…They Say it’s Your Birthday (It’s My Birthday Too… Yeah)

So guess who came to visit me this weekend?

Yep, this lovely, lovely lady.  And we’ve been having a splendid time together.  Friday, we did a whole lot of nothing, other than making stir fry and watching Julie and Julia.  Too bad the momster decided to fall asleep because she missed most of the movie.  Saturday was an extremely productive shopping day (I got some clothes and kitchen stuff)… and then we went to Sakura!  Yay for fake sushi!!!  Sunday was nice and relaxing, my friend came over for lunch and we ate this:

OMG… it was one of the best salads I’ve had in a long time.  Let’s see, it had strawberries, blackberries, yellow peppers, spinach, grilled chicken, and pomegranate blueberry vinaigrette.  *noms*  I think we had a good time together.

Anyways, my mom and I actually watched the last half of the Super Bowl, which is surprising because I’m not the hugest fan (I didn’t even know where the two teams were from, that’s how much I fail).  The only reason why I wanted to watch was because The Who were preforming the half time show.  And man, did they suck.  I know that Classic Rock is timeless and pretty much made of awesome, but maybe that’s if you listen to the old albums.  Ok, ok, Paul McCartney and Pink Floyd can still rock it, but Pete Townsend and Roger Daltrey sounded a little ragged and tired.  I would have also preferred if they had actually played through a song or two instead of a doing a medley.  But, I guess I’m glad the Saints won, just because they were the underdog… honestly, I could care less.

Today was supposed to be our spa day.  We were going to Hot Springs to a Bath House to get massages and rejuvenate ourselves in the ‘healing waters.’  Too bad I got a call from my boss telling me that the library was closed.  And then I opened my blinds to see about two inches on the ground.  I went back to bed, and when I woke up, it was snowing like gangbusters.  So no spa for us.

Also, Mommy can’t fly out tomorrow.  I guess what we’re getting now is moving North, and everyone is preparing for the worst.  So, hopefully she’ll be able to fly out on Wednesday.  Not that I mind or anything, I like having her around.  She’s pretty cool.  I keep joking that she flew nine hundred miles south to get away from the cold and the snow and… yeah.

She said if I have work tomorrow, she will do whatever I want her to do.  *evil cackle*

So we didn’t get the blizzard of the century like the East Coast, or a multitude of inches like Cleveland or Pittsburgh, but for Arkansas, it’s a ton.

You Probably Think it Bites Living in an Amish Paradise

I love forgetting about bananas because it gives me the perfect opportunity to make banana muffins.

Ok, so they look a little brown (and not as good as my Papa’s muffins), but they are delicious.  Plus, they make a much better breakfast than cereal bars.  Here’s the recipe:

Ingredients

• 1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
• 1 teaspoon baking powder
• 1 teaspoon baking soda
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 3 large bananas, mashed
• 3/4 cup white sugar
• 1 egg
• 1/3 cup butter, melted

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C). Coat muffin pans with non-stick spray, or use paper liners. Sift together the flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt; set aside.
2. Combine bananas, sugar, egg, and melted butter in a large bowl. Fold in flour mixture, and mix until smooth. Scoop into muffin pans.
3. Bake in preheated oven. Bake mini muffins for 10 to 15 minutes, and large muffins for 25 to 30 minutes. Muffins will spring back when lightly tapped.

nom…nom…nom…

So not much happened this week, but I did get to go to Friendship, the adult care center, and tell a few stories.  I met some of the sweetest people ever!  Hopefully, I can go back next month.

I did lay down some mad beats and totally rapped Weird Al Yankovic’s “Amish Paradise.” Because that’s how I roll.  *Flashes gang signs*

I was going to show a school group around today, but I got a call at 6:45 AM that went a little something like this:

Me: *all groggy and disgusting* Hello?

Boss: Marisa, we don’t have work today.

Me: Awesome, I’m going back to sleep.  Byeeeee

Boss: Uh, bye.

Yep, snow day.  Boo to the yah.

Other than that, Mommy’s coming to visit for the BIRFDAY in a week!

My Achilles Heel Would Be My Pancreas

I can’t believe it’s almost February, seems like yesterday that it was end of December.  Anyways, there have been a lot of goings on at the library, so I’ve been here, there and everywhere (which Beatles album…Bueller?)  Our first ginormous program is coming up in early February, so I’ve been gearing up for the craziness.  Have you heard of the Percy Jackson and the Olympians series?  If you haven’t, it’s like Harry Potter light plus Greek Mythology.  So it’s not the most fantastic piece of fiction I’ve read, but it’s fun and fast.  So you should read the series.  Right now *glares*  The movie gods have determined that the first book in the series, The Lightning Thief, is worthy of it’s own 90 minute feature.  I’m fervently praying to the movie gods that it doesn’t suck.  It comes out in early February, hence the big program, Camp Half-Blood.

