Earlier I wrote a bit about how I am being a bit more intentional in what I am listening to... but I still like variety. I discover new music the old fashion way: recommendations from friends or reviews in magazines like Paste. When I learn of a new artist I might be interested in, I search YouTube for samples to listen to. If I like the music, I order a physical CD. When the CD arrives, I rip it using a lossless codecs, and then play it through our stereo or one of our Apple i-devices.
I have known about Spotify for awhile as well as other music stream services. The idea of a HUGE library of music which is immediately accessible for no money is very attractive, but I am fairly picky about audio quality. I knew the audio quality from all the streaming services wouldn't be as good as my personal collection, so I didn't really give any of them a try. This weekend I was feeling rather nostalgic... I wanted to listen to some music I hadn't listened to in years. Some of that music is on records or CDs owned by friends who live thousands of miles away, some of it is on records that I haven't been able to play for many years. I decided to give Spotify a try since I had a number of friends who seem to love it. Spotify didn't have all the music I was looking for, but they had a lot of it. It's very convenient to use, just type into the search box what you are look for, and the results are grouped by song title, artists and album. Select an artist and you get a list of their most popular tracks on Spotify and a list of albums with tabs for a brief bio and a list of "Related Artists" which could use some work but is a good start. The audio quality wasn't as good as the CDs I had ripped lossless, but it was good enough that I could enjoy listening to the music that I wouldn't otherwise have had. I would recommend checking it out if you haven't yet.
Spotify has a bunch of "social" features. It's pretty easy to make information about what you are listening to available to other Spotify users, or to the larger community via Facebook or Twitter. I like the idea of being able to see what my friends are listening to as a way to discover new music, but I am not sure I am comfortable broadcasting my playlists. For the time being I have turned off automatic sharing on the preferences panel. Maybe I will be a bit more comfortable when more people share their playlists.
What's truly cool, is this can all be done using their free service. The ads are a bit annoy, seems like 30 seconds every 15-60 minutes. So hard the ads have been only about music and one ad for Mini Cooper. For people who are happy listening to music through computer speakers go ahead and stop reading now.
Besides the free service level, Spotify offers an unlimited level which frees you from the ads, and premium. Premium is $10/month and offers higher audio quality, supports streaming to Sonos, Squeezebox, Boxee, and the Spotify app that runs on numerous smartphones and tablets. I started with with free service, and then signed up for the free 30 day trial of the premium service.
There is a fairly complete article about how to stream spotify wirelessly to your stereo. They are missing two variant/options: use Airplay ready stereo equipment rather than an Apple device, and using a smart phone or tablet rather than a computer to provide the audio stream. I am already using an Apple Airport Express WiFi device to enable iTunes to stream music to our stereo, so a slight modification of "Option A" from the above article was the obvious winner. My modification is that rather than feeding the stereo directly from the audio jack on the Airport Express which has fairly marginal audio quality, we are using the optical output which feeds a DAC with bit-perfect music. So long as the DAC has a good anti-jitter circuitry, the audio quality is hugely better through the external DAC with both lossy and lossless sources.
Airfoil is a nicely done piece of software. It lets any audio on the computer to be sent to any Airplay device. This is something Apple should have built into the OS. Oh well. The free Airfoil client for i-Devices not only lets you listen to the audio stream, but gives you some basic controls (pause/start, skip forward, skip back) with both iTunes and Spotify. A nice touch.
A few words about the Spotify software for smart phones and tablets. The app is a bit clunky, but it works. There is something kind of cool about having access to a huge (>13M tracks) library from a pocket size iPhone. I tried using my iPhone plugged into the Tivoli PAL which produces a portable system which can play tunes for hours anywhere that has a network connection. Way different from the days of records which some members of the younger generation hasn't seen (funny video)?! Then I realized that the Spotify iPhone app can send its audio via Airplay, and since everything is living in the digital domain, this will be the same audio quality as using the computer to drive the stereo in our living room. Better yet, using the iPhone means that the Spotify controls can be in my hand, rather than on the screen of a computer which is in a different room. Now the dilemma... is the convenient, no ads, and better (but not ideal) audio quality worth the premium service fee. In past years, the answer would have said yes... but right now I am working to keep my burn rate down, so I am not completely sure.
