My House Smells Like Fennel

Because I had a coupon for $10 off on seafood with a $40 purchase, I brought home not one but two packages of fish on Saturday. Yesterday, after church and choir practice [more on that later], I came home and made “Pan-Roasted Halibut with Braised Red Onion” from Williams-Sonoma Cooking for Yourself. Except that I didn’t have halibut; I had flounder. And I didn’t have a red onion; I had a fat sassy shallot. And I also didn’t have any fresh thyme, and my dried thyme was nowhere to be found, so I used fennel seeds and my new mortar and pestle. I did have the cast iron skillet that Brother Sushi helped me pick out a couple of years ago, and I did have lemon juice and unsalted butter. And I did follow the suggestion to substitute fettuccine for the new potatoes.

I only ate half of the fish. Today I will take the leftovers to work, along with the last dab of leftover mashed potatoes, and certain people in the office will say, “Ewww, it smells like fish in here.” And I will eat my healthy lunch and cheerfully ignore them. Next time I will try the recipe as written, but I was quite pleased with how my substitutions turned out.

The natatorium, which is owned by a municipal government, will be closed for MLK Day. And I will not have to go get the mail at the Post Office today, so I’m not sure where my exercise will be coming from. I doubt that eight more toe increases on the Stripedy Sock’s mate, though certainly exciting to this knitter [or any other], will get my heart rate anywhere near the aerobic zone! Once I get the increases in and a couple of straight rounds worked so that I can place a marker, I think I will set the sock aside until next Sunday. I have really been missing LittleBit’s Firestarter while in the throes of finishitis, and I think it would be pure pleasure to work with fatter yarn and fatter needles for awhile.

Choir practice. I love to sing. I’m one of those people you see in other cars on your drive to work, singing along with the radio at 65mph. And we have a gifted choir director in our ward. He manages to be both passionate about music and kind to his singers. I have rarely sung in our choir since moving into this ward almost five years ago. Why?

(1) Exhaustion; until recently all I wanted to do after church was to go home and sleep. The CPAP has made a huge difference in my energy level, and I am thankful.
(2) Bronchial issues; I am occasionally asthmatic and cannot use a rescue inhaler because it makes my asthma worse and wreaks havoc on my joints. I never know from one day to the next [in allergy season, at least] if I am going to wake up a soprano, or a tenor. I am still not entirely un-crouped from the bug I picked up in November; it comes and goes like Boy George’s Karma Chameleon.
(3) LittleBit likes to come home immediately after church, refuel, and head over to her father’s and sister’s to visit. Now, of course, she also has to factor work into most of her Sundays, but I am enjoying the blessings of letting her get her driver’s license.
(4) Her father is also a singer, and when he was still attending our ward, he was usually in the choir. I can pick his voice out of the congregation when we are all sitting in our pews; it is all the more so when we are two out of twelve or twenty up in the choir loft. For better or worse, I still hear that man’s voice in my bones.

But yesterday I was feeling well-rested, and breathing easily, and LittleBit was at her final meeting of youth conference, and her father was presumably attending his new church, and I just wanted to sing. So I did. I took one look at the sheet music and knew that those top notes might as well be on Mars, so I moved myself on down the line to sing with the altos, though I have to fake a couple of their bottom notes. [I am a mezzo with limited range. Basically, the B below Middle C, up to about E-flat. Twelve notes. Nobody writes music for my voice. :( ] And I got to sing with the second sopranos for a few measures. I have three more weeks to learn this music, so I didn’t need to bring it home. And next week we start work on the music for Easter!

I think between the water aerobics and the singing, I’ll have my pipes cleaned out in no time at all. I really need to find the sheet music for my recorder and tootle around with it for a few minutes a day. [Playing trumpet did wonders for LittleBit’s ability to manage her asthma.]

I’m off to read my scriptures and root around for sheet music, though I think it’s far too early to subject the neighbors to the squeaks and squawks of a born-again recorder player. And then I’ll head over to the YMCA; I just called, and they are open. Woohoo!