Monday, March 18, 2013

The Gong Show of Everyday Life. Now with Ratatouille!

The GOOD:
I am still alive.

It's been fun, though. Teaching and rehearsing for a high school show that finished up on Friday - an incredible time but it meant not a lot of energy to devote to other things. I'll spare you the details but basically, even my need to keep my hands busy while sitting faltered.  I embraced the potato-esque and stared zombie-like at the tv for a few minutes each night until told like an over-tired toddler to go to bed. Sleepy "oh-kay." Trundle trundle yawn trundle.... Well worth it. Every minute.

No sewing happened.  Not really.  I did manage 15 minutes on my thread-painting the other day but just as a diversionary tactic with a fussy nephew.  He sat on my lap and we used the "sew-ming ma-sheen."

So here's where I'm at now.

The BETTER:
I did find a little time to actually cook something last weekend.  I've been trying to keep up with last year's mission to make one new recipe a week.  A lesson with some new English speakers led me to this video, and then to some marvellous ratatouille.  Seriously, the toughest part was the slicing, and honestly, how tough is slicing?



From this:

To this:

Easy. Delicious.  Served on brown rice with cold roast beef on the side. We all went back for seconds.

The UGLY:
Trying to get caught up on my interwebs after yet another absence. I've been away from Flickr, in email correspondence I'm woefully behind, and my reader is jammed packed with 15-16 days worth of unread goodness. It will take me days, maybe weeks. We're looking at massive numbers here.

Oh! and on that score, since folk are panicking:  I use Reeder as my RSS reader.  Apparently, although it syncs with Google Reader, it will still go on after Google drops its reader, which caused me a huge sigh of relief since I didn't want to have to go hunting for a new one.  Again. (Curse you, Mail!!) Why I like it:  1)I can sync between my computer, my phone and my tablet, 2)it's clean and has a decent interface, 3) the learning curve on it was steep and once I got the hang of it, it was better than what I was using before. As far as I know though, it's Mac and iOS only.

The UPCOMING:
I'm also working on a post for the Meet: My Machine Blog Hop this week - thank you to Erin and Stacey for the invitation!  My day is Wednesday.  You can read more all about the hop here, catch up with the other participants, and learn all about their sewing machines.  GREAT if you're considering an upgrade or second machine. Better if you're looking for more blogs to fill your Google Reader replacement.


Sew at Home Mummy
Here's the schedule:

Hope you enjoy it!! Okay - I've got to go do some stuff so that I can come back here sooner rather than later...

7 comments:

  1. Oh, I've missed you! So happy to see you at the top of my blogroll. I read off my blogroll, rather than a reader. *sigh* I know--probably ineffective...

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  2. I love your chickadee :-). Way to use that sewming macheen lol!

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  3. Your chickadee is adorbs. I feel you on reading blogs... I'm WAY behind. I am thinking about you, tho. Eventually, life will slow down. And who knows, maybe I'll show up at your classroom someday and you'll either be really happy to see me, or call security because your internet stalker is on campus. It's a toss up, right? hahahah. LOVE YOU. You know, in a non stalker kind of way. xoxo

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  4. Sew-Ming machine. Too cute. A fun post today. Glad you are well, just tired. Your dinner looks great. If I didn't have to work today, I would try it ; ) All my blogs show up on my blogger dashboard. Hope they don't all vanish and I hope people can still find me!

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  5. Your ratatouille looks great. Glad to hear that the show went so well!

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  6. I checked out Reeder but I don't want to pay for apps! I figure I'll find the perfect solution by the time reader retires... ;)

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  7. The ratatouille looks divine, but we're still in the season of weird baseball-y tomatoes. Maybe when summer arrives I'll give this a go. Did you sautee the vegetables separately, then combine? Or just throw it all in the pot at once?

    I hear you about being behind on internet homework. I love that you can just click "All Read" and it magically goes off my "to do" list. I do miss reading what people have been up to, but I love that I can scroll backwards through my fav blogs when I get a few minutes.

    Sounds like you've been in crazy-land for a while. Welcome back! And hang in there with the recovery. I'm heading into crazy-land tomorrow for a while.

    Elizabeth E.
    opquilt.com

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Who doesn't love comments? I appreciate every single one and try to reply to each. Unless you're a no-reply commenter. Then I can't. And I have a little sad moment. Like a dropped ice cream cone. So if you're a no-reply commenter and have a question, check the comment thread and I'll try to reply there. :-)