Sunday, September 22, 2013

Why I am Not a Food Blogger

My mom gave me subscriptions to Better Homes & Gardens as well as Southern Living last Christmas. Surprisingly I actually read a fair amount of these magazines (usually I just look at the pretty pictures). I have a Pinterest account with my own personal board of re-pinned recipes from other pinners. I am also a member of a board where the owner posts fabulous-looking food and treats. Really she's only posted 1 or 2 things that I didn't immediately want to try.

Sometime this summer I got the harebrained idea that I would cook dinner once a week with a recipe I had found somewhere. I mean, why pin all those things if I'm not going to use it? So I started reading the recipes everywhere and picking favorites. And adding to Iggy's shopping list. (Iggy does all our cooking. On my nights we order out.)

My first attempt was a flatbread pizza with brie as the cheese and some salad greens and dressing on top. It was almost ok. Undeterred, I tried green bean, apple and bacon sandwiches. I guess because the green beans are unusual they list them first in the title...but they also have bacon. The bacon is the most important ingredient (although I guess the green beans make them sound healthy). They've actually made into the "repeat" category - I have made them twice!

But then, for some reason, that was the end of my dinner contributions. (Stop while you're ahead?)

Fortunately I had another brilliant idea. We have family coming for the holidays in December. I could try out several recipes now and pick a few to make for them. But this time I'd rather bake. I actually like baking but have never gotten into cooking. So maybe this was a better fit. Plus I decided that I would do my baking while Iggy was watching football on Sundays. Then we're practically in the same room and it's just about like quality time, right?

So I spent a couple evenings scouring magazines and Pinterest again. I narrowed my list down to 11 things. So I decided to let Iggy pick the first one. He chose dark chocolate raspberry banana bread. Or maybe the 2 really brown bananas in our fruit bowl chose that for us. Either way, you should really, really try that one. We ate it all.

The next weekend I was more ambitious because the banana bread didn't really take as long as the football did. I picked 3 recipes. Here's how that went:

1. Pondered what order do things in for so long that the 1st quarter ends and all you have is a pile of ingredients on the counter.
2. Make the batter for Corona Cupcakes.
3. When those are in the oven, wash everything you used.
4. Start Cream Cheese Pumpkin Spice Bread.
5. Take cupcakes out of oven. Put bread in.
6. Wash everything again.
7. Make frosting for cupcakes but decide you don't feel like measuring anything anymore.
8. Frosting turns out runny. Be sad for a little bit, but then eat some. It's still pretty good.
9. Have the brilliant idea to put wax paper below the cupcakes then frost cupcakes as much as possible.
10. Football ends. You're not done yet.
11. Share leftover icing with dog.
12. Take bread out of oven.
13. Wash everything again again.
14. Realize sharing frosting with the dog was not brilliant.
15. Walk dog so that some of that sugar high is used up without destroying additional household items.

Anyways. I can't get the hang of cooking. My timing at baking is questionable. And I never remember to take pictures. I just eat the stuff. So, much as I like reading blogs about food and looking at pictures of food and eating, I don't think I will ever be a food blogger.

Sunday, September 8, 2013

Progress (or Be Careful What You Wish For)


I have never worked so hard to socialize a dog before.  The puppy we adopted in November last year was terrified of everything.  Now Indigo doesn't see any reason not to jump on everything that moves to see if it wants to play.  Progress, right?  (We are trying to teach her not to jump on people...)

We took Indigo to puppy classes. The first day I had to carry her into the store and then she barely moved from between Iggy's feet. About halfway through class she decided she might like to play with the other pupil, Brutus, a Mastiff-Bulldog mix only 6 weeks old. He lived with 2 other dogs and was certainly interested in saying hi. By the end of class Indie had developed what I like to call the Rob Blake Hip Check - a move where she nuzzles alongside Brutus, then whips around in a circle and smacks him with her butt. That first week Brutus would go sprawling. By the last week she was tugging at her leash to get into the store and greet everyone -- and her little hip checks into Brutus (who by then outweighed her by 20 lbs) only sent her sprawling.
 
I used to walk her and Radar at lunchtime.  
But after Radar went to doggie heaven in February (miss you, big dog!), the little dog spent most of our lunchtime walks trying to stay between my feet as we walked, presumably for protection. It's a scary world without your protector. Eventually she got to where she'd once again walk at the end of the leash instead of tripping me constantly. Then a bike might ride by as it got to be springtime and she was pulling at the leash in the other direction trying to get away. A few walks later she was barking at them like, "get off my path!" Eventually she got used to the bikes whizzing past us and they barely warrant a playful lunge. Until the day we came across a bike some kid had left on the path while they went to explore the river. What the hell was that? A bike without a rider? That certainly warranted the ears going back, the tail between the legs, all the hair on her spine pointing up like a mohawk, slinking up at an angle so as to have a better escape route and a growl meant to be menacing!
Once the 90-degree-days got here our lunchtime walks got shorter until I had the brilliant idea that I could walk her before work. That light bulb went off for me on a Wednesday night. So Thursday and Friday I got up a little earlier and we went for our walk in the morning. On Saturday I was all set to sleep in (yay!) except that around 5:30am *someone* thought they might sit on my feet because, hey, don't we walk every morning at 5:30 am?!? (You know how it takes 30 days for humans to form a habit? I guess with dogs it takes 2...)
 
About the only area we haven't made progress is with barking at the boys next door when they're playing in the back yard, barking at people on the barkpath that goes by our back yard (you might call that a bike path, but not if you lived here) and eating TV remotes. We've ordered so many replacement remotes that Amazon probably thinks we run a resale business. We humans can't seem to learn the habit of putting the remotes up on the highest shelf when we leave the house. 

Anyways, happy 1st birthday to Indigo!