Bathroom Work. Visitor, Pecan Pie #%#^

         The weather has been turning colder which has resulted in Stumpy spending more time in the house. Realizing with Dagney gone my lap is pretty empty; he has taken up her old spot! My “little girl” was only able to sit one way on my lap. Stump is skinny enough to where he can curl up which is very difficult to type around. I can’t deny him anything. My projects and journal entries can wait while he gets his attention.

 

I never recorded on my journal the visitor I had the other night. I was just walking out the back door to lock up the workshop when something caught my eye. I stopped still and sure enough I had a visitor. Perched on the electric line was an owl. I’ve had them visit my backyard before, but this was very unexpected. As luck would have it, my camera was in the back room. My visitor did not fly away when I left and reappeared. He was not as big as the last owl to grace my yard so I’m thinking he might be fairly young. I stood in the doorway and watched him for several minutes as he twisted his neck around surveying the surroundings. I went back into the house and when I returned some 20 minutes later he was gone. This is a horrible picture. It was taken without a flash pretty much directly into the security light: If you look closely can just make out my new friend. How I relish these kinds of interactions.

 

The upstairs bathroom project is finished up. How I love being able to do a project such as this without having to put out a lot of money. I was thinking of replacing the shower curtain. My old one came from Tommy and Lee when we had the big yard sale back in 1999. It was a pain to cut and hem it up to hang at an angle. I looked on line for one that could be modified. I could find nothing I liked that was in a decent price range. Checking out the old curtain in the newly painted room I was so glad to discover there was a pale orange in the curtain that highlighted the new wall colour. The curtain will stay!

 

Another aggravation in the bathroom was the handle control for the tub. That handle was always loose on the fitting. It’s an American Standard brand unit so this should not be happening. For whatever reason, the set screw in the handle had a slotted end. I was never able to get that screw wrenched down tight enough to hold firmly. It would still function, but having that handle rattling around bothered me ever since I bought the house in 1996.

Saturday was the last home football game. It was in the 4th quarter I got brave and headed to the old stand-by hardware store not far from my house. This is one of those places that carries the odd ball stuff the box stores don’t bother to stock. Traffic was not bad, but I had to hurry as people were leaving the game early and the gameday traffic pattern signs were being set up. I lucked out and was able to get a new replacement set screw with an allen head. It was such a good feeling to finally get that project done.

Now to get to work in the main living area: I’ll have to take down the brass bed and move everything from the east side. Next I’ll have to patch up any drywall problems and then tape up the woodwork and floor. This is when I’ll have to start buying paint. I can feel the tears coming!

Saturday morning I drove down to Bucks to get another bag of Fejoes. I think the world of Buck, but we are on different ends of the political and religious spectrum. I never bring up politics, but I don’t back down either.

It is so easy to spot the “Fox News People” which Buck is. He was on a rant about Social Security and what a rip off it is. The solution in his eyes was to let people invest the monies they would normally put into Social Security and that would sustain them through their old age. Unless you force people to save they won’t.   I brought up the fact to Buck, “That sounds great in theory, but suppose you had all your investments in supposedly safe world class companies like General Motors, World Com, or Enron that all went bust and left their investors nothing?” He was taken aback and replied how people would “just have to become investment savvy.” I let the subject

drop.

On the way home I stopped at the big “Super Publix” on 69. I ended up getting a beautiful hunk of chuck roast, celery, carrots, potatoes, and all the fixings for a pot roast.

Sunday was cold and damp, perfect weather to have the oven going. I tried a recipe I found on-line. First got out my grandmothers old dutch oven and browned two onions in olive oil. Took those out and then browned a mess of cut up carrots. After that the meat was browned on all sides. The meat was taken out, red box wine added, and the pan was “deglazed”. Everything was put back into the pan adding 3 cups of beef broth, celery, garlic, and rosemary. This all cooked at 275° for many hours. The kitchen smelled so good.

Then I decided to make up a pecan pie. This will be a first. I had a recipe from Southern Living which bakes in a frying pan. I had enough shelled pecans from Michelle’s back yard. I’ve not made up enough pie crusts to be really proficient. I had the unsalted butter freezing cold and on line I read if you use vodka instead of water the alcohol burns off and the moisture evaporates giving a flakier crust. I know you are not supposed to handle the dough much as it gets mixed. It just seemed to be dry when I patted it into a disc to set in the refrigerator.

When it came time to roll out I was able to get it to stay together pretty well. The rest went pretty well. It bakes 30 minutes at 325°, 30 minutes at 300° and then you turn off the oven and leave it set for three hours.

My pot roast dinner was so good. Desert will have to wait till Monday!

Monday morning I held back till I had my first cup of coffee to enjoy my initial piece of pecan pie. I was disappointed in it was not that sweet, however the crust turned out beautifully. Reading the recipe reviews I knew it was not going to be a real “wet” pie, but most people raved over it. Rechecking the recipe I realized I only put in ½ cup brown sugar. The recipe called for 1 ½ cups! I learned! Wait till the next pie. I still have two sacks of pecans to go through!