Life

Baby versus dog

2012-02-01T15:14:00.000-08:00

Ben had a birthday party at Fleming's. The attendees were William, me, Ben, my mom, my dad, and his fourth wife (my stepmother), Carol. Let me preface this all by saying that I really like Carol. I think she is good for my dad and has improved my relationship with him. But...she's crazy. She is an animal activist. We have mentioned several times that we wanted a dog, but her reaction each time has made us believe we would be disinherited if we got one. So near the end of Ben's birthday dinner, I felt obligated to tell her that we were seriously thinking about getting a dog. I thought it would be less likely that we would be disinherited if we mentioned it before we got a dog than after. Of course this didn't go over well.

She called me at work the following day and talked for over 30 minutes. It went something like this: "Elizabeth, let me tell you a story. Hopefully you will be able to relate it to the situation of you all getting dog because I see a lot of parallels. Shana (Carol's mentally retarded daughter who is about my age) wanted to have a baby a few years ago. She wanted it selfishly because others had babies and she thought she'd get attention if she had one. And I told her that she needed to really think about what she was thinking about doing. I told her that there was almost a 100 percent chance that any child she had would have her condition. I asked her if she didn't remember growing up how she always wished she didn't have this condition. I asked her if she really wanted to bring a baby into this world knowing that it could also have the condition. I asked her how she planned to take care of it, how she planned to afford it..."

At the end of this speech, Carol asked if I could see the parallels. I couldn't of course. First, a baby requires much more care than a dog. Second, I am not retarded. Third, I will not have a retarded dog. Fourth, I already have a child who I care for pretty well. Fifth, is this a joke? But I knew she wasn't joking. So I said, "Carol I'm not doing this selfishly. I love dogs. I grew up with them. I was an only child, just like William, and sometimes dogs were my only playmates. William needs someone to play with. So we need to either have another baby or get a dog. And babies cost 10 times more than dogs, easily. We can't afford a baby."

Then something even crazier happened. She said, "You need to have another baby then. Your dad and I will pay for private schools for them." So she is willing to pay $15,000 per year for us not to have a dog. Deal. I had my IUD removed today.

Fetus on Facebook

2012-01-18T00:35:00.000-08:00

A lot of people have put pictures of their ultrasounds on Facebook. I didn't choose to do that myself, but I am okay with it. But one of my friends, a male who is not married to his baby mama (and I don't think will be in a relationship with her), recently took it a step too far. He created an entire facebook profile as if it were the fetus. I called my best friend to tell her about this fetus' facebook page because she is much closer friends with the guy who did it. Not thirty minutes after I got off the phone with her, I received a "friend request" from this guy's fetus, granted I don't even know this guy that well. He is a nice guy and I'm not sure what is going on with him getting this girl pregnant, but I think he's gone off the deep end. Of course, I felt guilty for making fun of his actions, so I accepted the fetus' friend request. Then I called my friend back to tell her the fetus had sent me a friend request. She told me that the fetus was sending her instant messages on facebook, at which point we both just died laughing (but also felt sorry for the person.) I asked her if the fetus was messaging her "as the fetus" or as the father (our friend) because if it was messaging her as the fetus I would die. She didn't quite understand what I was saying so I gave an example of what the fetus message might say, you know, "Hey! It's me coming to you from the womb. It's dark in here but I'll be out soon! Can't wait to meet you!" That would have been too much but, luckily it was a message as the father. I really think it's great that he's excited about being a father though. I just wouldn't have chosen to show it quite that way.

Fight at Food City

2011-10-30T17:33:00.000-07:00

One of my friends just wrote a blog about her very bad day and this has been mine. I'm taking 9 graduate hours, working full time, trying to recover from shoulder surgery, and trying to make sure William and Ben get attention. Today, my shoulder has hurt worse than ever, I have been trying to work on a group project for class all day and haven't accomplished much, and trying to play with William. I didn't get in much play time so when William begged to go to the grocery store I couldn't say no even though it was late. We did our shopping and as I was walking up to the checkout some mid 20s girl literally ran up and tried to cut me off. We made a V at the checkout line so it wasn't clear who was there first. So I said to her "You know I was here first. " She rammed her cart in front of mine and walked around me to the register. I said, "You have to be kidding. I have a 3 year old who needs to bed and I can't lift more than a pound." She said, "You have no idea what kind of bad day I've had and I'll cause a scene right in front of your kid." So I pulled her cart back out and pushed mine in. The cashier first thought we were kidding but then asked the bagger to go check me out at an empty register, which he did. I have never felt so irritated or helpless. I swear if I'd had use of my right arm and William hadn't been sitting on top of the car cart (illegally), I would have punched the girl in face. What is wrong with people?

AJCC

2011-09-01T17:33:00.000-07:00

William had a great first day at the AJCC. However, a couple of hilarious things happened. First some background: 1) AJCC is a Jewish preschool 2) Ben's mom said William would be saying "Shalom"which is the only comment she made on the subject of switching William's school 3) William's teacher is a black man (Mr. Rodney) - he is awesome.

On the way home from William's first day, first he said "Mr. Rodney had a Woody." Then he said "Shalom." ROFL. Luckily they had put on his sheet that they discussed Toy Story and then William started talking about Buzz Lightyear so I knew what he meant, but still... And seeing a Jewish looking curly-headed 3 year old who is actually Catholic say "Shalom" has to be one of the funniest things I have ever seen/heard.

P.S.
I just discovered that William's teacher is also a professional wrestler which is cool with me. When I told my mom, she told me that Grandma Rolen (not really my grandma but the woman who took care of me when I was little) was also a wrestler. In Montana. Just when you think things can't get any weirder... Oh, and Rodney's wrestler name is Menace - The Blackanese Assassin. Good thing I appreciate weirdness :).

I'm going to have a nervous breakdown

2011-08-26T08:18:00.000-07:00

Something's gotta give. This week has been a real try on my sanity. I have been in pain with my torn rotator cuff and dislocated biceps tendon. I still have plantar faciitis in my left foot and now my left knee is giving me problems. My work situation is terrible because I haven't been able to get through to my supervisor and have been retaliated against for trying to do the right thing. The work itself has caused stress because one report I did affected people's livelihoods, even impacting some friends. William started preschool and his best friends are not in his class. He's been bullied, he's not getting naps, and comes home and cries every day. I'm taking 9 hours of classes in addition to my full-time job and family, but I consider it necessary because I need to leave my job asap. I've had several friends with their own crises, one of whom has pancreatic cancer. I have and have always had an anxiety disorder. Generally, I manage it with medication when it gets out of hand, but I'm afraid to take anxiety medication on top of hydrocodone for my shoulder pain. Today, I scheduled an appointment with a psychologist because I am really under an incredible amount of stress. I went to start the truck (I was already late) and the batteries were dead. Our house is on the market but not selling and I have always had a problem believing every house we've lived in has foundation problems (probably due to my anxiety disorder). In one house I was convinced the roof was going to fall in. I noticed today that our front columns have separated from the porch roof, so of course I immediately assumed it was foundation related. My blood pressure is up and I can't sleep for worry or physical pain. I have a somewhat unsupportive family and I'm an only child. In summary, I have a psychiatric disorder anyway which is being severely aggravated by a series of stressors. If it weren't for an incredibly supportive husband, a loving child, and some understanding friends I don't know if I could take it.

33 has not been great so far...

2011-07-26T19:48:00.000-07:00

Sunday, July 24th, I turned 33 years old. I spent the day driving to a conference in Lexington, KY that, it turns out, I was not registered for and had to pay for myself. I will get reimbursed but still... My hotel and UT car had been taken care of but not the conference registration. The car was another issue. The right armrest was not long enough for my right arm to reach when I had the seat pulled up in order to drive it. This normally wouldn't be a problem but because I have this torn rotator cuff in my right shoulder combined with recurrent subluxation, my right arm just sort of hung most of the drive up and when I got here I was in almost unbearable pain. When I checked into the hotel I discovered I had gotten the room right next to the elevators and ice machine, making it quite noisy. Then I had to leave after I finally did register to go to Rite Aid and get Advil and Icy Hot for this terrible pain. I seriously considered buying an arm sling but it was $30 and I didn't want to deal with all kinds of questions about it. I have already gotten questions about my tennis shoes (which I've been wearing with my dresses). I have been wearing them for the past two months with orthotic inserts due to another terribly painful condition called plantar fasciitis. Luckily today the woman who said something about the shoes understood because her husband, a marathon runner, also had plantar fasciitis. Tonight I came straight back to my room at 5:30 because I had forgotten to put the Advil in my purse and was again having shoulder pain. I ordered a pizza from Papa John's and when I got to my room and opened it it was separated completely into two halves. When I pushed them back together it was clear they were from two different pizzas because the pepperoni didn't line up at all. So I ate a pop tart and fell asleep from 7-9pm. Also, it's all over the news that there are bedbugs all over UK's campus, which is where the conference is held. When I came up here last year we ended up getting bedbugs and having to spend $1,000 to treat them plus take time off work etc. We had already concluded that this hotel (where I'm staying again) must be where we got them last year because it was the only place we traveled to around the bedbug event. If we get them again I'll flip out.

Knoxville is the place to be for free

2011-04-11T20:18:00.000-07:00

We had a wonderful weekend this weekend as a result of great weather and a great city. First, Saturday morning around 11:30am Ben, William, and I went to the Rossini festival, courtesy of the Knoxville Opera and the City of Knoxville. The event was free but, of course, there were associated costs. We let William do this big bungee trampoline thing for $5 for 2 minutes or so and we paid $10 to have his face painted like Spider-man (which also took about 2 minutes). After those two things combined he truly believed he was Spider-man the rest of the day. As the artist was putting it on she said "the red paint can be pretty hard to remove sometimes compared to the other colors," which was great considering his entire face was covered in a red base.

But whatever... he got it all over the car and everything he touched (because he kept touching his face) and then mom and I went to an estate sale and there was this really nice light yellow fabric chair that he stuck his face in. The lady working the estate sale saw him do it and just ignored it and told him how great it was to see Spider-man at an estate sale. Ironically she was not the only person to say this to him at the estate sale. It was sort of like when I took him to Keller Bend Park one day in his Superman pajamas. I would say no one has been in that park in 10 years but William and I passed a couple in the middle of the woods and one of them said, "Alright! It's not every day you meet Superman in the woods." I really think it is because other people say this stuff that makes him believe they really view him as the character and, thus, he is the character.

