Whoa, is this thing on?

I'm here! I'm alive! I just remembered I created this blog once upon a time and stopped using it. I'm contemplating my next blogging venture, and brainstorming my internet presence.  Maybe I'll be back here? I mean, I still love vodka AND cupcakes! Together! I need to get my creative juices flowing.  I've been lacking a creative outlet for too long, time to get my shit together!

P.S.

Look at my cute new shoes:

Nerd thought of the day:

(While searching for a phone number in a large binder of miscellaneous office documents) "I wish someone would invent Ctrl+F for physical documents..."

Has it really been that long?

I didn't realize it had been so long since I had last posted. Ok I sort of did, I was kind reminded of it, a couple.hundred.times... Oops.

So where have I been? What have I been up to? Lets see.. Remember those books I started reading? I'm all the way to NINE now! They went fairly fast for the first couple of weeks, but I've recently got more and more distracted. I get distracted easily. I'm pretty sure I have A.D.D never professionally diagnosed, but I would be REALLY surprised if it wasn't true.

Speaking of distractions, Guitar Hero III came in the mail last night, finally! I had ordered it off eBay a week or so ago and I had been patiently awaiting it's arrival. I was totally stoked to see it leaning against my doorway when I arrived home from work last night. That feeling was quickly replaced by annoyance when I tried to get into my apartment only to find that I was locked out. I'm pretty sure I'm the only person that has a key to her apartment but can still get locked out. About an hour later and 3 phone conversations with my apartment manager I was IN! Just in time to keep me from wetting myself. Knew I should have went to the bathroom before leaving work, note to future self.

But getting locked out did have a bonus! I had recently come down with a broken oven. I can't honestly say I ever really use it that much, maybe once a week, generally I keep to the stove top and microwave (yay singledom) but wouldn't you know it, it stopped work, and suddenly all I could think to make for food involved the oven. The time when I can't use it is when I want to bake EVERYTHING! Like for example, I have been talking about making butternut squash lasagna for AGES and finally when I actually had the motivation to figure it out, I couldn't do it. It's been driving me crazy all week, I've even been bugging friends to let me borrow their oven, no luck. My manager had told me the oven would probably need to be replaced and it "could take a few weeks" to do so. Totally bummed. Lame. So I get home last night, the oven is all of a sudden miraculously FIXED! I was so happy! Hooray! My dreams have come true! There will be lasagna! It will be glorious!

So did I finally make my beloved butternut squash lasagna? Was it fabulous and everything I had been dreaming about for WEEKS?!

No, I spent my evening playing Guitar Hero.

I'm not sure...

The following story is heart warming, utterly sad, and completely disturbing, all at the same time.

Suicide claims two men who shared one heart

The title of the story doesn't even capture the magnitude of the story completely.

Ever since I originally read the story yesterday morning, it's been on my mind ever since.

Hello Weekend, how I've missed you so!

It's Friday!!

Coffee in one hand, Top Pot donut in the other... I don't think I have enough hands to type up an update. Oh, I GUESS I can manage.

Another week gone, another weekend ahead of us. I don't know about you, but I LIVE for the weekends. I am planning my weekends on Sunday night, and Monday morning. Seriously, ask around. Not that I ever do anything too spectacular on the weekends, just knowing that I don't have to be at work in the morning is enough to get me excited.

Normally my weekend will include a meal or two with friends, an evening out consuming way more vodka than any human being should be allowed in one sitting, and then a day of laying in bed, all day, recovering.

Whoa I just got massively sidetracked... where was I...

Oh yes, WEEKENDS! I love weekends. Guess what I got last weekend, that I will be filling many many many weekends to come with



Yep, a sewing machine. One that works. One that I've already used to make some fabulous pillow cases with, I will be sure to post pictures later.

This weekend I plan on making a bag that I found at tiny happy. I'm super excited.

Of course, nothing is set in stone yet, because I also recently got these:



Do I have time for both? Which do I choose?! Only time will tell.

Have a fabulous weekend!

Reading

I just want to say, I've read a couple blogs where the bloggers were reading the Stephanie Plum novels by Janet Evanovich and highly recommended them. I am always looking for recommendation when it comes to books and even though I am only just into the second one of the series, I already LOVE THEM. I can't wait to read them all, I just wish I had more time to do so.

After the last post

I was talking to my boy about the fantastical machine that I posted at the bottom of the last post. I mean, I feel it's a really amazing machine, aside from the "Green" qualities, it would be quite convenient. I know whenever I'm using the restroom I always think about how I'd like to be loading the washing machine at the same time...

I thought I would share the following conversation followed. It made me smirk.

boy: in theory the wash water could clean your toilet
me: that would be cool
me: cleaning toilets is gross!
boy: you'll get use to it :)
me: i only clean toilets for jewelry
boy: what do you think our wedding ring is?
boy: a license to clean

Yeah.. we're nerds. He's delusional.

