Updated, with pictures

We were lucky enough to get to spend Saturday, which was one of the most beautiful days we've had in awhile, on a sailboat on the Chesapeake listening to live blues music and grazing on snacks and wine. The leaves are finally changing, the weather was warm but breezy, and while blues isn't exactly either of our favorite cup of tea, the performer was very good and there's something about being in the midst of live music that makes you enjoy something you might not otherwise choose. It was a great day. We were invited along by a colleague of Matt's, whom I very much enjoyed getting to know.

Sunday we couldn't go to yoga because I worked all day, which went fine. I came home and made potato soup--I'd been wanting to make it for awhile and couldn't find any recipes that did what I wanted, so, in the confidence born of a lot of experimenting in the kitchen lately, I just made one up. And I don't think I'm overstating anything here to say that it turned out GREAT. I would do it just the same way again. Here's what I did:

Potato Soup

2 T butter
2 T flour
1 onion, chopped
1-2 T dried rosemary
4-6 medium-sized potatoes, peeled and cut into chunks
2 stalks celery, chopped
4 cups water, or enough to cover potatoes in the pan
Splash of milk, cream, or half-and-half
Salt and pepper to taste

1. Lightly saute onion, celery, rosemary, and flour in the butter.
2. Add water. I used water but most recipes called for stock. We didn't have any so water worked fine, but it does necessitate adding probably a good tablespoon of salt at the end. I'm not giving firm amounts here because my reputation with such things is not good.
3. Bring to a boil; cover and simmer until potatoes are soft.
4. Using a ladle or big spoon, scoop out most large potato chunks and cooking liquid and coarsely puree in blender. Add milk or cream if using, just enough to lube things up.
5. Pour back into the pan and salt and pepper to taste.

The texture ended up something like mashed potatoes, which I liked, but you could always add more water or broth if you like it runnier.

And I even refrained from the temptation to add a bunch of cheese or cream or something and just let the mild, earthy flavor of potatoes and rosemary shine through on their own. We also had a heel of bread that Matt baked a week or so ago and so I chopped that up, tossed it with some oil and parmesan and baked them until crunchy--three cheers for croutons!

On the career-change front, not much has changed in the past couple of days but I'll share a thought I found interesting. I've been getting more into personal finance blogs lately and one called The Simple Dollar has been reviewing a book I'm meaning to read called Your Money or Your Life. Apparently therein is discussed the concept of “right livelihood,” which "is an ideal [which] basically means that you spend every moment of your life in accordance with your internal sense of values." Obviously that's rather, well, idealistic for daily life, but I will say that the idea of being a midwife--serving people on a practical but highly spiritual and meaningful level, every day--rings a whole lot closer to it than the idea of being a lawyer. One of the wonderful things about marriage, I think, is that you learn so much about yourself (along with each other) than you would if you were just existing in your own one-dimensional plane without the constant feedback of living in such close proximity with someone who knows you so well. And so when Matt tells me, "You know, I can envision you as a midwife a lot more easily than I can see you dressed up in a suit on Capitol Hill as a lawyer"--well, I'm inclined to listen to that.