Sunday, Jan. 08, 2012 - 7:22 a.m.

We're back home. Now I have to summon the spine to put away the Christmas tree when Q still keeps going up to it twice a day, touching every ornament she can reach and declaring, "Decorations!".

Delighted to be back to cooking with grains and vegetables.

I offered the in-laws a taste of my breakfast quinoa (with cinnamon and blueberries). They didn't like it. Said it was too textured for their tastes. I explained that it didn't have to be for breakfast, you can make it with savory stuff and have it as a side. They were unmoved. But it's not like they like, say, their rice or pasta to have the consistency of oatmeal. It's fine to want smooth breakfast food (I guess), but not to be able to think, well, how would this be with gravy over it? is a failure of some sort. I think they have a poverty of culinary imagination. I didn't argue, of course. You can't argue taste. But again and again, I am surprised at how viscerally wrong their food preferences are to me. There's no accounting for taste, goodness is a decision for the mouth to make, etc. etc. But I mean, really.

And then there was the time my brother in law claimed that the bland chicken enchilada casserole (with flour tortillas!) mil made would NOT be improved with the addition of green chiles. !!

I accidentally left the better part of a pan of salted rum caramel with macadamia shortbread at their house (failed to pack it for the plane), and I know it's probably been thrown out. A crime against the Kitchen. Let us have a moment of silence.

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Okay. Now what you've been waiting for: Cat poop update. The introduction of flushable wheat litter stabilized the situation, and we went for some time without incident. Until we got home and decided that we really should start closing off the hall door to help us keep track of Q (her room is right by the hall; it's nice not to have to worry about her wandering into our room, which is not entirely babyproof). I guess it was just too much; someone pooped on the floor on protest.

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