheasant as well--and, who knows, maybe we'll try it with venison at some point, too. Though I very much like it with polenta, you could also use mashed potatos (the first time I made this, I used a parmesan mashed potato cake, from the same cookbook, that tastes very rich but actually has very little fat in it); I'm sure rice would work fine, too, though I'd recommend brown and/or wild rather than plain white.

Today was kind of interesting, even as it was completely routine. On one hand, I found out, again by accident, that Mike, the guy they hired late this summer, is also making more than I am. It irritated me briefly, but I just let it go, mostly. I do hope that Bossman eventually learns--either the easy way or the hard way, I don't care--that it pays to pay people fairly and well. He hasn't realized that turnover has its costs, too, in part because his main core of guys, the hispanic guys, have been there for so long and aren't likely to leave. (If I could speak spanish, I'd tell them a few things.) He had Brad there for a few years, and me the past two years--the past year, especially--and he has a couple of store people now who manage things, more or less, but "managing" isn't the same as producing actual product, as Bossman will figure out when he's trying to get 2500 (or more) croissants out the door each week. (Johnnie did it before I did it, and the numbers weren't as high--for one thing, BT's restaurant wasn't a customer yet--and Bossman will tell you that Johnnie's quality wasn't consistent, in part because Johnnie had so many other tasks to do as well.) It will be especially telling if/when they start fucking up the orders for BT's restaurant, and I would be very surprised if that doesn't happen within, oh, four to six weeks.

I think what has happened is that, say, ten years ago, they were still digging out of the disaster that was the business when they were trying and failing to run things out of three stores/bakeries (that experiment ended in the 1980s, I think). As such, they all still have a Depression mentality, if you will, for completely understandable reasons. Except, in the last decade, a number of important things have happened: (1) the product has improved, immeasurably--not just the croissants, but also the bread, and the tarts, and just about everything except the donuts and cakes, and even the cakes are better-decorated, because Johnnie is extremely talented in that regard; (2) Bossman won a world championship, which got a lot of press and also improved his skills along the way; (3) the farmers' markets have increased in number and size; and (4) the previous three things have all brought many more customers into the store. The increase just in the last year is pretty dramatic: they had over 600 more customers this December than last December, for example, and 160 more customers on Christmas Eve, which is pretty astounding. It's been running at about an 8% to 10% increase over last year. In addition, a couple of big bakeries in the city have declined in quality, such that Bossman now supplies bread to several of the most highly regarded restaurants in the city, including several hotel restaurants.

In other words, the business is in a much different place than it was eight to ten years ago--and Bossman has to rethink the business if he wants to keep it. Those customers are used to getting all kinds of things they couldn't get even two years ago, which means someone has to make them. Right now, it's mostly Bossman, but he can't do everything. He used to be able to do everything--make up the slack by working 16-hour days--but the business has grown beyond that. I'm not telling him these things, mind you--not least because he hasn't asked--I'm just musing on what I see. I have no illusions about me, either; I'm not irreplaceable, except in the everybody's a precious unique snowflake sense. It'll take some doing, though, and probably more than he realizes, not least because there are a lot of little things I do and do pretty seamlessly.

The guys--Johnnie and Phil in particular--are bumming that I'm leaving, however. Phil keeps bugging me to make lasagna on Saturday, it being my last day and all. Johnnie and I were in the walk-in at the same time today, and he said, pointing at the pastry cream, "Who made that?" I said that I had (and it was one of the things he asked for Saturday morning, and I mentioned it to Bossman and said I'd do it--and about three or four hours later, Bossman asked about it, or said it needed to be done, and I said, 'I already made it."). He said, "Who's going to make it now?" I said, "That's not my problem." He said, "Oh, don't be like that--I'm going to miss you." And gives me a big hug. I actually think those guys have a better idea of what's going to be missing than Bossman does, but they'll also miss me personally, I think, not least because I laugh at their dumb jokes.

Tres

My three-day holiday is nearing its end, then three days of work at the bakery, then four days here, then a week or so in transit or on the east coast, then back here to wonder if I'm going to find work. Friend and I had a nice time--he picked me up on Monday when he got out of work, we stopped for some produce and shlepped my stuff (including various items for our christmas dinner) to his house, then went out to eat. Good food, good wine. Back at his place we were having fun dancing around and listening to music and suddenly I was hit by a wave of extreme nausea. There went dinner. I suspect I had imbibed too much--though it took a good long while to hit, as the nausea didn't occur until at least two hours after my last glass of wine--because I was fine, though tired, afterwards, and, especially, because we shared everything we ate. Weird (and mortifying), but there you go.

On Tuesday we got our sorry butts up and took a walk in the bright sunny woods, which was wonderful, and then came back to rekindle the fire in the fireplace and assemble dinner. As I mentioned, we had decided to make rabbit on christmas day. He had some in the freezer, thanks to his uncle, and I had a recipe that I'd made several times with chicken but that supposedly could be used with rabbit as well. The recipe isn't difficult, but it has a lot of steps to it and a few ingredients (pancetta, fresh thyme, shallots [which I replaced with onions anyway, as the produce store didn't have shallots], dried cherries, madeira in which to soak the cherries) that you're not likely to just have on hand, so it takes a prior commitment.

There were two entertaining bits--one was that, when i talked to mom to wish her a merry christmas, I told her we were making rabbit. "Coniglio?" she said. And I said yes, and she said that's what you're SUPPOSED to have on Christmas, coniglio in a wine sauce, with polenta. Well, I told her, that's exactly what we're having. I had no idea--I'm assuming this was something she had at home as a kid, but we never had it (though we did have rabbit on occasion, when my dad still hunted rabbit and pheasant).

