Friday (the 13th), I'm in love

I'm kind of obsessing over this whole Judgment Day thing - picking it apart from every angle and examining every facet to the "story."  This may be a relatively unpopular sentiment, but at the moment, I feel simple sadness for these people.  They truly believe the events their prophet has foretold will come to pass.  A slightly cynical side of me wants to be standing there with them, holding vigil from 6pm (when the great earthquake hits that signifies that God is closing the door to heaven) through to the next day when everyone is still here and safe.  It's supposed to be gorgeous this weekend.  Bright, sunny, happy weather.  Not exactly Endtimes weather.  A more compassionate side of me is genuinely sad for the heartbreak and feelings of loss these people have been set up for (or, have set themselves up for, to be fair).  Can you imagine feeling so certain of something that you base your entire existence around it for not just the few days that it has captured the attention of the general public but for years leading up to now?  Can you imagine being so sure of the future that you would rid yourself of all earthly belongings and separate yourself from your job?  Can you even fathom what would happen, how you would feel, the day after all these things were supposed to happen, when you're sitting in sunshine in an undestroyed field somewhere, not glorified?

It's devastating, really.

For our part, Mister and I started the countdown with Pasta e Fagioli from Veganomicon, although I forgot the roasted asparagus.  Pity - I guess we'll have to eat that up before 6pm Saturday...just in case we're wrong.

I actually found and purchased pennette this time around, but honestly, in these pictures, it doesn't look that different from the version I made with grown-up penne.  Regardless, it's one tasty beans-n-pasta dish and my Apothic Red (which I may rename Apocalypse Red) completed the meal perfectly.

I've rambled enough about this Pasta e Fagioli in previous posts.  Additionally, you may be wondering just what the heck Friday the 13th and Love have to do with anything I've said so far.

Nothing, actually.  But I didn't want to spend my whole post exploring my myriad conflicting feelings about Saturday, so I decided tonight was as good a time as any to fill you in on what Mister and I did on Friday the 13th.

My husband's family is a little strange sometimes.  I love them for it.  So, when my brother-in-law and his fiancee selected May 13th as their wedding date, explaining that it was the only Friday the 13th in 2011, not too many people were surprised.  What was surprising was that he managed to get my husband to wear a shiny lavender vest and tie.  Greeks should not wear lavender - it is NEVER their color.

Lavender accessories aside, my Mister, the Best Man, was very handsome all dressed up in grown-up clothes.

Apparently, varying shades of purple made up the wedding theme, as my mother-in-law and I laughed about the two lavender-clad Greek men matching very masculine things like....

The cake.  It's fun, isn't it?  White with purple flowers "blooming" off of toffee branches?  As you can see, the stuffiness of the reception hall prior to proper adjustment of the climate control made some of the blossoms jump ship, but the cake was returned to an appropriate temperature and fixed up before the reception started.  I feel kind of bad, now, about photographing it before the ceremony...

However, Mister and I were running out of ways to entertain ourselves, since we arrived 30 minutes before his parents and grandmother and 45 minutes before the bride and groom and wedding party.  No, we were not very early.  They were all very late.  Still, I got the chance to photograph one of the tables once it was set up...all in purple and lavender to match the wedding party.

Due to unforeseen occurrences (a superstitious person might even say "bad luck"), the ceremony actually ended up starting about the time it would have been finished.  Nevertheless, it was a lovely outdoor ceremony, which concluded just as twilight was setting in.

My little angelbaby (AKA, the bride and groom's daughter) was an adorable flower girl, wearing a poofy purple dress that might have been a size too big for her and definitely a lot of dress for a little girl.  In the picture above, you can see her 14-year-old sister, also in lavender to match the men, holding up the back of angelbaby's dress so she doesn't step on it.

This is the only picture in existence (as far as I know) of my husband holding hands with a child.  It was actually quite adorable.  The ringbearer (AKA, the bride's son) has a great amount of love and admiration for Mister, who once fixed a toy for him.  His whole face lit up when he arrived and saw Mister, so when he made his way down the aisle with his little sister, as soon as he was safely beside Mister he just slipped his tiny hand inside Mister's.

Believe me, I was not going to miss that photo op.  Speaking of which, I told Mister I was going to take a ton of pictures of him because "I don't ever want to see you in that color again but I don't ever want to forget this day, either."  I'm such a little devil sometimes. 

It was wonderful to see BIL so happy.  The reception was very nice.  My MIL and I opened the bar (we figured we'd been waiting the longest, so it was fair), and there were a ton of appetizers I could (and did) eat.  I love butlered hors d'oeuvres and regret that we did not get to partake of any at our own wedding.  We had hors d'oeuvres, the same ones as our guests, but ours were set out on trays in the "special room" we all hid in during cocktail hour so we could make our grand entrances to "Get This Party Started" (by P!nk) and the Imperial Death March (from Star Wars).  'Cause that's how me and Mister roll.

