Need Cooking Advice? Feel free to e-mail me...

Slap a bad accent on me, let me drop a chicken on the floor then put it back in the pot and you can call  me Julia Child.  Hel-lo!  Who made not one, not two, but THREE delicious dishes today?  That's right.  Me.  Little Miss Cooking Challenged. 

It's been a banner day, food wise.  I started out the morning with Wheatberry Muffins.  Lots of yummy things in them like fresh blueberries, whole wheat flour, and rolled oats.  Scrumptious.  

Still riding high on that success, at noon I made a 2-bean chili.  (Okay, so basically all I had to do was cut up an onion and open cans of black beans, pinto beans, and diced tomatoes, but hey--I had to add a few spices and bring it all to a boil then a simmer, so it still counts as cooking).

Verdict on that from the husband who likes his food plain and scrunches up his face if he spies chopped up bits of vegetables in his food? "This is great.  I'd eat it again."

Now the angels were singing. Only one thing could be bring me more glory: Chocolate.

You see, on Monday we both got a hankering for chocolate so I pulled out an organic brownie mix I'd picked up at the store.  Did you know that organic brownies don't taste anywhere near as good as the sugary full of bad-stuff for you brownie products?  Yeah, I probably should  have seen that one coming. I made the brownies and we spent the rest of the night brushing our teeth, trying to remove the aftertaste.

Which is why this afternoon, at my husband's request, I made the "real" thing.  Cut open a prepackaged mix, added egg water and oil and threw that baby in the oven at 325 for 28 minutes.  The result was brownie perfection.

So yeah, I'm thinking my next book will probably be a cook book.  One of those, "Oh, I used to be afraid to cook but now I'm a goddess in the kitchen" testimonials. And I'll tell cute stories next to the 3-page long recipes about what a simple recipe this is so that the reader will feel like a complete ignoramus if their food doesn't turn out like mine. Then I'll book an author tour and teach Martha Stewart a thing or two about how to make a good brownie.

Sounds like a plan.  

Movie Tips

I have two movie recommendations for you. First, Capote. Blair and I agree it's the best movie we've seen in quite some time and led us into an in-depth discussion on the death penalty at dinner afterwards. Blair has never read In Cold Blood and even though I have, seeing the movie makes me want to go back and read it again.  I have not however, read To Kill A Mockingbird.  Not sure how such a major book got by me, but there you have it. Harper Lee features prominently in Capote and I'll be at the library first thing Monday to get her book. I also have never seen the movie, which fact for some reason just about gave Blair a heart attack. So after I read the book, the movie rental is a must.

Other must see movie: Crash.  We rented it last weekend and I think it should be a must-see movie for all of America.  Throws up in your face a lot of the racial preconceptions you might hold or wish you didn't hold.  It wasn't always an easy movie to watch, but it makes you think. Also points out that there just are no easy solutions or one type fits all thinking.

I'll also throw in I'm a fan of Brokeback Mountain. It's a slow-paced film, but well acted and romantic and realistic and tragic. 

Today will NOT be spent planning the England/Scotland trip.  Instead, Blair is spending the day doing taxes. (With the hopes that said refund will pay for the England/Scotland trip. <grin> ) I've got a few assignments to work on and--buoyed by my success this morning with the WheatBerry Muffins from Better Homes & Gardens which were delicious--I'm trying my hand at a new 2-bean chili recipe this afternoon.

Happy weekend to all of you. 

Random Thoughts

I opened up this screen to make an entry and then sat and stared out the window for a good ten minutes until the phone rang. It was Blair, calling to tell me he's on his way home. He's been volunteering the last several weekends with an organization that provides free tax help to people. This was the last Saturday and they were busy. But he's on his way home now and after he eats a late lunch (he's moaning because I ate the leftover spaghetti for my lunch that he was planning to have for his but hey, I didn't know) we're going to go see Capote.  I just read In Cold Blood in the last year or so and am looking forward to seeing a movie that's been getting such great reviews.  Plus, I really like Philip Seymour Hoffman from all the past character roles I've seen him in.

