I still believe in summer days

Oh, summer weekends. I love you.

Project Exhaustion commenced on Friday morning. Zuko and I set out for a walk before work, which sent him out of his mind with happiness. I decided to stay in and be quiet that evening, so I made a veggie omelet and watched True Blood, which is pretty trashy, almost shockingly so. But I'll probably keep watching it with the excuse that it's summer.

I got up early Saturday morning and hit the streets again with Zuko. This time we decided to go ahead and run two miles. Frequent stops to lift his leg notwithstanding, he was a pretty decent running partner, and I think he had a great time. I made it to the farmers' market early enough for fresh eggs and also picked up some baby tomatoes and a basket of sweet peppers (yellow, red, purple, etc.) and some more of the spicy purple onions I got last week. I went home and did some chores and baked some sugar cookies. I went to the pet store and spent an ungodly sum on items to treat Zuko's ailment and distract him from making it worse. I bathed him for the second consecutive Saturday, this time in some medicated oatmeal shampoo and some kind of conditioner that is supposed to help hot spots. These products are probably a total sham, but whatever. I think he's enjoying the TLC, and I sure enjoy having a clean dog. I've been brushing him a ton and overall just trying to shower him with love and attention. I bought some Missing Link upon a reader's suggestion and have been adding it to their food just for good measure. I went on a 1000-yard swim that afternoon ... it was very hot outside and I could feel my back baking in the sun despite sunscreen, but there were giant sprinklers shooting out over the pool, so that helped. I continue to love swimming so much I'm ready to build a pool in my backyard. My backyard is totally big enough for a pool. How awesome would that be?

Saturday night, I went out to hear my brother play with my parents, and a friend came along and we stayed for a long, fun catch-up visit after my parents headed home. The musical highlight was hearing my brother's version of "Murder in the City" for the first time, which thrilled & touched my heart, especially considering that (a) I was with him the first time I ever heard it and (b) his version was awesome. (P.S. New Avett Brothers single is very pretty indeed.)

Sunday morning dawned, and something magical was in the air. It was cool. Actually cool. I don't know what forces of nature aligned to make this happen, but it was jarring in the most excellent possible way. I was in shock. I think it was in the mid-70s when I headed out for my 13.5-mile bike ride, and while I certainly got very sweaty, as usual, it was totally bearable and pleasant outside. It was therefore a great ride. I didn't need to downshift on any "hills" (in other words, parts of the route that are at the slightest uphill incline) but instead was able to pedal through them, which makes me think I might be getting a wee bit stronger.

It was so lovely that I decided to grab the dogs when I got home after changing out of my hideous (but lifesaving) padded biking shorts and take them both on a walk. I decided on a whim to head to the dog park, and I'm glad I did. Neither of them is super dog park-y -- they don't wrestle or play chase with the other dogs, and Zuko was not having it when a giant mastiff tried to start humping him, and Daisy mostly stayed close to me. But I, for one, leaned against the fence in the shade and had a great time watching the other dogs play. A big golden retriever sprinted across the park from one baby pool to the other, jumping in and rolling around then leaping out and repeating this action over and over in the other pool. In something out of a comedy script, a big pack of dogs played chase with a rubber ball that reached such heights of hilarity that the entire human population of spectators was laughing heartily in unison. Daisy and Zuko did not roll in the pools, but at least they stood in them briefly. So that was fun.

When we got home, I wasn't ready to be inside yet, so I walked to the coffee shop for an iced coffee. Being able to walk anywhere and enjoy being outside this much by late morning in July is unheard of. It felt like a little gift. I loved it ... I felt so in love with my entire neighborhood, seriously. I cooked a farmer's market egg and had some plain yogurt with berries mixed in for a late breakfast. It was a perfect Sunday morning.

