KirstenL4W

I was trying to finish up work today when a coworker came to my desk to see if I had an entry she was looking for. As I reached for the pile it would have been in, I got a paper cut. Considering the volume of paper I handle every day, this is not surprising, even though I rarely actually get a paper cut. But this tiny little cut caused me blinding pain - so much so that I started to sweat for a few minutes. Paper cuts are known to be painful, but why would this tiny little cut cause such a reaction? It was under my fingernail - my thumbnail, to be exact. And every time I hit the space bar as I type this post, I am reminded of it. Try as I might, I cannot hit the space bar with my other hand, because I am a righty, and my right thumb is the one that wants to keep spacing out.

Last week, FH and I went out to eat for lunch. Since this place serves breakfast all day, and it was still relatively early for me (for a Saturday, anyway), I decided to have pancakes. These were no silver dollar pancakes, though. No, these things resembled manhole covers. Yep, you heard me right. Check this out:

As you can see from the photo, it is a full 8 inches across. That’s approximately 20 centimetres to the rest of the world. That’s one enormous pancake. I ate the other one. Is it any wonder why I couldn’t finish the second one? And I know you’re all asking - where does one obtain such large breakfast foods? At the Black Bear Diner, of course!

After lunch, and running a couple other errands, we decided that we didn’t want to go home yet, didn’t want to do the usual things, and wanted something different to do. After a bit of thought and aimless wandering, we decided to go see the Lost City, in Overton, NV. Lake Mead is seriously low on water right now, and there is an old city that was flooded and left underwater when Hoover Dam was finished and Lake Mead was formed. With the water level so low, the ruins of the city are visible, and there’s a museum dedicated to it. Being the sort of people who are interested in such things, we headed up to Overton to see it. All I can say is that we were disappointed. We somehow thought we’d be able to see the actual Lost City. Nope. Didn’t even see Lake Mead at all. We saw a small-town ancient history museum that mainly exhibited the finding of the place, and a reproduction of a pueblo. Nice drive, disappointing destination. With all that’s been said about being able to see the Lost City, we really thought we’d be able to see it. Instead we find out that we saw the same exact thing we would have seen if Lake Mead was overflowing. The Imposter City.

My thumb is throbbing now and it’s affecting my typing, so that’s all you’ll get out of me until this darn thing heals a bit. So long for now.

I have rediscovered joy in the mundane.  I heard it was coming, and even took a quick peek once or twice once it was here.  But today, I did it.  My first real grocery shop at the new chain: Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market.  It’s Tesco’s foray into the US market.  I shopped at Tesco when I was in London, and aside from the joy that is shopping in a foreign supermarket, I liked the small store geared for city shoppers who cannot schlep home their week’s shopping on the Tube.

I also used to work for a supermarket, off and on, from the time I was in high school until I left to move to Las Vegas.  Added up, it was something like 8 years, but if you start with my original hire date of 1/1992 until I left in 5/2003, you’ll see that I just could not stay away from the place.  I even enjoyed shopping there.  When I moved to Vegas, I saw that the grocery scene was very different.  People aren’t loyal to a particular store.  How can they be?  No one store will carry everything that you want, like stores back home will.  Here, getting all that you want, all the brands, varieties, and flavors, requires trips to the 4 or so major chains.  Then there’s WarMart and her secretly smart and pretty cousin Kay, only one of which I have found actually has a food section.  We also have 3 chains of soccer mom natural grocery stores - Whole Paycheck, Wild Hay, and Trader Joe’s, where Boyfriend and I have taken to shopping lately.  But there wasn’t as much variety as I like, and I was getting really sad.

Enter Big Bad Mama Detroit.   BBMD lives right next door to a F&E, and loves shopping there.  Boyfriend and I were on our way to her house for dinner the other night, and we said we’d bring dessert.  Since she pointed out the F&E in the directions, I figured we’d stop there to pick something up.  The store is super organized, which appealed to my sense of order.  It’s small, with lower shelves, so you don’t get lost and don’t get whiplash looking for what you need.  And OMG the produce!  Being in the middle of the desert where it’s darn near impossible to grow anything, Boyfriend and I have both commented that we’ve thrown away better looking stuff than can be found in the average supermarket here.  But F&E has super fresh, great looking produce!  The best part is that it doesn’t cost an arm and a leg.  I picked up some rosemary, potatoes, strawberries, and salad fixins.

But wait, there’s more!  I nearly short circuited myself in the meat aisle.  I’m not a huge meat eater, but I like a variety.  Not only did they have big ol’ slabs of meat, they also had some ready to cook options like kebabs, seasoned meats, stuffed meats, and other delicious meal options.  I wanted it all.  I couldn’t decide, but finally settled on some chicken drumsticks for dinner tomorrow, and a big pork roast that I’ll stick in the crock pot on Wednesday with some BBQ sauce.  Both will give us plenty of leftovers for the rest of the week.  They were marked down because they were both going out of code in like, 2 days, but they looked just as good as the stuff with more recent dates on it.

The store carries a lot of its own brand for the rest of the groceries, but they did have a selection of name brands too.  Boyfriend and I are trying to focus on fresh foods, so we don’t buy pantry items as often as we used to, but they did have tahini, which I know can be hard to find at conventional megamarts.

Boyfriend and I have been spending less at Trader Joe’s than we ever did at a regular store, and even though I didn’t buy as much as we usually do, I found the monetary outflow to be on par with TJ’s.  I stopped in on my way home from work, and other than the quick dessert run the other night Boyfriend really hasn’t had time to explore, so I think we’ll try to stop by next time we do a grocery shop so he can really check the place out.  Even if it’s not a regular thing, it will allow a stop by the free sample bar to try the delicious foods they offer.   I know I’ll be returning.

