French Toast

I made 2 loaves of Challah bread this weekend, gave one to The Prayer Room for a Lord's supper I didn't go to (I was in a MAJOR funk this weekend). I saw that they had two BOXES of rolls to feed 10-20 people, so I kept a loaf. I might feel guilty about it, but the plan was to make this baked french toast. And I will never feel guilty about baked french toast. Then we ran out of both milk and eggs on Sun. Boo. Well Husband came to the rescue and went to the store yesterday to refill our supplies. What did I discover in the meantime? Toasted Challah with butter and honey.

Dammit.

Now I'll never get baked french toast with Challah.

And I really need to get to work. I need to push it to the MAX! GARH!!

Also, I'm reading Eragon by Christopher Paolini. Me likes. I have ramen noodles for lunch and I'm not excited about that. Wish I had butter, honey, and challah. I had a big conversation with Warren last night. Could have gone dreadful, but we both did very well and ended on a good note. Nothing is changing, just am glad he understands how I feel. Matthew likes when I read to him. We only have one book right now, One Fish, Two Fish, Red Fish, Blue Fish by Dr. Suess. I plan on going shopping today or tomorrow to get that kid some winter clothes.

And I desperately need to get back to work!

Ack, one more thing. I love love love Smitten Kitchen. The French Laundry at Home is my motivator for getting down and dirty in the kitchen, but Smitten Kitchen supplies the recipes! (I figured since I've got two of her posts in one of mine, I should bring up this blissful blog! *drool*)

WORK!

Not Much to Report

You know what would be really fun for me right now? I would like to take some time and go read to my elderly Grandpa. He is a fantastic quiet man who is suffering from old. He is just too damn old. Obviously, I'm not in the "let's live as long as we possibly can" camp. I'm more in the "If I pee on myself, I'm taking an enthusiastic tumble down the stairs" camp. But that is probably more do to the fact that I'm young. Maybe, as with most things, age will give me perspective.

I quite like reading aloud to people. The sound of my own voice makes me happy. I'm just that kind of lady. I like sharing a good story with others. I like to convey my excitement through my voice to make them excited. I also like to think I'm pretty good at it. My only measurement is against my husband who doesn't like roller coasters because they are boring. Uh huh. So if I can get him interested and even a step past that, slightly excited, I know I'm doing a pretty good job. What I mean to say about that is, I'm glad he tolerates it because I really like doing it.

I think Grandpa would like it because he is bed-ridden. He is lonely and bored. He can't do much but listen since the shaking due to Parkinson's makes it hard for him to speak, move, crochet (not that he can) or do anything except watch TV. And you know I'm more entertaining than the news right now. All they can think to talk about is money and politics, neither which affect him much anymore. However, he lives in Oklahoma, I live in (fat) Texas, and I have other responsibilities that keep me from it. Maybe I'll take a day. The man deserves it, that's for sure.

Anyway, I wrote all that because I don't have much else to report. Matthew is still the cutest monster. Warren is still the best husband. I still have the best job I can get (that I know of). Life is good, and I am bored. :-) How bout that?

I wished I liked reading the Bible more than I do.....

Unsatisfied

Bleck. I hate this feeling. To tell on my mother a little bit, she lives fairly unsatisfied. It drives me crazy. When I was young, but old enough to appreciate it, she went on a business trip to Europe. To call it a business trip was just down right insulting. It was a paid vacation. 2 weeks of EUROPE. I hadn't been, but I was smart enough to know that I should be jealous jealous jealous (and I was). She came back, and I was thirsting more for tales of her journey than a hug. Her response to my rather obvious question, "How was it?!".

"Fine, but the trains are HORRIBLE."

What kind of answer is that? How was Paris? Did you go to the Louvre? You were in Switzerland. Tell me about the chocolate you had by the lake! Dammit woman, give me ROMANCE!

Obviously she didn't deliver and left me very unsatisfied with her dissatisfaction.

So now I want to just kick myself for being unsatisfied with life. Bored. Grumpy. Not Satisfied.

