That Parasol is Too Small

This week I introduced Drewbles to the following mini series:
It's in the same line of "historical reality" shows as The 1900s House and The Edwardian Country House. I haven't seen those so I can't tell you how this one compares, but essentially, it's five single men and five single women put in this house for two months. The ladies all have chaperones to keep things proper, and everyone has a different history (inspired by their real life), social status and role. For instance, one lady is a countess but is secretly impoverished, one man is a naval officer and one lady is rich but has no title. The chaperones are all trying to get their girls the best matches, but of course everyone is constrained by the rules of the day.

I first saw this in Ye Olde Bloomington with Marcue and Ann, and lately I decided Drew should see it too. His comment after finishing the first episode was "This is so interesting and strange." If that's not a ringing endorsement, I don't know what is! But seriously, not only is it entertaining to watch modern people bumble their way through two months in the Regency period, but it's also super informative. If you have any interest in Jane Austen at all, it is definitely worth watching to learn more about the time period. Not only is there class, courtship and propriety, but there is also chamber pots, hermits and egg whites! Plus, if you have ever wondered how lady folk dealt with Aunt Irma, this has the answer. It will give you a new appreciation for modern *ahem* lady products.

To sum up: Watch it! It's only two discs and it will show you a whole new side of the Regency world.

In Which Our Hearts are Warmed by Tiny Furry Creatures

Happy Valentine's Day, world! I'm going to celebrate by wearing more red than usual, working, eating sushi and watching the traditional Disney movie. Later this week I will continue to celebrate by making these. Or maybe these. Or possibly both.

This year my Valentine's Day gift to the world is some pictures (none of which I took, alas, but you can find their source by clicking on them, if you so desire). I'm not sharing just ANY pictures though--I'm sharing KITTY PICTURES. Don't try to fight their cuteness.

Happy Valentine's Day!

In Which I Have No Tennis Ball

And now for the final act...the Tennis Ball's last stand.

But first I have two things to say. 1) No one need feel bad for not knowing about any part of this saga. We kept it under our hats. 2) Thanks for the well wishes! They were much appreciated.

Back to the Tennis Ball.

Tuesday dawned very early so that we could be to the hospital at 6 AM. We waited for a bit then I was sent off to get my blood drawn. Let me state for the record that I had my blood taken a number of times in January and never had a single problem. Sometimes I even watched the needle go in just to be tough. This time I got all hot and dizzy by the third vial and had to crumple up in the chair so I wouldn't pass out. After I dry heaved a little I felt all better.

The rest of the morning was much less eventful. In fact, I will break it down into the events that transpired, chronologically:

1) Nurse Jose walked in on my half-dressed self.
2) I put on Hospital Socks so my freshly painted red toenails went unappreciated.
3) I camped out in the pre-surgery area for a long time.
4) Nurse Jake made two attempts to get my IV in.
5) They took my glasses.

I mention my glasses because it meant that I never actually SAW the tiny robot hands in the room. I didn't see much at all except for blurry, blue-ish people wandering around a blurry room. Once I was on the table Nurse Jake told me to take some "yoga breaths" into the mask and I'm pretty sure I was out mid-courtesy laugh.

Can I just say how disorienting it is to wake up in a different place, in a different position with no memory of how you got there and without a brain capable of understanding anything? Well, it is. I have no idea how long I was in the recovery room, but at some point the nurse asked if I wanted to go see my husband and I said "Yeeeahhhhhhhh."

Off I went back to my room, falling asleep along the way. I am delighted to say that I had the mental capacity to follow through with my one goal for the day, and that was to make my first words to Drew be "What happened about me?" I DID IT.

And now for the medical information portion of this story. I actually never saw the doctor after the surgery, but he gave Drew the scoop whilst I was busy being passed out. Drew even got to see pictures of the Tennis Ball! I'm so jealous. I'm hoping I get to see them at the follow up appointment. It seems unfair that so many people have seen my innards and yet I am not one of those people.

