Little Grey Cloud

In case you were wondering what Jacky Scrapple was up to... It's no good.

Christmas, Etc.

Yesterday I made an apple custard danish, got a new coon-skin cap, put a bow on Jacky- the usual holiday business. I also got a few extra special gifts, including my dream typewriter. You may remember, I wrote about it in March!!! And now it's mine!!! I'm going to write a cookbook on it, whilst drinking vermouth and eating smoked almonds.
I don't know about anyone else, but I woke up today and ate a huge bowl of oatmeal. Then I immediately started in on my stocking candy. We have finished most of the maple candies and a lot of chocolates, and polished off the cassoulet from last night. It's disgusting. I can't wait to put on a bathing suit in a few days.

Sprout Sitting *and* Dropping Out Of Greek Mythology

I just dropped out of my Greek Mythology class*, so to those of you who were really sure that I would never learn to enjoy epic poetry, you were right. Here's the thing. My friend Nic is going to the Nordic Countries (all of them, via sailboat, NOT fair) for a couple of weeks. In his wake, I have been left along with 40,000 sprouts to babysit. I have not actually counted them but it seems like a fair number. The pressure is enormous. Having two dogs is already completely time consuming, especially when one is a control freak who lacks control of his bladder and the other is bad, but this is a whole new ball game. People are counting on me for the well-being of these sprouts. You see, Nic is a sprout dealer. I wont give too much of his game away, but suffice it to say I'm in deep. I'm fucked. The jar of beans ( just waiting for me to give them life!) might as well be a big jar of Jacky Scrapple's all needing to be walked.
My responsibilities include but defiantly are not limited to: Soaking the beans for 24 hours. Rinsing the soaked beans 4 times a day until they sprout (3-4 days). Delivering sprouts to clients. Repeating process until he gets home.

Hopefully I will be able to post photos of the journey from bean to sprout, but we'll just have to see how much strength I have left after all of this.


*Mom- I am still in school. Don't worry.

Holladays

Well... We'll see how this season goes as far as restaurant life is concerned. I'm feeling a little disheartened these days and here's why: Although we have still been busy, the threat of becoming un-busy has people tense and afraid. You know how people act when they are tense and afraid? That's what I'm up against. I feel like I'm being watched like a hawk by all parties involved. Customers, more than ever, are worried that I am trying to pull a fast one on them by recommending they order more than just a lettuce leaf, or that we might be trying to sell their jacket on ebay whilst they dine. The eyes of the restaurant have found new time to monitor side work duties as though my side work duties include handing out meds at the hospital (So I forgot a few patients... they'll recover).
If waiting tables becomes some sort of uptight affair, I might join the circus. THATS A WARNING TO ALL OF YOU. No one really wants to see me as a bearded lady for I only have one beard hair (so far, and also I'm aware that one is too many for most), and I have no flame swallowing or throwing skills. Really though, I hope that fear doesn't get the better of us. I'm here to feed people and "make them feel not annoying", and that's nothing to get in tizzy about.
Meanwhile, staff meal on saturday night made me feel all better. We had Kanas City ribs with cornbread. YES PLEASE!
Jacky Scrapple had a big helping of garbage for dinner last night while Kevin and I were out eating our own feast (holy crap did I have baked spicy dungeness crab? Yes I did.) and today it appears as though he isn't feeling well. It's time for a grass grazing walk.
Please, go out for lunch or dinner today and ask your server if they have ever considered modeling. Hot or not, they need the boost.

The morning after

You would think that Jacky and Hiro did all the work yesterday because they are EXHAUSTED. They both put themselves to bed before people had even left last night, and now are both still trying to sleep off their hangovers.
I am also in rough shape, due to lack of sleep and my own little hangover. But really, I can't complain. Yesterday was awesome. Jessika came over early in the day to get things going, and its a good thing she did. Kevin was running around the house and cleaning, I was in a baking frenzy with two pumpkin pies (which I think sucked), two apple tarts (one of which my landlord's brother knocked off the porch railing as it cooled, if only you could have seen his face) and a tray of sticky buns (glorious). Jessika had to manage the brussels sprouts, the cheese platters, the gratin, the stuffing, gravy, dinner rolls... I was too frantic to even pay attention to everything she was doing. We made beets and sunchokes with lemon rind and candied carrots as well, now that I think of it.
And the sangria! It was glorious. Red wine, sparkling cider and triple sec with cranberries and apples. I am now even more convinced that it's not a party without sangria. We drank tons of wine and also did plenty of Mexican brandy+peach brandy+sugared lemon shots (something Kevin used to serve a lot of in Arizona...creepy...). That might explain the hangover. Or maybe it was the Manhattan's.
I am excited to eat leftovers today because last night I was so overwhelmed and full from eating a million appetizers that I couldn't really fit much more in by dinner time- let alone dessert. We have so many leftovers. The turkey carcass is sitting outside in a cambro, waiting for me. When we ran out of refrigerator room we had to start using the porch. It's coldish outside...
As for now, I am going to start cleaning. We got so much help from everyone last night that my job isn't too overwhelming, but still I'd rather be taking a bath or sticking pins in my eyes.
Which reminds me- this morning a Wal-Mart employee was trampled to death at 5 AM by a crowd of redneck psycho shoppers, so skip the errands today people.

