Monday, March 31, 2008

Hey! BSA!!

I found someone else who never bothers to learn the lyrics. We can only hope that DFL checks the blog this week, because I'd love to get her reaction.




Ha ha ha!! KEN LEEE!!!!!! oh..it hurts....

Monday AMV

Sigh. . . I miss Avatar.

Saturday, March 29, 2008

Good Food Friday- Page 2

Page 2 of the Pig-Out Recipe Collection leaves us squarely in the Beverages portion of Beverages and Appetizers. Today’s recipe is “Slush Mix.”

1 lg package of strawberry Jello
4 c. sugar
4 c. water
1 (6 oz) can of frozen oj
½ cup lemon juice
1 (46-oz) can pineapple juice (seriously?!)\
1 (46-oz) can apple juice. (Do they even make cans this big?)

Obviously, this recipe has a ward social in mind, or possibly, the D-Day invasion force. I cut it drastically. I used a small package of jello, cut the sugar and water in half, used a full can (12 oz) of oj because, honestly, what am I going to do with a half can of frozen oj? Then I used a 12 oz can of pineapple juice, and 12 oz of apple juice.

I couldn’t find any frozen apple juice. Has canned apple juice gone out of style? Or is my grocer deficient? We may never know.

Here’s the directions:

Combine jello, sugar, and water in a saucepan. (A really big saucepan) Heat until sugar is dissolved. Add orange, lemon, pineapple, and apple juice. Put this mixture into a plastic container and freeze.

To serve: Remove from freezer one hour before serving. When mixture is slushy, pour into punch bowl and add ginger ale or 7 up.

Mine is still freezing, but once we serve it up I’ll let you know how it tastes. It’s a bunch of fruit juice and a load of sugar. How could it be bad?


UPDATE: hmmm, it's gooood. Sweet though. Really sweet. I bet you could get away with not adding any extra sugar and it would just fine.

Wednesday, March 26, 2008

Total Blackness

At my job, we print a lot of photos, which means that I've been trained to operate a large, sophisticated machine full of compartments, hoses, wires, tanks, and rollers that all break at random.

That was one impressive sentence. Anyway, so I was printing a bunch of photos, and an error message pops up. "Cartridge B out of paper."

No problem. This one I've done a couple of times. You open the door, slide the enormous cartridge of its rack, and replace it with another one. Except that all the other ones were labeled "A". I went and found a helpful photo guy and he said, "Do you know how to change out the paper?" and I said, "Sure, you just put in a new cartridge."

He smiled and said "Follow me, bring that thing."

So I hefted the empty cartridge and followed him into a dark room. Turns out, that for that particular cartridge, you have to change out the actual roll of special paper. Any light exposure, any light at all will ruin the entire roll of paper. So you have to do it blind.

He showed me how with a practice roll, First, slide it on the spinner, then place the wheel on, push it down, and engage the locking mechanism. Then place the spinner in the grooves on the side, if it's right, the roll will spin, then you find the tape, and peel it off, then thread the paper through a series of grooves, and then close the cartridge and snap down the locks on both sides. All in total blackness.

Now as a ninja, fighting blind and/or destroying things is no problem. Performing blind technical maintenance is a totally different story.

I had a practice round with my eyes closed. Then photo guy asked if I wanted him to stay while I changed it out. "Yes! and could you please stand by the light?" I was afraid that if I had to cross the room and turn out the light, I'd never find my way back to the workbench.

So he turned out the light, and it was SOO dark. I got the paper out of it's protective bag, and was surprised by how big it was. I found the "shiny" side by feel and then tried to thread it on the spinner, but I couldn't get it to go on. I couldn't figure out what was wrong, it felt like the hole in the roll was on, but it wouldn't push down. So I pushed really hard, and something pinged off, flew right by my face, and I screamed gave a battle cry that froze the blood of my enemies.

"Oh yeah" helpful photo guy said. "There's a plastic stopper on the paper that you need to take off before it'll go on the spinner."

I shot him a glare and even though he couldn't see it, I'm sure he felt its heat.

I finally managed to get the thing loaded up, but it was intense. I don't like not being able to see. Not At ALL.

Tuesday, March 25, 2008

North Carolina

My brother has a great patch of land down near Fort Bragg.



It was my first time in North Carolina. I didn't realize that it had so many pine trees. Here's their lake:



And some really nasty vines, which my brother calls "wait a minute" vines. Because that's what you say after they latch on to your clothes, hair, flesh, and then you have to disentangle yourself.



