The 'Great Feeling' In Action

Not even two week ago I wrote about how great I was feeling about he new year. If anything, that feeling is expanding and growing. I won't say every single moment of every single day is a high, but the overall sense that things are going as they should be, that good things are going to happen is unfolding day-by-day. 

I've been working very hard in my spiritual practices to focus on trust and gratitude. It has been an interesting practice. For the longest time I have been a believer and practitioner of 'visioning'. This is the creation of detailed pictures or word descriptions of what you really want to achieve in all aspects of your life. It has been a very positive thing for me. I've shared it with many others and they've also had positive results. But for some reason, it feels that is not what I should be doing now. What feels right is to NOT vision, but to just TRUST. And that's what I'm doing. 

The house remodel is finally, with a quickening pace starting to come together. We are hoping to actually start construction sometime toward the end of March!

I finished the Book. Segment Six. Typed the words 'The End' after finishing the last chapter after five long years.

I am getting leads on really interesting (and potentially high paying) new business. My existing clients are doing well and lots of fun to work with. 

Wife is definitely feeling better and better. We are going to forego any travel for now. Make sure she is really healed, and focus our energies on getting the house project done.

Theodora received a nice big donation from an ongoing donor that will allow us to finally get the computers we've needed and into a better office environment. 

I am off to Ghana tomorrow and will have a lot to write about from there. 

So while the outside world goes to hell, my personal world seems to just be growing and prospering. I don't understand it. But I trust in what is happening and am filled with gratitude.

Book Nearing Completion

Almost exactly a year ago I wrote a post about my finally getting back into writing the latest installment of my fantasy book series. Now I am almost finished with the drafting of this, the sixth book in the series. It has been an ordeal. As I mentioned last year, the first four books came forth like a volcanic explosion with me writing four books in just two years. Then the fifth book took about three years. I've been working on this one on and off since 2019. I am sure all the creative energy I put into Theodora was a major factor why this took so long. 

However, in the last couple of months, I've finally overcome some block and I've been writing at a steady pace that has not been there for quite some time. I'm hoping to wrap up the last chapter before I go back and edit before I head off to Ghana late next week.  

I've already started thinking about where I will take things once this book is finished. Up until now this has been a linear series. However, I have so many different characters with so many different potential story lines to explore, I'm considering taking a page from one of my all time favorite authors, Terry Pratchett, and create books that focus on individual characters and their specific stories/challenges. 

Feeling Great About 2025

Despite a political environment both domestically and globally that should be having me in permanent depression, I don't feel that way in the slightest. In fact, going into 2025, I feel buoyant.  

Why? you might ask.

Well one is I am on the upswing of my 'Groundhog Day' work cycle. This occurs roughly every third year during my transition life. (The cycle is roughly, realizing I have to work to travel the way I want, throwing myself into work, going on some trip that makes me wish we could travel as much as I want without having to work, letting my work slip, realizing I don't have the money we need to travel, throwing myself back into work.) This time, however, things are being supercharged by breaking of the wave of Baby Boomer business owner exits. 

This wave has been predicted for some time. But the pandemic and people's incredible ability to procrastinate has pushed it many years beyond when many expected. But, as the front edge of the Baby Boomer wave is now it their 70's, life is catching up. People are finding that 'stuff' happens, death, disease, burnout, etc. leading them to finally not being able to put things off. Unfortunately for them, by this time there options are severely limited. Plus it takes a good amount of expertise to carry off even those options. AND there aren't a whole lot of people around (especially here in New Mexico) who have the ability to help people work through those limited options. One of those few people is me! So I'm finding there are all kinds of opportunities. 

In addition to that, Theodora Project, is ready to go to its next phase (I wrote about this in December). We have a number of interesting new avenues for driving our growth. And I have a team that is carrying most of the weight. 

We are getting close to finally getting the house remodel project started. Most of the pieces are falling into place. We hope in a couple of weeks to have all the estimates so we can look at setting an actual date to get started!

