Pumpkin Palooza

 It happens every year. After a long and wonderful summer vacation, I go back to school. Wearing Capris and sandals, I watch what remains of summer from my classroom window, wishing the school was air-conditioned. A few weeks later, it becomes imperative to watch the weather, not knowing from day to day how to dress, while New England waffles on whether or not it wants to change seasons.

While the weather undergoes its identity crisis, I start slowly making my transition. One week I might make chili. I buy apples. I buy a pumpkin spice candle. I start wearing fuzzy socks. My favorite fleece blanket comes out of storage. I wear closed-toed shoes. (Reluctantly, I might add.)(Begrudgingly.) I go to Vermont with the girls and get inspired by the foliage. I find myself in a long-sleeved t-shirt and pajama pants and said fuzzy socks while watching the evening news. Fall blooms fill my vase, and pumpkin decorations find their way onto my coffee table. I finally light the pumpkin spice candle. Eventually there is no turning back. Even the warmest of days won’t warrant sandals, despite a new fall pedicure, and I embrace fall.

Yesterday I celebrated. As I watched TV and read in the late afternoon, enjoying the scent of my pumpkin spice candle while I sipped a pumpkin spice martini, I decided to bake some pumpkin bread. From scratch. Garnished with pepitas.

My very own Pumpkin Palooza.

Happy Fall!

[Heart] Note...to Fresh Ground Coffee

My first Krups coffee grinder was a Crate and Barrel employee purchase, back in the late eighties. I LOVED it. The difference was night and day.

Yet somehow I got away from it. Maybe it was when I started teaching and took a 50 percent pay cut and couldn’t justify the splurge, or maybe it was because for a brief time at the beginning of my teaching career I lived with my parents who, although they drink coffee says mine puts hair on their chest. I had found a canned brand that I liked enough, and had a stove top espresso maker for the occasions I wanted something other than mediocre coffee.

And then the price of canned coffee increased while the size of the cans decreased. I’m not sure if there were ever 16 ounces in one, but the average size now is 10.5 ounces. Reading flyers and clipping coupons and stocking up on canned coffee when it was on sale seemed, well, wrong. Ridiculous. Trader Joe’s offered an alternative, their own brand of joe that came whole bean in a 16 ounce container—which they touted in big letters on the poster that caught my attention. I used the grinder in the aisle and was on my way. Take that, [National Brand]! I thought.

And then, the second time I bought my coffee at Trader Joe’s I decided it was time to find my grinder, or buy a new one. The third time I bought my coffee and noticed the container was only 14 ounces, I got good and pissed off and stopped making the trip to TJs for coffee. I’ve been experimenting with different brands of whole bean coffee, grinding it home ever since.

There really is nothing like scooping my medium roast Colombian coffee beans into the grinder, pushing the button, and taking off the lid. I don’t think the coffee ever makes it to my coffee maker (cone drip, of course) without stopping in front of my nose for a nice, long whiff. Ever.

I really love fresh ground coffee. In fact, I [heart] it.

The Great Equalizer

Donna has a regular schedule of chemotherapy treatments: Tuesday, Friday, Tuesday, Friday, then an off week, then Tuesday, Friday, Tuesday, Friday, and an off week, etc. On Tuesdays she gets one IV bag of chemotherapy and one IV bag of the clinical trial drug;on Fridays she gets chemotherapy only. In between the two weeks of chemotherapy she gives herself shots to boost her white blood cell production. On the off weeks between chemotherapy cycles, she usually has scans to measure the progress—so far the success!—of the treatments.

Not everyone at Infusion on Tuesdays and Fridays is on the same drug or in the clinical trial as Donna, but we have come to know, or at least recognize, the regulars. There is the African American woman in her late fifties whose Jewish husband accompanies her. Another African American woman, who is an employee of the hospital, has coworkers stopping by all day for a few minutes at a time. There is the woman, Indian I believe, also probably in her fifties, who is accompanied by her sister--who could be her twin, they look so much alike!  And there is the woman Donna’s age, also Caucasian, with whom Donna shared stories and is now friendly, who has a 7 year old and a 10 year old at home, and who drives herself there from New York, on the exact same schedule as Donna. Yesterday I was so glad to see that she had a friend with her. I don’t think I’ve ever seen someone there with her! And I don’t know how she does that drive herself. Sadly, there was a newcomer yesterday, ten years younger than Donna and I, from the Bronx. She was with her mother.