Dragging

I am dragging. I feel like my face is drooping like a basset hounds. Guess how much sleep I got last night? That's right, 9 hours. I had a HUGE cup of coffee this morning. Helped about as much as a feather pillow. Having one night of restless sleep is one thing, but this has been going on for weeks now. Except it wasn't restless. I slept like a rock. Am I anemic? I really don't think so. At this point though, I'm not ruling anything out. I WebMD-ed fatigue and fainting. That was helpful. I deserve no more than I got though. Cheapies like myself with what seem to be rather large problems shouldn't be able to find the answer on the interest. I should go to a professional.

It is just that I know exactly how this will go. "You are tired and you fainted? Let's get some blood work." "Oh, you also have a brain tumor? Well even though you aren't showing one symptom related to that, we'd better get an MRI anyway." So I get my blood sucked, pay out the butt for an MRI, and the results end up, "Yeah, you have a benign thyroid condition. Deal with it" Or something like that.

The conclusions I'm coming to? I'm cheap. I'm lazy. I don't really want to find out about yet another problem I might have. I don't really want to pay to be told what I was prepared to do anyway; deal with it. If I could get another symptom, that would help, like another fainting spell. You just can't ignore chronic fatigue AND fainting. If I weren't almost positive that I am not pregnant, I would swear I was pregnant. That is what I'll do. I'll go see a Dr. when the symptoms are worse than feeling pregnant, because not much except a real potent disease feels worse than that.

*drag*

Comments!

Holy moly. I just found 2 comments on this thing. One was from a fellow back in Sept and the other was from the other day from the one and only Carol Blymire. Yeah, she freaked my freak in the non freaky way. Yes, I had to go there. You liked it.

I think it just cracks me up because this thing is kinda supposed to be a secret. How does a stranger and a person you look up to end up leaving comments? Really, I have an idea, I just don't want to get into it. I would rather muse about writing. Flipping through the posts I've written, I'm realizing that this is kinda fun. Some times I write about serious things. Sometimes I write about less serious things. I don't really use this as a way to vent, that is what Warren is for. He is an excellent sounding board. I don't really use this as venue to push an agenda. No one reads it, and I'm certainly no promoting it.

I guess I'm just taking a moment to look back and realize that this blog is serving its intended purpose. I am writing more. I am forming an opinion and "publishing" it. And I'm still doing this with almost no liability, which is something I like to think I need right now.

I think I'll take it up a notch and write about things I'm unsure about. Like Abortion? Hm. I don't know.

What I do know is that a stroll down to the cookie store is becoming so tempting that Im actually slouching in my chair. How is that for deep, insightful, truthful, and life changing?! I thought so.

Here is a fun fact!

Men's Fitness has ranked the fittest and fattest cities in America. I live in a suburb of both Dallas and Fort Worth. You might never expect a SUBURB to make this list. Well, you would be wrong. Fort Worth takes slot no.4 and Dallas no. 6. I thought to myself, "I guess I can take that avg and that would be what my city would rank since I live right in the middle"(which would be bad enough) never DREAMING a SUBURB would make their list. Well, I went to check out the other cities on the list and saw "Arlington" at the top. Surely that is not the Arlington I live in. Surely they mean a different Arlington. SURELY living between no.4 and no. 6 is bad enough. SURELY we are not NO. 2!!!! Here is our report card. It is a hard truth.

3 of the top 10 fattest cities are in one metroplex, my metroplex. 6 of the top 10 fattest cities are in one state, my state. Ladies and gentlemen, I know we've all heard it before, but I'm having a moment, bigger is not necessarily better.

I love Texas, and I had heard something like this before. Now that I know the cold hard truth, I am blown away (well, not really, its hard to blow down a fatty like myself, specially blocked by all the other fatties around me). I'm currently on a weight loss mission, so I'm not in that whole denial, hey that is funny, frame of mind right now. I'm in a, this totally sucks and how is that even frickin' possible and what about DFW makes us collectively the fattest metroplex in the nation?! frame of mind. There is A LOT that falls on the shoulders of each individual in the way of personal responsibility. But COME ON! How can one metroplex be so unhealthy and it not be on the shoulders of someone else as well? How do we as a whole just end up so stinkin' fat? I for one am all for increased restaurant rates and decreased health food rates. Something. Anything. To be near or in a city on that list is a real eye opener. To be near or in 3, well. That is just shameful. Makes me want to move to Minneapolis (no.2 fittest city). I've been there before, it is wonderful. I didn't note that it was particularly healthy, but Ill pay better attention when I'm house hunting.

