This Saturday night I am cooking:

Entree: Pan-seared Tilapia with a zesty tomato and cilantro salsa served ontop

Veggie: sauteed Zucchini, onion and yellow bell pepper (cut into squares)

Starch: Long grain and wild rice enhanced with taragon bits.

I hope it turns out as well as it sounds, lol.

I'm not sure if I will be cookin this weekend but either this weekend or next this will be the menu:

Entree: Chili rubbed sirloin steak topped with chopped scallions

Veggies: Parmessan zucchini

Starch: noodles with a jalepeno sauce.

There is a photo of this in my 9/10/06 blog. I have made a substitution on the veggies which shows there.

In a follow up to a previous blog about meeting with some professional photographers regarding my work, well I met with one this past Tuesday and part of the conversation involved things we do or that happens when we go for a particular shot. Here is the story I shared with this person.

I attended an outdoor amphitheater concert at a major university on the west coast. The concert was the Preservation Hall Jazz Band. I lugged in all my equipment and got there plenty early to watch warmups. Well I walked all around and got an idea of a shot so I went up to the stage while they were rehearsing and took various pictures and then moved to take the shot I wanted. The stage was a temporary one with a white canvas backdrop and canopy. The front of the stage had bunting help up by railroad ties.

I found the shot. it was the clarinetist and I wanted to capture the his face shadowed by the straw hat he was wearing and the beam of natural light focused on his fingers as they manipulated the instrument. It worked and I have a nice pic of it. So as I was leaving and packing up my stuff to go back to my seat the strap of my camera bag caught the end of a railroad tie and guess what happened. It loosened the hold it had on the bunting and all of the bunting chainreacted down to the ground. Yup, a full audience in their seats, the concert ready to begin and there is Tex looking like a complete idiot wishing he could escape but there is nothing I could do but take about 15 min (no one came to my aid) and put the bunting back up tucking it under the ties for support.

As I tried to quietly slink up to my seat members of the audience applauded my efforts and the applause cascaded and I was thinking hey this turned out ok, I did good. Then I turned around to find out the band had come on the stage, lol. oh well., lol.

Now for purposes of protecting the innocent I did a cropping job to cut out the face and only show the lighted area of his hands on the stick. I hope you enjoy...the total effect is pretty good (well I think so). I hope I related the tale well.

I am doing the Skillet Shrimp Scampi again (see pic if interested in blog dated 10/15/06) It is one of my favs.

I had an interesting conversation today, although it was brief it was very telling. In fact, I think I discovered a new term or group for sociologist to use. The term is Global Provincialism.

The conversation was with a world traveler and it was about food. Well when the person revealed they like tuscan food I mentioned that there was an excellent tuscan restaurant locally here in texas. Well now the first reaction was: In Texas?

So later I asked the person if they had seen the link. They responded yes and started to laugh by saying ... "you can't even buy a bus transfer ticket for those prices." The tone and the phrasing itself suggested the only good restaurants are the really the over priced ones. Now honestly, it is all about the food first and perhaps good food at an affordable price is something you don't see the merit in but hey that is more a statement of you than of me. So you can throw your money away on the over priced chic and I will invest mine in the delicious and wonderfully cooked, presented food at the local tuscan restaurant. Culinary snobery at its best, lol. I was about to say their loss but in fact it is the others patrons gain. So maybe it isn't a bad thing after all.

Bon apetite.

Let me start by telling you that the dinner Sat was very good. Not great but very good. Basically comfort food. But let me tell you the pisto manchego is outta this world. It is good with comfort food or the more sophisticated.

It is simply heavenly. Now normally I don't write recipes here I will email them to people (not pm). However it is so good and most would love it that I am tempted to write it down here.

Whatcha think?

The recipe for this Saturday is as follows;

entree: Pork Schnitzel with a tomato and corn salsa over it
Veggies; Pisto Manchchego (a Spanish tapatewed zucchini, Green Bell Pepper and tomatoes)
Starch: Vermicelli enhanced by garlic and kalamata olives bits.

Bon Apetite

It is the fourth consecutive day below freezing and the first day out of the 20's. I know that doesn't sound like much to y'all but honestly down here it is big stuff. Ok think about it, most of you couldn't take our August. Fifteen minutes outside in our summer and you have developed a good base for your tan. Now honestly, that doesn't sound bad for some of your alabaster white legged folks now does it.

So, the storm has finally subsided after 3 1/2 days of constant light freezing rain. My truck was a block of ice. Now one of those windshield scrapper wasn't going to work to get an inch thick, I mean solid inch and in some areas thicker than that of ice off. So here is what I did. I used an impact hammer to shock the ice and break its hold. And it worked as I tapped it you could see the spidered cracks under the ice appear and then just wisk it off. It worked so well that a neighbor using one of those plastic windshield scrappers came over to see what my technique was. Yup he rushed back and duplicated it, lol.

So now I have all this shattered ice around me and I was slipping and sliding like I was trying to cross a frozen pond in Minnesota or Maine or Michigan ( did ya notice I used 3 M states up north : - ) almost a ligitimate illiteration) or wherever. So how to fix this........I got my leaf rake. Up it took all the bits and I moved them out to the gutter.

So now I'm sitting inside enjoying the warmth and hoping there isn't another ice storm soon.

Tuesday, 1/16....So far there has been freezing rain, then sleet and now......now........now it is snowing.

Geeeeeeeeze Louuuuuuuuise.

The first wave of the storm passed and it has been a cold ass day. In the morning freezing rain but the afternoon wasn't so bad. Still at the just below freezing mark.

Tonight the second wave of the storm is predicted with tempts dropping into the mid 20's with sleet, rain and snow. These conditions are forecasted to last all day tomorrow.

So, yes I have enough beer (well for a day and a half anyway, lol) enough food and ummm what else....guess that's it. So if ya don't see or hear from me tomorrow then the lines are down as a result of the storm.

Hey for us it is a big deal, lol.