November 2006 Archives

Last day, guys. I successfully blogged every day for the month of November and don't you feel the better for it? I got some laments when I expressed happiness that this little experiment is now over, but I think the whole thing was good for getting me back in the blogging ways. I'm leaving tomorrow night for Atlantic City and will take it as an opportunity to go blog-free for a few days (although I'm not sure it counts if I'm just gathering material to post on another blog).

You guys are asking about the snow. The snow! I know Denver isn't the only place that got all this weather because I spent a good part of the past couple days canceling and rescheduling travel plans for people who were supposed to be flying all over the country. There is definitely something pretty about fresh snow, and standing in the middle of an empty parking lot at night after a few inches of it has fallen to the ground is really peaceful. Living in the city, I hadn't seen blankets of fresh snow stretching in a long time. It was nice. But of course the sun comes up and the cars come out and all the nice stuff turns to the same brown mess. And it's cold! Let me tell you that I got used to a car very quickly. Taking the bus in the snow is cold and messy and hard to go back to once you've experienced the luxury of driving yourself somewhere. Damn, we might have to buy two cars. Do all couples have two cars?

"The Office" better be glad it redeemed itself tonight with some Pam and Jim flirting because I've been furious at Jim this whole new season. As far as I can tell, he professed his love, Pam said she was getting married, DIDN'T get married because of said professed love, continued flirting with Jim...and then Jim promptly started dating new girl. What?? I understand the relationship is complicated and of course the series hinges on there always being this tension between them, but COME ON. If any guy did that to a girlfriend of mine I'd punch him in the groin.

The radiators in our place knock a lot. I know that has something to do with water trapped in pipes, but I'm not exactly sure how to cure the problem. I read that you can tilt the radiators to let water drain properly, but the radiators seem to be the non-tipping kind. Like stuck to the ground. Is that possible? Our landlords are all, "Oh old pipes always knock lalala," but we had radiator heat in our past two apartments with no trouble at all. And this knocking is loud. Like someone hitting a pot with a wooden spoon repeatedly at intervals throughout the night. Please, interwebs, help us.

Today my very pregnant co-worker's water broke while she was at her desk and she was whisked off to the hospital to have a baby. She probably has a real little baby now instead of a bump on her stomach. This is probably the closest I've ever been to a woman giving birth. It's kinda crazy if you think about it too long. Babies.

It was also cooking club tonight. We thought it was a good excuse to whip out the ol' chocolate fountain. Always good for a snowy night.

I miss my yoga class. I had the best teacher ever (Liz B.) and every yoga class I've taken since simply pales in comparison.

Our new place is only a couple blocks away from an Iyengar yoga studio, so I thought I'd try that out. I'm sure the yoga practice has wonderful longterm effects on your body and state-of-mind, and the two classes I've taken there so far have worked me out okay, but I don't know. They seem, a tad crunchy for me and the instructor I had tonight was certainly...how do you say? Full of himself. I had to listen to a long lecture about how this was a level three class, and wouldn't I agree that most beginners should start at a level one class? There were terms I wouldn't understand and props I just wouldn't be familiar with. So just so I was prepared for that, mmkay? And just because some people are young and flexible, they think they know everything, but--huh!--they don't necessarily know how to do things right.

Welcome to yoga class! Let's just relax now.

I thought I did just fine, but that didn't stop him from interrupting class to demonstrate how not to do something and tell the class how other teachers taught the skill wrong while looking straight at me. Dude! Just tell me to straighten my back a little! Maybe instead of my entire yoga teachings being totally bunk, I'm just a little off center right now. MAYBE.

Anyway, he mostly seemed like the kind of guy who was teased as a kid and now has a skill with which he can lord over others.

Even though I love paying money to have someone look down at me because I enjoy challenging myself, I think might have to switch up the classes.

Also, maybe I'm grumpy because I had to skip dinner to make it to the class on time. Humph.

Ug, can we pretend Sunday's post never happened? Yes, let's.

I've been collecting New Yorker covers for almost a year now. I used to hang on to the whole magazines, but I was afraid of becoming on of those people who live their lives in one giant fire hazard of an apartment. And while the magazines would be admittedly cool to have around in the future, what I really loved about them was the covers. So I started slicing the covers off first thing, to avoid the tearing and folding that inevitably happens, then I'd read the naked magazine. It seems like a small thing, keeping a cover every week, but the best part is that they accumulate quickly. It's not long before I had a nice stack to flip through. Last week's magazine cover--four covers actually, interlocking scenes by Chris Ware--struck me as entirely wonderful. I didn't realize that there were actually four different covers circulated until my friend Joey mentioned it on the phone. And now...now I want them all! So I'm appealing to you New Yorker subscribers out there. I have this cover:

Do you have one of the others? Were you just planning on throwing it away? Do you want to put the cover in a manila folder and send it to me and be thanked profusely on my blog? I'd even be willing to do a trade of some sort. It is toffee season, y'know...

Think about it! You can email me at lizworking at the gmail or leave a comment if you're feeling in the giving way.

Here are the rest:

UPDATE: Thanks, Krista, Beth, and Robin! You guys are my New Yorker cover heroes.