Lastly, Wife's health is slowly but steadily getting better. It has taken much longer than we would have hoped. But her progress is definitive. We still won't be traveling for a while, but we see that we will be able.

So, all kinds of exciting stuff going on. It is shaping up to be a fun year.

Redemption In The Form of Latkes And Pizza

Like the proverbial youngster riding a bike or a horse, if you fall, you just need to get up again. So the holiday week was marked by more cooking, and successful cooking!

We started off with Latkes (Potato Pancakes)

In years past I've had issues with too much liquid coming from the potatoes and onions. This year I made sure I squeezed and let drain the potatoes. And I took the shredded onion, mixed it with the eggs and added a small amount of flour. A small batch that I could cook quickly made a difference too.

 Great results!

 On New Year's Eve we made pizza

What was interesting was we were using a lot of the same ingredients as the lasagna - the same sauce, same cheese, same sausage. But totally different proportions and the crust compared to the pasta, led to completely different results because our pizza turned out great.

We were very remiss in documenting our process 

Wife rolling out the crust

 Final results - Meat and Vegetable

Hubris In The Form Of Lasagna

Hubris

English picked up both the concept of hubris and the term for that particular brand of cockiness from the ancient Greeks, who considered hubris a dangerous character flaw capable of provoking the wrath of the gods. In classical Greek tragedy, hubris was often a fatal shortcoming that brought about the fall of the tragic hero. Typically, overconfidence led the hero to attempt to overstep the boundaries of human limitations and assume a godlike status, and the gods inevitably humbled the offender with a sharp reminder of their mortality.

For months I have been thinking and talking of making lasagna. It is a dish that I've made since I was first married and I've lost track of the number of times I've made it. In the beginning, it was always associated with Christmas. I made a very specific, personalized version that was made to Wife's specific liking. As our children got into elementary school, they preferred we make pizza on the holiday and that became the family tradition. But I kept making lasagna at other times of the year. Always it was the occasional 'big event' dish because it took a lot of effort the way I did it. 

Then I started to make pasta from scratch. This led me to become more creative with the lasagna genre motivated by the lighter homemade pasta noodles. It had been a quite a while since I'd made one. It's the kind of dish that serves a lot so its nice to have a group to serve it to. Cooking for large numbers seems to be one of those things that one lets go off as age starts eating into one's physical abilities. So I hadn't the motivation.

But, with all the talking of my making lasagna prowess, I decided I was going to do it this holiday. I had in my mind a number of enhancements to make the process more efficient. Since Wife was my only customer, I would make the 'classic' version. I would create an epic blog post going step-by-step through the process to the glorious outcome. However, as my grandiose vision arose, the Gods saw the need bring things in line. 

A Tale of Death by a Thousand Cuts

It was not a single catastrophic failure that brings about the hubris like end to our story. It is rather a series of minor errors that combined lead to de-I's downfall. And since I am writing this as a mea culpa to my sin of hubris, I will go through all the gory details of my downfall

I went through much planning and effort to make for an easier time on the day of actual preparation. Here is everything laid out and ready to go. Though in that preparation, I already had planted seeds of the unpleasant future

From the upper left corner going clockwise - Cheese sauce, Italian sausage, Meatballs, Tomato sauce, Mozzarella cheese, Parmigiano Reggiano cheese. Below is my beloved 1950's something roasting pan I use only for making lasagna. (A note on the Cheese sauce - in Northern Italy they like to use Bechamel, a cream sauce. In Southern Italy they like Ricotta cheese. As most American Italians are of Southern Italian descent, Ricotta is the default ingredient. I didn't like either so I added cheese to my Bechamel. The problem with this, as we will see, is you lose a structure providing ingredient that Ricotta provides.)

You will note the Cheese sauce because it was made the day before had solidified. That was a root cause of one of my errors. You will not see that the Tomato sauce had a flaw as well. I like cooking it with some bone-in meat to give it more depth. But I chose a cut with a lot of smaller bones and connective tissue. These fell apart in the cooking process. I was able to fish out most. But some small bone pieces made it through. These were Very Unpleasant to run into in the final product)

Left to make on the day of, the pasta

Don't forget that all important Italian Semola flour!

