Wow, it’s been awhile…

I don’t even have a good excuse for you guys. I haven’t really been up to anything crazy and I haven’t had any terrible situations that required all of my time. I think I just needed a cyber break. No Twitter. No Facebook. No blog. Even email was minimal.

I write this blog mostly for me. It’s a diary essentially although I do hope it is helpful to those who come across it. So since this is just for me, I didn’t feel too guilty taking a break. And then today I was readying some older posts and I realized how much I enjoy what I’ve put out there and it inspired me to get back to it.

I came home to this home-grown tomatoes picked and waiting for my by the front door. We’ve had a little parking spat with our neighbor and he left these along with a note saying we could have the spot tonight. What a pretty peace offering!

I haven’t had one yet but I’m sure they’re juicy and flavorful!

What I did eat for dinner was actually the usual suspects.

Pan seared vegetables over quinoa.

I wasn’t feeling incredibly creative by the time I got back from my run and just wanted something I knew would be good that would be on my plate quickly.

Carrots, zucchinis and mushrooms into a pan…

And quinoa into the rice cooker.

I have been working with the rice cooker for a few weeks now and sometimes I love it and sometimes I hate it. For example, I wanted to cook quinoa tonight and, had I been a little more on top of my game, I could have put it into the rice cooker before I left for my run so all I would have to do is finish the vegetables when I got back, having dinner ready in half the time.

The rice cooker makes perfect quinoa.

All fluffy and soft and I don’t even have to think about it.

Now oatmeal, on the other hand…

…is another story.

While I was a little bummed this rice cooker didn’t have a timer or warmer, meaning I could make my steel cut oats the night before for an insta-breakfast, I was willing to work around that. I put the steel cut oats into the cooker before I headed out for a four mile run one morning, knowing the oats would be about done by the time I made it back.

I came home to that overflowing mess and lots of uncooked oats. Sigh…

So oats continue to get cooked on the stove. And since I’m making my way through this bag of steel cut oats before buying rolled again, I have to be willing to invest a chunk of time if I want to eat my favorite breakfast.

Other than learning the limitations of my rice cooker, the other issue in my life has been this beast.

That’s our beautiful, expensive dryer that absolutely cannot work in this apartment. We even had an electrician come to install the plug. After turning down someone who wanted to trade their gas dryer for our electric, I was utterly furious when I came home Friday to hear that our place is not wired in a way that can sustain the amount of electricty needed to power this dryer and that we were, once again, back to the drawing board on how to get our clothing dry.

I’ve had the dryer on Craigslist but after the madness to find a place to live and my need to discount form the digital world a bit over the last month, I haven’t been too proactive about getting something arranged. Which means I spend a portion of my Sunday (and my money…) at the Laundromat for the time being. Oh well, things could be worse.

I promise I’ll be sticking around for awhile. After all, the olympics are coming up and I think I might actually be signing up for a marathon in the fall so there is plenty to be talked about.