Okay, so I realize that fruit flies probably serve some larger purpose in life. However, I do not like them. I especially hate that once you get fruit flies they are nearly impossible to get rid of. We are not dirty people. Sure, sometimes we'll let the dishes sit over night before washing them and I haven't washed the windows since we moved in three years ago. But, our trash is always taken out on a regular basis, we try to clean the shower, and we do wash the dishes regularly.
Why are we being invaded by fruit flies?????
We've tried a couple different traps, but nothing seemed to work. Our first traps consisted of bananas, cherries, raspberries, plastic bottles and electric tape.
Then, we tried balsamic vinegar, a jar and some cellophane.
I was stressing out, thinking I need to get rid of these little monsters and fast. And then, Eureka!
Seriously, Eureka.
I set out some fruit and waited for the flies to congregate. Then, I turned on my powerful fruit fly sucking trap. They don't have a chance. I do look absolutely ridiculous vacuuming fruit and chasing fruit flies around the house with a vacuum hose. But, I think the fruit fly invasion of 2010 is almost over thanks to my trusty vacuum.
Well, I'm so far behind that today calls for two posts...
These are some of my food adventures from the last 10 days...
I went to the farmer's market and could not contain myself. There was so much deliciousness in one place that I was inspired!
Veggies, hot sauce and mint jelly...
I made pork chops with a light mint jelly sauce, carrots marinated in ginger, mustard and cheese cauliflower and a salad with a homemade cherry vinaigrette.
However, nothing was quite as good as the dessert:
Chocolate pots de creme - essentially egg yolk, heavy cream and chocolate.
I was a little worried that they wouldn't turn out correctly because I only realized I did not have a mesh sieve as I was continuously stirring and my chocolate was melting. However, I improvised and used a handy flour sifter...random, but it worked!
After such a successful dinner, I figured breakfast would be a piece of cake. When Lily and Liz were in town, we had breakfast at Cafe Continental. It was the first time I had Eggs Benedict; it was made with asparagus and crab cake instead of the more traditional Canadian bacon. I liked it so much, I wanted to give it a try. But, I didn't have the time until the last weekend in June. It was a rainy morning, so I was more than happy to sip my coffee and figure out the recipe. I had heard that hollandaise sauce was difficult and that poaching eggs was a bit tricky. I guess I have a knack for making eggs benedict...or I was just lucky, because I didn't have any major problems. My eggs poached quite well, though I did lose a bit of yolk on one of the eggs.
Eggs poaching.
English muffins, Canadian bacon, tomatoes and aspargus broiled.
So, here I am blogging a month later again. Eventually, I'll get faster at this and blog more often. Right. I can feel your faith in me slipping away as I continue to make these empty promises. At least I have the excuse that I've been busy.
June 12: Lily's Bachelorette Party My friend Lily is getting married in September, but we had a bachelorette party for her in June. Lily flew in from San Francisco and Liz, another friend, came in from Portland. We had a great time and ate so much food that I was ready to burst. I had Eggs Benedict for the first time ever and I loved them! See the next post for details...
Lily had the classiest penis straw I have ever seen. In fact, it was so fancy that the waiter commented that he liked her "crazy straw." Once he approached the straw and realized that it was a penis, he blushed and said, "Oh! I didn't realize it was a penis."
Lily and Liz both stayed at my place. The three of us and Ann-Marie spent Saturday enjoying brunch and book stores before heading out for the night. We had drinks at the Dane, followed by dinner at The Haze. It was an Asian and American BBQ place. It was not the best BBQ I have ever had; nothing is better than Dad's bbq chicken, after all. It was the best BBQ I've had in Madison, though. Good portions and flavorful. Then, we had fancy drinks at Opus...and that is when Ruby became integral to our party. As I began to drink my second martini at Opus, Ruby ordered a chocolate and orange martini. Ruby had three sips of her drink the whole night. When we started to leave, she made a stop at the ladies restroom.
She left her scarf on the chair outside the women's restroom; she was feeling the effects of her three sips at this point so I cannot vouch for what compelled her to do this. When she came back out, her scarf was gone. She did not realize this until she came back upstairs and someone asked, "Ruby, where's your scarf?" She went back to the ladies room to see if she had just forgotten it. Her scarf was gone. Now, a lesser woman might have just let this slide. No doubt, I would have given the scarf up for lost and moved on. Not Ruby. The Opus is a pretty small place, but it was packed that Saturday night and Ruby was on a mission. Ruby found her scarf. I unfortunately did not witness her discovery, but the story occupied us for at least the next twenty minutes. Therefore, I do not feel bad about recording it for posterity now.
