An apple a day and other tall tales

Let's talk about food, shall we? Have you been watching Jamie Oliver's Food Revolution? We became fans of Jamie, aka "The Naked Chef" back in our South Africa days. Anyway, back to his one-man revolution. He's hanging out in Huntington, West Virginia trying to change people's attitudes about food. It's not exactly the bastion of homemade granola and organic veggies there. Come to think of it, I'm surprised he didn't come to Oklahoma! We're ranked the 6th most obese state. West Virginia is third, so I guess they win. Here's what Jamie says...

"I believe that every child in America has the right to fresh, nutritious school
meals, and that every family deserves real, honest, wholesome food."

What? No more counting ketchup as a vegetable? No more pizza Fridays? I used to love pizza Fridays. And Mac and Cheese.

Eating healthy is an ongoing challenge. You know they say to shop the perimeter of the store to stick with the healthy foods, right? The bakery is on the perimeter! And so is the deli! Apparently "they" have never been to Homeland. "They" must have been hanging out at Whole Foods where, by shopping the perimeter they avoid the massive display of wine and other alcoholic beverages that are stronger than the 3.2 beer allowed to be sold in Oklahoma grocery stores.

In our house the men have eased into doing most of the cooking during the week. Hallelujah! Amen. I come home from work and the husband and the father-in-law are busy planning what to throw on the grill. Because real men only cook meat outdoors. And they try, really they do, to make balanced meals. Want a cinnamon roll and a baked potato with that pork chop?

Sometimes though, they just forget to eat. I KNOW! So strange. On Saturday they headed out to do their Saturday errands only to discover that the father-in-law hadn't had anything to eat - at 10:30 a.m. I'm sorry but my first waking thought, after "man I have to pee" is "what's for breakfast?". Mark got so busy doing yard work later in the day he forgot to eat lunch. Who ARE these people?

I guess it's up to us women to try to balance out the meat and potatoes diet. It was a man who started McDonald's. And Wendy's? Founded by a dude. The burger and fries is just another version of meat and potatoes. It's a man's food world out there. I've decided that back in the Garden of Eden, the fall of Man wasn't really all Eve's fault. The poor woman was just trying to add a little fruit to their diet.

Inquiring minds want to know

Thought I'd update you on a few things since I know you've been wondering what happened since I last posted about these topics. Because I know you have nothing better to do than wonder what is going on in my life. Well...

First, Tessa survived the solo on Saturday at Spring Sing. She did very well and is glad it's over. She had an entourage of 9 family members and friends and the grans came bearing a dozen red roses, so she was happy. We finished the night at Hideaway in Stillwater where, OMG, they were having a bad service night. Asking us to repeat our drink order 5 times to 3 different people(not kidding), bringing out a mini instead of a medium pizza, and completely forgetting one whole pizza didn't make for the best impression for those who had never been there. Usually they're way more on the ball than that. Thankfully we got out of there without any member of our party going ballistic. We were having a good time being together and the food was sort of incidental.

Hmmm, how's the world's fastest kitchen remodel going, you ask?

Next question.

OK, so it's possibly the world's slowest kitchen remodel. What can I say. Half the kitchen - the part with the appliances, is pretty much done. The other half, where the kitchen table sits, is now under major construction. Old houses are always full of surprises. This weekend we peeled back a layer of really ugly paneling to find...another layer of really ugly paneling...and under that...siding. Yep. One wall of our kitchen was at some point the outside wall of the house. Yay! At some point I thought about just painting the siding and calling it unique, but then we decided it would be weird unique, not cool unique. So here comes the sheetrock. We hope to be done by 2011.

How is the battle of the bulge going? Wow, you people ask tough questions. It's going. That's about all I'm going to say on that subject. Let's just say I haven't given up, a few battles have been won, but the war is going to be protracted and full of casualties. Baked goods beware. You are on the terrorist list and will find yourself living out your days at Gitmo.

I just thought of something. Gitmo would be a really good name for a convenience store. You know, like Shop 'n Go or Quicktrip. Their jingle could go "When times are tuff, go where you can git mo' stuff." I know. I'm a marketing genious.

Mark just got back from the grocery store, so I'm going to go unload the food and stop wasting your time.

