Some Marriages Have REAL Problems

One thing Brant and I do really well together (and often), is run out of gas. It's a Jackson thing for sure, because I never ran out of gas before we were married. I was too neurotic and embarrassed to run out of gas before I got married. The thought of holding up traffic and having to flag someone down to help me push my car into a parking lot sent me speeding to a gas station at a mere quarter tank.

I love being a Jackson.

Truth is, I'm still neurotic and I still care way too much about what other people think. But I married a man who while extremely intelligent and responsible, has some sort of ingrained aversion to working gas gauges. We drive a 46 Chevy Coupe. We have had it for around 6 years. Up until 6 months ago, it didn't have a gas gauge. Brant just winged it, I guess. He put a gauge in when we were getting ready to move. Only, we soon found out that while the gauge is historically accurate, it is not exactly gas measuring accurate. The little wand sort of flips around between 1/8 and 1/4 of a tank, and you think you have gas left, but you don't. Found that out when we ran out in downtown Boise. Luckily, we were already parked in a primo spot, so we just walked a few blocks to the nearest station.

Logical people, I'm sure, would just fill the car up when the gauge showed less than 1/2 a tank. I don't have much of a defense for the fact that we rarely do this. We get distracted, I guess. Oh, and it should be noted that the majority of times we have run out of gas, we have also been without a gas can. For some stupid reason we usually end up taking the gas can out of the trunk, and then sure enough we run out again, and realize what we have done.

One time in Boise, (in my old Jetta, not the coupe) we ran out of gas twice in one week, within the same city block each time. Who else can do that?

We ran out of gas a few weeks ago on the west side, when we were taking our friend MJ to lunch. Brant had to hitch a ride  to the gas station (and buy a can, of course) and then take a taxi back. MJ and I hung with the dogs under palm trees.

But today was the BEST. We drove into Kahului on Brant's lunchbreak to get the coupe weighed. We have to get it weighed as part of the inspection and registration process. So we drive up the ramp of this huge scale and have to wait a few minutes while the semi truck in front of us is weighed. While idling, sure enough, the car starts to sputter. We are on fumes.

Picture us, right up in that little box above the ramp on the left. Apologies for the iphone pic. Returned to the scene of the crime to snap this one.

Brant pulls right up behind the semi, to the only flat spot, and kills the engine. When its our turn we start the car on fumes, coast onto the scale, and cut the engine again. Make small talk, get weighed (3160 lbs), start the car again and coast down the ramp, down the street to the gas station. Made it beautifully, no gas can needed.


I was laughing so hard as we pulled into the station. I used to get so mad, every time we ran out. Infuriated. Who does this!!!!! Ridiculous! Obviously my fury didn't change our habits, and over the years I've learned to accept that many times we are just too distracted with other fun things to take notice of the gas gauge. And honestly? I kind of love this about us.

But you should probably keep this story in mind the next time we offer to drive.

Kiwi Car Care and Gluten Free Granola

I spent the morning gardening at Kiwi Car Care. Brant works there, and his boss has been kind enough to 'hire' me to clean up the plantings around the perimeter of the property.

The area is planted with gardenia and spider lily's, both of which I love. Going through a property the first time takes longer than usual, and this was no exception. I spent the entire morning on this one side (both sides of the fence). There were suckers to cut off the trees, gardenias to deadhead and prune, and a million little dead leaves and debris to pick up. It was fun! I've never meditated, but weeding and pruning totally 'zen' me out, so to speak.

If you live here, and ever need your car worked on (or know someone who does), I highly recommend Kiwi Car Care. And not just because Brant works there. I mean, Brant is awesome and can fix anything, so that's a plus. But I also recommend this shop on the basis that the owner, Kim, is a really good guy and runs his business with integrity. That is a trait that is worth promotion - especially in an auto shop!  He does very little advertising, and relies mostly on word of mouth. So there's my word. Go there!

I'm now sitting at Starbizzles drinking a drink too fancy to pronounce. I just wanted an iced coffee, jeez.

