Quarter Century

I've had a first, he said. I have offended a liberal.

Yep, that liberal would be me that would be a conversation with our pastor. Some of you may or may not be aware our mishap at church and the subsequent dialogue we have had with our pastor. I won't get into the whole issue but the crux is that there was what I considered offensive/disrespectful part of a sermon a two Sundays ago. We knew he meant no offense and it was an honest mistake but we also felt it could not go without a discussion. So I emailed and there was an apology and a nice conversation this evening with the three of us. He said he talked to a friend and told him about this, relaying the above title. Anyhow, Jay and I really enjoy the community at the church and are glad we are getting to know the pastor a little more now. We are going camping this weekend with people from church, too!

I made this two nights ago. Another smittenkitchen recipe. SO YUMMY! Acorn squash and poblano quesadillas. I didn't make tomatillo salsa because we already had fresh salsa in the fridge but next time I will  try it. 

 Note: Do not rub your face after handling the poblanos. I didn't think they were that hot because I have eaten them before but rubbing your face? not a good idea. Just FYI.

not a lot happened today

The day started with a lot of nytimes reading, even more coffee and some sniffles (and then claritin) because I have allergies now that we are enjoying decent temperatures finally. Then there was some of this....oh yes, baking of pumpkin muffins. Recipe from Smitten Kitchen (http://smittenkitchen.com/2006/10/promise-keeper-pumpkin-eater/). Cousin Paul had a mention of smittenkitchen on Facebook yesterday and it reminded me how much I love the blog! So i went there, and found these. Our house smells really nice, too!

Then there was some laundry and talking to my mom. I then found my old friends, these guys below, and went out on the trail for a run. These friends have made a reappearence in my life this week and are sticking around for a while since I am registering for the Jingle Bell 5K at the lake this December!

Have a great weekend everyone!

My corn bread muffins molded, and other updates

I made amazingly yummy corn bread muffins two days ago. I sauteed onion and jalapenos, added shredded sharp cheddar to them and they were so good! And then I left them in a tupperware on the counter and they molded. Silly me. What a waste! Obviously I should have put them in the fridge but I did not. 

Today I applied to two jobs at SMU. I would be happy to get either. 

 We celebrated Dashain last week. There are photos here in Jay's Picasa Album. There are also pics from mom's visit in the same album. Jay is my elder, he is sooo old, so you can see I am touching my head to his feet to show respect to my elder. Jay's sister saw this picture and laughed, so I am wondering how necessary that was or if Jay was having a little fun with teaching me about Dashain. Anyhow, the plant behind our ear is jamara that Jay grew. The stuff on our forehead is vermillion powder mixed with yogurt and rice. It is supposed to be bright red but our turned out orange. Go figure. 

We are going camping next weekend with church people! Exciting!

Have a nice weekend!

6th of October

Well, how about a quick update?!

Mom visited last week/end and we had a really nice time. We went to the Sixth Floor Museum, to dinner at our local tex-mex joint, to a cute neighborhood, Bishop Arts, that reminds me a little of Logan Square, to the Dallas Museum of Art and the Nasher Sculpture Center and to church. Jay cooked curry, I cooked pasta and amazing brownies, actually outrageous brownies and we went to see Contagion, which we all thought was good, a little creepy but good, and Jay said it had pretty decent science. Mom also hemmed our living room curtains and they look really nice now. 

Last night Jay informed me that TODAY is the 10th day of Dashain and we have to go get vermillion from the Indian grocery so we can do the holiday today. So we went out to Irving after work and purchased the things Jay said we needed, mung beans, black lentils, vermilion powder, flat rice and some other things. Here are two links to explain the holiday, although Jay will have to let me know if they are accurate. 

http://www.visitnepal.com/nepal_information/dashain.php

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dasain

We will be missing out on the McCormick's Creek/Shakamak crew this weekend and I really wish we were going to be there. Maybe another year we will be able to go. 

Oh, and Happy 30th Birthday to my big brother!

The People in My Neighborhood: Dr. House

There is a guy who works everyday at our neighborhood Starbucks. I know him because I go there sometimes I work on the shaded patio too. I also drive past the Starbucks at least 4 times a day to drop off Jay and pick him. I don't know what kind of work he does but he is from Michigan and then moved to Chicago. Now he has lived here for 15 some years. We chatted one day when he commented on my Birkenstocks. He said it is a wonder that it took Birkenstock so many years to make more fashionable shoes, like the ones I was wearing. He has an eleven year old and his family travels to Colorado for summer vacations. He only sits on the patio and sometimes has a dog that he brings too; a Bernese mountain dog like our Urbana neighbors, the Firmands, always had. He eats Starbucks oatmeal and smokes cigars.

