The weather wasn't bad, so I could get a nice enough crossbreeze to cook a
piece of meat without smelling it for the rest of the day, so I elected
to do that, to Andrew's delight.

 There was one more nice giant sirloin strip in the freezer, so I pulled it out
only to find that the vacuum sealer hadn't been totally right, so there was a
touch of frost inside the bag. It was also slightly unevenly cut, but at least
it didn't have bone shards in the bottom the way most of the ones from this
Auchan come with (the other store has more expertly cut meat, but I get my
prescriptions here).

 Thawed it pretty much, browned the edges (it was as most of the steaks are
thick enough to stand on edge in the pan), and cooked so the thick part was
rare.

 The thin end had had some of that frost and might not have been the tenderest,
so being a relatively nice guy I took that for myself.

 A pan sauce out of leftover Norton Malbec, the thickened juice from the
Bourguignonne deliciousness, and, because it was there, a bit of rendered suet
taking the place of butter. It transformed my end of the steak and might have
improved Andrew's.

 He also had a big baked potato, into which he shoveled nearly a stick of
butter in two goes.

 Considering the fragility of life, I pulled out the currently best wine in the
house, Sarget de Gruaud-Larose 15. Back when, Talbot was my favorite, but
for a while I took its stablemate Gruaud-Larose by preference (when my brother
and b-i-l offered it), and latterly, life being what it is, it's the cadets
Connetable Talbot and Sarget that are within my budget.

 This was quite a fine (but not AS fine) wine, its blackberry blackcurrantness
taming down with intriguing spice including a little clove and pepper coming
out, worth sipping with the meat. It was almost as good and delicate a wine as
to call for poultry (i.e., a pairing where the meat takes the back seat).

 Andrews's carrot cake for afters, which was excellent, not too sweet, though
she had frosted it with Martha Stewart's cream cheese frosting recipe, which
calls for too much fat and not enough sugar.



Next day was one of the fifty four F high days, and I took my walk extra early,
being whipped around by the wind; this guaranteed the dearth of insects, though
some of the flies have evolved into formidable fliers.

The plan was to have leftover pizza, so I put it out to come to room temp. I
figured a couple slices out of 5 (for some reason the parlor had cut it into
nine wedges, which takes some thinking) would do me with a beer, but about as
soon as I made that plan the lights went off.

Andrew got on the Internet via his phone (I think that costs extra, but this
seemed justifiable) and found that the situation involved 73 customers. As it
was lowery and unpleasant, I decided that an early retreat would make sense so
had the covers up over my head by late afternoon. Andrew gave up as well an
hour or two later, as her phone battery had pretty much given out.

SDGE had predicted the outage would be over by 1930, but it turned out to last
until past normal bedtime. At about 2230 I smelled burning pizza and found the
same ready for consumption, but I turned it down in favor of more rest. But
hark, what was that in the distance? I heard large glucks of liquid and
surmised that it was the remaining half bottle of Sarget from the night before.
I rushed out and managed to get a last sip before it went away. I was just a
tad sore that Andrew treated it as though it were $5 plonk - I'd not have been
upset if he had consumed it all in my absence, if he'd done so in a slightly
more aware manner than if it had been Diet Pepsi or Almaden. And Bordeaux does
not go with pizza.

If I have told his once, I have told his a thousand times.

--- GoldED+/W32-MINGW 1.1.5-b20120519 (Kubik 3.0)
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