I forgot to mention

I have a dog now. She loves to chew stuff up.

lucky me

My iPod is covered by the warranty even though the reason for the crack in the screen is a little iffy: my dog chewed it up. They didn't seem to care, though, and the replacement will arrive tomorrow. Hooray for Apple.

Why not? Certainly you wil get.

I'd had these ancho chiles sitting around in my fridge, waiting for me to get around to stuffing them. But I kept thinking it'd take a long time, so I never actually did it. Turns out it's easy! I fried some rice with onions, cumin seeds, and canned crushed tomatoes, and then put that in the peppers with some cheese and baked them (450 degrees, 15ish minutes). They could have been roasted beforehand - I think that would have made the peppers softer & milder - but they were delicious just the way they were.



Next time I won't take the seeds out of the peppers with my bare hands, though. I often have a lot of little cuts on my fingers, and it really burned for a while. The skin is only just starting to feel normal again.

cleaning out the fridge

A while ago, Meijer had salad greens on sale, buy one box get one free. So I had a whole lot of arugula. But I never got around to eating it, and it was wilting in my fridge, until I did this with it:

Arugula is a little bitter, so I added some sugar, and it's a delicious late lunch (with plenty of leftovers, of course).

minty milk

I bought some fresh mint the other day to cook with some fennel and onions I was making. But what do you do with the extra mint? That's always my problem with fresh herbs - unless I'm making a lot, I can never use it up before it gets dried out. This time, though, I have a delicious solution to the extra mint problem.

First, I shred up 6ish mint leaves and put them in a short glass with a teaspoon or two of sugar.

Then I put in a tablespoon or so of milk and muddle them around as if I'm making a mojito.

Then I fill it up the rest of the way with milk. It's very refreshing, and it reminds me of some "fresh mint" gelato the co-op sells. But it doesn't cost $5 for a pint, even if I use Oberweis milk.

beverages

I have a stuffy ear (I didn't know ears could do that), so I've been drinking a lot of Mom Tea.

meals: greatest hits

These are some of the food pictures I emailed to my envious friends before I thought to put them up here (most recent first).

I made this cake for my family when I visited them over Labor Day weekend:
For a week or so, I was making avocado and roasted pepper spring rolls for lunch:

You can't see much of the food, but for this birthday party I made veggie subs, vegan chocolate mousse, chocolate cake, and margarita chiffon cake.

I ate this mango, too.

This was my entry for Iron Chef Urbana. Nobody really dug my "rustic home cooking" theme, so I lost to the fancy seafood dishes. But actually the twice-baked sweet potato with grapefruit on top was really good. Next time I might make it with some kind of grapefruit glaze, so it's easier to eat.


I ate this for breakfast a couple of times:

dinner

I've been taking pictures of my meals and sending them to people. They are invariably envious of whatever I'm eating. So I thought I'd start blogging about food instead of sending email - that way the envy could be less exclusive.
Today I made a version of this zucchini kurma, from one of my new favorite food websites. I used patty pan squash, though, because it's always been my favorite and I brought some back with me from Michigan.

I chopped all the vegetables...


Then I had to fry some onions and spices...


Here it is bubbling away with all the vegetables added...


I finally ate it with rice and some leftover potatoes. Don't you wish you were also eating my favorite squash?

the Bed

My parents dropped by yesterday on their way to take my youngest brother to school in Mississippi, and they brought me a bedroom set. I had one, but they wanted to trade - they get a bigger one for the guest room, I get a smaller one that can fit better in my apartment. The great thing is, my new bed is the Best Bed In The World. It's old, it's pretty, it's soft, it's tall, it's comfortable, it's the best. It has a decorative knob at the top that wobbles if you move around a lot. It's simultaneously endearing and annoying; I think I'll just keep the knob in the closet.