I washed the red paint off at mom's house because 1) I didn't want to get it all over our house and 2) mom has kept baby oil in the shower as long as I have known her. The artist had said that if the red paint wouldn't come off baby oil would help. It actually ended up coming off pretty easily and I didn't really need the baby oil but I put it on his face anyway so he'd smell like a baby. I'm not really sure why mom wants to smell like a baby though. And it doesn't end at the baby oil. She probably has 15 bottles of baby lotion around her condo and she got really upset when she found out that Ben and I had sold some baby lotion at a garage sale we had last fall. Anyway after the paint came off William started saying he was Peter Parker.

Later Saturday we left William with mom while we went back to Rossini and ate in street on Gay Street then paid $20 to see Arthur and $15 for candy, popcorn, and a drink. That definitely wasn't free. I grew up watching the original Arthur with Dudley Moore so I wasn't expecting much. But I actually loved the movie and cried at least 3 times even though it was a comedy. I cry in movies I'm not supposed to cry in and don't cry in the ones you are supposed to cry in. Oh well.

Sunday Ben had planned on us all going to church. And I was actually planning on going because it's been awhile and I do it to support Ben. That all changed, though, when we saw the crime scene investigator outside with ALL of our neighbors. Ben lacks curiosity and had seen this out the window and didn't just immediately go out. Instead he waited until I got up and told me and I went outside having literally just stumbled out of bed. The CSI was dusting the neighbors car for fingerprints and I was getting really excited. I asked the group of neighbors that had gathered what was going on. Turns out it wasn't that interesting. Someone had broken into several cars (including our new Subaru) and taken some stuff out. And by broken in I simply mean they opened the doors of unlocked cars and ours was one of the unlocked ones. We had been to an appraisal last weekend and still had (an have at this moment) some pretty valuable stuff in the "trunk." They didn't take any of that. From what we could tell they only took a bag of change (maybe $10) and maybe some CDs that we aren't sure were in there. They took one neighbors' purse and anothers' amp. But what was really irritating is that they took all of our tulip heads. The one neighbors purse was found in the other neighbors yard with the tulip heads. I'm not really sure if that's what they're called but I'm talking about the top of the tulip (a flower). We're pretty sure they were kids. The CSI tried to subtly say he had been to our house before (when the previous owners lived here) but luckily we already knew that story.

After all the excitement we had missed church so we decided to run at Lakeshore, a wonderful free park. And later we had a wonderful picnic at the Cove at Concord Park with friends. The Cove is all around awesome. It has a great playground, you can play sand volleyball, you can swim in the lake, you can rent paddle boats, etc. And the kids all enjoyed the ducks too. One walked right up to us. I gave all the kids some of my ranch flavored Corn-nuts to give the duck. I got a little worried when the duck almost choked on the first one. I thought it wouldn't be good if the duck died right there in front of the kids and they caused his death. But he didn't die and we had a ball.

Sidebar:

As we were just sitting here Ben said, "I wonder if my dad's in the closet again." And I was thinking "What is he talking about? Was he ever "out of the closet?" Is he talking about alcoholism? Did he mean "off the wagon" and use the wrong phrase as usual?" Then I realized that he was being literal because the last two times Ben has called his dad during storms he was in the closet.

The Important Thing

2011-04-02T19:57:00.000-07:00

When William and I picked up mom this morning to go to the East Tennessee PBS benefit appraisal thing she said she only had $8. I thought she was saying she didn't have enough to get anything appraised for $5 each. But she meant she only had $8... to her name. This would upset most children but I'm used to it and I don't lend her money anymore but I did pay for her to have one item appraised and I bought her a large coke at Sonic. At the appraisal we had 5 things appraised by Case, who is supposed to be pretty good for Knoxville. Unfortunately he didn't pay much attention to our items because the people at the appraiser sitting next to him brought in a Tiffany vase that they had purchased at a local Cerebral Palsy benefit auction and it turned out to be worth $20,000. The items I brought were a huge beautiful wool rug that my grandparents had commissioned in Portugal, some bronze sconces with inlaid abalone that had been in my great, great grandparents house on Kingston Pike some 150 years ago, a silver plated tray made by Sheffield, and a fur coat that I got in college at a thrift store in Telluride, Colorado. The sconces won in value, as I expected, but still weren't as valuable as I was hoping. Either way they are hideous but made with incredible craftsmanship. They were in a flood in my aunt's basement which caused some of the abalone to separate but otherwise they were in great condition. I'll likely take them to him to auction because, while I'm quite sentimental about family heirlooms, I have so many it is ridiculous and they just sit in boxes in the garage. So hopefully whoever buys them will put them out and use them. The fur coat is actually what I was most interested in. I didn't know what kind of fur it was and I was afraid it was sheepdog. Turns out it is sheep, which is quite rare and they thought it was really cool, as do I. I used to wear it to class in college. I realize I was quite eccentric but that's why people like me (if they do).

After that we went to the First United Methodist Church thrift sale on Kingston Pike in Sequoyah Hills. Based on my experience last week at the TVUUC I was really excited about this. Unfortunately it was a total bust. As a side note I had gone to a yard sale in my neighborhood at 8am and Ben, William, and I had gone to one last night- nothing purchased at any of them. Then it was time for lunch and mom wanted to stop by her house and get barbecue sauce. When she came out she was carrying this:

Here's a close up:

I hope you can see the dirt on the side. Also notice that due to the way the saran wrap is put on, it is dried out. Oh it's jello salad. With pecans. She tried to force each one of us to eat some.

Then we went to look at a house off Alcoa Highway that I would love to buy. Before we went though, we had to go back by her house to get the keys to her office, then by her office to try to update her key. Of course it would not update (likely due to nonpayment or possibly due to technology retardation) so we had to call the eKey company and get a manual update. I want the house. It was just reduced from $325k to $175k. It's right next door to Johnny Majors and on a peninsula surrounded by the Tennessee River. And it's over 3,000 sq. ft. with 2 acres and all brick.

On the way back we stopped at a Pilot to go to the potty. And mom bought an Icee, I guess with her $8 life savings. Then she gave it to William and this happened, in our new car:

It's hard to tell from the picture but the entire Icee spilled on my vest and in the floorboard of the car. That cup has nothing to due with the Icee but it is something mom brought into the car. Then we took mom home for two hours before she was to keep William for our date night. We took him back at 5:30 because her car wouldn't start. It hasn't started on its own for about the past month or two so she calls friends or us or uses this battery thing we lent her. Sometimes, if she has to go somewhere like to meet people for lunch, she leaves it running for hours at a time just so she won't have to jump it. Then when we returned to pick William up after our date (which consisted of dinner at Taste of Thai and a trip to Kroger but it was very nice nonetheless), this is what we found:

Toys that, upon clean up, I discovered were mixed with dead bird feathers because under the chest to the upper left corner is the cat's graveyard for his kills.

I bought this head for mom for $2.25 a few weeks ago but I think it's interesting that she has located him on the back of the toilet.

This shadow box contains real human hair (60+ years old- mom's first haircut) and a volcanic rock that my grandmother brought back from Hawaii.

Notice the open cabinet and open drawer.

Overall though, William had fun at Grandma's which is the important thing. And he's still alive.

The Serenity Prayer

2011-03-30T19:44:00.000-07:00

God grant me the serenity
to accept the things I cannot change;
courage to change the things I can;
and wisdom to know the difference.

I'm not religious. But I've been through a religious phase during which I was obsessed with the serenity prayer. I carried it around on my keychain and had it up in my dorm room. I think the reason I liked it was because I lack serenity. I was thinking about it tonight after I became almost overwhelmed with frustration at not being able to change a couple of things that I believe need changing. I started thinking about how I needed to calm down before I do something I'll regret. Likely I will do something I'll regret. Screw serenity. I cannot accept the things I cannot change maybe because I also don't have the wisdom to know the difference... or maybe it's because I can change them. I hope it's the latter.

I'm an American Picker

2011-03-27T19:24:00.000-07:00

This weekend I went to a Seven Seas Estate Sale in Clinton, TN with Joel and Kristin Friday night and to the most incredible rummage sale ever on Saturday at the Tennessee Valley Unitarian Universalist Church. I bought 3 items at the Seven Seas sale, which Joel believed I intended to resell but I did not. I bought a board game from 1968 called Dynamite Shack where players wear super huge thumbs and try to pick up dynamite sticks and put it into this shack before the roof blows off. It can be worth around $60 and mine has all the pieces but I didn't buy this one to sell.

The game still works perfectly and, needless to say, William LOVES it. He loves any game and anything that scares/shocks you. At the Seven Seas sale I also bought "The Girl Who Played with Fire" for a dollar and a UT troll to put on my desk at work along with my buddha, my desktop Dwight, and the Sunsphere. ($5 total at Seven Seas) Overall, though, I was a little disappointed with the estate sale.

Saturday, however, I struck gold at the TVUUC rummage sale. I went crazy. I bought an oriental runner rug for $2,

I had honestly been looking for one and couldn't find one that I liked and they were all around $150 so $2 was doable.

I also bought a 1988 pink Barbie RV for $2, two early 1990s Easy Bake Ovens for $1.50 each, a working 8 track and record player for $5, a Schwinn Bantam girl's bike from the 1960s or 1970s with training wheels for $15, and a really awesome motorcycle toy for William for $2, and an awesome wooden kids table with two chairs for $5 for the set. The total for my first trip was $34.

Then I took the Barbie RV, one of the easy bake ovens, the thing that is evading my mind right now directly to Nostalgia on the way home. Then Ben asked why I didn't put the 8 track/record player out and I realized I had left it at the TVUUC after paying. We went back and they still had it, thank God!

After dropping Ben and William home, I went back to the TVUUC at noon because they had 50% off from noon to 2pm and they had a huge box of wooden Thomas the Train trains and tracks and other stuff that was marked $50 (which would have been a deal) but I thought $25 would be more reasonable. It wasn't there when I returned but there were plenty of things I still wanted. I bought soccer cleats for William for $0.25, really phallic looking iron andirons for $3.75, a framed and really cool New York poster for $1.50, a 12" bike to replace William's or resell for $5, a really cool pillow made from a wool oriental rug for $1.50, an old Radio Flyer ride on toy for $1, and a shredder for $0.50 (which I plugged in and tested with a couple of pieces of paper at the church- and we had honestly been thinking of getting one of these recently too). The total was $12.25 because I think they miscalculated by a dollar or so AND they threw in a free Tremont (GSMNP) coffee mug. Then I went back to Nostalgia to put out the andirons, poster, pillow, 8 track/ record player, and the old Radio Flyer ride on toy and the Barbie RV had already sold for more than 10 times what I paid for it!

