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i’ve seen a number of interviews with gabourey sidibe, the actress who stars in precious, and i’m consistently impressed with her – her cheerfulness and her ease with herself, in particular. a blog i read noted this quote from a recent interview:

“People always ask me,’You have so much confidence. Where did that come from?’ It came from me. One day I decided that I was beautiful, and so I carried out my life as if I was a beautiful girl. I wear colors that I really like, I wear makeup that makes me feel pretty, and it really helps. It doesn’t have anything to do with how the world perceives you. What matters is what you see. Your body is your temple, it’s your home, and,” she chuckles, “you must decorate it.”

i kind of wonder about the “a if I was,” but … good for her.

2010 01 08 katie daily Comments (0) Permalink

breakfast:
steel-cut oatmeal w/ a little brown sugar & cinnamon
a cup of hot carob for sid after he spent over an hour shoveling snow starting at 7:45 am

lunch:
after running errands and going to the gym, we ended up at blue koi for a mid-afternoon lunch

dinner:
will be leftovers, picked at. but tonight i’m planning on making a big pot of veggie stock and some light wheat bread. maybe vegan rice krispie treats, too. we’ll see if we have enough rice krispies or if the boy feels bold enough to go out for supplies.

[edited 1/9/10]
veggie stock got made:


veggie stock

i think it’s a bit tomato-y (i was trying to use up some tomato paste from the mac & cheese from the night before) but otherwise it’s probably fine. the tomato-iness means i’ll probably have to carefully select which soups i use it for, and i still need to figure out how to store it all in the freezer, but in general – easy as pie.

bread also got made, though not as planned. my dough wasn’t rising to my expectations, and i thought it was because our kitchen was cold. turns out my yeast was dead. the first batch went into the trash and i purchased new yeast last night and tried again.

first it all goes whirrrr:

whirr

then it rises (in the oven, in january). then it gets shaped into a loaf, and rises again:

ready for the second rise

then it bakes and smells yummy and comes out in a sturdy loaf:

done!

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2010 01 07 katie cooking Comments (0) Permalink

last night

for dinner? vegan mac & cheese, v.3, w/ peas. from my new cookbook, vegan yum yum by lauren ulm.

[edited 1/9/10]
verdict is: it’s yummy. best yet. this recipe involves red miso and tahini. i think it’d be good with a little garlic powder to give it some bite.


vegan mac & cheese, v.3

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2010 01 07 katie cooking Comments (0) Permalink

in 2010 news, the bathroom is painted and the mirror is on the wall.

tomorrow perhaps we hang pictures above the mantle in the living room, and we get the oil changed in my car.

after that? one cannot dream big enough to imagine the things that lay ahead.

sid told me his resolution for the year is that if something can be done in 5 minutes or less, he’ll just do it.

i didn’t have a resolution at the ready for the start of the new year. i had lots of ideas but nothing that seemed consequential or well-defined enough to announce as an official resolution. but there’s a lot to get done, and a lot i’d like to change, and a lot i’d like to keep in mind over the next year, so here’s a list. make of it what you will.

  • today was my last day working out with the personal trainer. i’m on my own now, for better or worse. i need to improve my cardiovascular endurance. i would like to lose at least 10 lbs. i’d like to lose more, but 10 seems manageable and puts me back to where i was in 2005. if i can do that, i can work on getting back to where i was at other yearly increments.
  • i want to figure out why my skin suddenly feels like finicky old lady skin and figure out how to fix it.
  • i really like cooking, but it stopped being fun to me this past year and started feeling like an unwelcome burden. i want to be cooking (and baking) a lot more, and i want to be documenting it all so that successes can be repeated and failures can be laughed off.
  • it’s time to be making things again. my office in this house is close to feeling cozy and usable and i have lists of things i want to do and materials to do a lot of them and so many ideas all the time and so many things i want to learn how to do.
  • enjoy my practicum
  • make the kitchen & laundry room usable
  • get sid to eat more vegetables
  • wrestle this house into feeling homey
  • not be too sad or worry too much when sid has to be traveling for work.
  • not be more than a month behind on magazines, if i ever manage to get caught up again
  • ride my scooter a lot. but not miss out on how nice it is to just ride with sid. and probably at some point i would like to learn to ride a vintage bike.
  • go out on top in my last semester of grad school.
  • do well whatever it is i end up doing after grad school. working or not, and wherever i may be.
  • stay in better touch with good friends and cultivate new ones.
  • visit north & south dakota finally.
  • remember that i am a tough cookie.
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2010 01 06 katie cooking
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in hindsight.

today is EPIPHANY! and while i haven’t really had any, i’m still thinking a lot about 2009 and what’s to come in 2010 and how to make the best of it.

