While Life Swirls Crazily Around My Head

And I am a writer, writer of fictions
I am the heart that you call home
And I’ve written pages upon pages
Trying to rid you from my bones

Our World: The Caminito del Rey

El Camino del Rey–filmed with a Sony handycam

The Caminito del Rey is a walkway pinned along the steep walls of a narrow gorge in El Chorro, near Álora in Málaga, Spain. From Wikipedia:

The walkway has now gone many years without maintenance, and is in a highly deteriorated and dangerous state. It is one meter (3 ft) in width, and is over 700 feet (200 m) above the river. Nearly all of the path has no handrail. Some parts of the walkway have completely collapsed and have been replaced by a beam and a metallic wire on the wall. Many people have lost their lives on the walkway in recent years. After four people died in two accidents in 1999 and 2000, the local government closed the entrances. However, adventurous tourists still find their way into the walkway.

Yikes, you won’t find me there…ever! Watching the video was close enough for me!

Caminito del Rey, originally uploaded by Gabirulo.

Found on Neatorama

The Basics: Check Your Oil

Why should you check your oil?

Checking your engine oil is very important because without oil you will fry your engine. By checking the oil you can detect if you need to replenish the motor oil in time before it’s too late. If you know your car is leaking oil you should check your oil level every time before you drive, otherwise every time you get gas is sufficient.

From About.com:

Checking your car’s oil level is the single most important thing you can do to extend the life of your car’s engine. In the time it takes to snap into a Slim-Jim, you can use a dipstick. Oil is the life blood of your car.

And most importantly:

Because my daddy said so!

Check the links above for nicely done instructions, or go to Expert Village for a short and sweet video.

Wednesday Mix

Healing and the Importance of Friendship

My friend, Diane, took me to lunch last week for my birthday, she apologized and said that she forgot my card and that she would mail it. I didn’t care, I  was glad to spend some time with her. She has been such a rock for me in the past year, she may never know just how much, but I know that I couldn’t have made it this far without her solid and incredible help and support.

The card arrived in the mail yesterday…it said:

Some years are better than others, but birthdays still come along. Since today is your day–take some time to celebrate your courage and your strength…to make wishes, and keep believing.

Happy Birthday

You deserve so much happiness! Thanks for your friendship. Love, Diane

Thanks Diane, and Hallmark, for making me cry…no (well, yeah but…)…for being there and finding such a perfect card. Sometimes tears are good…

Thanks to Diane and to ALL of my friends, not one of you has let me down. I have gotten exactly what I needed from each of you. Everyone different, none unnecessary.

I love you all!

Thank you.

Back to Sorting Slides

There are 100′s and 100′s of slides, if not thousands, I have thrown away 70% of them…and I am feeling a little bad about it. I know that somewhere in the garbage is art. Some scenic vista, tree stump, rock, animal, or flower perfectly recorded, worth millions…in the garbage.

I started (and last worked on) this project in May. Since Starr is gone, I thought it might be a good time to settle in and at least finish the sorting and culling. Then someday tackling the photographing, one year at a time.

That’s the plan.

I have finally finished the sorting, so I can put them away with a feeling of accomplishment. Until my next burst of energy (maybe 2011?), when I can start the next phase of the project. I did however take a few more test shots with my camera. I have decided that I need a new camera for this job, a nice new camera with tons of pixels…yeah, it’s really a necessity…I need it NOW!!…maybe I will go shopping for one tomorrow.

A girl can dream, can’t she?

I promise (cross my heart!) not to share every slide with you, but here are a couple that I took this weekend:

Cabin Treats: Mushroom Mini Quiches

Makes 2 Marie Calendar sized pies, or 50 some mini quiches

• 2 tablespoons olive oil
• 1 pound mushrooms, sliced (chopped for mini quiches)
• 2 medium shallots, thinly sliced (finely chopped for mini quiches)
• Salt and freshly ground pepper
• 8 ounces Swiss cheese (diced or shredded)
• 1 tablespoon flour
• 4 large eggs*
• 1 ½ cups heavy cream*
• ½ teaspoon salt*
• Sprinkle of nutmeg*
• Pie crust (I would use homemade or Marie Calendar’s frozen crusts for regular size quiches, and what I did for the small ones was to use Pillsbury refrigerated pie crusts (I used two packages)

Sauté mushrooms and shallots seasoned with salt and pepper in olive oil. Cook until mushrooms first release their liquid and then liquid evaporates and mushrooms are a dark golden brown, 8 to 10 minutes. Set aside to cool.

