Totally swimming in it!


I've got so much work to do right now. Things were supposed to get better right? We hired another person to help and I gave up a couple of markets. But then I gained a different, high-maintenence market back. In fact, I think I have more work to do now rather than getting any relief. And when I say more, I don't mean a couple extra things here and there, I mean like, a signifigant chunk more of what I had to do a couple of weeks ago. Sigh.

Monday

Monday was my birthday. I took the day off work and got some things done, like shopping (trying out my senior discount) and napping. I got some nice gifts including a swanky new chef's knife that I can't wait to use.

Sigh. Saturday's trip to H&M was fruitful, but cut a little short. I only had a couple of hours because I had to be back in Sac before 7. So I picked up a few basics, but had little time to grab and try on anything flashy.

Last night I made the mistake of wanting to be taken to Tower Cafe for my birthday dinner. I was craving an earth burger for the past week and thought that I'd get a chance to not only enjoy a nice hearty meal, but also have the option for a tasty (roach-covered) dessert. Sad, night! The earth burger was mega dry, so I only ate half and planned to take the rest home so I could doctor it up for lunch today. And the desserts all looked too roachy or old. So Leon got me all amped up for some cherry pie (my favorite!), and we headed to Rick's Dessert Diner because they seem to always have cherry pie. Guess what? They didn't have any cherry pie! On top of that, the whole place smelled like a urinal with whipped cream on top. Disgusting. So we went home dessertless, but not before I could drop my burger left overs on the car floor. Overall, it was a good birthday weekend. It just got a little unlucky at the end.

Swede dude!


For an early birthday present, I get to do a tiny bit of shopping at H&M this Satruday morning with APMD, my personal physician. I am sure I have a severe trendoflavin deficiency, so this should be just what the good doctor would recommend.

There's no place like Utah


We were in Utah this weekend, helping Leon's mom clean up grandma's house so it can be sold. Grandma now has a swanky, assisted living apartment and needed us to pack up all the family stuff to ship back to California for storage. It was the house that time and a proper dusting forgot. Here are some photos. The rest are on my flickr.


The living room. I loved the coffee table and I think the chair by the fireplace is being shipped to us.


The family room. I wish I could have saved this couch.


This buffet was so awesome. I hope it gets a good home.


We rescued this bird.


And these photos.


And this picture.


This old timey toy escaped certain death on the way back to Sacramento.


I finally got to try Utah french fry sauce. It tasted just like thousand island dressing. I like ketchup better.


Ogden was a weird place. I could never live in a city where the nicest restaurant was an Olive Garden. Not that I eat at fancy places all the time, but I feel like that this was an indicator for so much more.

I'm so, so glad to be back in Sacramento.

Lost last night


Holy crap! I tried following up with all the internet conspirators regarding last night's Lost episode but all of the regular sites I check are either down or way slow.

Moving on. I'm taking Friday off to get ready for this weekend, when we're going to Utah for a family thing. Eventhough it's going to be a lot of work, I'm still looking forward to it. I've never been to Utah before and can't wait to try the local delicacies. French fry sauce and utonian scones. Should be fun!

Thirty wonderful


TeeniClanger: Can I tell the internet that it's your birthday today?
LeonPeon: sure

Hey, today is Leon's birthday. Happy birthday Leon! No celebrations tonight because the dude has band practice, but festivities a la casa de Neon are sure to come. Clear your calendar for February 25 so we can put the BAR with the miztvah and shake our creeky old house to the frame. Snacks, drinks and maybe some live music or dj-ing (ahem, now accepting applications).

I might be changing my mind about Neko Case


So I've had the new Neko Case for about a week or something? Anyway. I've listened to it about 4 times now and whoa, caught by surprise this morning, I think I like it...as long as I don't think about the New Pornographers. Now, I know what I've said before about her. She is a little razzle-dazzle in the voice department and that's not going to change, but I can deal with it on her solo stuff here.





I'm also heavy into this Love Is All CD (thanks Leon, you always know what I'm going to like). I think this is the Girlfriendo singer? Anyway, it's so good in that punked out party music with horns way. Loving tracks "talk talk talk talk" and "make out fall out make up" best so far. The first one can be heard on their myspace profile. All the way from Sweden! They're going to be playing at SXSW. Kind of wish I was going now.

Ladies Love Leon


Hearts and arrows to my one and only on Valentines Day.

Tonight I was supposed to make a special dinner (Leon's favorite panzanella) but we got invited to another Travelling Chef party and we just couldn't turn it down. One more delicious gourmet vegetarian meal? Count us in, holiday be damned. I went ahead and made the panzanella last night anyway since I got kind of amped up for it.

Asparagus Panzanella
via Martha Stewart
Recipe link here.

