The Toasted Tomato

The bowling alley, the old saying goes, is the poor man’s country club and to that gem I say: If that’s the case, sign me up. Over the past year, we have reintroduced ourselves to our love of this game, with twelve of us meeting on a near-monthly basis in the winter and having so much fun we are considering having shirts made.

The entertainment begins the week before the event, when we start group texting to see who’s in. I’m not sure how it started, but the goal of those messages is to use as many bowling-related puns as possible: “Let’s pin down the details,” “Can’t wait to hang out with everyone. Turkeys included,” “Be there or be spare,” “This conversation has headed straight to the gutter.” This, along with a whole lot of Big Lebowski memes, results in a lot of laughs and a lot of anticipation for the night, in part because it reminds you how much you like your nerdy friends.

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A few years ago, several people told me there was a woman who’d just moved to Somerset whom I had to meet. She was a huge foodie and cook, my age, loved to travel, and didn’t have little kids or plans to have any.

I’m here to tell you, it’s extremely rare to find someone with whom you have all of these things in common (especially the cooking and kid part), so I was immediately intrigued. Then, with the endorsement of several mutual friends, I sent her a text and asked her on a blind friend-date.

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For the past five days, we’ve all been snug as a bug in a rug, haven’t we? It’s been great. Fantastic. The blizzard of 2016 was one for the record books, and I loved every single minute of it. Except for, well, the bugs in the rugs.

I’m not sure if I’m alone out here with this problem, but every winter, our house gets infiltrated by ladybugs. It starts some time in November, lasts until spring and these little ladies get everywhere: behind the bed, on window sills, in light fixtures, in the corners of every room. This morning I woke up and there was one crawling around the lip of my water glass.

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For the past several weeks, I’ve been researching literary magazines to try to find homes for the short stories I’ve written. It’s the first step in getting published and one that has only taken me, oh, three and a half years to take.

This is my second stab at taking this plunge, the first being a day much like this one last year. I had just finished watching the movie Nebraska, was sitting writing notes about its characters and plot development and, overall, feeling pretty good and smart about things.

So good, in fact, that I gathered the courage to scan the website for the literary mag Tin House, which has received piles of awards.

This, in the end, did not prove useful.

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There can only be one winning set of Powerball numbers and I’ve got it so sorry about your luck, losers. That’s a little haha I’ve been pulling this week and I’ve been getting quite a kick out of it.

As you know, $1.5 billion is up for grabs after there was no winner in last week’s draw. We have four tickets, a repeat of the same numbers we were randomly given the first time. Because that set of numbers definitely wasn’t picked the first go-around, there is a larger chance it will be this time, according to my husband. That math is too big for my small brain to absorb, so I just dutifully followed orders. Still, I think our odds aren’t much better than 1 in 292 million, which is so frightfully small I can’t really wrap my head around that one either.

But no matter how small the chances, there are always a few moments post lottery ticket purchase that you feel pretty sure you’re going to win. You tenderly treat the ticket — caress the soft paper, enjoy its Easter-themed colors — like a silk scarf and place it in a careful spot so you will not, under circumstances, lose it. Then you dream with your spouse about what you would do (i.e. will do) with your winnings.

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Not to start the New Year out on a tough note, but I’d be remiss if I didn’t dedicate this space this week to someone very special to me. On Dec. 21, my best friend Kristin’s dad was killed in a car accident, something so random and unfair, quick yet violent, I’m still not sure it’s real.

Throughout my childhood, Ken was a second dad to my little brother Matthew and I. He was endlessly charismatic, warm, funny, hard working and so successful he was a mentor long before we knew the word.

Ken and my dad were best friends and were constantly working on projects together. We lived in a little municipality about 20 minutes outside of the city, just far enough for it to be considered “the country.” As such, Ken and my dad fully embraced the opportunity to be Bumpkins.

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Every year, the minute Thanksgiving turns into Christmas, I head to Tuesday Morning and hope for something good. By this time, their Christmas décor is on the shelves and it’s all I can do not to rub my hands together in anticipation. Every year, I am looking to add to the only collection I have in this world, one composed of an army of nutcrackers.

It all started when I moved to Kentucky and realized my then-boyfriend was in possession of these stately gentlemen, some holding beer steins, one dressed like Sir Arthur, another like a Mouse King, some just standing around holding regal holding staffs. William loves a fully decorated house, so I plonked them down in random places and continued on my merry way.

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This holiday season, one of my goals was to master baking the French baguette. I wasn’t successful. But what came out of the effort is an image seared forever on my brain, one I’ve come to think of as a special Christmas gift from my oven to me.

The baguette is one of my most beloved breads, in no small part because it reminds me of Montreal. At my favorite restaurants, baguette is accompanied by salted butter, and sometimes paired with olive tapenade or even rillettes or cretons, which are country versions of pâté. The bread is always perfect — nice and crusty on the outside with a crumb that is flavorful yet tender.

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Every year at Christmas time, for some party, function or what-have-you, I am forced to bake. It’s an obligation that is always accompanied by a wince, as baking is my least favorite thing to do in the kitchen.

This, I’ve decided, has a lot to do with the fact that baking inevitably requires you to do complicated things to the pan before you can even start. For example, I hate greasing. And if I have to cut parchment paper out and then grease that and then flour it, I’m already in a bad mood. I want to heat up some oil or melt some butter and get on with it.

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Every November 30, you can find me sitting in agony at the dining room table. It’s not a pretty thing as I press my fists into my eye sockets, bite feverishly on my pen cap and, occasionally, moan in pain, something no one hears because no one is home. The day’s task? To write eight mini poems, which serve as scavenger hunt clues for Gabrielle’s advent calendar.

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