The other entertaining bit was cooking with Friend, which I enjoy. He had the recipe for the rabbit, too, as I had given him a copy of that cookbook at one point because I liked it so much, which was handy. I had assembled all of the ingredients, and we had decided on polenta and cauliflower in cheese sauce as our accompaniments to the rabbit. He wanted to do the rabbit, though, as he likes it and hadn't tried many recipes with it, so I let him take over on that while I made the polenta and cauliflower. We both chowed down, and then enjoyed some chocolate hazelnut cake with whipped cream (though I had unintentionally left the two tablespoons of flour out of the cake, it was quite good). I like cooking with him--and I like eating with him. He was commenting today on the good meals we've shared just in the last week. I think the key is that we both like nearly everything. I can't eat peppers or cucumbers, and I despise cantaloupe and severely dislike mint, and he doesn't like blue cheeses (though will make the occasional exception for a sauce or for something that doesn't have an overwhelming blue cheese taste) or pumpkin (which i regard as unfortunate, given my love of same), but otherwise we'll both eat nearly anything.

No, I still don't know what's going on between us, but I don't particularly want or need to probe all that much; whatever it is, it seems to work for both of us. He is using up the rest of his vacation time for the year by heading back to cheese land until Sunday, in a trip that will include getting more wood for the fireplace (and trust me when I say I'll benefit from that expedition) and going to lots of college hockey games. We'll get together Monday and do something for New Year's Eve--probably go see a band that he likes and that I liked when we went together once last year--and watch football on the 1st, then he goes back to work and I need to get my crap together for my trip east. I'm also getting a zen shiatsu treatment before I go (and, hopefully, as soon as I return), and then I can start to panic look for work of various kinds.

I can also work out for cheap, it turns out. The city park district has a bunch of fitness centers, including one quite near me that has just reopened and that features a fee of $30 for three months (normally it's $40, which isn't exactly expensive). I'm really quite excited about that, because I do need to start working out somewhere, somehow (and no, I won't just go for walks, even though they're free, and I do need something that provides more cardio intensity), but I was really unwilling to commit to even a YMCA membership without having a job or any idea what my freelance work will look like. This solves the problem nicely, and they even have rowing machines, which are my personal favorite cardio workout. It'll help me lose some of the weight I've added, it'll get me out of the house, it'll rebuild my cardio capacity, and so on and so on. And it's cheap--did I mention that?--and doesn't require a continuing commitment, so I'm for it.

A Perfectly Good Holiday

HoHoHo!

Which is how members of my family greet each other on christmas day, either in person or by phone. I can't provide you with the proper intonation in this medium, however, and I recognize I'm a day early. I also wore a santa hat at work yesterday (and to and from work, and to the store, and to dinner, and I may wear it today, too, to meet Friend, which will make him laugh).

More infielding at the bakery yesterday, plus I continued the countdown for Phil ("three days," I kept telling him). I made some pumpkin cheese galettes, filled some macarons, put macarons in the store, rounded some bread, and so on. I left at around 2, zipped to Whole Paycheck for a few things for tomorrow's dinner, rounded up some food, then watched the rest of "In the Heat of the Sun" (which I liked) and "Bend It Like Beckham," which I had never seen, rather than baking the cake.

"Beckham" was interesting, in that, for both girls, mom tried to enforce the patriarchy--with threats that the girl would never find a husband and with fears that the girl was a lesbian--and dad was the one who supported the girl and encouraged her to play soccer. In many places and many families, of course, dad is both the patriarch and the enforcer of patriarchy, while mom is the one who helps the girl get out from under. And that way dad gets to spoil the girl, too, giving her approval when she acts in patriarchally approved fashion, thus teaching her that Good Things will come her way if and only if she subscribes to the patriarchy. My family was much more like the two in Beckham, in that my dad has always supported me, pretty nearly unconditionally. Mom loves me that way, but she has been trying, for nearly 50 years now, to make me more "ladylike." Needless to say, she has been much frustrated in her efforts. That is, the other model is that mom reinforces the patriarchy, while dad is more ambivalent about it; this may be because mothers feel that daughters are a direct reflection of mom's femininity, and a less-than-ideally-compliant daughter is evidence of mom's failings. Or something.

Speaking of mom, mine has had two days of dialysis, and is getting more as I type. Her numbers are much better already, though she's still pretty tired. She's still hosting dinner tomorrow, though others are bringing various bits of the meal. Get this, though. Mom has not just a set of "good" china (and it's her second set since she got married, as she got tired of the old set, and, needless to say, I didn't want it) but also special christmas china. Of course these plates cannot be washed in the dishwasher (what are you thinking??), but she doesn't want to have to wash them all, so she dispatched my sister-in-law to get some nice paper plates. My mother was sufficiently appalled at her own behavior to mention this to me. Why she didn't just ask someone to wash the dishes for her is a little confusing to me, but, hey, I'm not there. If I were, I'd offer to wash the dishes so she could use her Christmas plates, ludicrous though I regard it to be.

Sooner or later, I must get out of my bathrobe and bake a cake--for fun, rather than for work--but not just yet, not least because I'm enjoying lounging around in the bathrobe, drinking tea; I may even go back to bed to read for awhile. I do have to figure out what to do about the fact that the recipe calls for a 9-inch springform pan, while I only have a 10-inch springform pan. I probably have some 9-inch regular cake pans, which, if lined with parchment and greased heavily, might do as well. Or I can increase the recipe by 15% or so, though that's a little dicier, given that the recipe is given in measurements rather than weights (which now just seems bizarrely dysfunctional to me--it's so much easier to adjust a recipe if you have weights rather than measures). Or I can just bake it in the 10-inch pan and know that it'll be a little flatter. Plus, I forgot to buy sugar, so I'll probably use a combination of superfine white, regular white, and brown sugar, which should be fine.