Tragedy is the word for the day, apparently

I kind of overdid the Starbucks last week. I guess I was feeling extra tired and pitifully in need of comfort food/drink. And for some reason, just the smell of a Starbucks store floods me with joy and contentment. And I'm not even kidding. If they would bottle that smell, I'd be first in line to buy a case and start spritzing my world.



On Saturdays Mark makes a Starbucks run and we sit on our little spots on the couches and sip coffee, read The Oklahoman, and drop crumbs all over the furniture from my Orange Cranberry Scone and his Cream Cheese Danish. We're creatures of habit. But this past Saturday a tragedy occurred while another tragedy was avoided. A dog, oblivious of my need for a steaming grande soy vanilla rooibos latte, ran in front of the car. Since it was a dog and not a cat, Mark applied the brakes, and MY drink went flying. (I just lost all you fellow blog readers who love cats. It's not so much that I don't like cats, it's that they make me itch and sneeze and they don't wag their tales to tell me how they feel. I don't like guessing. A dog tells you right off what they think).



So anyway, I was forced to choose between asking Mark to go back to Starbucks, or drink something else. To be fair, he immediately offered to go back. But I'm just not that selfish. But don't think I didn't consider it!



All that to say, I discovered I could make a pretty darn good soy vanilla rooibos latte at home. Rooibos tea is from South Africa, and when we lived in Joburg, it was my drink of choice. I brought back large quantities, and then had anyone I knew who was traveling that way bring me some more. Then I ran out and it was a tragedy. But then, glory to God, the USA discovered rooibos. It's sort of pronounced roy'-bus. But you have to roll the "r" and stretch out to rooooy, and the "bus" part sounds more like a hiss with a "b" in the front. OK, so I'm not a linguist. But you don't have to pronounce it correctly to try something new. You'll love it!



Ingredients:

1/2 cup vanilla soy milk
2 tsps sugar (can't be helped)
Rooibos Tea (often called Red Tea or White Tea - don't know why they can't decide, but look at the box and it should say Rooibos)
Hot water - duh






Heat your water in the kettle, heat your soy milk in the microwave or steam it however you prefer. Add 2 tsps sugar to the steamed milk. I would NOT recommend using honey instead of sugar. The honey overpowers the rooibos flavor. Add your tea bag and your hot water, let it steep a bit and there you go. Leave the bag in. It won't get too strong like a black tea.






And if you want the full experience, put it in a to-go cup with a lid, write your name on it, and have a loved one yell out "Grande Soy Vanilla Rooibos Latte for Cari at the Bar". Ahhhhh. Joy in a cup.


And that, my friends, is as close to a recipe as you are going to get on this blog.

Finally Friday

Here's a picture of the amazing iced sugar cookies I was drooling over in my tweet yesterday. I think iced sugar cookies trump any other kind of dessert. I gave a couple to each of my coworkers since we all had a rough start to the day. I'm not sure if it's good or bad that I've finally darkened the door of Clark's Bakery here in Bethany. First Tessa's perfect, fluffy pink birthday layer cake, then these awesome cookies. I can tell I'm going to have to treat it like a special-occasion-only place or I'll be in there every day.

I know you'll probably all be busy out with your sweetheart doing astoundingly romantic things together this weekend. Or not. But in case you have some time, here are some fun links.

One day recently I was listening to NPR and luh,huh,uved this story. It's the full hour of This American Life, but it's worth it. You can download it and listen while you're road tripping, or just treat yourself, get a latte, put your feet up and enjoy. Maybe it's just because I'd much prefer a good true story over fiction, but the story of Bobby Dunbar is fascinating.

And another truth is stranger than fiction thing...from my Dad. I'll post it since my siblings didn't.

And if you need a cute last minute Valentine's project, check here and here and here.

And, and, and...it's been a while since I posted the basic dogs on couch photo, so here you go.

No one said life was fair; aka daily whine

What does my body require in order to lose an ounce? Moderate exercise and a healthy diet? That's what the experts say, but no one told my own self. It has a plan of its own. One day of eating cookies, gain 3 pounds. (I didn't actually eat 13 cookies on Sunday. Maybe 6. And they were little). Two days of moderate exercise and healthy eating? Gain 1 pound. I guess the good news is that I gained at a slower rate. If that can be considered good news. I don't believe the so called experts when they say the pounds will magically fall off if you make small changes. I have to switch to carrot sticks and celery and water only if I want to start seeing the pounds come off.

