Shame on you, Congressman Shuler!

Abortion is legal.  The best way to stop abortion is to prevent unwanted pregnancies.  Before Roe v. Wade, well heeled women went out of the country to have their abortions performed, and less well off women went to illicit abortion providers who may or may not have been medically trained.  As a result, women died.  It is infuriating that Congressman Shuler (and the other representatives) would vote to restrict a right that is so intensely personal.  Every child born should be a wanted child.  How many children have you adopted or fostered Mr Shuler?

Congressman Shuler issued a press release stating that HR 3962 doesn’t provide enough reform or control enough costs.  However, if that were the case why bother with voting in favor of the Shupak amendment that would restrict access to abortions for ostensibly less than wealthy women.  Why didn’t Congressman Shuler present anything to the Small Business Committee that would have provided better cost controls or more reforms?  What reforms are Congressman Shuler looking for?

His press release states that he supports “many of the provisions in HR 3962″, but other than cost control he doesn’t specifically state where the bill’s reforms fall short.  On his Small Business page he points that healthcare costs have almost doubled since 2001 and that businesses are facing the decision of whether to pay for health insurance or lay off employees, but his solution on that page is to allow businesses to band together to create coops which would work within the existing system that Shuler says is “laden with waste, fraud and abuse” (from today’s press release).

The Senate is next so pick up your phones and call your Senators daily to remind them how you feel about our healthcare system.  I’ll be reminding mine that unlike them I don’t have free healthcare.  I don’t get to choose my doctor because my health insurance company does that for me.  For my annual physical, I have to schedule my appointment about six months out, and then I should expect to wait one, two, or more hours to be seen by the doctor.  Due to the huge price difference between the group and individual market, my employer choses my health plan.  If I were on the individual market, my only real option for health insurance company would be Blue Cross Blue Shield of NC; although they are not considered a monopoly BCBSNC collected over 96% of individual health insurance premiums in North Carolina in 2008.  I’ll also be sure to mention the millions of uninsured (like our friends who work forty plus hours every week, but still cannot afford health insurance) that the private market has failed.  I’ll voice my support for moving away from the fee for service paradigm and moving towards the rewarding healing the sick one; I’ll also share my dream of taxing the hell out of those prescription drug ads that harass me constantly to ask my doctor to please give me a prescription which might help the selectively fiscally conservative get on the bus.

Smitten Kitchen Cakes

My first SmittenKitchen baking attempt was a disaster; I thought Irish Car Bomb Cupcakes would be perfect for St Patrick’s Day, considering my love of Jameson, Bailey’s, and stout beer, but my attempt ended up severely stuck the silicone (i.e. notoriously non stick) cups.  However, I was determined to enjoy some of the delicious cakes I’ve seen since I started reading her site.  My second recipe was chosen by my husband for his birthday in August (although I ended up making the cake a few weeks later).  Thankfully he chose a single layer affair without any fancy decorations.  The results were delightful and sentimental (it tasted so much like a torte from the old, but now defunct, Old Europe that I used to eat on our early dates).  This cake was easy, but it tasted like a professional effort.  It is definitely one of my favorite cakes for both its appearance and taste.

For our third legal anniversary, we pondered and agonized over several delectable cakes, and we ended up with the Chocolate Peanut Butter Cake.  The original recipe is for a three layer cake, but I only have two round pans so I made two layers and some cupcakes.  Although I tried to eyeball it, the batter distribution between the pans wasn’t equal which resulted in one layer being much thicker than the other.  I did not overfill the cupcake tins, but the silicone cups were not again not as non stick as I thought they should be when I purchased them.  I also tweaked the recipe a bit: unsweetened not too smooth peanut butter (in lieu of smooth commercial peanut butter) and an entire cup less of confectioner’s sugar for the frosting (next time I will probably knock it back an additional cup).  Deb at SmittenKitchen provides a page of layer cake tips as well as advice with each recipe that have really helped me make better looking cakes.

Weekly Green Challenge (triple dose)

Last week’s challenge was to give your car some loving, and below I’ve given couple of simple and obvious suggestions.  Check out the honor roll for more ideas.

With the time change and checking your smoke detectors’ batteries, you should also think about getting the car a tune up.  In addition to saving gas money, routine maintenance will either help you over the 200,000 mile threshold or help you get a better trade-in credit.  Of course keeping the air filter and oil changed is important, but also be sure to have the tires rotated and their pressure checked.  Proper tire inflation helps with their wear and your gas mileage.