It's a chocolate hazelnut cake from the Food Pron Bimonthly (a.k.a. Cook's Illustrated baking book), and if I had any memory at all, I'd remember the fancy-ass french name for the cake. (Eggs are separated, and whipped whites are folded in to the rest of the batter.) Here's a second way the measures-rather-than-weights thing is a pain: the recipe calls for 1 1/3 cups of hazelnuts, which you then toast, and rub (to remove the skins) and retoast, and eventually grind with the sugar. Guess what? I have hazelnut flour in my freezer (and could have lifted some from work if I didn't, or bought some more at Whole Paycheck), but I don't know exactly how much to use. A cup and a third of hazelnuts is NOT the same as a cup and a third of hazelnut flour. I weighed some whole almonds at work (we didn't have whole hazelnuts), and I'm guessing about 200 grams; I'll make notes when I make this thing, and we'll see. But if they'd given weights, this wouldn't be an issue.

In any case, have a wonderful holiday--or day off, as the case may be. You may remember my father's immortal words, when I asked him why we celebrated christmas if we didn't believe in Christ: "We celebrate Halloween and we don't believe in ghosts; why give up a perfectly good holiday?"

More Better

Yes, indeed, today I was a utility infielder, even though I do, in fact, generally have a full-time starting position. I didn't need to play that position (laminator/trix) today, so I:

--tied dough into knots for dinner rolls (there were four or five of us working on this task at any given time, as the dough had to be cut/rounded by the Fortuna, and each ball had to be rolled into a breakfast sausage, and each sausage had to be rolled out a little longer, then knotted, and each pan of rolls had to be dabbed with egg wash and possibly drizzled with poppy or sesame seeds, and we made somewhere around, oh, 100 dozen I'm guessing);

--cut up the galette dough into 9.5-ounce chunks;

--was going to make ganache, at Bossman's request, except I remembered Lole had left some in the walk-in (despite my verbal abilities, I have a pretty sharp visual memory, which is an interesting combination), so I retrieved that, warmed and kneaded it a bit, transferred it to another pastry bag, and filled a bunch of chocolate macarons, some of which I put in the store;

--made streusel for the apple galettes;

--made multiple trips to the freezer downstairs for fruit, and, with Bossman, made galettes with said fruit (I'd get the fruit, then get the sugar mixture for the particular variety we were making and scale the cups of sugar mix; Bossman would zip over, roll out the dough for that variety and drape it in the rings, and I'd put in the frangipane, bread crumbs, fruit, and sugar, and close them. He's better and faster at rolling the dough out--though I could do it--and this method meant he would zip through the rolling then move on to the next thing, while I finished up the flavor then got all the crap together for the next batch. It also meant we could do other things in between. We made four peach, four strawberry rhubarb, four apple, four plum, and six mixed fruit; tomorrow we'll do some more apple and some pumpkin cheese);

--scraped the rest of the streusel into a smaller container and scraped the rest of the frangipane into the bag, as we'll use both tomorrow;

--started helping with the torpedos, until we realized that Mike had left the salt out of the dough. (Apparently Phil had said this, but Mike, rather than tasting the dough, said he'd put the salt in. Ooops.) The dough was mixed again--throw the old dough in the mixer, add some ingredients as if you were doing a new batch from scratch, and add the salt missing from the first batch--but I had nothing more to do with it;

--retrieved the leftovers from yesterday's lunch so Phil could warm it all in the oven;

--periodically refilled the croissant plates for the store;

--did two sweet tables (a dozen cream puffs, which were easy, except I had to wait for the whipped cream, and seven dozen of other stuff, including eclairs, for which I had to melt chocolate so I could dip them);

--scaled and mixed the stollen (yesterday I'd put the fruit and nuts to soak with some rum);

--scaled and mixed the miche (Bossman oversaw both mixing processes);

--after the stollen had rested and been folded and rested some more, shaped the stollen as Bossman cut it up, and, after it rested a little longer, worked with him to shape and fill it;

--put out the croissants for tomorrow.

Basically, I was Bossman's right-hand person today. No, he doesn't acknowledge that or mention it in any way, but I've been there long enough to know that it's true. (I wouldn't mind the occasional acknowledgment, mind you, but it's not coming from him.) I also take a certain pleasure in it--it's satisfying to be able to locate the ganache (or make some, if I'd needed to do that), and make the streusel, and assemble the galettes, and scale and mix a couple of doughs, and so on. Johnnie might have been able to do everything I did, but noone else there could have done the variety of things I did. I also continued my countdown for Phil--four days, I told him.

And tomorrow I get to do more of it.

Sunreturn

Happy solstice, everyone! It's my favorite holiday (seriously--for a few years running, my holiday cards were handmade [by me, no less] solstice cards).

Let's see. Apparently mom was starting dialysis today, but I haven't heard a report from anyone on how that went. I talked to both my parents yesterday and told them each that I'm going to be visiting; I had wanted to surprise them, but I thought it was better this way. Mom sounds pretty good. She's not a whiner, and she's known this would be coming eventually, so she's just accepting it and moving on. I suspect the dialysis will even improve the quality of her life in some ways.