Today I sold the Schwinn Bike for $60 (I had listed it on Craigslist for $75). I have also listed the kids table and chairs and the kids bike on Craigslist.

I'm pretty excited about the purchases but there were several other things I should have bought to resell including an antique Raleigh bike in great condition for $17.50 (likely worth $300+), two girls bikes with training wheels for $2.50 each, two high quality jogging strollers, a pack and play, a very nice huge custom high (thick) pile rug, 5 or 6 car seats for $1-$2.50 each, a huge custom abstract original oil painting, and possibly a nice pre-lit Christmas tree.

Money Thieves

2011-03-26T17:33:00.000-07:00

This week a series of events have occurred making me think people are out to get my money.

First, we went to do our taxes. I know you are thinking, yes, the Internal Revenue Service IS out to get your money. But that’s not the case here- or I guess they are but that’s not who I’m referring to. The Mattress Outlet is trying to get my money. Here’s why: I won a mattress and box springs set supposedly valued at $1,000 from B97.5 in December. Before we went to get our voucher we looked up the mattresses online on The Mattress Outlet’s website to make sure it was really worth it (which we thought it would be because we had just had bedbugs and needed a new mattress anyway so it was almost like fate). Online The Mattress Outlet listed that mattress set around $500. Still winning something we needed valued at $500 is a pretty good deal. So we went to get our voucher from B97.5 so we could go redeem it for our mattress set and they made me fill out a 1099, which stated the prize value at $1,000. I considered at that moment not accepting it and told them that the mattress set is not worth $1,000 and told them how I had looked it up on the website. They said I didn’t have to accept the winning but I did anyway. But then when we went to The Mattress Outlet, sure enough the tag on the bed said $500 (what it was selling for to the public) so I had Ben take a picture of it in case they did actually send us a 1099, which they did at $1,000. So when we went to do our taxes our tax lady was horrified but came up with an inventive solution that may or may not be okay- BUT WE DO HAVE PICTURE EVIDENCE OF THE MATTRESS OUTLET’S PRICE and I’m not paying their tax. My guess would be that The Mattress OUTLET has never sold that mattress set at that price because they are an OUTLET and the price listed was retail.

Second, I went the doctor a few weeks ago to have a procedure (no, it was not a cosmetic procedure). Anyway I had to pay $500 at the office which I did because I needed the procedure and thought I just had crappy insurance (which just changed in January). But then we received a “Statement of Benefits” from BCBST stating that they had covered the entire $2,000 procedure. Let me just pique your curiosity by saying that it was in the benefit of the insurance company to let me have this procedure. Anyway, I called the doctor’s office and the insurance lady said they hadn’t received payment from the insurance company but assured me that when they did, if it paid she would let me know and I would receive a refund. Fast forward and another week or two has passed and she hadn’t called. So I called back today and sure enough, the insurance had paid and she said she would be sending a $450 refund to me. But then she said it wouldn’t be until the end of the next billing cycle which is at the end of next month and there is something to be said for the time value of money.

Third, we bought a new car on Saturday, March 5 and traded in my Mercedes. I still owed a tiny bit to Mercedes BenzFinancial (MBF) but they couldn’t determine exactly how much because it was Saturday. To complicate matters I knew I had an automatic withdrawal payment of $400 coming out Monday, March 7 which I couldn’t change. So we decided to guess at the payoff and we guessed $1,200 which we knew was close. So that’s what they valued our payoff at when we did our car deal- in writing. I specifically told them I had a payment coming out Monday which would create an overpayment and they specifically told me MBF would then refund me the overpayment. So today I finally called MBF because I hadn’t received my $300 overpayment (they payoff was actually $1,300 on the date of our trade). The lady at MBF was very helpful and she said “Hmm, that’s strange.” Then she put me on hold while she went to discuss it with her supervisor. It turned out that MBF keeps meticulous records and they told me that Grayson had called AFTER my payment on the 7th to get a payoff quote. Then they only remitted that amount ($900) to MBF to get the title rather than the $1,200 we had agreed on. Goddamn Motherfuckers. So I called and said I wanted to speak to the finance manager immediately and held until he became available. He tried some song and dance about how that was an estimate of my payoff, etc. So what if I had told you my payoff was $100 when it was actually $900? You better believe you’d be coming back to me for the balance. Finally he agreed that he owed me $300 but told me it would be a month or so because they had to get the title, process the payment etc. And those Goddamn Motherfuckers didn’t send their portion of the payment in until Thursday, March 10 accruing (although slight) additional interest.

Roller Coaster of Luck

2011-01-20T10:04:00.000-08:00

Several crazy things have happened to us in the past month or two. It's been like a roller coaster of bad and good luck.

First, we had bedbugs that cost $1,000 to treat.
Then I won a mattress and boxspring set from B97.5 valued at $1,000.
Then Ben got three free tickets to Jay Leno for our trip to L.A.
Then our pipes burst twice in one week but we found a great, cheap plumber.
Then we got 2 free lower level tickets to the UT-Florida basketball game and the UT-Vandy game, which Ben would have paid a significant amount for.
Then I got a parking ticket in Circle Park.
I appealed it and it was reversed (which never happens at UT).
Then the Tennessee State Board of Accountancy called and said they would not accept 33 CPE hours of the 80 hours I submitted to reactivate my CPA license.
I appealed and they decided to allow those hours and reactivate my license which I assume rarely happens but definitely should have happened in my case.

Hopefully Lady Luck will be on our side from now on. I'm going to a Goodwill in L.A. today and plan to find a treasure.

The Day the Pipes Burst continued...

2011-01-13T19:59:00.000-08:00

To continue...

Since we had no water after the pipes burst we had to stay with mom. Here are some of the things that happened there.

I kept getting tripped up on something the whole time I was in the bedrooms, the bathroom, or the hall but I couldn't see it. Finally, Ben said, "What am I getting caught in? I can't see it." So I knew I wasn't crazy and I began to investigate it further. I reached down to feel the thing and followed it to its source. It was fishing line and it was literally all over the house. Ben asked mom why she had fishing line and told her we were getting all caught in it and she said, "Oh! I have been getting caught in something too!" There's no telling how long she had been stringing the stuff around because it was everywhere.

Mom offered to make chili for dinner but needed us to get beef. She asked Ben to get ground chuck to which he replied he would get ground round because "Elizabeth won't eat it if she sees how fatty it is." I said, "I know that ground chuck is fatty. I don't care what you get because I won't eat it anyway." When we were going to the store Ben said, "What else does she put in her chili?" He wanted to know this because, like me, he has learned not to trust anything she serves because there's just no telling how long she's had the stuff. Around 2008 we found a sausage in her freezer that had expired in 1994 and she defended serving it. We believe it had even moved houses with her- maybe even twice. But like I told Ben, even if all the ingredients were new, I still wouldn't eat it because her dishes are never clean. And I mean they are REALLY dirty. Ben laughed it off but when we returned and she started making it she was using the same pan that she had used that morning for eggs. I heard Ben in the kitchen say to her, "Are you sure that chili is going to fit in that pan?" This was cracking me up because I knew he had seen the dirty pan and was trying to get her to change to another, hopefully cleaner, one. He came out. looking frightened, and said to me, "Do you know what she was trying to cook the chili in? The skillet she used for eggs this morning." I laughed and said I told him so. He said, "No. It's not just that it was dirty. She did try to clean it but there were still little brown bits of egg all over it. But that's not even the problem. It was a skillet. The beef wouldn't have even fit in it, much less all of the other ingredients." Of course needless to say Ben checked before bed and she had left the eye of the stove on, a recurring problem.

I'm tired again so I'll stop here but I'll more to this one later.

The Day the Pipes Burst

2011-01-12T18:53:00.000-08:00

Let's start at the beginning. I felt terrible Sunday and was in bed taking a nap when Ben started screaming, "Get William!" then ran out of the house. I had no idea what was going on for a few minutes 1) because I had been dead asleep and 2) because no one told me. This part is still sort of blurry but at some point I wandered to the staircase where the door was open leading to the basement and saw a river spewing out near the ceiling right between the basement and garage. Then I woke up. The pipes had burst. Ben came running back in and out of the house for the next few minutes asking where to turn the water off and screaming while I was frantically on the phone dialing information for Roto Rooter. Roto Rooter was all booked and had no one available for emergencies which for some reason gave me some solace that we weren't the only ones going through this emergency. So then I tried to get on the computer but somehow couldn't find a good central location for plumbers. I ran around the house like a chicken with its head cut off looking for a phone book and found one more quickly than I would have imagined. I called Mr. Rooter whose number had been disconnected and Cedar Bluff plumbing who evidently didn't have weekend emergency service. Then I called some random company called HEP that had taken out a full page ad in the phone book (making them legitimate in my eyes at the time) advertising emergency service and they did have someone available. That someone turned out to be Ralf. Now before I continue I want to preface this with several things...I do not discriminate, especially against Mexicans because I love them and would move to Mexico in a heartbeat. But I seriously doubt that Ralf was a licensed plumber if he was even a legal citizen. I also think he may have been retarded. I don't know how to put it delicately- he seemed retarded. Ben also told me later that Ralf had spelled my name "Alizabeth" and that is how it would be spelled alliteratively. Ralf knew less about plumbing than I did and he said it would cost us $300 just to cap the fucking pipe until someone could come out and fix it for an additional fee that we assumed would be considerably more than an additional $300 later. I could go on and on here about how I ended up submitting a complaint on them to the Better Business Bureau but as I was telling one of my coworkers about this today she asked me who the company was and I said HEP and she said she sees their commercials all the time and proceeded to google it. See for yourself- it will tell you a little something about the company:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-gp5S0MNJBk

If I had seen this before I called I would not have even used them despite our desparate situation. In the meantime Ben finally ran next door to our neighbors house and luckily he was home and saved the day. He knew where to turn the water off at the street, he had a wrench to turn it off when it was stuck, and he had a wet vac to vacuum up all the water. All of a sudden after I called all the plumbers I remembered that the first thing Ben had screamed was "Get William" and I hadn't seen William for the past 15 minutes or so. When I finally regained consciousness I started screaming for William and couldn't find him anywhere. When I finally found him he was under his bed playing some sick joke on me. I'm going to pause here because this story isn't half over but I'm tired and the second part has to do with staying with my mom since we didn't have any water and, if you know me, you know that's an even better story. Let me also say here though that we came back to the house to meet another plumber on Monday (the next day) and as soon as we got home Ben went down and started trying to tear all the drywall off the wall. I told him to just wait for the plumber because we might not have to do all that. Sure enough he ruined part of the wall for no reason. Luckily, however, he was not strong enough to break through most of the drywall. I should stop making fun of him though because today is his 30th birthday and I love him.