So I stand corrected that potty humor is the great equalizer. Cancer is. There are people out there, although I don't know many (any) of them, who would not get a laugh out of a whoopee cushion, who go through life thinking that one of the things that separates them from people like me is immaturity/being crass/potty humor, Blah Blah. I say, go ahead, then, think we're different. But in the end we're not. Stop by Infusion someday at a cancer hospital, where I hope you never find yourself on the receiving end of an IV line, where despite differences in race or class or age or favorite brand of humor, every one is the same: human beings fighting cancer: the great, but evil, equalizer...where a whoopee cushion--or the laugh that follows--might be the best thing a person hears all day.

October is Breast Cancer Awareness month. I encourage you to reach out to someone with cancer, to share a laugh. And make an appointment for a mammogram if you’re due.

Scenes from Vermont

I'm back. We had a blast. Literally. Many of them, in fact, as Liz brought a whoopee cushion along. She forgot Scrabble and brought a whoopee cushion instead. You probably think it's childish, right, for four forty-something women in a ski house in Vermont to step on a whoopee cushion when things got too serious or quiet when we didn't want it to be, or sometimes just to laugh some more? In fact it was a riot. Unpretentious fun.

As far as I'm concerned, potty humor is the great equalizer. And bringing a whoopee cushion? Brilliant, Liz.

I'm already looking forward to next year.

[Heart] Note...to Lunch Club with Amy



Cajun Pot Pies with andouille sausage and shrimp

Now that I'm back at school, lunch club is back in session. I am cooking a little more--but not as much as Amy yet. I brought her a quesadilla for lunch one day, and chili another--both basic dishes that are part of my repertoire. In return I've gotten two of her latest, restaurant-worthy culinary experiments.

Last week Amy shared an absolutely luscious corn and crab chowder, and yesterday I was happy to take my care-packaged lunch home where I could properly enjoy these Cajun pot pies (she package the filling separate from the puffed pastry bowls, of course) with an appropriate beverage. They were delicious: spicy, creamy comfort food in a perfect little package.

As teachers with twenty minute lunches, we don't get to go out to eat. Ever. And making your own lunch day after day gets old fast. Changing things up with a foodie friend makes things better. That's why I [heart] lunch club.

My Challenge

Seems everywhere I turn, someone is criticizing education in America, and what we are doing wrong. Even Oprah, who values education, devoted an episode to the topic in her last season. Though she made it a point to praise the educators and schools where it is working--the implication is that in most places it is not. And in most cases, it is the educators who are being blamed for the failures. As you know, I am a teacher. So I take this personally. And I take considerable offense.

Several months ago a panel of politicians and students railed away on Meet the Press; students told stories that were patently absurd. Can it really be that a teacher regularly naps for entire class periods? And none of these children get the teacher next door? Or walk down to the office so that an administrator can rouse the sleepy teacher? Did anyone check on the veracity of this story? On the off chance they weren’t tall tales told by struggling students then by all means action should be taken. But what gets me is that any time someone tells a story, it is a variation on this theme: schools in America suck, teachers suck more. In fact, it is the fault of teachers that education sucks. Stories are taken as truth; educators aren’t given the benefit of a doubt because, as one of my colleagues likes to say, the concept of a teacher as a professional is gone. We are micromanaged, we are criticized, and we are blamed.

I challenge anyone who thinks teachers have it easy but get it all wrong to be a teacher. Go back to school, get your masters degree, and be a teacher. I dare you.

And I refer you to this opinion piece from the Hartford Courant, by Thomas Cangelosi, a reitred teacher, to read more.

[Heart] Note...to New England Lobstah

Summer does not want to quit this year. Even though many of us are back at work (ahem) and no longer able to enjoy these 80-degree days we continue to be blessed with, late September is one of New England's special gifts.

Another is Maine lobster, which I felt compelled to enjoy one last time this summer (despite the temps, fall is still in the air) the other night, and which I only needed to travel down the road to find at a restaurant whose name pays tribute to its source.

And while I would have loved to enjoy the company of Deanna and Jill, who both insist on going there when they are here from out of town, it was enough to have a lobster date without them. (Sorry, girls. I know you were jealous, but I had to text you and let you know! Should I not enjoy lobster because you both live far away?) Just me and this lobster roll, easy on the mayo, generous on the claw and tail. Dream date.

I enjoyed every bite...I [heart] lobster. I mean lobstah.