Wednesday, February 16, 2011

Plans and planning

After something of a slump, crew change today also brought in some fresh orders. We're turning the barge into something of a submarine tonight with a massive cargo destined for one of the behemoths of the sea- a post-Panamax container ship running in the far east trade.

As always, after a lull, there's a lot of fresh energy on board- aside from dusting cobwebs off my forebrain, I also was in deep discussion with Inappropriately Hot Foreign Wife on a happy subject: travel.

If the filthy fatherless thieves in the Massachusetts Department of Revenue don't completely ruin me next month when I file my taxes, The Family B is going to plan a trip to Brazil this summer.
This will be my first opportunity to meet my mother-in-law and my wife's 60-something cousins. Although I've traveled a fair bit in my past life as a student and later as a scientist, this will be my first actual vacation outside the US. Every other visit was for a purpose or a paycheck... anyhow I'm pretty excited.
Although my wife doesn't know it yet, I am mixing some business with pleasure on this trip. Since we decided to plan to retire in Brazil, hopefully when I hit 60 or so, I've been thinking about buying a rental property in one of Brazil's swankier locales- something I can use for drinking money when I'm old and bald(er) and living in a pair of flip-flops and a speedo.

In that vein, with the contagious festive mood coming from over the phone earlier, I was inspired to make a simple Brazilian dish- Arroz e frango , chicken and Brazilian-style rice with vegetables and a little farinha (coarse manioc flour) mixed in for texture. This is one of the few of my wife's dishes that I can put together without shaming myself. I've got a new secret weapon in store, however-

Maria's cookbook (a fantastic reference for anyone interested in Brazilian cooking) is available HERE ...and I'd recommend any of the dishes within- I've managed to impress with some of my new repertoire of skillz, and the editor of the cookbook even went to far as to research and forward a recipe to me that wasn't even in the book- which I suspect will by my upcoming Magnum Opus of cooking attempts, but more on that later.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Often, I truly appreciate the imagery you put forth with your writing. That's one of the reasons as a non-mariner I read your blog. However, the imagery of you in a speedo and a pair of flip flops is going a bit far.

Maybe, as penance, you should post a few more pics of Brazilian women at Carnival.

Anonymous said...

And of the lovely and talented lady in the passenger seat of your truck.