March Madness

There's something nasty going around the schools here so please forgive my absence- I've been very busy. I've managed to stay healthy which is key when you're the substitute. Michael caught a cold last week and I'm crossing my fingers that I haven't caught it.

Anyway, I went home on the fourth for a friend's wedding. I threw a few extra days in there so I could spend time with my family. As a bonus, Myriam and Dan also came in for the weekend. It was quite convenient that my plane landed in New Orleans around lunch time on Thursday. We lunched at Mr. B's and had roast beef sandwiches on Best Bakery's french bread for dinner followed by my cookie cake birthday cake with "lots of words" on it to maximize icing. If you've ever read the blog Cakewrecks then you'll appreciate this (even though the wording was intentional due to a lack of inspiration). Also, I obviously could not wait to tear into it so you're missing the "25 years old" at the bottom. I guess this silly cake turns out to be everything I could have wished for since that blog makes me cry laughing.

Oh man, I love cookie cake. Moving on. Friday Mom and I got a pedicure! We went to the grocery store with Mimi and then we went to dinner at The Grapevine. Sadly the restaurant is for sale and I have been trying to go there the past few times we've been home. Myriam and Dan met us there and we had a fabulous time as we always do.


Saturday Mom, Mim and I had to go shoe shopping. I found the shoes I've been looking for and they were on sale. Holla! Dan and Mom played croquet while Mim and I soaked up the afternoon sun on a blanket. This was cut short since I had to get ready to go to the wedding in New Orleans.

Granny's Grill was open on Sunday. My two grandmothers lunch at my parents' house weekly. One of them coined the name. After lunch and February/ March birthday cupcakes we played croquet. Dan is apparently a croquet master. I would really like to see a game with him and Brent who is also very skilled. The rest of us are pretty pathetic and the most joy comes from sending off other player's balls into oblivion. Here we are demonstrating the first move of the "croquet dance" which is performed when you do something exciting like actually get your ball through a wicket. Impressed by my terminology? Here are the official rules of croquet. (Mel- we were WAY off.) Also, I call for a rematch and this time I'll wear sunscreen so my game isn't affected by the tingle of sunburn on my forearm.

I left feeling rejuvenated from such a long winter and I returned to 64 degrees. Finally. And I'll leave you with some more dry cleaner humor.

The Academy Awards are upon us

One week left. I'm totally not concerned with what stars will be donning on the red carpet. I like movies. Have you seen the Best Picture nominees? I have. (Well, except for three- The Blind Side, Up in the Air, and Precious.) Hopefully I'll get to see Up in the Air this week. I hear it's really good. Now I will give you my opinions on the nominees. Please leave comments about what you think about them. I love talking about them! Don't worry, there aren't any spoilers.

Up is a beautiful story. The soundtrack is very well done as well as the animation, of course. I'd be glad if it won, but as we were discussing the other evening- an animated film winning Best Picture would open up a whole new playing field. If you haven't seen it, you should.

A Serious Man is based on Jewish culture. I don't know if that's the correct way to describe it, but it was really artsy and we didn't "get it." It's like one of those indie movies we watch and then try to remember who is to blame for putting it on the queue. So- two thumbs down. Why is this nominated?

Inglourious Basterds was awesome. Cinematography: check. Acting: check. Story: Check. This one has what it takes. Quentin Tarantino directed this so... it's not a family movie and it's pretty violent.

I already told you that An Education was good. However, it's not a contender in my mind.

District 9 was totally not what I was expecting, but it was fantastic. A totally new spin on aliens coming to Earth. Not scary- which is good. And I don't even like sci-fi for the most part. I would recommend seeing this one. It is a good story and I think it could win.

The Hurt Locker was also not what I was expecting. It wasn't your typical shoot 'em up war movie. I liked that it seemed real. Now that I think about it, I haven't really seen any present day war movies. It's probably not something I would be interested in, but it was a good film. I'm wondering how it went over in Hollywood... I think it could be a winnner.

I had trouble deciding if I wanted to see Avatar in theaters because it's got a nice price tag on those fancy 3D glasses. The only way to experience it obviously is at the theater so we went last week. I was expecting the story to be terrible, and it exceeded my expectations. I happened to like the Na'vi and their connection to their planet. The acting by the humans was not oscar worthy as I expected. The visual effects were what made the movie. I'm sure it will get the special effects or animation oscar- whichever's the correct term.

Birthday

I completely failed to get a picture of myself blowing out birthday candles. I made a garland out of felt and baked myself a strawberry cake. I will just have to show you a picture of the garland. It was a good day. I subbed for an Instructional Assistant who floats around the school sometimes in classrooms or sometimes at duty. It was a very easy day. Michael and I went to dinner at the Downtown Grille. It was delicious and we headed home afterward to cut the cake. Michael figured out how to video chat with multiple people through the website tokbox. Dad, Roger, and Max and Myriam, Dan, Joe, and Rugsby sang Happy Birthday to me on the computer and Mom, Aunt Jungle and Aunt Susan sang through the phone. Yay for technology!

I worked yesterday and my boss bought me a cupcake from the cupcake shop. Yay! After work I had 30 minutes to fouiller (fouiller (v.t.) [FOOYEH] 1. to dig. (v.i.) 2. to dig around; to search aimlessly (as in a drawer or closet). [Often said of children caught in places where they aren't supposed to be.] - Thanks to LSU's Department of French Studies I now know how to spell this) while Michael finished watching the Arsenal game at home. I love that word. One of my favorite things that Michael says to me is asking me "if I want to go fouiller." Sometimes there's nothing better than driving around and going wander aimlessly. Back to the topic at hand. I bought a nice used hardcover of Alice in Wonderland and Through the Looking Glass. I also found a Charley Harper coloring book at my favorite store on the Downtown Mall, O'Suzannah.