The Holidays and The Dentist

2010-12-29T19:47:00.000-08:00

This Christmas break William had a BALL. He racked up on Christmas presents and he's had more playdates this week than in his entire life. Christmas Eve he played with Natalia, one of his best friends from school, and her sister Anna at church. They were extremely loud and normally would have been disruptive but because it was the Christmas Eve Children's Mass, there were other children acting even worse. When they were up at the front of the church listening to the homily one little girl tore apart branches of a giant poinsettia (belonging to the church) and began beating her brother with it.

We went straight from church to mom's for Christmas Eve dinner. When we got there she had almost burned the house down with mushrooms. She forgot them and they caught on fire and left a soot mark all the way to ceiling and all over the kitchen cabinets. Ben spent 30 minutes cleaning before guests arrived. The guests were Ginger and Vaughn, Katherine and John, and their 4 children (Colin, 7, Kylie, 3, the twins Kenzie and Katie, age 14 months). This is a much smaller number than normal and was a little depressing. But William had a great time tackling Colin and Kylie...

Then there was Christmas Day. William loved his presents from Santa (and he got plenty). We went to Copper Cellar for brunch with mom and just the 3 of us went to Calhoun's on Bearden Hill for dinner. Pictured (above, I think- I really need to learn to format this blog) is William's favorite gift (which he requested from Santa).

The day after Christmas we had a playdate with John Thomas and Kate where William discovered his love of the frenzied game "Hungry Hungry Hippo." They gave him a gift and we didn't have anything for them. Fail #1.

Then I had a dentist appointment that afternoon for the first time in at least 4 years and probably more. It was just for a cleaning but I was so nervous I had to take an Alprazolam. I picked some random dentist on Ben's United Health Care dental plan because my former dentist wasn't listed. I should have known that if I could make an appointment less than a week out, this dentist wasn't first class. There were many things that disturbed me. First, was the waiting room. It had very thick burgundy carpet, furniture from 1980s Walmart, and it smelled heavily of goofy gas. But for some reason the thing that disturbed me the most about the waiting room was the fish tank. I didn't notice it at first but I unknowingly sat right next to it. I saw something move out of the corner of my eye. It was those damn sucker fish (I don't know what they're really called) but there were 4 of them all lined up sucking on the front of the tank with their toothless mouths. It just didn't seem appropriate for a dentist office.

Anyway, I filled out my forms, HIPAA and all and was taken back immediately. I had my x-rays, which I feel like is some kind of a scam since I came in for a teeth cleaning, and was escorted back to my chair. Again, I don't know about other dentists since it has been so long, but this one was set up like a hair salon with all the chairs out in the open. I thought it must be a HIPAA violation. I became anxious when I realized that my appointment was late in the day (3:30pm) and this didn't look like the most sanitary place so I was concerned that my dental instruments might have been used on someone else. The whole time the girl was cleaning my teeth she kept saying what a perfectionist she was about cleaning teeth (literally like 4 times) but it didn't take her very long and I think she completely forgot or missed the back of my teeth. I didn't have that great feeling you normally do when you leave the dentist and rub your tongue over your squeaky smooth teeth. After the cleaning she took me to meet with the dentist, except that was actually just back in the x-ray chair. Somehow I didn't notice it before but the hygienist was about 2 heads shorter than me... and I'm 5'4". I'm not saying anything about midgets, just that it's weird I didn't notice her height before. Another weird thing that I forgot to mention is that she kept talking about her pet pig and had a picture of it displayed prominently at her station. In the x-ray chair, the dentist came over poked about 4 teeth and said "No cavities" then walked away with no directions or anything. Luckily some other hygienist saw it and directed me out the door. As for the overall condition of my teeth- I have never had a cavity which, the hygienist told me, is likely because I produce an excessive amount of saliva. My mom told me it was because they had my teeth painted when I was young. I don't know what that means. But if it is the saliva thing, William likely won't have any cavities either.

I rushed home and we left immediately for another playdate with Natalia at her house. Of course they too had a present for William and we had nothing for their girls. Fail #2. I think this was the best playdate ever. The kids had a ball, Natalia's parents are hilarious, and we had some of the best food ever- Polish chicken soup (which actually has almost no chicken in it) and Polish cabbage rolls. They had also bought dinosaur chicken nuggets for William.

The next morning (yesterday) we met my college friend Betsy at the mall playground for a playdate. She has two adorable kids (a 1.5 year old boy and a 4 month old girl). William and Logan didn't really play together but they seemed to like each other. Betsy and I got to catch up and I just love her. We also went to Chick-fil-A and William sat in his seat the whole time and ate his whole meal. It was amazing.

Then last night some of my high school friends and I got together with our spouses/others and kids at one of their houses. It was hilarious. Someone brought pictures from middle school dances, one of which I looked like Blossom- I was dressed in a denim hat, a denim shirt, and jeans. We had 10 adults and 5 kids (a 4 year old, a 3 year old, a 2 year old, a 1 year old, and an 8 month old).

Today we didn't have a technical playdate but we went to Taste of Thai with Ben's family for lunch so William got to run around with his little cousins (1 and 3 years old). Tomorrow we're going to Nashville where we have a playdate tomorrow night with Drew, who is William's exact age, and Friday he'll have a playdate with 1 year old Clara Grace, my goddaughter. He's also been invited for a playdate Tuesday.

Tourette Syndrome

2010-12-06T19:13:00.000-08:00

I think I may have Tourette Syndrome. Or maybe my actions today are the result of stopping bad habits that are stress relieving, being premenstrual, and lacking sleep all at the same time. Either way today was not the day to cross me. It really started just after lunch when I remembered what someone told me this weekend about the ETSU Child Study Center (the equivalent of UT's Early Learning Center, where we pay a fortune for William to go). This woman had a 2.5 year old the same age as William and said their child center only closed one day over Spring Break. So I decided to get on their website to research. Of course the first thing I noticed was their rates were lower than the almost $800 per month that we have paid for the past 2.5 years, but that could be a cost of living difference. Their closing schedule wasn't online so I called the Director and she answered. What's important about the fact that she answered is that I've called the Director of the UT ELC 3 times lately and can't get him (his voicemail is even full). Then I asked her if she could send me their closing schedule and asked her when they closed. She said they closed for state holidays, the week between Christmas and New Year's, and 1-3 in-service days per year. Sounds like a lot, right? State holidays + week around Christmas is about 14 days (and the UT ELC closes all of those times too). Here's what really set me off though. ETSU Center is closed 1 to 3 days for in-service per year. UT ELC is closed 14 days for in-service per year IN ADDITION TO the 14 days for holidays and administrative closing mentioned. Below is my email to Sean, the Director of the Early Learning Center, and the object of my initial wrath today:

Hi Sean,

I am writing because I am upset with the current closing schedule of the ELC. For example, Fall Break (2 days), Spring Break (5 days), January 3^rd and 4^th (2 days), 5 days in August, (a total of at least 14 days). I think this is entirely too much “in-service.” Additionally, I don’t think there is much in-service going on the days specified above. Staff members are not off on these days, requiring us to take leave or pay someone for babysitting. The reason I believe there is not much in-service is because I had to pay one of my son’s teachers to babysit in our house one of the days over Fall Break. Even if there is in-service it is unnecessary to have that much. Staff members, including ELC staff members, should not be off on these days- they are not faculty. Additionally, the Child Study Center at ETSU is only closed for the regular state holidays, one week at Christmas, and between 1 and 3 days for in-service. Their program is also less expensive. Although, I am not pleased with the increased costs at the ELC, I could bear it if we were getting value from our service. The University of Kentucky affiliated “Early Learning Center” is less expensive, open 6:30am to 6:30pm and has considerably fewer closing days. UK and ETSU are the only two I have looked at so far but I think something needs to change and I will look into other comparable programs and give a presentation about it. You might not be able to control the costs, although as an internal auditor I believe there is always room for improvement in that area, but you can control the “in-service” days off. Thanks for your response.

Elizabeth H. Hall

Audit and Consulting Services

The University of Tennessee

149 Conference Center Building

865-974-0869 phone

865-974-6171 fax

I was worked up the rest of the day over this, subsequently forwarding my email to 3 other people.

Then I picked William up to take him to the Bearden branch library for a Santa Sighting. This actually turned out great. The Santa was great and we were the only people there for about 10 minutes and William LOVES Santa. Most kids are scared of him but William just kept smiling at him, walking up to him, and talking to him. I think he was happy to get to talk to Santa a second time because mom took him the first time and didn't translate correctly about what he wanted for Christmas. He wants a scooter and hopscotch. Mom took him to see mall Santa (that he saw the first time) by herself and told Santa that he was saying he wanted a brother. What? Way to set him up for disappointment, mom. First, it would be physically impossible for that to happen. Second, it probably won't happen anyway. Third, that is what she wants, not William.

Then we went to the mall for dinner. We went to the mall for two reasons: 1) I don't cook and 2) Ben's mom wanted Dearfoam slippers for the 8th year in a row for Christmas and they sell them in JC Penney. One year I got her another brand (still a pair of slippers though) that was actually nice and she didn't like them. Anyway, I could easily get sidetracked here but on to wrath #2. As always, I took William with me to Auntie Anne's where I would be getting my dinner (a jalapeno pretzel with marinara sauce) while Ben went to Chic-fil-A to get William's dinner and to Subway to get his dinner. The main reason I take William is because the carousel is right next to Auntie Anne's and he literally rides it every time. Tonight, for some reason, he didn't want to ride it at first and the line to Auntie Anne's was long so we got in line. Then when I got to the front of the line, while the guy in front of me was paying, someone put their kid on the carousel, William saw and heard it, and he wanted to get on. So I ran him over and put him on then ran back to my place in line and finished my conversation with the woman behind me who I had talked to the entire time, ordered, paid, and finished getting my drink right as the carousel stopped. Here it comes...

