Sleep With The Fishes

Alert! New crafting attempt. I will be making my own concrete vases. I have recently come across a "recipe" to make these awesome containers, in which the possibilities are apparently endless! Aside from all the different shapes that can be utilized, you can even use stain for color variation! The materials needed cost a grand total of $20. First attempt will hopefully be this weekend, I will keep you all posted.

Bye Bye Birdie

Last weekend I stopped off at my favorite antique store in all of Southern California, The Pasadena Salvation Army Antiques and Collectibles. There happened to be a storewide sale of 50% off(lucky me) so I picked up a few things here and a few things there. The one random object I bought that I am really excited about was this weird brassy gold tree stand that held these truly hideous bird statues of various color and species. Seeing the potential behind the ugliness, I bought the stand, broke the birds off, stripped it down to its nitty grits and repainted it with a matte acrylic brown. For under $10 I not only purchased the stand, but completely revamped the whole thing and scored an amazing jewelry tree in the process.

Juicy Juice

Never in my life would I have imagined that buying a juice container could be one of the most difficult tasks to successfully complete. My husband and I are avid coffee and soda water drinkers and we recently veered off that path to explore the wonderful world of juice and iced tea. In order to create and house the liquid refreshements, we needed our very own fully functioning pitcher. One that both dispenses juice in a timely fashion and doesn't fall apart at the seams. Sounds simple right? Wrong.

Our first attempt at owning our very own pitcher started with our wedding registry. We found a nice recycled green glass vessel that suited us both and we added it to our list. Someone was kind enough to fulfill our wish and gifted us with this aforementioned pitcher. We liked it, roomy, unique, it seemed as though it would have no difficulty living up to the simple expectation of holding liquid.

After a few uses, I noticed that there was the beginnings of a crack near the base of the handle. I began to have all these horrible images of me picking up the pitcher only to have the body of it snap off and smash to the floor spilling Pomegranate/Blueberry Passion Juice all over while at the same time cutting up my hands, fingers and feet. I immediately emptied the pitcher and headed off to Crate and Barrel for a prompt return.

As I approached the woman at the counter and explained my situation she replied. "That's odd. Did you happen to put any hot liquid in there?".

I turned a deep shade of red and perhaps too quickly answered, "Nope, not at all".

I was now completely embarrassed, was this MY FAULT? For I often did indeed put hot liquid in there to make iced tea. Had I caused the downfall of the pretty green pitcher?

"I'm pretty sure this one here is just faulty. Do you mind if I exchange it?" I politely asked.

I was eventually cleared to take home a new pitcher to replace the old one and I was damn sure this one would last. How could I have been so stupid and careless I thought to myself. This was my fault. From now on, only cold and room temperature refreshments would be poured into our pitcher.

As time passed and a few uses were had from our container, I noticed the same thing. A small little crack along the base of the handle.

"Oh no!" I thought. It IS the pitchers fault! It is too fat and heavy to hold. This was a full on Sir Mix A Lot container. Now I knew I had done nothing wrong. Once again, I packed up and headed off to Crate and Barrel. Thank God there was a new lady at the counter. A lady who asked no questions, but rather agreed with me that this vessel was INDEED faulty and should NOT be cracking under any circumstances.

At this point I gave up on the recycled green glass pitcher and instead exchanged it for a fancy splatter screen, which by the way, has been quite a nice addition to our kitchen accessories. I began to set my sights higher, perhaps we didn't need a pitcher, what we needed was a dispenser. I could see it already, a gleaming, shiny refreshment dispenser with a really cool spigot that we could use for sangria, lemonade, tea you name it and it would deliver.

By this time, Christmas season had rolled around so I found a nice juice dispenser complete with a shiny spigot and added it to my wish list. Santa granted and on Christmas, Keith and I were the proud parents of our very own liquid party device. We were stoked! After grocery shopping we put the thing to use and made some bad ass raspberry lemonade, mixing it up just right, placing the lid back on and placing it in the fridge. Later on in the day when I went to get a glass of juice, I turned the spigot and, nothing. Perplexed, I turned it more and more until I couldn't turn it again and still, nothing. The effing spigot didn't work at all!! It was some sick joke. Not even a drop of delicious flavored lemonade would come out.

"What the hell?" I shouted. "Keith!! What kind of bullshit is this!? Our spigot doesn't even work. Now we can't get the juice out! It's stuck."

"Let me see." Replied Keith, he tried everything and this thing was absolutely 100% useless. After fully accepting the fate of both our juice and new dispenser, we removed it from the fridge, cleaned it and retired it to a bottom shelf in the kitchen cupboard. At this point, I had enough of hunting for the perfect pitcher, I resigned myself to plastic bottles and cans. Until...

Two months later and eleven months after our wedding, we received a belated gift. It was one that we already happened to have so, once again, off to Crate and Barrel for yet another return. This time I had done some pre shopping research and found what Keith and I believed to be perhaps the perfect pitcher. It was a glass and plastic combo, had a turn lid, compact body for shelf storage complete with an easy grip side so I no longer had to worry about that glass handle snapping off and the added "Meggie likey" bonus of a retro design. Could it be? Was it even possible?...Wish us luck, who knew juice could be so difficult.

She's Such A Snob

"She's such a snob."

"Who is?" I asked, half asleep.

"Your Mom." Keith mumbled from the right side of the bed. My eyes shot open. I was immediately wide awake and on the defensive.

