Long day, short post

I arranged my day today so I could stay home all day and work--and yet it was lunchtime before I got back to editing my manuscript. I had to read email, read the paper, do a laundry, shower and wash my hair, do my yoga. All that eats up a lot of time. But I did spend a profitable afternoon working on my manuscript.
Tonight my memoir class met for the first time for the spring session. Lovely to have all those women together--they are so fond of each other, so sharing. We had one newcomer, but she fit right in and was the only one who had a piece to share with us. We listened spellbound to her reading about her father's descent into Alzheimer's. It sparked a lot of conversation, because many in the group are of the age where caring for parents is a major concern. Beyond that,  we caught up with each other's news and generally had a good time. I know I'm supposed to be leading this group, but sometimes I have a hard time getting control, because they head off in their own direction.
My longtime friend Linda came early, and we had a tuna supper--albacore tuna (that good stuff from Oregon) spread over greens dressed with a cilantro dressing and then topped with an avocado dressing. I decided to omit the chile from the avocado part but keep the curry. Now I think it would have been wiser to omit the curry and keep the chile--it needed that bite! I fixed pimiento cheese sandwiches for the group and, unfortunately, have too many left over. Sigh. I guess I'll have to eat them tomorrow.

Finishing a project

There's something  unsettling about finishing a project--a sense of triumph, yes, but also a moment of almost bewilderment. What will I do next? I sent off the rough draft of my Texas food book to the editor today--if she likes it and I end up with a contract, there will be a lot more to do. But for the time being it's out of my hands. Oh, of course I'll find snippets and recipes here and there that I want to add, but  for the time being it's done. And I wait.
Meantime, I can go back to my novel--no wonder the poor thing suffers. I work on it for a while, then abandon it, then have to go back and pick up the threads, each time hoping I'll have an epiphany about where the darn thing is going. I know roughly, but I'm really plowing through this first draft. Then there's the project my agent told me about--but I've heard nothing from him again or the publisher.
My mom always used to tell me that the Lord works in mysterious ways, and I am convinced over and over that it's true. Today, when I sent that first draft, the editor wrote back and asked if I'd be interested in co-authoring a book. She has a project, about women in the American West, that really interests her but needs some help. I replied of course I'd be interested. So, maybe, there's my next project.
Meantime, it's a busy week ahead, and tonight, with no project on my desk, at least no immediately active one, I'll read a mystery. There's been some posts on the Sisters in Crime listserv about what you do when you finish a project. Suggestions range from starting the next one to cooking to taking a vacation. My answer? Read a mystery.
Fixed a nice, light supper tonight. Some of that good tuna I get from Oregon, with chopped red onion and tomato, basil, capers, salt and olive oil. Yumm! I ate more than I thought I would. Did a bad thing (for the cat but one he liked) and drained the tuna water over some kidney diet cat food. Talk about self defeating! But Wywy was happy.

Cooking with what you have

Ever since I read Jam Today, about cooking with what you have, I've kept that thought in mind. So tonight, I pulled a delicious dinner out of my fridge. I've been enamored of the Pisces tuna Sue and I ordered, but it comes in 7-1/2 oz. cans, which makes too much for any one meal for me. One night I sauteed it in oil, added capers and anchovies and poured it over pasta; another night I added it to a tossed salad. But still almost half a can. So tonight I made tuna cakes, modeled pretty much on the way I've always made salmon croquettes but adding a bit of dill pickle relish (I'm not sure I even tasted it). But my leftover tuna made two good-sized cakes, so I enjoyed one thoroughly and saved the other for lunch tomorrow. I had a butternut squash that really should have been cooked before this,though it was fine. So I baked the halves with butter and sugar, scooped out the meat, mashed it all up with a bit more butter, and ate only a small portion. It's really low in Weight Watchers points and really high in fiber--so good for you. (Yes, I did count the butter and brown sugar). Then I had some good thin asparagus, so I roasted a few stalks of that. Voila! A meal fit for royalty. Tomorrow I must steam the rest of the asparagus every so slightly to keep it from spoiling.
Butternut squash reminds me to ask if everyone knows the trick for dealing with these hard-shelled critters. Slice around the middle--you won't get a deep cut at all, but at least break the skin. Then microwave for about three minutes. It will cut in half like a dream, and you can scoop the seeds out and get ready to bake. Also be sure to trim a bit off each base to give it something to sit evenly on in the pan.
As if that weren't enough, I made a cheese ball for my annual Christmas party and put it in the freezer. I am beginning to feel almost guilty referring people to Cooking My Way Through Life with Kids and Books (well, not too guilty),but the recipe is in there in the first chapter. It's a mix of Velveeta (those who scorn it are missing a great cooking cheese), cream cheese and blue cheese, with pecans, parsley, onions, Worcestershire and horseradish (I put a bit more of the latter in than the recipe called for, but it tasted great). Truth is, I have tasted a bit of this and a bit of that all day long, so I probably should add 2 unspecified points to my daily count--but I used them on chocolate. Even tried some salami at the deli counter at Central Market this morning.
Now I have a sink of dishes waiting for me, but I decided it was time to sit down and rest my back. Lots of reading to do tonight. Don't think I'll make my goal of two more queries and doubt I will either Saturday or Sunday. Both promise to be full days (by the time I get my nap in!) But full days in a good way.
A friend emailed from Nebraska wanting reading suggetions, so I began with the Deborah Crombie novels, also suggested Julia Spencer-Fleming, and I have a whole long list of books by members of Sisters in Crime to send her.
The good news of the day is that I have my car back! They guarantee me it will work. I picked it up around 5:30, when it was dusk and a little chilly for top down. I'll try it Monday--probably won't drive anway until then. Sue is driving us to Weatherford in the morning.

