Now that I have a free day, all I think of is food

On a cooking kick, mostly because I suddenly have money and time to shop (been broke for the past ten days), and it would be good to have something I can eat in the house.  First thing is I've ended up with a lot of couscous and have been thinking about doing something with mandarin oranges (the type in a can) and kalamata olives.  While buying the olives, I found some in a brined mix along with figs, so bought some of that (in bulk), and then decided it also needed green onions.  So it was 1 cup couscous (2 cups boiling water, it's the instant kind, probably coulda' used a slightly less liquid), 1 can oranges (drained and chopped), 1/4 cup of the olive/fig mixed chopped up, one scallion (sliced thin), and some of the mandarin liquid mixed with 1/2 a lime's worth of juice, salt, and olive oil as a dressing.  Today I chopped up pistachios and added those to it for texture.  Not bad, I'd eat it again. (Which is good; it made quite a lot.)

Now I'm making pesto with walnuts, because I ended up with a bag of basil.  And I'll probably make a fruit salsa with apricots and blueberries because it was the end of the season and the apricots were on sale at the farmer's market. (Cilantro, lime, red onion, jalapeño, salt.)  I'm growing tomatillos, and those are doing surprisingly well, guess they don't need much attention; I haven't been giving them much. Can make a salsa with those, too. (I have no knack for growing cilantro, have tried several times.)

All of this to put off having to clean up after some batteries that decided to suddenly corrode all over my bookcase within the last couple of days.  Reminder to recycle those as soon as possible.  Ugh.

The pesto is "meh," had to use a blender as I can't find my food processor attachment, and the blender doesn't really work all that well.  I'll still eat it, but it doesn't excite me.  I don't like basil all that much, but someone gave it to me.

It's already scorching upstairs, in for another hot week.

(I'm choosing to share this.) If crap comes up (skeletons, ghosts, buried pain), might as well deal with it and be done with it...ain't going away until you face it.  Forgiveness and letting go lets you move on and own your own life.  Don't let your past control you.  (Not saying it's easy, I know it's not, I've been looking at this shit and dealing with it for years, but it's getting better...are you happy with where things are for you?  Start. Your life is yours.)  If you need a hand to hold or help, please reach out for it...there are people that can help to process all this stuff so you can let it go and move on.  Ask them.

Quite frankly, the world could use more forgiveness and not taking our personal crap out on each other right now. And a whole lot more love, starting with loving and accepting yourself, all of you, and then dealing with the bad stuff from a place of that self love.  Beating yourself up is pointless, (just a vicious cycle where you make yourself feel like crap, but nothing changes.)  Face it and deal with it.

And know that there is love enough for you.  You are loved.