Soon it was time to head to my co-worker's house to help her bubble-wrap household items, which took the rest of the afternoon. Then I cooked dinner with some fresh shrimp from my mom and my farmers' market items ... so good. ("Food reclaims its story, and some of its nobility, when the person who grew it hands it to you." --Michael Pollan, In Defense of Food. And that is why I love the farmers' market. But more on that later.) I attempted kale chips, inspired by Erin, sprinkled with olive oil and kosher salt and a little romano cheese, but they fell a little short ... I think I didn't let them cook long enough because they were a little soggy. I'm going to try again.

Monday was an evening outing to see Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince. The pacing was weird, the scene transitions were choppy, and the Quidditch brooms were more phallic than ever, but the acting was good, the effects were grand, and the end was moving. I was not crazy about this book, and the movie was way too long, but Alan Rickman's line readings alone made it worth seeing (along with the marvelous Jim Broadbent, beloved by me in everything he ever does). Best part of movie, possibly, was seeing the terrific Where the Wild Things Are trailer for the first time.

Today began with a two-mile run with Zuko before work, which was sweaty but nice. His leg does not appear to be getting much better, but it doesn't seem to be getting worse, so I am cautiously optimistic. Tonight I ate some delicious fresh fish cooked by my mom, about a pound of her broccoli salad, and a pecan praline.

Meanwhile, weirdly, one of my favorite summer songs is called "Winter Song." It's by Sara Bareilles & and my beloved Ingrid Michaelson. I first heard it on one of this season's audition episodes of So You Think You Can Dance, of all places. Here is the song's very cute video. My favorite lines are these, and I find myself singing them over and over to myself as this summer goes by.

I still believe in summer days
The seasons always change
And life will find a way

Zuko

Oh, Zuko.

He's had a raw spot on his leg for a while now, and I've been watching it to see if it's getting better. It seems to be getting worse, though, and he licks it constantly, so I took him to the vet today.

Before we even saw the vet, he lunged at every man, woman, child, dog, and cat in the waiting room, peed on a bag of dog food for sale, and pooped on the floor. So it was an auspicious start.

The vet poked and prodded and squeezed the affected area for a minute before declaring it a "lick granuloma." It's caused by licking. It's psychological. It's basically an OCD thing.

I know it might be easy to assume that he somehow contracted OCD from my crazy ways, but he's obviously demonstrated OCD behavior since the day I met him, and it's usually in a repetitive mannerism kind of way. That day at the shelter, he jumped up and down constantly in his cage on repeat, like, boing, boing, boing, boing, boing. Every day when the mailman comes, he not only barks his face off but spins wildly in a circle chasing his tail again and again. He will jump up on the back door over and over and over, boing, boing, boing. He walks around a circle several times as if preparing a spot for himself before just lying down already. He runs along the side of the couch, pressing his side against it and plastering it with his fur, back and forth, back and forth. He is also a pacer. He paces back and forth from the living room to whatever room the cats are locked in when the dogs are inside. Over and over and over, back and forth, wearing a path on the ceramic tile. So he's got these repeat motions / movements / behaviors that he has always exhibited. It's just part of his charm (to me) / weirdness (to everyone else in the world).

And now his repetitive behavior is licking his leg raw. It's really upsetting me to hear the vet say there's really no treatment. He gave me some steroidal spray, but I don't really see the point of that when Zuko immediately tries to lick it off. The Internet says there's really not much that can be done.

I am going to attack this head-on as a psychological thing and do my best to make him so distracted and so tired that he lacks the desire and energy to stick out his tongue and start licking. If that means walking him every morning before work and having to reschedule going swimming or biking or running, so be it. If that means conducting vigorous towel chasing games in the back yard (wave the towel around, he likes to jump up and chase it), fine. If it means encouraging wrestling matches between him and Daisy, great. I worry this started when I was away recently and is being aggravated by the terrible heat that prevents the dogs from being very active at all when they're out in the yard. The heat will be a challenge in my new Project Exhaustion, but I think I can do it if I dedicate myself to it. I think the extra exercise and attention might help the situation. If nothing else, it can't hurt.

