WIAW 156 – Dancing Storms

So there was this feisty winter storm from the Dakotas that swept East across the Great Lakes. She’d heard that Arctic Air Mass was going to play in the New York area… And she arranged to meet up with a determined Southern storm. He, in turn, had a goal of becoming a proper Nor’easter as he moved up the coast, and was excited by the idea of going clubbing in New York with Winter Storm and Arctic Air Mass. They were all going to get together late Monday night…

But Arctic Air Mass had too much fun dallying in the Adirondacks and dropping snow there – and didn’t arrive until late Tuesday night. And dancing in NYC without the Air Mass just wasn’t any fun (and all the bars were out of ice) – so when the storms got together, they fought, and thundered, and she ugly cried all day Tuesday… but they finally pulled themselves together to move on up the Coast to New England. Still wasn’t quite what they’d hoped for…

So anyhow – it hovered around freezing all day yesterday, and we had nasty sleet that washed away some of the snow, and froze and was miserable, but we did not get 20″ of snow, which is just fine with us. And there is something about thunder during an ice storm… Today it is quite cold for March, and I can hear people outside literally chipping away at ice to clear paths – and winter is having (I earnestly hope) a last hurrah. Now can we not only have Spring, but keep it, too? All our flowers wilted last week, before the storm even arrived…

But oddly – I’ve actually felt better this week. Which is a relief!

And no, none of this has anything to do with what I ate last Sunday… But I’d been playing on Facebook with the conceit of the two storms meeting to go out on the town in New York (*&^^% tourists, one of my friends muttered…) and as events unfolded, they just kept fitting into the narrative…

So – I had tacos for breakfast. Remember tacos? Last summer that was the standard breakfast. I tend to go on sort of a streak. I need to be able to get up and fix something on auto-pilot, which does not involve standing in the kitchen making decisions… so I often eat just the same thing until I get bored, or something else looks interesting, or…

I’d actually made some refried beans, for the first time in ages, and had a little ham, and added cheese… On the one hand, they need some preparation in advance – on the other, they’re much faster in the morning, so I eat sooner (which is better, for me.) I need to get them back into the rotation! (And then actually, like, rotate…)

For lunch I basically tossed odds and ends in a pan. We experimented with frozen leeks Rich noticed in a store, so I sauteed them with more ham, then stirred in frozen spinach and cooked rice. Fast, easy, tasty…

And I had a nice little pork loin roast. Sometimes I marinate it, or season it, or even roll it – but this time I slung it in the preheated  oven, took it back out when it was cooked through, and that was it…  Beautifully easy, and the meat itself tastes good this way – nice and moist. Gotten some zucchini for a change, and simmered it in a little leftover pasta sauce, to serve with polenta. (When the meat is plain I like a little seasoning in my vegetables…) Both were still really easy, but all together it did have that Sunday Dinner feeling.

The party is on at Laura’s! If you wonder why I always give two credits, Jenn started it, and built it up. But it took more and more work, at the same time that so did her kid and other family needs, so Laura stepped up (with some others, but they’ve had to pull back for their own reasons.) I think we can manage this party without the Arctic Air Mass and thundersleet, don’t you?