I stayed up past 1 a.m. last night baking my first-ever loaf of bread. And it was . . . my first loaf of bread. As can be seen in the photograph above, she is not the prettiest girl at the dance, but, despite being dense and a little crumbly, this loaf tastes pretty good with a little bit of peanut butter spread over the top. I'm going home this weekend to attend a baby shower, and plan on returning with gluten flour (in addition to the second bookshelf I need desperately), which will, I hope, assist in the rising process, as that proved to be my biggest setback as a baker-of-bread. Oh, and maybe the mix needs a little more water, since the dough felt a little dry when I was kneading it.
The Roommate came home early last night, so we actually had a chance to chat as I was working on my bread. It was at this point that I realized that unemployment is turning me into a housewife. as she took off her shoes, I proudly exclaimed, "I did laundry and a load of dishes! And I'm baking!" I then proceeded to knit a baby blanket as I waited for my bread to rise.
In all fairness, my sudden retreat into extreme domesticity probably has something to do with the fact that I haven't made any actual friends (or acquaintances, or people at whom I nod when we pass on the street) in Chicago. Living with The Roommate is ideal--we operate on similar schedules, since she's a chef and I'm an insomniac, but keep opposing shower schedules, so there's never a race to the restroom in the morning. However, this also means that I spend a lot of time by myself--knitting, watching old episodes of Kitchen Nightmares on YouTube, drinking iced chai while I finish the A Song of Ice and Fire series--and I'm beginning to get tired of myself.
The other day, I finally had my "Oh God, oh God, oh God, what have I done?!" moment, and although the same exact thing happened when I first moved to Seattle, I was completely blindsided when it happened in Chicago. Suddenly, I was unable to stop crying, even when I left the apartment to read the letters of Vincent Van Gogh in the nearby Starbucks--in fairness, Van Gogh probably wasn't the best choice when I was already feeling weepy, since I kept reading sentences that sounded as if I could have written them and beginning to choke up again. So, back to alternating between GRRM, Sherlock Holmes, and Jane Austen.
Also: I broke a shoe at IKEA last weekend. Time to look for a new pair of decent dress flats.
It's sort of ridiculous, actually, how I managed to ruin that pair of shoes. I was neither running nor jumping nor lifting anything heavy. Instead, I was eating a spinach-filled crepe at the third-floor cafe before Mom and I headed over to look at textiles when the strap snapped off. I cut the straps off both shoes, hoping to salvage them, but without the Mary-Jane buckles, the shoes were too big and my feet blistered. So I threw them out.
(Millionaire Matchmaker is currently reminding me why I neither want to live in New York City nor date a millionaire. So there you have it. Thanks, trash television! And, God, this show's so sleazy.)
Since my IKEA shoe mishap, I have been traipsing about the city in the running shoes I bought before running a 5K in 2008, and, while normally I would never wear sneakers in public (Italy and high-maintenance singers, what have you done to me?!), I have to admit that it's much more comfortable than teetering down the sidewalk in heels. A few nights ago I walked over to River North, where I ate deep-dish pizza among the families of tourists seeking the "authentic Chicago experience." And yesterday, I made the trek to Wicker Park, whose legions of hipsters made me feel as if I was back in Seattle. I told two separate Red Cross canvassers that I can barely afford rent this month (mostly a lie), and a pair of Greenpeace canvassers that I spoke no English, only Italian. I do love walking--it's probably my favorite solitary activity, especially once the temperature dips below 80 degrees, and in Chicago the neighborhoods are so close that it's easy to walk from one to the next.
So, that's that. Bring it, Chicago. And, if you've got the time, bring me a job, too, please. I'm ready to give you a chance.
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