princesskatsumi

Questions courtesy of The Friday Five. Thank you.

1. What did you plant?

Nothing. This is the third year my new garage was to be built.

The first year it became too late in the season. The second year, the surveyor discovered my neighbor's fence was on my property. This past year was held up because it was determined the underground electrical service I requested was buried directly in the path of where my new garage and driveway are supposed to go.

The contractor did manage to tear down the old garage. With a bulldozer scooper thingy. Parked a dumpster on the street. It was all over within a hour.

I was told the electric company couldn't come out last late summer to prepare for autumn construction because it was too rainy. So. Instead they came out in February the day after a snowstorm and the trenching machine drove over my coaster wagon and propane tanks under the snow in my backyard. Which are typically stored in my garage which was torn down.

You couldn't come because it was raining but snow is okay?

Now the electric company thinks I am going to pay them to bury the wires a second time. No. I rented a jackhammer and tore up part of the existing driveway to provide access along the correct route. The work crew decided to bore under the driveway. That's your problem.

Once the driveway and garage and new porch are completed, I'll be doing new landscaping.

2. What was your favorite summer food?

Princess Katsumi's Sixteen Layer Salad with buttered toast. An enhanced seven layer salad. Usually has more than sixteen layers but sixteen was my number on the lacrosse, basketball, baseball and track teams in high school. And on my official Green Bay Packers home and away jerseys.

Suggested wine pairing: Wisconsin Prairie Fumé, most recently awarded Best Of Class at the 2019 Los Angeles International Wine Competition and the 2019 San Diego International.

With fruit fluff for dessert. One of us hates fruit fluff. She said so when I responded on her blog. And she doesn't even know what it is.

Since I was a little girl, I always wanted to try Eton Mess. Recently found out Eton Mess is a strawberry schaum torte. Which I've been making since childhood. A meringue dessert predating Eton Mess. Think of a schaum torte as an individual serving, single fruit fruit fluff. And recently discovered a Pavlova is a copycat and just a fancy schmantzy name for fruit fluff.

Fruit fluff is every imaginable fruit in season cut into managable pieces. Kiwi, strawberry, canteloupe, marion berry from Oregon, banana, peach, apple, blueberries, pitted Door County cherries... Whatever your little heart desires. Bake a large meringue. Top with freshly whipped cream. Real cream. The kind that comes in a bottle. To the consistency of whipped cream in a cream puff. Apply fruit pieces and more whipped cream.

When I have company over for dinner, I set the table with a dessert spoon and a dessert fork. Technically I think you're supposed to use a dessert fork.

Voi​là! Itadakimasu!

3. What song will remind you of this summer?

Due to the coronavirus and rioting, The Rolling Stones, SCANDAL, Summerfest (The World's Largest Music Festival), the summer-long series of ethnic festivals were all cancelled.

A few weeks ago I took the roadster out. First time with the top down since last September before I put her into winter storage.

No. I can drive rear wheel drive perfectly well in the snow. My company-issued car is rear wheel drive. In urban areas, salt and calcium chloride are applied to icy streets and highways. Which eats cars. Rust. And subzero temperatures are not good for leather upholstery or belts and hoses.and gaskets. So. She stays in a heated warehouse.

Hopped in the roadster. My travels took me to the basilica and beyond. Got back to the city just in time for Happy Hour at the Taco Bell drive-through for the new dragonfruit freeze.

Somewhere during the afternoon segment of my travels, I should have reapplied mousterizer / sunscreen. Although I am one of God's Chosen Children and came with factory installed PermaTan®, I was sunburned and windburned. Had a doctor appointment the next day. The nurse laughed as she applied the blood pressure cuff. I had what is called in the business as a farmer tan.

Summer 2020: An oldie but a goodie. From fifteen years ago, high school-age SCANDAL.




4. What was your favorite body of water to be in?

Not the Pacific Ocean. Got to the hotel in San Diego and went straight to the restaurant for supper. When I went to my room, there was a message from the cruise line. All sailings cancelled.

Snapped a photograph of the ship on the way back to the airport the following day.

 

 

With all the lockdowns and quarantines and curfews, never made it to the beach for kite flying. Maybe on New Year's Day for the Polar Bear Plunge.

 

 

5. What's been your favorite outfit?

 

Bought a new yukata for the Fourth Of July and summer festivals, a pair of white seerseeker shorts, a navy double-breasted blazer and a French striped navy jersey à la Brigette Bardot and Andy Warhol. Instead of white leather athletic shoes and military-style web belts, a pair of huaraches, a pair of espadrilles and matching woven leather belts.

Never got to wear them.

With the coronavirus, my go-to outfit has been my summer at-home uniform: men's white golf (or maybe tennis) shirts, men's oxford cotton boxers and tabi / footies. For those rare trips to the doctor's office or the Hawaiian delicatessen or Filipino restaurant for no-contact curbside pick-up: scrubs. Pink, hospital blue, hospital green, dark grey, black and indigo denim. Maybe a sports jacket.

I checked out the nurses at the hospital. We are roughly the same height. They do not roll up their pants. I'd shorten the hems, but where to get hospital blue and hospital green thread?

And I've purchased a few coronavirus masks from the deli to supplement my Hello Kitty, basic white and basic black. Made in Hawaii of the same fabric as aloha shirts. Too cute