put your paws in the air like you just don't care!

this is the first jigsaw puzzle i've done in many a year.  it otter be included on this blog, if i do say so myself.  and no, not because i'm going to cook him...

i completed it a couple weekends ago, and it's just begging to be captioned.  here are a few options i came up with:

"damn it, jim...i'm a doctor, not an engineer!"

"i can't work under these conditions!"

"hooray...it's friday!"

"this yoga stuff is hard to do in the water..."


 what other things is the otter saying?

guest authors

every so often, someone expresses a desire to share a recipe, which is something that should never be discouraged.  i don't claim that my blog is a particularly widely-viewed one, but i still like it and am willing to let other people make use of it (instead of trying to create their own blog from scratch).

if anyone wishes to participate, i will not try to pass your recipe off as my own.  you'll obviously have your own signature line at the bottom, and you probably won't be able to replicate my writing voice.  if requested, i'll even introduce you before-hand!

heaven

calvin and hobbes is arguably one of my favorite comic strips of all time.  so much so that i bought the box set of the entire collection (which was supposedly one of the heaviest books on the new york times best-seller list).  basically, it's a set of three coffee table books containing ten year's worth of comics.  who wouldn't love this?

i decided it was time to reread this collection, and now i'm remembering why i've always thought this comic was so fantastic.  case in point, the january 8, 1986 strip:

clearly, this is an awesome view of things, and it's an afterlife i wouldn't mind for myself.


incidentally, there's a calvin and hobbes search engine out there that will let you do a keyword search on the comics.  pretty much awesome.

ravel or unravel?

i like words...it comes from having read voraciously since kindergarten.  and i find it amusing that some unlikely (and seemingly opposite) words should in fact mean the same thing.  for example, "flammable" and "inflammable" both mean essentially the same -- even though one has the "in-" prefix.

in the same fashion, both "ravel" and "unravel" mean to disentangle, to unweave, or to cause to come apart.  granted, merriam-webster does list an obsolete definition for ravel as "to become entangled or confused," but still.  words are funny like that.

greetings to all the fiber artists from ravelry.com currently reading my blog.  i hope you find something you might like to try!

jamaican jerk vegetables

so i'm running out of rosemary.  it's a sad state of affairs, really, and it was one i wanted to rectify yesterday.  however, my local grocery store was sold out of this wonderful dried herb, and i was too lazy to drive somewhere else.  but there was a container of jamaican jerk seasoning...and i have always been curious to try this in cookery.  i also had potatoes in my pantry, carrots in my fridge, and broccoli in my shopping basket.

naturally, i decided to mix them all together.

ingredients:
- a couple potatoes
- a handful of baby carrots
- a few florets of broccoli
- jerk seasoning
- black pepper
- garlic powder

preparation:
cut the potatoes into chunks, and trim the broccoli into manageable trees.  throw these pieces, as well as the  baby carrots, into a mixing bowl, and toss with olive oil.  sprinkle on a healthy amount of garlic, black pepper, and jerk seasoning.

spread the vegetables on a baking pan (use parchment paper), and roast at 400°F for about 30 minutes.

verdict:
in hindsight, it probably isn't a good idea to roast the broccoli for the same duration as the potatoes and carrots.  next time, i would probably roast the potatoes and carrots longer (maybe 45 minutes) and add the broccoli to the pan later (maybe 15-20 minutes before the rest is finished cooking).  that way, the potatoes would become crispier, and maybe the carrots would fully caramelize.

as it was, the potatoes were cooked but lacked that extra crispiness, and the carrots were still a little al dente.  and unfortunately, the broccoli was mostly blackened.  also, the jamaican jerk seasoning has more of a kick than the smell from the container initally led me to believe! 

oh, the places you'll go

i have had a particular condition for a long time now.  in fact, i've had it since my senior year of high school (or possibly earlier).  it's a rather insidious condition that gnaws on me if i don't provide a suitable treatment every couple years.

the travel bug bit me.  i won't say that i suffer from it, but i do have an incurable case of wanderlust.

how did i end up with such a disease?  well, the fact that my dad periodically traveled around the world (south korea, germany, scotland, india, italy...) for his job may have made me think about what all is out there.  i don't think he particularly enjoyed travelling (or so he claimed, anyway), but dad did bring me back coins from his destinations.  this may not seem like much, but seeing foreign currency does make a kid realize that the united states isn't the only place in the world.

toward the end of my senior year of high school, one of my favorite teachers (mrs. every) set up a class trip to europe.  the notion of spending 10-14 days in europe sounded pretty much awesome, but i realized then that i wouldn't want to do that sort of guided tour.  aside from the fact that half the stops on that particular tour didn't appeal to me, i didn't necessarily want to be stuck with 10-15 people for the duration.  you could say that this was when the travel bug started buzzing around my head.

during my freshman or sophomore year at nc state, i attended a lecture that some guy gave about backpacking through europe.  i don't remember his name or the specific topics of the lecture, but he talked about how easy it was to get a eurail pass and skip from place to place.  he also painted an enticing picture of seeing other cultures close-up and personally.  that was when the travel bug chomped down on me.