On Monday, Boyfriend and I headed to LA to have lunch.  I know what you’re saying - there are plenty of really decent places here in Vegas to eat, but there was more.  Boyfriend wanted to meet some Silly Little Game friends.  Since LA is a 4-5 hour drive from Vegas (depending on traffic and where in LA you are going), it is on the lower end of reasonable for a day trip.  Heck, I go to LA just to shop at IKEA since they still won’t believe that Vegas is a viable market.  But I digress.  The topic here is lunch with friends.

The friends chose the Monte Carlo Deli in Burbank as the place to meet.  Just hearing that it was an Italian deli had me excited.  I’m from the east coast, and while the deli as a popular lunch spot is more of a New York thing, I just wanted a little individuality, which Vegas is sorely lacking.  There were some tough choices to be made, but I ended up with a bit of a lighter dish - the tuna salad with sides of green salad and pasta salad.  I just didn’t want anything heavy since we were spending a lot of time in the car.

We met the SLG friends outside and all went in together.  One of them is from MA, so we had fun whipping out our Boston accents, much to the amusement of Boyfriend.  I just don’t understand what it is about the Boston accent that turns ordinary speech into a circus act.  But hey, it keeps Boyfriend laughing, and his happiness is important to me, so I just roll with it.  Anyway, we all ate lunch, chatted, chatted some more, had some gelato, and chatted some more before the time dictated that Boyfriend and I get back on the road.  There’s a store in Fullerton that we wanted to get to before they closed, and then get home so that I could get at least a few hours sleep before work in the morning.

I was noticing a few things on the way home.  Barstow is about halfway between Vegas and LA, and provides a really good area to stop in - there are truck stops, outlet stores, and even some people that live there.  On the way back to Vegas I noticed a sign that said “California Welcome Center Next Stop.”  What I didn’t really understand is that Barstow is really the last real town before you hit Vegas, so why oh why would there be a Welcome Center for a state that most people, when passing that sign, are on their way out of the state?  Californians are weird.

There is a town rest stop about halfway between Barstow and Vegas called Baker.  Baker has a few tiny motels, convenience stores, and fast food places.   Baker is the home of the world’s tallest thermometer, which is a pretty neat feature - you can see exactly how hot it is in the Mojave desert when you’re on your way to Vegas or Death Valley.  My mom, when I told her about this, just had to ask, “Is it a rectal thermometer?”  Silly Mommy.  But we did stop in Baker for a reason, and that was Greek food.  Boyfriend is of Greek ancestry, and has gotten me to like a bit of it.  So The Mad Greek was the last destination of our trip.  We both got gyros with yummy rice pilaf and some baklava to go, all of which was yummy.

We rolled back into town around midnight, so I had to get to bed right away.  It was a great day - we got to get out of town, meet some friends, and eat excellent food.  Can’t get much better than that.

Is anyone here lactose intolerant? I am. I don’t have to religiously read the ingredients on food packages, and there are dairy products that I can have without much issue. But sometimes the rules decide to change themselves on me.

I don’t care to drink plain milk, but I make pudding and chocolate milk with Lactaid, which tastes the same as milk. I’ve never had a problem with my favorite ice cream, and I love cheese, especially a nice sharp, hard cheese. I don’t have issues with these things. I do avoid creamy dishes, though because of the cheese I’m OK with alfredo. I avoid all ice cream products from Sonic, which I learned the hard way. Even real whipped cream has been known to mark its territory. Italian food, which is often times smothered in mozzarella cheese, has never bothered me. Until last night.

Boyfriend and I were out for our weekly oil change last night. Our regular Greasy Spoon very suddenly shut its doors this week, leaving us in the lurch. We quickly came up with a new place to meet, which is a place that we’ve been to a couple times before. I ordered the chicken parm sandwich, which was delish. I didn’t notice until later, but there was an awful lot of cheese on it.

TMI ahead

I don’t like coffee.  I don’t like anything coffee flavored.  I don’t even like mocha, which is half coffee, half chocolate - and I am a huge chocoholic.  Therefore, when I wake up in the morning and start stumbling around, all I have is juice to drink.  After I fall asleep standing up in the shower, as nearly happened this morning, I find myself in a big hurry to get to work so I can get myself an o-so-healthy diet cola so I can finally get my hands on some caffeine.  This morning, I had an idea for a great product - caffeinated fruit juice.  They make juices with vitamins and calcium and all sorts of other stuff, so why not caffeine?  Then I wouldn’t need to resort to diet soda.  Seriously, what beverage options are there for us who need caffeine?  Coffee, tea, soda, and those jet fuel drinks.  Soda’s the only one I really like out of all those.  So come on, juice seller people.  Put some caffeine in the stuff so picky people like me can stay awake in the morning!

I weighed in the other day at WW.  I’m up one pound, but considering the bloat due to Aunt Flo’s visit, I’m not worried about it.  The bloat is gone already and I’m feeling even better.  I am having a few challenges this week, though.  Friday we had a potluck lunch to celebrate tomorrow’s big game.  Let me tell you how hard it is to figure out point values on stuff like that.  I did my best to behave.  First off, I made sure that I wrote down every single morsel that went into my mouth, so I stayed away from mindless munching (chips!).  I also kept myself to sample servings - no loaded plate for me!  And I only took one thing at a time, going back to my desk to eat it, and having to get up every time I wanted something else.  I stayed away from the fatty meatballs and dips, except for one spinach dip that my coworker assured me she made with lo-fat sour cream.  And I was extra careful not to stuff myself.  While I probably went over on my daily points allowance, it was difficult, if not impossible to calculate how much I ate, points-wise.

