Remarks

Monkey Candy on new WoW infos (yes I resubbed). Current plan is to transfer Solar off Khad, hopefully with hubby's hunter. WoW CS is being douchebags and saying they might not restore his warrior when they just did his rogue with hardly any qualms. Wouldn't be so bad if they just said no, but they're saying maybe and to use X mailing account. When they weren't picky at all on his rogue. durr.

I got one finger's opinon of what I think of the server managers at Blizz.

I want an omelette. With red onions and tomatoes and cheese. And an apple pie. And the monkies will not hurt me. :) You can just give me chicken noodle soup.

Living Life Anew

New news over for News Only to Me.

Its different feeling to be corraling together all the things that were frustrating me in my life. Not being able to have time to myself and husband, paying all the bills, consistantly keeping up with my part of the cleaning, and making sure there was a dinner on the 'table'. Telling myself that it should not be as impossible as I make it out to be when I let it pile up.

Besides needing to pick up my check today, I need to confirm that Nationwide hasn't goofed up on my insurance. I paid them a few days ago and the amount has already been withdrawn by them from my checking account. I have my confimation number from the payment, and it shows up online on my payment history.

But for whatever dumb mechanical or human error, there is still a button on my bill page that says I'm still due today for the same lame ass amount. I'm hoping its just because the amount cleared my bank today despite having been fully processed by NW three days ago. Y'know, the page hadn't been updated since I checked it at six am this morning. Because I really don't want to be cussing someone out over already paid money. And I sure as hell know that they didn't make up another payment for me already. Stupid stupid data.

*sighs*

I saw a funny t-shirt on the internet today. Gives me a giggle. A malicious one I suppose...

"I do very bad things, and I do them very well." Heh. Heh.

Carry-over, carry on

So yesterday was an alright day. Got a lot of things resolved, and despite having very little time I got a lot accomplished. That makes me sleep very well at night. Something both me and my husband agree on- this looks like a very mild Florida winter. We know that translates to probably another eventful hurricane season coming up when our lease ends. So whattheheck we gunna do y'know? Don't want to stay at the apartments for our third year. Who knows, hard to plan that far ahead when you can't rent a place almost eight months in advance or the free capita to lock it down. Who does?

Also, oddly enough I've been getting single paper cuts on each of my right fingers above the first knuckle. The one on my pinky yesterday drove me nuts like a painful hangnail. Weird stuff.

So Abe's Pizza has the best pepperjack steak pie. This is some good steak, its chipped and they put a lot of it on there. I wonder what other stuff they use the beef on?

In other news- Albertson's has been sold to the Sav-A-Lot corporation, and they've already said that they're more interested in the real estate rather than in reinventing the slowly dying chain. Personally, once they stopped carrying Tillamook cheddar we lost interest.

And this is a snazzy top. Because I like green and roses.

Famous Banana Oatmeal Bread

This is totally different from my Oatmeal Cookie Bars recipe. This is a favorite request mix. Use a very large mixing bowl if you double the recipe.

Again, uses a 9x13 lightly oiled pan. Set oven to 350.

Mix 1

Mashed 3-5 bananas
1/3c olive oil
3-4 T milk
1/2t salt
1/2t baking soda

Mix 2

1/2c cocoa
1/4c black walnuts
1T cinnamon
2c 1 min oatmeal
3/4c brown sugar
1/2c dried cranberries
1 1/2c flour

Combine both mixes and pour into pan. Bake for one hour. If you double recipe bake for an extra 20 minutes.

Perfect Brownies

Eggless, butterless pan brownies!

Makes around 12 1x1 squares 1/2" high.
10 min. prep.

1c self-rising flour
1c brown sugar
1/4c cocoa or to taste
1/2c milk
1/4c olive oil

Mix dry ingredients (use a fork), then the oil and milk. Makes a very dark and medium texture batter. I've been using a lightly oiled cast iron skillet to bake it in.
350 degrees for 35 minutes.

Simply Stuff

So yesterday after a couple of weeks being cooped up inbetween work/home/errands- my husband and I stepped out for a bit just to see some new things. No great rush. Ended up going to Brusters for ice cream (he had coffee toffee and I had chocolate oreo) and to the Avenues mall to explore. Made the payment on the JC Penney card and browsed for a couple of hours before exploring the rest of the mall.

Rack room shoes had these Skechers on sale that my husband liked. He hates having to deal with laces on his work shoes. I was looking around for some shoes to run/walk/whatever in to pick up later.

We both liked how black raspberry vanilla smelled. Yankee candle had a new lotus scent, but I didn't care for it as much as I did the Plumeria or peaches and sweet berries. We got a few sampler candles. I've already burned down the christmas cookie and cranberry chutney nearly to the base. Still have the Ocean water and Coffee to burn out of that batch. Got another ocean water to go with it- and pineapple citrus, Vanilla caramel, and I think meadow mist.
They had some swirled candles that smelled absolutely evil (chocolate chip and buttercream or the very berry)! and a new car odor neutralizing gel that is supposed to last longer- but nothing in a scent I cared for. I love food smells, farmhouse apple and lemon lavender were nice.

