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- [00:01]
A
Whether you've been cooking your whole life or you're just starting to learn, it's helpful to know how to be safe, efficient, and relaxed in the kitchen. In this episode, Hadley members Dawn and Dia join us to share their experiences with cooking after vision loss. I'm Ricky Anker and this is Hadley Presents. Welcome to the show.
- [00:23]
B
Hello.
- [00:24]
C
Hi, Ricky. Hi, John.
- [00:25]
B
Thank you.
- [00:26]
A
It is amazing to have you both. I know we're going to have a really good time and probably end up being very hungry after the episode. So I am looking so forward to learning a bit about each of you and what you do in the kitchen. And I think we're going to have a great time and share some very useful tips and tricks. And of course, as much as we are able to share between the three of us, there is no way we're going to be able to cover everything, which is why we are so happy to have so many clever listeners out there. So if you're listening and you have something to share about cooking, we're going to have info on how to do that at the end of the episode. So before we get into talking about your kitchen experiences, the good, the bad, the in between, why don't we get a little bit of information about each of you? So, Dia, I want to start with you. You've actually been on a Hadley Presents podcast before, so welcome back. But for those of you who didn't hear that first podcast, let's get a quick intro from Dia.
- [01:37]
C
Hi, Ricky, again, thank you for having me today. I'm very excited about being here and talking about cooking, which is one of my really, really big passions in life, and it still is, even with vision loss. And that I am legally blind. I have a disease called N A I O N Non ischemic optic neuropathy. Non anterior. And it happened in my left eye in 2019, and then I was unfortunate enough to have it happen in the right eye, which is very unusual, as the professionals tell me it is basically an optic nerve stroke. So I had the left eye and the right eye. As of present, I only have 15% vision.
- [02:31]
A
I'm so looking forward to hearing about some of the ways that you have adapted because cooking is such a huge passion for you and you certainly did not decide to let that go, which is awesome. So, dawn, this is your first time on the show, but certainly not your first time participating in things related to Hadley. You're always on the what's Cooking discussion group as well as other groups, and so it's wonderful to have you here. For people who don't know you, why don't you just give a quick intro, tell us a bit about yourself and as much about your vision loss journey is you're comfortable sharing too.
- [03:13]
B
Okay. My name is don Poyman, I'm 61 years old and I currently work for the Bureau for Public Health in West Virginia. My vision loss, it started in 2015. I was making Oreo mint ice cream and I saw a shade come down over my left eye. So the next day I went, I hadn't, did not have an ophthalmologist at that time, so I called one. Luckily there was one who's willing to see me the next day. And then my daughter drove me to the eye doctor and I said, ah, yes, you have a retinal tear or retinal detachment. And it's pretty bad because it's the entire retina that's pulled away. And finally In February of 2016, the Eye just said, that's it, I'm done. And it went completely dark. But I still had my right eye, which was at 2030 vision. But that was fine until November 10 of 20, 2022 when it decide to detach. Then beginning of 2024 is when everything went dark for me in that eye. And that's where it's been and that's where it's, it's staying. I don't think of it as a, a vision loss journey. It's to me, it's a life journey. I never really looked at it as, oh my gosh, I'm losing my vision, I'm going blind, what am I going to do? I just looked at it, this is my life. And, and so I made arrangements when I first was losing the vision. I, you know, I would change things on my, mainly my menus and stuff so I can make them more accessible in case it gets even worse. But I just look at it as, this is another part of my life and I just have to adjust.
- [05:01]
A
I really like the way you frame that because it's so true that life isn't just full of good things, where the bad things are an outlier. It is ups and downs and everyone just has different ups and different downs. And ultimately you hopefully arrive at where you are, where both of you are, which is, I'm excited to be learning things. Everything is okay. So a lot of times we hear from people who maybe they have lost some vision or they're in the process of doing that and thinking, you know, I never did learn to cook and so I'm going to start doing that now, but for the two of you, that's not the case. You've always been very interested in cooking, so this is one of those things that, as you are losing that vision, you're thinking about, okay, how am I going to do this? Am I going to do this? So I'm curious. And, Dia, we'll start with you. Did you ever think, well, this is probably something I'm going to have to give up, or was that just never an option for you? How did you kind of navigate that exactly?