for the last two days, i’ve been going through a bazillion websites and blog posts i’d bookmarked before & during the holidays and not yet checked out. several were driven by prompts from this website, on a ‘best of 2009′ theme. i was raring to enumerate all my 2009 bests, but now that i’m looking at them tonight, i’m a little uninspired. or, really, the issue is that they’re all pretty one note, because the best of 2009 is sid.

but, to humor my earlier plans:

best new food: i returned to vegetarianism after a lapse of a few (ok, about 9) years, and i’m ashamed to admit that i’ve discovered a number of meat substitutes (some more legit than others) that i like. a lot. this week i’m going to make seitan from scratch for the first time and see if i can break myself of some of it.

the best place: an overarching issue in 2009 was feeling out of place, so finding good ones was key. our front porch is a good place. our burnt-orange, ’70s-rec room gym is another. the creepy fairy tale cave at rock city. there was a spot i sat down while sid and i hiked up a mountain in colorado. i wanted to stay there forever. that was the best place.

restaurant moment: there was a weekend that spanned the end of january and the beginning of february, and sid and i found that we’d independently made plans to be in chicago over that weekend. he to move one last load out of his old apartment with the help of ryan, and i to visit samantha. on that saturday night i made plans to get he and ryan out to dinner with me and several friends – phil and michelle, courtney, and laura. when he arrived he slipped me a wrapped gift – a three week anniversary gift, a book on state shapes. i think i spent the entire dinner grinning at him. phil regaled everyone with stories, and we all laughed until we hurt. and that was just the start of it.

2010 01 06 katie daily Comments (0) Permalink

you will undoubtedly already have noticed my “books read” and “movies ranked” posts. this serves as a more general 2009 wrap-up and 2010 look-ahead.

when hunting for past-years’ book & movie lists, i found a year-end meme that i filled out in january 2005. the most salient item from that list is #9 – “what was your biggest failure?”

my answer? “my failures are both too numerous and too insignificant to bother listing.”

this remains true.

oh hell maybe i’ll just fill out the whole damn thing again as a short-cut. then post a FREE STYLE thing after i finish painting the bathroom.

  1. What did you do in 2009 that you’d never done before?

    2. I ran over a five gallon package of pickles in an H3. Also, got married.

  2. Did you keep your new years’ resolutions, and will you make more for next year?

    3. Yes and no, insofar as they were resolutions at all. At the end of the year I cut soda out of my diet in an effort to eliminate migraines and lose a few pounds. I in fact lost 20 pounds between that and regular yoga, and my migraines nearly disappeared.

    However, the ‘resolution’ that most will remember was that I, with a chorus of many friends, declared 2009 The Year of Katie, in which I resolved to be elaborately, selfishly, and thoroughly single. FAIL. I first spoke with Sid on January 5, met him on January 10, and we were engaged on March 18. Married on August 8.

  3. Did anyone close to you give birth?

    4. Andrew & Molly gave birth to Elijah in February, and I am so in love with that little boy.

  4. Did anyone close to you die?

    5. Not especially close, no, but lots of fairly-close. My friend Anne died of a brain tumor several months ago, very unexpectedly, after her treatments had appeared successful. The husband of a very close friend of my father’s passed away around the same time, and while I did not know Cy well, I knew his wife and children well since my childhood.

    There are a number of people I’m worried will die in 2010. I just received news that my Aunt Rita’s boyfriend Randy’s brain tumor is resurging and he likely has only a few months left. My paternal grandmother made a speech at Christmas this year indicating she felt it might be her last. And my maternal grandfather is really slowing down, worrying my grandmother and the rest of us quite a lot.

  5. What countries did you visit?

    6. Just the US this year. A planned visit to Canada fell through due to timing issues. We were all over the US, though, throughout the year – Nevada and California in March, St Louis in April, Indiana in May, Boston & New York in June, Washington DC in July, the Smoky Mountains, Chattanooga, & Asheville in August, Chicago in September, Colorado in October, and St. Louis & Indiana in December.

  6. What would you like to have in 2010 that you lacked in 2009?

    7. Every year I fail to buy winter-appropriate but still cute shoes.

  7. What date from 2009 will remain etched upon your memory, and why?

    8. January 31. March 18. August 8.

  8. What were your biggest achievements of the year?

    9. Finally finishing that damned baby sweater, several months too late. Surviving a wedding. Surviving fall semester. Passing motorcycle school with flying colors.

  9. What was your biggest failure?

    10. “my failures are both too numerous and too insignificant to bother listing.”

  10. Did you suffer illness or injury?

    11. Recurrent colds. The usual. I fell out of the bathtub once, super exciting. Several baking-related burns on my forearm.