There was some older woman (around 60) and her husband sitting at the bench right next to the carousel and as I was walking over to get William she says to me (in a very ugly tone): "You need to pay these people for half the ride. You should be ashamed of yourself." I pulled out the one dollar bill in my hand and said, "I come here all time and we ride this every time. Almost every time another child gets on and I am happy that the dollar I have already put in is being used more fully. I was going to let him ride it after I ordered anyway but since there was only one child on it (and he heard it and saw it) leaving two empty seats I put him on." I was thinking about giving the people with child 50 cents (half the cost of the ride) but then I realized she was NOT EVEN AFFILIATED with the people she was saying I should pay. Then I lost it a little bit as the other people with the child simply walked off leaving me in front of this woman. I said, "You need to mind your own business." And then I walked about twenty feet away (just past Auntie Anne's toward the food court) and something made me turn around and almost literally scream "BITCH." I don't think I've ever done anything like that in my life. It was really embarrassing. I essentially proved right there that I was, indeed, a bad mother. Either way, I think the woman's husband was really embarrassed of her behavior. I went and told Ben and couldn't let it go and kept thinking of mean things I should have said to this woman (rather than what I did say) to the point that I insisted we walk back by there on the way to JC Penney so I could finish her off. Fortunately for her, she wasn't there.

Then, after JC Penney, we went to the play area in the mall. As you might already guess, this is where rant #3 comes in. Except this time it was on somebody else's three year old. William was standing on top of this thing (like 3 feet up) and some other little 3 year old came over and pushed him. Luckily he has my superb balance and strength, and he didn't fall. Nevertheless, I got up out of my seat, looked the kid right in the eyes and said, in a mean voice I didn't even know I had, "We don't push." Ben was mortified. That is when he insisted we leave immediately because I was looking for a fight and shouldn't pick it with a 3 year old.

Ben just said, "What do you blog for if only one other person reads it? I don't even read it."

Now Ben is watching "Doogie Howser."

Bedbugs

2010-11-24T09:25:00.000-08:00

It all started about two months ago when Ben kept getting bug bites all over him. With the stories in the news about bedbugs at UT Medical Center, he was convinced we had them. I was not getting bitten and was tired of him complaining and spending hours on the internet researching bedbugs so I told him to go to the dermatologist. He went and the dermatologist told him he believed, based on the large size of the bites, that they weren't bedbug bites but instead were likely bird mites or some other kind of mite. We found this believable as we did have a bird's nest in the garage just below our bedroom. We removed the nest and Ben felt better for about a day. But then he kept getting bitten. I still showed no signs of being bitten.

We searched the bed for bedbugs several times, removing the mattresses, looking at the seams, etc., as I had been taught to do by my Hall Director training on bedbugs. We never saw any. Ben even vacuumed the bed and surrounding and saw nothing. By this time he was washing the sheets twice a week and started sleeping in the other bedroom sometimes. And he continued to get bitten and get hives.

One morning he found a bug in the bed, very tiny and red. Nothing like the pictures of bedbugs. I put it in a ziploc bag and took it to the UT Entomology department (to Dr. Karen Vail- who was the one who did my bedbug training as a Hall Director). Dr. Vail was really excited. It was still alive and she rushed it to the microscope. It was running around trying to get out of the light. It was a cimicid nymph. Meaning it wasn't yet fully developed and she couldn't really tell what it was. She went to the other room and got out this tray of dead bugs on pins, trying to identify it. She had her assistant on the internet looking up various bugs. It was a bedbug. And this is where the nightmare really begins...

We use Russell's Pest Control for our regular pest control service so we called them out to look. Sure enough they found one or two adult bedbugs and several eggs on the back of the headboard of our bed. At first they said it would be $200 per room and recommended treating at least William's room and our room and probably the guest bedroom too. I can handle $600. Then they called back and said they would have to treat the whole house and it would be $950. So I called Dr. Vail who couldn't recommend a specific pest control company but told us to get estimates. So we did...Orkin was $600 for the first room and $300 for each additional. Cooks was $1,500 for the house plus you had to buy a mattress cover FROM THEM for every bed in the house and we have 4 beds. I didn't even ask how much that would be. Then Allied came out and said it would be $350 per room but we could just do our room and William's room, so this was really the cheapest option we had at this point ($700). We choose Russell's for $950 for the whole house simply because they offered a year warranty and the other companies only offered 30-60 days.

Russell's came out Friday (Ben and I both had to take the day off work) and started bagging up every soft thing in our house for us to take to the laundromat and dry (and some to wash). Evidently drying kills the bugs. Anyway, we have a lot of stuff, and a lot of it is soft. Stuffed animals, tons of clothes, curtains, sheets, comforters, towels, etc. It was literally 500 lbs or more of stuff. The bed of our truck was overflowing with trashbags and the double cab was full too. I had to drive separately. Right before we left it was time to sign the contract. I told Ben, in front of the Russell's manager, to make sure it said we got a year warranty. He immediately says, "Oh. We don't do year warranties on bedbugs. 60 days is the max." I'm like, "We chose you because of the warranty. You were not the cheapest option. We also have our regular service through you. Call the salesman and put the warranty in the contract or leave and we'll get someone else." They had just spent two hours bagging up all this crap and we still hadn't signed the contract. So the manager calls the salesman and he confirmed that he did say it was a year warranty. (Ben had asked him like 4 times so we knew he had said it.) The manager decided to honor the warranty, we signed the contract, and off we went to the Family Bubble on Sutherland, which was recommened because it's fairly new and has free wi-fi.

I naively brought my computer like I would have any time to get on the internet. When we got there the place was full of Mexican women taking up almost all the machines, likely doing laundry for pay. Ben wanted to leave but we decided to stay and luckily they left after about 30 minutes. We spent the next 6 hours or so taking up every dryer in the place, folding sorting, re-bagging our soft stuff. My mom even came to help. I was dizzy and exhausted from being on my feet all day. It was what I imagine hell to be like.

And worse, I had posted on Craigslist that we would be having a garage sale the next morning (which Ben thought was unethical considering our bedbug problem). We had been advised to keep William out of the house for the night due to the chemicals used to treat the bedbugs. William and I went to mom's house while Ben went home and stayed up half the night putting all the stuff back where it went. I got up and left mom's house at 5:45am the next morning to get ready for the garage sale. I was already physically exhausted from the day before but got it together. And we sold lots of junk. We didn't, however, sell the problem bed (which, by the way, was the only place in the entire house they saw evidence of bedbugs...so did we really need to pay $950?). If you are interested in a queen sized leather bed, queen boxsprings, and queen mattress give me a call. I'll give you a deal.

Ben is still getting bitten. Stay tuned.

Playdate Chaos

2010-10-10T07:42:00.000-07:00

This week was Fall Break at UT. This means that I am not off work but the Early Learning Center is closed. I guess they assume all parents are either students or faculty, but unfortunately I am staff. I wouldn't have even known that it was Fall Break except that I got an email from one of the moms of William's classmates, Natalia, asking us to come over Friday for a playdate. She invited us and a couple of other children and moms. In her email this is what she said (I cut and pasted this from the actual email):

OK, let’s shoot for Friday after nap. I’ll pick Anna up and then plan to be back around 2:30 – 3:00 pm.

She never gave any other time and another mother responded that she would be there around 3 so Kate, Natalia's mom, wouldn't have to rush to pick up her older daughter, Anna, from Sacred Heart. William had a terrible day sleepwise the day before with no nap and he didn't go to sleep until midnight so I was really worried that we wouldn't make it by 3pm. However, he did go to nap around 1:30pm so I woke him up at 2:45pm to go. We got ready and made it there a few minutes after 3pm. I thought I had the right address but I hadn't printed the directions so I wasn't sure. We went up and knocked on the door several times with no answer. So I called Ben and he looked in my email for Kate's cell number. I called her and she said "Wow. You are prompt." She's British so I guess they say "prompt" in Britain. She said she was about 20 minutes away. As I hung up the phone a second mother, Maha, and her daughter, Avani, showed up. So we just stood in the front yard while the kids played on a dirt-covered cobweb filled plastic castle with a slide in the side yard and waited. As we stood there Maha got hit in the head twice by falling acorns. Then Kate and her daughters arrived, as did Sissie and her son Nicholas. Within minutes Sissie was stung by a wasp, the kids were all covered in mosquito bites, Nicholas rode the tricycle off the front porch and got hurt, and William knocked over the entire table that Kate had brought into the front yard, spilling all the strawberries, homemade brownies, organic milk and apple juice that Kate had put out. It was total chaos. A little more background- the front yard was completely overgrown, yet that was where we were playing. It was also quite steep, hence the reason the table fell over, as did the bounce house that Kate also brought out. The backyard was a cliff and it was completely wooded so that wasn't an option. I forgot my camera so I used Kate's but she said she hadn't uploaded pictures from it in years so I didn't take many since I assumed they wouldn't make it off the camera. A little more background: Kate and her husband are both Nuclear Physicists, as is Avani's dad. Kate is from England and her husband is from Poland. Avani's mom is from India and her dad is from Germany. Nicholas' mom is from Greece and his dad is from Pakistan/Germany. I actually really love this and I'm so glad they include us even though we are the "ugly Americans." Back to Nuclear Physicists, they are incredibly smart but don't pay much attention to detail. Anyway, we finally went inside and I was pleased to see that their house is as cluttered as ours. Unlike us, though, they didn't try to hide the clutter. It probably didn't even cross their mind, because they are Nuclear Physicists. The funny thing is- we had a great time!

Ungrateful

2010-06-01T20:25:00.000-07:00

I am ungrateful. I'll attribute it to the fact that I'm an only child. I expect to get my way and get everything I want... and generally I do. I definitely believe part of that is simply believing that I will get what I want while Ben rarely gets what he wants because he doesn't believe he'll get it. But that's a post for another day. This post is about being ungrateful.

Ben's aunt, a former nun who essentially moved to Knoxville the first summer William was in this world to help us out and babysit, came up this weekend from Nashville to get William a wooden playground. So as I was researching playgrounds I came upon a trampoline. From that very moment forward, a playground was out and a trampoline was a "must have."