I'd never heard the song the bride and groom danced their first dance to, but it was pretty and clearly had meaning to them as they were singing it to one another while they danced.  The groom also danced with his mother to Josh Groban's "You Raise Me Up," while I successfully prevented Mister from ruining it for me by complaining about how much he hates Josh Groban's voice.  Mister gave a very nice and slightly impish toast, followed by the Maid of Honor, the bride's daughter, who burst into tears about one sentence in.  Happy tears, don't worry.  Another fun, touching, and somewhat unconventional part of the evening was when, in lieu of the bride-father dance, the bride's 18-year-old son asked her to dance with him to Boyz II Men's "Mama."  I have to admit, I've never seen that before.

I had a ball, dancing the night away with my sisters-in-law and cousins, even a couple of aunts and of course, plenty of nieces.  One niece and one nephew in particular were very excited to see Aunt Natalie, which always makes ya feel good.  The food was very nice and the open bar was certainly welcome - the champagne was surprisingly tasty and MIL and I took care of the "leftover" glasses at our table.

Best of all, we get to do this all over again (as long as no one gets swept up to heaven on Saturday and the venue doesn't get eaten by a big earthquake) in a few weeks for a cousin's wedding!  Fortunately for Mister, he's not in the wedding this time, so he can wear black, not pastels.

That was truly amazing.

birds of paradise = Blackbird

It is the third day of October and I'm still so excited about that (and all that is to come this month) that I could bake a cake.  And I might!  I'm listening to the rain gently tapping against the side of my home and giving thanks that it held off through all of today's festivities - it literally started within ten minutes of Mister locking our door behind him.

I got up first, which is a little unusual on Sundays - even if I wake up, I usually lie in bed and wait for Mister to gain consciousness.  However, this Sunday I awoke to the awful clamor of our alarm clock, which I had set before retiring so I would have time to re-color my hair before the wedding.  I dyed it a couple of weeks ago because I had well over an inch of 25% grey roots showing and because the color had almost completely left the bleached sections of my hair which had two affects: on one hand, it simply gave the impression that my whole head of hair was a bit lighter than it was which annoys me - dark hair colors suit me better.  On the other hand, it's not like these sections completely drained of color, leaving me with pleasant little blonde streaks - no, they maintained just enough pinkish color to just look dirty and unkempt.  However, the Garnier Nutrisse that I used looked great for a couple of days and immediately abandoned my hair with each subsequent washing... permanent hair color, my eye.

I would like to take this opportunity to plug for Feria hair color.  I'm relatively sure that by putting that out there, I will find a comment within the next couple of days telling me of the dozens of horrible things they do to animals or our environment or something.  I really hope that doesn't happen, because I LOVE their line of hair color.  Every time I use Feria, I wonder why my dumb butt ever tried anything else.  The reason is always the same - price, but honestly, I'll pay the extra $4 to have hair as brilliant and vibrantly colored as my hair is right now.  I used Ruby Rush, one of their "Power Reds."  It enhanced the black in my hair and turned the bleached bits a vivacious true red and I am completely in love with my hair color right now.

Anyway, we got in our [shared] Audi A4 and zoomed out to Lancaster County.  Holy cow, that car is fun to drive!  It accelerates effortlessly and drives so smoothly a person could easily go 90-100 mph without even realizing it.  No, Mom, I did not go 100 mph... but I got nothin' to say about 90.  Most of the time I was responsible, but there are a lot of open roads between here and the winery, and I haven't driven a car that fun to drive since Mister and I rented a Mustang for our first Tahoe trip in 2003. 

The wedding was beautiful - we hadn't met the bride until today, but from the way her whole face was taken up by her smile and the way her personality showed through even when she was trying to be solemn and serious saying her vows, I could tell she was perfect for our friend.  He looked very happy and they had the most exciting "You may kiss the bride" moment I've witnessed!  It was great to see some friends we hadn't seen in a while, including one who came all the way from St. Louis for the joyous occasion. 

I would like to take an opportunity to do an anti-plug.  Lancaster County Winery is a lovely setting for a wedding (even though a week of rainy days makes it very difficult for women wearing high heels to walk across the grass to the outdoor seating).  There is a delightful mural in the banquet room with multicolored birds of paradise that look very much like our friend's tattoos.  There is a lot of neat antique farm equipment and winery-things to look at while milling around the somewhat pitiful food and drink offerings.  This is in no way a reflection on our friend or what a great time we had at his wedding, but the caterers are pretty awful, and I mean that in the nicest possible way.  Perhaps they were going for a French influence with their portion sizes.  However, considering that the only things there that I could eat were butternut soup and cubed fruit, I would have appreciated slightly more than four spoonfuls of soup in my tiny little bowl.  After Mister and I made our way back to our table with our meager plates, another couple came back and the female half had a hummus wrap.  About 5 minutes later, Mister and I went back out to where the "food" was, and I asked about the hummus wraps and was told "Oh, I'm sorry, we gave those to the two vegetarians."

