Four Star Meal at Five Below Zero

Who doesn't the love the mid-winter?

Oh, that magical time when you can't remember a world without snow and you cease to believe there ever will be a world without snow. When you start looking at your significant other as though they have a second head and begin to believe they were placed on this earth, in this cabin with the sole intent of driving you bonkers. That my friends is the indicator that your cabin-fever-o-meter might just be soaring off the charts. Run, don't walk, out of that front door. It's time to get out of the cabin.

On Sunday, Andy came home prematurely to deal with the whole ice dam situation and effectively threw the remainder of the day into a tailspin. I don't know about you, but I can't get anything done when Andy's around, even when he's quietly sitting in the other room. I knew as soon as he walked through the door at 12:30 that my work day was done.

Just the other day, Andy had declared himself "in the mood for a Crooked Spoon dinner."

I needed to record my latest radio commentary in town and neither I nor my stomach were up for the fare served at our usual restaurant haunt that Andy was clamoring to "get a quick burger at." "Why don't we go into town and go to the Crooked Spoon," I suggested. It was an idea about as logical as the time we set out to drive 30 miles, one way, for a beer.

Still, we set out, in the Corolla, on glare ice roads. The Corolla does impressively well on snowpack conditions, but gets a little shaky on glare ice. As we moved forward, I could feel the car slipping ever so gently. "Oh this was a good idea," I muttered. Town was 55 miles away. We were going about 27 mph. This was going to take a while. 

But we did make it to town. I recorded my commentary in the peace and quiet of the Sunday afternoon radio station and then we headed down to the Crooked Spoon for a winter feast of duck on alfredo pasta and homemade meatloaf and mashed potatoes.All those nasty, cabin feverish moments started to slip away as quickly as a bit of melted butter on my tongue.  

"Look at us," said Andy, swirling his glass of cabernet. "Having a four-star dinner in five below zero."

Full of good food, we headed home. I shimmied on down the road at a reckless 35 mph. As I poked long, a car behind me quickly caught up to me, raising the hackles of my type A driving personality. Who did they think they were? "Back off buddy," I yelled into the rearview mirror. I planned to pull over at the next feasible stuff, but the vehicle had other plans. They passed me.  It was the county sheriff. (You know you're a cautious driver when . .  . .) We hadn't laughed that hard in a long time.

How do you battle cabin fever this time of year?