Pico de Gallo! Or maybe, Salsa!

Mark and I had lunch at Barberito's today. He got a meat skinny, and I got the cheese quesadillas with a side of sour cream and salsa. The salsa was fantastic! It wasn't really hot - and I like hot salsa. If you had asked me, I would have said it was pico de gallo - it was chunky instead of saucy - but I don't guess I really know the difference. Anyway, I had one of those moments where I thought "Hey, I could make this! What's in this - tomatoes, shallots, cilantro, is that lime?, - I could so make this!"

So I'm stopping by the store on the way home for a few items anyway, and I grab some fresh cilantro, a lime, and a can of petite diced tomatoes. I drain the tomatoes, finely dice a shallot, chop a handful of cilantro, drizzle in a couple turns of the olive oil bottle, juice the lime, salt, pepper and Presto! Pico de Gallo! Or Salsa! Whatever - it's really, really good! Again, not spicy like you get with the peppers. The lime and the cilantro give it a slight sweetness that's really tasty.

Right now it's "marrying flavors" in the fridge, which means, I think, it's only getting better. Yay! Tonight I'll be munching on chips and salsa while we watch season 2 of Lost on DVD. I miss that Mr. Eko. Good times.

Not the Story I Thought He Was Telling

So, I pick the boys up from school. Ben immediately starts in with one of his high-octane, play-by-play stories.

"We were playing basketball in the gym today and I was at half court and Alex was driving the basket so I MOTORED down court and I jumped right when he jumped and I sky-walked about a mile and got right up in his face and when he tried to make the shot I reached way back behind me and slammed my hand forward and REJECTED him so bad and when I landed I was sure I had diarrhea'd myself but then I went to the bathroom and I was fine."

Disappointed!

Mark and I work in different departments in the same ops center. This never used to happen, but for some reason, since I've been back, I regularly get emails that were intended for him. I think people type the last name in, and it auto-fills alphabetically, and I come up first, or something. Anyway, people can't be bothered to make sure they're emailing the right person, so I read through these messages trying to figure out why the heck Jim Bob in Dallas wants me to join some call at 2:00. And then I realize what's happened, and forward the note on the Mark, and say something witty like "this must be for you!". It's really fun when a conversation gets going and I have to forward like fifty notes on to him, or reply back to everybody to leave me the heck alone and read the &^%#$ distro next time! But I digress.

Today I get an email telling me that I've won an award! This is no Spot Award - this is the big one. The grand poobah of awards. Recipients get a day off with pay, $50, a prime parking spot, and a lovely piece of lucite to clutter up their desk. So I read that subject line "Congratulations! You've won an award!" and I am PUMPED. PUMPED! I start thinking what I'm spending my money on, and when I'm taking my day off. PUMPED! But as I read this email, I don't find my name anywhere. Like three people won awards, but none of them are named Creevedog. So I check the address list. And there I am. Right there in the cc line, with all the other department managers who have someone on their team who won this month. People like, say, Mark. Not people like, say, me. I've won jack. Some guy on Mark's team is spending my $50 and parking in my space.

As Kevin Kline would say "Disappointed!!!"

Play Ball!

After a disappointing (no, make that painful) two and twenty-two record last year, the bad boys of Bolton Block came out swinging to start the 2008 season off with a 14-1 win over Scott's Farms. One kid even took one deep his first time up. Ben put up two Ks, but he went down swinging hard both times. He made up for it on defense - he made an awesome catch in center, then gunned a kid down at first trying to tag up. You gotta love baseball!

(Sorry about the bad picture - Mom left the real camera at home.)

What I'm Reading Now

Nineteen Minutes, by Jodi Picoult. She's one of my favorite authors these days. I highly recommend Plain Truth (set in the Amish country) and Second Glance (with a supernatural spin). Vanishing Acts was really good as well - about a women who discovers she was kidnapped as a child. Picoult also writes about some pretty disturbing stuff - My Sister's Keeper is one that I have no desire whatsoever to read (I'll let you look up the story line for that one yourself.)

Nineteen Minutes is borderline too disturbing for me, but I'm trying it anyway. It's about a high school shooting spree reminiscent of Columbine. Picoult does a lot of research for her books, and brings a lot of realistic details to her writing. She also has a very readable style. I'll keep you posted on this one.

