Bread! The only difficult part is thinking ahead. But, in the world of bread, a six hour gap between pulling the three ingredients out of the pantry and enjoying crusty, chewy homemade bread is well worth it. If you have yeast, bread flour and a large covered pot, I recommend you start right now. Recipe from
the NY Times website.
And then I used the bread to make a delicious roasted vegetable sandwich. Take the following ingredients, thinly sliced: eggplant, zucchini, little tomatoes, green pepper, red onion, with a little cooking spray, salt, pepper and garlic powder.
Apply high heat (450) for 15 minutes or so.
And layer with a little cheese and pesto on above lovely bread.
The asparagus is just for fun. I love asparagus.
In other news, I went to a different chiropractor, and he told me cartilage tears do not heal. Looked it up online. Talked to my dad, one who's experienced many sports injuries. He agrees. Cartilage doesn't heal.
So, the five months I've been waiting, icing, stretching, electro-treating, ultrasounding, running side-wise and backwards, and otherwise treating my knee has done nothing but manage pain. That's insane. I could have taken an aspirin if that's all that I wanted. So, in all probability I'll have arthroscopic surgery on my knee.
AND I hope soon. I would really hate to be on crutches while trying to teach school. And I just got a call saying that my classes are going to be HUGE. 45/46...teenagers...in one classroom. The brilliant solution is to give me the same huge amount of students, but without a conference period to keep up with the work that all those students will make for me. As long as they don't expect me to teach or the students to learn, it'll be fine. %)
It only looks and tastes like savory, crisp and chewy focaccia with all the olive-oil goodness you could dream of. 
I have no idea how you really make it, but I just used my standard "Speedy No-Knead" recipe, spread it in a pan with some olive oil, rosemary, salt and pepper (slightly more complete directions here)...and well, six hours later...that's all she wrote.
And then I used the bread to make a delicious roasted vegetable sandwich. Take the following ingredients, thinly sliced: eggplant, zucchini, little tomatoes, green pepper, red onion, with a little cooking spray, salt, pepper and garlic powder.
Apply high heat (450) for 15 minutes or so. 
And layer with a little cheese and pesto on above lovely bread.
The asparagus is just for fun. I love asparagus.
The reason why the water is hot (140 degrees!) is because the porous rock of the region, sandstone, draws up the hot water from under the earth before it can cool as it would at other springs. 
And it was hot. I got the whole bath treatment at this old-timey bathhouse. First, the whirlpool bath, with super-hot water dripping in onto a board where your feet are, then a sitz bath (or the bootie-bath), then the steam cabinet (holy cow that was hot...I felt like a dumpling!), then they wrap you in steaming hot towels, then the needle shower...which was fantastic. That's the "bath" part. I got a massage too because, hey, I'm there already...so...you know...gotta do it. ;-)
It was a nice break after hiking over the entire east part of the part. It was beautiful though. Very forested, green, pretty rock formations and views, like here from near the Mountain tower.
And no, Casey was not the only one who was silly during the trip (for him, see below!)
Actually in Hope, Arkansas. Casey on the front porch of Bill Clinton's first home, after crawling under the fence.
Casey, on the grenade statue which was totally out of place on historic Bathhouse Row.
Casey on the spitting frog...we were quick with this one.
Casey on the huge rock, during our 4-hour hike through the State Park. We saw lots of cool rocks, but this was by far the biggest.
And, last but not least, Casey on the huge tank at the far side of the park. It was also totally random...so Casey had to sit on top of the gun, of course.
