Recipes, Reading, & Beauty Tips

I've been digging for more information about my dad's family, who lived in Oakland.  A family full of secrets, some of which my sister and I have figured out, others only to be guessed at.

Yesterday I nearly went blind reading newspaper archives online, but--Eureka!--I came across a tiny article on page 10 of the September 11, 1949, Oakland Tribune that described the bus accident in Piedmont that mortally injured my grandmother.  She had no ID in her purse, but she did have a business card from my dad's antiques shop in San Francisco.  The police called him, and he identified her.  I'd known only bits of the story before that.

 

Disturbing and very sad, but it feels good to have the facts



2.

Pork roasts:  How many have I overcooked?  The last time was Christmas 1996--you can see how long I've been defeated by it--the last Christmas my dad was alive (still feel bad about it-- overcooked pork and undercooked green beans).  True to form, my sister and I, nervous about undercooking it, roasted it to the point where it was dry and tough.  Awful.

Last week I came across a recipe online that made me think I should make another stab at it.  This time it was a pork tenderloin, and it was good. Very tasty and not dry.  The seasoned rub takes it to another level.   And it's easy:

Pork Tenderloin with Seasoned Rub
4 servings; preheat oven to 450 degrees

1 tsp garlic powder
1 tsp dried oregano
1 tsp ground cumin
1 tsp ground coriander
1 tsp dried thyme
Salt
1-1/4 pounds pork tenderloin
1 T olive oil
1 tsp minced garlic

Mix the dry ingredients, stir.  Sprinkle over tenderloin, then rub them on the meat, pressing the rub so it sticks.

In large skillet over medium heat, add olive oil, then minced garlic; sauté 1 min.  Put tenderloin in pan and sear (less than 10 minutes), turning the meat with tongs.  Transfer meat to roasting pan and bake for 20 minutes.

 

3.

I'm really enjoying Beautiful Ruins, by Jess Walter.  Boy, he took some chances writing this book, and it works, I think.  Fresh Air's Maureen Corrigan, whose voice drives me so crazy I always turn her off, agrees (blurb on the front).

The picture of the cover looked vaguely familiar to me, and when I studied it, I realized that Jerry and I went to this Cinque Terre village, Manorola,  in Italy in 2011.  In fact, we ate lunch at a restaurant there that I could just make out in the photo.

Here's a picture I took of him while we sat there:

Pretty cute
 

4.

 

You can skip this section if you're not shallow.   In my seeing-65-hove-into-view mood (a year and a half, but who's counting?), I've been checking out more beauty tips. 

 

First:  If you wear bangs, and esp. if you wear bangs and have a cowlick (I do), try this tip I found on You Tube:  Dry your bangs first, when they're very wet.  Snap on the blow dryer attachment that funnels the hot air and using a flat brush,  blow the bangs first to one side,then to the other,  across your forehead, brushing them madly as you go until they're thoroughly dry.

Bottom brush, wrong; top brush, right (not pictured: the flat brush)

Second:  And this is so basic that everyone else is doing it, I know: Use a fully-round brush to blow dry your hair if you want fullness.  I was using a half-round brush and blowing mostly the ends, and guess what, it was flat. This has made a huge difference in the flat-hair department. 

Also, I'm doing what my hairdresser does: sectioning off  my hair so that I'm drying the lower sections first.  I bought some cheap, cute clips to do this. Whole procedure takes time, which is why I'm in my jammies at 1 pm.

Another strategy:  I don't use the highest heat on the blow dryer anymore.  Too drying.

Third:  The Estee Lauder "Advanced Night Repair," which I got a sample of recently seems to do some good.  Skin feels plumper.  Still have the dreaded "11" between my eyes, though.

 

Always way behind the curve on fashion, I finally bought some mauve nail polish.  (Jerry took one look at my hands and said  I look like I'm not getting enough oxygen.  It's the color of ceanothus, I pointed out, one of his favorite moth host-plants.)

But then I found an article in the fall fashion edition of the New York  Times magazine that announced that glamorous, pointy red nails are back.  No more "politely blunt manicures."  These are mid-century and "dangerously modern." 

The current look for nails

Also, lips that are stained are in.  You want to look like you've just bitten your lips in pain. 

Not going with this

 

5.

Rooting around on the computer, I discovered that my grandparents' house in East Oakland, in what used to be a working class neighborhood but now is such a scary place that no one goes there unless they have to, has had a large addition tacked on the back, taking up much of my grandmother's prized garden.

Here she is sitting in the garden in 1942:

Daisy in her garden in East Oakland in 1942

 

An English garden with stepping stones and a bench

 

Here's how the garden looked in 1995, when the house was sold after years of being rented, both of my grandparents long gone.

 



 

Not much left of Daisy's garden. (Note color of flowers.)



 




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