"You don't even know my Mom." I snapped, now sitting upright and ready for a verbal altercation. I looked over to my right and realized that my future husband had been talking in his sleep. "That's weird" I thought to myself. "Keith." I said. Nothing. "Keith". Silence. No response. He was completely, absolutely 100% asleep. After a few failed attempts to elicit a response from the slumbering talker I laid back down and eventually drifted off myself with no more disturbances during the remainder of the evening.

The next day over coffee, I asked Keith if he remembered the sleepy incident from the night before and he swore to have no recollection of any of it. We laughed it off and thought nothing further of the matter.

In the dead of night a few weeks later, Keith shot out of bed around two or three in the morning as if all hell had broken loose. He made a mad dash for the bedroom door yelling "The bathtub's overflowing!! The bathtub's overflowing!!!" Practically tearing the door from its hinges, he ran down the hallway only to return moments later, shuffling his feet along the carpet, not saying a single word. He slowly made his way back into the bedroom, crawled back under the covers and within thirty seconds, light snoring was audible from his side of the bed. My eyes open and brain completely confused, I remained lying on my side,"What the ---- is going on?" I silently asked myself.

It was during this time, that I also began to notice some strange "goings on" in the kitchen. My mornings would start off as normal as any other. I would wake up, get out of bed, wipe the sleep from my eyes and paddle off to the kitchen to start a pot of coffee, but things were never left the way they were the night before. Only occurring between the hours of 11p.m to 7a.m, a mysterious mess would be made and left for clean up as if someone had cooked something, but failed to finish the task. Peanut butter smears would jump out at me from the countertops, my eyes would lock onto fingerprints made of jam and chocolate pressed onto the light switches and refrigerator door, cereal boxes torn open with no regard for the crispy flakes inside. It was as if some sort of "Wild Planet" animal eating frenzy had unfolded just moments before I rounded the corner. God forbid if there was ice cream in the freezer because it wouldn't last more than 24 hours. Cartons of Chocolate Moose Tracks and Fudge Ripple left on the kitchen counter practically licked clean, housing nothing more than a lone spoon hidden well below the confines of the sticky sided containers. Did we have mice? Were there kitchen gnomes living in our walls?

"Keith, what is up? Why are you eating all of our food?" I asked one sunny morning over breakfast.

"What are you talking about?" He replied. "I didn't eat anything."

"What do you mean you didn't eat anything? Half of our groceries are gone, dude." We looked at each other, both equally confused. "Are you eating in your sleep!?" I asked, half accusatory, half bewildered. It was then that he admitted to me that he has, in the past, occasionally and unknowingly partaken in an eat/talk/walk whilst sleeping activity, oftentimes not remembering any smidgen of his "nightly adventures". He even revealed that he has eaten so much at times that he has become physically ill, the end result culminating in an upheaval of any and all stomach contents the following morning.
I accepted this quirky trait actually finding quite a bit of humor in the various "sleep/eat incidents" until it spilled over to our then roommate's fine European chocolates...

Our roommate Cortney had studied abroad in Sweden during college and while she was there, she developed quite a taste for a certain Swedish candy bar unavailable to us in The States. One summer, a friend of hers that she became acquainted with overseas had come to Los Angeles for a visit. Her friend was considerate enough to remember her affinity for these particular chocolates and brought an ample supply as a gift. Cortney was ecstatic, completely through the roof with sugared excitement. Parading through the house she exclaimed to us all how much she simply adored these chocolates, that they could not be beat. They were the best things on earth.

A few days later, I heard her cussing up a storm from the other end of the apartment. I walked down the long, narrow hallway leading away from the living room and towards her bedroom. Timidly peeking my head through her half opened door and said, “Hey Cort, you okay? What’s up?”

She looked up at me, the box of chocolates in her hand, “My brother Kyle is an asshole. He knows how much I love these chocolates and he ate one. Asshole.”

“Dude, that does suck. What a bummer.” I replied, feeling sorry for her chocolate plight. After a brief discussion regarding the greedy actions of her brother, I turned around and headed off returning to my previously interrupted activities.

The rest of the day passed as any other and I eventually relayed the story to Keith of how Cort’s selfish and unthinking brother ate some of her nearly impossible to obtain chocolate treasures. “That sucks.” Keith stated. “Cortney really likes those chocolates.” He then reached into his shirt pocket to retrieve a pack of cigarettes, but instead of extracting his Parliaments, Keith pulled out a certain wrapper to an incredibly hard to obtain Swedish chocolate candy bar. My mouth hung open in horror. Keith looked up at me, terror in his eyes. The wrapper slowly fell from his hands and silently dropped to the carpet, our eyes glued to the evidence now lying on the floor.

“Oh no.” I gasped. “What are you going to do?”

“Maybe I shouldn’t say anything.” He whispered, “She thinks Kyle did it.”

“You can’t let Kyle take the fall. You have to tell her what happened. Explain that it was an accident and you didn’t know.”

“You’re right.” Keith said. He resigned himself to the fact of having to come clean, to "take it like a man". Gathering all of his strength, he stood up, pulled his shoulders back, took a deep breath and prepared for war. As he reluctantly headed off towards Cortney’s room I hoped that I would see him again someday.

A Room Without Books.....

When I heard that my neighborhood was getting a brand new library, I was ecstatic. As I child, I lived for the library. My Mom took me all the time and I read any and everything I could get my hands on, but as I got older, I changed and the library, well it stayed the same. Until recently, I was convinced that libraries had become a thing of the past, ancient relics long forgotten, left to fend for themselves, eventually, over time eroded down to nothing more than broken walls and rubble like a modern day Pompeii. So, as the libraries fell into disrepair and Boarders and Barnes and Noble(the library-esque fancy bookstores)were springing up all over, I, in time, dropped out of the library circuit and flew solo.

