I Love You More than Sophie Loves Me

This was a declaration of love written to me from Daniel. I found it in a card left for me while he traveled to one of the interviews he secured.

If you knew Sophie and of her great love for Daniel, you might start to grasp just how much this means that Daniel loves me.

Sophie is attached to Daniel at the hip. She thinks they are bosom friends. Wherever he goes, she goes. And if she doesn’t get to go, she mopes pitifully or cries, hoping he will come back for her.

Don’t get me wrong, she loves me too but she has spent almost all of her time with us hanging out with my currently unemployed husband and she thinks they are soul mates.

It is sweet. I don’t know how she will feel about Daniel going back to work one of these days. I guess we will have to cross that bridge when we get there.

I Love You Moore than Alaska

Daniel's interview with Alaska Rim Engineering went well, though we won't hear anything for a few weeks. While the idea of moving to Alaska is alluring, in an adventurous sort of way, we are trying to be realistic about the whole thing.

Upon doing some research, moving the 4000+ miles to Palmer, Alaska is quite daunting. The expense and planning involved would be equivalent to moving to another country. All of this will factor in, if Daniel were to get an offer.

For now, we will continue to wait and try not to think too much about what it would mean to accept a job so far away.

I Love You Moore than Unemployment

The unemployment saga is continuing in the Moore household. Although we do have some good news to share after 8+ months of unemployment...

Daniel was contacted last week by the small company he interviewed with in Knoxville, TN. Unfortunately, they have been playing phone tag and we do not have concrete news.

Daniel called TVA (based in Chattanooga, TN) and they have been busy trying to secure permits for Bellefante, and have not made a decision yet. They hope to decide something in the "near future." Daniel thinks this is government speak for "We'll let you know when we are good and ready."

Daniel had a phone interview today with a company in Jackson, TN.

And the biggest new news is that a company from Alaska called today to set up a phone interview for tomorrow.

So that is where we are at. Ultimately, we are still waiting, but it is encouraging for things to feel like they are happening. Who knows, he might end up actually  having options.

Things That Make Me Happy

1. Spontaneously deciding to take Friday off of work to head up to the mountains.
2. Hiking Max Patch bald with amazing 360 degree views of the Smokey Mountains.
3. Perfect weather with a Carolina blue sky and lots of sunshine.
4. Letting Sophie run off leash on the bald - she was in doggy heaven.
5. Our little tripod (with strap) that we can use to take photos of us when there are no people around.
6. Getting a camp site beside a river.
7. Spending part of an evening soaking outdoors in hot mineral water springs after an afternoon of hiking. (Daniel thinks it was just heated tap water pumped into the tubs, regardless, it was a nice way to spend an evening).
8. Laying under a majestic starry sky - you don't get views of stars like this in the city.
9. Getting an electric site so that we could use an air mattress and our electric blanket. This was luxury camping for us. Normally we go for a primitive site, but we decided since Sophie had never been cold-weather camping before that we better make sure she would be warm enough. Good thing we did this, she slept under the blanket with us, only getting out a couple times. Then we would wake up and find her shivering and get her to get back under the blanket.
10. Sleeping in because the air temperature is so cold and you don't want to get out from under your blankets.
11. Enjoying a cup of hot coffee mixed with cocoa while you sit on the bank of the river.
12. Eating a country breakfast at the local Smokey Mountain Diner - almost rivaled Bobby's in Searcy. A cup of coffee, two eggs sunny-side up, country ham and toast for me.
13. Hiking the Lover's Leap trail. The views from the top of the French Broad River, the town of Hot Springs and the mountains beyond were beautiful.
14. Getting to sleep on the drive home because you volunteered to drive there.
15. Taking a hot shower at home then going to bed early in your own comfortable bed. 

The Night of the Barking Dog(s)

I would have written about this yesterday, but due to lack of sleep and a busy week at work, decided to take a brief hiatus from the internet.

Thursday night we went to bed, same as usual. Around 12:30 AM Sophie started barking. These barks were "don't you dare come a step further, or I will eat you" kind of barks. Not something we were expecting to wake up to.

Unsure of what she was barking at, Daniel went to investigate. He checked all of the rooms and made sure everything was locked up. Sophie has never acted like this before, so we were a bit shaken up, but decided everything was OK and went back to bed.

I slept off and on until 5:30 AM when Sophie started with the barking again. We both sat up in bed immediately and Daniel went to see if he could find what she was barking at. When he came back, he said he had heard something small scurrying in the basement.

I tried to go back to sleep, but then our neighbor's dog started barking and wouldn't let up. An hour later it was time for me to get up to get ready for work. Before leaving, I decided to eat a quick bowl of cereal. When I opened the pantry, I noticed that one of the boxes of cereal had a hole that had been chewed in the top of it.

Case solved: It would appear that Sophie had been protecting us from a mouse that was having a midnight snack in our pantry.

Follow up: Last night Daniel set a trap in the pantry and baited it with some of the cereal. We went to bed and within 30 minutes heard some noises. Daniel got up to check it out and we had caught a mouse. Hopefully we will have no more issues with Sophie barking at mice in the night.

Even though I didn't get enough sleep, I am glad Sophie responded so aggressively to an abnormal situation. I hope that if we ever have a real intruder, she will respond in kind.