I'd like to leave you with a few pics of yesterday's project - granola.

Gluten-free Almond Butter Coconut Granola to be more exact. This was my first attempt (or second, if you count the first batch I burnt) at granola, and although I liked it, I think the recipe needs more tweaking. This batch was made with agave nectar and white sugar as the sweetener, because that's all I had on hand. I'd like to try a batch sweetened with Maui cane sugar or honey. Mmmm......

Also, I didn't have any add-ins, which is sad. I think it would be delicious with banana chips and macadamia nuts. But we ate it as is, over homemade coconut ice cream and it was just fine.

 

You guys, I realize I am horrible at recipes. While making the granola I thought 'I should write these measurements down.' But then I was all 'No, too much effort. Just wing it!'  Lame of me. I can tell you that I loosely followed the oil ratio recommendations in this recipe from Smitten Kitchen (which is such a great blog). I made a much smaller batch - here's what I threw in the bowl:

-1 cup gluten free oats (Bobs Red Mill)

-somewhere between 1/8 and 1/4 cup canola oil. 

-1/8 cup agave nectar

-1/8 cup white sugar

-1/4 + almond butter

-1/2 finely shredded coconut

-cinnamon, lots

-dash of salt

Mix it all up real good, and then spread on a baking sheet lined with parchment paper.Bake at 375. After finding out the hard way with my first batch, I realized with my oven, I needed to only bake my granola for 9 minutes exactly. Even a minute over and it would burn. So experiment with your oven and above all, just check/stir the darn granola frequently! I let mine cook for 5 minutes, stir, cook for 2, stir, cook for 2, DONE.

This granola project was brought to you by my new bowls. These came from Costco and totally rock. They stack within each other for compact storage and each one has a lid. And the colors! Oh, I love the colors. 

 I see more projects in my future.

Next Time We Should Interview As a Team

Here’s part of my run on Saturday. Brant and I drove down to his shop and he worked on his car while I got my long run done. It was 7 miles this week, and it went fine. My legs (especially my left calf) are achy today, which kind of surprises me, but I’m blaming it on the slight incline and headwind  Whatever, it’s done, and that makes me happy. 

We pretty much just hung out the rest of the weekend. Sunday morning was supposed to involve the beach, but we ditched it so I could go to a job interview. It was for a gardening/farming job and I did not get it. (I think if faced with that choice again, I will be choosing the beach). The dude who owns the farm keeps like 100,000 bees on his property and decided to go with someone else since I had a bad reaction the last time I was stung. Or at least, that’s what he said. Fair enough.

So that sucked, but on the bright side it looks like I will be doing some part-time gardening around the shop where Brant works. Mostly pruning, deadheading, and weeding. Basic clean-up. So that’s cool. It will be nice to get my hands in the dirt again.

Oh! And I almost forgot! This will matter to very few people, but Friday I went to Savers and thrifted the coolest painting to hang on our wall. I also found a neat bowl from India that now serves as a catch-all for our keys, change, sunglasses, etc. Small things to buy, but they have really helped make our home feel like, you know….a home. With suitcases containing the bare necessities, I’ve struggled with feeling like we are on a perpetual vacation. But knickknacks and wall art?  Now we’re putting down roots. :)

Totally Thought I'd Be a Surfer Girl By Now

Feels like I spent today making things. We do almost all of our cooking from scratch, and on Monday’s I like to cook up big pots of things so the cooking for the rest of the week is easier (quicker). There are black beans in the crock pot right now. A double batch of quinoa in the fridge beside two batches of breakfast cookies wrapped in parchment paper. The cookies are kind of a disappointment, but we will eat them anyway, slathered with peanut butter. There are peanut butter/chocolate/banana cookies (these are pretty good, but too doughy in my opinion) and strawberry lemon cookies (which taste nothing like strawberries or lemons, sadly).

Here are two confessions for you:

1. I think I might be addicted to HGTV. Can’t stand the design shows, but am obsessed with House Hunters and Property Virgins, especially.

