So...whats for dinner?

Bob brought home leftovers late last night--four sriracha wings, fries and Greek salad. So dinner tonight was the wings & salad. Blew off my support group meeting (having no issues and didn't feel like driving up to Evanston) as well as picking up wine Bob ordered a couple of weeks at a Tuscan winemaker dinner ago--there's a tasting and buffet there tomorrow night, so I will drive the four blocks so I can ferry the half-case home in the car. (Too heavy to schlep with a luggage cart, especially if the weather doesn't cooperate). Might have a little gelato for dessert, or cut up some strawberries. Maybe both.

Speaking of berries, I put some in the bottom chamber of a fruit-infusing water bottle (“Define,” the one designed by a teenager and shown on Shark Tank). then added water to the top chamber. I'm very disappointed, as I can't keep it from leaking around either the bottom cap or the joint between the chambers. Anyone have experience with these? Just ordered some spare O-rings in case the ones in the bottle were defective.

SpecialK, this is the dual-chamber bottle: fruit goes in the bottom chamber, then the top chamber (with a strainer at the bottom) screws atop it, and finally the lid screws on. The bottom cap of the bottom chamber is removable too. I have the sinking feeling that when I discarded the box to make room in my suitcase, I might have discarded the O-rings too (at least the spare one). I used to have an interior-infuser bottle, but it was next to impossible to take it apart and the top broke off after the second fill.

I ordered a packet of 4 replacement O-rings--$1.50 including shipping. But I emptied the bottle and checked all the pieces--all O-rings are intact and properly seated. I screwed the bottle back together, making sure the threads were properly aligned and tightened. I put a paper towel down beneath it. I will go back in a few minutes, but I expect that towel to be saturated. It’s not condensation, as I can feel the water seeping from all the joints. I think it’s a design defect endemic to this type of bottle. Maybe the “Sharks” were enamored of it because they didn’t have to use production models of it for any length of time.

Yup, it's the “Define." Methinks it needs to go back to the drawing board for more precise “definition.” I Googled “Leaking Define Bottle” and got a page of Amazon reviews--half of which are one-star, some mentioning mold and all mentioning leaks. Same complaints appear on the product’s Facebook page. This may be a problem with no solution. I will look for other types of infuser bottles and hope they work.

Blood work is done! I was not all that polite given they had me wait 25 minutes past my appointment time, and people who arrived long after me were taken in first. [Turns out, they prioritize those with doctor appointments.] As I was making lunch, not more than an hour after the draw, Dr. Christina called. Those markers are down another 19%!!!! in the past four months, they are down 43%. I am almost at the same level that I enjoyed for four years on Faslodex. I feel like crap today, but so much easier to feel like crap if the stuff is working!!!!

Dinner tonight is designed to be easy since I will have to head to the airport to pick up my mother. She arrives tonight after over 3 weeks in the UK. We are grilling a rib eye, baking some potatoes and then I will make a salad. I have also started some bagels which I will serve for our breakfast in the AM. I have some smoked salmon and cream cheese. I will offer her an egg as well. This will be my breakfast for a few days as well. Then we head to the condo, have a coffee with my other sister who will drive in after rush hour, and then they will both head home. We should have our inspection [maybe] tomorrow. I can only hope!

*susan*

p.s. I once again have a HelloFresh gift code which is good for $35 your first order from them. If anyone wants it, PM me.

Susan - GREAT news. WOW numbers down again. And that 43% number is fantastic. Hope your short visit with your Mother is fun. The dinner & the breakfast sound good.

Such heartfelt good news about the marker drop.

Lunch was a big salad with lettuce, radishes, cauliflower, tomatoes, English cucumber, avocado, etc. Supper was a handful of "Crunchmaster" multi-grain, crunchy oven baked, 6 seed crackers with some cheese. Maybe I'll have an apple later.

My niece & baby from San Antonio and nephew & wife & baby from HI, are all in town while the latter find a house since they've been transferred here. They're coming to pick me up tomorrow to go eat "New Mexican" food. Stacked green chili or fiery red chili enchiladas - yum. I'm going to celebrate with a margarita since I can't drive anyway. I want Susan's rib-eyes. Next week I'm taking my neighbors who have hauled me clear down to the med center several times out for an upscale steak lunch. I should be able to cut meat by then.

Susan, I am so happy to hear your good news...

Eric

HappyHammer, thanks for posting that invitation. I would love to make a trip to NC but the date won't work for me. DH and I will be packing up the cargo trailer and preparing to head north to MN at the end of May.

Dinner may be lamb chops tonight.