Our household is into our sixty-second week of being a one car household!  With our one year milestone and our return from walking hilly San Francisco, we decided to park the car one day a week.  If you have public transit, use it!  Not only will it reduce your footprint, but you are also providing a good job to someone in your community and decreasing the congestion for someone else.

This week’s challenge to have zero food waste is second nature for me, thanks to my mom’s super frugal habits.  Dinners’ leftovers became either lunch or a late night snack, and I carry on the tradition in our home.  If I don’t eat it, my husband will most likely throw it in a burrito wrapper with cheese to finish it off.  My biggest problem with food waste are those ingredients I buy to make special recipes then fail to incorporate into our weekly meal plans.  This week I have a portion of cream cheese left over from the super awesome peanut butter chocolate cake I made for our wedding anniversary, but other recipes include my favorite golden sesame tofu that leaves me with pineapple juice or the plethora of recipes that call for just egg whites or egg yolks.

Regarding the reclaimed or recycled challenge, I did go for Marcal’s Small Steps because it was half the cost of the Seventh Generation pack, and I don’t mind it (and my honey hasn’t complained yet either).  Thanks for your thoughts!

Ophelia’s World Cafe

Although I’ve seen the ad in the paper and over at Ashvegas, I somehow still managed to forget about the free Just Because Your Asheville concert.  So rather than promptly do the grocery shopping after yoga, I decided to eat lunch at Ophelia’s World Cafe on Eagle Street so I could catch Larry Keel.  This location used to be Bearly Edible, which also does a great festival stand with $1 grilled cheese and the pricier (but still cheap and greasy and good) pesto mozzadillas.  Even though Ophelia’s google listing still references BE, my server informed me they were most certainly no longer affiliated.  Everything on the menu seemed simple to prepare like food one might expect from a food stand, and the lunch menu was a scant page.  I decided on the roasted eggplant quesadilla and tempeh with a side salad over the either of Middle Eastern plates (both with hummus, baba gangouj, and tablouleh with pita and crudites and the more expensive one offering falafel as well).  My salad was a yummy little spring mix with carrots, onion, and raw peppers (green and red) then lightly dressed with their shallot vinaigrette, and my quesadilla was filled with chunks of tempeh, tiny cubes of eggplant, cooked onions and peppers, fresh mozzarella, and pesto in a plain flour shell.  The beer list is good for a small restaurant by most standards, but by Asheville standards it is weak.  The list was fifteen or so deep and consisted of three Abitas, two Sierra Nevadas, two pumpkin beers, and three”local” beers in Gaelic, Cottonwood Pumpkin (of which they were out), and Duck Rabbit Milk Stout.  I thought they had draft beer, but the menu doesn’t denote bottle or draft.  After my initial annoyance at being told to sit wherever then being moved twice, the service was good.  I ate late in the afternoon, being the second to last table before they closed for the dinner shift , and my server neither hovered or ignored me.  I was also impressed with their toilet; it has a button for half flush or full flush.

10 Fun Facts

Thanks to Nicole at Forthright Fattie for the Honest Scrap Award.  Here are my ten unknown to the internet world facts:

1.  I participated in Mock Trial in high school, but I am no good at off the cuff so my attorney dreams died.

2.  Even though I’m all about reducing emissions, I love to drive fast, and I want to be able to drive fast around curves without worrying about sharing the road.

3.   I always thought I would die before I turned 27.

4.  Until I started sleeping with my husband, I had never used the snooze button.

5.  My first car, Tilly, was in Patch Adams.  They used it for two or three weeks, and I got $800.  My parents and I purchased the car for $900.

6.  Over Thanksgiving break traveling through SC on 85, I received two speeding tickets (one on the way home and the other on the way back).

7.  I love dystopian novels and movies (The Handmaid’s Tale, 1984, Brave New World, V for Vendetta).

8.  If I weren’t so cheap, I would have a coffee habit.

9.  The traffic in Atlanta drove me to smoke the entire time I (kinda) lived there.

10.  Although I’ve never really lived anywhere aside from AVL (even when I lived in the ATL, I was back home about once a month) and it feels so much like home, I think anywhere that my honey and kitties and doggy and good food are could be home.

