three strikes

and she's out.

after two earlier scraps, one with each of the smaller dogs, tonight ms. penny has used up all her chances. i'll never know what really happened because i didn't see it, but for whatever reason she snapped and grabbed the smallest of our dogs by the neck and jerked her around like a ragdoll. so far the little one is okay, but there is no way we can keep them all after something like that, what if next time we're not so lucky. to be real, there should have never been a this time.

i've been feeling bad about not doing right by this dog for a month or so now and my plan was to have her spayed, put her back in training and make a new start. i was just talking about it today, but it is too late for that now. i'm going to do my best to find a place for her, but i know it will be tough with her behavior issues. i don't even know how long i have to get her relocated, but i'm sure it's not much more than a few days. i'm hoping my vet/trainer will have some recommendations and maybe one of them can at least keep her for a bit so i can work something out. it's a huge lesson for me to learn, but i feel horrible that she is going to also have to pay the price for my mistakes.

i don't think i've stopped crying for more than five minutes in the past few hours and i know it will only be worse when i really do have to let her go. she has such potential to be a great dog, i just have to find her a better owner, and fast.

thumbkin

i won't even breakdown the extraordinary genius of how i accomplished it but there is now 1/4" x 1/2" rabbit ear shaped gash in my left thumb. the mofo hurt superbad, i had a few swigs of jameson and thought about going full cowboy and pouring some on, but when plain old cold water hurt, i knew that was out.

i'm not sure what to do next. i'm definitely investing in some new sterile non stick pads. i had used bandaids, removing as gingerly as possible, it was like starting all over again with the bleeding and the hurting. for now it's al fresco with some ointment and it doesn't hurt and isn't bleeding but i have a lot to do today so i know i need to bag it up soon.

you know you're getting older when...

your purchases are being rung up at the register and you remark to the cashier that you have not seen such a price on tofu in nearly nine months. it's nerdy enough you noticed earlier when you put four blocks in your basket, but to make mention of it a few minutes later, oldsville all the way.

hopefully our sleepover party will balance that out a bit. i climbed up on homemade shelves and liberated truck shelves to fetch the air mattress from the forbidden zone of the garage. i feared i was not agile, strong or small enough to get the job done but as always i found a way. it's time to pump it up, make some pizza and watch some scary movies with my niece and sister. oh yeah we're going to talk about boys and braid each other's hair too, duh.

friday is my day

this is my third friday off work. other than the hit to my check, it's been great to have the extra free day. eventually my workshare unemployment will kick in, but with so many people out of work i'm sure it will take longer than it would have in the past. i'm not worried about it yet, when i do get the money it will just be like reimbursement or more like the tax refund i'm probably not getting. i got my w-2's last week so if i stay productive i'll file this weekend and see what's what.

i woke up a little before eight, had cheerios and banana and half a grapefruit for breakfast. i'm on my second cup of tea while my first load of laundry is headed for the dryer. i'm doing sheets next, excitement abounds!

my sister is off friday's too so we had tentative plans to go antique shopping but maybe that will be another week since she hasn't made it downstairs yet. she didn't go to bed as early as i did last night, 6 or 7, like last thursday too. its a disturbing trend i aim to put a stop to really soon. the four days i am working are non-stop action-packed fix-it fests so maybe when i get to the end of it, i just don't have anything left. try again next week, today i'm only worrying about my home-work.

keen-what?

when i packed my lunch this morning i had mixed feelings about the nearly empty produce bin, proud of having not been wasteful but wanting to fill it up again. i don't normally go to the market in the middle of the week but i picked up a few cookbooks at lunch and decided to try one of them right away. even though i've been saving money by borrowing instead of buying, i still haven't made the best use of the books. i used to at least make some copies or try a few recipes, but lately i had not done more than a few flip throughs.

since it was supposed to rain, i decided to make the quinoa vegetable soup from you won't believe it's not vegan. it was my first time using the bouillon cubes and i had loads of anxiety about not dissolving sufficiently and also that i should have only used one instead of two. i was also concerned that the only seasonings mentioned were salt and pepper. true that you can't go wrong with the classics but a little extra spice never hurt anyone. i won't really know how it turned out until tomorrow but to be safe i eventually added in some bay leaves and the last tablespoon or so from my tube of tomato paste. those things are lifesavers.

p.s. in addition to my soup supplies, i also got a few key ingredients to make french scramble again. i'm hooked. and since i have tempeh and potatoes, the brunch bomb is ready to drop sometime this weekend, if not friday morning.

hail to the chief!

after work i went to get champagne since i couldn't not raise a glass to our president. i wasn't sure what kind i wanted but after a brief deliberation decided on this bottle of joy. it wasn't until i got home and started taking some really bad pictures that i noticed i'd chosen domaine carneros - i shall toast the new d.c. with some d.c.

