20

Well this is an obligatory post to make my 20th post. This weekend I'll be interviewing to be a youth group leader at a local church. It should be fun. I like working with kids, but middle school aged kids will be a challenge. I'm also going to be grilling with Kristin tonight and I'm bringing bratwurst! I love bratwurst, especially the ISU MEATS lab kind!!!!

home buying

Well let me tell you, it's complicated enough without trying to haggle with people and pretending you're not interested when you really are very interested. I really wish I knew how to do this, but I don't so I am just trying my best.

Long story short, a person was selling a home and the lot next to the home. I just wanted the lot, but the person is retiring and moving to Florida, so they really wanted to sell the home. The Realtor tells me that they'd throw in the lot if I bought the house for just over list price. This would've been an amazing deal. At first I thought I couldn't afford it because I'd have to sell the house right away. So I made an offer on just the lot. And then I changed my mind and said I wanted to buy the house and have the seller throw in the lot too. But since the offer on the lot was a certain amount, the seller had become sure that they could sell the house alone for more than I could afford to pay for the lot at the price I offered plus the house price. So to clarify, because the seller knew I wanted the lot, the seller got greedy and decided to say that they won't sell for anything but $40,000 more than their original verbal offer. So I backed out completely. I felt cheated, but I think I did the right thing. If they are desperate enough, they'll come back!

update!

My weekend was pretty boring, but I did get to see Superbad on Friday. So that was nice! It's a pretty funny movie and it may make some geeks in high school have high hopes of getting a hot girlfriend, but I don't think 2/3 of the guys in that movie would even have a chance with any of those girls in real-life high school. People are too concerned with image at that point to date people that aren't in their crowd.

I cleaned my apartment on Saturday. The Pine Sol smell is finally going away. I always feel good when I mop the floor because I imagine the disinfectant killing all the bacteria and the wet mop getting all of that dust. But don't worry, I'm not some sort of weird neat freak. I've only mopped twice since December '05.

I hung out with Kristin on Sunday and I had a Cold Stone Creamery cake batter milkshake with real yellow cake pieces. We also cooked steak and it was delicious. It had a Kirkland steak rub on it and it was cooked almost a perfect medium. I got lucky on that one!

Crazy stuff is happening this week and I'll write about it if anything really happens!

asi es la vida

I now have 3 SIM cards, 2 for work and one personal. My new work SIM has 3G internet enabled and I did a bandwidth test yesterday and got 700kbit/second download speeds. I am very excited about that because now when my regular internet dies, it won't even phase me. I'll just hook my phone up via Bluetooh or USB (for faster downloads). It works like a charm too.

The last intern left today, she gave me 5 cookies. I ate all of them. I wish everybody would suck up to me like that... I also stole her badge clip because mine was almost broken. I almost feel like I just robbed the grave of somebody because she just left and all and I'm already picking over her things. I didn't talk to the interns that much, but today I was reminded again about how much of my life has passed and how much I miss college life. If I could take their place I would. What's the rush in life?

I made an offer on a lot to build a house on today. My Realtor expects that they'll give me a counter-offer because mine was low. We'll see. I hope they just need money badly so they'll accept anything. The lot has been on the market for awhile and they are also selling their house, so I think that I'm in a good position. We'll see, we'll see. Nevertheless I'm taking my first step (again) towards building a house and I hope this time it'll all work out!

Weekend Update

I had a very good weekend starting on Wednesday because that was my Friday! Kristin and I baked molasses and peanut butter cookies. Of course, I ate a bunch. Thursday Kristin and I headed to Iowa at about 10AM. We had made delicious sandwiches to bring along the night before so I had forgotten them. I kicked myself for that because I was really looking forward to it! In the evening we met up with my whole family and we went to a Casting Crowns and Tree 63 concert that my dad had bought tickets for. That was my first Christian concert. It was alright and I was glad we weren't sitting close to the speakers. They had a scary looking drummer who they "let loose" do do a solo and it reminded me of a Tool concert.

On Friday Kristin and I headed up to Ames to see my campus and eat all the food that I missed. I ate the West Street Deli sandwich that I missed ever so much. After that I had Pizza Pit wings and cheese bread. It was all so delicious. I also picked up some ISU MEATS lab bratwurst and ate some of that for dinner. I was in heaven that day.