The more interesting part was wandering around the sears appliances. I think we're going to have a kenmore home. Check out this washer and dryer! HE is for High efficiency! Pacific Blue he4 washer & Pacific Blue he4 dryer. The washer has a sanitary cycle, the dryer has a center drying rack, and there is a setting on both for jeans, delicates, and bulky bedding. Hurrah! The extimated bulkiest load would be 23 towels - 3.8 cubic feet of cleaning power. Ahhhh.

And apparently you can get Pur water filters on your refrigerator. I guess that isn't a bad idea- no more having to deal with the stupid jugs. We fell in love with the Elite line. I forget which frige we saw- but one had a large enough space for the water dispenser you could fit a coffee pot on it. Neat.

Recipe: Brown Sugar Buns

About a week ago I had made an unsuccessful variant of this recipe- in fact the only thing that turned out that day was the sweet bread sticks that I made into cinnamon sugar pretzels. Last night I was a little short on a filling meal and made the following. I did the best I could to keep track of ingredients, so some leniency is to be expected. I'd advise that this be rolled out onto wax paper or a floured surface.

Makes approx. 16 2" rounds

3c self-rising flour (retain 1/2c extra)
2/3 c brown sugar
1c milk
5 T-1/3c honey
4T olive oil (retain extra to periodically keep the dough from sticking to surfaces and the bowl while getting desired consistency- may use up to 1/3c or 1/2c)

For filling - 1c brown sugar, and ground cinnamon shaker

The trick is to combine the ingredients into a dough the texture of kneaded bread- when a hank is pulled away it should form thick strings. At the very least it should be as dense as dumplings for soups. A workable mixture that can be rolled out and cut. I was able to put the dough into a 9x13 oiled pan with a 1c dough left over and cut into 12 pieces around a third to half of an inch thick.

Each piece is then worked into a ball or ravioli or turnover style. Its pretty adaptable. A ball then needs to have a deep depression that can hold 1t of the brown sugar filling and dashed with a bit of cinnamon. Pinch the dough from the sides over the top of the filling. Ravioli style should be a 1 1/2" wide by 1 1/2" bit of dough, deposit cinnamon/brown sugar, and cover with another square. I had only moderate success with this style since my dough was a bit more moist than allowed for closing the ravioli. I suppose that one could try making croissants this way as well. Turnover style, just take a general square of dough and place the filling in the middle. Take a corner of the dough to meet another side so the closed form is that of a triangle. Use a fork to pinch sides closed.

Don't worry if things get messy with any of these, the recipe is pretty forgiving. Just desposit whatever mess you have in a lump on the oiled pan and reapply the filling into a depression and work dough over the filling as best as possible. I had some buns that were the shape of cookies with brown sugar cores, on up to combined psuedo- round loaves of sweet bread with deep swirls of brown sugar and cinnamon. The goal is sweets and making a mess. When working with the dough, keep your hands and surfaces a combination of oiled or floured. Either works and won't harm the dough.

Bake for 20-25 minutes at 350 degrees.

EDIT: Also makes GREAT baked pretezels- roll the dough into thumb thick rods about a foot long and roll in sugar/cinnamon. Bake for no longer than 20 minutes.

Book Log

Book Log updated with In the Forests of Serre. Very Good recommendation! I have more Sandman books to pick up from the library. I suppose I will do that on Monday. I also suppose I will do a final review of my reactions after I finish the series as a whole. While the library takes their sweet time to get them to me in order. Ugh.

Can't Get Enough

Sorry, I did it again. Pets featured in this article, mostly cats. I think this man had either had a stressfull day, or found the irony in the situation.

A 911 dispatcher was reprimanded for responding to a mother’s plea for help with an unruly child by saying: “OK. Do you want us to come over to shoot her?”

This was in response to 'Lori' calling 911 after she came home to find her daughters fighting. Apparently one had kicked a hole in the door. Nice to see she has so much control over her kids that she keeps 'call 911' in her parenting manual. Of course, the way some of these doors are made of plywood I don't think kicking a hole in one would be too difficult.

News Posting

Oompah. More news for your lovin'. If you're in a hurry, skip to the bottom of the article for the important part about the beef that is a grade above prime. You ain't finding this stuff at Winn-Dixie.

Sticky or Stickey?

Whatever its spelled, I was looking up to see national holidays that banks and stuff would be closed down on. I delightfully found some stamps that would be cool to grab sometime (had a collection since I was twelve). Chinese year animals, constellations, and Jim Henson & Friends. That's when I noticed this:

Starting January 8th, 2006 an additional $0.02 postage stamp will be necessary on all $0.37 first class mail.

BAH! Make it $.050 already!

I have a lot of reviews pending but no promises on when I'll deliver. ATM trying to finish up some character development and working on a logo. I have no idea where all these ideas are coming from, I just hope I can keep track of them all.