2. Despite dreaming of it for years, now that we have moved here, I am afraid to try SUP (stand up paddling). Intimidated by the ocean. But as a friend of mine put it, time to pick up my skirt and drop my purse.  

Ah….noted.

What are you intimidated by? Any tips for not dying in the ocean?

The weekend in fragments (mostly).

Bought an ice cream maker. Coconut Banana ice cream rocks. Ran 6 miles on Saturday. Ran too late, it was hot. No water. Seriously considered chopping my hair. Bought plates at a garage sale. Grilled hot dogs with friends. (Applegate Farms hot dogs are delicious).  Brant played basketball. The dogs wandered away.  Walked on the beach Sunday morning. Drank a mango smoothie. Looked for shells. Ham sandwiches with friends for lunch. Did too many dishes. Homemade pizza for dinner. Then movies and bed. 

Mahana Ridge Trail Hike

* I wrote this last night, but was way too lazy to actually post it. So if the time-line seems off, that's why. 

Yesterday I went for my second hike with the group Maui Hikes, and it was awesome. Great trail, nice distance, incredible views, and awesome company. Many, many photos were taken and thankfully I wasn’t the only one holding up the group to get just one more angle of many shots.  I dig my fellow hikers. They were Erik (founder of Maui Hikes), Chris (Erik’s friend) and Debbie (just flew in the night before, visiting from California).

I should be posting an informal review of our hike (plus more pics) on the Maui Hikes site soon.  I'll let you know when it's up. 

Today, my legs are tired. I covered another couple of miles along the beach after our hike, while waiting for Brant to pick me up, making my total mileage around 8.25 miles. So much for that mere 30 minutes of cross-training I was supposed to do. I nixed my run today, due to dead, sore legs. I don’t know – I’m positive I could have pulled myself off the couch and run. I’m not that tired. But my shins are sore, and I decided that yesterdays time and distance on my feet count towards training, so I’m just gonna not run today, and then continue with training days as normal. Isn’t it crazy how we runners have to twirl it around in our heads, and justify if we do or don’t run? Will it mess up my training? Am I being a wimp? Suck it up? But will I be promoting injury? Less is more?   If you only knew how much brain energy I put into deciding whether I should run today or not.  I KNOW I’m not the only one who does this. Fess up.

Runners are a special kind of crazy.

It’s out of my hands now. The sun is getting ready to go down and no way this girl is running in the dark. Brant is on his way home from work with explicit instructions to bring Reese's Peanut Butter Cups.

I’m eating processed candy crap for dessert, but guess what I had for lunch?

It may look like pea green baby turds on veggies, but in fact it is cucumber & tomatoes topped with balsamic basil dip. Picked up a bag of local basil and cherry tomatoes at the farmers market yesterday and I don’t know, I guess I felt like turning snob because I made an appetizer that required balancing vegetables. And involved dip that looks like  a baby diaper, but tastes like tomato/basil/balsamic heaven. I’m sure caviar doesn’t look pretty either.

Dip

Put these things into a blender or food processor:

½ an avocado

spoonful of veganaise

1 – 2 tablespoons balsamic vinegar (to taste)

6 – 7  large leaves of fresh basil (or more, depending on your tastebuds)

Blend it.

Slice cucumbers. Slice cherry tomatoes in half and put on top of cucumber slice. Top with dip. Drizzle with more balsamic and fresh ground black pepper. Feel high and mighty. 

How does the internet work?

You may (or may not) notice a new comment system here. I installed Disqus today, because I wanted the ability to comment back on the comments you leave here. Anyway, I have no idea how it works. So I'm just gonna do my best, and if you notice weird things perpetually happening here (uh, duh), please say something to me. The first thing I'm trying to figure out is: when I comment back on a comment you left, are you notified in any way? Because dudes, if not, how the heck will you know I commented back? Ugh, it's hard being so narcissistic.

