What I'm doing for 2008

Of course I have new years resolutions. Who doesn't? What self-respecting, red-blooded American citizen-being wouldn't take advantage of this time to say what they want to do better in the next year? I don't plan on actually following through on any of them for longer than a day or two, but we'll see. A day or two spread out over a year isn't really so difficult.

1. Post more on my blog

2. Stop swearing so much

3. Stop swearing so much in front of the kids

4. Stop swearing at the kids

Damn, that's already getting up there. Now for some random things I'd like to do:

5. See more shows, movies, etc.

6. Have more dates with my wife. Which means getting more babysitters. Which is fine, but means putting an effort into things. I was saving 'making more of an effort' for 2009, but as long as I'm here...

7. Vote more. I did actually vote in the last local election. But it was for school board members, and since I know nothing about the candidates, I wrote in my own name. That's why I probably shouldn't even be wasting anybody's time.

8. Read more

9. I'd love to play more Canasta. Nobody really gets into that though. Maybe online?

10. Do more around the house. Last year I concentrated on the backyard, which was probably a bust. It's a muddy mess right now. We'll see if any of the new grass took. I haven't cleaned the gutters in over a year. The house needs to be re-painted. I re-did the deck, but half-assed, so slapping a coat of waterproof paint doesn't actually fix rotten deck boards. The fence is falling apart in places too.

11. Stop using the kids as an excuse for why I don't get things like home improvements done. It is true though--since the wife and I only have one day off together, I'm alone with the kids on my other day off. And they're not too good about playing quietly while I clean the gutters.

12. Stop using the kids as an excuse for why I don't get things done.

13. Start putting the kids to work to get more things done. They can't do gutters, but they can probably pick up rocks.

14. Lose 20 pounds. Of course most people have this on their list. In my case I'm being modest, I should probably lose 30 pounds.

15. Stop making lists.

New post

No, not this one...the one below it. Just a little note...what I wrote is about 1/20th of what I wanted to write. But sometimes it's not best to wait until midnight to post something, especially when your wife is trying to sleep and you're keeping her awake with the pounding keyboard. Anyway, I just wanted to get something up here so my mom will have something to read next time she checks my blog.

Love you mom!

Where in the world...

In anthropology, there is much use of the word cosmology. In studying so-called primitive societies, cosmologies help explain the relationship of human beings to the rest of the universe and are therefore closely tied to religious beliefs and practices (thanks Dictionary.com!). It's a word I hadn't hear before taking my first anthropology course in college, but it's a topic I've been thinking about ever since.

The latest thing to get me thinking about this was a post at the Great Whatsit. This post, to be specific. As it goes, I had written my own comment to this post, but deleted it at the last minute. Deleted it because a) nobody cares what I have to say on the subject, and b) I have a great place to post stuff that nobody cares about on my own blog without having to mess up someone else's.

Anyway, here's my take on the whole thing: My cosmology only extends to my daily life for the most part. I don't care much what's going on outside my own home, outside my work, or what goes on that doesn't affect me in a daily capacity. I know, I'm sticking my head in the sand, and I do it willingly. I guess what's been worrying me the most lately is that I've been doing it for the past 13 years or so and I figure it's got to catch up with me sooner or later.

Now, this sort of view definitely has its perks. I don't have to worry about politics. I don't have to worry about voting, and if I do decide to vote, I don't worry if I don't like the outcome. I pay attention to the news enough to know what's going on in the world (because you obviously have to pay attention if you're going to keep your Jeopardy skills honed). I just don't get worried unless the bad news is in my home town.

To some extent, my world view encompasses Washington as well as Oregon, so if I'm going to choose an identity, it's as a Pacific Northwester. But that's it. That's about as far as it goes. What's going on in California? Don't much care. Washington D.C.? Doesn't worry me. Bush stole the election? Not going to change the world for me. I do understand that it will change the world for others, so I'm not saying that you shouldn't care...I'm just saying that it doesn't bother me.

Same with religion. I grew up going to church every Sunday. When I decided it wasn't for me, it was a relatively clean break. Now I don't think about it. I don't worry about what church is right, who's going to hell, or what I'm going to do on Sunday. It's no longer a part of my world view.

