Weekend

Timmy and I had a really nice weekend. On Saturday, we slept in a little, which felt awesome. When I woke up, Timmy immediately asked if I wanted to go on a bike ride and ride three bears. I wasn't really feeling it, but I agreed anyway. The weather had been really rainy lately, and since it was nice we needed to take advantage of it. I whipped up a delicious batch of waffles with my brand new waffle maker, and we ate those for breakfast. After lazing around for a little bit, the bikes came out, and off we went! I was really not feeling it at first, and I complained a little bit, but Timmy knew better and ignored me, of course! So eventually I shut up...and soon enough, I started enjoying myself! There's nothing like biking over big hills and enjoying the rushing downhill after. I brought my new GPS with me just so I could take it out and stare at it every so often. It did a good job. It was a 31 mile ride with 2500 feet or so of climbing!

When we got home, it was still gorgeous weather out, so we hopped into the car with the dog, and went to the grocery store and then Target. I went in and ordered myself a java chip frappachino, as well as a strawberry frappachino for Timmy. The cashier was one of my favorites - he knows how to say a few things in sign language, and always makes sure to use them. I taught him a few new signs, which he was really excited about. When I went to pay, I noticed that I was only paying $2.50 for both frappachinos together, which was cheaper than only one is. So I was really confused and I asked the cashier why the price was so low. He laughed and said, "Just pay! It's a token of how much we like to see you!" So we got some cheap yummy drinks. Score for being nice to people!

We then wandered over to Petsmart with the fuzzy doggy, and let her sniff around for a while. All of the kitties were fast asleep, so they were really boring to look at. To make up for this, one of the rats was especially interesting. He would only blink one of his eyes, no matter how long you stared him down for. If you blew lightly into the cage, he would attack! It was funny, but I didn't do it for long because I'm sure he was kind of stressed out. Navi got a treat from the cashier on her way out, because everyone is such a sucker for her.

Then we wandered to the beach so that Navi could play! She ran and leapt and fetched and swam and all that doggy goodness. We played on the beach for a while, then went for a little walk around the peninsula. We climbed through some woods for a bit, and I found a huge bush that was no longer rooted into the ground. I picked it up and poked Navi with it until she tore it to smithereens. Silly doggy. Then we walked back to the car, drove home, and started making nachos because Timmy is a nacho addict. Cheese, sour cream, guacamole, salsa, seasoned ground beef and all that goodness.

Then we went to bed early because....

We had to wake up early on Sunday to head to the mountains! After the last two times we went snowboarding and saw that a ton of people keep dogs in their cars while they are on the mountain, we decided to try! We were going to take the dog with us and spend half the day snowboarding, and half the day walking with the dog in the snow! Navi loves snow, so I was really excited to be able to take her with us. We packed, Jon came over and packed, and then we all set off! Navi slept in the backseat on top of Jon, and I fell asleep too while Tim drove. A few hours later, we arrived! We took Navi out so she could play in the snow, and we jokingly told her to hop up onto a snowbank that must have been 4 or 5 feet high. We didn't think she'd make it and that we'd have to pick her up and throw her on top, but that dog can jump! She made it and leapt and bounded around. She was a very happy doggy. After she played for a while, we went back to the car, dressed for snowboarding, and went snowboarding for a few hours. Kirkwood is a really fun mountain because it is so big that no one part of it is extremely crowded, and there is a large variety of terrain types. Lots of fun! We snowboarded for a few hours, then we all headed back to the car to eat. Navi is really fun because we don't really need to keep her on a leash. She just stays close and she listens to what we tell her to do. So we ate, and then Jon headed back to snowboard some more while Tim and I hiked up another part of the mountain with the dog. We kept our snowboarding boots and clothes on, and just started hiking! It was an unpacked, untouched area of snow, so we were falling in halfway to our knees, and sometimes to our knees! It was very, very tiring, but it was so worth it because of how delighted Navi was! She would roll, and jump, and eat the snow, and start sprinting, and run around! It was so cute. I think next year, we will take up snowshoeing or something rather than snowboarding so that we can bring Navi along more. I love having her with me at all times, and I would never seperate from her if I could. We tried to get to the top of the mountain, but it was soooo tiring. We were so close, but we were so tired too. So we decided to do the next best thing: roll down the mountain! And roll down the mountain we did...until we were so dizzy we thought we would throw up. It was funny because Navi would charge downhill after us, and notice that she sent a lot of snowballs rolling down the mountain, and charge after the snowballs! We spent a lot of time rolling things down the mountain so that she'd chase after it! It was very cute. After a while, we finally got back to the car and changed into normal clothes. We thought we had a long time to wait until Jon got back to the car, but turns out something is funny with Tim's watch and Jon came back pretty shortly after! He changed, and then we headed back home! We were all exhausted, especially Navi, but it was a great weekend!!!

GPS!

