Tag: food

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Odd Man In

I showered late last night so I could sleep in a bit and still get my car de-iced this morning. I let it run for about half an hour before I could chip all of the ice off, and then made it in to work. The roads weren’t bad, and I expected at least a few people to show up, but not one other soul was there. I just sat in the dark by myself for a while with some hot Earl Grey and milk.

After a while, I got up to check the weather outside. Justin and the rest of the maintenance crew were there working, so I thought I’d try and catch them huddled together for warmth in their warehouse. The joke was on me though, because they were actually at Sequoyah working on something. I penguin-waddled around a while until I got a text back from Justin that they were headed to the performing arts center to unload a truck that showed up in spite of the ice weather.

It had started to thunder-sleet again, so they decided they were going home when they got back. I followed suit and finished up downstairs, then went to see Summer at Superfast. She had just left though, so I tracked her down at Walmart where we picked up some things for dinner.

I found a couple pork butt roasts on sale, so I started up the smoker and got them going as quickly as I could. The girls eventually came over for the evening, as I struggled to get the grill up to temperature to fully cook the pork. It also seemed like my Meater thermometer was reading low on the ambient temperature, but in any case, the meat spent far too many hours on the grill as I continued to shovel charcoal in. I ended up finishing the roasts in the oven, and completed the meal with baked potatoes and grilled asparagus.

The girls sat around and watched TV until they could eat. The meat was predictably dry and tough, but had a pretty good taste. Everything was pretty salty though, so I’ll have to watch that in the future. I’m sure it won’t be so hard to do when it’s not literally freezing outside. At least I got a nice smoke ring and flavor out of it.

We get an hour late start in the morning, and I’ll take advantage of it with how sore I am from running around all afternoon. It’s also time to bring some smoked cheese and crackers in. I haven’t had any with crackers, and I’m excited about the sausage slices I found.

I’ve got to clean… everything.

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Aparent

The girls let me sleep in a bit today while they did chores. I eventually got up and warmed up some tacos for a really early lunch. Summer brought Eaddie back home after going to the gym. I just hung out at their house all day, not getting into anything much. Autumn decided that she wanted to go to her father’s house, which caused a bit of commotion since we had dinner plans with my parents. She continually pushed us with attitude until she finally finished her chores enough so that she could go.

Noah showed up after a while, and let us know that he lost his job at Walmart. We talked a bit, and I had him start on an application for the school district. Summer made a lime pie, and we headed to my parents’ house to grill some steaks for Mom.

Autumn showed up with plenty of time while I got things cooking. Mom didn’t have any of her usual teriyaki seasoning, so she winged it with some soy sauce and ginger. The food was good, and we all had a little bit of time to visit, but the girls had homework to finish up, so we headed back home before it got too late.

Summer went straight to bed. Autumn went straight to her room. Eaddie came out and did homework next to me, randomly asking for my opinions on her choices or wording. I dug into the wide world of aftermarket MagSafe charging, but never solidly landed on any products in particular. I’m anxious to find something semi-universal that we can implement though.

SHOTS SHOTS SHOTS

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Bunsday

I had a bellyache most of the night and into today, and I could only assume it was from the pizza. I tried not to let it keep me down too much, but it still made for a short day. Summer took Eaddie to the high school early in the morning to help with the robotics tournament. She wanted us to bring her some lunch though, so after a while Summer and I went to Popeye’s. We ate a couple chicken sandwiches there, and then ordered one to take to Eaddie. When we got there, the power had gone out and they were outside goofing around until they got it fixed.

From there, we went to my parents’ house to visit for a bit. Mom wanted to grill steaks the next day, so we made plans to come back for that. Then we went to Kroger to find a tomato and some fancy burger buns to eat with the hamburgers that Summer got from a customer in Conway, who also happened to be an old friend of Dad’s from school.

As soon as we got back to my house, Summer left for the gym and I nearly passed out in the bed. I just felt super cold and unbearably sleepy, but I never gave in to my desire to nap. I just laid in bed until I eventually decided to head up to Summer’s.

Eaddie stayed the night with her friend, but Autumn came home from her school trip. Summer grilled the burgers, which we ate with some of my smoked cheese. Then everyone went to bed super early.

Eaddiot.

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A Dandy, Mandy Birthday

We had a really long, relaxing meeting this morning with some fancier donuts than usual. It really felt like we didn’t have much of anything to do, and everyone was just happy to be at the end of the week. Jacob wanted some help troubleshooting a sound system that kept going to sleep, so I went to the junior high with him for a bit.