Here's my justification for a trampoline over a playground:
1) They are half the price of the kind of playground Cathy planned on buying. (Cathy is Ben's aunt which, by the way, is pronounced "ant" not "ont")
2) They can be more easily moved if we move houses, which is real possibility if you look at our moving history.
3) They have a longer useful life. For example, I am 32 (almost) and still love to jump on a trampoline but I wouldn't be caught dead on a playground. Okay, so if you know me, I probably would but that's beside the point. I prefer trampolines and kids use them into high school.
4) William and I could enjoy the trampoline together rather than me watch him on a stupid playground. As Ben mentioned, though, it might be good for me not to play with William every second of the day.
5) There are other reasons that aren't coming to me right now but reasons 1-4 should be sufficient by themselves.

Ben mentioned the trampoline substitute to Cathy but she wasn't interested. Of course this made me mad. Cathy has been talking about getting William a playground for a year now so I could have guessed this would happen. Nevertheless, I was mad. I didn't participate in the shopping or the 16+ hours of playground construction over the past two days.

I was mad, mad, mad. And certainly ungrateful for the money and hard work that Cathy and Peter put into that stupid thing in our back yard. I mean this was all about me, right? Oh wait... it's about William but I know he would prefer a trampoline too.

You think I'm going to come around and say that I shouldn't have been so ungrateful or should have been glad just to have it but when you think about the fact that William won't use that stupid thing past the age of 5, it cost an arm and a leg, and trampolines are more fun, you have to reach the same conclusion.

It turns out William likes the playground. I knew he would but still know he would prefer a trampoline. And... William is ungrateful too. After he played on it all night tonight we got in the car and he found a booklet of other bigger playgrounds and said he wanted those instead. I don't blame him. He's like me. He's rational.

Recipes for Ben's Birthday

2010-01-11T07:46:00.000-08:00

I am not very tech savvy and I'm lazy so I wanted to have an easy way for everyone to access the recipes repeatedly. Thanks to everyone who participated! Here you go:

Amy Gipson Wingo January 7 at 10:25am Reply

Green Bean and Corn Casserole

1 Can of Shoepeg corn

1 Can of French style green beans

1 8 oz. sour cream

1 cup shredded cheddar cheese

1 small onion diced into very small pieces

1 can cream of celery soup

1 roll of Ritz crackers crushed

1 stick of butter

1 small bag of slivered Almonds

Drain corn and spread evenly on the bottom of a 9X 11 pyrex dish. Then drain green beans and spread evenly on top of corn. Then take cheese, cream of celery soup, and sour cream and mix in sepreate bowl. After those ingredients are mixed, spread evenly on top of green beans. Then take the stick of butter and melt it...then add almonds and crushed crackers to the butter. Sprinkle the mixture on top. Bake for apprx 20-30 minutes at 350 or until casserole starts to bubble.

Happy Birthday!

Amy, Robert, and Clara Grace

Charlie Sharbel January 7 at 10:40am Reply

The Chocolate Toast

1 cup any kind of chocolate flavored coffee (I made this originally with chocolate macadamia nut coffee)

1/2-1 shot Frangelico hazelnut liqueur

1/2-1 shot Prichards rum liqueur (can substitute an whiskey / bourbon)

Add Bailey's until desired taste / coloring is reached (along normal creamer lines, you can also substitute flavored Bailey's to augment taste)

As a variant, you can start with pure chocolate coffee and use mint flavored Bailey's to make a mint chocolate toast. Also, the overall kick can be varied by using 1/2 shots of the liqueur but it must be consistent or the end product won't taste quite right.

Beth Ilana Newman January 7 at 11:28am Reply

Cheeseless Cheesecake!

(Its less fat and more delish)

* 2 containers of Tofutti cream cheese (make sure to get plain... Can get at Kroger)

* 2 eggs

* 1 tablespoon lemon juice

* 1/2 cup of sugar

* 1 teaspoon of vanilla

* Ready to use graham cracker pie crust (I like to use the Oreo chocolate kind! It's soooo good!)

*Mix together (easiest with like a hand mixer that you plug in, you know?

*Put mix on crust and bake at 350 for 30 minutes...

*Put it in the fridge for a long time until its really cold!

If you really like chocolate - drizzle hot fudge on top before eating!

Hope Ben has a great birthday! Miss you Elizabeth!

Kenzie Ownby Blackwell January 7 at 6:57pm Reply

Curried Squash Soup

You can keep this in the fridge for up to 4 days or up to 2 months in the freezer.

(do not add the milk until you are simmering and about to serve)

3 Cups fat-free, less-sodium chix broth

2 cups chopped onion (about 1 large)

2 tsp bottled minced garlic (I used fresh)

1 1/2 tsp grated peeled fresh ginger

1 tsp salt (optional - I didn't use)

1 tsp red curry powder (or any curry powder)

1/2 tsp ground coriander

1;2 tsp freshly ground black pepper

2 lbs cubed peeled butternut squash (3 cups) - I buy the frozen kind pre-cubed

2 medium apples, cored, peeled, and diced (2 cups)

THE RECIPE calls for the use of a slow-cooker for 8 hours (you place all ingredients in on "low").

I don't like to use a slow cooker, so I just put in a small dutch oven or other soup sized pot and simmer for about 2 hours on medium-low. Works the same!

Then, you scoop out 1/2 of the mixture and puree in blender / food processor...repeat with the rest - return to the pot and simmer 1/2 an hour longer on low.

You can put in fridge / freezer as is - or - add 1/2-1 full cup of skim milk (depending on how creamy you like it) - and simmer another 10 min so the creamy is warmed through- and serve!

Kenzie Ownby Blackwell

Dixie Cavier

First, drain the following:

2 cans white hominy

4 cans black eyed peas

Place the above ingredients in a large bowl.

Next, chop the following veggies:

1 Red Pepper

1 Green Pepper

1 Yellow Pepper

1 Orange Pepper

1 bunch green onion

1 red onion

2 jalapeños

2 cloves garlic

2 medium tomatoes

Stir into bowl with hominy and black eyed peas.

Cover mixture with 1.5 cups of Kraft Zesty Italian dressing (the fat free option is also good) and stir.

Serve with sour cream and tortilla chips.

Melanie Sharbel Lockhart January 7 at 9:29pm Reply

White Chicken Chili

1 lb. Chicken, cooked & shredded

1 onion, diced

2 cans Great Northern beans, drained

1 can chicken broth

1 8 oz can green chilis

1/2 t garlic powder

1 T oil

1 t salt

1 t oregano

1/2 t pepper

1 cup sour cream

1/2 cup whipping cream

Combine all ingrediients, except sour cream & whipping cream. Cook 1 hour. Add creams & cook 20 mins.

Bryan J. Murphy January 8 at 9:54am Reply

2 Regular Items (2 Desserts Coming Up)

Corn Casserole

1 can whole kernel corn (dump around 1/2 of juice)

1 can cream corn

1 cup Velveeta cheese (cut into cubes)

1 cup thin spaghetti (break into 1/3s or 1/4s)

1 stick melted margarine

Put all ingredients into a 2 quart casserole dish sprayed with Pam. Bake in oven for 1 hour at 350, stirring every 15 minutes. (Or you can use a Crock Pot, stirring every 15 minutes. 1 hour on HIGH, 2 hours on LOW.)

Bryan J. Murphy

Hamburger Quickie (Hamburger Pie)

1 unbaked 9 inch pastry shell

1/2 pound ground beef

1/2 cup mayonnaise

1/2 cup milk

2 eggs

1 TBLS cornstarch

1 1/2 cups shredded cheddar

1/2 cup chopped onion

1/2 chopped green pepper (optional)

Brown meat over medium heat. Combine & stir mayo, milk, eggs, and cornstarch until smooth. Stir in beef, cheese, onion, and pepper. Pour into pastry shell. Bake in oven at 350 for 35-40 minutes or until knife inserted at center comes out clean.

Kelly Cash Keen January 8 at 10:24am Reply

The Best Way to Get Your Veggies: Cauliflower Gratin

1 (3lb) head of Cauliflower, cut into large florets

Salt

4 tablespoons unsalted butter, divided

3 tablespoons all-purpose flour

2 cups hot milk

1/2 teaspoon ground black pepper

1/4 teaspoon grated nutmeg

3/4 cup freshly grated Gruyere, divided

1/2 cup freshly grated Parmesan

1/4 cup or more bread crumbs

Boil cauliflower florets in salted water till firm, 5 to 6 mins. Drain.

Meanwhile, melt 2 tablespoons butter in med. saucepan over low heat. Add flour, stirring constantly with wooden spoon for 2 mins. Pour hot milk into mixture, stir till boiling. Boil, whisking constantly, for 1 min. or until thick. Remove from heat and add: 1 teaspoon salt, pepper, nutmeg, 1/2 cup Gruyere, & Parmesan.

Pour 1/3 of sauce on the bottom of 8X11X2 baking dish. Place drained cauliflower on top, then spread the rest of the sauce evenly on top. Combine remaining 1/4 of Gruyere with bread crumbs and sprinkle on top. Melt remaining 2 tablespoons of butter and drizzle on top. Sprinkle with salt & pepper. Bake for 25 to 30 mins. until top is brown. Serve hot or at room temp.

Bryan J. Murphy January 8 at 10:42am Reply

Puppy Chow (You may have made this before under another name.)

12 oz chocolate chips (semi-sweet morsels)

3/4 cup peanut butter (creamy)

1 stick margarine

1 box of Crispix cereal (at least 12 oz, not more than 18 oz)

16 oz unsalted peanuts (optional)

2 cups powdered sugar

Melt chocolate, peanut butter, and margarine together. Pour box of Crispix into a large bowl along with peanuts (optional). Mix (if you use the peanuts). Pour melted mixture into bowl and stir with a large plastic spoon until mixed well. Pour 2 cups powdered sugar into a paper or plastic bag. Pour bowl into bag and shut. Shake well until cereal is covered in powdered sugar. Use more powdered sugar as necessary.

Bryan J. Murphy

Caramel Layer Chocolate Squares

50 light caramels

1 pkg German chocolate cake mix

1 small can evaporated milk

1 cup chocolate chips (semi-sweet morsels)

3/4 cup margarine

1 cup chopped walnuts (optional)

Combine caramels and 1/3 cup evaporated milk over low heat until caramels are melted. Set aside. Grease (with margarine) and flour an approximate 13 in X 9 in pan (so that things don't stick to it later). In a large bowl, combine dry cake mix with 3/4 cup melted margarine and 1/3 cup evaporated milk. Stir until dough holds together. Press half of dough into greased/floured pan. Bake at 350 for 6 minutes. Set aside for a few minutes. Sprinkle chocolate chips over baked crust. Spread caramel mixture over chocolate. Sprinkle chopped nuts over caramel (optional). Press remaining half of dough mixture over caramel. Return to oven and bake 15-18 minutes. Remove and set aside for 3 hours. Place in refrigerator to finish setting caramel.

