dijous, de maig 31, 2007

Conferencing

I'm off to a conference for a few days and get to visit with my friend, LeeAnne, who will be getting married on July 7. Mixin' business with pleasure, oh yeah!

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dimecres, de maig 30, 2007

Wedding Gift- LundeRoy Stationers, Inc.



My friend Sharon asked each of her girlfriends to contribute to a part of her wedding as our gift to her instead of doing the registry thing (which she had already done for her first wedding to her late husband). I would have gone right for the bouquet but it was "taken" so I chose to do her invitations.

Austin and I spent a good part of Memorial Day working on them and I think they turned out really well, especially considering that we are not the scrapbook-y, crafty types (though I like to think we are somewhat creative). Since there are three layers, we had to cut each sheet and then attach them. This is an area that in which I am very, very weak. Geometric and spatial skills just kill me and it felt like that part of my brain was completely missing. Austin had great diagrams/blueprints with measurements and layout and he saved the day. He also freehand attached each sheet after I applied the adhesive, boasting a sixteenth of an inch margin of error ("margin", HAR HAR!).


I think they look better in person than in the pics. For example, the flash made the middle layer look too white compared to the buttery top sheet. I wish I had made the font a point bigger and should have had less white space on the top and bottom of the copy but OH WELL. I think Sharon and Matt will enjoy them and it was definitely one of the most thoughtful wedding gifts I have ever contributed to.

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dilluns, de maig 28, 2007

Weekend

Hmm, now that classes are done, having a three day weekend doesn't have quite the effect it does during the school year. Friday we ran a few errands and made dinner and ate outside. I grilled some corn, buttered it, then rolled it in cotija cheese and squeezed lime on it. Really good but the grilling part was sort of irrelevant. You could easily boil the corn and not have to worry about pulling the husks down, removing the silk, pulling the husks back up, soaking in water, grilling, then removing husks. Just sayin'.

Saturday we started getting ready for our Sunday night get-together. Austin made his usual, awesome salsa and I gave the salsa verde a try, roughly basing my creation off this recipe. I had only worked with tomatillos once before so it was enjoyable but with tomatillos at $3.99/lb, well, I guess I don't feel a burning need to make my own salsa verde again. Especially not with our favorite, nearby Mexican restaurant selling it by the pint...

Anyway, along with the salsa, we did a few other food prep tasks and some cleaning. Having people over is always good for the house cleaning because it means we have to clean to a level beyond our own sometimes lazy standards.

Saturday night we went to my friend and colleague's wedding reception. It happened to be where we had ours and happened to be just a year shy of when we were last there for our own wedding. It was fun to be on the guest side of it and really appreciate the venue.

Sunday we got ready for our guests. I made 14 lemon tartlets that we topped with fresh raspberries and mint. I basically used this recipe which was the only recipe to survive the big dinner I made when Austin returned from The Great Paintball War. Instead of doing one big lemon tart, however, Austin had the idea of doing individual tartlets and luckily there are pre-made graham cracker shells just for that (I'm just not big on making my own crusts, bad housewife ha).

In addition to the tartlets, I made a really easy pasta salad that I had at a friend's graduation party a week ago. I just boiled up some pasta nuggets and tossed it with chopped artichoke hearts, peppercorn feta, and jarred pesto sauce. At the last party, they also included cherry tomatoes.

Later, Austin grilled brats and burgers and a boca-brat for me. There was much grazing throughout the evening and I think we'll be grazing on the leftovers today.

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dijous, de maig 24, 2007

Art Shopping

Today is a rainy, cool day that reminds me of Seattle. In fact, I went to Starbucks and had them make me the "London Fog" drink that a barrista in Seattle got me hooked on (and going to a free-standing Starbucks rather than the one I usually go to inside of Target made a big difference). Anyway, after that, my friend and I went shopping for a wedding gift for our colleague. We went to a little studio that is tucked out of the way and we found the perfect gift for a Spanish Professor: a charming sculpture of Don Quijote. It was an easy decision but we stayed for a long time, admiring all the other cool pieces and chatting with the owner. It was also nice and warm in the studio since he was in the process of firing some pots.

I love shopping for art and this summer, Austin and I are going to shop for our anniversary gift. I have a feeling we might find something good when we are up in Bayfield for a wedding since there are lots of wonderful galleries in that little town. There's no rush, though, it's just got to be the right piece.