100% awesome

today i celebrate two wonderful beginnings, the inauguration of the first president of color and the birth of the best mom in the world. it's mama and obama all day long. she is 56 (doesn't look it!) and he is our 44th, so it really does add up to a 100 percent party. thank you america!

p.s. here is something mama and obama have taught me:

bet yr bottom dollar

tonight we're going to see the stage production of "annie" at the kodak, so excited. i think what makes it more special to me is that the movie came out when i was five and we're taking my niece to see the show when she is five. i remember my mom taking me to see it at the la mirada mall and we had bon bon's and i thought i was the shit. i even had a little red annie type dress that i wore non-stop that year. the following christmas i got some really cool annie barrettes and a necklace too. i'm not sure my niece will go as nuts as i did, but i hope she enjoys the show all the same. i got the soundtrack from itunes so i'm sure it will be blaring on the way up and on the way back, at least until she knocks out.

b + b

 

soup's on. at tj's the other day i saw the 17 bean and barley soup bag and it seemed perfect. the directions were a bit lacking but i think in the end it worked out alright. i know it sounds dumb to need directions for soup, chop, sautee, season and simmer, etc. it didn't specify how large a can of tomatoes and the seasoning did not seem like enough for such a huge mess of soup. so i put a 28 oz can of diced and ended up adding a bunch more seasoning and a few squirts of tomato paste too. i only had a few quick tastes before we left to see grand torino, but i think it's winner, just like mr. eastwood.

c'est si bomb

for the past year and a half i've been working to eat healthier, and little by little i've made some strides. i've bought so many cookbooks over the past 8 years that they fill up their own shelf, which led me to stop buying since until recently i was only using two or three of them for one or two recipes. now i am making better use of what i have. i'm also borrowing from the library to get closer to my goal of awesomely delicious food that is incidentally quite good for me.

i bought skinny bitch in the kitch at costco for half price sometime in the past year and hadn't used it until today. i always looked at their books since they have great prices, every now and then they have something that is in my interest. i had no idea this book was vegan. i picked it up to see what it was about and since the price was right i snatched it up. i'm not really into the "bitchy" schtick of it, and i'm not aiming for "skinny", but if the recipes are a success i really don't care where it came from or what it was called. the french scramble was hella good. next time i will make some home fries and tempeh bacon for a total brunch bomb.

fight on

today we went to a national DOMA protest/rally in pasadena. it started out great, the organizer gave us supplies to make signs and we signed some petitions.

after 45 minutes in the car, i had to use the bathroom superbad and luckily they had one open for us. i feared city hall would be on lockdown for the weekend but it wasn't, at least not at first. making signs and snacking, left my niece with a messy face so i went to go get some towels. the door was closed, it was also locked, wtf? it was open a few minutes ago. i saw a guard down the hall and asked if there were any open bathrooms and he asked if i had a permit. i told him i wasn't the organizer but that we did have one. i brought him over to our area and everything got sorted and re-opened. he said the other guard had told him to lock everything down after the gospel choir across the way (who were amazing) had finished up, as if there was only one event today.

i guess that's a small taste of what it feels like to be treated differently. i'm glad we showed up to stand up for our lgbt brothers and sisters, and will keep doing so for as long as it takes.

after the rally we went to lunch at bean sprouts in arcadia since we orean-ed ourselves out a few weeks ago. i'm not sure we'll make a special trek to go there, but if we are in the area we might give it another go. the spring rolls and fried tofu were my favorite dishes. then we went to whole foods to stock up on a few things our local markets don't have. when will we the 909 get love whole foods, when?

curl up

i've been letting my hair grow out for a few months and it is approaching year 2000 levels of bigness. i never thought it would do that again since i've been keeping it so short for the past few years. maybe it had been trained to be tame. quite the contrary, if you let it grow, it will fro.