For one summer during high school, Heather and I became obsessed with Slurpees. We drove all over town looking for new flavors, and when we'd see them it was like discovering your favorite movie star was actually sitting in 7-11 this whole time. We became disillusioned with Coke varieties pretty quickly, and found out that lots of little distinctions exist between seemingly similar flavors (ie, cherry, wild cherry, and Fanta cherry). At one point, we took dramatic black and white pictures of each other holding the Slurpees. We also called some 800-number and made the poor operator on the other end list off all the individual flavors so we could transcribe them and know what we were up against in our quest to taste everything. It turned out there were like 70 different flavors in rotation (including some obscure ones that I'm not sure ever really existed like Dragonfruit and Blueberry). We swore we would do everything in our power to taste everything we could.

But then, for no good reason, we got sick of Slurpees. Maybe the summer just ended or our enthusiasm simply ran its course, but for whatever reason, the fiery passion we had for the drink came and went. I can't drink a Slurpee now, of course, without thinking of that summer.

At the end of the week it will officially be December and the end of this posting every day for a month. Ha! While I've enjoyed writing on a regular basis and getting reconnected with all my blog friends, there is something to be said about not having to post at 10:30 on Saturday night because you forgot to do so earlier and your obsessive side won't let you slip a day.

We saw "Tenacious D" and I have to say: meh. I definitely laughed at some parts, but maybe the humor is just a little off of my own. Like the beginning sound check? Where they are animated and they fart around the theater showing you the surround sound? And then a tagline comes up that says, "The audience is baked"? Yeah, that KILLED. I haven't seen a reception like that since the first "White Girls" trailer at the Cobble Hills theater.

The time was listed wrong online, so we had an hour to kill before the movie started. Luckily, some genius built a Dave & Busters next to the theater, so we threw away some cash riding motorcycles and killing zombies, though not at the same time (but wouldn't THAT be a fun game?).

Here's a piece of advice: stay away from the airplane game. Because even though you will be tempted to climb into a cockpit simulator and fly through the air on a vibrating seat, it won't happen because you will get confused about how to accelerate, drive off the runway a little bit, and the game will tell you that's not allowed and you will lose. About 15 seconds after sitting down. Who ever heard of a transportation-related video game where you lose for straying off the road? All I know is the fun of the motorcycle game comes from accidentally plowing into chain link fences, mowing over cheering pedestrians, and dying by unintentionally driving your bike into the engine of a plane.

The city is quiet today. Of course, this is coming from someone who didn't wait in line all night to be the first person through the doors of Best Buy to save a couple hundred bucks on a television, nor someone who went anywhere near a mall, nor someone who really left the office much at all. The internet is just as quiet.

I ended up making a pie filling from scratch and pouring it into a store-bought frozen crust. After scouring the internet for a good basic recipe, I landed on this one thinking, if anyone knows how to make a pumpkin pie, it's Martha Stewart. And Betty White. A winning combination if I ever heard one. For a vegetable, I was looking for something with green beans, and landed on this recipe (also Martha) which struck me as too funny not to try. Basically, it's the gross green bean casserole with canned mushroom soup and fried onions from a can, BUT this one is made entirely from fresh ingredients.

I was all, "Ha ha ha, that is SO funny. Won't THIS be fun!" And then I told J about it and his face turned white and he got a frowny mouth and said, "Ug, I hate green bean casserole." And I was like, "But this one! This one has fresh green beans, and there's no soup, and I fry up little shallots instead of ripping open a bag of Funyuns!" And he conceded that he would try it, but, y'know, don't get your hopes up. Then, sometime around the point where I'd snapped, washed, cooked, and blanched* 1.5 pounds of green beans while simultaneously cutting and cooking a pound of mushrooms and some bell pepper, I had this thought: hmm, mom doesn't really like green bean casserole either. And Jon's a picky eater. And you never know with Dave. Which leaves....me and Dad. Then the recipe seemed less funny. Because the joke only really works if you are like me and kinda like the gross version of the casserole but can't really think about what's in it while consuming it. With the new recipe, you can think all you want about the ingredients because they are all fresh and nice. However, if you hate the taste of the gross version, the fact that you've substituted fresh milk for canned globules of soup is a moot point.

But I cooked the whole thing because it was TOO LATE TO STOP NOW! I thought it looked perfectly lovely and brought it over to my parents' house, where it was greeted with wary enthusiasm. It went under the broiler for crisping at the same time as the smashed sweet potatoes with marshmallows. J was put in charge of pulling out the dishes before they burned. "Watch those marshmallows!" my mom intoned, "One minute they're brown, the next they're burnt beyond recognition." J kneeled down and squinted at the expanding white pieces. "Seriously, don't blink."

This freaked J out a little and he finally yanked them from the oven when they got delicately toasted, before they could turn on him. We all congratulated him on a perfect watch. Then, about four minutes later, my mom gasped and ran to the oven, where she pulled open the door to reveal my little casserole, smoking to high heaven. It had been forgotten about in all the marshmallow intensity, leaving my fried shallots to be burnt beyond recognition. I gave J some grief while my dad danced gleefully around the kitchen saying, "Ha! I'm just glad it wasn't me watching those! Ha!"