Ruby: Hey, where did you get that scarf?
Thief: Oh, I bought it at the store.
Ruby: Well, that looks like my scarf that I left outside the bathroom.
Thief: Bitch, it's my scarf!
Thief's Date: It is not. You weren't wearing a scarf when we got here tonight.
Ruby: I'll take my scarf now. (Thief hands over scarf in dismay.)
Thank goodness for a daring woman and observant man! And, congrats to Lily & Josh!
This "sport" looks like something Cara and I would have made up as kids. It also resembles a great game that we used to play when boys chased us from the swings to the merry-go-round and a technique I used as I aged to fend off unwanted come-ons.
In the historic sport of Shin Kicking the winner is the one who knocks down their opponent. The sport was suspended in its heyday because it attracted the riff-raff of society. Thank you Wikipedia for your infinite knowledge and excessive citations. For those of you who doubt that this is a real sport, I suggest: http://www.thecolor.com/Category/Coloring/Sports.aspx. As soon as a sport makes it onto a kid's coloring book website, it's legit.
Of course, there is significant preparation prior to a shin-kicking contest. First, it is apparent that you must pick the right socks. I'm pretty sure I would want Gryffindor socks in gold and maroon if I were in this competition. Second, after you have chosen your socks, you then stuff them full of hay. I'm not sure how they keep themselves from getting a rash from the hay, but I'm no expert. Finally, you kick your opponent in the shins as hard as you can in hopes that they will fall.
Sorry for the hiatus on blogging folks...apparently success is related to consistency in this world. So much has happened in the last month that I don't even know where to begin. I think a quick and dirty version of life in the last month is in order.
May 14: Apparently the debauchery on May 7 was not enough for this girl. After two more exams, we spent a little time at State St. Brat's followed by a bit of fun at James's house. I stole a couple pictures from Meredith and Janet so you could see what the afternoon was like; but the resolution was total crap since I took them from facebook. However, all you need to know is that the weather was beautiful. We played a little corn hole (or bean bags) and I started to feel better once the test nervousness wore off and the beer started to work a bit of its magic. The most exciting portion of the night was watching my classmates enact a little Red Hot Chili Peppers music. The video is a bit long, but perhaps enjoyable for those who participated.
May 15...We went to a lovely wedding. Many memorable moments that I'll hopefully get to blog about later. One quick quote:
Friend: Kevin? Who's Kevin?
Me: The groom.
Friend: The groom?
Me: Yes, Kevin is the groom.
Friend: Oh yeah!
May 24: Started my job at the Wisconsin DOJ. Plenty of work before the first week was over. Four words to describe most of my cases: prisoners can be crazy.
May 28: Law review assignment turned in. Yes, I will take my life back now. Thanks.
Memorial Day weekend: Parents in town. Huzzah! We had a lovely meal at Jolly Bob's on Willy St. I'm in love with their drinks and the food was pretty good. We also watched a bit of Gamera. What's Gamera you ask? Why, it's a giant, flying tortoise from prehistory that was released from his frozen state in the Arctic Ocean by a USSR submarine waging nuclear attack on the US. Oh, and he eats and breathes fire, will drown boats full of people, but refuses to hurt children. You can defeat Gamera by knocking him on his back. It's impossible for a turtle to flip back over after that type of defeat...sort of like trying to lick your own elbow or chasing your own tail, except more fatal.
How many law students does it take to start a grill? One? Five? I'm not really sure, I might have been a little too tipsy to remember.
On Friday, I took my international law exam. (Boy, am I glad I don't have to do that again!) After the exam, it was time to celebrate my 27th birthday. I had been planning a grill out for about a week; of course, we were blessed with beautiful weather on my big party day. It was a balmy 48 degrees and rainy - just perfect for a grill out on my patio. Okay, maybe not perfect weather, but that wasn't going to stop me. The night before those who were thinking about coming to the party got fair warning that if the did decide not to come, they were not allowed to blame it on the rain.
A lot of people joined me for the party! Woot!
Seriously though, I told people the party would go from 1-4 PM. Of course, I was late, blaming that on an international law exam and my own failure to check the bus schedule. Oops! I definitely missed at least one party-goer because of my lateness (sorry again, Biz!). But, I did have a couple people wait me out...I forgot that many of my friends are Type A and were of course going to be on time. Once I made it home, we got the party started. I made pasta salad and there were plenty of munchies.