Tomorrow there is another challenge - the monthly brunch buffet.  I wouldn’t be so concerned if it was just the potluck or the buffet, but the fact that they are happening two days apart means I need to be more careful.  Tomorrow is the day that Boyfriend and I, along with our regular group of miscreants friends meet for a Sunday brunch at one of the local buffets.  Most people end up rolling themselves out of the buffet because they eat too much.  I have been to a buffet so often that I no longer feel the need to stuff myself silly.  There’s a strategy to it.  First, I cruise all the stations to see what’s on offer.  Then I head to the salad bar to fill up on healthy stuff.  After that, I pick one station at a time and select a few things that look good, taking only small portions - sample sizes, if you will.  I space it out, since we tend to be there quite awhile, so there is no hurry to cram it all in.  And of course, one cannot forget dessert.  Dessert portions at the buffet tend to be smaller than at a restaurant, so it’s possible to try a few things without going overboard.  I just hope I can keep it under control tomorrow.

The Beeb

Boyfriend has been spending a lot of time with his new girlfriend, Beeb. How strange it is to find a native Californian, with no concept of a holiday like we have in New England, eating weird foods like sushi and avocado, and yet he has such a fine appreciation for Jolly Olde England. His only caveat about watching it so much is that he is tempted more and more to just sell everything and move there. Now, I’ve been to the UK - 3 times, in fact. I love it there - LOVE it. And I don’t think I would hesitate too much if that ever became a reality. I’d just end up overthinking it - the logistics of moving overseas, the logistics of being American in a foreign country, etc. And that sort of overthinking would stress me out to no end. But it would be a good kind of stress. So, (insert British accent here) dear Boyfriend, keep spending time with Beeb, sweetie darling.

The Post Office

The post office, like all government offices, was closed today for Veteran’s Day. When I have to work, as does everyone I know, on these so-called “floater” holidays (aka bank holidays, aka if you’re lucky you get one or two of these off per year in addition to the big holidays), we tend to forget that things like the post office are closed. I had my latest mix CD to mail out for the exchange, and considering what a procrastinator I can be, I wanted to mail these out the minute I was done with them rather than let them languish in my car for a month. So after work I stopped in at the post office, and for a second I was relieved that it wasn’t crowded. Until I realized that the main post office in all of Las Vegas would never be that deserted unless it was closed. Have no fear, they have an automated postage machine that’s available 24 hours. It’s like an actual clerk without the human. I had 11 packages and no complicated questions, and I was paying with a debit or credit card, so I figured that this would be easy. Until it decides that each individual package is a separate transaction. After swiping my card, entering my pin, and taking a receipt 4 times, I decided to just buy the stamps, since I knew exactly how much they were. This nifty machine lets you buy stamps in any denomination you want. I needed 7 more stamps for $1.14 each. BUT this silly little machine only has the ability to do 5 at a time. Two more transactions later and I was done. I took my 6 receipts, stuck my postage on the packages, and dumped them in the parcel drop. Phew! Next time the post office decides to take one of their bi-weekly holidays, I’ll plan ahead and NOT TRY TO MAIL SOMETHING.

Chocolate Chip Cookies

Boyfriend decided after dinner that he wanted dessert. Since we haven’t been shopping yet, we didn’t have anything dessert-like in the house. Boyfriend was asking for cookies, so I went to the store to get the rest of the ingredients for chocolate chip cookies, since as far as cookies go, they are the easiest as far as I’m concerned. Now, I do realize that we’ve been trying to eat healthier by shopping at non-crap stores like Trader Joe’s, there’s only one recipe I was considering for chocolate chip cookies: the recipe found on the back of a Butter Flavor Crisco can. Oh yeah, not just lard - butter flavored lard! I just hope the darn things last until I get home from work tomorrow.

Delta Airlines & Orbitz

Waaaay back in February, I booked a ticked to Southwest Florida International Airport so that I can spend time with my sister and my newest niece, Mia, for Thanksgiving. I did my homework and instead of choosing the absolute cheapest flight I found, I took my sister’s schedule into consideration and picked a flight that would arrive and leave at times that were convenient for her, so no late night arrivals or early morning departures. In fact, I’m not even coming or going during Mia’s nap time. I was also watching the connection times. There is no such thing as a non-stop flight from Las Vegas to Ft Myers, so I knew I’d have a connection. On such a busy traveling weekend, I did not want a tight connection, so I picked an itinerary with a 3 hour connection in Atlanta. Not my first choice of airports, but whatever. 3 hours should allow for a delay and still get my on my connection.

Back in June, I got an email from Orbitz telling me that the airline has made a change to my itinerary. I looked over the email, and the new itinerary and old one were exactly the same, so I did nothing, as advised by Orbitz if all was acceptable. Well, today I decided to log into Orbitz to check things over, and there was a change - a big one. They changed not just the time of my flight, but my entire flight from Las Vegas to Atlanta, leaving me with - get this - a 34 minute connection. Totally unacceptable, even if I was connecting in a teeny tiny 1-room airport during the slowest of travel times. So I called Delta India, spent 20 minutes explaining to the guy why a 34 minute connection was unacceptable and I wanted to be back on the original flight I booked, put up with him as he tried to fly me out of Vegas on Wednesday night (to make my connection Wednesday morning in Atlanta), put up with him as he changed my Atlanta to Fort Myers flight, then finally got it right by putting me back on my original flight. Grrr. He emailed me a new copy of the itinerary, and I have a printout of the original flight change email, “new” itinerary, and the email from Delta India with my old new itinerary. I’m not checking any luggage, and I don’t plan on getting all pissed off, I just want to get to Ft Myers. I’ll get there early and with plenty of smiles to make sure I get on the flights I booked. Something tells me I’ll be ok getting to Florida, since most people don’t all fly on the same day going to their Thanksgiving destination. However, they all absolutely must fly home on that Sunday, so something tells me I’ll have issues while connecting in Cincinnati on my way home. I’ll let you know.

So that’s all for now. Time to start composing my post for Tuesday, in which I reveal my latest mix exchange CD.

As I mentioned in a previous post, I grew up with your garden variety Betty Crocker 1950s Cookbook (Betty Crocker)kind of food. You know the stuff - Tuna Casserole, meatloaf, etc. But there were also some interesting variations on the norm.