- [06:14]
C
It was never an option. I knew I had to adjust, and I knew that adjusting was going to be a little bit challenging. Not difficult, but more challenging. And I learned how to make my cooking shortcuts. And I remember watching my little Italian mama, and pretty much that's how I learned how to cook, was just observing how she did things. So I just never, ever thought, I can't do this. I have several tips on how I remedied that. Right now, it's shortcuts. It's how I improvise in the kitchen and just maneuver and to be safe. That was my biggest fear, was burning myself or cutting myself. And that is the challenge of it for me.
- [07:09]
A
But it sounds like once you said to yourself, I'm not giving this up, the rest of it just became logistics of, okay, I have to figure this out, not I can't figure this out.
- [07:21]
C
Exactly. Absolutely. And I never, ever thought, I can't do it ever. Never again. It's a mind over matter. You have this challenge. And I also don't believe that I have to deal with being legally blind. I have to deal with how to adapt. It's life.
- [07:40]
A
And, Don, for you, cooking has always been a passion for you too, right?
- [07:45]
B
Oh, yeah. I mean, I watched my bohemian mother cooking, and I would just. I would be the one kid in the house of five kids that would cook and bake. And then later on when, you know, in high school, I would. I would. They could cook all the time. And in college, I started at a pizza place and then became assistant manager of the pizza place while I was in college. You know, that's just the way I did. And so I've been cooking back and forth, and when I started my job, I'd always cook and bring things to people at work. I've always enjoyed cooking and baking.
- [08:20]
A
When you knew that your vision was changing, was there a point where you were thinking, well, I'm not going to do this anymore. We're going to have to figure out something else? Or did you Start adapting and figuring things out immediately as your vision kept changing.
- [08:37]
B
Yeah, I just kept adapting. There was never a point of, well, maybe I can't do anything or maybe I can't cook. It's just what I did decide a couple things is one, I'm not going to be cooking. And bringing it to work is I don't have shortcuts, I have long cuts. Everything takes so much longer. And so the. That's what I did. So. But I said I'm not going to do the big cooking that I did in the past. And the other thing is I said I'm not going to for safety reasons, I'm not going to deep fry. But other than that, I still do what I've been doing. I make. I make some changes on stuff, but just takes me longer.
- [09:13]
A
You know, a lot of times we hear these stories of someone who has climbed a mountain or they've become winner of cooking contest or they've done something just over the top. Amazing, amazing. And it feels inspirational in a way because like, look, this person did this amazing thing. But in a way it's not relatable because I don't know about all of you, but when I try something, there's usually some disasters before there is the perfection. And we don't always hear about those disasters. So I want to change that. I want to hear when you were learning to cook and figuring out your adaptations. Share some times when things didn't quite go as planned. Dia, we'll start with you.
- [10:07]
C
Absolutely. Several since my vision loss. This is awfully humorous. But because I could not see to drain the spaghetti after it was cooked in the pot, I brought it to the sink with the colander and I thought that the spaghetti was in the pan. It was not in the pan. I was emptying out a pot of boiling water with no toxic. Funny. It totally is funny. And I stood back and laughed. I have fried a hamburger patty with the paper on it.
- [10:49]
A
Done that too.
- [10:50]
B
Yes.
