Raving Amicks

Tyler and I just got back from our three-week trip to Germany and Ukraine with our friend Vlad. During our trip we visited Lübeck, Berlin, Munich, Kiev, a small village in Western Ukraine, and Copenhagen. It’s really hard to write a single blog post about a three-week trip where we took 1,968 photos, so Tyler and I are going to split the duties (he’ll write a post about Ukraine sometime this weekend).

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With Tyler’s help during President’s Day Weekend (he had a three-day weekend back then), I reupholstered our dining chairs that he had picked up for $10 years ago. They originally had dirty and cracked white vinyl on the seats, plus they were really hard and uncomfortable. Now they have high-density foam seats covered with beautiful white leather, and our butts sigh with delight each time we sit on them (or maybe it’s just the leather sinking into the foam that sighs). One of the chair seats isn’t quite as taut as the other (surprisingly, the second one we did), but they’re still infinitely better than before. Now I just need to strip and re-stain them during a summer dry spell and we’ll be dining in style.

Osa also approves of the new seats:

Inspired by a friend’s recent skillet apple pie, I made my own from this recipe. It’s a really annoying site that makes you have a log in, so I’m also posting the recipe below.

The only thing that I would change is to add a little salt to both the crust and liquid mixture that you pour over the apples. Otherwise, the crust came out beautifully and it’s a mighty tasty, homey pie.

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Well, we’ve had the puppy for a little over a week now. I guess Tyler and I were just too lazy to take pictures, upload them, and write a post. Oh yeah, we were also busy reorganizing the apartment. And later Tyler was busy with battling what was potentially the swine flu. It was a flu anyway—a flu that he conveniently came down with 48 hours after attending a video game expo where there was a swine flu outbreak. All those video gamers not washing their hands and then eating lunch makes even me feel sick.

So now we have a cute, fluffy puppy that loves people and loves to snuggle. But oh the whining. Oh god, the whining. This is the whiniest puppy I’ve ever met. I feed her food, she scarfs it down—while whining. I give her a walk, she bounds around happily—while whining. I look at her, she whines. I hold her, she whines. All I can guess is we’re simply not giving her enough attention. Or maybe she’s just pissed that we haven’t given her a name yet.

On the flip side, she makes a really good bookend:

Here’s the dinner I made for me and Tyler tonight. I went a little overboard—especially with portions, which is a constant battle when making new recipes for just two people. The bottom left corner of the plate features the carrots that Father Amick gave to us last week. I wanted to use the fingerling potatoes we also got from Father Amick, but I had some older potatoes in the fridge that I felt I should get rid of.

The dinner was: pan-fried salmon that was marinated in lemon juice and herbes de provence, potatoes that were also pan-fried and cooked with aged goat cheese and more herbes de provence, a simple baby mixed green salad with olive oil and balsamic, and glazed carrots with tarragon and chervil. I used only half of the carrots, and the recipe really brought out their tasty homegrown flavor. It was so good that I think I’ll make it again with the other half of the carrots later in the week.

Over a month ago, a local terrier breeder with which I’ve been in contact emailed me about six weeks ago and said “I have a female Wire Fox puppy. If you want her, let me know and send a deposit.” That was all I knew, and all I needed to know.

After close to 9 months of being dog-free, of being on the wait list for 7 different local rescue groups for terriers, of being told repeatedly by the city pound and the humane society and a number of different non-profit rescue groups that we suck because we live in an apartment and don’t have a fenced yard even though we are amazing people and will spoil any dog rotten with love and love and more love, I finally was close to getting a dog. Holy crap, a dog! Of course I want the dog. It’s a puppy from a reputable breeder, it’s 1.5 hours away, and it’s a female. Yes, I want the dog. Here is my deposit. Thank you, come again.

So last week, I get another email with some pictures of two cute puppies gnawing on each other and being all floppy and puppy-like. The only text is, “These are the two females of the litter. Which one do you want?” (more…)