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As you know I love to cook, but have been hesitant when it comes to cooking meals with meat. The main reason I believe is that (a) I fear I will under cook it & poison people and (b) if I’m only cooking for myself, I don’t want the hassle. Back when I lived in Hoboken, I went months without eating meat, mostly due to the fact that I didn’t have the patience.
Living at home with my dad, the ultimate carnivore, I figured it was time to get over my fear and start learning how to cook dishes that included meat .
Last week, I decided to make a meatloaf, the ultimate American meal. So I browsed around the Internet & collaborated a couple recipes that ultimately resulted into a pseudo Italian style meatloaf.
First thing I did was whip up a quick tomato sauce; two cans of chopped tomatoes, 2 cloves crushed garlic, a handful of basil, and salt & pepper. I let that simmer while I made up the meatloaf. Here, there are Italian breadcrumbs, 1/2 of a chopped onion, a squirt of sriracha sauce, pepper flakes, 2 eggs, more basil, and flat leaf parsley. 
Isn’t he handsome?
So I threw this guy into the oven at 400 degrees for 30 minutes. Afterwards, I topped it off with the tomato sauce, mozzarella cheese, and some dried oregano and cooked for an additional 30 minutes.
Afterwards, I sided it with some angel hair pasta tossed with spinach, olive oil, garlic, and a little bit lemon juice & of course some crusty bread.
Yummmmm….I must say I was very pleased with my first turkey meatloaf & hip hurray nobody got poisoned 
Sure in retrospect I haven’t been looking all that long & hard (I’ve only been home since June 1st) , but hip hurray I got a job! Starting on Monday, I’ll be working for Inked Magazine, a beautiful tattoo lifestyle magazine!
It’s going to be interesting getting back to working everyday, having a schedule, and not having as much free time. But I think it’s going to be a great experience. Based on first impression, the office has a great vibe, lots of creative people, and hopefully I’ll fit right in. So we’ll see. Regardless it feels great to start moving forward again.
Like I mentioned previously, I spent all last week in Pennsylvania at an event called Pennsic with my sister & her boyfriend Kris. And like I thought, it was absolutely insanely hilariously quirky & intense. Probably what I liked about it the most were the parties (obviously), people watching, and all the great people that I met. Honestly I was a little nervous walking into a situation where I basically didn’t know anybody, but found it amazing to be so warmly welcomed. So here are a couple fantastic highlights:
- Wonderful friendly guys who, when were bored, felt the need to give massages. And not just any massage, but AMAZING. Oh boy I was so spoiled last week.
- I thought my friends could party & drink a lot, but my sister’s friends took it to a whole other level. I could hardly keep up, wondering around Wednesday if I’d be able to make it till the end of the week.
- The amount of creativity in the area was overwhelming. Walking through the market was something I so enjoyed to do because you got a chance to see all the amazing things people were working on. It was extremely inspiring & made me want to rush home to apologize to my sewing machine for neglecting it. And the musicians! Oh lord, such rich and diverse music. We would walk around and just let ourselves submerge in such talent.
- Who doesn’t love the sounds of bagpipes and drums in the morning?
- Sweet tea vodka & Mike’s hard lemonade…delicious and always guaranteed trouble. One thing my sister, Kris, & I learned was never start drinking them at 3:00 in the afternoon…completely took us all out of commission around midnight. They are delicious and sneaky.
- Belly dancers!
- My tent flooded 2 nights. We were very amazed that my father, the civil engineer & lover of researching before each purchase, would ever buy such a thing. When I confronted him, he immediately assumed I MUST have not closed the windows. Right. Luckily all my stuff was tucked away in plastic containers, so the only innocent bystander was my pillow who I threw away after the week ended.
- MEAD. I haven’t been exposed too much to mead, but wow, is it delicious!
- Talking about Harry Potter around a campfire….with people who went to Harry Potter Fan Appreciation Conventions. Amazing.
- Hot guys dressed as pirates.
- A second chance at haggis! Who would have thought 2010 would be a big year for me & the haggis? Remember back in January when I went to the Burns party & had my first experience with it? I wasn’t all that impressed. Apparently every year at the camp’s weekly party, they order a haggis. So I figured to give it another go. And what do you know, I like haggis now.
Overall, great week. I got to spend some quality time with my sister & Kris, finally got to experience what Pennsic was after years of hearing about it, & it helped me get out of my life a bit to re-charge. Now I’m ready for the next step, whatever that may be.
One day while I was off to an interview, some guy pulled me over from Tattoosday blog asking if he could take some pictures of my tattoos and feature them. Sure, why not. A month or so went by & I pretty much forgot about it. But look! Today’s entry on http://www.tattoosday.blogspot.com is me!
Go take a look!
You can hardly turn on the television or look at movie previews without Nicolas Sparks’ latest & greatest being mentioned. And you know what… I am getting sick & tried of him. How does the man do it? Nick is probably the biggest hopeless romantic that has ever lived. Between “The Notebook”, “Dear John”, & “A Walk To Remember”… it’s a guaranteed night of weeping. Has he ever had a happy ending?
I’m not going to lie, I did like “The Notebook”, but obviously I sobbed hysterically through it’s entirety. In my own defense, the first time I watched it was around the time my grandpa died, so anything to do with senior citizens & their long romances were touchy subjects. Psh, thanks alot Nicolas.
