Of scarves and chess and food

11-10-2010
Originally uploaded by cspatrick

Friday, October 22, 2010 Day 114
We slept late and I spent the morning getting a package and a letter ready to mail. After lunch we went shopping. We stopped at one of the open market stalls in the Comédie and I decided it was time to buy a scarf – gray – to go with my black coat. It is made of wool and silk and the washing instructions only use those little universal symbols, and they provide for no washing whatsoever – no machine wash, no bleaching, no tumble dry, no ironing, no dry cleaning. I suppose that leaves hand-washing and drying flat, but the instructions don’t say that. Hm . . . .

Anne called this morning to invite us to dinner at her place on Monday. She was speaking yesterday about her frustrations with her computer, and much of what she described sounded like the computer simply needs to be reconfigured. I volunteered Roger to help her reconfigure it, so she called to offer the inducement of dinner in exchange for the help. Roger agreed so we signed on.
Yesterday evening I got a message from Christian that my computer is in. We are meeting him in Milan in a couple of weeks and he is bringing it with him. I can’t wait to get it. Roger has been looking into flights and trains to Milan but hasn’t found any good deals yet. Train is cheap, but it has a couple of drawbacks. First, the trip is seven hours – ugh! But more importantly, right now the trains are erratic because of the strikes. We might end up stuck somewhere with no way to go onward or back. Not an ideal situation.

Roger had his best day yet playing chess. He played at the top table and beat his opponent. This was a particularly sweet victory, as he beat the guy who is normally defending the table. He lost to the next opponent he played, but he said he almost had it won when he ran out of time. His opponent had only three seconds left – a moral victory even though it was a loss. Then he played another game at the top table against the strongest guy, and they drew the game. Under the “house” rules, a draw means that the guy defending the table keeps the spot. Another moral victory, maybe not quite as big. I guess he scared off the good players – he called me around 5:00 and said he was on his way home, as the only players left did not provide enough challenge to him.

I fixed a sausage skillet mélange for dinner, and Roger suggested that I post the recipe because it was really quite nice. I had about a pound of chorizo, which I browned in a bit of oil, then set aside. Next I tossed three toes of minced garlic, a coarsely-chopped onion, one each of red pepper and green pepper, coarsely chopped, 5 small potatoes, cut into chunks, about a teaspoon of curry powder, and a teaspoon of Mexican spices. I sautéed these, and when they began to stick (no Teflon pan here), I stirred in the sausages and half a cup of water, covered, and let simmer for about 15 minutes. When the potatoes were done, I took the lid off and cooked until the water evaporated, then added the surprise ingredient – a chopped mango, cooking and stirring just until the mango was warmed. It turned out to be very delicious, with the mango serving as a wonderful counterpoint to the spices and the sausage. Since arriving in France, I have been putting fruit in unexpected places, first salads, now main dishes. We ate it with the ubiquitous baguette and wine and were quite sated.
The photo has nothing to do with today's adventures. I just like the door! It is the door to Vivien's and Alain's house in Séte, which I thought I would share since we didn't get a photo done today and further since there were too many other photos I wanted to share from that day.