Monday, January 23, 2012
Monday, January 16, 2012
Unemployed. Yeah!
In June I left Stanford and joined Simply Hired. It was a great move for me. I was going to be leading three teams: big data, service/ops engineering, and IT. Two of these areas I know well, the third, big data I had some background, but I was going to need to work at getting up to speed. It's always great when your employer is paying you to learn, especially if it is in an interesting area. This was a great opportunity for me.
I really liked what I saw in the company. Coworkers that were easy to work with. No bureaucracy... a huge improvement from Stanford. Several times I made suggestions about things I had no responsibility for. The response was always "Oh, that's a good idea. We will give that a try before the week ends." Simply Hired had been running for a number of years, but in many ways it was like a one year start-up. I think this is because several months before I was hired the company's exec staff started the process to reboot the company, improving focus and realign staff which included bring in some senior folks to help mentor and direct a fairly young team.
When I joined Simply Hired, we hoped Libby has several more years of life. The plan/hope was to work a couple of years, and then stop working to be with and care for Libby. Over the summer Libby's health failed much more quickly than expected. I found myself frequently needing to dash out to check on Libby at home, trips to the doctors office, or the ER. I found my coworkers supportive and understanding. When it was clear that we were looking at months (turned out weeks) not years, they granted me a leave of absence, even though I had been out of the office more than in, and they were very flexible about bring me back to work. But after careful consideration, we all thought rather than waiting for me to return (which might not happen), it would be best for a clean separation.
The only problem now is when people ask the question "Who are you, what do you do?", I don't have a clean answer. I think for many of us, a big part of identity comes through our job. I was talking with some people I just met at church a couple of weeks ago. I was asked about myself. My immediate answer went to work, and it sounded awkward. "Well, ah, I am trying to quit my job, but it hasn't happened yet." Well, I have succeeded, so now what do I put on my "card"? Unemployed? Stay-at-Home Dad? In Transition? Middle-Life Crisis Dude? Grieving Windower? Seeker? Nothing really captures the full picture. For the time being, I think "Stay-at-Home Dad" is the easiest for people to grasp and is the single biggest focus, but that is just one piece of the next year.
Many people have asked me about my plans. The short summary is that I am going to avoid "work" until 2013. We are blessed to be in a situation where doing this is not a financial strain. In 2012 I am going to focus on taking care of Helen, taking care of myself, figuring out how to do all the things Libby used to do, and spend some time really exploring what I want to do in the second half of my life. Twice in the last eight years I tried to leave the high tech start-up world to do something radically different. Both times I found myself right back doing the same sorts of things I have been doing for years. In 2013 what will I be doing? Not sure yet. I have a year to dream, explore, experiment. Could be I discover (as I have in the past) that I am made to do the work I have been doing all along and I find myself right back in the world of high tech start-ups with a new energy and renewed vision. Then again, maybe it's time for a change: maybe doing something with an NGO, some sort of full time ministry, or back in school preparing for a completely different career. It's a bit scary, but also exciting. Losing Libby has been very hard, but it's also been an encouragement to spend the rest of my days doing things that I deeply love and believe in. Kevin Kelly's interview about living as if you only had six months has been a real challenge to me. I have been asking the question what if I knew I would only live 6 month, 1 year, 2 years. What would I do? How would it change my life? I don't have any definitive answers yet... but I am pretty sure at least a few things will change.
I really liked what I saw in the company. Coworkers that were easy to work with. No bureaucracy... a huge improvement from Stanford. Several times I made suggestions about things I had no responsibility for. The response was always "Oh, that's a good idea. We will give that a try before the week ends." Simply Hired had been running for a number of years, but in many ways it was like a one year start-up. I think this is because several months before I was hired the company's exec staff started the process to reboot the company, improving focus and realign staff which included bring in some senior folks to help mentor and direct a fairly young team.