Oh, back to the medical stuff. Essentially, they made three smallish incisions and the Tennis Ball was taken out without a hitch. They also found a bit of endometriosis on one ovary (why does it feel so TMI to write the word "ovary"?) and snipped that off as well. Who knew, right? It's strange to think that so many things can be going on in your body without your knowledge. Thank goodness for tiny robot hands. Oh, and those doctors.

I spent most of the afternoon doing this:
I also spent some time lying on the bathroom floor because I thought I would pass out in there. There is no picture of that.

But here are some pictures of the prizes I got:

The sponsors of "How to Survive Wednesday"

At long, long, long last! And not a trace of...whatever that new one is called (that's a legitimate brain freeze)

I wish I had got a picture of these at the hospital when they were in better spirits. Hydrangeas are so lovely and so fickle.

Flowers from work. Thanks, work!

And thus the end of the saga. I have since named my snip snapped abdomen Tummy Tummisimo, and it appears to be healing up fine. It seemed weird to post a picture of the snip snaps, but if you would like to see how it all looks, I will happily email it. Who WOULDN'T want to see my stomach, right!?!?

In Which I Send the Tennis Ball Off in Style

I mean, it's the least I could do after...hmm...well, never mind that. Anyway, here's how the ol' Tennis Ball and I are spending the night:

Stopping at the library to stock up on reading material
Eating a lot of delicious Indian food
(In case you're wondering--we had Chicken Tikka Masala, Lamb with mushrooms, garlic naan, regular naan and cucumber Raita...so good)

Watching some Daria
Playing some Harry Potter
Having this fellow wait on my every whim (you're doing great at it, fellow!)
I hope you've enjoyed your night, Tennis Ball, because you aren't getting Indian food and snuggles where you're going.

In Which I Expound on a Tennis Ball

Disclaimer: Hopefully this blog post does not sound blithe. I'm not blithe about it per se, but I prefer to write about it with a certain degree of blitheness. It's a skill I learned from Gilbert Blythe. Oops, there's that blitheness.

Once upon a time, at the start of 2012, I was with child, but spoiler: I'm not anymore. I'm not saying that to get pity or whatever (though of course I won't turn down pity)--it was very early and it's just one of those things that happens. But it does play a pivotal role in the rest of the story so there it is.

So back in the early days of 2012 (ie, January 3), I was at home with Drewbles. I'd started bleeding the day before and it was getting worse the next day so we decided to get a professional opinion on the situation. We tried one place, then another and were finally sent to the ER, which makes this story sound much more urgent that it really was. It's much more dull when you know that insurance coverage and a lack of certain equipment was the blame.

And so began my first foray into the ER. It mostly consisted of Drew and me sitting there talking about how we had been sitting there forever. But in the process of our stay, which lasted several hours, they did a *ahem* quite invasive ultrasound and the doctor casually announced there was "a mass." After which he proceeded to leave and never return. Thanks, doctor!

The doctor arranged to send us to a nearby women's clinic two days later so they could pilfer some more of my blood. He also set up an appointment with another doctor, who turned out to be totally MIA the day of the appointment. Thanks, doctor!

Luckily one of the nurses came to talk to us and actually was interested in the mass! Thanks, nurse! So what was that mass? A uterine fibroid. (Fibroid=a benign growth) Can you guess how big it is? Yep, it's the size of a tennis ball. Just a fleshy mass the size of a tennis ball all up in my bidness.

By the by, I don't recommend doing a google search for pictures of fibroids.

It was another few days before we could meet with a third doctor, who actually exists AND was very helpful. He confirmed the miscarriage and we talked a long time about this fibroid. Since they're benign, doctors often will just leave them if they aren't causing any symptoms. But given the size of mine and the possibility that it is squishing my baby-making vitals, the doctor said it would be best to take it out. He also said there's a chance it could be an ovarian cyst, which means I could wind up one short in that department. BUT we'll be optimistic and stick with the fibroid theory. So this is what is going to happen this Tuesday:

Just imagine that penny is a tennis ball. Okay, so maybe that isn't *exactly* how the surgery will go. Actually the best part about this whole thing (besides having the tennis ball removed, I suppose) is what will actually be doing all the work:
Tiny robot hands! That may not be the official term but you get the idea. Here is how it actually all works:
The doctor sits yonder and controls the robot hands while utilizing a tiny robot camera to see the insides. In the past they removed fibroids via c-section so let's give medical science a big hurray.

