1. The steel blue sky and crisp cold air beckoned me to slip on my back pack and head out into Kellogg on foot. I stopped in to see Phyllis at Kellogg Insurance and paid our home and auto insurance for the next year, dropped my Avista payment in their parking lot pay box, and bought the groceries I needed to get going on my Thanksgiving cooking projects, packed them inelegantly in my pack and walked back home. I racked up about 3000 steps, a number I hope to increase over time, but a good one for now. I felt the benefits of this walk all day -- circulation felt good, I was a little more alert, and I know this walking will reward me with deep and restful sleep.
2. I also needed paper towels, an eight pack of seltzer water, and a bag of dog food. Since these items wouldn't fit in my pack, I drove to the store. I also went to the clinic to have my monthly blood draw for the U. of MD. Tracy, the world's finest phlebotomist, casually told me she has been driving my blood kit personally to the post office to make sure it goes out in the mail the day of my blood draw. I told her I'd be happy to deliver the kit myself and so after a fifteen minute wait while my blood clotted and Tracy spun it, she brought my kit out to the waiting room and I rocketed to the post office. Luckily, a post office patron was registering for a mailbox and it was going slowly, because Tracy called me and nervously asked me if I'd mailed the kit yet. When I replied I hadn't, she exhaled a booming sigh and told me she'd forgotten to include a bar code -- and without it, the U of MD wouldn't accept my blood. No problem. I rocketed back to the clinic, Tracy met me at the door, rectified her oversight, and in a matter of minutes I was back at the post office and mailed my blood to Baltimore.
3. Back home, I soaked a package of black beans for four hours. While they were soaking, I put two trays of cornbread pieces in the oven for about an hour and assembled the ingredients I needed to make sausage cornbread dressing. I put it all together in a large mixing bowl, covered in with plastic wrap, and I'll take it back out on Thursday, let it reach room temperature, and bake it.
I also made a pot of black bean soup, an old favorite from Molly Katzen's Moosewood Cookbook. I wish I still had my original copy of this cookbook from over thirty years ago. I wrote a bunch of notes about variations I used to apply to this recipe, but that book is long gone. I think, though, if I keep making this soup, some of those things I did in the good old days will come back to me. If you'd like to see the recipe, it's right here.
Luckily, the Zags game wasn't on until 8:30 and I finished cooking and eating my dinner just in the nick of time to go over to Christy and Everett's and watch the Zags all but surrender a thirteen point second half lead to Illinois, but hang on to beat the Fightnin' Illini 84-78 in their opening game of the Maui Jim Maui Invitational.
Free throws. Make those free throws. Had the Zags not clanked several free throws late in this game, this contest would not have been so tight. The Zags also committed a ton of turnovers. But, I have to admit, it was fun to watch the frantic Illinois squad, led by hot shooting Trent Frazier (who was draining threes from Kapalua), charge back in this game and give the Zags a scare.
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