Cheese is Power

Today I went over and traipsed around lovely Point Defiance park. As I was heading home, I decided to take the "scenic" route and explore streets I really don't know. And then there it was - a shiny and lovely 7'11 calling my beverage-loving name =-). Shababbler! Psssssst......Shababbler - you know you want a gigantic soda!!! How could I resist? I went in to get my tank of soda, opting for the 44 oz. super big gulp as opposed to the 64 oz. double big gulp (which I later regretted as those extra 20 ounces would only have cost 20 cents more.....you always regret it when you slurp up the last drops =-(... and I almost always get Diet, so it's not like the calories really matter).

Anyways - as I capped off my super big gulp and grabbed a long, colorful straw (yay straws!! I love straws =-)!!), I saw the nacho chip machine. You could choose your container of chips and then go crazy with the cheese and chili. Unlimited amounts of cheese and chili at your disposal!!! I'm not a big chili fan, but lord do I love cheese. YAY CHEESE!!!!! And I had just practiced restraint the night before in the grocery store and told myself that it really wasn't necessary for me to buy shredded cheese (even though it is quite hard to resist shredded cheese=-(). So here I was with my tank of soda in hand face to face with the marvelous gooey cheese machine. Cheese at my disposal, as much as I wanted! I'm sure there must be a small corner in heaven that has a gooey-cheese dispenser =-). So I grabbed the chips and opened the bag. My approach was to be one of maximum cheesage. A small layer of chips topped by loads of the warm, creamy, cheesy goo =-). Another layer, topped by another river of cheese goo. Followed by another and another and another....until all of my chips had been placed and were floating around in a lake of lovely cheese goo =-). Woohoo Cheese Goo!!!!!

My ride home took a while because I was guessing at the streets. Those who know me well know I have a tough time waiting to get home to sample tasty goods such as this, so at one light I risked getting cheese lap in order to partake in a bite of my warm, lovely, cheesy nachoey goo =-). A bit spicy for my spice-wimp tastebuds, but it was LOVELY, WARM CHEESEY GOO!!!

I finally got home and I did what I had to do and then set down my feast of cheesy-nachoey goo, along with the remainder of my "I-wish-you-were-a-double-but-you're-only-a-super-Big-Gulp." As I started to partake in this cheesy delicacy, I realized that, even though I didn't think it were true, it was possible to go overboard on the cheese =-O!! You can imagine my shock and disbelief....how can there ever be too much cheese?!?!?! But it was true, and my beautiful cheesy loveliness possessed perhaps a bit too much cheesy loveliness =-(. By this point the once crisp chips were soggy remnants that had long since drown under the demands placed by the cheesy lake. I had to bust out the spoon - and the spice was still a bit of an obstacle. Believe it or not, I actually put them in the fridge to come back to later. I'm hoping when I approach them later things will be better. I know the chips have now fallen from grace, but I can't just throw away all that cheesy loveliness =-(.

So the lesson, dear friends, is that yes, there can be too much of a good thing. Well - at least if that good thing is an endless supply of what you believe will be cheesy heaven. One must learn to pace themselves in the land of cheesy loveliness and realize that, the chips should not be entirely lost and forgotten in the lake of cheese. A river of cheese would have been more appropriate, but I was simply too excited to have control of the cheese button. Let this be a lesson for everyone - so that my chips will not have drown in vain!!!

Is the truth in the toilet paper?

As you enter into any new living situation, you wonder if certain incidents represent singular occurrences or dreadful habits. When you are living with a dear friend for the first time, you hope that the things that might bother you are just "one-time things." The problem here lies in the inevitable discrepancy between what you view as "annoying" or "worrisome" behavior, and what your roommate views as such. Things that would never in a million years bother you may annoy the heck out of the other guy or gal and vice-versa.

Which brings us to the toilet paper. The first time I saw the roll left with just a scraggly sheet or two as our "stored-for-guests" roll (being in a more obvious place than the other stash) had been ripped open and left on the counter, I was certain it must have simply been because she had been too frantic in the morning to bother, and that she was in a rush for work. Because who would do such a thing if they were loaded with time? So that moment was worrisome, but forgiven. I was hopeful it was a one-time (or merely occasional) thing. Tonight proved this is not the case, and that sadly, my beloved friend of years and now roommate is crap at dealing with toilet paper (pun intended) =-(.

