Category Food

GoodTimes

Angel Ackerman Leave a comment

I often walk over to Easton Hospital to do my regular bloodwork. Yesterday, I walked by the new GoodTimes coffee shop in the basement of the building at 20th and Fairview in Wilson Borough. I had noticed the work going on in the space over the summer before they opened and was very excited to see what actually opened in there.

Someone recommended them on a Facebook local group and I found their Instagram page. I learned they have an Aussie influence like my good friends at Pie + Tart and that they are open early mornings for the most part now. Which is great for me, because I am often out and about at 7 a.m. When Eva was young, this location was close to one of our favorite trees on 20th, across from the unused parking lot. I wonder what would have happened if this coffee shop existed when I was walking the neighborhood kids to (and from) elementary school twice a day.

This location is on what was our regular route, because I usually walked the kids down Ferry, to Ferry and 20th, where one of the neighborhood boys had a grandparent, up 20th to Lehigh, so that we would then walk past the hospital, and then the final block to the elementary school was up 21st. That way the kids, if they walked the route alone, could easily be found OR have a safe place to go in an emergency.

I have this fantasy now, of imagining myself carrying my own backpack and stopping at the coffee shop once I deposit the children at school. I could read a book, journal, or have my own quiet time…

But alas… the schoolchildren are all in their 20s now.

When I walked by this place yesterday, I saw a man standing outside with a reusable shopping bag at 6:57 a.m. I thought, “Wow! They have a line before they are even open.”

A woman came out, opened the door, and let him in.

Later that day, I was at the restaurant (wearing my super-awesome, blinking, floral crown because it was Glow-in-the-Dark night. It was around 8 p.m. I think. I was the person delivering food outside, which I normally don’t do. And honestly, I am still a little unnerved that I was put on this position for 5.5 hours with teenagers and young 20-somethings who lolly-gagged and made me do all the WALKING. I walked about 14,000 steps in less than four hours, OUTSIDE in TRAFFIC as someone with a mobility disability prone to falls. Why would you think it’s a good idea to send a fall risk unattended into a busy parking lot? For hours?)

A man in a black truck accepted his food from me and asked, “Hey! Did I see you this morning at my coffee shop?”

So we had a brief but pleasant conversation and now I’m supposed to stop in for a free coffee. I offered to bring him a free book.

This Pizza May End Decision Fatigue

Angel Ackerman 1 Comment

This blog and website started life as my journalism portfolio, and if you look to the side menu, that stuff is still there. It morphed into some place to chronicle my travel writings, my adventures, and my restaurant “reviews,” and then headed down the road of my disability experiences. I guess, in essence, this blog can serve anything.

One of the best perks of social media is exposure to restaurants and attractions you’ve never heard of– with many of them in your own backyard.

Instagram decided I needed to know about Spice Crust Pizzeria, located at 2910 Easton Avenue in Bethlehem, Pa. It’s a pizzeria– and it does indeed serve standard pizza, but it’s specialty is traditional Indian flavors served on pizza. Now, Eva and I love two things: pizza and well-done Indian cuisine. Other members of our household are less adventurous so we left them home. Now that we know they serve boring pizza, too, we can bring them next time.

If you know Easton Avenue, it’s in the plaza behind the Dairy Queen– the one Eva and I call “creepy plaza,” because the area is a little run down and at night can look extra dilapidated.

In the midst of my recent health journey, and refining my eating patterns, I don’t eat out much. And working part-time in a fast food restaurant, I do typically make good choices like kale salads and yogurt and fruit cups but when I’m stressed I eat the ginormous fried chicken sandwich and gain two pounds the next morning.

So if I’m going to make a choice to eat out, I want it to be special and “worth it.” And I want options that aren’t fancy sit-down ordeals, but conducive to a relaxing evening of doing nothing. For many of us, pizza is a go-to. And Dominos, with its inexpensive delivery and special deals can be cheap and satisfying, but so bad for your body. Chinese and Indian are other great go-tos, and at least offer more opportunities for vegetables, but Eva and I see those menus and order enough food for a family of ten.

This is a great compromise– the ease of pizza, the lazy shove it in your face experience, but the culinary adventure of spices outside your everyday repertoire. (And I made an Indian-spiced lentil stew on Sunday that I have eaten for the last three days, but this was still better, and more delightful, and welcome.)