If you’re so inclined, leave a link in the comments with your ten unknowns.

Recycled or Reclaimed

This week’s Change the World Challenge from Reduce Footprints is to purchase the recycled option of a product you don’t normally buy the recycled version of, or if you don’t have an item that fits the bill discuss using reclaimed materials.

I have no problem with recycled paper towels or sandwich/bulk item bags, but I do not like recycled paper toilet paper.  It irks me because its manufacturers have the audacity to make it less soft and cost more than conventional toilet paper.  However, I will succumb to peer pressure and give it another go.  Which brands are cushier?

Fog

Our last day in San Francisco, we awoke to fog.  The weather punished me for being so grumpy on Sunday morning and not riding across the Golden Gate Bridge.  My wonderful husband optimistically suggested that we run up Telegraph Hill to Coit Tower so we could we get a good view and see if the fog might lift so we could ride across the bridge.  Rather than head down to Union Square, we walked up Leavenworth a few blocks then over to Hyde where we caught the cable car and rode it to the waterfront.  We got to ride past Lombard, but we opted not to walk down it.  We tried to catch a bus up Telegraph Hill, but much like the rest of our trip we failed to note where we to catch the bus and which number so we hoofed it.  Unlike the forced march down the Embarcadero, the chilly weather was in our favor.

From Coit Tower, our chances didn’t look good for biking across the bridge.  We took the Greenwich Steps down, and although the picture I took at the top of stairs looks lush, the Filbert Steps have much better scenery.

We meandered around trying to decide what to do in lieu of our bike trek.  Ina Coolbrith Park and Macondary Lane and the Octagon houses were on my wish list so we set off for Ina Coolbrith based on my shorthand notes but without the benefit of a map (no free wi-fi!).  We ended up finding Macondary Lane and walking through it, and then realizing that we had missed the park by a block.  The park has nice views, but for the hike I preferred Buena Vista.  After walking in circles to find the park, I forgot about the Octagon houses that were only blocks away (although most likely steep uphill blocks away) so we caught the cable car that runs on Mason and took it back to home base for much deserved shower.

On our last San Francisco night we dined at Le Colonial; it is a very lovely Michelin starred restaurant with elegant decor.  Of course we were underdressed, but our server didn’t seem to mind.  He did, however, seemed determined to sell us the most expensive items on the menu even though we did not request his opinion.  Our entire meal was delicious and eclipsed by the superiority of The Slanted Door.  I enjoyed an ahi tuna tartare with taro chips for my appetizer and spring roll dish that I was instructed to eat like the bánh xéo from earlier in the week.  Le Colonial provided the best service of any of the restaurants we dined at, and their food was good (if not divine).

Sunday at The Slanted Door

Our Sunday was a could’ve, should’ve day.  First we slept in a bit later than we should’ve, second we could’ve gotten bagels for breakfast the night before.  We strolled down to Union Square to catch a bus to the Fisherman’s Wharf where we going to rent bikes to ride through the Presidio and across the Golden Gate Bridge down into Sausalito to enjoy a mid afternoon lunch and catch the ferry back; however, it was my lack of food and general bitchiness that threw a wrench into our plans this time.  I think I was worried about whether my out of shape body would be able to bike the few miles.  So instead we walked down the Embarcadero in the blazing sun and against the flow of pedestrian traffic away from the gapping tourist trap of Fisherman’s Wharf.  At the Ferry Building, things suddenly looked much brighter (figuratively as I don’t think it could’ve gotten much brighter literally).

