I love my house.

It's a cacophony of water droplets leaking from every possible faucet throughout the house.

It's a tiny clink resulting from that of a tin bowl catching water from the leak in our roof every time it rains. We've got a whole symphony.

It's the sound of nasty cat, scratching around in our roof/attic/unexplainable area above our heads. I have absolutely zero idea of how it got up there, or exactly where "up there" is since nasty cat is nowhere to be found there, but it adds a nice mix to the percussion of the falling of the water globules.

It's a nice electrical problem creating a nice strobe light effect as the electricity in any given room flashes out, just to flash back on as we switch the breaker box. Drying my hair may be interrupted many times, but at least there's a nice disco atmosphere through the process.

It's the explosive water spewing--no, flooding from the tap in the kitchen and the resultant dance and squeal while trying to make it stop. It just adds to the rave ambiance.

It's the toilet that won't flush from either 1) plumbing problems, 2) a broken flusher, or 3) water turned off by the city for various other dance moves of girls prancing around with their knees squeezed together hoping the toilet will be working. Soon. Just in case the other dance moves were not to your satisfaction.

It's the outrageous heating bill that only results from pitiable insulation that you must pay to get into such an uncontrollable party.

It's the furnace that goes out to control the heat of this party.

It's one of a kind.

It's the one.

It's the only.

It's the yellow brick house.

It's where I live.

Meh

Please meet the friendly neighborhood stray cat that now resides in the home of the people that live in the basement of my hosue. I call it Meh, and only with a grimace. I have one problem with it, and one problem only. It's still alive.

I have never liked animals, I will never like animals, and nor will I pretend to. As mentioned, we found this cat as a stray when we first moved in, and I found it disgusting beyond all belief, although it seems I am the only one that thought so. It was skin-y. Not just skinny. You know the kind, where the flesh and fur is just hanging down off the bones so you could reach out and grab a handful of solely furry skin if you felt like catching fleas. The fur was thick and matted, scary to the touch (not that I touched it or anything. Good heavens, I did not touch it.), let alone to look at. In addition, underneath what would have been the tail had it existed resided a nasty, strange, brown clump that mysteriously resembled something of dry fecal matter tangled up in its fur. I wanted to throw up when I saw it.

Before I could take care of this pesticide myself, my lovely neighbors below me took matters into their own hands, and I gradually noticed the cat plumping up little by little, getting less timid, and I soon heard the faint sound of a bell tinkling with every bound of the animal, which required a double take, hoping my suspicions would not be confirmed. A bell? On a collar? Oh dear. A collar. Suspicions confirmed. Next thing I knew, I was being disturbed by a maddening yowl coming from my front porch, and a furry ball darting in the house every time the door opened. I found myself attempting to coax it out from under my bed, or calling to my neighbors to come retrieve their own vermin. I didn't worry too much. I didn't think it would survive the winter. Especially when it was left to fend for itself over the cold and snowy Thanksgiving and Christmas break when everybody left.

Alas, it's still alive. I only regret I didn't call the animal shelter when I could.

Guilty Pleasures

I may or may not have just spent a wee portion of a class period and the past hour plus indulging in this:

http://www.cheekykitchen.com/ (Delicious food, fun cooking, and amazing photography--three things dear to my heart. I couldn't stop.)

and this:

http://www.tastespotting.com/ (A bottomless pit to a vast array of food blogs and websites. I may never emerge again. I will practice self control. I will practice self control. I will practice...)

You may have already been aquainted with said websites, but all I can say is this may become a problem for me. So if you're slightly strange like me and delight in this kind of thing, please enjoy; however, I warn you, I was allowing myself one more page to drool over for an hour. And that was just for today. Now, if only I could channel such attentiveness and fixation to my textbooks I was planning on reading during that hour.

A kind of long post about nothing too interesting. The real title? Happily Ever After

I always have mixed feelings after finishing a really great book. It's typically a good feeling of completion. The plot has come to a close, the conflict has resolved, the unraveled ends have been tied, everything's happy, and you feel all warm and fuzzy inside. It's all fine and dandy, and a good time was had by all, or at least until the book is closed and completion is actually admitted. This is the point at which I frequently find myself experiencing with a feeling of loss.

Maybe I'm too emotionally involved. Okay I am too emotionally involved. I'll admit it. When I get wrapped up in a really good book, it almost quite literally becomes my world. I find myself enveloped into the details of the environment, and I can't help but wrap it into my everyday life, even outside of actually reading the book. I'm driving to the store and I find myself wondering how all those people would fit in that car if every last one of them suddenly turned into warewolves (Yes, I sadly admit that I read the Twilight series.). I find myself making mental bets on who would win the argument across the wall if their hands clutched wands and murmured spells escaped their lips. I find myself worrying that the clunk of the heater I hear as I drift off to sleep is Javier drawing ever nearer to capture Jean Val Jean, whom I suppose must be hiding in my closet. I attempt to imagine a world with no color, and try to extract memories of warmth and happiness in bitter times, wishing I could give them to others in desperate need. My heart breaks as I imagine my little nieces and nephews and kid friends marching off to war, and I wonder if I've been charitable and fair to those with calloused and impious scars on their hearts. It goes on and on.