- [10:51]
C
And that, that cracked me up because when I bit into the hamburger patty, I ate the paper. So that was another. I call it funny tragedy, which it wasn't. I've cooked a pizza in in the oven with the cardboard under it and tasted the pizza and it tasted like cardboard and I couldn't figure out why it was cardboard. So those are a few of the the humorous things that have happened to me. I have burned myself. Those are the bad things. I have cut myself and I have spilled significant amount of stuff in the kitchen and that has aggravated me and it's Very frustrating. But I pick myself up and I shake it off and I continue. So I'm not giving up that. And when I talked about shortcuts earlier, what I meant by that is I no longer have huge family surrounding me as I did when I was newly married. And in the course of my marriage, I should say where the kids were home and I made pasta sauce from scratch. And now I do the shortcut. I use the jar sauce, or I do olive oil and garlic in a saute pan with fresh parsley. Those are my shortcuts. Instead of beginning from scratch. And it's okay. It's okay that I open up a jar of pasta sauce. Let's say that's okay. And I would do that if I had company. Probably the most important thing is I don't do shortcuts on my specialty items. So I still do that all from scratch. But I have definitely slowed down to make sure that everything I'm doing, I'm doing adequately and slowly so I don't make a mess and I don't mess up the recipe. And the recipe is not in a paper. All my cooking is in my head.
- [12:49]
A
And how about you, Don? I bet you have some disasters to share as well. Or maybe everything has always been come out perfectly for you. I don't know.
- [12:58]
B
Well, it doesn't come up perfectly. So I'm different from where Dia, he does it all, you know, cooks by her memory. And the recipes are all in her head. Mine are all recorded. They used to be in books and now they're all in. In the computer database where I could locate them, find them. They're all organized nicely. Begins with, I put the source where I got the recipe from. It was from mom or if it was from a website or a book. And then I put in there, if I make something and I, I find something new, like, oh, I should have done this, or maybe I'll change this. I put notes in, in the beginning of the recipe of what I did last time, what worked, what didn't work. And so that's what I've always done. And if something doesn't work, then I may, I'll turn it around to make it work. But I had some of the nonstick pans and I would put a little cutout circle from the rubber type of shelf liner in between so they don't scratch. And I left one in there once when I was making bacon and onion jam. And at first it just, it was like, well, there's something sticking to the bottom. This is weird, but okay. It'll loosen up. And then I realized after a while what it was. Now, I could have thrown it out, but it's bacon onion jam. So I scraped it.
- [14:14]
A
You were not letting that go to waste.
- [14:17]
B
I scraped it off and threw the, the liner out. You know, it's bacon onion jam. You can't just throw it out. And then there was one time that just happened the other day. I make a lot of Thai peanut sauce because I love Thai peanut sauce. And apparently I grabbed something and it was the wrong container. It felt like the same container in the same consistency, but it happened to be some sweetened condensed milk and I dipped my celery in that and I'm like, this doesn't taste quite right. It's still good, but, but you can work with knives all my life. So I've never cut myself in the kitchen. I have not burned myself. What I do is we have a gas range. And I said, well, this is going to be tough. So I no longer use the gas range. What I do is I put a cutting board on top of the gas range and then I put on a single burner induction range. And all this stuff I had before I lost my vision. I bought that to see if we were going to get an induction range or just a regular electric oven range in a previous place that we had to replace, replace it with. And so I said, well, I'll try it. Well, so now I cook on that exclusively. And I use my two main pots are enamel coated cast iron 12 inch skillet and a 10 inch 5 quart Dutch oven. And what's great about those is first you don't get heat coming up the sides. The top parts where the handles are don't really get that hot because of the, the way the induction range works. And in the beginning I could see the inside because it was white. So that really helped out. But I can also stir with one hand, pouring with another hand and it's not going to spin around. They're heavy. But you know, that's what I use mainly for my cooking. So I don't get the burn. And my oven was nice enough to come with. It has the two, you know, three shelves. I only use the one because I only cook one thing at a time. And it's. Even if it's in the oven, it's just one thing at a time. And the shelf pulls out like a normal shelf. You know, you kind of wiggle in there, but it also has little rollers on it and it has another shelf right on top of that so you slide that on the rollers. So that was great. But I only cook one thing at a time if I'm, you know, the sides are either pre made and frozen and then thawed or they're cooked and put into a warmer while I work on something else. But yeah, because if I make more than one thing at a time, then when I put something down, I'll go to do something else. I'll have no clue where that, that item was that I just put down on the, on the table.