Wow.  Apparently, there are only two vegetarians in all of Lancaster County and they are not us.  What is with this weird perspective flesh-eaters have that makes them think that only vegetarians would be interested in not glutting themselves on a rotting corpse?  If an omnivore eats a "vegetarian" dish (weird stuff, you know, like pasta, or a PB&J, or cereal), will they shriek and melt like a witch in the rain?  Why would you go through the effort of making only 2 hummus wraps?  What if there are more than two vegetarians but only two of them bothered to check ahead (ahem, that was US)?  What if one of the obese Lancaster natives decided to try to lose half of herself and didn't want to gorge herself on swedish meatballs, chicken cordon bleu BALLS (think breaded and deep-fried...welcome to Pennsyltucky), or crab-stuffed mushrooms?  What if people would actually like to eat something more substantial than hors d'oeuvres and would be happy for a wrap even if it didn't have mutilated flesh on it.

So, boo on you, Enck Catering.  Talk about cooking in a bubble.  Did it strike any of you as odd how quickly your fruit plates were being depleted?

After zooming home in the happy Audi and parking the car in its reserved spot, Mister and I went inside to change our clothes and shoes and then headed back out into the crisp Autumn evening to visit the brand-new and much anticipated Blackbird Pizzeria.  Blackbird opened this week in the spot which was previously occupied by Gianna's Grille and it appears they're off to a great start!  The place was pretty packed when we got there, around 7ish and we had to wait in line behind two other couples, with more people falling into line behind us.  They had 4 pies out and ready to serve, but also made pies to order.  There are a few sandwiches and they're just getting started.  There are hand-cut fries and four drool-worthy cakes.  Best of all?  Everything is vegan.  A common complaint about Gianna's was that it "swung both ways," which could (and sometimes did) result in vegans getting cow's cheese on their food and you couldn't trust that the grill was cleaned off between cow steaks and seitan.

Mark Mebus, the owner, was previously a chef at our beloved Horizons and the customer two people ahead of us is a current chef there.  I felt like asking for autographs and I knew we were in good company.  It smelled so good in there and I hadn't eaten anything substantial since breakfast, so by the time we ordered, my stomach was trying to eat me and I wanted a cheese steak and a pizza and fries and a piece of cake.  Fortunately, I know me, so I just got a seitan steak and fries to split with Mister.  It was not the best seitan steak I've had, but like I've mentioned, the Basic 4 Veg. Snack Bar in Reading Terminal Market is going to be tough to beat.  They were good, substantial and belly-filling after starving for a couple of hours.  The seitan was thinly sliced, which gave it a whole other look and mouth-feel than other vegan steaks.  Mushrooms, peppers, and onions come standard, but I asked for no onions (we didn't know about the mushrooms) and they delivered.  Mister and I had mixed reactions to the cheese - it's Daiya, which I used in my fail casserole.  I'm still forming an opinion, although at the moment, I can't say I would become addicted to it and I'm a bit suspicious of people who say they are.  Mister, on the other hand, is not a fan at all.

The people were friendly and helpful. Their cakes make me want to buy a new wardrobe of larger sizes and elastic waistbands.  They serve the full line of Virgil's soft drinks.  The fries were tasty and crispy on the outside, fluffy on the inside.  I have already secured Mister's promise that we'll return and try the pizza...and cake.

at last, my love has come along..

My lonely days are over
And life is like a song
At last, the skies above are blue
My heart was wrapped up in clovers
The night I looked at you
I found a dream that I could speak to
A dream that I can call my own
I found a thrill to rest my cheek to
A thrill that I have never known
Oh, yeah when you smile, you smile
Oh, and then the spell was cast
And here we are in heaven
For you are mine
At last

Today marked the anniversary of my second blissful year of marriage to my best friend and love of my life. Ironically, when I woke up this morning, it was gray and pouring rain, just like it was two years ago. I was running ahead of schedule (how many brides can say that?), had collected everything I needed the night before so that I wouldn't have to rush in the morning. All I had to do was shove Angst into his box (kitty carrier) and stumble through the rain to my car with him and all the other stuff I was taking. Oh, and don't forget the umbrella! I finally get out to my car and the remote entry wasn't working. Prepared to hit the killswitch on my car alarm the minute I pop open the door manually, I turn the key in the lock. No alarm. When I turn the key in the ignition...nothing. So about an hour later, after much swearing and pouting, Angst and I and all my stuff have been reloaded into Mister's truck and we're on our way to the beauty salon. At noon on the dot, the rain stopped, the clouds cleared and it was a beautiful sunny day, the wet spots on the road the only indication it had rained at all. Everything went beautifully until about two hours before the ceremony, when my husband's taxi breaks down and they have to get another one and they're still 45 minutes away from the church. Miraculously (obviously), he got there on time and commenced to making me the happiest woman on earth. And he still does, every day.

