January 29, 2010

I got Tiger'd

A few weeks ago Adam called and left me this voicemail.

Hey. This is Tiger. I need you to do something for me. It's huge. I need you to change your...number....voicemail... (Justin, his roommate cracks up in the background, says something probably along the lines of "you idiot, you messed it up!" Adam laughs as well, breaking his very serious tone and then tries to continue.) Call me back. Please.

Here's the actual voicemail that Tiger left for one of his girlfriends. He says "Hey, it's Tiger. I need you to do me a huge favor. Can you please take your name off your phone? My wife went through my phone and maybe calling you. So if you can, please take your name off that. Just have it as a number on the voicemail. You got to do this for me. Huge. Quickly. Bye."

My boyfriend is such a dork.

Sick Girls Like Corn Bread

First of all, did you know Jewel has made like four or five albums since her first one in the 90s? Pieces of You was one of my first CDs (along with Dave Matthews Band, Crash). I recently heard Foolish Games on the radio and suddenly got a Jewel craving. So now I'm listening to that album on LaLa.com. But the song Pieces of You, kinda disturbing!



You know what I miss? Mixed tapes. Mixes on CDs just aren't quite the same. There's nothing quite like sitting by your boom box, waiting to hear a song on the radio so that you can hit the record button, and inevitably get some of the DJ chatter at the end of the song on the tape too.

The most exciting thing that happened to me this week involved my plumbing and pasta in my bathtub. On Tuesday the kitchen and bathroom sinks started to drain slowly. I then discovered that not only were they draining slowly, but they were draining right into my bathtub! SCORE! I tried Drain-o and plunging but no luck. Pretty soon my bathtub was a log of what I'd eaten in the past week. Good thing I don't care much if I don't get a shower ever day, or for three days.

Well, I've managed to get sick three times in the past month, which is pretty rare for me. Cold, Norovirus (which is the most hilarious and gross stomach bug EVER), cough/fever. (By the way Foolish Games does not sound pretty when sung by someone who is on the verge of losing her voice. Worst sound that has ever come out of my mouth.) I'm hoping for a healthy February. So not much cooking or baking has happened. I did make some black bean soup and corn bread earlier this week though. The soup was so so. The corn bread was fabulous. I want to make it again with chili.
The recipe calls for milk or buttermilk. I don't drink milk and really only use it in baking, substituting soy milk most other times. And usually it works out fine. I've made some damn good gratin potatoes with soy milk. The only thing I've had trouble with is alfredo sauce. My body cannot handle all that heavy cream but oh good Lord I love alfredo sauce. Soy milk, in my experience, when heated up and subbed for heavy cream in this case, gets sweet, and alfredo sauce should not be sweet. Does anyone have any tips on cooking with soy milk or other dairy substitutes? Anyway, back to the corn bread. I didn't have milk and was almost out of soy milk. I did however have heavy cream for some weird reason, so used that instead. No need to do that I'm sure. I'd stick with milk or soy next time.


January 21, 2010

Reach

The past week the news has been full of stories of from Haiti. Bodies piling up on the streets, rescue efforts at schools abandoned because survivors at this point were unlikely, no clean water or food, crime, and general hopelessness. This picture, though, defies all that. It literally embodies the word HOPE for me. That little boy was buried for eight days under rubble, and amazing rescue workers pulled him out. Talk about second chances.


I want to do my small part and was thrilled when one of Jack and Jill's fairly regular writers emailed me saying she felt the same way. She suggested writing an article about the children in Haiti, how they are coping with the aftermath of the earthquake, and how kids here in the U.S. can help through various organizations and charities. I hope that we're touching kids and opening their minds with the magazine. Who knows, but I like to dream :)

January 18, 2010

It's All in the Family

Heeiiy! If you read this post, this blog, my word vomit, would you mind commenting on this one? I'd like to know if anyone other than my dear mother and my brother come around. Muchas gracias!

Mira and I have a new neighbor. Well two to be accurate. We have a new neighbor in the apartment across the hall. We also have a new neighbor living somewhere near one of our favorite trees in the yard. At night I let Mira out just quickly in the yard outside our building. She usually walks directly to this one tree, pees near it, and inside we go. About a month ago, out we walked as usual around 11 p.m, right over to that tree. I was hardly paying attention, bracing myself against the frigid night air. Mira had her eyes on the ground as she sniffed for the perfect spot. Somehow both of us managed to miss the GIANT MOTHER EFFING POSSUM sitting by our favorite tree, frozen/"playing dead" (like we were stupid enough to think it was dead, it was standing up on its hind legs!), and staring right at us with its beady little eyes and tiny pink nose. I'm pretty sure I screamed, I dragged Mira in the other direction, and then continued to scream and curse loudly as Mira found a new spot to water. We hurried upstairs and, from the safety of my apartment, I peeked out the kitchen window. The offender was still by the tree, only it'd unfrozen and was starting to waddle around now that the coast was clear. Possums are seriously ugly, seriously gross, and even worse when you suddenly find yourself standing three feet from them. Trust me.
OK, so no more possum sightings until last week. Our confidence in the favorite tree had been renewed, our fears lulled into a stupor. Thankfully this time I happened to be looking up and spotted the possum by the tree about six feet away this time, again frozen and staring at us. I diverted Mira, who had also spotted the beast. Apparently they're known to viciously attack dogs. Come on, how could you attack this sweet face?