1 pound medium asparagus [Food Source has killer asparagus right now!]
Salt and freshly ground black pepper
1 seedless cucumber, peeled and cut into 1/2-inch wedges
8 cherry tomatoes, cut in half
2 small tomatoes, such as red, Green Zebra, or yellow, each cut into 8 wedges
1 medium red onion, cut into 1/4-inch-thick wedges
3/4 cup kalamata olives, pitted
1/4 cup capers, drained
6 one-half-inch-thick slices country-style bread, crust on, torn into 1-inch chunks [I use Il Fornaio rosemary bread]
2 tablespoons red-wine vinegar
2 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil

1. Snap off and discard the tough ends of asparagus. Bring a medium saucepan of salted water to a boil; prepare an ice bath. Cook asparagus until bright green and just tender, 2 to 3 minutes. Transfer immediately to ice bath. Drain; place on a clean kitchen towel.

2. In a large bowl, combine asparagus, cucumber, tomatoes, red onion, olives, capers, and bread; toss to combine.

3. In a small bowl, whisk together red-wine vinegar and olive oil; season with salt and pepper. Pour vinaigrette over asparagus mixture, and toss until well coated. Let sit until bread absorbs juices, and serve.


I skip the onion, because that's me. Last night I did without the heirloom tomatoes, too because they're not in season.

Total deliciousness.

Walmart?


Best thing overheard this weekend:

At Deseret thrift on Saturday. A woman answers her cell phone and says, "Hello? I'm at Walmart."

Liar!!

It was a fruitful trip to Deseret for me. You know what though? If anyone would have called my cell while I was there, I might have lied too, but only to keep everyone away while I took in all the spoils. I got a good pair of Campers-y looking sneakers, a necklace with a bird pendant and a couple of scarves I'm going to make pillows out of, all for about $6. I also found a really awesome pair of men's maple colored beetle boots. If you know dudes with a size 11, they should go right down and pick these up for $8 before they're gone.

I don't get it


I watched Animal House for the first time last week. I didn't get it at all. Not one laugh from me or Leon. Was this movie made before comedy was invented? What am I missing here?

Best of times


Last night's feast as prepared by Joshua Ploeg was absolutely killer. We started off with a shopping trip to the bermuda triangle of grocers. Food Source (who knew their produce was so good and cheap?), Trader Joes and then the Co-op. Then massive amounts of cooking (him) and cleaning (me) ensued. We set up two tables across the living and dining rooms.



Then I bothered Joshua while he cooked. Joshua, where did you learn all this, what are your favorite things to cook, what kind of knives do you use? Finally at 7 or so, people started to roll in and nibble on the appetizers.

Crostini (lady slipper bread?)
with:

Slow roasted tomatoes. These things were serious. They were roasted for like 5 hours.

Then there was this salad with hot, buttered walnuts, greens, pears and figs.


Delicious! Everyone enjoyed it.


I didn't get to take many other picures of the food. Total slacker! But trust me, it was all good. Chickpea cakes with sofretto sauce, chick'n sautee with a congac almond sauce, risotto verdi, broiled asparagus and red/gold beets in a tomato garlic puree.

And for dessert? A very deadly pomegranite cheese cake with pomegranite sauce.

Even Heylove had a blast.

Just look at this tiny prancer!

I was wrecked by the end of the night. All that cleaning! Joshua tried to help, but I insisted that he have a beer and take a load off. Just don't worry your pretty little head, okay?

Right around midnight, I finally went to bed only to be woken up at 2 AM by some psycho girls. They came to do our door, ringing the bell and knocking, just wailing and screaming. Leon and I scrambled to the door to see WTF. So from what I could see through the blinds, there were two girls on the porch, but one ran away. The other one kept knocking, so Leon opened the door. He tried to shoo her away, telling her she had the wrong house but she said that her grandpa died and demanded to come in and see the bathtub. Yeah, whaaaa? I think they used to live in our house a long time ago. Leon called the cops. Hey you would have, too! They were crazy. Eventually, the girls left, then they came back again, and then left again. 30 minutes later after we'd gone back to bed, the cops showed. Anyway, those girls were pretty lucky that my sister didn't hear them last night or else it would have went down in a fiery latina fist fight.

Chef


Tonight I'm squeezing my way into a dinner cooked by the travelling chef guy and tomorrow I'm squeezing my friends into my place for a repeat performance. So very excited! I have lots to do though. Tons of cleaning and planning. I have no idea where I'm going to fit everyone, but I'm sure it'll work out. Ladies can sit on their dude's laps, right?