There are definitely some subjects that I'll have an opinion on, however. Pedophile priests are bad whether I believe in religion or not. Bush is always going to lose the fight against words. I might vote for Obama this time if I do decide to vote. And if I decide not to vote, I don't bitch and moan about the outcome. I understand that I can't say anything if I don't vote. One guy's gonna cut taxes and the other's gonna raise them? Ok by me. I'm gonna pay them either way, just tell me how much I owe. I know Americans are fat and lazy and talk too loud when they're on vacation. Still doesn't bother me. I don't identify myself as one of those. Even if I get fat and lazy (not a far stretch), I'm gonna whisper when I'm in Europe. But the American identity isn't a part of my cosmology.

Is this world view wrong? I don't think so. As I mentioned before, I do worry that it's going to backfire one of these days. Maybe the next president will decide to put everybody with my name in prison. Then it will be too late, and I'll wish I had done things differently.

At least I'll have time to revise where I fit in.

Favorite Cheeses

I like cheese.

I like cheese a lot.

If you add some cheese to a recipe, it becomes good. I like ham and cheese the best. There are no two other flavor combinations that taste as good as ham and cheese I think. Maybe whiskey and Coke. Peanut butter and jelly being a distant third.

Have you ever had Stilton cheese? It's like bleu cheese times 20. I've only had it a few times, and I'd been drinking or I never could have eaten it. But it's really good. I keep meaning to buy some but I don't drink much so I'm always afraid it's going to go bad before I get a chance to drink enough to eat some (pretty ironic, I know, since it already is bad).

Bleu Cheese is my favorite kind of salad dressing. I've been loving it for like 20 years now. When I was a kid it was French and Bleu cheese, but now French is a distant memory and it's just the BC. If a restaurant doesn't have BC I pretty much won't have salad. It's good on top of steak as well.

Gouda is another favorite. Comes from living in Germany near the border with Holland, where Gouda is the ubiquitous, inexpensive cheese that everybody loves. Like cheddar here. I prefer smoked Gouda most, but then again, I like just about any smoked cheese. Especially with ham.

Pepper Jack is awesome. I didn't discover it until later in life. It gives things a zest they might normally be missing. I made a recipe the other day for a kind of tortilla/chicken layered casserole, using nothing but pepper jack for cheese. It was a mistake. I should have put some orange cheese in as well. But it was zingy.

Swiss is another I didn't like as a kid so much, but got used to in Germany. If I'm having a sandwich, Swiss is what I'm wanting to be having on that sandwich. It's easy to get a lousy Swiss though.

You probably haven't heard of Provel cheese before. It's a mix of Provolone and Mozzarella that is specially made in St. Louis. They put it on their pizzas there and it has a special taste that is unique to the city. Provolone is good on sandwiches too.

Asiago is great too. Ranks up there along with fresh parmesan. Love it on bagels.

Myzythra, if you haven't had it, is awesome grated over some freshly made spaghetti. Brown a stick of butter first (just cook it over low-medium heat for like 20 minutes until it turns brown, but not grainy). Then top it with the grated cheese.

Dubliner - One of my new favorite cheeses. Kind of in the Asiago/Parmesan vein. Great with a baguette.

Cheddar, Colby, Jack -- those are all good too. Not really favorites though.

Canned cheese - Heaven!

Kid Elves

http://www.elfyourself.com/?id=9605990093

Thanks Wayne, for showing me the scoop.

Turkey Day Wrap-up

So we had a great weekend with the family around. My parents and my brother and his family. We ate our brined turkey (moistest bird in Oregon), ate our 10 pounds of mashed potatoes (seriously, we had to throw half of them away, we made so many), at our sweet potatoes (better warmed up), ate everything that was thrown at us then ate some more.

In between eating we played the Wii. Everybody loved it, the whole family was up and about playing Wii Sports. Tennis, golf, bowling, pool. The grandparents were squaring off against the grandkids, brother versus brother, husband vs. wife--if the Wii had been around the past couple hundred years we wouldn't have had any wars, we'd just be playing video games. That's how much it brings people together.

I bought a little gadget the other day called the Skip Doctor, or something like that. It fixes your cds, dvds, games, whatever's round and shiny--if it's scratched and doesn't play correctly, the skip doctor fixes it. This is especially useful around our house since both kids know how to bypass the child guard on the dvd player and get the dvds out. They then throw them around the room, rub sandpaper on them, skate across the rough sidewalk on them, do whatever it takes to scratch them up nice and good. Seriously, it takes about 2 hours from the time the new dvd is opened to look as if we'd had it for 10 years.