This new library however was changing things. It had restored my faith. I wanted to return to borrowing books. I yearned to take advantage of all the free materials available to me. I was shocked that a city located in a state as broke as ours was actually going to spend real money on a house of books. Spend they did, yes indeedy, twenty one million dollars in fact. That amount of money can work some serious magic. It was unbelievable and I was so thrilled it was a mere mile from my home. With it finally built I must convey to you how beautiful the structure is, they really spared no expense. The landscape gets two enthusiastic thumbs up. It even has a fancy pants glass rock garden in varying shades of blue nestled along side a crafty little succulent garden(my current fave foliage). The building itself resembles something mid century modern with lots of windows, open and airy. Clapping my hands together in library induced joy, I just couldn't wait to get in there and procure my very own library card.

The interior of the building was equally as impressive as the exterior. The entryway displayed smartly designed grey stone modern steps and beautiful wood accents. The downstairs housed a few closed off meeting rooms, one of them claiming to have Scrabble Night. I though it was kind of a cute idea, but Keith pointed out that you might want to reevaluate your social agenda if you live in LA and come to the library to play scrabble with strangers.

This was no library from my youth, you know the ones, constructed out of that familiar old depressing red brick. The inside housing the grossly outdated burlap orange and red chairs, the cheap middle of the road stained wooden tables, the berber carpet colored some heinous shade of gold. The heavy drapes, the American flag proudly displayed near the drinking fountain. It was as if they spent half their time as libraries and the other half as the local DMV. This sleek, brand new beauty had self checkout, lots of computers and overall a very modern uber-hip look as if I myself walked into a Dwell photo shoot. As we hit the top of the stairs we were there in the nerve center, the real inner workings of the library, and it was.............. about as big as my living room. This was the smallest, sorriest excuse for a library I have ever seen. I had just about as impressive of a collection as they did and I assure you I did not spend 21 million to obtain it. Nowadays at the library, you can rent dvds, books on tape, magazines leaving even less room for the actual books, you know, those things with paper and print. NO ONE was looking at the books anyway, but boy oh boy were the dvds flying off the shelf. I'm sorry. Did I mistake my local Blockbuster for the library? The only somewhat impressive book section was the Children's(which is good because I plan on using it as much as possible) but really. Twenty one million dollars and I swear they only spent about $2000 of it on actual reading material. Obviously that glass rock garden that I stopped to admire outside was worth every penny.

In the meantime, why don't you kick the Scrabble Club out of that conference room and put some books in there!!

Soap Chips for Lunch, Anyone?

I do believe that my first official craving has kicked in. Frozen yogurt. Not the kind that you buy at the grocery store, but the kind dispensed and made to order with copious amounts and varieties of toppings. I have actually always liked frozen yogurt, but now I find myself thinking about it morning, noon and night. When I got up today and was contemplating what to make for breakfast, I found myself secretly yearning for a chocolate, coconut twist with fresh berries and chocolate shavings.

As far as cravings go, I don't think I have made the worst possible choice in the books. I have heard it all from chicken livers to cottage cheese. Gross. There are even some women who apparently crave things that are entirely unedible, like dirt and soap. There is a term for this, what I consider to be "disorder". Sorry, ladies if I offend, but with all the delicious foods out there why in the hell are you craving dirt? This condition(to put it lightly) is called pica

"Pica is the practice of craving substances with little or no nutritional value. Most pica cravings involve non-food substances such as dirt or chalk. The word pica is Latin for magpie which is a bird notorious for eating almost anything.
Some speculate that pica cravings are the body's attempt to obtain vitamins or minerals that are missing through normal food consumption. Sometimes pica cravings may be related to an underlying physical or mental illness. (get out, really? Mental Illness you say?)
The most common substances craved during pregnancy are dirt, clay, and laundry starch. Other pica cravings include: burnt matches, stones, charcoal, mothballs, ice, cornstarch, toothpaste, soap, sand, plaster, coffee grounds, baking soda, and cigarette ashes."

So see, yogurt ain't so bad. There is one thing however about my current sub zero obsession that I do have a problem with. In this city, the only type of yogurt I can readily get my hands on is corporate.

Starbucks(the evil empire which has succeeded in running practically every independent coffee shop out of town) apparently has an evil and crafty younger sibling, Pinkberry. These two horrendous beasts have the same M.O. They find a small Mom and Pop establishment, set up shop just a few doors down and proceed to bankrupt, bleed out, and stomp any and all related competition. I firmly believe that these products are no better or of higher quality. In fact, I despise Starbucks coffee and will avoid it at all costs. I think it tastes horrible, like burnt sludge. Also, while I'm at it, why can't you just name your sizes S,M,L? Does one really need to say "grande" when ordering? Oooh, what a clever and witty marketing ploy. Are you trying to make me feel"wordly" as if I am in a foreign country ordering coffee?

Pinkberry you smarmy little brat, are no better. Over the years, I have borne witness to all the little indie yogurt shops one by one, hanging their heads in defeat and closing up shop. There is only one I know of who has survived this corporate brutality(even with a Pinkberry newly opened right around the corner). This beautiful yogurt shop is in the Valley and it is hands down one of the best I have ever visited. Studio City Yogurt. When I lived in that area, I used to walk over there at least four times a week. You just can't compete with these Peter Parker-like dispensers of frozen goodness. No one can. They are the masters, the king of kings. Every day, five flavors, one dairy free, one sugar free. When you request toppings they put them in the bottom of the cup AND on top of the yogurt. Not to mention, their frozen yogurt is a far better consistency than Pinkberry's(which I think resembles ice milk) and you can always change it up with crazy, fun new flavors. The shitty part for me is that I no longer live in the Valley and the only yogurt shop near me is Pinkberrry's.