Joel Kramer January 8 at 11:15am Reply

Blue Cheese and Bacon Mac and Cheese

1/2 pound dried pasta (I use penne)

1 tablespoon butter

1 egg, beaten

pepper

salt

2 and 1/2 cups crumbled blue cheese

1 cup monterey jack cheese, shredded/grated

1 cup milk

5 eight inch pieces of bacon, cooked and crumbled (I use turkey bacon)

1) Heat oven to 350 F, and grease a casserole dish. (I just spray mine with Pam.)

2) Cook the pasta in salted water, drain, and put in a large bowl. Add butter, and pepper to taste. Add the egg, and mix it all together so everything gets coated.

3) Add the cheese and bacon, and mix again. Pour it into the baking dish, and then pour the milk evenly over the top.

4) Bake for 45 minutes.

If you don't like blue cheese, swap out all the cheese for 3-4 cups of shredded cheddar, and it makes a really nice oven baked mac and cheese.

Betsy Kampas Henderson January 8 at 10:45am

Cheese Grits Casserole

3 cups of water

1 teaspoon salt

1 cup Grits

1 1/2 cups of shredded sharp cheddar cheese

1 stick of butter

3 eggs, slightly beaten

3/4 cup milk

1/4 teaspoon cayenne pepper or dash of tabasco sauce

Preheat Oven to 350. Bring water and salt to a boil in large sauce pan. Slowly stir grits. Cover. Reduce heat and cook 15 min., stirring occasionally. Remove pan from heat. Stir in 1 cup of cheese and butter until melted. Add eggs, milk, pepper and blend well. Pour mixture into greased 2-qt. baking dish. Sprinkle remaining cheese on top. Bake for 1 hour or until cheese is golden brown. Cool 10 min. before serving. Makes 6 - 8 servings.

Betsy Kampas Henderson

Lemon Cookies (Taste pretty much like the Ham n' Goodies version) - so look out, they are addicting :)

1 pkg lemon cake mix

2 eggs

1/3 Cup vegetable oil

1 Cup confectioners sugar

1/4 teaspoon lemon extract

1 tablesoon milk

Preheat oven to 350. Line baking sheet with foil. Mix together cake mix, eggs and vegetable oil. Drop by rounded teaspoons onto baking sheet and bake for 5-8 min depending on your oven. Do not overbake. Place cookies on a wire rack to cool.

Icing

mix together confectioners sugar, lemon extract and milk. When the cookies are cool drop as much icing as you like on them!

Happy Birthday Ben!!! xoxo, Scott, Betsy and Logan

Joel Kramer January 8 at 6:21pm Reply

Easy Hummus

2 cans chickpeas/garbonzo beans, rinsed and drained

1/4 c. lemon juice

1 tsp. salt

3-5 cloves garlic*, to taste

1 C. vegetable/canola oil

Throw everything into a food processor and blend the hell out of it.

*If you use the pre-minced garlic that comes in the little jar, 1 clove = about 1/2 teaspoon

Eric Andrews January 8 at 8:20pm Reply

Someone just sent me this recipe... so since I am never around a kitchen, I'll submit it in my name. (I trust the cook who sent it to me!)

Instant Gourmet Noodle Bowl

Recipe is for one serving

1 (3-oz.) package Oriental flavored ramen noodle soup pack

1 Chopped green onion

2 Tablespoon chopped fresh cilantro

½ Cup fresh trimmed snow peas

6 Peeled and deveined, medium-sized raw shrimp

½ Cup shredded napa cabbage (optional)

Stir together flavor packet from ramen noodle, 2 cups water, green onion and fresh cilantro in sauce pan. Bring to boil, add noodles and snow peas. Cook 1 minute, and stir in shrimp. Cook 2 minutes. Transfer to a serving soup bowl, and top with napa cabbage.

Makes 1 serving.

Prep: 10 minutes

Cook time: 5 minutes

Lynn Keen

Durkee Chicken

8-10 chicken breasts, deboned and skinned

1 Jar Durkee Sauce

2 cans Cream of Chicken Soup

Spray dish and put in chicken. Mix sauce and soup and pour over chicken. Cover and cook at 350 about an hour. Serve with rice. Pour gravy on rice.

Lynn Keen

Apple Pie

Pastry for double-crust 9 in pie

5 to 6 cups pared, sliced apples

2 T flour

1 cup sugar

1/4 t. salt

1 t ground cinnamon

2 T butter or margarine

Into pan filled with pastry, unbaked, arrange the apples. Combine the flour, sugar, salt and cinnamon and sprinkle over the apples. Dot with butter. Arrange top pastry and slash to let steam out. Seal and flute edges. Bake a 375 or 350 for glass pan for 1 hour and 15 min. or until crust is brown and apples tender.

Lynn Keen

Jamabalaya

1 onion, chopped

1 T oil

1 can tomatoes, l lb 4oz

1 lb shrimp

1/2 lb. ham

1/2 pound sausage, hot

1 clove garlic

1/2 tsp. crushed red pepper

1 T flour

2 cups stock or water

1 cup raw rice

1 T parsley

1/2 tsp. chopped thyme

salt and pepper

In a large pan with a lid, put the oil,add chopped onions. When they have wilted a little, add flour and brown slightly. Add ham, cut in l in pieces, the sausage (browned), the shrimp and the tomatoes, chopped. Simmer in covered pot about 30 minutes. Add garlic, pepper, rice, parsley, thyme and salt and pepper. Cook with cover on till rice is done but not gummy. Watch to see if more water is needed.

(can use Andoulie sausage)

Lane Jarrett January 8 at 10:01pm Reply

This is one of Jonathan and my favorites. It freezes great!

Chicken Divan

Ingredients

* 2 (10-ounce) packages frozen broccoli, chopped

* 6 cups shredded chicken, cooked

* 2 (10 3/4-ounce) cans condensed cream of mushroom soup

* 1 cup mayonnaise

* 1 cup sour cream

* 1 cup grated sharp Cheddar

* 1 tablespoon fresh lemon juice

* 1 teaspoon curry powder

* Salt and pepper

* 1/2 cup dry white wine

* 1/2 cup freshly grated Parmesan

* 1/2 cup soft bread crumbs

* 2 tablespoons butter, melted

Directions

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.

Remove the outer wrappers from the boxes of broccoli. Open 1 end of each box. Microwave on full power for 2 minutes, until thawed. Drain the broccoli and put into a casserole dish. Add the shredded chicken.

In a medium bowl, combine the soup, mayonnaise, sour cream, Cheddar, lemon juice, curry powder, salt and pepper, to taste, and wine. Whisk together to make a sauce. Pour the sauce over the broccoli and chicken. Mix well with a spatula.

Place the mixture into an 11 by 7-inch casserole dish or 2 (9-inch) square disposable aluminum foil pans that have been sprayed with vegetable oil cooking spray. Pat down evenly and smooth with a spatula. Combine the Parmesan, bread crumbs and butter and sprinkle over the top.

Bake for about 30 to 45 minutes.

You can also top it with Cheddar or Gruyere cheese.

Michael Griffith January 9 at 12:30am Reply

Shrimp Louie

Ingredients:

1 Cup Mayonnaise

2 Tablespoons Grated Onion

2 Teaspoons Minced Green Onions

1 Tablespoon Lemon Juice

1 Teaspoon Worcheshire Sauce

½ Cup Chili Sauce (~1 bottle)

Dash Cayenne Pepper

Salt and Pepper to taste

Elbow Macaroni (~16 oz. box)

1 Package of Small Bite-Size Shrimp (Frozen)

Directions:

1. Cook Macaroni, drain, place in large mixing bowl.

2. Thaw shrimp in strainer under luke-warm water, lay out on paper towels and pat shrimp to remove excess water.

3. Mix all wet ingredients in a bowl (this creates your sauce).

4. Finally, mix the sauce with the macaroni and shrimp.

5. To personalize dish to your taste, you may add additional lemon juice, worcheshire sauce, cayenne, salt, pepper to taste.

6. Refrigerate until chilled, ENJOY !!!!!!!!!!

Michael Griffith

Southern Chocolate Pie

Ingredients are for one pie, double everything for two pies

• 3 Eggs

• 3 Tablespoons Cocoa

• 1 & ½ Cups Milk

• 2 Tablespoons Flour (Heaping)

• 1 Cup Sugar

• 1 Teaspoon Butter

• 1 Teaspoon Vanilla

• 1 Frozen Pie Crust (Pillsbury Pet-Riz brand)

Directions

• Separate egg white from yolks. Then, mix milk with egg yolks. Mix cocoa, flour, and sugar in separate bowl. After mixing, then combine wet and dry ingredients together and whisk thoroughly. Warm over medium heat while whisking to prevent sticking. Whisk until thick, and then add vanilla and butter.

• After thawing pie shells, poke vent holes in pie crust and bake until golden brown. After cooling, add chocolate filling to pie crust.

• Beat egg whites on high speed until stiff then add 1 Tablespoon of sugar for each egg white gradually while mixing. Add meringue to pies and bake @ 350 degrees until meringue is golden brown.

Kim Payne January 9 at 10:05am Reply

Hi Elizabeth - I love quick recipes after a late night at work and the gym or if Adam works super late so we copied created these favorites from restaurants around town!

Shrimp-Apple Salad (serves 2)

1/2 lb. of 26-30 medium count raw shrimp

pinch of Old Bay Seasoning

pinch of Garlic Powder (or fresh garlic minced if you have on hand)

pinch of salt and pepper

1 granny smith apple

1 bag of prepackaged spinach

Feta cheese

Sliced Almonds or Chopped Pecans, toasted

Balsamic Vinaigrette (preferably Maple Grove Fat Free)

Remove shrimp from outer shells and mix with seasonings, spray a skillet with cooking spray and pan fry the shrimp until done. Place a generous amount of spinach on two plates; chop the apple and divide among both plates; toast either the almonds or pecans in a separate pan and divide among both plates, top with cheese and dressing - ENJOY!

Variation: Substitute strawberries and rotisserie chicken for the shrimp and apple for a different and yummy taste!