Luckily the burnt pieces flicked right off and the casserole was saved. For me and my dad to eat. Everything was delicious, including the mashed potatoes and gravy, which is my favorite part of the meal to eat leftovers of. We praised my mom's cooking, but I learned you have to be effusive and specific when complimenting the dishes. Apparently, no one said anything in particular about the mashed potatoes and when I went to pack up leftovers she looked at me guiltily and said, "I threw them out. No one said anything about them, so I assumed they were no good!"

But it's okay. I have enough casserole leftover to last me til Christmas.

* Somehow we don't have ice cube trays. I don't know how that happened, but "plunge into ice bath" isn't usually an instruction on a recipe that I trip over. Until I had the beans boiling and realized I had no ice with which to make a bath. So I improvised. With an ice cream maker bowl. This actually worked fantastically. In fact, a little too well. I came back 10 minutes later and had to pick the beans out of the layer of ice that had formed on the inside.

Who blogs on Thanksgiving, huh, NaBloPoMo? I'm guessing there are even fewer people reading blogs. Seriously, if you're reading this right now and it is officially still Thanksgiving, please leave a comment because I am very curious.

Also, after doing that, you should go read this hilarious story about crockpots and soup. Because it's better than anything I'm going to give you today.

Eat some stuffing!

I've posted this recipe before, but maybe I should just post it every year, because every year I get a call from Willow asking for the cashew gravy recipe one more time even though she has it somewhere, she's sure. This is a really nice vegetarian "cream" gravy, but because there's nothing weird about it (ie no textured vegetable protein or quorn or other meat-like oddities), carnivores tend to enjoy it, too. I also promise it has nothing to do with this gelatinous monstrosity.

Cashew Gravy

6 T. raw, unsalted cashews ground to a fine powder/paste
1 ½ C. water
1 T. cornstarch
1-2 T. soy sauce (I prefer a milder organic kind. If you've only got Kikkoman or something, go easy on it)
squirt of lemon juice
seasonings to taste (I use freshly ground pepper and a little garlic salt)

Grind the nuts in a food processor or blender until a paste starts to stick to the sides. While the food processor or blender is on a low speed, slowly add the water. Transfer about a third of this mixture to a saucepan and whisk in the cornstarch. Heat and stir constantly until gravy starts to thicken. Pour the rest of the cashew mixture into the pan and add soy sauce, lemon juice, and seasonings. At this point you can really tailor it to your tastes by adding more of whatever you like. Although adding giblets at this point would be very counterproductive.

I'm also in charge of the pumpkin pie this year. A coworker is in the same position and called home to get her mom's recipe, which is always a hit. Her mom was excited and said "Oh, I have the perfect recipe! It's right on the can!" Which is funny, but really I'm in the camp that pumpkin pie pretty much always tastes like pumpkin pie. You can't screw it up like you can an apple pie or a cream pie. It's very straightforward. One year, I cooked the pumpkin from scratch and scooped and drained the innards and lalala it tasted exactly like a pumpkin pie when I was done. Maybe side-by-side, some recipes will win out over others, but the truth is you're eating a piece at the end of a big meal, and as long as it tastes like pumpkin and the crust doesn't suck, you're pretty much golden.

That said, I had to ask the food guru herself what she thought and she pointed me in the direction of two recipes (Maple Pumpkin Pie and Honey-Pecan Pumpkin Pie) that do sound delicious.

I guess what it really comes down to is whether the praise for going the extra mile will be rewarding enough to justify the energy expended on on creating a real pumpkin pie. And whether the praise would really be any different if I brought a cheap store-bought pie.

Well, a sister in-law, but who's keeping track? J's brother called with the good news that there will be a wedding in the near future and I for one am completely psyched. Isn't it strange that late in life you can get new siblings just like that? (Well, J actually found out he had a real sister he didn't know about a few years ago, but that's a different story). One of the biggest kicks for me after our wedding was thinking of J's brother as MY brother. It shouldn't really change anything, a simple title, but it does. Plus, wedding! It was serious wedding season for a bit with my friends, but now it's seemed to cool off a little. I'm a big sucker for the whole ordeal, and it's fun in a different way when you actually get to eat things and drink things and you don't have to plan or pay for most things.

Have you seen this show "Miami Ink?" It comes with our free cable and I found myself fairly engrossed with the whole idea of tattoo parlor culture. (This has nothing to do with anything, but I think the highest rate of the misused apostrophe s happens in signs that declare "Tattoo's." Like a family bar on Fantasy Island.) Here's what I couldn't get over: all the people coming in to get tattoos were doing it to "remind" themselves of something. One man wanted "some sort of puzzle man with the heart piece missing" to remind him of what his dad was like and what he didn't want to become with his own son. A woman came in wanting a pinup picture of herself tattooed on her outer thigh to remind her to "always be myself."

Which begs the question: how forgetful ARE you?

Like the woman who was missing her left arm? And got a tattoo of a broken heart on her left side? To REMIND her of what's missing? Yeah, you'd think the MISSING LEFT ARM would kinda serve as it's own reminder, but I guess not. She's all, "Something's weird with me today, but what is it? Hmm, what's this heart tattoo...Oh shit, that's right! No arm."

