Adventures in the Kitchen part 4

If you have read my blog since it's inception you know that I was quite adamant that while plenty of great food blogs exist out there, this would not be one of them. And while I insisted that I wouldn't be blogging about my "expertise" in the kitchen, I lied. You can look back to June 2010 to see the original adventures in the kitchen.

While I may be pretty inept when it comes to cooking, I am a "little" better at baking but I could crush anyone when it comes to using the microwave. Imagine my surprise when I learned I could actually bake something in the microwave. This turned out so good that I couldn't resist the opportunity to pass it along. Did you know that you could "bake" brownies in the microwave? Now I know some of you are thinking, warming up a frozen pre-packaged is not baking but I'm not taking about those. I'm talking about baking brownies in a coffee mug.

Here's what you'll need.
4 tablespoons flour
4 tablespoons sugar
2 tablespoons cocoa
1 egg
3 tablespoons milk
3 tablespoons oil

Mix all the dry ingredients and then spoon in an egg and then add the milk and the oil. Now you're ready to "bake" your brownie. Bake for approximately 3 minutes, if you have a powerful microwave like I do, you may only need to bake for 2 - 2 1/2 minutes. Enjoy!

Spring!

This picture has absolutely nothing do to with spring, except for the fact that it was for sale at the flower show I went to yesterday. The flower show was a bit of a disappointment, seems this year's theme "Rock the Garden" was more about rocks then it was about gardens. Lots of landscape companies highlighting all the ways they can create a fabulous backyard oasis using stonework. Truth is I'd rather see more flowers.

But isn't this piano the gaudiest thing you have ever seen? At the same time, it's hard to take your eyes off it. It does not go with the color scheme of my house at all, yet I want it in my living room. Looking at makes me smile and I think had I had this piano as a child I would have practiced more. Perhaps I would have been a concert pianist by now.

At any rate spring arrives here sometime tomorrow and I couldn't be happier. Spring is my absolute favorite season for a number of reason. Each day that we get closer and closer to spring I know that I can once again say good bye to winter. Some of my favorite flowers, hyacinths and tulips bloom in the spring. I can finally put away the heavy sweaters, boots and mittens. New life, iced lattes, Easter, NHL playoffs. What's not to love about Spring?

If You're Irish, Come into the Parlor

And this is where it all began. Well it probably began somewhere before here but this is the family homestead in County Galway, Ireland. My grandfather was born in this house and lived here till he came to the United States as a young adult.

I feel very fortunate that I have been able to travel twice to Ireland, once with my family and a second time with friends. My first trip to Ireland was for a friends wedding, she got married here.

Yes, that's right I have a friend who decided she was so special that she couldn't have just an ordinary wedding, she needed to get married in a castle and not just any castle but a castle in Ireland. It was the most spectacular wedding I have ever been to and I'm pretty sure that no other wedding I ever attend will measure up. This wedding and the two weeks we spent there are some of my most cherished memories.

The funniest part about my first trip to Ireland is that the day after spending a weekend in castle, we moved on to spend a few days with friends who live in Ireland. In the castle I had a bathtub the size of most people's bathrooms and a shower head the size of a small cafe table. Let's just say that I took my fair share of showers and baths while I was there. The friends that we stayed with had built a new home for themselves on their family property, we stayed in the original family cottage. My bedroom there? Well I could sit on the twin bed and basically touch all four walls, and the bathroom? My kitchen sink leaks more water than the shower in that cottage.

I don't normally consider myself to be high maintenance but it really is hard to go from being a princess to Cinderella.

Emails, books and other surprises

After 6 weeks off recuperating from surgery. Countless hours of sleep, lots of television and a few very good books. I returned to work yesterday.

I had 1,732 emails waiting for me. Oh and these. To distract me from the massive amounts of email.



And if you are looking for some good book suggestions may I suggest the following:

Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close
The Good Thief
Flight to Heaven
Churched One Kids Journey toward God despite a Holy Mess

My Mundane Life

Post surgery life has been a bit mundane. People keep telling me it's okay that I get up at 8:30 in the morning, take a morning nap and an afternoon nap. I feel like a 6 month old. I'm told that sleep is good, that is helping me heal. Quite frankly I'm annoyed by it. I'm not sure why but I envisioned these weeks off of work as being endless hours of reading, I stocked my Kindle with multiple books and I was ready to read. Problem is after about 30 minutes of reading I find myself drifting off to sleep. So instead of reading I have spent more time watching daytime tv.

