Sunday, April 30, 2006

No do-overs

Last night's made-at-home supper: dee-lish.

So of course tonight I had to try topping it by making - or attempting to make - homecooked chicken quesadillas. They weren't horrible; my mom said they were great. But the truth, I think, is that certain foods are just better purchased at your favorite fresh-Mex eatery and quesadillas are one of them. The salsas have more zip, the cheese is more oooey-gooey and you're just happier because you feel taken care of. Maybe it's just me.

One thing: Food Network's Rachael Ray notes that when cooking at home you have the advantage of controlling your portions. This is true.

I have tomorrow night's dinner-for-work now - leftover buffalo baked chicken and garlic pasta shells - so there's one benefit to my weekend of cook it yourself mania. Unfortunately, I now also have two packs of guacamole. My mom is a fan, but me? Not so much.

For the low, low price of free

Thanks be to Manta (who hepped me to this) and the geniuses at sendspace, I can put free stuff here for you. Click on the link, download, pop into your iTunes and enjoy, enjoy. You'll have to register for sendspace but it's free. No strings attached. Just don't opt for the sendspace max thing and you're aces.

Randy Crawford and The Crusaders: Streetlife
Spoon: I Turn My Camera On
Michelle Shocked: Prodigal Daughter (Cotton Eyed Joe)

Saturday, April 29, 2006

D.I.Y.

Tonight I was inspired to cook dinner. While not a big deal to many people, this is huge for me. The menu was simple: baked chicken strips in buffalo wing sauce, pasta shells in a creamy garlic sauce (store-bought mix; I know) and a starter salad plate with chopped mixed greens, sliced red bell peppers (so sweet!) and tomatoes.

It was delicious. Now I wonder why I waste money eating out when I'm capable in the kitchen.

Tuesday, April 18, 2006

Fork over the Roosevelt

My friend Rogers' girlfriend, Amy, is one of the coolest people I know. Those of us who have worked retail or who currently suffer for low pay at retail jobs but try to be good customer service reps in this age of "Service? The hell?" clerkitude can understand why she responded the way she did to this stone wall masquerading as a human cashier. Plus, Amy's just flat-out funny. Check this, y'all:

"Never let it be said that I'm not a sucker for marketing gimmicks. CVS has a program called Extra Care, which gives you two percent back on your purchases and $1 for every two prescription you fill. I scour their sale ads every Sunday and use coupons on their sale items and literally get stuff for next to nothing. I am a big CVS fan because of this program. (Some other day I'll tell you about the time I got $35 worth of stuff for $7.)

Yesterday afternoon, I had a tremendous headache and no headache remedy handy, so I pulled into a CVS. This was not my friendly local CVS, but an Alpharetta CVS (Alpharetta is a completely separate blog topic). I find my BC powder, grab a drink, and head to the counter to check out. To my chagrin, I discover that I'm using an alternate set of keys, so I don't have my handy CVS Extra Care card with me. This is no problem; I know that they can look it up with my phone number. Here's the conversation that ensued.

Surly Clerk: Do you have a CVS Extra Care Card?

Me: I do, but I don't have it with me. Can't you look it up with my phone number?

Surly Clerk: (Didn't wait a second before responding) I've already swiped mine.

Me: But you can look mine up with my phone number. I want my credit for my Extra Bucks.

Surly Clerk: I'm going to have to void the transaction.

Me: Okay. (Like I care if she has to void the transaction!)

Surly Clerk: (Continuing to ring up my purchase.) Your total will be $5.05

Me: You didn't look up my card.

Surly Clerk: You want me to void the transaction?

Me: Of course I want you to void the transaction! You don't get to get my credit! (Yes, I realize that I'm talking about ten cents here, but she had really pissed me off by this point.)

Surly Clerk: I'm going to have to get a manager.

Me: OK (Like I care if she has to get a manager.)

Surly Clerk: Loud sigh...Troy!

Transaction is voided, completed, and appropriately credited to me.

So, yes, I overreacted over ten cents, but the fact of the matter is this heifer sits there and tries to steal the credit for customers' purchases to put them on her own card. She doesn't even try to do the right thing. In every other CVS I've ever been to, they'll offer to look up your card using your phone number. If she had tried and been unsucessful, then sure, go ahead, she should use her card. I don't even have a problem with the fact that she swipes her card for people who don't have one because they get the benefit of the sale prices (although she should offer the customer the option of signing up for one).

There's nothing like someone trying to steal your dime on Easter. I ought to call and complain to the manager."

Saturday, April 15, 2006

Shop 'til you drop

My mom sent me to the grocery store the other night with this list:

One bunch tomatoes
One pack choc. donuts
Chicken
One box bandages
One box candy
One small pack beef bologna
Two bananas
One small box soda crackers
Milk - 2%
One box Pinwheel cookies

Yeah. I'm not kidding. The only things on the list that were for me were the tomatoes, chicken, band-aids and milk (my mom is lactose-intolerant). Otherwise, that's all her.

Pushing the cart through the aisles as songs I remember being cool during my college days serenaded my search - and let me interject here to say that you indeed know you're getting old when you hear The Sundays being played over the supermarket Muzak in the produce section - I felt my face redden at the thought that eventually I'd have to take all this junk up to the checker in order to escape the confines of Where Shopping Is A Pleasure. So embarrassing when the clerk scans your stuff and gives you a not-so-surreptitious look that says "You keep eating like this and you're gonna die."