I took Friend out to dinner for his birthday last night, which means I left work after only 9.5 hours or so, plus I went in nearly an hour late this morning (I punched in at 7:50), as I'd warned Bossman I was going to do. We had a wonderful dinner, even though we ended up at his second choice restaurant because his first choice was full of holiday parties and there was a 1.5-hour wait for a table. The place we went is set up such that you can either order from the menu or, for a fixed price, they bring you a bunch of little plates of appetizers, and then a couple of pastas, and then an entree (which you choose from a list); they will also bring you a glass of a different wine with each of those courses (there are three price levels for that option). I've never ordered from the menu the half dozen times I've been there, in part because I like to sample the bits they bring. Last night: appetizers were olives; little balls of fresh mozzarella drizzled with a flavored olive oil; a parmesan-encrusted caramelized onion slice; and some little veal meatballs. The pastas were wide ribbons with a duck ragu and rigatoni with parmesan, italian sausage, spinach, and cauliflower. For our entrees, Friend had a hunter's stew with quail, rabbit, white beans, and spinach, and I had braised pork with white beans and greens (kale, I think it was). We both took home wads of our entrees--I had some tonight, with added spinach and over pasta, and I'll get another meal out of it as well, and Friend took his leftover stew to work today with a hunk of bread I had on the counter. (I told him it was a sign of my affection for him that I was willing to give him the heel of the bread--and it was semolina sesame sourdough, no less, which may well be my favorite bread at the bakery.) I insisted on dessert, which was a slice of candied orange--including the peel--and a scoop of hazelnut chocolate gelato. It was simple and spectacular, and we shared a glass of the dessert wine they suggested as a pairing, and it was wonderful, too; the caramel notes in the wine played off the rest of the dessert beautifully. All in all, a wonderful evening.

Friend is heading up to visit his family this weekend--which is when they're doing their christmas thing--and returning Sunday evening. He has to work Monday, though he expects to be told to leave early. Thus, our current plan is for me to work like a crazy person at the bakery for the next two days, then meet him downtown Monday for dinner (another place to which we've gone has a great deal on Mondays--if you sit in the bar area, all their wines are $5 a glass, which is a great way to sample wines that are normally $12 a glass). The place opens at 4:00, so that should work out okay. I'll shlep along whatever we'll need for dinner on Tuesday. The current menu includes rabbit (which he has in the freezer), using a recipe that I've made several times with chicken and that includes madeira, pancetta, dried cherries, and tasty goodness; broccoli and cauliflower with a cheese sauce; polenta or potatos (it would be easier to bring the ingredients for the former, so I'm leaning that way); and dessert of some kind. I may make a chocolate hazelnut cake, if I get sufficiently ambitious and am not too tired and I remember to bring some hazelnut flour home from the bakery. The other part of our plan is to watch the LOTR trilogy Christmas day, though we may not have the wherewithal to do all of that--it's more than 12 hours of viewing, after all.

I only worked until about 6:00 tonight. I did manage to rearrange my production schedule such that I'm not laminating or shaping croissants tomorrow or Sunday, which means I'm available to be a utility infielder and do whatever needs doing. I did a little of that today, too. Phil wants to know whether I'm making lasagna or pizza or what next Saturday (for my last day)--I told him he should make it, not me. We'll see; someone will make something.

I also decided to give myself a break. I've continued to gain weight, such that many clothes don't fit. But I've also realized that I can't take any serious steps until I'm not at the bakery, in part because of the availability of the food and in part because of the aforechronicled hours, etc. So I'm just not going to think about it for the next couple of weeks. I'll get it together and start exercising and practicing yoga again, and I'll lose the weight--just not in the next two weeks. I've also realized that I can work out at city park facilities for quite cheap--way less than a gym--so I'm excited about that, even if I'm not sure how far I'm going to have to shlep to find facilities. Yes, I know I could Just Walk, but I also know I won't do that.

Countdown

Talked to dad first thing this morning, then mom called later in the morning. She sounded tired, but otherwise not too bad--though I suspect she's a little down, too, because she'll be starting on dialysis soon. She's managed this balancing act for far longer than anyone (including her doctors) thought she'd be able to do it, but she's putting herself in danger of system collapse if she doesn't. Two stupidity stories: (1) She was due to get an iron injection today, which she apparently gets in the outpatient procedures area of the hospital. They don't want to release her until she gets that injection . . . but no one could seem to figure out how to make that happen, according to my sister-in-law. I suggested that mom insist that they put her in a wheelchair and she'd give them directions to the damned clinic. It's in the same hospital, people; surely someone can figure this out? (2) Apparently they finally got her into a room at around 3:00 am. They woke her at 3:30 to take her blood pressure, at 4:00 to take a blood draw, and at 4:30 to weigh her. I'm surprised they didn't wake her at 5:00 to check her height. I understand why they had to take those measurements, but is there a law against taking all three at the same time? From someone who is obviously in bad shape, and, btw, hasn't slept?

Today I was talking to Bossman across the table about young guys--I forget what the particular point was--and I mentioned that Axe body spray shit. He looked puzzled, and Mike (being mid-20s himself) started to explain, but I said to Bossman, "It's Hai Karate for this generation." He cracked up, but everyone else just looked puzzled.

Later: One of the kids who works in the store is an engineering student at the nearby university, family lives in a nearby suburb, he's Hispanic, bilingual (and quite cute, but, according to Bossman, not the brightest bulb on the tree). So he was working in the back today, helping out, and I said, "Hey, Dan, does your family make tamales for the holidays?" And he says yeah, or, at least, they have tamales, but they don't make them any more because it's too much work for his mom. So I said, well why don't you help her? He says, well, my dad never did, and he starts explaining how she pays a neighbor for the ones they need because it's so much work, etc. I asked again, why don't you help her? And again he says, well, my dad never did. I interrupted him and said, "Wait, I'm not getting this. What's the connection between having a penis and not being able to make tamales? What's the problem? Does it get in the way or something?" And he's kind of embarrassed, but laughing (and, I think, getting my point), and I see Bossman snickering, too, and Bossman adds that that's why the toilet paper is never on the roller in the men's bathroom--it's women's work. (Now, I know Bossman doesn't really think or act that way; he was providing an interpretation rather than a justification, and I could tell he was amused.)