I think it’s necessary to separate this post into two parts. My parents are divorced, so I grew up with not only my mom’s cooking, but also my stepmonster’s. One can cook. One only thinks she can.

My stepmonster is the one who thinks she can cook. She’s the worst kind. Her cooking is mostly edible, but that’s giving her too much praise, really. She screws up pasta. For example, she’ll cook angel hair pasta because it’s quicker, ok. Then she’ll go sit down and play a couple hands of solitaire (with a real deck of cards. No sophisticated computer games for her.) As she’s playing with herself, the pasta is boiling away. Keep in mind that angel hair pasta only takes about 3-5 minutes to cook, depending on the variety you buy. Hers? Comes out way thicker than regular spaghetti. And all the starch that cooks out of it and sits in the cooking water ends up as giant blobs of slime all over the pasta, because she doesn’t understand the concept of rinsing. I mean, if she doesn’t understand the concept of cooking time, then it’s a given that she doesn’t get everything else that comes after that.

Let’s see, what else has she messed up? Oh, speaking of cooking times, there’s the roast beef that takes 45 minutes to cook. Sure, she likes her meat rare, but the rest of us would at least like it warm in the middle. So yeah, gross. And then there’s her famous debacles:

Pot Roast - you know how when you cook a pot roast you usually put some root vegetables in the pot, like potatoes, carrots, turnips, etc? She gets tired of the same old thing. So one time there was broccoli in it. It was so nasty that the dogs wouldn’t even touch it, and these dogs ate nearly everything. My sister and I were stuck eating this crap.

Chicken Cordon Bleu - chicken breast with a stuffing of ham and cheese, usually Swiss cheese. In this case, my stepmonster decided to use Velveeta. Oh yeah. AND - it gets better - she put melted Velveeta on top of it before she put it in the oven. Do you know what happens to processed cheese product when it’s in the oven for that length of time (because she never undercooked chicken)? It turns into a plastic shell. ‘Nuff said.

Then there’s her famous food combos. My stepmonster is of the belief that all meals must include a meat, starch, and vegetable. What she doesn’t get is the whole concept of complimentary side dishes. There is one combo in particular that sticks out in my mind. (I fully expect a scathing phone call from my sister for bringing back this repressed memory.) One summer evening, dear old stephag decided to feature summer squash on the menu. Summer squash was always watery and soggy, way overcooked. That cooking time thing again. The meat has long since been forgotten, since it is not important in this equation. What is important, however, is the starch that was on the meal. It was - get ready for it - Spagettios. You read it right. My sister will tell you that summer squash and spagettios do not go together. So will my old next door neighbor, who got out his garden hose to wash all the puke out of the neighborhood, most of which landed in his yard. Nine times she puked. I don’t think my sister has had either one of those foods since.

Meals with my stepmonster weren’t all that bad. Sometimes we went out to eat. In fact, it was a regular weekend thing, so we always had that to look forward to. Also, we visited my mother on the weekends, and my mom can cook. Most of what and how I cook today comes from her, and of course my dear Gram and Grandma.

So, Mommy’s cooking. Mom has about a dozen tried and true meals that I always look forward to when she makes them. However, being blond, my mom has been known to mess things up on occasion. (No offense to blonds who would be offended by that.)

My mom’s meatloaf rocks, because she makes it like a giant Swedish meatball (my Mom’s grandparents came from Sweden, so we know how to make a real Swedish meatball). Basic meatball recipe includes finely chopped onion, salt, pepper, and allspice. One night I took a bite of the meatloaf.

“So, how is it?” Mom asked.

“Well, it’s good, but there’s a bit too much cinnamon in it,” I replied.

“What? I didn’t put any cinnamon in it. That’s allspice!” Mom took a bite, realized that it was cinnamon, and went over to the spice cabinet. She starts tearing through the carefully arranged yet overflowing cabinet to get to the designated allspice spot, where she sees… cinnamon. Well, it must be someone else’s fault, because the allspice is not where it’s supposed to be. The rant went on for awhile about this, as my human garbage disposal stepfather happily ate the cinnamon-infused meatloaf.

Another time my mom made tuna casserole. “So, how is it?” she asked. It just occurred to me that whenever my mom asks how the meal is, it must be messed up. She never asks that when everything turns out ok.

“It’s really good, Mom, but there’s not a lot of tuna in here.”

“I forgot it,” she said with a sheepish grin on her face.

Those are the two that come to mind. Luckily, my mom doesn’t make it a habit of screwing up dinner. Though she did call me last night to ask how to de-heat chili. I didn’t know, but Boyfriend did, so when I called her back to tell her she said that the chili wasn’t too hot, it was just that all the spice seemed to land on the spoon that she was stirring/tasting with. Just another blonde moment.

One of my favorite meals, though, is something that was created from a screwup of Biblical proportions. I mentioned before that my family came from Sweden. Well, Swedish cooking is rather bland, and somewhat basic. When I was in Sweden about 10 years ago now, my friend told me that a lot of stuff we take for granted now, like spaghetti, is still considered exotic cuisine, mostly by older Swedes, but it’s fairly new to Sweden. When my family came over less that 100 years ago, they’d never seen the stuff before.

One night, I believe it was one of my mom’s cousins, ate over a friend’s house and had spaghetti for the first time. The meal was described to my great-grandmother, who tried to replicate it as best she could. Pasta, hot dogs, and tomato soup. Campbell’s, straight from the can. Ok, maybe the first incarnation had ground beef in it. It’s good that way too. But hot dogs is where it’s at today, and it must be made with elbow macaroni so that it can be called by its proper name: Smiles. It is my ultimate comfort food, the one food I will eat when nothing else appeals to me.

So now you know the story of how my palate was developed. I bet my sushi post makes a lot more sense now. Boyfriend certainly is a lot more enlightened about my food cravings than he was when we first met.