- [16:44]
A
And that's actually a really good tip. That's something I do too, is when you're in the kitchen and you're doing so many things at once, it's easy to lose track of something. And maybe you're accustomed to glancing over and seeing where it is when you've lost that ability. Now suddenly, if it's a matter of timing and there's something that you've got to get to quickly and then there's something else going on too that can be a little bit nerve wracking. So just taking that time to say, I'm going to concentrate on one thing at a time and it makes it easier.
- [17:23]
B
And I cook everything like it's a stir fry. So everything that I'm going to add to something is already put into a bowl, measured out, because I measure everything or I don't use measuring cups, I use the weight on everything except for measuring spoons for spices and stuff. But everything else is done by, by weight. And so I have all that stuff lined up. Finger bowls or bigger bowls and it's all in a line. So when I start going, I just put all that in there and I don't stop and grab something off the shelf because again, you're trying to do that and you got something cooking. So I just, I don't know, it's just like a robot.
- [18:00]
A
I love how everyone has different approaches to this. And so one tip that Don just gave is to have everything ready to go before you even start. And that way you're not frantically hunting around in your kitchen to try and find something dia. What about for you? What would your tips be that have really helped you the most in terms of figuring out how to stay relaxed, have fun and get what you need to get done in the kitchen.
- [18:34]
C
As Don said. I also put everything out on the counter as I know what I need. All my spices, all my refrigerated items, and I keep those on the counter and then I add those. So that's one of the things I line up Everything. So my three items that I absolutely love, love, love are I have a lot of countertop lights that I work with. I have a light, a gooseneck light that is mobile, and I can point that over the pot on top of the stove. So it helps me to judge if I'm making soup. I know how much liquid or oil that comes to the surface I have to skim off. My lights are my life. I adore them. And I have at least 10 lights around the counter right now, and they're always on during the day. They help me to see where I'm walking and also especially when I'm cooking. So that's the one thing. And the second thing is I use my hand a lot. I feel. I feel what's on the counter. I use my hand for measuring. And that's something that my mother did, I never did when I had vision. And now I'm using that again. And that's really interesting that, you know, it's kind of a full circle thing. And then my third thing is I have an electric stove, which I'm not fond of, and I keep the electric burners on low, and then I slowly turn them a little higher, and I scan over the item that I'm cooking. I don't walk away. And it's pretty boring, but I have to do that. I have to slow down and learn that I can't walk away like I used to. Somebody told me this, which is quite interesting. If you lose your sight or you lose any of your senses, your other senses kick in. So my hearing kicks in, and my tastes kick in a great deal more than they did before when I had vision. So that's usually what works for me. As I said about the lighting, that's so, so important. And then one of the most important things that I'm finding is to take inventory in your cabinets. Instead of buying another olive oil container. Look in the cabinet, you probably have one. Or look in the cabinet, you probably have garlic powder. I have like four garlic powders right now, and I keep buying them because I didn't know that I had them because I can't see them. So that's kind of another little tip.
- [21:17]
A
Yeah, just to keep that running inventory. And sometimes that's easier said than done because it's. How do you organize things? How are you labeling things? And sometimes if you're anything like me, I should be more organized than I am. So I, too, have three chili powders and so on for you. Don, do you have some tips, tricks that you would share that have kind of made things a little easier or more efficient for you or things that you didn't used to do, but you do now.
