Mowing the Lawn

Thelma was gone this evening and had Emma with her, so it was the perfect opportunity to let the boys eat food that is normally quite low on Thelma's list of approved dining options. Before driving to the high school to pick up Braeden from play practice, I asked Mark, "Would you rather have Chinese food or stop at Little Caesar's to get pizza?" Then, inspiration struck me while he was agonizing over the choice. "What about both?" I asked.  His eyes lit up and I could see he knew where I was going with this. "How about we make a Chinese pizza?" Mark started to rattle off a list of ingredients. That kid knows how to build. Usually, it's Legos. Tonight it was pizza. The original idea for a Chinese pizza came during a recent in-the-van-driving-somewhere conversation. I challenged everyone to come up with a strange pizza combination. Between Braeden and I, we imagined a combination that included General Tso chicken in some form. Braed...

This is day 53 of dieting and I finally fell off the wagon. I was doing so well up until this point.  There have been frustrating times.  Times when it would have been easy to bury my stress beneath a mound of flap jacks or in a giant bowl of chow mein.  Times when I could have given into the siren song of humus or the cold indulgence of ice cream.  I've stared awkwardly at fruit.  I've dreamt of chocolate lava cakes. But I had persevered until this evening.  And I have—or used to have, rather—twenty seven pounds to show for it. Cumulative Weight Loss: No one's perfect. I get that. It's just how I fell off the wagon that bothers me. I was pushed off by this guy: "Little Caesar!?  Really?  The creepy little purveyor of bad pizza?" I know.  What can I say?  He got me.  I didn't intend for it to happen. I can't believe it myself.  I've had so many opportunities to cheat.  So many better alternatives than ...

Day 1 in the books as a single parent while Thelma is away at BYU for her yearly pilgrimage to  Women's Conference .  Traditionally, life without Mom has meant an orgy of fast food and takeout.  No sooner had I dropped Thelma and my mother off at the airport then Braeden was calling me to see what I had planned for lunch. "I was thinking we could go to the Grand China Buffet," he suggested in his sweetest voice. I'm determined that this year will be different, though.  We aren't going to eat out every meal.  We're going to make our best attempt at cooking for ourselves, controlling our portions and choosing (moderately) healthy ingredients.  That's our plan and we're sticking to it... starting tomorrow. Tonight, it was the Grand China Buffet after all.  Braeden speaks of it in reverent tones.  Eight tables of Chinese and American food plus a Mongolian grill and sushi bar.  He must have been playing it up behind the scenes because E...

As you will have read on Thelma's blog , we celebrated Valentine's Day by cooking and enjoying a seven course meal as a family.  Our children loved it.  It felt novel and luxurious.  They keep talking about "our seven course meal" as if it is something we now own—some badge of honor for us to proudly wear.  That night, Mark prayed and gave thanks that we were able to attend church and have a seven course meal. Thelma came up with the great idea close enough to Valentine's Day that I was willing to discuss and dream with her about how to pull it off.  Ordinarily, Thelma likes to plan our holidays six to eight months in advance.  I prefer to start thinking about things a few weeks ahead of time at the most. Thelma and I have had a few multi-course meals, but not many.  I'm sure any meal where some of your food is served at separate times technically counts as a multi-course meal, but I don't think a meal should really get credit just because the kid behind ...

I found myself with ninety minutes to kill in Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport this afternoon while waiting for a connecting flight to Grand Forks, North Dakota.  It was just enough time to learn a few valuable life lessons. There I was facing the semicircle of food court fare.  Should I have a hamburger from A&W?  It would probably taste good, it would sit in my stomach like a rock and I risked special sauce or some other condiment dripping down my front.  Maybe a prepared sandwhich from the cold case at the looks-like-a-Starbucks-only-more-expensive coffee stand?  No.  I've had the best at Pret a Manger and everything since just disappoints.  What about sushi?  I wan't to like it.  I really do.  But I don't.  Besides, it brought up bad memories of a run in with a bento box last week.  Pizza?  Maybe in hindsight, but the little express boxes looked like they had been baking under the heat lamp a little too long. I settled on the Chinese food.  Blah.  To borr...