Confession time - I'm amused by Regis and Kelly (at least their host chat time) what did they do last night while I slept? Regis is 79 years old and is way more active than most people I know. I'm less enchanted by the interviews they do and most likely who ever is on their show has already been on the Today show earlier in the morning or will show up on The View later.

I am not a fan of The View. I think the ladies of The View are quite rude to each other, they are more interested in getting their point across than actually listening to each other. I find them rude and insensitive.

I draw the line at watching soap operas, although my mom is a fan of Days of our Lives and I am embarrassed to admit that when she watched I was able to quickly pick up on what was happening in the lives of the residents of Salem, USA.

At this point in the day, I typically try to read, end up falling asleep and seem to wake up just in time to watch either Oprah or Ellen depending on my mood. I finally have permission to drive which has opened up a whole new set of opportunities for me. Tuesday I went to the post office, Wednesday to the pharmacy to have a prescription refilled and to buy hair color. I'm not sure if this is true or not but I believe the anesthesia they gave me in the hospital made my hair grayer than usual. Today I took my car to the car wash. And tomorrow I am quite excited about actually going out for lunch and spending an hour with my friends, I just hope I don't fall asleep in my soup.

Bedwarmers

People think I'm crazy when I tell them that I have actually trained my cats. Molly and Moses came to live with me 8 years ago. I like the idea of having a dog, but with out all the work and extra care required of dog ownership. So I set out to train the cats as if they were dogs and it has worked. Moses and Molly (almost always) come when I call them. Moses responds specifically to whistling but not just any whistling my whistling and he is especially fond of the tun "The Lion Sleeps Tonight" typically I get a 95% response rate with that tune. Molly will fetch a small cloth ball and return it to me and both of them are more than happy to oblige me when I ask them to come sit with me and keep me warm.

I've also trained them to go to bed at night, typically around 7:30 or 8:00 p.m. I will say "time for bed" or "let's go up" they then follow me upstairs to the office, where they hunker down for the evening. All this training has gone to pot since my hospital stay. I was gone for 10 days and while my mom lovingly cared for them she did not try to put them to bed each night.

My first night home from the hospital was horrible, I felt lousy and they were very aware of my intense pain and quite frankly my lack of interest in them. I didn't try to instill my bed time rules but instead have allowed something I know I will be sorry for. The cats are now sleeping in bed with me. I had always said my bedroom would be a cat free zone, but as I sit here in bed, Molly is warming my left side and Moses is taking care of keeping my feet cozy. I actually find their purring to be soothing and their snoring to be a bit amusing.

It is still up for a debate how long I will allow this to go on, I'm also wondering how easy it is to retrain a cat.

Food Glorious Food!

I ate a scrambled egg today, that's big news considering my last "real" meal was January 25th the day before my surgery. After surgery I went home with the instructions of staying on a liquid diet for a couple days and then begin introducing soft foods into my diet. Turns out that pesky little bowel obstruction happened before anything other than lemon ice passed my lips.

When I left hospital number 2 they too advised just liquid until I see the doctor again. That appointment happened this afternoon and he deferred to my surgeon who I meet with tomorrow. So for the last week I have had a diet of broth, yogurt, oatmeal and get ready for it, milkshakes; which really is not that exciting. I am craving something salty in a big way. Yesterday was Superbowl Sunday, besides Thanksgiving, I can't think of any other day when food seems to take center stage. My mom has been here taking care of me while I recover and my friends have been incredibly amazing at blessing her with meals each night. Last night my friend Laura brought my mom all the fixings for submarine sandwiches, chicken wing dip and chips and chopped veggies for dipping. It was all I could do to not just stick my finger in that dip and taste real food again.

I was an emotional wreck today, I blame it on pain, exhaustion and a lack of protein. I cried on the way home from the doctor today, I am desperate for a tuna fish sandwich or something that I actually have to chew. As my mom and I pulled into the garage I looked at her and asked "A soft boiled egg could be considered liquid right?" She agreed of course and quickly got to boiling water for me. When she handed it to me I asked her to stick it in the microwave for 30 more seconds to make it just a bit hotter. In that time it turned from soft boiled to scrambled and quite frankly I have never tasted something so good. Tomorrow after I meet the surgeon I am really hoping for a tuna sandwich or maybe some mac and cheese.