Meanwhile, I told Phil today that the 29th is my last day. I think he's kinda bumming a bit. Cute Boy is going to take over for three months or so--he's coming in tomorrow so I can start training him--and I'll make sure he's trained to help Phil, too. I keep pulling things out of the air these days, too--today I found the stollen filling for Bossman, after he'd searched the walk-in and given up, plus I suggested throwing some shredded parmesan into the garlic asiago pepper bread, because we were short of asiago and very long on shredded parmesan. We were all kinda goofy today, though, and it was fun. There are things I will most definitely not miss--like flour in every crevice of my clothing and my being--but there are other things I will miss a lot.

Aaaaaand now . . . .

of COURSE my mother's in the hospital again. Apparently dad took her at midnight, because her congestive heart failure was sufficiently bad. I don't know details--my brother was my source of info, and he didn't know much either, and I hesitated to try to call my mom because she hadn't slept in a day or two, and of course I'd probably manage to wake her. Basically, her kidney function is such that she is, as my brother put it, on the precipice of needing dialysis, and the least little stress puts her into the congestive heart failure state. To put it bluntly, without a kidney, she's not getting any better. She may be able to maintain for a little while longer, and, if she starts dialysis, she may be able to maintain in that condition for awhile, but there will be no improvement without a kidney, and the decline could be precipitous. So there's that.

Otherwise, I managed to get many errands done yesterday, and today I mailed the one package that needed mailing, plus I called a friend who probably thought I had fallen off the face of the earth, so those bits are going well. One of yesterday's errands was to take my change to one of those coin-counting machines: I keep quarters, of course, but otherwise change just seems like a pain, especially given that I'm usually in chef clothes, so I had been throwing it into a dish. Now I have a Starbucks card worth $16.12, which feels like free money, though, of course, it was my money all along.

Eight days left at the bakery, and only seven of them will include lamination, because I'm showing up this Sunday to be a utility infielder rather than a laminatrix. Despite the incipient panic occasioned by the prospect of having no job whatsoever, I continue to think it's the right thing to do. Terrifying, yes, but it's the only way I can do anything else. Or so I've managed to convince myself. We cut one of the tortas from the other day, and it rocked. I may actually try it at home, though I don't know that I can make a laminated dough without a sheeter at this point. If I do, I'm going to try the orange version. Which means I'd have to share some with anyone named Orange.

Don't Read This if You're Hungry

In a political aside, this is why I support John Edwards.

Added: Turns out that Paul Krugman agrees with me on this one.

Turns out Bossman is more concerned that there be enough croissants until he gets back than concerned about me coming in to the bakery through the 2nd. I sat down and figured out a production schedule that will keep the bakery in croissants until he gets back, plus leave him with some wads of laminated dough in the freezer, and I think my last day will be the 29th. As i was doing my calculations, I realized that the total number of plain croissants I need to make for the next two-and-a-half weeks is smaller than the number I was making weekly during the height of the farmers' markets, which provided me with a certain amount of perspective.

Yesterday I made some torta russa, which is puff pastry in a large-muffin-sized cup (we use the paper cups in this picture, specifically the one at 2 o'clock, for monkey buns, as well as for the mini tortas), filled with a mixture of butter, eggs, lemon, sugar, and almonds. (In fact, I think the baker who developed this formula was the one who was at the bakery last spring and who told me my croissants are better than the ones he gets in Paris.) Bossman had started it but then had to make some deliveries, so I took care of it. We add some lemon curd to the bottom of this, which works out quite nicely and improves the lemoniness of the flavor; i think an orange filling with some not-too-sweet marmalade on the bottom would work, too. I would have baked them a little longer, but they were still quite lovely. I made some cannoli filling for the store. I helped Bossman coat mini rum balls in chocolate sprinkles. And then I helped with the gingerbread house kits, mostly by taping boxes. Bossman's dad had cut up the sheets of gingerbread (using patterns that are easily 25 years old) and bagged the toys (snowman, Santa, candy canes, etc.) we include in the boxes, and Bossman had made a big batch of royal icing, so he glued house bits together and stuck them on gold circles, while I put the house and a bag of toys into the cardboard box and taped it shut; we has a pretty efficient assembly line going. There's an order for 80 of them for today, and we got through about 40 or so before he ran out of icing, plus there were another 19 up on the shelf.

I was all full of ambition when I got home, too--I intended to do my laundry, but someone was removing laundry from all four washers, prior to refilling three of them. i settled for putting plastic over my bathroom window for insulation; finally replacing the shower curtain liner (I've had the replacement for two or three months, but hadn't gotten around to putting it up because I intended to get new shower curtain rings, ones that would be easier to open and close; as (a) it became clear THAT wasn't going to happen soon, and (b) the old liner got steadily more grody, I just used the old ones again); replacing two burned-out light bulbs in the dining area fixture (amazing how much more light you get when you have four working bulbs instead of two); sweeping the floor and doing some general tidying; collecting garbage, including the piles of catalogues I don't want; and making some dinner.

I did get the laundry going this morning early, and I talked to mom, who now has, on top of her other issues, an abdominal hernia, but they don't want to operate on it unless it strangulates because they're afraid that'll force her onto dialysis. I could also tell that she hadn't taken her lasix yet--she doesn't take it every day, but modulates her consumption based on how she's feeling. (Too much makes her sick, too.) When she's gone more than a day without it, the congestive heart failure kicks up a notch and she starts coughing some, which is how I could tell. Oy. At least she's started getting a little exercise (on the treadmill two days in each of the past two weeks, plus her volunteer stint at the Crayola factory), so perhaps my nagging on that score sunk in. My mother also informed me that I should be there for Christmas, no matter that it's the busiest week of the year at the bakery.

I wish I didn't have so many conflicts about visiting my family. On one hand, flying is cheap enough and quick enough that even I feel a little ridiculous taking the train--but I still hate to fly, which just reduces the enjoyment of any trip. And, much as I love my family, they have never, ever spent a holiday with me: not when I lived in Philadelphia, not since I've moved here in 1985. Never once in 30 years. Instead, I get lectures on how I shouldn't spend the day alone. Who fucking cares? One of my best Christmases was the one where I saw four movies in two days--by myself. Loved it. Obviously my mother is in no condition to travel now, especially in the middle of winter, but you get my point.

