1. What is your favorite vegetable?
That depends - what season is it? Right now it's probably still those lovely fresh sugar snap peas growing in my garden. They're the most gorgeous things ever.

2. What is your favorite salad dressing, sauce, gravy, or condiment?
Salad dressings often squick me out. I have to walk a very fine line with them things. Does butter count as a condiment? Because if that's the case, I have to confess to butter abuse. I think of all the bottled stuff on my fridge door, I get the most mileage out of hot sauce and jam. Usually not together.

3. What is your favorite culture's food (American, Chinese, Creole, Indian, Italian, Mexican, Soul Food, Southern U.S., etc.)?
NOOooooo you can't make me choose!!! Not fair! Ummm... Mexican, Indian, Pennsylvania Dutch. I can keep going, though.

4. What is your favorite beverage?
Mango Lhassi.

5. What is your favorite food?
Oh good lord, that's like, a whole new post. Is it fresh tomatoes sliced on a nicely buttered slice of bread, with just a little salt and pepper? Is it black raspberries freshly picked? Is it pan-fried fresh morels? Is it burritos? Is it Thai red curry? Is it toast? Is it sushi? Is it the almighty avocado in all its glorious forms? AAUGH DON'T MAKE ME CHOOSE!

I'm all graduated and stuff! Hooray! Summa cum laude, baby!

As hard as it was to work full-time and go to school, I have to say it was worth it. Going back to school was the best decision I ever made. I don't mean in terms of what it would get me on the job market, because that's not why I did it. It was more a decision of personal satisfaction: finishing school was completing a commitment to myself. So were my grades. Many times, people would tell me to stop sweating my grades so much. They'd remind me that I already have a full-time job, and that no one cares about my school record, anyway - the only thing that matters is that I got my diploma. Well, no, actually, it mattered to me. I feel good that I put forth my best effort. I don't care if no one ever looks up my school record ever again. Heck, they didn't even announce the "summa cum laude" thing on stage. But, forever after, I will know that I did it... and it feels good. Damn good.

One of my teachers, Kathryn Summers, always told us that we had a choice: we could slack off, do all our reading at the last minute, and throw in the minimum effort on our papers just to pass, or we could put in all the work necessary to excel. She didn't care what grades we got in her class, she would say. What she cared about was the bigger picture: the habits we were building in ourselves for a lifetime of accomplishment. Thank you, Ms. Summers, and thank you, UB.

So now that the dust is starting to settle, it means I can now start catching up on everything else. I have quite a number of projects I kept setting aside for "when I'm not so busy with school." Looks like it's that time now!

I am supposed to be writing papers and instead I am poking LJ (obviously) and watching Red Dwarf Season 1. What's worse, I am too lazy to move the laptop and the cat to change the disk, so I am now on the second watch-through. I could be on Season 2 by now, but laziness has prevailed. How pathetic is that?

Last night I had a fabulous time hanging out with Claire and Shannon. I very nearly had forgotten how healing tea is. As a consequence, I've been making up for it by sipping tea all day today. It was the perfect day for it. What about a rainy Sunday doesn't call for tea? I have to say, though, I was quite distressed to find that none of my cookbooks (and I have more than a few) had a recipe for madelines. That makes no sense at all. I should not have to turn to teh intarwebs for a madeline recipe.

Okay, enough of that. Guess I better get back to work now. ;)

So in our kitchen, which sometimes becomes the Kate and Dave school of Mad Science, we had an amazing breakthrough in Baconology. We realized immediately that we could not keep our discovery to ourselves - NO! We had to share it with all our friends, so that more people could share in this experience. And so, my friends, I entrust you with this knowledge.

Bacon + Peanut Butter + Marmalade = PURE DELICIOUSNESS.


Go forth, my friends. You have been enlightened.


/don't worry, it only seems kinky the first time.

Have you all been reading Tigers and Strawberries? It's a great food blog. I've got it on my RSS feeds. Today, the inimitable Barbara had a post that I love so much I want to take it home, dress it up in PJs, and snuggle with it. It's all about soup, and food waste, and a lot of other things too.


So anyway. Last night I was planting some pepper seeds - not the ones I ordered, but seeds I had saved from last year's plants. I ended up planting three varieties of hot peppers: Jalepeno, Thai, and one I don't know the name of but is very pretty - the leaves are dark purple and the peppers are go from purple to red. (Of course, I call that one the "purple pepper." Because, hey, what else can you do?)