That's it for birthday happenings. What? You want to know about my presents. Ok, I'll tell you. Michael bought me a Mignon Faget Sno Cone pendant in Strawberry. It's super cute and will be darling with spring and summer tops. He also bought me a new sifter that functions by turning a wooden knob rather than by squeezing the handle which can be quite distressing. Last but not least I got a box of Godiva truffles. Score! And I should mention that I got to see my favorite student on Thursday and he drew a picture for me.

Theo likes to open presents just as much as his mommy

Today I filed our taxes online. Who knew it was so easy? I plan on cleaning house after we take Theo for a walk since it's a nice and warm 46 degrees outside. I also started knitting a springtime shawl yesterday while watching Sense and Sensibility. Speaking of movies, I'll catch you up on the best picture nominees we've seen this past week. Now I'm rambling and I will go. I'll post the birthday pictures after our walk.

February Book

I just finished reading Emma. I think it has to be my favorite Jane Austen novel. I loved Pride and Prejudice, but Emma was different. So maybe there's not much of a comparison. Of course they are both love stories. I guess I appreciated the comedy in Emma more, and it moved faster for me than Pride and Prejudice did. I am clearly no great book critic. ha!

My artsy shot of Emma

I am a little sad that I am finished with Jane Austen because there are at least three movies made for every novel. After Best Picture nominees on my Netflix queue are something like five movies for the last two books I read.

So I have a few days left in the month to decide what I want to read for my March book. I am thinking Alice in Wonderland. I saw a neat old copy in a book store on the Downtown Mall. Maybe I will go to work early tomorrow to check it out.

In news related to books, I joined a site called Good Reads where you can keep track of books you've read and books you want to read. You can befriend people and see what they have read, too. Seems much more enriching than stalking your friends on Facebook.

Happy Mardi Gras

I'm blaming the snow for the delay of posting those last two entries as well as for any other lack of motivation as far as Valentine's or birthday cards (or thank you's from Christmas) are concerned. I did some serious spring cleaning on Friday in an effort to make the snow hurry away. This didn't work. In fact, we got a couple more inches yesterday.

We saw "An Education" on Saturday after work. It's one of the 10 movies nominated this year for best picture. I am making it a point to see all of them this year before the awards show. The movie was based on someone's memoirs and the screenplay was written by Michael's favorite author, Nick Hornby. We both enjoyed the movie, but I wasn't wow'd by it.

We went to our friend Billy's home for dinner and we watched some of the olympics. I am sad we don't have cable because I can't watch the figure skating. Maybe I can find it online.

Sunday we had a fabulous Mr. B's dinner planned out. Duck, shiitake, and goat cheese spring rolls with Ginger Soy dipping sauce, Pecan crusted catfish with Creole Meuniere Sauce and White Chocolate Brownies with Mr. B's Chocolate Sauce. The spring rolls and the catfish turned out better than they looked. We decided that we'd leave the spring rolls to Mr. B's. Much more trouble than they're worth. The brownies were delicious and this time I put the correct amount of coffee in the sauce. It was a very labor intensive meal and while we both enjoy cooking, I'll be on the lookout for an easier menu next time.

Michael had the day off yesterday for President's Day. The city schools used it as a snow make up day and I got a call to sub as an Instructional Assistant in a Preschool class. The teacher that I was with was excellent and I had a positive experience. Needless to say I was completely wiped out when I got home and I was dreading going to the grocery store. I opened the door to Michael cooking Mr B's Gumbo Ya-Ya. This was especially comforting because it had started snowing around 1 o'clock.

The ingredients patiently wait for the roux to get dark enough

The recipe says the roux should be the color of mahogany (we settled for a little lighter)

The roux was made with butter instead of oil and it was deeeelish

Who dat?

I went with some friends to a Superbowl watching get together. What a game! We made boo hoo noises when the camera was on Peyton Manning. It's nice to know that I'm not the only person that thinks he's a loser despite his being an excellent football player. And that's all I'll say about that. We were sad that Reggie didn't propose to Kim Kardashian on national TV. Maybe it was the spacey blazer she was wearing?

I wasn't overly impressed by the commercials. I think the crowd favorite was the Denny's commercials with the screaming chickens, especially the one with the chicken in space. Careerbuilder, Monster, and E-Trade lived up to expectations. The beer commercials were a letdown in my opinion and the Doritos commercials were extra weird this year.

Snowmageddon

We didn't get the 30 inches they were predicting for Friday and Saturday. Thank God. The 14 1/2" is nuisance enough. The bad part was that it snowed all day then sleeted in the evening, stopped for a bit late at night then continued to snow until about 5 or so Saturday evening. So the trees were weighed down by ice and snow. We only lost power for a couple hours yesterday evening, but I think thousands were without power in Albemarle County.


Out of the five days I was scheduled to substitute I was able to sub one day. The toy store was closed on Saturday and they are forecasting 3-5 inches of snow (along with some rain) for tomorrow.

Unlike December when the weather stayed cold enough after it snowed that it didn't melt so easily, it warms up now (by warms up I mean mid to high 30's) during the day and refreezes at night. This is scary as far as driving (and sometimes walking) is concerned so my car shall stay put for quite some time. I also have to wait for the snow in front my car that the snow plow deposited to melt because it's all ice and I can't shovel it. In other words, it's a hard knock life.

That's my rant. Michael was able to make it home Friday afternoon (yay!). So we watched movies and cooked and had a mini snowball fight. We went to nearby friends' to have a few drinks and play some games on Saturday. I am halfway through knitting my second mitten and will be sure to take pictures. They are going to be so warm! I have plenty more crafting and reading to do. Now I just need to get to the grocery store.