There is nothing like seeing an animal who annoys me almost all of the time suffering to make the love in my heart pour forth. I've been scratching his belly, brushing him, and loving on him like I haven't in a long time. He is really such an idiot -- he cannot be restrained, causes monsoons in the bathroom during baths, does not mind, is sent over the edge by thunder as if being personally tortured by Thor himself, flails uncontrollably when riding in the car, scratched my ex-fiance's cornea with his paw while roughhousing, flunked out of obedience school, ate my houseguest's jewelry, emits loud and relentless staccato barks in the middle of the night until I get up to let him out, has tried to eat the cats on numerous occasions and is the reason the dogs and cats live forever separated, and steals pizza off your plate -- but he's not a bad dog. I love his black eye and the dopey way he cocks his head when I talk to him. I don't want him to have lick granuloma. I just want him to be healthy and happy. It is strange to think it was eight years ago this summer when I first brought him home. He's still got a lot of love and life in him, and I realize this is minor in the grand scheme of things, but I don't like it one bit.

I don't hate Zuko.

Clumsy times three

On Monday, these things happened:

(1) While parked at the coffee shop on my way into work with my pie on the front seat, I noticed a river of blue goo pouring off the edge of the pie dish all over the seat. I opened the car door and lifted the pie over myself as carefully as possible so as to not drip all over my white skirt and hung my feet out the car while I tried to sop up the juice with a combination of print-outs of triathlon registrations and a plastic bag. My feet started itching and burning wildly and I looked down to see they were covered in fire ants from the parking lot. Fun! I screamed, kicked my flip flops off, and slapped the ants off my feet with one hand while trying to balance the dripping pie away from my skirt. It was a great start to the day.

(2) After dinner, I carefully prepared a dessert of plain yogurt with diced strawberries and bananas and a little bran cereal. I pulled the top off the bottle of agave nectar in order to drizzle a few drops onto my bowl of heaven, and about a 1/2 cup of agave nectar gushed into my bowl, onto the counter, down the cabinet, and onto the floor. This is syrup so sweet that only a few tiny drops can sweeten an entire bowl of food. Now my yogurt was swimming in it, and cleaning it up everywhere else was just a picnic! Good times.

(3) Later, I was hand washing dishes, as is the life of a woman without a dishwasher, and I stabbed myself in the thumb with the sharp point of my damn corn on the cob holder, and it spurted blood.

What next? What next, Monday?

Clearly there was nothing to do but lie prostrate and watch The Bachelorette while reading Taran Wanderer.

Misc. things I'm enjoying:

(1) Swimming in the morning. Wonderful, meditative, exhausting way to begin summer days.

(2) Re-reading the Chronicles of Prydain. So comforting and refreshing. I was set to read Blood Meridian for book club, which I'm sure is an excellent book, but more than one person told me I should NOT read it, and knowing just a little of how violent it is, I'm not sure I can stomach that in a month like July. Or ever. I don't enjoy violence, for the most part, apparently, unless Colin Farrell is involved, such as in In Bruges.

(3) Posts about So You Think You Can Dance at Low Resolution (such as this latest one on the state of the dance floor) and A List of Things Thrown Five Minutes Ago (such as its latest post which recaps where we stand now with our top ten). These people love the show like I do but write about it and analyze it better than I ever could. I really cannot overstate the degree to which this show brings joy to my summer.

(4) Bravo's reruns of season one of The West Wing. I had forgotten how much I once loved this show and how wonderful it was in the beginning. I am loving this chance to rediscover it.

(5) Seeing my little brother play.

That's it for now.

Weekend update

Putting my feet up on a cloudy Sunday afternoon feels pretty great. It's been a nice weekend.

