Neat shit worth sharing

I'm hoping to post a recipe tomorrow. I've already made the food, but I'm a little worried about time since I'm leaving early to get a possible patdown before my flight to Baltimore tomorrow. So in case I don't get to it, I owe ya' one and Happy Thanksgiving!

Now onto the good stuff.

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Did you ever read Goosebumps growing up?

I guess I was kind of a strange kid in that as other girls my age were reading stories about horses and teenage babysitters, I was stuck on Goosebumps. I LOVED these books and owned just about all of the original series.

So imagine my happiness when I found a blog, Blogger Beware, dedicated to snarkily summarizing all of the books!

One of my favorite parts from Monster Blood:

It seems either the dog's grown larger or the leash has grown smaller. I swear to God it takes Evan like forty pages to make the connection between his growing dog and the Monster Blood it ingested. Oh wait, I'm sorry, ***SPOILER ALERT***

Definitely a blog worth keeping around when I'm bored and nostalgic.

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If Goosebumps isn't your thing, maybe music is. If neither Goosebumps nor music is your thing, then just stop reading altogether and reassess your values.

Amazon is practically giving away MP3 Downloads this Christmas. Everyday they offer a new selection of super cheap-o albums. Yesterday they had Kayne's new album for $3.99 and today they're offering Belle and Sebastian for $1.99! It's enough to make you want to impulse buy daily!

Recipe of the week, Nov 14

Thanks to daylight “savings” time, the sun has already set when I leave work at 5:00pm everyday. Add that to the fact that this week was going to be crazy busy and I knew that my desire to cook would be minimal.

So I decided to make this delicious Asain noodle dish – which makes a lot and taste even better the next day (bonus!). I can’t find a link to the recipe anywhere and I certainly didn’t make it up myself, so hopefully my description will help.

Here’s my cast of characters. I couldn’t find fresh sugar snap peas because they’re not in season, but I found that the frozen ones already had the tips broken off – laziness rewarded.

Start by mixing the sauce in a small bowl:

1 clove of chopped garlic
3 tbsp of sesame oil
2 1/2 tbsp of apple cider vinegar
3 tbsp of soy sauce
1 tbsp of ginger.

Then boil water for the vermicelli noodles. I used wheat ones because I love the taste of wheat noodles when you’re cooking with fresh(ish) vegetables.

While the noodles are cooking, heat 1 tbsp of sesame oil in your wok or large skillet (but seriously, get a wok) and cook your onions and asparagus for around 3 minutes on high heat.

Then add the sugar snap peas and the sauce you mixed up. Cook on HIGH for another minute, then lower to medium heat.

After your pasta is al dente, drain and add to your wok (see why you need a wok?). Let cook on medium heat, mixing for around 2 minutes.

Then I toasted walnuts by letting them sit in my conventional oven at around 300degrees for around 3-4 minutes. Top your delicious asian noodle dish with the toasted walnuts and your done!

While it sounds like there’s a lot involved, this dish only takes around 20 minutes to make because the vegetables cook rather quickly. And like I said, it’s great the next day when the flavors have really been able to mix together!

Neat shit worth sharing

Hello blog. Goodbye hiatus.

Finally, the test is over with. I won’t know my score for six weeks and to be honest, I’m considering not even looking at it when it gets sent. That’s how little I cared for this test and the standardized testing scheme in general.

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The best post-test cathartic moment was getting to clean my apartment the next day. I know that’s nerdy but a weeks worth of mail, study materials and clothes had piled up all over my normally relatively clean apartment.

I wish I would have known about this awesome site during that mess because it was all too easy for me to misplace my phone.

How genius is this? As someone who lives alone and doesn’t have a landline, I may have to bookmark this site!

And when you find your phone and answer, you get to listen to a female computer voice assure you that she’s happy you found your phone. I guess that’s handy if you’re really lonely or something.

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These have seen a lot of blog love, but I have to share the adorable chalkboard speech bubbles available at PlayingGrownUp

I love the wedding trend of renting photobooths or better yet, just setting up your own photo background and having your guests take fun pictures. If you plan on getting married you NEED to do that and you NEED to incorporate these adorable signs.

These are at the top of my gift list for engagement parties.

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Remember how much I love calendars? Paper Source has by far the cutest monthly calendar I’ve ever come across. Don’t believe me? Well iKea does as I first spotted them in their latest catalog

Did you spot them? They’re the 2011 Zoo Calendar puzzles.

