futurethoughts >>

Feeling all domestic, I guess

2010-05-11T16:15:00.002-04:00

Trying to get a handle on a minor down-in-the-dumps moment...

Bryon is working a temp job (it's even in his field) for the next 3-4 weeks, so I am spending a lot of time hanging out with just me and the cats. I have gotten a bit of housework done, but I have more to do, plus at least one errand I need to run today, and I'm having trouble getting up the motivation to go do it.

Motivational powers, ON! ...nope, not cutting it, so far.

I have read three books in the last three days:

I've done some laundry, cleaned the bathroom, and picked up some of the clutter.

I tried a new recipe last night:

Baked Eggs and Tortillas in Creamy Tomato Sauce, from Martha Stewart's Everyday Food magazine. Delicious and easy. There are EIGHT eggs in this thing, but the idea is, it's a meal with lots of protein but no meat. Good for breakfast too.

Oh, and here's a picture of a blueberry cobbler I made a while back:

It was good, but actually needed LESS blueberries. Wouldn't have thought that was possible, but apparently I was wrong. Recipe here.

Maybe it was the motivation of talking about food, but I'm all hopped up to get going on lunch and my errand now! Whee!!

Drive-by

2010-04-30T12:52:00.000-04:00

Quick rundown of what I'm up to lately:

- Got FLOOR TICKETS for the Muse concert in Newark in October! I am sooooooo excited... they added something like 10 shows to their US tour for the fall, so I guess it must be going well!

- Had a nephew in the hospital all last week. He's fine now, after fighting off pneumonia and a really bad bacterial infection in his lungs. Poor kid.

- Still hunting on the job front. Bryon has had a couple of big interviews and we're still waiting to hear on one of them, plus he's got a temp job with the other company so at least that will be a paycheck for a solid month.

- Still finishing up FFXIII. We only have two trophies left to get (and one of those is for getting all the other trophies) so now it's just gil-farming (which is done completely through item drops in this game since you don't get any gil for the battles - kind of ridiculous). Wheeeeee.

- We're watching fun stuff on Netflix...

- I've been cooking up a storm. I've successfully planned menus and done my grocery shopping according to the plan for two weeks (uh, not two successive weeks as last week went to crap with big job interview stuff and hospital visits) and I'm quite enjoying it. I'm trying new recipes, practicing old ones, and trying to get us to eat healthier meals.

- I also went running yesterday! Well, running/walking. I have no stamina at this point so I run when I can and walk the rest of it. I am sore today and I'm taking that as a good sign. Might go for a short run again today to try and keep the muscles limbered up. Finding that the Genius playlist on my iPod is perfect for this—started it off with Fallout Boy and it kept me in perky, fun music for the duration!

- Finished some interesting books recently, my two favorites being:
and
(You can read my reviews on GoodReads if you click on the covers in the GoodReads widget in the sidebar.)

Anyway, drive-by over—off to do something productive.

Current Music: cats meowing

Paying bills and other non-exciting stuff

2010-04-06T17:30:00.000-04:00

Blahhhhh. Had a conversation with my mother today that reminds me just how many major life things I have to sort out at the moment. Where to live, where to work, what to do there... it's getting a little overwhelming. Thank goodness I have Bryon here with me or I think I'd really lose it and just curl up in a ball in my bed and read all day, every day. Maybe knit a little.

Anyway, Mom and I had our last Girls Read (afterschool program) today, so that's done. The girls seemed to enjoy the books and I know I had fun helping out.

Bryon and I are probably 4/5 of the way through Final Fantasy XIII. We beat the story part ages ago, but this game is structured so that lots of things don't even open up until after you beat the final boss (which is rather silly, if you ask me). I'll probably post a far-too-wordy review once I'm done, if I feel like it.

I was super-excited to pick up these two books:

even though I had to wait five days after their release date to find them at the bookstore (booo!). I'm halfway through Changeless already and it's marvelous.

I've been cooking here and there. I made a pretty decent blueberry cobbler (although honestly, it had too many blueberries—I didn't think that was possible), a carrot cake from scratch for Easter, as well as some successful dinners. One I particularly liked was au gratin potatoes with sausage medallions. I think tonight will probably end in pancakes... not a bad way for it to go.

We've been watching a lot of stuff on Netflix's Instant Viewing. We finally got rid of our digital cable about a month ago, and signed up for Netflix again. We haven't really missed cable AT ALL (minus knowing that Craig Ferguson's Robot Skeleton Sidekick debuted last night, but I'm sure I can find that on YouTube) and we're watching lots of interesting and fun things, such as:

...and also some fabulously bad sci-fi movies, such as:

Gene Simmons is also in this movie. It just wouldn't be the same without him.

