Nowhere Near Figuring Life Out

At The End Of The Rainbow

noreply@blogger.com (Dev) — Tue, 11 Sep 2012 05:17:00 +0000

I got a finger nail design request from my sister. She wanted to see a rainbow, cloud, and a pot of gold. Here is the result:

Since I had some trouble trying to draw decent lines in the rainbow I was a bit freaked out to try the design on my right hand, so I decided one hand was enough and to make lots of little fluffy clouds to at least coordinate.

I aspire to be one of the bitches described here...

Maybe a little more practice and I can be. I've already got the bitch part down at least.

What I've Been Cooking...

noreply@blogger.com (Dev) — Mon, 10 Sep 2012 16:00:00 +0000

...and you should, too, because this stuff is yummeh!

I've been a cooking machine on the weekends, making and freezing stuff for lunches. It's not all exactly super healthy stuff (hellooooooo heavy cream!), but I've been seeing way too many posts by people on Facebook about all of the chemicals and crap in processed foods and it freaks me out a bit so it makes me feel better to cook my own stuff. And it's been nicer to my wallet, too. Bonus.

But even if Mountain Dew is out to kill us all (have you guys seen that post? It's ruined me for that delicious citrus flavor!), I'm not giving up Dr Pepper. No way, no how.

Now, on to the recipes! Get your shopping list ready, people!!

Not all Monkey Bread is created equal. There is now Lemon Monkey Bread. And I don't remember making it with crack, but there must be some in there because I had a hard time not eating the entire pan.

And speaking of monkeys, watch this video on how to open a banana. As God as my witness, I will never struggle to open a banana again!

Super Easy Chicken Gnocchi Soup. Yay for soup! Even if it is still humid as all hell here in Arizona, I don't care, I wuvs my soups.

And in anticipation of fall weather, I made this Pumpkin Cheese Bread. Also, here's a little reminder regarding fall foods...

You've been warned...

Want a hearty breakfast that sticks to your ribs but you have no time to cook in the mornings? Make and freeze this Baked Oatmeal. And make the recipe your own; I said, "Oh, heeeeeell no!" to walnuts and put in peanuts and cashews instead and used orange juice because I had no orange zest on hand. I wish I had just left out the orange though because it really doesn't need it.

And last but not least, my new favorite obsession, Chicken Cordon Bleu Pasta. OMG, OMG, OMG, is it good!!! It's so ridiculously delicious! Cook your chicken right in the bacon grease; trust me on that, it will make everything so much more flavorful.

Happy cooking!

August Into September

noreply@blogger.com (Dev) — Sun, 09 Sep 2012 07:16:00 +0000

Are you as excited that fall is almost here as I am? Or maybe where you are it is already fall because you don't live in holy-hell-can-it-get-any-hotter-and-what-happened-to-our-dry-heat Arizona (in which case, I am insanely jealous of you.). I can't remember the last time it was so humid in this state. Monsoon season can kiss my butt. I'm so ready for leaves to change color, it's not even funny. But in between my moments of feeling super gross and sweaty, here is what I've been up to...

Losing weight!!!!!!!!!!
That's right, I finally lost some. I am now down to my horrible stomach flu weight, sans stomach flu. This also means that I am officially ten pounds lighter than my highest most Fatty McFattykins weight. It's starting to get dark here early though and before I know it it's going to be dark by the time I get home at night from work, so I need to either start walking before work or get creative at new exercises I can do in the privacy of my own room. Or make a sweatshirt covered in bicycle reflectors to wear at night so I don't get run over. Sexeh!

*****

I started my newest semester of school. I figured it would be another class where I don't know anybody, but no, I'm in the class with daughter of the Executive Director from work.
Fookin' A, man.
She also used to work with me (yay, nepotism!) and asks me every time I see her how work is, and it is so hard to lie and say that it is good when we've had to deal with employee hour cuts, not being able to get needed supplies, and just total mismanagement which I blame mostly on her mom, my highest boss. She's a nice enough gal, but I don't want to talk to her about work, even if her mom wasn't such a huge source of annoyance and a hindrance in being able to do my job lately. I wish I was a better conversationalist so that I could get on to other subjects before she asks me about work. But I'm at the point where I don't really want to talk to anyone about work because I'm tired of constantly bitching about things that are out of my control. It's actually made me happier doing that. Sometimes you just don't need to talk about things for them to get better, you know?
It might be a long semester though. Good thing class is only once a week.

