15 April: Wednesday

Buenos Aires, Argentina: Another gorgeous day! The wind stopped - again in the early morning hours - and we enjoyed temperatures into the mid-80s. A perfect day.

I walked/jogged and DT left the resort to ride his bicycle into the countryside. I saw no pelicans, ducks, nor amphibious reptiles. I did, however, nearly crash right into the hissing goose. Didn’t see him/her at all, and she/did not see me - so we scared each other and hissed at each other. Dang. I wish those eggs would hatch.

As I wrote yesterday, we had something to today, something that required leaving the resort. I had not left in ten days; DT leaves on his bike several days a week. We went to look at a house for sale!

Before the lock-down, we had gone to open houses at a country club situation. We found a house with a perfect floor plan, but the decor was not to our liking, meaning a bit refurbishing would be needed - just cosmetics. But this country club has hundreds of houses and only 7 floor plans, so we only had to wait for one to pop-up for sale. Nothing was popping. In the meantime, I found another house in the same country club that would easily fit our needs, but it was well over our 3000 square-foot maximum. (We want about 2500 square feet. After talking to the agent that showed us the original house, she agreed to meet us today. She opened the house, opened all the doors, so we were hands-free inside the house as she waited in her car. We wore masks and I wore one glove. DT touched nada.

We liked the house, but it did seem cavernous - and we just sold a nearly 6000 square foot house. The clever agent suggested we go back and have another look at the perfect floor plan house that needed a bit of help with the decor, so we did. Again, we really liked the house, the way it is situated (very important how a house is placed to deal with the hot sun). We just couldn’t get our head around the very Spanish decor... with our very Asian furniture waiting in storage for us.

I sent the link to the Lovely Lisa. She is a decor Queen, comes by it naturally (not from my side of the family; not from Dave’s side of the family... so??) and she has studied at the UCLA interior design school. The girl has a good eye. Lisa feels Spain can be switched-out for The Philippines. Easy fix. Walang problema, Ina.

Lots to think about, and it was so wonderful to get outside the bubble!

It had been ten days since I had replenished our larder... and don’t forget DT had to go begging for vino last night, so I went to the grocer today. After looking at the two houses, I brought Dave home and went alone. It is safer if only one of us goes to the supermarket, and it just can’t be him because he would have to go down every aisle ten times with my list and call me ten times. Makes sense that the cook does the shopping (in our relationship).

I used to love grocery shopping. No longer. Everyone must wear a mask now in California. Masks are required anytime citizens are not home, or in their car. No one is allowed inside a shop without a mask.

No one is chatty in the grocer now. Everyone stays their 6-foot social distance. It’s like everyone is just trying to get out of there as quickly as possible. Good grief, woman, choose an apple already, and get on with it! The produce guy did not ask me what I was going to prepare with the fennel bulb. He used to.

The new normal?

Tonight was the final night of Passover (I know, it felt like three weeks this year), so I did it up a bit. The appetizer tonight included Tillamook (supermarket score!) and Manchego cheeses, olives, pickles and cashews. Repetitive, but nice, as we were both starving.

If it were up to me, all four portions of the plate would be filled with cheeses.

Dinner was easy, but did involve a few steps. I slivered one fennel bulb (kept a few fronds for garnish must garnish, and roasted the fennel with a bit of olive oil drizzle for 10 minutes at 400 degrees. Then two wild-caught Sockeye salmon fillets were put on top of the roasting fennel, and the oven was reduced to 350 for a few minutes. The salmon was then finished under the broiler just to brown-it-up. The fish was served with the roasted fennel on top, garnished with fennel fronds. Lemon juice over the salmon, of course.

Meanwhile, I was boiling leeks to make one of Dave’s favorites: Leeks Vinaigrette. There are so many recipes for this dish, but the best one I have found is here. Our salad tonight was tomato slices. Gourmet!

We have salmon leftover for lunch tomorrow.

Until my next update, which I hope will include a photo of a martini (it’s been 8 nights!), I remain, your masked correspondent.