Resting, gardening and eating...

It had snowed a little overnight, leaving a light dusting on the roads. There was no real accumulation, but they were a bit slick.

I went out at lunch to the Aco Hardware store and bought an opaque square storage tub for the Shitake mushroom garden (a birthday present from Lu and Sadie). I had originally thought I’d buy one of those cheap aluminum cooking trays, (Jake suggested two, one inside the other in case of leaks). But since the sunlight is so diffused where I’m going to put it, I thought it would benefit if the light could also come through the tray itself. The garden needs 4 – 6 hours of non-direct sunlight per day.

I ate the last of the wild mushroom agnolotti with truffled crème sauce, along with one fried eggplant for lunch. They both were excellent!

There were snow flurries on the way back to work, but still nothing sticking.

I spent most of the afternoon on the concrete floor out in the construction site with our Telecom guy, trying to get one phone working in the Maintenance office. The Maintenance guy’s boss has been complaining about the phone and computer outage, BTW. But, that didn’t work, so I arranged to have the wiring vendor come in Thursday morning and show us his plan.

While we were in the office, the Maintenance guy showed up and I apologized. He said, “Hey, no phone, no computer? I’m enjoying the hell out of this!”

Needless to say, my legs were screaming by the time I left at 4:00 PM (I’m back on my usual part-time hours). But, luckily, the first Food Network magazine from Amy was in the mail box. So, I fixed myself a drink, put my feet up on the couch (ahhh) and read it from cover to cover. Thanks again!

I called Lu to thank her for my Christmas presents (Jake had them delivered today). We had agreed NOT to get each other anything (I can’t afford it and I think neither can she) so it was just two suet cakes (for my birds) and a bag of homemade granola (for me). But all I got was the voice mail, so I left my thanks electronically.

I started watching the local news and finished up with the NBC Nightly News (my usual MO). Near the end of that, Lu called from a traffic jam on the Pennsylvania turnpike. I told her thanks for the gifts and she explained she never got my Brother Jim’s call. She reminded me she recently switched phones and, that while Coletta had her new number, Jim must have called her old one. Then I remembered a discussion we had New Year’s Day. They (Jim and Coletta) needed a new address book, so Jim used a software program to pull it from his Christmas card list. This could have been the problem.

After we hung up, I started on the Shitake mushroom garden. I was surprised! There were already two mushrooms growing and I hadn’t even soaked it yet. But I filled the bag up with water and closed it. That needs to soak for 8 – 10 hours.

Then I moved onto dinner. I cut off eight thin slices of the cold corned beef (if the meat is chilled and you have a sharp knife, you can cut some really thin slices). Then I began to build my Reuben sandwich.

I buttered one side of a hearty rye bread and put it buttered side down in a skillet. I topped that with two slices of Swiss cheese (it’s a wide loaf) and then two slices of corned beef.

Using paper towels, I squeezed out the extra moisture from some bagged sauerkraut. I topped the corned beef with that and then added some Russian dressing on top of that. I added another layer of corned beef and more Swiss cheese. Then I topped that with another slice of buttered rye bread, butter side out.

I set the burner to medium and grilled the sandwich until each side was golden brown. It's tricky flipping that bad boy over, BTW. I cut the sandwich in half, added some big olives to the plate and went in to watch some TV. The sandwich was excellent, but so big I could barely finish it.

I made myself go to bed at 10:00 PM.