Shannon Phillips

Yesterday’s veggie box held: broccoli, carrots, four little eggplants, lots of little sweet peppers, a big bag of grapes, five peaches, three tomatoes (yay!), three zucchini, and two cucumbers.

Robin has already eaten almost all the grapes.

Last night we were lucky enough to see the Anti-Sara and two members of the Phillips extended family we hadn’t yet had the opportunity to meet: Melinda and her lovely daughter Lindsay. We had them over for dinner—I made grilled sausages and peppers, a big salad (using the broccoli, carrots, and cucumbers, with homemade avocado ranch dressing), and a peach cobbler. Everything came out all right but the sausages took forever to grill on our little George Foreman grill, so we had a very long dinner served in several courses. It’s, uh, sophisticated and European? Anyway, it was nice to have all this lovely fresh produce on hand when we were having guests.

Robin, by the way, adores all the relatives but especially Lindsay, who he went really a bit crazy for. He would cackle like the Joker whenever she so much as looked his way. She was sweet enough to spend a lot of time playing with him, but as the night wore on and dinner went past Robin’s bedtime, he got more and more wound up, and eventually bit Lindsay twice in his mania.

The biting thing is worrying. Robin’s been biting Sam lately too. I don’t really get bitten, I think because my presence is soothing rather than exciting, and the biting happens when he’s really wound up. We’re using time-out as a response right now, but the discipline doesn’t seem to really take when he’s in that super-hyper state. I’m just hoping it doesn’t become a huge problem, because from what I’ve read online biting can be a really hard behavior to break. My inclination is mostly to try and keep him from getting into those manic states, but of course sometimes it’s hard to avoid.

Anyway, meal plan. Tonight I’ll make ratatouille over quinoa to finish up the remaining veggies. The weekend’s going to be busy; Saturday is my day with friends, and Sunday I’ve volunteered to help out at my local comic store, which is having a big event starring Neil Gaiman. My job is keep the crowds from trampling Neil in their excitement. There are going to be some big guys around to help with the crowd control if it comes to that: but I was drafted specifically to be “cute and charming” and try to keep the mood pleasant while everyone waits in an orderly fashion to have their books signed. It’s a fun job because I get to hang out near Neil the whole day, but I’m also a little bit nervous because, well, I want to do a good job. And as Brian (the store owner) said, “If someone tries to shoot him, I am sorry to say that you’ll be the one that has to try and stop the bullet with your bracelets.” So that’s a responsibility I take pretty seriously!

Anyway, I’m probably only cooking one of those days, and it’ll have to be something simple like pasta. We have some sausages left over, so maybe I’ll do pasta with sausage and some sort of spicy greens, spinach or broccoli rabe. Then on Monday, something seafood-y: I’ll have to see what they have at the fish counter. Oh, I think salmon is in season? So maybe salmon cakes with arugula or something.