It's still 2019

Wow, tough year.  Alot of pressure relieved after escrow closed.  Mom is settling in, though I bet I can now write a drama from what goes on in memory care (other residents, not Mom).  Alot of people get rubbed the wrong way because of other resident's false memories or faulty reasoning.  But I'm glad memory care exists for these otherwise physically healthy people.

Probate is almost done but we won't be able to close by end of the year just because the Los Angeles County courts are so slow.  Maybe in January? Definately by March.  Meanwhile my goal of ending the storage of my Aunt's stuff by the end of 2019 is going to happen.  I have the last two weeks off work (company shutdown) so I can deal with it.  The movers packed up alot of things I told them not to, so I will have to dig through boxes to get rid of stuff I don't have room for.  It'll be much easier when the stuff is here, rather than in LA.  Next year's goal is to end Mom's storage by Dec 31.

Oh no, I've got another fixation!  Years before I got the Instant pot, I wanted a donabe, a Japanese clay pot you use on stovetop or in the oven.  I finally sprung for a small one (7 inch diameter), supposed to serve 1-2 people.  First attempt - damn it's too small.  There's only enough room for a baby bok choy so I have to bring noodles into the broth a little at a time while I eat.  I still needed Instant pot to make the soup stock with meat, so no regrets there.  It was also too small to cook the noodles, so I had to do that in a separate pan.  I thought I'd be able to treat dobabe like the thermal cooker I tried to buy before Instant Pot, it doesn't look like it'll work that way.  It doesn't retain heat as efficiently as the thermal cooker.

I've been going to this Chinese restaurant for about 20 years where they make a spicy eggplant casserole in a clay pot.  I want to learn to do that.  Seems complicated, so I'm going to try other things in the donabe first, like mung beans.  I've done mung beans in the Instant Pot already but now that I'm only cooking for me, I'm trying to cook smaller going forward so that I don't throw out half the batch when it gets old.  I have a small freezer.  Until I use up my aunt's walnuts & cranberries, I don't have room to freeze half a batch.

I think I mentioned previously that I realized I had a room full of "models who don't move much" when I go to visit Mom in memory care.  So I've been trying get a sketch at every visit.  It doesn't always happen.  Sometimes I feel more like writing than sketching, or maybe I'm just busy with Mom, or sometimes she wants to go to her room early so I don't get an opportunity.  It's been a few years since I filled up a sketchbook.  I think I started to get busy with caregiving around 2015, because that sketchbook is still around with lots of pages to fill...well, it's probably in a box now but it'll come back out when I settle in with Auntie's furniture.