- [21:49]
B
There's changed a little bit. And so my first one was my spice rack, which is 60 items in a spice rack, which is a lot. So I brailed those and I brailled them in a special way so the braille doesn't fall off. And someone who side you can still read the labels. So what I do is I program my a lady to tell me where my spices are and I just ask her to say find a ragno and it will tell me what row and what column it is. So that's very nice. I cut it down to 48 and now I'm starting to put in mixes which I can take one one spice jar and put it in there and stand instead of taking out four of them. So I already have them pre mixed now. So that. That was very helpful. That's one of the first things I did because I knew that was going to be a problem and that's when I could still see. But my daughter helped me with putting on the braille and stuff like that. So that was very nice of her. And then for the inventory now I have a couple different pantry things that I use. I have spice pantries and you know, leftover that I don't have a lot of canned goods, but I have, you know, your basic canned things of your diced tomatoes and your coconut milk and stuff like that. Well, those. I always had them in rows and I could tell what the cans are or the bottles were the easiest. But now I have a computer database so it'll tell me, I can say, okay, where's my Thai chili sauce? And it'll tell me which row, which shelf and which row it's in and how many are there. And when I use it up, I take it off the list. Same thing with my freezers. My upstairs freezer just has the meat and I buy it in bulk at Sam's and then I vacuum seal it because I don't get the store a lot. And so I freeze my meats and then I cl. Certain like in them. For chicken, it's clipped in the middle. There's one clip for chicken breast, two clips for chicken thighs. Beef is clipped on an end and then I also put them in separate bags. So there's one bag of chicken thighs, one bag of chicken wings and and so on. And then my other one has all my pre made stuff like I'll bring. I always have Mac and cheese Pre made and vacuum sealed and put in there. Same thing with corn, cheese and sweet potato casseroles. So those I can take out in thaw and use, but those again are put into the computer of which shelf and what kind of container they're in. So that's the way I label my stuff. Instead of putting labels on everything, I just use the computer. But I've always done that on other things like new storage bins in the house and stuff like that. So I just started using that for the cooking.
- [24:19]
A
So you already had some things that just, they were the way that you approached how you organized things in your house already. It just so happened that it was kind of a universally useful thing to do. So once you started losing your vision, you didn't really have to make much of a change on some of those things.
- [24:42]
B
Correct. And again, I just adapted some of the things that I did. You know, the freezers, I would just put things in. I. But I still, after a while, you can't tell what's in there. So I'd write it on the vacuum seal bag or, you know, I put a lot of things in the quart jars and vacuum seal those and put those in the freezer so I don't get the freezer burned. But now I, I record where it is on the computer so it's very easy for me to locate. And they'll say, shoot, I wonder if I have Italian sausage. I thought I did and check and sure enough, I do have some, some bulk sausage and I know where it's at.
- [25:15]
A
So when it comes to devices, I think everyone has their favorite little gadget or device or measuring thing or, you know, for me it's my air fryer in my instant pot. I love them so much because there's a lot that you can do where you can walk away and clean the kitchen while they are doing their thing and not standing over it. So, you know, those are mine. But I bet each of you have those things too. Whether it's utensil that you use for measuring or a device or a talking scale or whatever it is. So I'm curious. We'll start with you, Dia. Do you have certain things that have just become. You couldn't live without them in the kitchen?
- [26:00]
C
Absolutely. As I heard you speak about it, the biggest grin on my face back in the 70s when Tupperware was big. I have the yellow colander, the yellow Tupperware colander. And I have all kinds of cool silver colanders imported from Italy. And I can't give up my Little handle, yellow colander. And it's my go to for, you know, draining pasta, rice, any kind of things that I need to drain. So that's one thing. The second thing I can't live without is my toaster oven. I do incredible amounts in my toaster oven. And when I'm doing a shortcut, let's say I'm gonna make french fries. And I don't have any of the fancy gadgets. I don't have the air fryer. And so I do everything by hand, which it works for me. So I take out the frozen french fries and I put them in a dish in the microwave, and I defrost them right from the freezer. And then I put a little olive oil in a aluminum pan, and I bake in the toaster oven. And then I change it to broil. And I get the best french fries with a little bit of olive oil, not a lot, and a little bit of salt and whatever spices you would like to use. So that's. Those two things are my go to. My slotted spoons are my lifesaver. I think that's the beginning of it off the top of my head.
