« June 2006 | Main | August 2006 »
July 31, 2006
the new best pasta salad
This is only pasta salad I've ever eaten the next day, when it's left over, and still liked it. Good shit, man. This makes a boatload, so be sure to have someone onto whom you can pawn half of it off. Also, this is great for taking to potlucks because there isn't any onion in it, and so people will actually EAT it, rather than do the lean-in-sniff-and-bypass.
1 lb of elbows
1 lb of bacon cooked and crumbled
1 tomato diced
1 green (or which ever color) pepper diced
1 lb of mozarella cubed
1/2 to 1 C of ranch dressing (I like Newman's, because there's no MSG in it)
I didn't measure the ranch, I just dumped it on everything and mixed it, so I'm guessing that measurement. Plus, you should just put how much dressing you want--you might want it wetter or whatever.
Posted by mryonker at 11:04 AM | Comments (2)
July 29, 2006
it's that time of year again
when half of my blogroll bloggers are making reports from the BlogHer conference in (San Jose?) California.
Geeky Mom
Dooce
Suburban Bliss
Fussy
I read through the BlogHer reports each year with a combination of envy/longing and indignation. And while my indignation, to be sure, is borne completely out of the envy, I still give it a little consideration as a valid reaction.
The exclusionary nature of the gathering peeves me. One must have certain resources (green paper resources, mostly) to be able to participate--especially when one lives in the east and the conference is always on the west coast.
Of course, if I could convince my family that this conference was a necessary trip for me to take for my research, I would be able to scrape up the money and babysitters necessary for me to be gone for a long weekend in the summer (read: rack up the credit cards and desposit the children with my mom). But because my research--the stuff that is fast evolving into a disseration project--is about blogging, somehow I find very few people (outside of my scholarly peops) who take what I'm doing seriously. However, when on the surface (from many reports), the conference simply looks like one big trip to CA for Starbucks, sushi, and lipstick, this makes it hard to convince anyone (myself included) that I should indeed be participating in the gathering.
There is something important, to be sure, in the BlogHer phenomenon: that even with the networks and communities that emerge in such online spaces, we still seek out (and envy) "real" interaction? A similar physical congregation of running bloggers in Chicago has recently emerged as well; while it is not of the proportions of BlogHer, it is similar: once a month a group of running bloggers meet for dinner to somehow "solidify" their online connections.
It makes those of us who participate in online communities because of the ease of access and lack of logistic constraints (we can participate regardless of where we are, or what time of the day it is, or whether our kids are with us or not, etc) somehow second-rate, that once the communities move past simply the blogging networks and into something "real," those of us stuck in our houses are less-than.
Well. I didn't mean for this post to turn into a whine fest. And really, if I had the $$ to go to BlogHer, I'd be there--but NOT without a second thought about the long tail (of which I am a part) of bloggers who must read about the sessions from afar, and how Andrew O'Baoill is right: the technology of social software does not afford users that ideal public sphere where stratifications are flattened.
Posted by mryonker at 11:04 AM | Comments (5)
July 27, 2006
outside blogging
That is, blogging while outside. Is damn near necessary on a day like this, when it temp is near 90 and closing up the house does little to keep the stinky heat out.
The perks of outside blogging are that one gets to observe, first hand, the oldest son bouncing a golf ball in the driveway enough times that eventually, it hits the windshield of one's car with considerable force (which, incidentally, is already cracked and compromised). Fortunately it does not break.
One also gets to observe the smaller son riding his scooter full speed down the driveway, "popping wheels" intermitently, stopping only nanoseconds before crashing into the garage door. Repeatedly. One wonders when the small boy's luck will run out.
Can one still harvest/eat cilantro after it flowers?
Posted by mryonker at 02:11 PM | Comments (0)
July 16, 2006
dun
As the smartest person I know told me on Friday when I drove to campus to turn in the last exam,
I'm dun. D-U-N, dun.
So, we left campus. I had all my crazy kids with me, and for whatever reason, it was all I could do to keep from crying as I walked away from the building.
And really, I'm not done. I still have to actually PASS.
So as we get into the car, the kids are hungry and begging for burgers. They plead for McDonald's, and I acquiesce, simply because it's been for damn ever since they've had some nice greasy cheeseburgers and played some DDR.
We get our artery-clogging meal and we eat, and I'm beginning to feel a little better. I'm sitting at a table, not reading a damn thing, and watching the kids go up through the human-sized hamster tubes and coming down the slide.
Until Jack comes down the slide one last time and says to me: "Mom, I think someone pooped in the slide."