There is one thing I HAVE to say in defense of their report card. They had this to say about the residents of Arlington, "Arlington residents are 92 percent less likely than average to go cross-country skiing. That's the 4th lowest rate in our survey." Lets take a stroll down geography lane. Arlington in located in North Texas. It has an avg snowfall of 2" a year. We spend several weeks of each summer in the triple digits. Seems to me like the only two thing necessary for cross country skiing are flat spaces (which, admittedly, we have in abundance) and at the very least SNOW. I should note as an actual resident of Arlington, I find that 2" statistic hard to swallow, unless of course you are counting ice, then yes, MAYBE we get 2" of cold shit on the ground. Come on! Of course we don't cross country ski! Maybe we could pay to have snow shipped in and then we wouldn't be fat anymore.

In all truth, they are building a ski resort somewhere near by. Yup, an indoor ski resort in TEXAS. Which was once a part of MEXICO. Which is where people go to get drunk and tan. Not ski. I'm just saying. Maybe they can ski in Mexico, but I promise they would rather be drunk and tan.

If I weren't already on a weight loss mission (and doing pretty well if I say so myself) I would start today. Now I am going to enjoy my hummus and pita chip snack. YUM!

She's Out For the Count!

I was just working along around 2pm yesterday and then I felt like I needed to go to the bathroom. Right away. So I quickly got to the throne and then felt like I was gonna throw up. I picked up the trash can and then felt like I was going to faint. Well, when I woke up with a sore tongue(I bit it) on the rug in the company bathroom with my drawers around my ankles, it took me a min to figure out which feeling won. Thankfully there was not a tie because that would have been super gross. I got up much too quickly (even after lying there for 5 min praying no one would need to use the restroom and then knock and then I would have to tell them they really could not come in to help me since they would hear in my voice that all was not well), I finished up, then I promptly went to lie down in the back. The trash from the bin I dropped when I fainted was still all over the place. I did not care. I laid there until Warren came and got me and took me home.

I was perfectly fine every second of the day before that, and except feeling very weak, every second after. WHY did I faint? Hm? I'm not pregnant. I didn't do anything funny. I had eaten that day. Why? I never felt bad and still don't feel bad. I am sleepy even after a full nights rest every night this week, but that is it. I'm sleepy. And I fainted. What is the deal?!

Anyway, now I feel woozy talking about this.

The French Laundry at Home

I fell absolutely head over heels in love with this blog some time ago. It is called "The French Laundry at Home". Hopefully you are more cultured than I am, and that title makes sense to you, but for those more like me, I'll explain. Apparently there is this coffee table cook book called the French Laundry. By that I mean most people look through it, not try and make anything out of it. It is Thomas Keller's book named after his famous restaurant. It is gourmet. I mean super gourmet. It is not as scary super gourmet as this woman's net project, Alinea at Home. Close enough I say. Apparently Alinea is about coking sous vide. I'm so unfamiliar with that, I'm not even sure if I spelled it correctly, nor do I care. Ms. Blymire just published her last recipe for TFLAH and seemed like she had quite a good time doing so. It really was quite a successful project for her.

I left her a rather lengthy comment talking about a number of things, but at the end I started to tell her about how her blog was shaping my life. I thought I would finish the thought here since I didn't want to leave such a huge comment in her comment section.

I haven't tried, and have no ambition to try any of the recipes in TFL soon. For one, they scare me silly. That might seem like I haven't learned a thing from TFLAH, but I have, believe me. But they are much too big for me. I'm still trying to get roasting a chicken down and making stock at all. For two, I don't have half the equipment I might need. With some careful improvising and planning I think I could work around a lot of that, but it still hampers the ambition. I also don't have the funds, for three. What makes a recipe good is the ingredient, and much of the ingredients are somewhat pricey. I could swing it maybe 3-4 times a year, but not at all consistently. I know Carol had to carefully budget to pull off as many recipes as she did in such little time. I also know that the point isn't to try and swing this stuff consistently, but still, it is a reason. I'm not swimming in cash. I'm not even playing in the sprinklers. For four, I don't even have the book, nor can I afford to get the book. I haven't tried very hard to find a cheap copy for all the aforementioned reasons, although I do hope to get a copy some time soon.

