short and sweet while my hands are clean

It's been a messy, dirty day.  One of the few things I do look forward to with the imminence of springtime is that the warmer, more humid days restore the moisture winter sucked from my hands.  I look forward to the day I can wash my hands without having to immediately slather them with hand lotion, before they become taut and shiny and feel all papery.  Blech.

Anyway, I'm waist to eyeball high with boxes right now and a little overwhelmed by the knowledge that tomorrow is our last full day in this apartment.  When I look around, it looks like there's still so much to pack, but when I pull out the boxes (the guys at the liquor store love me - they won't have to pay their recycling bill until March) and start putting stuff in them, I find myself running out rather quickly.  We had an early dinner (more in a moment) and then I got to packing up my kitchen, but I figured it was time for a Blog & Wine break, so I opened up my Malbec before I packed up the corkscrew.

Dinner tonight came to us via the talented (and busy!) hands of the cooks at Blackbird Pizzeria.  My intention had been for us to eat at Blackbird - less trash and clean up for me - but there was not a single table open in the whole joint!  Good for them - it's always great to see a business like that do so well while other pizza parlors only blocks from there are switching hands so quickly they're not even bothering to put up the new signs.  We ordered our food to go and flipped through Grid while we waited for dinner.  While we waited, it occurred to us that one reason there were no tables open was because they are not exactly fast food.  Anyway, we got our bag of goodies and took it home:

After far more deliberation than I felt the menu warranted, Mister decided on the Chickpea Salad Hoagie, which appears to be the vegan equivalent of chicken salad.  It was a lot of sandwich - probably about 14" (Mister's guess).  He started out enthusiastically enough, but he seemed to lose steam about halfway through, beginning to devote more of his attention to the fries.  Once he'd finishd the first half, he rewrapped the second half with great gusto, at which point I realized exactly how big a sandwich it really was and he made some comment about only being able to stand the texture one half at a time.

Mister takes his sandwiches very seriously.  If they aren't perfect, it's as though it is a personal offense.

Speaking of serious - these are some serious fries!  Mister and I agreed (as we conquered that pile with the zeal of people who haven't eaten fries since...well, okay, since Monday) that these are very, very good fries.  The outsides are perfectly crispy while the insides maintain a soft, light texture, and the folks at Blackbird have the salt thing down pat - not too much, not too little.  It's like the Goldilocks of French Fries.

As I mentioned, I got the Roasted Eggplant Grinder and it was astonishingly good.  I ate the whole thing happily, along with my share of the fries.  It's ever-so-slightly too oily, but that's really just my terrified-of-fat-calories side talking - the garlic-infused oil really makes the sandwich.  The marinated eggplant, broccoli rabe, and roasted red peppers certainly help create an amazing sandwich.  I definitely preferred this sandwich over their cheesesteaks, mainly because this sandwich had just a sprinkling of Daiya, rather than it being a main ingredient.  I think it worked very well on this sandwich because there were several other bold flavors to balance it out - it really kind of dominates the seitan in the cheesesteak.  Perhaps if the seitan was seasoned a bit more creatively, it would hold its own against the Daiya...food for thought.

Anyway, I'm about to run out of wine (and steam), so it's back to the boxes...let me leave you with a few glamour shots of our mess:

I don't know why I was surprised, but it actually took two boxes to pack all of my cookbooks.  I guess this makes sense, since I had three shelves devoted to them... 

I refer to this as my Fail Box.  This is probably the crappiest packing I've done yet.  I just kind of tossed all of my cookware into a really big box.  It's crammed in there pretty good and Mister already practiced picking it up, so I think it will make its way two blocks without any major damage.  It is neither orderly nor attractive, though.

from the floor to the middle

middle to the top...that's quite a pile

I have absolutely no idea what's for dinner tomorrow, so stay tuned!