The Slanted Door beckoned our empty bellies, but the thirty minute wait directed us to the bar.  I began with a kir royale to quench my thirst, and my husband went with an unfamiliar wheat beer.  Our seat at the bar was directly in front of the raw prep station so we both ordered a half dozen raw oysters; I opted for West Coast options which were all quite delicious, and my husband ordered the plate as is and also enjoyed it thoroughly.  With our fortune at the raw bar, we decided to share a live scallop; it was absolutely heavenly with its fresh creamy saltiness.  If I could regularly eat raw animal this tasty, I would never dream of giving up flesh.  Following with the Bay Area obsession, my next drink was Summer on the Danube which consisted of sparkling wine and elderberry liqueur; I do now love elderberry liqueur.  For my next dish I moved to the hot side and ordered the bánh xèo (Vietnamese egg crepe); the food runner was kind enough to tell me how it is normally eaten as I most likely would’ve skipped the leaf lettuce completely which would have greatly taken away from the dish.  The crepe is sliced then wrapped in the leaf lettuce then dipped in the sauce then eaten.  All of the flavors came together to make this dish my favorite from the trip, from the slight bitterness of the lettuce to the earthiness of the mung bean sprouts to the clean crispness of the mint and basil leaves to the sweet, spicy ginger of the dipping sauce to the greasiness of the cooked crispy egg.  I have not stopped craving this, even after I attempted to make a vegan alternative that was less than awesome.  The ginger pushed me into a dark and stormy, which is a drink that has sentimental value; I first enjoyed it the week before we married in Key West, and this trip to our friends’ wedding doubled as a big three (legal) years anniversary celebration for us (albeit a couple of weeks before the actual date).  This version is the epitome of a dark and stormy.  Their house made ginger syrup is the secret; it has such a powerful ginger punch that cuts through and combines with the sweetness of the dark rum and the soda to make bliss in a cup.  After the dark and stormy and the egg crepe, my tofu entree was good, but I really only remember the exotic sweetness of the lemongrass.  Our service was slow with many long moments of trying to get our bartender/server’s attention to order the next drink or dish or get the check; however, the food was wonderful.

We slowly strolled out of the Ferry Building into the bright sunshine and decided since we were in the Financial District we might as well hit the SFMoMA.  Much like the MoMA, the SFMoMA was overwhelming at times.  I enjoyed many of the pieces, but others annoyed me.  One piece was a short Airstream style travel trailer; another was a colorful painting that I initially liked, so I read the placard for it to discover the protrusion was a piece of elephant dung.  The photography exhibits were the highlight and made the admission (twenty dollars including the five dollar surcharge for the Richard Avedon exhibit) worth it.  Unlike many museums, the SFMoMA allows non flash photography.

Exhausted from all the walking and alcohol, we walked through the Yerba Buena Gardens but decided to skip through it.  We caught the F line back to the Embarcadero so I could check out the Diego Rivera murals in the Rincon Center (another example of us backtracking).  We then rode the California car up to Nob Hill so we could see the Fountain of the Turtles and Grace Cathedral.  The cathedral was amazing and humbling; I respect churches that spend all their money on doing good works, but I love and cherish the magnificent buildings that religious congregations build.  I took photos of the doors called The Gates of Paradise, but I felt disrespectful taking photos of the interior.

After the cathedral, we returned to the apartment for a refreshing 7 and ginger and showers.  For dinner we decided that nothing could possibly top our lunch plus we were reeling from the cost; Uncle Vito’s on Powell St seemed like a good place for cheap eats.  Cheap they were, but even so the service and food left much to be desired.  The service I can forgive, because it was cheap.  The food, however, was bland, boring, and not even worth repeating.  If ever in San Francisco, avoid Uncle Vito’s.

The Wedding

After our amble around Nob Hill, North Beach, and Chinatown, we returned and got ready to bake in our finery.  Fortunately, the dress code was casual with the bride and bridesmaids in embellished daisy flip flops and the groom and groomsmen in Chacos.  Even so, it was hot.  We have lost the record for having the hottest wedding ceremony ever (Key West in October at 10am, and everyone was pouring sweat).  Hot is hot is hot, and I hate sweating in dry heat just as much as I hate sweating in Georgia.  We had a ten minute stroll to the Powell St BART then a forty minute train ride (the fare is less than five dollars!) out to Pleasant Hill then a fifteen minute shuttle to the ceremony, which provided ample opportunity to get mussed up.

I know it sounds cliched, but the ceremony was just beautiful.  They were married under this fantastical oak tree on top of a hill with views of the surrounding valley.  Her parents’ home was full of light, and the ground were littered with little touches (like the sunflowers in the bowling balls and the flower fountain).

While I expected my favorite part of the ceremony to be the reading of “Invitation” by Shel Silverstein by a friend of the bride’s son accompanied by an interpretive dance by a friend of the groom’s daughter, I was really touched by the bride’s sister-in-law’s reading (“The Invitation” Oriah Mountain Dreamer).

