Gallivanting in the Garden

Last Sunday was a day rotten to the core – rainy, gloomy, good for nothing but staying inside and hibernating. But then Monday did a complete hundred-and-eighty with sunny skies and balmy temperatures.


So I went to The Huntington. It’s a shame, I know, but I’d never been before. The Japanese Garden is closed for sprucing up, but the place is still plenty big to kill several hours.


In one corner I found piles and piles of wonderfully prickly cacti. They made me think of Dive.


For most part you’re allowed to walk on the grass too - that’s how I found these delightfully slimy shrooms. I think they are Velvet Foot Mushrooms, but won’t swear to it.


I found some stone children frolicking around – my favorite kind, they’re very quiet.


Stone people need stone chairs to sit on.


One of these days I need to go back to check out the library and the museum too.

Turkey

I know it's not Turkey Day yet, but I was in the mood. I got a nice half turkey breast and stuffed herbed butter under the skin. I also boiled some potatoes, sliced them up and put them in the bottom of the roasting pan. On top I placed the turkey breast, and into the oven they went. During roasting some of the butter escaped, nicely juicing up the potatoes. Delish!

I didn't make cranberry sauce because I had some from COSTCO - yummy and all natural.

Flea Market

It's cold, wet, and miserable today, and there's no way I'm going anywhere, even the flea market. However, I've never posted last month's pictures. So here they are!


Ferret circus. Why not? I bet Hamlet is much more fun with ferrets.


I kinda wish I bought this bunny-shaped tea pot. I don't know what I'd do with it, but it's fantastic.


Once a hustler, always a hustler.


Only you can prevent forest fires! Oh wait, wrong bear.


Dummies freak me out.

Spooky

Spooky, spooky, oh whoa, all right
Spooky, oh yeah yeah
I said Spooky yeah yeah...


It's the season for the scary, freaky and bizarre.


Haunted cake.


I hope it's gooey inside.


And I thought Hollywood was freakish enough already.


Lord Voldemort would disagree.


No comment.


Look Ma, there is a face in my pelvis!


...

Chestnut Cheesecake

I was rooting through my cupboard and found a can of chestnut spread I probably bought as an impulse once. It was a billion years old, but being in a tin it could have added another billion and it still would be good. I opened it and found it sweet. Wondering what the heck to do with it, I figured cheese cake could work. I just had to adjust a recipe I had already. Here it is:

Chestnut Cheesecake

Crust
2 cups of finely ground cinnamon graham crackers
1 stick (4 oz) melted butter

Filling
8 0z cream cheese softened at room temperature
8 oz sour cream
8 oz chestnut spread (technically it was slightly more, but who's counting?)
4 eggs
1/2 cup sugar


Preaheat the oven to 325º F

In a mixing bowl combine the crust ingredients with a wooden spatula until it's all even. Coat the bottoms and sides of your baking pan with the mix. Use your hand; don't be a wuss. If you want to be all proper, use a springform pan, but only if you have extra wide aluminum foil at hand. If you don't, use a solid baking pan.

In a bowl slowly beat the cream cheese with an electric mixer till it's smooth - ca. one minute. Add the eggs one by one, continuing to beat slowly. Add sugar and beat till creamy. Add chestnut spread and sour cream. Mix well. Don't forget to scrape down the sides of the bowl time to time. Pour the filling into the crust-lined pan.

If you used springform, set it on a sheet of oversized aluminum foil and fold up the sides around it. Place the pan in a large roasting pan. Pour boiling water into the pan till it comes hallway up to the pie pan.

Bake for 45 minutes. It will still jiggle in the middle, but it will firm up. Cool for 30 minutes, then chill in the fridge for at least 4 hours.


Okay, so it doesn't have the prettiest color, but it tastes good.

iGallery Augury

I’ve realized that these days almost all my posts are about the flea market – meaning that I post once a month. So just to break the pattern, I will post something else, even though I went to the flea market yesterday. Instead, here it is a random selection of iPhotos with a nonsensical commentary. Enjoy. Or not. It’s all the same to me.


The world will end in 2411. Don’t you believe me? You fool.


I have irrefutable evidence – I divined it myself from this double egg yolk. It’s so obvious.


The Heavens will split open,


and the Earth shall rupture.


From the depths of the Sea,



the beasts will rise.


Humankind will be split into two, to be sent to Heaven


and Hell.

Or did I mix the two up?

Papoo's Hot Dog Show

Is no more. And that makes me sad.


Papoo's still stand on the corner of Riverside and Rose at the edge of Toluca Lake and Burbank.


There used to be a cool sign up front, but it's gone already.


I had breakfast at Papoo's a few times after friends of mine moved to the neighborhood. It was nice cozy place, and the food was way better than at Bob's Big Boy across the street.


I don't know what happened, but I'm guessing it might have something to do with the economy. What doesn't.

If you want to know more you can join "Save Papoo's Hot Dog Show" on Facebook.

Summer Time

And the living is easy. Supposedly.


There's a heat wave here in L.A. The temperature hit 106º F yesterday here in the Valley. Meanwhile, Hurricane Irene is threatening to wipe New Jersey off the map. I jest.


My brain has turned to mush from the heat; no clue what to write.


So enjoy some more flea market photos.

Three

I've gotten inconveniently busy as of late. It shall pass. Till then I have random flea market weirdness.


I found these two singing trios at two different stalls, far apart from each other. They're completely different, yet similar.


Makes you think that there should have been a third somewhere, but there wasn't. Or maybe there was, I just didn't find it. Have I failed a mystical quest of utmost importance I didn't know I had?

I frequently have the feeling that reality is swooshing over my head, while I stand like a half-blind wretch in the grocery store, surrounded by blur.

I was listening to Spider Robinson's The Callahan Chronicles, and an expression jumped out at me: "flurry of triplets." I thought "What a great utterance!" and was jealous that I didn't come up with it, like Chanlder's "The streets were dark with something more than night." Then I Googled it, and apparently "flurry of triplets" is a musical term? And I was picturing three identical ankle biters turning a house upside-down.

Scandalous!

So the world didn't end. Again. I'm trying to be magnanimous about it but it's hard not to feel smug when a bunch of bigots and homophobes end up with eggs on their faces.

So instead, here are a few shocking images.

I have to admit I haven't worn pantyhose in a decade. I don't like them; wearing them makes me feel like a sausage stuffed into a plastic casing.


It makes me wonder how a thin, sheer layer nylon (or silk) could ever been the dividing line between decent and indecent.