She got home this evening after work and was well into "relax-and-do-other-stuff" mode when I went in to tinkle. Before I even got to the task at hand I noticed a completely barren roll of toilet paper hanging nakedly on the rack (or whatever it's called). I was mortified. Not because I was in the middle of anything - I had only just walked in - but it became painfully obvious to me that my roommate didn't give a rat's behind about toilet paper etiquette =-(. Because this time she truly had plenty of time to deal with changing the roll....all the time in the world. Ho hum, perhaps it was a habit =-(.

I walked straight out and asked her if she seriously had just left the roll completely stripped and still on the rack like that. My tone was one of horrible confusion - not anger, but certainly a hint of accusation (without being downright bitchy). She smiled and said something like "ooops, sorry." But she then went on to say that she normally just waits until she goes in again to bring in another roll. Obviously she had forgotten she has a roommate now =-(. There was no hint of true concern or care. She must have forgotten that there was another roll stashed away right near the toilet. There was also no moment of "Oh - I'll make sure I do it next time" =-(. Even my brother changes the toilet paper roll. I must say, this incident has me worried. I'm a stewer and someone blatantly ignoring toilet paper etiquette will certainly drive me mad over time. Perhaps that's the plan? Maybe she didn't really want a roommate after all =-p.

FAKER!!!

So I guess there's a city council election coming up, and that's why I've been seeing signs for "Denny Faker." As is usually the case with politician type campaigns, the last name is really big on the sign. VOTE FAKER. Hehe =-p. Makes me laugh, Such an apt name for a politician =-).

In other observations as I drove around today, I noticed a crow that seemed to be wearing little crow-sized snow shoes as it walked on the grass. Which was just silly since it's summer ;-p.

Happiness and Despair through Food

I have had some wonderful highs and lows in the land of food as of late. As was mentioned in the last post, I recently went home for about a week and a half or so. Right before that trip home I bought some sliced mushrooms in the store. It was an unwise move as I hadn't even unwrapped the container before it was time for me to fly off. However, not wanting to lose out on what would undoubtedly be taste-a-licious mushrooms, I decided to make the freezer their new home while I was away. If any of you have attempted this before you know that that was a foolish mistake on my part. Very foolish =-(.

I returned from the scorching heat of the Central Valley with my head full of an assortment of thoughts. "Thank God the weddings over!;" "Damn I have a lot of crap to unpack.;" " Dude - I sooooo need to get a job!;" "I hope my precious mushrooms are okay." So I opened up the freezer and saw that what had once been strong, white mushrooms had turned into shrivelly-dark something-or-rathers =-(. I figured if I returned them to their former residence (the refrigerator) things would look up once they had time to defrost. That thought proved to be nothing more than misguided wishful thinking on my part. The next day I tried to sample one, and it looked dreadful (perhaps like a squishy brown slug), but the taste was that of a waterlogged mushroom (faint mushroom flavor anyways) that had seen better days. I did not give up on my squishy brown something-or-rathers! I had bought lettuce and other salad makings and decided to attempt to place some of the beasts onto my salad. Sadly I had to admit that there was just no way. They were slimey and disgusting to touch and I kept thinking of slugs, and the small smattering of flavor that still clung to the something-or-rather just wasn't enough. It was then that I made the painful (but wise) decision to dispose of the remaining 95% of the once beautiful mushrooms =-(. So I have learned a sad lesson, and hopefully by reading this you can avoid ever making the same error.

But what about the Happiness you spoke of Shababbler? You said it was both happiness and despair! Yes, it's true.....there have been some very happy food moments since I have returned. Perhaps the Food Gods are telling me that even when mushroom errors go too far, other tastebud miracles can dance around you and lift your gastronomic spirits =-).

On Friday I strolled into a supermarket in an effort to get just one thing. Whatever that one thing was I forget, but of course it turned into several things finding their way into my basket. I went to the salad dressing isle and I debated buying another dressing. I had one I had bought cheaply somewhere that just didn't float my boat. As I eyed the Newman's Own I debated splurging and buying another dressing. But when you have no job and you already have dressing at home, forking out that $3.50 for something that sounds good, but that may, in reality, suck, is something you have to debate. What if I didn't like the taste? It's such a risk on dressings (new ones anyways) - you take a leap of faith when you buy one, hoping that the flavor will be all you had hoped for. So I boldy took the risk and picked up the Light Sesame Ginger dressing with Paul Newman's animated face sporting a rice-paddy hat and a foo-man-choo mustache.

