The Faudie Returns...and Doesn't Talk About Food

I know, I know, I know, Gentle Reader, it's been a long while. If it hadn't been for the husband's handful of posts since my last in February, you'd probably have given up this blog for dead. But in an extremely early morning (3 a.m.) burst of monkey brain syndrome, I find myself wanting to post.

And not about food. That's one of the reasons I had to set the blog aside: I just didn't have a really healthy relationship with food. I'm slowly getting back to that point where I can enjoy cooking and not be swamped by a motherload of guilt and anxiety, which is really nice. That's not to say I haven't tried a few recipes that were winners and some that were forgettable, but I won't be doing any catch-up posts. Onward and upward, non?

So why the post? Really, that's a good question. I suppose I want to yammer a little bit about the end of summer vacation. That's right, the boy returns to school on Monday. Luckily he's still at that age when he can be excited about school, so his upbeat attitude helps me not get so stressed about his return and my own return to a less free-wheelin' schedule.

We've marked the end of Summer Vacation 2010 with a trip to the Blue Bell ice cream factory in Brenham (unless you like being swarmed by a lot of pasty white people who seem to breed uncontrollably paired with what amounts to a $5 scoop of ice cream, mark this outing off your list of things to do before you croak), along with a final trip to the pool where the boy took his first two weeks of swimming lessons and, later in the summer, passed his swimming test so he could start going off the diving board. Naturally, not enough lifeguards showed up for work on our final day, so the diving well was closed. But, hey, at least the asshole manager wasn't present to scream at patrons and lifeguards alike and generally make everyone's time there a living hell. The boy and I both appreciated his absence tremendously.

The husband and I even sneaked off to attend a movie on Dobie Theatre's penultimate day operating as a Landmark Theater exhibitor. Of course, this weekend also happens to be UT's Mooove-In Day for all on-campus dwellers, so we had to wade through crowds of overprivileged kids milling about while their helicopter parents unloaded all their useless electronic toys (really, you need that X-Box 360 for college?) and some more useful items (a change of underwear) with the help of returning students who were pumping Lady Gaga on a stereo (yes, a stereo, not on an iPod speaker setup). I felt terribly old as I glanced at the faces of the students, and I also felt terribly happy that my college experience was far behind me and paid off.

I'd worried that the theater might be swamped with nostalgia last-timers, but I needn't have expended that mental energy. The theater, like the entire Dobie Mall (a misnomer if ever one existed, for it's a glorified low-end food court with the requisite military recruiting office near one entrance), was largely deserted, offering proof why Landmark pulled the plug. Seeing as Saturday was its penultimate day, the theater was having a fire sale on its concessions: candy for 50 cents, sodas for a buck and 2 bucks for any size bag of popcorn. The husband was thrilled, although I think he was a tad disappointed no nachos with Rico's cheese were available. And I'm proud that he passed on the bagel dogs (although those might have already been sold out).

Since we haven't been to see a movie together since The Dark Knight hit theaters, we didn't haul down to the UT campus on Mooove-In Day for nothing. Since the Dobie was sort of Austin's first art house theaters, it was the only place showing Cairo Time, a character-driven film whose main attraction for us was its lead male star. (And allow me to say here that my attraction was on a different level than the husband's. It was perhaps apropos that I'd had to work my way through a college crowd because, boy oh boy, watching and, yes, drooling mentally over Sid again just took me back to my younger days.) It opened on Friday and closes on Sunday. Woohoo.

I'm not going to review the film because, well, I don't find reviews terribly useful--unless it's a review for a movie that deserves to be skewered, and the FSM knows plenty of those movies are made these days. But if you want to see a movie with no special effects, no big event moments (big chases, big explosions, big revelations, big plot twists) and not a big amount of chick-flick schmaltz, then it might be worth your while to check out Cairo Time. If you're not into the premise of the film, then at the very least you might enjoy some lovely images of Cairo.

Since turkey meatloaf hardly seemed appropriate following said breathtaking images of Cairo, the boys and I headed to Alborz for Persian. Damn oh damn did that ever hit the spot! One sour note, though, and that was the hummus. It was a bit on the bitter side, and I'm not sure why. I suspected a decreased quantity of garlic, but perhaps the garlic used had gone bad. Or maybe I've grown too accustomed to the red bell pepper hummus we've been getting from Sprouts. That's some tasty stuff there! But the bummer hummus didn't spoil our enjoyment of the fabulous food, and as always we topped the evening off at Dairy Queen with a buffet of Blizzards.

Really, Gentle Reader, it's no wonder I'm fat again, eating that way.

Inspired by the late summer bounty of fresh veggies filling the shelves at Sprouts, I'm off to start work on something called Marrakesh vegetable curry (yes, at 4 a.m.). I'd originally thought about making ratatouille, but I found my taste buds leading me to more familiar Persian/Indian/North African territory. Watch out, eggplant, here I come!