I even tried it out on an 18 year old cd I had, the best of the Velvet Underground. This was one of the first cds I ever bought when I was in high school. The case has been missing for the past 8 years I'm sure, so it's been run through the washer. Half the songs skipped half the time. Ran it through the skip doctor, and voila!, good as new. I heartily recommend it.

One thing I can't recommend is the Safeway store in Tigard on Highway 99 near King City. I was in there the other day with my Dad, buying a couple stuff. This little old lady was ahead of us in line, and the guy that was ringing her up started scanning our items as well. I wasn't paying much attention, so I assumed that her own transaction was finished. The lady tells him she hasn't paid yet and then I tell him he's scanning our stuff. The guy doesn't apologize to the her, doesn't even acknowledge he did anything wrong, just starts re-scanning our stuff to remove it from her transaction. She says something about wanting to look at the receipt because she wants to make sure he got the right stuff, and he says, "It's fine, I removed that stuff", in an assholish tone. Then as he hands her the receipt he says, "Thank you Mrs. Grawarshkisoundslikethat". She doesn't notice this because she's asking him a question about the receipt, but what a total prick. That's when I look at his nametag and read that he's the assistant manager.

Working in retail myself, I recognize that everybody can make a mistake. This wasn't a very big mistake either, but I also know that you apologize when you make a mistake, and you don't make fun of the customer and blow them off to downplay that you messed up. That's the kind of thing that loses customer. It's like they say, if you have a great experience at a store you might tell 1-2 people, but when you have a bad experience you tell at least 10 people.

Hey, assistant manager at Safeway, Stop Being an Asshat!

Giving Thanks

Went shopping this morning for the thanksgiving meal. First we dropped the kids off at daycare, then the two of us went to the grocery store. It's very rare that we are off on the same day without kids, so it was kind of a nice break. Where'd we go next? Back to Crate & Barrel, because we just don't have enough stuff from there, and there's nowhere we'd rather be on our one day off.

We're brining our turkey this year. Seems to be the 'in' thing to do. Everybody's talking about it. I hope it works. The turkey was still a little frozen in the middle, so the Missus had to reach her hand inside and scrape out the gibblets and pull out the gross neck while getting frostbite and scratches on her fingers from the frozen icicles.

She made a small batch of mashed potatoes to check out the recipe, and they were good. I made a light lunch of turkey and gouda on a baguette and toasted in the oven.

Now just waiting for the parents to arrive, whereupon we'll go pick up the kids and try to relax while still fretting about all the preparations for tomorrow.

Woohoo.

To keep you from being disappointed

Sorry for lack of updates (I feel guilty about this almost every day). Busy with Noah's first birthday party planning, Thanksgiving planning, excuse for not updating planning. Lots of planning, very little execution.

So here's a little video of Noah walking.

Beck as a 2 1/2 year old girl

Sonny & Cher

You've kind of got to squint to see the resemblance. You might as well just call them hippies, but you get the general idea.

Noah kind of looked like a version of Sonny/Hitler/Jimi Hendrix. Of course, neither of them even had any idea what they were doing, and no, we didn't teach them to sing, "I've Got You, Babe". Maybe next year.

I kind of wanted to catch Cher in the "Half-Breed" phase, but we were somewhat limited in the costume choices as we waited until the last minute due to our San Diego trip.

Enjoy.

Latest Pics of the Kids

The kids posing in some homemade sweaters made by a friend of the family. I gave them both haircuts yesterday, so they don't look so much like dirty hippies. Smiling dirty hippies.

The kids are getting much better at playing together now. This usually consists of Noah chasing Lexi around, but she loves him almost as much as he loves her. Except when she's using him as a stepstool. Or he's getting drool all over her.

Good times.

Wherein I make cooking my bitch...

So a lot of my recent experiences with cooking have been negative, I must admit. But I'm here to tell you that the past two nights in a row I've managed to turn it around and make something that I was not only proud of, but that actually tasted alright too. Turns out the secret is ------

Casseroles!

Well, don't let me get too over-excited all at once. I know I've messed up casseroles too, so I won't say I've mastered them, but these two dishes turned out well.

