Rage of Achilles

...I found this in the Classics Department while I was volleying for signatures on a form yesterday. I thought it was hilarious. It's a picture from my phone of a wrinkly old cartoon, so pardon the terrible quality.

2 Saturdays Ago

Listen up, you. This is the my Saturday Story.I went to the beach at noon and walked all the way down to the channel and then back. It took around 4 and a half hours.
I learned some things. I guess you don't have to leave the city to find real magic.



I wish you could have been there. It was so quiet, just the crashing and receding of a thousand waves muffled by sand. It was just me and the sea.

Figs

Saturday we went to Disneyland. Be jealous, unless you were there too. Anyway, here are some pictures to narrate the day.
(Waiting just inside the park for Mom and Kevin to buy their tickets)(Waiting in line for Splash Mountain)
(Splash Mountain--Ian cracks me up regularly.)
(The Aftermath)
(Space Mountain--see if you can zoom in on Kevin...)
It was a day full of fun, screams, and fermented children.
P.S. the title of the post is irrelevant.

Cakewrecks

I've discovered a little gem of a site...
www.cakewrecks.blogspot.com
You just have to see the site. Here are some examples...
This one just makes me laugh because our "Dad" likes to put quotation marks on random things. And because apparently these people aren't sure exactly if he is their dad...and 20th what???
Sometimes the weird errors come from the decorator not understanding the request, or just making a mistake, like these unfortunate cakes...(this is supposed to be Curious George, it looks more like something from Planet of the Apes if you ask me)
I think the order for this one was given over the phone, which would explain why instead of three dots, there is...
And (my personal favorite)...
This cake was advertised to be used as a dieting tool. It has jelly filling.
Obviously this wasn't made by a professional (I hope not!) but it was entitled "Macho Man Cake" by the person who made it. I think their platter was a little too thin if that's the case.
And this one was found in the refrigerated section being sold as-is (it wasn't ordered), so what was going on here is known only to the decorator...
Go to the site. The person writing that blog delivers these oddities much better than I do. AND-- hours of laffs.

Hippo Birdie Two Ewes

Monday was Kevin's 20th birthday.

He had class from 9am-9pm, so in order to try and make it a better day for him I secretly planned a gathering of his friends (only the ones I'm friends with too since I don't want the other ones at my house) to meet at 10 (that's when they all could make it-- sad) and throw him a suprise dessert shin-dig. It worked. The lights were off when we arrived (we'd been hanging out at his place watching Mystery Diagnosis) and Kevin was reluctant to go in because he knew Justina and Robert were home and didn't want to walk in on a fiance makeout session (so he said). I pushed him in, the lights flew on and everybody said "Happy Birthday!" Kevin just said "Oh" and grinned.

Then we had pie and soy ice cream (he's lactose intolerant now if you didn't know)

and he opened his 2 presents (one from me and one from Justina and Robert)-- a watch and August Rush. He had a good time and was pleasantly suprised.
He was also a very good sport when I told him I wanted to put all 8 party hats on his head.

Cups cups cups cups!

I've been doing a lot of cooking lately. I haven't been doing much dish-doing though.
They're getting a bit out of balance.
I thought I'd put the recipes up for people that might be interested.
First I made pitas, hummus, and falafel. I'll let Adrien tell you the recipes for those since it's her god-spiel. But the pitas puffed in our oven! It was an incredible feeling.
Then I made zucchini bread. This is a childhood fav (at least for me), so siblings may want this one:
3 eggs well beaten (fluffy)
2 cups grated zucchini
1 cup veg. oil
2 cup sugar
3 cup flour
3 t cinnamon
2 t vanilla
1 t salt
1 t baking soda
1/4 t baking powder

1. Grease loaf pans
2. Add zucchini, eggs, oil & vanilla to mixing bowl.
3. Add sugar and mix well.
4. Add remaining ing. (flour, salt, etc) and mix well.
5. Bake at 325 degrees for 1 hour

Then I made quiche lorraine. Very tasty. Try it.
Dough
1 1/2 c flour
1/4 t salt
10 T butter, cut into chunx
1 egg

1. In a bowl, combine flour and salt. Add butter and mix to coat w/ fingers or pastry blender, rubbing or cutting butter into flour until you have fine particles (I find fingers are better).
2. Add egg and stir with fork (or fingers) until dough holds together (it will be very crumbly, so don't expect too much)
3. Shape dough into ball and roll out onto (very!) WELL floured board. Roll to fit a 10-inch pie pan, and put it in there. Make dough flush with top rim, folding excess dough against pan sides (inside, not out obviously) and press firmly in place.

Quiche
10 slices cooked, chopped bacon (I use fakin and it's a little chewy, but pork meat generally makes me ill, so that's just my preference)
1 1/4 cups diced Swiss or Gruyere cheese (Swiss is softer and therefore easier to cut)
4 eggs
1 1/4 cups whipping or light cream
1/2 cup milk

1. Scatter bacon in pastry shell; sprinkle with cheese.
2. Beat eggs to blend with cream and milk. Pour into pastry. Grate some nutmeg on the top.
3. Place on lowest rack in 350* heat oven (*=degrees) until lightly browned on top (55 minutes). Let stand 10 minutes. Serve cold or hot.

I also made biscuits from the Bisquik box and Digiorno pizza. And chocolate milk.
Yum.
I'm thinking of making big pretzels next...if I can get around to doing the dishes.

Of Shoes and Ships and Sealing Wax

Sunday night Kevin and I went for a walk around the neighborhood. It was a very nice evening. It was slightly overcast and I actually wore a long sleeved shirt because of the chill.
I love Long Beach sometimes. The parrots were squawking overhead periodically and we could hear the foghorn out in the harbor a couple of miles away.
I came across a weary traveler in my path and helped it on its way.

Eels In Snakes' Clothing

PART ONE
Since the death of Ruth, we have obtained another long-tailed grass lizard. His name is Loci, not because he is the set or configuration of all points whose coordinates satisfy a single equation or one or more algebraic conditions, but because he's crazy. As in "loco." Anyway, he and Smee get along a lot better than Ruth and Smee did (seeing as Smee starved Ruth to death in a matter of a couple of weeks and Loci has been around for a few months now). Justina rigged up my desklamp in such a way that we can give the lizards some extra "sun" for a few hours in the morning. They like this very much, and crowd to the corner where the light is brightest and sit on their little popsicle-stick deck.
Here is Smee exerting his dominance over Loci:
Here is what they do when someone gets too close to the glass:


PART TWO
I was restless. And when I'm restless I organize, decorate, clean, etc. It's very strange. So when I got back to Long Beach, I redecorated the bathroom. I'm actually pretty proud of myself. I did everything myself (research, purchasing, putting together, mounting, etc). Justina did provide $10 for the project and Kevin put up the towel rack while I put up the shelf so it would be done faster. Then the shelf was crooked so we had to remount it, so he ended up putting up that one too, but still. He also (because he's stronger than me) put the tension rod shelf jig up. But everything else I did by myself, so I'm very proud of the outcome. I have to say though, I was too lazy to hem the shower curtain...

And here are some pictures since the video isn't the best quality.


Price breakdown if you're interested: (rounded to the nearest dollar)
shower shelf~ $15
rug~ $13
curtain~$12 (+$1 for the liner+$5 for the curtain clips)
shelf~$5
towel thing~$5