So instead of having a baby AND a tennis ball, we now just have the tennis ball. Hopefully sometime we will have the one and not the other, but at any rate, come Tuesday the tennis ball will be history.

In Which I am Successful

Remember the magnets I made to improve my running motivation? Well, they were not *entirely* successful, but I did keep using them. It was encouraging to see a board with at least a few magnets on it, but my motivation for running was just MIA until last fall or so. Even so, it has been a good long time since my board looked like this:
5 days of running, 3 times with Pilates and one 5K! I'm hoping this will make up for not doing a lick of anything next week, and I'm also hoping this same motivation will stick around until the week after. It's so much easier to sit at a desk all day when I've been running beforehand.

And just because you asked, here are pictures from the 5K this morning. Drew's Pop came along too and both menfolk placed first in their age group. Drew also won a frisbee of all things. I got um...well, anyway, it was great and fun and very cold.

(Check out those guns!)

(It was so bright I thought my eyeballs would burn up.)
Oh, did I mention that there was a frozen yogurt walking around?

Dilemmas

Tonight we're supposed to have this white bean soup for dinner (pureed white beans and I get along). It's healthy, it's good for me and it requires using my immersion blender, which is always a treat. The trouble is that I keep thinking about something we had for dinner last week...
Look at them sitting there so innocently, stuffed with cheese and eggs and bacon. True, it would require a stop at the store while the poor white beans go neglected and unloved. But do I really care about beans in the face of this possibility?
No. The answer is no. Those beans never had a chance.

In Which I Compile Another List of Recipes (aka, Beans)

I've been thinking a lot about tennis balls lately. I know that sounds ambiguous at best and random and stupid at worst, but it's still true. One of these days I will explain my tennis ball thoughts, but for now I will talk about food. Food > tennis balls.

On a side note, is anyone else still frustrated with extra holiday poundage? Harumph. Though I have to say, all that fudge was worth it...at the time...and now...

First, I have made chili. Not once but twice! In the same week! This is impressive because I have never been a big chili fan, mostly because I am not a big bean fan. Black beans and I are great friends. White beans and I are acquaintances. All the other beans and I are frenemies--I'll eat them when I must and make barfy noises the rest of the time. Black beans are the sole reason why I liked these two chilis:

Slow Cooker Chipotle Chicken & Black Bean Chili
I am a fan of anything in a crock pot. If I could make everything in a crock pot, I would. Anyway, this was super tasty. I'm not really sure exactly what the chipotle taste is, but it was good. And hot. Side note: if anyone knows what else to do with chipotle peppers in adobo sauce let me know...

Healthy Spicy Beef and Black Bean Chili
Super fast, super easy and tasty. I think if you spent a little more time on it it could be better and more interesting, spice-wise. But sometimes fast wins out over interesting.

Crock pot Mango Enchiladas
I combined these two recipes, and they were so very delicious. I don't know when exactly I became such an enchiladas fiend, but they're so good. They have quickly climbed up my list of favorite foods.

Bloomin' Onion Bread
My advice is to make this today. Maybe even right now. Then proceed to devour the whole thing in one sitting. Okay, don't do that, but that's what you'll WANT to do, despite knowing how much butter is in it. But I cannot say enough that you should make it RIGHT NOW.

Crockpot Cheddar Beer Chicken Tacos
Okay so ours were minus the beer. Still good! Yep, that's pretty much all I have to say about this.