Note:  A selection of photos from Day 3 are posted in my Picasa public gallery . As a missionary I learned to warn people that as soon as they began to feel God's spirit more fully in their life, they could also be sure that temptation and trial were just around the corner.   One follows the other .  Light and dark.  Good and evil.  Chocolate and Kraft macaroni and cheese. So, I should have figured that something would come along and try to spoil my fun now that I'm a full three days into this vacation.  It happened tonight.  I saw hell.  It looks like a rainforest, the food is overpriced and the waiters are dressed in khaki.  Thankfully, I managed to buy my escape for $65 plus tip. The Rainforest Cafe may seem like a nice place to eat, but I've said the same thing about KFC on occasion.  That doesn't make it right.  The food was OK.  I had a mild paella with muscles, calamari, shrimp and andouille sausage.  Unfortunately, I was sitting across from a pair of animatronic...

"I'll be fast," she just said. "It doesn't take me long to be eloquent." Thelma is writing a blog as we speak. She is itching to get something out. I can guess what it is . We just returned from dinner with my parents and siblings to celebrate my mother's 60th birthday. Thelma and I walked into the Olive Garden lobby a fashionable ten minutes late at 6:40. My brothers had been there since 6:00. By the time we arrived, the natives were already restless. By seven o'clock the situation was becoming dire. We had been told repeatedly that a big party was getting ready to leave and we couldn't be seated until they had left. Meanwhile, numerous smaller parties were coming and going all around us. At 7:15, my brothers told me I needed to go deal with the situation as the oldest. I did my best to make the host and hostess uncomfortable about the situation. When that didn't help, I asked to speak to the manager. Restaurant or retail manager...

After 24 hours in the cocoon I call the Marriott Maida Vale, I finally emerged a few minutes ago for fresh air, exercise and food. I've done far too much sitting around and staring at a computer. It's strange this is what I call work. This sitting, typing, talking, thinking, writing. That's the new reality on the edge of cyberspace. It doesn't feel right to call it work sometimes. It doesn't burn enough calories. It doesn't get me dirty enough. A stain on a shirt every now and again when I spill something at lunch. What does it say that my clothes are so clean as to make a stain look out of place? If my hands are clean, if my palms are without callus, have I really created something of worth? There is danger when we stop being part of the creative process. There is danger to the human spirit when we can't see the product of our own hands. When we become just one step in a process, just one role in a factory, we stop being fully human. We are com...

On a scale from zero to three, with zero being best and three deserving adjectives like "abject" and "utter", this has been a 2 Tasty Kebab week. Tasty Kebab is the kebab and chip stand next to the train station a few blocks from my hotel. It's not great food, but it's convenient and fast--rare qualities in London dining where dinner can easily last three or more hours. The number of times I'm forced to visit Tasty Kebab is in direct relation to how busy or chaotic my week has been. (By the way, avoid the fish and chips unless you like your fish with the scales still on. Ask Braeden and Emma about it some time.) On the plus side, I was fully expecting this to be a 3 Tasty Kebab week. The fact that it stopped short at two is really rather positive. On the other hand, even a 2 Tasty Kebab week has left me so exhausted that it is now 4:30 in the afternoon and I've only been awake for a hour. I should be rushing off to the museums before they close...

I feel cheated by the fascists over at Dahl Spice .  "Recipes from the Dahl Women."  Now why would they assume that the only recipes worth posting are those from the women?  While they've been fixated on strawberry pudding , strawberry salad , strawberry soup and strawberry power sharing schemes that don't involve the men, I've been whipping up some darn good grub. I present Pasta all'Arrabbiata as my protest entry.  The term arrabbiata  means "angry" in Italian.  This is pasta in the angry style. There's really nothing sinister about it, though.  Arrabbiata sauce is angry because it traditionally includes simmered red chili peppers.  Some recipes call for chili flakes like the ones you find in pizzerias.  I like it with chilies, but I find yellow pepperoncini  burn with a milder intensity while still infusing the sauce with a good flavor.  If my kids can handle it, so can you. Here is what you need to gather: 1 lb of chopped tomatoes.  I prefer...