Thanksgiving, Course 2: Southwestern Potato & Veg

Next round!

Southwestern Potato and Veggie Medley

Corn tortillas
sprinkle cheese (topping)
handful cilantro, torn

1/2 cup onion, chopped
2 or 3 cloves garlic, finely chopped
2 roma tomatoes, chopped
1/2 red bell pepper, chopped
4 mushrooms, thickly sliced
5 small/medium red potatoes, THINLY sliced
5? tbsp EVOO
2 pinches of red pepper seeds
1/2 jar green chile sauce (medium or hot)
salt & pepper

Coat large saute pan with oil; heat. Add potatoes; cook on medium 3-5 minutes. Add garlic, cook another 2  minutes, approx. Add onions, tomatoes, belle pepper, mushrooms and half the cilantro. Cook another 5 minutes, adding oil when necessary.

When potatoes are slightly browned, add green chile sauce and red pepper seeds. Salt and pepper to taste; cook down until sauce has taken slightly sweeter, smoky backnotes (some brands you may want to add a pinch of sugar while cooking).

 Meanwhile, heat tortillas until pliable.

Split veggie medley and sauce amongst tortillas. Add cheese and cilantro. Serve immediately.

Wolves just love to eat babies...

Okay...so I was reading a newspaper article the other day concerning the reintroduction of different wolves around the States, and I just...*shakes head*...don't quite know what to do with people sometimes.

lol.

Having spent a great deal of time in Yellowstone no doubt influenced my views on this subject, but it's not like I grew up in an area with wolves, so they were a big bad scary thing only to be found in fairy tales. They're completely non-existent where I lived as a kid, and yet I remember being excited about the prospect of wolf reintroduction back in the 90s, even if it was thousands of miles away. (Why? Cuz it's cool!)

We humans are not predatory enough to manage ecosystems all on our lonesome. Despite hunting season, about the most predatory we get as a culture are those crazy women who do extreme-couponing....you know, the dreaded great white grocery hunter.

That being said, certain ecosystems need large predators, like wolves, to keep things in line.  For humans, there's more to fear from the naturally territorial and therefore easily pissed off moose than there is from a skittish little wolf pack. Believe me. 

But errm...yeah...not everyone agrees with this. It's a big deal out west (western United States, I mean). In fact, I'm probably irritating a lot of people by my little introduction here. Oh well, I had to introduce the following somehow:

In 2007, a politician actually informed the public that there's nothing wolves like better than the sound of laughing and crying babies, and thus wolves with jump through windows and become baby-snatchers to gobble them up.

Yeeeah....uh... I'm paraphrasing of course, but not by much. A politician actually claimed this in 2007. Can you believe it! Not 1807, not 1907...2007. Get real.

So my next story kind of spins off from that...stay tuned!

And yes, I love it...

If ever there were a city that could make a girl smile, that city would be San Francisco. Honest to God. No, really. I'd post a picture of that smile and the other smiles I crossed, but alas I've not been able to upload my photos yet, because there are just too many and have taken too long. There's just too much to see; too many people to say hello to; too many sea lions at which I must laugh; too many friends with too many pictures needing taking; too much seafood to eat in restaurants with fantastic views. If, however, you read this post and there are pictures, it's because I was able to upload them all at the airport and choose the ones I wanted for this post.

I leave in the wee hours of the coming morning, and I shall be sad for it. I met two really absolutely wonderful people (Hi guys, if you're reading this!!!!) completely by accident or luck or fate or whathaveyou, and I can't wait to see them again (miss you both!).  More on that when the time comes, but I won't go into all that until I have, again, photos uploaded to prove it.

Aaaanyway, I didn't do everything on my list, but I did the free stuff (lol) and lots of things that weren't on the list that I didn't realize existed until I got here. If you ever get the chance to go to San Francisco and have any questions on good locations to write, eat, wander, get out of breath from walking hills, look at pretty stuff, taking jumping pictures, feed sea gulls, catch some sun, do government paperwork, shop, drink, watch sea lions, find cheap fruit and/or socks, well, ask me! I'll be your one and only SanFrancisco tour guide. I feel like I know this place like the proverbial back of my hand. Incidentally, it's quite tanner. For all the fog I heard about, I've seen five straight days of sunny sun sun sun.