*****

I made these Orange Muffins. I didn't have enough baking powder and they were kinda greasy and they didn't bake evenly. They tasted good though.

I made this Tuscan White Bean Soup. I.LOVE.IT. But next time I'll add more beans to beef it up a bit, or maybe some potatoes. We'll see.

On the fancy claw front, I went to a 9 year old's birthday party, so I did my nails like balloons.

I saw it on Pinterest only a few days before and decided it was the perfect time to try it out. The green pulled up into the white polish though, so it looks like an accent nail, but no, it's just cheap polish being stupid.

I now swear by this Detox Bath remedy for when you are getting sick. I've done it twice now because the crappy humid weather was messing with me and then one of my coworkers came to work sick and passed it to me. It works like a charm and feels so good when all of the little bubbles are fizzing on your body. It makes me want to sit in Hydrogen Peroxide all of the time.

And that's mostly all I've done. Fun times of the over 30's.

30 Day Music Challenge - Day 12

noreply@blogger.com (Dev) — Mon, 13 Aug 2012 01:45:00 +0000

Day 12 - A song that reminds you of your best friend

Or, er, of some best friends...

30 Day Music Challenge - Day 11

noreply@blogger.com (Dev) — Mon, 13 Aug 2012 01:43:00 +0000

Day 11 - A Song That Reminds You of Summer

30 Day Music Challenge - Day 10

noreply@blogger.com (Dev) — Mon, 13 Aug 2012 01:41:00 +0000

Day 10 - A Song That Makes You Cry

Pretty much any Jim Croce song reminds me of my Dad and can start the water works.

New Stuff and Random Gripes

noreply@blogger.com (Dev) — Mon, 13 Aug 2012 01:38:00 +0000

This post is a practice in procrastination.

Cuz I gots ta keep up my procrastination skillz, yo.

I should be cleaning right now, but I've drank half of a gin and tonic and now I don't feel like moving. Who wants to move around after a good cocktail? No one. They just want to sit and talk. So let's dish, shall we?

I was sick for two weeks. TWO WEEKS. I can't just get a cold and be over it in three days. Oh no, I have to get stomach flu and sinusitus all at the same time on top of each other. And then when I finally go to Urgent Care, it's like a work reunion with kids and their parents showing up for various reasons of their own to the Urgent Care, too. And the following week I found out my boss' mom was at the Urgent Care, but since I sounded so much like shit, she ignored me and left me be.

She's a smart lady.

I was thrilled for 5 minutes that my stomach flu seemed to be an effective diet and I lost about 7 pounds. But then as I got better and dehydrated myself, I put back on 5 pounds.

Damn you, water!

But now that I can function as a human being again, I'm back to my neighborhood walks and I even timed it today so that I can walk to school when fall semester starts next week. The college is right next to our housing development and it takes me a whole stinkin' 12 minutes to walk from my front door to the classroom door. I don't know why my lazy ass never walked to classes when I first moved to Arizona and I was a full time student. I'm not really losing weight from my walks, but I am keeping my blood pressure down, and I don't want to lose that footing with winter bringing it's early nightfall.

And the reason I am not losing any weight is because I make things like this: Homemade Sugar Cookie Ice Cream.

Screw you, Ben & Jerry! I'm breaking off our relationship and being an independent woman now.

Holy crap is that stuff good. And rich. And now that I know I can make ice cream like this, I am thinking up new recipes. I've already promised my Mom that I would make her a Rolo ice cream. I feel better about stuff that I can make myself rather than buying stuff from a store, even if both products equally enlarge my ass. I think I've been seeing too much stuff on facebook that people post about chemicals and junk in our foods and it's making me all paranoid about what goes into my mouth.

I'm in the process of cleaning and rearranging my stuff since my parents realized that I'm never moving out and they should take their furniture out of my room and let me move my furniture in. Cleo thought it was all done for her so that she had more places to relax.

Needless to say that she was quite forlorn when I kicked her out and put the drawer in. Now whenever I open the drawer, she comes running to jump back in and reclaim her space.

By request, I painted my nails to look like shoes.

I did both hands. It was hard enough to paint my left hand, but being right handed and then trying to paint my right hand was hard as hell. But I did it. And now I am inspired to do some more intricate stuff. And find a better top coat; after all of that work I put into my nails, the top coat made the polish bubble and they became shoes and sponges, all at the same time.