My sister called me a little while ago. I was kinda surprised that my phone was ringing, since most of the people who call me are on the east coast, and it was well after 11pm there when she called. She was so excited, she had to call someone, and I was the only person she knew who would be awake. Just a few minutes before she called, she and her man were out on the lanai enjoying the evening when all of a sudden, the utility poles on the next street blew up, one after another all in a row. She said it was spectacular. Of course, she’s enjoying the romantic candlelight right now. Ah, the things I have to look forward to when I go to visit her for Thanksgiving.

Earlier today, I decided I was going to finally try a sandwich shop that continuously wins Best of Las Vegas awards. I saw that they had a roast beef sandwich - not a sub with au jus - so I decided to try it. I have not had a good roast beef sandwich since I was back in Massachusetts. You just can’t seem to find one once you leave Mass. And all you fast food enthusiasts out there, please don’t even suggest Arby’s. I ate there once - ONCE. They have roast beef loaf instead of the real deal. I’m all set with that. What I want is a good old fashioned roast beef sandwich.

While the sandwich I had today was far beyond Arby’s, it was not what I had expected. The meat was well done, and though I usually like my meat on the fully cooked side, there is only one way to eat roast beast: rare. Also, the meat was a bit over-seasoned, and though it was shredded, it was cut way to thick. They grilled the roll for me as I asked, but it wasn’t buttery enough. At least they had Tastykakes. Yes, I know, Tastykakes aren’t a New England thing, but gimmee a break. My mom is from New Jersey and I developed a liking for them on my many visits to the family farm.

I want a roast beef sandwich with rare roast beef, sliced on the thinnest deli slicer setting. Yes, I want my meat to be see-through. A very buttery onion roll, grilled to a light golden brown so you get a nice crunch when you take a bite. Lots of mayo. Some people like BBQ or horseradish sauce, but I like to clog my arteries. I can’t find one here. I asked a coworker today if she knew where I could find one. Since she lived in Boston for a number of years, and she’s been in town at least as long as I have, I figured that if anyone would know she would. And yet, she didn’t. Meh. I guess I need to add it to my list of foods to eat when I go back there again.

On a side note, I was in the middle of composing this post, switching back and forth between tabs, and on my way back to the tab that I had my Create Post in I accidentally clicked the X to close it instead. OH NO!!!!! But I checked the menus in Firefox, and lo and behold, I came back without having to recreate my post. For those wondering, I went to History > Recently Closed Tabs. It not only brought me back to this page, but my entire post was intact! Yippee!

And time for some more pimpin’ - Zac was on tv this morning pimpin’ the hearse club. It was an interview on early morning news, and you can view it here (if you can’t see it, look for the “Get a hearse!” segment. Don’t forget to watch the video!

In other news, the winds have stopped blowing all the smoke from the California fires out to sea, and while it’s not blowing this way like it did in 2003. Back then visibility was pretty bad - less than 1/4 mile and the whole valley smelled like a big campfire. The smoke is here now, though, and my eyes are really bothering me. This picture shows the smoke coverage as of today. The air quality forecast shows a smoke advisory issued through Sunday, though in the moderate level. So we can still see where we’re going when we’re driving around, but my eyes will be feeling like this for awhile. Joy.

I could probably find some more links for you, but it’s late and I’m going to watch the news. Kevin Janison is telling us that the lack of winds is keeping the smoke here through the weekend.

Thursday was Boyfriend’s birthday. He thinks he’s old, but really, he’s not, so he just needs to get over that. Anyway, I was absolutely forbidden to tell any of our friends that his birthday was coming up. He did not want a big deal made and did not want to be surprised. Well, I got around that, and without breaking any laws that he set for me. Hahahahahahahaha!

I may have mentioned that Boyfriend’s ex-gf was instrumental in getting us together. We are all friends, so that made it easy to plan things behind his back. A little over a month ago, we were all at a party and I had some time to chat with her. I asked her if she knew when Boyfriend’s birthday was, and she gave me the date, so I knew she had the right answer. I then told her that I was under no circumstances allowed to tell anyone about it. She got that ear-to-ear shit-eating grin on her face and said she had it covered. Ha! Now I was able to make a big deal about it without breaking any rules or doing much of anything in the way of planning. I knew the rest of our friends would run away with it, because that’s the kind of pals they are.

As for a more private celebration, I new there had to be a gift. I had a few ideas of what to get him, but wasn’t having much luck finding what I wanted. No worries, it still leaves me ideas for the holidays. Anyway, I was just checking one last store at the mall when I found a Pouring Shield for the Kitchen-Aid mixer. Boyfriend has a Kitchen-Aid, which if any of you have used one is the greatest stand mixer ever. Boyfriend likes to bake, but makes a horrible mess because food is always flying out of the bowl. The pouring shield prevents this, so his gift ended up being one of those utilitarian things that makes (my) life easier. (I’m the one who does the cleaning, but let me tell you, cleaning up last night after he made cookies was much less of an ordeal than cleaning up after he made pie a few weeks ago.)

Now don’t go thinking that I’m the kind of girlfriend who gifts The Greatest Boyfriend of All Time with a little hunk of plastic and calls it good. Oh, no. No, the next part of his gift was designed to make him deliriously happy. Since they say that the way to a man’s heart is through his stomach, I took him out for dinner.

Before I go any further, let me tell you a few things about Boyfriend and me. I am from New England - suburban, bordering on rural. Adventurous eating is something that is just not done where I come from. I have an aunt and uncle who travel quite a bit and they eat weird stuff when they travel, and my step dad is known in the family to be a human garbage disposal. But other than that, our diets are really quite basic - the All-American, 1950’s Betty Crocker cookbook kinds of diets. Boyfriend, on the other hand, is from California. He eats weird stuff like avocados and sushi and other weird California stuff. So finding a happy medium is not always easy when either one of us is craving food from our respective back home area. Boyfriend thinks I don’t try enough new things (read: stuff he likes), but he’s slowly coming to the realization that I am one of the most adventurous eaters in my family and is starting to cut me some slack.