And so I added a few healthy items to the basket - trail mix, water, salad in a bag, those protein shakes I've grown to like - but it was a little like using a squirt bottle to try putting out a roaring brushfire. How lame my box of protein shakes looked, sidled up against that bag of 16 Softees chocolate donuts and a sleek deli-pak of Oscar Mayer 100% Beef Bologna ("No fillers!"). Despite its shiny silver packaging it simply couldn't compete with good old American Death Snacks. It was too wholesome, too full of vitamins and minerals.

Oh no. Checkout time. My hands trembling as I hastily placed the items on the conveyor belt, I fretted over when I'd get The Look. Maybe I should hide behind the newer, glossier TV Guide this time or attempt to screen out the "You gonna die" glance by tossing in an Archie's Pals 'N' Gals booklet at the last minute so that I'd instead garner a "You so crazy" look, which would still be mortifying but somehow less shameful in a personal way. At least with Archie you're rotting your brain, not your arteries.

"Any coupons?" the checker, a lady in her early 50s said, not bothering to look up from the register as she totaled up my order. No, I replied, handing her my check and ID. She glanced at it, handed it back, finished bagging my sad, shameful array of suicide via preservatives and told me to have a nice day without batting an eye.

She made no judgments. A veteran, she'd been through the wars.

Wednesday, April 12, 2006

If you close the door

"Keep the wine glass out and drink a toast to never." It sounds like a fair plan to me so I'll try it.

Monday, April 10, 2006

Mis vecinos

The immigration debate. It's a tough one. We've got to secure our borders, no doubt about it in this age of global terrorism. Realistically, that should include the Canadian border as well. Don't give me that "Oh, but we've got a secure, peaceful border alliance happening with Canada" argument; like terrorists wouldn't seize the opportunity to enter the U.S. through the lovely Great White North as opposed to Mexico. Give me a break.

I regret that we've ignored the issue of border control and people from other countries entering the U.S. looking for work to such a degree, both politically and socially, that we're now seeing mass protests against legislation that would make it a felony to be in America illegally. It's so sad that the many people who were so desperate for a better life, who were willing to work at whatever job (or jobs) they could get here may be categorized as criminals for believing in the American dream of hard work, sacrifice and earning your way to success because we now have to worry about terrorists who are just waiting until the time is right to strike us again inside our borders. It's not unlike when the 19 good kids in class have to stay in for recess because the one class clown wouldn't stop talking. Everyone suffers when one bad apple rots the crate.

And in my own neighborhood, I see the result of legal immigration. Our stuffy old neighbors who never spoke to anyone moved out and in their place (and former homes) we now have Melissa and Rene and their kids, Alejandro and Lena and their kids and... they're the best. The street has never been more alive than when I first moved here in the early '80s as a nine-year-old and found that I had a ton of kids to hang out with. Mexican parties go on regularly here and I'm always not only invited but am made to feel like a guest of honor because my neighbors know that I'm good with kids, their kids like me and anytime their kids need a safe house to spend time in until Mom or Dad can get home from work, I'm here for them and they're more than welcome to drop in. Never a problem. I look out for their kids like I look out for my nieces (who are best buds with my neighborkids and their parents). Finally, there's a sense of real community here again and I think it's great. Rene, my neighbor two doors down, puts in natural wood flooring for a living. He put ours in last summer and the house never looked so good. Excellent work. He's a perfectionist.

But the thing is, my neighbors are all legal. And I'm glad because they, like me, work hard for everything they have and they deserve their lovely homes and nice cars, etc. Yes, I'm conservative but I want people to come here, work and live out the American dream. I don't want them to be criminalized for that. But I think it's important for them to follow the rules like my neighbors did. In the long run, it makes things so much easier for them and for those of us who are lucky enough to be born American citizens. My neighbors, the legals who have turned our once-boring street into a vibrant community, are proof that the system works if you work within it. I'm so glad I live in their neighborhood.

Thursday, April 06, 2006

Moving right along

Let me just say that I am.

Tuesday, April 04, 2006

It had better be tonight

Confession: It's ab-fab here this evening. Sunny, crisp for spring - in the 60s, low humidity, night's not going to fall until exactly 8:01 p.m. EST. The perfect evening to go out and do some Peachtree Road Race training, to get outside, to just BE outdoors.

And I want to. Really. I do.

But my sister is here and she's feeling horrible. She's had an awful upper respiratory infection for the past week and a half and she drove over from South Carolina to do a favor for me - a pretty big favor - and so I feel like it wouldn't be right to leave the house, even though she's currently in the guest room sleeping or reading or resting or whatever. She'll be heading home tomorrow and I'm sorry I had to ask her to help out because I didn't know just how sick she still was. Had I known, I wouldn't have asked.

So I'm going to sacrifice this glorious late evening and stay in. It's quiet in my house right now. My mom is lying down, too, and I'm the only person up and about. There's something nice about that, something relaxing about the quiet in the midst of a house that is, for a change, hosting someone other than my mom and me.

Still, when I look outside and see the waning sun I do want to be out there - not so much in here. But my sister did something nice for me and enjoying this evening in here where I can get her water or whatever if she needs it is the least I can do for her and I don't mind that at all.