(The best part is the last 10 seconds of the video. We laughed and laughed.)

Soooo... all that said, it's been a bill-paying kind of day, and it's about to be a dinner-making kind of day... off I go!

Current Music: - Bryon watching Spartacus (the TV show)

The husband's doing a fantastic job

2010-03-15T02:00:00.000-04:00

The husband has returned, and he has racked up major brownie points! Upon finishing his class, he returned home and changed out of his uniform. He asked me to check the pockets before he threw it in the laundry—and what did I find but FINAL FANTASY XIII! I've been wanting sooooo badly to play it! Then he told me to go see if the new pillow he bought while he was up there smelled funny.... and the FFXIII strategy guide was sitting underneath it!

What a guy!! The most impressive part of this feat is that he managed to pull it off without me spoiling the surprise somehow, like... buying it myself by the time he got home, or meeting him out by the car before he got a chance to tuck everything away. I am extraordinarily skilled at unintentionally ruining surprises.

The game is completely awesome so far. The thing I'd heard about it the most is that the story wasn't very good in comparison to previous games, but I'm actually really intrigued and this is the only Final Fantasy that has ever made me cry! Twice already! The graphics are amazing (of course)... to be expected since this is the first FF made for Blu-Ray. They have actually reached the point where the people in the actual gameplay segments and in the cut-scenes are almost indistinguishable. I LIKE the characters, and in particular the clothes and hair are just so cool! There are a bunch of knit items as well, and I'm just waiting for patterns for those to turn up online somewhere...

Anyway, it's been sort of busy this past weekend with a nephew birthday party, hanging out with friends, and doing a little website updating for my former employer. I've still got a lot to do on the webcomic template for Danielle, too. Dusting off these rusty HTML skills has been a rough experience. Perhaps the generous application of MORE COFFEE would help?

Right now it's time to catch up on all of our anime and then play some more FFXIII.

Current Music: The sound of Bryon watching a silent movie version of Last of the Mohicans in the background. I bet it sticks closer to the story than the Daniel Day Lewis version did (not that that would be difficult).

Brass Needles podcast

2010-03-12T14:40:00.000-05:00

I'm just getting into this whole podcast thing, but I've already found a second podcast to love!

It would be difficult to find something more "my cup of tea" than a podcast about knitting, cosplay and sci-fi—and Brass Needles, by "Miss Kalendar," fits all of these requirements quite nicely.

Each episode features a brief discussion of these topics, focusing perhaps on a particular knitting trend, a sci-fi show, or convention cosplay. Miss Kalendar is clearly passionate about all these subjects and I enjoyed her insights and opinions. I also found the snippets of fashion analysis (so far provided by Gail Carriger, author of Soulless) very interesting—they even made me go look up the companies that were mentioned.

I will continue to listen to the Brass Needles podcast and I encourage anyone with an interest in these subjects to do the same. The episodes are brief (around 10-12 minutes) and you can easily get your daily dose while checking your e-mail or updating your Ravelry notebook!

With a little help from my friends

2010-03-11T21:03:00.000-05:00

Oh, the good stuff that happened today. I feel like I got a lot accomplished.

I...

got up earlier than I have in a while
put the Netflix DVD in the mail already (the one that I watched last night)
mailed out the agreement for my severance pay
activated the debit card that my unemployment goes on
finished reading The Pilot's Wife, which I can now ditch
called the unemployment office
turned in a bunch of video games at Gamestop to take advantage of their EXTRA 50% trade-in credit promotion (which ends Sunday, by the way!)

The best part, though, is that I finally listed a whole bunch of stuff on eBay, including some games that I thought I could make more money on than I would have at Gamestop. Well, the biggest batch of games (.hack parts 1-4) were listed at 8:19 and sold at 8:40 for their Buy It Now price of $64.99!! That's $15 more than Gamestop would have given me for turning in ALL the games I had brought in. Now we'll just see if any of the others sell—but even if they don't, that first sale has covered all the listing fees and everything else is just gravy.

(That would be Bishop helping me with the eBay listings—by flopping on the computer desk between me and the keyboard.)

Now I'm off to knit and watch more of the the BBC Robin Hood with its absolutely ridiculous action scenes. Ahh, Netflix, how I've missed you and your instant viewing.

"Mailbox Zero" and randomness

2010-03-10T02:27:00.000-05:00

In the spirit of actually contributing to the "green living" aspect of this blog, a link: How to Achieve Mailbox Zero. It's suggestions on how to get less junk mail (or other mail, since it also advocates switching your bank statement to online billing, etc. etc.). I would like to point out the first comment, though, that suggests that sending your junk mail back to the post office isn't going to help anyone.