In fact the pasta turned out extremely well...accept for one problem I will uncover below.

On to assembly - a layer of sauce on the bottom followed by the first layer of pasta

 

You might notice one of the unforeseen flaws here, the delicate nature of the pasta.

Our next layer is the Mozzarella, Meatballs, with another layer of sauce

Here we find another error, the amount of sauce. It is a delicate balance. You need enough sauce so the lasagna isn't dry. But too much at it will be soupy and not hold its shape.

Our next layer will add the Cheese Sauce, the Italian Sausage, and more Tomato Sauce

Two more errors - it's not easy to notice in the middle picture above but I put that whole container of Cheese Sauce in because it was solid and I couldn't get it to spread out. But when I cooked it, it all melted creating a lot of liquid. And I put a lot more Tomato Sauce on. We're like the lasagna version of the Titanic at this point not realizing our doom is upon us.

The last layer of Pasta with more Tomato Sauce and a coating of Parmigiano Reggiano.

Then into the oven

Where I proceeded to make a series more errors. I had seen on a recent video where they cooked the lasagna at 350 degrees covered in foil for 30 minutes and then under the broiler for 10 minutes to crisp the top. HOWEVER, should have remembered that because of the size of my lasagnas and the effect of altitude that I needed to cook it at a higher temperature. And I've never covered my lasagna so why I decided to do so now was a mystery. 

It took much longer to cook as a result. When I put it under the broiler, I was distracted because one of the daughters called. It ended up partially burning on the top! The final blow.

Wife and I were starving. Under the best of circumstances one should let his rest to firm up a bit. Historically, my first day lasagnas have always been on the 'wet' side. But this was a soup. A major contributor? The Pasta. It was great pasta. Just the wrong pasta for this application. The delicate pasta simply didn't hold its shape in all this liquid. Store bought firmer pasta would have been a much better choice.

The sad looking plate

Now here is the real irony. The flavor of it was really good! It was spot on the classic version. BUT I DISCOVERED I REALLY DON'T LIKE THAT VERSION ANY MORE!  Our tastes change at every aspect of life, and I just don't enjoy the Tomato Sauce forward version that this is. I like my more delicate, meat sauce versions that go with my homemade pasta. 

So my Hubris event was complete.

Holiday Shopping - Eldership Style

 While Wife slowly builds back her strength from the blood clot event, we're taking a decidedly low key approach to the holidays. As it is with family so far away, this has turned out to not be a time when we do a whole bunch anyway. 

We did put up our tree, an artificial thing that has gotten so misshapen and whose built in lights only partially work that we've committed to finally dumping it at the end of the season. While I did most of the heavy work, Wife did do the final decorating. I must say it is one of the more tastefully decorated trees we've put out. Probably because I was prevented from putting on the massive amount of tinsel I usually do. 

We were hemming and hawing on getting presents for each other. This is true for so many couples if you've had success in your life. You pretty much have what you want or if you want something, you just get it. So we've opted for version of that pragmatic approach. We each are going out buying things for ourselves. Then we are giving it to our spouse to wrap up and present as if they bought it. 

I'm telling you we will be like kids again as we open package after package getting all the things we had our heart set on for Christmas.

Transition Of A Different Kind

Daughter #1 is visiting.

After Wife's blood clot event, she wanted to come and spend time. I was thrown back to the 1990's. When we first moved to New Mexico, I suddenly had this strong feeling that I had to be with my parents much more than I had been. For the next 18 years I would go to Connecticut 3 or 4 times a year just to spend time with them. 

It's been lovely having her here though sobering at the same time. She (of course) has been trying to help out. Wife and I being of the independent mindset had a bit of problem letting go. She asked if she could help with the laundry and making the beds (which dominates my Saturdays). I am in the process of giving her instructions on using the washer and dryer. She says,

"Dad. I'm a nearly 50 year old woman with children in college and high school. I've done a bit of laundry." 

Point taken. Sigh. Another transition taking place.