As I leave early in the morning, this was just a quick little post to which I shall later add pictures. And I shall post a detailed series of dealy-bobs on my upcoming travel writing blog!!! Yes, that means another project. I know, I know. *ducks head*

But what's a girl to do?

Travels: San Francisco!

Hey everyone! A to Z Challenge aside (which I'm horribly behind on anyhow), I'll soon be traveling...

to San Francisco!

Any of you near or around there? Let's have coffee (or tea) and annoy the poor baristas with how long we sit and chat and type, lol.

To continue, I hope to be able to time and do:

Pier 39 predawn for the seals.
Zoo
Gardens
Coit Tower
That one really long walk down from Coit Tower
Alcatraz
City Lights bookstore
Lots of coffee and tea stops
Maybe hit a show (music) or something
Beach
Beach trail (can't remember the name)
Aquarium
Ballet studios (for research)
Library (for fun)
Trolley car rides (of course)
Golden Gate Park
Golden Gate Bridge

Ummm...any recommendations, those of you who live there or have been there frequently?

Directly following that I'll be heading to Montana--Bozeman to be exact. From there it's south to Yellowstone for the summer. But that's to live and work and play, not to vacation.

That being said, as sporadic as my posting has been of late, it's bound to get even worse. The coming week will likely be a flurry of packing and travel arrangements...but I want to try and post every day of my trip, right up until I no longer have WIFI.

That's all for now; I'm off to the post office for shipping boxes! Yayy! (That "yayy" was semi-sarcastic, mind you.)

A to Z: "C" as in Call for Events

Howdy! I'm scrapping what I was going to put up for the letter "C" in favor of a much more exciting idea, I hope...

I'll post any and all writing-oriented upcoming events for the month of May (since April is already upon us, I'm skipping it) where I am now and in my home state--that I know of, at least.Will post by state first to keep it navigable.

Those of you who feel the urge upon you, comment below as a way of updating the list; I'm sure I'm missing some great events! But please be sure to include the State, City, Location (as in business or address), Title and Date.  That way everyone who swings by this page can get a feel for what's hip and happening or whatever it is people say.

As for me, here's what I know:

Colorado
Boulder~  Laughing Goat Coffeehouse: "'So You Think You're a Poet' Reading Series" Monday nights
Colorado Springs ~Poor Richard's Bookstore:  "Writers Night." May 28
Denver ~ Tattered Cover:  Booksignings by various authors. May 1-3, 7-10, 21-25, 30 and 31
Englewood ~ Doubletree Hotel: "1001 Ways to Market Your Book." May 3

Missouri
Kansas City ~ The Writers Place: "Riverfront Reading" May 4, May 11
                       Uptown Arts Bar:  "Blue Monday."  May 14
                       Johnson County Library: "Poetry Reading." May 15 <-------------- This is technically KS
                       The Writers Place: "Sunday Salon."  May 20
                       The Writers Place: "Workshop: Lessons from a Bestseller." May 24
                       The Writers Place: "Reading and Book Release."  May 25
                       The Writer Place: "Writers Place Salon."   (open mic) May 28
Saint Louis ~ Kirkwood Train Station: "Family Friendly Open Mic Night." May 8
                       Touhill Performing Arts Center: "St. Louis Storytelling Festival." May 3
                       Focal Point: "St. Louis Poetry Slam." May 17

                                                      

TCE Catch Up 1

Well, hell. *sigh* Haven't finished the last two TCE stories, but I'm afraid if I don't post 'em I'll never get around to finishing either of them....so here's the beginning of my story for TCE prompt 26, which concerns the dangers of macadamia nut cookies. Only I haven't gotten that far along yet--perhaps you'll be able to see where I was going with it. More likely, not. LOL.

Here it is:

Untitled

This Sunday, Pastor Brim, now growing gaunt around the edges, woke earlier than usual. The lines in the space between his eyebrows had deepened during his sleep.  A soft-spoken man outside of preaching,  when the Holy Spirit came upon him during his sermons  his voice boomed and thundered around the sanctuary like something he’d heard as a boy listening to horse races on the radio. His real name was Peter Brown, but everybody had called him Brim for so long he sometimes forgot to think of himself as any other way. The name came from the fire of the Holy Spirit that flew into him whenever he got to preaching, and it was wonderful and a bit frightening, and full of the fire and brimstone his congregation had come to know and respect and love.