Unless you're the "Memento" guy, "remind" is not the word you're looking for.

You made it through the week of secrets and lies! Now I'll give it to you straight and tell you where I divulged and where I stretched the truth a bit. Although, sometimes I did a little of both.

Sometimes I use fake names to leave incendiary comments...just to stir up trouble.
SECRET!
I was roundly accused of doing this on the most popular website I frequent daily, eatfeats.com, mostly because 95% of the commenters there are using aliases. They do it to call people out, voice unpopular opinions, or just entertain themselves. I have so much fun trying to guess who's who (we're on to you, Rhonda) and reading the wars that ensue, I'm not sure there'd be room for me with an alias. So, I'll be honest when I say I don't use fake names there to start trouble (just to gently make fun of people when they make their aliases argue with each other). And I don't use fake names and boobs in real life ;-)

However, let's take a quick trip back to 2005's Ultimate Blogger. Specifically this entry (entry is NOT WORK SAFE but the link there to the comments should be fine, just careful scrolling up). Anyway, hi I'm "Carin." And boy did I stir up some trouble there. And you'll notice that I not only lied once, but I went and defended myself with another lie. I was so embarrassed about the trouble this caused and I immediately called Willow and made her swear never to tell Mike or Steve, which as far as I know she never did. A couple years later this is just funny to me.

I was in space...camp.
SECRET!
Well sort of. Actually I was in The Young Astronaut Program. I don't remember anything about it except launching a few rockets and making paper airplanes. I did, however, grow up to marry an Ohioan, so maybe I learned something after all.

I'm going to Atlantic City for the meatball competition.
SECRET!
Although it's not much of a secret anymore. I found super cheap plane tickets, am planning on staying up the entire 24-hours I'll be there. Woo! I officially don't really have the money to be doing this at all, but I'm a sucker for an eating competition. Plus it's Krista's and my one year anniversary of covering these things. PLUS! Remember those eater magnets we made for the 4th of July? Well we are auctioning a set on Ebay and people are crazier than I thought, because they are up to $51 now, which is all money going towards travel expenses.

The reason I got serious with my guy is because I saw his baby pictures and I wanted to see what our kids would look like.
LIE!
I'm just a sucker for ANTM. And the most bizarre commercial ever. (Maybe not as weird as the toothpaste commercial here. But close.)

Someone else owns naked pictures of me.
SECRET!
It's true. I am probably 18 in those pictures and pretty naked. On some rocks outside, I think. But the person who owns them is Heather and they were part of some photography project. As far as I know, they never saw the light of day. She's the best person in the world to be in possession of things like that.

I don't like to play Risk because I'm afraid to lose.
SECRET!
Sally's right that I used to say I didn't like to play because it was boring. But I actually like the game. It just terrifies me when I start to lose. I get really panicky when someone attacks me or I lose guys or I'm spread too thin. I'm panicking now just thinking about it! I do like Taboo, though. Good game, there.

I had to replace it, but he never found out.
LIE!
This is just a flat out lie. It was a cool picture of a broken fan and I just made something up to write on it. Eh, it was Sunday and I was feeling lazy.

That's it, kids! I hope you enjoyed the game; I sure did. It's a perfect way to fill up a post if you get stuck. I highly recommend it, mostly because I want to know your secrets and lies now.

Tomorrow I'll reveal the truths and lies.

Overly competitive or just a liar?

If this is true, I wouldn't waste a postcard on baby pictures.

Truth or a Deodorant Commercial?

Is this the real life? Is this just fantasy?

The confessions/deceptions continue.

I think I've decided to reveal the (non)stories behind the postcards all at once at the end of the week.

Maybe you should play this week, too.

Without internet access yesterday, I had to do an emergency post via a willing participant. Hope you enjoyed your guest post!

We are really tired. We unloaded our cubes, ran around getting furniture, cleaning, and food shopping. We unpacked several boxes, discovered we have free cable (J says I shouldn't say that, because they will come and take it away from us), showered, ate some Quiznos, did some laundry, made the bed, put together the bathroom, and collapsed into exhausted heaps only to realize it was only 5:30 pm.

The cats are still with my parents until we can get the house in some sort of working order. Or at least not have the counters covered in vases and other breakables. We visited them today and Max is all out of sorts. J was petting him and asking him how his night alone went.

J (to Max): Are you upset because you didn't have any legs to sleep on?
Me: Why didn't he have legs to sleep on?
(pause)
J: Your legs.

Here's our apartment!

J and I moved into our new place today.

At first I thought 6500 square feet was too much space for two people, but then I look at our built in home theater and two person shower and think, no this is perfect. And let me tell you, I am soooo glad I hired a decorator. He really took all the hassle out of making the place feel more like the home I wanted. When my neighbors come over I want them to feel so envious about our entry hall with Italian marble columns and 50 inch plasma screen in the living room they go home and cry themselves to sleep. I want J and I to be the Jones everyone else wants to keep up with. Isn't that what life is about?

So here I am now. The movers have all just left and the decorator is hanging some paintings on the wall. I don't know who painted them yet, but he assures me they are extremely talented and very popular.

J is sitting in his den reading a biography on George Washington Carver. If there is anything that man loves it's a good story about a man and his peanut. After I'm finished writing this entry I'm going to go try and find the kitchen.

