What A Long Strange Trip It’s Been November 18, 2007

This is my final post. It’s been fun. Thanks for all the laughs.

Riley

Son of a Gun We’ll Have Big Fun On the Bayou November 18, 2007

I have several fresh herbs in my fridge right now: basil, oregano, thyme, Italian parsley, and rosemary. I bought them all for dinner last night (as mentioned in my previous post). The fresh herbs made all the difference in the meal.

I love mincing fresh herbs because they are so aromatic, especially rosemary. I just read Practical Magic by Alice Hoffman and she wrote such evocative descriptions of the herbs, I might have salivated while reading. Or maybe I just have a drooling problem. Possibly both. Have you ever had your mouth numb from Novocain and discovered that you were drooling and no one bothered to point it out to you because they liked seeing you make ass of yourself? Not that I have any personal experience with such a thing. How did I wind up talking about this? Back to the herbs.

When I was younger, I did not cook with many herbs. The recipes I used generally had an inexpensive grocery list but the herbs to season them seemed to double the cost. And that was money I was not willing to part with. I realize that if I had just coughed up the money on the first recipe, I’d have had the herbs for all future recipes, but I just didn’t want to do it. Instead, I seasoned everything with Tony Chachere. I love Tony. He was, and is, good to me.

When I moved to California, my brother in law had never heard of Tony and fell in love with him over a burger at a Labor Day BBQ. Years later, for one of his birthday gifts, I gave him a canister, an empty shaker, and the ingredients for Tony Chachere’s All Purpose Creole Seasoning, which was given to me by a church friend who hailed from Lafayette. For my wedding gift, she gave me a recipe box with a variety of Creole recipes. This one is by far my favorite:

Tony Chachere’s All Purpose Creole Seasoning

26 oz free flowing salt, like Morton’s
1 1/2 oz ground black pepper
2 oz ground red pepper
1 oz pure garlic powder
1 oz chili powder

Mix well. Enjoy.

To season seafood:
Take half the mixture above and add the following:
1 tsp thyme
1 tsp sweet basil
1 tsp bay leaf

Mix well. Enjoy.

Moose Caca November 17, 2007

Friends came over tonight. Wine was had, jokes were made. I fed seven adults. I made a garlic spinach appetizer, spanokopita (layer after layer of phyllo dough…), stuffed grape leaves, and vegan moussaka, which is not moussaka at all, but a veggie and mashed potato casserole.

The spanokopita and grape leaves were (not meaning to brag, but—) the bomb. Everyone loved them.

However, I started cooking at one o’clock and still hadn’t managed to have everything ready in time because there were bouts of cleaning and kid-interaction interspersed in the cooking time. After everyone had eaten the appetizer, spanokopita, and grape leaves, the moussaka was still cooking. So I cut down the time of the baking. And therein lies the problem.

Impatience.

Why didn’t I just let it cook the allotted time????????

I could have just told everyone, look, sorry, but dinner will be late. Enjoy everything else I made. But nooooooo, I had to jump the gun and serve the moussaka too early (it was supposed to cook for 1:30 hours, and I pulled it out at 1:10). As a result, the eggplant was not cooked well enough. Truthfully, though, the whole dish had a bland taste to it, and I don’t think it had anything to do with the cooking time but the combination of spices (or lack thereof). And what a disappointment. Everyone was so excited by all the other dishes and then I had to end on the GROSS BLAND DISH.

I did get to save myself partly with the almond shortbread cookies for dessert. But still, the taint of the bad not-moussaka dish ruined my confidence for the night. Throughout the entire post-dinner and enjoyable conversation with my friends, all could really think was “did they all think the not-moussaka was gross?”

Of course, no one complained and as they said goodnight they all thanked me for the wonderful meal. I can only hope that the memory of the spanokopita, grape leaves, and almond shortbreads live on, and the moussaka is never again remembered.

And out of curiosity, who does not enjoy Spaceballs or Three Amigos? I just learned that one of my friends HATES them.

Giving is Better Than Receiving November 15, 2007

Back in the college waitress days, I worked with a guy whose name for the purposes of this blog shall be Lucky, in honor of the belt buckle he always wore. Lucky used to come into work every day where I would ridicule his belt buckle and then we would go about our business of waiting on tables. Maybe we would have a beer (or four) at the end of the night. More than anything else, Lucky loved to say “There is no such thing as true altruism” with a close second of “Do you want to have sex?” These remarks were not reserved for me alone but all the lovely ladies of the restaurant, except for one who was not-so-lovely, who we later found out was in the process of becoming a woman but still had man parts, which actually explained a lot, but that’s whole other story…

ANYWAY, Lucky said that no one ever really did something to benefit someone else out of the kindness of their heart but for some form of selfish reward, even if the reward was simply to feel better about themselves for doing something nice. No matter what you said, he always fell back to that “emotional benefit” that made the act of “true” altruism null and void. Since I was in college at the time, I was surrounded by people who wanted make changes in the world, people who believed in their individual capabilities and power. And I resented Lucky’s insinuation that humans are inherently selfish. After college, of course, I did get a taste of just how selfish some people can be and I had to wonder if Lucky had been associating with them back in the day.