The church in which he spoke the word of God was a humble brick building and sensible, but the sanctuary had vaulted, arching ceilings made of good pine with a high ridge right down the center so that when his congregation looked up, the effect was of looking into the bottom of a vast ark tipped upside down on everybody as they sang and prayed. The decorations were few; flowers for special occasions and the alter candles. Two rows of twenty pews flanked the alter, also made of good local pine, and the carpet, though a low one, was soft and sturdy. 

He knew as he rose that morning that the spiritual lives of his congregation were at stake, for he could feel the Devil himself walking the earth, and had been stalking Pastor Brim for weeks. He could see his shade hanging outside the brightest window, following the noblest souls, even amongst them in their good and godly community. Every shadow under every tree, every ungrateful scoul on the faces of men and women, every horror and every sin--the Devil. So he scrapped the sermon he’d planned on doing and done wrote up another, woe-filled, terrifying new one and knew that today, more than any other day, he would have a chance to turn back the tide of sin and non-belief, and save his fellow brothers and sisters from the temptation of evil in its most purest form.

Answering For--TCE 21 (or so)

Still adjusting, but here's the prompt and the story: 

"I remember.

I wish I didn't remember.

Maybe if I wish hard enough, the memories will just fall away. Like the smell of old perfume dissipating. Like the innocence of white chalk darkening under the rain. Like the dying color of that crimson blood as he washed it from my hands."

Answering For

I wish I didn’t remember.

The cup tree was a dead one, some ancient and half-rotten lightning stump of a live oak about one roof high. It was long since stripped bare of any bark, and the chipped ceramic coffee mugs and tea cups of the years shined against the pale wood. Time was, it had been a bottle tree; the glass had long dangled in the winds to capture roaming spirits; to keep people from harm.  One by one the bottles with their translucent blues and greens and browns were replaced by more practical cups and mugs and mason jars, so that if anybody ever needed a cup to break their sup, it wasn’t hard to find one.  I remember the details like these, the waking up in the heavy fogs and going out to water the taters beside the house, the smell of almost mildewed water gathered in the coffee mugs and antique tea cups from the heavy rain the night before, or the way the honeysuckle made the air so sweet at night while it crept into the clapboards of the house. It’d be nice to remember these things and only these things, but I don’t.  Life ain’t nice.

Neither is death.  

Cup Tree stood smack in the intersection of two gravel roads which met where the top of one little hill joined a great big one. At the time, I lived alone in the peach-colored clapboard house just a bit down the hills’ intersection, and figured I would every day of my life, for a time expanding as far as the eye could see, disappearing somewhere beyond, somewhere into a distance hazed with clouds and humidity and the green glow of leaves and bugs in the sun. Yes, that was what I figured.  But this is the story of how I figured wrong.

“You get any reception out here?” Allie squinted into the sun beside the house where we both stood, arm raised, waving a cell through the air with her chicken-leg arm. It was summer, an early one, and I’d been working all morning long on keeping the weeds out of the tater row.

“S’it look like I get any reception out here?”  I’d wiped the sweat from my forehead, leaned against the house. How she kept on all those layers and layers of makeup I’d never know; if she’d ever smile it’d crack like the clay dirt. “Who you tryin’ t’call anyways?”

“Jim. He’s got a new batch cooked.”

“You need to keep out’a that business.”

“Mind your own,” Allie said with a snap, dropping her arm. “I’m only fixin’ to call him ‘cuz I heard tell down at the station that the cops is fixing to bust Perkin’s Bar for sellin’, and I don’t wanna see him go to jail if he don’t need to.”

I’m pretty sure I’d glared at her.  We both knew it wasn’t  true. And we both knew it wasn’t none of my business.

Nothing Nowhere and Nearly in Nebraska--TCE 21

I can't believe how many weeks it's been already! Here was the prompt for this week: "There's only so much you can account for while doing dead man floats on the shallow end of the kiddy pool."

This isn't quite where I want it; I think I had too much to include and now it wanders, rather than being what I planned.   Oh, and WARNING! Quite a bit of foul language in it, and some mature subject matter.

Hey, how do you spell carnie? Carnie? Carney? Too brain-fried...