Small changes my a...pple loving self.

Speed blogging

OK, I set a 30 minute time limit on reading/writing blog posts this morning since work calleth. So here's a recap of my weekend in bullet points. Because I love bullet points. I wish I could always communicate in bullet points. None of this Hi, how are you, your hair looks nice, did you sleep well, hope you had a nice weekend chit chat. I'd rather just start out the day with

• It was a weekend. I'm sure you had one too.
• Have work to do, so going to my office.
• Why isn't there any coffee?
• Leave me alone until at least 10:00.

But that doesn't win friends or get you any brownie points with the boss. Anyway, the clock is ticking, so here's my weekend in numbers.

• 11-the number of hours I slept Friday night.
• 1-the number of decaf soy caramel machiatos I had from Starbucks. Usually it's at least two per weekend, so I'm cutting back on behalf of my waistline and the economy.
• 4 - the number of hours wasted entertaining myself by making a new header for my blog and creating a super bowl bingo game.
• 1 - the number of kitchen chairs I got painted. Only five to go. Maybe by April.
• 2 - the number of times I cleaned up dog puke. Seriously, stop eating weird stuff out of the yard.
• 2 - the number of times I told Mark to go in the other room while I cleaned up dog puke so I wouldn't have to clean up his puke too.
• 30 - the number of minutes I played on the Wii.
• 13 - the number of chocolate chip cookies I ate at the Super Bowl party.
• 352 - the number of beautiful, precious, noisy children at the Super Bowl party.
• 1.5 - the number of quarters we lasted at the Super Bowl party before taking our old, grumpy selves home.

Now do you feel enlightened? My time is up. Have a nice Monday. Kisses.

Super Bowl XLIII

Oh goodie. The Super Bowl is Sunday. I asked Mark where he was going to watch the big game. He said he was trying to decide whether to watch it at the east end of the couch or the west. We need more friends!

Time for my second annual installment of information on all things Super Bowl for the uninitiated. Or uninterested.

This year's Super Bowl is an epic battle between, um, two football teams. The game will be played in Tampa Bay. Oh yeah. It's between the Arizona Cardinals (yay) and the Pittsburgh Steelers. It's odd to me that the official Super Bowl XLIII website doesn't really mention which teams are playing. Apparently we are supposed to already know that. Duh! So I had to look it up elsewhere on the internet.

After Janet Jackson's 2004 wardrobe malfunction, the Halftime Show planners are still too freaked out to be very innovative. So Bruce Springsteen it is. In fact, come to think of it, no one with breasts has been featured since that year. Paul McCartney, The Rolling Stones, Prince, Tom Petty. No breasts in the bunch. So no danger of wardrobe malfunctions. If you think about it, if any of these guys had wardrobe malfunctions, there would just be a collective "eewww" from the universe. They're gonna run out of old male farts pretty soon. There will, however, be someone with breasts singing the National Anthem. It will be one of Jennifer Hudson's first appearances since her mother and brother were murdered just a few months ago. God bless her!

The best part of the Super Bowl is the commercials. Am I right? You know it's true. This year there is the first ever 3D commercial. You can pick up your 3D glasses wherever SoBe drinks are sold. This is what the crowd in my living room will look like.

If you too want to run an ad during the Super Bowl, it will cost you 3 million for a 30 second spot. That's a lot of pressure on those advertising people. Hear that Tessa? What do you have to say in 30 seconds that is worth $3 mil? This is your future.

The Super Bowl can be a dangerous pastime. And I don't just mean broken limbs or cracked skulls. Or heightened cholesterol levels. Emergency rooms report patients choking on chicken bones, backs thrown out from sudden leaps from the couch, and, most serious - urinary retention problems. I know - it's tempting to stay put through the commercials, putting off the inevitable trip to the little boys room. But unless you enjoy the catheterization experience, don't put it off. And for pete's sake, do not, I repeat, DO NOT, open your beverage of choice with your teeth.