Chicago

I'm listening to last weekend's This American Life right now. I love this show. I caught most of it in the car Saturday morning, but but I drove out of signal and lost it. There's a story about Chicago towards the end and how the bridges smell like chocolate. I've never heard that before, and I didn't get a chance to experience the chocolate smell when I was there a couple of years ago. Though I'm sure the smell will be gone by the time I ever make it around to there again (thanks EPA!), I would still like to go back and do a proper pizza tour. When I was there last I ate at Gino's East, often rumored to be the source for Zelda's delicious recipe. Let me just say that Gino's pie was not so great. The cheese was overcooked and chewy. Other than that, the sauce was identical to Zelda's. It smelled the same, it tasted the same. Maybe I got a bad pie?

JT Leroy finally unmasked. Times article confirms. But we knew this already. What I want to know is how do all those celebrities feel knowing now that they were duped.

Wrecked.


In case I forgot to say, I got my car back finally. But you really wouldn't know by the way I spent my weekend checked out on the couch. I napped, I watched television and I read. I drove the dog to the outback of Citrus Heights for a Boston Terrier play group. She had a great time. I felt sort of uncomfortable geeking out with the other dog people, so we didn't stay much longer than an hour. The only thing that most of us had in common were our dogs anyway. Heylove had a blast. I saw her pee in the plastic pool. My dog is a pool pee-er? I'm shocked.

I made a soup later on that fed us for a couple of days. Criminis, brown rice, onion, garlic, rosemary, chickpeas and fresh spinach, mix it together with broth, in a soupy manner. Super protien power. Via Martha Stewart.

By Sunday, I started to feel pretty bad about my slothenly ways and went for a yoga class. I must be a total wimp, because today I'm sore from the stretches and poses we did.

Overall, I was rolling pretty hermit-like.

Foxy Stu


I've been listening to the new Belle & Sebastian CD for a couple of months now and I finally feel pretty familiar with it.

Favorite tracks so far are:

Track 4: The Blues Are Still Blue
By far my favorite song on this one. So T-Rex! A real hip shaker.

Track 6: Sukie in the Graveyard
Who is Sukie and why is she in the graveyard?! I don't really care, but I kind of want to be her. I love the fuzz they put on the bass in this song.

Track 9: Funny Little Frog
I think they're going to have a video for this one. I need to research and find out where I can see it. I read somewhere that someone thought that this one was religious, but it sounds like a love song to me. But would this be a Belle & Sebastian album without a religious reference?

This one is not a favorite, but I wanted to mention it anyway.
Track 8: Song For Sunshine
Remember when they made Legal Man, and tried to play it off like it was a joke song? Are they effing kidding with this one, too? I can't warm up to it at all.

I got my tickets in the mail yesterday to the 3/21 show. I also took the day after off, just in case I'm too wrecked to come into work.

A little better

But still not right.

I couldn't make mine really look like me.

Whole lotta


I got a whole lotta:
1. Bad dog. Heylove is berserk lately. From acting the fool in dog class to straight up not listening to us at home. Yesterday she went nuts at the dog park and bit Leon's shoe. He had to get all bouncer on her and carry her out like a drunken brawler. As punishment she got ignored all night. At first I was cool with it when I got home. Later on, she looked so sad and needy I just wanted to pick her up and love her. But I didn't. She got some loves this morning and Leon is on berserk dog duty today at home.

2. Rental car. Robbie got me a rental car Wednesday night. I've been driving around a Dodge Neon. I hate it. I love having my own wheels right now, but this Neon is huge and the gas milage sucks. I went to Whole Foods last night, which used an alarming 1/4 tank of gas.

3. Menu choices. Travelling chef is coming to Chez Neon next Thursday!

4. Work to do.

5. RSS feed. Leon told me to put this on my site. I don't know why or what it does really and please don't try to explain it to me. I think I just need to see it in action and I can't do that with my computer at work because it sucks.

6. Pregnant friend. Today she finds out if the baby will be named Reggie or Delicious Coates!!

Travelling chef


I totally want to book the travelling chef dude at my house!

leonthrowdown: whos the traveling chef?
niklectric: The guy from Mukilteo Fairies!!
niklectric: I loved them.
niklectric: I think you pay him and then you charge your friends admission. Like a show.

Oh, what a gamble though. Who would come?

Body Shop, both kinds


Body Shop - the place in the mall.
I got a gift certificate to this place for christmas and found some really good deals on their post holiday sale. A bunch of shower gels, a body butter, lip gloss and a scrubby thing. The cranberry gel I got smells so yummy I want to put it on ice cream and eat it.

Body Shop - the place that still has my whips.
I talked to Robbie yesterday about my car. We're on a first name basis now. "Robbie, what is up with my car?!" The glass guys are being difficult and didn't want to come out and put my back glass in yesterday, so Robbie's supposed to get one of his guys to drive it TO the glass guys today. I might have my car this afternoon, but looking at Robbie's track record on predicting when I'll have my car, I am going to put my money on Thursday. I seriously can't take another day of this. My car has been jacked up since new year's day and in the shop since January 9.