  11. What was the best thing you bought?

    12. New socks and underwear.

  12. Whose behavior merited celebration?

    13. Sid

  13. Whose behavior made you appalled and depressed?

    14. Sid

  14. Where did most of your money go?

    15. School, wedding, house. It was an ugly year, expenditure-wise.

  15. What did you get really, really, really excited about?

    16. Sid. Doughnuts.

  16. What song will always remind you of 2009?

    17. Three of them:

    Hello Saferide – The Quiz
    The Cars – Moving in Stereo
    Husker Du – Eight Miles High

  17. Compared to this time last year, are you

    18. i. happier or sadder?: both
    ii. thinner or fatter? despite the 8lbs i gained in the last month, i’m still about 12 less than this time last year.
    iii. richer or poorer? i’m richer. sid’s not.

  18. What do you wish you’d done more of?

    19. Relaxing. Cleaning. Cooking. Kissing.

  19. What do you wish you’d done less of?

    20. Worrying.

  20. How did you spend Christmas?

    21. St. Louis for the Eschbacher Family Christmas, then to Indianapolis for a week with the Sowders. Then back home to celebrate with my family after the fact. Busy busy busy but all of it was wonderful.

  21. Did you fall in love in 2009?

    22. Did I ever.

  22. What was your favorite TV program?

    23. Mad Men

  23. Do you hate anyone now that you didn’t hate this time last year?

    24. I do not.

  24. What was the best book you read?

    25. As you may have noticed, my book-reading was a spectacular failure this year. The Vonnegut book did make me cry several times.

  25. What was your greatest musical discovery?

    26. Sid.

  26. What did you want and get?

    27. Good grades, a little tree for a spot in our front yard, a full-face helmet, and a pastry blender.

  27. What did you want and not get?

    28. A bigger kitchen.

  28. What was your favorite film of this year?

    29. Away We Go

  29. What did you do on your birthday?

    30. Turned 29. Had dinner with family. And then we had friends over for a birthday/Halloween party at our house that was delightful.

  30. What one thing would have made your year immeasurably more satisfying?

    31. Being able to relax and have confidence in all parts of it.

  31. How would you describe your personal fashion concept in 2004?

    32. Regrouping.

  32. What kept you sane?

    33. Frannie dog. The hot corn pillow.

  33. Which celebrity/public figure did you fancy the most?

    34. I’m too out of touch this year to answer this question.

  34. What political issue stirred you the most?

    35. What didn’t. I’m deeply, deeply disappointed in the health care debacle.

  35. Who did you miss?

    36. So many friends. Why are you all spread so far and wide?

  36. Who were the best new people you met in 2009?

    37. Sid. Ryan and Megan. Sid’s family.

  37. Tell us a valuable life lesson you learned in 2009:

    38. I’m keeping my 2004 answer:

    “life is a highway/i’m gonna ride it all night long”

  38. Quote a song lyric that sums up your year:

    39. And if I fall, would you pick me up?

2010 01 01 katie uncategorized Comments (0) Permalink

books of 2009

In case you hadn’t already put it together, 2009 was one hell of a year for me – school-wise and personal life-wise. Sadly that meant it was not one hell of a year for me, reading-wise. In the last few weeks I’ve finally started to put a dent in an epic backlog of magazines, and new books given as Christmas gifts make the unread shelves bulge even larger. I only read three books for pleasure this year, and one of them was really a 50 page pamphlet on local history. All other books were for school or cookbooks. Ho hum. Here, in all its glory, is the 2009 list:

For fun:
01 Armageddon in Retrospect Kurt Vonnegut
02 How the States Got Their Shapes Mark Stein
03 Old Westport William A Goff

For school:
04 The Changing Academic Library: Operations, Culture, Environments John M. Budd
05 Guide to Library and Information Agency Management Charles Curran
06 Fundamentals of Collection Development and Management Peggy Johnson
07 Librarian’s Guide to Online Searching Suzanne S. Bell
08 Licensing and Managing Electronic Resources Rebecca S. Albitz
09 The Organization of Information Arlene G. Taylor

For cooking:
10 The Garden of Vegan: How It All Vegan Again! Tanya Barnard
11 How It All Vegan!: Irresistible Recipes for an Animal-Free Diet Sarah Kramer
12 La Dolce Vegan!: Vegan Livin’ Made Easy Sarah Kramer
13 Vegan Brunch: Homestyle Recipes Worth Waking Up For-From Asparagus Omelets to Pumpkin Pancakes Isa Chandra Moskowitz
14 Vegan Cupcakes Take Over the World: 75 Dairy-Free Recipes for Cupcakes that Rule Isa Chandra Moskowitz

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2010 01 01 katie daily Comments (0) Permalink

today:

- haircut w/ my hairdresser who i totally adore and cracks me up
- mani/pedi with sidney. i have trashy trashy xmas trees painted on my big toes.
- found a workable dress for our big nutcracker night out tomorrow night
- failed to find a pair of jeans that look reasonable after trying on probably a dozen pairs
- saw a preview of it’s complicated. it was terrible. bad wealthy baby boomer cliches. audience roared. sid wanted to leave. i’m incapable of walking out of a movie.
- dinner again at kin lin. time to stop.