Back to dinner out. In the ultimate sacrifice of making my man happy on his birthday, I decided that I was going to choke down a piece of fish bait take him out for sushi. Boyfriend loves sushi, whereas I, coming from Massachusetts in particular, believe that there are only 2 ways to eat fish: beer-battered, deep fried and covered in ketchup, or baked/broiled/fried with lots of breadcrumbs and butter on the top. Either way it is served with a potato of some sort - either fries or baked/mashed. But do note that the fish is COOKED in both circumstances. Cooked in normal ingredients. Sushi, as most of you probably know, is raw fish wrapped in rice and seaweed and stuffed with other weird stuff like avocado, which seems to be in every freaking different kind of sushi there is. But no matter, it was going to make him happy for me to try it, so that is what I was going to do.

I was going to do a bit of a fake out on him by parking in the Red Lobster parking lot, which is next door to the fish bait sushi place that Boyfriend has mentioned. But before we got there, he figured it out, so dammit, fake-out cancelled. No matter. I had already done some reconnaissance on the place and saw that they had teriyaki bowls, so I would still have something to eat. We got there, sat down, and Boyfriend started going over the menu with me. There are some varieties that have cooked seafood in them, which was good since I am still completely repulsed by the thought of eating raw seafood. To me it’s on par with eating raw chicken or pork, so that was a no-go. Boyfriend selected some with cooked crab in it. Not a huge fan of crab on its own, but I suppose if I had committed to this, then that was it.

Let me tell you something else about sushi. When it arrives at your table, it is cut into bit-sized pieces. Well, bite-sized if you have a ginormous mouth like say, Julia Roberts, or you have a flip-top head like that cartoon guy in the Reach Toothbrush commercial. I do not have a huge mouth (no comments from the peanut gallery, please. I am talking about physical size here.) When I was getting braces on at the ripe old age of 16, I had to have not only my 4 wisdom teeth pulled, but also all 4 of my first bicuspids removed to make it all fit properly. My mouth is small. Individual pieces of sushi are not. They are not dainty, like the tiny 1-inch petit-fours you see on fancy dessert plates. No, they are huge 2-inch diameter rolls that are 1-inch high. How does one delicately shove it all in their mouth at one time? I didn’t want to appear that I was spewing sushi all over the table for any reason. I wanted to be polite and eat it all and actually have it go down. The giant piece was not going to do, so I cut it in half. I put it on my fork (because by now it would have fallen apart had I attempted to use chopsticks), and held it in front of my face for about 10 minutes before I finally got up the nerve to just shove it in.

It was not terrible. It wasn’t great, either. The crab meat was a bit overwhelming, and the rest of it didn’t leave much of an impression on me either way. Boyfriend had a look on his face that was mostly amused and of course totally in love with me for doing this for him. I finished chewing it and chased it with large amounts of Diet Coke, and ate some teriyaki, which, by the way, was really not that good. After a short time I finally got up the nerve to try the other half. This one didn’t have as much crab meat in it, so I thought it would be easier, but no, I was wrong. This one had a giant blob of cream cheese in it. Have I mentioned that I hate cream cheese? So this piece was worse because of that vile, tangy substance gluing itself to the deepest reaches of my mouth and refusing to budge. A refill on my Diet Coke finally fixed that.

The rest of the evening was really awesome, since it was more natural and I really had nothing to do with it (other than putting the pieces in place that allowed the cat to let itself out of the bag). We met our friends at our usual Thursday night gathering. There were a lot more people there than usual, and the vibe was really great, which is just not something that can be planned. One of our friends brought a cake, a delicious black forest cake, and we talked and laughed and had a great time. I really couldn’t have done a better job, because like I said, the vibe of the evening was really natural. On the way home I told Boyfriend how I got Ms. X in on it, and he was quite impressed with my sneaky, devious nature while still following his wishes.

So that was it - I ate sushi, and it wasn’t terrible. Boyfriend thinks I like it, because he says my face gave me away. I wouldn’t go that far. I might try it again, perhaps in a better quality place that has really good teriyaki, but I can assure you, like all Asian and Asian-inspired foods, it will not be something that I crave. But I ate it, and I did it because I love my Boyfriend and wanted him to have the bestest birthday ever. I don’t know if it was the best birthday ever, but he did say that it was a very good birthday, so mission accomplished.

Yes, please.

Boyfriend and I have been trying to save some money by not eating out as much. However, when the weekend rolls around we are usually out of the proper foods to make a meal and in no mood to go grocery shopping, so we end up eating out. Saturday night we opted for LoneStar Steakhouse. We’ve been there before, and I used to eat there a lot when I worked for Mad Scientist, and have never had a bad experience. Until now.

We ordered our drinks, the usual diet sodas. After more than a few minutes went by, we still had no sodas and I was starting to get the feeling that this was the wrong choice in food joints. A few seconds after I mentioned this to Boyfriend, the manager on duty came by and said they were having trouble with the CO₂ line on the diet soda and offered us something else to drink. We made our selections, and were also offered a free appetizer for our wait and inconvenience. Since we already ordered one, it was taken off our bill.

The server came around to take our dinner orders. Boyfriend placed his order, and I placed mine. I was ordering the Sweet Bourbon Salmon - a dish I had ordered many times before and have had good luck with. When I told the server what I wanted, she informed me that they cook it medium, and asked if that was ok. Excuse me? I told her that I wanted it cooked the way salmon is supposed to be cooked - all the way through. There are no degrees of done-ness with salmon - just raw, done, and leather. It should be cooked until it is opaque and flakes easily with a fork. After a few minutes of me making it perfectly clear that I wanted my fish COOKED and Boyfriend telling me to calm down, the server went to put our orders in. When our dinner arrived at the table, they asked me to cut into it to make sure it was the way I wanted it. It was not. My salmon was still translucent and a very different color on the inside. It finally came back a few minutes later, cooked properly and the manager on duty apologizing profusely and offering to take it off the bill. In the end, we only ended up paying for Boyfriend’s dinner and drink (I drank water). We also agreed that we would not be visiting LoneStar again for a long, long time if ever.

