I have ANOTHER announcement to make:
I have my MerryLande EMT-Basic card! I am legal!
Double Yay for Vunderland!
Yay for Vunderkind job and for BBBobbio bein’ legal!
I packed. Go Me!
Hearty congratulations to both **Vunderkind **and you, Bobbio!
Whew! It’s been a busy day and I still have metric ton of stuff to do!
I went to the butcher shop this morning to pick up my prime rib roast and boy howdy, was it ever busy in there!
After that, I dashed to PetSmart to pick prezzies for the dogs so they have something to unwrap Christmas morning.
After that, I went to Safeway and bought everything else I needed for the Christmas Day meal, plus a couple of other items.
After that, I came home unloaded and put away the groceries, drank a diet coke, and then dashed back out to Starbucks to pick up a couple of gifts for last minute guests.
Now, it’s time to wrap prezzies and clean. Dinner will be Marie Calendar Chicken pot pies because I have too much to do to worry about fixing a full on dinner tonight.
This is the first night I’ve spent all by myself with no one else in the house in…it must be at least two years. It’s eerily quiet.
I just figured out how I know someone who friend-requested me on FaceBook a few months ago. It was a girl I used to hang out with at lunch in high school. :smack: Totally forgot her last name. And then I poke through my events and find out that the old high school gang is meeting for drinks and reminiscing at a bar in Charlotte tonight. Not that I’d be able to go, seeing as how I have to work tomorrow, but damn I wish I could go. 
Whoops, I need to pack my dad’s autographed by Terry Brooks 1977 copy of Sword of Shannara so I can present it to him with all appropriate fanfare Sunday. He knows I’m giving it to him and he’s excited.
I talked to OYKW a little bit ago. He’s at one of his brother’s house. I do believe he’s been in the adult beverages a bit. 
So have I. Just a bit though. I must travel tomorrow.
Also, I finished all the ironin’. Rah.
So friggen tired. Spent the day with my mom then grocery shopping then cooking and cleaning. My mom took a bunch of her junk jewelry bag purchases to the Gold exchange at the mall and found out she had $113 worth of silver so she sold it and put it toward an iPod touch 4th Gen for my stepdad (he always got her hand-me-downs before now) and she’s so excited to give it to him.
I got 2 box sets of MST3K for the house present (Sweetie and I decided not to get each other presents but that we’d get something for “the house”). Sweetie laughed at me and agreed that it’s an awesome house present. Who needs responsible stuff?
Sweetie and I went grocery shopping and spent $180 on food for the next two days. Then he started his chili for my family gathering tomorrow (if you can have a gathering with only 3 guests) and I started the twice baked NOTs and green bean casserole.
My mom gave us a baker’s rack and it has a new home in the kitchen against the brick wall and between the charcoal grill and stove (both are built in). It now houses the stuff that was on our counters so now our B.A.K (big ass kitchen) finally has the counterspace and workspace it should have. We worked together, with the 3 dogs underfoot and still had no problems with elbow room. It was glorious.
I have the oddest craving for a grilled nutella and cheese sammich and I have no clue if it’ll be good or not but I think I’m gonna do it anyway.
Congrats to everyone who deserves them!! Seems to be a lot of congratting going around lately.
Okay, you’ve all been doing proper human things, but I have not. I suspected sleepwalking, but not sleep driving.:eek::eek::eek: One time I walked a city block to buy kleenex, at about eight thirty in the evening. Another time I talked to the neighbors about their barky dog in Spanish, using words I didn’t know I knew. But I put bells on the door and hid my keys, so there’s only been one instance of sleep walking where I poured some juice and spilled a little of it on the counter.
It’s been months and I thought it was over. Umm, noooo. Evidently I got up, dressed, put on makeup, did my hair, got my purse and keys and drove to MalMart which is several miles away on a dark road. Even awake it’s tough to drive because the lines are nearly invisible.
In the store I picked up that book I ordered on-line, then some socks for my mom, as stocking stuffers, and some diet Dr. Pepper. Then I got into my car and drove home. All asleep. Evidently I’m undetectable as a sleepwalker, which hurts my attempts at genial eccentricity. On the other hand, I’m unlikely to end up on an episode of Cops.