So time and time again, there I find myself eating my yogurt while listening to horrible tween pop piped into the seating area. At least I know I am much safer there than in the backyard eating handfuls of burnt log or dirt.

The Piece de Resistance

On the second Sunday of every month a magical occurrence happens in Pasadena. R.G. Canning's Rose Bowl Flea Market. This is the flea market of all flea markets. It is so huge that you literally cannot complete it in one visit, and you can forget about it being inside the stadium, it is way too big to put inside the Rose Bowl. Instead it sits on each and every parking lot in and around the monolith playing field. I have been living here for 11 years and still look forward to it every month. You never know what you are going to find and whatever you do, I guarantee you won't find it anywhere else.

My latest mission at home has been a decorative overhaul on the living room including the mantle. I don't really know of a name for the style I have been going for, but I kind of wanted a "vintage natural history museum" type feel. I had decided that the piece de resistance needed to be either some type of rogue or vintage taxidermy. Being that no one in my family or any of my friends were, or currently are, interested in trekking into the woods dressed in camouflage, waiting for some innocent woodland creature to cross their paths so they can kill, skin and eat it, I was out of luck. In addition to that fact, I also have this little voice inside me that prohibits me from buying one new. You see, with rogue at least you know the animal was found dead or donated and with vintage you are buying something that a hunter or taxidermist is not making a direct profit off of. Whatever old school item you purchase generally surfaces from someone's basement or estate sale.

In considering the piece, I did a little perusing of ebay and craigslist and what I saw was cool, but also accompanied by a pretty hefty price tag, usually around $200, so I knew the only place I could turn to, the only place I could trust was the Rose Bowl. It was decided and Sunday in the late morning, my friend and I headed out on our monthly excursion, not sure what we would find, psyching ourselves up to maneuver between the slow moving folks and carts. Excited to uncover some type of "I have to have this" treasure.

I hit the motherfucking jackpot. I had found it! Vintage deer antlers mounted on a small plaque of brown velvet that I'm guessing were about 50 years old and I scored it for only $40 dollars. There was going to be some work involved, don't get me wrong, but the total cost would be far less than what I had been seeing around and I was recycling. After I bulldozed my way back to the car(you would be surprised how fast a crowd will part when you are headed their way holding a huge set of antlers) my friend and I headed off to Michael's. I had to buy a few more things to complete my masterpiece.

Back at home, I had a pile of vintage flocked wall paper from the 50's and I thought one of the prints would work perfect as a backdrop for the antlers. So, for $1.99 I bought a plain 9X12 piece of wood with beveled edges and a wall mount. Then headed back home to put it all together.

Upon returning, I rolled up my sleeves and got to work. I carefully glued the wall paper to the wood, drilled the antlers to the plaque, turned it over, nailed in the wall mount and "voila" my centerpiece was complete.

Hello Bambi.

What Lies Beneath

While I would love for this entry to be about our Indian excursion and nothing more, I'm afraid I can't do that. There were forces that evening plotting against us. Dark forces of which we were not aware.
First off, the dinner is over and done with. We survived it pretty much in one piece(if you just excuse one burned hand and a couple of cuts). There are a few flaws with the "greatest ever" Indian Cookbook that I feel are very necessary to point out. To begin with, the recipes, as indicated by the text, were most certainly not easy nor were they simple. I will admit that part of the fault lies with me, I should've throughly read each step of every recipe we were executing to see exactly what would be required of Annie and I, and I didn't. My neglecting to do so, resulted in a Chicken Tikka that only received a 20 minute marinade instead of the 3 hour minimum that was required. Oops. Also I would like to inform my readers that there is nothing simple and easy about using a mortar and pestle to grind onions, cilantro and chilis "into a paste". It is, in fact, a near impossible feat requiring the upper body strength of Hulk Hogan, instead of paste, we ended up with a fine salsa. Yes, we deviated, yes, we improvised, some of it being the fault of the cookbook some of it our own.

In one of the directions the cook was to "place ingredients into a pan", while the photo showed a pot, bad editing, translation issues, I just don't know. What I do know is that pretty much every recipe called for green chilis, both Annie and myself could never find anything titled "green chili" we found lots of chilis that were green, but they each had their own name, so we ended up using serrano, thai, and some HUGE chili that ended up tasting much more like a green pepper. Overall, FYI, we both agree that the thai chili, hands down was the most effective of the bunch.

The "greatest ever" book also led me to believe that cooking 2 main dishes and a few sides would not take up too much of our time, but it did, four hours of manual labor as well as Annie's "private reserve" of red wine. So, instead of eating at 6:30 food hit the table well after 8pm.

To sum up, nothing was horrible, some was bland, all was edible. It should be noted that we did receive an enthusiastic "thumbs up" on the chickpea curry from all the guests. However........

Unbeknownst to us, while we were all enjoying the fruits of our labor, the perfect storm(minus George Clooney) was brewing underneath the house. It all started of course, with a potato, not deep fried though, just a peel.

In the beginning of the evening, I peeled a slew of potatoes and slowly fed the scraps into the garbage disposable. All of a sudden, the sink(both sides) started filling with water, we had blockage people. It was an additional pain in the ass, to cook and use all these dishes with a sink that wouldn't drain, but manageable. I couldn't quite figure out the problem, the disposable was working just fine, so nothing was stuck there. At one point my husband, both hands pressed flat over the sink drain, performed something that looked an awful lot like CPR to no avail, perhaps he forgot the "breathe" part. Then he and a fellow guest got overly ambitious and pulled apart the pipes underneath the sink, no clogs there. Where ever the problem was, it was deep under the house, so deep that we had no access.

