Kindness Challenge – Day 4

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Day 4: Give money for each bed in your house to a homeless organization

I gave money to the Maple Valley Food bank, an Elves program for people displaced by the hurricane, and I gave my kid a dollar to put in every bell ringer’s bucket we came across. I’ll keep doing that last one all month.

And because I like to give until it hurts….

Ostrich Mentality is also a free download today. Consider this a little early Sinterklaas gift. Add your happy little review to these others…

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If you don’t know what I am talking about with the whole Kindness Challenge, you can find the calendar here. All normal posts will resume in January. Enjoy the time off. Enjoy the kindness. Practice a little yourself.

Kindness Challenge Day 3

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Day 3: Leave a happy note for someone else to find.

 

I wrote this happy note for my son. I want to encourage him to continue his language studies. He’s really good at it and has been struggling lately with other formalized learning.

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In case you don’t speak Dutch it says:

Dear Kiddo,

I hear you have been studying Dutch this year. Good Boy! Extra candy for you.

-Sinterklaas

He’ll find this Wednesday morning in his klompen filled with candy.

 

If you don’t know what I am talking about with the whole Kindness Challenge, you can find the calendar here. All normal posts will resume in January. Enjoy the time off. Enjoy the kindness. Practice a little yourself.

Kindness Challenge – Day 2

~ tahenryauthoress ~ 1 Comment

Day 2: Make some homemade gifts to give away this season.

Too easy. I actually started crocheting in January for this. LOL.

Spoiler alert: all my friends are getting home made washcloths and yummy not-homemade organic soap. I took a small skein of cotton and a crochet hook everywhere in my purse this year. Every class the kiddo had, every dentist appt, every PTA meeting. LOL

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I am crocheting a scarf for my father in law’s girlfriend.

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And I am making two hippopotami for two boys who LOVE the Christmas Carol “I want a hippopotamus for Christmas.” It will eventually have legs, eyes, ears, and a tail.

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How about you? Do you ever make gifts?

 

Wednesday Words 11.29

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Today I got to see a review of my short in The Box Under the Bed.

The reviewer complained that he knew what was going to happen from the start and that it was all sexual tension instead of fear.

But it was well written. Gee, thanks.

LOL. I always though one of the hallmarks of classic horror is that you know it’s coming, you see it coming, and yet you are helpless to stop it.

Silly me.

At least it was well written. LOL

Book Review: Pride and Prejudice and Zombies

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Stop laughing. You know you’ve been tempted to read it. This version is by Jane Austen and Seth Grahame Smith.

I don’t know why but this book didn’t set off my “Don’t screw with the canon” alarm. I love Jane, I do. I reread all her books every year. I read a lot of spin off books. My favorites being the entire series by Elizabeth Aston. And Pride and Prejudice and Zombies was just another spin off book.

How did I like it? Hard to say. I enjoyed reading it, mostly. Some things rubbed me wrong. Some things I thoroughly enjoyed.

The good:

I love that some people close to Elizabeth fall prey to the plague. It’s not just red shirts.

I love that there are some honor deaths, from people I wouldn’t have expected it from in the original. I can’t decide if Sean is implying that he loved her more than Jane implied or that he loves his own self image more than Jane implied. I don’t want to get too specific in case you decide to read.

I love that the girls are warrior in service to the queen, that they’ve been trained to be warriors. And I love that it’s yet another thing Elizabeth is judged for.

Things that rubbed:

By the end, I felt every time Sean mentioned the seven cuts, I was being cut. Too much. Too often. Too lame. No specifics.

The sexual promiscuity. It was a big deal in the first book. Way too casual in this one and in conflict with aspects of the story the new author didn’t change. If sex is casual then why does everyone assume Lydia was kidnapped. And if it’s so shocking she ran off with Wickham, then all the other sex cannot be so casual.

The eating of a heart. Ick. And really when the country is over run with zombies, I’m not sure anyone would be eating internal organs.