I got my new GPS! After a few months of going back and forth between wanting the Garmin Oregon vs the Garmin Colorado 400t, I decided the Colorado was a better fit. When Tim and I go backpacking, I usually have some gloves or mittens on. The Oregon is a touch screen, and I read a lot of reviews saying that it didn't work with gloves. I don't want to pay $100 extra for a GPS that I have to remove my gloves constantly to use. I also used someone elses Colorado and I really liked the controls. Sometimes with a touchscreen, since they can make any menu setup they want, things actually become harder to find because the manufacturer tries to over-simplify the menu and it all becomes overly complex. With the Colorado, there is a little rock-n-roller control that you can turn in circles (kind of like the ipod touch control) with a button in the middle. There are two additional buttons on the GPS besides the power button. With the rock-n-roller control, you can zoom in and out, as well as pan around the map. It's surprisingly simple and very nice. I finally made the final decision while talking to my dad on Sunday, and purchased it off amazon! It arrived at work yesterday, and I've been walking around staring at my GPS ever since! I love it!!

Ultimate Frisbee!!

I had another ultimate frisbee game tonight. I always really liked my teammates, but now I'm super excited to see them every time we have a game. There are a lot of really amazing people. They are really happy, they play really hard, and while sometimes we get over-emotional and a little upset over the game, we always forgive each other. There's a boy named Adam, and he and I work really well together on the field. Our cutting style is a perfect match. He likes to cut first, and I like to cut right after the first cut, fake a cut upfield, and then take off sprinting downfield. Adam likes to throw an outside-in which goes up and out of the field boundaries, and then drops back in. Those are my favorite throws to run for, so whenever he cuts I'm always right after him and he turns around and looks for me. I also tend to look for him because since I know his cutting style the best, I can tell whether he's faking or whether the direction he is currently running is where I should throw. Sometimes with a league like this, where everyone is randomly drafted onto a team, it is hard to really know a teammate; you can't predict what they are going to do and sometimes you mis-read and throw somewhere they aren't planning to run. There's another guy named Dan (there are at least 6 Dan's on this team!!) but this particular Dan is so deaf conscious. Sometimes on the field, they will dramatically change the play style from man to zone defense, which is a really hard change for me to pick up on. With man defense, you just have one person that you are guarding, no matter where they go. With zone defense, there are positions on the field that you guard. It's difficult when they change it during play from man to zone because everyone calls out the positions they will play. I always have a little bit of a lag between figuring out that play has changed, and figuring out where the last position is that I should take. I've gotten really good at making a fast transition, but it's still a lot of stress for me sometimes because my lag could mean that the other team scores. Whenever Dan is on the field and they switch, he always sprints to me, grabs me by the shoulder, looks me in the eye, says, "ZONE. YOU ARE LEFT WING. GO!", pushes me in the right direction, and then goes to his location. It really reduces my stress on the field and it's so amazing that someone is willing to take the initiative to make sure that the whole team is functioning as a team. There's another Dan who is just the most amazing deep runner ever. He can jump a mile high, and catch anything. He's also the most encouraging person I've ever met. I'm really good at deep cuts, but I tend to not take them in co-ed frisbee because the men are faster. He always tells me to cut deep because it doesn't matter whether a guy is faster; it only matters that I beat my mark and try my hardest. So he's really helping me grow as a player and take more advantage of the full field. Believe it or not, these are only three of the amazing people on my team. There are many more.

Birdie!

I made a birdie and nest for my rosebush! I found a template to sew a bird online, got some pretty fabrics, and hand sewed a bird! I used yarn to make a simple nest. I think he's really cute! I have to think of a name.

Timmy's Present!

Timmy got his Christmas present from my parents today! It is a 10" onion chef's knife by Shun! His hands are so big and knuckly that whenever he chops food, he raps his knuckles into the cutting board! In December, I sent him to a knife workshop at Sur La Table, and he tried out this knife. Apparently it has a special handle made for people with bigger hands like Timmy! I think it's kind of funny that a Japanese company has a knife for men with big hands. Well, when he tried out the knife, he liked it a lot! So now he has it! Look how delighted he is!

Right after he opened it, I realized that he doesn't have to cut anything but ham for dinner! He was sad, so I gave him a carrot to chop up! He chopped it up in a jiffy, and then let me try the knife out. The knife slices through the carrot like butter. Then he sliced a few pieces of cheddar cheese for me to munch on, since I forgot to bring lunch to work today! Funny story is that when this shipped, it accidentally got sent to our old address! I went over to the security office today to explain what had happened, and it happened to be my favorite security guard! She asked where I'd been, moped when I told her we'd moved, and we chatted for a while. She gave me the package without a hassle, since it so clearly had my name on it. Look at the pretty grain on the knife!!

Roses!!

I really wanted to add some flowers to my kitchen. I don't like real flowers because they are either cut and thus on a rapid path to dying, or I forget to water them and kill them myself. When I got home from work, I started making little roses with assorted red papers that I had laying around. Timmy suggested that we go on a walk with the dog during a lull in the rain, and on the walk I found a nice little stick with lots of twigs and branches sticking off. Since I was holding this stick, Navi wanted it. I kept picking up other sticks and feigning interest in them, but Navi wanted the stick I intended to turn into a rose bush. I didn't let her have it, and told her that it was mine. We got tangled up in the leash a few times because I'd switch the stick from my left to right hand, the leash would be in front of me, and she'd loop around behind me. Then I wouldn't learn from the first time, and do it again. When we got back from our walk, we took a detour to Target to pick up some glue, picked some pizza up on the way home, and started watching Jakob the Liar. I've already seen that movie, so I made roses and started my rosebush while watching! I can't get a good photo of the whole thing because it is night, but here is a smaller photo of one or two roses on the bush! I hope to find a few more sticks to complete the whole effect, and even make a bird sitting in a birds nest. We'll see how far I take this; I'm pretty pleased with what I've got so far!