As the season of Thanksgiving and Christmas is upon is, this is always a time of year where even the most selfish people do something good for their fellow man, even if it is just to get a tax write-off. And to those selfish people (none of whom I’m sure read my blog), I have a wonderful website to share with you. The click to give website, which has nifty little buttons that you click on once a day to donate goods to various charitable causes—feed the hungry, give mammograms, give child care, give books, protect the rainforests, or support animal rescue.

Who knows, maybe—just maybe—you could even buy something from these sites to make their sponsors feel it’s worthwhile. Christmas is around the corner, after all. (oh, and high five to Flying Mum who introduced me to this site)

There’s also Greenle, http://greenle.info/, a search engine that donates a portion of its profits to green causes. Kinda like the web version of Credo, the new name of the phone & mobile business of the company Working Assets. (Note to Working Assets: I dislike your new name. It sounds too much like Greedo)

BTW: A couple days ago, I mentioned Blackle as a search engine that uses less power, but that only applies to you if you use a CRT monitor (no school like the old school). If you use an LCD less than 24 inches, Blackle uses more power. Now you know.

Where Are Pony’s Glasses? November 14, 2007

(See more pix here: wordless wednesday
Wordless Wednesday )

Go Blackle November 14, 2007

For those of you who do not know, there is a website search engine called Blackle, www.Blackle.com. It is powered by Google, so it is providing you with the same search engine. What is the difference? Why, the color of course. Blackle’s screen is, as the name suggests, black, and powering a black screen takes up less energy than powering a white screen.

I would love to end this post right now because I am in the middle of my own personal pity party and you’re not invited, but I feel like an energy saving tip is a poor excuse for a blog post, so I feel compelled to write something else.

Today, I went to the library and checked out the following books:

The Uses of Enchantment by Bruno Bettelheim (because I saw it on the shelf and thought it looked interesting)
The Man Who Mistook His Wife For a Hat and Other Clinical Tales by Oliver Sacks (because a friend recommended it)
The Things They Carried by Tim O’Brien (because another friend recommended it)
Heroes, Villains, and Ghosts: Folklore of Old California by Hector Lee (because I saw it on the shelf and thought it would be nice to know about local area folklore; perhaps I can take the kids to these places and scare them into avoiding bad behavior)
Language and Mind by Noam Chomsky (recommended by a friend)

What does this tell you about me?

1. If you recommend a book to me, I WILL read it–or I’ll at least check it out from the library and try to read it.

2. I am prone to impulse buys. I realize I’m not technically buying these books, but the behavior is the same in a bookstore.

3. In three weeks and one day, I will owe the library $1.25 and counting.

EDITED TO NOTE: Blackle only uses less power if you use a CRT monitor (no school like the old school). If you use an LCD less than 24 inches, Blackle uses more power. Now you know.

Carnival of Family Life: Now Showing at a Blog Near You November 12, 2007

This is the November 12, 2007 edition of Carnival of Family Life. And yes, I read every single one of them.

Time to grab some unhealthy buttery popcorn, a 44 oz soda of your choice, a box of Raisinets (because Milk Duds are gross), and have a seat in one of those nifty stadium seating style seats, because there’s a lot going on here for you to see. Oh, and if your movie requires the use of 3D glasses, now is a good time to put those on.

Matthew Spears presents That childlike state, and Love. posted at Loving Awareness.

Super Mega Dad presents The Adventures of Super Mega Dad - Incredibly Amazing posted at The Adventures of Super Mega Dad.

Mandy presents Kid Created Stains posted at Building Blocks
Blog.

Veteran Military Wife presents A Better Way to Sort Laundry posted at Life Lessons of a
Military Wife.

Kevin presents Parenting a Child with Attention Deficit Disorder posted at More4kids Parenting & Family Life.

The Not Quite Crunchy Parent presents Paranoid about Plastics - Honestly, What’s a Mother to do? posted at The Not Quite Crunchy Parent.

Karen presents The Fine Art of Practicing posted at Family Briefs.com.

Brip Blap presents rich mom, poor mom posted at brip blap.

Kailani presents What Happens At Home Doesn’t Always Stay At Home posted at An Island Life.

laura presents the inquisitor posted at Adventures in Juggling.

artthailand presents Founders Day posted at artThailand.