Anyway, in the course of planting these peppers, I re-used my 12-space seed starting trays from last year. Two of them were fine, but fragile enough that I imagine they won't last another season. One had already split along the edges of the seed-wells, so I had to throw it out. Which left me with one set of pepper seeds left to plant, and nothing to plant them in. And then I remembered, DUH, I have eggs! I pulled the styrofoam egg carton out of the fridge, took out the last egg from the carton, and put my dirt and seeds in there. Instead of wrapping the plastic wrap tightly over the seeds, I put in four toothpick posts on the corners, to lift the plastic up and give the seeds a little breathing room.

But I still had one lone egg, rattling around in the fridge. Best thing to do is hard-boil it, to help prevent a messy eggy disaster. (Hey, I know I'm a klutz. I try to work around that.) And then I thought, well, heck, since I'm boiling the egg, I should mark it so we know it's a hard-boiled egg, right? Inspiration struck. Rather than waiting to doodle on the egg with a marker, I just threw some dry onion skins in with the white egg, and - voila. Hard-boiled egg is now brown. I was really pleased with myself for discovering such a simple hack.

Of course, it didn't last too long anyway. Hard-boiled egg is now breakfast, sitting in my tummy. ;)

I'm not just posting this because a friend asked me to. I'm posting this because it's a nifty idea and the auction is filled with pretty shiny things that are making my shopping-senses tingle. Go forth! Check it out for yourself!

Con Or Bust details:

Hello!

In conjunction with the Wiscon FOC Assistance Program fundraising effort, we are pleased to present con_or_bust, a fandom auction to support the program's sponsorships for fans of color attending Wiscon 2009.

What is the Wiscon FOC Assistance Program?

Started by kate_nepveu as part of fight_derailing, the FOC Assistance Program seeks to meet the needs of fans of color who would like to attend wiscon, but are unable to do so without some form of assistance. Assistance offered includes, but is not limited to, money for travel, a con membership, and/or lodging space. You can find more information about the project by visiting the announcement post.

How Can I Sign Up?

If you or someone you know is a fan of color who might benefit from this program, please check out the submission guidelines to submit a request for assistance... Parties who request assistance are not identified to donors. The project will do its best to meet needs that might otherwise prevent you or someone you know from attending Wiscon in 2009.

How Can I Help?

If you have space to share in your hotel room or suite, or otherwise feel that you can assist in this project, please take a look at the list of requests. Please let kate_nepveu know if you are able to meet the need for a space request.

Donations will be accepted through Paypal, Amazon gift checks, as well as check or money order. More info about donation options is available in the con_or_bust userinfo under "How Do I Pay?".

Any donations in excess of requests will be donated to the Carl Brandon Society.

Also, donations of items and promotion for con_or_bust are needed.

What's Con_Or_Bust?

con_or_bust, the fandom auction in support of this initiative, will begin March 18 and continue until April 11 or until all needs are met.

Please sign up for con_or_bust and encourage your friends to do the same, as we are already attracting offers of CDs, jewelry, and other goodies. Lots of good things will be on offer and you don't want to miss it!

We still need donations of auction items. Fanfic offers, editing and beta assistance are encouraged along with tangible items. All donations of funds or auction items, no matter how small, are accepted. Those who wish to do fixed-donation offers are also invited to participate.

Auctions may be posted now as a preview. Please review the auction template for details on posting your auction.

More information about types of offers, how to bid, etc. is available in the community userinfo. For ideas on what you might be able to offer, you can check out the vast array of things that have been offered in previous fandom auctions such as livelongnmarry or saveours00j.

Where Can I Find Out More?

Please feel free to contact popelizbet for any questions regarding the auction. Questions regarding aims of the project? Read kate_nepveu's original post about the idea, or visit fight_derailing for more info.

Thank you in advance for any help you can give! Please feel free to repost this wherever seems appropriate.

So in case I haven't mentioned, I somehow ended up as Poetry editor for this year's Welter (UB's literary magazine). I'm not really editing poems, I'm more of an acquisitions editor. Want to know what that's like?

