Hi all you Beauty-Beings!
Wow, it's been such a long time since I've visited these boards and posted here at our International Coffee House! Since Facebook sent me an email telling me today is
Sandy's birthday (well, it's probably already actually the next day in Oz now!), I wished her a happy birthday there last night my time, and then came here and spent a couple hours reading through this thread from the last time I posted (which was last August 27th!) up till now. Happy Birthday once again,
Sandy, by the way! :-) I was reminded just how fond we've all always been of discussing food on this thread (saw a few mighty good-sounding recipes typed up here that I'll have to go back and make copies of too!), and I also saw that you asked about me here sometime in March of this year,
PP, and that you wondered if I'd write in with one of my characteristically long email messages at some point. Well, here I am now, and I've never managed
not to write a long post before, so I imagine that this time around will be no different!
Hmm, looks like the dust bunnies have accumulated in the corners of our lovely cafe again. Since I'm the first one here in a little while, I'm sweeping up, and using a spray bottle of my favorite Meyer's geranium-scented aromatherapy all-purpose cleaner, to wipe off the tabletops, so it'll smell really nice when you all arrive! I'm also brewing us some "Larry's Famous Chai," from the coffeehouse a few miles from our new place (yes, we've moved since I last posted! More on that shortly...). It is such a lovely-flavored chai, and I think their secret is that they use some kind of orange-flavored black tea as the base (in addition to all the regular chai spices), and I wouldn't be surprised if they maybe even add a wee bit of orange essential oil to get that intense orange flavor. They offer a variety of different nut/seed/etc. milks to mix the brewed tea with, in addition to the more standard dairy, soy and rice milks. The other milk choices are almond, hemp, hazelnut, and coconut. Having tried them all, my personal favorite is the hazelnut milk, so you all can take your pick of which kind of milk you'd like in your chai.
Oh yes, and I have an assortment of my favorite Dagoba organic dark chocolate bars here as well, broken into neat rectangular one-ounce pieces, for those of you who'd like some. The kinds I have today are New Moon (bittersweet, 74% cacao), Conocado (single-origin chocolate from the Dominican Republic, 73% cacao), Xocolatl (spicy chocolate with chilies, cacao nibs, maca, nutmeg and vanilla, 74% cacao), and Eclipse (the darkest, least-sweet choice, "pure extra bittersweet," with an 87% cacao content). On their wrappers is written, "
You can deprive the body but the soul needs chocolate." (These Dagoba folks are my kind of people!
) I've put bright pink tablecloths on the tables and laid out several bits of chocolate on some festive brightly-colored plates so that it almost feels like a party is about to begin! Welcome, Everyone!
So, to begin the catching-up process, the last time I wrote in here, the online eBay art gallery that Ron and I were members of had recently fallen apart (as did the first, in-person, gallery we were in, as many of you may recall!), so it was the second art gallery we were members of that had fallen apart in two years or less!
I mentioned that one of our friends had jokingly told us at that time that we should write a book on how to close down an art gallery!
And when I posted that here on this thread,
Laura kindly replied, "Third time's a charm!"
and, all this time later, it turns out that she was right!
(So far, at least!) ...To make some longish stories at least short enough that my post won't be a complete novella taking up multiple pages of this thread
, Ron and I both got asked to join a new online eBay art gallery at the beginning of this year, one started by some of the former members of the previous gallery. And this one's still going strong at present!
Unfortunately, however, at this very same time, we unexpectedly found out that we needed to move: We were living on the bottom floor of a duplex with the landlady living on the top floor. It was the first time we'd ever lived in a duplex, and it started out well enough, but over time, it became apparent that the landlady was not only uncomfortably negative (to the point that we came to avoid her as often as possible), but that she also had unspoken expectations regarding us, and was frequently pushing on our boundaries in various ways. Since this was the first time we'd ever lived in a duplex, it hadn't occurred to us that such a situation might arise, and since we are both quite private people, it was quite uncomfortable for us. However, since there is such a high housing demand in the Santa Cruz area, and it's such a desirable location, it's quite a process to find a new place to live (not to mention the whole process of packing up everything and moving it all, etc.), so we stayed there for 2 1/2 years anyway. Finally, though, the situation came to a head toward Christmas-time last year, when our oven stopped working (it's such a weird synchronicity that a couple of you on this thread also talked about your stoves/ovens not working a few months back!
), which required us to interact with her. To make a long story short, this one event precipitated a series of boundary-related conflicts that escalated to the point that, even though we are excellent tenants, who have alway paid the rent on time, etc., and have always gotten excellent recommendations from all our other landlords, this landlady got angry at us and, at the beginning of January, she actually asked us to move out (though "asked" is a bit of a euphemism for the manner in which she went about it)!
