Deborah Lipp

I honestly don’t know when I became a person who scolds co-workers.

I was in the kitchen getting myself coffee. The head of our business unit was in there, and another guy was in there, chatting him up. The other guy is one of those inappropriate, loud, geek types. And he sat on one of the kitchen tables. He sat on one of the kitchen tables.

I said “Get your butt off of where we eat food.”

Then I said “Now go get a sponge and clean it off.”

He did it. Then he got kind of sarcastic and was all “I cleaned it just for you, Deborah.”

I said “Everyone who eats here appreciates knowing no butts were on their food. That is a reasonable boundary to have.”

And the thing is, first of all, butt on the table? For fuxake! But second of all, when did the kind of nagging I do at home as the mother of a teen become the kind of thing I’m willing to say to anyone, any time? Isn’t that…disturbing? Is there something wrong with me?

Whatever. At least the table is clean.

This one turned out well…not too hard, not too easy.

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If you’re new to this blog, allow me to assure you I don’t actually do food all that often.

But…

Cream cheese and walnuts.

The walnuts stick in the cream cheese so they don’t fall out. It’s a major protein boost and super tasty.

Brussel sprouts and green beans in butter with apple slices and fresh dill (really good, but I think just the green beans would have been better).

Onions, peppers, and zucchini in oil with fresh thyme and pomegranate seeds (really good, but I decided to add the pomegranate seeds kind of late in the game, so it tasted just a touch too much like my usual Italian mix underneath).

Portabello mushrooms and prosciutto with Marsala wine (oh. my. gods.).

When I was a girl, my older brother would come into my room early in the morning, while I was still asleep, and go through my shit. He’d steal stuff, read my diary, all that. Often it would wake me.

Last night, Arthur plugged his MP3 player into the computer to charge. This morning, early, he came quietly into my room to get it, and I rolled over and said

“Jay?”

Freaky. I mean, then I screamed and told him to never do that again, but weird that something from over thirty years ago is the first thing that rises to the level of language.

Arr, me hearties.

AND I got friends and relatives who’ve longed to hear me say that for years.

Holy Mother of God! All solved in under 90 minutes!

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Madeline L’Engle has died at the age of 88.

A Wrinkle In Time was one of my go-to books as a kid, I read it over and over. Despite my notable memory problems, I remember large chunks of the book. I still find the explanation of a tesseract, as the ends of cloth meeting one another, incomparably useful.

Madeline L’Engle brought me wonderful characters, extraordinary ideas, and concepts of science and philosophy that didn’t talk down to a young mind. To me, she will live forever.