Henry Cate presents The servants at our house posted at Why Homeschool.

Renae presents Of Equality, Value, and Birthday Parties posted at Life Nurturing
Education.

WorksForMom presents Absolutely NOT posted at What Works For Us.

Karen Shanley presents Take It From the Top posted at Author Mom with Dogs.

Rose presents November is National Adoption Awareness Month posted at Learning at Home.

pickel presents Jenny, Enough posted at Discussing Autism.

scott white presents What’s In A Name? Ask momspit! posted at The Branding Blog By
Brand Identity Guru.

e-Mom presents Let Grandparents Shine During the Holidays posted at C h r y s a l i s.

Betsy Teutsch presents Ten Kid Gifts Least Likely to Become Landfill! posted at Money Changes Things.

Betsy Teutsch presents Great Gifts with Really Bad Unintended Consequences posted at Money Changes Things.

Karen presents Christmas Present Shopping - new style posted at Miscellaneous Adventures of an Aussie Mum.

Robert Bach presents Will Trade Song For Animal posted at Kintropy In Action.

Matt M presents Caring for the Goldfish Bowl posted at The Pet Haven.

Eden presents so worth the wait. posted at Our Family Village.

Summer presents Reading Is Fun! posted at Mom Is Teaching.

A dating story for the married set:
zamejias presents Not Anything But Everything posted at Verb.

Double Feature:

Madeleine Begun Kane presents Charge! posted at Mad Kane’s Humor Blog.

Frugal Fanny presents Why Kids Need Allowance posted at Frugal Fanny’s.

K T Cat presents Getting my Daughter to Make a Budget posted at The Scratching Post.

Silicon Valley Blogger presents Ready To Retire Right Now? Find Out If It’s Time To Quit The Rat Race posted at The Digerati Life.

Donna Freedman presents Buy me something! posted at Smart Spending.

Eric presents How To Help Your Children and Grandchildren Retire As Millionaires
posted at Husbandhood.

paidtwice presents My Bargain Shopping Successes I’ve Paid For This Twice
Already… posted at I’ve Paid For This Twice Already….

Super Saver presents Personal Finance Lessons For Our Daughter posted at My Wealth Builder.

My Dollar Plan presents How to open a 529 college savings plan for your children posted at
My Dollar Plan.

Michelle Sweeney presents Travelling With Children posted at Tonic Gifts.

Charles H. Green presents Americans, Travel and Rushing to Judgment posted at Trust Matters.

Recipes, and the dangers of tasting while cooking…

Dana presents My near death experience posted at Simple Pleasures.

Aparna presents Distaste for food-Home Remedies posted at Beauty and Personality
Grooming.

Stephanie presents Baked Potato Bar posted at Stop the Ride!.

Christine presents Cinnamon and Honey Crepes posted at Me, My Kid and Life.

Jennifer in OR presents Ode to Veterans posted at Diary of 1.

Jeniffer presents thethirtydayyear.com » Blog Archive » Fire! posted at thethirtydayyear.com.

Matthew Paulson presents How to Get Your Family Prepared in The Event of a House Fire
posted at FinanceIsPersonal.com.

Okay, so these posts are nothing to do with robbing banks, but they are about having fun the old-fashioned way, arts and crafts:

Char presents Printable Webkinz Activities posted at Printables for Kids - free word
search puzzles, coloring pages, and other activities.

Melitsa presents Natural display posted at Play-Activities.com.

Karen Weideman presents Fun-Filled Friday: Thanksgiving Ideas posted at Little Fun; Little
Learning.

Dana presents Principled Discovery » Saturday School: Make your own simple circuit
posted at Principled Discovery.

An Ordinary Mom presents The Thanks and Giving Tree posted at An Ordinary Mom.

Amanda Harris presents When Your Next Door Neighbors Are Hillbillies posted at Pajama Mommy Community.

Lucy Baldwin presents 5 Things I Learned From Moving 17 Times posted at Moving Help Central.

Like Dick and Jane, these posts have nothing to do with working in a chain gang, but rather are about staying calm, cool, and collected.

Terri Mauro presents Turn Down the Emotional Volume posted at About.com Parenting Special
Needs.

Carole Fogarty presents Hand yoga for stressed out frantic moms: posted at THE HEALTHY LIVING LOUNGE.

Warren Wong presents How To Calm Down posted at Personal Development.

Tupelo Kenyon presents Persistence and Perseverance for Winners – Losers Just Quit posted
at Tupelo Kenyon.

ENDING CREDITS

That concludes this edition of the carnival of family life. Submit your post for next week’s edition here, which will be hosted at An Island Life. (BTW, if you submitted and don’t see yours listed, drop me an email ASAP and blame it on the faulty movie projector.)

