The One Where I Have a French Friday Disaster

Sorry I've been ignoring you. I kind of feel like one of those parents who go on business trips all the time and then bring back lots of little trinkets and sometimes food to make up for the fact that they just Were Not There.

Unfortunately, I do not have anything with which to bribe you and to apologize for the fact that I've been a lax parent blogger, but I can update you on things that have been going on.

I attempted to make my FFwD recipe for my mom's side of the family's Thanksgiving, which is held the Sunday before Real Thanksgiving.

I've had a few recipe disasters in my day, but none like this one.

I had everything ready. My greased casserole dish held sliced potatoes (all sliced with my new-to-me Cuisinart, which, I'm convinced, could chop ANYTHING), fresh-ish herbs, garlic-infused cream, and a couple of other things. It was lovely.

I did what Dorie told me to do, and that is to put a piece of parchment paper on a cookie sheet and put the casserole dish on top of that, just in case anything spilled. If something spilled, you don't want it going into the bottom of your oven.

Indeed.

The thing about parchment paper is, NOTHING sticks to it. When I made my parents a moose cake for their anniversary, and I tried to tape parchment paper to an outline of moose antlers so I could use melted chocolate to fashion the antlers, the tape wouldn't even stick to it.

Keep this in mind.

So I'm in a hurry when I'm putting this thing in the oven. I'm in a hurry because we have to leave in 45 minutes, and this stuff needs to bake for an hour. 15 minutes won't make THAT much of a difference, was my rationale.

For whatever reason, I chose to pick up this parchment paper-lined cookie sheet containing my potato thing with one hand. Now, when you pick up a rectangular pan with one hand, it's going to tilt a little to the other side where you (for whatever reason) have no hand. This happened. What also happened, thanks to the parchment paper, was that as I went to put the thing in the oven, the entire dish slid off the sheet and exploded at the bottom of my oven.

The dish didn't explode (thanks, Pyrex!) but everything in it did. It was a fountain of potato, cheese, and garlic-infused cream. So I cursed, grabbed the glass dish out of the bottom of the oven, turned off the oven and then did what any good chef would do.

I freaked out and cried.

D was in the kitchen when all of this was going on, so when I started freaking out, saying, "What do I do? I DON'T KNOW WHAT TO DO!", he was all, "Just leave. I'll take care of it." I tried for another second to figure out how to fix it, and he was all, "Sarah. Leave."

So I did. I went into the bedroom and cried some more. And then I thought, "I should take pictures of what's going on so I can write about it!" But then I thought that taking pictures while D was fixing my epic, epic error might be considered bad form. So I did not.

Needless to say, this dish did not go to Thanksgiving with us. An apple cake did, though.

This was not the end of the potatoes, though.

D somehow saved a lot of the ingredients in my erstwhile potato dish. They sat in the fridge for a while, and then, the other day, I decided to give it another go.

Rather than carefully infusing the new cream with garlic, I whisked it with onion powder. The recipe said to fill the cream to the edge, and if there wasn't enough, to add milk. I did just that. Then into the oven it went.

This is what happened:

. . .um?

I should note that there were some other potatoes in the dish (it didn't bake as empty as it looks), but I'd taken them out to try them, before discovering the sea of cream in which these things were swimming.

Maybe it's because the potatoes sat in the fridge for a while. Maybe it was the milk. Maybe it was the cream. I don't really know. What I do know is that this dish ended up being an epic fail.

I didn't do the last week of November's FFwD (I forgot, plus we were out of town), but hopefully, I'll catch up soon. I also have other things to write about, but I've been overwhelmed with my new Web site project, I've just kind of shut down, bloggily. I'll get it all figured out one of these days.

And, just so you don't think I'm a total failure, I'll show you my blueberry-cranberry pie I invented:

A little on the sweet side, but D said it was "the best berry pie [he'd] ever had." And he's got Southern grandmas, so I think that's saying something.

If you wonder -- My new blog/Web site venture is going to be baking-centric, so while I'll still be talking about non-baking food here, when the spirit moves me, my baking stuff will be moved to its own site shortly. I'll be sure to post the address for that for those who are interested.

The One Hundredth

It's been like two weeks since I've been here (actively writing, at least) and there's not a lot I can say about it, really, except that I haven't had a lot to talk about that people would want to hear about.