I admit it's also nice to have something to put my clothes in. But I'm really mostly excited about the Bed.

fairytale logic / magical reasoning

Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows ended exactly the way I expected it to. Every last loose end tied up the way I personally would have tied it. Do I know from narrative conventions, or what?

one good thing

A lot of things have happened, but one minor positive is that I can have green hair again.

week-ender

Sunday morning I read Ender's Game, which Matt gave me for Christmas. For a long time, I'd been planning on reading it but the time never seemed right. That's partly because I have weird behavior when it comes to books - I know if I start reading one, I'll read it as continuously as possible until it's finished. Stupid analogy: when that happens I think of the West Wing episode where Leo is explaining how he can't just have one drink - he has to get smashed. I have to... get book-smashed. But anyway, I think this reading style is part of the reason I haven't finished certain books: long, complex things like Gravity's Rainbow or Ulysses physically can't be read the way I got used to reading when I was a kid. I did a good job pacing myself with Norwegian Wood; maybe this summer I could take on an intimidating book without reverting to marathon reading sessions and long, forgetful rests.

events

Classes ended for the school year. I partied for four days straight, made some new friends, was hung over, took some finals, got a blue belt in BJJ, and threw a party for my graduating friend.

The BJJ thing is a big deal to me. Belts aren't easy to come by. I'd been a white belt for two years, and I do actually put some work into it. I feel like this is something I have to live up to. I don't feel like I am as good now as the blue belts I know were when they were my "age." Maybe that's because they and I have been improving, so we don't have an objective measure of how good anyone is or was. I feel like I have responsibilities now. Mostly they involve being a good "big sister" type to new people, and working hard so I don't suck at BJJ myself. The Indianapolis tournament is going to be a whole new animal now.

towering

Back in high school I used to be a non-actor in the drama club. I stage managed and built sets, worked the lights, and designed a few things. A few days ago I dreamed I was visiting my high school and there was some sort of drama emergency - they needed me to do some backstage stuff.

I had a few minutes to prepare for the show, so I was walking around taking charge. I was standing in the audience, and saw R. from BJJ standing on the next step down from me. I went over to say hi, and he scowled and said, "Don't tower over me like that." I think it's weird that somebody would show up in my dream just to scold me for being tall.

finals month

This month is disgustingly hard. I'm close to the end, but I'm going to be pretty unhappy between now and then. At least I'll never have to do it again - I have two classes' worth of credit left to take, and I'm not going to take them in the same semester.

After classes end, Porn Chowder is playing on May 5th - what a great day to have a show! I wonder if they know any songs in Spanish.

Also, I ran 2.5 10-minute miles today. I know I ran 3 miles a while ago, but those were slower. I could probably have pushed it to 3 today, but running is kind of boring.

off the mat(s)

Some yoga teachers like to classify life into "on the mat" (yoga related) and "off the mat" (not yoga). But those phrases also have a parallel BJJ meaning, so whenever yoga people say that I always get distracted trying to reconcile the fact that anytime I do yoga I am both on and off the mat simultaneously, depending on how you define "the mat". I don't really have this problem when BJJ people use the expression, because I hear it a lot more often in that context.

When's Porn Chowder going to play again? I heard it was in the first week or so of May, but I need to know. I need a countdown.

stereotype threat

That study I read a while ago about stereotype threat, besides pointing out that if you imply that blondes are stupid they'll do worse on math tests, also had interesting points about how people can be defended against stereotype threat. I think the main thing was that if you tell people a stereotype exists but science has shown that it isn't true, they don't have problems. I don't remember exactly.

So I've been wondering: my project for the teaching class is about differences in confidence, expectations, and performance between male and female engineering majors. Am I stereotype-threatening myself? Or am I defending myself against stereotypes by educating myself about the causes of observed differences?

Also, the lab I'm taking in the fall is at the same time as the 5th-semester Chinese class. So it turns out I have to learn Portuguese. I can always take more Chinese next year.

os alquimistas dao le

Should I take a fifth semester of Chinese in the fall, or should I learn Portuguese? I'm considering it because I've heard the next Chinese classes focus a lot more on reading and less on speaking. I think speaking is more fun, so I'm kind of disappointed by that. Also, since I am into BJJ there is some incentive for me to learn some Portuguese. I'd probably be a quick study, too, because I used to be pretty good at French.

lady-specific ailments

Guys, I'm not shy. If you don't want to hear about boobs and things, wait until I post something else.

Turns out that the reason I was so hungry last week was that girl week just started. Strange things happen to me around that time. I don't really have the stereotypical cranky-and-crying thing. Usually not much happens, but the sudden eating streak was unusual and worthy of comment.

Additionally, I went to jiujitsu today, sweated a lot, and then got really cold. I took off my under-armor shirt and just wore the t-shirt around in hopes that I would warm up, but it didn't work: my bra was cold. There's no resolving that problem.

Also I forgot to drink my tea again. This time it just got cold, not bitter.

just in time, too

I just ran three miles. In a row.