First, you will need to do some basic training. Every morning, load anywhere from 6 to 10 bricks into a bag. Carry that bag with you wherever you go. Once in a while you might even take a brick out and look at it. Do this for about a week so you will have the muscle development necessary for the task ahead.

Send out the call for submissions. Post it on Craigslist, print it in your local paper, send the call out to all the mailing lists and message boards you've ever been on, put up a card on your supermarket's corkboard. Give complete strangers your e-mail address, and ask them to send you poetry. Then get ready.

On the first day, go pick up your battered copy of Douglas Adams. and turn to the Vogon poetry. As you read the Vogon poetry, say to yourself, "This is the best poetry I will read all day." Because it will be true.

Open your e-mail. Print out all the poems you get. Try to keep everything in order, because it will be important later. As you go to the office supply store for your third pack of printer paper, be grateful for the brick-training you did earlier.

Now start reading. Nothing I say now can prepare you for what you are about to experience. You will read poetry so awful that you will wish for an army of poo-flinging monkeys that you could send to visit these aspiring authors. You will read poem after poem after poem after poem of excruciating mediocrity. You will read poems that make you flinch because you will remember, uncomfortably, that poem you wrote last year that was almost exactly like this one, and oh god was it really as bad as this? You will read. You will pray for the sweet release of death.

And then... then, after what seems like thousands of bad poems, and worse poems, and poems that are almost halfway okay, you will find it.

That poem. That author. "This...," you will say, in awe, fear, wonderment, "this is... not bad." You will read it again. "This is... good. No, this is amazing! This is everything I ever wanted in a poem! This is GOLD!" You turn the page, and before you know it, you have read all of their poems, and you are transformed by the shock of their words! You have become a god-touched lunatic. You are scribbling, "I love you, Author X!" in red ink on every page. You want to dance waltzes with this poetry, you want to devour it whole, you want to shout stanzas to passers-by in the middle of the lumber aisle.

And you start to think... yes, it's worth it... even as you pick up the next bundle of papers.

Anyway, at least that's what it's been like for me.

and I was not the only one who thought that back-seat sensors for children left in cars was a good idea.

This article is heart-wrenching, but it's not just a sucker-punch to make you cry. It's marvellously well-written, and about something I think more people should be aware of.

Fatal Distraction


I've written about this before, so I feel it's worth saying: despite my ranting, I genuinely do try to be a loving, tolerant, person. But people who get on their high horse about this and tell me that the parents are just bad people who deserve what they get - well, those people make me want to punch them in the nose. It's a system fault. That system is the human brain, and the human brain IS NOT PERFECT. Sometimes it makes errors. Sometimes it makes catastrophic errors. I would love to see more people realize this, and stop blaming the parents long enough to look for a solution instead.

Spring is coming! I'm so excited. :)

Earlier this week I ordered my tomato seeds from Seed Savers Exchange. I can't say enough good things about them. Wonderful products and fantastic customer service. I dream of one day taking a trip to Iowa to visit their farm. Really!!!

So what am I planting in my garden this year? Oodles of tomatoes, plus a couple more things, including some peppers, a snap pea, and a pumpkin that supposedly has more of a "bush" habit (which my husband will appreciate, as last season's pumpkin vines were apparently quite hard to dodge with the lawnmower). Honestly, I only meant to order a few seeds, but everything looked so darned NEAT that I got carried away, and the next thing you know...

Tomato, Black from Tula
Tomato, Gold Medal
Tomato, Cherokee Purple
Tomato, Currant Sweet Pea (Organic)
Tomato, Moonglow (Organic)
Tomato, Bloody Butcher
Pea, Amish Snap
Squash, Cheyenne Bush
Pepper, Quadrato Asti Giallo (sweet)
Pepper, Fish (hot)

Did I mention I'm excited about having a garden this year?

I'm having a horrible, crappy day, but every time I think about my seed order, I get a warm happy feeling inside and can't help smiling. :)

Okay, folks, so I posted something about a call for submissions for our school's literary magazine, Welter. I just wanted to give you the latest, because we can't make an awesome lit mag without awesome writers like you. If you are getting nervous jitters about submitting your work for publication, this is a great way to get your feet wet. If you are more relaxed and just have been told that you write well, and wouldn't mind sharing with a couple hundred new best friends, well, come on over!