Yummy!

Today was a rainy day and we had no more doggy food, so we opted out of the usual morning walk and went for a drive to the petstore with Navi in tow. We stopped at Target first, got some coffee, and then wandered over to PetSmart to pick up dog food. After we got the food, we walked back to the car and decided to take Navi to the beach since there was a lull in the rain. When we walked to the beach, Navi took off for the water as usual. I went off in search of something for Tim to throw for Navi and when I looked back to see where Tim was, I noticed someone waving at me. They had a hat on with their raincoat hood up and a big pair of sunglasses so I could not figure out who it was. I looked at the man behind her and noticed that he had Gabe's beard. It was Britt and Gabe with Nova! We talked with them for a while and laughed at silly doggy antics. After a while the rain picked up again and everyone decided to go home. Timmy started playing the piano. I spent a little time cleaning the kitchen and sweeping the floors. I can't believe how much sand and dirt we track in; I guess it makes sense because we are always out and about, but it just makes me wonder how much stuff gets stuck in carpets forever. I sweep up more daily than I ever seemed to get out with a vacuum at the old apartment. After a while, cleaning got boring and Timmy was still playing the piano. I noticed that I still had several oranges left over; I'd brought some home from work because the secretary ordered too many and they were going to go bad. I'd used the zest in the orange muffins I made, but I hadn't done anything with the orange itself. I don't really like to eat oranges, and I don't think Tim likes to because he never does. So I decided to make another loaf of orange cranberry bread. I squeezed all the oranges and used that juice, mixed it up, and popped it in the oven for an hour. Timmy was still playing the piano.

Pam and I had plans to make fresh pasta and meatballs for dinner, so I got to getting all the ingredients out of the pantry. I had a little shock when I discovered that the bottle of pasta sauce that was living in the pantry a few days ago grew a pair of legs and ran away. Or maybe we ate it when I found that day-old Gorgonzola walnut ravioli at the store...but how hard can it be to make pasta sauce, anyway? I turned on my laptop, turned to trusty google, and searched spaghetti sauce recipes. Every single recipe seemed like all you did was saute up some onions and garlic, throw in some variety of canned tomato, whether it be tomato sauce, pasta, whole tomatos, or diced, and then add lots of Italian spices and simmer. Do I need a recipe for that? Can't I just do the good old a dash of this, a dash of that, and a taste here and there to see how its going? I then opened up my favorite blog, smitten kitchen, and discovered that the latest blog post was, surprise, surprise, spaghetti sauce! With three ingredients. No spices. Canned tomatos, two onions (that you discard after simmering!), and butter. Well, after watching Julie & Julia, and seeing how much butter they put into everything, that was sounding pretty good. So I delved into my pantry and brought out two 28 ounce cans of whole tomatoes and two onions.

Enter Pam, and we start our cooking frenzy! First, we make the pasta dough so that it can rest for an hour. Since the dough had to stand for so long, we mixed together the meatball ingredients and rolled them all out. We had to wait before starting the rest of dinner, and I was coming very close to ruining the movie Julie & Julia for Pam, so I put it on so she could watch it before I ruined it! I watched it last night after snowboarding. While I liked the movie as a whole, I found Julie to be annoying. Pitching fits in the kitchen every time something little went wrong, treating her husband like scum when he treated her like royalty, and acting so completely ungrateful for what they had. I understand that it's a movie and they had to highlight some personality traits to add drama and such, but it doesn't change the fact that her character was incredibly annoying. Anyway, I learned a few things from the movie! For example, why doesn't my chicken ever brown? Cuz I never dried it. If you want your chicken to brown, you're supposed to dry it with a paper towel before you cook it. I had no idea! Another funny thing about the movie is the difference between the parts where there is actual dialog, and the sections of the movie where Julie is blogging. I don't mind the acting in the movie at all, except for when Julie is blogging. She moves her mouth all funny, has weird facial expressions, and it just doesn't correspond with blogging. I mean, as I'm typing this right now, my face is completely blank. Yet in a movie, you can't have twenty portions where you are typing with a blank face. So you have to gam it all up and do weird things with your mouth and be really into the blogging and...it just didn't translate very well. Especially since I'm a big facial expression reader.