double stamp

i am not a gentle person, i tend to beat things up. my wonderfully janky nokia phone shows a million times more wear than anyone else's in my family and we only purchased them a few months apart. i'm not intentionally careless but i am quite clumsy. when i got my ipod i was sure i would do something stupid to wreck it and i did.

it was not the ipod itself but the headphones. the cord got stuck in a door and i didn't realize it until it i felt something tugging me back. i taped it up and kept going until i remembered i had another pair with a shorter cord i wasn't using. they were even retractable so i shouldn't repeat the same mistake twice, and i didn't, until monday. i just finished helping sort mail and i was going to leave for lunch. proud of my good deed and anxious for some fresh air, i started for my desk. i think i got two steps before i felt the familiar tug accompanied by a thud and some pieces flying. luckily i had the old taped up set in my desk drawer so i didn't have to go commando for the rest of the day. as much as i wanted to rush out and get new headphones, i knew i could use the b-list ones for a while, but not too long since they barely survived the first accident.

tonight after dinner we went to sanrio to get a gift for my niece's friend. i told myself i wouldn't buy anything since i have to budget better now, but i could not say no to a new set of headphones. they were cheaper than the ones i was going to replace and so super cute. i totally lucked out since it was double stamp day. it's a newer store and they had so many adorable things i had to pretend i didn't see. i want to go back at the end of the month when i should have more room in the budget.

i remember saying i would quit hello kitty when i turned 25 but i couldn't. i've definitely scaled back, i'm not so far gone as the days i joked about having my ashes scattered over puroland. i'm not sure when i will think i am too old for hello kitty, if i ever am. i need a cute pill box for when i am an old lady, right?

taking a leek

my first one, definitely will not be the last. i had some leftover vegetables from the chili, quinoa hibernating in the cupboard, and a christmas copy of vegan vittles waiting to be used. this is quinoa primavera, my first time with leeks, quinoa and the most awesome paring knife ever (another gift).




the dish was delish, can't wait to try more new recipes and eat a greater variety of healthy foods. i got fresh from the vegetarian slow cooker yesterday, so excited. i can cook and not cook, like those mercury insurance commercials.

after a messy day of work, my twelfth day of christmas is ending on a merry note. though i desperately wanted a break from family after so much time at home, i appreciate them so much more after reuniting with my work "family". my mom has been great, per usual; my niece more delightful than ever; my sister and i are getting along great and of course dad is dad, reliable and sarcastic as ever. i helped my mom and niece with their homework, good refresh and fun. my niece has a spelling test on friday, she is going to kick it's ass just like her math worksheets.

i'm going to be work-free on fridays for a month or two, not sure what to do with the time that doesn't involve spending money. i am going to check with the volunteer coordinator at the library, was going to anyway but its a bigger push now. the number one and two things i want to work on with the extra time are wheel related, car and bike. i want to learn the bike first but i know if i do that then i will keep putting off the car, so that has to be first. actually second and third since first i have to read this year i will.

comfort food

hopefully this awesome lunch makes the first day back a bit easier. i have leftover scrambled tofu and tempeh bacon for breakfast too. thank you vegan cookbook queens bennett and moskowitz!

wrap up

i made garden patch chili from vegan bites last night and some corn muffins too. it was supposed to be my "play-offs chili" but so far i haven't watched more than a few plays of one of the games. i have some errands to run and some chores to do but it will all pay off when i finally get to watch milk tonight.

i so do not have my stuff together to start back to work tomorrow. my wake/sleep schedule is totally bonkers. i am going to need a rocking playlist and lots of tea to get any amount of work done tomorrow. i need to get a lot done since i was still catching up when i left for the break. it will be good to be back and even better when i'm not behind.

on the whole the holidays went well. my aunt gave us way too many tamales so we had to share them lest we become tamales ourselves. i won the money prize in the white elephant game for the first time, 100 bucks. xmas day we stayed home and played some games, dad watched the bourne trilogy in a sitting and i finally baked some cookies. day after xmas dragged ourselves to abuelita's house, love her but it is too damn far sometimes, every time actually. we had jack and the longest game of uno ever, so that took some of the edge off, but i am still pissed about the beans. new year's eve stayed home and had cava, watched twilight zone well into the next day. my niece is scared of talking tina just like i was, classic.