Basically we’ll have a bunch of stations set up where kids can come and do crafts/activities.  My favorites are playing with a plasma ball, making your own balloon sword, and playing Super Mario on the Wii.  While Camp Half-Blood goes on, I’ll be running a quiz bowl.  Now do I know anything about running a quiz bowl?  I didn’t, but I kind of do now.  Making up the questions was so much FUN!  Why?  Because basically I got to go through all five books in the series and pick out broad concepts or nit picky points and turn them into questions.  All 200 of them.  Yeah, it was totally worth it!  The quiz bowl is the only thing that kids actually have to register for and the response has been TREMENDOUS.  I mean holy crap, the teams for the quiz bowl were filled more than a month before the program started.  Basically, the pressure is on and I’ll have to make this thing awesome.

Now onto other non library related things:

Not much has been going on except the fact that I’ve had the worst sinus cold/pain for the longest time.  The awesome thing about Arkansas?  It was 60 degrees today.  The downside?  The pressure/weather change plays havoc with my sinuses.  Oh boy.

I’ve been watching a lot of good TV shows and cooking/baking, especially since I had a lot of free time during the long weekend.  I’d thought I’d chronicle some of that with my fancy new camera.

The first thing I thought I’d tackled was my Mom’s recipe for Beef Stew.  It has to be one of the most delicious things I’ve eaten, and I can copy this recipe pretty well:

Beef Stew

2 lb beef chuck roast (bone in, if you can find it)
1 small white onion, chopped
3 beef boullion cubes
1 lb carrots, peeled and rough sliced
2 stalks celery, rough sliced
4 medium/8 small potatoes, rough chunked
1-2 tbsp. vegetable oil
Salt & pepper
Garlic powder

Cut meat into chunks and remove any extra fat, add to heated vegetable oil in a good-sized pan.  When meat is brown, add onions and cook until softened.  Then add the boullion cubes and about 1-1 1/2 cup of water.  Mix well and cook for at least 2 hours.  Place in the refrigerator overnight.  The next day skim off all the accumulated fat and discard.  Heat the stew, add carrots, celery, and potatoes.  Cook for at least an hour.  Check for doneness by ease of fork going through potatoes & carrots.

I should have cooked it in a pot, but all I have is a crock pot right now.  Here is what it looks like while it cooks.  It smells so good…

Here is the final result that went in my belly.  NOM NOM!

Froze the rest.  Funny/true story: When I was checking out at the grocery store, the cashier looked at the beef bouillon that I was buying and said, “Bouillon is probably my favorite English word.”  *giggles helplessly*

I haven’t baked in forever and I was feeling pretty antsy on MLK day because I didn’t have work, I decided to make Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough Truffles.  I think my co-workers appreciated my efforts.

Here’s the final (and more importantly) delicious product

Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough Truffles

Makes approx. 3-4 dozen.

Ingredients
2 1/2 cups all purpose flour
1 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon baking soda
1 cup (2 sticks) butter or margarine, room temperature
3/4 cup granulated sugar
3/4 cup packed brown sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla
1/3 cup milk or soy milk
1 cup mini semi-sweet chocolate chips

14 oz dark chocolate candy coating

Directions
Beat butter and sugars and in large bowl with electric mixer on medium speed until light and fluffy. Add soymilk and vanilla. Stir in flour, baking soda and salt and mix on low speed (or by hand) until incorporated. Stir in chocolate chips.

Cover and chill dough for 1 hour.

When dough is firm enough to handle (it may help to lightly flour your hands), form dough into 1″ balls and arrange on a baking sheet lined with waxed paper. Place sheets in freezer and let chill for 30 minutes.

Melt chocolate candy coating in a double boiler or in microwave according to package directions. Using forks or a dipping tool, dip cookie balls into candy coating to cover. Tap fork on side of pan to remove any excess coating, and return to waxed paper-lined baking sheets. Chill until set. Store, chilled, in an airtight container for up to 1 week (though good luck making them last that long).

Random Question: If you could a body part to be your Achilles heel, where would it be?

Looky…looky…pictures!

On a different note… it snowed… and then melted 10 minutes later.  God, I love living below the Mason Dixon line.

Stop the Bus… I’m BACK!

Oh…hey!  It’s really been a month?  Crap buckets.  Well, sorry dear readers, I’m sure you’ve missed hanging on my every word.  But I think I’ve been busy… I think…  Anyways, what’s going on?  I’ve missed you blog… eh, kinda.