In any case, I end up fibrillating about when to go, how to go, and on and on, and on top of that I have to make it a point to let go of the resentment--that is not baggage I want to take with me. I did finally make a decision today and made train reservations, with sleeping accommodations, which increases the price significantly but improves the quality of the trip; it also means I can bring my laptop without reading the fine print and bring as many, and whatever size, bottles of shampoos and moisturizers and body lotion and whatever as I want. I can also bring the poster I had framed for my parents (I'm on the poster, in my chef clothes, so I'll be lucky if they put it in the garage) rather than trying to package and mail it.

Speaking of the poster, Friend helped me out significantly today. He had some vehicle errands to run, despite the snow, so he offered to meet me at the place where I had the poster framed so i wouldn't have to sherpa the stuff on trains and buses. From there we went to a nearby drinking establishment to have a beverage while we waited for the restaurant to open at 4:30. We also made plans to celebrate his birthday (which is Friday, but he's playing hockey that night, so we'll celebrate on Thursday, which means I can deliver baked goods that he can take to his family over the weekend) and christmas--he'll be back for christmas eve, and he's working that day, so I can concoct a dessert and he can come fetch me and we can hang out at his place in front of the fireplace and/or the TV and drink with abandon. On christmas day we may do a LOTR marathon, coupled with some fancy-ass cooking (we might even cook Thumper) and possibly a trip to a suburb to hear the band we're intending to see on new year's eve (although there's every possibility we'll be way too comfy on the couch to contemplate that expedition). Then we both work for a couple of days--different ones, in that he has vacation days to use up and I have to work until the 29th--get together for the new year, and I head out on the 3rd and get back on the 10th, whereupon I start whatever it is I'm going to be doing. All in all, I think there's a good blend in there.

I don't know how my coworkers and Bossman are reacting to my leaving. He seems okay with it, but he never shows anything, and his wife went out of her way to thank me for "staying," and she was complimentary and appreciative, so that was nice. (I figured she'd be all one way or the other, and I was glad it was the one way. The other might have become unpleasant.) I've told Johnnie, who looked surprised and dismayed, but I haven't told Phil or Artie yet; Bossman may do that tomorrow when I'm not there. I know that Phil will miss me: I help him out, a lot, and it's generally wordless, in the sense that I just step in, lend a hand with a particular part of a process, then go back to whatever I was doing. A few tasks we've managed to streamline in ways that accomplish the task much more quickly than he can do alone and more quickly than other people manage. It's subtle, but it's there, and I know he recognizes it.

The same is true with Bossman, for that matter; there are dozens of small ways that I lend a hand--fix an invoice for the delivery guy; make cannoli filling or pastry cream (the latter of which I hate, but will do); check in the dairy order or the dry goods order; finish some task, like the tortas yesterday; fill the macaron trays in the store; and, of course, magically produce 2000 to 4500 croissants per week without anyone else needing to think about it. It's true that I had Lole for the summer, and I would have been screwed without that, but even then noone else needed to be involved. In some ways, Friday morning is a perfect example: I didn't have the ingredient I needed, so I had to occupy myself, and I managed to do that in productive ways. I'm sure this takes different forms in different environments--the Tart probably has a different perspective than I have, for example, because she works a line and I don't--but I think the general principles apply in every single workplace. Some people make themselves useful, and will find ways to do so as needed, while other people will . . . not. I really enjoy being in a workplace where the former greatly outnumber the latter, in part because that goads many people in the latter category to do more or better than they might otherwise do and in part because it means everyone really is working together, even if we're all doing different tasks. Sometimes I marvel at how much we manage to produce at the bakery.

At the moment, however, I'm marveling that I've managed to keep my eyes open long enough to finish this. I'm fading fast, even though it's only 8:45, and I have shlepping to do tomorrow, so I'm going to give up and go to bed.

Like a Rolling Stone

To answer kstyle's question, I don't exactly know how it feels.

I am, of course, a little terrified. i don't have a job. I don't even have any freelance or temp jobs lined up. Yes, I've had several interviews (four, to be precise, with a total of seven people) that I think went pretty well, but no one has intimated that I'm going to be hired or made an offer, so I know better than to count on that in any way, shape, or form. I do have a little money in the bank, and a little more on the way from a few different sources (the last few bakery checks, plus a couple of freelance checks), which is how I planned this escapade. And I've also decided that if I don't get an offer by the time I get back from my visit east--i.e., mid-January--or if they say they're not interested after all, then i start looking for a temp agency immediately. I can simultaneously look for more freelance clients, of course, but getting at least a little income will take off some of the heat and drain the reserves more slowly.

I'm also relieved. The job has been wrecking me physically, in several dimensions. I get no real exercise, I do a lot of repetitive motions, I eat a lot of crap, and I'm on my feet for 9 to 12 hours a day, lugging around 15-pound wads of dough. The place is loud. I'm constantly dinging myself on one thing or another. (I whacked my shin the other day--through my pants mind you--hard enough to draw blood. When I raised my pant leg to see--because it hurt--Bossman said, "80-quart mixing bowl?" and I said, "No, a bucket." Yes, I seriously bruised my shin on a plastic bucket. He, meanwhile, has several new burn scars--baker's tattoos, he calls them.) The job wrecks me in other ways, too, but the real reason I'm quitting is that I never intended to work this hard for someone else. If I can't start my own bakery, then I'm going to do something else for pay (and, for that matter, if I still wanted to start my own bakery, I'm not going to earn enough capital to do that by working for someone else).

