The Orange

A sense of humor is required.

So, I bought an orange. I figured one orange would be just right as #1 son doesn't like them. 

So, here's my orange.
 

What? 

In my soon to be "nest 4 one" (which has developed a borrower who shall remain nameless) how do I deal with this type of "leftover"? Say, I had just wanted a slice. Say, that I hadn't had someone helpful enough to leave this in my refrigerator (OK so he was betting that it would make me laugh) and raise this question.

Take note that the perpetrator no longer lives here so my assumption that my house will soon remain "just the way i left it" may be a mile off target. 

So in my quest to not be wasteful, a wounded orange may be a nice metaphor, but what are my options? I could take a picture of it and send it to my "borrower" and ask about it. That goes without saying. A cryptic "all I wanted." via text message. A lesson to be learned there perhaps but that's for another day. I could Google it. Come on, not really. What would Google say? What would I find on Ask.com? I couldn't help myself. I kid you not - there were over 752,000 results. 

Did you know that you can repel mosquitoes and ants, keep cats away from furniture, scrub cast iron pans with dried orange rinds, soothe migraines, clean your microwave or make orange extract or citrus vinegar? A very entertaining way to enjoy my last cup of coffee this morning. 

Did you know that you can make orange peel kindling? I guess it smells better than newspaper (duh!), it leaves less creosote deposits and the oils in lemon and orange peels burn longer. I wonder how many pounds of useful kindling we've tossed in the garbage over the years? Can you hear my inner Italian gearing up for guilt here? Probably not. But how to dry it in cold and damp upstate NY in the middle of winter/spring? 

So...here's what I did. I made an orange salad for lunch, (it's a traditional Italian thing) orange slices, a drizzle of your finest olive oil (I happened to have a bottle of  F.OLIVER'S Extra Virgin Olive Oil - made for dipping), sprinkle with sea salt & fresh ground pepper, perhaps a tiny splash of aged balsamic if you've got it. Since I also have the proverbial leftover bananas cooling their jets on the counter looks like banana bread is in my future. While the oven is cooling I think I'll toss the pieces of orange rind in on a cookie sheet to dry. 

Fire tonight perhaps. I keep thinking it will be the last one of the season. And just for the record, I am not shoveling the driveway. I do wonder how long it will take for that six or eight inches of snow on there to melt? I could Google that. Probably not. 

A sense of humor will definitely be required.