No really. A large portion of the reason I keep this blog is for relationship. Connections. I like to be connected to you guys. Hence wanting to comment back.

In other news, I am going on a hike tomorrow with Maui Hikes. We are doing the Mahana hike in the Kapalua Resort Trails. I hear it's around 5 miles. All I know is it's on the opposite side of the island from me and Erik from Maui Hikes is being nice enough to let me hitch a ride with him. I'm bringing him treats though (lemon sesame cake with strawberries), so we will be sort of even.

I'm excited about the hike - it will be a good cross-training workout, and it will be cool to explore more of Maui.

Bite Update (and a recipe)

I had a vague dream last night that the centipede came back to visit me. When I woke this morning the bite marks were red, a little swollen and itchy. Creepy much?

So it's been what? A week and a half since the bite? Here's what it looked like right after it happened (as if we need a reminder. gag.)

Pretty much the next morning it looked almost normal. I put that melaleuca gel on it (thanks grandma) and the next morning, and all the way up through yesterday you could barely tell anything had happened, save for the two, tiny scabbed over puncture marks.

Right now it looks like this:

Both puncture marks a little red and swollen, like a mild mosquito bite. And itchy.

Itchy is good though, right?  Doesn't it mean it's healing or something?  Why the swelling and redness? Is there still poison in there? And why did I dream about a centipede last night? We are not even going to fully discuss the possibility of another one being in my bed because A) there was NOT another one in my bed, and B) my fragile little mind, people. My fragile, little mind.

Anyway, that's the update.

Now for Dirty Coleslaw. This recipe is based on a recipe for blue cheese slaw  found here. Brant modified it to suit his tastebuds and I gotta say, I love his tastebuds. This stuff is the bomb. No offense to the original recipe of course.

Dirty Slaw Ingredients

-green cabbage, chopped for slaw
-veganaise (we ALWAYS use Veganaise because we love the flavor. But I'm sure mayo would work fine too).
-balsamic vinegar
-agave nectar (regular, raw blue agave. no weird flavors added)
-red pepper flakes
-blue cheese chunks (we usually use the kind in the big tub at Costco)

Instructions:

Chop cabbage. In a bowl, mix all remaining ingredients except blue cheese. Brant's magic ratio is:

4.5 parts veganaise
3 parts balsamic
2 parts agave
1 part red pepper flakes
1/2 part black pepper

Basically just mix all that stuff up in a bowl real good. Play with the ratio, taste, play some more, till when you taste finally, your eyes roll back and you say "THAT is THE flavor I was looking for."

That may or may not be how it is made in this house.

Once you have your perfect sauce, pour it over your chopped cabbage and mix well. Add blue cheese crumbles and mix again. Done.

I love this salad. And I love my husband. And I love that he made this salad. Amen.

Snails, Sales, and Sugar

Found this guy in our yard yesterday.

 

We hung out for awhile. The dogs tried to eat him.

Finally sent him on his way. 

P.S. How cool is that spider on the blade of grass?

The weekend was awesome. I am reeling from the amount of sugar consumed. Did you know Hot Tamales and Starbursts are both gluten free? Halle-freaking-luja.

Saturday morning we went to the Seabury Hall Craft Fair.  Seabury Hall is a private school here in Makawao that takes students from 6th -12th grade. The craft fair is an annual event that fundraises for student tuition financial aid. The campus is amazing! I can't believe kids get to go to school there. Our landlord is the principle of the Seabury middle school and gave us passes to the craft fair. Score. While we were looking forward to checking out the vendors and food, we were mostly excited because there was a rummage sale.

Brant scored a never-used gps unit for $10.
I scored a blender for $3.

We also got a couple of beach towels, a hat and visor for me to run in, and work shoes for Brant.

Oh, and and eggplant and pineapple at the craft fair farmer's market.

I could pretty much die from excitement over my blender. It's an older one, maybe from the early 80's? But it's super clean, and holy motor it is powerful. Smoothies and banana ice cream here I come.

