Lessons Both Ways
Monday, we had a couple of hellacious storms - thunder and lightning of biblical proportions and rain that would have made Noah nervous. The first hit in the afternoon and if it had gone on, I would have passed on my Monday night SNB. Don’t like to be driving after dark in bad weather. But things seemed to quiet down and by the time I left, it wasn’t even raining anymore.
But, at about 9:00 PM, it all started again and there we all sat, needles in hand, jaws in laps, watching another monster storm through the windows of the Border’s caf. At one point the rain was so heavy, we couldn’t see the cars in the parking lot.
The worst of it was over by the time we left, though it was still raining. I navigated my way home at a fairly measured pace as visibility was no better than so-so and there were lakes in the streets. There wasn’t a lot of traffic either, thank goodness, but when I was about 3 miles from home on a long, straight stretch, a young man in a muscle car roared up behind me and swung into the oncoming lane to pass, He was doing about 60 mph and he threw up a tsunami as he went by. Lily (my car) doesn’t handle “wet” well in terms of keeping the windows clear so I always have the driver’s window open when driving in the rain and, of course, I got soaked by the tidal wave.
I also slowed way down because, for a minute, I couldn’t see anything. This was a good thing because when the windows cleared, I saw this speeding youngster try to pull back into the right lane right in front of me. He turned too sharply, slammed on the brakes and promptly lost all control of the vehicle which jumped the curb, piled into a fence, nearly turned over, popped it’s trunk and stalled.
I was completely stopped at this point and waited to see if the kid was all right. He tried to get the car going again, but that wasn’t happening. Then he got out of the car and started to run around it in something of a frenzy, wringing his hands and running them through his nearly non-existent crew-cut. There was no blood and he was moving normally. It was clear that he was unhurt, though very upset.
You know how you sometimes wish for instant karma? When someone cuts you off, or shoves you out of the way and grabs the last sale item? You think how pleasant, how gratifying it would be if some small kind of cosmic justice were to make itself known?
It isn’t gratifying at all. I was so glad the kid was unhurt (and that no one else had been hurt by his lack of judgment) that there wasn’t any room for smugness. I would have thought I’d feel something along the lines of “it-served-you-right”, but I didn’t. Despite the impromptu (and cold) shower all I could feel, as I drove the rest of the way home, was gratitude that both he and I were okay. He was probably in trouble - but that’s way better than being dead.
So we both learned something.
The Cheap Easy
Okay - on to the latest “creation” from Robbyn’s kitchen. It’s probably only new to me, but I pass it along anyway, just in case. This makes enough for two and with a small salad or a vegetable, is quite a nice dinner. It was born (LOL) in the usual way. That is, it was the night before shopping day and there wasn’t much in the refrigerator.
Spud-go-‘round
Take two medium or three small potatoes (we like the Yukon Golds - yummy!). Wash them off and peel them if you prefer. I like potato skins so unless they’re really grungy, I leave ‘em on. Now get a fork and poke each potato four or five times. If you’ve had an especially bad day, poke ‘em some more; it won’t hurt anything and you may feel better afterwards :) Put them on a microwave safe plate and stick them in the nuker. Our microwave has a setting for potatoes but if yours doesn’t, the manual should give you an idea of how long to cook them. In our oven, three potatoes take about 10 minutes to cook.
The rest of the fixin’s
Once that’s going, get the rest of the stuff ready. That can include almost anything you have hanging around. Here I’ve got about 6 oz of corned beef (cut into cubes), three large mushrooms (sliced) and a few slices of Provolone cheese (which was cut up later). You can use anything you have here. The original meal was made with several torn-up slices of smoked, Virginia-style ham and cheddar cheese - any bit of meat and/or vegetables that you have hanging around will work fine. Cheese is a nice addition too, but not necessary.
Once the potatoes are cooked, remove them from the microwave and cut them up. You don’t have to be fussy about this, just chunk them. You can do this right on the plate. Butter them, if you like. Then layer on the other ingredients. Order doesn’t matter much - I like the cheese on top :)
Then put the plate back into the microwave for another 2-3 minutes to heat the rest of the ingredients through and melt the cheese.
Ta-taaaa!
I should have nuked this for another minute or so to get the cheese a little more melty - but it tasted pretty good anyway. I know, I know, it should have been Swiss cheese with corned beef. I didn’t have any and the Provolone worked fine :) Those little specks on the surface are freshly ground black pepper. I put pepper on everything. Well…not ice cream…
From beginning to end, it only takes 12 minutes or so and only uses one plate and one knife. Fast, easy and pretty, darned tasty.
Enjoy!
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I’m so glad no one was hurt, but what a little idiot that lad was!
Well yes, and probably a drunk little idiot to boot - though I don’t know that for sure. Hopefully, he’ll think twice next time.
Excellent that no one was hurt! That’s always the most important thing. A car can always be repaired or replaced.
Dinner looks yummy! Much better than the bizarro pasta concoction that emerged from my stovetop the other night.
Heheh - I LOVE bizzaro pasta concoctions, Caren. Around here that’s known as Kitchen Sink Pasta (as in “everything but…”) or just “Robbyn’s been at the macaroni again” :)
You should try black pepper on ice cream. Good vanilla ice cream with fresh sliced strawberries. A little liquer (sp?) with it is very nice as well! 
Thanks for the suggestion, Sharon! I may have a go at it one of these days. Just out of curiosity, what do you put on a steak? 