When I joined Simply Hired, we hoped Libby has several more years of life. The plan/hope was to work a couple of years, and then stop working to be with and care for Libby. Over the summer Libby's health failed much more quickly than expected. I found myself frequently needing to dash out to check on Libby at home, trips to the doctors office, or the ER. I found my coworkers supportive and understanding. When it was clear that we were looking at months (turned out weeks) not years, they granted me a leave of absence, even though I had been out of the office more than in, and they were very flexible about bring me back to work. But after careful consideration, we all thought rather than waiting for me to return (which might not happen), it would be best for a clean separation.
The only problem now is when people ask the question "Who are you, what do you do?", I don't have a clean answer. I think for many of us, a big part of identity comes through our job. I was talking with some people I just met at church a couple of weeks ago. I was asked about myself. My immediate answer went to work, and it sounded awkward. "Well, ah, I am trying to quit my job, but it hasn't happened yet." Well, I have succeeded, so now what do I put on my "card"? Unemployed? Stay-at-Home Dad? In Transition? Middle-Life Crisis Dude? Grieving Windower? Seeker? Nothing really captures the full picture. For the time being, I think "Stay-at-Home Dad" is the easiest for people to grasp and is the single biggest focus, but that is just one piece of the next year.
Many people have asked me about my plans. The short summary is that I am going to avoid "work" until 2013. We are blessed to be in a situation where doing this is not a financial strain. In 2012 I am going to focus on taking care of Helen, taking care of myself, figuring out how to do all the things Libby used to do, and spend some time really exploring what I want to do in the second half of my life. Twice in the last eight years I tried to leave the high tech start-up world to do something radically different. Both times I found myself right back doing the same sorts of things I have been doing for years. In 2013 what will I be doing? Not sure yet. I have a year to dream, explore, experiment. Could be I discover (as I have in the past) that I am made to do the work I have been doing all along and I find myself right back in the world of high tech start-ups with a new energy and renewed vision. Then again, maybe it's time for a change: maybe doing something with an NGO, some sort of full time ministry, or back in school preparing for a completely different career. It's a bit scary, but also exciting. Losing Libby has been very hard, but it's also been an encouragement to spend the rest of my days doing things that I deeply love and believe in. Kevin Kelly's interview about living as if you only had six months has been a real challenge to me. I have been asking the question what if I knew I would only live 6 month, 1 year, 2 years. What would I do? How would it change my life? I don't have any definitive answers yet... but I am pretty sure at least a few things will change.
Monday, January 09, 2012
Exercise and Modern Society
In the last few years I have not been taking care of myself. Libby was often needing to go to treatment or a doctor's appointment several times each week. Adding one more trip seemed too much, so I just never got around to scheduling appointments with my doctor, dentist, etc. I wasn't eating as well as I should. My backpacking trips drop to almost zero because I wasn't comfortable leaving Libby for more than a day. The only exercise I got was riding my bike to/from work.
I have known that I should be taking better care of myself. There is good evidence about how diet effects both the quality and quantity of life. There has also been a lot of research into the effects of exercise. There is a fascinating screen cast about how 30 minutes of walking makes a big difference in people's health. Click the link because it's really interested, and for some people, I hope life changing. There is Growing Evidence of Links Between Exercise and Mental Acuity. There is also well documented evidence that exercise helps control both depression and anxiety. I have seen some of these effects in my own life. I find my mind sharper after I have exercised and I feel more ready to face the day. Several years ago I developed a habit of taking 1-2 days personal retreats when life seemed to be getting away from me. These retreats would be solo backpacking trips where I was walking 20+ miles each day. This is a fairly significant physical workout. Often times, solutions to problems I have been struggling with for weeks would jump into my mind as I was walking. Part of this was likely the solitude, but I think the physical activity played a part in this as well.
