AROUND AND ABOUT FROM 3-24-25 TO 3-30-25

  Hello Family and Friends, thank you for reading my around-and-abouts and letting me know by emails, texts and comments, that you enjoy them. It is enjoyable for me keeping in touch with you all, letting you know what we have been up to and in return, what has been going on in your world. Again, thank you!

Weather forecast from 3-31-25 to 4-7-25

A lot of food talk with pictures this week, so maybe you had better not look at this while you are hungry.

Monday, March 24th, 2025: I have just returned from the DMV, in a different area that our son told us about. He said it was a little quieter than where we were before, with shorter lines of people. Very true! We had an appointment and arrived early but were seen way before our set time. The process was smooth and we were out the door in no time. One thing I was surprised at, that although we got this Real ID well before the May 9th deadline, I still have to get it renewed again before my birthday in July of next year. This is when my ordinary driver's license would have expired. The process won't be as long though as I had to fill out extra forms today. Apparently the rules have changed.

No breakfast today but when we got back and for lunch, I told my dear other half that I fancied the same chicken sandwich that he fixed yesterday, plus the addition of a mug of tomato soup. Very nice! No photos of that one though.

Tuesday, March 25th, 2025: Again, no breakfast as we were discussing where to go for our weekly lunch and I was tired of MickeyD's. 

I suggested driving to Gregg's favorite, the Bahn Mi place, which I have shared before. They do the best Bahn Mi Sandwich on a French Roll that we have ever had, and it is consistently excellent. We always order the meatball sandwich which is nothing like the Italian-style meatball. They are made of ground pork and seasoned differently with Vietnamese flavorings. You can look at a recipe here to give you an idea of what is inside the bun. Not exactly the same as ours as we have more slightly and delicately pickled vegetables.

He had a longer wait for the first time ever and we arrived later nearer the lunch hour rush.  I was outside sitting in the car reading the news on my phone. 

The delay in the store was because they were waiting for a new batch of bread to be baked, which is all done on the premises.

 

He was in line for 20-plus minutes but once they had the bread, he was out of there in a few minutes, and we had our car picnic. That fresh-from-the-oven French roll was the best ever! (As you can see, he likes to send photos while he is waiting. Do we go together or what? The photo below is a cropped version of above, so that you can see a few of the different foods they have on sale. Looks like they had a recent delivery and were still putting boxes away.)

On the way home the man said something to me which I didn't hear. This had happened earlier at home and the second time I said perhaps he was mumbling. He then said no, it's your hearing, you need to go get your ears checked." I turned to him and said, "Well, someone may think me as deaf as a doorpost, but that someone needs to be reminded that the eye doctor said I've got better eyesight than he has and who knows, maybe even better hearing. Stop mumbling!" You'll have to read last week's account to get that one. He had a good laugh, which was my intent, always enjoys the banter and as he is practicing his French, "Touché" he said. And to add, Gregg has a pretty loud/clear speaking voice and so does our son. And yes, my hearing check is on the list because he may be right on this one.

Word of the Day? 

Touché (pronounced ‘tooshay’)

Example: when you pull a rare fast one on your husband, he just might say "Touché". 

The word Touché means, "You hit me with the tip of your foil" in fencing, or "Wow, that was a perfect retort, or “You made a really good point." or "Touché Denise, and stop looking like a cat who has just finished the cream!"

The foil is one of three fencing blades used in Olympic fencing. Who knew? Not me apparently.

Interesting information online, and I got all this from a website I found on my curiosity journey, all thanks to Gregg and his improbable mumbling and my probable unhearing, and his "Touché".

Gregg actually took fencing which was a compulsory class in his first year at the naval academy in 1965. 

Well, I made my 'point' that day, doesn't happen very often and yes, I am smiling.

(There is no rhyme nor reason to my posts. Jumping from one topic to the other is how I roll.)

Anyhow, he and our son met up in the afternoon. I was happy they got together, and I enjoyed pottering at home for a few hours. 

Later, Gregg had just gone upstairs for the night when I thought I heard some yowling not too far away. I was listening when Gregg came downstairs to tell me, and we heard it again. I opened the front door and peeked out just in time to see a fox on the opposite side of the road in my neighbor's front yard. It was trotting along, clearly visible in their door lights and only seconds in sight, but it was a lovely one. I wondered if it was the same fox our son saw on his way into the neighborhood the other day. There are several around. There is a creek and a wooded area not too far away, where we think there are dens. A nice ending to our day. 

Wednesday, March 26th, 2025: the sun is shining. Lovely! My breakfast was a late lunch of Weetabix with a cup of strawberries, 4 dates and pecan halves. 

