snow day!

a lot of folks up here in the pacific northwest got a snow day today.  last night it snowed almost 20 inches where i live, which is tremendous for us.  i didn't have to go to work early today, but i knew i had patients so i got up and took my shower and frowned around the house for a while, until my tech called and said the two patients we had scheduled for today had canceled. suddenly, i had the day off, and that frown seemed kind of ridiculous.  the kids also had the day off, and D had the day off, so there was a whole lot of loafing going on over here.  it was great.  we pulled our old futon mattress out into the living room, watched movies, drank cheladas (dear whoever invented the chelada, i love you!), made a giant pot of bean soup, and did i mention the lazing about?!  the girlchild built tunnels in the snow for most of the day, the cat went a bit stir crazy, and the boychik went out for a bike ride to see what sort of shape the rest of the neighborhood was in.  that gave D and i some alone time, ahem, and i have to say, being a grown up on a snow day is AWESOME.  truly.  our schedules have been wonky lately, and getting two minutes alone with D at any time has been kind of a miracle; having a whole hour or so to ourselves this afternoon felt downright decadent.  i know that a lot of parents and couples have that feeling, and those moments when you realize that for weeks all you've been talking about has been kids and bills and what's for dinner, and then suddenly you can talk about other stuff, and it's like "oh yeah, this is why we started dating!"  having a grown up conversation about anything else feels so novel.  today's topics were food concessions, geodesic housing, and i admit, we snuck in a little talk of bills and wedding planning.  it was really, really nice.

it was also my pop's birthday today, and while part of me was sad (of course) i was glad i could stay home with my little family and be sad with them.  when he was born, my grandmother was terribly ill with a bout of tuberculosis.  in fact, when she realized she was pregnant with him, her doctors all advised her strongly not to go through with the pregnancy because she was already so sick.  in 1948, if a doctor advised you (out loud) in the midwest to terminate your pregnancy, you had to be seriously unwell.  the day he was born, right afterward they swept her off to a sanitarium and sent him to live with an aunt who already had nine of her own children; but she always said pop was her 10th.  he was there for six months before his mother was well enough to even see him.  he was a wanted baby, though, and everyone did what they could to take care of him while my grandmother was sick.  if he were alive today, i would have bought him some candy he liked, some sort of toy or something ridiculous.  he wasn't much for big gifts; he liked weird, small things.  i drew him a birthday card one year with a robot on the front and he always kept it tucked in the china hutch behind his seat at the kitchen table.  that sort of thing was what he dug, and i appreciated that.  i wish i could have called him today and told him to have a good day, and sent him something dumb in the mail (like those cadbury fruit and nut bars! he loved those), but having a dinner he would have liked and remembering him was pretty good too.  i have days where remembering him doesn't hurt so badly, but days like today are kind of a challenge.  being able to stay home and enjoy the snow made it easier.  

i want more snow!

so i can put off packing, and just keep knitting all weekend. bring it on, clouds!

snowy snow snow

when i got up this morning the sky was clear and blue and cold, but now the clouds have blanketed everything and i suspect what the weathermen said about more snow might be true. which means i should run the very few errands i have right now, before it starts and everyone decides to run theirs.

i have been knitting a lot of those super easy, fun, colorful bibs from mason-dixon knitting. i've knit so many of them at this point (finishing number four today!) that i don't even need the pattern anymore. they are such a fun project to work on, and as much as i love to actually knit, i also love it when the end result is so damn practical. right now i'm just playing with colors and striping patterns, before i dive into this video. i'm still waiting on some wool from knitpicks to arrive, and just yesterday i discovered the needles and such i'd ordered from joann's were supposedly delivered about five days ago. that would be great, if i'd ever actually gotten them. i'm still waiting on an email from the shipping department to tell me what the hell happened. being that i'm sort of suspicious by nature i'm wondering if someone didn't see the box on my front stoop and swipe it. although i've had lots of boxes on my front stoop and none of them were stolen. i'm not sure what to think, but i'm irritated that i don't have what i need to start work on some new projects. thankfully the mindless garter stitch of those baby bibs is soothing. i'll have photos of the bibs later, which reminds me that i need to order another charger for my camera's battery. i left mine at my sister's and we are having one hell of a fight right now, so i don't think i'll be seeing it any time soon. dammit.

it's supposed to snow today

i don't think it will, though. the sky is all clear and cloud-free. i don't know much, but i know you need clouds for snow.

i'm going down to the craft store because i can't stop knitting right now. i've been toying with the idea of creating a separate knitting-only blog so that for those of you who get bored to death with those posts won't have to see them, then i realized everyone in my real life has to deal with my knitting, so why should you be excluded? if my roommate's have to live with baskets of yarn everywhere, point protectors, needles, scraps of yarn and patterns all over the house, then you can read about it sometimes. plus, as much as i like knitting blogs, i like blogs that are more about all the different aspects of people's lives, and it just happens that right now i'm going through a knitting phase.