Anyhow, don't get me wrong, it was a good movie. There was a funny part, although unrealistic, with lobsters. There was also another funny part dealing with onions. So I'd say you should watch it! Well, when Pam and I were sitting down watching Julie & Julia, I was also thumbing through a cupcake recipe book that she had brought with her. A chocolate batter and chocolate buttercream frosting caught my eye, and darn it...I wanted some chocolate. So we got up, started baking the meatballs, and whipped together a batch of cupcake batter and put it into a cupcake tin. The meatballs came out, the cupcakes went in...and then we started the tomato sauce. We threw butter, halved onions, and the cans of tomatoes into a big pot and let it simmer for 45 minutes. After that, you remove the onions. That's it! That's the pasta sauce! Then the cupcakes came out, and gosh, they looked a little silly. Maybe the eggs had been too small. They had the right texture and all, but they couldn't hold themselves together if their little lives depended on it. So we weren't having cupcakes. But we were having dinner, so we focused on that.

The sauce and the meatballs were almost done, so we got to rolling the pasta dough! The dough was a little soft, so we had a lot of problems getting it to flatten rather than just...smoosh all over the place and get stuck to everything. So we kneaded in more flour and that seemed to do the trick. We rolled it all out, then cut it up with another pasta attachment! We plopped it all into the water, and in probably 3 minutes, it was cooked! We tasted it...and it was so wonderfully tender! Its amazing! So that was a rousing success, I thought. By the time the pasta was done, the sauce and meatballs were ready, so dinner was served! At long last, Timmy stopped playing the piano to eat. Cooking marathon for Pam and I, and piano marathon for Tim. Dinner was yummy!

After dinner, we discovered that we really wanted some cupcake-y goodness...but our cupcakes were a mess. We decided to just scoop out all the "cupcake" into a big bowl, and we brainstormed what we could do with our new crumbled cupcakes. One of us made a comment that it would taste really good with vanilla bean ice cream and after I lamented that I had none, Tim piped in from the other room (while playing the piano, I might add), "you can make vanilla bean ice cream." Why, yes, we can. We made a simple vanilla bean ice cream (so that we didn't have to cool an egg custard) and at the last minute, we figured we'd throw in some of the cupcakes! Delicious, right? Well, since the cupcakes were still warm, no matter how hard our little ice cream maker churned...it couldn't freeze the mix into ice cream. So after running the ice cream maker for 30 minutes we just poured the mix into a pyrex bowl and put it in the freezer. It will taste good tomorrow! We were back to square one: brainstorming. We could just make the icing, and serve it on top of a bowl of cupcake crumbles. At this point I was getting tired of cleaning a never-ending mound of dirty dishes, so when I looked at the recipe for the frosting we had originally intended to make I was rather turned off by the amount of work it required. We'd have to re-make our "double-boiler" contraption, wash all those dishes all over again, use up tons of bowls....and then I remembered that Pam had told me she found an amazing chocolate icing that was really easy to make. So I looked that up, and we made that instead. You boil sugar and cream so it's all bubbling for a while. Then you dump in butter and chopped chocolate, stir it up, and add in vanilla. Then you cool it, and ta-da! But even in the fridge, it took forever to cool. It was getting late, I wanted my dessert...and after a while I just said, thats it! I'm going to serve cupcake soup! I got out three bowls, filled them with cupcake crumbles, and drizzled warm icing all over the top. I gave them each a bowl, and we were all very surprised how great it tasted. Yum.

So that was a lot of cooking. I think I'll stick to something simple tomorrow night. We'll see how long that idea lasts, especially if it's raining.

Snowboarding!

Today is Navi's 2nd birthday! Apparently I don't love her, because I took her to doggy daycare at 5 am and went snowboarding! (That's not true. I love her lots. She loves daycare!)

We got up far too early, and I'm sure I whined up a little storm while we loaded the snowboards into our snowboarding rack, threw all our gear in the back, and drove to daycare to drop off Navi. Then we drove over to pick up Andrew and Jay, load up all their gear, and drove to Kirkwood. I love Kirkwood because it has a lot of fun terrain. There are lots of steep trails, trails with a more gradual slope (yet still pretty fast trails), and lots of terrain types. There are trails filled with trees to swoop around, wide open trails, little cornices to jump off (no thank you), large cornices to jump off (no way), groomed trails, ungroomed trails, and goodness knows what else. The mountain is also really big. The only weird thing is that since the summit is around 10,000 feet in elevation, whenever I am on a trail that is so gradual that I have to remove a foot and push to traverse the trail, I get really winded and out of breath. Thankfully there's not much traversing at Kirkwood, unless you just want to torture yourself. Then you can find all the traversing you want.

Jay is an awesome snowboarder and he used to be a snowboarding instructor, so he gave me a few tips on how to turn faster. I've never been on a mountain with such steep terrain, so sometimes I end up not being able to turn very quickly. So I end up having to go painfully slow and coming almost to a stop before making my next turn. He gave me a lot of pointers, and a few drills to try, and I think I'm already getting better. Practice makes perfect! He and Andrew are a lot of fun to be around. They are the kind of people who always see the silver lining, and are really cheerful, joyous, and wonderful to be around. Jay is the kind of person you want to learn from, too. He's always got a smile, something to comment on to pick up your spirits, and then he gives you a few pointers. Even if you manage to screw up every single thing he asked you to try to focus on, he still finds something that you did more correctly than before to comment on. I like people like that because its always easier to digest, "your back hand was so much more stable that time! I'd still like to see you focus on keeping your shoulders a little more steady, and use your legs a little more" than it is to digest, "you didn't really manage to keep your shoulders steady, so your legs aren't being used as much as they should be." Just the way you phrase things can really change someone's day, and both Tim and Jay are excellent at phrasing things so that you always feel good about yourself. I'm sure Andrew would be the same, but I've never had the chance to learn from him. He is an incredible skier, though, I'll say that much.