Although we feel that she behaved quite unfairly and unprofessionally, and were very upset by the whole thing
, it was also actually a blessing in disguise that this all happened, because it got us out of that unhealthy environment much sooner than we'd have gotten around to moving otherwise.
In looking for a new place, we headed for the hills, up into the low-lying mountains 10-15 miles north of Santa Cruz, where we found a trailer for rent (finally, a totally detached dwelling!) in a lovely setting in the redwoods in the cute little town of Ben Lomond, which was apparently settled by the Scots long ago, and the name means "Beacon Peak" in Gaelic. We moved in in February, and despite the dwelling's small size, it has a relatively sizeable, well-shaded, gardenable yard with a large redwood tree, and even a holly tree (complete with lots of red berries) growing in it. Since the previous tenant had cleared away all the plants in the yard to use it as a parking lot(!), the yard was largely just bare earth when we first moved in, so we planted violets and wood sorrel, also known as wild shamrock (
Sandy, I think this may be the same plant you mentioned that you found growing in
Geoff's yard that he thought was a noxious weed, and that you took a cutting of to plant in your garden -- another interesting synchronicity!), which love to grow in the shade beneath the redwoods, so they are thriving, and we're hoping that they will soon spread to fill up the whole yard! In fact, here's a picture of one of the clumps of our shamrocks (their official name is "
oxalis oregana") -
Sandy, is the the same plant you were talking about,or pretty similar? (Let's see if I can remember how to post an image here!):
It took us a while to recover from the drama and exhaustion of that whole traumatic "forced-moving" phase earlier this year, and we seem to only just now be getting fully settled again. I used to think of myself as a pretty positive person, but am repeatedly surprised lately to realize how much more negative I've been ever since that all happened (but at least awareness is the first step in changing it!). I'm still also struggling with getting my art productivity levels back to where they really need to be, especially after a huge interruption like moving --- that's an issue I've continually wrestled with during these past few years of attempted self-employment as an artist after being in "normal" corporate jobs for so many years -- my earnings, how much I sell, are now so directly tied to how much I can produce, and how quickly, on a day-to-day basis. Fortunately, however, Ron's is being quite prolific and selling quite a bit of art lately, and our rent in this much smaller place is almost half what it was before.
I also just finished taking a wonderful class with a very abundant and spiritual relatively-local female visionary artist on painting the black madonna (who, as she explains, represents the divine feminine for all people, since black includes all colors). It has really helped me to get back some of my lost painting enthusiasm, because she has a very spiritual approach where you first infuse intention into the canvas by writing positive, affirmational words on it (like Love, Peace, Joy, Abundance, etc.), then you create the painting in several layers, reshaping the images over and over, "tending and nurturing" the painting, and using painting as a form of prayer and meditation. I enjoyed the class so much and got so much out of it that I'm hoping to take another one of hers before too long.
I'm also still thinking about getting certified as a nutritional consultant and/or a master herbalist (or taking a "holistic health practitioner" program that includes both), which I've long been interested in, and would also eventually give me other income-making options in a field I'm really interested in in addition to art. Now that we're finally beginning to get more settled again, I'm starting to look into that possibility again.
So that's what's been happening with me lately. What's going on for all of you?
PP, have you sold your place yet? By the way,
Theunim and
Lucky, it's great to meet you both, and I've enjoyed reading your posts here, along with all those of all my old friends here. Sorry if I missed anyone else; there was quite a bit of reading to catch up on over the past 10 or 11 months of this thread!
What fun it is that this thread is still going strong! Long live our International Coffee House!
Lots of love to all,
AquaDeb
One of these days I really must get over that...) but anyway, it seems from my memory it has spinach and riccotta along with mushrooms in that too. Oh it was so good...sigh... gaining weight here just thinking about it. 
Italian food has been on my mind lately because one of the two big supermarket chains here is having sort of an Italian festival with recipes and promotions and what not... 
Not really sure why - I used to LOVE to cook, but for some reason it feels too much like work these days.
Still you could put me to work and maybe even teach me a few of your culinary specialties to bring home for George. Of course, the invitation is always open for you to come here and direct my kitchen efforts from the ease of a chair...wine glass in hand of course. 
Pet xxxxx 
I'm merely a budding baker and cook, I don't think I'm as good as Sandy says I am, but I certainly hope to be able to come up with my own wonderful secret recipes in the long run.