So it seems like the right and sensible thing to do, even though, on paper, I shouldn't be quitting one job before I have another one in place. I have also recognized, however, that, if I do end up doing the freelance copyediting and proofreading, I'm never going to have the time to search for, get, and complete those jobs while working at the bakery. That is, to implement that plan, if that's the one I end up implementing, I need to have the time to find those jobs.

But you guys know all of this.

Here's another thing: it's not like I'm giving up, say, health insurance to do this, or bennies like the ones the Tart gets. It turns out that the bakery does not, in fact, have properties in the Cayman Islands at which I can stay at a drastically cheap rate. Even my "vacation" wasn't really two weeks' pay, it was 80 hours of pay. (My brother the mechanic gets vacation pay based on his average weekly check, and, because he's flat rate and he's good, that's a lot more than 40 hours of work per week--which means his vacation pay is higher, too.) My point isn't to complain about the bakery--I can point out ways that Bossman could more easily keep people like me, but that's a different subject. My point is that my pay there is nothing special, and making up that pay, or a portion of it, isn't the same as making up a full-time salary, or even hourly pay with benefits.

Meanwhile, today was an extra grind, because I had to wait for the dairy delivery to get my lamination butter, plus I made up the monkey buns, so I put in another 11.5-hour day. I already have 2.5 hours of overtime this week, which kind of makes my point for me. Tomorrow I'm probably going to be assembling gingerbread house kits--or whatever else someone needs, as I don't need to laminate. The only other thing I need to do this weekend is finish the editing job I THOUGHT I'd finished (a few days early!) last week, except I'm an idiot and forgot to do the short bio, intro, and table of contents. I was going through things last night so I could invoice and realized this; the production editor says she's okay with getting everything Monday first thing, but I still felt kinda dumb. It's a small job--less than $200--so I'll throw in a 10% discount on the invoice. Other than that, though, I need to do laundry, and maybe play with the new computer toys, and . . . not a lot else. There's some talk of seeing Friend on Sunday, but that partly depends on how much alcohol he consumes Saturday night and whether he's up for anything on Sunday. Monday I should do a little holiday shopping, and perhaps actually ship a few things off to their various destinations.

I had a pretty good conversation with Chuck today, too; he seems to be doing well, and I'm glad for that. I find that I still can't watch (or, sometimes, even think of) "Elf." But that's for a different post.

I have decided to visit my family the first week in January, and I've nearly decided to take a train (because I really hate to fly, and that reduces the vacationy aspect of any travel), but I haven't booked anything yet. Today Bossman asked me to stay at the bakery a few extra days, because he's going out of town on the 28th or 29th. It turns out that his real concern seems to be that there be enough croissants in the freezer so his going away doesn't matter, which means I don't necessarily have to be there on a given day, I just need to make sure there are enough laminated dough products in the freezer. I'll double check that tomorrow, and then book the travel. I'm also going to get bro involved such that I can surprise my parents, which will be amusing.

And is wine an adequate dinner? Tonight's survey says yes.

Plunging

I did it. Today I told Bossman that my last day at the bakery is the 28th.

The Importance of a T

Today's interview seemed to go fabulously well; I really enjoyed it, if you want to know, and I seemed to connect with the person (the HR guy, as a matter of fact), and I'd say they're still pretty interested in hiring me, even if they don't quite know what they're going to do with me. Thanks to my previous 873 interviews there, I was able to say, "I think what you need is X," and have HRGuy say, "Yes, that's very astute of you." But you know? Until I show up for work the first day, it's not a done deal. Hell, I don't even have an offer yet.

I've also been busy: coffee with J, book-buying for the nephews and CS, and dinner with Friend last Monday, lots of nothing on Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday (I think: I don't remember precisely), a hockey game with Friend on Friday, beer with Lole and his Cute Girl and Mel and her husband (she worked at the bakery last spring, until she got the Brazen Tart internship) on Saturday; slept late Sunday morning, because it was the first day in months and months where I had nothing to do, then Friend came over and we went to breakfast, he tried (and failed) to fix my internet connection, then we headed to his place for a fire in the fireplace, and checking out whether we should do a computer trade, and a simple dinner in front of the TV ("Kinsey" followed by a tape of a football game). I headed to the interview from his place today, then came home and waited for the internet-fixer.

Somewhere in there I managed to acquire a cold, but it's a strange one, in the sense that I didn't have the typical cold symptoms, I just had to blow my nose a lot, and, yesterday, I sounded a little hoarse. So, okay, whatever; I have tissues. Better than having issues.

I keep thinking about Stuff, too. One thing that makes the conversation difficult, I think, is that few, if any, readers in this little space really look to Stuff to provide meaning or comfort in their lives, so we can look at the piles-of-stuff people (if I may categorize for a moment) and kind of shake our heads, even as we recognize that, in many parts of the world (and country), even the most simple-living of us would be regarded as fabulously wealthy. So there's that. At the same time, at least a few of us have been or are in situations (or have/had relatives in situations) where money would have made, or did make, all the difference. And not big wads of money, either; not big-mansion-on-the-lake money.

Or here's another way to think about it: do the math to figure out what you make, after taxes, in a day. Now, imagine someone who makes a million dollars a year; not a lot, by the standards of the mansions on the lake. Assume s/he gives up half his/her income to taxes (which is already probably wildly inaccurate, in that there are likely tax shelters about which you and I know nothing). That person earns $1923.08, after taxes, each working day. That person gets more in a DAY than I need to pay my monthly rent, health insurance, student loan, and public transportation each MONTH.

Or yet another thought: when my sister-in-law secretly didn't pay the mortgage for 18 months and my brother and she and my nephews were days away from losing their home, my parents and my SIL's mother were able to help out, prevent that from happening. My mother helped them get their finances together, and I think they're fine now. Or how about these past couple of months, when my SIL had her knee replaced AND my brother was out of work with a torn bicep? If they'd been barely scraping by, or if bro hadn't upped his disability insurance last year, or whatever, they'd've been screwed. The point is, none of the amounts of money about which we're talking is all that much to the mansion people--they wouldn't notice it.