Robert J. Wingo Jr January 9 at 12:07am Reply

how about my recipe for a jam sandwich. Take 2 pieces of bread and jam them together. Serve at room temperature

Kate Gower January 9 at 12:40pm Reply

Aunt Jeanne's Garlic Mashed Potatoes

4 medium sized Idaho potatoes

3 cloves fresh garlic or 2 tbsp minced garlic

1/4 cup milk

2-4 tbsp butter

salt

course ground pepper

Peel and cut potatoes into even pieces. Rinse potatoes and place into sauce pan. Cover with water, and add garlic and 1/4 tsp salt. Bring to a boil. Cook until tender (about 15-20 minutes). Remove from heat, and pour off all of the water. Add milk, butter, salt and pepper, and mash everything together. With a hand mixer, whip to desired consistency.

Suzanne Perry Wright January 9 at 1:54pm Reply

Here you go...enjoy! None of these are terribly healthy...there, you have been warned! Happy Birthday, Ben!

Swiss Chicken (we use Mozzarella or Pepper Jack)

2-3 pieces boneless chicken breasts

sliced cheese (1 per piece)

1 can cream of chicken soup (optional! I do it both ways)

1/4 cup white cooking wine

Pepperidge Farm stuffing (sprinkle 1/2 cup on top)

1/2 stick melted butter poured on top

Bake 350 degrees for 60-70 minutes.

Suzanne Perry Wright

Stromboli

1 roll/can pizza dough (like Pillsbury's)

1/4 lb. pepperoni (sandwich-large slices are the best)

8 oz. pkg. mozerella cheese

1 egg

1 tsp oregano

Parmesean cheese (topping)

Optional toppings: mushrooms, peppers, onion, broccoli or asperagus (steam first).

Beat egg with oregano. Spread dough into large rectangle. spread 1/2 of the egg mixture on dough with a pastry brush. Cover with pepperoni and cheese, other toppings. Roll lengthways, put on greased or oiled cookie sheet with seam on bottom. spread remaining egg mixture on top. sprinkle with parmesean. Bake 350 for 30 minutes or LESS...watch for browning!

Suzanne Perry Wright January 9 at 2:53pm Reply

Asperagus with Ginger

1 1/2 lb (or less) asperagus, trimmed

2 tsp vegetable oil

2 tsp minced fresh ginger

1/2 tsp sugar

1/4 tsp salt

1/4 tsp pepper

1 tsp sesame oil

Saute asperagus in 2 tsp oil over med-high heat in a large nonstick skillet for 7 minutes. Add ginger, and saute 1 min. Stir in rest of ingredients, cook 1 minute.

Megan Grindstaff January 9 at 6:00pm Reply

Apple Dip:

8 ounce pkg cream cheese, softened

1/2 cup of white sugar

3/4 cup of brown sugar

1 tsp of vanilla

1 (8oz) pkg Heath Bar Toffee Bits (found near the choc chip morsels at grocery)

Mix together the cream cheese, white sugar, brown sugar & vanilla. Fold in the toffee bits. Chill. Serve with the Granny Smith Apple Slices.

Variations: You can play around with the amount of sugar you add. Some people use less...losers.

Quick, easy, delicious! Happy Birthday, Ben! Feel free to invite me over when you try these recipes ;)

Scott Frith January 9 at 6:09pm Reply

"Frith special"

Small empty glass

Add four cubes of ice

Add double shot of Jack Daniels, Single Barrel Whisky

Cheers!

Lizzie Kinard Kelly January 9 at 10:45pm Reply

What a fun project! You guys will have lots of fun trying all of these great dishes! Here are some of my favorites from my recipe file....Lizzie

Emilou's Shrimp Creole

1/4 cup vegetable oil

1/4 cup flour

4 cloves of garlic minced

1/2 cup celery chopped

1/2 cup green pepper chopped

1/2 cup onion finely chopped

2 cans tomato sauce

1 1/2 teaspoon salt

1/2 teaspoon pepper

1/8 to 1/4 teaspoon cayenne pepper (1/4 makes it spicy, 1/8 will satisfy most folks)

1 1/2 pounds raw shrimp

3 cups cooked rice

Heat oil and flour over medium high heat stirring constantly until it is smooth and the color of peanut butter. Add garlic, onion, celery, and green pepper and cook in this mixture until tender. Add tomato sauce and seasonings. Cook for 20 minutes stirring frequently. Add shrimp and cook 25 minutes more. Serve over rice.

Lizzie Kinard Kelly

Corn Chowder

4-6 slices of bacon cooked and set aside

1 red pepper finely chopped

2 stalks celery finely chopped

1/2 cup onion finely chopped

2-3 tablespoons oil

1 can corn

1 can cream of potato soup

1 can cream of chicken soup

milk (fill each soup can with milk after emptying the soup)

oyster crackers

Chop vegetables and saute them in the oil. When the veggies are tender add the corn, 2 cans of soup, and milk. Crumble bacon and simmer until the soup has thickened (about 10-20 minutes).

Herb and Betsy Sharbel

Magically Moist Chicken - Makes 4 servings

1 Chicken, 2.5 to 3.5 lbs, cut in parts

1/2 cup Hellmann's Real Mayonnaise

1-1/4 cup Italian seasoned bread crumbs (Kroger has them)

1. Brush chicken parts on all sides with Hellmann's real mayonnaise.

2. Place bread crumbs in large plastic food bag...add chicken one piece at a time;

shake to coat well with bread crumbs...place on rack in broiler pan.

3. Bake in 425 degree F oven 40 to 45 minutes or until golden brown and tender.

Herb and Betsy Sharbel

Coca-Cola Cake

2 cups sugar

2 cups flour, unsifted

2 sticks butter

3 Tbsp cocoa

1 cup Coca-Cola

1/2 cup buttermilk

2 beaten eggs

1 tsp soda

1 Tbsp vanilla

1-1/2 cup miniature marshamallows

Combine flour and sugar...heat butter, coke, and cocoa until boiling

pour over sugar and flour and mix.

Add milk, eggs, soda, vanilla, and marshmallows...beat well (everything with this cake is done by hand, not mixer).

Pour into a greased and floured oblong pan, 13x9x2

Bake at 350 degrees for 45 minutes, or until a tooth pick in center of cake comes out clean.

Ice while hot.

Icing

1/2 cup butter

3 Tbsp cocoa

6 Tbsp Coca-Cola

1 box powdered sugar

1 cup chopped pecans

Combine butter, cocoa, and Coca-Cola, and bring to a boil

Pour over powdered sugar, and beat well

Add nuts, and mix

Ice cake while cake is hot

Melissa V. Griffith January 10 at 7:31pm

Macaroni and Chicken Casserole

2 cups raw macaroni

2 cups cooked chicken

4 hard boiled eggs

2 tbsp. chopped onion

2 teas salt

2 teas accent

2 cups milk

2 cups shredded sharp cheese

2 cans mushroom soup ( I use cream of chicken since I alergic to mushroom)

Mix all ingredients - Let stand in refrig for 24 hours.

Bake in 9x13 pan at 350 degrees for one hour and 15 minutes.

Let stand 15 minutes before serving.

This is one of the recipes that Ben's grandmother - Grandmom - gave to me and it was a favorite of hers. Please give her credit.

Priscilla P. Griffith

Melissa V. Griffith

Chocolate Chip Pie

1 cup sugar

1/2 cup flour

1 tsp vanilla

2 eggs

1 stick margarine - soft

1 cup chocolate chips

1 cup chopped nuts - pecans, walnuts or none at all

1 deep dish pie shell

Mix first 5 ingredients together, fold in chips and nuts. Pour into pie shell. Bake at 350 for 30 minutes or until brown.

Serve with cool whip or vanilla ice cream

This is from me and it is a great pie.

Love to you all

Melissa

2010

2010-01-08T20:38:00.000-08:00

According to blogger I have started 4 blogs over the past two years. Each of them have exactly one post. So this year I'm going to try to blog more than one time.

2010...

10 years ago for New Year's to celebrate the millennium I was in Atlanta at a friend's apartment. We drank heavily, videotaped our antics, and partied like it was 1999 (because it was). I can't believe how much has changed since then:

2000

May
Graduated with two bachelors degrees in Business Administration (Logistics and Transportation, Marketing) and a minor in Spanish

August
Started my first real job as an apartment complex assistant manager (Jefferson Commons- now called The Commons at the corner of 17th and Grand in the Fort)

December
Went on my first date with Ben, my husband

2001

May
Quit Jefferson Commons and started working as an "accountant" for my dad's companies (Scotts Lawn Service and Cloud Southern Fuel)

November
Got engaged to Ben (I think). The whole experience was so horrific I really can't remember. Ask Ben.

2002

August
Started the MAcc program at UTK. Graduate Teaching Assistant to Lynn Reeves and Harry Hughes.

December
Became Catholic (I think). I didn't do the normal RCIA so I wasn't confirmed at Easter but I can't really remember when it happened. I'm pretty sure I had to be Catholic 6 months before our wedding.

2003

July
Graduated from MAcc program.

Got married to the greatest person on earth.

Spent the month (and into August) in Europe.

September
Started my real first real job as a Staff Tax Accountant at Pershing, Yoakley, and Associates which I hated more than any job I've ever had.

October
Sold my condo at Cherokee at Westcliff and bought house in Lyons Crossing.

2004

March
Quit PYA in the middle of Tax season.

April
I won't say.

May
Started working for the best public accounting firm around- Coulter and Justus, PC.

2005

January
Sold Lyons Crossing house and bought one on Westland Drive in Rotherwood which we renovated with Blaise Burch. Not because of Blaise but because I loved his name and thought it was unique- I wanted to name William Blaise. Ben didn't agree.

April
Quit C&J to go work for a "Big 4" firm, KPMG. Much better pay but the job wasn't as fun as C&J.

June
Bought 6 condos in Sequoyah Hills from the devil aka Glenn McBee, bringing us to a total of 8.

August
Sold 8 condos in Sequoyah Hills for a loss after a fire and no insurance.

2006

May
Quit KPMG to try real estate. Unfortunately, I love residential but chose to work in commercial which didn't work for me.

2007

May
Got pregnant.

June
Found out I was pregnant on Father's Day.

July
I won't say.

August
Started working as a Hall Director for UT in Strong Hall.

2008

January
Moved to Knoxville Place which would become Volunteer Hall

February
Had William (the greatest baby on earth!) on Valentine's Day!

2009

August
Quit working full time for UT to do a Ph. D. program in School Psychology

Moved into a house after two years in dorms/apartments

2010

???