On Friday evening, I relaxed to the max with a cook-whatever's-left-in-the-kitchen-dinner of roasted sweet potatoes, green bell peppers, chick peas, and celery over whole wheat orzo. Surprisingly tasty. I watched Parenthood, which has held up remarkably well over the past 20 years. Seriously: every moment is perfect, particularly every one involving Dianne Wiest.

I arose at the crack of dawn on Saturday morning to go on a 15.5-mile bike ride with a friend. It was nice. I still struggle a bit getting foot #2 into the toe clip but I feel practice will help me improve in this regard, much as I can now grab and replace the water bottle with ease. It was nice to ride with a friend instead of solo and great to be done, showered, and ready to go to the farmers' market by 8:15. I bought eggs, a basket of assorted sweet peppers, and some baby tomatoes and ran into my parents, who bought me some small spicy onions and a dozen big fat shrimp. I keep meaning to become a vegetarian, but my mom made tuna salad this week, and then they bought me shrimp, so I keep failing. It was fun to wander through the market with my mom, who basically bought all of the peaches and all of the corn.

Saturday was a busy day. I don't remember the exact order, but I went on a very satisfying greeting card shopping spree, bought a bike rack for my car I have no idea how to install and a tire patching kit I have no idea how to use, bathed not one but two dogs in the tub and half-assedly put the bathroom back together after the great flood caused by Zuko, enjoyed homemade cool-brewed iced coffee placed in the freezer for a while to get slushy, watered all my plants, and washed a million gross and furry dog towels.

That night, I decided to thank my parents for petsitting during my recent trip to D.C. by bringing a movie over and cooking them dinner with the farm-fresh fixins. I cooked the shrimp in a skillet with olive oil and a little Tony's and sauteed garlic, the tiny purple onions that basically made my eyeballs explode with tears, red and yellow bell peppers, and tomatoes in olive oil until they were caramelized and mushy, mixed the shrimp in, and served it over whole wheat angel hair. My mom cooked a half-dozen corn cobs and we ate every single one of them. It was such a fresh and sensational dinner and we all moaned a lot and celebrated our local farmers. I tried to explain The Omnivore's Dilemma to them and how it has revolutionized my thoughts on food but I'm not sure I did a very good job. We rubbed our bellies and watched Stranger than Fiction. I knew they'd be prime for another Emma Thompson/Dustin Hoffman movie after the way they loved Last Chance Harvey, and they really enjoyed it. After not seeing it since it was in the theater, I'd forgotten how good it is. It's so, so good! Love. Also good: The Book Thief, which I love on a level that prevents me from being very articulate about it.

I took to my bed with The Castle of Llyr and slept well, going grocery shopping this morning and attempting to put a dent in the piles of pet hair wafting through my house. I had a nice lunch with a friend and headed to the gym for a treadmill run, which was surprisingly tolerable, thanks largely to my intense enjoyment of the adorable, inspiring, and triumphant "Expressing Yourself" from Billy Elliot and Queen's "Don't Stop Me Now."

Then I put Patty Griffin on loud and made myself my first ever pie. It's a blueberry pie with a pecan crumble topping. I feel really good about this and hope I don't burn it. I can smell it baking now, and I am kicking back with season four of Weeds, which I've gotta tell you, is not exactly uplifting. The problem with this show is that not a single character is likable. They are all fundamentally vile. If Mary Louise Parker were not so pretty I doubt I'd keep watching it, but there you go.

This is really the first part of my summer, this week ahead, where I'm not on vacation or super-duper busy at work. It's in stark contrast to last summer at this time, when all I did was read, analyze, and write about graphic novel after graphic novel for class in every waking moment. I have to say that it's pretty pleasant. I'm going to have to hit the training hard in the next few weeks pre-triathlon, see the new Harry Potter movie, and mentally prepare myself to swim 500 yards in a lake filled with brown water and slime.

And ... the pie is ready!

Life is good.

D.C. for the 4th

Another summer, another trip to D.C. to see my sister. I'm not going to break it down day by day; instead I'll break it down memory by memory, most of them involving good food and good people.

