Taking It All In

Tracy Jordan is a character, you say?

I know this should be the least of my concerns, but who taught him that you say the state and then the city when saying where you are? "I'm in Texas El Paso! Somebody's gonna get pregnant!"

Where Past and Present Intersect

Flat Bread, Not So Flat Abs

Tom and I have made this Butternut Squash Flat Bread with Cheddar and Pine Nuts twice since I spotted it in REAL SIMPLE magazine last week. Try it for yourself, or come on over for dinner because more likely than not we're ready to make and eat it again. It's so good.

Freeduce, Freeuse, Freecycle

Just this week I just started using this thing called Freecycle and I think it's a fantastic idea. I'm sure many of you have been using this forever, but for those to whom this is new, here's how it works. You sign up for a Yahoo account (if you're like me and didn't already have one established) and then you join your local area's Freecycle group. The site combines all the submissions ("Wanted" or "Offered") and sends you an email daily, or you can just check the site and opt out of the emails. It's surprising the things people ask for and offer- from TVs to bike wheels to furniture to sewing machines. I just started listing things I was hoping to part with this afternoon and I already got a taker within an hour or two of posting. A guy named Steve is coming tomorrow to pick up a duplicate pasta pot I had that was taking up our limited and valuable kitchen cabinet space. It's nice to know that someone who needs what you have is going to make use of it, and it feels good to cut back on unnecessary consumption if your neighbor happens to have just the thing you were looking to buy. I believe there's an old adage that addresses this perfectly: One woman's trash is another man's pasta pot. Something like that.

Where in the world is Rickeman? San Diego.

Over Tom's spring break we also had the pleasure of spending a day in San Diego with Tom's cousin Steven and his wife, Patricia. Steven took us all out on a sail around the bay departing from the Navy Yacht Club in Coronado. It was beautiful and sunny and we all had a great time when we weren't getting attacked by flying ropes. Thankfully the sail took place before we all binged on sour candies from Fuzziwig's and made ourselves sick. Ah, it was all worth it in the end because it was a great and memorable day.

Steven, our fearless Captain.

Our gracious hosts. Thank you again for a wonderful day.

Tom, the First Mate, taking a turn at the helm.

Guiness and Miller

Tom Rickeman, whose favorite show is Deadwood (true) and whose favorite movie is Blazing Saddles (not true, but let's let it go for the sake of illustration) had never ridden a horse before last week. Luckily he got Miller, a trusty old loper of a horse who was not as interested in illegally munching the new spring growth as my horse Guiness was.

Tom, mounting his trusty steed.

Guiness, as I mentioned, was a muncher. So much so that the lady who was leading our horse ride cautioned me to keep him back at least a foot behind her horse because mine liked to bite hers on the ass (you can say that when the topic is horses, right?) and then hers would kick mine in the face resulting, no doubt, in my death. Thankfully this did not happen.