over the next couple years of college, the thought of taking a trip to europe lodged itself in the back of my head.  by the time my senior year rolled around, i had decided to spend the summer after graduation backpacking through europe.  a couple friends joined me, and we spent six weeks in the summer of 2006 circling western europe with about any mode of transportation imaginable (foot, taxi, train, bus, boat, and airplane).  after experiencing the excitement of getting lost in a foreign country, meeting new people from all over the world, and seeing some amazing things, i can't stand the thought of never stamping my passport again.

i did add another passport stamp in 2009 when i went to portugal.  nobody else wanted to go, so i spent a week and a half wandering around by myself.  sadly, i haven't been out of the country since then, and it's probably getting about time for another excursion.

i have a list of places i would love to visit, but the order of priority shifts on an almost weekly basis.  some people have a map on their wall with the pushpins showing where they've been or where they want to go.  until i have enough wall space for a suitably large map, i'll just have to make due with a digital dartboard.  the red markers show where i've been, and the blue markers show places i want to go.  additionally, i'm keeping track of which states i can recall visiting (airport layovers don't count); at some point, i would love to say that i've visited all 50 states.


View digital travel dartboard in a larger map


where else do i absolutely need to visit?  if there are any other must-see destinations, i ought to add them to the list.

all around the world

perhaps unsurprisingly, the majority of my blog views come from the united states.  after all, i live here, and my family and most of my friends live here, too.  but i do have friends in foreign countries, so it's kind of neat to see that my blog audience extends to both germany and the united kingdom.

today, however, i was looking at my blog statistics, and i was intrigued to see a view from someone apparently in kazakhstan!  i have absolutely no idea who i know in kazakhstan, and i didn't realize this was nifty enough to show up on search engine results.  at least not yet, anyway.

if you're viewing my posts from outside the united states, please leave a comment!  i'd love to hear how you discovered my blog.  for that matter, i'd also be interested in hearing about recipes that i ought to try out.

creative writing for amateurs

one of my friends has been encouraging me to write, which is perhaps one of the reasons i created this blog.  so i uncovered a writing competition whose prompt is to write the opening sentence (25 words or less) of a story based on the photo below.

when i first saw the picture, two completely different things popped into my mind: william carlos william's poem entitled "the red wheelbarrow" and nirvana's nevermind album.  random, i know, but my mind works in mysterious ways.

still, after a couple drafts, i came up with a sentence that made me happy.  i have no illusions of greatness, but maybe i'll actually dabble with turning it into a story.

as soon as she hit the water, charlotte knew the dress -- a beautiful crimson silk -- would be absolutely ruined.

feel free to submit your own entry (deadline of 2/25)...but no thieving of my idea!

key lime pie

no, i didn't actually make a key lime pie.  but i did get a piece (with raspberry sauce, even) today!  all because i am eminently forgettable.  maybe i shouldn't derive so much amusement from this...but i just can't help myself. =)

background: some people were going out to lunch at work today (fun times).  however, due to coming down with a cold this week, i've been left with a cough for the past couple days...nothing terrible, but it just isn't something i would subject people to at a restaurant.  so i wasn't intending to go.  but still, it's funny when people call from the restaurant asking where i am.  i could probably pretend to be offended that a whole group of people walked out of the office without first stopping by my desk, but i find the whole situation entirely too funny to act outraged about it.

free pie?  score!  and it might even convince me to try my hand at making one some day.

on fame

judge me if you wish, but i'm watching the first episode of the taste on abc -- and it's almost entirely because anthony bourdain is on the show.  based on no reservations (and various other shows like top chef, etc), mr. bourdain is irreverant, sarcastic, and is unafraid of telling it like it is.  he has, to say the least, some rather evocative and cutting critiques of the food he dislikes, and it's amusing to hear his opinions.

i highly approve of his sense of humor and would love to meet him in person some day...but no way in hell would i want to cook for him!  call me crazy, but i even spent some time trying to find a way to beg and plead for a chance to carry camera gear for the travel channel (and specifically, for no reservations).  it would have been worth it to travel to beautiful places and have a local fixer who knows where to go to eat some absolutely delicious foods.  so what if the camera crew would be doing grunt work most of the time?  i'm convinced it would've been worth it.  sadly, no reservations is now ending, and this opportunity never came to pass.

there are quite a few famous dead people worth conversing with (einstein, twain, and feynman, to name a few), but would i like to meet many live celebrities?  not so much.  some people may want to meet celebrities just so they can say "i've met him" or "i saw her," but that strikes me as somewhat shallow.  for me, i'd rather meet interesting people; if they happen to be famous, that would be kind of a neat story.  but fame does not, in general, strike me as a valid reason for wanting to meet people.  infamy, on the other hand...!

maybe this notion of mine is because i'm somewhat allergic to attention.  i prefer a degree of anonymity, and constantly being in the public eye (and under the proverbial microscope) is a rather scary thought.  given that, maybe it's just as well that i'm not pretty enough, talented enough, or smart enough to become famous.