What I HAVE done, however, is this. I have started going a little crazy in the kitchen. I'm not cooking through anything, I don't have the patience, time, money, or attention to do something like that. All of those things go to more important things. I have started reading a number of food blogs and printing off their recipes. I've also started tackling my moms classics like saffron risotto (no where near on mom's level, but it is the best dish I make no exception), Coq Au Vin, greens, broth, and this freaking awesome Mexican casserole. It might not seem like a real recipe since it has cream of crap in it, but holy moly, it knocks my socks off, and Husband cleans up 2/3 of it when I make it. I have a peanut noodle thing I LOVE to make. Its another fave of mine I can do. Every weekend I am attempting another recipe. I cook one or two new things a week. I think for a crazy busy full time working mom of a toddler who might not even have the satisfaction of a good dish to look forward to, this is kinda awesome. Because a lot of times I fail. I mean fail fail FAIL. Like throw it out, no one needs to suffer through that, lets eat grilled cheese instead, fail. Sometimes I'm convinced it is the recipe, but other times, I know it's me. And that is okay.

Why is this such a thing for me? Because I am good at anything I try. It sounds conceited, and I guess it is, but it is the truth. I am generally good at anything I try. Knitting, jewelry making, math, reading, singing, acting, teaching, writing, drawing, physics, construction, electronics, etc. I am a jack of all trades. In a way it is nice because, well, I'm decent at almost anything I try. I'll never be an expert, and I don't care. I don't have the personality to care about becoming specialized. If midwifery is for me, I'll never go on to be the the field's expert. But I'll be good at it. The one exception I've found so far? I know you've guessed it. Cooking. Truthfully, I'm not that shabby for someone who has only been trying for 3 years. Really, not shabby but not good. I'm not slightly talented. I do not have the upper hand. I have several friends (including husband) that are much better at this in the same amount of time of trying than I am. That is perfectly okay. Also, there are other things I'm not good at, but I don't care enough to try to get better or be bothered about it. I'm not good at organizing, but I don't care to be, get it? Well, I care to be a good cook. I have this mission in life to best my mom on this. I don't know why. I love my mom and admire her. And I have to be a better cook than she is. :-) I don't have to be, but it is something I just admire the crap out of and I want to emulate it. She is my cooking hero.

BUT, it was TFL that kicked my rear into gear. I had to get over my phobias and get to it. I wouldn't be good at this for awhile, and many things would be wasted in the pursuit to culinary happiness, but just like Carol, I had to just stop thinking about it and try to expand my comfort zone. Did I want to be known as the lady that ate out everyday? Or could I press through the bad dishes and become a respectable cook in the kitchen I pay a lot for (as it is the biggest room in our house by far)?

When you are good at almost everything you try, you shudder at the thought of hindrance of something you would like to do for lack of talent. I just can't say, "Looks like cooking isn't for me." Maybe if I were so bad it was lamentable, but I'm not. And I'm getting better, much better. Perhaps The French Laundry at Home came just at the opportune time and gets all the glory for something that would have happened anyway? I don't know or care. It was SUCH a pleasure to read that blog, and I know her next project will make me just as impatient for the next post as this one did.

Hopefully one day soon I can try the "Cornets". Or maybe the easy "Gazpacho". Also this dessert looks delightful! And honestly, though she hated making it, these sandwiches sound delish! And this. *drool* Until then, I will be perfecting my roasted chicken (which came out not all the way cooked last time.... uh huh)

I know you aren't reading this Carol Blymire, but thanks for sharing your hobby with us. You didn't have to blog it. You didn't have to let us in, but I'm really thankful you have. Thankful you will continue to. Some things are just entertaining, like tetris. Other things, like your blog, are insights into a quest. We saw your heroic side saddle your steed and take this challenge on full tilt with fear in your eyes, and cuts and bruises when you fell off. A lot of us are too afraid to dream. Too afraid to think of the cost. You showed us it is okay if life is hard, because then it has the chance to be good. You haven't impacted just my cooking. You've impacted the way I see life. I have fun. I refuse to be bored. I think about the things I want to do and try to figure out how I can get them done, even if they are spending more time playing with my son or changing my career. So... thanks, again. Have fun with Alinea!