Alone in the Kitchen with an Eggplant

Alone in the Kitchen with an Eggplant is a compilation of essays that offer a glimpse into the eccentric tendencies of individuals when left to prepare a meal for themselves. To be eaten alone. I read this book a couple of months ago and truly enjoyed it. Though I have never had great success with cooking eggplants I do love the brilliant color. The taste just doesn't do it for me.

Tonight I am alone. Normally this would mean a quick stop at Chik-fil-a on the way home from work. For me, the thought of cooking a meal for one makes the experience seem more lonely. However, inspired by the book, I decided to make the effort to cook something that I enjoy, something that I know Daniel doesn't particularly care for. For tonight's meal, I decided on Sunny-Side-Up Eggs cooked in Baked Tomatoes and Red Peppers.

With this plan in mind, I came home to an extremely-excited dog. It seems that she was more interested in 1) being fed and 2) going outside, than letting me start my own dinner. So I frantically sliced up a red pepper and threw it, along with two cloves of crushed garlic, into a skillet of heated olive oil.

Sophie finished eating and starting dancing around, whining to go out, so I dashed downstairs, opened the door, ran out on to the deck with her, then tried to sneak back upstairs to finish my cooking.

No dice. She followed me up the stairs and continued to whine, even though the door was still open for her. We really need to work on her learning to be outside (ALONE).

By this time, my peppers were starting to get soft, so I added a can of diced tomatoes to the pan, turned the burner on low and covered with a lid. I left this concoction to simmer for 30 minutes while I went back outside to throw the ball with Sophie. I must admit that I get great joy out of watching Sophie chase a tennis ball - she seems so content, ears flapping in the wind, happy to just run and fetch and repeat.

Though she eventually got bored and we came back inside and I still had 8 minutes of simmering left, so I cut myself a slice of leftover pumpkin spice cake (remember I am eating alone, so eating dessert first is completely appropriate).

With a few minutes to go, I loaded dirty dishes into the dishwasher, then I uncovered the food and cracked two fresh eggs on top of the mixture. I added some cracked pepper and sea salt, then covered again to let the eggs cook until the whites were set and the yolk was still runny (this is the main reason this dish is best for me to eat alone, Daniel wants his eggs, chicken, fish, steak, whatever, DONE).

Once the eggs had cooked. I poured the food into a bowl, sprinkled on some feta cheese, then downed it all with a glass of milk. As usual, I ate too fast and have a slightly burned tongue to show for it. Other than that, it was delicious.

During dinner, Sophie continued to whine. Not sure if she is missing Daniel or if she just wanted to go for a walk. I gave in and we took a post-dinner walk around the neighborhood.

If I hadn't been in such a rush to meet Sophie's needs, I probably would have taken the time to put on some jazz music and really enjoy the moment of cooking. Life doesn't always let us have those moments. Sometimes life is crazy and you have to run around and meet other needs and responsibilities. Even with the craziness, I still enjoyed my meal and am thankful I took the time to make myself something tasty and healthy, instead of relying on fast food as my eat-alone staple.

On Canoeing and Stupid Rednecks with Guns...

For Daniel's 29th birthday, we decided to go up to Cary, NC to stay with college friends (Heather and Jonathan) and spend Saturday canoeing. This idea came about when watching a PBS program about The Benjamin Vineyards & Winery who teamed up with the Haw River Canoe & Kayak Company to offer canoe trips on the Haw River that included paddling to the vineyard for wine and dessert. However, after some research, we opted just to go up and paddle (since we are currently on a shoestring budget).

We headed up to Cary on Friday night, then got up early Saturday to head up to Saxapahaw, NC to paddle. Unfortunately for us, the river was down due to a recent lack of rain. It was a very lazy day on a lazy river. We had to get out to portage around a dam (see photo album), but even with that the day was pretty laid back.

After our portaging experience, we had about 5 miles to paddle until our pull out. As we continued paddling, we all heard gun shots in the distance. We didn't really think too much about it initially - we are after all in a rural area and maybe there was a shooting range in the vicinity.

As we continued paddling, a couple of kayakers passed us and let us know that there were people up river that were actually shooting directly ACROSS the river at targets. They were getting ready to head back and encouraged us to follow them and to hug the left side of the river.

As we got closer to the wide open area where the shooting appeared to be occurring, we suddenly saw something skip in the water about 30 feet to our right and heard a loud "zing" sound. Some irresponsible moron (and that's putting it nicely :-) ) had shot a round up the river towards us. I don't think they were intentionally firing towards us, as we were still a long way away. (If they were, I'm quite thankful they had very poor aim).

Daniel yelled for the firing to cease (which it did). When we got closer, we saw a group of people hanging out on the right side of the river, with their targets on the bank on the left side of the river. I suppose the one shot was a stray. In all seriousness, we were pretty lucky that we didn't get hit by the stray bullet and that they quit firing when Daniel yelled.

There is a time and place for shooting targets, but if you are going to do it, you should be ABSOLUTELY SURE of what your target is, what's in line with it, and what's behind if if you miss or the bullet ricochets.

We are so thankful that our idyllic day did not turn into a nightmare.