Redemption

I absolutely hate having kitchen failures. It's fine if I cook something and one of us doesn't like it... Unless that one of us is Rashan and I cooked a lot of it. I don't like leftovers for more than a day or two. He can eat them until they're gone. My main issue with leftovers is eating the same thing day after day. I need variety in my life. There's not a single thing I want to eat daily. There's barely anything I want to eat once a week every week for a month.

But when I say kitchen failures, I mean flat out FAILURE. Like no one can eat that because it's inedible. It almost never happens. But when it does, I moan and wail and gnash my teeth and metaphorically tear my hear. Yes. I go biblical. A little dramatic? Mayhaps. But I don't like losing. Or failing. Monday was my food loser day (for the year I hope). I set out to cook Tyler Florence's ultimate fried chicken. I just knew I was going to rock this out! My mom doesn't know how to fry chicken? No matter! I will fry this chicken up and work it out!

I set my peanut oil up and put in my aromatics (fresh herbs, garlic still in the husk) and got ready to show that chicken who's boss! It was smelling amazing! Except it seemed like it was taking a long time to come to temp... Hmm... Let me turn up the heat a little. MISTAKE!! Garlic burned, oil ruined. And now? Out of control smoke. OUT OF CONTROL!!! Setting off the smoke detector twice out of control. The most smoke I've ever seen in a kitchen out of control. Smokier in the house than some bars that still allow smoking out of control. Open all the windows and the front door and it still takes the good part of an hour to become inhabitable again OUT OF CONTROL.

Y'all. What!? But my chicken was already marinating in lime juice so I moved to plan B... oven fried chicken. I'd made it before and it was delicious and crunchy. I needed redemption! I also needed to finish this salad with Ty's Ultimate Vinaigrette. I added it to romaine and feta. Then I decided to "bake" AKA microwave in plastic wrap for 8 minutes some small potatoes to mash with crema, salt, pepper, milk & a drizzle of olive oil. It was all good. But that vinaigrette? Tyler! Yes! That vinaigrette was all the king's horses and all the king's men! I could even have it either sans sugar or with less sugar. It was really really tasty. Rashan looked at me like, "For real? Yes!" Can I say it? REDEEMED! And PHEW! I've become so much better at rolling with the punches!

Then at 2 a.m. I wanted a biscuit. Like really wanted it. Like so bad I looked up recipes. I have no buttermilk and no lemon to make buttermilk. What to do... keep looking. I found a buttermilk-less biscuit that took 25 minutes including prep time and got to work. By 2:30 we were eating AMAZING biscuits from scratch slathered with peach preserves. NOW I'M REDEEMED!! Hmph! (Ordinarily there would be pictures to go with this post but me, my phone and blogger are in a fight so just "imaginate" if you will...)

Except... when I tweeted about wanting a 2 a.m. biscuit, someone told me that was a really specific craving and asked if there was something I wanted to share. Y'all... I'll share it here first. I'M NOT PREGNANT. Oh. That. The point of the tweet was to show if I want something, I get up and cook it. Not a subtle hint that I am with child. Jesus take the wheel.

He's Mine & I Love Him

The other day, Rashan and I were chatting about randomness when I popped up with something I imagine I'll ask him to do when I'm pregnant. I don't even remember what it was but he looked surprised. Then he turned and looked me in the eye and said, "I can't think of a single thing I won't want to do for you when you're pregnant." *swoon* Just SWOON!!

Monday Mindspacing Vol. 140: Oh. Hai. Edition

Hai is the most hilarious incarnation of hi to me! Mostly because it's used for snark purposes in conjuction with someone doing something of or related to a previous decade. Example... I saw a man in a Pelle Pelle sweatsuit. Oh. Hai 1998! LOLOL You know it's been too long since you posted when your husband who hasn't posted in over a year taps you on the shoulder. (He should be quiet on that front, though.)

1) I started to blog about the girl who flashed Rashan at a Cinco de Mayo party but the story was too ridiculous for blogging. I felt too old for what I typed. She was drunk so I completely ignored her. Not worth my effort. But it was a very strange situation. It bothered me more the next day than it did at the time.
2) I ran a free "5K" on Friday. Those "" are so necessary. First, it was at most 2.9 miles versus the 3.1 it should've been. 2nd, it was an obstacle course complete with ropes, tires, fire fighters with a hose on hills, running on trails and grass. If you had told me that I would've stayed at home. Not a happy camper.
3) Reminder: Bitterness is not a good look at any time. It is worse during a holiday.
4) My mom and sister took this Mother's Day to let me know they'd like me to have some babies. Exit stage left.
5) I'm running 10 miles on Tuesday. It's surreal. A year ago I'd never run so much as a mile without stopping.
6) I want to take an adult ballet class. I loved ballet as a kid. I took tap and jazz too but ballet! So elegant. Le sigh.
7) It rained and rained and rained here over the last almost 24 hours. We had a roof leak about a year ago so I kept praying it wouldn't return. It didn't. Yay!
8) Our wretched fighting neighbors vacuum even more than they fight. Bizarre, n'est-çe pas?? Last week one of them started vacuuming in the middle of a fight. ????
9) I still need to edit our wedding video... I should probably get that done before our first anniversary, huh? 6 more weeks!
10) SIL and future BIL are sickening on facebook professing their love for each other. Rashan and I make retching noises every time. I still haven't decided what I'm cooking for their wedding dinner. Though she's vegan, no one else is and she didn't specify what she wanted. I told twitter I'm doing a bacon ice cream with honey butter sauce on leather plates. LOL I kid I kid. But I'm going to cook whatever I feel like cooking + these three way gingersnaps (ground ginger, crystallized ginger & fresh ginger) my MIL stans for.
11) The show "Girls" is hilarious! "Veep" is less enjoyable for me but still watchable.

Awards and Such

When I was in undergrad, I was obsessed with awards. I wanted to win an Oscar or an Emmy or 6 (seriously... 6 was the number I chose) before I turned 30. I got slightly more realistic once I hit the real world, but I still want a bevy of awards to outfit my mantle or library one day. I haven't talked about it in a while but I made a 15-minute (but expandable) documentary about the grandfather I never met for my MFA thesis. He died 41 years ago, 11 years before I was born and no one ever really talked about him. Not my mom or her four brothers or my grandfather. So I made this film to find out more about him. Really to find out anything other than he was a preacher and a World War II veteran. I'd only ever seen one or two pictures. I found dozens more pictures and learned more than I could have ever imagined including the fact that he fought for civil rights in Mississippi. It was pretty amazing.

Fast forward to last month. I entered my film into the Student Academy Awards. I was terrified. And then shocked when I learned I was one of 10 regional finalists in the documentary category. My region has more than 40 states! Nationwide, more than 500 people sent in their films in multiple categories. At this point, I had a 1/3 chance of making it to the national competition in L.A. I was so nervous. I went back and forth over whether or not I wanted to win. I know! What a nut job!

Once I decided I definitely wanted to win but was scared to hope for it (again... really?), I found out I didn't make it past the regional finals. I was crushed but still pretty proud and amazed that my little old film made it that far. I was so amused thinking of how amused my grandfather probably would've been! Can you imagine that I didn't tell anyone because I didn't want to have to tell them if I didn't make it to the next round? I don't know what's wrong with me. I'll do better the next time I'm up for an award and every time one of my films gets into a festival. My film was a regional finalist! Amazing... Oh I know you're probably going to ask how you can see it. Festivals are funny about people seeing things before they get to screen them so after I scrape up some money to enter it in festivals and screen it, I'll make sure you guys get to see it!