After a long day of snowboarding, I got a migraine, so I quit a little earlier than the others. I catnapped in the car while they kept snowboarding/skiing, and then when they got back to the car, we drove home. It was a long drive, but we picked up Navi before we dropped Andrew and Jay off, so they got to deal with her happily licking their faces into oblivion while driving the last few miles home.

When we got home, Timmy and I gave Navi her happy birthday bone! She always licks the nasty looking bones with an air of desperation when we go to the pet store...and I finally caved and bought a nasty bone, although less nasty than the bones she would prefer. She loves it! Normally after going to daycare, she passes out within 30 minutes of getting home. But because I gave her the bone, she stayed up late! I had to take the bone away before she would go to bed!

Wow!

You will not believe what I made for dinner last night, especially if you are my mom and dad. The past week or so I've been really focused on using up everything I buy and not going to the grocery store to pick up anything. I've also been thinking that I need to force myself to cook something totally out of my comfort zone once every other week or so. So when I had a whole bunch of baby spinach sitting in my fridge, and not enough stuff to make a good salad...I turned to google in the search of recipes to use up this spinach. I discarded several findings because they either had something not currently living in my fridge or they were just a little too weird. I finally found a pretty simple recipe that assaulted all my senses...and I had all the ingredients at home: baked eggs with spinach and mushrooms. I told Tim, and his first reaction was "eww" but he said to go ahead and try it. "Maybe it will surprise us!" Well, surprise us it did.

When I got home from work, I went for a short bike ride down and up the hill to get my blood pumping. Then Pam came over to see the new apartment (pictures are on their way! I promise!) and we went on a walk with the dog. We chatted up a storm, touching just about every topic there is, and I asked if she wanted to stay for dinner. I warned her that it was going to be nasty cooked spinach, but she accepted the offer. Like Tim and I, she doesn't even like cooked spinach.

I boiled water in my dutch oven, and wilted the spinach. I wilted while watching the spinach wilt. My nose wrinkled at the smell. I've always hated wilted greens. My dad used to make a cheesy risotto with some sort of nasty wilted green in it (perhaps chard?) and I would moan and groan my way through dinner. I would pick out every last remnant of the nasty green stuff, and to my great chagrin, this recipe popped up far more often than I would have liked. After the spinach was fully cooked, I drained it in a colander and ran cool water on it. I gently squished out all the liquid, and chopped up the nasty spinach pile.

Then I threw onions and butter into the dutch oven, and softened the onions on the stove. The mushrooms were then thrown in, and cooked until they were soft. Have I told you how much I hate mushrooms? Tim loves them. I always buy them to put in his salads, but god forbid I ever cook with them. The mushrooms were followed by a little bit of heavy cream, salt, pepper, freshly grated nutmeg (which always smells so amazing compared to pre-ground nutmeg), and the chopped spinach. This mixture was brought to a simmer, and started to smell...well...not awful, I suppose. I made three indentations to the mixture, and into each of these I broke an egg! Then I baked the whole concoction, uncovered, in the oven for 8 minutes until the egg whites were set, but the yolks were still a little runny.

When the dutch oven came out of the oven, I wrinkled my nose, and told everyone that I had a backup plan in case it was inedible. I portioned out the recipe onto three plates, and handed them to Pam and Tim, with more warnings that it was OK if it tasted nasty. I almost put a pot on the stove with water to boil for quick execution of plan B. Then I took a bite, and decided it wasn't necessary; it wasn't just barely edible, it was good. Really good. The small amount of freshly grated nutmeg added such a good flavor. The sauce as a whole was delicious. The spinach didn't taste nasty. The mushroom weren't terrible and slimy. The flavors were terrific. And the egg managed to really pull the whole thing together. May I have some more?

hummingbird!!

I saw a hummingbird in the garden tonight at sunset. It had a brilliant red throat, and it was gorgeous. When the light hit him right, it appeared as if his throat was covered in rubies. When we went to the Spanish Village in Balboa Park over the holidays, I picked up a really cool glass hummingbird feeder to make up for the one that broke during the wind storm. I have to find a place to put it up so that I will see it, and take a photo of it for you!!

Whoops!

This morning at work, my phone would not stop ringing. It was vibrating all over my desk, every 10 minutes, on the dot. I looked at the number, and it was a represenative from National Instruments that I've told repeatedly not to call my phone. This continued for 3 hours, and I started getting really annoyed. My battery went from fully charged to nearly drained. In the past, he's continued for days and days until I turn off my phone for a few days. I was at the verge of snapping, so I picked up the phone and very nicely said, "I am deaf, and I cannot answer my phone. In that National Instruments system, I know there are several other ways listed for contact purposes. Please use one of those to contact me, and stop calling."

After that, I got a sheepish email from the rep apologizing, and he said what he wanted to say. I replied back to the email answering all his questions.