I did finish Julie and Julia - it got better, I have to say, but still not as good as I'd hoped. Two and a half out of five stars.

Opening Day!

Today was opening day for Little League! In keeping with tradition, it poured down rain. So much so, they canceled all the festivities. Oh well. At least I got one photo.

What's In a Name?

I read several blogs on a regular basis. Most of them are listed on my side bar, but I occasionally read others. I'm curious about something: where did your blog name come from?

In my case, my URL name 'CREEVEDOG' comes from my first real job. I worked in a Help Desk, and we used these old mainframe systems. Our user IDs were so prevalent in these systems, we just started referring to one another that way. CREEVE4 was my ID (my first initial, coupled with a common misspelling of my maiden name) and that somehow morphed in Creevedog. Some of our IDs stuck so well that we still use them to this day (take my good friend Twinger, for example.) So I use Creevedog anytime I need a unique identifier that I know no one else is using.

Mixin' It Up came from my desire to feature my mixer prominently. I thought it would be a neat metaphor of sorts for what I would write about, but now, three months later, I don't think I've really mixed anything up, metaphorically speaking. But I do continue to mix up cookie batter and the like. So it works.

What about you? If you have a blog, how did you choose the name? And the URL name? And if you don't have a blog, what would you name it if you had one?

Random Thoughts on Travel

Sorry about the absence of posts - I was in Dallas on business. And I have a few questions:

1. When someone compares your actual face to your picture ID, what should you do? Make eye contact? Look wistfully away like you're in an Olan Mills photo? What?
2. Airlines now board planes by zone. "Now boarding Zone 1" and so on. There is apparently no penalty for throwing an elbow and boarding outside your zone, by the way, but I digress. The zones are boarded front to back. Wouldn't it make more sense to board back to front? Or for that matter, window seats to aisle? Just a process improvement idea.
3. What did people do in airports before they had cell phones?
4. When you drive into DFW from I-635, you go through a toll booth kind of a thing where they give you a ticket. Looks like a ticket you would get in a parking garage. Then you drive about a quarter mile, and go through another toll booth kind of thing. This time, they take the ticket back. What the heck is that?
5. Why do you feel so foolish standing around without your shoes on?
6. Why do people try so hard to appear like they don't need to hang on for dear life on the train in the Atlanta airport? Do they think they look cool, being all stiff and lock-jawed? They look like they're being electrocuted. I hang on with both hands and bend at the knees - I'm not impressing anybody.
7. Why do flight attendents get shoulder belts as well as lap belts in those little jump seats they sit in? If those shoulder belts increase my odds in any way, I would like some, too.
8. What does Don't Mess With Texas really mean? How would someone "mess with" a state? And what states can you mess with? Rhode Island? Idaho?

That's all.

The Great Outdoors

Mark and Ben just returned from their first camp out with the Boy Scouts. They camped Friday night on the Virginia Creeper Trail, biked 27 MILES on Saturday, camped again on Saturday night, and came home this morning. If you aren't familiar with the Creeper Trail, it is a former railroad, which means is it flatter than most hiking/biking trails in the area. They biked on the flattest part of the trail - it gets steeper right past Damascus, VA, where they camped - but it was still quite an undertaking. I am very proud of Ben for sticking with it - it was his first time camping and biking a trail like that. Mark said he was quite the trooper (and I imagine Mark was quite the trooper as well!)


I am attaching a few of the pics they took of the campsite, and one aerial shot that I got from the Creeper Trail website - they started in Damascus and biked 13.5 miles to Abingdon, VA (shown on the map - the start of the trail), then 13.5 miles back to their camp.

What I'm Reading Now

Julie and Julia, by Julie Powell. It began as a blog, then became a novel, and will soon be a major motion picture. The concept: a wacky New Yorker attempts to cook everything in Julia Child's Mastering the Art of French Cooking. In one year. In a small New York apartment kitchen.

