My life and times on a reverse island
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Wednesday, November 25, 2009
I don't know if anyone uses Method brand soaps/etc. I don't happen to. I've taken to mixing almost all my own products. I might have bought some of their stuff in the past; I truly don't recall. But I won't be buying any in the future.
I find their new ad positively disgusting. They are, supposedly, attempting to get required labeling of ingredients on products with this ad. "If you don't know what's in it, how can you ever feel clean", I think is the idea. You're supposed to send this ad to your legislators to help make that case.
The only case I think was made was that degradation, humiliation, harassment and other unwanted sexual advances (up to and including rape as far as I'm concerned) towards a human being--in particular in this case, a woman--is not only acceptable, but "humorous", "fun" and "captivating" (as email replies from the company have called the ad/material).
Blech. I'm trying to figure out how anyone feels okay after watching this. Anyone? Please enlighten me! Seriously.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eP3vbG7YHuM
http://www.methodhome.com/post/2009/11/20/when-did-clean-become-so-dirty.aspx
Monday, November 16, 2009
Cute little piece of furniture. Perfect for a smaller dining room in need of a bit of extra storage space as well as display space. Or, really, in any room in need of storage and/or display space. The two pieces come apart, so it's shelves and the cabinet. So, anything from china hutch to books to altar space to whatever.
Let me know if interested. :)
http://raleigh.craigslist.org/fuo/1467135262.html
Monday, August 24, 2009
The rind is in its final stages right now, and soon will be canned/processed and stored away. It looks perfect! And the syrup tastes perfect! I haven't actually tasted a piece of rind yet as it's still bubbling away in the syrup, but it looks and feels great.
This is an absolute piece of cake to make! It's oddly a very expensive treat whenever I see it for sale, and there's no reason for that. Basically use up your trash (the rind) then put in really just a few minutes of work (and quite a few hours when the rind is just soaking in different types of fluid) and that's that. I'd say it's much easier to make than jams and such.
I forgot how wonderful watermelon was until I made that salad the other day, and now I have all the more reason to go buy some more of it. I can keep myself stocked in cheap rind for the rest of my life. Woohoo!
I love making something I've never made before, especially something that, for some odd reason, seemed mysterious or complicated to me. I guess it was just so foreign to me as I never saw/heard of the stuff until my mid-20's that I imagined it to be complicated. Huh. Strange how the mind works.
I adore this stuff. Definitely one of those things that this Yankee-ish person scoffed at when she arrived south of the Mason-Dixon, but was certainly willing to try. And my sweet tooth was never happier with that first wonderful bite. Ahhh...
So, I happened to make a watermelon salad yesterday (watermelon, olive oil, lemon juice, salt, pepper, tabasco and mint with optional feta and/or onions and/or olives; very tasty!) and now I have all this rind that I almost put in the trash. And then realized I could pickle it. Yay!
So, I'm doing that today. I've found some recipes and will likely start with those. But, if anyone has a time-tested recipe or hints for the process, do let me know as I always like some pointers on something I've never made before. Otherwise, I'll start with the basic recipes I've found and tweak over time as I learn, I'm sure.
Tuesday, May 19, 2009
I've seen a few third-party references about Twitter mention the @ sign in some fashion that then proceed to call it the "ampersand".
Which...it's not.
Is this mistake being made by random people who happen to label the @ wrong, or does some sort of odd Twitter canon actually demand that we now label @ instead of & "ampersand"?
Sunday, May 17, 2009
We have been playing for a few months now, and been tracking results for 13 weeks. It's going quite well. In addition to the fun we've had, we're absolutely saving money while simultaneously stockpiling a good amount of food.
Now, I've always kept a well-stocked pantry, but we are seriously well-stocked now! Our freezer is nicely stocked, too. I know I could easily eat for 4+ weeks off my original stockpiling (when money was very tight years ago, I did just that!). I can't begin to estimate now, but I think we could probably get more like 6-8, if not many more, weeks out of out stock. That is, if we ate the proper portions and not like your average Americans. ;)
After 13 weeks we have spent ~1300 and saved an additional ~1000. So, we're spending 100/week on groceries for two, but are leaving with a rather overstuffed cart worth close to double that. Keep in mind that if 100/week sounds outrageous for two people that 1) we no longer eat out at all (other than vacation, occasionally with friends, etc.), 2) we have a stockpile that would keep us nicely fed for months even with no income, and 3) we have a broad range of stock so that we can make nearly any recipe without having to shop for special ingredients (okay, the gram/chickpea flour for an Indian fish batter was something new, but I'd say that's rather specialty for most households).