In the gallery below, you will see two medium pizzas. The one on the left, where you can see a pizza box, is the veggie paneer pizza. The one on the right is the chicken curry halal pizza. They are very beautiful, colorful pizzas full of texture.

We arrived and we ordered the halal chicken curry pizza. Eva grabbed a couple of their in-house-bottled mango lassis and I picked a lychee drink, which was very floral yet not heavy. It offered a great reprieve from the spiciness of the pizza.

We later learned that they make their own yogurt for the lassi, and Eva brought home three more for her breakfast. The lassi has the perfect blend of sweet from the mango, and tang from the yogurt, but had a delicateness to it that I would attribute to their homemade yogurt. Eva has already texted her father about stopping on his way home from visiting his mother to get her more.

We also ordered the fried broccoli cheese bites. Yeah, I probably shouldn’t have. I didn’t need more food and I certainly didn’t need fried food. If I hadn’t ordered those, the scale might have been kinder to me today.

But it is nice to do something out of the ordinary.

The pizza arrived and it was really amazing. They didn’t skimp on toppings. Every mouthful was full of flavor and exploding on the tongue.

That’s why we ordered the second pizza to take home. It’s waiting for us in the fridge.

Their web site reads: “Diverse Tastes, Unforgettable Flavors, Offering a Unique Dining Experience That Blends the Rich Flavors of Indian and Italian Cuisine.” Visit their web site here.

The Brussel Sprout Challenge

Angel Ackerman 1 Comment

This summer, since May specifically, I have been doing well with writing in my journal everyday (which is especially nice as Lauren Wenson and I are facilitating a journal writing workshop at the Easton Book Festival in October.

I hope that now that my journaling consistency has been restored that I can apply some of that same discipline to this space. we’ll see how that goes.

On Friday night, my daughter yells from the kitchen:
“Hey, Mom, you could totally eat 14 side orders of Brussel sprouts at Red Lobster, couldn’t you?”

I thought about it, and if a side of Brussel sprouts in like six to eight Brussels… I did some quick math. “14, no. But I could totally eat ten.”

“No way,” her boyfriend replies. “If you ate that many Brussel sprouts I would pay you $100. And I’d pay for the Brussel sprouts.”

“When are we going to Red Lobster?” I ask.

The answer was today. I did the research. One order of a premium side of Brussel sprouts is 380 calories. They are roasted, with soy ginger sauce and crispy onions. That’s a lot heavier than I was thinking. But a bet’s a bet.

I didn’t really have time to prepare. We left home Sunday morning around 11:45 a.m. when I started to get hungry. I had had a cup of coffee at 7 a.m. but nothing else. When we arrived at 12:15, we were the only people in Red Lobster, besides the one guy day drinking.

We do a brief explanation to the waiter. He promises to bring them with no crispy onion topping.

“You better eat, girl,” he tells me.

Game on. He returns with my first five orders, reporting that the chef wanted to put them all on one plate but he said they had to be on separate dishes.

I get a glass of water and only have a sip. First three bowls disappear in about fifteen minutes. Next two slow down, and I’m not enjoying the large, wet ones. I like the ones that look overcooked. The dry roasted leaves are easy to consume and taste better, especially as the big sprouts get cold.

I get up to use the bathroom. I’m definitely satiated, but I’m not disgustingly full. I order two more sides of Brussel sprouts.

When I get have way through the next platter, I realize how nonstandard some of the portions have been. And I’m getting really bored of chewing, and the flavors are getting monotonous. I don’t want to eat Brussel sprouts any more.

Eva is disappointed. “Oh, come on. You can’t stop because you’re bored. You’re not even full!”

“Do you know how hard it is to eat cold Brussel sprouts when you’re over them?”

She gets a brownie sundae and can’t finish it. So, after five-and-a-half plates of Brussel sprouts, I finish her brownie sundae, drink the rest of my water, and finally enjoy a Red Lobster cheddar biscuit.

A woman holding a sundae glass enjoying a brownie sundae with five empty plates piled in front of her and some portions of brussel sprouts
Me, eating Eva’s sundae

Eva’s boyfriend put $60 on the table. my prorated winnings.

“That might be the dumbest thing I ever spent $300 on,” he said.

We all found that hard to believe.

