What have you been doing?

Where did the last week of my life go? I find myself asking this more often then not. Not specifically referring to last week, but to time in general. Things get so crazy sometimes. You spend all of your youth wanting to grow up and once you get there you long for the life you had with no responsibilities. I know, I know, it's just a fact of life you say. True, it is. I often wonder how many other people out there have a life that parallels mine. I will be poking along, taking care of all the things I need to do then BAM! I have more things thrown at me than I can handle. Now, to be honest, I bring most of it on myself and furthermore you would think by this point in my life that I would have learned how to properly manage my time. I wonder if I'll ever learn to just say "no".

We had a wonderful Thanksgiving with the wife's family. We were in charge of bringing butternut squash. I'm no fan of squash and have never cared for the way it has been prepared in the past, so this year I decided to "kick it up a notch" and buck the trend. The traditional way to cook butternut squash is to halve it and cook it till tender. Then scoop it out and beat it like mashed potatoes. You can add some spices and maybe some brown sugar to liven it up, but it just doesn't do it for me. We found a recipe that cube's the raw squash and saute' it with shallots. You then add chicken stock, brown sugar, various spices and cook it for about ten minutes. At the end you add some balsamic vinegar and pepper it for taste. In theory it sounds fairly easy but, have you ever tried to cut raw butternut squash? It's not an easy task by any means. To top it off, we had to make it for fifty people. Now, we didn't know how much to make. We guessed at 24 servings and there was over half of it left over. Either there was so much food that everyone took a smidgen or it tasted like crap. The wife had to remind me that it was squash... who goes back for seconds, for squash? I'd like also to talk about the wonders of sugar and butter. If you add enough of either ingredient or both, you can make any dish edible. Case in point - sweet potatoes. I have never cared for them. To me there is nothing "sweet" about them. One of the wife's cousins prepared a dish with sweet potatoes and tons of butter and sugars. It was topped with some crusty combobilation of pecans, brown sugar and something else crunchy. It was served as a side dish, but I went back to it at dessert time. It was heaven! So tasty! I think that the sweet potatoes really are used as a filler for the recipe because their original flavor was no where to be found - thank god. The fried turkeys were a hit with the Cubans. One of the turkeys was consumed before it was completely carved. Vultures.

I spent the better part of last week finishing up a contracting job and then spent the rest of the time working on our siding project. The gang came over yesterday (Sunday) and then today, two of the cousins came over in the early afternoon. We finished tonight. Well, I wouldn't say we are finished but, the installation is for the most part complete. There is a two foot wide section on the back corner behind the chimney that need to be done. I can handle that on my own in about a day. The front around the door has yet to be finished - we haven't decided on the material to be used yet. I have some trim work to take care of around the garage door and under the overhangs. Then, the whole house needs to be caulked and painted. So, it's far from finished, but the battle of the installation is over. Check that off the list.