A Mighty Fine Life

I have a new layout! Inspired by Cym, I began poking around looking for something that struck my fancy, and with only moderate screwing around with it, this one did. It is very bright and lemon-y fresh: queenitsy.

(Note to poisonivory: It also inspires a feeling of guilt for not having worked on Tart, so there's that.)

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I made a pretty good dinner earlier this week, which is only notable because I don't usually, you know...do that. It was super easy -- garlic, tomato, black beans mixed up in the wok for a while, put over pasta, with cheddar cheese on top -- but DELICIOUS.

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This was a bad week for HIV.

The CDC has been in the process of revising the estimated number of cases in the U.S. up for awhile. DC is at a minimum of 3%, which is FUCKING HUGE, and it's probably an under-estimatiion. It's okay, though, because the Pope wants to fix the global pandemic by asking us all not to use condoms anymore, since they don't work anyway. Spiritual renewal and true friendship, though. That'll do it. Not condoms. Yuh huh.

Um, so, I bought most of a new wardrobe today. I spent an incredibly amount of money, but I swear none of it was frivolous -- anyone who has seen my wardrobe (such as it is; there should be quotation marks around the word, honestly) knows I needed some new clothing. And I found the absolute most adorable, cutest winter coat in the entire world. I'm pretty sure. (It's purple. It looks like something Kenley would design on Project Runway -- very early 60s. I look like a plucky girl reporter. It is SO CUTE FOR REAL.) So there's that.

Aside from that, I managed to somehow update all three of my non-LJ blogs this week. It's remarkable, really.

Feminist nerd blog: ABC Family's "Greek": Surprisingly, Really Good! (It is. I swear. You should all watch it: every episode is online at abcfamily.com. DO IT. Come on, the really attractive naked boy in the cowboy hat in my new icon is the male lead! You know you want to see that.)

Active Voice: Two Mini-Reviews: Bruce Coville’s “Alien Adventures” and “Unicorn Chronicles” . What it says in the title. Bruce Coville rulez!

Tweenage Wasteland: The Suite Life on Deck. You guys, it was bad. Even for the Disney Channel. Even for The Suite Life. Really, really bad.

OH! And I cooked dinner, specifically with plans to save the extra for lunch tomorrow. I never do that! (It's veggie fried rice, if you're curious. I expanded the list of "things I can cook" another meal. Now I can have spaghetti OR rice, thank you very much...)

ETA: YES, I CAN SPELL "COAT," SHUT UP RACHEL.

Fresh Direct just delivered several boxes of delicious foodstuffs to our apartment! Hooray! However, one of them was definitely not intended for us. And while I don't the extra beefsteak tomatoes -- yum! -- and heck, I don't mind the corn on the cob or the giant broccoli, it just seems like a shame that the ham and the chicken are going to go to waste in apartment of strict vegetarians...

ETA: Tomato was delicious! Nom nom nom.

I now feel pretty confident that I can make this sauce reasonably well and without setting anything on fire anymore, thank you very much. I've done it a few times, now, because what I realized is that after years of my family thinking I was extremely odd for never, ever using spaghetti sauce, what I objected to was the sauciness, not the tomato-ness. Which makes sense; I love tomatoes, but hate ketchup, too. But the good thing about the sauce is that the meal pretty much ends up being spaghetti, with tomatoes!

I'm still not great with garlic; I have chopping issues and am never sure when is long enough for it, but that's mostly because I am not ever particularly patient, but especially not when I'm hungry.

Speaking of tomatoes, there's a farmer's market in my neighborhood every Saturday morning, and harriet_vane now makes a habit of rolling me out of bed before it closes so we can procure fresh, nummy vegetables.

There's a bread stall, which has excellent sourdough rye bread, and there's also a cheese stall which has amazing goat cheese with black olives in. Needless to say, the combination of the two is fantastic (and is usually what we eat for at least four meals on the weekends). Last weekend, however, my mom was in town, but as she also enjoys fresh veggies, she accompanied us, and offered the sage suggestion of also getting a head of basil and a giant tomato. Goat cheese + tomato + basil over sourdough is the BEST SANDWICH EVER, y'all. Srsly.

I have decided I should learn to cook at least a little. I mean, I already can make a mean bowl of pasta and, you know...grate cheese over it (a meal which got me through all of 11th and 12th grade, as well as junior and senior year of college (when I had a kitchen instead of a meal plan) and the not-quite-year I lived at home after graduation.

It seems like eating something other than that might be a good idea. Because, yeah. One meal.

So last week, poisonivory was the only one of us who really knew how to cook, and she kindly not only cooked for all of us, but did show us what she was doing. She made a damn fine spaghetti sauce for us all, and since today I was hungry and we happened to have canned tomatoes and garlic and spaghetti (yeah, it was a pretty easy sauce...when she made it....ooh, foreshadowing!), it seemed like a nice, easy, yummy lunch, and a good place to start. Right?

Um.

When Jess made spaghetti sauce, she didn't set the stove on fire.

However, apparently when I set things on fire, I do at least have the presence of mind to grab flammable objects like dish towels out of the way before they catch fire and, you know, set the whole apartment ablaze. So it was only a few seconds of flame. By the time Rachel ran in to see why I was screaming, it had gone out.

But other than the garlic being slightly burnt, it turned out well!