Tomato sauce with Onion and Butter
We had this just last night and today I keep thinking about how good it was. I was skeptical--I mean, three ingredients? How could that really be so great? No, let me tell you--it was really, really good. It might have converted me from ever using bottled sauce again. It takes a little while, but for how much effort you actually have to put in it's totally worth it.

Buffalo Chicken Dip
Yeah, it really doesn't look like much, but you'll want to keep eating it anyway! I almost halved the buffalo wings sauce so that it wasn't too hot.

Chicken Taco Soup
More black beans! I should start my own black bean farm. This was another victory for the slow cooker (I didn't sautee my onions before hand), but since we had it the same night as the Bloomin' Onion Bread it got a little overshadowed.

Well, now you know what we've been eating lately. You can sleep well at last.

PS: No, I didn't get any of these from Pinterest.

PS: Bonus recipe for fudge (I left out the nuts because they just don't belong in my food).

In Which I Offer a Link

...to our art blog! I can't even remember if I ever mentioned our art blog on here, but it's been humming along (more or less) for a good while now. Tonight I finally added a link to my sidebar and here is another one, just in case anyone has been missing out on it all this time.

That's all.

A Puzzle

Well, I guess it's 2012 now. How weird. That deserves its own post, I suppose, but for now, here is something unrelated to New Years. For Christmas, Drewbles got this cool puzzle of the Disneyland map (1000 pieces) and we spent a couple of nights putting it together this week. Look how grand it is in completion:

(That's the last bits of my Captain Rex helmet marshmallow lollipop)

Now I will illustrate the difficulties of it. For one thing, the pieces are quite little and for another thing, there is a LOT of detail on there. I'm pretty sure that the only things not labeled were smoking areas and bathrooms. The only downside was noooo Captain EO.
And of course the picture on the box wasn't big enough to be terribly helpful.
Even so, what fun is a puzzle without a challenge? We will surely put this one together again and again.

Christmas Postscript

Just because.

XD

I still can't believe this is actually happening in my life. It looks so great I won't even fuss about how good looking some of the dwarves are, hah.

Something for the Archives

Just in the interest of housekeeping...

• The Shadow of Your Smile, C
• Turn of the Screw, B
• The Thirteenth Tale, B
• Jude the Obscure, B+
• The Beatrice Letters, B
• Lemony Snicket, A-
• The End, A-
• The Penultimate Peril, A
• The Grim Grotto, A-
• Beastly, C
• The Slippery Slope, B+
• The Carnivorous Carnival, A
• The Hostile Hospital, B+
• The Vile Village, B+
• The Ersatz Elevator, A
• Sisterhood Everlasting, C+
• The Austere Academy, A
• The Miserable Mill, B+
• The Wide Window, A-
• The Reptile Room, A
• The Bad Beginning, A-
• Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, A
• The High King, A-
• Taran Wanderer, B+
• The Castle of Llyr, B+
• The Black Cauldron, A
• The Book of Three, A-
• Entwined, A-
• The Invisible Man, B
• The Island of Dr. Moreau, A
• White Fang, B+
• Crocodile on the Sandbank, B-
• Cold Comfort Farm, A-
• Clockwork Three, B
• The Return of the King, A
• The Two Towers, A
• Fellowship of the Ring, A+
• Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell, A
• Mockingjay, B+
• The Princess Bride, B+
• The Silmarillion, A+
• The Phantom of the Opera, B
• The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, C+
• Violet Eyes, C+
• Alice in Wonderland, B+
• The Dark Divine, C-
• The Wonderful Story of Henry Sugar and Six More, B+
• Neverwhere, B+
• James and the Giant Peach, B+
• The Witches, A
• The Incredible Journey, A-
• The Luxe: B
• Julie & Julia: C+
• The Girl Who Could Fly: C+
• Just Take My Heart, C+
• Peace Like a River, A
• Three Willows, B
• The Prestige, A
• The Return of the King, A+
• The Two Towers, A
• The Fellowship of the Ring, A+
• The Hobbit, A-
• The Children of Hurin, A+
• Brave New World, A
• Catching Fire, B+
• The Hunger Games, A-
• The Graveyard Book, A+
• Camille, B+
• Confessions of a Shopaholic, C+
• Everyone Worth Knowing, B+
• On the Street Where You Live, B+
• I'll Be Seeing You, B+
• The Devil Wears Prada, B+
• Everyone Else's Girl, C-
• Starring Sally J. Freedman as Herself, B-
• We Have Always Lived in the Castle, A-
• Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, A-
• A Great and Terrible Beauty, B
• The Talented Mr. Ripley, A-
• Persuasion, A+
• Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince, A-
• The Wrath of Mulgarath, B
• Coraline, A
• The Ironwood Tree, B-
• Lucinda's Secret, B
• The Seeing Stone, B
• The Miraculous Journey of Edward Tulane, A+
• Return of the Native, A-
• Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix: A-
• Forever in Blue, B-
• Girls in Pants, B+
• At Home in Mitford, Karon: B
• The Dollmage, Leavitt: C
• Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire: A-
• Far From the Madding Crowd: A-