While we were all consumed with what was going on in the kitchen, the bathroom sink decided to join in on the blockage festivities. Now we had no where to wash our hands. What was next? The shower? Thankfully no. However, I had an entire counter filled with grease, guts and dirty dishes and there was nothing I could do about it.

The next day we called the plumber to come out and give us a hand. The appointment was for five so he shows up no earlier than six. Awesome. Of course it was a Harry Potter weekend on ABC Family. Which I'm beginning to believe that every weekend is, then during the week it becomes Harry Potter Weekday. If it happens to be a holiday then it is Harry Potter Halloween, Thanksgiving, Flag day, whatever fits the bill. The only movies they show are Harry Potter, do they have the rights to anything else? How many times can I watch The Prisoner of Azkaban?

So, while I'm watching Harry sneak out of Hogwarts via The Maurauder's Map, the plumbers are bringing the dreaded snake into the bathroom. I'm a little on edge, last time we had a plumbing issue, the snake caused a foul, disgusting, black sludge of an explosion in our bathroom, and without fail it happened again. Why do we pay you to make a horrid mess of our home Mister Plumber Man? Why? Sick, black ooze all over our bathroom, pools of stagnant, disgusting water under the sink, on the floor, and do they bring anything to clean it up with? Nope, wouldn't be prudent. The plumber walked out with my wood oil in his dirty, grubby hand and asked if he could use it to clean the floors. Seriously? How about you use the gallon of bleach I have sitting next to it, to keep my whites white and my floors sterile, perhaps that would work better than a little lemon oil? Or do you know something that I don't.

With the bathroom complete they tackeled the dual kitchen sinks. Apparently these were so far gone, along with all the pipes that there was nothing more they could do. Another appointment had to be made to replace all the corroded eighty year old metal under the house, the main pipes, the linking pipes, basically our entire habit trail was no longer "up to par". As if the initial sludge attack wasn't enough, we have to deal with it all over again this afternoon.

Meanwhile, I still have all those dishes to do.

The Sweets and the Spices

The big day is tomorrow. Have Annie and I gotten in over our heads? Perhaps, we ARE cooking for ten. That may not seem like a lot, but one year I tried to cook for thirty and describing my demeanor as "disasterously psycho, bordering on Leona Helmsley" would be quite kind. Hopefully the two of us can handle ten hungry, judgemental guests.

All the major decisions and shopping excursions have been dealt with. We have uncovered a savory sounding recipe on the internet thus solving our spinach problem, and decided not to get too ambitious by hand making the samosas. Instead we chose to buy "authentic" frozen ones from our local Indian market. If I may take a moment, by the way to give this local market its well deserved "shout out", India Sweets and Spices is nothing short of super bad ass, like Harvey Keitel in Pulp Fiction. They have EVERYTHING Indian, in every size imaginable;(well, not everything, I didn't see any elephants) Bollywood movies, frozen foods, oils, clothes, shoes, grains, yes, sweets, yes, spices, mixes, the works. I spent about an hour in there no doubt looking like a moron staring intently at all the foreign packaging and various tasty treats. I wanted it all, but could only afford some.

Into the wild we go. I hope we have enough potholders.

Tipping the Scale via Tubers.

Today marked another visit with the doctor. It isn't so bad once you get past the initial agony of the weigh in. Without fail, every month, the first thing they do is put you on the scale. I am convinced that this is some type of evil torture the nurses do to remind you that from here on out you aren't getting smaller, only bigger, much bigger, so big in fact that eventually you can no longer see if your shoes match your outfit. Each visit marks a new little chink, a little higher than the last. It brings to mind that yodeling mountain climber game that they have on The Price is Right. You know, the one where the guy slowly climbs up the mountain of money while singing, only on my mountain he ain't counting dollars, he's counting pounds, baby! Pounds.

I don't blame it on being pregnant, or the baby, I blame it all on the potato. The potato is the "root" of all evil. I frigging love potatoes. Especially the potato hiding behind the deep fried guise of "the chip". Ah the potato chip, hickory smoked, ranch, ruffled, I don't discriminate. As if "the chip" isn't bad enough, I also have do deal with its rat bastard brother "the french fry". This jerk, that I just can't seem to get enough of, has cost me many a wasted calorie during the last few months. To save some face, I won't even get into the variety of dipping sauces that I also, just can't seem to live without. Why, oh why can't I love steamed asparagus or carrot sticks as much as I love the fried golden goodness of an Idaho or Russett?

The Family Heirloom

As some of you may know, I am a bit of an antique fanatic. Generally speaking, if something has been built or manufactured after the year 1967, I 'm not interested. Vintage stereos, kitchenettes, dishes, a bar, all the lamps in the house, hell I even own a vintage aluminum Christmas tree. So, when it came time for someone in the family to pass on one of "the family heirlooms" a call was placed yours truly.

My Mom's side of the family is Polish Catholic and large, very large, not in the girth category, I mean in numbers. If they felt inclined to do so, they could start an army, first cousins, second cousins, aunts and uncles, that after 34 years even I can't keep straight. A while back, I received a phone call from one of those cousins, a cousin I had only met once, when I was four. She explained who she was and informed me that she was living in Tucson. Apparently she had called the family back in Michigan and notified them that my great grandmother's dresser she had been holding onto needed to find a new home due to lack of space. My Mom immediately told her that I was the cousin to call, so eventually plans were made for the dresser to be shipped to some family friends on the West side of L.A., and it would be my duty to pick it up.