Seasonal summary and hoping for new beginnings

Angel Ackerman Leave a comment

My daughter is in the garage doing yoga right now– an old set of yoga DVDs I found on a discount pile somewhere 20 years ago. I used to used those DVDs once or twice a day, each routine a mere 20 minutes, and its impact huge on my body. I should be out there with her right now, but although it is 8:30 in the morning on a Sunday, I am already knee-deep in work. So maybe after my 9 a.m. meeting I will give it a go on my own.

I’ve had some successes in life lately, but health and fitness is not one of them. I’ve been struggling with my mobility since before my trip to Ireland in March. Some of that is due to lack of movement in my routine. Some is due to lack of chiropractic care and not enough stretching. Some is weight.

But now I’m experiencing more and more symptoms of anemia. What started as mistyping words– not misspelling but using completely different words: “basket” coming out of my fingers instead of “basic” and “winter” instead of “window”– has nos (and I just typed “not” instead of “now”) escalated to incidents of brain fog (driving past the bank instead of to the bank) and drinking too many caffeinated beverages without feeling their impact and literally not being able to keep my eyes open at 2 or 3 p.m. despite having healthy sleep hygiene and getting to bed on time. And all of these symptoms get worse with the heat and the sun. Which is also classic anemia.

I scheduled my annual blood work for tomorrow morning at 6:45 a.m. It’s not due until September so the insurance company will probably love that. I also left a message for my chiropractor, Nicole Jensen at Back in Line, because even though it puts a strain on my finances, I need the care.

My right leg is definitely leaning into its femoral anteversion, and the best way I can describe it is like I have a tree trunk instead of a leg that I’m dragging around. And then once it’s a little straighter and not locked into a weird position, any yoga I do will help keep things limber.

I started taking my vitamins last week: vitamin D/calcium with breakfast, iron with lunch, and vitamin C with dinner if I remember).

I’ve also cleaned up my diet and I think I can say that except for breakfast with Laurel at Panera on Tuesday, all food has been prepared at home. I have tried to make sure I get more fresh fruits and vegetables and include a protein with every meal. With this routine, I have lost five pounds this week. And I know that is all the sodium/water weight leaving my system. But if I with another 7 pounds off this summer, I could be at the weight I was last fall when I saw my primary care physician last fall.

Both Eva and I have struggled with motivation to eat so far this spring/summer season… We’ve both been busy, stressed and exhausted. Eva’s taking an online American Sign Language class through Purdue University and her midterm is tomorrow. It’s really cool to watch her learn. And to help her study.

We’ve both taken to finding items that are easier to eat. Often these are easy-to-grab meat products and snacks for her, and meal-prepped items like overnight oats for me. Last night we both needed something for dinner so I made tuna fish sandwiches which also helped us use some of the aging iceberg lettuce in the fridge. I’ve been adding kale to everything I can, especially pasta and eggs. My other coup was a make-your-own quesadilla bar– I had flour tortillas, corn tortillas and refried beans from the dollar store, all items I keep on hand (in addition to beans I cooked from dry and froze, in seven different varieties); we had lettuce, tomato, and onion left over from burger night; and on a whim, I had just purchased sour cream and a huge block of cheddar. We even had fresh limes to give everything a citrus kick.

Speaking of food, I’ve been tracking my food in the Omada app again. I still believe the Omada program is a waste. If you have issues with food and weight and health and don’t have a previous understanding of nutrition I can’t see it helping. It only helps me because it reminds me what I’ve eaten, how I’m trending and gives me some basic nutritional summaries. But the fact that my insurance company gets charged $30/month just because I stepped on a scale is nuts. My coach is really good, but for the most part she can’t tell me anything I don’t already know.

So much of health is making the hard and responsible choices.

And doing what you need to do.

It’s also the only app/system that gets worse over time. Their AI-driven logging system can’t identify basic foods, and when you try to edit the listings with information from the actual label, it just ignores you. Omada does not believe in tracking calories. It encourages instead you make better, educated decisions based on your hunger and how you feel. I understand that calorie-counting can lead to some psychological issues, but in the end, weight loss is math. They do track fiber, added sugar, protein and saturated fat. But not sodium. If you have a chronic weight or heart problem, you need to understand sodium.

