A new term...

is starting. I'm a college librarian--if any of you are college students, or want to be, or once were... what would you want a librarian to tell you?

I've taken classes, blogged (albeit, not professionally) and built a website. What should I say to those internet saavy, as well as those who aren't so internet oriented?

we rock a Wednesday night...oh yes, we do!

We came home from work, we went for a walk, both of us had a late lunch and weren't hungry for dinner...what does one do on a wednesday night? Paint the bathroom, I suppose...

Bye bye yellow, hello blue!

I trimmed the baseboards and around the sink and mirror. While doing so, I blasted my favorite radio station, 1690 AM, you should check it out sometime. Tuesday nights they play the Americana show, which is awesome.

Here's Tavo, blasting Sandro and trimming out the ceiling. Aren't up on your 60's Argentine singers? Here's the wiki on Sandro. (it's required knowledge in Tavo's family)



In case you didn't notice, we have really tall ceilings. (and lots of spidery friends) No spiders were harmed in the painting of the bathroom :)

Also threw together a loaf of bread for sandwiches tomorrow. Almost Labor Day! What are you guys doing over the weekend?


...okay, we're headed back to roll it out!

Weekend cooking--Tavo does a chop

I don't eat meat and as I'm generally the grocery shopper and cook, Tavo very, very rarely eats meat at home. This weekend, though, we house sat for his parents (who are in Colombia for a month--wowza!) and he decided to cook up a pork chop for himself.

Check out the chef and his meal :)

Am I jaded or have I lived in the ‘hood too long?

Tavo and I were reading on the front porch, and a young, blonde, frankly out-of-place looking kid walked by, then came up to our front porch. It’s about 9 pm.

He had an Emory alumni shirt on, so we figured he was local.

He said he represented a grassroots movement of the Democratic Party and was talking about the leaps and bounds his activist group was making in securing Democratic fundraisers and rallying and etc. in parts of Georgia that were previously completely Republican, which many places in our conservative state are. It made sense. I have always been a staunch Democrat and Tavo has slowly been veering away from his Republican thinkings…(he thinks older liberal women are hot—you should see him watching PBS)

And then our porch visitor said he was fundraising.

I said, “You don’t really expect us to give you cash, do you?” Just for background, we have homeless people and crackies ask us for money about every night—less now that we’ve been here a few years. Regardless, this isn’t a Beaver Cleaver type neighborhood.

He said, “we prefer checks, but everyone can give what they can…”

I asked to see his credentials—I’m not giving my bank account number to just anyone. I then proceeded to point out that his certification had been expired for 8 months, he had no official signatures, and his badge had no seal and was the type you could pick up at kinkos for a dollar, etc.

He left quickly, embarassed, after saying I was the first person who’d mentioned his certification was expired and that he’d notify his boss directly.

My question—what if he was real deal grassroots and I just dissed a movement that I believe in?

The pictures don't do this justice!!

With the abundance of zucchinis and tomatoes, it only made sense to make a big old grilled veggie sandwich. I took many pictures with the camera phone--believe it or not, these were the good ones!

This was an enormous sandwich. We used a whole loaf of sourdough bread, garlic, crushed tomatoes, two grilled zucchini, a huge tomato, and stuck it under the broiler with layers of Havarti. That and a few glasses of chardonnay made for an ideal dinner.



Have you guys been watching the Olympics? I'm so excited that the running has finally started. Quick shout out to Angelo Taylor from Atlanta who won the gold in 400M hurdles! (he's got the sunglasses on)

fig season in Georgia

We got some figs in our CSA this week--and I couldn't get my friends to eat them! Have you had fresh figs before? They're quite delicious. Because mine were so ripe, I ate a bunch, then sliced and froze the rest for smoothies. Here are some cool fig pictures that I didn't take (still haven't gotten a new camera)

borrowed from: www.flickr.com/photos/brianhbradley/823933463/


borrowed from istock

You know, there is a fig tree where I walk at lunch. I'll see if I can upload a nice blurry cameraphone pic after lunch.

New York get ready...

The dirty south is coming.

We're heading out tonight for Fabulous Newburgh! Our good friends, Amanda and James, are getting married! Surprisingly enough, its just about a year to the day since we last went to visit Amanda and James.

(seen here in Chinatown with Baby Seamus on the way!)
Last year we stayed in a hostel in Morningside Heights, but this year we're staying up in Newburgh for their wedding.

Congrats to the Great Amandini and James!

Huevos Rancheros

My CSA was full of tomatoes, green onions, cilantro and peppers! Its like they were begging me to make salsa. And as we hadn't eaten breakfast yet, we threw on some beans and eggs to add to the fun.

This may not look like "traditional" heuvos rancheros--but do a quick google image search. There are thousands of images and no two seem to look alike. I know there's a lot of egg lovers out there--how do you make your huevos?


Lini's version:
Black beans, sauteed with onions, cumin, cayenne, and coriander. After they cook down for awhile, I crack the eggs right on top of the beans and cover until the eggs set. Scoop it up and place on warm corn tortillas (you can fry them) and use a liberal amount of salsa. We put some bleu cheese on top because...well, why not? Our salsa was very heavy on cilantro and jalapenos (I have 25 of them--I'm using them liberally in EVERYTHING).

Pizza via camera phone

Albeit blurry, this pizza was too good not to share with you. My passion for pizza runs like a river through the mountains of my soul...just kidding, but I'm seriously pizza crazy.

I ate it in Brazil. I've cooked it for friends and posted about my family's Christmas Pizza. I actually make up a batch of dough and some homemade pizza about 2-3 times a month, but would bore you silly posting them all.

This pizza was a departure for me as I didn't use red sauce on it. I am a fiending nut about red sauce and spent many years cultivating perfect sauces for pizzas, pastas--but that's a different topic. I used a kalamata olive tapenade (very basic one--mostly just chopped olives)and my organic CSA veggies, quick sauteed before added to pizza.



Basic Dough--flour, yeast, water, salt
-brush with kalamata tapenade
-quick sautee eggplant (salted and drained), peppers, onion, garlic
-chopped garden tomatoes
-fresh basil
-bleu cheese
-drizzle with honey and crushed red pepper