Taste trumps color

Today, I felt like being creative in the kitchen. I’ve always admired chefs. I long to be more skillful in the kitchen, invent my own recipes, and wow people with deliciousness. I was just not in the mood for another turkey and cheese sandwich. I searched the fridge and freezer and took inventory of what was inside. There was chicken, broccoli, pre-cut seasoning veggies, left-over white rice, and fresh garlic. Ooooh, and some red wine. Idea! Put all these ingredients in a skillet and let it simmer with the wine. Chefs do that all the time on the Food Network.


I decided to lightly brown the rice with the veggies… that came out well. Then I needed to prepare the chicken. Interestingly enough, this chicken was pre-cooked, and had just been frozen. Holla! I basically just needed to heat it up since it was already cooked through for me. I added the red wine. I guess professional cooks know about adding wine to food. I’m questioning whether they actually add red wine or maybe it’s just red wine-based vinegar. Maybe it’s always white wine…. I watched the chicken cook, and slowly, it become pink… oh, then lavender. The chicken absorbed the flavor, and unexpectedly, the color as well. HA-HA-HA. I really don’t know what I was thinking. Here I was cooking WHITE meat in RED wine. Duh.

Pastel purple chicken doesn’t look very appetizing, but could it really taste bad? It’s not like I added poison to the chicken. As soon as I took that first bite of my mauve-colored breast piece, I knew right away that color didn’t matter. It’s what’s on the inside that matters. Please, don’t judge my purple chicken. It’s delicious.

Ever tried to break into your own house?

I blame this incident on my new garage door opener… and maybe, Beta. I would have written this post on the day it happened (Wednesday), but I've been preoccupied with essay-writing for Texas Teaching Fellows.

Beta is a special dog. He's active like a puppy (despite his non-puppy size), runs at the speed and style of baby gazelle being chased, and only plays with toys that squeak. One of his all-time favorite things to do is watch the cars and trucks pass by our house. From our sloping backyard, he'll stand at the highest point, watching and waiting for the nosiest vehicle, and once he's gets the right one, blindly chases it along the fence. Sometimes he just spins around and around in circles. To each his own, right? Well, lately Beta has decided that he'd rather stay outside in the hot sun and chase cars rather than return to a cool air-condition house with his canine lounge bed and squeak toys. He just stubbornly ignores his name and the command "Come". My dog: the rebel. Well, it's annoying. I can't chase him down to get him in the house, but I feel guilty leaving him outside for such a long time in this increasing Texas heat. Since he disobeyed that morning about coming in before I left for work, he was just going to have to stay outside until I came home for lunch.

While on my way home around noon, I was worried about Beta. I hoped he had enough water and had found shade. I pulled into the garage using my new garage door opener, and immediately headed to the backyard to get Beta inside. I found him wedged between the wall and the air-conditioner unit trying to get into the shade. I attached the leash to his collar, but he came quietly and submissively, as if, he finally regretted his decision about not coming inside when he had the chance. When it was time to go back to work, I merrily headed towards the laundry room to get to the garage. It's important to know that the door leading the garage door has a lock on the door knob. It's one of those doors that can be locked before it is shut. And that's exactly what happened; I turned the lock and shut the door. I open the garage door and hopped into Harriet. Uhh… the key light was blinking. I moved my purse closer the ignition (my car has this keyless feature, meaning the key just needs to be near the car to operate it). Well, moving my purse closer didn't work. Still, no luck. Are my keys even in my purse? I dug around and …(*insert bad word here*)

I knew without a doubt that I had locked the door, but I tried it just in case it would miraculously unlock itself for me. It didn't. (*insert a string of impolite four-letter words here*) Ugh! I could visualize where my car keys lay, and unfortunately, a locked door and some hallway separated us. So now my stubborn dog, Beta, is comfortably locked inside the house while I'm locked outside. I tried going through the backyard, hoping maybe I forgot to lock the backdoor. Turns out, I have an incredible memory for locking things. Before my garage door opener, I had to go through the front door, which has a normal lock. You know the sort - where you open the door, shut the door, insert key, turn, and leave. It would be near impossible to lock myself out of the house in the pre-garage door opener days.

After trying all the doors, I called my parents, hoping they had some spare key hidden somewhere. Nope. Well, then my Dad suggests trying to go through a window. Ummm… I just thought back to that news story with this Black (Harvard, maybe) professor was locked out of his house, and tried to break in. It resulted in his neighbors calling the cops, and the situation getting political. There's really not a good way to break into your own house… especially, when your house in on the corner. If I tried to be sneaky, I'd look suspicious. If I looked obvious, well, I'd still look suspicious. I tried popping off a screen like Dad suggests. Well, I'm happy to know that our screens don't just pop off. Although, I didn't work too hard on prying it off. It was the middle of the day, and I was fighting the rose bushes to get to a window on the front of our house. It was plan I was happy to abandon. Mom just panicked when I told her the news. She promised to leave work and come home to rescue me. Really? She wanted me to wait an hour for her? I'm cleverer than that.
I decided to just call one of my co-workers to pick me up from my house to get back to work. That was an awkward conversation.

"Hey, can you do me a favor?"
"Uh, sure. What?"
"Would you mind coming by my house to get me, so I can return to work? I locked my car keys inside… and myself outside."
"Ba-ha-ha…Sure thing!"

 I could only laugh at my situation, too. My solution: un-stack a lawn chair from the garage and wait in the shade.

April showers bring May flowers

So a few things may have rained on my parade recently, but that just meant there would be some blooming...

1.  My brother came home... so I left for awhile.  I'm in Miami for ANOTHER week, and I've been here for a week already!!  It's been a much needed break.

2.  After lots of sweat and soreness, I'm no longer a size 10 but a 6-ish.  I can't recall the last time I could wear something that was a single digit.

3.  My first attempt to take my Generalist 4-8 content exam for teacher certification was cancelled due to a snow-strom!  Crazy, huh? I stopped studying completely until the week before my rescheduled test date.  After much stress and doubt, I passed!! 283/300!  So pleased!

4.  My car killed my iPod.  I pitifully took it to the Apple store to be saved, but instead it was replaced for FREE!  It only had a 1 year warranty and it was over 4 years old. Amazing customer service, Apple!

5.  I regrettably allowed my mother to trim my hair... big mistake.  Not only did it look rough and dead still, but now uneven and butchered.  Weeks later, new haircut! Talk about serious damage control.

So...

Decisions I'm making and goals I'm setting:

1.  Go into teaching for awhile.

2.  I must go back to school... I miss it.  So, I'm deciding on graduate programs or law school.

3.  I'm going to France and Australia next summer.   I'm not backing out.  I'm going! :-)

4.  Oh, and I'll begin my search for a date to Dana's wedding...maybe... whatever.