I used to have an "online diary" (they weren't called blogs back in the day) back in high school/college/whatever and it was emo-tastic. If I was fighting with someone, I wrote about it (subtly, passive-aggressively, obvs). If I was being all unrequited about a non-relationship, I wrote about it. If I had a bad day, I wrote about it. It was all there, in black and white (and purple) for the entire world to see.

I just went back, actually, and looked at that old journal. I did want to share this one entry I made. I've changed names (because OBVIOUSLY), but everything else is still the same. It was a letter to my boss at the time:

Dear Boss,

I understand that you're older and sometimes don't get references that other people get. I can understand why, that time you told me I could take a laptop to a press conference and write the story on the way home, you didn't understand why Carrie laughed when you said I could "whip it out" on the way home. I get that. I get why you don't know what "the shocker" is. I get that, too.

But, dear Boss, the expression is "chewed out." If you do something wrong, someone might "chew you out" for it.

That is why I would recommend never, ever repeating what you said to me today, which is that, because of the High School Letter Incident, that you would be "eaten out by the school system superintendent guy."

I'm just sayin'.

Love,
Sarah

OK, THAT was funny. I remember that, too.

But the entry immediately following that was about how going out to dinner with two couples sucked. (I was, clearly, single at the time.) And then there was a survey. And then there was a direction to my newest blog (the one before this one), because I was trying to get away from the desperately depressing downer of an "online diary" I was keeping.

I KNOW that you don't want to hear about it, and the reason I don't recount everything negative that happens is because, one, I don't want everyone knowing. I think that's simple enough. There are a lot of wonderful people that come and read, and I love you all for it. But there are also people who are just trying to keep tabs on me, to know things about me, so they can, potentially, use it against me in the future. (You guys? If you want to stay more hidden, use a computer with a different IP address. Just FYI.)

I also know that when there are blogs that are all doom and gloom, you lose interest. Personally, I've lost a total of 3 readers along the way, and that always happens after I write something about bad things going on. So I pretty much know my audience.

But on this, my 100th posting, I just wanted to say that I'm still here. I'm still here and I'm trying to get back on track. I love my job, and I have a birthday coming up, and we'll just see how it goes.

Cheers. Here's to 100 more.

The One Where Christmas is in May

Happy Tuesday everyone. I've spent the last little while feeding my Google Reader obsession (I'm up to somewhere between 90 and 95 blogs I follow now. . .) and now it's time for a Christmas Update.

. . . . . . .

What?

"But Sarah!" you say. "It's May!"

True. My family, for whatever reason, doesn't do Christmas ON Christmas anymore. (We don't do Thanksgiving on Thanksgiving either.) We were going to have it in January, but then my cousin (the one I mentioned was in the car wreck?) wouldn't have been able to make it. So the whole family, plus a couple of cousins from Massachusettes, got together at my uncle's house for barbecue and Yankee Swap.

(I didn't take any of the following pictures, FYI, except for the one of the dessert. They were either taken by my uncle, my aunt, or my SDad. Or possibly Mom, I'm not sure.)

Here's John, my little cousin who was in the car accident. He's doing a LOT better, even though he's not able to really communicate that well, or move around on his own. That sounds really bad, but trust me. MUCH better than before.My brother and sister looking. . .angry? Gangsta? I'm not sure about this one.Then there's my mother and HER siblings behaving. . .as siblings do.

And, of course, the dessert. (Crappy quality thanks to it being a camera phone photo.This is a chocolate peanut butter trifle involving chocolate cake (it was supposed to be brownies, but I didn't have the time to make them), vanilla pudding, peanut butter, and Reeses Cups. Yum. I also made deviled eggs, but didn't take a picture. (And, by the way, my sister, who's 18, said they were "Legit, the best deviled eggs she'd ever had." This is the second time she's said I made the best (whatever) she's ever had, and I take that as high, HIGH praise coming from a teenager.

Yankee Swap went. . .better than expected. I actually HATE the whole concept of YS. For the uninitiated, Yankee Swap means everyone who's playing brings a present, and they're put in a pile. Then everyone draws numbers. The first person picks a present and opens it. The second person can either open a new present or steal the present from the first person. And so on and so forth.

Makes me crazy. My OCD way of things needing to be a certain way doesn't jive with this, because if something is mine, if it's given to me, then it's MINE. This isn't to say I'm selfish. . .it's not that I want everything. It's that if something's mine, it belongs to me. I'll share it, but it goes home with me.