Less than an hour later, he calls again. I let it go, and 10 minutes later, he calls again. The third time he called, I really lost it. I picked up the phone and angrily snapped, "WHAT!!!! Do you think that I MAGICALLY obtained a sense of hearing in the last fourty five minutes?" and I hung up angrily. Really got some snap on the phone.

Judging from his latest email, he feels very small right now.

...Oops?

Happy Waffling!

This morning when I woke up, I decided I was in the mood to make waffles. I didn't have any buttermilk, but I'd been wanting to use another recipe of mine that doesn't have buttermilk. This recipe is a little more labor intensive; rather than mixing dry ingredients, wet ingredients, and then combining the two, you have to separate the eggs, mix dry ingredients, mix wet ingredients, combine, then whip the egg whites until you have stiff peaks and fold this gently into the batter. It's not really labor intensive, really, it's just not as simple as my typical go-to recipe. I like this recipe too because it has a different texture than the buttermilk waffles I make.

I first multiplied everything in the ingredient list by 2/3rds because you can't halve a recipe where you have to separate three eggs. Then I whisked the dry ingredients together and measured out the correct amount of milk in a measuring cup. I beat the egg yolks into the milk and poured this into the dry ingredients and stirred it up. Then it was time to beat the egg whites. I got out my hand mixer and almost started beating the egg whites when I realized that this was the perfect chance to use the immersion blender that Timmy got me for Christmas!! So I put away the hand mixer, got out the immersion blender, and attached its little blade. I stuck this into the egg whites and whirred and whirred but all I got was a little pile of bubbles. I stopped to think about it for a while, and I realized that a flat blade isn't really incorporating air like a pair of beaters do. So I take off the flat blade attachment and start putting the immersion blender away in order to use the hand mixer when I noticed that my immersion blender also has a whisk attachment! So I put that on, and whisked away until I obtained the stiff egg whites I wanted! I folded them into the batter, brought out my spectacular waffle maker, and heated it up.

When the waffle maker was pre-warmed, I poured in a half cup of batter, and went to set it to the right temperature. My temperature gauge has been determined to cause problems lately, and it didn't feel like it was engaging correctly. I tried my best and walked off and came back a few minutes to a excessively crisp waffle. The green light still wasn't on so the waffle maker wasn't identifying that the waffle was overdone. Rather than being spotty like before, I consistently had problems. Eventually I just started timing it and removing the waffles when they were done even though the waffler didn't think they were finished. The waffles still came out well, but I was sad that my waffler doesn't work well anymore.

I turned on my computer and discovered that my dad was online to chat! I told him that my waffler, which he bought me around this time last year, had finally decided to retire. He said that he had bought it from Williams-Sonoma and it had been an exclusive product. Thus, they should stand by their product and replace it. He called Williams-Sonoma to confirm, and they said to take the waffler into my local store with the order number for a replacement. Time was of key because I had almost had the waffler for a complete year, so I decided to go into Williams-Sonoma right away to get it replaced. Timmy and I took the dog for a walk first, and then I bungee-d the waffler to my bike. We set off and whizzed down the hill to the Williams-Sonoma store in Emeryville. When we announced that we wanted a replacement, the first cashier was a little dumbfounded because they no longer carried the product. She called her manager, who seemed much more competent, and after an initial flustered period, he realized that he could call in the order number and the Williams-Sonoma headquarters would be able to deal with it and send either a replacement or a card with the monetary amount on it. I decided to go for a replacement because I really fell in love with this waffler. One thing it really has going for it is that once you know how to use it, you NEVER make a mess. I really hate square waffle makers because when you put the batter in the middle and close it, the batter never spreads to reach the corners, and yet it runs out the sides and makes a big mess. I don't understand why square waffle makers even exist. The villaware waffler I had was circular, and one half cup of batter works perfectly. You can easily control exactly how you want the waffle to come out, and it never disappoints. So I figured I'd give it another chance. If it gives out in a year again, I will explore other options. Yet I will never convert to a square waffler.

So now I will have a replacement by January 18th, and I will be back to happy waffling again!

Do you like Navi's new look?

Bike Fail!

Late at work last night, I discovered I was missing a part that I needed in order to complete a series of tests. The tests were very time-crucial, so I decided to get the part from the hardware store on my way home, and complete the tests today (Saturday). When I got home, I jokingly asked Tim if he wanted to come along to work and he didn't really reply, so I figured he wasn't interested. Yet come the morning and he was talking about different ways we could bike into work. I haven't biked to work yet from our new apartment, and I'm not yet sure what the best way is. I don't really want to bike through Oakland because stopping at an infinite amount of red lights doesn't really start my morning off on the right foot. One option is that I could commute from our house straight west to the water, and bike the usual way to work. Another option is to bike south on the ridge of the mountains to San Leandro, descend to the water through San Leandro, and then bike back North to Alameda. This route has much more climbing, is more tiring and time consuming, but it would whip me into better shape than I am in now. Which is always good...so maybe I will do it once in a while although I'm sure it will never be an every day thing.