Dinner: we made a new shrimp dish and were going to add scallops, but it would have been too much. The shrimp dish was outstanding. The seafood was purchased at Costco, frozen in large packets and I will share that dish next Monday. 

Snack: This you will have seen in yesterday's Monday Morning Recipe post. I had bananas and strawberries that needed to be used and found a recipe for Strawberry Banana Cake. That was another ten out of ten. I am still looking for nice meals to serve up when family arrives in the middle of next month.

Thursday, March 27th, 2025: another quiet day so far at 1:39 p.m: breakfast was the same as yesterday beginning with the letter 'W'. 

Lunch/Dinner: We have just eaten the scallop dish I mentioned yesterday. Another winner on our never-ending mission to eat more seafood - sautéed in a mixture of olive oil and a sauce of lemon juice and butter added. I will share it on here eventually. So easy, simple and fast! I served both shrimp and scallops with steamed broccoli.

Snack that evening: a slice of the Strawberry Banana Cake.

The sun is shining! The current temperature is 55 degrees F.

In the evening our son and daughter-in-law called.  They are in Los Angeles for a few days and wanted to let us know they had arrived. It is a semi business trip. 

Friday, March 28th, 2025 at 11.23 p.m: Gregg went off to meet his old friend for lunch. I spent my time doing a few chores, blogging and watched a show on Netflix called Tracker. I quite liked it but only watched one episode. It is about a man who finds missing people and I thought was very well done with good acting.

Breakfast/Lunch: I didn’t feel like breakfast until noon, and had a small slice of the banana and strawberry cake, with blueberries on the side. I froze the rest of the cake for another day.

Dinner: I had a single portion of a stir fry I found in the freezer. Neither of us were that enamored when originally made a few weeks ago, and yet I couldn’t bring myself to throw it away. I liked it more this time round. It had ground cooked pork, shredded cabbage and carrots (a coleslaw mix), and baby corn you usually find in a can that also had beansprouts and sliced water chestnuts. Not bad and ate something fairly light and nutritious while not having to cook anything, but did not like the addition of the can. There was a brine taste that even after rinsing did not completely disappear. I won’t add that again. Normally we like stir fry a lot.

Gregg came home and told me about his day. 

Saturday, March 29th, 2025 at 8.40p.m: for breakfast Gregg picked up our weekly doughnut and my coffee which carried us through to dinner which was cheese on toast and a commercial beef and barley soup with veggies. It was another no-fuss-in-the-kitchen day today.

We drove over to Lowe’s, our home and hardware store. We are interested in getting a couple of chairs and a small table to go on the deck in the far corner.

My knee was acting up and I didn't get too far walking around, but I had a great time looking at all those open blooms. However, I didn’t see anything I liked enough to purchase in the way of outdoor furniture. 

A big truck was outside and the gentleman delivering said he was dropping off flowers and plants from North Carolina. Inside, the cash register was busy with over 20 people in line, but we were basically reconnoitering. I took photos of flowers with prices and loved looking at the different ones. I want to go through the photos quietly and decide which to get. Gregg is leaving it up to me to choose. I'll point to the spot and he will dig the hole.

Spending a quiet evening. We find ourselves with our head in a book more often than not. I completed the jigsaw puzzle below…

and sometimes play a game of scrabble. If there is anything I want to watch, my dear other half goes upstairs early and I may either watch an episode of something, or a movie. I enjoy ‘Dark Winds’ which is a series that takes place in the 1970’s. It is about the Navaho Tribal Police in the southwest and the acting is very good. I started the third series a couple of weeks ago. 

An early night is in order, we are both getting tired.

Sunday, March 30th, 2025: Very nice weather and sunny. It was 80 degrees F. according to our car thermometer. It didn't feel that warm but there was no humidity. No breakfast and nothing until we went out for a late lunch at Santini's, a submarine sandwich shop. Gregg ordered a cold cut, and mine was a steak and cheese. We shared a packet of fries. I take half of mine home with me and reheat for dinner. Gregg fixed himself spaghetti that night. This week has turned into something like a food fest, and I keep saying next week we should do better at not eating out quite as much. 

We had another lovely chat with my brother-in-law in Germany. Always lots to talk about and we enjoyed at least an hour on FaceTime. Such a fun guy to talk to, especially when we all get going and always a brother, not just a brother-in-law.

With our fox sighting this week, I started thinking of them and did a scribble sketch of a fox today. You can see the original that I chose to copy. 

Scribble, scribble, scribble, never perfect but fun to do.

And on that scribble note, thanks for following along on last week's daily journal…

and a very happy first day of the month!