Wednesday, May 19, 2021

Windows, Doors and Egg Rolls


I am getting new windows installed this week, they said it would take 3 days and they've just completed 2 days. All the new windows are in place and some of the trim. Tomorrow they will complete the trim.


Before coming in they asked me some Covid-related questions and then said they would be wearing masks and expected me to do so also, which I agreed to. As it turned out, one of the two workmen never wore a mask, but he also never entered my home, working strictly outside. I chatted with him at one point and he said he didn't believe in vaccines, but he realized that he was going to have to get vaccinated in order to keep working. I said nothing but thought, "good!"


While they install the windows I am weeding my garden, a task I don't relish but since I had to stay home but not in my house it does seem like a good time to get that out of the way. I think I am doing a couple of years worth of weeding.

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I dreamed about Hapi last night. We were on a trail we have often walked, she had her old energy back and was trotting along briskly with her tail up. Her coat was almost completely grown out except for a white patch on one shoulder. It was nice to see her back to her old self.

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So, a few days ago I was cleaning up the muddy patch on the back door left from Hapi scratching there to notify me that she wanted inside. I couldn't get it all off, I think she managed to scratch through the paint and it was going to need repainting. I was thinking about what colour I wanted, and that reminded me of the Green Door and the Orange Door, two Chinese restaurants in Vancouver. They are no longer there but they used to be on a back alley in that city's Chinatown. There was no signage and no advertising, you heard about them by word of mouth and you basically had to walk down that alley looking for a green door or an orange door. I don't remember which one I ate at (it was in the late 60s), but there were no windows. Once inside you felt like you were in someone's basement, with an open kitchen along one side and big dining tables along the other side.

My boyfriend and I asked for two egg rolls each plus a couple of main dishes. The waiter gave my boyfriend a funny look, but we didn't know what that was about. He went away and shortly came back to say that they had run out of egg rolls and we could only have one each. Okay, that's weird, but okay. He went away again and after a while he returned with the egg rolls. They were huge. Each one was a full meal. We immediately cancelled the rest of our order and the waiter did not seem surprised or perturbed by that, I think he was expecting that reaction. We were greenhorns and had no idea what was meant by an "egg roll". It was almost literally a rolled up egg omelet filled with ground meat and vegetables. I'm guessing three or four eggs in each omelet.

So remembering that experience, as a result of cleaning the door, I then wondered how you would make such an egg roll, and whether it was something I could reproduce myself. I tried it out with what I had and it was pretty good. I just used what I had in the fridge, some celery, an old carrot, a very old frozen soyburger, an onion, some sweet Thai garlic sauce, and of course eggs. My omelet wasn't big enough so there was too much filling and I had to just spread the filling on top of the omelet and eat it with a knife and fork. A work in progress.

1 comment:

Wisewebwoman said...

Those windows look lovely. And my mouth watered thinking of Chinatown in Toronto and the fab meals we'd get there. I think you and I met over Thai Food on Bloor for the 1st time. :)

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