This dresser, I would guess is about 80-90 years old with a pretty bad ass swivel mirror on top. The only problem I had with it, was that my Great Aunt Genieve painted it a heinous "shabby chic" grey. I thought, to myself "No problem, I'll just strip it down, varnish it with some nice espresso stain and shellac it". Easy, breezy, right.

Well, the years have past, to be exact, six of them and I, like my New Year's resolutions that I no longer make, had good intentions but did not follow through. I moved onto other projects (like the time I covered my entire dining room in bamboo fencing). Once, a few years ago, I actually attempted to strip it, bought all the necessary tools; sandpaper, gloves and paint thinner. I hauled the whole thing out to the front yard and started on the "easy part", the drawers. The "easy part", sucked. It was practically impossible. Not only did I have a difficult time getting the paint off, but there are a lot of grooves and curves in this thing that are really hard to get to. So, back in the bedroom it went. Right now, what we have resembles something you would see on the side of the road with a sign saying "FREE" taped to it.

My goal is to get this thing done. I know I can't paint or stain while I have "my little passenger", but I'm throwing it out there now so I have a constant reminder(apparently the dresser itself, isn't enough) of my infamous half finished job, which also happens to drive my husband nuts.

Operation Family Heirloom. Finish date, September 1, 2010. Am I woman enough, or will it get passed on to some other family member half finished with grey paint and naked drawers?

Prenatals: The Glorified Vitamin

Prenatals, the required supplement for all pregnant women. Apparently when you're pregnant, both your body and baby need more of some vitamins and less of others. If I may, a glorious and grand "Thank You" to the pharmactiucal companies, for taking the time and money to figure this all out. Let us also, not neglect to give them a big round of applause and a couple high fives for the accompanying price tag that goes with it.

One of the first visits to my doctors office involved a somewhat lengthy discussion about the importance of prenatals and how they must be taken every evening. I was told to watch out for too much vitamin A, what foods to stay away from and which I should eat more of. Sure, it all made perfect sense to me. I asked my doctor, "Which prenatal should I buy"?, "We will prescribe one for you". Was her answer, oh, ok I always thought you bought them at the grocery store, I was not aware that one could get a prescription for a vitamin supplement. So, they sent me home with a few samples of various prenatals that would last me about 3 weeks until I had to go to back for my next appointment.

As I left the office, I eyed the different samples that were given to me, the cute packaging, feminine colors and carefully chosen graphics that "spoke" to a pregnant woman. None of these vitamins came in the regular vitamin bottle with a sticker around it, oh, no, apparently when you became pregnant, your vitamins really stepped it up a notch. The packaging I was holding reminded me of fancy soaps or make up with coined phrases like "its gentle nature is its strength". Sounds like some kind of fancy, ecologically sound shampoo, right?

So as the weeks go by, I take them and return to the office for my next appointment where I was given a few more freebies, just because, I suppose, and was written a prescription for one of the prenatals that I had "sampled". My doctor said "When these samples run out, go ahead and get this filled. This is the prenatal I generally prescribe to all my patients. They seem to really like it". Ok, sounds good. Will do. The prescription that was written for me also came with a coupon for $100 off over the course of a year. Odd. A coupon for a prescription, I never got one of these when I had to take Tylenol 3 or Vicodin. Never did my Cipro or Amoxacillin have a "buy one get one free" incentive. I shrugged it off, stuffed the fancy, cute packages and coupon into my purse and left the office.

When it was time to visit the pharmacy, I dropped off my said prescription along with my pink, feminine scripted, Victorian styled coupon and did some grocery shopping. I would like to take this moment to interject and let you all know I have health insurance, good health insurance. In the past, whatever prescribed medications I had to purchase never cost me more than $20 for a month's worth. In fact, one time I was hit by a car while in a cross walk and was in a lot of physical pain. Duh. I was given a bottle of 60 muscle relaxers, 60 Vicoden and 60 Naproxen, for $60, just take a moment to think about the street value on that. When I walked out of Vons that day I felt like "New Jack City", but I digress. Back to the original story. I approached the pharmacy counter to pick up my vitamins, and the lady behind the counter said "$49.99". $49.99 ARE OUT OUT OF YOUR MIND!?!?!??! I choked a little. "Um", I replied, "Did you include the coupon I gave you?". "Oh, I forgot, one moment please". Well ok, now we're talking!! That brought it down to $39.99. Forty bucks WITH insurance coverage AND a discount!?!?! I knew I had no choice but to buy the prenatals, but I was pissed. I took the bag and went home, fuming that I had to spend so much on a few fancy vitamins. What the hell was in these to justify the cost? Kryptonite? Gold? Diamond dust?

Upon returning home, I took the tampon looking floral printed box out of the bag and saw the retail cost of one month's worth of these vitamins was $79.99. What?! Now I didn't feel so bad paying $40, but still, come on. I curse you, white jacketed pharmaceutical jerks. I really wanted to get down to the "nitty grits" of why these cost so damn much. The prenatals at the grocery store are around $20, not great but reasonable being that I don't need a coupon or be responsible for insurance payments to get them. So, I looked online and this is what I found.

Q: What's the difference between over-the-counter prenatal vitamins and prescription prenatal vitamins? Is the difference important?