TGIF!

I know it's Friday, and I really have no room to whine. But, could it really only be 3:30? Really? I say this a lot, but today is seriously the longest, slowest day in the history of time! It's not that I have anything fantastic going on after work, but to not be here, would be fabulous.

I actually wish it was tomorrow. I plan to do some thrifting and fabric shopping before heading to my favorite Betty's house. Where we will get into all sorts of shenanigans, like we do, and it will be lovely.

On a completely seperate note:

Am I the only one that wants one of these?


Happy Friday to all!

I left my heart in San Francisco

So I went on a "vacation" last week. I use the quotes because, while it was a vacation, when I think of vacation I think of relaxation, rest and a whole lot of doing nothing. Maybe that's because I can't remember the last time I actually took a vacation and went somewhere. My vacations usually include a few days off work, my apartment and my bed. But this was a great trip, and it was good to get out of the city for a few days and explore a part of the country I had never been before.

A few months ago the question was asked to my friend Claire, what she wanted to do for her birthday this year. Her response was she wanted to go on a road trip, and she wanted it to be San Francisco. No party, no big celebration. We had been talking about taking a group vacation for some time but nothing had ever come of any of our other plans. But this, we knew we could do! So for the past few months we had been doing some planning, deciding dates and getting all our ducks in a row. How long would it take, where would we stay, what would we do? For a bit of the planning process I was extremely nervous, I felt like I was the only one that really had put much thought into all the little details. But that was just me freaking out, and after a few days of that I realized, whatever happens, happens and we will make the most of it. I didn't care if I ended up sleeping in the car, I would make it to San Francisco and I would have some much needed FUN. I have to say, to put it very simply it was a great trip. We left last Wednesday night after work and drove straight through to San Francisco, getting there at approximately 10 am on Thursday. The drive was good, tiring as you would expect, and the sleep in the car was not very restful. I think I managed to pull about 2 hours max, and ended up sucking down Diet Rockstar like it was going out of style. While I absolutely love driving at night, and I always have, crossing the Siskiyou mountains at 4am in fog so thick you can barely see 3 feet in front of the car, and every passenger is asleep, is NOT my idea of fun. Talk about stressful, I'm pretty sure I sprouted at least 2 grey hair from that experience alone. Thankfully we made safe and sound, just in time for our Anchorsteam Brewery tour, and our free beer. That's pretty much the best way to relax after a long trip, lots and lots of tasty beer. I highly recommend it.

But aside from the driving, the trip as an absolute success. I couldn't have asked for anything more during a quick trip to San Francisco. Fisherman's Wharf, Alcatraz, good food, shopping at H&M, seeing my Joshua, meeting new people from the area, overlooking the city from Twin Peaks at night, driving around the city and seeing Chinatown, the Presidio, the Golden Gate, and so much more! It was so much fun, and great memories I will keep with me forever. Between the 3 of us, I think we took just under 1000 pictures. I have posted some to my flickr page, but I will post more when I get a chance (I was going to do that last night but got distracted). I plan to post more about my trip, but that will come later, for now I leave you with a picture.

Taken from the top of our hotel, I have to say, when I think of California, even before being there, it was a picture like this that I thought of.

Today's PSA from your resident vegetarian

Did you know Mars does animal testing? I had no idea. I am shocked and disgusted.


Learn more at MarsCandyKills.com.



Real post coming soon. Promise.

Have a great weeked!

Not a lot of time for a post right now, there is a pile of gross dishes in my sink, calling my name... they've been calling for awhile, but I can't avoid my fate any longer.

But I have something important to say. There is this lady I know, who I love dearly, and I think everyone else will love her too. She is pretty hot stuff, quite the Betty I would say. You can find her at http://forthebettys.freeblogit.com. I absolutely adore her, and I promise you will too. She has a lot of great stuff coming soon, so if I were you, i'd stay tuned.

She likes vodka too... and cupcakes.

By the way, it was brought to my attention that comments were not friendly to non-google users, so that has been fixed!

Header

Do you like it? I do!

Just my opinion

http://www.cnn.com/2008/POLITICS/03/04/slaughterhouse.abuse.ap/index.html

Federal officials recalled 143 million pounds of beef last month after the Humane Society of the United States released undercover video showing workers at the slaughterhouse abusing sick and crippled cows.

Honestly, if they had video of every slaughterhouse in the world there would be such a MASSIVE recall on meat, everyone would turn veggie. Hm... theres an idea

New theme!

Because I have some crazy OCD tendencies over certain things, I had to change my theme on my blog. Even though I don't even really see it, it was bothering me, something fierce. So being lazy, I had someone else do all the work for me, for now. I feel so much better now.