Before I left the store I saw an insanely reasonable - if not downright cheap - price on blueberry's. I love blueberry's!!! Love them, love them, love them!!!! And getting this larger container was actually cheaper than the smaller one with my club card =-). So I bought the hefty container of yummy blueberry's. Yay blueberry's!!! However, the disturbing thing about the blueberry's is that in less than 24 hours I almost ate the whole container. Nearly more than a pound of blueberry's!!!! Seriously. I just showed Gwen how many I had eaten and she was shocked. I really should be blue at this point.

But what about the Newman's Own Sesame Ginger dressing Shababbler? How was it? In a word......amazing! It was/is spectacular and delicious and everything my tastebuds had hoped for and more!!!!!!!!! Woohoo!!!!! And it's fat free!

So there you have my highs and lows in the land of food over the last week. Depressing and delicious, but lessons have been learned and tastebuds have rejoiced in happiness =-).

My Trip Home

Some of you may have noticed I have increased my font size. I've had a few people tell me that, due to my color scheme (which I love), they can't read what I write. If, at this size, you still can't read it, but want to, I suggest copying the text into a word document. Okay - business taken care of =-p.

So, the other day I returned from a long haul back home =-). I love home because of all the groovy Shababbler-Approved people that reside there =-). Granted, I only moved up here at the beginning of June, but I had a wedding to participate in, so duty called. Almost everything was great....although the wedding I, perhaps, could have done without being more than a guest.

One of the home highlights had to be the super-fun rafting trip =-). It wasn't crazy whitewater (which I would have loved), or anything like that, but breezy and relaxing coasting and fun with my amazing family and some awesome friends =-). Yay rafting!!! Love it!!

We also had a couple of dinners to get more friend time in, and some visits as well. And even though I haven't really been gone long enough for people to really miss me, all in all I got a lot of good visiting in =-). Yay good visits!!

The bummer was, I was hoping to get work at my old job, but the timing didn't work out on that one =-(. So my butt continues to be poor and in need of employment, which, in many ways seems to be the story of my life =-p. If I hadn't gone to college I wouldn't have all these pesky school loans to pay!!

ANYWAYS!!! On to the reason for the trip! THE WEDDING!!! Now, I'm really not going to say much about it here at all. I doubt that the Bride reads my blog, but there's no need for me to write things down. The wedding itself went off nicely, and the temperature had managed to drop off a tad from the 103 degree days leading up to it. Ahhhhh the joys of the central valley in July =-p. It was a religious ceremony, and a religion where women are seemingly expected to be more subservient than in other religions. Needless to say, I had to remember that as a bridesmaid all of the folks in the audience who wanted to could see my facial expressions, so when the officiant was saying things I didn't approve of, I had to remember to try to smile, but a couple people told me they could see my lips tightening at times despite my best efforts. I wasn't the only one, one of the bridesmaids got her Masters in Women's History, so she had her moments too.

I had been given the impression the bride would not be speaking at all, so I was happy that she was allowed to repeat some vows. When you know the Bride is a strong, independent woman, you want to hear them say something, even if that's not the tradition in this religion. There was one glitch when the officiant said what we all assume was the wrong word and the bride hesitated before repeating...during the hesitation he cleared up that he did not mean that the bride would "humiliate" herself in front of her husband, but that she would be "humble." I know the bride was having the ceremony she did to appease her parents, but I am really glad she had the balls to say "Excuse me?" when the officiant made that error.

And then it was off to the reception, which was lovely and had belly dancers to boot. Let me say that the Bride looked beautiful and I'm sure the pictures will be lovely. However, she was snappy and biting as hell to myself, her sister (Maid of Honor) and her parents). Few others outside of the wedding party probably noticed, but us lucky four were the recipients of lots of angry, rude and biting comments that made me wish I had simply been a guest.