And they encourage you to aim for 50% nutritous. I average 50% on any given day. Today I’m at 57% so far, but I’m due for lunch. That may change. Now, if you know me, you know– I try to make my meal choices as close to vegan and minimally processed as possible. I had gestational diabetes when I was pregnant with Eva, and trying to eat 2800 calories in six meals a day with no sugar on a vegetarian diet got me very bored. Thank God I decided to incorporate tuna into my routine. I can still remember some of those routines. My ten-thirty a.m. snack was large curd cottage cheese and usually strawberries or raspberries and my 8 p.m. snack was decaf coffee and unsweetened soy milk. (I had to do something to make the “milk” drinkable.) I still can’t look at a plate of food without seeing its protein and carbohydrate estimates in my head.

screenshot of the Omada app showing the list of protein, fiber, fat and sugar stats

Most people don’t have my experiences. And I know myself. For instance, if I eat a meal out, even if I make the good choices, I will gain 3 pounds the next day.

Most people don’t stay invested in their choices like I do– so if I only eat 50% nutritious, how does a standard American diet rank? I wouldn’t want to know.

So far today, I have had:

  • about 16 ounces iced coffee with a healthy pour of half and half. (That comes in at 50% because the coffee is considered a healthy drink, even if I drink it at every meal. The half and half on the other hand is not nutritious, because of its saturated fat content, but it has calcium, vitamin D and protein and isn’t sweetened or processed like other creamers.)
  • For breakfast, a little more than half an apple with skin on, with cinnamon sugar and mixed nuts. Water, 30 ounces, and one scoop of my Powdervitamin electrolyte powder which has no calories, is the most dense with minerals and salt, and sweetened with stevia. But because of the sugar on my apples and the powder, that again ranks my meal as only 50% nutritious. I could have used a processed caramel fruit dip or an icing and Omada would have ranked my choice as just as it did when I added just a touch of sugar. And the electrolyte powder gets treated like a sugary Gatorade even though I need that supplement to prevent orthostatic hypotension because I don’t eat many sodium-rich foods and I drink so much water. How many other people drink 50+ ounces of fluid before 9 a.m.????

My plan remains simple… More movement, more yoga, eating at home, and not eating due to stress. And in a few months or maybe a year I will write a blog post like this. Again. Which I do so frequently. As I struggle and fail and disappoint myself. But permanent change is a long game and it’s hard when the only person who holds the power and the motivation is yourself.

Cliffs of Moher and Galway with Wild Rover

Angel Ackerman 1 Comment

Today started early.

I was up at 5 a.m. to do some writing before leaving for Cliffs of Moher and Galway on Wild Rover Tours. It’s clear across the country, as Dublin is on the east coast and rather central and this day trip would take us straight across the the west coast and the Atlantic Ocean.

We met the bus at 6:55.

We left the hotel at 6:30.

I experienced some unusual motion sickness. So M took that as an occasion to drug me on the way home.

We stopped at a service plaza where I purchased overnight oats that turned out to be the best oatmeal I ever had.

The Cliffs were gorgeous but they had a lot of wind. The wind tossed people around.

Ireland has stone walls that serve as property lines and date back 5,000 years. I knew that, in a way, but I did not suspect how many there are. They are everywhere. The Burren, as Stephen the tour guide said, had some of the most welcoming, beautiful scenery anywhere in the world. As M said, “I don’t usually get off on a field of grass but…”

I don’t have many photos because I needed to save my phone’s battery life as we were away all day. The bus had USB charging ports but I have a USB-C cord. Perhaps if M reads this he will send some of his photos.

But I do have a video of some unusual, but also ordinary, traffic. Keep in mind, they drive on the left in Ireland so that narrow passageway in the video is indeed the other lane. “This is what we call gridlock traffic” Click here.

The craziest part of the day was when we reached Claddagh Jewellers on Shop Street in Galway, I felt something family about the branding of the shop. I studied the window displays and I found the wedding rings Darrell Parry and I ordered from the Irish store, Donegal Square, in downtown Bethlehem. We spent hundreds of dollars on them and waited for months for them to arrive from Ireland.

And we got compliments on them all the time. In the last photo in the series, the gold ring directly in the center of the bottom row is the men’s version.

Takeaway and the World Cup Qualifier

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I wish I could tell you I went to bed early last night, but at 7 p.m. I got my second or third wind. M suggested Indian takeaway, because we felt it would be a great experience to get takeaway, because Americans do take-out and our takeaways are lessons not dinner.

And Spice & Rice had fal— an extremely spicy item.