This blogpost made me hungry

Two things this morning, first of all, I really really need to change, fix, something... this layout I've got going on here, it appears far too cluttered, and is making me slightly claustrophobic.

Secondly, having recently become a vegetarian... Hey! It's been one month today!.. Anyways, since I've stopped eating meat, I have noticed two things (at least 2 that I'm going to mention right now), it's definitely not easy, and I've been trying to cook a lot more at home.

Let me just go ahead and put it out there, I've never really been someone who cooks. Yes I know how, I can even make recipes far more complicated than boiling water and adding noodles. I just don't, not a lot anyways. I think these days it is mostly due to the fact that I'm single, living on my own, and cooking for 1 sucks. I'm bad at portion control, and I always make too much food. Leftovers you say? Sure, sometimes. Most of the time, they go forgotten, or unwanted, and result in a container in the refrigerator that looks like it came out of a high school science class.

But what I have found, without the option of meat, or any byproduct of, like say, top ramen seasoning (aside from oriental, which, word on the street is it IS veggie friendly) if you don't enjoy eating salad for every meal of the day, and don't want to overdose on carbs, you have to be, very creative sometimes in your meal preparation. Ok to be fair you don't HAVE to be, I have spent many nights just eating beans, or brown rice, or Doritos er, anyways... Where was I? Oh right, cooking, veggie style, and getting more than one food group, for a non cooker has been very interesting, but guess what? I ACTUALLY ENJOY IT! I know, no one is more surprised in this realization than myself. I guess I should add here, what makes things really interesting is the fact that I tend to live fairly cheaply. I try not to spend a lot of money on food, it can be SO expensive, and I'm by myself, so I've been trying to work on how much of what I buy actually gets wasted (it used to be a LOT) so a lot of things are made with very minimal ingredients, and definitely nothing fancy. I read a lot of cooking blogs and there are some GREAT recipes out there, that maybe one day I will try, but lets just say, food is not the top priority of my budget.

Anyway, the whole point to this was, I made a yummy, easy dinner last night, that I really wanted to share. I suppose it's technically cooking, though really it didn't require much effort. I wish now I had taken a picture of the masterpiece before shoving it into my face... maybe next time, maybe.

To be fair, and to give credit where credit is due, I found this recipe on a livejournal community and knew I had to try it. It's very similar to a meal I had at a veggie restaurant last weekend too, which was absolutely fabulous. More on that later.

I actually made a few alterations to this, though I don't know the exact amount. I used 4 small corn tortillas, but pretty much everything is the same, give or take some cheese... (Ok I had to have used more than 1/4 a cup, I LOVE cheese) Anyway! Here you go!

INGREDIENTS

2 (7-inch) flour tortillas
1 small sweet potato
1/4 cup black beans drained and rinsed
1/4 cup shredded sharp cheddar cheese
Salt, chili powder and cilantro to taste
Hot sauce (optional)
Fat-free cooking spray

DIRECTIONS
1) Peel sweet potato and chop into small pieces. Boil for about 10 minutes, or until very soft. Drain and mash.

2) Lay out one tortilla. Cover with 1/4 cup mashed sweet potato, 1/4 cup black beans, 1/4 cup cheese and salt, chili powder, cilantro and hot sauce. Cover with second tortilla.

3) Spray frying pan with a little fat-free cooking spray and fry your tortilla a few minutes on each side, until cheese is melted and beans are heated through.

Let me just say, they were FABULOUS! I'm out!

The key to making Monday a success

Eating cake for breakfast.

I can already tell this is going to be a great day...

Walking into my office, immediately tripping over my own pants, falling on my face. Yep, it's Monday. Ugh!

What to expect here

I always like to set the bar as low as possible. I'd rather be pleasantly surprised later, than completely depressed and feel like I've failed. So, here is what you can expect here, not a whole lot. I mean, ideally I'd love for this place to become what I've always wanted in a blog. A catalog of lifes little lessons and tales, misfortunes and good times. But who am I kidding. That's right, no one.

I've created this space because I feel I am at a point in my life, where I there will be a lot of changes coming my way (hopefully) and everyone needs a space, a forum, a way of making yourself sane by getting those things in your head out. You know, so you don't go crazy (please let me pretend like I'm not already, thanks). This is my space. One of them anyways.

I can't make any promises not to get all emo at some point or another. What I will promise, I will never, ever post song lyrics, of any kind. No surveys written by kids, with questions about what my favorite subject in school was (math) or what side of the bed I sleep on at night (the middle) and no test results telling you if I was a power ranger, which color would I be. (I'd totally be the pink one).

Before I end this for now, a quick explaination on the title above. It's quite simple really. I love vodka, and I love cupcakes.