04/7/2020

Our beautiful mountain view was obscured again today by those dark, brooding clouds. The San Joaquin Mountains are definitely getting some snow out of todays rain dump.

The world news today while a bit dark and brooding too did bring a few glimmers of light. After more than 10 weeks, China on Wednesday ended its lockdown of Wuhan. The city where the coronavirus first emerged, the city that has shaken the global economy and thrown daily life into upheaval across the planet is starting to come back to life. If you haven’t already seen the article in the link, its well worth the read.

So here is how day nineteen of our sheltering in place went:

• The only new picture I took today was the dinner shot. Hey priorities right!!! Does it count that I am researching a new DSLR camera? My top favorite so far is the Nikon D5600 . What I really want is more zoom capability than we currently have on the Panasonic Lumix point and shoot which actually has a great lens so the image quality is pretty darn good. I use my iphone camera the majority of the time so I am hoping all you photographers out there will chime in here with your suggestions or thoughts.

• Donned my fancy face gaiter, helmet and took a bicycle ride with my friend Kristen. We rode about 8 miles again today and I wanted to go longer but my hiney and “girl bones” declined to continue….whiny hiney! Good news, I may have actually burned the calories I consumed during happy hour tonight – YAY!!!

• Ralphs Grocery via Instacart delivered a few bags of goods we needed. What’s cool is that I can shop for friends and save us all the exposure of going into a grocery store. Upon delivery to our door, we bleach wiped the plastic bags, brought the bags inside the coach and bleach wiped everything in the bags that we could. I divided the goods and Wally took 2 bags of groceries over to our friends Kristen and John.

• We used Zoom to have cocktail hour today with friends Dave and Tanya who live in Portland Oregon. There have been many an evening spend sitting around their kitchen island, sipping wine and chatting while Dave cooks. While it doesn’t replace being there with them, it was great to see their smiling faces.

• Tonights dinner was Pork Mole Tamales with a Red Chile Sauce, Cumin Spiced Black Beans and a Cabbage Salad with Fresh Oranges. I did not make the tamales because why would I when I can get the best ones ever from the Tamale Store in Phoenix AZ. They do ship, but so far I have been able to get personal deliveries when we have friends from AZ come visit …Thanks Laurie and Tom!!! The red chile sauce is easy to make using good quality red chile powder. If you have some from Hatch NM…you are a serious red chili fan! I was all out of my hatch blend but Penzeys Spices red chili powder is a fine substitute.

• The fridge is full of possibilities, thinking about making Crab Ramen Noodles for dinner tomorrow… we’ll see!

• Worked on this blog post.

Day nineteen was mellow and uneventful, the rain pattering outside felt cleansing while we just stayed at home.