May 27, 2024 Breakfast - Granola, milk, yogurt, and Tropical Fruit Salad, Lunch - Chicken Salad Salad. Dinner - Pita Sandwiches

May 27, 2024 Breakfast - Granola, milk, yogurt, and Tropical Fruit Salad, Lunch - Chicken Salad Salad. Dinner - Pita Sandwiches

Today I tried to get back on a reasonable diet.

I started by eating Granola, milk, yogurt, and Tropical Fruit Salad at 9:00.

We then went on a walk in the Bosque of about 1000 steps there was no water fowl but we saw lots of turtles in the southern pond.

When we returned home Suzette went to work and I finished 2001:a Space Odyssey.

I then ate lunch at noon, a salad of greens and cherry tomatoes from our garden covered with the lovely chicken salad Suzette made yesterday and drizzled with Spanish olive oil. I also toasted a slice of baguette and covered it with slices of Jarlsberg cheese and melted the cheese in the microwave in 22 seconds and added about a dozen green cracked olives.

I then watched the last couple of points in the match at the French Open today, in which Rafa Nadal was eliminated in the first round that will probably be his last appearance at the French Open that he has dominated for so many years.

I then started my 2023 income tax preparation.

And worked until almost 4:00 when I drove to Costco but it was closed.

When I returned I picked the blooming Mr. Lincoln rose and put it in a vase beside my side of the bed, so I shall have sweet dreams tonight.

I then watched the news and at 6:00 Suzette picked some more lettuce from our garden and we started dinner. Tonight we decided to prepare lamb filled pita pocket sandwiches.  Suzette ate one-half and I ate two halves. I made a quick shallot, tomato, and cucumber tzatziki and we filled each pocket with sautéed lamb, tzatziki, labni, lettuce and slices of feta cheese and split a Carlsberg beer.

We then watched two episodes of the Antique roadshow. The first featured item with a connection to the exhibitor.  My favorite was one at the recent Santa Fe session where a man showed a small Calder sculpture that Calder had given him for his 15th birthday when his father who was a friend of Calder’s took the family to France and stayed in Calder’s compound for several days.  The small sculpture that combined a mobile with a stabile was appraised for $300,000. The second hour was 2015 Albuquerque and the high priced item was a portrait by Jean Patterson, student of the great Spanish painter, titled “the answer” that also appraised for $300,000.

We then watched Boston sweep Indians in the Eastern NBA finals and Dallas Stars beat the Edmonton Oilers 5 to 3 to take a 2 to 1 game lead in the second round of the Stanley Cup Finals.

At 9:30 Suzette went to sleep and I blogged and read a bit with a cup of chai.

I noticed tonight that there must be a psychological timing interval between a meal and dessert.

Tonight I waited about ten or fifteen minutes between my first and second pita sandwich and I was motivated to hungry for dessert.  The second sandwich must have mimicked the interval between dinner and dessert and satisfied the craving for dessert.

Bon Appetit

May 26, 2024 Snack - Pain au Chocolate brunch - Steak, Mushroom, Onion, and cheddar Omelet Snack - Pita Sandwiches. Dinner - Calabacitas with Pork and Rice

May 26, 2024 Snack - Pain au Chocolate brunch - Steak, Mushroom, Onion, and cheddar Omelet  Snack - Pita Sandwiches. Dinner - Calabacitas with Pork and Rice

I awakened at 7:45 and watched Fareed Zacharia at 8:00.

We then made Brunch. I diced the PPI grilled steak, about 4 oz. of red onion, three medium Portobello Mushrooms. Suzette sliced slices of Murray’s Croc Cheddar and broke three eggs into a bowl.

Suzette went to the garden and picked about a dozen cherry tomatoe. She sliced about 7 in half and added them to the sauté of the ingredients less the cheese. 

She then whisked the eggs and added the PPI chive ringlets leftover from last night and added the eggs to the sautéed ingredients. Finally, she lay slices of cheese on 1/2 of the omelet and flipped one side onto the other side and cooked the omelet until the cheese melted.

About 15 minutes before Suzette finished cooking the omelet I ate a pain au chocolates and made a cup,of chai.

When the omelet was almost ready, Suzette made a Bloody Mary and served the omelet with a pile of blue berries on a puddle of sweetened whipped cream cheese.

I also toasted a piece of bread that I buttered and ate with the omelet.

We ate outside under the gazebo in the breezy morning air and watched birds sitting on the wire along the alley side of our garden.