A: Folic acid. Regarding folic acid, over-the-counter vitamins have this 400 micrograms dose, but prescription vitamins have a full 1000 micrograms (1 milligram). So the advantage to the prescription vitamins is more than enough folate. These also have more iron, as well as formula mixes of other vitamins that have been tested extensively by large corporations who have spent a whole lot of money to ensure a good, safe product. Because the dosages are larger, and therefore prescription, they also have to deal with extra FDA scrutiny, which of course is to your and your baby's benefit. If you can't tolerate ANY vitamins, remember that we got by for millions of years worth of pregnancies without them. But let's not go back to those days, vitamins-wise, unless there's no other choice. The point is that vitamins are not a deal-breaker, but they're a terrific idea.

Hmmmmmm......I wonder what the street value of 1 milligram of Folic acid is.

The Heat is on and the Yogurt is in the Fridge.

Saturday, January 9, a.k.a. Traversing the Indian Palate Day will be here soon! I've already enlisted the help of a willing friend so I won't have to go it alone. However, a few troubling occurrences regarding the dinner have already unfolded. For one, this so called "greatest ever" Indian cookbook does not contain a single recipe for Saag Panir(spinach). Odd, quite odd. Needing spinach on the menu my friend and I made an executive decision. Left with no other choice, we must deviate from the book and search on the internet for a fitting recipe. I can't seem to let go of the fact that if this book is indeed the greatest collection of Indian recipes that ever was, would it really be necessary for me to look elsewhere for suitable a side dish? I think not. The second troubling issue that came up was regarding the photo on the cover of the book. Over the weekend, one of the guests that will be here for the dinner was inquiring what was going to be on the menu, as he picked up the book he half jokingly remarked "This doesn't even look like Indian food". He is right, not any that I have seen anyway, although, I do not by any means profess myself to be an expert in this field. We shall just have to sit tight and see. As of now, the menu has been chosen. Saturday the following will be made and served.

Chicken Drumsticks with Herbs and Spices
Tandoori-Style Chicken
Potato Curry
Chickpea Curry
Samosas
Potatoes and Peas
Saag Panir
Raita
Naan

No Interest, No Payments

So, my husband and I aren't exactly what you would call "tech freaks", we don't have Iphones, or employ various applications to our devices in order to make our lives easier, no Playstations or Wiis. In fact up until last Christmas our TV was the same one I was watching in my parents house when I was in fourth grade. In addition to the wood paneled moving picture box, we also were in possession of a terribly old and cheap DVD player that I had won years ago in some silly raffle. This player was so bad that we actually avoided renting movies because the picture was completely blown out. No matter what you were watching, it looked as if the actors were about to enter the pearly gates of heaven.

Thanks to the words "no interest, no payments" all of this has changed. Have we crossed the line? Quite possibly.

It all started on Christmas. We were gifted a new DVD player, finally. One of those things we need but never want to spend the money on ourselves. It isn't the principal of it, we just never think "Hey, let's go buy that new DVD player that we need so badly". At any rate, there was some cable that we needed in order to hook the player up to the television. Keith is pretty good at this stuff, for me, this is where I exit stage left. You could tell me all day long that red connects to red and the elevator doors in my mind close. Electronics are, and always will be as foreign to me as calculus.

Off to Best Buy we go to get nothing more than a $10 cable so that we too can view new releases and take advantage of Netflix. This is when things started to get "excessive". My digital camera, I also won, in the same silly raffle a few years back. It is a terrible, terrible joke of a camera. It might as well have been made by Fischer Price. Anytime I am in Best Buy I slowly gravitate toward the camera display, picking each one up longingly, dreaming that one day it might be mine. This is when we heard the words of the floor salesman. "We are offering no interest, no payments on all purchases over $249.00 through tomorrow". Keith and I looked at each other and I simply said, "We need this for the baby". I did. I went there. I used our future offspring as an excuse to buy myself a new camera, but hey, we NEED good quality pictures of the baby. Not ones that make a polaroid shot look amazing.

He agreed and after that it was all over, down the rabbit hole we went. We both have Ipods, we need a Bose sound dock. Our computer speakers just aren't loud enough to saturate the house and our fellow neighbors homes with the sweet, sweet sounds of Wilco or AC/DC when I'm cleaning house. "Hey, we need some new studio headphones too, those other pairs we own simply don't cut it".

Upon returning home with our glorious new purchases, Keith made the brilliant discovery that our new Bose not only had the ability to play our ipods, it also was able to run all existing sound in our home including the TV, DVD and record player into surround sound......... all we needed were a FEW more components and cables.

Two more trips to Best Buy, one to Ikea, two to Radio Shack, four miscalculated drill holes in the wall, eight hours of manual labor and it was "alive, alive"!!! Getting extra crafty Bob Villa style, we breathed new life into our old 90's stereo speakers by adding them to the mix, one on each side of the couch. We officially had our own surround sound in the living room. Now, when it rains on TV, it motherfucking rains in the living room too!!

As Randy Newman would say, "L.A. We Love It"

Ah, Los Angeles, the sprawling, far reaching suburban type feel, the smog, the traffic, the cheese, the surfers, the porn industry, the bums. Contrary to popular belief, quite a nice place to live.

There are a lot of people out there in this big old world that detest Los Angeles(or think they do anyway). I hear about it all the time, "You live in La La Land"?, "Los Angeles, The Land of Fruits and Nuts", or the ever so bold comment "I HATE L.A." Really? Have you ever actually been to L.A? Do you really, truly know it, or are you just slightly familiar with Venice Beach, The Sunset Strip, Rodeo Drive, Hollywood Boulevard, the vapid excuse for television programming also known as The Hills, Universal Studios and some of the other various and plentiful tourist trappings of the entertainment capitol? Well, if those are the only places you've visited or viewed on your television, shame on you. There is a whole other side to L.A., an amazingly, awesome side, a place I am proud to call "home".