A minor aside...

Do you remember that episode of the Office called "Drug Testing" (season 2)? In it, Michael Scott says "I hate drugs, I hate them." Okay, so that's a really short thing to remember, but I've seen that episode like 15 times. ANYway, I feel that way about computer viruses. I just hate them.

To back up, last night little Quinn got attacked by some kind of stupid virus thing. It completely confunded avast!, slowed things down and kept my Internet from working, even after a boot scan took care of a few files. I wound up doing a system restore and so far that seems to have fixed the problem. But it is so so so annoying to me that instead of working on the things I planned to do last night I had to instead do a bunch of scans and restarts and fussing, all because some girl with a lip ring (see the aforementioned episode) made this stupid virus.

Anyway. This vexes me, but in the interest of ending on a positive note, here's a gif.

I'm not sure why this is so funny...

...but it is! *snort*

T-Gives is for Arts

Because it's Thanksgiving, I will now list a few things I am thankful for, in no particular order except for the order they are in:

• Mylo Xyloto
• This cake (which is currently in the oven)
  
• Drewbles
• Days off

I'm also grateful for the time to do arts. There's been a lot less time this year than in years past, but I'm happy to have the time I get. Okay, maybe sometimes I complain about not having more time, but at this moment I am having a better sense of perspective. I cannot do all things! ANYway, the other night I colored up a little something that Drewbles drew for me. The story behind this picture is best told in an excerpt from one of my e-mails to D-Rew:

"People think it’s hip to be heartless! But only I am ACTually hiply heartless. That’s like my Voldemort line, instead of “Only I can live forever” I say “Only I can be hiply heartless.” And then I’ll say “Nyyyyaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa!” and hold my wand all funny. Probably in my case a wooden spoon would be more appropriate."

With that introduction, here is my Blogger profile picture:

Now back the cake. Happy Thanksgiving back!

Fall is for Food

This fall I have been trying all kinds of different pumpkiny foods. Pumpkin is one of my very favorite things and while I am always happy with just a plain pumpkin pie, this year I have been branching out.

Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Cookie Pie
I made this twice. Not necessarily because I loved it that much, but because the pie crust came in a pair. It was good, but it was much more chocolatey than pumpkiny. That would be great if I wanted a chocolate pie, but I really wanted pumpkin pie. I also had to cook it quite a bit longer to avoid a totally goopy middle.

Colonial Pumpkin Bars
I actually made these last year, but even now we talk about how good they are. I think that's all I need to say.

Pumpkin Lasagna
I liked using pumpkin in a main dish, and this was good. But, like the chocolate pie, this wasn't quite pumpkiny enough for me. Maybe that's from using a little more ricotta than the recipe called for, I don't know. Overall it reminded me very much of butternut squash.