We went grocery shopping Saturday afternoon and got Brant the rest of the ingredients to make his 'dirty coleslaw.' Our landlords wanted to try it and had bought the cabbage and blue cheese - we just had to buy the rest of the ingreds and make it. Martha Brant was disappointed because although it still tasted good, it tasted different than usual. I think it was because we used a different balsamic vinegar than usual. Certainly didn't stop us from eating the entire batch in less than 24 hours.

Speaking of Brant's culinary skills, this is the dinner he made last night:

It was phenomenal. Black beans and rice, all seasoned up. Avocado, butter lettuce, cilantro, widow-maker hot sauce. And a hearty portion of dirty slaw. He doesn't cook often, but when he does, oh man is it good.

The rest of the weekend was spent pretty much like this:

Law & Order, NCIS, Top Gear, lounging, sleeping, candy, more sleeping.

I got my 5 miles in Saturday morning. More rain running. Looks like it's fairly clear out there now, so I better get going.

Hope you had a lovely weekend too.

It's like running in the shower

What is this? A squash?

It's just hanging there.

Oh man, the weather here is still crazy. Rain & wind. It's cool though because you know, it's rainy and windy and still 80+ degrees. I love it.

I'm feeling all hardcore because I got my run in today, despite the rain. I saw a break of blue sky around 10am so a threw on my running clothes. Sure enough by the time I was leaving our driveway the clouds and rain were back. After running for only 2 minutes or so, I had myself talked into turning around and canning the whole thing, but by the time I got back to our house I talked myself back into completing the run. Jeez. Anyway, it turned out great. Sure beats the cold rainy runs in Boise. When I was done I was soaked through, but like I said, hardcore, yo.

Now I'm eating vegan enchiladas from yesterday (what?) and trying to sweep all the dog hair out of our house.

What are you up to?


P.S. If my internet connection holds out, I'll be making some changes to the blog today - like the header and layout. So don't panic or anything.

Stash

 I walked into town yesterday, to find someone who would fax one sheet of paper to our realtor. Found a postal shop who could do it for $2 per sheet to the mainland. I wish I had a scanner. As I was walking up the hill and out of our neighborhood I looked back over my shoulder and saw clouds so beautiful I had to stop, stare, be quiet. They were Hallelujah chorus clouds. 

Makes me also seriously wish I had a camera with me that could more accurately capture the scene.

It is raining as I type this. Soft, drizzly rain, and we are socked in gray skies. A far cry from yesterday.  But the winds are blowing, and bits of blue show here and there. There will be sun later.

I’ve swiped a plastic folding chair from our landlords makeshift shed, and I’m sitting at the utility table (also plastic and borrowed from landlords) in front of our window looking out into the purpley/blue flowered plumbago bushes in the yard. I’ve already drunk most of the coffee we brewed this morning (6 cups) and I’d like more. Time to break into the iced coffee stash in the fridge. It may be rainy, gray, and windy outside, but it is still warm enough for an iced beverage. 

Now

Wondering when these words will begin to sound like me, and not an imitation of some other blogger I read last week, yesterday, an hour ago.

Thinking about fear. Everything I do, or do not do is motivated out of a thought based around fear. A few times in my life I have overcome that fear – jumping into 50+ ft. of water and snorkeling for the first time, and whitewater rafting are the two that initially come to mind.

Looking forward to next weekend. We have plans to go to a big rummage sale/craft fair put on by a local private school. I’m looking for a few things to brighten our house: bath towels, a garbage can, spoons.

Remembering yesterday and how I got to spend almost the whole day in Kahana all by myself. Ran the first training run on the lower road. Said ‘good morning’ and smiled. Felt like my heart was going to burst with happiness.  Found a hemp wallet on the sidewalk. Set it on the rock wall hoping its owner would see it and claim it. Six hours later it was still there.

Dreaming as always. Lately of making jewelry from the shells and coral beach treasures I find. I’d like to wear a bracelet refined by the ocean.