I've spent some time cooking lately so I suppose I must include food as one of my preoccupations this week. You should know that I am a leftover cook: I refuse to throw away food. The first cookbook I published was about leftovers and one reviewer said you could save $1000 a year following my recipes and advice. My second cookbook (about cheese) had pen and ink illustrations and the illustrator made a special page of drawings for me - of rotting food with fumes coming off it, or cobwebs, or covered with mould. Just so you know.

A few weeks ago a dear friend went to New Orleans and brought me a present of a Gumbo Mix. I used it and made a gumbo with peas and okra and chicken (meant to add shrimp but forgot). She was not free to come and share it so I put it in the freezer. This past week I thawed it when I had my talented grandson and his wife for dinner and I baked a double cornbread to go with it, double because in addition to cornmeal I mixed in corn niblets in maple syrup to cover (and used less sugar). The next day I had a Devonshire cream tea birthday party for a friend. I made the scones and another friend looked after the Melton Mowbray pie, the cucumber sandwiches, and devilled eggs - with a dollop of caviar (lumpfish). I added sherry, three cheeses (Brie, Manchego, and Danish blue), green grapes, and of course - tea. Oh, and individual chocolate cream cheese cakes purchased for the birthday occasion.

So the next day a friend who had intended to drive to the U.S. was turned back by a blizzard and invited himself for dinner. I served gravlax (with red onion, gravelaxsass ((honey mustard with dill)), and buttered brown bread, with akvavit and beer. (He brought the akvavit.) Dinner was baked pork tenderloin in a garlic and honey marinade with roasted Honey Crisp apple slices on the side, mini-potatoes in butter and chives, brussel sprouts, a baby spinach and avocado salad and vinar terta for dessert. (My Icelandic tastes are showing.) Today I made soup with enough chicken broth to thin a leftover casserole of cooked chicken, peas, carrots and couscous. Tomorrow I will serve lunch to my daughterin-law and son when they come to help me with some non-functioning machines (TV and Bose). I'll make crab wraps and you already know the recipe for that because I published it a few weeks ago.

This isn't really about leftovers and cooking, it's about trying not to gain weight, trying, in fact, to lose.

I usually forget my REM the moment I open my eyes: CLICK, and the dream is gone But this morning it lingered with me and I know enough about dream analysis to figure out what's going on. Years ago I took a couple of courses in Jungian dream analysis and joined a dream group (four people including me) for a while, to help me get on with my life after my husband's death. My dreams at that time all boiled down to obstacle courses, presented in many different ways. The mind is a basic punster. Yes, I know all about Nobel Laureate Crick (double helix) who denigrated dream analysis and stated the obvious fact that dreams are just a clearing out of the detritus of the day. But there's still something there that sometimes has to be dealt with or at least recognized.

I dreamed I was taking care of a baby (lots of preamble, including a celebratory church (possibly ) service. I had to change it before a party after the ceremonies. It had a full load and I had to get it cleaned up and back before the festivities started. But I was in a hotel room and the toilet had stopped up- water all over the floor. I threw down towels to sop up the mess, but I had no water to clean the infant - and I had a plane to catch. I think the father was Tom Selleck or looked like him, possibly my lover, not sure of that. Anyway, I left him at the party. I was about to call room service for a pail and more towels when I woke up and didn't click off. I was a bit vague about what I was doing for a few minutes, looking for a pail.

Okay. I remember babies mean new work, a new project. That's my book. The full load is my product, something I have to work on to clean up. The plane to catch, of course, is not only the deadline for my book I must finish but also for the trip. And the difficulties are my activities right now. I'm doing too much other stuff. I'm cooking for people (today, a high tea birthday party for a friend) and doing too many other things when I should be writing that new chapter.

"Oh for a holiday in a complete vac-u- um!" Remember that line from The Lady's Not For Burning? Well, today will be no vacuum for me.

How is your day?