Oh, and one last thing that will bring sighs of relief from millions. The reported shortage of buffalo wings has been greatly exaggerated. There will be wings. Hallelujah. Amen.

T.G.I.M.

I'm off today since I worked 14 hours on Saturday. I have a quiet Monday to myself to do whatever I want. For some reason on days like this I don't want to shower. It just seems like such a waste of time since no one is here to see or smell me. There are so many other fun things to take up the day. And who knows, I might exercise and get all sweaty, and then I'd just have to shower again. It's a slim chance, but a chance, and I certainly don't want to shower twice.

The nest is empty again with Tessa back at OSU. She's been kind of dragging around all week after having her wisdom teeth removed, but boy did she perk up when it came time to pack and head back to her sorority house. You've never seen laundry done so quickly and with such cheerfullness. As with everything in life, it's all about the motivation.

I spent some time over the weekend in rural Oklahoma and caught up on the local gossip discussed in the diner. One woman who used to weigh about 400 pounds got a lap band and now weighs 90 and is dying because it slipped, but doesn't want to have it taken out. A precious 7 year old boy is dying from a heart condition and he got his wish from the Make A Wish Foundation to go to a NASCAR race and see Dale Jr. Families who have been dirt poor all their lives are now getting rich from oil and gas wells drilled on their property and are busy buying up diamond rings, big houses and bigger trucks. You can make more money working a weekend at a cock fight than you make all week in your regular job.

Also, thought I'd share some Do's and Don'ts - a few things I've learned:

• Do take the time to enjoy the landscape and the space. A breathtaking sunset and a huge full moon are much easier to appreciate with nothing obstructing the view.
• Do wear camo to the local diner if it's hunting season and you don't want to stand out as that city woman.
• Do have lunch with the county sheriff. Too many reasons to list.
• Don't go to the local diner expecting to order their specialty fried catfish on Saturday because Friday night is all you can eat fried catfish night and there won't be any left.
• Don't order the calf fries unless you fully understand what you're getting and are in full agreement with eating cast offs from the castrating session at the local ranching operation.
• Don't discuss the local cock fights when you're eating lunch with the sheriff.

Christmas related meandering

Mark just suggested I take a picture of him and the dogs since they are so cute. I'm all, do we really want yet another picture of you wearing that same orange OSU shirt, sitting in your usual spot on the southwest corner of the green couch with the dogs piled on you? Probably not. But I took them anyway because I'm a good wife like that. I'd share but they didn't come out very well since I took them with my iphone which doesn't have a flash because I was too lazy to get up and fish the camera out of my purse. The iphone doesn't have a flash but it's not because I'm lazy. I don't think that was a well constructed sentence.

We've had a busy day but didn't accomplish much. Mom hosted a party to kind of honor a newly married, distant relative couple who were visiting. The theme was "It's A Wonderful Life". We borrowed a big, theater sized popcorn maker from my office, and we made ice cream sundaes and root beer floats in cute old fashioned glassware. Mom bought bakery cookies in the shape of stars and bells and filled a big glass cookie jar. I thought it was brilliant for a fun Christmas party. I think we forgot to put the actual movie on the TV though. Wonder what happened to that. Anyway, now I know who has a ton of sundae glassware things if I ever need them.

By the way, we were trying to figure out what a Black Cow was. Some people thought it was a root beer float. Some thought it was a root beer float made with chocolate ice cream. If you're dieing to find the answer, click here. Root beer always reminds me of an Ogden family story where Grandma Ogden, who apparently liked to make homemade root beer, made some at Mark's house when he was a boy. Good? No, bad! It somehow exploded and there was root beer dripping from every surface in the kitchen, including the ceiling. After Mark asked me to marry him we went to A&W to get a root beer. I know. We're dorks. But it was the only place open and I didn't want to go back to my dorm just yet. I love root beer.

I should probably send out Christmas cards. I don't have to buy any since I have about three years worth in my cabinet that I never sent out. I think some are actually already addressed. No one will know, will they? If you read this blog and you receive a Christmas card from me this year, rest assured it was lovingly selected and signed just for you and is not a left-over from last year. Really.

OU is about to play Missouri. I better stop blogging and get ready to act like I care.