Granted, there are some things about this city that I don't really care for; road rage, smog on a hot day, scientology, the public school system here is deplorable to say the least(what city doesn't have its cons), but the good far outweighs the bad. Once you find your niche, your pocket, a whole new universe opens up. Where else in the world can you get the ocean, the desert, snow, mountains, hot springs, amazing wineries, chinatown, thai town, little tokyo, the flower mart, the wholesale district, restaurants of ALL kinds, friendly, helpful people, all kinds of cultures, nature reserves, crazy huge flea markets, hiking not to mention shopping all within a 2 hour drive of one another. Not many places my friends, not many. I love waking up in December or January and being able to take my dogs on a walk wearing jeans and a sweatshirt, no long johns, no hats, no gloves, no shoveling my driveway, or salt on my car, no tornado drills or hurricanes here. I relish my ability to open the door to my backyard and pull some lemons or oranges off the trees to make fresh squeezed juice in the dead of winter, or sit on the patio enjoying a cup of coffee. Bar-B-Que on New Year's Day anyone? I think you get the picture.

Many of you may think L.A. is nothing more than a ginormous slab of cement on top of which us locals reside along with the cockroaches and wanna be actors, the wide eyed star struck youths trying to "make it". So far from the truth. So to those of you who choose to turn your noses up at Los Angeles, go ahead, truth be told, you really have no idea what you're missing.

First Creative Endeavor of the New Year, The "Aloo Patar" Plunge

4,3,2,1, Earth below us, twisting, turning, watching, waiting...... Sorry, I love that song and it seems like a fitting intro to my
current creative undertaking, which will be no less then a leisurely culinary stroll through the Indian subcontinent. Have I ever cooked, attempted to cook or even THOUGHT about cooking Indian food before, you may ponder? Hell no. Absolutely not. In fact until quite recently, I was throughly terrified of the dishes peppered with both strong smells and bright colors. In all honesty, it was the consistency of the servings that really threw me off, I hate to be graphic and inappropiate, but it all looked like well, diarrhea to me, utterly and completely, visually "unfit for consumption". Yes, I was a hater. It was all I could conceptualize when I would see it laid out before me, or spooned out on and nestled onto someone else's plate. I don't quite recall the day or the event for that matter in which I boldly sidestepped my fear and took the "Aloo Patar" plunge, perchance it started with an innocent samosa or a solid enough looking potato dish. What I do know is, that once I did, I was on the downslope side of the tallest, steepest rollercoaster hill, only gaining more and more momentum as I continually shoveled spoonful upon spoonful of the mouthwatering delicious varities of curries down my gullet barely surfacing for a breath of air. Sexy, am I right? Since then, I have always searched for any reason, any excuse to "go out" for Indian. Now, I will attempt to recreate the magic in the comfort of my own home.

When I opened the cookbook, most of the spices were the type I was not familiar with and had no idea where I might find them. It seemed daunting and expensive. A little discouraging when you aren't really sure WHAT exactly you are cooking with, what it looks like, how much it costs, yadda, yadda, yadda, you know the score. When this happens, I usually change course and end up making cupcakes instead. Cupcakes, I know. Cupcakes I'm familiar and comfortable with. Measuring out flour, salt and sugar is no crazy cook's secret to me. Refusing to be deterred from my path this time, I earmarked about 10 recipes and made a list of all of the foreign sounding spices that would soon need to find a cozy home upon my spice rack in order for me to complete my mission, my travels into the unknown. Garam masala, curry leaves, ground tamarind just to name a few. Thyme, rosemary, mustard seed, dill, these things I knew, and knew well, but the others, foreign territory my friends, and I, for one, was excited.

I took my list with me and hit the open road hoping not to spend a car payment's worth of money on a few piles of ground plants and roots. Spice shopping has always been a deterrent to new recipes and cooking for me. Whenever I'm at the grocery store, I think I want to try something new until I pick up a bottle of saffron or fennel and quickly put it down when I see it costs more than two whole chickens and ground coffee. In my search for these new, exotic items, I knew better than to even glance at a Vons or Ralphs and before I broke down and bought everything at the one stop local Indian market, I thought I would do a little investigating at one of my well liked, appreciated and perhaps underrated world markets, Cost Plus. What do you know? They had it all. I procured the aforementioned ingredients for a suprisingly insubstantial hit to my pocketbook. Each spice was about 99 cents, the most expensive ringing up at $1.99. Now there was no turning back, I must trudge forward into the culinary unknown, for chicken and rice were both easy to find and cheap. Will the dinner be a smashing success or a fantastical failure? Only time will tell. Countdown to January 9, 2010. 4,3,2,1 Earth below us, twisting, turning, watching, waiting.............

Happy New Year!!

Hello and Happy New Year to you all! 2009 has passed us by and it seems like many people are glad to see it go. I hope 2010 is a fantastic year for everyone!

I myself have never been a fan of celebrating New Years. I like to refer to it as "amateur night". I hate driving in LA during this time of year, it frightens me to my core. In general, it's a bit of a nightmare anyway, but mix in a few hundred drunk people, check points, a little dash of traffic and you've got yourself a real life, high stakes video game. At any rate, I did venture out and ended up having a relaxing evening with a few friends in Hollywood while still managing to get to bed by 1am.

I never make any resolutions for the New Year, I stopped after the first thirty or so failed attempts. I always start out with good intentions but consistently end up breaking them by Jan 2 or 3, however I still can't help but feel like the clock just reset and things seem just a little brighter; new and fresh. I always want to clean the house, or box up clothes I no longer wear, you know, a little "out with the old, in with the new". On the other hand, maybe I'll just cook some bacon and eggs.