What have I been doing???  Erm.  The first half of my month was taken up by Santa program stuff at the library.  We had about 1,000 kids visit both branches of a period of four days to see Santa, listen to a story, and make a present for a loved one.  It was fun… and extremely stressful, but man am I glad it’s done.  Then we had our public visit Santa.  So, Santa and I got to shoot the shit for about six hours while families trucked in and out for pictures.  Excited and petrified children are about the cutest things in the world… except kittehs.

Then I returned to the Great White North and it was spectacular like I predicted.  Good food, good company, good presents, and plenty of Rock Band.  So, I (and my other cousins have determined) that we are going to make a Rock Band… band and go on the road.  I think we called ourselves The Four Cousins (name pending).  Needless to say, my time at home was not long enough.  Don’t worry Cleveland, maybe next time we can stretch our torrid affair into a week or more.

The flight to Cleveland, spectacular.  The flight back to Arkansas, was… well… stressful.  Let’s just say I love flying during the holidays (!) and that I made my flight for St. Louis 10 minutes before the plane pushed off from the gate.  I also had the fortune to be so out of it that I freaked myself out.  When we got into the air, I checked the time on my iPod and freaked because my connecting flight in St. Louis left at 8:10, and my little screen kept flashing 7:45.  In a complete moment of ‘dur,’ I had forgotten about the time difference.  I. Am. An. Idiot.  So I had a mini panic attack for nothing.

Being back in Arkansas is nice.  It’s warm and my nose finally stopped bleeding.  Plus, I had the cutest patron interaction today.  This month, our character for Who’s Hiding in the Library is Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer.  So basically, the patrons have to find a paper Rudolph for a prize.  So a little boy came up to me and asked me how to get a prize, I explained the process, and he immediately gave me a copy of the book, Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer.  Oh, it was so adorable.

To my surprise, I discovered that tomorrow is New Years Eve, so here are some of my resolutions:

- Eat healthy

- Exercise

- Kill insects without guilt or mercy

- Blog more

- Keep on being my awfsome self

If you think of anything else I need to do, let me know.

(PS- Got a digital camera.  I guess I should take pictures of my apartment so you can see where I live)

GET ON YOUR BIKES AND RIDE!

I’m sure that all of you have seen both of these videos, but I just had to profess my love for one of the world’s greatest bands… and what better way to do that than through two ginormous pop culture ‘figures.’

Yet Another Reason Why John Green is My Hero

I know I’m getting redundant in my Twilight hatery, but I couldn’t pass this up!  Also, I almost agree with everything this awesomely awesome dude says:

*Groan*

How did I start my week?  I saw New Moon.  Now, no one has stoned me for my hypocrisy (or saying Jehovah), but at least you’ll be happy that I didn’t enjoy it.  Don’t get me wrong, I had a lovely time with the people I went with.  It was the movie.  I think at some point I took out my keys and tried to jab them into my eyes, but my glasses kept getting in the way.  So let the roasting begin:

It all started out when I saw the ‘trailer’ for the new Jackson Four reality show.  Dear God in Heaven, are you serious?!?!?!  So of course, I said something to the effect that do they really need to ride more on the coat tails of their white woman brother?  And the woman next to me looks at me and says they need the money, they’re poor.  I couldn’t say anything for fear of a beat down, but I remember rolling my eyes.  And then the movie started.  I think the commentary in my head was about the same for Twilight:

 

Twilight commentary:

Edward: Say it.

Bella: 100 year old stoned, glittery, obsessed creeper?

Edward: Erm, true, but I think what you were going for was ‘vampire.’

New Moon commentary:

Jacob: We can’t hang out anymore

Bella: Why not?

Jacob: Because you’re small, pale, ugly, pathetic, weak.  Oh yeah, you will never be as wonderfully ripped as me.  I’m off to play with my new friends… byeeeeeeeeeeee!

 

I think by the time Bella went to Italy, I turned to my friend and said: is this movie over yet?  I got so bored, the commentary in my head died, and my brain turned to goo.  I could actually review this movie, but I’ll let you read this instead.  (I apologize in advance for the foul language and any other stuff that might offend).  I’ll admit that while writing this section on New Moon, I think my brain exploded and blood shot out of my nose.

Onto happier things!

Wednesday was a whirlwind because, well, all the little childrens were out of school.  My story time crowd was pretty ginormous (practically all new people), no one came to watch the movie (so I watched Meet the Robinsons by myself), and the adult community care center turned me away.  The only bad part of the day was when two children decided to drop their backpacks down from the balcony to the bottom floor (one almost hit me in the head).  I think steam came out of my ears and I distinctly remember yelling at them.  And then I got ‘yes ma’amed,’ which totally alleviated the entire situation because I went back into my office and had a short gigglefest.

