Chicken curry with rice and family albums

It wasn't without slight trepidation that I assisted Lynnda and Tracy in making chicken curry and rice last Thursday; 2-3 pot meal  details are a bit harder to control than one pot soup.  But we did well: Lynnda brought an electric frying pan where she sautéed chicken, and then potatoes, onions and carrots, while Tracy, Jarvis and I cut up a mountain of vegetables.  We set one pot with brown rice to simmer, and another pot where the fat droppings from electric pan + about 10 cans of coconut milk went; to the second pot we added our fresh chopped veggies, then chicken and veggies sautéed earlier.  After the mixture simmered long enough Lynnda seasoned it with garlic/ginger sauce she prepared earlier, salt, copious amount of curry powder, garam masala and few other spices.  Tasting it told us both that a bit of 'something' would  bring the curry stew together - so we hunted the kitchen and added a big can of diced tomato, then 2 huge bunches of cilantro that Tracy just finished chopping and voila:  very tasty chicken curry.

When I was checking if the rice is done, Lynnda said:  'put a stick of butter in it'.  She and I have different approaches to Nickelsville's cooking: hers is to make gourmet comfort food - as homey and tasty as possible (it works! - people love her coking); mine has more of a healthy slant:  low fat, lots of veggies, hardly any diary; now our styles  collided.  But Lynnda is the chef on Thursdays so I obliged (well, cheated a bit, 3/4 stick of a butter for huge pot of rice), while musing that hopefully there is never a Nickelsville's vote to rate our cooking, because I have no doubt who would be voted out of the island.

Over Brooke's delicious cupcakes for dessert Karen and John shared small picture albums.  Karen's contains a picture of herself from 20 years back (she didn't change that much, except now she is not wearing makeup), glamour shot of her daughter, then home and backyard pics of her children and grandchildren - they all live on the other side of the country, so photos are all Karen has for now.  John's album was about his life in China: he and his wife, their home, holidays pics, street scenes; a life he hopefully can resume soon.

Joan Laage

Richard told me that Nickelsville voted to see a performance of Japanese dance butoh, kindly donated by Joan Laage,  a professional butoh dancer.  John said that after reading an article he thinks that an explanation of this rare form of dance would help in appreciation of the performance.  Now it's time to schedule it with Joan and perhaps prepare a small flyer.

Butoh is a dance expression that emerged out of post-WWII Japan. During a time of heavy Westernization and atomic disaster, many Japanese artists sought expression that moved towards more authentic self-identification. Tatsumi Hijikata developed Ankoku Butoh, which translates to "dance of the dark soul." Almost 50 years later Butoh has evolved and branched out all over the world and is in a constant state of change.

One and a half months before Nickelsville moves away from the fire station - where will they go is still up in the air.  Everyone is calmly talking about it, Jeremy mentioned that stuff they acquired will need to be packed and put in storage and generally there is a talk about downsizing, as Nickelsville likely will return to living in tents, without indoor kitchen or storage room, as they have now.

A few weeks ago 3 years old sponsorship of Nickelsville changed from Veterans for Peace to....  i have to dig that info up and put a link to the new organization.