1. Chicken casserole. This one didn't make me proud because it was fancy or anything. I got the recipe off the Campbell's Cream of Mushroom Soup can. Though I did give it a twist by adding some french cut green beans. I sort of melded the Campbell's recipe with a green bean casserole recipe on the back of the Safeway Beans can.

Ingredients : Chicken, Cream of Mushroom Soup (a Smith family tradition, by the way), 3/4 can of green beans, Salt, Pepper. Bake for 30 minutes, then add a little cheese and some french fried onions and you're good to go. Now that I think about it, not only was it my idea to add the green beans, I also added the salt and pepper and cheese. Campbell's must really want your dinner to turn out poorly if all they ask for is soup and chicken. That means I actually improvised, and won! Shiiittttttt yeah!

2. Beef Bourguignon. Ok, this one I'm pretty proud of. It was also in a casserole book, but it is more stew-like to me. Basically involves a bunch of half-decent ingredients (opposite of #1, above) that you cook on the stove top, then bake in the oven for 2 hours. Except that scenario wouldn't work out with my schedule today because I was minding the kids, so I went from the stove top to the slow cooker instead.

I just looked up beef bourguignon on Wikipedia and realized that my recipe was kind of boring compared to the traditional method of cooking, but I think I still got the idea correct. The main ingredient I had a problem with was the bouquet garni. The cookbook said you could find this at most grocery stores and I was looking amongst the spices, but after looking at a picture of it that I googled, I see this isn't something that comes in a bottle. It's basically a few different herbs tied together and tossed into the pot, then taken out before eating, like bay leaves. Oh well, now I know for next time.

Anyhoo, the main point to take away is that I cooked two things that turned out well. Maybe not exactly gourmet cooking, but it was nice to have them taste at least as well as I was expecting, if not better. What I really need to focus on now is side dishes. I usually get so carried away with one major recipe that by the time it's finished and ready to eat I realize I've forgotten to make anything to go with it. Apparently potato chips are not a side dish, though they do fill the rest of the plate quite nicely.

Going to California

Heading off on vacation for a week, so don't expect any updates. As if...

Brushes With Fame

Have you ever run across a famous person? I always hear others talking about star sightings they've had, but it never seems to happen to me. And with good reason...I don't expect to ever meet anybody I know, so I'm never really taking stock of those around me. I have had a couple of incidents, which I will now relate (in chronological order):

1. Billy Barty - This one I'm not even really sure about. I remember meeting a dwarf when I was a kid, and I think it was this guy.

2. Spider Man - Also as a kid. We went to the mall in Seattle where Spider Man was appearing at the local Nordstroms to sign autographed posters and take pictures. I was mega-excited, and I asked him some silly question, like does he sleep in a web-hammock. He was really nice but I think I got scared and wanted to leave really suddenly.

3. Dennis Rodman/Carmen Electra - I was at a casino in Vegas during a college weekend getaway and everybody was moving to the side to let someone through, and it happened to be these two. Rodman had the leopard-print hairdo at the time and everybody was whispering his name. I'm glad they did or I wouldn't have recognized them.

4. Matt Damon/Bob Vila/Barbara Bush - These three supposedly shopped at the store I worked at in Boston, but I never saw any of them. Well, I saw the lady that was supposedly Barbara Bush, but I thought it was just some Grandma. Bob Vila bought a pan scrubber, and Matt Damon was eating lunch around the corner from the store. I walked along the sidewalk and saw some guy in a baseball hat, so I like to believe it was him.

That's pretty much it. My goal for 2008 is going to be to look for more famous people.

Rube

This summary is not available. Please click here to view the post.

The Greatest Thing Since Sliced Bread

http://baconsalt.com/

I mean, seriously, what's better than bacon? Ham n' cheese mebbe, but otherwise not much.

The Score So Far:

Mark:2

Food Disasters: 43

I forgot to mention that with my Rachael Ray disaster, I also made an appetizing dish that was part of the recipe. Crostini topped with Manchego cheese that's been mixed with parsley and chopped roasted red pepper. Slice a baguette, broil the pieces for about 10 minutes until slightly brown, then mix together the ingredients in a bowl and put them on the browned toast. Then stick back in the broiler for another 5 minutes until melted. The cheese is pretty important, as I tried it again last night with Parmesan (that store didn't have Manchego) and the cheese was overpowered by the parsley.