I pause, not really thinking he could be serious. Thinking someone probably farted, or some baby had a diaper full, but not thinking that someone actually left turds in the hamster tube.
But nooooohooo. Some kid HAD ACTUALLY SHIT in the slide, and both my boys ended up with someone else's crap all over their shorts.
OH MY GOD. It was the most disgusting thing I've EVER had to deal with. Since is Josh full-fledged potty trained, I do not carry a diaper bag or a change of clothes for ANY CHILD anymore. I had nothing to put on either of them.
The rest of the story is a blur. I know I ended up throwing Josh's shorts and socks in the trash in the bathroom, and I stripped Jack down in the parking lot before he got in the car. Jack was especially traumatized, and gets VERY upset when I recount the story for anyone.
So the day I finished my exams ended up being, all in all, NOT relaxing at all.
We came home and I hosed the boys down in the driveway. Then I went inside and lay on the couch and watched _The People's Court_.
Posted by mryonker at 09:48 PM | Comments (8)
July 13, 2006
it came off, finally
So, after a full day of swimming lessons, and a trip to the beach with extra kids, and several other things that put me in a foul mood because today is the last day, really, for me to be finishing my last exam, and because I'm a fool I agreed to babysit the day before I was supposed to be done, but I'm not really done yet but I still agreed several weeks ago to take an extra kid today, and so the day has been a washout. I'll be up all night, I'm sure, making up for time lost.
But there *have* been some highlights:
J-baby, to whom I should probably refer as J-toddler now, dropped trow at the beach and peed in the sand just under the guard stand. My dumbass self stood in the water paralyzed with embarrassment, and then stoopidly began to SPLASH WATER into the sand where he peed. Like I could somehow clean out the pee from the sand. REALLY. My brain is completely on hiatus.
And that damn toenail finally came off--the one that I was sorely disappointed that I didn't lose during the marathon--apparently I did lose it, it just took a long while (6 weeks!) to finally come free. Now I'm a really runner: I have officially shed toenails.
And my B received a letter from his college yesterday: he's one of two in his department to be awarded a full ride scholarship for next year, based on the fact that he is a big nerd. But I really like nerds a lot, so for me to call anyone a "big nerd" is a compliment; I am extraordinarily proud of his over-the-top geekdom.
Did I mention my toenail fell off? Damn.
Posted by mryonker at 05:45 PM | Comments (3)
July 06, 2006
comfort (food)
Thanks to my mom for this one.
Just a quick distraction. Here's another great thing to eat. For this, however, I make no claims about its healthfulness. In fact, even *I* can only eat this every-so-often because while I love oyster sauce, it can be overpowering.
A hunk of extra firm tofu
A pile of cornstarch
Enough oil to put 1/4" in the bottom of a frying pan
Oyster sauce
Slice the tofu into <1/4" slices, and then cut them in half (on the diagonal, if you're daring)
Coat the slices in cornstarch
Fry the slices for a couple minutes on each side (they won't brown, but they'll get crispy-clear/white)
Drain on newspaper (paper towels will stick)
Eat drizzled or dipped in oyster sauce--preferably standing over the stove as you cook them
Leave the kitchen a mess, complete with the kids' half-eaten lunches on the table, dishes in the sink, junk all over the floor (go ahead and throw the perishables in the fridge). Rush back into the office to continue exam prep
Oh, yeah. Ignore that last step. It's mine.
Posted by mryonker at 12:48 PM | Comments (1)
July 02, 2006
uncle (or, the pain junky)
I'm crying uncle. Uncle! already.
Here's what I'm giving in to:
1. the pain of this exam process. It is really, really, grueling. Obviously, me crying uncle doesn't actually make the proverbial uncle* quit twisting my arm behind my back--the twisting will continue for another two weeks--but UNCLE, ok?
2. the marathon. The running buds have been at me since, oh, the day AFTER we did Buffalo to start training for Harrisburg (thereby starting the "one marathon per state" insanity). I have, of course, said NO NO NO. And they've cajoled, and said "Oh, come with and do the half while we run the full," and "Just do the training with us." Yeah, right. Any marathoner knows that you stand in the FULL MARATHON line to pick up your packet, looking smugly at that HALF MARATHON line, which is always 3 times as long (because most people have some sense, really). The 18-week training starts next Monday. I'm in, babes. I'm in. Because I'm giving into the PAIN OF IT ALL.
*whenever someone talks about crying "uncle," I always imagine a socially-inept uncle tickling and tormenting some child who is yelling "UNCLE! UNCLE!" I actually have no clue the actual etymological lineage of the phrase. Feel free to enlighten me.
Posted by mryonker at 10:09 PM | Comments (3)