After breakfast we each clipped foliage overhanging the pond and I deadheaded several roses and picked three that I put in vases.

We then worked at our desks, but after an hour I started watching the Charles Schwab Invitational being played at Colonial Country Club in Fort Worth.  I was great seeing the club and the beautiful fairways and Trinity River.  I watched until 4:00 with a break at 2:00; when I heated two halves of a pita and filled them with tomato slices, labni, slices of cooked lamb chop, chopped onion, and lettuce. I ate about a dozen cracked green olives with the sandwiches.

Then I sliced three yellow squash, four zucchini, a small onion, and a Pasilla chili.  Suzette diced a smoked pork chop and three beef franks and added sautéed the meat with some onion and then added that with its olive oil to the vegetables that I added a skillet of water to and Suzette cooked the Calabacitas until 5:00.

I took a nap from 4:00 when the tournament ended until 5:00 during which time Suzette made a lovely chicken salad with the leftover breast from the roasted chicken she brought home last week plus Mayo, the lemon cooked minced shallots (mignonette sauce) I made for the oysters Friday evening, celery, boiled egg and diced apple.

Suzette went to the garden and picked two sprigs of tarragon that I minced and she added to the chicken salad when I returned to the kitchen.

She then heated PPI rice and served us bowls of rice covered with Calabacitas.

After an early dinner at 5:30 we watched Doc Martin and then Dallas win game 3 against the Minnesota Timberwolves.

I ate a bowl of chocolate cherry ice cream garnished with Suzette’s homemade maraschino cherries and whipped cream.

After that we watched the last two episodes of The Gentleman until 10:00 when Suzette went to bed and I stayed to drink a cup of chai and blog this entry and read 2001.

Another Sunday filled with cooking wonderful food and relaxing. I took fewer than 2000/steps today.

Bon Appetit

May 25, 2024 Breakfast - Bagels with Gravad Lax Lunch - Pain au Chocolate and latte Macchiato dinner - Vichyssoise and steak Salad

 May 25, 2024 Breakfast - Bagels with Gravad Lax  Lunch - Pain au Chocolate and latte Macchiato dinner - Vichyssoise and steak Salad 

Suzette went to work at 8:30 and I read 2001: Space Odyssey until 10:30 when I toasted two slices of bagel that I spread with cream cheese and garnished with slices of red onion, Gravad Lax and capers and ate with a cup of chai.

I then went to my desk and worked until 1:00 when I ate a pain au chocolate with a latte Macchiato.

I watched some golf and at 2:30 when Suzette returned and Henry came over he and I finalized the repair of the building at 524 Romero and then I discussed how I invest in stocks until 4:30 while Suzette napped 

Suzette woke up at 5:00 and we decided to make dinner.  I poured the remaining Vichyssoises while Suzette went to garden and clipped a handful of chives and fetched the heavy cream from the garage. I stirred heavy cream into the soup and sliced the chives into thin ringlets. I toasted two slices of baguette and we poured out the remaining Trader Joe’s Grand Reserve Sauvignon Blanc.

I diced the half of the remaining steak and Suzette sautéed it and added it to the salad.

We garnished the Vichyssoises with chives.

The soup was so thick and filling, we could only eat 1/2 of the soup, but we ate all of the salad.

We then watched Dallas beat the Edmonton Oilers in Hockey and Boston take a commanding 3 to 0 lead over the Indiana Pacers in the NBA.

At 8:00/we watched Father Brown and then Suzette went to bed.

I stayed up to watch Death in paradise and Paris Murders.

I then finished this blog entry and read more of 2001 Space Odyssey.

I regained most of my muscle strength today.

Tomorrow we will walk in the Bosque and see if my muscles have returned to full strength.

Bon Appetit

May 24, 2024 Breakfast - Tropical Fruit Salad with Granola Lunch - Martha’s El Pottal. Dinner - Oysters on the half shell, grilled steak and Asparagus salad, and corn on the Cobb,

May 24, 2024 Breakfast - Tropical Fruit Salad with Granola Lunch - Martha’s El Pottal. Dinner - Oysters on the half shell, grilled steak and Asparagus salad, and corn on the Cobb, 

It was a great day of food, but a little more activity than my body could handle.

I read in bed until around 10:30 when I ate granola, yoghurt, and tropical fruit salad. Instead of milk I used the accumulated juice in the bowl of fruit to moisten the granola, which I prefer because it shifts the favorite away from dairy and toward fruit.