I saw a paratrooper jump, and got to eat some amazing NC bar-b-que. They have a really interesting vinegar based sauce that I loved. I also had some truly amazing hushpuppies.

It was a blast.

Monday, March 24, 2008

Whoa, is it Monday already?

Apparently, everyone took Easter weekend off. I hope it was nice and the Easter ninja treated you well!

The Easter ninja cleverly hid 12 plastic eggs in my room. I have found 8 so far. I'm afraid of the traps that may be in the closet.

So it looks like we need to do some catching up.

I have stuff for Good Food Friday, but I don't have time to cook tonight, so hopefully I'll have that tomorrow.

Wednesday, March 19, 2008

Fun PSA



I only counted 12 passes, dang it.

Easter!

Are we all ready for Easter weekend? I love Easter. Every Easter my folks send me a care package, with an awesome chocolate bunny and other assorted goodies.

This year, I'm going to drive down to North Carolina to visit my brother. So blogging will be light, since I'm leaving tomorrow.

Wonder Woman, I leave it to you. I look forward to your Good Food Friday. Don't let me down!

Sunday, March 16, 2008

Monday AMV-early

Know what I miss? Avatar.

Know what I danced to this weekend? 80s music.

If only there was some way to combine the two....



I'm going to a party right after work tomorrow, so I posted our music video a little early this week.

Saturday, March 15, 2008

Eggnog Update

So...you CANNOT overcook eggnog. When your stirring it on the oven, once it looks like eggnog, thick and whatever, take it off the heat. Otherwise the egg solidifies and then its all over. When I took my nog out of the fridge, it had the consistency and texture of tapioca pudding. I couldn't bring myself to drink it, but I did eat some with a spoon, and it tasted like eggnog but that pudding thing...bleh.

Nog, Disposal...Disposal, Nog.

Thursday, March 13, 2008

Good Food Friday - Page 1

My good friend Nan has started Good Food Fridays on her blog, and asked her friends to participate. I believe all you have to do is post a recipe, and then talk about it.

Unfortunately, most of my recipes look something like this:

1. Boil spaghetti noodles
2. Put Prego “Garden Variety” Spaghetti sauce on top of noodles
3. Dinner!

It gets even worse on Fridays, where it looks something like this:

1. Go to restaurant
2. Read menu
3. Dinner!

I went to our shelf of cookbooks for some help. My first thought was Rachel Ray, but then BSA reminded me of the unfortunate “Stoop” incident. A recipe so awful, that my subconscious has repressed all memory of it except for a vague shuddering recollection of a pot full of something red and lumpy. So instead, I’ve picked the “Pig-Out” Collection of Recipes from the Lincoln, NE 4th Ward Relief Society.

For Good Food Fridays (which will probably never happen on a Friday, but it’s the thought that counts) I’ll pick a recipe from a page, going through it in chronological order.

Since I’ll be napping tomorrow in preparation for the Leg Warmers concert in Maryland, I’m doing my Good Food Friday tonight.

Page 1
Appetizers & Beverages

Eggnog

2 c milk
6 eggs
¾ c. sugar
¼ tsp salt
1 c milk
1 tsp vanilla
2 tsp rum extract (or imitation rum flavoring, or rum, or whatever)
Nutmeg

Now I know what you’re thinking, that’s a Gaston-level amount of eggs. I only made half the recipe, because there’s only 1 of me. But if you find yourself surrounded by 12 outlaw bikers whose rage can only be cooled by a big cool glass of eggnog, then by all means make the whole recipe.

Directions:
Heat 2 cups of milk in a medium saucepan, just until hot. Set aside. Beat eggs, sugar, and salt. Slowly whisk the milk into the egg mixture and return to saucepan (I whisked the eggs into the milk, right into the saucepan, it didn’t seem to make any difference) Cook slowly over low heat, stirring constantly for 15 to 20 minutes.



This is important. If you don’t beat enough, or if it heats too much, you might suddenly get something that looks like really runny scrambled eggs. My solution to this little problem was to beat it silly.


Beating it silly

Once your done stirring, remove from heat. Stir in the 1 cup of milk and vanilla. Refrigerate until chilled. Before serving, add rum extract and sprinkle with nutmeg.

I don’t have any nutmeg, so I’m going to sprinkle mine with ground Cardamom, which is similar to nutmeg, but I like it better.