But before I end this, I want to say no matter how much stuff we have in Denver it will never make up for the friends we had in New York. The warmth and good feelings our friends brought to our little place in Sunset Park will always stay with me. Whether it was Krista's sense of humor and ingenious wit or Josh's sexy ass, each of them brought something unique that can never be replaced with material goods. I remember the day Josh pulled J from a burning building, his selfless acts always reminded us of the hero in a classic comic book, or maybe it was just the tights he always wore. And who could ever forget when Krista would lift her head up to the sky and sing in Prospect Park on a Sunday morning, bringing all the birds and squirrels out to greet her in a harmonious human/animal platonic orgy of love.

Ahh, memories....anyway, I wonder what our cook Fernando is making us for dinner?

Um, yeah, and this entry might have been written by someone other than Liz because she just moved into her new place and she's actually without computer access right now. But I'm sure I captured her thoughts perfectly....

I'm thinking I need a little something to spice up this blog every day thing, so starting Monday, I am going to launch Secret, Secret, Lie. Every day for a week, I will create and post some sort of Post Secret type postcard that will either divulge a real secret of mine or a baldfaced lie. I leave it for you to guess which ones are which and I'll reveal the real answers the next day. Or maybe at the end of the week. I haven't decided.

I am taking a bold step here because, what the hell postcards do I have? None. Also, I'm not entirely certain I have any good secrets. (I always have good lies!) I want to emphasize that these will be Post Secret in style ; I can tell you right now I don't have anything I wished I'd said to that priest and I'm not suicidal. And because I won't have any anonymity, they will probably be of the tamer variety. Did I mention we're moving tomorrow? To a house that doesn't have internet set up yet? Or, like, a scanner? Secret: I LIKE TO TORTURE MYSELF.

Moving around some drawers yesterday morning to retrieve a pair of shorts that had become lodged, I came across an old letter. The room was dark and I couldn't make out the writing. I could see a couple phrases: "haven't slept," "letter you wrote," "thinking about." I love that moment before you are able to tell what something like that is, because the possibilities are endless. Was it an old love letter? From whom? Was there drama? I took it into the light and realized it was written to me by a guy I really screwed over in college. The letter was from pre-me-screwing-up time and was very sweet. The phrases I saw in the dim light were really quite innocuous, talking about staying up late to finish a term paper and how the changing seasons make you think differently. I would tell you about the screwing over part, but I'm still hideously embarrassed about it.

Seeing the note was nice, though. I used to write much more letters than I do now. I blame blogs and email and cell phones. I've stayed in touch more with random strangers than close friends of mine that live minutes or hours away.

Real Girl was spot on:

Though, to be fair to Corie and Ryan, someone was supposed to bring cookies and there was a big ol' tossed salad. This was the first time I'd made a banana cream pie since about 7th grade, when I'm sure I mixed a package of vanilla pudding with some bananas, dumped it into a store-bought crust, threw some cool whip on top and called it a day. Oh, how my culinary snobishness has grown. Actually, I don't have anything against store-bought crusts, but I thought for cooking club, I should roll out the real thing. I got the recipe from my bible, The New Best Recipe by those Cooks Illustrated people who know everything about everything. I should warn you before you make this, that it is a bit of a time consuming recipe. All told, I had to spend three nights on it to get everything done. There are all these fussy steps about making sure everything is the right temperature because of little scientific facts about frozen gluten strands and browned bananas and all that. But it turns out, if you follow the recipe verbatim, you get one luscious pie with a crisp crust, thick vanilla/banana filling, and golden bananas.

Crust!

1 1/4 C. flour
1/2 t. salt
1 T. sugar
3 T. vegetable shortening, chilled
4 T. cold butter, cut into bits
4-5 T. ice water
1/2 C. graham cracker crumbs

Mix flour, salt, and sugar in food processor until combined. Add shortening and process until the mixture has the texture of course sand, about 10 seconds. Scatter the butter pieces over the flour mixture; pulse for one second bursts, about 10 times. There shouldn't be any pieces bigger than a pea. Turn mixture into a medium bowl and sprinkle 4 T. of ice water over the mixture. Using a rubber spatula, use a folding motion to mix. Add an additional T. of water if needed just until it comes together. Flatten into a 4-inch disk, wrap in plastic, and refrigerate for an hour or so.

Sprinkle the work surface with some graham cracker crumbs and roll out dough , using more crumbs on top so dough is entirely coated. This will keep the crust from getting soggy! Genius! Roll dough into pie dish and make a fancy edging if you want. Technique like so. Refrigerate about 40 minutes, then freeze for about 20 minutes (gluten strands!).

Line the crust with foil and weigh down with beans, rice, or pie weights to keep the crust from bubbling up. Bake in a 375-degree oven for about 25 minutes. Remove foil and weights and cook an additional 5-6 minutes until golden.

Filling!