***

Tonight, I sit here consuming a decadent triple-chocolate-chip muffin from Dunkin Donuts... thinking about a job possibility that scares the stuffing out of me (more on this later), and reading bits of a couple of books here and there.

ALLLLLLMOST convinced myself to just get rid of the two Anita Shreve books I've had for years without reading them, then got sucked into the first chapter of The Pilot's Wife and now I'm a third of the way through it. Le sigh. I think I'll survive the depressing storyline since I already know the gist of what happens, although I can see that if I let myself think about it too much it could be devastatingly sad.

North and South is our book group's read for the month, and I'm really looking forward to it.

Anyway, I did accomplish some tasks today. The reading program was fun (we're reading Betsy-Tacy and Tib, which I adore), I have officially turned in my cable box, and I have resigned myself to probably getting a car stereo at Best Buy since their prices and selection beat out the local shops by a lot.

It is so time for me to be in bed. Bishop (the cat) is giving me with the "why are there still lights on" face from his perch on the cat tree, so I guess I will force myself to go.

Current music: Metric - Sick Muse

AHAHAHAHAHA.

2010-03-09T00:42:00.001-05:00

Battery recharge, YA lit, and stuff to do

2010-03-08T23:09:00.000-05:00

Ahhhhh. I made a trip to see Bryon and I feel like the visit recharged my emotional batteries. Lame as it may be, I really hate it when he's not here. I spend way too much time on the computer, frequently forget to eat, and just get kinda down. Being that he was getting out fairly early on Sunday, he asked if I wanted to come up, so I got to hang out with him and also had lunch with him today. I feel soooo much better, and also better prepared to get through week 2.

On the way back here, I made a couple of stops, which involved picking up the following:

(Final volume of Love*Com! Woohoo!!! I hope they also translate the follow-up series, Love*Com D... also, Once Upon a Marigold is GREAT so far!)

In the same bookish vein, today I read this fantastic article on Young Adult literature. My mother is definitely a frequent candidate for the "mother test"—I just hope she's enjoyed most of what I've gotten her to read! I also loved this:

YA authors are able to take themselves less seriously. They're able to have a little more fun, and they're less confined by this idea of themselves as Very Important Artists. That paradoxically leads them to create far better work than people who are trying to win awards.

So, so true.

Aaaaaand, what else? Oh yes, the stuff I want to accomplish tomorrow:

Take cable box to cable provider (we're getting rid of our cable)
Take recyclables back
Help Mom with after-school program
More job hunting
Cook a decent meal for myself
Visit the car audio place to look into getting a car stereo that has an input for my iPod. Lack of this feature is driving me bonkers, especially because I have so many CDs that are only in MP3 format (i.e. I can't take the CD in the car unless I burn a copy).

We'll see how all that goes.

This is Friday Night

2010-03-05T21:05:00.000-05:00

I made leek & potato soup. "Made" is a loose term considering I bought a bag of pre-chopped-up leek & potato soup vegetables, and all I did to it was add chicken broth and puree it in the blender, basically. Still, it was tasty.

Now I'm listening to the Nerdist Podcast and cracking up.

I'm also midway through Knit the Season (the third Friday Night Knitting Club novel). Best news: I finally grabbed a book on a book sale bag day that I thought I could probably sell online... and I've sold it already! Two bids! It's got 5 days to go but I've already made at least $6 on it. I feel all validated and stuff.

Recovery

2010-03-05T00:47:00.000-05:00

I'm still recovering from the Muse concert in Fairfax, VA. Kim went with me (since Bryon ended up not being able to go) and they have converted her, MWAHAHAHAHAAAA!!! (I knew they would.)

Physically, I'm all back to normal, but I'm fighting the urge to drive 6 hours the other direction to see them in Montreal next week. Yarrrrrrrrrrrrgh. I was thisclose to driving back down to Baltimore to see them Wednesday night, but Mother Nature intervened, and it was snowing here and down the East Coast. Sigh. I guess I avoided another long, boring drive through Pennsylvania... which is way, way too big.

Being that it's the age of the Internets, you can actually watch the entire concert on YouTube, should you desire... here's two of my faves (although the entire thing was stellar and amazing and lots of other really great words):

(Ok, side note, the first part of this video, they're jamming because they're waiting for the crowd to manage to pop the last of the giant floating eyeball balloons. XD)

Bryon is still away at his class for this week and next, and it's pretty lonely at my house. I'm getting lots of cleaning and laundry, etc., done, reading a bit, hanging out with the girls, and even went to see a really great art exhibit at a local museum. (I got to see art by my favorite illustrator—Trina Schart Hyman—and I didn't even know it was going to be there!)

That's about all I have to say for now. I'm off to read some more.