Especially when that sweet face does this?!


(Sorry, I couldn't resist...) Anyway, I think the possum has officially taken up residence somewhere near our tree. I'll be on guard from now on.

In kitchen news, I have two family recipes for you. The first is Oma Macaroni. My grandmother (we call her Oma) always made this when we would visit her and Opa in Holland. It's one of those foods that will always have memories attached to it of sitting in their kitchen, which somehow never seemed brightly lit, eating at the long table, my grandfather at the head, Ian, Oma, and I on the long side, and Mom at the other end, two casserole dishes of macaroni on the table. Ian, picky eater that he was, required a small casserole dish all to himself with only the pasta and tomato paste baked up together. I like making this in the winter because it's nice and warm, and really pretty flavorful. The second recipe is for my dad's banana bread with a few additions. Pappy made this always and I could eat slices upon slices in one day. When I was a junior in college and finally figured out that I had a kitchen, I asked him for the recipe. I added the chocolate chips and cranberries two goes ago, and with those additions, I prefer this in muffin form. As just straight banana bread, I like it in a loaf pan. Fair warning: the batter is seriously tasty, and the bread itself can be consumed within hours if you're not paying attention.


January 8, 2010

Bits n Pieces

Today has been relatively unproductive because I've been browsing various food blogs and Etsy is continuously posting awesome things on their Twitter. I discovered this blog that way and spent a good half hour reading past posts. I like this elephant I found there.
He's so full of happy colors that he's blowing them out of his trunk. He can't even contain them!
This item though, I question. There is no joy exploding out of it anywhere, unless you count the possible poop explosion out of the butt. This is a drop crotch jumpsuit. Please please don't get me wrong, I will sacrifice fashion for comfort any day. I wear a boys onesie around my apartment frequently, and trust me, it's not flattering. The jumpsuit, however, has multiple problems. One, the name. Why in the world would you put the word "crotch" in the title of something you are trying to sell? What does the word "crotch" make you think of? High fashion? A piece of clothing you'd wear in public? I think of, well things that are honestly grossing me out a lot. I'm not going to play the what word do you think of next game with the word "crotch." Better to do it with the word "elephant." Anyway, I also wonder why a drop crotch is a good idea on a garment when it makes the butt look like a very full diaper. I don't know, that's just me, and I know very little about what's in as far as clothing goes.

Next is Train Song. I think a lady named Vashti Bunyan originally wrote it in the 60s. Feist and Ben Gibbard do a really nice cover of it on the Dark Was the Night compilation. Today I like songs that are a little sad and a little filled with longing. I like this line
but suddenly now, I know where I belong
It's many hundred miles, but it won't be long


OK, so then NPR posted a free download on Second Stage of John Heart Jackie, a very nice and mellow and folk-y duo. They cover Train Song too, but you'll have to go to their MySpace page to listen to it. (and while you're there, listen to their other songs too!!)

Righto. Have to still post the Oma Macaroni. Also made banana bread last night, but in the form of muffins and with chocolate chips and cranberries. SOOO GOOD I might die. Made an epic fail soup. By Sunday you will have the two epic un-fails.

January 5, 2010

A Sugar Cream Pie New Year

Where were you 10 years ago? What were the decade's top songs/artists/albums? 2009's best music: Vote Now! Not going to lie, I got very tired of seeing these types of polls and articles pop up in my inbox and on my Twtitter feed. So here's mine.

2009: Fine as a Swine
-I traveled to Las Vegas for the first time (!)
-I took over Jack and Jill magazine (!)
-I reached a quarter of a century and have had various small quarter life crises (...!...?)
-I came to terms with the term "broke" and made some lifestyle changes such as canceling cable and cutting shopping (not !)
-I visited camp under the guise of a work trip and got my flight paid for (!!!) hey I did write an article on my fave place in the world for the mag
-My dog was banned from my parents' house (not !)
-I fell into more new music than I could have ever have dreamed of (!!!!!!)
-I decided to one day open a bakery in North Carolina with Bette and have a prostitution business on the side (!!!!) (anyone interested in a "cherry pie" aka a tall blonde with big tatas and a midget on the side?)
-I celebrated the two year anniversary of my return to Indianapolis (not !)

My New Year's resolutions are as follows: put $100 into my savings account every month as car payments have ended, pawn off baked goods on unsuspecting coworkers in an attempt to lose weight, have formulated a move to North Carolina plan by the end of the year.

In 2010, more specifically Jan 12, Vampire Weekend comes out with their second album! You can listen here until then. I've got a couple more listens before I comment on it, but so far, so musically nice on the ears!
In 2009 I also made a sugar cream pie. Here's how that story goes.

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