Tag: #Food

  • ODDS and ENDS: I Hate Fractions, Breakfast Memories, and I Have a Problem…

    ODDS and ENDS: I Hate Fractions, Breakfast Memories, and I Have a Problem…

    (Three is a magic number…)

    Fractions suck. They have sucked since I was first introduced to them back in 5th grade, and to this day, they are still sucking away. I know that their suckage has continued because my daughter came home with math homework that was nothing but stupid word problem fraction questions. “It takes 1 3/4 cups of flour to make a batch of cookies. Dave wants to make 4 1/8 batches of cookies. If Dave has 8 2/3 cups of flour, how much flour will he have left over after he bakes his cookies?” Honestly, who gives a shit. Why aren’t they teaching kids to convert the fractions to decimals, because the world runs on decimals. Lucky for the kid, she didn’t inherit her father’s useless mathematical mind, and at least can handle it better that I did.

    This morning, as I was waking up the kid, and getting breakfast started, a memory shock-shot into my head. I returned to being four or five years old, sitting at the kitchen table eating Franken Berry cereal, watching my mother in her old yellow robe whisk and glide around the kitchen make school lunches for my brothers. There was a radio on top of the refrigerator that was playing “Fun, Fun, Fun.” I was trying to follow the lyric, but was confused. “What’s a T-bird?” I asked my mom. “It’s a car,” she said. “Why does the dad take it away?” “She got in trouble.” This was all confusing to me.

    I’m addicted to my phone, and it’s becoming a problem. Sure, a little of it has to do with doom scrolling because of all the news of late. Yet, I know that I am spending too much time on my phone. I lost a half hour just now, looking a videos of people signing about how awful musical theatre is. Like, I need to wrap up my writing this morning, and get to my chores… but I had to see if there were any new ICE videos. Now I feel like I am behind, and the day is slipping away. I have to put it down. I have to stop. I have to do better and more constructive things with my time. Like come up with a good button to end this piece…

  • ODDS and ENDS: It’s Cold, Life with an Oxford Shirt, and Yellow Cake

    ODDS and ENDS: It’s Cold, Life with an Oxford Shirt, and Yellow Cake

    (Tin Roof! Rusted!)

    It’s winter now. That was fast. Seems like last week, it was still Autumn around here. And I don’t just mean because it was Thanksgiving back on last Thursday. No, there were still colored leaves on trees. Then, this morning, it was 21 out, and all the leaves were gone. Just bare trees, and cold winds.

    My mother used to always buy me blue Oxford Cloth Button Down shirts growing up. I hated the shirt style. It seemed too formal for a kid to wear, and if you did have one on and went to school, the other kids would make fun of you – call you a nerd. Though I always had one in my closet, just in case when I need to wear a tie. When I was in college, and hated doing laundry, I started wearing the Oxford shirts again, and on some level, it felt comfortable this time around. I am sure it had everything to do with no one calling me a nerd. I kept Oxfords in the rotation when I started working professionally, as they looked smart with a tie, but also not too formal, like I wasn’t trying to dress up. Now, it’s what I want to be in all the time. Not sure what that says about me.

    Sometimes I just want a box-mix yellow cake with chocolate icing for desert. I know that yellow cake doesn’t really have a unique flavor – I think it’s vanilla, right? But right now, I really want to have that lite, spongy sheet pan of a cake. And the icing as well. That cream cheese icing with coco powder. Nothing special, or ground breaking, just solid great tasting icing that isn’t too sweet, and with a slight hint of biter chocolate. That cake feels like the best comfort food I could have right now. Maybe ice cream would be more comforting, but it’s too cold for that. No, I want right out of the over yellow cake.

  • Mom’s Out of Town! What to Eat?

    Not that this happens very often, but the wife is out of town for a work conference, which means it’s just me and the kid this week. This situation means different things to different people. For my wife, this conference is an opportunity to network, gain more knowledge, and further her career. For me, it is a little more work taking care of the kid by myself, but I am happy that I can help support my wife’s career while at the same time, I get the home office to myself, so I can work on my writing projects. For the kid, who is a little sad that mom’s not around, but she is tempering this because in her mind, she gets to eat fast food with dad. And I know that’s true because the kid said that to me last night.