It’s like they wrapped my meticulous need for planning with the fun of animal figurines! These are definitely on my wishlist.

Neat Shit Worth Sharing (Holiday edition)

So because I failed on doing a recipe this week (spending $700 on application fees does not inspire one to go to the grocery store) and I may end up failing next week (impending standardized test don't help the appetite), I thought I'd give you a present.

As the holidays are approaching, we're all getting ready to give and receive. If you're like me then you've got bookmarks of cool gift ideas and wishlists from various stores filled with things you want. Wouldn't it be nice if there was one website that you could compile all of the things you want AND the gifts you want to give. Well friends, this is my present to you:

Wishpot lets you create as many lists as you want and lets you easily add items from any store. You can set the settings so that everyone can view your wishlist or that you can keep lists private (like your gift list). Now my anthropologie, amazon, etsy, etc favorites/wishlists can all be compiled into this resource! And you can list items based on how much you actually want them; currently this ring is in my "I really want it" priority:

How perfect for Christmas! Hence why I need it so badly.

Also they have this really handy toolbar that I was a little hesitant to download at first. This is because downloading allows them to access your history and see what stores you've been scoping out. But let's be honest, I'm posting on a blog and I have facebook, there is no such thing as internet privacy. So now with this toolbar, I can be looking at an item online, decide I want it on my list, click the handy wishpot button and BAM it's added to my list with an image, price, and link.

If your interested in seeing my list you can review it HERE or you can do a people's search if you already know my last name. I know I'll be adding to it a lot more as the holidays approach.

If you love this idea, you should join and add me! I'd love to see what people want!

Neat shit worth sharing

I’ve kicked it up full gear on this whole graduate school applying thing. I won’t go into too much boring detail, but I’ve applied to all but two (edit: ONE!) schools and once I take my last crappy standardized test next weekend, I’ll be FINISHED.

But I need a little lightheartedness right now, so hope you enjoy these two items.

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I’ll start with this new, um…quarky, blog I found. I need another blog to follow like I need another $150 standardized test to take, but this one was too good to resist! It’s titled Bangable Dudes in History – just check out this historical hottie below, can you guess who?

Joseph Stalin. Yea, Stalin. He was gorgeous! Of course I don’t like him for his ideals but that hair!

Anyway, the blog is worth checking out because the genius author also creates a pie chart to fully evaluate why these people were major, in her own words, boners.

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Have you seen this single by Willow Smith (of the Jada Picket and Will Smith geneology)? I love it for many reasons but the front runners are the fact that a young, black girl is singing about how much she loves her hair which is fantastic/empowering AND the song just makes you want to bounce.

And it’s currently my ringtone, which conveniently just went off during work. That’s the risk you take being fabulous.

A little bit new

Quick note: I know all the grass is all dying, but I couldn't help but change to a greener header.

Hope you like it!

Font: dubtronic inline

Recipe of the week, 10/24

This week was another one of those times where I didn’t have an exact recipe per say, so I pulled from a bunch of different sources.

Truly this is probably one of the easiest things to make and probably the most hearty – Pulled Pork Sandwiches. Oh yea!

I wanted to buy Pork shoulder/butt (I guess these things are interchangeable…I can tell you the meat on my shoulder versus my butt is not) but alas the butcher didn’t have anything smaller than 6 lbs. So I decided to get a nice manageable 3 lb pork roast. It didn’t yield that nice bone-in-taste but it was easier to shred.

I went home on my lunch break to start cooking the pork.

I began by trimming away that top layer of fat then I rubbed each side with cumin, salt and pepper.

I just happened to be wearing my favorite (faux)pearl necklace that day and was channeling a little Julia Child

After the rub, I placed it in the crockpot with some beef broth and water until it was submerged.

Then I set the crockpot on low and went back to work

When I came home four hours later, I shredded the entire roast and started to make my Pulled Pork sandwich.

I’m only using a small portion of the shredded pork for this sandwich as I have plans for the rest of it. I began by cut up an onion to put in with the pork and coated them both in Rich’s Sweet Heat (a delicious locally made BBQ sauce). I let this bake in the oven at 350F for around 15 minutes.

Then I served it with my favorite side dish – sweet potato fries (those are sweet potatoes in the photo above, already peeled).

These are easy to chop, season (with whatever your preference is), and bake for 30 minutes in the oven.

Then once everything is all baked and compiled, I had a delicious, hearty pulled pork sandwich with sweet potato fries

I’d love to hear if anyone else has some hearty meals to get them through the winter!