The Battle of Dovecote Crest

2010-02-25T15:50:00.001-05:00

Last night, while discussing layout/software for webcomics with Danielle, she sent me to the site for The Battle of Dovecote Crest. Everything about the site impressed me—the layout (which is what we were looking at, primarily), the organization, and most of all, the artwork.

I got completely sucked in and read the entire run in one sitting.

Dovecote Crest is about a group of people working as reenactors at a small history museum/visitor center at the site of a relatively unknown Civil War battle. Written by Hailey Bachrach and drawn by Bridget Underwood, it's a really a very impressive "side project" by two talented people.

The story appealed to me on many levels. I'm a history major with a minor in museum studies, and Charlie (Charlotte) Grant's struggle with dreams of being a "real" (or academic) historian definitely hits home. I'm also tremendously amused at the chance to read about history nerds like Jeremy Lee, with his sometimes-tedious encyclopedic knowledge of the Dovecote Crest battle.

This comic manages to be hilarious, heartwarming, informative, and even raises some of the issues students of history face (like the difference between academic history and history from the bottom up, focusing on the experience of the little guys rather than the generals and politicians). I loved every single character, and the story made me both laugh and cry.

Go read it right this minute! You won't be sorry. (I love the art so much, I couldn't decide which link banner to use!)

Dusting off the rusty HTML skills...

2010-02-24T23:10:00.000-05:00

Ok, today, after a long exploration of options and a discussion with Danielle, I have switched myself back to Blogger. Why?

In preparation for a large-scale project. I'll be designing a Blogger template for Danielle's forthcoming webcomic, Wayward, and also one for her artist blog. We looked into a lot of ways of setting up the webcomic, but for financial reasons, and to get the options we wanted, I think Blogger will work best.

I wasn't that satisfied with Wordpress anyway—particularly the fact that it doesn't allow JavaScript. I was able to tweak one of the templates into something I like pretty well (unlike Wordpress, Blogger actually lets you DO that without paying a fee) and it's been good practice.

Who knows, if I can get this up and running, maybe it will inspire me to do some freelance web work—always assuming I can find some customers.

***

Other stuff that's up: My grandmother is on a little foray into a nursing home (at least for a few more days) due to a nasty fall. I've visited and will visit again once I'm positive I'm not coming down with a cold... she is doing okay, but really doesn't like it there, understandably. We are all looking forward to getting her back home.

I finally finished a pair of mittens I'd started over a year ago. Thankfully I'm still wearing the same coat, so they still match! They are a bit sparkly and I've crocheted myself a string to put through my coat sleeves. The last time I made mittens, I lost them the third day I wore them. *sob* I'm also back to working on the Sideways Spencer sweater, making excellent progress. I'll have to let Danielle know; she's making one too.

As for books, I've blown through a couple of James Pattersons so I can get rid of them, finished a couple of library books, and now I'm reading The Disreputable History of Frankie Landau-Banks, which is moving along quite quickly.

I also read two books out of the Unicorns of Balinor series, and it triggered a mental image of another unicorn story I'd read when I was a kid, something about a mother and baby unicorn, and the mother having flowers in her mane, and they were living in a house with a thatched roof. Thinking it over, I had a vague recollection of the mother unicorn TURNING INTO the house, and that when she did, the roof had the same flowers in it that she'd had in her mane. Luckily, throwing "unicorns turning into houses" into Google was enough to get me to someone on Yahoo Answers who knew what it was! (It's The Baby Unicorn by Jean Marzollo. I'm getting it out of the library soon.)

Other than that, the job search is fruitless so far. I stopped in at the labor office for a meeting and to look through the job listings book. I'm feeling very, very hopeless about the whole thing right now and I'm not sure how to deal with it, emotionally or practically. I spent a couple of hours yesterday looking at history museum websites to see if any are hiring. Unfortunately, I didn't see anything for the type of position I can do. Oh well—gotta keep plugging away.

A bright spot for this week so far was helping my mom with her after-school reading program. The girls are a pleasure, really interested in the program and the book, and seem to have a lot of fun with it. Next week we're onto a new book, and we are trying to brainstorm activities to go with it. Woo!

I guess that's about everything at the moment. I will try to be better about posting.

"But... fish-people! Man-eating fish-people! Damn you, SyFy!"