I’m going to see my doctor soon and mention all this, but what do I do till then? The keys have to go in a lock box of some sort, right? Just please don’t let me sleepwalk to the store to buy the lockbox. Sheesh.
Jeez Ashes[sup]2[/sup], the weirdest thing my kid ever did sleepwalking was pee on the water heater. The utility closet was next to the bathroom, so it made sleepwalking sense…
I’s tahred. I made 2 double batches of fudge, and 2 single batches of cookie dough. VWife has to do the baking. I also learned something new: when making fudge, don’t put the vanilla in as soon as the sugar mixture comes off the burner. I never realized vanilla extract could explode… :eek::rolleyes:
You never put any extract in until the last possible minute because any heat will cause the volatile oils to dissipate and thereby lose flavor.
Ashes[sup]2[/sup]- your story gave me chills. I’d hate to have a problem like that.
12.5 more hours of retail Christmas Hell. most presents bought and wrapped. Canes win.
Congrats, [bshineycat**, and Vunderbob!!!
Spaz, also the Feats of Strength.
Wow Ashes, that’s scary.
Aside from that, isn’t it great when Christmas means jobs and other good things?
So I ended up with two checks equaling almost $1000. That’s not a typo. :eek: Supposedly its to cover next week while the company is closed. I didn’t have the heart to tell her that’s more than twice my normal weekly check.
I dropped off my last timecard at the temp agency, had sushi for lunch, and bought Mom a bunch of stocking stuffers and a couple of things for myself. Mom was home when I got there. She’d ended up with a tabletop foosball table from their Yankee swap, so I get that. And she was given rum balls, which me and dad get. She was so happy about my job she insisted I open a Christmas present. I insisted we all open one, so I got a Nanowrimo sweatshirt, she got one of her stocking stuffers that I half-assedly wrapped - really pretty green glass napkin rings and Blackjack gum - and Dad got a tin of Danish cookies.
And then I took a nap.
Yep, it’s scary and weird and for some reason embarrassing. Let’s hope the doc can figure out a solution.
Merry Christmas for anybody going a traveling. I’m leaving for my sister’s really early Christmas morning. Then we’ll pick up Mom, visit and presents, eat tamales and then I go home. My BIL isn’t my favorite person so this suits me just fine.
I learned some very important things while cooking tonight and I feel the need to share.
-
A clean fridge is so much better for prep cooking for the holidays. (I got smart and cleaned first this time - SO much easier!!)
-
If the potato timer goes off while you’re eating dinner, don’t forget to check the potatoes after you finish eating. (Totally forgot about them. The small-medium taters cooked for about 2.5 hours.)
-
There are some things which are worth the added cost. Heavy duty Reynold’s wrap is one of these things. (I didn’t have a single piece rip the wrong way and all of them fit very snugly over the pans they needed to cover. I was also able to label them with a sharp Sharpie and it didn’t poke through. I’ll continue to use the cheap stuff for cooking clay but the heavy duty is it for cooking food from now on.)
-
The medium sized disposable metal pans from the grocery store are the perfect size to fit on half a fridge shelf and can stack 4 high. Best of all, the cooling racks fit snugly over them so the food doesn’t get compressed when stacked.
-
Make sure the pepper jack cheese doesn’t have too much anger to it BEFORE adding it to something 12 other people will be eating.
-
A clean kitchen before cooking is easy to keep clean while cooking. A messy kitchen is a sad kitchen.
All in all, I think it turned out ok. The tater skins are a bit tougher than they usually are but it actually made them easier to scoop and fill and they have better structure for not collapsing in the pan. A couple people wont be able to chew the skins but they have trouble with tater skins anyway. The filling came out really well. I’ve tweaked the mix every time. I’m currently using sour cream, cream cheese, cheddar cheese, monteray jack cheese, pepper jack cheese, chives, and bacon. The taters have to be piled wicked high to use it all! Sweetie asked just as I was finishing, what I usually do with the leftover filling. He looked so cute and sad when I said that I never have any leftover. He did get to lick the spoon though. I don’t have tater tops like Mooooooooom does because I cut the taters in half (at the request of everyone who has eaten them so far).