1/2 C. plus 2 T. granulated sugar
1/4 cup cornstarch
1/8 t. salt
5 large egg yolks, lightly beaten
2 C. whole milk
1/2 C. evaporated milk
1/2 vanilla bean, about 3 inches long, split lengthwise (you can substitute extract here, but you'll miss out on the little seeds in the filling and a super rich flavor. I really recommend going for the real bean here)
2 T. butter
1-2 t. brandy (I'm pretty sure the brandy my dad pulled out of the liquor cabinet is older than me. I don't know how necessary this ingredient is. I only used a teaspoon, so I wouldn't go out and buy a bunch of brandy only for this recipe.)
2 medium bananas

Whisk sugar, cornstarch and salt in medium saucepan. Add yolks, then immediately but gradually whisk in milk and evaporated milk. Drop in the vanilla bean. Cook over medium heat, stirring frequently at first, and then constantly as mixture starts to thicken and begins to simmer, 8-10 minutes. Once mixture simmers, continue to cook, stirring constantly for 1 minute longer. Remove pan from heat; whisk in brandy and butter. Remove vanilla bean, scrape out seeds, whisk them back into filling.

Pour filling into shallow pan (another pie pan works well). Put plastic wrap directly on surface to prevent a skin from forming; cool on the counter until warm, about 30 minutes. (At this point, you can put your palm on the covered surface and jiggle it around a little...it feels weeeird. Like some hot liposuctioned fat. Or something equally appealing.) Do not let it get cold! That will result in lumps and grossness. Hot will brown your bananas. Warm is the key here. Pour 1/2 of the warm filling into pie shell, slice the bananas over filling, then top with second half of filling. Once again, place sheet of plastic wrap directly on surface. Refrigerate until completely chilled, at least 3 hours.

Topping!

1 C. chilled heavy cream
2 T. sugar
1 t. vanilla extract

Whip that shit up. I might have used 3 T of sugar. Top pie with cream. I decorated with some white chocolate curls, but you can bring your fancy any way you like it.

The Democrats win, Rumsfeld steps down, and Britney is getting divorced. What a newsy coupla days we're having!

At the new job here, I've had to order a bunch of office supplies to fill up my desk. Here is what I realized: at some point in the past three years, I became an office supply connaisseur. A bit of a snob. I have very distinct preferences when it comes to pen sizes and post-it note holders and types of desk calendars. The realization came to me as I was pouring over the catalogue looking for a particular kind of envelope moistener. The kind with adhesive. I'm sure there was a time in my life when I got by just fine with one of those old-fashioned plastic things with the sponge on top, or even--god forbid--my own tongue, but those times are long gone, my friend. I am now a woman who requires a both a special brand of moisturizer and moistener. And also small binder clips, because those medium ones are WAY too big for a few sheets of paper.

I like being in a bigger office. After three years of being in a tiny one, the change is good. There are people I don't know, a big kitchen stocked with teas and coffees and industrial sized coffee creamer containers, emails that go around offering tickets to things or announcing happy hours; there are office things like "Bagel Wednesdays" and the person with a secret drawer full of candy that she'll share with you. Sometimes when you go into the kitchen, there are lots of people there and they all joke around and talk to you and it's very friendly. Okay, I'm new so they don't really talk to me yet, but they talk to each other. And I listen in and am all, "Wow, look how big that creamer container is! That is a big container!" and they'll look in my general direction and smile. Which is nice.

Tonight is food club and the theme is "Foods You Can Toss." Can you guess what I made? I'll give you a hint: it has comedic value.

Seriously? Only Mike has seen "The Prestige?" I was hoping for more of a lively discussion there.

Happy voting day. Or end of voting day. I had to wait on line for an hour and a half (in the midst of a 20-minute period where the server for all of Denver was down and the lines weren't moving at all). After all the waiting, it was pretty easy. They had some new weird machine that had glowing green arrows and a giant yellow button to press at the end. Not quite as satisfying as pulling a big lever, but what it lacked in drama it made up for in technological superiority. Here's my secret: pulling the lever always felt a little like pushing that button at the crosswalk. Impressive and mechanical, but not entirely convincing.

It was in the 70s today, so standing around in the sun wasn't so bad. Plus all the pro-votey people were out in swarms, giving people bottles of water, encouraging us to stick it out, and driving end-of-line people to other voting locations (you can vote anywhere in Denver! No specific districts at all! You check in with a lady on a computer and then the voting machine is magically set up to allow you to cast votes appropriately). I saw saw two people I knew once upon a time. One girl I went to high school with who is decidedly more of a lesbian than the last time I saw her, and a guy I dated for about 5 minutes. They were those awkward kind of meetings where you haven't seen each other in years and years, but you are really only passing each other briefly in line and are also surrounded by hundreds of strangers who are all bored out of their skulls and dying for someone to start talking about something interesting so they can eavesdrop a little to pass the time. I wonder if I'll see either of them again.

Denver's been like that for me: I keep expecting to run into people I know every time I turn around, which of course doesn't happen that often. So on one hand I'm always surprised when I'm at a large gathering and there isn't a lurking someone I went to camp with, and on the other, I'm always caught off guard when they do show up. You always want to be that better, brighter version of yourself than they remember.

Because I am tired and I still haven't written anything for today, I thought I'd share some old pictures with you instead. Embarrassing for me, entertaining for you: win/win.