All in all, we love it! Week after week of hovering around, and occasionally topping, the 50% off mark and every week saving so much that a manager has to come and approve the transaction...now that is FUN!
Ahem. Okay. So we need social lives. At least we're saving enough money to have them someday. ;)
Thursday, May 14, 2009
Home from our amazing mountains vacation. Actually got in early, around 3:30ish, which also let us pick up the dogs today rather than tomorrow morning.
Had a great time and did all sorts of things and will likely post more about it later.
Thursday, April 2, 2009
ETA: cancel that request! I found it! It was in the coupon section of the Sunday paper! :) "Angel Lush", just a crap fluffy recipe that might work well for spring/Easter stuff (especially with angel food and strawberries on sale...). Yay. :)
...for angelfood cake layered with strawberries and some sort of pineapple cream fluffy goodness?
I saw a recipe the other day for such a thing and it was talking about being great for when strawberries go crazy/in season and I thought I'd tuck it away for later. Some strawberries are coming out now and some are on good sale, so I thought of making this. Now, I cannot find the recipe. I swore it was in one of my cookbooks, but I can't find it again. Not in the magazines I get related to food. Did one of y'all post something? :/
Yeah, yeah, I can find plenty-o-similar recipes online but there was something about *this* one that I really loved. And yes, I could fake my way through it just fine. But that's not what I'm after, not for this, not right now.
So...anyone? :/
Current mood:  argh
AKA: Taxes, 2008.
School ending and starting, student loans in all directions, old jobs and new jobs, marriage, sold one property, investment and other accounts moving all over the place, all kinds of charity donations, etc. etc. etc.
I think the only new-tax-thing we didn't do was have a baby. Thank goodness! Phew! Back to the taxes... Blergh.
Monday, March 30, 2009
Sunday, March 29, 2009
I mentioned recently that I had a really hard night but was struggling to talk about it here. It's not so much the topic that has me stuck, it's the getting across the feelings. Perhaps I've accepted that I can't ever get those feelings and that moment across fully. So I'll share just a few basics here. The "facts" of what happened, and a handful of thoughts/feelings/tangents/where my mind went.
Here's the deal. This is very sad stuff. It's disturbing. It's not for the faint- or tender-hearted. It is not recommended for pregnant folks or maybe even parents at all. I don't know... I don't know how to qualify it. Maybe it's best for no one to read it and it just be vaguely therapeutic for me.
But, this is just one aspect of my job and a reality of life. I share it to get some aspects of it off my chest, and perhaps to share with others how varied and how complex and how challenging my job can be at times. My involvement didn't highlight the very technical side of nursing, nor the physical or mental skills. This is mostly touching on the emotional aspects, which in some ways I think does nursing as a profession an injustice. My job is so much more than being the angel that comforts and holds hands. But sometimes, as I think most of you would grok, this is still the most challenging aspect of it. Tough IVs, new technology every day, complicated med regimens, complex health histories and plans of care be damned... This stuff wears you down.
( Cut because this is probably a bit much for quite a few folks )
We reached a new milestone in our grocery shopping/savings tonight in which we saved more than we spent. We've been doing TheGroceryGame(.com) and enjoying it. Worth the small fee every 8(or is it 12?) weeks and definitely helping us stockpile basics. I keep a well stocked pantry already, but now we're seriously well-stocked and for very low (sometimes free!) prices.
( Blahblahblah, cut because it's long )
Thursday, March 12, 2009
I've been working quite a bit of OT lately but this week only worked my expected 3 days. So, I have four days off which should be a nice thing.