After Libby went home to her Lord, Helen made it very clear that I was to take care of myself because she had no desire to be an orphan. Her concern broke my heart and gave me the motivate to get serious. I did a personal assessment and I realized I was in pretty poor shape. I decided I needed to visit my doctors and dentist, start eating better, lose some weight, and I really needed to get more exercise. I wanted to believe that my daily life provided me with enough exercise, but clearly it had not been working out. I hate the idea of exercise for exercise sake, but I have the need for some serious catch-up.
This has gotten me thinking about exercise in modern society. Many of my coworkers regularly go to the gym just as I am now. We pay for the privilege to do hard work. Often times, we are doing this in somewhat dark smelly places, even before the sun has come up. Some of us go beyond that and pay someone to push us further and harder than we think we can go. I find myself imagining in a conversation with one of the jews from Moses' time. I tell them what I am doing and they say:
alright, maybe not that (any Hebrew I knew when I was 13 is completely gone), this was google translate attempt of going english -> hebrew from the text
I find myself wondering how we can back to lives that are more integrated and don't have us sitting around so much. There are things like the sit/stand desks, but that doesn't see enough to me. I don't have any great ideas. Maybe something will come to me, or maybe one of you have some ideas. Care to share?
As for me, I am going to the gym for awhile. I have a Costco $319/2years membership to 24hour fitness. The money has been spent, so I should take advantage of it, or it just goes to waste. If I had done a month to month membership it would have been easy to rationalizing quitting the gym after a couple of months "to save money". I have also resolved never to let myself get back into such an awful state but also not to let exercise get out of control. I have see many people who try to build strength beyond what is needed or their bodies could handle. Rather than getting healthier, they are limping around with injuries from their excercise. A good cautionary tale was just in the NYT about how yoga can wreck your body. Well, it's off to the gym now for my next round of torture.
I have known that I should be taking better care of myself. There is good evidence about how diet effects both the quality and quantity of life. There has also been a lot of research into the effects of exercise. There is a fascinating screen cast about how 30 minutes of walking makes a big difference in people's health. Click the link because it's really interested, and for some people, I hope life changing. There is Growing Evidence of Links Between Exercise and Mental Acuity. There is also well documented evidence that exercise helps control both depression and anxiety. I have seen some of these effects in my own life. I find my mind sharper after I have exercised and I feel more ready to face the day. Several years ago I developed a habit of taking 1-2 days personal retreats when life seemed to be getting away from me. These retreats would be solo backpacking trips where I was walking 20+ miles each day. This is a fairly significant physical workout. Often times, solutions to problems I have been struggling with for weeks would jump into my mind as I was walking. Part of this was likely the solitude, but I think the physical activity played a part in this as well.
After Libby went home to her Lord, Helen made it very clear that I was to take care of myself because she had no desire to be an orphan. Her concern broke my heart and gave me the motivate to get serious. I did a personal assessment and I realized I was in pretty poor shape. I decided I needed to visit my doctors and dentist, start eating better, lose some weight, and I really needed to get more exercise. I wanted to believe that my daily life provided me with enough exercise, but clearly it had not been working out. I hate the idea of exercise for exercise sake, but I have the need for some serious catch-up.
So, for the first time in my life, I joined a gym. I met one of their trainers and got a basic assessment. I was in even worse shape that I realized. I learned that my scale at home was under reporting my weight by eight pounds. It's going to be some serious work to get to where I should be. As I surveyed the instruments of torture contained within the gym's walls I realized I didn't have any idea how to use the machines, and certainly no idea how to design a workout to get back into shape. I decided to sign up for several sessions with a trainer so I wouldn't break myself. I suppose I could use some iPhone app like iMuscle or GAIN, or follow something simple like Vic Magary's minimalist fitnesss guide, but having a human being who could watch what I was doing seemed like a good idea.
I have been going to the gym six days a week since the end of November. The trainer has kept me pushing to my limits but not going so far that I break myself. There have been days that I am not sure that I could turn the steering wheel to drive the car home from the gym, or when I got home I wasn't sure I could lift a glass filled with water to my mouth, but I was able to do these things. I hope and pray that in several months I will be in reasonable enough shape that the gym won't need to take up as much time and energy as it is right now. I can see progress: my heart no longer continues to race for tens of minutes after I stop exercising and I have dropped more than a percent of body fat. I have also noticed that I am feeling better, and it seems like it's easier to concentrate. Maybe there is something to the healthy body / mind connection.