In other words...

PLEASE PLEASE PRETTY PLEASE (with sugar on top), please submit something to our magazine?

I'll be honest, I want to make this year the best ever, and that means getting submissions from lots of great and talented people. Don't make me name names, because I will stoop to that, but I think you know who you are. ;)

Here's the official word on Welter that I am supposed to pass around:

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Dear Friends,

Welter, UB's literary magazine, is looking for poems, short stories and essays for its spring, 2009, issue.
You don't have to be a UB student or staff member to send us work. We are open to all writers.
(Last year's issue was featured in the Baltimore Sun.)

To check out our guidelines, go to:

http://welter.ubalt.edu/welter/submissions.html

And if you have any questions, please email us at welter@ubalt.edu.

Thanks! We hope to hear from you.

The Welter Editors

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

So - get cracking. Um. Please.

I'm busy, but I'm excited. Part of my VERY LAST SEMESTER (WOOOO!) at UB involves a class called "Publication and Performance." It is the responsibility of this class to publish Welter, University of Baltimore's annual literary magazine (since 1965!).

Sooooooooooooo...... there will be more updates from me as I get time, BUT the one thing I wanted to make sure to tell all of YOU is that we need submissions! I know I have a lot of lovely and talented writers on my friends list. I've read your stories, and I know you deserve a chance to shine. Well, here it is!

The following statement is what I'm officially supposed to use to talk Welter up. The following statement has not been evaluated by the FDA.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Dear Friends,

Welter, UB's literary magazine, is looking for poems, short stories and essays for its spring, 2009, issue.
You don't have to be a UB student or staff member to send us work. We are open to all writers.
(Last year's issue was featured in the Baltimore Sun.)

To check out our guidelines, go to:

http://welter.ubalt.edu/welter/submissions.html

And if you have any questions, please email us at welter@ubalt.edu.

Thanks! We hope to hear from you.

The Welter Editors
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

p.s. Last I checked, the website said something about "submissions are only accepted in the fall." Ignore that bit.

Hello, LJ friends! I apologize for my long absence. From Thanksgiving out, 2008 was extremely hectic. Good, but hectic.

So how about that new year, huh? 2008 was good to Dave and I. We bought our house just as 2007 drew to an end, and at this time last year we were scrambling to get moved in and settled before I had to go back to school. Then there was that whole wedding thing in May. :)

In 2008, I (re-)discovered how blessed I am to be surrounded by wonderful friends and family. I am beyond grateful for having the people in my life that I do. If you're reading this, that means you, too. Thank you.

I'm looking forward to 2009. I can't wait until January 20th. I am looking forward to graduating in May. I'm looking forward to finishing some projects that have been put on the back burner while I was in school. I'm looking forward to starting some new projects.

In the immortal words of SpongeBob SquarePants, "I'm ready! I'm ready, I'm ready, I'm ready!"

Funny, witty, and more pointed than a startled hedgehog. It's like the Terry Pratchett of protests. Thank you, Princeton.



(URL: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=59IK28ry9eQ)

So I took this 8-week women's self-defense course that I absolutely loved. I couldn't stop talking about it. Heck, I was so gung-ho about it I wanted to become an instructor. Every woman should take it, I said. I still believe that's true. At least, I think I do. I'm not sure.

See, at the end of the training, we had a final thing called "simulations" where we went up against a guy in a red suit who tried to abduct us. We had to use our training to fight our way free and escape.

Oh god did I ever do badly. I got away but I think it's only because he went easy on me. I remember a lot of flailing. I don't remember using any of the techniques I learned. I was so nervous and scared I wanted to puke. At one point I ended up on the floor with one shoe off.

It's been a few days and I still am filled with overwhelming shame and humiliation when I think about it. They videotaped everyone's trial and on Thursday our class is meeting one last time to watch and give us each a DVD of our simulation. I can't even think about that simulation without feeling sick to my stomach. There is no way I want to watch it in front of a group of other people. I feel like I let my teachers down. I have ZERO self-confidence left. In fact, I have less confidence now than I did before I took this course.

Part of what hurts the most is how excited I was by this class before the simulations. I really loved everything about it - and then it went so horribly wrong. I thought I had finally found something I was good at and excited about and was really SOMEWHERE I belonged. And then. This took ALL that away.