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dimecres, de maig 23, 2007

SAHNM (stay at home non-mom)

Thanks to Bad Z for the awesome term that describes my current status. I submitted grades on Monday afternoon and have since been seasonally unemployed (I think? Maybe that's not the right technical term for me but that's kind of how it is.)

Anyway, I've been spending most of my time cleaning the house because it really needs it and because we're having people over during memorial weekend. Besides that, I've been reading lots of travel narrative and wondering why Austin and I don't just up and move to the Pyrenees, buy an old cottage, and spend our days remodeling it and herding goats or something.

This is a boring post but I'm enjoying a little downtime for now. It's really, really nice.

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dilluns, de maig 21, 2007

Finalizing Final Exams & Grades

Last week sort of flew by since it was final exam week. On Tuesday, my colleagues and I wrapped up a project that we had been working on since January; we are making it into a presentation for early June and are hopeful that it will also be published in article format. We'll see, either way it turned out well and it feels good to have some closure on it.

Thursday I gave all my final exams and then took myself out to lunch, grading while I waited for my crab salad sandwich and garbanzo pancetta soup. The little cafe was rather busy so I got a lot of grading done and then headed to my salon for a haircut. This was followed by more grading.

On Friday, I went to visit some friends that I had met at my very first job out of college. Usually, you don't stay in touch with people like that but we went through a traumatic management experience together and I guess that's what solidified the friendship. They had a bonfire and we just relaxed and caught up.

On Saturday, I went to a friend's grad party. He had finished his Masters in International Management, very cool and had I stayed in a corporate setting, I think I would have considered such a degree. The party was wonderful- perfect decorations, awesome food, and it was fun to see some old friends again.

Saturday night I was back home again. Home alone, even, since Austin had gone off to fight in the Great Paintball War (aka his annual paintball/camping event with the boys). I enjoyed the night to myself and watched a chick flick set in Paris.

Sunday I ran some errands with the intention of making Austin a really nice meal, both because I had been too busy to cook lately and because I thought he might enjoy it after a weekend of subsisting on hotdogs and beer and cigars. The meal I had in mind was from the most recent issue of Bon Appetit but my culinary endeavors lacked the results I was hoping for.

First off, I made a lemon cream tart with a champagne-berry compote for the top. This actually turned out the best of the dishes except that I inadvertently bought a larger pie crust than I had intended so the tart itself was nestled down in a giant crust and looked ridiculous.

The other dishes (sorry, too lazy for hyperlinks) were roasted shrimp in a champagne-shallot sauce with an orzo shallot risotto. Well, the roasted shrimp turned out nicely (just tossed them with olive oil, kosher salt, fresh ground pepper, and some lemon zest-- can't go wrong there) but the champagne-shallot sauce was really runny and had been reduced to the point that it was too sweet. The orzo risotto turned out like a San Francisco treat gone wrong. It wasn't bad... it just wasn't good. Plus the recipe said you just throw all the liquid on top of the risotto and let it absorb. When I made more authentic risotto (also rice and not pasta based), you added the liquid in a number of additions, waiting for absorption before adding more. I have no idea what the science is but maybe that's what made a difference?

Anyway, we basically ate all the shrimp and had a nibble of the risotto. The tart was really good in spite of its unfortunate aesthetics and that recipe just might be made again. I probably won't try the other dishes again since there are other recipes that produce a similar effect that I know will yield better results. Ah well, that's how it goes.

Now it's time to spend most of the day finalizing the grades. They aren't due until tomorrow evening but hopefully I can finish them today. Then it's off to another Sand Crab v-ball game. Pinch, pinch!

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dilluns, de maig 14, 2007

Weekend

On Friday evening, Austin's mom arrived and we went out for dinner. We got home around 9:00 and talked for about an hour before we all fizzled out and went to bed. This meant we woke up earlier than normal on Saturday so we went to a coffee shop for a relaxing and delicious breakfast. After looking at all the cool kitchen gadgets, wines, and other delicacies at the cafe, we headed to the farmers market. Even though it's early in the season, it was a lot of fun to walk around and check everything out.