I was really pumped about this book, because I was really pumped about Mastering the Art of French Cooking, after being really pumped about the Julia Child memoir. So far, I've been rather disappointed. The book is more about the author's personal angst, and the cooking so far is only mentioned here and there - it certainly isn't the focus. I'm OK with angst, but it's difficult to sympathize with the author because she really isn't all that likeable. She uses lots of profanity, and is frankly rather vulgar. I might not stick with this one.

You Know What I Hate?

VRUs.

Why is it that when a person asks you your name, you can say "Belinda Manfredchensen" with no problem, but when a machine asks you your name, you feel like a complete moron when you answer? And when a person asks what you need, you can say "I need to make a payment," but when it's a machine asking, you just get SO MAD!?!?!?!

I work with a guy who doesn't say the word "wash" like the rest of the human race. He says "worsh". He had to call Sears one time because his dishwasher was on the fritz. He got a VRU. Imagine the hilarity that ensued.

Lion King Seats

Hadn't planned on getting them this early, but when I found front row mezzanine seats, how could I pass?

I Found My Thrill

I have been reading a lot about the health effects of blueberries. We have a program at work called "The Healthy Heart Campaign", and it goes on and on and on about blueberries and how great they are. My biggest issue with the blueberry is the cost - $3.99 for a half a pint. That's a lot of money and not a lot of berry. But this same Healthy Heart Campaign reminded me that I would gladly spend $4 on a cup of coffee, why not fresh fruit? Touche, Mr. Mackey. Touche.

So I have begun investigating ways to bring this uber-berry into our diets. The first coup I found was the frozen berry option. Sure, it's not "fresh fruit", but you can get almost four times the berry for the same cost, and with very little nutritional sacrifice. Sweet! And the frozen berries I've found are much bigger and healthier looking than their fresh produce counterparts.

Now that I have a supplier, I have begun looking for blueberry recipes. The first is a no-brainer: the blueberry muffin. A breakfast classic. The Barefoot Contessa has a great recipe that I have been using - go to foodnetwork.com and search for "Blueberry Coffee Cake Muffins", or, if you are fortunate enough to own her Barefoot Contessa Family Style cookbook, see page 174. The only change I make is using white whole wheat flour instead of all-purpose. I can tell a difference in texture, but I actually like it better. I included a photo - I tore the muffin in half so you could see the huge purple-ness of the berries. (The muffins actually bake bigger and taller than the one pictured - it was the runt of the litter and the only one left.)

In addition to the muffins, I have been making a mean blueberry banana smoothie. Ben loves them, and he and I have split one for breakfast every day for a week. You will need:

1/2 to 3/4 cup blueberries
One whole banana, sliced
1/2 cup vanilla or plain yogurt
One tablespoon honey
3/4 to one cup milk (depending on how smooth you like your smoothie)

Mix thusly:

Look at that awesome color!

This makes enough for two, unless you're just really hungry.

Easter

Let the children sing
A song of liberation
The God of our salvation
Set us free

Death where is thy sting
The curse of sin is broken
The empty tomb stands open
Come and see…

- Travis Cottrell

Zuppa!

Ever since the early dating days, Mark and I have loved to go to Olive Garden for the Pasta E Fagioli soup. We've always wanted to try to recreate the soup at home. Our newsletter at work runs a recipe each month, and last month's was a recipe for Pasta E Fagioli in the crock pot. We gave it a try, and it rocked! It was a little thicker than the OG version, but just as good.

You will need:
2 lbs ground beef (I actually cut it back to one pound to make it more soupy)
1 onion, chopped
3 carrots, chopped
4 stalks celery, chopped
2 (28 oz) cans diced tomatoes, undrained
1 (16 oz) can red kidney beans, drained
1 (16 oz) can white kidney beans, drained
3 (10 oz) cans beef stock
3 teaspoons oregano
2 teaspoons pepper
5 teaspoons parsley
1 teaspoon tabasco sauce
1 (20 oz) jar spaghetti sauce
8 ounces pasta

Brown the ground beef, drain, and add to the crock pot with everything but the pasta. Cook all day on low. Boil the pasta for 10 minutes or so, drain, and add to the soup. Enjoy!

Warning: this makes an insane amount of soup. We have a rather large crock pot, and it fills it to the rim. But oh....is it good. We add a little red pepper to it as well, for that extra kick.