He did not order fal. He ordered spicy chicken vindaloo and I ordered lamb korma, which shocked him because I don’t normally do mild dishes. I got the meal for one deal for 20.95 euros, which included a drink, a starter, a pilau rice, a naan (I got mango peshwaari)and poppadom. So much food. I don’t know how they consider that meal for one. That is easily meal for two.

We wandered down to the restaurant around 7:30 p.m. and it was dead, enough so that M was nervous that maybe the food would be bad. While the food cooked, we meandered to the end of the block to Peader Brown‘s, a traditional Irish pub that has a history of Irish Republicanism. They had several televisions visible from the tented outdoor area as they were at capacity because of the World Cup Qualifying match between the Czech Republic and Ireland.

The moon was bright and the game was amazing, each time we went to return for our takeaway, the Irish team scored. We wondered if maybe we were a good luck charm.

We read the pro-Palestine posters, and M even noticed a Palestinian flag across the street. That’s not surprising as the Irish are acutely aware of the politics of ownership by occupation.

We also started calling the Czech team and each other feckin eejits as I had stopped at a curiosities shop earlier in the day where they had some interesting mugs and dirty feckin eejit soap. (“Weird is wonderful,” the window said.”

This also led to M and I conversing about why Ireland has such a “cussing culture” and my hypothesis went to the idea that the Irish have a long history as a working class culture, people who have survived on an island for a very long time (in Dublin’s case 900 years).

Speaking of oddities, I saw a sign in the window of the barber:

“Spectacles and Wooden Legs always Wanted.”

We brought the takeaway back to our room where we stuffed ourselves with a delicious feast that we could not finish. So we piled it into the fridge, but we have no microwave so we may need to reheat it with some creativity with hot water from the electric kettle.

And then we turned on the game.

Now we were exhausted and stuffing our faces with Indian food, but the Irish team was giving it their everything. And we couldn’t stop watching.

The game remained 2-2 and went into double overtime, and an Irish player and a Czech player collided so hard the Irish player left on a backboard. (I have to Google that and see if he’s okay.) Those boys were tired, sweaty, covered with grass stains and still playing an intense game.

And then it went to penalty kicks. M tapped out. He can’t handle penalty kicks. But I had to know who won. The Czech team missed the third kick. The Irish team missed the fourth. Then the Irish team missed the fifth and the Czechs did not. The Czechs won the game on the fifth penalty kick.

From the news:

New York Times

Irish Mirror

I should have grabbed a Guinness. (I’m glad I didn’t because I needed a good night’s sleep! We even have pint glasses in the room.)

Day 2 of my Spring Break: The National Zoo with my daughter

Angel Ackerman 2 Comments

Last night didn’t go exactly as planned… there was a horde of children ages 5 to 8 and even kids in arm floaties in the hotel pool loudly playing Marco Polo at 8:30 p.m.

So Eva and I got our massive can of bar nuts out of the car and watched Treehouse Masters on HBO Max. Apparently, that’s one of her favorite shows from middle school that she used to watch when she slept over at her grandmother’s house.

Departing DoubleTree

We got up this morning and headed to breakfast– which made Eva very excited as they had a nice selection of bread and smoked salmon. I found it rather mediocre, but perfectly serviceable. It was not included with the room, but I paid for the add-on, so it was $25 for the two of us.

The server was delightful, and when I asked him about my breakfast with the room, he asked for my coupons, which they did not give me when I checked in. We went to the front desk and got them. He was very attentive and tried to find Eva dill pickles when she requested them, and he must have thought he succeeded because he brought her a very substantial pile of more bread and butter pickles.

Now, if I had to leave a review for this particular Doubletree, I would give it a three out of five stars. Do not compare this rating to any guidebook or official system. It was a decent hotel. It also smelled amazingly clean. But there are a few things that disappointed me:

  • They charged me twice for parking. I guess I’m going to have to sort that out.
  • They forgot my breakfast coupons.
  • They did not have towels in the pool area, despite stating we did not need to bring ours from the room.
  • The rooms seemed small.
  • My past experiences with Doubletree felt more full-service. More amenities, more things to do, better dining and room service, which this hotel did not have.
  • They had specials at the bar advertised that had ended three days prior.
  • The refrigerator didn’t seem very cold.
  • In general, I don’t like the coffee at Hilton. Especially the coffee left in the room.

We did not stick around so Eva could take her swim, and digital checkout (and parking right next to our room) made leaving a breeze.

“Hurry up!” Eva told me. “We have relaxing to do.”