Now, I know that there are some fish varieties that do have degrees of done-ness. Sushi is one thing I refuse to eat. I don’t eat raw fish, and I don’t eat cold fish. Ahi tuna is another one that I’ve seen served rare - seared on the outside and raw in the middle. Again, not something I’ll eat. Until Saturday evening, I’ve never heard of salmon being cooked any other way than all the way. I have salmon quiet frequently at home and when eating out, and have never had it offered to me any other way than DONE. I did end up going to LoneStar’s website and letting them know how appalled I was at the restaurant offering undercooked seafood. I’ll probably get some coupons in the mail.

After the dinner debacle, Boyfriend and I went home to watch a movie. We ended up watching Dogma - one that I’ve never seen before but Boyfriend has. It was quite funny, but there was a lot to it. I’ll probably have to watch it a bunch more times to get a lot more of the jokes. Boyfriend says that being subjected to Catholic school as a kid helped him understand it more, and thinks that Catholics (current and former) will have a better understanding of the movie than Protestants and non-Christians. I myself am Lutheran but didn’t have a formal religious education growing up, but that’s a story for another time. In any case, a funny movie, some ice cream, and the company of Boyfriend at home were all that was needed to turn a bad outing into a good evening.

Have any of you been to Trader Joe’s? I’ve been in a few times, when I was shopping for 1, and usually would pick up a little something here and there, usually frozen foods. TJ’s is usually lumped in the same category as Wild Oats and Whole Foods, since they tend not to carry the same varieties of processed foods that conventional supermarkets do (no sugar puffs cereal, no foods in neon colors, etc). The other stores, however, cost a lot. They don’t call it “Whole Paycheck” for nothing. But if you shop at the other stores, they start to look like conventional stores dressed up in natural clothing. Not that Trader Joe’s is 100% all natural and all organic - I’m sure if you start looking hard enough you’ll find a preservative or something on one of their labels.

The thing that surprises most people once they start shopping there is that TJ’s is less expensive than a traditional supermarket. Yep, that’s right. Boyfriend was shocked at how little we spent, and we even got a giant piece of salmon for dinner. Now forget about your local Wally World megalomania mart - they may have better prices on regular stuff than the regular stores do, but come on now. Shopping there is a chore. Shopping at TJ’s is fun. The food looks great, yummy, delicious, even when it’s sitting in the frozen food cases. I’m inspired to cook when I’m there, and trust me, that ain’t an easy thing for me to feel.

Boyfriend did have a few criticisms. One, they’re not open 24 hours. In Vegas, all supermarkets are open 24 hours (except for the wild and whole ones). So closing at 9pm like they do puts a serious crimp in the last minute plans to go get some frozen taquitos. Boyfriend also said the the selection was a bit slim. Now, the stores are small - really small, like the tiny supermarket my extended family shops at when they’re spending time at the summer home at Lake Ossipee, NH. But when you go there and really look at the selection, you’ll see that they really don’t lack anything. Everything you need to make a decent meal - not even a health freak meal, I’m talking about a regular decent meal - is there. Besides, who really needs the toaster pastries with purple frosting?

Dunkin’ Donuts is coming to Las Vegas. My life will finally be complete.

I love roasted garlic. And now everyone in the office knows it. I just had some Chicken Crostina from the Olive Garden that I originally had the other night - “Potato-parmesan crusted chicken breasts sautéed with roma tomatoes and roasted garlic. Served with linguine tossed in a creamy garlic-butter sauce.” - and it was absolutely delish. But after the salad, breadsticks, and Hot Artichoke Spinach Dip, it was all I could do to get the rest of my dinner down without exploding. So, to-go box it was and to-work it went.

I’m also reminded of another one of my favorite Italian restaurants - Vinny T’s. At Vinny’s, the bread basket is nothing short of spectacular. The bread itself is focaccia bread, but it’s the way it’s served that makes it what it is. They give you - get this - a whole head of roasted garlic to spread on your bread and taste the garlicky goodness! Oh yes! It’s worth it to go there just for that.

I myself am a bit lazy to roast garlic, since I spent most of my adult years cooking for 1. I usually keep a jar of the minced, roasted garlic in my fridge, and it’s great to just plop some on some pasta with garlic-infused olive oil. That, some fresh asparagus and fresh grated Parmesan cheese are a wonderful meal that combines the best of yummy flavors and comfort foods. These days I cook for Boyfriend as well as myself, and lucky for me he likes roasted garlic as much as I do. I even spied a garlic roaster in his kitchen, which will have to get dusted off and used one of these days. One thing’s for sure - he doesn’t mind kissing me when I have roasted garlicky breath!

I was recounting this anecdote to someone over the weekend, and thought I’d post it here - especially seeing as how Crowjoy posted pics of yummy looking appetizers made with quail eggs.

When I was a kid, my dad used to like to do silly things to amuse us kids. By silly, I mean lame. One time we were having Deviled Eggs, but Dad kept calling them Eggs Deviled. In trying to correct him, the conversation went something like this:

Dad: Mmm, these Eggs Deviled are pretty good!
Me and/or Sis: Daddy, they’re Deviled Eggs.
Dad: That’s what I said, Eggs Deviled.
Us: Nooooo, it’s Deviled Eggs.
Dad: Eggs Deviled!
Us: Dad, say ‘Deviled’.
Dad: Deviled.
Us: Say ‘Eggs’.
Dad: Say eggs.
Us: Now put it together.
Dad: Deviled Say Eggs.

I have not eaten another Deviled Egg since then, but I have eaten many, many Deviled Say Eggs. Perhaps now someone outside of my household will enjoy the delicious wonders that are Deviled Say Eggs.

Photo courtesy internet search 

What do cheese and lemons have in common? Well, for starters they’re both yellow. And they both have to do with weird food issues I have.