In a small bowl or baggie toss cheese with flour. (I think this helps keep the cheese from settling completely at the bottom of the quiche pan.)

In large bowl, combine eggs, cream, salt and nutmeg.

For regular quiche: (assuming two crusts as I always use Marie Calendar’s which come in sets of two)

Prebake crusts for a few minutes at 375 degrees. Evenly divide batter between the two pans. Then evenly add mushrooms and cheese. Bake at 375 degrees for 40-45 minutes or until knife inserted in center comes out clean. Let cool at least 5 minutes before serving.

For mini quiches:

Using a circular cookie cutter, cut pie crusts into 2 inch circles…as many as you can. Spray mini muffin tin with canola spray if necessary for ease of removal…I didn’t do this for mine. Press circles into the cups of a mini muffin tin, repairing holes if you happen to make them. Try to press the dough around evenly filling the cup the edge of the tin.

I used a pitcher to pour the batter mix into the cups, filling them nearly full…more than 75% but you don’t want the batter to be even with the top. I added cheese to each cup, then mushrooms and a few more pieces of cheese on top.

I baked these at 375 for 10 minutes or so, I didn’t time it, I watched them. They are done when puffed up, and slightly browned. Let cool slightly, then remove from pan to wire rack.

Repeat steps until you are tired, or you have run out of crust, eggs or filling. I had left over mushrooms and cheese although I think I could have been a little more generous with the fillings.

These are good served right away, but are also good reheated from frozen. I let them cool and then spread them on a cookie sheet. Placing them in the freezer like this until frozen and then transferred to baggies.

To reheat, preheat oven to 375 degrees, and place frozen quiches on a baking sheet. Heat them until hot, 10-12 minutes.

* For the mini quiches you might need to 1 ½ times this portion of the recipe. I believe that I made a second small batch of eggs and cream.

Note: I made these for Starr’s graduation party…using bacon and cheddar for one batch, and just cheese for another…use what ever you want…be creative.

Dragonfly’s Favorites: Starr’s Self Portrait

It was her senior year of high school, spring of 2007, and Starr was taking Advanced Photography. This was one of their first assignments, Sunny helped her. I like it because it is so different than any other picture of her, it is more of an opposite portrait.

The Big Clean Up

Now that Starr has moved back to college, I have been busy reclaiming my space. Super cleaning everything that I have ignored all summer. Since Starr wouldn’t do it, I picked up and cleared all the stuff at the top of the stairs…all the stuff that has been lingering since Starr moved home in May.

Okay, it was a little better than this, but not much. I fear for her future house…as I am sure my mom did for mine.

First the top of the stairs and then to my room, clearing out the pile of clothes that has also been there since May…Starr’s clothes. Gone. It is my room, darn it, not an extension of her closet!

I still have a lot of work to do, but the major piles are gone, and it feels good.

Now I just have to get back in the swing of cooking  for one. : (

Write About The Woods

It was a couple of years ago now, and I still haven’t done anything about it. I’d almost forgottten about it when yesterday I had Oprah on while cleaning house. It was a repeat, but her guest, Genevieve Piturro, was talking about looking for inspiration, and how when hers hit her, it was like a voice in her head that just said “Pajama Program” and she just knew.

It reminded me of the voice I heard a couple years back. I was waking up, still in bed, but not alseep when I heard a loud male voice, in my head, in my room, as if standing next to me, say “write about the woods”.

The woods.

First off, I am not a writer. Secondly…what woods? And why? I have considered it from time to time, and maybe when I write it, something will click into place, something in my life that has been out of sync. I don’t know. My first thoughts were that I should write about the woods near Granddaddy’s farm in Tennessee, there was something magical there, more than just trees, but I am not yet connected to a story or idea to write about.

I am going to give it some more thought…maybe actually put pen to paper.