Week of Crazy

Well, I have gone through some pretty terrible stress in the past week. With everything going on, I just don't know where my head is these days.

Friday
I'm pretty sure Friday had a lot going on, but really all I can remember is one thing: Mini Book Club. A few of the ladies from my knitting group got together at our last potluck and decided to start a mini book club that will meet here and there to discuss a book we've been reading. The really big reason I'm mentioning this is that it's a very good book. I've never really been one to read books in the adolescent fiction genre, but honestly I didn't think that this matched up with my original concept of "adolescent fiction". I seem to mentally equate the term with Twilight, which I know is erroneous, but the author actually uses some great vocabulary and doesn't have me wanting to gouge my eyes out with a spoon with inanity of writing. The book is Sabriel by Garth Nix. We were supposed to read the first five chapters for our meeting and I sort of inadvertently read the entire book. I know! I'm bad! It was a great book, though. Check it out.

Another book I'm reading is The Kingdom of Gods by N.K. Jemisin. That is the third in a trilogy a good friend suggested to me a while back and I waited forever for this book to come out. It is amazing, though. Just absolutley amazing. I really enjoy the writing and the Universe is very unique and unlike anything I've ever really read before.  If you're interested, read the trilogy. They are phenomenal.

Saturday

I weighed in and met my 10% goal. Huzzah! I have an awful lot of pride for that and am looking forward to doing well in the future! I got my 10% medallion but it broke on my keychain because I wouldn't stop fiddling with it. I'm hoping to talk to my leader on Saturday to see if I can't get a new one. But... yay! 10%! That, according to my mother, is 97 sticks of butter. I think I'm going to have to start putting my weight loss in terms of sticks of butter. It's just amusing.

Then, I went up to Austin for our Disablot. It was a lot of fun and I was very happy to see everyone. It has been too long. The kids were very entertaining and I endjoyed seeing them. We were asked to bring an item that we felt represents someone we believe is one of our disir.  I brought my great-great grandmother's practice violin.  According to my great-grandmother, Beatrice the Younger or "Bebe" (and this may be shaky, as she suffered dementia near the end), this violin is the one that Beatrice the Elder played when she met her husband, Frank.  Sort of an interesting story and rather weird to hold that same violin in my hands, many years later.  Anyway, the violin was given to me when I was starting to play in the orchestra in middle school.  It has since been reduced to storage state, with strings loosened or taken off altogether.  It is in need of a new chin rest since the fastener for the original finally gave up the gost a few years ago, at which point my parents decided to retire it and get me a new violin.  I have since stopped playing, but I would really enjoy getting back into it again.  Music is something that has literally created my family, in many ways, and I have many fond memories of my great-grandmother Bebe and music, as it was one of her many creative passions. Anyway, I thought that this particular instrument was a rather huge piece of my family history and I am sure my cohorts are well aware of how much regard I have for my great-grandmother, maybe it was time to go back a teensy bit further and go into that bit of family history.  Family history is certainly not something I am lacking, per se. The rest of the gathering was wonderful and Jenn made a fantastic stew. Very tasty stuff, I must admit.

I ended up staying overnight due to the just... blahness... of not wanting to drive all the way home afterward. I mean, really, who can blame me?  Fun people, great atmosphere, interesting discussion as opposed to two hours of driving home? Decision made fairly easily. I must say, also, that they have some crazy comfortable recliners. Really. Anyway, it was good that I stayed because this meant I could partake in the interesting late-evening activities. The night involved mead and a lot of interesting discussion about runes. I have never been particularly interested in the runes for divinatory purposes, though, so I did not have much to say on the subject.  However, the meanings behind them are very fascinating and I was very interested to learn more about them. More reading is in order, of course, but I'm quick to point out that that seems to be the case for all of my knowledge about Heathenry, and I'm hoping that there will never be a point at which I say otherwise.

Sunday
Well, a good part about Sunday is... that I woke up. That was very good. The recliner was good to sleep in and rather comfortable, so there was no problem with that. We had pancakes for breakfast and it was really great to just sit and have breakfast with my peeps, you know? Yep. We had a bit of amusement trying to rouse some of the folks who stayed up a bit later than we did. I would say we were only marginally more wise, but the margins are very slim on that one. Anyway, it was soon time to go home. I was not excited about the trip, but it wasn't so horrible.

The interesting times really began when I got home. My sister and her fiance were leaving to go horseback riding and my little brother was rather upset about the entire thing. So, I talked to him and we decided to go bowling with my friend, Chris. It was good and we had tons of fun. I even won the first game. Can you believe it? If you've ever been bowling with me, the answer to that should be a resounding "no". Anyway, it did happen. I swear it. Dax got very upset at the end because he didn't win. He gets very upset and down on himself. It just has a lot to do with all of the things that have been going on lately. Anyway, we did go home later and he calmed down quite a bit. It was pretty fun, all in all.