Austin's mom left around noon to go see her mom so the Lunderoys descended to the basement to work on The Project. Storage Room A had finally gotten to an unbearable level of junk and needed to to be maintained. It was a two person job because we both had random things in there from our lives prior to cohabitation. In fact, some of my stuff was moved directly from my little grad school apartment to storage to the basement of our current residence. It was almost eerie finding my entire grad school backpack intact, bus pass and a to-do list in the front pocket ready to go.

Anyway, besides finding the occasional nuggets of long gone days, we ended up generating four and a half leaf bags of garbage and massive amounts of recycling. It was almost shameful and we solemnly swore never to be so disgusting again. It was also enlightening to remove so much physical baggage from our home and to have a good spring cleaning.

There is still more work to be done; I have to sort through tons of grad school files, binders, and packets. Austin has Rubbermaid bins full of various cables and cords that look like gigantic knots. I also need to go through Storage Room B though it's more like a glorified closet and won't be as bad to prune.

We worked on the cleaning and organizing most of Saturday, then I spent about five hours on work stuff on Sunday, and now it's Monday afternoon with our first Sand Crabs volleyball game coming up at 8:00pm... can't wait!

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divendres, de maig 11, 2007

Last Day of Class

Woooooooo!

Confidential to Bad Z and RJN: Meet me at the Roasted Bean tonight?!

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dijous, de maig 10, 2007

Awww...

One of the dorms voted me favorite professor* of this academic year. It was a surprise and really made my day. Incidentally, it's the dorm most known for being loud, having parties, etc. Wooooo! It's also where Austin once lived and was a local celebrity for the most creative arrangement of dorm furniture into a bar.

*Technically, I have a different title but since I want to be a professor someday, it's always fun to see it in print.

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dimarts, de maig 08, 2007

Beware the Mighty Sand Crabs!

Austin and I joined a bar league volleyball team that one of my students organized. Last night was a sort of "open court" event so we had the opportunity to practice together and assess the awesome strength of our combined forces. It was really funny that my student had put this together yet whenever the ball came to her, she literally ducked and covered, shrieking "oh my god!" So what I'm trying to say is that we are probably going to win this whole thing.

We also needed a name. This was challenging since the group is made up of my student and her husband, a psych prof, Sean and Angie, and the Lunderoys. There isn't really an underlying theme that unites us so, after much brainstorming, Austin came up with "the sand crabs" since we play in a giant sandbox. What a beautiful, powerful animal he had chosen! It was immediately embraced by all and then we even came up with our theme: "we come outta nowhere and we pinch you where it hurts." Plus we have even created a sort of pinching hand motion that we do to intimidate the opponents and to rally our team.

Goooooooooooo........ Sand Crabs!

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dimecres, de maig 02, 2007

New Member of Our (Subie) Family


Last week I ended up getting a new car! After lots of pondering and some looking, I had narrowed down my criteria: first it had to be all wheel drive, second it had to look cute, and third it had to be fun to drive. It all came together when (by chance) I saw a new Subaru Legacy at the grocery store. Austin then tracked one down in the year, color, and with the features I wanted and we were off to collect it.

The only thing is I had sworn that after the Paseo moved on, I was going to get a manual transmission. Well, I had to compromise a little on that since my new car is an auto (though it has regular auto, sport auto for "spirited" driving, and you can also manually shift gears though there is no manual clutch). The compromise is that there is a fun-to-drive, bright yellow manual available to me whenever I want so it worked out alright in the end.

I really, really love my new car and I'm still getting used to seeing it in the garage and the parking lot at work however I must pay my last respects to the Paseo (aka the Passé, the Peso, the Pisseo, etc.) I bought that car when I got my first job in Burnsville, MN as a Human Resources Coordinator. The Paseo was tiny, sporty, and in my modest price range. Some highlights of its time with me include a trip to Bluefin Bay to hang with Bad Z & co, a visit to graduate programs in Iowa, and several moves that involved filling it with boxes like a clown car.

I was surprisingly a little sad to see that black car go (doesn't the Buddha say that attachment to material possessions leads to pain and suffering? hmmm...) but as Austin astutely pointed out, having working heat and defrost alone were reason enough to upgrade, the litany of other "issues" not withstanding.

Anyway, I've moved on and I'm loving the Legacy. Spring sunshine and fresh breezes coming in through the moonroof can't be beat!

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