On Saturday the whole family went to see the covered bridges in Madison county. We also ran into John Wayne's childhood home while on the way. After we were all done we saw a sign for "Grandpa's Workshop" so we decided to check it out. Some grandpa opened up a shop in the middle of nowhere and sold lots of wood items. The cutest little kid was there too. She seemed like she was out of a storybook because she was so adorable. We got some free knickknacks and then headed home. I felt bad for not buying anything, but there wasn't anything I wanted! For dinner, we had a massive dinner that consisted of bacon wrapped fillet mignon, grilled potatoes, broccoli, and corn along with green beans and brown rice. Needless to say, I also over ate on Saturday. The whole weekend we played a lot of games of Apples to Apples and the whole family ate it up. I was happy about it and Kristin was also a big hit with the family.

Sunday was a travel day but we still managed to go to Target, eat at Tacos Mariana's, watch half a movie, and go to the church where my dad's church was visiting and eat their food. I over ate that day too! weird. It was all fun though. I had a great trip!

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Crazy dream

I had a dream that I wasn't able to finish, but it still made me wonder what made me think this up while I was sleeping. It was my birthday party and my family had invited like everybody I ever knew to it. And they lived in this gigantic house with a parking garage with four or five levels and a club house that was so big I had to run across to get from side to side. Anyway, I get there by train and for some reason there is this girl Ellyn there in the same car. Back in the day I had tried to date her but somehow she just ended up not calling me back, and I didn't call her back ever. She was on the train with my sister because apparently my sister needed her help or something. So I was trying to be nice and talk to her and I was trying to be nice by asking where she worked. She was like "nowhere... nothing" and she looked away, so because I was such a smooth guy in the dream, we got off the train and I kept talking to her and she admited that she worked at a plant nursery, but I was expecting that she'd work in a law office or something. I was shocked but I thought it was cool and I told her that my mom loved plants and that they should talk. At that point Ellyn disappeared from my dream.

Then came in Brian Brecha (not my best friend Brian) And he starts talking to me and people swarm around him and somehow this makes me feel cool. I'm saying hi to everybody I used to know in high school. I roam the area and find different pockets of people, and everybody was there even people I didn't like. Phil, the jerk who hated me in middle school who ended up flunking out or something senior year was also there. It was crazy! I ignored him. I then remember seeing a guy "Andrew" who was somebody that my family knew but I didn't and there was an even bigger crowd around him. I didn't want to compete so I took my crowd outside. Then I wanted to find Kristin because I felt bad that I hadn't seen her. So we all went to the parking garage and looked around and then went back into the house to find her. And that's when I woke up. hmmm.

During the dream i remember seeing a lot of faces of people from high school, but I don't remember where I saw them in the dream so I didn't write about it. But I wonder why my brain chose to reunite just about everybody I could think of from my high school and a few people from college at my parents gigantic dream house. Why brain why?

My weekend in photographs

This weekend I went crazy taking pictures and I took a whole roll in black and white. I felt really good taking a bunch of pictures again.

Today was already too good not to write about

I woke up at 7:00 and had myself a bowl of Safeway blueberry cereal. Lucky for me I already had my morning planned. I brushed my teeth and headed outside for my nice cool morning bike ride. So I rode my bike for an hour. I got back home and changed clothes to go on the elliptical because I slacked off and didn't exercise on Friday. [flexes muscles] Now I'm all stronger! Then I hopped in the shower and de-stinkified myself. I called Tony and asked if he wanted to go to this Freecycle free for all event where you can find a lot of used stuff for free, no catch. Tony was busy, so then I started to rethink my plan on going today. I thought, well I was going to go by myself before deciding to go with Tony, but I think Kristin would really enjoy going. So I decided to put off going to the free for all until Sunday when I can go with her. But then my morning had a gap! What ever was I going to do?

Eventually I decided to watch a movie and then eat lunch, which consisted of the last bits of pizza rolls, buffalo chicken bites, and an Italian sausage. Well, I had successfully gotten through another 3 hours. What can I do now? I thought. I felt the sudden urge to be creative and take pictures with my film camera in black and white. Unfortunately, I didn't have any film. So on the way to the camera store, I decided that I wanted to take some pictures of my truck. So I also took my truck to the car wash. $10 well spent... My tires were dirty!