Last night was my first night off and unfortunately it was migraine hell. I would say the very worst I've ever had, but when you're in the middle of a bad migraine, each one feels like the worst. I was in pain, I couldn't stand light nor sound nor touch (my skin got super sensitive and everything from blankets to clothes to air moving at all made me want to cry), couldn't sleep, was nauseated and vomiting (or "vomicky", as most of my patients say for some reason), meds took forever to kick in and I swear made me feel worse, etc. etc. I finally sorta slept and had horrible dreams that had me waking up sobbing and unable to stop even though I was completely aware these were only dreams. Finally, maybe around 7am (my normal think-about-bed-time) I think I did fall asleep. Had some funky work dreams, was still in some pain but it was much more tolerable, but more or less did sleep. Until about 2 pm. Still with a headache but it's manageable. But with that post migraine (or post migraine med?) haze about me. Tried OTC meds. Tried coffee. Now with a soda. We'll see if I'm human again by the time M gets home in the next hour.
( Other stuff, since I'm here )
Wednesday, February 25, 2009
We've been happily without cable for a couple months now. I'm very much enjoying the "extra" time I have when I don't default to wasting it in front of the tv. I.e. putting the thing on for "background noise" and then getting sucked into crap or reruns of good shows I've already seen, etc. I'm all for good/great tv when it's good and enriching in some fashion, but we really just wasted time in front of the thing. I came to understand my mother's incessant pleas to "turn off that boob tube!" in my childhood.
So anyway...no cable meant we refound all this time to do stuff we actually loved. It's been great. We did still have basically one channel, 22, though. It was grainy and it's certainly not the most exciting channel out there, but it was nice to have.
If we did want to watch news or some live tv update/speech/etc. it was likely on there. Sure, the internets do provide, but sometimes together on the couch is a nice way to watch such things, too. And, if we really did want "background noise" (and didn't feel like music or whatever), we had that available. One night putting away laundry, I had some juicer infomercial on. I truly just wanted mindless chatter/noise in the background. Nothing to get sucked into there. But the chatter was nice for whatever reason.
Now with digital conversion, 22 is gone. We do still have one analog Spanish-language channel... :/ We thought about getting the conversion box. But I kinda like having no TV. I liked having the one channel, though, as described above.
So...I'm just curious. Any other noncable/satellite folks previously relying on antenna converted over to digital for rare tv moments? Do you still just get the signals from close stations? Did it open up more channels? Like it/dislike it? Just curious. The converter box is not at all a big expense, but before we expend anything, I'd love to hear more about it.
Thursday, February 19, 2009
Today M and I drove into work/school together, and of course drove home together as well. We worked/"clinicaled" from about 7:30-3:30. Came home, enjoyed a bit of afternoon together and will probably go to bed at fairly normal times. I must admit...this has been kinda nice. Probably not nice enough to give up my night shift pay. But...makes me think about it. I can just keep holding onto the idea that in another year (or so), M might be working and we might be *close* to the same schedule. RadTechs at WakeMed generally work 4 10's, so it won't be perfect, but...hopefully close. It is awfully nice to feel kinda normal, though. Wow. Never thought I'd say that. :)
On more frustrating fronts... ( Water heater crap )
Tuesday, February 17, 2009
So we're not exactly big VDay folks for various reasons, but we do tend to honor it a bit. For the most part, our celebration of the day was the entire weekend/trip, but we did each end up getting each other something in the realm of stereotypical silliness. ( Gift exchange )
So, to start rather vanilla about our weekend... ( The food. )
I've been happily enrolled in a trauma nursing course this Thursday and Friday, so that means my work schedule got changed a bit and I only have to work on Tuesday night and then a short shift (8 hrs) on Friday night, which happen to be the two nights M is working this week as well.
So, we will quite happily but strangely have nearly the same schedule this week and therefore have some nights together. And, I think we'll even be able to have a couple lunches together Thu-Fri, and maybe even commute to work/school together on Thursday.
Amazing! A miracle! And it makes me all the more excited for him to be done with school so that there's a chance we could get jobs on the same shift and actually have regular time together again. Our funky schedules are definitely a challenge in our own relationship, let alone in having more "normal" social lives with others.
Monday, February 16, 2009
Exhausted. Sore. Content. Still reeling a bit. Had a positively fantastic time on all sorts of level. May try to write about this more in the coming week. :)
Mmmm...can't wait until next year. Or maybe until camp. Or even LR... Hmmm...
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