The moment this photo was taken has been ingrained in my memory as the moment I realized that on some level, parents don't care what their kids think. Especially if a parent gets it into their head that his kid is pretty cute, but would be WAY cuter, say, inside a trash can. I can distinctly remember the flash of inspiration crossing my dad's face, and my almost instantaneous grasping of the situation and adamant refusal to go along with his plan. I remember a momentary cajoling on my dad's part, a thin argument about how funny it would be if I were in the trash can. I would be like Oscar the Grouch. Again, I wasn't persuaded. But by this point, my dad was no longer listening to me and had decided that it would be much easier to just pick me up and put me in the trash can. Which is what he did. I voiced my protest the best I could:

Of course, it's sorta funny now, in retrospect, but there's still a part of me that remembers not wanting to be in the trash and being overruled. However, in my dad's defense, it wasn't outside my character to crawl into things with my head sticking out.

This last picture has nothing to do with being in any sort of container, unless the 80s count. I don't even think it was Halloween, but my friend had a costume party and I went as...whatever this was. A Cyndi Lauper somethingorother. I got to dye part of my hair pink, which was probably the coolest think I'd been allowed to do up to this point (this was approximately seven years before my mom would give me the silent treatment for dying a little braid underneath my hair blue with Manic Panic, no costume party involved). My friends at the party were also quite impressed, and I won the prize for best costume.

Also, that shirt was my mom's, though I don't remember her wearing it. It's like a wearable version of an Aha video. I can only hope my old clothes age half as awesomely as my parents' did.

After lengthy encouragement by my parents to go see "The Prestige," we finally got around to seeing it this weekend. (Similar praise was offered for "The Illusionist," but the only thing I can think of when I hear about that movie is this post. Also, I will choose Scarlett Johansson over Jessica Biel any day. And then there's the Christian Bale trump card.) I really did love the movie, but I have some questions that need answering. In order to keep this non-spoily, I'm going to take the discussion to the comment section.

I've heard this from almost every person I know who lived in New York, but moved away: you run out of time to read. I had a whole system down: New Yorkers on the subway, books before bed, manuscripts on the weekends. Since I managed to stay in publishing, my weekly reading load hasn't decreased (it has, unbelievably, increased), but my commute time is halved and I'm not sure balancing Talk of the Town between my steering wheel is going to work out so hot for me. I've been reading my magazines before bed, but I lose focus quickly. I pick up good books, but then my magazines pile up. With the upcoming move, I only guess the gap will widen between what I should be reading and what is in my "finished" pile.

I know this shouldn't be a big deal, but I feel like I am failing a little bit! Of course, the great fall television line up and a spattering of clubs isn't helping anything, but still. Here's the thing: I really want to reach my 52 books in 52 weeks goal (please see aforementioned obsession with fulfilling little arbitrary goals set for myself) and we are already at week 45. I'm not doing terrible. I'm caught up to about week 41, but I'm gonna need some good ones towards the end to help me make up those final numbers. You can see from my list below that I am not above counting a short book for credit, but I feel better about it if I'm reading it because it was recommended or if it gives me something to talk about with others. Kiffe Kiffe Tomorrow? Perfect. Kristy and the Cat Burgler? Cheating. A hardbound graphic novel shelved under memoir? Great.

So here's what I'm looking for: books from this year that you loved that I am obviously missing. Or books from previous years that you think I might have missed. The book should either be fairly short or completely engrossing. I don't think there's room left this year for a long novel that, while ultimately fulfilling, is a chore to read. Plus, I've already given three weeks of my life to Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell.

1. Garlic and Sapphires by Ruth Reichl*
2. Secret History by Donna Tart*
3. ADD by Brad Listi
4. Veronica by Mary Gaitskill
5. The Taxonomy of Barnacles by Galt Niederhoffer
6. Weight by by Jeanette Winterson
7. The Penelopiad by Margaret Atwood*
8. Mayflower by Nathaniel Philbrick*
9. A Death in Belmont by Sebastian Junger*
10. Wickett's Remedy by Myla Goldberg*
11. Final Solution by Michael Chabon
12. Don't Get Too Comfortable by Daniel Rakoff
13. Birth of Venus by Sarah Dunant*
14. The Little Lady Agency by Hester Browne
15. Horsemen of the Esophagus by Jason Fagone*
16. Family Tree by Carole Cadwalladr
17. Eat This Book by Ryan Nerz*
18. Bad Twin by Gary Troup*
19. Homeland by Sam Lipsyte
20. Ethan Frome by Edith Wharton
21. The Ponder Heart by Eudora Welty*
22. In Cold Blood by Truman Capote*
23. The Man of My Dreams by Curtis Sittenfeld*
24. Never Let Me Go by Kazuo Ishiguro*
25. The Helmet of Horror by Victor Pelvin
26. Color of Water by James McBride
27. Book of Salt by Monique Troung*
28. Gilead by Marilynne Robinson
29. Saturday by Ian McEwan
30. Pick Me Up by Zoe Rice*
31. A Widow for One Year by John Irving
32. The Hours by Michael Cunningham*
33. Kiffe Kiffe Tomorrow by Faiza Guene*
34. Fun Home by Alison Bechdel*
35. Talk Talk by TC Boyle
36. The Heart is a Lonely Hunter by Carson McCullers*
37. Heaven of Mercury by Brad Watson
38. The Dissident by Nell Freudenberger*
39. Blindness by Jose Saramago*
40. Dream Angus by Alexander McCall*
41. The Glass Castle by Jeannette Walls*
42. Kafka on the Shore by Haruki Murakami (so far: *)

* Recommended!

