So... nobody tells men under what circumstances they can use viagra, pay for sex, make family decisions, career decisions, etc... People assume that most of the time, men make the best decisions they can for themselves in any given situation.
But with women, it's a bit different. People often seem to think that a woman, given the choice, would not make such great decisions for herself. That she might panic or do something rash and stupid just for money or take advantage of services offered to help people in bad situations. (Take advantage as in "use inappropriately," not as in "these services are HERE FOR PEOPLE IN HER SITUATION.")
... Take Roe v. Wade, for example. Women had to go to court-- repeatedly-- to get the right to decide if it is a good personal choice for them to have a baby or not. And to get appropriate medical help, legally. And even today, that right to decide for herself is being eroded and contended. Many people believe that a woman is not equally important as a child or a man, not equally as capable of making the best decisions she can for herself in any given situation, and that she shouldn't have the right to make her own choices about her life path. That somehow, her life can be sacrificed for others' desires.
And often, the best decision a woman makes is that she will keep her baby. And that's great. It should be her right to make that decision as much as any other. But if she knows the baby will grow up in squalor, without love, without food or clothes or a safe place to sleep or be born addicted to drugs... If she knows the best thing she can do for herself and her pregnancy is to not become responsible for another person... she should have the right to make that decision, too. It's her body, it's her responsibility, it's her choice. And I, for one, generally believe that a woman is wonderfully capable of making the best decisions she can for herself in any given situation.
Today just happens to be the day that Roe v. Wade was decided. So, believing in the Goddess and believing that women are intelligent, capable, wise and wonderful-- I celebrate the few victories we women have, where someone in power actually agreed with me, and gave her the right to choose what she does with her own body.
Wednesday, January 23
Tuesday, January 22
Somehow, I Managed
About the crock pot...
Somehow, I managed to ruin a rather large and expensive crock pot stew. It was basically a bunch of fresh vegetables, a grain, some mushrooms, chicken broth, water, salt, and a bit of garlic. It tastes... bad. Bitter, and somewhat like warm moldy bread smells. If you ever have such a thing in your kitchen. Happens to me all the time.
... uhh... totally distracted by my cat. She is on top of a box (an empty box) that has a handle hole in the top, and puts her a good two feet closer to the dangling branch of one of my hanging plants. She has so far nearly biffed it by trying to reach up to the plant and play with it, by leaning WAAAAAY over the edge of the empty box to observe her domain from this new height, and by reaching one paw as far down INTO THE BOX (through the handle hole) as she possibly could, just to see what she ran into. Last but not least, she just now nearly biffed it by jumping down off the top of the two-foot-tall-but-one-foot-wide empty box. And she loved every little trouble-making minute of it.
I think I need more glee in my life. That sort of "I know I probably shouldn't be doing this but it is SO MUCH FUN!" gleeful feeling, mixed with a healthy dose of dangerous curiosity.
...sigh...
Yet again, I find myself envious of my cat.
Anyway, the lesson I'd like to share with any other hopeless cookers out there is to BELIEVE THE LABEL on the dried shitaki mushrooms. You want to soak them in water for at least 30 minutes, and then put them into DIFFERENT WATER to cook. And, I also suggest putting them in at the very end of the crock pot cycle, with your herbs. Also, if you try to use barley as your grain, put in something really sweet like ginger or sweet potato or something to help things along. And, most important of all, don't put in more than ONE ingredient you don't usually cook with per crock pot challenge. Or follow a tried and true recipe-- someone else's recipe.
This is actually the secret behind my insistence on cooking very simple foods with only a few ingredients. Fewer things can go horribly wrong. Including my spelling of the word "rescipee."
And if I ever catch the guy writing the script for this, I'm inviting him over for one of my "tasty" home-cooked meals, and I'm going to force him to eat seconds. In fact, there are actually two more helpings of this horrible goo sitting in my fridge right now. And I have no idea what to do with them.
Somehow, I managed to ruin a rather large and expensive crock pot stew. It was basically a bunch of fresh vegetables, a grain, some mushrooms, chicken broth, water, salt, and a bit of garlic. It tastes... bad. Bitter, and somewhat like warm moldy bread smells. If you ever have such a thing in your kitchen. Happens to me all the time.
... uhh... totally distracted by my cat. She is on top of a box (an empty box) that has a handle hole in the top, and puts her a good two feet closer to the dangling branch of one of my hanging plants. She has so far nearly biffed it by trying to reach up to the plant and play with it, by leaning WAAAAAY over the edge of the empty box to observe her domain from this new height, and by reaching one paw as far down INTO THE BOX (through the handle hole) as she possibly could, just to see what she ran into. Last but not least, she just now nearly biffed it by jumping down off the top of the two-foot-tall-but-one-foot-wide empty box. And she loved every little trouble-making minute of it.
I think I need more glee in my life. That sort of "I know I probably shouldn't be doing this but it is SO MUCH FUN!" gleeful feeling, mixed with a healthy dose of dangerous curiosity.
...sigh...
Yet again, I find myself envious of my cat.