2010-01-29T19:30:00.000-05:00

Stuff as of late:

Work is over. I am sad. I can't get used to having no schedule.
Gotta get back into the dinner routine. Doing okay but I need to structure myself more, and also brave the freakin' cold to get the proper ingredients. Made steaks, sweet potato fries and brussels sprouts the other night; tacos tonight.
Read Out of the Dust by Karen Hesse, a fictional free-verse diary-like account of a 13/14-year old girl's experience in the Dust Bowl during the Great Depression. Really interesting, and I'm following it up with The Worst Hard Time: The Untold Story of Those Who Survived The Great American Dust Bowl by Timothy Egan, a non-fiction book on the same subject.
Trying to get up the motivation to get the apartment back in shape now that we've taken down the tree and all the other Christmas decorations.
Between finding it used and trading in two games (that got me $13.70 in trade-in value), I managed to get Wii Fit Plus for $2.79!
Battling a slight migraine that has been bothering me on and off for the past few days. I suspect it's related to the weather. At the moment I'm fine.

The two funniest things I've seen in the last few days:

1. The BBC just redid Emma again, and it was playing on Masterpiece Theatre the other night. We only caught 5 minutes of it, but it was enough to keep me laughing for 20 minutes. There was a giant picnic/outdoor event going on, and someone had made a very elaborate tower-shaped cake involving fresh flowers.... and what was clearly the same cathedral cake pan I have sitting in my cupboard. (See a couple posts previous if you want to know what it looks like.) We laughed and laughed and laughed. You're about 200 years off, set dresser... did you think no one would notice?

2. Stealth Cat. Gets hilarious halfway through. The Japanese title says the cat's name is Daruma-chan.

One goal down

2010-01-19T16:43:00.000-05:00

Finally made my hair appointment. 10 inches of hair got chopped off today around 12:30. Woohooo!!!

While I have no regrets about cutting it off, I almost think it's not short enough, and it will take a few days of messing with it to see how it's really going to look on a daily basis. Right now it sorta looks like Yuna from FFX, a haircut I have always enjoyed, but I'm not sure if I'm enjoying it on me. We'll see.

Work tonight. Three more shifts, then possibly one on Sunday, and then we're done. It will be weird, and I will miss my co-workers. Meh.

Meditations for women who do too little

2010-01-18T07:01:00.000-05:00

Well, crap. Why is there no calendar each year to help women like me get off their butts? But no, just Meditations for Women Who Do Too Much.

The Mike visit went pretty well - I think we covered all the major bases of what he wanted to do (tattoo, shopping, some home-cooked meals, a few movies) and threw in some extra stuff to boot. I hope he has a safe trip back to Iraq, and of course that he is safe while he is there.

In the meantime, I have one week left of my job and I'm no closer to knowing what I'll be doing next than I was before. The husband isn't much closer either. I am panicking, and just keep berating myself in my head for us ending up in this situation at 30 years of age. Weren't we supposed to be smarter than this by now? It could be so much worse, though. We aren't in any debt and both cars are paid off, so those are two positives. I also finally got my military ID this week, so that was some progress (too bad two of our friends had to wait the 3 hours with us since we made a big mall trip out of it...). Will keep plugging away.

The apartment's back to medium-level mess again, but will be better once the Christmas tree box is out of the living room... probably a job for tomorrow since it's a federal holiday and all the places we wanted to go to accomplish things tomorrow will be closed. Le sigh. Still no progress on the vacuum cleaner part - going to have to get on Sears's back, I guess.

In less urgent news, I finished reading Dracula, and it was terrifying and marvelous. I hope it will be something I will re-read many times. I know I read a lot and focus a lot on books, but I know exactly why I'm doing it and I'm just letting it happen for now. With all the other crap that's going on at the moment, reading (and buying cheap books) is something that makes me feel good and I'm milking it for all it's worth.

I do have a constant stream going on in my head, thinking about how to save money and what we could give up if we had to. I think we are pretty flexible on a lot of things, and will do whatever has to be done.

Let's just hope we start DOING it instead of just thinking and talking about it.

Suspicious daschunds! Biblioteca!

2010-01-06T00:45:00.000-05:00

This article over on Abebooks cracked me right up: Remaining Unread: The Top Ten Reasons We Don't Get To Certain Books. I certainly fall prey to the bargain bin on a regular basis (even if there are no suspicious daschunds) - especially if I find a book in it that I always kinda wanted to read anyway, such as The Secret History of the Pink Carnation, or Nobody's Princess. One of my non-resolutions is to not buy so many books on impulse. I'm not going to stop myself from buying books I've been waiting for specifically, such as Changeless by Gail Carriger, or the third Hunger Games installment. But all that impulse buying? Bad. Very bad. I am pretty sure it will be a lot less of a problem being that my job is going away at the end of the month, and I won't have new books paraded past me at every opportunity. Sigh.

Managed to actually cook dinner tonight - homemade mac & cheese. This was the first time I've made it, and I followed the recipe pretty closely and will adjust from there. This time I used half American cheese and half mild cheddar; next time I'll use sharp cheddar, and omit the onions too. Still, not bad for a first shot.