and here i am, writing a blog for anyone and everyone to read...go figure.

around it goes

so after more than 20 years since robert jordan first published the eye of the world, the final novel in the wheel of time series has been published.  i've been reading (and re-reading) this massively epic fantasy series since maybe the sixth or seventh grade, which means that as of now, these books have been a part of my library for more than half my life.  scary.

i've known for awhile that a memory of light would be out this january, but i never got around to pre-ordering.  considering how i tend to wander into bookstores on a fairly regular basis, i figured i wouldn't forget to pick up a copy.  because i'm just good like that.  so this past friday, i bought book 14 and began to read it.

maybe i should have stretched things out a bit...savored the experience a little longer.  but let's face it: the storytelling was pretty darn compelling, and i really didn't want to set the book down.  before i cracked the front cover, i made a guess that it would take less than a week to finish.  however, after less than 36 hours, i was done with more than 900 pages.  thus endeth the last book in a very long series.

give me another few years, and i'll probably start reading the whole thing yet again.

break an egg

i have accumulated a few pieces of kitchen paraphernalia over the years, but the first item i bought for myself back in 2006 was an omelet pan.  did i know how to make omelets when i bought the pan?  only vaguely.  before my purchase, my experience was limited to watching the guy in fountain dining hall make my breakfast.  but i was determined to learn.  fast-forward about six years (and much experimentation), and i am pleased to say that people now express their approval of my omelet-making skills.

behold

clearly, there is a method to the madness of omelet preparation, but i don't claim to understand why certain things work (or don't, as the case may be).  but they are perhaps my favorite things to cook.  it takes artistry.  and i enjoy thinking that i have a little bit of artistry in my soul.


ingredients:
2 eggs
milk
texas pete (or other hot sauce of your choice)
fillings of your choice (for the pictured omelet, i used bacon pieces and shredded some of dad's smoked turkey)
shredded cheese (i typically just go for cheddar)
black pepper

preparation:
crack the eggs into a bowl, and add the hot sauce.  i use three or four shakes because i like a little bit of spice.  beat the eggs with a  fork or small whisk.  add milk and mix some more.  i use maybe 1/4 to 1/2 of a cup, but it sort of depends on the size of the omelet pan.  too much milk and the pan will overflow...clearly not a good thing.

spritz the omelet pan with cooking spray, and sprinkle the fillings.  be generous...there is no reason to skimp on the bacon (or whatever).  as an exception, be careful when using tomatoes; i like tomatoes in omelets, but i've noticed that too much juice will prevent the egg from setting properly.  i think it's the acid.  but anyway, by putting these ingredients in the pan before adding the egg mixture, they get cooked into the omelet itself.  fancy!

put the pan on the stove, and turn heat up to medium to medium-high.  once things start to get warm, i make sure the egg mixture is well-stirred and carefully pour it into the pan.  as the mixture starts to cook, the edges of the omelet will begin to set.  use a wooden spatula to push the edges down.  carefully tilt and rotate the pan to allow the uncooked egg mixture to reach the edges.  continue to do this until no liquid egg mixture is present.

continue to cook for a minute or so, and then sprinkle the shredded cheese on top.  i personally like a lot of cheese in my omelet, so there is no reason to skimp here, either.  let the cheese melt and continue to cook until the omelet is less shiny.  clearly, this is a technical term to help you know when the omelet is done, and it's essentially where the artistry and experimentation comes in; it takes awhile to figure out just how long is optimal for a nicely browned (but not overly browned) omelet.

because i put the cheese on the omelet while it's still cooking, i don't flip things in the pan.  when it's finished, i simply slide the omelet onto a plate, and i let it fold over on itself as it slides off the pan.  add some freshly cracked black pepper if desired, and start eating!

the itch

it has been over three years since i last got my passport stamped...and more than a year since i've been on an airplane.  and 2012 kept me confined within a mere four states.  even worse, i have only increased the length of my wishlist of places to see...sadly, i have not placed any new checkmarks on that list in the past couple years.

don't get me wrong, it isn't like i haven't gone anywhere or done anything lately; looking back over the past year, i've been to the beach, to the mountains (multiple times), and to several places in between.  i've reconnected with a few old friends, and i've met some awesome new people.  but i suffer from a chronic case of wanderlust.  and the symptoms have been increasing as of late.
 
so yes, i clearly need to go somewhere new and unfamiliar in 2013.

although i have numerous european and pacific destinations on my list, i sort of want to stick to north america this time around.  san francisco would be awesome...especially if royal crown revue ever happens to perform again.  and i'm led to believe that there is some exceedingly tasty food to be found there.  not to mention the opportunity to drive through big sur country. 

another alternative i'm considering is vancouver.  in hindsight, i absolutely should have gone to the winter olympics there; even now, i'm kicking myself for not thinking about it beforehand.  but i understand that it's a fun place with some scenic drives of its own.

decisions, decisions...