Nutmeg's Big Day

Nutmeg had a big day, today! First, she had her first vet appointment since being spayed back in January or February of 1998.

Tom had noticed some clear discharge coming from one of her eyes, and it wasn't opening as wide as the other one. She seems to have a little infection, which we'll treat with an ointment. It should clear up in about a week.
Then I took her to work with me.

Tom had errands to run after the vet appointment, and I had to finish up a few tests before leaving work for the day (for the game this evening), so she sat on my desk for about 45 minutes while I finished them up.
She had quite an adventurous day!

Ravens vs Bengals

My, my, my - for a regular season opener, the Ravens didn't look much better this year than last. Unfortunately, we lost to the Cincinnati Bengals, 16-23. For one brief, shining moment in the second half, where we were finally in the lead, all was right with the world. Then, an interception was thrown, and the battle began anew. When there were only two minutes left in the game, we had the ball, and came close to scoring, but two sacks later, the game was over :-( Of course, the highlight of the game was halftime. The Ravens had erected a statue of Ray Lewis outside the stadium, and he gave a speech during halftime. The band put a well-executed "52" on the field (Ray's number).

Can you find me? I'm at the bottom of the two, in front of the drum majors (wearing capes).

Purple Friday

It's the first Purple Friday of the 2014 season!

We had a lot of the same stops that we normally do - Raven's corporate sponsors (Smyth jewelers, Verizon stores, M&T Bank locations, Giant supermarkets) - in addition to a new stop (Merritt Athletic Club), and some schools. My favorite stops are the schools. The first school was a complete surprise to the students. They were in a Safety Assembly when the band marched in, followed by the cheerleaders, and finally Poe and Rise and Conquer! I love their excitement! Here are some pics of the band:

Merritt Athletic Club

Giant supermarket

You can also see some news reports on WBFF Fox 45 (Ravens Fans Across Baltimore Celebrate 1st Purple Friday - WBFF Fox Baltimore - Top Stories), WJZ 13 (Ravens Fans Psyched For 1st Purple Friday Of The 2014 Season « CBS Baltimore) and WBAL (Purple Friday Sept. 5 caravan events schedule | Sports - WBAL Home). I noticed that I got plenty of air-time :-)

BLT - the New Way

After seeing the idea of weaving bacon and cooking it on Pinterest, I decided to give it a try. It worked fabulously! I took three slices of bacon, sliced them in half, and wove them together. Then, I cooked them.

Before

After

They fit on the sandwiches perfectly, and when eating our BLT's, there were no little pieces of bacon falling out of the sandwich. It was great!

The Mistress of Normandy

This book was much easier to read than the last one. I finished reading "The Mistress of Normandy," by Susan Wiggs, in a few days.

The hero was consistent in his love for the heroine, but the heroine made many mistakes that were quite annoying, trying to use his love to fight for her beliefs. Kind of annoying.

Assateague Adventure

This morning was a busy one. We got up extra early to walk down the Boardwalk to the Inlet to get some sunrise pictures with the pier in the picture. I think some of them turned out well.

Afterwards, we took the Assateague Adventure cruise. It started with a ride to West Ocean City's harbor, where we saw many fishing vessels and heard about Ocean City's history. Next, we went to Assateague Island, where we disembarked in order to look at the wildlife.

We saw wild hermit crabs and little schools of fish. It was great! Then we traveled up the Inlet and saw the wild ponies on the ocean side of the island.

Then, back on the beach, I finally finished reading "The Templar Salvation" by Raymond Khoury!

I acquired it last year ago, after one of my knee surgeries, and didn't start reading it until July 5 of this year. It had a good story line, but it wasn't an easy read.

Lima Beans

Jeff was on vacation last week, and his wife is a member of the co-op at Brad's Produce. He asked us to pick up their share of vegetables for the week, and one of Tom's decisions was lima beans. We fixed them tonight, loosely based on a recipe from Tricia Yearwood.

Lima Beans

Ingredients

• 2 quarts fresh lima beans, shucked
• 1/2 teaspoon, heaping, salt
• 4 tablespoons butter
• 1/4 teaspoon pepper

Directions

1. Fill a large pot with water, add lima beans and salt. Boil 30 minutes, or until lima beans are tender.
2. Drain lima beans, return to pot, add butter and pepper and stir.

Tom is a self-proclaimed lima bean expert (even though I have never seen him eat them in our twenty years of marriage), and he said they were the best lima beans he has ever eaten - but he wouldn't add more pepper. I, myself, am a lima bean virgin, and I thought they were good - with a little bit of added salt.