I do lament we could not try the taco truck across the street as it had very good reviews on Google maps.

We checked the oil in the car, and at 9:15 a.m. we headed to CVS. We purchased an eclectic variety of items, not because we needed them on this trip but because we were curious what selection they might have. And they had soooooo many hair products for my curls and I had coupons…

We left CVS at 9:36 and arrived at M’s house at 10:15. By 11, we were in the car because Eva wanted to visit the National Zoo.

Smithsonian National Zoo

The Zoo parking was full, so we set the GPS for M’s old apartment and decided to try our luck at the back entrance to the Zoo. Eva found a spot on street that we thought was nearby. It ended up being almost a mile, and an uphill walk. But we certainly got our steps in!

But we did get to see this beautiful mural of Marilyn Monroe. We passed a Nando’s.

The Zoo was crowded. It was also everything Eva remembered. She spent most of her time commenting about the habitats and how well the zoo provides enrichment for the animals.

The exertion made my walk a tad unstable and I experienced some exercise-induced asthma and some high heart rates. Probably got some sunnburn too.

And then Eva got the idea maybe we could leave from the back of the zoo and not have to walk back up the hill.

We could not.

We were also pleasently shocked to see how many alcoholic beverages were available at the zoo– and how many moms with open cocktails were chasing toddlers.

We left the zoo at 2:45 to return to M’s house. We stopped at Manhattan Market for beverages. And I showed M my DK travel guide to Ireland from 20 years ago and my Irish/English dictionary.

Day 1 of my Spring Break: Harrisburg, Pa., and Gaithersburg, Md.

Angel Ackerman 2 Comments

Eva and I are traveling to Washington, D.C., so that I may grab a flight to Dublin with my traveling companion M on Wednesday.

M. and I have not traveled in about a decade, and this is probably the first time we are traveling someplace where they are not shooting each other.

But that’s another story.

Eva is on spring break and for some strange, serendipitous reason, she has no pet clients this weekend. She’s exhausted after finishing her home renovation project on our hallway.

I could have taken Amtrak from Philly to D.C., as a matter of fact that is how I am getting home. But Eva wanted to visit D.C., and thought it might be nice to visit the National Zoo. She had hoped she could introduce her boyfriend to our friends in D.C. but he is traveling to a welding competition.

Now, Eva didn’t want to make the 3.5 hour one-way trip to D.C. and then turned around a few hours later and drive home alone.

But we learned none of our friends would be home Saturday until late.

So we booked a room at the Doubletree in Gaithersburg, MD, basically because they had a breakfast, an indoor/outdoor pool and who doesn’t love the warm cookies?

And Eva never had the warm cookie experience.

So at 9:30 we checked the old in the car– she’s an old girl and has been acting a tad funny lately about her oil. It disappears and then reappears. Maybe she has some build-up. We know she’s burning some… but to be safe, we check her often. And today we checked her cool in the flat garage

She looked good. But we have oil with us just in case.

We headed to Sheetz, and by then I already needed to pee. Eva put gas in the car. I hoped to find the cookies and cream puff things but every since I decided to try them, they never have that flavor.

Next, we went to Grocery Outlet. I need my famous $7 pen set. This cheap set of gel pens comes in a plastic case and I love them. Each set lasts about 6 months before my favorite colors start running out.

Meanwhile, Eva was in charge of road trip snacks. She selected:

  • 2 C4 energy drinks in zero sugar, very fruity flavors. I find these are easier to stomach than coffee or soda when temperature can not be maintained. Plus we both like them so we can share, and save space in the cupholders.
  • A present for someone’s birthday that has nothing to do with this trip
  • sunglasses
  • A massive can of bar mix nuts
  • A fairly big box of those nutty buddy style wafer bars that Little Debbie makes but instead they were made by Nature Valley and trying to be fancy. 20 of them.
  • A bag of beef jerky– some plain, some ranch, some buffalo, all mixed in one bag

We were on the road by 10.

Around 11, we got a phone call– the dog had bit the neighbor and the neighbor went to the ER. Now, it was a minor bite, but it broke skin, and the neighbor wanted to make sure he didn’t need shots/antibiotics. But that’s another story. But it sure did put a stressful spin on the next couple hours.

At 11:30, we arrived at Midtown Scholar Books, once voted bookstore of the year by Publisher Weekly. See my review here on the Parisian Phoenix blog. (It was $4.35 to park for 90 minutes in downtown Harrisburg.)