Enter curmudgeon model... seem to have been doing that a lot in these recent blogs:
When I was a kid I wasn't into team sports, but I was active. Yes, there was a lot of reading, building electronics, and hang out with friends, but I also walked or rode my bike as transportation, using manual tools to build things, climbed trees, and regularly went backpacking/climbing. I wasn't a jock, but I was fit. Somehow all of those muscles are gone. I suppose it was life getting more busy. Well, that, and I dose of simple laziness. I also think a major contributor is that more and more life seems to be spent interacting with electronic devices rather than the real world.
When I was a kid I wasn't into team sports, but I was active. Yes, there was a lot of reading, building electronics, and hang out with friends, but I also walked or rode my bike as transportation, using manual tools to build things, climbed trees, and regularly went backpacking/climbing. I wasn't a jock, but I was fit. Somehow all of those muscles are gone. I suppose it was life getting more busy. Well, that, and I dose of simple laziness. I also think a major contributor is that more and more life seems to be spent interacting with electronic devices rather than the real world.
This has gotten me thinking about exercise in modern society. Many of my coworkers regularly go to the gym just as I am now. We pay for the privilege to do hard work. Often times, we are doing this in somewhat dark smelly places, even before the sun has come up. Some of us go beyond that and pay someone to push us further and harder than we think we can go. I find myself imagining in a conversation with one of the jews from Moses' time. I tell them what I am doing and they say:
אז תנו לי לקבל את זה מצר, אתה בוחר להיות עבד לאדון עבד במשך מספר שעות ביום.
אתה לא צריך לעשות את זה. אז אתה נותן כסף כדי לעשות לך את זה השתגעת
alright, maybe not that (any Hebrew I knew when I was 13 is completely gone), this was google translate attempt of going english -> hebrew from the text
So let me get this strait, you are choosing to be a slave to a slavemaster for several hours a day. You don't have to do this. You are giving them money to do this to you? Are you crazy?There was a time than nearly everyone engaged in hard physical labor in the course of their daily lives. They didn't have power tools, electric kitchen appliances, cars, etc. The day was spent moving. Muscles got built from daily activities. People looked forward to when the hard labor would end, and they could rest. Often people dreams of jobs that didn't require them to have to engage in such back breaking work. These days, many of us spend our whole day of "work" sitting. Maybe we get up and walk around the office a bit to talk with people. Some people don't bother doing this, Skype, Jabber, or AIM remove the need to move. While we are sitting around our physical bodies are getting weaker and weaker. When work is done can we enjoy our leisure? Nope. We now need to get through traffic (sitting in our cars) to get to a gym, where we pay for the freedom to exercise in the comfort of a gym. Something seems a bit off here.
I find myself wondering how we can back to lives that are more integrated and don't have us sitting around so much. There are things like the sit/stand desks, but that doesn't see enough to me. I don't have any great ideas. Maybe something will come to me, or maybe one of you have some ideas. Care to share?
As for me, I am going to the gym for awhile. I have a Costco $319/2years membership to 24hour fitness. The money has been spent, so I should take advantage of it, or it just goes to waste. If I had done a month to month membership it would have been easy to rationalizing quitting the gym after a couple of months "to save money". I have also resolved never to let myself get back into such an awful state but also not to let exercise get out of control. I have see many people who try to build strength beyond what is needed or their bodies could handle. Rather than getting healthier, they are limping around with injuries from their excercise. A good cautionary tale was just in the NYT about how yoga can wreck your body. Well, it's off to the gym now for my next round of torture.