J picked up one of these at the store:

It's called a horned melon and is from Africa. J called me up at work to tell me that this would surely be an exciting experience. At the store, the sign described it as having a melon/lime/apple/cucumber/banana taste, which I guess was some produce guy's way of covering his ass. With that description, I was picturing something more like jicama, but was greeted with something more like this:

Though the fruit originated in Africa, It tastes like something the Japanese would have invented. A little slimy, a little tart and filled with seeds, my first taste reaction was that I was eating a fancy facial mask. I don't know where banana and apple came from (or really, melon), but the taste is pretty much a very sour, slightly sweet cucumber that's been sitting in a plastic bag in the back of the fridge too long.

I'm also not sure about eating a fruit that looks like it was designed specifically to keep anything from eating it.

Speaking of eating, we ordered Beau Jo's pizza last night. This is some delicious "mountain pie" pizza with thick crust, thick cheese, and a slightly spicy sauce. The restaurant chain is famous for their "challenge," a relatively small (in competitive eating terms) pie that makes up for its size by weighing in at 12-14 pounds. A team of two has an hour to polish it off. We asked the guys at the counter if their store offered it and they got very excited. "Oh yeah! But you gotta be really hungry." I told them I knew some competitive eaters and they positively lit up, "Like REAL competitive eaters?? You tell them that if they come and do it, they'll get $50 bucks each and t-shirts!" Which is pretty cute, don't you think? But then they upped the ante by telling us that no one has beat the challenge in TEN years. Are you eaters out there listening? Because that sounded like a gauntlet being thrown. down.

Skinnyboy, Colorado native and resident competitive eater, tried recently, but didn't make it. I, being who I am, spent the rest of the night thinking about dream teams to complete this challenge. Then, like, a whole competition made up of dream teams.

All's I'm saying is you can stay in our spare bedroom.

Hey! We found an apartment! We are almost not living like high school versions of ourselves anymore! I say "apartment" out of pure New York habit, but the truth is we are moving into a little house. It has a breakfast nook, two bedrooms, a lavender bathroom with a skylight, a basement with an extra room, a backyard and garage, and--people--a washer and dryer. For less than a studio in Park Slope. We don't move in until the 11th, but I am counting the days until I will have all my winter clothes back and can sleep in my own bed again. Of course, when I imagine our cute apartment I imagine with all the furniture that we actually don't have anymore. But I'm sure it will be perfectly homey with a solitary rocking chair and a bookshelf.

Another thing about living the suburban life is that I listen to a lot more radio. I listen almost exclusively while driving to or from work, so it is mostly drivetime shows. And let me tell you, I'm not sure whether it's the fact that I haven't listened to radio in so long that it's grown a forbiddenly tantalizing sheen, or if my tastes have just gone down the drain, but I cannot get enough of my morning shows. I think I was hooked the day I tuned in to find Whoopi Goldberg on with The Wiggles and Amy Sedaris. I mean...WHAT?? I later learned that The Wiggles are not always co-hosts, and most of the time the guests are lesser-known (to me) actors. But my morning self does not care. My morning self thinks Whoopi's thoughts on menopause are humorous, and likes to hear her warn people against spelling her name wrong when they try to get to her website.

Some items I cherished growing up that are still in my room:

A copy of Jonathan Livingston Seagull
A gold necklace adorned with tiny sculpted ceramic roses
An hourglass
My name carved out of wood (6th grade shop class)
A ceramic cat
A green, crushed velvet homecoming dress
Hexagonal mirrored candle holder

Y'all, it is a good thing UrbanHonking has that main site that lists all the blogs as they update, or I'm not sure anyone would come here anymore. I feel like a bad mother who went out for a pack of cigs and came back two weeks later. But, I'm back now, baby! Doncha still love me? I brought you a pinwheel and a stick of beef jerky.

But you see now it is November, so now I will be back and better than before. Because one of the things I like to do is impose meaningless deadlines on myself and then stress out when I'm not meeting them. And even though I am now in a "writing club" (along with a "cooking club," and possibly a "craft club" and "mahjong club." Oh my god do my Denver friends like clubs), I think I might kill myself if I tried to do NaNoWriMo. I think the ideas is especially hard for me after working in publishing for five years, where if you learn one thing it is that just because someone writes several hundred thousand words, a novel it does not necessarily make. You know who submitted a lot of novels? Prisoners. So I've spent a lot of time reading bad writing, which makes me lose faith in writers, and reading a lot of great writing, which makes me realize there are reasons I am on the other side of the desk.

This is all to say that while I am too much of a wimp to commit myself to a month of novel writing, I think I can totally write on this blog every day for a month. And there is a NaBloPoMo set up just for lazy non-writing bums like me! And I don't even want to hear it if it was your New Year's resolution to post on your blog every day and you have been doing it. I know. You = awesome. Me = sucka.