Pumpkin Pancakes with Apple Cider Syrup
Once again, I would have been happy with a stronger pumpkin flavor (I just REALLY like pumpkin), but that said, these were still super delicious pancakes. And the syrup? It's better than the pancakes, which is saying something. Really, you gots to try the syrup. The recipe made a lot of both--I would probably halve it for just the two of us. I should say I will halve it because we'll definitely be eating these again.

Whole Pumpkin Pie Soup
This year I wanted to do something different from our usual dinner in a pumpkin and this was a great alternative. I made this kind of last minute and wound up using one of the pumpkins we had outside the door and it worked just fine. And by "fine" I mean "deliciously."

Caramel Apple Cider Cookies
Okay, they're not pumpkiny but cider is equally seasonal and I love it. Also, I LOVE these cookies. I haven't stopped thinking about them since I made them last night. Just writing this is making me want to go over and get another one. Nom nom nom.

Roasted Tomato Soup
Okay, this isn't pumpkiny either but soup is seasonal, right? Tomatoes are one of my very favorite foods so it's no surprise I would like this soup, but I really really really like this soup. I wound up not baking it with the "lids", and instead just broiled some cheese on crusty bread and put it in the soup after. Still tasty and a little faster.

Pumpkin Whoopee!
This recipe gets an ! because it's my favorite of the pumpkin goodies. I got this recipe from one of my sisters-in-law, who got it from one of her sisters, I believe. Drewbles and I struggle to not eat the pan all at once. It's SO good, even with its silly name. Make it! To make it is to love it.
1 can pumpkin puree
2 t. cinnamon
1/2 t. salt
3 eggs
1/2 t. ginger
1 can evaporated milk (12 oz.)
1 c. brown sugar
1/4 t. nutmeg

white or yellow cake mix
1/2 c. butter, melted

Mix all ingredients except cake mix and butter, and pour into greased 9 x 13 pan. Sprinkle cake mix on top, then drizzle with melted butter. Bake at 350 for 50 minutes.

The Days of Yore

I started this blog in the summer of 2004, can you believe it? That's got to be some kind of record. Okay, maybe not, but it has been around for a while now. In all those years I changed the design once--from light dots to dark dots. And I'm pretty sure I changed it back to light dots within a month. When I started this blog there weren't many design options to choose from, and I just always liked those dots. Once the blog template business started booming I thought I might change it but the scrapbook look has never been my thing. Plus I just like those dots.

Well. Lately I have been thinking that maybe it was time to move on from the dots at long last. But I wasn't sure what to change it to. I'm still not into the scrapbook thing and my own ideas were rather uninspired. UNTIL. Last Saturday morning as I was running down Center Street it came to me. "Brilliant!" I said to myself. "Don't forget it." (I always make a point of telling myself not to forget my brilliant plans) I have had many great ideas in my time that I never followed through on, but this one I did. And it looks just how I want and I did it all myself!

So, the point of all this is that the dots are finally gone. I probably should have taken a screenshot of the old look since I don't think that template is even available anymore. Anyway, check it out the new look and praise my cleverness if you feel so inclined.

An Ode

I've been on a Cheezits kick lately. The white cheddar kind is my favorite, but lately I have been scarfing down the new Baby Swiss variety. Basically I will eat any kind of Cheezit you put in front of me. This is not too surprising since I would happily eat cheese at any and every opportunity, but yesterday my enthusiasm produced a haiku. I sent it to Drewbles, but I think I would be remiss in not sharing it with the whole world (because the whole word reads my blog, yes?). Here it is:

Little bits of cheese
Baked into crackers for me
I’ll eat you all up

Also, in the process of finding an image of a Cheezit box which I never used, I found this picture. I feel a certain kinship with this wee fellow:

One Two Three

I have been thinking about this song lately.



Not like "Here are my deep thoughts on this song, let me show you them" kind of thinking. My thoughts are more along the lines of "That's a great song. I should listen it a lot." And to paraphrase the daddio in Princess & the Frog, a song that good just gotta be shared. Not that I want to replace Bono with Michael Stipe or anything.

Side note: why is U2 not as good as this anymore?