Domesticity

I have been out of work for one week now and I have been a cooking machine. We have been in our house for 3.5 years and I usually ran the dishwasher once a week, maybe twice. This week I have been running it almost twice a day I have been cooking so much. I currently have banana bread in the oven, I made pancakes from scratch the other day. I always thought it must be hard to make pancakes hence why they have box recipes, but no, not really. Maybe it takes 5 more minutes to prepare, but in the grand scheme of making breakfast, not a big deal. They were also pretty amazing pancakes. I made lasagna for Adam and I on Christmas (which isn't really that hard, but still...) with some glazed carrots and sesame ginger green beans. Both made from fresh veggies. Our normal dinners include some sort of frozen, pre-seasoned, steam in the bag veggies. Those are fine to have on hand, but it's nice to cook with fresh ingredients. I also made some deviled eggs for the first time. They are surprisingly not as complicated as I thought they were. Of course I brought them to a family gathering where someone else also made deviled eggs. I really don't know what people did without the internet for recipes. I can type in the most generic terms and find what I want. Love it.

Adam and I have one more Christmas gathering, it was postponed due to illness of the host, but I've volunteered to make the desert for it. I've decided to make cheesecake cupcakes of different flavors. I have a basic recipe, and now that I know the difference between confectioners sugar and powdered sugar (as in there is no difference) they should turn out a little bit better this time around. But I'm going to add some raspberries, chocolate and caramel to the basic recipe and hopefully my variations will be a success. If all else fails, I will make Adam's favorite cupcake recipe that I just got last weekend from his mom. They are chocolate cupcakes with a cream cheese filling. I found a recipe online awhile ago, but they never tasted the same as his mom's. She gave me the recipe and the difference was the chocolate used. I was using a cocoa powder and she used nesquik. Yes, the stuff used for chocolate milk. Who knew such a minor change could make such a difference.

My family found out a couple weeks ago that my uncle Terry, the one we always take bowling, has throat cancer. Terry thought he had strep for almost a year before he found out that wasn't it. He went into the hospital last week because he was having difficulty breathing, he got a tracheotomy this morning. His cancer is so far along, that if he didn't have the surgery soon it would constrict his airways in a matter of weeks. He's in recovery now, so we'll see how things go. He is an avid smoker, but he's actually doing pretty well not being able to smoke. The next steps are going to be chemo and radiation, but we're not sure if Terry is going to be up for it. Again, we're just going to have to see how things go.

Hope everyone had a good holidays... happy new year!

Bus Etiquette

The morning bus ride is usually pretty quiet, and I like it that way. It's morning, I'm tired. I just want to sit in peace and stare out the window, or if I'm motivated, read my book.

Today, the bus was on time for once, there was a driver change (from the nicest driver ever) and since the change this new driver has been over 10 minutes late on more than one occasion. If my bus ride is only 20-25 minutes, being 10 minutes late really isn't an option. Today's bus ride included a middle aged man dressed in camo yelling to the bus driver to carry on a conversation. I was semi-able to tolerate this until the older middle aged woman on her cell phone got on the bus. She thought 8:30 AM on the 23rd was the appropriate time to get Christmas lists and addresses for people. At some point her conversation started to sound like she was talking to a therapist...

"Ooooh." (A breakthrough has just occurred) "I've been acting like a victim"

I'm one of the first stops downtown, and all I have to do is get off the bus, walk across the street and into the building and I'm in the lobby of my work. It's easy, there's even a cross walk telling me when I can and cannot walk. Today, a man in the cross walk decides he's going to direct traffic and wave through the cars that are turning. I don't think so. The cars will be able to turn! You do not need to assist them in their travels. Just get out of the crosswalk and they will get on their way.

This could be the most productive day ever, or the longest day ever. I'm going to start by organizing myself. I've only been here a month and it looks like some papers have thrown up all over my desk.

Lots to say but not a lot of time

I started a post a while ago, but haven't been able to finish it, so I haven't written since thinking that I need to finish what I start. I'm finally saying "F-it" I'll finish it later.

Agenda items:
New job is good. Learning the ropes, or their ropes. Like what I'm working on. No, love what I'm working on. Still working on my role in the grand scheme of things, figuring out how all of the different roles fit together. It's new for me to work on a media only account. No account people, no creatives, no planners even. Just connection planning and media, I like it. I just found out I'm going to a research conference in January, so I'm excited about that. Mostly the fact that it's in LA in Jan. Granted its only a day, but I'm pretty sure a day away from this freezing cold will be worth it. We have a week and a half off for the Holidays, very excited to finally have some time to relax and sleep. This semester of school was rough and very draining, so I'm happy its over. Whenever a semester ends, I get in a kick to eat better and work out. While I haven't used the gym at work yet, I have every intention to use it. I also just got some winter workout gear so once it gets to be above 0, I will run outside...

I just have to say its really hard to eat better when you are surrounded by plates and plates of cookies. Trying to use some self restraint.

Happy holidays to all and to all a goodnight.