AIC

So Monday nights are what I call my Adventures in Cooking nights because it’s the only night of the week where I come straight home after work. Resisting the temptation to stop at one of the 300 fast food restaurants on the drive home isn’t easy because I’m quite ravenous at that point in the day. Sometimes it’s all I can do to not to rummage around in the glove box and start munching on my car registration papers.

But I digress.

Last night I decided to try to make this:


Looks tasty, huh? That is Broiled Steak Sandwiches with Balsamic Vegetables.

However, I forgot I’ve never really had much experience with the “broil” setting, so a phone call to Mom was in order.

Me: I’m trying to cook dinner.
Mom: That’s great! Good for you!
Me: It requires me to broil steak and I wanted to ask if I’m supposed to leave the oven door open when I’m broiling.
Mom (sounding concerned): No. Some people might leave it open a crack, but not the whole door open.
Me (sound of oven door being hastily closed): Oh, sure. Sure. I was just, um, checking.
Mom: But you do have the steak in a broiler pan, right? So the juices can drip down?
Me: The recipe just said to put it in a foil-lined baking dish. I don’t … have a broiler pan.
Mom: Okay, so it’s in a dish. Okay. Good.
Me: It smells great; I’m just going to turn it right now.
(Sound of crash, yelling, and abrupt disconnection of phone. Mom calls back.)
Me: I burned my knuckle! Call you back!
(Disconnect phone again. Call back 20 minutes later.)
Me: Sorry, I burned my knuckle on the heating element.
Mom: I’m sorry, hon. You okay?
Me: Yes. It hurts.
Mom: Don’t let this put you off cooking, though. You’ll learn. Of course, if you had paid attention when I tried to teach you when you were younger….
Me: Don’t go there.

The result?
I had a steak. That’s it. I was so hungry by the time the meat was done I decided to forgo the rest of my sandwich. It would take too long to make.

My goal next week is to get past the first ingredient.

Not for the Faint of Heart

Well, who knew that removing cat urine from carpet would elicit such helpful responses? Certainly not myself. Many thanks for all of the suggestions. I finally broke down on Saturday and purchased a black light for the express purpose of detecting any unknown spots.

Boy was that illuminating. (No pun intended.)

The box the light came in had a handy legend so you could also identify any other, um, materials. It also gave other possible uses (so you would feel better about your purchase, I suppose), one of which encouraged you to take it along when you travel so you could check out your hotel room.

I saw that special on TV already, so I know that’s the last thing I want to do when I check into the Motel 8.

Anyway, I waited until dark and turned the light on. I had fun at first waving it around, checking out the brightness of my socks and the watermark in my stationery paper. Finally, consulting my handy guide, I started going over the carpet in the office. And now I know why I couldn’t get the odor out of that room.

Because Hamish did not merely confine himself to one corner as I had previously thought. It wasn’t just the carpet that was victimized. Cardboard boxes and plastic bags fell before his onslaught.

On the upside, it looks like Kids N Pets did not let me down. On the downside, I’ve got a lot more cleaning to do. And when I’m done, I’ll still have this handy light for, well, what else can I use this light for? I’ve come up with a few ideas:

1. I can check the progress that Crest Whitestrips make over time in order to not appear as Ross on Friends.
2. I can investigate dollar bills for counterfeiting.
3. I can hold my own personal rave party. Granted, we don’t abuse any substances at our house (except maybe Doritos and root beer), so it may be a rather tame rave, but we can blow whistles and jump around all the same. (Tangent thought: How many Weight Watchers exercise points do you think you could accrue by jumping around?)
4. I can get into fluorescent wall art.
5. I can mesmerize the cats.

Any other suggestions?

Friday’s Blender

1. I was so tired last night I forgot to take my contacts out before falling asleep. I never sleep in my contacts (bad for your eyes, no matter what they say). It was a novel experience to wake up and see. I didn’t even stumble on the way to the shower.

2. Continuing the tiredness theme, I forgot to put conditioner in my hair this morning. At the moment, it’s having a party up there, twisting and turning uninhibited, springing free of every attempt to restrain it. I think I’m just going to order it some pizza and give up.

3. Ha! Finished the second draft of the novel. As this was a near-complete rewrite of the first draft, I feel as though I’ve written two books this year. I just joined a critique group, which is exciting.

4. Completely random: In a recent poll of co-workers, we discovered that two of us have dreamed about the second coming of Christ while four of us have not.

5. Our tap class has a new teacher – a man (!)– who apparently thought we were capable of greater feats than we had ever attempted before. I did manage to throw down on my Maxie Ford’s, though not quite at the level of this gal.

6. What really killed me, however, was doing these across the floor for most of Monday night.
This requires muscles I didn’t know I had. I’m aware of them now.

7. I’ve noticed a lot of my long sleeved t-shirts are noticeably short in the arms. Sitting here, typing this, I’ve got a good couple inches of wrist bone sticking out. This only became apparent when the temperature dropped so low that exposed skin began freezing.

8. Any suggestions for getting cat urine out of carpet? I’ve tried: Resolve, Nature’s Miracle, Kids N Pets, and Borax. I’m about at my wits end. I’ve read that if you use a black light you can pinpoint all the places your pet has, um, doused. I’m almost afraid to do that, however. What if it turns into some sort of CSI tableau? You know, they turn out the lights, put the special black light on, and a massacre scene reveals itself? Hmmm.

On that happy thought, I hope you have a great weekend!

Beyond Humanity

I lift up my eyes to the hills —
where does my help come from?
My help comes from the Lord,
the Maker of heaven and earth.

He will not let your foot slip —
He who watches over you will not slumber;
indeed, he who watches over Israel
will neither slumber nor sleep.

The Lord watches over you —
the Lord is your shade at your right hand;
the sun will not harm you by day,
nor the moon by night.

The Lord will keep you from all harm —
He will watch over your life;
the Lord will watch over your coming and going
both now and forevermore.
--Psalm 121

For 2008 my resolve is to remember WHOM I belong to and WHO watches over me. I want to rest in His will, taking only paths that are secure and firm and strongly guided and directed by Him. And the only way to be sure that I am on that right path is to dig deep in God’s Word and carefully pray and evaluate if what is before me is aligned with it.

The past year has not been easy, and I do not know what lies ahead, but I cling to the truth of God’s promises and His sovereign hand.