I missed it yesterday because we were busy running around, having lunch with Saugata, and coming home to see Andrew, but yesterday, March 21st was SANTANA’S BIRTHDAY!!!
She is such a party puppy!!
Out of curiosity, we researched Freckles’s birthday…approximately October 13, 1994…She will be 14 this year!!! So old!!
Also, Happy Birthday to Dori, whose birthday is the same as Santana!!! Yay!!
I spent two years re-making leftovers for my roommate Veronica while I lived in KY. She was super-wonderfully fussy and generally wouldn’t eat straight leftovers, so I learned to take whatever dinner we had and make it into something completely new (roast beef turned into mock-Philly steak & cheese; garlic chicken turned into stir fry or lo mein; smashed potatoes turned into amazingly creamy fried potato cakes for breakfast; etc.)
Anyway, I had a ton of Chicken Tortilla Soup leftover….
I strained the liquid out of the solid parts of the soup (veggies and chicken basically) and put the liquid, a cup or so of shredded cheese, and a little bit of the chicken and veggies on low heat to melt the cheese and make it into a thickened sauce-type-of-thing.
The rest of the chicken and veggies got rolled up into four leftover, unbaked tortillas, lined up in a baking dish coated with cooking spray.
The melted, hot sauce went over the filled tortillas, just to cover, and then the whole thing got topped with a little more cheese.
Covered with foil, baked at 350 degrees for 30 minutes…uncovered and continued to bake for 10-20 minutes.
DELICIOUS.
Probably not technically enchiladas, but close enough for my tastes.
So, I’m doing work in the University Downtown Center while Hicania is in class…I wish I had headphones.
1) A girl behind me on the computers was telling her friend, pretty loudly, about some lip-waxing/burning misadventures. You burnt yourself using face removing cream…because you left it on for double the time you are supposed to…stop talking.
2) The guy on the opposite side of the partition from me, on his cell phone: "Yeah man, I’m surprised our phone call didn’t get disconnected yet…I mean, my apartment internet has been messed up all day." WHAT?!
3) A community group focused on getting money to plant trees around various neighborhoods in Binghamton (a valid and good goal, I’d say) decided to hold their meeting LOUDLY in the comfy chair area where I was reading/studying, because they couldn’t find the room they had reserved.
4) Some random woman (not faculty, staff, or student) tried (also loudly) to convince the guy running the info desk in the computer lab that she needed a student to teach her to do something on the computer, and that she needed to tape record this teaching session, with detailed descriptions of which buttons were being clicked ("like…second from the left…little image thingie…like on the screen."). Also, that the system they have for signing something out or in is inefficient and they should fix it. AND that she would like to meet with the director of BU’s computing deal to get non-university people access to printers…or something.
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To make us all happier:
A lot of things have changed for this semester (my CDC ‘internship’, less Scholars meetings, classes only TR, job search, apartment packing), and I’m still adjusting to things that changed last semester (the gym routine, free weekends, no Matt, no Hicania in my office). So, I realized that I need some new routines.
1-Job search, Chai tea, & This American Life. Andrea introduced me to Chai tea which not only makes me feel sophisticated and fancy, but gives me a reason to use my wide variety of mugs, AND is delicious. Tonight I drank tea, caught up on like 3 episodes of TAL, and browsed new job posting on about 80 web sites. I am ridiculously relaxed and excited at the same time…there are finally jobs I’m interested in/possibly qualified for, and unlike every other time I’ve looked at listings, I’m not ready to curl up in the corner and sob about it. Is it the tea? Is it the NPR? Is it the fact that I had CDC training today and feel like I’m actually on the way to doing some active job searching? WHO KNOWS. But any way, chai is delicious, superintendents are nuts (TAL #346), and Santana is being sweet and cuddly like you’d never imagine.
On that note:
2-Blogging about the adorableness of my baby puppy. (More writing in general).
Gorgeous, right? Andrew brought his digital camera home from school and after I got back from Queens with Matt, my adorable little brother presented me with a series of absolutely wonderful photos of Santana. I think this one looks like a professional portrait or something. I have no idea how he got her to cooperate and sit still for so long. I usually get a camera full of puppy nose when I try. I might be turning into one of those grossly in love puppy-moms…Matt and I started a puppy baby book for Santana last week. I took her to a groomer (just for a bath and nail trimming!) and she got her scraggly fur trimmed (I will admit, that made me a little sad…I love that she’s a scruffy pup) and a girly, flowered bandana, which I have left on for the past three days. She might be completely spoiled…but she makes me feel better and smile even when I am feeling depressed, sick, lonely, whatever. She is the sweetest, cuddliest puppy ever and just loves to play, be close, and pay attention to every move you make. It is one of the best gifts I’ve ever gotten (UK graduation gift from Veronica) and right up there with the important parts of my life. She loves Matt, Matt loves her, she loves bacon, I love bacon, she loves running around in giant circles, Freckles loves slowly following her around. Done and done.
3-Monday Date Nite. My partner GA last year was one of about…oh, maybe…five reasons I didn’t have a complete meltdown during my job between August 06 and May 07. I was really afraid we wouldn’t see much of each other after we stopped working together…NOT SO. We managed to have mostly weekly date nights on Tuesdays last semester that got slightly more sporadic later in the semester. This semester we’re going with Mondays for early dinner, late movie. The bonus is that she’s got class in the UDC between dinner and the movie, so I’m going to set that time aside for me to sit in the computer lab down there and get definite work done every week. I think this will be super helpful and give me some regular scheduling where so much of the rest of my stuff this semester is super flexible and doesn’t commit me to specific hours for most of the time.
4-Craftiness! A while ago, my aunt (ex-aunt-in-law?) bought me some scrapbooking stuff as a gift, and I have since been mildly interested in it. Then this past October, Marinda invited me to a "Stampin’ Up!" party and I was completely hooked. I am trying hard not to spend lots of money on it, because it can get expensive, but every once in a while I treat myself to a mini-splurge. And during weeks when I’m particularly stressed, but not necessarily overly busy, I force myself to set aside an hour on a night in the middle of the week and stamp for a bit — it is SO relaxing for me, and then I get to have some concrete result of the relaxation. I think it overall has a great effect on me, so I am going to make it a part of my weekly routine this semester to keep me on track and in the not-flipping-out range of existence. Andrea and Kelly also taught me how to knit (well, almost), and that requires more patience to get something close to a feasible result, but it is still relaxing, and can be done with slightly less-focused concentration. So, YAY! Plus, it all gives me an excuse to sit with some girls and relax and catch up.
5-Puppy walks. Yeah yeah, back to the puppy. On top of a more regular gym routine, as the weather warms up, I want to get back into the habit of long walks to Rec. Park with Santana. She loves the walk and the park, and I love to watch her explore and then get tired of walking and try to pull me up random steps into strangers’ houses to go home. Really, the reason for wanting exercise in my routine is self-explanatory, but the need for adorable puppy fun is less obvious if you aren’t turning into a crazy dog lady like I am. 
6-Reading for fun. My two class (Modernism something or other & Masterpieces of the Novel) are a mix of books that look wonderful, and books I will trudge through. I read a bunch of wonderful stuff since last semester, and my list of books to read keeps growing. So, even if it’s slow, I’m going to build in time for reading non-school books. Next on my list:
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Invisible Monsters by Chuck Palahniuk |
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The Tenth Circle: A Novel by Jodi Picoult |