So when I actually finish the book, it's like the world I have been living in for the past x amount of time has suddenly and unwantingly disintegrated with the close of the book. I have to come back to my own life, which is not quite as exciting as escaped convicts, mysterious cowboys, and magical make believe lands; or as dramatic as wars amongst children, lives of teenage girls who reach unattainable aspirations, or marriages of illicit lovers. Sure, the book may end in a happily ever after story tale ending, and that's great for them, but I'm left feeling as though I'm still dangling on a cliffhanger. Just as I feel a sense of completion in the book, just at the point where I feel as though the character's life (aka--mine, because I am that character now.) is where it aught to be, when the last page is read, and the book is closed, WA-BAM! I travel back through the time/world continuum and look up from the closed book to see my world once again. To hear my obligations calling. To feel my duties I've been neglecting demanding my attention.

So glad you had a happy ending, dearest Cosette/Fulton/Harry/Ender/Marjorie/super awesome character I have grown to love and adore that doesn't even exist, but now what am I supposed to do? I'm still in the middle of my story! I suppose I have learned some good things from some of you, and I suppose now I need to carry on with on my own story, tie up my own unraveled ends, resolve my own conflicts--present and future, fall and learn from my own shortcomings, rejoice in my own successes and blissful life, and find my own ultimate happy ending down the road. Let me just, you know, pick up this other book along the way...

Nobody's brain works this way. Nobody's.

You know you need to loosen up your schedule when you find yourself having to plan and map out everything down to your potty breaks throughout the day. You know your brain is in no state of mental being when you pull out of your secret study corner to realize you haven't slept, eaten, used your vocal cords, or had any kind of human contact in an uncomfortable amount of time. You know you need to relax when you find yourself annoyed at the unsuspecting person who knocked on your door due to your current level of high anxiety, your severe need to continue studying, and how dare they interrupt you. I hate finals week. It does weird things to me. The human body is not meant to undergo such conditions.

But it's okay, becuase I like this video.



Amen sister. Watching this on a daily basis will be a necessity this week.

It's after Thanksgiving. I'm allowed now.

After cooking apple pie, pecan pie, cheesecake, rolls, stuffing, sweet potatoes, pasta salad, and eating turkey, frog eye salad, mashed potatoes, more pie, and after enjoying the company of friends and family, and after much thanks-giving...

It's Christmas time!!! I've already enjoyed setting up a Christmas tree, cutting out paper snow flakes, buying Christmas presents, making Christmas crafts, decorating an apartment all Christmas-like, and making the season's first Christmas cookies. Now please enjoy my favorite Christmas clip. Go ahead and watch it multiple times. I won't judge.





MERRY CHRISTMAS!

Turns out I'm a sucker for pumpkin

I love fall. Fall means pumpkin. Anything pumpkin is delicious. I love pumpkin, and I overdosed on pumpkin this week--from breakfast to dessert, and everything in between. I had it all, and I loved every last heavenly bite.

My craving pumpkin week started out with making pumpkin pancakes. It was no let-down.

2 c. flour
3 tbl. brown sugar
1 tbl. baking powder
1/2 tsp. salt
1 3/4 c. milk
3 eggs
3/4 c. canned pumpkin
1/4 c. oil

Combine dry ingredients. In 2nd bowl combine remaining ingredients. Stir milk mixture into flour mixture until slightly lumpy.

A day or two later, I thoroughly enjoyed pumpkin and sausage pasta. It hit the spot on every level.

Hitting the end of the week, I still had pumpkin left, so I ventured into realms of unknown recipes and made pumpkin blondies, only with butterscotch chips instead of white chocolate chips. The new recipe was far from a disappointment. I hit success.

In between I had tastes of pumpkin chocolate chip cookies and "pumpkin jems," which interprates to be something about a pumpkin muffin with some kind of cream cheese filling in the middle. Slightly mysterious, yet definitely scrumptious.

In my perusings, I restocked my pumpkin recipe inventory. I found a recipe for pumpkin nutella swirl bread. There's also always the options of pumpkin cheesecake, pumpkin oatmeal, the original pumpkin pie (Thanksgiving is just right around the corner), pumpkin roll, pumpkin chili, pumpkin hot chocolate, pumpkin anything and everything! Bring it on! It seems I ran out of pumpkin though. Oh dear.