Hey everyone, thanks for all the encouragement through chemo. I am one week past the last infusion and am doing well. Anyways, I wanted to cue everyone into this thread started by Princess under the Chemo thread. The link is: https://community.breastcancer.org/forum/69/topics...

It is support for a petition for research into cancer mets. Would love it if everyone will lend your support, we need everything we can get.

Thank you.

Evidently, I am the only person eating these days..... Dinner was Chicken satay, pickled carrots with shallots, a Malaysian cabbage, and Jasmine rice. I also made the Sweet and Spicy Dipping sauce. So darn good. There is just enough leftover so I can make a fried rice with chicken and cabbage for my breakfast. [Have I mentioned how difficult this breakfast thing is for me?]

I am pondering what to do with my 5 lb pork shoulder. I am thinking about making carnitas with most of it, and then making a banh mi cured and smoked pork with the rest. Bahn mi means I am now making rolls, pickles, paté, and unami mayo. But, I do love a good banh mi! Of course, I can go down the street and just buy one, but where is the challenge in that?

*susan*

I was conflicted for awhile about going to NC. SERFA (the Southeast Regional Folk Alliance) is in its sixth year at Montreat retreat center in Black Mt., a bit east of Asheville. I committed both to attending the conference (doing four showcases) and giving the concert in Hickory months before the odious anti-LGBT bill NC’s legislature & Gov. recently enacted. As to the conference, Montreat has declared that attendees should use whichever restrooms they feel comfortable using, and its governing body, the Presbyterian Church (USA) has gone on record supporting LGBT rights including marriage equality (and redefining “marriage” as the committed union of two consenting adults). Local 1000 (the Traveling Musicians’--or “Folkies'”--Local of the American Federation of Musicians, founded by--inter alia--Janis Ian, Pete Seeger, and Tom Paxton) has issued a statement condemning the statute but supporting holding the conference at the Montreat location for at least this year (there will be a meeting at SERFA to decide what to do in 2017 and beyond should the statute not be repealed).

It should be noted that the Asheville metro area, which includes Black Mt., is very progressive (a university town with many Northern transplants) and its citizens are mortified by the state gov’t’s actions--regarding both the anti-LGBT and voter suppression legislation. Further east, the Research Triangle area (Durham, Chapel Hill, Cary) is also progressive and similarly disapproving of the state’s behavior. (Some locals kid that “Cary” is an acronym for Containment Area for Relocated Yankees).

As to the benefit concert, it would be manifestly unjust to penalize a wonderful charity and its beneficiaries for the misdeeds of the elected officials of the state where it is located. Yes, I support Springsteen’s and Bryan Adams’ decisions to cancel their concerts--but they were for-profit shows. Were my concert in Hickory a regular paying gig and not a benefit, I too would have pulled out. But I passionately believe in the work of Healing Touch, Happy Hammer and her sister have worked hard to facilitate this concert, and I am looking forward to meeting my BCO sisters.

Susan, sounds like the return of your mom and breakfast visit went really well, despite your being able to enjoy just a bite (JUST A BITE??!!) of the delicious doughnut. A most cruel meds side effect, in my opinion!

Welcome back North, Joyce. Adorable "pooch in a pocket". Thanks for bringing some sunshine home!

I hope your concert goes well, Sandy.

Yesterday DH and went on a sparkling wine mini "tour" in Harvard Square. We'd bid on and "won" this with some friends last Fall at a local charity auction. It was fun what made it particularly interesting for me was that we started in a place called NuBar which was a lovely comfy modern lounge attached to a now very modern hotel where I spent my first weekend in Boston when it was a pretty old, not modern, place.....49 years ago!!! Oh the delightful memories of youth...... and beauty of progress!

We had a cheese platter, then an eggplant flatbread with our sparkly at NuBar, then oysters and some seafood fritters at The Red House, where we concluded our "tour". After, we headed to Watertown, where we had a delicious dinner at Molana, a small Persian restaurant. We enjoyed a lovely eggplant appetizer with pita bread and grapeleave rolls. And I had a chicken kebob with the most delicious sweet/sour cherry basmati rice. I am crazy for cherries, so I loved this, and brought half home, so get to enjoy it again tonight! DH had lamb chops, which looked tasty. Some of them came home too. . The waitress gave us "the picture menu" once she noticed the confused looks on our collective faces as we tried to interpret the names of the entrees. That helped!

We were supposed to take a walking tour of a great bird watching area between events, but opted out since my allergies are at peak peformance now. Ugh!

I hope all the elderly parents and caretakers are doing well today.