Day 38 - Phooey 2

Good comment about the mushrooms, Georg! Thank you! Nope, I don't season them before sauteeing, and only damply wipe the crud off. So I'm not sure what accounted for success this time. However, I have another 1 and 1/2 packages of mushrooms in the frig, so there will be further experimentation. I'll be reporting here. Come to think of it, you have to wipe beef dry before browning, so maybe the same holds true for mushrooms -- that they need to be thoroughly dried off before hitting the oil. Maybe my mushrooms WERE drier than usual after cleaning this time and I just didn't realize it.

Anyway, I'm definitely feeling better today, but still not great. I slept until 10 a.m., which maybe helped beat back the bad bugs. Had a terrific breakfast of warmed-up pizza. One of my guilty pleasures. Dinner was snacks, which we often indulge in over the holidays. Such things as thinly-sliced salami, brie, crackers, dates, mandarin oranges, and goat cheese. I like to play with my food. I LOVE finger food. These "winter picnics" always seem the height of luxury to me. We usually do it up big time on New Year's Eve, adding treats like shrimp, smoked salmon, and chocolate-covered espresso beans. Ah, bliss.

The only other thing to report is that we now have $5,000 to help pay for all the additional repairs we had to make on our Los Osos in order to sell it. Like a new leach field.... The buyer has entirely backed out and has left his deposit behind. I would rather have sold the house by now, but will settle for being rid of this guy. Our landscaper will be doing some repair work to the front garden, bringing it at least close to its former glory. Then the house will truly be in near-perfect condition for a REAL buyer! And we will have all the misery totally behind us. So, I guess that's a good thing.

I also started work on moving into/unpacking the rest of the upstairs now that the downstairs is pretty much under control. January 1 for totally moved in (mostly) or bust!