We decided to take the harder route to work, and after walking the dog, we set off. We pedaled up and over Grizzley Peak, and up and down the ridgeline. After biking for perhaps an hour and fifteen minutes, we turned to stay on Skyline Boulevard, and suddenly Tim's back tire started wobbling! He managed to stop without bailing, and when we looked at his tire, the sidewall was shredded! The inner tube had a huge slice in it! We figured what happened was that the bead popped off, and then the rim was riding on the sidewall and inner tube, shredding both.

That's not really something you can fix on the road easily. We didn't have a spare inner tube, and patches don't work for a huge slice in a tube. If we'd had a spare inner tube, we may have had options...but we had none. We didn't know where any of the bus numbers in that location went, nor did Tim want to put his bike on a bus rack. I didn't want to ghetto-fix the wheel and bike farther, only to be in a worse situation later. After a while, we decided that the best option was that I bike home, get the car, drive to pick him up, and then drive to work from there. So I turned around and pedaled back home. When I got there I gathered some normal clothes for Tim, changed quickly, grabbed the doggy, and off we went in the car! The whole way to Timmy I would tell Navi, "we are going to rescue Timmy!" She started staring down every cyclist she saw in hopes that it would be Timmy. After driving for 30 minutes, I finally rescued Timmy!

Then we ate a yummy lunch at in-N-out and went to work. On the way home, we stopped at the beach so Navi could play! We found an old tennis ball, and threw that for Navi to fetch for a while. When we got home, I failed at making flank steak. My mom told me to broil on one side for 5 minutes, the other side for 5 minutes, and then let it rest for 5 minutes. I did that, but it definitely was too rare. We didn't like it. The oven may not have been fully preheated though, because there is no light to tell me when it is. Timmy is going to build a little strobe light so that I know when the oven beeps, because right now I have no idea. Who knows! After dinner, Timmy went off to Vince's for the night, and I decided to stay home. I went to take a shower, and when I came out, I discovered that Navi was chewing her gross rawhide bone, while soaking wet and sandy, on our couch! She was very pleased with herself until I told her she was a very bad dog.

It's ok, though. All I had to do was vacuum the sand off the couch, and scrub off a little rawhide gristle! Good as new!

How about those lights?

While Tim and I were moving, I came across this house decked out with christmas lights! There are camels, the wise men, the baby jesus, reindeer, a sleigh, lots of ornaments, little trees, and then that there at the top is Santa sticking out of the chimney! It is kind of overkill, but I have to admit that it looks a lot nicer than some of the eyesore christmas lighting displays I've seen!

San Clemente!

For the holidays, Tim, Navi and I drove down to San Clemente where his parents had rented a vacation house for a week so that they could be close to all their kids. Jonny lives in San Diego, and Lizzie's house was actually in San Clemente, about 8 or so blocks away from the rental house! Timmy and I stayed in one of the rental house bedrooms because we live too far away!

On Christmas morning far too early to make me happy (3a!) Timmy woke me up. I stumbled around gathering my things and passed out in the car while he drove and drove and drove South. After a while, I woke up, and we switched so that I could drive. My mom gave me two watermelon lollies as a stocking stuffer, so I pulled those out when the drive got boring, and we slurped on those for a while. Very tasty. I love good old fashioned watermelon candies. We managed to drive without the GPS for a good while and not get lost. Somehow, it had frozen, and neither of us had picked up on it! When we realized it, we reset it, and discovered that we had been driving through LA for a while already! We were managing to slip through without much traffic! Yippee!!

We arrived at Lizzie's house around noon, and I got to meet her boyfriend, Brett. Lizzie suggested that we all head to the beach and go kayaking. They had three kayaks among them, which was perfect because Tim could go out while I watched the dog, and vice versa. They also had lots of extra kayaking clothes, so we all suited up and headed to the beach! Navi was really excited to be on the beach, and I got to learn how to do a t-rescue. I didn't get to try a full roll, though, because I got tired. I'm not really comfortable with being upside down in the water yet!

After that, we headed back to Lizzie's, and cleaned all the kayaks and kayaking gear. We packed it all up, put Navi in her crate, and drove down to San Diego to Jonny's place. Shortly after we arrived, Jonny left to pick up their parents from the airport. Lizzie, Brett, and I started dinner, which was stuffed chicken, green beans, and ...something else that I can't remember. After dinner was the present exchange. I was getting pretty sleepy at this point, and after a while we drove Joyce and Ron to their hotel (since we didn't get the rental house until Saturday) and then we headed back and fell asleep on Lizzie's floor.

The rest of the week included lots of fun! We went to a local farmers market, and poked around there. I discovered roly poly squash, which I think is such a silly name. We also found lots of flavored honey sticks, and grabbed a few. There was a stand full of candy / caramel apples, and of course, I tried a peanut caramel apple which was pretty yummy. The main street in town had a little doggy bakery, so I picked up two mini pupcakes for Navi! I normally wouldn't, but since it was vacation, Navi deserves treats too! The pupcakes were covered in a tower of very thick frosting, and pretty sprinkles on top!