So, needless to say, it's a very, very frustrating game for me. I'll play it, but it's frustrating. I ended up with this really, really ugly chicken (I'll have to put a picture of this thing up. It's UGLY. And a leopard-print Snuggie.

Excellent.

D got this foam thing to put on the wall that says (I think) BAM! It's like the sound effects drawn in old comic books? It's kind of awesome. (That does not mean, however, that when he started to put it on the wall right beside the front door, I didn't go, "Um, how about over here?" and put it on the wall beside the bathroom around the corner. It's cute and kitschy and I like it, but not in the main foyer of my living area.

So that was Christmas. Sounds like we'll be doing it in May from here on out.

The One Where I Lose (Another) Temp Job Randomly

I always feel the compulsion to start out entries with "I know it's been (x-amount of days) since I've written, blah blah blah." I don't know why. Do I need to apologize for my intrinsic laziness?

Maybe.

So, since last time I was here, I lost my temp job, worked briefly at another temp job, and got in the running for a nanny job.

I'm aware of how much I hated the job I was doing before, but when, on a Tuesday after work, my staffing agency woman called me and was like, "They don't need you anymore," I may or may not have hit the floor. The next day (at least, the next day's day) was the 1-year anniversary of losing my newspaper job, a story that, if you don't know it, I'll be more than happy to relay, but that I don't think needs to be gotten into here. (I say the day's day, because I actually left on a Wednesday, but the date was the 4th, which was a Thursday this year.)

The thing I don't understand is why, if I want to leave a temp assignment, I'm required to give them a week's notice, but if they don't need me anymore (read: are too cheap to pay me anymore) they can literally have the agency call me on a Tuesday night and tell me not to report in Wednesday morning. I had STUFF there, you know? I had a flower, and a calendar, and a thank you card D's kid drew me. And, to add insult to injury, when I got the picture back, there was water spilled on it, presumably from the little martini mix bottle I'd had the flower in. How hard is it, really, to think to dump water out? I'm just saying. Pissed me off.

So I worked for 3 days at another place where I've worked before and LOVE, and they want me back to work like 4 days next month, if I don't already have another job by then. It's kind of a catch-22 there, because I would LOVE to go back and work there, but it's not until mid-March that they'd need me, and I'd like to have a job. . .at some point. But the nannying thing might work out, I don't know. But then I'd have to be like, um, I know I just started at the beginning of March, but I need these days off, kthx.

Still have no Internet at home, which is annoying. SO. ANNOYING. I currently have 285 unread items on my Google Reader, and I have all ideas I'm not going to get through them this evening, because I don't feel like sitting in this Barnes and Noble that long. I no longer have the patience to sit in B&N for long periods of time, because I've had to do it so much recently, for use of the Internet. But you know? At-home Internet is expensive. And I'm unemployed. So there you go.

It appears most of the city is doing Valentine's Day early, I guess because it's on a Sunday. When D and I were downtown today, even though it had snowed overnight, and was freezing, there were a lot of women running around in skirts and strappy heels. I'm guessing that's due to the VD festivities. If you're wondering, yes, I still hate the "holiday" and no, being in a relationship for this year's event has not changed my mind in the least.

But you know what IS exciting? Girl Scout cookies. I saw a troop of them set up outside of a Harris Teeter earlier today, and got way more excited than I should have. I'm going to have to buy a few boxes of (ridiculously expensive) Samoas and Tagalongs to put in the freezer. As I explained to D earlier today, my putting the cookies in the freezer has nothing to do with trying to make them keep longer and everything to do with the 'out of sight, out of mind' theory. If I'm not looking at them, I'll eventually forget they're there, and so when I open the freezer, it's like, "Oh my God, COOKIES!" And then I'll eat a few, put them back in the freezer, and begin the whole process over again. Lather, rinse, repeat, eat some freaking cookies.

I'm certain there's more that I should update people on, but I'm about blogged out. On to dodging people trying to find parking spots at restaurants.

(For those wondering, I'd no sooner started to write a thing, making fun of people and their VD activities, and D hands me a super-sweet card, the inside of which said "Happy Heart Day" and underneath it, he'd written, "(I know you're not into Valentine's Day.)" Aw.