I have a small pan of taters and another small dish of green bean casserole (yuck) for my family’s gathering tomorrow. Sweetie’s chili is cooking now so my stuff will just need to go in the oven tomorrow.
For Sweetie’s family gathering (half the size it should have been since his brother is a twat) is prepped too. The squash is cubed and ready for boiling and mashing. The taters are ready for second baking. The green bean casserole (yuck) is ready for baking. The ham is still thawing. The stuffing is boxed and takes about 10 minutes to cook (I’m much too lazy to make everything from scratch). The meat pies and desserts will be coming with the family. The paper plates, plastic cups, and plastic utensils are stacked and ready for food (yes, we’re too lazy for dishes too). Marshmallows are on the fireplace and ready for roasting. Trans-Siberian Orchestra channel is set in Pandora.
I’m ready for Christmas!!
Damn, Ashes! Worst thing I’ve done asleep - lately - was tell my mom to shut up. Embarrassing, but not that dangerous.
rod
I seem to be alternating good days and bad ones. Yesterday: good. Today: sucky. I got up at 7, very early for me, and was all racheted up to finally put in the closet system I got my mom for Christmas last year. (The closets in our house are small, and even then, the space is barely used at all.) I asked phoukabro minor for help - meaning mostly shifting the big heavy stuff, and helping me clear out the closet and tear out the original shelf and rod. Except, he took it over and wouldn’t listen to me. When he took a break, I told him I’d work on it myself. I had to tear out what he’d done and start over.
Then, I took my dad to go pick out a new mattress. Except, he couldn’t decide, the sales lady couldn’t find what she’d promised my mom, delivery was going to take seven days, and no one in the store knew what a trundle bed. Then, Dad completely lost the whole background on what we were getting, why we were getting it, how we were handling it, and why I was there to help*.
He’s old. That’s okay. He shuffles instead of walks. That’s okay. Sometimes, if I get distracted, I forget to walk very, very slowly, and get ahead of him, which annoys him. That’s okay, and I always apologize. But when he says maybe I should practice walking three steps behind him and follows it with “I’m joking, I’m joking, I’m joking” . . . no, that’s not okay. It’s an asshole thing to do. Pointing out the Sikh couple walking past us as an example when the wife is clearly walking beside her husband just a couple inches back is just . . . wow.
I spent the rest of the day putting in the closet, wondering how it is my brother thinks you can put a woodscrew through drywall and have it hold up several hundred pounds of clothes, and this makes him better at home repair projects than me. Or that levels are for wimps, reading installation directions for the cowardly, and girls don’t know how to hold a hammer.
And Mom wants me to figure out how to deal with Dad, because she’s out of ideas.
Fucking hell.
I am so glad I’m done. It took me half an hour to get from the 290 off ramp in Auburn to the pet store and that normally only takes about 2 minutes (if I catch all the lights at red). I was so tense and wanted to cry by the time I parked and got into the store. Once I started shopping for dog toys though, I was totally cheered up. Something about walking up and down the aisles squeaking every toy I see makes me happy. 
The worst thing that happened today was thinking I was safe in my warm home with my Sweetie and the crazy dogs, only to find out that the taters in the pantry had gone bad and I had to go back to the damn grocery store to get more. I was so annoyed at that, I didn’t even put my bra back on. Of course, I ended up totally self conscious when I got to the store and walked with my arms folded across my chest.
Home. Exhausted. Cheerful. Going to bed so I can do it all again tomorrow. Including mine and my dad’s annual Christmas Eve trip to the mall.
zzzzzzzzzzzzzzz
Oh yay insomnia. I woke up at 5 a.m. after going to sleep at around 11:30 last night. I have to work today and then drive three hours to my Oldest Sister’s place. I may take a nap before I leave, it depends on how I feel.
See y’all in the next MMP! Merry ChrismaFestiKah!
Up, caffeinated, off to [del]the riots[/del]Christmas Eve. I might get to see my “just friend”
after work(which would be an awesome Christmas gift in itself.).
Most of the kids in my store like the dog toys better than the kid toys.
{{{{phouka}}}}
Ashes[sup]2[/sup], :eek:
Yay for cash, ShinyCat!!!