Much ado about nothing and a little 4th of July nostalgia

So I've had a little writers block lately. Although, I'm not much of a writer so I guess I can't really blame it on that. Really I have just been a little uninspired lately and I haven't felt like blogging much. Just in case you couldn't already tell that from my last entry, which, yes, I realize was way weak. Part of it is because really, nothing exciting is going on. Just everyday normal life. Which I realize is still quite different from my former everyday normal life, but still it has become rather normal and un-news worthy to me. And of course I could probably find something to blog about everyday, like my disgusting, moldy, mildewy washing machine that I have been trying to clean, but really, who in their right mind would be interested in that? Not that most people are that interested in my newly acquired granny knitting skills either, but I suppose that doesn't stop me from using my blog as a forum to show it off. And I have actually been finding it quite difficult to write a blog with such a mixed audience. I find myself searching for just the right way to say certain things, leave many things out entirely and of course leave out a few (or in the case of the migraine from hell story, many) choice words.

But enough of my whining! Onto the not so exciting last few days........ So we had quite a boring weekend last week. Phil had to work from home pretty much the entire time so needless to say we didn't get out too much. We did make a quick trip to the beach before sushi with some friends on Saturday night, but other than that we just stayed at home and watched bad movies on HOT, our cable provider. HOT.....Bad Movies are our Specialty. If you've seen "Snakes on the Plane" with Samuel L. Jackson then you can get the gist of just how bad it really is. Of course we spent one afternoon roasting and peeling some more chiles, and the collection of little frozen baggies in our freezer is multiplying quickly and will no doubt soon take over the freezer. I picked up 5 more kilos (that's like 11 pounds I lugged around the city for the love of my sweet husband!) and hopefully that will be enough chile to keep Phil sweating and crying into his food all winter long. And this time I was smart and bought disposable gloves to wear so that I could save myself the embarrassment of having to sit with my hands in a bucket of milk.

I spent most of the week doing the usual cleaning, washing, grocery shopping, reading, working out, avoiding my Hebrew and cooking. (Trust me, if you have the time, one can easily stretch all these tasks to make it seem like you are very busy indeed.) Since we have all this newly found green chile-esque chile, I have been making an abundance of Mexican food. Unfortunately we cannot find corn tortillas here which has kept me from making green chile chicken enchiladas, one of our favorites and for me a comfort food that my Mom used to make when I used to live at home way back when. And we are such salsa snobs that we don't get anywhere near the salsa offerings here. If I wanted chunky ketchup, I could make it myself thank you very much! Instead we stick with homemade pico de gallo and guacamole. There will definitely be an empty suitcase traveling to NM with us in October to be filled up with El Pinto salsa, corn tortillas and some chipotle chile powder.

I've also been a little uninspired in the kitchen lately. Of course I have many recipes I would like to make but a lot of them I have been having trouble finding the right ingredients. Just one of the many lies we were told before moving here "Oh, you can find everything you want in Tel Aviv". Sorry, but wrong! So besides Mexican I usually make a lot of pasta dishes which quite frankly gets a little old after a while. And we eat a ton of chicken. I think we are about to sprout feathers and start clucking we eat so much damn chicken. Meat is hard to buy because I don't know most of the time what exactly it is I am buying, plus we don't eat a lot of red meat anyway. Obviously pork is pretty sparse here, although it is available if you know where to go. (Which usually means an extra trip on my already three stop grocery shopping expedition.) And for some odd reason I have had a really hard time finding fish. There is certainly no lack of delicious fresh fish in the restaurants but as far as buying and cooking it myself, I have not had much luck. Clearly, the oily salmon incident turned me off of the whole idea anyway. I did manage to buy some ground and seasoned lamb and beef to make kebabs (not what we think of as a kebab in the US, but more like just a little patty that you grill) and we stuffed them in some fresh pita with hummus and spicy sauce and they ended up being quite delicious. Although that was almost a day long process from looking in the grocery stores, to finally asking someone where I could find ground lamb and following her not so great directions and getting lost in the steamy summer heat. Then I had to book it back to the apartment because I was afraid they might get "cooked" if I was outside too long.

Phil's been working hard all week but we did manage to squeeze in a movie yesterday and we saw Sex and the City. Thank goodness they use Hebrew subtitles instead of dubbing over the voices. And we actually have a movie theater literally outside our front door which is quite convenient. I'd been begging Phil to take me to see it since it came out the end of May and we finally found a time when a) he wouldn't be interrupted by work (although he actually was but only very briefly) and b) we had the time and it wasn't too late in the evening to go see it. See if you go to a 2 hour movie here it really ends up being like a 2 and half hour or longer affair. First, along with the usual twenty minutes of previews they also start with about 10 minutes of really annoying commercials. And many of the theaters, although luckily it doesn't seem to happen at this theater by us, have an intermission where they literally stop the movie in the middle of a scene, mid sentence, for a 5-10 minute "intermission". The movie was surprisingly good and I was quite impressed as most TV shows that turn into a movie generally don't live up to the original show. So if you are a Sex in the City fan, I definitely recommend it. And thanks to the Hubby for taking me and being brave enough to be the only male in the theater!

We're trying to figure out some plans for the 4th of July but it looks like we will be spending it alone. Some work friends are having a large BBQ at their house near Jerusalem and there will apparently be about 16 little kids running around in a not so big space. Needless to say, that wasn't on the top of our list for exciting things to do. And as it looks like Phil is going to have a super long day a work today (like he might be there until midnight and yes, you should feel very sorry for him), I'm sure getting up and driving to Jerusalem on Friday will not be his idea of a good time. So it looks like we'll just be hanging out at home. We did hear of a possible fireworks display put on by the American Embassy although our source for that information is none too reliable. But if it turns out to be true I am sure we will try to go check it out. I think I would be a little sad to not see any fire works on the 4th. Otherwise it looks like we will just be working on our tans and sweating it out on the beach. It's so warm now that even the water is tepid and non-refreshing and the sea is also starting to fill up with jellyfish (which along with the puffer fish in Hawaii scare the bejeezus out of me!), which we were told were making their annual showing a little early this year. I'll just be frying myself on the beach and skipping the water this time, thank you very much.

(SIGH) It makes me a little homesick to think of all the barbecues and family and friends getting together to grill, eat watermelon and watch fireworks. Although I am not sure why since I really haven't done anything like that on the 4th of July in a really long time. Those days of family reunions in the middle of nowhere Nebraska are long gone. I would have to say that my favorite memory of the 4th was the year both sides of my family were gathered there for the holiday (yes, my parents came from the same little town of like 300 people, or at least it used to be that big but now it is much smaller!). There were hardly enough beds for everyone and I kept getting shuffled from one Grandma's house to the other. I remember my cousin, my aunt, my Grandma and I made a 4th of July flag cake with blueberries, strawberries and bananas as the colors of the flag. It was awesome. I searched high and low for a picture of it but just could not find one. It may be on Phil's laptop as it may have been used in the wedding slide show but I could not find it on our computer anywhere. (I'm sure if it was there it got wiped out when our hard drive died.) Oh well, you will just have to picture it in your mind for now, in all it's delicious red, white and blue glory........ Happy 4th of July to everyone!