I e-mailed my teacher to send her a picture of Alaska she had requested, and in the e-mail I told her about the issues I am having, and pleading for her help. I told her she was just about the only person out there who could give me some kind of meaningful reassurance about how the simulation went.

Her response?

"Thanks. Alaska is gorgeous."

I admit it, I cried.

I haven't been able to stop thinking about this. I can't even put into words how upsetting it is.

I was off yesterday, but I got up when the alarm went off at six so that I could go to the polls and vote with my husband. He's a Republican, so we voted against each other, but I was just happy to be voting.

I was happy to stand in that long line that went out the building. I was happy to see such a great turnout, and such a wide range of people, young and old, men and women, in all colors... everyone was there because they loved their country, and wanted to help create a future for America by voting for the person they thought was best for her.

I stayed up to 1:30 last night/this morning watching history being made. I saw the crowds in Chicago. I watched Obama's victory speech.

And even now, I can't stop crying. Yesterday was an amazing day, and I am beyond proud, beyond happy... because once again, America did something great. I'm going to be a great big sap for the next few weeks because I feel like writing love-letters to my country. If America were a woman, I'd be writing sonnets to her eyelashes right now. I get like this a little after every election, because voting does that to me, but this time - this time, I feel like she loves me back.

Congratulations to President-elect Obama.

This is beyond amazing.

~*!!!*~*!!!*~*!!!*~*!!!*~*!!!*~*!!!*~*!!!*~*!!!*~

I've just reached a completely meaningless benchmark here at work and I want to celebrate to make it awesome. What should I do?


I can't give you any background, except to say that it is a minor annoying task that starts out my workday, every single day, and I am choosing to celebrate the milestones on it rather than let it bother me.

So - come on! I want to hear some suggestions! :)

~*!!!*~*!!!*~*!!!*~*!!!*~*!!!*~*!!!*~*!!!*~*!!!*~

So I know I haven't been very good with the updates. I'm back in school this semester, taking three classes while working full-time, so my time is a little... strained. I also am about to start a fourth class, this one two nights a week, but fortunately it's only a phys-ed type class and will only be about a month. Otherwise I'd go nuts. Not that I'm not already.

Anyway, one of the classes I'm taking is an online course on Buddhism. (Oh yes, I do love being a Creative Writing major - we get to take all kinds of great classes!) Anyway, now I'm learning a lot about Buddhism, and as part of my course requirements, had to go learn how to meditate, so I did that this weekend.

I realized that I have an easier time believing in God* than I do believing in Karma. =/ It's not that I don't believe "what goes around comes around", but I don't think it's a perfect system, and I think there are some dangerous, dangerous pitfalls to that belief.

I've got it pretty good right now. I'm married to a man who loves me, and we are comfortably well-off in a nice house. A friend of mine told me it's because I'm a good person, and it's what I deserve. I don't think so. I know a lot of good people who are having difficulties. That doesn't make them any less good. I don't want to look at a two-year old starving and beaten and think, oh, he must be suffering bad karma from a past life. That isn't right. I want to see a person who is suffering and try to help. I don't ever want to assume that if something good or bad is happening, it is because of karma. I want to instead think that life is more random than that, because then I will be thankful for the good, and when the bad comes for others, work to help them through it, and when it comes for me, hopefully I will understand that it is a part of life as well. But I think that using the word "karma" can often invite blame, and that's not good or helpful.

Fall is so crazy.

First of all, I should explain that storms, especially sudden storms, knock me out. It has to be the barometric pressure change. It's like having an off-switch in my head. One minute I'll be fine, the next - GONE. Sleepytime. Then I'll wake up and it will be raining and I'll be all, "Oh, that again." I know, there are a lot worse things that could happen, but it freaks me out a little sometimes. If I am driving or doing something where I need to stay awake, I can usually postpone it for a little while, but not for very long, and if I skip sleeping entirely, the world is NOT a happy place. Am I a freak? Does this happen to any of you?

All day yesterday I was restless and awake and couldn't stop moving. (That was, up until ten minutes before the storm hit. :D )

Today I am a little bit chilly and have a bad case of wanting to eat everything in sight. If I didn't stop myself, I'd eat a block of cheese, and bread, and soup, and then crawl under a big pile of quilts and sleep for days.