    Now, let me explain…

    See, on the whole, we really don’t eat fast food in our family. We try to cook at home as much as possible, and when we don’t feel like cooking, we either order out, or go to a local restaurant. When we do eat fast food, it’s usually because we are traveling on the road and need something quick. When the kid usually gets fast food, it’s because she’s over at a friend’s home, and it turns out to be a big treat for her – in the “forbidden fruit” kind’a idea of a treat. The wife is more adamant about no fast food as compared to me, but we are both in agreement that the kid needs to have a healthy relationship with food, and she needs to know how to cook healthy for herself when she heads out on her own.

    That was a real long way to go to say that dad get her Chipotle last night. And I do really like Chipotle, it is my one weakness; if I can get it without catching any grief from the wife, I will.

    But the kid has upped the ante; She wants to try Taco Bell. And I am torn on this one. I used to eat a lot of Taco Bell when I was in college, but I didn’t eat it for flavor – I ate it because it was cheap. I am pretty sure the kid wants it because normally she would never get it, but we have good Mexican food in our neighborhood; two good restaurants, and three taco trucks. Maybe they are a little more expensive, but they taste way better!

    I know that I will cave, and I know that I will suffer for it.

  • Doomsday Dinner Preppers

    (This has nothing to do with Doomsday, or Doomsday Preppers… I just like the way the title sounded.)

    Not that anyone is keeping score, but I am a stay at home parent, and, by the way, I really do enjoy it. But that’s not what this is about.

    As the primary care giver to my daughter, that means I am the go-to guy when it comes to getting her to soccer practice after school three days a week. It’s not a huge burden, and though it can be dicey getting to practice on time, it’s a good way to spend some time with the kid. But as the primary care giver, that means when we get home, I also have to get dinner going.

    Which brings me to prepping diner for my family. I’m not talking about anything complicated here, just getting all the ingredients ready ahead of time, sometimes in small efficient containers, so when we walk in the door, I can start making it.

    I have been doing this for a couple of weeks now, and I have to say that I get such a feeling of satisfaction of sweeping into the apartment, seamlessly moving into the kitchen, beginning dinner, chatting with the wife when she’s off’a work, and having everything ready within thirty minutes, give or take. I’m like John “Hannibal” Smith – “I love it when a plan comes together!”

    (Sorry if you are looking for dinner prepping tips… I have none other than buy more small ramekins.)

    It’s having the ability to reliably and dependably provide food that my family wants, night after night. It’s about making people you care about happy. And we can sit around the table and talk and connect, and be together.

    I know that I am not breaking new ground here, but I am a little surprised at home much I have come to enjoy cutting vegetables and measuring out herbs several hours ahead of time.

    I didn’t know I had it in me.

  • ODDS and ENDS: My Head Hurts, (Place Holder), and SOUP!

    (Revved up like a deuce…)

    I didn’t sleep well last night, so I know that’s the main reason, but man, my head hurts. On a scale of 1 to 10, 1 being barely there and 10 being the worst pain imaginable, I would say I am at a 2. But the pain in behind my left eye, going up the left side of my head and ending at the back of my skull. Usually, when I get pain behind an eye, that is the red flag of a migraine. But like I said, the pain is low and that leads me to believe that this will become a dreaded migraine. In fact, it’s been years since I had one. I used to get migraines a handful of times a year, while normal headaches would happen at least once a week. You might find this hard to believe, but this would happen to me back when I was working a normal 9 to 5 job. I think it had everything to do with stress, and now I don’t live as stressful of a life, but there are still stresses.

    (Place Holder for a good idea)

    You know who loves soup? Me and my wife. You know who hates soup? My kid. You know who is willing to try any food you put in front of them, except soup? That is also my kid. I find this so confusing about her. I’ve asked her often, what is it about soup that you hate? And she just says, I don’t like soup? But she likes ramen. She loves when we make a Japanese hotpot at home. She loves getting pho. But soup. Even a normal basic chicken noodle soup, she hates. And this hatred for soup has been growing. The kid won’t touch a stew, or gumbo. My friend made a really great gazpacho the other day, and she refused to try it. The wife and I are getting a little worried as we are getting closer to Autumn, and we have soup plans. (And I realize how funny and odd that last sentence was.) There’s a clam chowder I want to make, and the wife has her eye on a couple of different French stews that she wants to try. We both found a mushroom soup recipe that we want to try, and I found a video of a Japanese vegetable soup that think would be perfect for a cool Fall lunch. I mean, we are going to move forward with the soup plans, I just really don’t want to leave the kid behind, nor turn her off to the idea of soup for the rest of her life. You know, like how people who ate too much canned tuna as a kid can never have anything with tuna in it, no matter how well prepared it is. I don’t want that to happen to the kid. But… soup. SOUP!