Crying abundant and very cathartic tears on the airplane while finishing The Book Thief on the way there; a Thai dinner in the rain; visiting with my sister's officemates, some of whom are major So You Think You Can Dance Fans, and feeling as if I'd found My People; seeing my sister and brother-in-law's very cute apartment for the first time; waiting in a very long line while chatting over iced coffee for brunch at Eastern Market, where I got The Brick, a creation with an egg, a slab of ham, and actual hashbrowns sandwiched between two slices of toast, and a side of grits, of course; going running in a place where it was 74 degrees in the middle of the day, which felt like a miracle, enjoying the pretty sidewalk flowers in my sister's neighborhood and seeing the Capitol appear when rounding the curve of a hill; stopping at a fancy grocery store after my run and being yelled at for accidentally cutting in line at the seafood counter and getting between a woman and her giant bag of crabs; feasting upon a creation of my brother-in-law's, peppers and onions and garlic and tomatoes mashed up in a blender and simmered forever and ever until sweet and delicious pasty goo that when served with shrimp over pasta with a side of rosemary bread rivaled the best dishes I have ever eaten in an Italian restaurant; watching episode after episode of season five of The West Wing, one of the years I didn't watch it, and deeming it, in its often jarring Sorkin-less weirdness, "Bizarro West Wing"; going on another run on the 4th of July, again relishing the mindblowingly pleasant temperature, heading around the Capitol all the way down the Mall through the Folk Life Festival, feeling mighty patriotic and swell when running up the sidewalk sloping up to the Washington Monument, meeting up there with my sister and bro-in-law for stretching and a stroll through the very beautiful World War II Memorial, taking a moment at the pillar engraved with "Louisiana"; stopping for a very cold and totally worth it $6 cup of Stella Artois at a Wales tent at the festival, remembering our most wonderful time there five years ago this summer; gathering with some of their very nice friends over beers and snacks before heading en masse on foot back over to the Mall to watch the incredible fireworks lighting up the sky behind the Washington Monument; heading to the Dupont Circle farmers' market to see B.'s sister at her booth and enjoying seeing her and tasting her wares; walking from there over to the lovely Tabard Inn for an amazing brunch of fontina grits, a warm basket of assorted breads, iced coffee, a mimosa, an asparagus/sundried tomato fritatta, waffles topped with fruit, and a side of bacon, yes ma'am; walking past the White House and feeling a surge of joy and pride relative to its current occupancy; going to see Away We Go, which I found refreshingly honest and funny and real; dining on the sidewalk of a Cuban restaurant with my dear old friend Elizabeth, ever-wonderful; taking an impromptu day trip to Annapolis, which is surprisingly quaint and charming, eating crab cake sandwiches by the bay, strolling up and down the streets window shopping, and leaping around the grounds of the state capitol like lunatics; and dining at Matchbox with more of their friends, who were delightful, and enjoying veggie pizza with potato chips on top and several more Stellas.

Before I left for this trip I had kind of a heavy heart, and I think getting away was just what I needed. I think the best part of any vacation, on top of the great times had in its duration, is the feeling it leaves in me once I'm home. In every moment of fun and laughter with my sister and her husband, both of whom I love beyond measure; with every nod of understanding over fajitas in a discussion of how we enter the world; with every sight of the crape myrtles which seemed so much brighter there, not being burned and baked by the scorching heat we're having here these days; with every sip of cold beer; with every step on my runs through their neighborhood and past those buildings and monuments that never cease to leave me a little in awe ... I felt my heart growing lighter and letting go.

Now that I'm home, I feel more free, more focused, and more ready to embrace the pleasures of the summer ahead of me. I feel ready to enjoy this dinner I just made of onions and bell peppers and zucchini and yellow squash and carrots and celery and almonds and green peas and chick peas and whole wheat orzo topped off with a little romano cheese. I feel like me again.