Monday, January 02, 2012
Romans 8 and Christmas Dinner
In the last couple of weeks I have been thinking a lot about the Bible's teaching about how we, as Christians are called to live. I have spent a good bit of time looking at Romans 5-8. At the core of this passage is our inability to be good or to do anything truly right on our own. Thankfully, God is at work... he forgives us, covers our sins, gives us a new nature, a new heart, a new source of power. This is completed work, though we often try to live as if we are in control and have the abilities in ourselves. When we try to do things from our own strength we will see failure as is described in Romans 7... the harder we try, the worse it is.
Romans 8:6 says "For the mind set on the flesh is death, but the mind set of the spirit is life and peace". So what is the mind set on the flesh. Is it planning to do bad things? No, it's much more. It's reasoning from our own perspective, trying to control, trying to justify ourselves, trying to do life without God. It's charting our own course, trying to fix things, make things ok. Doing this always ends up in a mess.
Since I have been thinking about "life in the spirit -vs- flesh" so much, I thought I was understanding it pretty well. Christmas day came. This is our first Christmas without Libby. I was intent on doing as much as I could to keep up family traditions, to make the day as normal as I could for Helen. Almost from the start of the day we were off track. Helen woke up late. She decided to skip open stockings and go strait to breakfast. We did make waffles for breakfast, but she didn't want anything else. After opening presents she was still tired and wanted to take a nap. By the time Helen was up from her nap I was feeling pretty stressed. The minor issue was that while our tradition of going to the Redwood was still possible, but it was going to have to be Henry Cowell, not the preferred Muir Woods.
The more difficult issue was that I was only going to have 1-1.5 hours to prepare a complicated dinner than I have never made before. I had been worrying about making this dinner for several days. We have a standard Christmas menu that Libby developed over the last 26 years. Most of the recipes come from the Silver Palate Cookbook. Not the most complicated recipes, but not simple: orange carrot soup, blueberry chicken, green beans with cashews & parsley, fresh bread, scallop potatoes, chocolate mousse. Ack! I couldn't find the recipe for scallop potatoes, so I had to scramble and find something. Cook's Illustrated came to my rescue with their 2005 holiday scallop potato recipe. All of these recipes take a fair bit of labor. I felt pressure to get to the cooking, but I really wanted to go to the redwoods. So I push us out the door. We got in the car and I stepped on the gas hard... maybe speeding the journey by a minute.
On the drive I thought I had calmed down. Helen and I started to talk about the week, what we were thinking about, what we had been doing. I was talking with Helen about some of the things I was seeing in Romans, and how I wanted to share them with a couple of friends who didn't seem to be understanding how it worked. They were still laboring under "the law" described in Romans 7... trying to fix things that they weren't capable of fixing.
Well... about half way through the drive Helen told me during the day I have gone from "Bad Dad" to "Worse Dad". Ouch! As we talked it became clear "bad dad" cared more about executing all the family traditions than he did how his precious daughter was feeling. "Worse dad" was getting angry at his daughter for standing between him and successful execution of his plans. Ugh!! Here I was, talking about how important the perspective in Romans was, while completely missing the point in my own life. Rather than "the law" being something from the Bible, it was my list of expectations for Christmas.
Thankfully, there was time to recover. Helen and I laughed about it. We had a great walk and talk among the redwoods. While we were walking and then on the return drive I completely forgot about the need to make dinner, I wasn't feeling any pressure.
Once we got home I got to work. The food prep went faster than it should have. We ended up having dinner on time. The meal turned out well. Helen (and I) thought the the scalloped potatoes were better than any we had made before.. but how could they not be good with 3 cups of heavy cream. The only problem was that I forgot to half the chocolate mousse recipe. This turned out to be a blessing. I was able to take mousse for eight over to the Taylors, have enough for Helen and I, some of her friends, and another family of five. Christmas wasn't the happiest day ever, but we were able to be content, and celebrate the birth of the most important person who ever lived. Thank you God.
Romans 8:6 says "For the mind set on the flesh is death, but the mind set of the spirit is life and peace". So what is the mind set on the flesh. Is it planning to do bad things? No, it's much more. It's reasoning from our own perspective, trying to control, trying to justify ourselves, trying to do life without God. It's charting our own course, trying to fix things, make things ok. Doing this always ends up in a mess.