Anyway, the lesson I'd like to share with any other hopeless cookers out there is to BELIEVE THE LABEL on the dried shitaki mushrooms. You want to soak them in water for at least 30 minutes, and then put them into DIFFERENT WATER to cook. And, I also suggest putting them in at the very end of the crock pot cycle, with your herbs. Also, if you try to use barley as your grain, put in something really sweet like ginger or sweet potato or something to help things along. And, most important of all, don't put in more than ONE ingredient you don't usually cook with per crock pot challenge. Or follow a tried and true recipe-- someone else's recipe.
This is actually the secret behind my insistence on cooking very simple foods with only a few ingredients. Fewer things can go horribly wrong. Including my spelling of the word "rescipee."
And if I ever catch the guy writing the script for this, I'm inviting him over for one of my "tasty" home-cooked meals, and I'm going to force him to eat seconds. In fact, there are actually two more helpings of this horrible goo sitting in my fridge right now. And I have no idea what to do with them.
Monday, January 21
More of a Good Thing
A while back, Crazy Aunt Purl asked her blog readers for good crock pot rescipees. Believe it or not, I'd actually embarked on my second attempt at crock-pot ownership just that week. The first attempt was one of those "oh, that would be great!" costco purchases, that doesn't look ridiculously large until you get it home, and realize you'll have to store the crock pot that feeds 20 people in one go... somewhere... and that there are a total of ONE PERSON at your dinner table...
The second attempt, well, Fred Meyer had a sale on crock pots, and the one I got is only supposed to make three servings at a time, if you fill it up all the way, which I don't. I even bought and cooked chicken in this thing, which is actually a minor miracle. I haven't cooked chicken in about three years, unless I was trying to impress somebody. And I think that only happened once. (For the record, it worked.)
Anyway, I heard about the blog post of rescipees for the crock pot, and went to check it out, and all these descriptions of food were SO YUMMY... I went to the store on my way home from work today, and bought an onion and some real vegetables. And I even cut them all up and dumped them all into my crock pot, and ... well... I guess I'll find out how it tastes tomorrow. But I feel so darn HEALTHY to be making something that takes more than 3 minutes to cook! (Now in case you were worrying, I actually do eat healthy food most of the time-- and cook it myself, basically from "scratch"... well, I don't make my own chicken broth... but anyway-- don't worry.)
AND THEN somebody actually mentioned that the dutch oven can be used the same way as a crock pot, but you put it in the oven at 350 (?) for five hours, and that same tremendous juicy stew of yummy foods happens. Wow.
I love food. I love it even more when it both tastes good and is good for me. Especially when I'm stressed out, and not getting enough sleep. Which would be most of the time, really... Going to bed at 11pm and getting up at 5am will do that to you. And not working and job-hunting, and moving to a new place to live, and being in a major car accident that was actually your fault, and sorting through every dagmn piece of crap you own and deciding that at least 1/3 of it MUST GO AWAY, and attending a major conference in your professional field-- on the other side of the country-- mid-move, and...
Well... I'm hoping to establish a more productive and less stressful routine in February. I really count my new year as starting then anyway, so I'm still really hopeful about everything. Hope is my friend. And, really, so is my new crock pot. Friends are a wonderful thing to have, let me tell you. I'm lucky that way. (And I'm not talking about the food.)
The second attempt, well, Fred Meyer had a sale on crock pots, and the one I got is only supposed to make three servings at a time, if you fill it up all the way, which I don't. I even bought and cooked chicken in this thing, which is actually a minor miracle. I haven't cooked chicken in about three years, unless I was trying to impress somebody. And I think that only happened once. (For the record, it worked.)
Anyway, I heard about the blog post of rescipees for the crock pot, and went to check it out, and all these descriptions of food were SO YUMMY... I went to the store on my way home from work today, and bought an onion and some real vegetables. And I even cut them all up and dumped them all into my crock pot, and ... well... I guess I'll find out how it tastes tomorrow. But I feel so darn HEALTHY to be making something that takes more than 3 minutes to cook! (Now in case you were worrying, I actually do eat healthy food most of the time-- and cook it myself, basically from "scratch"... well, I don't make my own chicken broth... but anyway-- don't worry.)
AND THEN somebody actually mentioned that the dutch oven can be used the same way as a crock pot, but you put it in the oven at 350 (?) for five hours, and that same tremendous juicy stew of yummy foods happens. Wow.
I love food. I love it even more when it both tastes good and is good for me. Especially when I'm stressed out, and not getting enough sleep. Which would be most of the time, really... Going to bed at 11pm and getting up at 5am will do that to you. And not working and job-hunting, and moving to a new place to live, and being in a major car accident that was actually your fault, and sorting through every dagmn piece of crap you own and deciding that at least 1/3 of it MUST GO AWAY, and attending a major conference in your professional field-- on the other side of the country-- mid-move, and...
Well... I'm hoping to establish a more productive and less stressful routine in February. I really count my new year as starting then anyway, so I'm still really hopeful about everything. Hope is my friend. And, really, so is my new crock pot. Friends are a wonderful thing to have, let me tell you. I'm lucky that way. (And I'm not talking about the food.)
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