Check out past carnivals by clicking this button:



Ooh! Technorati tags!
carnival of family life, blog carnival

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Are you still sitting here watching the credits? The movie is OVER!

Bath Time Fun November 11, 2007

After reading this post, I am inspired to tell you about my kids and their lengthy bathtimes.

The Boy and Little No Limit have a love-it-or-hate-it relationship with the bath. There is no middle ground.

When they hate it, they run away the second they hear running water, crying and screaming bloody murder. I always make sure the windows are closed lest the neighbors hear us and think I’m torturing my poor darlings. Needless to say, they don’t bathe every day when they hate the bath. I won’t tell you how un-often they bathe because it might make you feel like you need to squirt your eyes with that water cleansing bottle from chemistry class because you’ve been reading my dirty blog.

When the kids love the bath, they LOVE it, running to the sound of water whilst joyously tearing their clothes off. Who cares if they bump into the door, not them, because it’s time for WATER!!!! WHEE!!!!!!

I like it when they like the bath, because they will play in the water FOR-E-VER (The Boy is limited because of his skin, but Little No Limit can take all the time she wants). And while they play with the water, I can catch up on reading. Sometimes, I’ll soak my feet while I read. Other times, I’ll opt out of reading and give myself a pedicure and/or manicure instead. On one occasion, I did a mud mask. I scared The Boy, though, so I can’t do that anymore.

BWAHAHA

Currently, bathtime is fun and games in the House o’ Riley. Looks like I have a couple John Leguizamos in the making (seriously, this guy takes singing in the shower to a new level):

Flood by They Might Be Giants November 11, 2007

The first time I heard the Flood album by They Might Be Giants, I was in seventh grade. I was in my bedroom, either studying or brooding or both, and I could hear this music coming from my brother’s room and I thought, “That makes me think of the circus. And now, I must dance.”

I walked into his room and asked him what he was listening to. He handed me the CD with its unassuming sepia toned cover. I asked him to make a tape of it for me—yes, a cassette tape, how old am I—because while he had saved up his lawn mowing money to have a CD player in his room, I simply used his old tape player and asked him to record all his CDs onto tape for me (and while I got the cheaper end of that deal, my father would say I got the losing end because of the sound quality, but hey, I’m not an audiophile like he and my brother are). Anyway, that was the beginning of my love of They Might Be Giants.

Senior year of high school was probably the pinnacle of my love for TMBG, when I both attended their show at The Edge (doesn’t that sound like a devilishly cool club? Not so much) and performed one of their songs in a school variety show. The term variety is used loosely. We called it a variety show, but it was actually a performance of drama student-directed shorts. The name of this show was (cringe) Corn Deluxe. Our show had nothing to do with corn nor was there any reason to tag “deluxe” on to it, but, well, it was high school and we were being *unique*. The signs for Corn Deluxe said “Aw, Shucks, It’s Corn Deluxe!” proving, once again, that the truth is much dorkier than fiction could dream of being. The act in which my friend and I performed a TMBG song went like this:

Susan and I strode onto the stage and told everyone we wanted to do a sing-a-long. We rallied the audience into a rousing rendition of Itsy Bitsy Spider (which they did, because we’re JUST THAT CONVINCING). Then, when we were finished with Itsy Bitsy Spider, we sang “Spider” by TMBG (from the Apollo 18 album) a cappella. The few in the audience who knew it sang along. The rest were confused.

Those of you unfamiliar with this song should consider watching this fan video, or if you’re a Farscape fan, watch this one instead (it’s only a 50 second song).

About halfway through college, my TMBG listening declined, but it has made a reappearance of late, thanks to the wonderful world of Disney. I figured if the kids enjoyed TMBG’s Disney songs so much, then they would love their other stuff too. Tonight, I put on the Flood album and suggested we dance, and I have to say, there’s a reason that after 17 years, Flood is still in the top 5,000 on Amazon. We danced to the ENTIRE album. This translates into approximately forty-five minutes straight of me encouraging the kids to follow me around the house in jumping, swinging, hip-shaking, and knee-bending. It turns out that while I could do that for hours on end when I was in seventh and eighth grade, one play of the album is enough for me now.

The kids are climbing the furniture and want to play it again. And I? I want a nap.

I end with my two favorite TMBG videos. The first is “Istanbul(not Constantinople),” the second is “Particle Man.” Tiny Toons rocked.

Not Such A Small World After All November 10, 2007

Here’s an interesting article on Disney’s planned renovations to the Small World ride, sent to me by Brassy Girl. Per her recommendations, be sure to read the last few lines.

How’s that leftover Halloween candy tasting to you now?