Eva had a doctor appointment via Zoom at noon so she took that in the car and then we visited Broad Street Market. Apparently, oldest market in America in continuous operation. We weren’t hungry– all those road trip snacks but they had all kinds of ethnic food from Chinese (I think) to Korean, Jamaican to African.

1 p.m. We crossed the state line into Maryland while on the phone with Larry Sceurman.

At 2:10 we arrived at Doubletree Washington DC North in Gaithersburg MD (about 40 minutes from M’s house). We got our cookies and our parking pass. We didn’t really need our keys because I used Hilton’s digital check-in, chose my room and they had emailed me that it was ready and activated my digital key which I can use from my phone.

I picked a room on the end of the lower level, away from any noise but fairly close to the indoor/outdoor pool.

And there’s a frozen yogurt vending machine in the lobby.

Panera and CVS are within a third of a mile and there’s a food truck in the shady looking parking lot across the street that has good reviews on Google Maps. I wonder what time they open in the morning… They don’t… the internet says they are closed Sundays. I might have to head out there tonight…

Eva and I went to Habit Burger and Grill because it was three-in-the-afternoon and we were hungry but not insanely hungry and while it is a chain, it’s not one we knew. I saw it had a free self-serve pepper bar with jalapenos, banana peppers and pepperocini. So we had to investigate.

I had a nice fish sandwich and limeade.

We came back to the hotel and I did some stuff for the business while Eva did some schoolwork. We plan to go swimming tonight.

Great date

Angel Ackerman Leave a comment

Because I review so many books on Amazon, and use reviews as a way to maintain my own memory of things I ordered online, Amazon invited me to be a product reviewer several years ago.

I do my best to take my work seriously, and today I wrote a review I enjoyed reading.

(If you are here looking for more information on the writer’s conference that concluded yesterday, that’s what I’ve been trying to write when I got hungry and sidetracked by adjwa dates.)

Hard to believe that a small fruit can travel halfway around the world into my mouth… I love dates, and a good medjool date is my favorite. Or so I thought. So as someone who occasionally suffers from anemia, I love incorporating dates into my diet for the iron. As someone who loves sugary candy, dates are the perfect food to compensate for those sweet cravings. I had never had an ajwa date.
At first, the small size intimidated me. The pit-to-date ratio was more pit than fruit, but once I tried the date, the sweetness and texture surprised me in the best way. They were chewy and firm enough to have a great mouth feel, and also properly giving and moist. Each one turned out to be the perfect bite-sized treat.
The package is gorgeous and provides information about the type of date itself, the nutritional information and the company information.
These are highly specialty dates cultivated in a certain region of Saudi Arabia (Medina), so it’s more like buying a specialty imported cheese or wine than a simple fruit. In that way, the price seems reasonable. (Think of it like “champagne” technically only refers to sparkling wine from the Champagne region of France or the cheese from the caves of Roquefort.)

We now have a deep freezer

Angel Ackerman 1 Comment

We recently got an old, hand-me-down deep freezer.

And at the same time, the federal government shutdown and Pennsylvania state budget impasse have complicated SNAP benefits for families who have them.

I heard on the news that 1-in-8 Americans have SNAP (Supplemental Nutrition or “food stamps”). I heard one story this morning about an unemployed widow with a 15-year-old son whose soundbite suggested she sent him to school so he could eat breakfast and lunch.

I hope she’s sending him to school for an education, first and foremost.

I consider myself a fiscally-conservative Democrat who believes that education and healthcare should be attainable and fair. I would love to have a Ph.D., but I can’t afford to finish my masters and I refuse to go into debt for it. I also have a disability, and even when I am well-employed I often have to make choices about my medical care.

Right now, I have my own small business. I work a part-time job in the food service industry to provide some reliable income on a steady timeline. I am an adjunct instructor at my local community college, and if you break it down to an hourly rate, I probably make a similar wage at my fast food job (because of the fact that I did not have the money to finish my degrees). And I have freelance writing and editing jobs and a mini author’s assistant job.

And I’m always on the look out for more. Applied for another this morning.

