not a bad life, all in all

We managed to be surprisingly productive in spite of ourselves this weekend. We woke up late Saturday morning not really wanting to do the things on our to-do list, but decided we'd work for an hour, just an hour, and call it good. Two hours later, the dishes were done and half the laundry was folded. Hey, you take your victories where you can get them.

It was a beautiful, beautiful day and not wanting to miss out on the first sunny day in more than a week, we decided to knock another thing off our list by making a trip to Portland Nursery to get replacement pots for the two shrubs on our front porch. See? We can be downright efficient when we have half a mind to be.

Portland Nursery, fortuitously enough, was having a sale on all their pots and we got an additional discount on one of the pots we chose that had a chip in the rim. Easy peasy. We found a new restaurant in the area to try for an early supper, and spent the last hours of the day snuggled up in a cozy pub, with a view out the window, a pint (for him), and a tasty meal. I love our life.

lunch, black strawberry box:

• stir fry -- beef, kale, spinach, carrots, red pepper, onion, broccoli, special sauce
• half jasmine rice, half short grain brown rice
• satsuma orange halves
• Rancho Royale apple chunk
• cashews and yogurt covered raisins

Comments

[Anne Hawley]

Suddenly, I'm about ready to get back to my bento boxes. This Japanese commercial inspired me, and so do your bento posts. (The commercial doesn't really need translation, but in a nutshell, the mother makes bentos daily for her sullen teenaged son throughout high school, and he never thanks her till the very end of high school, when he remembers to leave her a note. Very touching. Also the food looks fab.

Your productive weekend sounds so nice. Where's good to eat near Portland Nursery?

[Bitty]

HOLY CRAP HOW CAN A COMMERCIAL ABOUT BENTO MAKE ME CRY AND ALSO HOW THE HELL DID YOU EVER EVEN FIND THAT YOU ARE BOTH EVIL AND AWESOME.

Wow, wow, wow. Loved that. I love the box she was using, though it was HUGE. Well, probably not huge for a growing teenage boy. I think I'd wither at the prospect of having to fill a box that big every day, though. Thanks so much for that.

Also, I'm glad (and humbled) to inspire you to return to your bento boxes. I would imagine it would fit in well with all the other work you've been doing.

Lots of great places to check out near the Portland Nursery on Stark. It's not far from Crema, and that whole area, particularly along 28th, is jam packed with great options: Esparza's, Tabla, La Buca, Ken's Artisan Pizza, many others. Staccato Gelato is just down the street if you're in the mood for a little treat.

The place we went is Coalition Brewing Co., which is right next door to Crema (where Noble Rot used to be). It's small and nothing super spectacular, but they have good food that aren't the typical greasy pub food. (Although I don't know that anywhere in Portland hast typical greasy pub food, do they? McMenamin's, I guess. Most others are either not greasy but typical or greasy but not typical.)

We had the chili dogs, which is kind of hilarious, and could sort of be considered pub food (or pub-type food, at any rate). But the chili was homemade and flavorful without being spicy, packed with lots of veggies, the hot dogs were VERY savory beef hot dogs,freshly made buns, and instead of a side of fries, it comes with a heaping mound of a nice mixed green salad with a light vinaigrette. Filling, organic, homemade, and good. We also had an appetizer of pretzels (regular dry pretzels, not the bread kind) with their creamy beer dip. You know how I feel about anything with beer in it, but I could eat this okay and not gag at the taste of beer (I could still taste it, but it wasn't overpowering and the dip itself was good).