Well, it really is a good thing that Stephen is hosting Paper Chef this time around. It is hard for me to believe that my energy level and interest in cooking is so very, very low. I think the series of breaks (both physical and metaphysical) coming up are much needed.

I didn't end up cooking a single new thing this weekend although I did think about the Paper Chef duck/pear/nut butter/ginger challenge. I was going to try roasting the duck on high heat in a nut butter, ginger, garlic, soy paste with roasted pears and bitter greens. But instead I went to one of my favorite restaurants in San Francisco, Boulevard, for an old friend's birthday on Saturday and then enjoyed a roast chicken picnic al fresco at the Bruns Amphitheater in Orinda while watching a (truly) fantastic production of The Tempest by the California Shakespeare Festival.

So I'm sorry but no duck. Things will be quiet around here for the next few weeks. I am transitioning to a new job which is really exciting. I am taking a much too short break to go wander up the North Coast and walk through redwoods along the shore. Hopefully it will rain (I LIKE rain).

Coming up is NANOWRIMO which the rest of my family usually enter - which in turn means I won't have a single conversation with them for the month of November.

But I like November more than October. Her in California, October is when we get hot days and cold nights and it gets drier and drier as the Sun tries desperately to stave off the clouds from the coast. I am waiting for the clouds. By November the Sun has lost. The rain comes. The cold comes.