The contradictory dilemma of creativity

I've been thinking a lot about creativity, especially when I do my morning three pages of free writing (I do this as many mornings as I can, though I don't come anywhere near the seven days a week recommended in The Artist's Way. This writing is supposed to enhance your creativity, but how do you measure that? And if you measure it, aren't you applying the rules and forms that are the opposite of creativity? Similarly, retirement is supposed to be freeing my creativity to write the great American novel--or at least the great American mystery. But if I do as everyone says you should in retirement, move at my own pace, it takes me most of the morning to do my free writing, exercise, shower, answer emails, read the paper--I get precious little writing down. I admit that didn't worry me much as long as I was waiting for an answer, but now that I've had a rejection, I feel I need to move ahead (I did send out two queries today). Writing requires self-discipline (argh, so does dieting!). But aren't self-discipline and creativity polar opposites. I don't want to be one of those artists who creates larger-than-life canvases at three in the morning, but I would like to strike a happy balance.
I know that now, more than ever, I'm good at putting things between me and writing--manuscripts to read for TCU Press or other sources, social events, etc. This morning, while free writing, I had an epiphany of sorts (I used to have a friend who had an epiphany every day and the rest of us giggled about it). The things I put between me and writing bring me tangible results--sometimes money, often the company of good friends. So today I also finished a novel I'm reading for TCU and arranged a potluck get-together for ten or 12 neighbors for Sunday night.
I'll cook the entree, which is a funny story in itself. I'm doing a radio interview Saturday on a local station in a small town not far from here, and when the host got the review copy of Cooking My Way Through Life, she emailed that she was going to make gorilla casserole that night. I think it's really called meat and pasta casserole or something, but the last line of the recipe was "You could feed ten gorillas with it," so the kids and I always called it gorilla casserole. Next day, the radio host reported that it was yummy but even when she halved it, she had a lot left over. So that's what I'll make Sunday night--haven't made it in years.
And here I am back to food again. Last night I opened one of my special cans of Pisces tuna, fresh caught on the Oregon seacoast (no dolphins endangered), canned immediately, and only cooked once. I sauteed it in some olive oil with onions, a couple of anchovy filets, and some capers, and added it to a small amount of pasta. Really good, but I used less than half the can, so tonight I made a tossed salad with tuna (still have about 1/3 can left), leftover green beans that Jacob didn't want, some green peas from the bag I keep in the freezer, grape tomatoes halved, and a bit of lettuce--actually would have been better without the lettuce. Got to get over thinking lettuce is essential to a salad! I dressed this with a vinaigrette that had--you guessed it--some of that open can of anchovies in it.

Poisoned Press Webcon, tuna, Deborah Crombie

Today was my last stay-at-home, get rid of this cold and lethargy day, and since I felt a bit of cabin fever, I know it's over. I was supposed to go to a baby shower this morning but didn't want to take germs as a present to the mom-to-be. Today Poisoned Pen Bookstore/Press sponsored an all-day webcon on mysteries--live sessions with authors speaking, taped sessions, and print text to be read. I had signed up months ago and spent much of the morning cruising the web site. I didn't do too well with the live sessions--in one I watched the speaker talked too fast and had absolutely no camera presence. But I thoroughly enjoyed the text presentations on everything from Why Write Cozies to the Advantages and Disadvantages of Writing Historicals. There was a coffee shop discussion site, but I didn't have the right equipment on my computer for that. So the experience was a six-of-one and half-a-dozen of the other for me. This afternoon I finished the novel I was reading, napped, did a bit of office work, and was generally lazy. It was a glorious day today--warm, sunny, a perfect fall day. I know my brother thinks I spend too much time indoors, and today he was right. I should have been outside enjoying the weather. But I had given myself permission to do what I wanted today. My neighbors, Jay and Susan, walked across the street to the school carnival, and I laughed at them. When I had little children and had to go to those carnivals, I dreaded them. Couldn't imagine anyone without children going just for enjoyment, but they found it colorful and full of activity.
A whle ago I read in a food book about Pisces tuna, canned in Coos Bay, Oregon, by a small fishery where the dolphins swim alongside their boats but are never caught. Pisces offers several products, like salmon, smoked salmon, etc., but I wanted the albacore tuna packed in water. The gentleman at the fishery assured me their fish is never frozen, never cooked before it goes into the can, and then it is cooked once. It's much more expensive than Chicken of the Sea albacore but I eat a lot of tuna and thought it well worth it. Sue and I split a case, and I had some for the first time tonight. What I tasted plain was mild and good, not at all fishy, almost like chicken. Considered all kinds of tuna recipes but ended up with creamed tuna, with green peas and a lot of white wine in the sauce, along with just a bit of cheddar. Good but a little rich. Of course a 7 oz. can made enough for three people. My friend Charles has been in the hospital but is due out Monday, and I told him I'd bring some food--he just might get creamed tuna, which is a comfort food.
After I finished the novel this afternoon, I told myself I would not start another and would, instead, get serious about rewriting my own novel. But the new Deborah Crombie novel I got last night was like a siren call, so I started Necessary as Blood. One of the things about series that you get hooked on is that you mentally live in the world of the characters--so, tonight, it was comforting to be back in the world of Gemma James and Duncan Kincaid. I'm in for a happy read, but, yes, I'll get back to the novel.
I also spent time today planning my annual Christmas party. I've been dickering with Jamie about Saturday vs. Sunday and have finally decided on a date. I threatened to cancel it, since my budget is now limited, but everyone I talked to said they didn't care what they ate, they just wanted to visit. Some said that's the only time once a year that they see some people. So I'm forging ahead.