Then at 12:30 I drove to Martha’s El Portal on Rio Grande near Central and met Henry for lunch.  We actually ordered breakfast enchiladas with a fried egg on top.  I ordered my enchiladas with ground beef and red chili. Henry ordered chicken and green chili in his enchiladas.

The enchiladas were served with refried beans and cottage fries. The amount of food was overwhelming but interesting, except the tortillas were not soaked enough in chili sauce and were a little dry.

After lunch we drove to 524 Romero and decided how to repair the damaged north wall and planter wall.

I then drove to Smith’s on Carlisle and bought items for the dinner party, including hot dogs and hot dog buns, shallots, chocolate cherry ice cream, chocolate chip ice cream sandwiches, yellow squash, and blueberries.

I then drove home and put the groceries away and then lay down for a one hour nap. At 5:00 when Suzette arrived at 5:00 I awakened and made a mignonette sauce with lemon juice and minced shallots and Suzette made a cocktail sauce with catsup, horseradish sauce and lemon juice.

I then sliced 1/2 cucumber, four radishes, and three tomatoes and Suzette rinsed and spun lettuce. We then assembled the salad and added some crumbled feta cheese.

Suzette snapped and tossed asparagus with salt and pepper and olive oil.

Aaron, Monica, and Alexi arrived at 6:45 with steaks and three dozen oysters on the half shell. I opened a bottle of ? Perez cava that combined three Spanish grapes in a complex and delicious flavor. There weee three types of oysters, Rappahanock, Blue Point, Wellfleet That elevate while the boys played the girls in bocce. This was my first game of bocce in years and I enjoyed it with the help of Aaron picking up and handing me the balls.j

After the game of bocce and when all the oysters were eaten we went to the kitchen and started the main entrees, grilled hot dogs, rib steaks, and asparagus with salad.

Suzette then grilled the hot dogs and their hot dog buns, three steaks, and the asparagus.

Aaron and I dressed the salad and Monica asked if we could drink the Bottle of Chateau Haut Lafitte Le Petit 2018 that I bought for $30.00 at Costco.

The wine was lovely with dinner and everything was delicious. Unfortunately, I my muscles became weak and I only ate a hot dog and one slice of beef.

Aaron and Monica ate about 1/2 steak each and complimented us on the wine.

We finished dinner about 10:00 and I sat down and showed them the Leonard Cohen documentary titled Hallelujah.

They left around 10:30 and we went to bed.

Bon Appetit

May 23, 2024 Lunch - Salami Salad with Tabouli Dinner - Chicken Mole with Rice

May 23, 2024 Lunch - Salami Salad with Tabouli Dinner - Chicken Mole with Rice

Today the market was amazing that resulted in my second largest gain in one stock with one of the largest losses in all the other stocks in my portfolio in a long time. Nvidia rose $88.50 and the Dow dropped $$605 and the NASDAQ dropped $65. Those two tidal waves meeting resulted in a net gain of 1.6% to my portfolio, resulting in a new high.

I ate a pain au chocolate and drank a cup of tea at 9:00.

Then I read most of an interesting article in a recent New Yorker on the British Museum’s antiquity collection.

At 2:00 I made a large salami and tabouli salad with dried black olives and dolmas with Yasmin’s garlic bread.

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At 3:30 I took the empty propane bottle to be refilled which turned into the biggest adventure of the day. At my first stop of the day at U-haul where I discovered that the bottle had to be re-certified.  I took it to Ortega’s Propane, where I was told that bottles expired after 12 years and my bottle had expired and needed to be exchanged and the Maverick gas station at Comanche and I-25 or at University and Menaul exchanged bottles. So I drove to the Maverick at Comanche and I-25 but the6 were sold out of bottles.  Finally at the Maverick at University and Menaul I acquired a new bottle of propane and returned home 1 1/2 hour at 5:00.

We were not terribly hungry and watched two episodes of Netflix’ The Gentleman and then Suzette heated the two drumsticks in mole sauce with rice and asparagus with bottles of Negra Modelo.

We then watched Midsomer Mystery from 8:00 until 9:30 at which time Suzette went to bed and I watched the end of the game 1 of the NHL series between Dallas Stars and Edmonton; Oilers that Edmonton won.

I then blogged while I drank a White Russian and watched Ari Melber and then Lawrence O’Donnell and went to bed at 11:30.

Bon Appetit