As to my concerns about the wedding fare, they were washed away with the first hors d’oeuvre I popped into my mouth (Checkers Catering handled it).  I saw three trays circulating; one of shrimp on a wonton chip (I don’t do shrimp so I didn’t try this one), a stuffed mushroom, and a caprese slider.  The sliders surpassed the others, with cherry tomatoes so ripe and sweet and tangy coupled with creamy fresh mozzarella and a basil leaf; the serving trays had a balsamic vinaigrette in them so each slider came dressed.  The main buffet started with a fresh spring mix salad then a mashed potato bar followed meat and poultry stations with rolls (I didn’t find the portabello mushrooms and when I was directed to their location I had missed them); of course, there was plenty of beer (two from New Belgium Brewery and Miller Lite with a Sierra Nevada keg making a late night entrance) but with the heat the white wine was hit hard and early.  The cake was nice and moist, and its frosting was not overly sweet.

Between the heat, sweat, the morning wander with another full day planned, and an hour trip back to the city, we were ready to head back around nine.  I begged to wait to see them off, but the taxi had already been called.  If only we had known that we would pass the limo on the way down the driveway we probably could’ve held out to send them on their mini moon.  Like we did, they will be taking their real honeymoon after the wedding dust (and excitement and stress) has settled.

We used a taxi five times during our week long stay with two trips being to and from the ceremony.  The forty minute train ride cost $4.90 one way, and it runs every twenty minutes from around 4a to after midnight five days a week (Saturday it starts around six am, and Sunday it starts around eight).  Public transit done well rocks!

Chinatown and Top of the Mark

On Wednesday, my honey dubbed me Drill Sergeant because I was determined to take in as much of the city as we could during our week stay (with days eaten by travel, wedding events, and weather) so before we had to get ready for the 40 minute BART ride to Pleasant Hill, we checked out Union Square and Chinatown.  My favorite part about San Francisco’s and Vancouver’s Chinatowns were the gates and the bilingual street signs (although Vancouver has a better gate).  I also loved how CitiBank and Bank of America gussied up their buildings (the Bank of America we drove past in the Castro actually had rainbow flags hanging in the lobby).  For his lunch and dim sum fix, my honey ate at the Four Seas; I did not partake as I was not yet hungry, but the service was abysmal.  Although we arrived at lunch, he only saw two dim sum trays before our time constraints required us to leave.  After several minutes of being by passed I gave my credit card to the hostess which she delivered to the wait staff; we waited another several minutes for someone to appear with the receipt.  A lady we had not seen arrived with our check, but rather than drop it she hovered over our table while my husband completed it.

After all the waiting and watching him eat, I realized that I might not be eating for several hours (depending on the wedding reception fare) so we wondered around Chinatown making our way back to North Beach, but Italian wasn’t calling my name.  Somehow (I cannot be trusted to navigate), we missed Portsmouth Square but (walked several blocks north and out of the way and) found Washington Square and St Peter and St Paul Church so we caught a bus back down Columbus where I did take this neato shoot of Cafe Zoetrope and the TransAmerica Pyramid.

Heading back to the apartment, we caught the California car that led us to the Top of the Mark which we had missed on our previous day’s itinerary as a drink spot.  I am glad we visited during the day as my honey took some gorgeous photographs of the city.  I enjoyed a lovely fourteen dollar Valley salad (baby spinach, grilled endive, Point Reyes Bleu, tomatoes, and candied walnuts)  along with my fourteen dollar a glass pinot noir.  I must say that the salad was delicious with a surprisingly generous portion, and my pinot noir was rather tasty (Gloria Ferrar).  I decided to forgo the $23 a glass Moet White Star (please note this bottle retails for around $60), but I did understand that I was paying for the breath taking views not whatever was being served.  In fact our server assumed we just wanted to take the pretty pictures as he brought us our drinks and the check before I had a chance to order lunch.

After such delightful daytime views, I insisted we return for evening views.  Unfortunately, the loudest New Englanders imaginable sat one table away recalling their days of drunken debauchery; however, I did get to sample a 12 year old Jameson pour with my molten chocolate cake.  The pour wasn’t as enjoyable as I wanted (it was more like scotch than my beloved Jameson), and the cake was dry and missing the super chocolate divinity of the last molten cake I enjoyed (thanks Rezaz).  My honey did enjoy his $13 Mojito more than his $10 chardonnay from our previous visit.