℘℘℘ – Three Pages. Overall a fun read. If you like Austen and want another way to read Pride and Prejudice for amusement, give it a whirl.

Sunday Sup: The vegetable drawer pasta

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I know you are scratching your head. The vegetable drawer pasta. What?

Ok so I needed dinner for the fam. I hadn’t been shopping much. Things have been hectic lately. I won’t get into all that. I looked in the fridge and the freezer and this is what I came up with.

Preheat your oven to 400. Put parchment paper on a baking sheet. Now search your veg drawer. Pull out a few options that go together. I used heirloom grape tomatoes, orange bell pepper, and crimini mushrooms. Roasted them until the tomatoes are about to burst and the other stuff is soft, lightly browned, ready for consumption. 25 minutes in this case.

While the veg are roasting, microwave your spaghetti squash or start your water for real pasta. No judgement here.

Also start defrosting some fat shrimp in the sink.

Fry 1/2 pound bacon, in pieces, then pull the bacon and saute the shrimp in the bacon fat. Two minutes a side maybe less, watch for them to be opaque.  Pull the shrimp as needed so you can cook them all single layer.

Add the roast veg to the pan with the bacon fat and force your tomatoes to pop. It makes a kind of sauce with the bacon fat. If you’re using spaghetti squash, scrape it to make the long strands. Throw everything together (shrimp, bacon, veg, spag squash) and top with fresh Parmesan.

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Fiendish Friday: The Dark Side

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Tis the Christmas season. My fam decorates Thanksgiving weekend. It became a habit before the kiddo came along and we kept it when we started throwing Sinterklaas parties. That’s always the weekend after Thanksgiving. It all made sense.

The kiddo wanted his own tree which he got a few years ago. It’s cute and small and fits on his book shelf. But it’s white. And this irritates my dark side loving child. So this year, Darth Vader makes an appearance.IMG_20171124_093230

Balance is restored in the Star Wars Christmas universe. LOL

Book Review: Unsolved Mysteries of American History

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This book was a gift, I think. Maybe it’s been on my TBR shelf for so long, I can’t remember. Unsolved Mysteries of American History, by Paul Aron.

If you’re looking at that title and thinking cheesy titillation and misinformation was contained with the covers, you might be right. At least part right. There is some gasp, shock, and awe writing going on but there is also a strong measure of interesting information. The author compiles other people’s research and theories and only occasionally proposes his own theory.

The chapters are short snippets that make for convenient reading. Maybe ten minutes a topic. And each chapter ends with a bibliography. I like that. I can go read his sources on a subject that interests me and learn more.

℘℘℘ – Solid 3 pages. Interesting read. Interesting design. Limited target audience. If you aren’t a history geek, this would bore you quickly. If you are a history geek, you know 90% of the material already. So it’s the in between, those with an interest and a high school level history knowledge who would most gravitate to this book.

Sunday Sup: Yummy Chicken

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Good Morning!

Last night I made the best chicken. I swear the hubs and the kiddo were ready to fight a light saber duel over the last piece. Guess I should have made more.

Make your rub –

2/3 tsp cumin, 2/3 tsp dried Chipotle chile powder, 1 tsp garlic powder, 1 tsp onion powder, 8 grinds of sea salt, 1 tsp black pepper, 1 tsp oregano. Stir. Slowly add olive oil and stir until you have paste. We’re talking tablespoons of oil, not cups.

With your fingers rub the paste into both sides of your boneless, skinless chicken thighs. It should be a nice gentle coating. You should still be able to see the chicken. Think a starry night and the stars are your rub. This amount of rub covers both sides of 6 large thighs.

Grill the chicken, both sides 5-6 minutes each until beautiful grill marks appear and the meat is cooked.

I served mine chopped over rice, baja black beans, and salsa. Jalapeno jack cheese for the hubs and I, none for the kiddo.

I couldn’t get pictures once the fill-de-beasts tasted the meat, I was lucky to get any for my bowl. LOL