- [27:40]
A
Awesome. And what about you, Dawn?
- [27:43]
B
Well, my scale, I have a talking scale now because I weigh most of my ingredients. And then I do also have my thermometer, which is for meat and talking thermometer for meat. And obviously baking, you know, to know when my cakes are done, bread or done. I mean, I can touch them on the top, but I'm afraid to do that a little bit because I may miss the top and hit the glass casserole dish or something like that. Not going to burn. I don't want to burn myself. So those are my two big ones. I do have a nice toaster oven. It can do all sorts of things, but I use it solely for toasting and for baking. And I do have my instant pot and my for making, like, ribs and. And soups and stuff like that. And also creme brulee. I'll make that in the instant pot. And then my air fryer is my friend. The one I have is a Ninja Foodi air fryer. It can do a lot of things, but I use it solely for air frying. But it is a clamshell design, like a George Foreman. And so in the. The plate that you put the stuff on is elevated, so when you heat it, it heats all the way around. You don't flip things over and you cut your time in half. But I can cook two turkey legs in it.
- [28:53]
A
So I actually do have the ninja foodi. And one thing I love about it is exactly that. For me, flipping things over, that's my nemesis. Especially if it's smaller things. I feel like I'm never going to get them all flipped, but if I can just give them a good shake halfway through, that's perfect.
- [29:17]
B
Yeah. And the other nice thing about it is if, let's say I'm making bacon wrapped shrimp that have a date stuffed with blue cheese in it, I can go ahead and take that the the basket out, put it on a tray, and while the ninja foodi is heating up, I can go ahead and place all my shrimp in the basket while it's a cool basket and then I can open it up and drop it in there. And that works out real well. And instead of trying to put it in with it, you know, after it's been heated up, but at least the inside is hot. So. So that, that works out well and real well and everything's nice and crispy and stuff. But yeah, I mean, I have a lot of things that if I didn't have, I would just do it a different way. But the air fryer and the bumps are important too. Those are the low tech things for putting bumps on things so you know where to push and where to turn on.
- [30:10]
C
Yeah.
- [30:10]
A
Because a lot of that becomes difficult to memorize after a while. And dia, I think your tips about light really come in here too, because if you do have some vision, making sure that what you're doing, if you don't want to be squinting at things when it isn't necessary to do that, make that area either easy to see or make some of those things easy to feel like. Rather than leaning over to look at what your oven or your burners are set out, you can mark those or, or do what you did dia, which is have it starting low and then turn it up little by little till you get to where you want to be.
- [30:59]
C
Well, and also I'm totally night blind. So for me to look in my freezer or look in the cabinets, I need a flashlight because I'm blind in the dark and that helps me. And I do use the bumps also on different bottles and so forth and different items. But being that the lighting helps in let's say I open the freezer, I cannot see anything that's in that freezer. I need my light. So not only do I have the counter lamps, I have flashlights also that I have magnetized on the side of the freezer or the refrigerator that I can grab Easily. And look in the freezer. Now, if the freezer isn't organized according to what I know it to be, if I have a helper that comes in and she may load the freezer for me, I have to ask her where she put everything. And then she organizes it like, you know, the pork in one line and the fish in the other line in the freezer and so forth. So that helps me. Also, if it's changed, I'm all messed up. I have to reorganize it. And that. That's another challenge. But I can do it as long as I have the lighting. And, you know, another example is in a restaurant, I cannot see a thing when I walk in into a restaurant. First of all, restaurants are usually very dark, and I have my cane, of course, but still, ordering from a menu is extremely difficult. Again, the lights that I carry in my purse help me. I bring them out.