Birthing Assistant

I FINALLY got a hold of my midwife (seriously, the woman has been swamped). We FINALLY talked about me helping with births! I'm FINALLY on her on call list!

And here is the best news. I will be working for free for some time. I don't know how long. I will be working in the middle of the night and on weekends, maybe. Currently, I have no one to help me watch Matthew when I'm called on the weekend. So, in truth, while I am freakishly excited, I don't know how I'm going to do this. All of my friends are so busy and can't commit to being on call. I know a couple of people, but they are kind of out of the way. The one person I could for sure count on, Husband's mom, I don't want to bother since Sat is the only real day off she gets. Yick... Lord. Please send someone to help me.... Some ones to help me.

I wish I could just make a list of anyone willing and then give them all one day a month and maybe or maybe not need them depending on if I'm needed. I don't know if this is going to work like that.

X-Box 360

I am so very bad ass.

Our X-box 360 gave us the finger a couple of weeks ago, and by that, I mean the Red Ring of Death. It is a ring, 3/4 the way lit that flashes red meaning, "Uh, I'm not working any more and you can't make me." Unless of course you ship your box ($30) to Microsoft and pay their extortion ($160) to fix it. Hm. Sweet. Especially when the price of a new box is about $200 or something like that. Husband found this "fix it yourself" video linked from the Microsoft website, so it seemed legit. He went ahead and ordered the parts and then said to me, "Hey, babe, I think you can do this. Why don't you give fixing it a shot?" Uh, because I'm not an electrician? What a set up! Yeah, put me in charge so that it is my fault if the damn thing was a rip off and the X-box blows up in my face and he has an excuse to spend several hundred dollars on a new one! I don't think so!

Well, he gave me the puppy dog look and the line, "It's not like that. I just know you like taking things apart and putting them back together. I thought it would be fun for you...." Dammit. Then I felt bad for jumping to conclusions and blaming him for being a prick when I was the prick. Now I had to take on the liability. Such is marriage.

So the parts came in the mail and I spent the better part of 2 hours (it was supposed to be a one hour fix) scrubbing of dried caked thermal grease from these sensors. Then I lovingly spread some new goo on and reconnected some important parts to wait for the thing to heat up and re-glue everything together. It was supposed to blink 3 red lights for 2 min and then blink 2 red lights for 2 more min for a total of 4. It didn't. It just continued on with the 3 red lights of death, and I slumped in defeat. Husband gave me a hardy pat on the back and a encouraging, "Nice try."

I wasn't going to dump the whole unassembled thing in the trash, so I finished up the video, just in case. I plugged it back in and sure as shit, we had green lights!!!!!!

THANK GOODNESS! I was so excited. Warren fell in love with me again and we had a good time that night celebrating my victory!

Right before you half way reassemble things, you are supposed to hand tighten the bolts, which I did, but I don't think they were tightened enough. I think that's why it wasn't working right. Then after your 4 min test, you tighten them with a wrench and reassemble the whole thing, so I went ahead with that and WALA! Magic! Working X-Box 360!

Like I said, I am so very bad ass.

AANNDDDDD I'm convinced!

If this midwifery route is for me, it will be the CPM. I just read a blog entry on a woman in CNM school who is basically in med school. I don't think so. I don't have the time, the money, or the heart to do that. No way. I have what I believe to be a very sound theory about the way life is going to be for U.S. citizens. It is going to be less rosy.

We live in such a time where we have the luxury of choice every day, all day. This won't last forever. We are one or two more major crisis's away from being just like every Joe blow country out there struggling to make it. I hope it doesn't happen, but it could. I can't take out the kind of loans it would take to get my CNM, because they could come take my house. I don't care to spend 8 years becoming a CNM because I want to be practicing ASAP. What if the crash happens before I am licensed (aka educated)? Then it was for naught and I still don't have a house. And I don't care to care for a woman through her whole life (and be educated to do it). I care to help women birth babies. When/If things end up for the rest of us like they are in Houston and New Orleans, then we need to be real. A birthing mom won't give a crap if I can prescribe a medication no one has access to, she cares if I can help get that kid out of her. Plus, I still believe that 8 years field experience is more valuable than 8 years of book experience that might have nothing to do with what I want to do anyway. If it is to be, then CPM it is, unless otherwise convinced.