But to get back to my point, as I opened this blog, I couldn't really think of what to write about.  I've had a number of random little thoughts cross my mind in the last couple of days, but nothing that can stand on it's own as blog worthy.  So I thought we'd try a little smorgasbord, dump everything in, and see what we get.  In no particular order, here are my thoughts:

• I wonder if we eat too much Chinese? We eat out at the little place in our town at least twice a week. That much MSG just can't be good for us.
• I just finished reading Joan Didion's A Year of Magical Thinking.  I'm captivated by the life she and her husband led. The book is about her coping mechanisms after his sudden death, but in coming to grips with that, she replays a lot of their life together.  They were both writers and worked from home. Sometimes they collaborated on screenplays. If she was in a different town, he might hop a plane to meet her for dinner, then hop a plane back home. They ate dinner out at 11 at night in New York, splitting a pasta and small salad. They threw dinner parties. They would take over a hotel room in Hawaii for months and work from there.  Their world was filled with their work and with each other.  They appear very intellectual. I wonder what it would be like to be in their circle of friends or to lead a similar life?
• I'm obsessed with American Idol again. And a new Amazing Race starts this week. Might as well just plant me in front of the TV with a remote and be done with it.
• My yoga class was cancelled today so I did a Pilates tape. My abs hurt. Maybe I should skip a yoga session a week and replace it with a pilates session instead.
• I need new jeans for England.  Do people dress up to over there or can I get away with being comfy in jeans and gym shoes?
  
• Watching the judges comment on American Idol on whether contestants were "nice" or "real" or "sincere" got me thinking...I wonder how my personality would be perceived in a type of "American Idol for writers" competition? I'm not so sure I'd fare well...
• Why? Greedy.  I want my book to sell. You know those people that say, "Oh, if I can reach only one person in life, I've succeeded..."? Screw that. If you like my book, tell your mom, tell your friends, send postcard reminders and take out an ad telling people so.  Hustle, people, hustle!
• Critique groups. I adore mine and would never leave, but I'm not so sure it's a good idea to have a rough draft of a novel critiqued. I'm wondering if I should submit old stuff for critique while I'm working on the new stuff.  Still in the mulling over stage on that one.
• I haven't heard from my mom in over a week.  Why?
• I'm ready for Spring.  I think what happened is that my daffodils bloomed due to all the warm weather we've had. But it's supposed to be 22 degrees Monday morning so we're not out of it yet.
• I want to spend tomorrow planning our England/Scotland trip.  After I try out a new muffin recipe I ripped out from Better Homes & Gardens.
• I cleaned the house this morning. An exercise in futility as the Tile Guy will be here Monday and all the dust will come right back with him, but the clean house will provide me with a very happy 48 hours.  My mood elevates dramatically once things are clean.
  

Interviewing: Sometimes Less is More

I've over interviewed for an article I'm putting together on traveling with pets in an RV.  It's a 1200-word article which means 2-3 interviews would suffice.  I'm up to six.  My challenge now is to put all the information I've collected into a succinct article to the best of my ability without worrying about possibly having to injure the feelings of others if it turns out I can't use their information in the piece.

This is why I try not to over interview.  When people are kind enough to share their time and knowledge,  I don't like having to call and tell them that I couldn't fit them into my article. I think it's rude and shows poor planning on  my part. But I over interview sometimes out of a general panic (for lack of a better word). This is a new topic for me in a magazine I've never written for before.  So I want to make sure I nail the subject and therefore go into an information-collecting frenzy. This actually does a disservice to me as well.  I can't possibly insert all the information I've collected and if I try, I'll end up with a disjointed article with no flow or focus.  But I'm always loathe to leave out good information I possess.  It's better to have a focus, conduct the 2-3 interviews, write the piece and move on.

On the bright side, I'm interested in my topic and everyone I've talked to has been extremely helpful with some really funny stories.  I spoke to a woman yesterday who RV's with her 10, count 'em, 10 cats.  And I spoke to a woman who traveled for a year around the country with her two chihuahuas.  Great stories.

But sometimes less is more, and later today I will sit down and go through pages and pages of notes and try to figure out what stays and what must go.  It will all work out in the end.  It always does and I pull comfort from that.