Missoula, Pt. 1

Missoula, Pt. 1:

It's short, it's really sweet, and all blurry pictures!

Enjoy.

 Little girl puppy!

Same little girl puppy!  SO CUTE!

Little boy puppy!

I have to wait until they have some personality...right now, they're really just little lumps of sleeping, squealing fur.

More soon!

xo

Elizabeth

Here in Montana...

...The quality of eggs is simply better.  Sometimes, they even go the distance to disguise themselves as store-bought eggs.  This one took a page out of my grandpa Gene's book, and donned a toupee.

I FINALLY HAVE A TON OF PICTURES OF MONTANA!  Stay tuned, check back after these messages from our sponsors, adjust your rabbit ears and unplug everything else.  The first act of your feature presentation is, really, I promise, about to start.

With love,
from Montana

Bud Light and Big Hats

-At the Madison County Fair!  This moment was about the peak of the event for our group, it went downhill, and quickly, from there.  Some parties not to be named might have been scolded by, well, vague is better.  Just sayin', this was a great moment...

Ellis, me, Marguerite, Todd, and Brad in front of the demo derby arena.

<3

P.S. Our birthdays this week are...
 ANGELA BRANCO, TAYLOR CHEAIRS, and CHRIS RUSSELL!
Congratulations, happy birthday, and eat cake!

Arm Yourself! With Knives and Orzo!

Dearest Readers,

Many have fantasies of their own armouries, slaughtering their way through a zombie apocalypse (or a zombacalypse, depending on who you ask), or just enjoy nerding out with fellow hunting buddies about what magnification their new scope offers.  The truth is, family and friends, that I, too, am part of this growing slice of American society.  And I love it.

My recent accomplishments include firing my first AK-47 (I hit a reasonable number of the things I was aiming for), and getting a tour of the Zombie Tools workshop in Missoula, MT with the owner, Maxon McCarter.  Zombie Tools is a bladesmithing outfit that offers killer cutters with names as sharp as their blades: Urban Bone Machete (versus the Backwoods Bone Machete) and the Phalanx, just to name a few.  Between the forgework, machining-like precision, and zombie-massacring potential, I was in heaven.  Huzzah shops!  Thanks to Maxon, I have some pictures to show you lovely readers of some blades in the final stages of finishing.

The shop

Maxon McCarter at work

Wax prep for...

Acid etching!

 Aah, the glorious finished product, ready to ship out to zombie slayers around the world.

~

After a whirlwind weekend in Missoula, Marguerite and I returned home and enjoyed a delicious cold orzo salad of her own creation:

Cold Orzo Salad:
-3 cups dry orzo, cooked (nearly doubles in size after cooking)
-1 cup drained artichoke hearts, cut into bite-size pieces
-1 cup sundried tomatoes
-1 medium size red bell pepper, diced
-3 large cloves of thinly sliced, lightly sauteéd garlic
-1/2 cup crumbled plain feta
-salt and pepper to taste

with Dressing:
-1 T dijon mustard
-splash balsamic vinegar
-2 T olive oil
-1 T lemon juice

Cook orzo according to package instructions, set aside or refrigerate uncovered until cool.  Then, combine remaining ingredients and dress.  It's ready as soon as you think it's ready, but as with many cold salads, the flavours combine as they sit and are much better after 24 hours in the fridge.

ENJOY!  Thanks, Marguerite!

Please visit the Zombie Tools website:
http://zombietools.net/

Oodles of poodles of love to you all, be good, always use the safety on your firearms and cut away from yourself!
-Elizabeth

OH!  I almost forgot to remind you to check back soon for recipes for Basil, Zucchini fritters and Purple-Potato, Cauliflower, and Blue-Cheese frittata!

...And the skies are not cloudy all day

Dear Readers,

Howdy!  Please forgive the absence from my posting post, between the thousands and miles and boxes and constant readjustment, I've neglected correspondence both personal, professional, and public.  But never fear!  The urge to gloat verbosely is not lost, and thus neither is your chance to be involved in the best parts of my life here in the Ruby Valley!

My dear readers, you have so much to look forward to: new and old recipes amended for baking at altitude, recipes for wild game, and stories about my successes and failures at organizing meals, as well as oodles of beautiful pictures, and simply wild stories about the wonderful people of the Ruby and their lives here.

In lieu of such particulars today, I will offer you photographs from a hike buddy Margi and I completed a few weeks ago, off of Mill Creek Road.  Enjoy!

Why Montana?

If you're one of those people who have recently asked me this and also not received a reply, here you go (and I'm sorry I've been so bad about returning emails).

It's stunningly beautiful here.  Nothing blocks your daily sunrise and sunset, and you don't need a forecast to know what the day's weather will be like; instead, you can watch it roll in over the mountains and as the clouds pile up and darken, you can run and get your jacket!  There are real thunderstorms here.  To us kids from the West coast, a good thunderstorm is a pleasure.

The people here are different, and by different, I mean better.  (Not that my people in Seattle and Oakland aren't wonderful, but in MT the density of wonderful people is vastly higher.)  I've made friends who take me horseback riding, will teach me how to hunt elk with a gun and a bow and arrow, tan hides, can, hike, camp, and more.  There are so many placed to go peakbagging (look it up!).  I have a part-time job at Patagonia thanks to a new friend named Brad, some under the table work from a rough-and-tumble lady called Weber, and another blacksmithing apprenticeship with a master named Glen.  I have a fresh start, and the momentum to make the most of it.  If that's not enough reason to move, I don't know what is.

If you need a little more convincing though, consider all the aspects of city life I won't have to deal with: No more parking tickets or traffic, no more threat of theft, no more drive-bys at the end of my street, no sad doggies stuck in apartments, no sirens screaming in the middle of the night.  At the moment, perhaps the greatest thing is no more night skies without stars.

As they say:

Montana,

It doesn't suck.

WELCOME to ROCKIN' THE RUBY

My dear, dear reading public,

Welcome to the relocated blag - formerly known as From Oakland with Love.  Due to many recent ch-ch-ch-changes, I, Miss Author, have picked up, and put down, in the beautiful Ruby Valley of southwest Montana, and more specifically, Sheridan.

Not ten timeless days ago, I could be quoted saying that I wouldn't be leaving Oakland any time soon, let alone ending up in Montana.  If you don't believe me, quit your job, cut ties, and come pay me a visit.

It must be stated right here and now that the opportunities I face here in Sheridan and the greater area would absolutely not be possible without my friend, Marguerite.  Her brilliance, hard work, and strength of character have earned her the love and affection of many in the Valley and the extension of her community and resources to me is an absolute honor, one I will not squander.

Please stay tuned for the tales of wilderness, exploration, and the slow breaking in of a wide-eyed and open-hearted city girl.

You know what they say,
You can take the girl out of Montana,
But you can never take the Montana out of a girl.