However, right before I was going to go to bed... my mom's dog decided to pick a fight with our new porch cat, named Sage. I have the feeling that she's some sort of Maine Coon mix because she is just absolutely ginormous. Here is a picture for reference:

Anyway, the stupid dog got a scratch on his eyeball so my sister and I went to take him to the vet. He was fine, but there were hours of waiting just to see him have a cone put on his head and given eyedrops. However, the wait was very amusing! There were some interesting signs in the examination room. I have an example.

I have no idea if it was the exhaustion or what, but for some reason this was absolutely amusing. Anyway, we had quite a bit of complaining to do before we had someone finally see the dog and we got his silly cone put on at about 1:45 am. Ugh.



Monday

Nothing happened. I was sick. I did do an awesome marathon of Bones, though.

Tuesday

Well, I was miraculously better that morning but decided to stay home, anyway. I have quite a bit of interesting fun times when I am sick and don't realize it, so I decided to stay home. I'm glad that I did, because my dad very crankily went off to the emergency room complaining of a stomach ache and lo and behold! Appendicitis. My sister caused mild panic when she translated this as a ruptured appendix, but he did have surgery and everything is fine. He came home yesterday and is doing very well. I just hope he doesn't decide to go running around all willy-nilly while he's home on "vacation". Bah.

I have a lot going on in the next few days and, because this week has been a week from hell itself, I have not been very good about exercising. Ugh. I'm going to have to work a bit harder at it next week, but I'm trying to do well. Really. We'll see how it goes. The Internet connection at the house has been fixed, so I am going to hopefully be able to update as things happen. Hopefully.

Cottage Pie

Well, on Sunday night I decided to cook dinner. It was a good evening all around and full of enjoyment. I have decided to share a recipe that is a huge hit in my family. The recipe is for Cottage Pie, which is a huge hit in my family. In the US, it's common to hear cottage pie called shepherd's pie, but shepherd's pie refers to the use of lamb or mutton, which we don't really use much here. I confirmed that with a friend the other day since we've been calling it shepherd's pie all along. The more you know! At any rate, it's a family favorite. My brother gobbles the stuff up like you would not believe. It's a good way to get him to eat vegetables since they're mixed in so well.

I would like to note, that this recipe is one that can easily feed a family of seven with at least one serving left over for lunch when served with a salad. If you have a regular, normal-sized family I would suggest using one casserole dish, one pound of meat, and one pound of vegetables.

 

Also, by recipe... I mean general recipe. I'm absolutely terrible with measuring out actual food items while cooking and am famous for my method of "some" cooking. Put some of this, some of that. Never an actual measurement beyond what I happen to see on packages when I open them. Ha.

Ingredients:

2 lb lean ground beef or turkey

2 lb frozen mixed vegetables (I tend to get the ones with carrots, peas, green beans, lima beans, etc)

7-8 medium-ish potatoes (I tend to get the red potatoes and approximately one per person that is a size that would not make them cry if it was a baked potato)

Fat-free sour cream

Worcestershire sauce

Garlic- fresh, minced, powder... we like it all

Ground black pepper

Basil

Thyme

 

1. Set water to boil and preheat oven to 350.

2. Peel and quarter potatoes.

3. Peel a few cloves of garlic and add in to potatoes. This is optional. We are garlic FREAKS.

4. Put quartered potatoes and whole garlic cloves in boiling water, boil for about ten minutes or until fork tender.

5. While waiting for potatoes to boil, put meat and vegetables into a large pan to brown and cook, adding Worcestershire sauce in not-too-liberal amounts along with minced garlic, ground black pepper, basil, and thyme. Notice there are not measurements because I tend to cook by smell. Also, be sure not to accidentally dump ALL the Worcestershire sauce in. There is such a thing as too much.

6. When potatoes are ready, strain out the water and set aside.

7. When the ground beef or turkey is browned, evenly line the bottom of two casserole dishes with the mixture and set aside. If you use meat with a higher fat content, you may want to strain it to get the oil out. If it's too fatty the oil will bubble over the mashed potatoes when baking. I don't usually have this problem since we use very lean beef or turkey, like I said.

8. Mash your potatoes and add ground black pepper and garlic powder. Add fat free sour cream to the mixture to give it a more smooth and creamy texture. I do this because I am on weight watchers and it is significantly better than butter as far as points go. If you like butter in your mashed potatoes, go for it. This is just a healthier option.

9. Smooth the mashed potatoes over the cooked meat in the bottom of your casserole dishes. I tend to do this with a spatula and make cool ridges and such. 

10. Put in oven and cook for half an hour or so or until potatoes become golden on top. I do not like to bake mine as long since the little dude is usually doing the hungry dance in front of the oven pretty much immediately after it goes in.