I get home all excited about all the pictures I was going to take. And on the way out of the car I hear the "ding ding ding" and I see that my lights are on so I turn them off. Then I shut the door still hearing the "ding ding" without paying attention and then I reach for my keys.... and BAM it hits me.... The car was still dinging. I had no keys! So I was thinking about how Kristin warned me that I should have a spare. And how now I had just put my foot in my mouth. To make the story even funnier. my apartment keys are attached to my car keys, so I couldn't get into my apartment. I reached for my cell phone, but I had left it on the charger! Thank goodness I live in an apartment because otherwise I'd be locked out for good! I went to the office and they gave me a spare key to get into the apartment and grab my cell phone. I call my dad and ask if he can mail my keys for Sunday delivery because FedEx used to do that. But they don't anymore I found out. So then I get the bright idea of calling the Mazda dealer instead of paying $60 for a locksmith. Luckily, they could make a key by just using the VIN! PHEW. So I got a ride to the dealer and so ended my crazy ordeal!

After that I had a bunch of fun taking pictures. I only took 12 shots so a special somebody had better be ready to be photographed in artistic black and white on Sunday ;)

Oh those interns

Today, they made their own fake news bulletin. (click the image to read)

When giving blood

Do not give them your real phone number. I've received 2 phone calls in the past 3 or so days from them asking for me to donate again. Yes, donating blood saves lives, but I really dislike telemarketers! I didn't get sick the last time I donated blood. So I am happy about that, but I like my blood and I wish there was a way for them to take the blood w/o digging in my vein for 3 minutes trying to get blood out. I have narrow veins gosh darn it, you digging in that needle hurts! Oh well, I'll still go again though because it's the right thing to do, but no more telemarketing!

This really would make baby Jesus cry

One of five drivers in fatal hit-run stops for victim - The only person to stop after a man was hit by 5 cars and being fatally injured was the one who hit him second and least severely. This is a very sad thing to see and I really hope this isn't statistically accurate because if 4 out of 5 people would drive off after hitting a pedestrian, then our world really is in a sad state.

Happy Camper

I now have 24 bratwurst waiting for me in the ISU MEATS lab freezer. I will soon be reunited with a long lost college love. [tears up] Now all I have to do is figure out how to eat a West Street Deli sandwich, chicken wings and cheese bread all in the span of about 3 hours and I'll be set!

I think I'm also going to stop by the good ol ECSS office and say hi to my former co-workers. Of course every single student that I worked with will be gone, and that is sad, but I'll still have the memories. They can never take away my memories.

I brought a ton of peanut butter cookies into work today. I haven't sent out a mass email though because I don't want people making a mess in my cube. I'll put the cookies out in one of the main asiles around 11 after Tony comes in because he gets first dibs for helping fix my TV problem.

What do you do when you're bored?

Bake cookies!!!!

...and post about it in your blog. I made some peanut butter cookies with a similar recipe to the molasses cookies Kristin and I made the other day. I think I'm going to bring these into work tomorrow. I made almost 50 and I still have a ton of dough left! I'm refrigerating the rest until Kristin comes back from Colorado.

Grandma's Best Peanut Butter Cookies
1 cup brown sugar, firmly packed
1 cup white sugar
1 cup Butter Flavor Crisco
1 cup creamy peanut butter (Skippy)
1/2 teaspoon salt
2 large eggs
1 teaspoon vanilla
2 teaspoons baking soda
2 cups flour (1/4 cup more if needed)

1. Cream together the sugars, Crisco, peanut butter.
2. Add the eggs and vanilla.
3. Sift the dry ingredients together and add gradually until blended well.
4. Roll into tablespoon size balls.
5. Roll cookie dough balls into sugar.
6. Place on cookie sheets- do not mash with fork in normal "peanut butter cookie" fashion!
7. Bake at 350° oven for 11-13 minutes.

Soft Molasses Cookies
3/4 cup shortening
1 cup packed brown sugar
1 large egg
1/2 cup molasses
2 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon salt
2 teaspoons baking soda
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1 teaspoon ground ginger
1 teaspoon allspice
1 teaspoon nutmeg

1. Cream together shortening and brown sugar.
2. Stir in egg and molasses and mix well.
3. Fold in dry ingredients and stir.
4. Cover and chill till firm (1-2 hours).
5. Preheat oven to 350°.
6. Roll dough into small balls and roll in white sugar.
7. Place on lightly greased cookie sheet.
8. Bake at 350° for 9-10 minutes.
9. Leave on sheet one minute until set.

Food I miss from ISU

It's funny that I miss food from college more often than anything else. Yes, I miss the parties and the ability to sleep all day and lack of real bills. But day after day, I wish I could find something similar to so many of the foods I ate at ISU. Here is a list of food I miss the most and I hope dearly that I can find a way to eat some again before I die ;)

1) ISU Meat Lab bratwurst - I hope to head over to the market and buy at least 4lb of this next time I visit Ames. They're open from 11:00-1:00 on Fridays so I can't wait to stop by.