I have a couple of friends who have really been struggling with some hard issues. They need to understand life in the spirit rather than the flesh. I recently finished reading Becoming a True Spiritual Community by Larry Crabb which talked about how the community can embrace and love someone working through this. Crabb talks about living in the downstairs (flesh) or upstairs (spirit). Crabb's book really encouraged me to come along side these friends. I have been looking through the rest of our books, trying to find something that would be good for my friends to read, something that would help them to move from a "Yes, I have read Romans 5-8 100s of times" to understanding what they have read. I know that just a book can't make that happen, only God can, but often books can be used by God to break through. Of the books we own, I found that The Normal Christian Life by Watchman Nee seemed to be the best, so I re-read it, to be sure it would be good for my friends as well as to grow my understanding. I found The Normal Christian Life even better than when I first read it. I wonder if the first time I read it I was doing the "Check. This is a doctrine I know" rather than letting it really challenge me and grow my understanding. I think it is the single best book I have read about Romans 5-8.
Since I have been thinking about "life in the spirit -vs- flesh" so much, I thought I was understanding it pretty well. Christmas day came. This is our first Christmas without Libby. I was intent on doing as much as I could to keep up family traditions, to make the day as normal as I could for Helen. Almost from the start of the day we were off track. Helen woke up late. She decided to skip open stockings and go strait to breakfast. We did make waffles for breakfast, but she didn't want anything else. After opening presents she was still tired and wanted to take a nap. By the time Helen was up from her nap I was feeling pretty stressed. The minor issue was that while our tradition of going to the Redwood was still possible, but it was going to have to be Henry Cowell, not the preferred Muir Woods.
The more difficult issue was that I was only going to have 1-1.5 hours to prepare a complicated dinner than I have never made before. I had been worrying about making this dinner for several days. We have a standard Christmas menu that Libby developed over the last 26 years. Most of the recipes come from the Silver Palate Cookbook. Not the most complicated recipes, but not simple: orange carrot soup, blueberry chicken, green beans with cashews & parsley, fresh bread, scallop potatoes, chocolate mousse. Ack! I couldn't find the recipe for scallop potatoes, so I had to scramble and find something. Cook's Illustrated came to my rescue with their 2005 holiday scallop potato recipe. All of these recipes take a fair bit of labor. I felt pressure to get to the cooking, but I really wanted to go to the redwoods. So I push us out the door. We got in the car and I stepped on the gas hard... maybe speeding the journey by a minute.
On the drive I thought I had calmed down. Helen and I started to talk about the week, what we were thinking about, what we had been doing. I was talking with Helen about some of the things I was seeing in Romans, and how I wanted to share them with a couple of friends who didn't seem to be understanding how it worked. They were still laboring under "the law" described in Romans 7... trying to fix things that they weren't capable of fixing.
Well... about half way through the drive Helen told me during the day I have gone from "Bad Dad" to "Worse Dad". Ouch! As we talked it became clear "bad dad" cared more about executing all the family traditions than he did how his precious daughter was feeling. "Worse dad" was getting angry at his daughter for standing between him and successful execution of his plans. Ugh!! Here I was, talking about how important the perspective in Romans was, while completely missing the point in my own life. Rather than "the law" being something from the Bible, it was my list of expectations for Christmas.
Thankfully, there was time to recover. Helen and I laughed about it. We had a great walk and talk among the redwoods. While we were walking and then on the return drive I completely forgot about the need to make dinner, I wasn't feeling any pressure.
Once we got home I got to work. The food prep went faster than it should have. We ended up having dinner on time. The meal turned out well. Helen (and I) thought the the scalloped potatoes were better than any we had made before.. but how could they not be good with 3 cups of heavy cream. The only problem was that I forgot to half the chocolate mousse recipe. This turned out to be a blessing. I was able to take mousse for eight over to the Taylors, have enough for Helen and I, some of her friends, and another family of five. Christmas wasn't the happiest day ever, but we were able to be content, and celebrate the birth of the most important person who ever lived. Thank you God.
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