Oh, lord. Sometimes the internet just writes itself. Two minutes ago:

Stine: Hm, that's what we should do, start a dance club.

The Husband: Yeah, we can get a big club space, and during the day it can have rolling shelves with books on it... it can be a used bookstore during the day and a dance club at night.

Stine: Oh my God. What would we call it?

The Husband: ...the Biblioteca.

HAHAHAHAH. (We are desperate. Don't count it out yet.)

Goals for 2010

2010-01-03T01:01:00.000-05:00

I'm fully aware that I am very bad at keeping resolutions or even finishing the many lists of tasks I make for myself, but I'm doing it anyway. These are some of the goals I have for the upcoming year:

Establish some kind of workout routine, whether it's Wii Fit, running, pilates... SOMETHING. And STICK TO IT!
Figure out this whole job thing... for me and for my husband. This is probably the most important goal I/we have for the new year.
Deep-clean the entire apartment.
Fix the things that need to be fixed (or get landlord to fix them). I'm sick of having a sliding glass door that we can't leave open because the screen door falls off if anyone breathes on it.
Read more books from my own library than from the public library this year. Once I've read them, I'm sure I'd be fine with ditching many of them, which will free up shelf space.
Cook much, much more often. Bake more too - but especially cook more.
Cook healthier meals - more greens, fruits and veggies.
Wear makeup more often. It doesn't have to be every day, but I need to make more time for it in the morning.
GET MY HAIR CUT. Can't wait for this. I'm donating my hair to Locks of Love (again).
Spiff up the ol' wardrobe, maybe. This depends on money.
Give the alternative remedies (for anxiety and migraines) suggested by my doctor a solid try. (This requires that I find the sheet where he wrote down all the dosages... darnit.)
Complete some of the knitting/crochet projects that are languishing on the needles, including the sweater I knit in two days but never sewed together. Oops.
Actually DELIVER some of the items I've made for people and/or babies, preferably before the babies are 5 years old.

I'm sure I'll come up with other goals along the way, but these are some of the biggies.

Heads up...

2009-12-31T22:15:00.000-05:00

Seven-Up. Cake, that is.

I was hunting for a Bundt cake recipe that would let me use my cathedral cake pan (as well as the lovely cake stand Mom got me for my bridal shower), and came across one for Seven-Up Cake on AllRecipes.com. This particular incarnation had 110 reviews and still maintained a 4.5, so I figured I couldn't go too far wrong! The "batter" is so heavy it looks like dough through most of the mixing process, and I very nearly broke my mixer making it (burning smell but no actual smoke), but it was worth it. I will say, the butter/sugar mixture really does need AT LEAST 10 minutes of mixing to get a nice smooth consistency.

Sadly this was only the second use for both pan and stand... must do more baking in 2010.

Typed to the sounds of rockin' out

2009-12-30T23:24:00.000-05:00

The husband is playing Guitar Hero 5 in the background, which he got me for my birthday. We didn't have any real interest in it until I discovered that they had put Matt Bellamy - only the lead singer of my FAVORITE BAND - in the game... and that it came with a red sparkly guitar (akin to Bellamy's). Drool. We are enjoying it, as there are lots of good songs, and I have also discovered that I can play bass on expert mode.

We had a lovely Christmas, visiting my mother-in-law's family for Christmas Eve, watching the (six) nephews open their (mountain of) stuff Christmas morning, going to my aunt's for Christmas dinner, and then to my parents' house for our gift exchange. It was a little turned around from "normal" this year, but we enjoyed it.

I even got to squeeze in a fun project, converting a bridesmaid dress from 1969 so the husband's mom could wear it to Christmas Eve! (Her sisters were duly amused - they all have the same dress since they were all bridesmaids in one sister's wedding.)

Since then, life has involved work, cleaning, a bit of rockin' out, a doctor's appointment, visiting my grandparents, and preparing for our friend Mike to visit on leave from Iraq. I swear, this apartment will be clean and presentable by the time he gets here, and boy did it need it. I just haven't had any energy for cleaning/cooking/much of anything lately, thanks to work getting so hectic. I just come home after a shift and lay on the couch, and usually fall asleep hours before I intend to. Sadly I'm also sending my nutrition to heck since I have to eat in the food court a lot, and have been drinking coffee like crazy because my husband's parents gave us a brand spankin' new coffeemaker that they just happened to have sitting around (these things happen, when his father is involved. It's amazing.)...

Now we're off to the grocery store, to buy some food with actual nutritional value, plus a final container of eggnog if they still have it. (Just discovered it this year, myself, and now I'm obsessed!) Hopefully this means that I'll be posting soon with tales of excellent cooking experiences and better eating (and drinking, to stay better hydrated). Hopefully...