Now they are officially married, so hopefully her anger will fade away. The Groom is an awesome guy and I'm sure they will be great together. The only time I could tell her smile was absolutely genuine and heartfelt was when they were dancing their first dance together. And they are off on their honeymoon as the official Mr. & Mrs., happy I'm sure about it all being over. I'm happy it's over too =-p.

The Post Office Sucks

Those who know me know that the post office and I have had a somewhat tumultuous relationship over the years. As an overall entity, due to our history, the post office leaves a sour and unpleasant taste in my mouth. Mind you, I know there are plenty of kind and admirable people working for them, I even know some. Even so, if I was asked to do a quick word association and the examiner said "Post Office," my first response would be "evil."

Considering my roommate has family members employed by the evil entity, I try not to voice my distaste too often. Today I am feeling quite vocal. My Grandma had told me she was sending a letter, and more days passed than I thought should be likely and I had still not received the letter. I spoke with her tonight and she told me it had been returned. I had her read the address off to me, and it was exactly as it should be written. The message they left was "Addressee Unknown"! Those liars!! I have received a package and a letter from my family, and now the postal people decide I'm unknown?!?! You jerks!!! Isn't it the responsibility of the tenant to decide if they know the freaking addressee or not?!?! I think so!!!!

And no, I didn't fill out a change of address form, but thousands of people around the country move every week without filling those things out. Normally I would, but I am clinging to my residency in my home state since I don't plan to spend forever in the new one. But, more importantly, I have been maintaining the old address because the job I have in my Sunshiney-Home State is one I can keep, and I don't want them to decide I need the boot if I change my permanent address.

I am soooooooo mad!! I guess my Pacific Northwest Postal Carrier has decided he is a Postal Superhero and is making it his own personal battle to keep my mail from going down the mail slot. GRRRRRRRRRRR!!!!! I knew I was on a list!!!!!!!!

Fourth of July

I know we've skated past the Fourth, but hey, I've been busy and I'm ready to go back to it now.

This was one of the most kickass Fourth of July's I've ever had =-)!! Yay Kickass Fourth of July - Woohoo!! I've had some lame-ass Fourth's before too. Like the time I worked at an Amusement type place and I was given the crappy 4-11 p.m. shift for my barely-over-minimum wage job and missed the supposedly killer fireworks display all my friends got to enjoy. Or the time I was working at a residential summer camp (where the Camp Director was a total Dictator), and we were in Fire Hazard country and couldn't even think about sparklers =-(.

Anyways - this Fourth was not one of those lame ones of years past!! It was absolutely groovilicious =-)!! My roommate's family have some friends who have a big shindig on the Fourth. They live on the Puget Sound and have a house that's right on the water. We got there and set up tents in their backyard and then it was time for the fun to begin =-)!!! We started off with a jet boat ride jamming around the Sound - wind in our faces and pretty awesome weather...it was pretty rocking! Then, we did time trials on a rowboat. Gwen and I lost the time trials to the young teenage boys, but it was fun and we got a workout =-p.

BUT - the ABSOLUTE COOLEST part of the whole shindig was getting to ride a jet ski for the very first time =-[)!!!!! YAY JET SKI!!!! Ohmygosh!!!!! That was without a doubt the most fun I have had in ages!! First I timidly climbed on back as Gwen took off, but after we had been whirling around for a while she asked if I wanted to switch. Driving is so much cooler!!!! You get all the power to drive as fast as you want (full throttle baby!!!), and you don't bounce as much as you do on the back. Later I went out by myself and took off just whizzing far, far away. Which did become somewhat problematic when I got confused as to which cove their house was in. I went out on my own twice and I loved it. I zoomed around for ages, coming back just to make sure no one else wanted to go out. I even saw a seal out in the Sound, and I cut the engine hoping it would come up again, but it didn't. It was a gorgeous day and I never would have come back in if it hadn't been time for dinner, even the blister I got on my hand was worth it.

The night was capped with a phenomenal private fireworks display. About 7 houses chip in for the display and one of the guys is a certified pyrotechnist. They rent a barge where the $10,000 worth of fireworks are shot off, this year it was to the tune of Frank Sinatra. The show was insanely cool! There were fireworks we'd never seen before and it was awesome!!! Definitely a Fourth to remember!!!