- [32:45]
A
And that's just figuring out different ways to do the same things. Rather than saying, well, I'm just not going to go to a restaurant anymore or I'm not going to cook anymore or whatever, it's figuring out ways to keep things organized and make them work. Work for you. And I love that both of you have totally different approaches, and yet they're both completely valid. You know, Don, you approach this like a scientist. Dia, you approach this as a. You measure things with your heart kind of thing. There's no. No measuring spoons involved. And Don, you have tactile things. Dia, you have light to look at what you're doing. And in the end, you're still doing exactly what you want to do in a way that works for you. And I think that's really important. So I think that's what I would say to anyone who is thinking about learning to cook or wondering about how they're going to continue to do that. With vision loss, there's no wrong way to do things. It's about finding the way that works best for you. So what advice would you give to people who are in this situation and not sure if they can do it or just feeling a little bit of fear, whatever it is, Dia, we'll start with you.
- [34:10]
C
Well, I would say just give it a try and start slow. That's a huge part of this. To start out slow, use your microwave for some of the things, and then use your toaster oven or use your oven, whatever you're more comfortable doing. You can use your crock pots. You can use all of your, you know, gadgets, as Don mentioned. And, yeah, we are Totally different cooks. And I admire his technical skills. That's incredibly fun and interesting. I would say to people that are scared to start just to start slow. And if you have a helper, that will also give you more confidence to point out things and to show you things that would make it easier for you to be confident about booking.
- [35:06]
A
That's great. And Don, what about you?
- [35:09]
B
Well, you start out slow and you see, what can I do? How can I work? And if it doesn't work, is there a way I can make it work? You know, how can I do this differently, that I can do this safely? And you just have to think about it. You know, it's not just thinking outside the box. It's also thinking inside the box. You know, what do you have available for you? You know, all the stuff that I have, except for the two talking elements that I already had and I was using since, you know, I was 17 years old. But, yeah, you just think about it and don't get frustrated. If you get frustrated with it, just stop and say, okay, let me try something different. Sure, it's a little sloppy, but it still tastes good. I had this, of course, also before I lost. Started losing my vision. It is a light that goes on a headband that tilts and is also motion control. So you will tilt it to where you need it to focus, and then you can turn it on and off, and you can also make it low or high with it with a wave of your hand. So I use that at work quite a bit. Those are incredible. Like I say, they're all hand controlled. If you get the right one, so you don't have to touch up, you know, by your head with a dirty hand or something. You just swipe your hand and so. And it goes right where you need it.
- [36:25]
C
Don, I appreciate that I have that. And you know what? I'm extremely vain. It messes my hair up. I think if we make some humor out of this, we can get through it even quicker and better and easier and more confident. We have to keep our humor. We have to laugh.
- [36:49]
A
I think you're so right about keeping the humor in things, being able to laugh at yourself. And dawn, you said it too. Being able to, if you get frustrated, stop, try a different way. Ultimately, it's about knowing that the important bit is kind of the end result. And it may take a little more time to get there. There may be some frustration along the way, but those are learning experiences, and I think it's well worth giving it a try. And now to all of our wonderful virtual neighbors who are listening. What's working for you? What's keeping you comfortable, safe, efficient, just less stressed out in the kitchen. If you would like to share those things with the community, we would love to hear from you. You can call our podcast 847-784-2870. You can email us podcastadleyhelps.org we'll have that in the show notes as well, along with a link to a page where you can just record right from our website and send it to us that way. I can't wait to hear what you all have to share. Dawn, Dia, thank you so much for sharing your time and your expertise and I will definitely be calling on both of you for recipes. So there you go.
- [38:21]
C
Thank you. Rukin, nice to meet you. Donna.
- [38:23]
B
Same. Same here. Dia, thank you very much for listening to my humor and giving me some tips. And Ricky, as always, you're wonderful.
- [38:32]
A
Thank you. Thank you both. Got something to say? Share your thoughts about this episode of Hadley Presents or make suggestions for future episodes. We'd love to hear from you. Send us an email at podcast at hadleyhelps. Org. That's P O D C a s T at hadleyhelps. Org or leave us a message at 847-784-2870. Thanks for listening.