Stupid people annoy me and should all stop talking. Cases in point:

Just yesterday I had a guy say to me after introducing ourselves to each other, "Isn't that a boy's name?" While the sarcastic asshole in me wanted to grab my boobs and say, "Funny; they feel real..." I knew it wouldn't be appropriate since I was at work. So instead I just made a curt reply about how it was a unisex name as my coworker backed me up and said it was a girl's name at the same time. People, whatever you think is a boy's name or a girl's name, just get over it. Really. People like me don't want to hear it, especially since we had no control over what our parents named us. Just ask Jessica Simpson's daughter, Maxwell Drew, when she's old enough to talk.
The day before that I had a Mexican woman make fun of me in Spanish, right in front of my face. While I may not speak Spanish fluently, I do know enough that I can tell when someone is being a dick to me. I called her out on it in English; that mind fucked her a lot. It also mind fucked my other coworker that does speak Spanish and had been smiling when the Mexican lady was making her jokes. Needless to say, that coworker is on my shit and do not trust as far as you can throw them lists now. Just because I'm white doesn't mean I don't know words in other languages and I highly suggest that next time you take the classy and high road and just talk shit about me behind my back. Like what I'm doing to you two now, putas.
Ryan Lochte. My God. Every time he opens his mouth to speak, hetero women start hearing the same argument inside their body: Brain - "He's so stupid! He needs to just shut up!" Vagina - "Who cares? Look at him! If we're sitting on his face then he can't talk, so it's a win-win!!"

And now that the gin and tonic has worn off a little, it's time to resume the proactive exercises that I have no skillz in. We'll dish again soon.

30 Day Music Challenge - Day 9

noreply@blogger.com (Dev) — Thu, 09 Aug 2012 16:00:00 +0000

Day 09 - A song that makes you want to dance

30 Day Music Challenge - Day 8

noreply@blogger.com (Dev) — Wed, 08 Aug 2012 16:00:00 +0000

Day 08 - A song you liked when you were younger

Obscure white female rappers from the late 80s time!! I still have this on cassette...

30 Day Music Challenge - Day 7

noreply@blogger.com (Dev) — Wed, 08 Aug 2012 06:21:00 +0000

Day 07 - A song that is your guilty pleasure

30 Day Music Challenge - Day 6

noreply@blogger.com (Dev) — Wed, 08 Aug 2012 06:17:00 +0000

Day 06 - A song you can always relate to

30 Day Music Challenge - Day 5

noreply@blogger.com (Dev) — Wed, 08 Aug 2012 06:13:00 +0000

Day 05 - A song that has a new meaning to you every time you hear it

30 Day Music Challenge - Day 4

noreply@blogger.com (Dev) — Wed, 08 Aug 2012 06:10:00 +0000

Day 04 - A song that reminds you of something sad

The song is actually about a 7 year old that died in a horrible car accident, and I think of it every time I hear this song. You can read about it here.

30 Day Music Challenge - Day 3

noreply@blogger.com (Dev) — Fri, 03 Aug 2012 20:07:00 +0000

Day 3 - A Song That Makes You Laugh

30 Day Music Challenge - Day 2

noreply@blogger.com (Dev) — Fri, 03 Aug 2012 20:05:00 +0000

Day 2 - A Song That Helps You Clear Your Head

Back From Hiatus

noreply@blogger.com (Dev) — Wed, 01 Aug 2012 21:18:00 +0000

Hi. Did ya miss me?

I went MIA for a few weeks. Why? Because I had to work 40 hours a week and I decided to take 2 summer classes at college so that I can get done with my degree a semester early and that combination left little room for anything else only because most weeks I worked over 40 hours and I picked two super hard classes to do simultaneously during the one semester of the year where you have only 8 weeks to complete a class instead of 15. At the end of the day, almost all I had time for were brainless Zynga.com games and a variety of Mike's Hard Lemonades.

I'm so glad that the summer is over (at least in the school sense for both elementary and collegiate levels.).

There were some pluses to the summer, like getting to feed an emu.

It's so ugly, it's freakin' adorable.

I also discovered that doing nail art calms my nerves and gives me a sense of accomplishment in life.

Behold my creations to date! Clockwise from left: The Splatter Nails, The "Mermaid" Nails, The I-wanted-to-use-my-black-crackle-polish-and-then-decided-to-paint-3-base-colors-on-each-nail Nails, The Fruity Nails, The Ombre Nails (which looked like fire if you are young or candy corn if you are, er, more mature in age), and The Galaxy Nails.
Luckily for me, my mom is an Avon lady, so I get killer deals on nail polish. And that means this whole nail art obsession is going to be going on for a while as long as she keeps me supplied and Pinterest keeps me inspired.