Work and play

2009-12-15T23:18:00.000-05:00

Things I've done in the past week:

watched my 6 nephews for five days (along with my husband, thankfully)
made highly successful meals while doing so, including lasagna and chicken with green bean casserole
discovered that Phineas and Ferb is hilariously awesome
finished Forest Born
went to the doctor, who told me that my sore throat was a "thrush" (whatever that means) and also that my dizzy spells, which have been happening over the last several months, are probably from being dehydrated, which can lower your blood pressure (mine is already low normally) and make you really sensitive to changes in heat
did some Christmas shopping
worked
finished Xenosaga III, thereby completing the trilogy (I really liked the games but the end was depressing and some of the plot was RIDICULOUS)
started Grandia III (and no, I haven't played Grandia I or II; loving this one so far though)

Things I need to do in the coming week:

wrap a LOT of presents
buy a few more
CLEAN THE FRIGGING APARTMENT
do some laundry
go to the vacuum repair shop to see if ours can be saved
finish the other book I have signed out
make a vet appointment for the cats
force my husband to write a resume

Sigh. I'm getting pretty bogged down by a lot of this stuff, and I find myself sitting around and doing the easy, fun stuff instead of the hard things. I really need to fix that.

Successss

2009-12-02T05:25:00.000-05:00

Made bangers & mash for dinner tonight. With gravy (although I used store-bought gravy. Wasn't even gonna ATTEMPT that at the moment). AND IT WAS MARVELOUS. Finally found a kind of sausage that the husband and I both like! The mashed potatoes even turned out better than normal.

I also picked up an issue of Martha Stewart's Everyday Food, which looks promising. I love that it has a shopping list for the 5 main recipes - very helpful. We'll see how the recipes go!

***

We put up our Christmas tree tonight! I found some really neat garland at WalMart today and I started actually getting into a Christmas-y mood, so I figured I better strike while the iron was hot. When my husband was deployed last year, all my holiday spirit went right out the window. The only tree I put up was 4 inches tall and made of silver tinsel. I am sure it would have been different if I'd had kids, but when I'm alone, I become somewhat of a grinch, I guess.

The tree looks great, and I have more decorations to put up.... so off I go!

Cooking stuff; tech vs. tradition

2009-12-01T05:40:00.000-05:00

First off, I actually cooked stuff for Thanksgiving! Being once again relegated to the "bring a veggie" or "bring the rolls" crowd, I realized something. I think that part of why I am so inexperienced at cooking, especially for the holidays, is that i was never entrusted with anything of significance. So, this year I decided that even if i was bringing a veggie, it was going to be something that required some actual cooking.

Hence: Grandma's Corn Pudding and Green Bean Casserole (we used a different recipe that didn't involve crackers - the one off the French fried onions package). The corn pudding recipe is apparently really more like scalloped corn, since it uses lots of eggs and is extremely fluffy rather than being bread-like. Both styles are delicious. As for the green bean casserole, I'd made it before and would make it again. I can also attest that both items reheat well.

***

On a very different subject... I found this blog post by David Weir very interesting: Time to Move My Bookshelves Into My Pocket? This is an issue I've considered as well, as my book collection has surpassed 1,000 and my bookshelves are stacked two-deep (even though I bought two more shelves a year or so ago). I get dragged down sometimes by the idea of just how much stuff I have, and the effort it takes to move it all when the need arises. Obviously books aren't the only problem, but they are the most numerous, and one of the heaviest.

I don't think that the choice between physical books and ebooks has to be all-or-nothing. There are books in my collection that I don't plan to ever discard, and which may get passed on to my children someday. But there are also hundreds of books that are just sitting there waiting for me to get to them - in some cases, these have been in boxes in my parents' basement for ten years or more - and I think I (and my parents too) would benefit from having them in a digital, space-saving format.

I've been drooling over the Kindle and Barnes & Noble's new nook reader. I've seen the Sony eReaders in person and they hold no sway over me. The idea appeals to me, but the price does not. Even if I was willing to shell out the $259 for the device itself, I am pretty disgusted with the prices of ebooks. You cannot tell me it takes as much money to publish an ebook as it does to print, package, and ship a physical book, even though I do understand that the bulk quantities being produced do lower the costs per book. Happily, some companies are trying out new options and are offering their new release ebooks at lower prices. Still, there is no such thing as bag day book sales for ebooks, so far - I won't be picking them up for a quarter or fifty cents.

I am semi-impatiently waiting for a full demo model of the nook to arrive at our local B&N...

Happy Thanksgiving!