2) Gumby's pepperoni rolls - I had some of these when I visited Illinois State back in Nov. They were heavenly

3) West Street Deli capicola and pastrami on panini-style toasted dark rye with mayo, black olives, banana peppers, lettuce and tomato - complicated order, but it is seriously the best sandwich I have ever put in my mouth.

4) Pizza Pit fried buffalo wings - These come in at a close second to my all time favorite fried wings from the Chicken Shoppe in my home town. Unfortunately, the Chicken Shoppe no longer exists and their delicious wings are lost forever.

5) Pizza Pit cheese bread - Italian bread covered in a thick layer of mozzarella and Italian spices then baked until the cheese is gooey and the crust is crispy. Dip it in a cup of fresh marinara sauce and you'll be in heaven.

6) Home Team Chicago-style sausage pizza - For the price, this pizza couldn't be beat. It cost only $6 without any coupon, and it lasted me at least 2 meals. A lot of people didn't like Home Team but I loved them and now that they're closed. The closest location is in Des Moines, and I don't see any indication that they serve this pizza anymore :(

7) Totino's Mexican pizza - OK, this is just frozen pizza, but you Chicagoans think you all are too fancy to stock a $1 Mexican pizza, don't you???

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Macbook woes

On Sunday, I tried to burn a CD in my new Macbook Pro that I bought 6 months ago, but to my dismay it spat the blank disk right back out like a 3 year-old spits out canned spinach. Frustrated, I tried another blank disk, followed by another, but only more 3 year-old fits occured with these disks too. At first, I wanted to give the laptop the benefit of the doubt because my newest CD-R was at least 4 years old (I bought a 50-pack in college). So for sanity's sake I put in a DVD-R that I had burnt a home movie onto to see if the computer would spit that out too. And since you're reading this, you can probably guess that the computer refused to read that disk too. As a last resort I put in the OS X install/restore disks that Apple provided and the computer refused to read those as well. So now I knew something was up and I did some research online and I found out that many people with supposed "bad hardware" had the drive malfunction after the latest Apple superdrive firmware update.

Luckily, my Apple is still under warranty. So I took it into my local Apple store to have tech support verify that my drive was indeed toast. Because I am the luckiest person alive, the first blank CD-R they placed in the drive was read just fine. I got worried. I thought to myself, "These guys are going to force me to take back a broken drive just because this one disk works" Lucky for me, even though the computer recognized this disk, it refused to burn any amount of data to the disk because the "data was too large" according to the on-screen error message. The technician also noticed a weird noise coming from the drive so he said he'd have it replaced. Phew, that was close! Of course he also noticed another problem, which was most likely on the software side that has me worried if replacing the drive will fix. There was only one burn speed , maximum, available. I sure hope the drivers are not corrupt now after the superdrive firmware update and I will be able to set my burn speed again!

While I was still at the Apple store, I decided to bring up another rather minor issue I had noticed since I first received my Mac. I have a magical "J" key that sometimes will not register a keypress even if the key was fully depressed. This probably happened about 50% of the time if I typed fast and with lighter keystrokes. But that day, the key worked wonderfully for the technician. I swear this computer has a mind of its own! Luckily, I was able to reproduce it readily by pressing "J" followed by "K" repeatedly. The technician then removed the key and noted that the rubber spacer under the key was almost completely torn off and that caused the misalignment that caused the key presses not to register. My luck had changed and the technician ordered a new keyboard. They say the parts will be in the store within 2 days and the repair will take up to 2 days. Although I don't like the fact that my computer will be gone for 2 days, they say that no data would be lost if I had the computer repaired in house as opposed to shipping it off to a service center. Yay Apple!

Movies, Molasses, Marklar

Friday was the start of my movie marathon weekend. Well I only saw 3 movies, but that is more than normal! I went to see the Simposons Movie with Tony, Kristin, and her friend. It really didn't seem all that exciting and it seemed like just another episode to me. But I guess after writing a show for 15+ years you start to run out of ideas. It really is one of those movies you should see in the dollar theatre but not shell out the money for the full-price ticket. It was really short, but I was glad because we ended up going to the 11:00PM showing because of random scheduling mix ups along with people going to the wrong place and having to find the rest of the group. Before the movie I had a great piña colada at Bahama Breeze. And before that, I had cooked the chicken saltimbocca for Kristin and Tony to try. Even though I burnt the chicken it was still moist because of how it was cooked and everybody claimed to like it! Kristin even had a second piece (2 days later).