oh! i got an email from a very nice lady the other day saying that the journal she works for wants to use one of my photos for the cover of their next publication! it's not a great picture of mine, but i'm still sort of excited. i'm going to try to find a better version of it they can use today, after i get home from my crafty excursion. i'll tell you more about it this afternoon! no more procrastinating in front of the computer.

how to have a successful snow day

1. go ahead, get up early. it will just make the day longer, and will make the nap you take in the afternoon that much more enjoyable.
2. take a shower, if you must, but under no circumstances put on make-up or a bra or brush your hair. this will ruin all the fun of being disheveled all day.
3. it helps to have a cat or dog around to nap with, and feed illicit treats. a toddler might be fun too, but only if they like napping and laying around the house.
   
4. watch the movies you kind of always meant to watch but never got around to.
5. finish a knitting project. if you want to make it a really successful snow day, finish two. (you can substitute any crafty project for knitting.)
6. watch everyone else shovel the walk while laying on the couch.
7. don't answer the phone! the outside world does not exist!
8. do some internet shopping. it will make you feel like you've accomplished something, and give you something to look forward to in the mail. today i ordered some new knitting needles on-line with one of my gift cards, and will be ordering some more yarn tonight after i finish project #2. i have a rule right now about finishing big knit projects before starting new ones!
9. drink stupid amounts of coffee spiked with non-dairy creamers. the sugar and caffeine is extra delicious on a day like today. if you are worried about getting too big a buzz, make a pot or two half-caf, but don't tell anyone.
   
10. gloat about your snow day on your blog. revel in the smugness of having only been outside once today, and not for any good reason, and not for very long. go relax some more, and check back in the next day!
    

hey, guess what?

it's snowing again! they are calling this phase two of the blizzard, and honestly with all the hype surrounding it i kind of thought it wouldn't happen. weathermen, you freak out about things so often that i basically don't believe you. have you ever heard the story about the boy who cried wolf? take a lesson, jerks. all day today the sky definitely looked overcast and menacing, but by three this afternoon all we'd gotten was some paltry rain. i was really thinking we weren't going to get any snow here in fort collins, that only denver would get hit, but then right at six it showed up. it's about ten now, and it hasn't let up at all.
M is convinced we're all going to be snowed in for quite a while, so he made go grocery shopping with him after work. all i really needed was toilet paper, but it was fun to see what he buys at the store. you can learn a lot about a person by what they buy, and how they shop. like M does not look at labels or prices, which makes me INSANE. i followed him around the store, picking up what he picked up, looking at it and saying things like, "do you know what's in this?" and he kept saying, "no, put that down." i ended up buying two of the last four boxes of mac and cheese on the shelf, some pumpkin spice creamer, and the toilet paper i came in for. there was pretty much nothing on the shelves, since everyone else in town is stocking up, but i did that last week so i wasn't really in need of anything big. plus, getting snowed in means having to eat all the weird stuff in your cabinets anyway. don't people know anything? it's like god's way of saying, "hey, stay in for a few days and catch up on your reading/movie watching/board game playing. and while you're at it, figure out what to do with that can of tomatoes that's been in the pantry for months, why don't you?"

snowed in or not, i have the next three days off and the whole house to myself. i plan on doing nothing but drinking coffee, sewing, knitting, painting stuff and wrestling with the cat. oh, and watching movies. yay for pay-per-view! it means movies at my house, no waiting in line, no returning them, not having the movie i want all rented out, and not having to leave my home. i love you, pay-per-view. i have lots of good things to tell you about christmas, and a meme i've been tagged with, but right now i want to go enjoy being snowed in. i have some mac and cheese that needs to be cooked, and a kitten to watch tv with. hooray!

snow days are the best days

why? take a look at the list below, grandly titled "why snow days kick major ass;"

1. watching the cat freak out at how the snow is taller than she is. she got up on her little paws to sniff at the top of the pile only to sink in, which totally pissed her off, but not enough to make her come inside.
2. drinking beers and cocktails while knitting and watching everyone else slave over digging their cars out so they can go to work.
3. having the day off to enjoy all the snowy-snow goodness.
4. eating leftovers of last nights primo dinner.
   
5. watching bad movies. and good ones. and bad tv, too!
   
6. starting and finishing a knitting project in one afternoon. granted, it was a kids hat knit with bulky yarn, it was a piece of cake project, but it still felt satisfying.
   
7. not taking a shower! wandering around the house looking moderately homeless and disheveled, and loving every second of it.
   