When I got back to the shop, I poked around a little bit until lunch time. Then a big group of us went to La Chiquita. We even got Tammy and Kelsea to go with us, which has never happened before. Thomas ended up paying for everyone, which was super generous. I had the fajitas for the first time in quite a while, which reminded me how much better they are than just about anything else on the lunch menu.

The afternoon went by pretty slowly after that. I ran home to grab a package, but otherwise didn’t have a whole lot at work that was just super pressing. I closed out what tickets I could for Gary and myself, and eventually made it to four o’clock.

I ran straight home and got to work making my smoked queso dip. I cooked some chorizo, then melted smoked Velveeta, smoked shredded blend, and some smoked pepperjack into the Rotel, garlic, and jalapeños. I forgot my onion and cilantro, which would have freshened it up quite a bit. The chorizo also ended up being a big mess because the grease bubbled up around the cheese and popped everywhere. It tasted alright though, and not too smokey.

As soon as I loaded that up into my little crock pot, I headed to Amanda’s for her birthday shindig. It was just her and Sarah, their roommate Steven, and their friend Khris there, so it was a really chill evening of just hanging out and playing a couple games. We picked up some pizza and candy from Casey’s, then played Sushi Go, followed by Cards Against Humanity.

I left shortly after midnight, when we wished Amanda a proper happy birthday. Then it was straight home and to bed after a long, waking day.

It don’t confront me none!

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Back in Zax

I remember sleeping pretty hard and dreaming when my alarm went off this morning, so I wasn’t very happy to have to get up and go to work. I made it in just a hair late, but there was nothing going on anyway. Zach had Jacob, Kyle, and me go out to the graveyard to sort through some of the stuff that was out there. I pulled out a working overhead projector, if for nothing else, then for awesome hand puppets.

When we got back inside, I made myself some English breakfast tea with milk. I had forgotten how much I like milk with tea. It was a pretty quiet day after that. I helped with a few things here and there. Zach, Thomas, Josh, and I went to Zaxby’s for lunch, since they were finally open for dine-in again. The only thing I didn’t miss was their prices.

The afternoon went by quietly as well. I went to Oakland at the end of the day to take care of something, and then Zach met me there after school to help install a new touch panel for the room that had the whiteboard ripped off the wall.

After we dropped that stuff back off at the graveyard, I headed home for a quiet night to myself. I finally picked up a bit in the kitchen after smoking all of that cheese. Then I ate some of the beef that was leftover from our night out a couple weeks ago before getting on the treadmill for a bit. I didn’t feel super great, so I stopped a little under two miles and came inside to go to bed.

Tell me it’s Jason Bourne without telling me it’s Jason Bourne.

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Taco Threesday

I didn’t want to get out of bed this morning, and ended up going off routine. I made it to work a couple minutes early to little fanfare, and tried to find some work to do. Brody came around for some help, which kept me busy for a large part of my day again. I did go by Oakland for a little bit, but even that was a pretty quick in-and-out.

I almost didn’t go to lunch, but the guys chose Taco John’s and I couldn’t pass up a meal under $3. I felt pretty satisfied after that, too. The afternoon was uneventful, and I ended up killing some some until my Google user research call. That was kind of interesting, but not really as fun as I thought it could have been. I would have hoped for more insider information, but there was nothing really groundbreaking.

As I left, Eaddie called and asked me to pick her up. I had to go by Oakland for a few things anyway, so it worked out. Evidently the autism room had a kid rip the SMART board off of the wall, so we’ll have to figure something out for that tomorrow.

We didn’t spend much time at my house. I vacuum sealed some of the shredded cheese, and then we left for Summer’s. I picked up another taco along the way, and then ate it along with some more leftover double decker tacos once we got to the house. Autumn was out late at some wrestling event, and then it was a quiet evening until an early bedtime.

Increasingly elaborate tortilla sandwiches…

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Super Cheesy

It was a crisp sort of frosty this morning, lugging my cheeses back home for smoking in the evening. I made it in to work without event, but Gary messaged to say he would be out for a few days after slipping on ice and breaking his arm. It was pretty quiet, otherwise. Thomas sounded significantly better, and said he was finally nearing normal.

I spent a large portion of the day finishing up some work for CPPC, between helping Brody with random things. I thought I’d make it to Oakland at some point, but I never did.

Zach, Thomas, and I went to Arby’s for lunch. I had thought to myself recently that it had been a while since we’d eaten there, so it was a treat. Their new Brisket, Bacon, ‘n Beef Dip was awesome, and then Zach bought us all turnovers for dessert.