On Saturday I watched Cruel Intentions with Kristin. I remember liking that movie back in the day and I still do, although I have a more jaded viewpoint on the way love works now and I have a hard time believing that somebody could fall in love with another person in a matter of weeks. The movie still showed that you could change for the better and in the end, you'll get killed for it. It's those life lessons that I so adore! (sarcasm)

Molasses Cookies

Blueberry pancakes started the day on Sunday. Kristin came over to make them with me. We put the heat on too high though so they either burned or were slightly undercooked between the blueberries. Next time I'll do better, I swear! We also tried making a recreation of the Walker Brother's flapjacks by adding a lot of extra water to one pancake. It was thin, but it just didn't have the same flavor. I think it was most likely the pancake mix we were using because I remember having a slightly undercooked pancake made at the YMCA with very similar flavor. Walker Brother's probably adds a couple of secret spices to their flapjacks and I bet that's what made them taste so good! Later in the day I watched the Rocky Horror Picture show with Kristin. It was a weird movie, but I had to watch it because people referenced it all the time in college. I really don't know what was so awesome about it though. It kind of reminded me of Clockwork Orange, which is a very very twisted movie. You don't want to watch it.

While watching the movie, we made molasses cookies. Kristin has loved these cookies since childhood, and I really am starting to like them too. While making the cookies, I learned that Cracker Jacks are actually molasses flavored, and not just some crappy caramel flavor like I had thought as a kid. Anyway, Molasses cookies are delicious spice cookies made out of a bunch of tasty spices including, ginger, nutmeg, cloves, cinnamon, and of course, molasses! These cookies get my stamp of approval! They kind of remind me of ginger snaps, and I probably have eaten them and mistaken them for ginger snap cookies. I've eaten 10 since making them last night. Good thing we made small ones because I'm sure I'd have eaten more mass-wise if they were bigger!

Chicken Saltimbocca

I was looking for some baked chicken wings with some delicious looking glaze I had seen on Food Network while working out, but I found this first... mmmm. I think I'm going to make it!


Recipe courtesy Giada De Laurentiis
Show: Everyday Italian


6 (3-ounce) chicken cutlets, pounded to evenly flatten
Salt and freshly ground black pepper
6 paper-thin slices prosciutto
1 (10-ounce) box frozen chopped spinach, thawed
3 tablespoons olive oil
1/4 cup grated Parmesan
1 (14-ounce) can low-salt chicken broth
2 tablespoons fresh lemon juice

Place the chicken cutlets flat on the work surface. Sprinkle the chicken with salt and pepper. Lay 1 slice of prosciutto atop each chicken cutlet.

Squeeze the frozen spinach to remove the excess water. Season the spinach with salt and pepper. In a small bowl, toss the spinach with 1 tablespoon of oil to coat.

Arrange an even, thin layer of spinach atop the prosciutto slices. Sprinkle the Parmesan evenly over each. Beginning at the short tapered end, roll up each chicken cutlet as for a jellyroll. Secure with a toothpick.

Heat the remaining 2 tablespoons of oil in a heavy large skillet over high heat. Add the chicken and cook just until golden brown, about 2 minutes per side. Add the chicken broth and lemon juice, and scrape the browned bits off the bottom of the pan with a wooden spoon. Bring the liquid to a boil. Reduce the heat to medium. Cover and simmer until the chicken is just cooked through, about 8 to 10 minutes. Transfer the chicken to a platter. Simmer the cooking liquid over high heat until it is reduced to about 2/3 cup, about 5 minutes. Season the cooking liquid with salt and pepper, to taste. Remove toothpicks from the chicken. Drizzle the reduced cooking liquid over the chicken and serve immediately.

computers are smarter than people

Today my belief that computers were smarter than people was reaffirmed. I went to order pizza from Pizza Hut for delivery. I told the guy over the phone my address and he said I was out of their range. I figured this was a bunch of bull because they're about a mile away from me. But I decided to call the other Pizza Hut that is a mile away in the other direction in another suburb. The lady who answered said that they could not take an order because I was in the other suburb. So I gave up talking with people and placed my order online. The system automatically selected the first Pizza Hut I called. 25 minutes later, I had my pizza! The computer knows where I live and the computer can see that I'm only a mile away from the first location and it placed the order for me. Good riddance to human error!