Auburn Farmer's Market

Decided to go to the Auburn Farmer's Market today to browse the stalls. I could wish for a little more variety in the types of vegetables sold. No broccoli or cauliflower--I go to the Federal Way Market for that, as the Sidhu Farm (I believe they are from India--the parents have that lovely lilting accent, but their kids sound like your average middle-class American teenager) from Puyallup has beautiful, flawless specimens of those vegetables. But the Auburn market does have lovely Swiss chard, which I bought, and which I didn't see in the Federal Way market last week. Nice that Auburn has their market on Sundays, whereas Federal Way and Kent have theirs on Saturday.

The Auburn market does have nice-looking pasta, however, and so I bought some garlic lemon pepper angel hair as well as spinach fettuccine. I plan to use the garlic lemon pepper with perhaps a salmon alfredo or a seafood Italian stir-fry with a basil and oregano wine sauce. The latter is the hubby's favorite, as I use a good deal of garlic in it--fresh garlic from our garden. I have also used leeks on occasion from our garden when I don't have onions. It has a less harsh taste than onions, less of a bite. I like both tastes, so it doesn't matter much to me which one I use.

Of note also at the Auburn market is local organic beef (from nearby Covington), as well as honey. Two local, small bakeries are also featured, one of which specializes in European goods (Euro Market). And then there are the superb Gosanko chocolates.

I didn't get the chocolaes, but I just might get a few the next time I go there.

Later: I have never had Swiss Chard before, and now that I've cooked them, I'm going to get more--they're like spinach, but without the harsh edge on the tongue, and with a sort of nutty aftertaste--very nice! It went well with the garlic lemon pasta and seafood, very, very nice.

Repeating myself

I just noticed that I mentioned the shorter commute, etc. on Twitter as well. I guess I must be REALLY happy about it. :-D

It's good to have more time

...at home. I timed how long it takes for me to get to work, and it's only 10 minutes. Ten minutes! Compare that to 1 1/2 hours at the old job. God, it's so wonderful. I actually came home for lunch, did a few errands, and then went back to work. Then I came home, cleaned up a bit, then went to pick up the hubby from the airport.

I know, I know, it sounds so mundane. But all this time to do stuff. I can actually have some time to have breakfast in the morning, and then have some time to relax in the evening before going to bed.

I don't have to pay for parking, and I use less fuel. There's a Safeway nearby, so I can buy inexpensive lunch food if I forget to pack a lunch, instead of going to a deli that charges at least $9 for lunch. It's as if I got a raise, seriously.

So now I am going to devote some of that lovely time to writing on a regular basis. There are a few empty cubicles at work, so I can probably go in one of those to write. I'm happy.

New book cover!

The new book cover has arrived! I've posted it up on my web site. I rather like it--the colors are nice, although the gal holding the chalice looks a bit spacey. I don't know if she represents any of the heroines in Jo's, Mary Jo's, or Barbara's stories, but she doesn't look anything like mine. But that's fine. It's hard to represent different elements of an anthology, but I think this one works all right.

I'm looking forward to seeing the whole book. I've become used to seeing my books in the final stage, but there is nevertheless the sheer simple pleasure of holding the finished product of one's labors in one's hands.

I'll put up an excerpt once I see the manuscript in its copyedited form.

The Cows are Gone

I live on the hills just above the Green River Valley, and there is not one week that I don't go down to the valley and drive through lush farmland. Not far away is Smith Brothers dairy farm. When we first came to live in our house about 23 years ago, there were cows along West Valley Highway, in fact there were cows just down the street from where live. I loved seeing the little calves walking their wobbly way to their mothers every spring, and how they'd gain coordination over the course of a month, and run around the grassy fields.

The cows are all gone now.

I heard that most of the dairy farmers in Western Washington have either gone out of business or have left to go to Eastern Washington. Between the lower price of milk, and the extremely high cost of complying with environmental regulation these days, farmers can't afford to run their dairy farms any more. I'm not seeing as many vegetable farmers in the valley much either, which is too bad, because the Green River Valley is one of the most fertile river valleys in the world.

Instead, there are warehouses and strip business offices all along West Valley Highway, empty because of the recession. I'd prefer to see the cows grazing along the highway instead of the empty warehouses. At least there'd be productive use of the land.

Smith Brothers is still delivering milk, though--that's where I get my milk and dairy products. I guess they get their milk from the few remaining dairy farmers around, although I expect they most likely get it from across the mountains. It makes me feel sad to think that farmers are being booted out of the most fertile land in the world. There's something wrong about it being paved over and industrial warehouses being built over it, only to be left empty. Covered over wasted space, so that even passersby can't see the land any more.

I see this happening because I live close to these farms. But I don't think those with the biggest voting and political impact--people who live in the bigger cities of Seattle, Tacoma, Bellevue, and Everett--know, perhaps even care, that their local food sources are disappearing.

The weird thing? If we kept environmental regulations reasonable enough so that local farmers could afford to operate their farms, we wouldn't be having huge trucks burning tons of fossil fuel to transport our food hundreds of miles. The food would be available much closer to home.

Buy local. It's the sensible thing to do.

New Job, new story

Two good things:

I got a new job, MUCH closer to home, and will begin in a little more than two weeks. It's good because it's only 10 minutes to drive to work at worst, the parking's free, and the pay's the same. Compare that to 45 minutes (if all is well, as much as 2 hours if the traffic's snarled, or an hour and a half by bus) to where I work now, and parking fees that are anywhere from $12 to $18 per day. It'll add as much as 10 to 12 hours a week to my life, seriously. I'll use less gas. It'll be a freakin' savings. It'll be like getting a pay raise.

The second good thing is that I've sent in my edits for my Regency-set novella, "Miss Templar and the Holey Grail," and it was such amazing fun to write that I feel rarin' to go on something else (elements of the book: the Holy Grail, the Spear of Destiny, Sir Walter Scott, Almack's, and "where's Waldo?" Trust me, it works). I went through the different story ideas I've salted away over the years (as long ago as 1999!) in my "ideas" folder on my computer. I believe I will look over my demon book to see how that looks and maybe send that out. It's finished, but I haven't looked at it for years, so I will probably need to do some editing.

I actually found a number of books I began writing years ago, but left off writing. Some of them paranormal, a few of them Regency (which aren't published any more except as historicals). One of them that I really do like is "The Spy and Lady Nye," which I think is a fun title. I was reading it over, and it reads well, and I wouldn't mind continuing it. However, it's a Regency, no paranormal that I can think of, but I do believe I was intending to put a few explosions in it, as I haven't put explosions in a book before. Unfortunately, print publishers aren't publishing Regencies any more. I suppose it could very well become a Regency historical, but I truly don't want a duke as a hero, I have a baronet instead. Publishers tend to want dukes and such, but seriously, I am tired of dukes.

Oh, and then there are a few pages of a humorous Regency-set story regarding the children of Corday and Simone (of Night Fires). It looks like their son has turned out to be an experimental wizard.

Let's see...there is the fully-fleshed out plot for an Irish story set in 1798. That one is a keeper. Involves fairies, a werewolf, magical spells, spinning wool and knitting (my hobbies!), and the Irish rebellion. I might work on that one.

It's fun looking over these potential stories.