The return of "Lumpy Fart" chili

Mark cooked this weekend, which cut my kitchen time a bit (no dessert) but also provided a meal I didn't have to make.  He only makes chili, and he had to make a huge pot of it for a potluck at the gardens.  I won't be going, because potlucks are a) disgusting; b) not usually vegan friendly; c) disgusting.  One less meal to cook is always a good thing from my perspective.  I made the following:

• chickpeas-pressure cooked, packaged, frozen
• potato chips
• chana masala (sort of--maybe closer to aloo chole): I've made this dish before, and it's delicious, but I had some potatoes I wanted to use up this week, so I made a double batch of it, using 3.5 c. chickpeas and 3.5 c. diced tomatoes. It turned out really well, and Luce loves potatoes so much that she's giddy whenever I add them to a dish. :)  I made way too much, so I sent some with Dej.
• shepherd's pie: Mark's favorite, but I fucked it up this time and am so unhappy with myself.  I used unsweetened (good) vanilla (very bad) coconut milk instead of the original. The mashed potatoes had a decidedly vanilla twist to them which I did not at all enjoy. My family didn't complain, so I'm not sure if they were being really polite or truly didn't notice.
• cashew gravy (for the shepherd's pie)

Mark's been gone almost every weekend again and many weeknights.  I'm feeling like a garden widow already this year, and it's not going to get better until somewhere around July or August. I think he's getting very tired/burned out already, because he was unusually crabby/rude last night. I'm still annoyed with him.

L has been a little challenging and hormonal this week, too. I need this week to start getting better really soon!

Last Weds., L & Dej went out to do some shopping and returned with a 30 gallon aquarium, filter, light, rocks, etc.  L set the tank up in her room on Weds. and conditioned the water.  M took L & her friend, Katie, out Sunday afternoon to get the fish--two goldfish.  They're quite cute. She has always wanted fish and is responsible enough to care for them herself.  She used her own xmas/birthday money to fund the endeavor.  I hope it goes well for her. I still retain many childhood scars from some of the nasty things our childhood goldfish did (you never get over going to bed with two fish in the tank and waking up with one bigger one), so I'm fairly trepidatious about this.  I don't like that when they get sick or diseased, the options are so limited for them.  It will be an adventure, I'm sure. 

Last Saturday morning I noticed a little sparrow fluffed up on the ground and became concerned when he didn't move with all the other sparrows when the dogs went running out by him.  Then Damon circled back to sniff him, and the little guy scrambled under a container and tried to hide. I walked over and picked him right up. He was very cold, so I held him to my chest for quite a while. I know he was in bad shape, because he was totally relaxed on my chest (not a good sign with a wild animal!) while I warmed him up.  I gave him some Pedialyte (more animals die in the winter due to dehydration than starvation) then put him in a cage with food, water, warm towels, etc.  He hung out for quite a while, looking pretty docile.  After a few hours, he started to move around, stand up straight and tall, and become frightened and try to hide when I approached the cage. There was nothing physically wrong with him, other than being weak and cold, and at this point he was doing great. I carried the cage back outside (it was fairly warm and sunny by this time), and he immediately got excited and started flying around the cage. I opened the door, and he flew perfectly over to the conifers in our back yard where he and his friends live (or at least hang out most of the time).  He stayed in that spot for 15-20 minutes, and then all of his friends came back, and I lost track of him. I've been carefully monitoring that feeding station to see if he weakens again in this cold, but no problems so far.

The heat lamps and warming pads in our garage are getting heavy use.  We had to replace one of the heat lamps this weekend.  We also picked up another heated bird bath. We have one in the front, but that's so heavily trafficked, we wanted to add one to the back yard.