Suzy Says

Big River, Friday afternoon

I jumped right back into country life. Allergies back in full force, sleeping with a sweater on, cold mornings.

Amazingly, I actually unpacked on Thursday afternoon. I think my crabbiness gave me extra energy, since my usual method is to leave the suitcase open in the living room, taking things out of it as needed for oh, say, about a week, and wondering why it doesn’t unpack itself.

So I was ready to get up and go when Megan asked me if I’d like to join her and Lu in walking the dogs at Big River on Friday. The whole day turned into more of a marathon than we expected, as you shall see.

We were trapped in Little River, near the scenic cemetery, by roadwork. There’s no cell service there – the dead have no need to call anyone – so we couldn’t tell Lu we’d be late. While we waited, Megan said that the seasons here are waiting for rain, rain, waiting for rain to stop, and construction. We must be somewhere between the last two.

We finally got to our destination, where Lu was waiting for us with her two beautiful dogs, Harlow (right) and Marco:

Schatzi was happy to see her friends:

We set off down the path beside the river:

The tree was felled by the winter storms.

There were wildflowers everywhere, craggy cliffs of daisies:

Somehow, we spent two hours walking the dogs without quite realizing it. We parted ways in the parking lot, Lu returning home and Megan and I heading into nearby Mendocino to buy provisions for dinner. We had decided to make some new Indian recipes: poppadums, chicken tikka masala, and naan. We struck out on the lentil flour for the poppadums, so they were 86’d from the menu at the last minute. We still hope to find it online, though.

Returning home, we had to hurry to get the chicken marinating and the naan rising. Making the chicken was a leap of faith for both of us, since we are horrified by yogurt. We kept telling ourselves that this is the way they make it in restaurants. I heroically cleaned up all the yogurt-related dishes. If that isn’t love, what is? We laughed at the fact that Megan can scrape up brains off the highway, but can’t touch yogurt.

We barbecued the chicken, then put it in the sauce to simmer while Megan cooked the naan on the barbcue. She also made some dipping sauce for the naan: olive oil, slightly crushed Egyptian caraway seeds, and coarse sea salt. We had dinner in the garden as the light slowly faded.

It was a good day.