8. even knowing i have to go into work tomorrow isn't that bad. we're close to christmas, i only have a fews days of work before i get to open presents and see if my parents really do love me (ha ha ha), i've fed everyone i know cookies so far, and sooner rather than later my hair will be all nice and short again. the combination of alcohol, sugar, christmas songs and crafty good times has made me impossibly giddy.
   

this is real weather

all day yesterday the weathermen did nothing but talk about the "storm of the year," all the customers talked about what getting ready for big snow, and all i did was roll my eyes. you hear a lot of hyperbole from pretty much every weather "authority" these days, so like everyone else i just look the other way when they show up on the tv, and check out the sky before i leave the house in the morning. clear? no hat. cloudy? hat.

i went to bed last night at 1 and there was no sign of snow. the sky was cloudy, but whatever. i woke up this morning to a nice, even layer of snow, a ton of insane wind, but it wasn't that big. i've seen snow like that before, so i got dressed, made breakfast (cheesy grits! best breakfast ever!), and headed out. the roads were definitely sort of rough since the plows weren't really out in force yet, but i just did what i always do; drive slow and steady. got to work, only to find out everyone that didn't live in town was excused from work, and it was just me and M and our assistant manager. we goofed around for a while, a few folks braved the elements to see us, but it wasn't many, and they were all either jerks or retards. while at work the wind picked up even more, and it was decided that the store would close and we'd all get to go home! yay! my assistant manager and i went to the grocery store and liquor store across the street, picked up things to make big dinners and beers, and then went home.

i got stuck in the parking lot for about twenty minutes. the trip home, all three miles of it, took over half an hour. i saw a few accidents, got passed by just about every asshole with a big truck and a tiny penis, got stuck in a snow drift at a stoplight, and when i finally made it home, i got stuck one more time in the parking lot. whoo! getting stuck in snow in a skirt, with wellingtons on, so close to being able to just go inside and warm up by the fire was extra-super-lame. however, one of my seriously nice neighbors helped dig me into a spot, and i gave him a beer and finally got to go inside where my roommate and i went right to work lounging. we made a delicious roasted chicken with veggies, some mashed cauliflower, and ate cookies. it was a great night. i wanted to take more photos of the snow, which continues to fall and is at this time seriously deep (if i wanted to i couldn't drive out of my parking lot), but it's cold out there! instead i'm going to bed where i will watch cartoons. i have the day off tomorrow and i plan on trying out a new recipe i have in my head for a cross between egg-in-a-hole and frittata, watching movies, finishing my sweater, baking eggnog bread and trying to take not blurry photos of the snow.

whoo!

we totally got snow. snow in the middle of october! it was snowy enough that by the time i got off work i had to scrape my car down and got to bitch about how cold my hands were. i can't wait to get my mittens out and enjoy it. today's snow was pretty melty, and not much stuck, but it was still fun. for whatever reason, drinking coffee on days like today is quite possibly the best thing ever. the other best thing about today was the recipe for chicken fingers my sister sort of gave me. i say "sort of" because it was more of a suggestion and it led to this recipe. it is approximate and needs some work, but it is basically as follows:

• get a package of chicken tenders, or cut up some skinless, boneless chicken breasts
• breadcrumbs
• buttermilk
• honey
• salt and pepper and herbs you like
• cooking spray like pam.
• baking sheet and cookie cooling rack
  

soak the tenders in buttermilk to cover overnight. add about a tablespoon of honey per cup to the buttermilk mixture. let is soak long and hard, friends. the next night, heat your oven to 475 degrees. yes, i know this is hot. while the oven is heating, get your breadcrumbs ready. i used plain ones in a can because i had them in the house. you could use seasoned ones, or even panko, which i am going to use next time because i think that would rock. season up your crumbs with your favorite herbs and some salt and pepper if you are using plain, and lay it out in an empty pie pan or something equally as shallow. place the cookie cooling rack on the baking sheet, and spray with pam. this is the secret cool part of the recipe because the cooling rack keeps the tenders from getting all soggy on the bottom in the oven. the next part is gross; fish out the tenders from their buttermilky-salmonella-soup, and dredge in the crumbs. coat! coat well! place on cooling rack. the tenders won't shrink much while cooking, thanks to the juicy powers of buttermilk (which smells kind of gross, but i can assure you it tastes good with the chicken and makes for the moistest, most tender white meat in the world, and this is coming from a girl who hates white meat and usually sticks to dark). bake in the oven for 12 minutes, or a bit longer if you want them to crisp up some more. let them cool for a couple of minutes before you remove them from the cooling rack; you want the crust to seal.

easy as pie. serve with delicious dipping things, cut up and throw on a salad,or use the leftovers in sandwiches. if you use a low-fi buttermilk this is actually a pretty low-fat, lower in carbs, high in protein good thing, which will make you feel better about using high-fi ranch or bluecheese. i think the next time i make them i'm going to try using panko and sesame seeds, for a little extra crunch, and then maybe make a gingery teriyaki dipping sauce. i'm no alton brown, but these were delicious.