Dark and Stormy

Things are crazy here in San Diego right now. Winds, rains, flooding. The water is coming down so hard, it's like living under a waterfall! Except it only seems to happen in brief buckets - as I learned when I left the house for my morning run with Thatdog. The first 1.5 miles were like running through fog - wet, but not raining. Then the skies opened up and the two of got a morning shower neither of us was thrilled with. And then, just about a block away from home, the skies cleared again. Weird. Thatboy tried to tell me last night that he drove through a river on his way home. "The splash was 15 feet high!" I'm thinking of sticking a life preserver in his trunk.

When the weather gets like this, it sometimes makes me feel like I'm not in Southern California anymore. The torrential downpour so heavy you can't see the car in front of you on the road reminds me of the hurricanes we had in Florida. Huddling the house with the windows taped up, crowded around the radio with only candles to light the room. The dark and cloudy skies bring me back to Pennsylvania winters and shivering after diving practice which was a winter sport there. And I had a winter sport nickname. We all had nicknames on the diving team, and mine was Snow White. During the summer when I was out in the sun all day, my hair would lighten to a reddish brown, but in those dark days of winter it was a rich dark brown - almost black when it was wet from diving. Pair that with my super fair skin and blue eyes, and it's not hard to figure out where the nickname came from.

Since moving to California I don't have the same drastic hair change. My hair is fairly constant year round because the sun is fairly constant year round. Which means every winter I get "winter roots" - where the dark brown growing in doesn't match the sunbleached ends. So every winter, when the skies are dark and cloudy, I rectify the situation in my very own hairsalon/bathroom, dying my ends the rich brown of my roots. Except something went wrong this weekend - somehow the dark brown didn't come out so dark brown. It would appear I have dyed my roots the red brown of my ends! Not noticeable to anyone else, but it feels very strange for me to have "summer hair" in January. Especially when it is very wintery and dark outside.

I can say I had better success with dinner than my hair. This came out exactly as I was expecting. I knew I wanted to make stuffed peppers with rice, but forgot to check and make sure we had rice. We didn't. We did however have a couple boxes of Uncle Ben's long grain and wild rice - which is Thatboy's hands down favorite side ever. So I figured I'd just use that. It worked! Although, to be honest, I think Thatboy prefers his long grain and wild rice unadulterated by peppers and marinara. When he starts making the rice instead of requesting it, I'll probably take his preferences more seriously.

Wild Rice Stuffed Peppers

1 bell pepper, cut in half lengthwise

1/2 cup Uncle Ben's wild rice

1/2 lb ground turkey

1 egg, lightly beaten

1/4 cup bread crumbs

1 cup pasta/marinara sauce

1/4 cup shredded parmesean

1) Preheat oven to 350. Remove seeds from peppers and place in a baking dish.
2) Combine wild rice and box seasonings, turkey, egg, and bread crumbs in a bowl. Stuff this mixture into the peppers.
3) Pour pasta sauce over peppers and sprinkle cheese on top. Cover and bake 45 minutes.