Back in NY

I went to visit my brother in Falls Church (a DC suburb) over Friday night and Saturday afternoon (we had to be back in NY to collect our CSA share). When we got there, my sister in law already had a giant truckload of food at the ready, as it was a Hindu holiday. She had dosa batter at the ready, sambhar, vegetable soup, potato curry, coconut chatni, and just when you thought that was enough, she even made vada and some sweet. The food just kept coming and coming and coming, seemingly endlessly. We ate and talked and really had a good time. This is why I love South Indian cooking so much: a lot of it is vegan already, and extremely tasty. It's such an excellent baseline to learn vegan food, and a really great jumping-off point.

Around 3 AM, we all trooped off to bed.

Everyone conked out. My sister in law had been awake since 5 AM that morning. My brother was up at 4 (his work starts at like 6 AM). I had come directly from work, so I was already tired enough to begin with, but the bus journey was another long drawn out thing, as we hit DC traffic HARD, so we were stuck in there for an extra hour. The next morning was still more food, and chatting, and eating and talking and eating and cooking and eating. Did I mention eating?

The niece and nephew were thrilled to meet their New York uncles after such a long time (I hadn't seen the two in about four years, and Puppy had never met them). The niece is eight, and quite a bright little girl. She's powering through stacks of books as fast as her mom can manage to find them. Nephew is a five-year-old bundle of energy who doesn't stop bouncing around from the time he wakes up until he goes to sleep at night. He eats apples (even though they're as big as his head) by the truckload, and absolutely loves them. They're lovely to visit with, but I don't think that my nerves can handle much more than measured doses. I don't quite do too terribly well with children.

So we get home, and I regale my mother with my adventures (as is my wont), and the best friend calls. I switch over, and she regales me with her adventures of the past couple of weeks. Finally, I notice that it's well past 1, and I'd been up since 9 AM after going to sleep at 3 AM the night before. I hastily bid everyone a good night, and crashed asleep.

I wake up today, and it's raining outside (again!), which made things cool, so I didn't even bother getting up for a few hours, so I could enjoy the soft breezes and the sound of the rain on the window. Puppy comes home lugging a GIANT thing of kale. When I say it's a large amount, you know it's huge. It was epic. There was enough for me to fill the turkey roaster three times. No, I don't roast turkeys, but that's what that dish is called, and I use it expressly for cooking ginormous amounts of leafy green veggies, because cooking those on the stove is a pain, since they require such a giant pot, only to wilt down, and make the pot seem stupid. Gods, I love that CSA of ours.