Good afternoon!

More vacation relaxation happening over here. For me, at least. Greg seems to be working away as usual.

I started the morning with a pot of steel cut oats (oats, almond milk, banana, chia seeds, vanilla, cinnamon, and raisins), a 3 mile run, and my first hot shower of the year. (Our hot water has been broken since the morning of January 1, and we’ve been taking freezing and incredibly fast showers for a couple of days.) A beautiful morning indeed.

Yesterday I did some more cooking and baking:

A big pot of extra tomatoey minestrone.

 

With a couple of bunches of kale from the market.

 

And a loaf of vegan pumpkin bread with the most wonderful cinnamon sugar topping.

 

Other than spending lots of time in the kitchen with breaks for walking and running, I’ve been doing a lot of reading.

I finished the first of 23+ (hopefully) books for 2013 last night: The History of Love.

 

Lucky for me, my sister is a very well read English Major who always has book recommendations for me. She usually has a copy of the book to go with the recommendation, too. This was one of 4 books borrowed from her personal library while I was in Milwaukee, and it was very good. It’s the kind of book that makes your (my) arms ache with sadness and is also hilarious.

I started another book from her collection last night as well: The Man Who Ate Everything.

 

I knew this was the book for me because I too would like to have eaten everything. Or at least eat professionally. But seriously, so far it’s good.

I’ve also been reading from these fine texts:

 

Next books on the list, in no particular order:

 

I know I’m on vacation because I even cleared and dusted my bedside table.

 

What are you currently reading? Any recommendations?

Tonight we’re making Ethiopian food featuring homemade injera, the teff for which has been fermenting in a bowl on the counter for two days.