Angela Law

animal lover, gardener, knitter, and gourmet cook
 
movies

the upside of anger

I used to really like Kevin Costner. He had a remarkable string of good films (The Untouchables, No Way Out, Bull Durham, Field of Dreams, Dances with Wolves, etc.) Then, after cheating on his wife and his subsequent divorce, he had a remarkable string of forgettable films (I’d tell you about them, but I haven’t seen any of them). Some might call that karma.

But he made a list of all of the wrongs from his past and set out to make things right and then turned his life around. Oh. Wait. That was Earl who did that. I don’t actually know what Kevin did, but whatever it was, it looks like he’s back on track with this movie.

The movie was a simple story about a woman whose husband left her and their four daughters. After this happened, she would sit around all day and drink with her neighbor (Costner), who she later formed a relationship with. The movie had the requisite plot twist at the end.

I did learn some important signs that you might be drinking too much:
1. you switch from beer to vodka
2. drinking while wearing your pjs
3. wearing your pjs all day long
4. you buy 3 bottles of Grey Goose at your weekly trip to the grocery store

As for sign #4, if you’re buying 3 bottles of Grey Goose at a time, not only are you drinking too much, but you obviously have too much money. But, I digress.

Brian and I both enjoyed the movie, but I was even more pleasantly surprised with our snack choice of the evening: pretzel nuggets with honey-mustard sauce. I made the honey-mustard sauce myself. Ingredients: coarse-grained mustard and honey. Pretty easy, eh? It turned out pretty well. And, surprisingly, it went well with our Margaritas. I wasn’t so sure it would, but it did. And, it was way healthier (but, not tastier) than last week’s snack–a can of pringles and a gigantic vat of homemade chip dip. But, you can eat that kind of crap every week. Not at this age, anyway.

gardening & landscaping, motorcycles

mint invasion

You couldn’t ask for a more beautiful day in April, so Brian took today off so he could ride his motorcycle all day. And, I do mean all day. He got up this morning, took the long way to Bellwood and met up with his former co-workers for lunch. After that, he drove here, there, and everywhere, finally arriving home about 8 hours after he left.

As if this wasn’t enough riding for one day, he and Jacob went out for another hour long ride after supper. Who am I to argue?

What does this have to do with mint? Well, while the guys were out riding, I worked on my herb garden. I did the edging, weeded, trimmed the dead growth from the perennials. There was nothing more to do. Except one thing–remove the extra growth from the mint that has invaded every neighboring plant in my herb garden.

My herb garden is in a checkerboard pattern, with square stepping stones making up the checkerboard. The mint grew under all of the bordering stepping stones and into the neighboring plants. I had to remove all of the surrounding stepping stones in order to remove the extra mint. Talk about invasive! It does not help matters that I have three types of mint growing. If I can’t figure out a way to contain their growth this year, I think I’ll cut back to one plant next year to make my life a little easier (assuming removing a mint plant is a feasible action). Until then, I guess I’ll be spending the summer keeping the mint in check.

gardening & landscaping, motorcycles

gardens and bikes

Given the beautiful weather we’ve been having this week, each night we’ve been going outside after supper. I’ve been doing gardening and yardwork. I find it very relaxing to do this type of work when I’m not on some kind of schedule to get things done. Typically, I don’t start on the yardwork until May. It’s not that there’s nothing to do before that, I just never get around to it until then. But, this year is different–there are no big spring projects on the schedule (unlike the past few years). So, I can pace myself a little better this year.

I guess I can thank the neighbors for this. It all started on Monday when they cut their grass. So, I put “cutting the grass” on Brian’s Monday evening agenda. While he was outside doing that, I did the trimming. The trimming led to pulling weeds and such from around my vegetable garden (which is well under way–garlic, onions, lettuce, and potatoes, so far).

Each night, Brian has also been working with Jake to help him ride a bike without training wheels. He’s going to be six next month, so it is time. He’s doing pretty well. I’m sure he’ll get things figured out by summer.

And, this evening we went to Cernic’s Suzuki and bought Jake a motorcycle helmet. Jake is all about motorcycles, let me tell you. He and Brian went out for a little ride around Westmont this evening. Here’s a picture of the happy couple.

I see many hours of quiet gardening in my future.

music

10,000 days

God bless the internet.

Brian downloaded the new Tool from the internet last night. The new album isn’t due out for a few more weeks, but we have it now! I’m sure Maynard’s panties are in a bunch if he’s found out that the album was leaked, but he should give it a rest. It’s hard to be patient when you have to wait this long between albums.

I gave it a few listens today. I haven’t been able to form an opinion yet as it takes me a few weeks of listening before I can form an opinion on a new Tool album, but I’m sure it’ll be good. There are some elements that remind me of the last album. I found this kind of surprising because all of their albums have been very different in my opinion. Another first impression is that it is not as heavy as I was expecting, but maybe my ears are just tuning in to the mellow parts. Time will tell.

holidays

happy easter

This morning I was planning on getting up at 8am, but Jake had other ideas. He awoke at 7am, came into our bedroom and said that the Easter Bunny hadn’t left him anything. Of course, he went no further than his bedroom before he made this determination. Brian told him to check the dining room. Jake did and found his basket and a bunch of hidden eggs. He reported back to us that indeed, the Easter Bunny had visited after all. And, he surmised that the Easter Bunny was probably afraid to go in his bedroom because Lizzy was sleeping in there. Makes sense to me.

A little while later, he yelled for Brian to come and check something out. It turns out that darned Easter Bunny left some candy wrappers and a box that contained a toy motorcycle (that was in Jake’s Easter basket) in our garbage can. So, apparently he assembled the basket here, too. Lazy rabbit!

After all of this excitement, we went to church. We’re getting smarter in our old age and actually got there when there were still seats left. After church we came home, got changed, and gathered up some stuff to take to my parent’s where we spent the afternoon eating too much food. And what do you do when you’ve spent the afternoon eating too much? Well, apparently you go home and eat some more. At least that’s what I did.