In any case, there isn't a whole lot of romance you can affect on a Tuesday evening after you've both just worked a full day and it's 8:30 pm. So Mister greeted me at the door with kisses and smiles and while I was putting down my bag and taking off my jacket, he disappeared into the bedroom and came out with gorgeous long-stemmed red roses. They smell so good (and so edible, to Angst) and roses are my favorites (I know, it's cliche, whatever) and red is my favorite color. I'm such a lucky little wife. After more smiles and kisses, I got to work on dinner. We both have off from work this Friday, so we're going to have a date and celebrate for real then. Tonight, we had Chickpea Stew with Fried Polenta and this time I didn't overpulvarize the stew/sauce:
Also, we had some fun accompaniments, resulting a gorgeous (and delicious) still life:
When I was at Whole Foods on Sunday, since I was just picking up olives for the sake of eating them and not because I needed a specific kind of olive for a specific recipe, I decided to get a few of all the different kinds we've never had before. It started with these amazingly emerald green olives, then some very plump purple olives, and I know we've had them before, but these other green olives are just so good, and I'll grab some mezze mix Greek olives while I'm here... So we sampled them with dinner. It's a shame I can't remember any names...the emerald green ones were very oily and mild in flavor, which was in total contrast to the plump purple ones that were SO flavorful and bitter that I forgot for a moment that Balsamic vinegar is not made from olives.

Regarding the newest challenge of ethical decision making: I appreciate the feedback I got on my last post, specifically pointing me towards www.savethesheep.com, another PETA project. I really like it when people not only share with me their own opinions on matters like this but also provide resources that (I assume) helped them to make up their minds. I took quite a while to plod through that website and other links provided, and as always, found PETA's photojournalism to be shocking and in generally poor taste. I understand the point is to show the absolute brutal truth in the cruelty experienced in probably the vast majority of industry-related animal farming, but there is a very good reason people look at PETA fanatics the way they do: it seems like a cult. The tactics are very much the same - evoke a very strong reaction to something in order to win people to your point of view. And it works - after all, exposure to PETA propaganda and videos were what caused my first go-around with veganism in 2003.

The information on savethesheep.com and various other sites it linked to was somewhat helpful, at least in clearing up a few things regarding the treatment of wool-producing sheep and wool-harvesting procedures. I learned a few new and horrific vocabulary words, like mulesing (I'm not going into it on a full stomach - you can look it up if you're interested). However, there is a vital piece of the puzzle missing for me still. PETA has taken the time and extraordinary effort to put together a list of "cruelty-free" brands and vendors of various vegan things (leather alternatives, things of that nature) and at several points they praise the wonderful synthetic materials used in goods made at "value" stores like TJ Maxx, Marshalls, etc, as well as Victoria's Secret and other "high-end" retailers. The piece that's missing is people.

I have mentioned before that my primary reason for becoming a vegetarian was actually related to how the meat industry exploits and harms people, though I do find the mistreatment of the animals in question abhorrent as well. But what really helped me make my mind up was knowing how many more people we could share our food with if we just stopped feeding it all to the cows we breed and raise just to kill and use to overfeed our grossly overweight nation. Believe it or not (though, if you're reading this, you probably believe), there actually is enough food in the world to feed all the people of the world, but instead, we're feeding it to livestock that won't live much longer anyway. So when PETA pushes for the purchase of synthetic materials sold in the stores on their special "cruelty-free" list, it makes me wonder if PETA has forgotten that Humans, like Bees, are also animals and also should not be mistreated or exploited for other people's gain. If you took that list apart, you would probably find more of those shops purchase goods made in sweatshops than you'd be comfortable with. I don't care if I sound like a fundamentalist, God-made-man-to-rule-over-the-earth-and-everything-in-it ignoramus - I still think it's important to prevent cruelty to people who are treated about as well as these factory-farmed animals, and if that means wearing wool from a sheep rather than a cotton shirt stitched in the 11th hour of labor by a 12-year-old, well then I guess I'm just not a PETA spokesperson.

Nevertheless, I welcome more of your thoughts on how to be
1. warm
2. ethical/compassionate
3. stylish - I am NOT wearing polar-fleece or any of that other fuzzy crap and puffy coats should not exist outside of the juniors department of {insert store name here}.

So please, if you have insight for me, leave me a comment!