I love the smell of cigars. I hope my Uncle Jeff is not offended that I associate the smell with him. I associate it with my Uncle Jeff and Taylor family beach vacations. He may have smoked a cigar everyday of every vacation we were on together or perhaps only once or twice, but it is an instant association and bring about good memories. There was also a security guard that worked at a bank in Bucktown in Chicago. Everyday I passed him at 7:45am and he would be smoking his cigar outside the bank. Smelling his cigar in the morning did the same thing. 

Anyhow, the guy who hangs at Starbucks looks a lot like Hugh Laurie and talks like Dr. House. 

In other news, I am going to see a movie and have dinner with my book club friends tomorrow. We are seeing Midnight in Paris, which I have only been wanting to see for months now, so that will be fun. 

I also took a knitting class yesterday at The Shabby Sheep. Lovely store. Lovely people. Lovely time. I am looking forward to going back and making some pretty things with all the gorgeous yarn they have. 

Some random thoughts for Thursday!

Apparently I can only blog about the dinner I make. This was what was on the table tonight. 

This Cooking light recipe I had in a magazine from several years ago and is linked here at cookinglight.com. 

Jay and I had a great Labor Day weekend. We had breakfast with Jay's old co-worker and his fiance who were in town. We went to Fort Worth Saturday, visiting the Kimbell art musuem and the Stockyards. Pictures here. Sunday we got to spend time with Lina and Paras, and the girls of course. These little munchins were, of course, the highlight of my weekend!

  We went to Home Depot on the holiday Monday to get an adpater for our grill to use the regular larger 20lbs tank. This should be a nice change from changing our little tanks so often and throwing them away because you can't recycle them. 

The weather here this week has been simply perfect. Cool breezes and sunny....it is like someone turned off the oven that was the outdoors until last weekend and then it dropped 20 degrees and now 84 feels chilly.....never thought I would feel that way!

I think we are in for a lovely few months weather-wise....

Not that I am remotely thinking of staying here long-term, but can we all appreciate how darling this house is in our neighborhood?

Listed here

I don't want to give Jay false hope that we will be staying here, I just appreciate charming old homes!

Once Upon a Mattress

Who knew?! Mr. Shuester and Zooey Deschanel were in this version made for Disney in 2005. I think I need it! Although, it surely cannot be better than the Zuppke Theatre production!

I was trying to embed the youtube video but apparently my skills are not up to the task yet. 

Dinner

I made this for dinner tonight! 

Red Prawn and Mango Curry from Nigella Lawson. This is a picture from her website. My version didn't look quite so perfect but was perfectly delicious!

http://www.nigella.com/recipes/view/red-prawn-and-mango-curry-16

I hope you had a nice dinner too!

 

friends?

So in an attempt to make friends here in Dallas I began by googling "book club, dallas" and I was able to find a few book clubs in the area through meetup.com. I was able to join one this week that had luckily read the Hunger Games, which I read on vacation two weeks ago. Really nice ladies. Good discussion. I feel like my 5mins of internet research was well worth meeting four nice young ladies in Dallas that at least like to read and talk about books. 

This week I applied for a few jobs. It is a time consuming process to rework your resume for different types of jobs and prepare proper cover letters for each one. We will see what comes of it, if anything. I have a few more jobs that I will be applying to next week. 

I am going to ask Jay to take some photos this weekend of our home and we will post them. It is looking like a home now. I think we are going to grill pizza tonight for dinner. It seems like the proper dinner for a Friday night. 

A Very Holy Sunday

Jay and I spent Saturday going to IKEA and getting a rug for our living room, a dining table and chairs and a lot of curtains for our first floor apartment. We would like to be able to enjoy the sunshine without having people looking into our windows. 

Sunday we went to church at the First Presbyterian Church in Dallas. People were extremely welcoming and friendly. It seems like the kind of place I was looking for, so I am hoping it is a good fit. Afterwards, Jay and I then went to this temple in Irving. It was interesting for me. I had never been to a Hindu temple so it was a new experience, although Jay isn't religious so I am not sure how soon we will go again. Then we went to eat some Nepali food nearby. I really wasn't a big fan of the dish we ordered. It was spicy cold chicken and had a strange flavor that I couldn't place. However, the momo was delicious. We also picked up some pani puri that we had later for dinner. Yum.

I am hanging pictures and curtains today. The curtains are little more involved than I had imagined. Our apartment is really looking like our home now. It is amazing how much different it looks after a few additions.

I am going to run to the store to get some mirin for a recipe I am making for dinner tonight! Cheers!