I started my career in public relations, and ended up in print journalism, which led to a long career of lay-offs as newspapers died. I worked in non-profit communications and development, where I learned a massive amount of useful skills like grant writing but also experienced a ridiculous amount of toxic managerial behavior. Some people work in the non-profit sector because they want to make the world a better place, but at the same time, many of those people have either childhood trauma and/or personal insecurities that create some challenging environments in an already difficult field.

I mention all of this because I have experience with unemployment. I have experience with being the single mom with maybe enough resources to survive a month. I was a single mom raising a teenager who lost her job during the pandemic and did not find out if she qualified for unemployment until the weekend after she accepted a new job. I was unemployed for four months and had opened my home to one of my daughter’s friends who didn’t feel safe in her own home.

I applied for public assistance because I was volunteering at a non-profit that provides services for people exiting human trafficking situations and my “boss” suggested it. Because I had no income and I had an official dependent, I received more than $700/month in food stamps. And Medicaid. Which was a great help. Even though I only received food stamps for four months, I rationed them so they lasted almost a year.

I had accepted a job in the warehouse at Stitch Fix. I loved that job, and the company, but after three years they decided to close our warehouse. After three years at a wage where my take-home pay was the same as what I had made as the development manager for a small non-profit with a two-million-dollar annual budget (thanks to the fact that Stitch Fix offered their employees free medical benefits), I found myself laid off again.

And when my unemployment ran out, I once again applied for food stamps. I had gone on multiple interviews, built up my small business, but still struggled with the cost of my medical care– my estranged husband put me on his benefits but my medicine was $50-$100 a month and all my doctor’s appointments I had to pay out of pocket because of the high deductible. So I really hoped I would qualify for Medicaid again. And I did.

I also qualified for $525 in food stamps.

Around this same time, Trump got re-elected and the cheap refrigerator I bought started freezing the food in the refrigerator and not freezing the food in the freezer. But I couldn’t afford a new fridge– and I still can’t– so we started buying only what we could eat in a few days, or foods that could safely thaw and refreeze.

Lettuce is not one of them, if you were curious.

The point of all this is to ask: Regardless of how you feel about who uses food stamps or how the government distributes them or whether or not people try hard enough or work hard enough, why is no one asking why we have a system where 1-in-eight Americans qualifies for food stamps?

I have seen and heard so many things about the system, and I have known people who work in the branches of government that distribute these types of assistance and they are all people who want to help. I have met people afraid to work because they might lose assistance, and I have seen people who need the help lose it because they made too much money. (And, like me, it’s usually people who need medical care.)

I have about $2,300 left on my deductible this year, and I have spent almost an equal amount if you read my EOBs from the insurance company. I’m losing my hearing in one ear and I need a hearing test and a visit with the audiologist. The muscles in my one leg have been spasming 24-hours-a-day for almost a year now and I just blamed it on my cerebral palsy but my neurologist has concerns that previously noted damage to my spine (from all these years of walking crooked) may have caused nerve damage in my lower back. And my one finger has been doing crazy things for about a year.

That’s probably at least $6,000 worth of tests. Do I just try to schedule it all before the end of the year and finance the $2,000+ remaining of the deductible on a credit card? Or Able Pay? or do I wait until I am better off financially?

Back to the deep freezer. A friend of the family was hoping to get a decade-plus year old freezer out of his house. We took it. We took all the stuff from our cheap refrigerator that needed better freezer conditions and piled it in. And I thought– when Trump was elected an I was worried about the future of food stamps, I didn’t have a freezer to fill. I did however invest in every non-perishable food item I could tolerate.

Dried Beans. Plain-old Rice. Canned Fruit. Canned Vegs. Nutritional Yeast. Some condiments. Canned Tuna. Spam. Canned Chicken.

My childhood traumas leave me to ruminate frequently about food scarcity, financial security and general stability. I will probably always behave as if every trip to the grocery store is the last one I can afford. And I have done my grocery shopping at the Dollar Tree and the Grocery Outlet because I only had $20 left to feed us for the week.

The Office of Vocational Rehab considers me the most severely tier of worker, whereas the federal government says I do not qualify for disability because I work so much and at so many jobs. But the federal government doesn’t take into consideration that I have to work that hard to make ends meet. And I don’t always succeed and I often hurt myself doing it. And I just work past it.

But how do you determine an equitable way to decide who deserves help? And I ask a third time: Why does 1-in-eight Americans receive food stamps? What is wrong with our society if 1-in-eight people cannot afford to feed themselves according to the criteria the government sets forth?

Food for thought.