 Nothing Nowhere and Nearly in Nebraska

It was a standoff. He stood before Shelley with the cool May rain dripping down a long nose, clothed in the kind of things people wear when they take kids away from their fathers.  Behind him, the car idled. It was nice; a kind with four doors as if he had kids of his own, but Shelley had peeked through the windows only moments before and it was spic and span. Behind her spread the front row of trailers, most of them the same tone of the sky. The sky was a bright gray, so bright you could hardly believe it was raining, so bright you could tell that the sky wanted to be white but knew it was too dirty. All this part of the city was dirty, real dirty. The mud squished over Shelley’s bare toes.

“How old are you?”

“Go to hell.”

He looked around, his jacket getting wetter by the minute.

“You know where your Pa is?”

She stared him down. She knew she had a mean stare; it was something she’d figured as a necessity when she was young, maybe six, maybe four or five, when she’d ran away to her pop’s. Couldn’t quite be sure she was six when she’d left her mother’s home, but Shelley knew it was the year she was supposed to start school and didn’t, and that’d been three birthdays ago. She still celebrated them each year, even though she wasn’t sure of her age. But she did it quietly—with dignity—out back, pretending that the overturned tire atop the brush pile behind the trailer park was a giant cake all for her.  

“Hey, girl,” the man said, stepping closer, “I said, you know where your Pa is?”  To which Shelley said nothing. Not that it was any of his business, but she hadn’t seen her pa in a couple weeks. Hadn’t been her business to find him; she wasn’t his keeper.  Just like he wasn’t hers.  The man took another step.

“You get the hell away from me, boogerface.” He blinked at her. They were both sopping, dirty looking to be sure. “Can’t be more than seven,” he muttered.

“Nine.”

He looked a real long while at her. Brushed the water from his face one side at a time.

“Nine, then,” he agreed. “And stop your cussing.”

She nodded a tight nod.

“You like hot cocoa?”

Three hours later, she was on her way to a new home.

The Ice Cream Truck of Death

*** This has been a lost week for me; things somehow piled up and I am yet again late! So sorry! I'll be catching up shortly.

For now, here's Week 20's story for TCE. The prompt was: "I find myself drawn to the shadow domain." 

 Wish I'd spent more time on it; it's not quite what I was hoping. Ahh, well. That's what editing is for, right?

 Warning: for any folks who believe today is the Rapture, this will be insulting. It also contains mild swearing.***

 The Ice Cream Truck of Death

Almost everyone in town called it the ice cream truck of death. It turned onto Main from a side street and headed towards Marjorie’s house. The truck was owned and operated by the local holy rollers; they also did the skating rink outside of town. Alongside the freshly painted warnings of the End Times and quotes of scriptures were the pictures of orangesicles and peanut-covered drumsticks. Tonight, the dusk air was heavy with the possibility of rain, but comfortable, and exoskeletons of the 17-year cicadas made the walk from the screen door to the porch swing set a crunchy one, so she'd taken to tiptoeing. Marjorie sat comfortably in the swing, beer in hand, watching the sun set over the top of Mrs. Ritchie’s house across the street, sharing her swing with one of the sweet-tempered red eyed bugs and her guitar. 

It was the time of evening when her friends would stop by for a visit, since there wasn’t anything else to do. Have a beer, catch up. Sometimes she wished there was more “happening” to her, to Centerville, but the evening was nice and she wasn’t going to let herself be annoyed by a lifestyle she hadn’t the wherewithal to change.  Marjorie picked up her guitar and strummed a G to match the ice cream music, eyeing the truck. It looked like it was slowing down.

It was. The ice cream truck of death pulled to a stop in front of Marjorie’s sidewalk, its happy-go-lucky music a determined drone. The driver’s side door slammed. Around the front of the truck staggered the best looking man Marjorie had ever seen on the face of the Earth. He was dashing. He was virile. He was sex and romance and maniliness in human form.

And he walked like he was drunk or something.                                                                       

Surely those Bible bangers didn’t let the alcoholics drive their ice cream truck. Marjorie tried to sit her beer in the shadows of the porch behind the swing set before the man could see it. The man hobbled onto her sidewalk, clutching at his stomach, his throat. Locks of fine hair dropped to cover his face.

“Please,” he gasped, coming to a wavering stop at the base of the porch steps just before her, “may I ,” –gasp— “ingest some of your,” –gasp— “hops beverage?” Gasp, gasp, rasp.  Marjorie pushed her swing back a bit. He was terribly handsome. Almost unreal. But still, a strange man doesn’t just drive up to your door in a holy roller ice cream truck and ask you for your beer, especially in a place like Centerville. It’s just not done.