Now a smarter man than myself would say, "Hmm, the recipe that only contained 4 ingredients turned out well, whereas the recipe with 11 ingredients was shit, what's going on here?". And that smarter man would have a point. I have no use for the smarter man. The Mrs. pretty much made that same point last week. I have a couple reasons for not wanting to use simple recipes.

1. I can still muck up a simple recipe. I know that if you follow the recipe exactly and are careful it should turn out fine, but I can still mess it up somehow.

2. If I mess up a simple recipe, I don't really have any excuse. If I mess up a complicated recipe, I can blame any number of factors--the instructions were unclear, my store didn't have the correct ingredients, or my usual excuse, I drank too much whiskey while cooking and everything just kind of fell apart.

3. On that one day where everything just comes together just right and I make the most heavenly morsels that you've ever eaten, then I'll be even prouder because it wasn't the easy recipe.

Don't bother pointing out how stupid my thinking is on this point...a smarter man (or Mrs.) has already told me. Anyway, thanks for reading, and if you ever want a homecooked meal, let her know.

Rachael Ray

I whipped up a dish from my new Rachael Ray cookbook last night. I'm not sure whether I love that woman or loathe her. My opinion seems to ping-pong back and forth depending on what day it is. Lately she's been bugging me by being everywhere at once, but because the Mrs. bought me a RR cookbook for my birthday, I felt like I should put it to use. So I picked out a soup recipe that had mostly ingredients that I like, though one that I don't (cooked spinach).

So I start by browning a 1/2 pound of chorizo. In the recipe it says I should quarter the chorizo lengthwise, then make thin slices from these. I don't know what chorizo she uses, but I couldn't cut that shit for all the tea in China. It didn't cut, it pulled apart into chunks. So instead of nice slices of chorizo it looked more like mashed brown stuff. This wasn't a good sign, though I later learned it's about the taste it adds to the dish, not necessarily the substance.

Then I cut up an onion and some garlic and cook it up. Then defrost the frozen spinach, add it to the onions and garlic, and puree the bastard in a blender. Our blender sucks the big one. It didn't puree anything but the bottom 1/5 of the mixture, so I had to stir, then puree. Repeat, oh, 10 times.

Put all this back in the pot, add some chicken broth, add some bite-sized chicken chunks, and let those cook in the soup. The result is baby-poo. With chicken.

Seriously, had she told me at the beginning that it was going to look like green baby crap, I probably would've just made grilled cheese and tomato soup. Mandy had already been home sick throwing up all day, but she gamely ate a few bites for me. I had to drink a beer first before I could try some. Luckily the accompaniment of crostini with manchego cheese mixed with parsley and roasted red peppers provided something solid to help the green shit go down.

I did take the leftovers to work today and ate while I read a book. This way I didn't have to look at what I was eating. And you wanna know something? It was pretty good! Even the spinach added to the dish, which is the least it could do, after giving it the sickly green finish. I know what you're thinking, couldn't you have left the spinach out? No, because one of the reasons I can't cook is because I often make detours from the main recipes and these turn out horribly, so I'm trying very hard to actually follow the instructions. But I think if I had just used a little less spinach and maybe some more broth the results would've been much more satisfying.

I don't think I'll make that again though.

Happy Birthday...

to my sister, Stephanie. She's not that old, but still two years older than I. She thinks she hasn't accomplished much in her life, but everybody who knows her begs to differ. Love you sis!

Designer Clothing and Idaho

Part of the awesomeness of my job is that I get to dress up each day for work. Dressing up might be a stretch, at least as far as imagining me not looking like a schmuck, but I have to wear button-down shirts and tuck them in, which definitely counts as dressing up in my book.

Lately I've been wondering about the fashion designers who create the looks I wear. The funny thing is, I don't really know who they are. I'm not talking about the Tommy Hilfigers, Hugo Bosses and Calvin Kleins...I'm wondering who David Taylor is, Van Heusen, and Hagar. You never see them on the style channel, never read about them in magazines or hear about their awesome fashion shows in Paris and Milan. But obviously they're real names of people who design clothes, aren't they?

And what's with these ultra-conservative types who rail against homosexuality then get caught in toilet stalls with their pants around their ankles? Jesus isn't going to save those guys.