The Employment Insurance Office, and Recipe for Key Lime Pie

Today I went to the EI office to give them my records of employment. I drove up into the parking lot, through the exit of course, so it was a little bit curvier than it should have been, and since this is a small city it doesn't matter, it's not like anyone was trying to get out of the parking lot. There are many things in the same plaza as the Services Canada (which is what they call it now. Honestly. Can't we just still call it Unemployment Insurance and Human Resources Canada and quit using the doublespeak? It was definitely an Orwellian moment.) including a Salvation Army store, quite fitting actually. Go on the dole, grab some used duds to go to your next (non)interview in. Lots of stuff, most of which I ignored because I was trying to overcome the feeling of Not Wanting To Go In.

It's a terrible thing to have to go on unemployment. I've been paying into it since I was 16, but that doesn't mean that I should ever have to use it. It's for other people, not for me. It's for people who get laid off or who are abused at work or who are contract or seasonal, or who just can't stay there any more for a billion reasons. Not for me. I stood in line and waited, and the line wasn't long, just two guys in front of me, but one was taking a long time.

When it was my turn I sat at the desk of the nice lady with the flat look on her face and talked a mile a minute about my roe from one university being wrong, isn't it wrong? the start date is wrong, it's the date after my mat leave, it's not the real start date, that's wrong, isn't it? and I messed up on the money for the other one, I made it (ridiculously small amount) per year instead of over the six months, so that's wrong, okay? and there's a break because it's two separate contracts and the pay was different, can we fix that? I did it wrong. Is it fixed? Oh look, there's my file on your computer. There I am. And now we have notes on my file in your computer that say I did things wrong. Well, that's fine. Four weeks? Right. I can wait four weeks for something to happen with this. And in the meantime I'm looking for a job, you know? Because I don't want to be doing this, I guess no one does. Thank you, you've been very kind. Thanks. Thanks. I hope I don't have to see you again. Not that I don't want to see you again ever but I don't want to have to come here again. Okay? thanks. You've been very helpful. I'll leave now. Thanks.

It wasn't quite that bad, but close. About a third of that paragraph was going on in my head, the rest was spewing out all over the desk of the nice lady. She was very nice, but she also seemed to have been doing this job long enough to have a permanent "whatever you say" look on her face.

I'm in the works then, to collect unemployment. I know, it's been Employment Insurance for ages now, but it still isn't to me.

I got a call back from the headhunter today and the company to whom he'd submitted my information didn't want to interview me because my experience in their area of expertise is too old. No surprise, but another blow to the head today. Also heard from a good friend of mine that his wife is no longer living with him; he didn't comment further about it but it's another thing to add to the list of sad things that are happening right now.

Me, I'm sad. As I said to someone today, I'm not staring into the black abyss (and every time I write that word I think "abbess") of depression or anything like that, I'm just not very happy. The black abyss would cause another hair colour change; last time things got bad I went from my natural blondy-mousie hair colour to this current vibrant red that I'm sporting. I still like the red a lot, so I don't want to get to where I have to change the colour. That would be no fun.

On another topic, over at this site there's a push for something new to be created every day in May. I'm no artist...far from it...but I can post a recipe when I blog in May because I do like to cook, and I'm pretty good at it. Today's recipe is for something that everyone in this house loves: key lime pie.

Be warned, my recipe descriptions are somewhat unconventional.

Key Lime Pie: You need to buy a bag of those little key limes, and two cans of sweetened condensed milk. Here the limes cost about $4 for a bag, and there are about 15-20 in the bag. I've seen recipes where you're told that you can use regular limes, but they're lying to you. Regular limes don't have the flavour intensity that the key limes have. You also need to make a pie crust of some kind. I often use Jacques Pepin's short crust (sweet crust) although I've also used a standard pie crust or a graham wafer crust. If you don't bake much then I'd say use the graham crust, which is just crushed graham wafers and butter pressed into the bottom of a pie pan -- there's a recipe on the box of graham crackers. The short crust or regular pie crust both have to be pre-baked, and you let that cool while you're putting the key lime stuff together, as follows. (you need to preheat the oven to 350F, but it'll only take 10min at the very most for your oven to reach this temperature, so preheat it about halfway through the juicing in step 2.)

1) Use the fine side of a grater, and grate the rind (zest) of about half the limes. After the first couple, you might consider promising oral sex to your partner if they'll do this for you, but hold off, don't promise yet. Grate the limes yourself because you haven't yet gotten the lime juice out of the little limes. Just the green part of the rind, not the white part underneath, it's bitter. You need about two tablespoons of rind, if you end up with more then don't worry about it. Like I said, it should take about half of the little limes out of the bag to get this much rind.

2) You need to juice the little limes. There are many ways to get the juice out of citrus fruit, and since the key limes are small, many of these will become painful after not too long. This is a good time to promise the oral sex to a partner who likes that as much as they like key lime pie, if they will do the juicing. If you are without a partner, or they are not interested in helping you (and woe to them) then here's what you have to do. Cut the little limes in half and take out as many of the seeds as you can. You will not want to dig the seeds out of the juice, you will be angry about the juicing already, so seed the limes first. The limes are little, about an inch in diameter, and they are full of fucking seeds. Full. Now, you need to get the juice out of the little buggers, and if you have a reamer, that will work best. (really, it would never have occurred to me that there was a national reamers association, but there is. amazing.) You can get a reamer from any kitchen store. I have a nice glass one that's similar to the one we had when I was a kid. And the little limes? they slip right off that thing and you bang your knuckles a lot when you're juicing the little limes...and then your fingers get very sore especially if you have arthritis like I do and the limes are cold...Eventually, you will have juiced all the little lime halves, and as you do this by the way, you're pouring the juice into a measuring cup. You need one cup of lime juice. If you don't get a full cup of juice out of the bag of limes, you will probably have at least 3/4 of a cup, and you can top the rest up with water. Really, I promise it won't matter, but if you're a purist, then add some Reallime or something like that. Did you preheat the oven? If not, this is the time to do it.

3) whew. Now the easy part. In a big bowl, whip up two eggs and two cans of sweetened condensed milk, the lime juice and zest (rind) from above. Mix that up with a whisk so it's all homogeneous, and gently pour it onto the crust of choice. Bake at 350F for 30min or thereabouts. The centre of the pie should still be a bit jiggly but not liquid.

4) Let the thing cool for at least an hour before you eat it. We like our key lime pie a tiny bit warm around here, but that's ridiculous for most people, so once it's cooled down, cover it with plastic wrap (unless you like a skin on your pie, and some people do) and put the thing in the fridge to cool completely. Garnish with whipped cream if you like (I don't, but I'm not a whipped cream fan at all.) and serve to your adoring fans.

5) I did bastardize a recipe out of The Best of Fine Cooking: Cooking Fresh (2005) for this pie. Best to give credit where credit is due.