But then I think of his wife. Could you imagine being married to him? His office is probably like the office of Professor Umbridge from Harry Potter; all pink with decorative pink plates with kittens all over the walls. His wife must be the strong one in the relationship, having to comfort him during sad movies & commercials. She’s the one during the night who has to go downstairs with a baseball bat when Nick hears a noise.
Or do you think he just enjoys making girls cry? Maybe he had a hard time during high school where he was constantly being rejected. Perhaps one day Nick vowed that he would get back at them all by writing heart breaking weepy stories, leaving them with doubts that there is no such thing as a happy ending. Obviously once you find love they are going to die from a weird disease or get dementia… When you look at it that way, he wins. Who knows..
As you probably noticed from a blog ago, I’m SO stuck in a rut. Not only is my job search not going the way I hoped, but things are on the rocks with Kyle. I won’t get too much into it, but basically since we’ve been back in the states, our relationship has been off. And slowly things got to a point where every time I had a drink, would basically explode on him with all the things that I wasn’t happy about or wished he had done differently during my mother being in the hospital and the two months after she passed away. I’ve been so terribly confused; my life, where it’s going now, who I want in it, & what the next steps to take. So I’ve asked him for a break to be alone to sort my heart & brain out.
Way back in New Zealand, I started planning with my sister going with her to this event she has gone to forever called Pennsic War. It’s this…well it’s hard to explain. Here’s the explanation from the website:
“Pennsic is an annual event, in the guise of a “War”, between the Kingdoms of the East and the Middle of the Society for Creative AnachronismPennsic is also the largest Society event, with attendance in recent years exceeding 10,000. The scheduled activities include large melee battles, tournaments, archery, stage performances, dancing, and hundreds of classes on medieval topics. The marketplace has over 200 merchants selling a variety of wares.”
What will I be doing in the midst of all this excitement? Probably happily (and hopefully) dressed like a gypsy, sipping wine all day, exploring, and dancing. Just what my soul needs <3
Seeya in a week, hopefully with a clear mind & all the answers.
When the summer basil gets as beautiful as this..
…there is nothing else to do but make pesto!
Cute side-note: as I was picking the basil, which is right next to the basement window, look who was peeking through attempting to join in on the pesto making fun!
Anyway, I grabbed a handful of basil & put it in the food processor with walnuts (would have preferred pine nuts, but a girls on a budget), 1/2 cup of grated Parmesan cheese, 1/2 cup spinach, 4 cloves of garlic, salt & pepper to taste, & about 1/2 cup of olive oil.
Earlier, I had cubed & cooked up some chicken breast & made pasta – but be sure to save about a cup of the pasta water for later – so in a pot, I mixed together the pesto, chicken, & pasta, adding some of the pasta water in to mellow out the pesto. Without the water, the pesto would have been too thick & intense.
And voila! I topped it off with some chopped up scallions and sided it with some crusty bread – a delicious summer meal & great way to enjoy your summer basil crop.
Sigh.. I don’t think I’ll ever find a job. I don’t know what I was thinking quitting my job & assuming that someone would welcome me back with open arms when I was ready to come back to the professional world.
So far I’ve been to
- 3 recruiters – all of which made open exciting promises & had so many opportunities, but of course didn’t follow-up with any good leads…even after I emailed AND called.
- 4 interviews for restaurant/cafe managing positions. One I didn’t get, one I got but was way too low paid, & another two I’m waiting on.
- 1 interview at Rolling Stone. Yes I said Rolling Stone. Maybe I’ll hear back, maybe not. I’m not staying hopeful.
And must we not forget the 500 jobs I’ve probably applied for over the course of the past two months.
It just sucks, you know. The last time around when I was looking for jobs my mom would always say, “keep looking, there is the perfect job out there for everyone”.
I can’t help but worry that there isn’t a job out there for me…that there isn’t anything out there that I’ll really love, but more just deal with.
I’m kinda having a sad down day.
Due to the fact that I have no job and spend my days pretty much alone, it’s been perfect conditions to float around the pool all afternoon and read good books. I’m at a place where I should NOT be buying anything, let alone books, but the good news is my parent’s house is stocked with tons of them, most that I haven’t read. Alas the bad news is that the majority of my moms’ are self help or spiritual – she was a healer and constant mover of inner exploration & growth, so her bookshelves are lined with titles like, “The New Creative You”, “The Power Of Now”, & “Be Your Very Best Self”. Stuff like that. But there is a gem or two in the stacks, things that I was able to dig up that have turned into miracle reads.
Take for example, “The Help”. I had never heard of it, but apparently it’s been a very popular book – been on NY Times list for a while. Well within the first couple pages, I was hooked! It’s a beautiful story following the lives of three woman living in the south during the 1960’s & the relationships between the upper white class & African Americans who are their help. One is Skeeter – a writer who came from a wealthy family. She had friends who were all from the upper class, but after graduating college, knew there was more to life than just getting married and having babies. Then there was Minny, a hot tempered woman with loads of kids, an abusive husband, and the ability to lose jobs quicker than anyone else. And finally, Aibileen, who is also Minny’s best friend. She was the sweetest, hard working, & good hearted person. The type of character you immediately befriends. Aibileen loved the children she helped to raise, had no patience for her employer, who also happened to be one of Skeeter’s close friends. The three lives crossed when Skeeter decided to write a book about life as the help in Mississippi of a white home. Minny & Aibileen help Skeeter to speak to all the people in the area. I won’t give anything else away because it is just absolutely gem. I have a copy, let me know & it’s yours!
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Literary Loves
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