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2009 12 17 katie daily Comments (0) Permalink

sorry, internet, for being such a moaning nutjob all the time. i’m open to suggestions for how to mellow out again.

as i have been for four of five days this week, i’m at a cafe working on finals. my group project got turned in tuesday, my biggest paper got turned in last night, and now i have six more pages to write on a case study and budget hullabaloo for my management class. i probably should have stayed home though because this one might be better with some thinking out loud and talking it out and sadly there’s no one here for that today.

i’m in a real mood lately. school is a big part of it. at night i’m so tense i can’t sleep. during the day i’m achy and worrying and i’m breaking out and i’m nauseous all morning. i felt pretty good for awhile but then accidentally listened to a couple of songs that make me sad, and then a friend said something to me, with good intentions, that instead managed to be a insulting and insensitive and made me want to go sit in the bathroom and cry.

so anyway not much progress on my paper yet but i’m hellbent on getting it done by midnight (24 hrs before it’s real due date). sid’s off to see six metal bands tonight so it’ll be me and the dogs at home. maybe they have some opinions about budget cuts and navigating civic governance.

as soon as this paper is done, my focus is on feeling normal and happy again. it’s going on the to-do list as an item.

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2009 12 11 katie daily Comments (0) Permalink

austin is cold, but there was no snow to speak of. at least no snow if you’re from anywhere other than austin. around noon i went to travis high school to meet one of my brother’s physics classes, and as i drove the two miles to the school, a handful of flakes darted through the air, only to disappear before they hit the ground. if any managed to finish their journey, so few others had managed that together they made no impression. that made no difference to andy’s 11th and 12th grade students, though – they begged andy and their (real, full-time, non-student) teacher to let them go out into the courtyard to watch the snow.

his students were charming and funny and total teenagers. his school is something like 80% hispanic, with 100% being on the free lunch program. he has lots of funny stories about the students that i couldn’t begin to properly relay, but the best is that today a few of the seniors insisted to him they needed to leave class to go to the principal’s office, instead of taking a practice test for the (no child left behind) TAKSS test. today was his last day, so he humored them. instead of heading to the principal’s office, they ran out to the parking lot, piled into someone’s car, and sped to the nearest grocery store where they picked up a cake iced to say “good luck mr. e=mc^2″:

apparently the original plan was for a girl to bake him cupcakes, but she was sick all week and her mother apparently forbid her, mid-mixing, to risk mixing her illness into her baked goods and she was sent back to bed.

this morning i slept in late late late in andy’s cozy apartment, and then took a long long long and hot hot hot shower to ease into the chilly day. after meeting andy’s students i headed toward the UT campus to meet sid’s friend millie (who i’d not previously met) for lunch. it took me 20 minutes to find parking, and with another 15 minutes to kill, i stopped for a small chai at caffe demedici at 22nd & guadalupe. with a warm drink in hand, the windy few blocks down guadalupe seemed much more pleasant, as did the opportunities to met many dogs along the way. we had lunch at veggie heaven, a vegetarian chinese joint that has some affiliation with the falun gong. i ate yummy basil tofu w/ vegetables and nibbled at millie’s broccoli & seitan and her coconut bubble tea. we ate until we popped, then we got into her car to head to toy joy for vegan softserve & toy shopping. i got vanilla w/ chocolate sprinkles, and she opted for chocolate peanut butter. both were amazing, and big servings got gobbled down in spite of our big lunches. we both left toy joy with one souvenir – she got a terrifying parrot for her father to add to the family christmas tree; i got a terrifying dolphin keychain with blue laser eyes to attach to my scooter key. millie also sent me away with four big pieces of her homemade vegan cornbread to share with sid or to share with andy – my pick. it was a fun afternoon and didn’t feel like i was lunching with a stranger at all. we spent most of our time talking about food and cooking and more about food, and about how she never ever cooked before this year but now loves it, especially since her vegan boyfriend enthusiastically gobbles up everything she eats and then oozes compliments.

tonight andy and i intended to go see the road, the new viggo mortensen movie based on a cormac mccarthy novel, but by the time we got to the south austin outpost of the alamo drafthouse, the movie had sold out. our next scheme was to go to a middle-eastern market nearby to get hummus and bread and other goodies, but by the time we got there, it had closed for the day. plan c was to come back to his house, make sushi, and watch something via netflix instant watch. andy’s sushi was super yummy and we ate until we were about to pop, and then dug into his cake. meanwhile, we’ve been watching jan svankmeyer animations and are on to the documentary michael pollan made based on his book, the botany of desire. (we have just learned that the only society that doesn’t have a native intoxicant are the inuits. because absolutely nothing grows up there.)

it’s been a good day.

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2009 12 04 katie travel Comments (0) Permalink