When we got back, I printed off some copies of the CPPC email and changed policies, and walked them over to Transportation, as well as all the way out to the bus barn for the drivers less likely to read their email. The rest of the afternoon just got quieter and quieter until quitting time.

As soon as I got home, I rushed to get things ready to smoke my cheese. I did some quick research, sliced up all of my big blocks, and loaded them onto a metal rack to stick in the grill. My A-Maze-N Tube Smoker lit off like a champ, and we were off to the races.

I stuck around for about an hour and flipped the cheeses, then went to Taco Bell to pick up dinner. I video called Summer while I waited in line, and then made it home to eat. I flipped the cheese some more, then did a couple miles on the treadmill before coming back in to finish things up.

It took me a bit to get the vacuum sealing right, but I was pretty pleased with the results. All of the cheeses looked pretty good, but I won’t know until at least the end of the week how good they really turned out. They’ve got to rest a bit while they’re all wrapped up, so the smokey flavor mellows out. I did sneak a couple pinches of the shredded cheese though, and it was pretty good.

Sucks to suck.

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Mush Fry

Today didn’t manifest much. The girls got up and went home. I ate some leftovers and eventually took a shower. Then I met Summer at Walmart to pick up some groceries and walk around a bit. I bought a ton of cheese to try my hand at cold smoking it, so I’m excited for that. I also got a bunch of stuff to make smoked queso on the grill.

I picked up a taco on the way up to Summer’s house, then started prepping veggies for stir fry for dinner. I kept forgetting ingredients, so by the time everything made it into the wok, the broccoli and cauliflower was had all turned to mush. At least it tasted okay.

I was bored the rest of the night, and spent a little time cleaning up some email before bed. Weekends just aren’t what they used to be.

Damn, they got me with the more expensive quart jug.

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Gossip Grill

I woke up at one point this morning and thought I would be up for good, but then slipped back into a deep sleep for a couple more hours. I felt pretty good after that, but woke up to Eaddie in the doorway, talking at hyperspeed after pulling an all-nighter with friends. It didn’t take very long for her to slow down to a crawl after Summer left for the gym though.

I grilled some leftover cheddar jalapeño sausages for us for lunch, which took quite a bit longer than I expected over a single burner on the grill turned up to high. It probably would have heated up a lot more with extra burners on, but I just figured one should be enough.

The rest of the day was pretty well burned up as Eaddie eventually passed out. I let her sleep for a while, but eventually had to get her home. We stopped at Walmart for a pork loin, as well as some shrimp, a salmon fillet, and asparagus on a whim. Summer made some butternut squash and fried potatoes at home, and I grilled the rest for a big dinner.

The girls finished up some chores, and then it was really early to bed. I was just happy to be tired after sleeping in so late.

What a gas!

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Helton John

We got up and around this morning, I took a shower, and we went to Sam’s for lunch. I knew immediately that I had eaten too much, even though the fish and chicken were both much smaller cuts than usual. Summer and Eaddie went on to their houses while I went back home to get ready for our trip to Little Rock.

I worked up a headache bad enough to take some medicine. Summer said she encountered some attitude with Autumn that ended in her being told to leave the house, and Summer and Eaddie coming back to my house. Eaddie just hung out there while Summer and I went to pick up Suzanne and Trent.

We made it to Conway and stopped for a carwash. Then we went straight to The Butchershop for dinner. I was still pretty full from lunch, and also could not get comfortable in the booth where we were seated, so I was just super uncomfortable the entire time.

After we ate and packed our leftovers, we headed to the arena and parked right up front in one of the main lots. Then we had to walk around the building to find the end of the line until the doors opened. We spotted Wesley and Cindy, as well as Ben from Oakland as the line folded on itself. Some girl cut in front of us in the line, which was pretty pointless on account of how fast the line eventually started moving. It really burned Summer up, but she wasn’t willing to do anything about it either. Next time we just need to bring some pigs blood or something to throw at people like that.

We were sat dead center at the opposite end of the arena to the stage, which made for a great view of the lighting and projections. I knew exactly which songs I thought I would know, and a good time was had by all. Evidently Elton John does not walk across the stage. He rides his piano wherever he wants to go. I thought it would have made a really cool trick, but it seemed like he literally only used it for transportation.

It took us forever to get moving once we got back to the car. We ended up hopping a curb and getting right out after a while. Then it was a quick drive home and quickly to bed.

My favorite was the song about “Who’s the boss?” Hold me closer, Tony Danza!