And it's that disparity that irks me. Not because I want the piles of money or stuff, but because I think we should all have access to some insulation.

Speaking of which, the other thing that irks me is that the rich are insulated from their mistakes--or even just unfortunate events--in the way the rest of us are not. Yes, my brother was insulated by my parents, and we are all extremely grateful for that. Yes, he actually spent the money on disability insurance, but not everyone can afford that. We all should have some insulation.

On the other hand, all the money in the world would not have saved my sister's life (even as a little of that money might very well have saved others' lives). So, yeah, it's messy. What I most try to avoid is carping on the people most nearly around me--because that only serves the purposes of the really rich. Let the poor and middle class fight over the crumbs, while they feast on the whole cake, all while thinking they deserve it.

Cavalcades of Cavalcades

On the other hand, for a bunch of laughs, go check out Sara's latest cavalcade of bad nativities. While you're there, check out the previous collections (left margin links at her blog). These crack me up. Make sure to scroll down in the main blog for Jesus Christ on a surfboard.

Stuffing

In a wonderful, thoughtful, blurty post, kstyle touches on a bunch of issues that have been floating in my brain for months. (And I may have written part of this here, so pardon me if I'm repeating again.) Warning: this is kind of all over the place rather than aiming for a single specific point.

At one point this summer, I walked home from work. Although I live in a neighborhood that is populated by gentrifiers as well as by working-class and poor people, by students and drug dealers and old hippies--i.e., in a neighborhood that has a mix of people and housing stock--the path from work is through one of the older, more wealthy suburbs around this city. (A little further north of where I work you can find one of the richest burbs in the country; we go through it on the way to the outdoor music venue.) What this meant is that I was walking through one of the country's richest suburbs, past old, well-maintained lakefront mansions. In my chef clothes. After earning somewhere around $100, before taxes, for 10 hours of hard physical work.

It put me in a viciously bad mood, and anger at myself was no small part of it. I was looking at these houses and feeling resentful and unhappy--not because I particularly want those houses, mind you (and I'll get back to that in a second), but because, even were I to want one, it is completely and totally out of my reach. I don't work any less hard than the people who live there, I'm no less smart, the work that I do is no less useful (or, at least, I don't think it is), but nothing I have ever done or am ever likely to do will provide me with the means to own one of those houses--or, possibly, any property at all. And I was angry at myself for that covetousness, and for that resentment; I really don't like feeling that way, and I find it shameful and embarrassing that I cared enough about it to get myself worked up about it. But I've been thinking about it for months, trying to tease the various bits out of it.

As noted, I wouldn't want one of those houses, and that isn't sour grapes on my part. In the northern, richer suburbs, the houses on the lake make the houses past which I was walking look small. Some of them are uglier than shit--McMansions, or nearly so, or just plain big and stupid and ugly, with lots of architectural flourishes that serve no function--but some are quite beautiful, and they are nearly all on acres and acres of land. But if I had one of those places, who would maintain it? Yes, I know, those people don't mow their own lawns, do their own laundry, or (literally or figuratively) clean up their own shit, but I'm working-class enough such that it just seems wrong, somehow, to have so much space that one can't maintain it oneself. (And, as if to mock me, an issue of the Nature Conservancy magazine from around that time featured a board member from one of those suburbs. She loves to fly-fish, and she has probably donated big wads of money to protect lands that might otherwise be destroyed or industrialized, i.e., not everyone who lives in those burbs is a self-satisfied, greedy fuck, and in fact some people use that money for the betterment of the world.) That is, living in such a mansion would require such a change of being for me as to probably cause my head to spin around and around.

I also know, from my brief sojourn in the land of the (for me) well-paid, that having (for me) a lot of money doesn't mean I go spend it all on Stuff. Despite the occasional indulgence in consumer toys--hello, iPod--and an improved wardrobe (some of which was necessary, given the fact that much of my clothing was still from grad school or before), I discovered that I didn't go buy lots of Things and I still looked to buy things on sale. Even the new computer is in part justified (or rationalized?) by the fact that, if I do end up doing the editing work full time, I want to be more mobile. It was useful to have that well-paid episode, because I think it's one thing to imagine how one might act, and another thing to observe how one actually acts, i.e., I certainly was more self-indulgent, primarily with going out to dinner, because that's one of my favorite things, but I also did Responsible stuff, I upped my charitable contributions, I paid off loans early, I didn't live beyond my means, and I made it a point to save. The experience helped me recognize that, when push comes to shove, I don't particularly want a big house or a lot of stuff. I want some insulation from calamity (or, at least, the kind of insulation that money can bring); I want to be able to go grocery shopping without a running tally in my head that I compare against my bank balance or budget; I want to be able to treat (or help out) a friend or my brother.

And here's the other thing, and I'm sure I've mentioned this before: Wealth does not remove your problems. You still have to figure out your life. Wads of money can insulate you from some of that, of course, just as it can get you health care, say, but bad and sad things still happen when you're rich. You can be as aware or unaware with money as without it; you can just afford a better class of drugs, and better lawyers, and better rehab.

Unlike kstyle, however, my issues about upper classes aren't at all latent. It's not stuff-envy--I really don't want the houses or lawns or whatever; I don't want the vehicles or closets full of clothing or servants. It's that I don't trust piles of stuff. What can one possibly do with it all? (Note that I understand the line between "enough" and "too much" is wide and very, very blurry, and everyone's mileage will vary considerably, depending in part on where one lives.) I try not to impute evil thoughts to people who have lots of stuff, but part of me wonders what hole they're trying to fill with all that stuff.