Well, Happy Chinese New Year!  It’s the year of the Rooster.  I don’t know what that means for all of us, but I bought a golden chicken icon to worship just in case.

I found the statue yesterday as I explored Chinatown looking for some ornaments to buy for a  New Year’s party I’m throwing.  It’s a celebration for me and several four year olds, so it’s going to be totally baller.  Sorry, you can’t come.

Anyway, on a strange whim, I decided on a foot massage at an establishment that claimed it did not mind performing foot massages.  Now, a Dutch guy I know once said, (of visiting the red light district) “It’s nothing.  It’s like changing your shirt.”  I still don’t know what the hell he meant by that, but I am now aware of what it’s like to pay someone for a totally soulless experience.

To make a long, boring, and pointless story short, the woman put on a pair of plastic gloves and weakly massaged my feet for half an hour.  Listen, I’m well aware my lot in life is not a difficult one…but until a person reluctantly caresses you with gloves normally reserved for rolling burritos…well, lets just say, it’s a brand new experience.

But, then I came home and made this salad.

Chinese Cucumber Salad

• 1 large cucumber, smashed and cut into bite size pieces
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 1 tsp sugar
• 1 TBS rice vinegar
• 1 tsp sesame oil
• 1 tsp soy sauce
• 1/2 TBS avocado oil
• 1/2 garlic clove, pressed
• red pepper flakes-to taste
• sesame seeds-to taste

1. Place the cucumber in a colander and salt.
2. Leave to sit for 15-20 minutes
3. Squeeze out as much liquid as possible.
4. Add the remaining ingredients.
5. Chill.

Please bear with me while I try to incorporate things from the 1950’s that I can, in fact, tolerate.  I’m all for drag racing, bold lip colours, malt sodas, and having sex in cars designed to look like rockets…but there’s some crap I’d rather do without.

I won’t go into it because this is not a political blog.  This is a blog about a lonely woman with crippling anxiety who likes to dress like a Mexican wrestler and make food nobody wants to eat.  I know my audience.  I’m not about to mess that up through having an opinion.

Hot Diggity Hash Browns

• 4 potatoes peeled and grated
• 3 spring onions sliced
• salt and pepper to taste
• olive oil-a splash for the mixture, and some for frying

1. Squeeze the potatoes in a towel, and get out as much moisture as possible.
2. Mix in the remaining ingredients.
3. Heat a few tablespoons of oil until hot, and add the potato mixture to the pan in a thin layer.
4. Cook the potatoes for 5-7 minutes, leaving it to set, until golden brown.
5. Flip it nicely, (don’t be a dumb broad like me) and get a good crust on the other side too.

*Serve it to your man with some eggs and thick cut bacon, after you go to town on one another in a 1957 Ford Thunderbird.

I looked up “Blue Monday” on Wikipedia, but my attention span mimics that of a man on Tinder trying to get out as many dick pics as possible, so I only read the last sentence of the first paragraph.  Essentially, it said that “Blue Monday” is pseudoscience.

Pseudoscience or not, it did make me reflect on what I failed to accomplish last year.  In a flash of nauseous remembrance, my list of 2016 goals came back.  All that was missing from that insane rider was, “Number 26. Genetically engineer a lesbian pre-Marc Anthony J-Lo,” Needless to say, I didn’t get there.

This Blue Monday made me mourn the person I might have been if I’d tackled just a few of my projects. Maybe right now I would be…

• The proud owner of a UK driving license.
• Wearing cropped jeans with confidence.
• Living within three miles of a Mighty Taco.
• Not devastatingly lonely.
• Speaking Chinese.
• Getting paid to play my accordion at Bat Mitzvas .

Who knows what 2017 will bring?  I’m taking two classes: Painting and Drawing and Creative Writing.  I know that sounds promising and normal, but so far I’ve sketched a still life of a toilet paper roll, and written a free form poem about the conflicting emotional attachment I have to my cat. But today, the sun is shining, and I have my driver’s theory test booked for February 23, 2017.

Moist Chicken Nuggets

• 10 chicken thighs cut into chunks
• 2 eggs, whisked
• 1/4 cup arrowroot flour seasoned with salt and pepper
• 1 cup almond meal
• 1 tsp salt
• 1.5 tsp paprika
• 1/2 tsp coriander
• 1/2 tsp cumin

1. Preheat the oven to 425f/220c.
2. Mix the almond meal, salt, paprika, coriander, and cumin.
3. Line a baking tray with baking parchment.
4. Dredge the chicken pieces in the arrowroot flour.
5. Dip the chicken pieces in the whipped egg mixture.
6. Coat in almond meal mixture.
7. Arrange on the cooking tray and bake for 16-18 minutes.
8. Really, really good.

I’m at a loss at how to describe this year’s Thanksgiving.  I could blather on and on, but I’ll stick to the lonely meat of it.

What I did:

1. Ordered sushi.
2. Watched “The Way We Were.”
3. Gave a homeless entrepreneur a probiotic chocolate bar.
4. Dissected the Amanda Knox Netflix documentary with a orphaned drifter on Facebook messenger.

How I made peace with being alone and unloved:

1. Appreciated not having to eat jello with nuts in it.
2. Experienced the thrill of watching a young Robert Redford get a second chance to shrug off the oppressive yoke of 1950’s whiskey dick with Barbara Streisand in front of a roaring fire.
3. Delighted in the perfumed shame of feeling as out of touch as Gwyneth Paltrow.
4. Most of all, I was thankful for this quote regarding Amanda Knox from my friend, Shawn Doherty: “I’m interested in your thoughts because it seems like all Americans think she’s innocent and the British think she’s guilty.  But as an Italian I know the truth is that it was a satanic ritual.”

Ann Wall’s Artichoke Dip

Now, I get that I’ve been lazy as of late.  But I’m not feeling my best.  I’ve been living  off of protein cookies and fighting an alarming premonition that, very soon, women will be required to carry a note from a male relative in order to travel freely in North America.  These are tough times, so I went back to basics.

Here’s a gem from “The Best of Ann’s Kitchen, Volume I.”