I got to go swimming a lot during our Summer Camp, and while I haven't lost any weight lately, I did tone up from it. And I taught 2 kids how to swim in 10 feet that could barely swim at the beginning of summer and I got another girl that I started teaching how to swim last summer so confident in herself finally that on the last day of camp, she went off of the diving board. I'm so proud of my little boogers!

I got through a crap semester of school with 1 A and 1 B. The sad thing is that the B was in Art History and I am an art teacher. WTF, right?! I had a lousy professor is my excuse, but now I never want to take another Art History class ever again.

But now I am back to part time work with a vacation this week (that I have spent sick, bah!) and I'm ready to get back to doing some stuff I love instead of feeling stressed all of the time. So I plan to:

blog more
keep bombarding people with pictures of my nail art
do fun challenges here and on facebook
get myself organized (slowly but surely)
get more exercise in and start cooking more
and do whatever else strikes my fancy

I'm also changing my name. I've been using the pen name Dru, but then I get emails from people that see my comments on other blogs and then I have to explain the pen name. And it was originally used for protection, but honestly, I have found that if I don't want something to be said and spread around, I'm not going to say it, pen name or not. So hi, I'm Dev. How was your summer?

30 Day Music Challenge -Rules and Day 1

noreply@blogger.com (Dev) — Wed, 01 Aug 2012 20:26:00 +0000

It's time for a new music challenge! This one comes from Heck Yeah Tumblr Challenges and here is how you play:

Every day is a new theme. Post a video of a song that fits that theme for you. Easy, no?

Day 01 - A song that makes you happy
Day 02 - A song that helps you clear your head
Day 03 - A song that makes you laugh
Day 04 - A song that reminds you of something sad
Day 05 - A song that has a new meaning to you every time you hear it
Day 06 - A song you can always relate to
Day 07 - A song that is your guilty pleasure
Day 08 - A song you liked when you were younger
Day 09 - A song that makes you want to dance
Day 10 - A song that makes you cry
Day 11 - A song that reminds you of summer
Day 12 - A song that reminds you of your best friend
Day 13 - A song you sing to in the shower
Day 14 - A song you like hearing live
Day 15 - A song people wouldn’t expect you to like
Day 16 - A song that holds a lot of meaning to you
Day 17 - A song that annoys you
Day 18 - A song you have as your ringtone/want to be your ringtone
Day 19 - A song you’re currently obsessed with
Day 20 - A song from a new album you are waiting for to come out
Day 21 - A song you want to dance to at your wedding
Day 22 - A song that would be the theme song to a TV show about your life
Day 23 - A song that makes you angry
Day 24 - A cover song
Day 25 - An acoustic song you love
Day 26 - A song by your favorite band
Day 27 - A song you make fun of
Day 28 - A song that reminds you of your boyfriend/girlfriend (if you don’t have one, make one up :])
Day 29- A song currently stuck in your head
Day 30- A song that you haven’t listened to in awhile

So kickin' this challenge off, I have my Day 1 song from Barenaked Ladies singing about ninjas. If this song doesn't make you happy, then you are dead inside, my friend.

Hump Day Video Day - T'Pau

noreply@blogger.com (Dev) — Wed, 16 May 2012 16:00:00 +0000

I heard this song yesterday and it made me happy, so I thought I should spread the happiness out a few more days...

Saturday Food For Thought

noreply@blogger.com (Dev) — Sun, 06 May 2012 01:29:00 +0000

Hump Day Video Day-Kimbra

noreply@blogger.com (Dev) — Wed, 02 May 2012 16:00:00 +0000

It's so 80's sounding. I love it.

Saturday Food For Thought

noreply@blogger.com (Dev) — Sat, 28 Apr 2012 16:00:00 +0000

Hump Day Video Day-Julie Brown

noreply@blogger.com (Dev) — Wed, 25 Apr 2012 16:00:00 +0000

April ends with a classic funny song...

Saturday Food For Thought

noreply@blogger.com (Dev) — Sun, 22 Apr 2012 00:27:00 +0000

Hump Day Video Day-Adam Sandler

noreply@blogger.com (Dev) — Wed, 18 Apr 2012 16:00:00 +0000

Not a parody this week, but instead we have one of the greatest love songs ever written.

Saturday Food For Thought

noreply@blogger.com (Dev) — Sun, 15 Apr 2012 00:53:00 +0000