It’s no secret to those who know me that I ♥ Pasta. I also lurve garlic. So one evening, when out to eat at a local chain restaurant with my mother, I saw Lemon Garlic Chicken Pasta on the menu. It sounded good, and this place was a safe bet as far as ordering “outside the box,” so to speak, so I ordered it. But something just wasn’t quite right. I could not get over the feeling that it was laced with lemon dishsoap. It didn’t taste soapy, but that artificial lemon scented cleaner feeling was definitely there.

A couple months later I thought I’d bring in one of my usual micro-meals to work. This one was also a lemony dish, and again I got that weird lemon cleaner vibe. That was it. I was done with lemony dishes. I don’t even put lemon on my fish. Who said that seafood had to be served with lemons, anyway?

Don’t get me wrong, I don’t hate lemons all around. I love a good refreshing glass of lemondade. And lemon meringue pie is da bomb. Lemony sweets in general I love. It’s lemony savory dishes that I take issue with.

Now on to the cheese. I have the opposite affliction with cheese. I love cheese, especially the hard cheeses that have a nice sharp flavor to them. Bring on the Cheddar! But desserts? Nope, not for me. No cheesecake. No cannolis. No dessert foods that involve cheese. It’s just too heavy for me. I like my desserts lighter in texture and calorie density (ok, maybe not that second one, but dessert should not sit like a brick in my stomach).

I do have many other food likes and dislikes, but these are the ones I get the most comments on, because of the rules that come with them. Yes, I’m weird. Go ahead, tease me all you want. I dare you. I’m still not having Chicken Piccata for dinner with cheesecake for dessert - even if it’s chocolate cheesecake.

Now that I’ve recovered from my minor heart attack over my lack of control with the mouse, which resulted in my messing up my layout big time, I’m ready to post.

So, the big weekend. A big, beer-drinking weekend. Um, I don’t drink. And I don’t wear green on St. Patrick’s day just because I have red hair. I like going against the grain, doing the unexpected, being rebellious. It bothers people to see that I don’t display any holiday spirit, especially on a holiday that’s supposed to be for people like me (meaning pasty white skinned redheads). Whatever.

I did have a nice day though, which could have been any weekend day out of the year. I gathered with some friends and had dinner. The group I spent the weekend with was a bunch of transplanted New Yorkers, and we had ravioli and Italian meatballs along with conversation in the way that only a New Yorker can give. No green beer on the table for me! I prefer pasta to corned beef any day, so this was great. I like small, simple gatherings like that with just a few friends. I did end up crashing there, which was fine because it’s such a comfortable place to be. Slept in, eggs and bagels for breakfast, some more conversation, a catnap, and finally time to go home. It was a great, relaxing weekend.

Last night I took some time to chat with friends online and catch up with reading my blogs and a few other message boards. I’ve been starting to consider paying for a blog template, but there was just the whole paying part of it standing in my way. I couldn’t bring myself to want to pay for it when there are so many free templates available. But, after my little snafu this morning, I looked into it again. The site I contacted doesn’t require payment until installation, so it should be risk-free. Of course, if I knew more about web design and had a decent program to do it on, I’d be doing it myself. That’s probably the one thing I hate most about this new Blogger crap. I don’t get a chance to go into the code anymore and do it myself. They make it too easy to not learn any html/css/xml. So any learning I’ve been doing in that regard has come to a screeching halt, and as they say, if you don’t use it, you’ll lose it. Now it’s all I can do to remember how to do an href tag to make a live link. Ah well.

Ok, those of you not from New England probably don’t know what a Fluffernutter is. It’s one of the best sandwiches ever. Marshmallow Fluff and Peanut Butter, preferably on white bread. Simple. Yummy. Find out more here.

I’ve mentioned before that finding all the yummy foods I grew up with is not easy now that I am 2700 miles away from home. Marshmallow Fluff is one of those indispensable ingredients that I was craving. And no, that Jet-Puff crap is no substitute. Anyway, I was shopping at my local supermarket when lo and behold, I saw it - the beautiful white jar with its red cap and vintage label. Oh, yeah. Into my basket it went. Now I am enjoying one of my favorite sandwiches, to be followed with some cookies. It’s good to have some easy yummy comfort food.

Photo courtesy internet search 

I’m working at the store a lot this week, which will keep me busy enough. Seems like after the excitement of last week, between the accident, ending a job, and the break from a real schedule, I’m back to something quasi-normal and honestly, it’s a bit of a letdown. Oh well. Things will be exciting again soon enough. I should know by the end of the week about my car.

I also talked to my new supervisor at my new job. Yes, I will definitely be working for my friend. Of course this car thing put a crimp in the plans, so I’ll be starting when I get back from NH with my new car.

I would really like for my dishwasher to be fixed. I can deal with using paper plates and plastic utensils, but I still can’t cook for myself because I do not have disposable cookware. How do I make scrambled eggs? Macaroni and cheese (something I’ve been really craving the past few days)? I went and ordered a bunch of Chinese food last night just to have something to eat. As much food as they give you, it’s never as much as you think it is when you start planning meals.

Blah. Time to get back to my boring life.

I went to the 99¢ store at lunch today, since I was actually able to step away from the office. I as I was walking around, I remembered when Sis first told me she was pregnant. She said the baby didn’t like chocolate, and were joking that it can’t belong to Sis if that were so. But, as Mia doesn’t like chocolate (we’ll change that after she’s born), I saw some great stuff there and got that instead.



I’ll keep the chocolate for myself, since I deperately need it. (No I don’t. Really I don’t.) Yes I do. Who am I trying to kid?

For those who can’t find these candies anywhere, you can get them here. Another good source for favorite foods you’re nostalgic for is Hometown Favorites. Perfect for people like myself who can’t find their favorite foods because they moved too far away.

Anyway, as far as my sister goes, just a couple more things to get her.