Not A New Beginning

*This week's prompt for The Chrysalis Experiment was "I think you're my new favorite puzzle." Contains mild swearing. Can't decide on a proper title (which is usually a sign I've got a holey story, lol). But...

Without furthur ado:

Not A New Beginning

Iris knew as soon as she saw the Thursday paper chucked against the screen door that it was going to be another bad day. She stood there for a moment in the silence, door open, red-and-brown flannel nightgown flapping against her knees in the early dawn wind, and looked up and down the street. All the cars were in their garages, all the curtains closed,  even all the gardeners were asleep still, dreaming of digging beds under the sycamores to stash their rows of impatients. For a moment she considered hopping in the truck and driving all around town, plucking people’s papers right of their front porches, but there wasn’t no sense fighting something like this. So she went back inside, to her puzzle and her grapefruit and coffee — her “old geezer” breakfast that Annie teased her about so much.  Iris preferred to think of it as sensible. She locked the door behind her.

The paper’s headline — “Local hero discovers wife is mother” — made the acid of her coffee rumble in her stomach. She didn't read it; didn't need to. Instead, Iris found the puzzle piece she’d been looking for, and slipped it into the gap that showed the oak of the kitchen table. It was so quiet; almost the good kind of quiet rather than the bad. But that wouldn't last. Sooner or later Annie would show back up, dark hair frizzed with humidity, eyes wild, all sunburned and looking like a prophet or a bum, and then she’d start in on “what they was gonna do about it.” You could put money on it.

The sound of truck doors slamming in the drive, and whispers, arguing voices. Iris sighed. Right on cue.

“Iris, open up,” Shawn called through the door. So it was all three of them then, she saw as she came to the foyer, Shawn towering on one side of Annie, his fist wrapped around her arm all firm and white knuckled, Zack struggling on Annie's other arm.  As soon as they came in, Shawn done chucked Annie loose, almost knocking both her and Zack to the floor.  Annie flopped on the couch. The house filled with sounds.

The Long Sun

So I'm terribly behind in the creative department this week..raraahhh! I'm not quite sure how it happened, but yet again I started writing one story for The Chrysalis Experiment, then part of the way through, scrapped it and began another. *sigh* The week fifteen prompt was "And neither have I wings to fly."

I apologize if any of this comes across as stereotypical or offensive; most of the capture narratives from this era are horribly, horribly one-sided, and so I did what I could and tried to make it as unoffensive (but, oh, storytelling-like) as possible.

Enough blabbering! Here you go; TCE story, week fifteen, fairly unedited as of yet. 


The Long Sun

The white man sat quiet between Grass Fire and Little Bison. The three of them stared into the fire, but the white man hung his head. He smelled like dead men and fire water.  Next to his guard he looked very small and weak.  But the day had been a good one, and celebrations would last long into the night, for it was a full moon and we had great victory in battle this day. The fire bounced shadows off the dancers against the mighty trees surrounding us.

Grass Fire and Little Bison were small among the Ni-u-ko’n-ska. Each stood as tall as the head of a horse, but no taller. Yet they were very great warriors. Their eyes shone dark against their skin, all the hair plucked from their faces far back so that the dark, thin crest of hair, edged with porcupine, showed their ferocity. Our people have long been two things; very fierce in battle, and very tall. Since these two were not very tall, they were very, very fierce in battle.

The little white man, much earlier in the day, showed himself vicious in battle and vicious in capture, injuring many of our best men, killing four without fire. It was a great honor to be guarded by Grass Fire and Little Bison, but he did not look to care.  He did not look to care for anything.

“In the morning the waters will rise,”  I said to Grass Fire and Little Bison as I walked over to them. “Too much rain this season. We can unbind him and let him roam; he will not get far until the time of harvest when the waters go home.”

“This man has treachery in his heart, Big Wind, and fire in his blood,” Grass Fire said. “He may bring bad fortune to us all if we loose him.” The silent of the two, Little Bison merely nodded his head once.

“That may come,” I agreed. “But Chief said it must be so. Loose him, but pick a runner to follow him, so he does not come to harm or bring any. He is ours until harvest.”