Both of my Thanksgiving feasts were amazing.  Truly amazing.  So amazing that I am NEVER going to eat again (or wait until Christmas).  I would say more about how much fun I had (which I did BTW), but then I start thinking about the food that I ate.  And my stomach starts to hurt.

I think I might go lay on the couch, keep digesting my food, and watch endless episodes of Get Smart.  That sounds like a fantastic idea.

Countdown to Cleveland: 23 days

 

Need to Add Another Notch to the Belt

It’s that time of year again…

Happy Thanksgiving…

That’s the Way it Crumbles… Cookie Wise

*Sigh* I really need to stop watching old movies…

So, I thought it was going to be a crazy, crazy week, but it was only crazy for two days and then tapered off.  Like it should.  Monday was the Mystery night program and I thought it went only ok.  I’m sure other people will tell you different since I had over 30 people show up.  While a lot of the kids enjoyed the program and worked as a team, I had a few who either didn’t understand the concept fully, didn’t care, and goofed off.  I got pretty livid, which surprised the hell out of me when I kind of snapped at two youngsters in my group.  I also had someone complain that they felt that because the mystery night involved MURDER, it was not appropriate for his/her children.  *headdesk*  I politely told this person that I had advertised the program as a murder mystery.  Later, I talked to my supervisor and she agreed with me, plus she reminded me that we had talked about the appropriateness of the program (because I was nervous), and decided that since the murder had taken place five years into the past, and there was no body, it would be ok.  In no way was the murder mystery inappropriate to 7-12 year olds.  But then again, I’m not a mother.  I have to remind myself that I can’t make everyone happy.

The puppet play went over pretty well, my favorite being the play that our young adult librarian wrote, The VERY, VERY First Thanksgiving.  When I say first Thanksgiving, I mean it involved dinosaurs.  Hilarious.  The kids came up with some good ideas for our Christmas puppet plays (Funny Night Before Christmas, Goldilocks and the Three Elves, and Reindeer Tryouts).  I already wrote an amusing take on the Night Before Christmas.  It involves a very frustrated narrator who keeps getting interrupted by different characters.  Here’s a snippet:

Narrator: With a little old driver so lively and quick, I knew in a moment it must be St. Nick…

Santa: I WANT MILK AND COOKIES!!!

Narrator: I said ‘lively and quick,’ not fat and lazy!

Santa: I can’t help that every girl and boy leaves me cookies and milk, they’re my weakness.

Narrator: Oy vey, where was I?  Oh yes, More rapid than eagles his coursers they came, and he whistled, and shouted, and called them by name…

Santa: Now, Oreo!  Now, Tollhouse!  Now, Nabisco and Nestle!

Narrator: No!  No!  No!

Well, I thought it was vaguely amusing.

My family got their webcam, so we were all able to talk face to face!!!  That’s pretty exciting, except for the fact that I always get this feeling that I need to look somewhat presentable when we talk…

I went out to dinner and shopping with a friend on Friday, that was very nice.  I had sushi… well fake sushi.  You know, not raw fish, but crab and shrimp.  What can I say?  I’m not that adventurous.  We both had a nice time.

This week should be nice and short, but Wednesday will be fun.  I have story time at 10:30 (I got a little *warmandfuzzy* after a bunch of moms were adamant that I would be doing story time), showing a movie for all the kids that are out of school at 11:30 (Meet the Robinsons), and then going to an adult ‘daycare’ center to tell them my Anansi story and do a craft.

I have to get it out of the way.  I.  Am.  A.  Hypocrite.  I blatantly mock the Twilight franchise and tell everyone how much I detest the books… but I’m going to see the New Moon tomorrow with fellow librarians.  Don’t worry, I will bring something sharp to jab at my eyes.  Yes, please throw rocks me.

Also, happy news!  I get to do Thanksgiving twice this year (once on Thursday and once on Friday).  Before I go any further, I have to thank the tons and tons of people who keep inviting me to their house or their family’s house.  Very sweet.  I have this sinking feeling that someone will have to roll me to work because I will have blown up like a balloon ala Violet Beauregard.  Tons of wonderful food, and I get to contribute with Pumpkin Cheesecake and Chocolate Chunk Toffee cookies!

God, I do go on.  One more thing, I promise.  I’m excited for Secret Santa and our Christmas party.  I need to do a quick poll.  So if you could either do the poll thingy or leave comments below, I’d appreciate!

Countdown to Cleveland: 30 days