As more people started to arrive, I thought it might be time to start up the grill. If you read my last post, you know that I don't exactly get along with my grill; I swear it's out to get me! Well, on Thursday, I tested the grill out and was able to get it to work. I thought that I had it figured out, so I did not decide to borrow a grill from the neighbors. Do you see where this is going...
We boiled the brats in beer. I ran into the rain and set the grill up near the garage so I could stand inside the garage while we grilled outside the garage. At this point, I was at least halfway through a bottle of Pomelo (yum!) on an empty stomach (bad idea!). I pulled off the rack on the grill and the cover that dissipates the heat. I turned on the gas, threw in the match, and Voila! A working grill completely ready to grill those delicious brats (thanks, Crespo!). I closed the lid and had some more Pomelo.
I checked the grill a couple minutes later and it was out. Shoot! I took off the rack, took off the cover, and tried my trick again. No dice. I tried again. No dice. And again. No dice. At this point, the pressure of no food for guests and my friends staring over my shoulder giving me backseat grill directions makes me a little nervous so I make everyone stand in the back of the garage. I try one more time (fail again) and figure there must be something else wrong.
James suggested that we might be out of propane. I don't think so...the tank feels heavy to me. Someone else checks...feels heavy to them too! Apparently, I need to start lifting some free weights soon because James pulled the tank out and quickly declared the tank empty. Darn! Now, who wants to take me to the gas station to exchange the propane tank? Maggie? Nope; she had half a beer and made the responsible decision not to drive. Dave took me instead and we quickly replaced the propane tank. Game on! Except, not....
A full tank of propane was attached and the grill still wouldn't work. The rack was off, the cover was off, matches were thrown in and nothing... Now what??? Someone suggested I use my George Foreman...however, that's broken too! This must be God sending me a message: Jayme, you are not meant to grill, try baking instead. I decided to make the best of it and threw the brats in a skillet. This didn't work for some of the guys though, so they went to work on the grill. Eventually, it started working again and we brought the brats outside again to put them on the grill. I avoided interacting with the grill and there weren't anymore problems. How many law students did it take to work my grill? I have no idea, but it must have been at least 5. Ridiculous.
The rest of the party went off without a hitch; I think the last party-goers left around 9 PM...a mere 5 hours after the planned party end. Apparently, it was fun for more than just me.
Here are a few pictures from the party...the blurriness only indicates that we were having fun, not that we had imbibed too many beverages.
And...many thanks to Maggie, Liz and Bornali for the lovely gifts!
What's a corn holder you ask?
It is a very dangerous weapon primarily used for holding corn or self-mutilation.
Tonight, I had my friend Maggie over for dinner. First, we spent twenty minutes trying to get the grill to work and praying to the grill gods that we would not singe our eyebrows. We gave up on grilling our brats. Note to self - must buy new grill before grill out party planned for Friday.
We made salad and corn on the cob without incident while we discussed international law. Discussion basically entailed repeating the mantra: International law is easy. I know international law. Self-affirmation works. The eating commenced and the fun began.
This is a corn holder.
While attempting to eat my undercooked corn on the cob (I was too impatient to let it cook the whole time), something crazy happened. Yep, you guessed. I stabbed myself in the face with that sucker. Corn holders should come with a warning label; they are quite dangerous.
To stop the (very little amount of) blood coming from the two new holes in my face, I had to pull the old toilet paper trick that so many men have used throughout time. Maggie could not keep herself from laughing at me [not that I blame her...this was ridiculous].
Also, I'm not sure why I look like a crazy person in this picture...
Corn holders have undergone a lot of innovation since the 1920s. This device looks more complicated, but perhaps safer considering my circumstances. There are some crazy corn holder patents out there. There are also some very expensive corn holders out there; maybe these come with a safety guarantee. I might upgrade to these corn holders because they are too hilarious or these corn holders because they look safer than the ones I own. Whatever happens, I will not be investing in these corn holders or these corn holders. Though the unicorn corn holders are fun (and witty), I do not need anything more dangerous than the standard corn holder in my life. How's that for glorious nonsense?
I'm a blogging failure...I tried to start a blog last year. After four updates, I started law school and did not look at my blog again. This time it will be different.
My goal is to share with you, people of the interwebs, one bit of glorious nonsense each week.
My inspiration is Lewis Carroll's The Jabberwocky. "Somehow it seems to fill my head with ideas--only I don't exactly know what they are!" -- Alice For your reading pleasure... http://www.jabberwocky.com/carroll/jabber/jabberwocky.html
Today's glorious nonsense...courtesy of the daily squee. I took my constitutional law exam today. Afterwards, this is how I felt. see more