2009-11-26T15:08:00.000-05:00

Things I am thankful for:

my marvelous husband, who is so friggin' good to me
my lovely, entertaining, not-drama-prone family
many great friends who are smart, funny, and fun to be around
two most excellent kitties, of course
a nice place to live and nice things to fill it with (way too many things)
a job that I enjoy, for the most part

I hope everyone stops to think about what they are thankful for today. And eats lots of yummy food.

"Do they have to keep repeating EVERYTHING?"

2009-11-25T16:40:00.000-05:00

Finally had a day to relax yesterday, so I spent a bunch of it playing Xenosaga III. That game.... it's mostly cut scenes. You can literally sit there for an hour watching movie bits without having to do more than X through the dialogue. The story is confusing as heck, and the voice acting is mostly terrible... and yet somehow, I'm still enjoying this game. I'll be sad when it's done, because then there is no more Xenosaga to play.

I did manage to take books to the used bookstore yesterday, so that's one goal accomplished for the week. Unfortunately she only wanted a few, and I have a whole box of them to go. I guess I will just donate the rest to the library book sale.

I'm doing pretty well on the thermostat - using blankets and sweaters instead of turning it up. I'll stick with it as long as I can stand it. It's more of a lifestyle change, really, and I'll be very happy if I can switch myself over permanently.

Looking forward to Thanksgiving tomorrow, and I don't even mind having to work Black Friday. (We'll see how I feel about that after Black Friday is over.)

Let's give it a shot

2009-11-22T03:35:00.000-05:00

I recently picked up one of the many, many guides to greener living in the bargain bin. It's Green, Greener, Greenest: A Practical Guide to Making Eco-Smart Choices a Part of Your Life by Lori Bongiorno (with a forward by Frances Beinecke). I like the idea of this book, because it isn't the type of book that expects you to just jump into total lifestyle change from day one. The author of this book gives you options of just how far you want to take things, whether your limiter is expense, access to necessary items, or just motivation.

The chapters are divided into categories such as Food, Home Building, Babies and Children... and in each category, suggestions fall under "Green," "Greener," or "Greenest." This bypasses the feeling you get with some books where if you're not following every single instruction, you're just being too lazy to make the effort and obviously don't care about the subject matter at all (a good example of this, in my opinion, was Skinny Bitch).

Goals for this coming week:

Instead of turning up the thermostat, use blankets and wear warmer clothing. Obvious, but I'm a giant wuss about being cold. So, I'll try to be less wussy.
See if the local used bookstores will buy any of the books I'm done with... and if they won't, donate them to the local library sale.
Bonus task: find out if the local recycling plant offers tours! I am fascinated by this process and I'd love some confirmation that the effort I put into recycling is really worth it.

Happily, we got to hang out with friends tonight (for the first time in weeks, I think) and it made us clean up the apartment. Our spare room, however, is a TOTAL DISASTER and we really need to tackle it. There is a lot of stuff in there just waiting to be dispersed to the right place - eBay, Salvation Army, etc. - and we need to reach the point where we can see the floor again. Weed out, weed out, weed out! My unruly stash of craft supplies (especially yarn) is not helping either, so I'm determined to use some of the stash for Christmas gifts this year. Less money spent, and I'll be making use of yarn I just haddddd to have at one point or another. One project has been completed already, and I have a few others in mind. Finishing up UFOs also falls into this category.

The husband made a nice dinner tonight, so we ate a decent meal, and I am using the leftovers to pack a lunch for tomorrow so I'm not stuck eating in the food court again. Wish me luck in remembering to take it with me. Heh.

Here we go

2009-11-21T02:39:00.000-05:00

Things that have happened this year:

fiance got home from deployment (technically, on New Year's Eve last year)
got married
did another semester of school
decided NOT to do another semester of school

Things that will happen soon:

turning 30
losing my job

Things I need to work on:

clean more
learn to cook
live greener
assist with finding a job for the husband...
did I mention learn to cook? Because that's a big one.

I don't know how successful I will be in keeping this up, but I need some motivation to get moving on these issues, and I thought it might help to have a place to discuss some of it - questions, progress, successes, failures.

I'm just trying to get my head together as I (soon) begin my third decade and the supposedly "grown-up" phase of my life. Probably will throw in some book and knitting stuff on the way.

Par exemple: One of the best books I've read lately is Soulless by Gail Carriger (the first book in her forthcoming Parasol Protectorate trilogy). It's everything I didn't even know I was looking for in a paranormal romance. Highly recommended if you don't mind some werewolves with your tea and crumpets.

Something else to check out: Simple 4-Step Carbon Footprint Calculator. I checked mine and it said 14.3 hectares. We're good on recycling but probably bad on electricity and gas. Admittedly, it's a rather simplistic test.