We went to Balboa Park in San Diego, which has the spanish village, the san diego zoo, and lots of other things. At the spanish village, I picked up two new beads for necklaces. I also found a beautiful glass hummingbird feeder to replace the one that -sniffle- died. After wandering around for a while, we headed over to the San Diego Zoo and saw lots of animals. The San Diego Zoo is so big that I am always sick of animal watching by the end, and that is saying something because I really like animal watching. Timmy took a gadzillion photos of everything, so maybe I will add some of his photos here eventually! At one point in the zoo, we had a choice between the monkey walk and the tiger walk. Timmy told me, "we should go see the monkeys, because the tigers are always laying somewhere that you can't see." Then his parents veto'd his decision, and we went to the tiger walk anyway. Funny thing is the tiger was hiding in the grass when Timmy walked up. As soon as Timmy lifted up his camera, the tiger saw, and came crashing up the ladder towards the window to stare at Timmy. So Timmy got some amazing tiger photos. There was also a very cute polar bear who was playing in the water with a ball. He'd throw it, do somersaults in the water after it, eat it, and he was generally having a blast. He drew quite the crowd, and I watched him for quite a while.

After the San Diego Zoo, we were all ravenous so we went out for mexican food. Yummy! I tried one of those burritos that are fried...and I won't be doing that again. After that, we went to a very expensive dessert place in San Diego. Ten dollars for a slice of cake! It assaulted my senses. I ended up choosing the most complicated cake I could find; it had layers of mouuse, creme brule, chocolate cake, and a really thick chocolate goo. I picked it because I have no idea how I'd get creme brule into a cake. I figured that if it was going to cost $10 dollars a slice, it better be a complicated slice that I would never want to make myself. Timmy (willingly) and I (grudgingly) shared a slice and it was pretty delicious. Timmy is a lot smarter than I am, because after my half, I was about to die of a sugar coma. Silly me!

On one of the days, we went wine tasting! I'm not very sophisticated, and I only like wine with a high sugar content. They gave us six choices, and I immediately looked at the dessert wines. There were four dessert wines, so I had to try two other things. I finally went with two different white wines, which I didn't like. Then I got to the dessert wines, and two weren't so good. There was a port wine, and they made you drink it while eating chocolate, which was pretty cool. The second to last wine I had was a sweet white wine that I really, really liked. I never really like wine, so I bought two bottles! After that, we went to in-N-out because Ron had never had it before. It's a west coast thing, so you have to experience it! Then we went to the Wild Animal Park, which was more of a safari take on a zoo. There was a hummingbird aviary with a gorgeous hummingbird. It was kind of freaky because these birds are used to people being there. As a result, they will fly really close to your head! I couldn't get used to that. There was this section of the zoo that you can't see by walking. You wait in a very long line for about an hour, and you get onto a little train. The train takes you around, and you see these big pens where several different animals are combined. The lions are always alone, though. One lion was sleeping like Navi. At the zoo and the wild animal park, there were always a lot of ducks in any water bird exhibit. I wonder if zookeepers hate ducks. They probably eat a lot of the bird feed, and you can't exactly get rid of ducks, can you? There were a lot of ducks, so I think that even though zookeepers love animals, they must really hate ducks.

One of the days, Timmy, Lizzie and I went out for a nice road bike ride. We rode along the beaches and the water, and then doubled back and went up into the hills. While we were pedaling up the hill, Lizzie pointed ahead, and signed, "W-A-L-L" I looked up, and the hill got really steep! So we slowly panted and chugged our way up the hill, and conquered it anyway! Then we got our reward when we whizzed home at supersonic speeds! That same day, we also had a campfire on the beach. We had wooden skewers, and we had a fun time trying to toast the hot dogs without burning ourselves! Then we had s'mores, and mmmmm...s'mores. I love s'mores. Navi was really good at the beach, and just laid down next to us. We went out wading, and Timmy and I found a dead lobster. It was picked completely clean by whatever ate it. We put it on a rock (without touching it!) and carried it to shore to show everyone else. Lizzie picked it up with her bare hands, which freaked me out. Then we threw it back into the water. I also found some fun shells. I almost brought them home, but then I realized I'd do nothing with them. So I threw them back.

Another day, we went to the Getty Center in Los Angeles. It is this beautiful museum with amazing architecture and fun fountains. I didn't really like the art exhibits that much because it was mostly religious painting, but one exhibit was called "small trades." It was a collection of photographs of people of all different trades in all different areas, done a long time ago. It was funny to compare policemen from London, Paris, and New York. They all looked so silly and different! They had comparisons of all different trades, and locations. The only weird thing was they duplicated a lot of images...so you'd see the same image 4 or 5 times in the exhibit. I didn't understand why. Timmy spent the entire time trying to figure out what kind of rock the center was made out of. He was convinced that it was fancy poured cement, and I was convinced it wasn't. Turns out it was some fancy fossilized rock with a silly name.

On New Years Eve, everyone stayed up for the ball drop. I was engrossed in a book, but everyone played lots of board games and wii. When it got close to midnight, we turned on the TV to watch the ball drop. It said it was live programming, but it was of Times Square. How could it be live, when the ball dropped three hours earlier in NYC? I thought that was silly.

Then we went to bed and drove home the next day after cleaning up the house. It was fun, but I was glad to be home!