Fast, cheap, good: saute tofu, stir fry vegetables and if you have it, chard, in soy sauce, mirin and sesame oil. Made it last night because I was too fried to do much of anything else.

Had to be replaced at 11 Edgewater. Peter phoned around 5:30 am, called Spencer Hallet. They were out before 7. Amazing service.

A few days ago, had a yen for hash so fixed some ground turkey, onions, carrots, green beans and poultry seasoning. Had some of it for breakfast, baked the rest as a cottage pie with crust on the bottom and mashed potato on top for lunch. Brought some to Peter, who declared it “tasty”, and scarfed down the rest for supper.

We had a couple of days of melt, and late yesterday afternoon, it got cold again.

During the melt, I was able to clear a path from the street to the back stairs.

That was a priority because I’ve fallen twice in the last week and a half. Miraculously and so far, I’ve not broken anything.

I left one of my canes in a Chatham shop a couple of days ago and retrieved it yesterday.

It was a two-hour round trip, but worth it. I was so happy to have the cane back.

It bothers me to lose things, and not retrieving an item that has given me good service is unthinkable, even with the expense and inconvenience.

When I was very young, I lost a tiny purse in a cab in New York City. I still remember crying my eyes out, which must have driven my family bonkers.

It has to do with being lost myself, I think.

My husband Ron is bright and good-natured, a combination hard to find.

He can also be self-absorbed, easily frustrated and an inveterate procrastinator.

I am very hard-working, considerate most of the time to friends and family, reasonably well-informed, and a decent cook.

I am also impatient, distrustful, frequently late, and have a vicious temper when provoked. I am poor at foreign languages, physically unattractive and have no sense of style.

We all make compromises.

Ron’s preference is for small, dark women. His “all the girls I wish I’d loved before” include Maria Muldaur and Annette Funicello. Instead, he’s married to me, dear fellow. By taking that step, he’s made a huge sacrifice for our family’s benefit. Put into that perspective, I can easily live with his faults. Then again, considering that Maria now weighs about 300 pounds and poor Annette has MS, maybe he’s not that bad off after all.

‎”People do not die for us immediately, but remain bathed in a sort of aura of life which bears no relation to true immortality but through which they continue to occupy our thoughts in the same way as when they were alive. It is as though they were traveling abroad.” ~Marcel Proust

They are right, January is the coldest month. The Herald warns this morning of wind chills as low as 16 below tonight and tomorrow morning in Boston.

We are getting later sunsets, though; it’s still light around 4:30 in the afternoon.

James and Shane slept over last night, but we didn’t do anything outdoors yesterday. I worked almost the entire day on web stuff.

It’s that time again:
From the 1983 Old Farmer’s Almanac

One of the people I follow on Facebook suggested that those of us who have been abused in the past try to build a “mountain” of positive memories.

To start with, positive memories of M-E-N.

This is a lot harder than it seems. When I think about those closest to me, the memories get swamped by feelings that I would rather avoid.

The point is to remember interactions untainted by commerce, with people you know personally, not favorite authors, philosophers or statesmen.

My neighbor John is the first one I can think of. He’s always come to my aid when I needed help and never expected anything in return. In spite of some serious health problems, he’s always uncomplaining with me and he’s never patronizing about the fact that he knows so much more than I do.

My friend Steve Garrity from college is another. I haven’t seen or heard or thought about Steve for years, but he was always kind to me. A Vietnam War vet (in fact, a Marine), Steve was real stand-up guy, bright and with a great sense of humor. I remember a couple of field trips we took with our ecology prof. One time, it was raining so hard, we had to sleep in the prof’s car. We laughed and laughed, and it makes me happy to think of it.

I knew some really nice fellows in Seattle: Mike, who took Peter and I camping once, and the late Gordon Cowan, husband of my friend Chris Cowan. Gordon was a real gentleman’s gentleman, calling his wife “lovey” even in the course of an argument. Gordon was the one who broke the news about my adoptive father’s passing away.

I have good memories of my cousins Paul and Rick, associated with our summer visits to their parents’ house in Plymouth. Paul has a brilliant, acerbic wit. Rick is a retired public school science teacher who is extremely handy and an excellent father, husband and son. It makes me happy to remember morning walks to the donut shop or trips to the ice cream stand, which amazingly is still there.

Not a bad start.