My eggnog is still cooling, so I’ll post an update when we actually try it (you have to refrigerate it for several hours.) Some of you who may have been around me during the holidays, or at least long enough to hear me refer to eggnog as a “nice big glass of holiday snot” may be surprised by my choice of recipe. Well, it was the only one on Page 1 that wasn’t hot, and it’s too warm to make hot cocoa or cider.

Wednesday, March 12, 2008

Tuesday, March 11, 2008

Know what cracks me up?

Cops on segues.

Even better?

Mall cops on segues.

And if said mall cop shoots you that cop glare? Well you are fully justified in giggling, because DUDE, no one looks intimidating on a segues.

Not even Batman.

Monday, March 10, 2008

Monday AMV

Not the best edited AMV, I prefer ones that feature lots of small clips, but it cracks me up whenever Fire Girl tries to kiss Black Cat.

A Big Greek Wedding

Saturday I went into DC to attend a friend's wedding. The guy she married was Greek, so she converted to Greek Orthodox, and they got married in the Saint Sophia Cathedral. It was beautiful, full of domes covered in gold leaf. The priest conducted first in English, and then in Greek, so there was lots of chanting. My favorite was the back up chanter (I believe he's a cantor?) providing the "ohms" he had a nice voice. There was also lots of getting up and down, and when standing, wondering when we could sit down again. It was kind of fun to watch when various women would give up, and shrink a couple of inches when they slipped out of their shoes.

After the ceremony, which was gorgeous, there was a reception at the Omni Shoreham, a historic DC hotel. There were appetizers, served by waiters, and then an extremely fancy wedding dinner. Started with an arugala salad, with nuts, cranberries, pears and goat cheese. Then there was tenderloin, grilled asparagus and au gratin potatoes. Then a white mousse and raspberry cake.

And then there was Greek dancing. Where everyone joins hands and then you step and kick and step and kick and do whatever the leader is doing, with the occasional clapping and "Oh-PA!"

I did pretty good. Jumped right in and didn't look too stupid. Although I would pay too much attention on copying footwork and not on line movement, and then I would crash into a very nice, patient Greek lady.

It was loads of fun.

Wednesday, March 05, 2008

AAAAHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

The creepy evil president from 24 is on Medium and he's freaking EATING PEOPLE!!!



This Guy! This one right here!!


Why on earth am I watching this all by myself?! Don't eat the meat Allison! Don't eat the freaking meat!!

Pop Quiz

Is this cereal awesome?



A. Yes
B. Hell Yes!!
C. Gross! Who put their cinnamon-sweet fingers all over my food!

You know what really impresses me about this new fingerprint design? All three class characteristics (Loops, Arches and Whorls) are represented. You just don't expect that kind of attention to detail from a sugar cereal.

Also, I had a request for pics of my new fighting shoes.

Here they are:


And here they are on my little feet, with accompanying black pants:

Tuesday, March 04, 2008

His Cheeseburger

For anyone who doesn't have the benefit of small cousins. My sister does a perfect impression in case anyone wants a live performance.

WHOOO!!!

I BOWLED A TURKEY!! I BOWLED A TURKEY!! I BOWLED A FREAKING TURKEY!!!!!!

For those of you who might not be familiar with the bowling vocabulary of Northern Virginia, a "turkey" is when you bowl three strikes in a row.

I now have a new high score of 153. Oh yeah, Corbeau bowled half a perfect game.

Monday, March 03, 2008

Monday AMV

With a cool new anime called Black Cat.

Sunday, March 02, 2008

Penelope

I really liked this. It's hasn't been getting a lot of advertising which is a shame. It's a modern fairy tale about a girl who's born with a pig nose and it's great.

Let's see if I can't find a preview. Ah, thank you, Youtube:



It has the same charming tone that Pushing Daisies does, with the narration and the bright colors. It also has a really good message, and parts of it are just hilarious. I definitely recommend seeing it.

I also saw Spiderwick, which I liked, but was a little more frustrating. I spent the whole movie saying "Why doesn't he just leave the Stupid BOOK in the STUPID HOUSE!! How many times does he have to be told!!"

But maybe that's just me. :)

Saturday, March 01, 2008

Star Wars Funny

This is just too adorable.



Also, I saw in Penelope last night, and it was really good. It has lots of bright colors and the same modern fairy tale tone that Pushing Daisies has. I really recommend it.