chicken noodle soup

A couple weeks ago, my honey asked "when's the last time we were sick? We haven't been sick in awhile..." I immediately shushed him and looked around for something wooden to knock on (not difficult in our home, which is almost entirely wood). So, naturally, I've caught some version of the crud and have a pot of chicken noodle soup simmering on the stove. Just in time to be all snotty and gross for graduation this weekend.  

Another Chapter

At almost exactly the same moment in my life when my hubby and I got hitched, I also began another chapter in my life. It was that thing that all college graduates dread: I went back to school. Thankfully, this wasn't your typical sit in a classroom taking notes then try to remember it all for a test. I learned something even better than if I'd been sitting in a classroom day after day.

I learned that it's okay to fail, as long as you try something new.

I tried composting with worms, which failed because they got overthrown by maggots. I tried to figure out if bats prefer to hang out near a bat box, which failed because they left for the winter. I tried automated composting, which failed because the motor got gummed up. I tried to get my neighbors to recycle electronics, which failed because they already do. I tried composting in a tumbler, which didn't fail!

As this particular chapter of my life draws to a close, I know I will carry on trying new things. Some of them will fail (like the color paint I tried near the fireplace, or the new recipe I tried for dinner last night). Others will not fail (like trying to make my own fire starters, or trying to grow an indoor kitchen garden (technically, the jury is still out on this one, but I'm being optimistic)). 

Without school, I'll have time to try to deliciously infuse more homegrown foods into our diet, try to figure out how to keep the kitties out of the dresser (yes, it's that much of a problem), and try to get more excited about football.

Another sappy post...

...about why I love my hubby:

Over the weekend, we were working on one of many home improvement projects. After awhile, my hubby asked: "why is there so much Katy Perry music? Is this the Katy Perry station on Pandora?" 

Me: "yup."

Adventures in Dinner

My honey doesn't often have time to go to the grocery store. But when he does, the results are markedly different than when I do the shopping. 

The essence of his shopping trips is "I like that. I'll get it." Whereas I usually try to buy ingredients that go together to make cohesive(ish) meals. Once, when I asked my honey to get groceries, he brought home: pizza rolls, frozen corn dogs, cereal, milk, and beer. Which would be great if we were a couple of bros in college, but we're not. 

Last week, we went to the store together. As we wandered through the produce section, my honey stumbled upon the peppers. "Ooh, jalapeños... Let's do jalapeño poppers." Now, I have never eaten a jalapeño popper, much less made one. I have no idea what else we might need. I assume there's cheese involved. Most foods worth eating involve cheese. Did my honey decide to purchase cheese to go with our jalapeños? He did not. 

Tonight, I decided to go for the poppers. Fortunately, there is almost always cheese in our fridge. A little cream cheese, some mozzarella, a dash of hot sauce, and we were in business. I have to say, they were pretty good. 

I may have to go with my honey's random food cravings more often. Perhaps starting with corn dogs. Mmm corn dogs. 

Love is...

my wonderful honeybunches coming to my rescue when we were getting ready for bed last night and I discovered a spider crawling on one of our pillows and may have slightly freaked out about it because I'd already taken out my contacts and couldn't see properly. And he didn't even laugh at me for freaking out over a spider. 

Daffodils

Here in Southern California, spring seems to have come early this year (sorry, rest of the US... actually, not really). On our lovely mountain, it has only really snowed once, and that wasn't technically even this year (we woke up to 14 inches of snow on New Year's Eve, which, while this winter, was officially last year). 

So all of our plants and animals think it's springtime. The squirrels are acting frisky, and there are daffodils blooming everywhere. 

Let me repeat: EVERYWHERE. 

Now, I don't exactly despise daffodils, but they're certainly not my favorite flowers, either. They've always seemed very plain to me. So why the **** are they in every single yard here? I finally asked one of our neighbors: it's because nothing eats them. Not the squirrels, not the deer, not the gophers. So now I can't decide whether to leave the 20 or so daffodils that popped up unannounced in our yard or to rip them out of the ground and replace them with something useful (which was my original plan). Maybe I'll wait and see if someone else makes the decision for me. Perhaps Roxy will dig them up, even if the frisky squirrels won't touch them.

If You Give a Bonnie a Ladder

If you give me some free time, and if Nick is home but doing homework...

I'm going to want to do home improvements. 

If I want to do home improvements, I'm going to look for a ladder.

If I find a ladder, I'm going to get on the roof.

If I get on the roof, I'm going to see that the gutter needs cleaning.

If I clean the gutter, Roxy is going to want to help.

If Roxy decides to help, she's going to try to eat the leaves and dirt and everything else that's getting chucked off the roof... And she's going to get dirty.

If Roxy gets dirty, she's going to need a shower.

If Roxy is getting a shower, we might as well shower the kitties, too.

If we're going to shower the kitties, we're going to have to find them.

If we're trying to find the kitties, Mr Grey will have vanished.

If Mr Grey has vanished, we're going to have to search for him.

If Nick goes outside to search for him, I'm going to search inside.

If I'm searching around inside, I'm going to notice Mr Grey through the window.

If I notice Mr Grey through the window, I'm going to have to run outside naked as a jaybird to grab him. 

If I have to run outside naked as a jaybird, I'm going to be glad we don't have more neighbors.

Painting

My honey and I have been working on painting our new home. When we bought it, the exterior paint was peeling away like crazy. Not exactly weatherproof. The trim was the worst, so we started there. Scrape, sand, wash, paint. Scrape, sand, wash, paint. Scrape, sand, wash, paint.

There's a lot of trim. 

Finally, we're done with that (at least as much as we can reasonably reach). So we picked out a color for the main body of our home. Before, it was a deep red. By the time we're done, it's going to be what I've fondly been referring to as really f*cking red. 

The color we picked for the house is called Burning Bush. The color we picked for the trim is called Snowbank. Fire and ice. Seemingly opposites that complement each other. Like a lot of things. Including my honey and me. 

NewsPocalypse

In the evenings, my honey likes to watch the news. We watch the news on several different channels in an attempt to get a well-rounded idea of what's going on in the world, and what different channels deem to be of importance. We've noticed an alarming trend spreading across channels. 

The news seems to have lost sight of what News is. The dictionary defines News as "a report of a recent event; information; the presentation of a report on recent or new news" (http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/news). And yet, the news "reports" on television try to sensationalize more stories than they actually report. They turn everything into a NewsPocalypse, NewsGate, or NewsAgeddon. At the risk of sounding like NPR, isn't it time to put News back on the news, and get rid of the sensationalist verbiage that is nothing more than a pathetic fight over ratings? 

In other news, isn't "news" one of those words that sounds like nonsense when repeated multiple times? 

The Crud

I typically really enjoy sharing things with my honey. We share the best spot on the couch when we're watching tv. We share ice cream and ideas. We also share germs. Strangely, I'm not as agreeable to this last kind of sharing. Whenever we share germs, whatever kind of crud it is always seems to hit me harder. Maybe next time my honey will find a way to share some of his killer T cells.