Boca!

There has been a recent flurry of activity in my life, including going back to school. I do hate going back to school!!!! But it's fine. I'm actually glad be enrolled in some of the classes I'm taking this semester considering the political atmosphere this fall. 

Anyway, for my last day of "summer vacation" Kevin, the puppies and I hiked some mountain in the Mount Jefferson wilderness park. The hike was steady and beautiful, all lush scenery and trickling streams. But the top! Well, a little below the top- is Boca Cave. You climb into it and the soil is red and damp. The cave itself is enormous. Its like a big spooky cathedral. Once you're inside, you turn around and look at Mount Jefferson through the mouth of the cave. The view is nuts. Jacky and Hiro are regular cave dwellers. Someone at the bottom warned us that the dogs wouldn't like it, but was he ever wrong! 

Speaking of dogs, I would like to mention the passing of my childhood dog Hattie. She was a small but fat Corgi. I spent most of my time with her making fun of her and her short legs. She barked at everything and only got in trouble a few times in her long life. She was my moms companion, and I would like to send my mom all of my love, and you should too. 

At the top of this post you might have noticed some kind of beautiful dessert. What is it? you're wondering. Well I'm here to tell you, its a plum cardamom upside down cake, and I made it last week. We have a few friends who claim to be pizza allstars, so we invited them over to prove it. They really are. We had a lot of pizza that night, and a lot of wine. And then we had cake. I made it in our cast iron deep skillet from start to finish- who knew? First you caramelize the plums in brown sugar and butter, and then you pour the sponge cake batter on top and pop the whole thing in the oven.  Success!! Careful with cardamom- that's a crazy and intense spice.

A very special evening.

And it was. Today when I arrived at work I noticed that it was pita-bar staff meal. I like bars of all kinds- sandwich bar, hotdog bar, baked potato bar... Pita bar looked especially fun with hummus, flank steak and fresh pitas. Sadly I was full from a hot lunch date to Hotlips Pizza and the dry cleaners with Kevin. If I had known it was going to be a bar style staff meal I might not have had two pieces of pizza, but whatever. 

What's important here is that I had a star spangled evening. One in which I WAITED ON JOHN MALKOVICH. What did you do tonight? Probably not fuck up John Malkovich's order the way that I did! Ha ha! And I did... We chatted about padron peppers and pinot noir, and I got over being nervous very quickly. After spending a great deal of money on a bottle of wine he put ice cubes in it, but I think that that goes with the celebrity status. If I was a celebrity I would be ordering white wine spritzers left and right and never once feel ashamed the way I do now. He was well spoken and dressed very stylishly in seersucker and sneakers. Duh! 

Enough about that- but I could go on so if you want more details... call me. I reallllly want to go on.

I need to backtrack to saturday night (when I waited on a certain terrible portland band that I wish to forget, but P list celebrities nonetheless, to stick with tonight's famewhore theme). Dave Briggs made us a very special staff meal- corn dogs and tots. I also got a special treat: I was asking one of the cooks to make me a quail egg omelette with but one tiny egg because it would be so cute, and he thought I really wanted an omelette so he made me one with duck skin... and chicken eggs. It was not cute and served on a flower petal the way I suggested, but it was absolutely fantastic. Fluffy and fatty. I don't know how one person could be so lucky.

On saturday morning I went to see Sam at her job. She too is a waitress, but she is forced into working BRUNCH. Something I can't imagine- a fate worse than death. I was one of her few tables at this point though so I got spoiled rotten with attention. Attention and trout! This was served with a piece of speck seared onto the skin, atop corn and lobster mushroom hash. I am obviously still thinking about it.

Finally, Jacky has fleas. And... I waited on John Malkovich.

I'M BAAACCCK!!!!

I just read yet another thing that makes me feel humorless and full of shame. Todd Levin is the kind of funny that lets you know that even if you and your friends think you are funny on occasion, you are not.

I had a sad thought a minute ago when I was trying to fall asleep- I heard Jacky make this tiny groan sound, and I thought: what if Jacky is dying.

Then,

 aw, even as Jacky dies he sounds cute. 

I feel guilty for putting "Jacky" and "Die" in the same sentence since that's an impossible and imaginary horror movie idea. But I thought it, and it's true that even when he is choking on his own fur and spit it's precious.