I love Zoku

I first heard about Zoku at a work conference in Phoenix over the summer. I was immediately intrigued. It is a Popsicle maker that freezes juices right in front of your eyes in as little as 7 minutes. Every time I mentioned this to Philip he ridiculed it completely. Long story short, Philip saw a video on how to use it and wanted one. I got it for him for Christmas and it has been in use nearly every day since. We keep the unit in the freezer all the time and bring it out to make fresh Popsicles with an array of fruit juices and nectars. Today I decided to try to make a yogurt pop, so while shopping I saw a bottle of Blueberry Kefir, a smoothie drink, and snatched it up, rushed home and made my very first non fruit juice pop. It was delicious and froze super fast. Below is a photo of my Kefir pop and our trusty Zoku. If you are ever over, don't forget to ask to make your very own pop!

expressway

I never drive the expressway to work. I always take city and suburban streets and love that I don't have to get on I-94. One of my favorite things on my route to work is the drive thru Starbucks where most of them know my drink by heart :) Anyway, after work I had to go to a store in the city and the best way to get there was to take 94. So off I go with my back seat full of boxes blocking my rear view sight. For some reason I think West is the right way to go. I think the suburbs had me turned around. West goes to to Wisconsin and I definitely did not want to go to Wisconsin. I think quickly and get out my handy new GPS and before she gets all started up I get off at the next exit thinking I could just turn around. Wrong. That exit went East and no U-turns were allowed. Anyway, my GPS kicks in and starts yelling to me in her very nice British voice, "turn now...recalculating....go .2 miles and turn left....turn now....recalculating" and on and on. Still going the wrong way I turn into a small mall parking lot to turn around. I finally make it on the expressway going the right way and make it into the city. One would think I don't know my way around, but I think I'm too comfortable that I don't even pay attention anymore. Now I know. Pay attention.

the death of a tree

Tomorrow is the last day to get your Christmas Tree recycled in Chicago, and yes, we still have our Christmas Tree standing. At this moment Philip is un-decorating the tree while singing Christmas Songs and whining about how Christmas was only 3 weeks ago but feels like forever ago, followed by some statement about how much he loves Christmas.

Luckily for me tearing down Christmas decorations is not as important as putting them up for Philip, when every ornament I hang is constantly scrutinized for proper location. Decorating tends to work best when we each do something when the other isn't home and then the other "fixes" it when the first isn't home. I think we are down to a system now.

We hope to get this tree to Margate Park by tomorrow so that the city can mulch it and continue beautifying our parks and wherever the heck else they put thousands of Christmas tree mulch. I figure this little donation will save me a dollar down the road somewhere, right? If we succeed we will have made ourselves a bit greener than last year when we missed the cutoff date and had our tree in the house into the beginning of February. I vaguely remember dragging the carcass through my condo hallway to the back door and sometime later purchasing a saw to hack the poor thing into pieces small enough to fit into our dumpster. I remember vaguely as if it was a bad dream that should have never happened.

So back to un-decorating I go and to greenifying Chicago a tiny bit more.

chores

Today was very productive. Even though Franklin and I slept in till 10am, I got many things done that I have been putting off. I immediately went to the gym and rand for a good 40 minutes while watching a show on those handy little TVs. It was so warm today (40 degrees) that I was very comfortable outside for short periods in my gym shorts. After leaving the gym I decided to treat my salt covered car to a top to bottom wash. I remember when I was a child washing cars with a pressure washer. I now prefer credit card accepting automatic car washes with undercarriage sprayers. Sitting in that confined area while being sprayed by multiple nozzles is very relaxing.

Off to the vet to pick up more food for Franklin. If you are unaware, he is on special vet food because he has food allergies. This is very normal for Frenchies and finding a way to balance his belly has become a normal part of our lives. I love it that when I walk in there is an assistant that always remembers me and says, "hello Mr. Taylor".

After lunch, I decided to jump into cleaning our condo. You would be amazed to see the amount of pet hair the vacuum picks up. Recently, we finally bought a real mop to replace the silly sponge one we had been using which finally fell apart. So, I mopped all the wood flooring from front door to back and boy what a difference it makes.

I figured while I was in a cleaning mode, why not "treat" Franklin to a nice warm bath. He was very good throughout, but lost it a few times near the end when he was getting blow dried. I think he thinks that it is a game and he jumps up and down as if he is getting ready to play with a small animal. Very cute while rather annoying.

Now I am sitting with a clean Franklin on a clean sofa in a clean room. A rarity around here, but very nice.

Birthday Dinner

Philip's afternoon appointment was cancelled so we had time to go out for a quick dinner to celebrate. Indie Cafe has always been a favorite of ours for three main reasons: It's 2 blocks from our house, the food is amazing, and it is super affordable. So naturally, for a nice dinner we chose to go there. I had Scallops wrapped in bacon for an appetizer with hot Oolong tea and for my main course I had a Cape Cod Maki roll and ,my favorite, a Sweet Potato Tempura Maki roll. I don't know who thought of deep frying sweet potato slices and wrapping it up in rice and seaweed, but I think we should be friends :)

Philip got me a customized Starbucks card for Christmas. Le t me tell you, it may have been one of my favorite gifts. Anyway, two of my favorite perks are free soy milk with drinks and a free drink of your choice on your birthday. Today is my birthday, so I made a special trip to the Starbucks in Andersonville just to get a special drink of my choice. Naturally when you are getting something free you go all out, right? So I got a Grande Soy White Mocha and gave him my card. I got my receipt and noticed later that I got free Soy Milk, but was charged for my drink. Was I supposed to tell them and the entire lounge that it was my birthday? Anyway, I sent a friendly little message to customer service and assume that they will make right. Check out my cool card below.

cheesecake

Today was not my birthday, but because I am not working tomorrow one of my associates who always makes something for people on their birthday made me, from scratch, a New York Cheesecake and on the side cherries and sauce to top it off with. As I poured the cherries on my cheesecake and tasted it I was shocked to realize that they were cooked from fresh cherries and not from a typical jar as so many people do. It was deliciously amazing! I only took a small slice to start so I wouldn't stuff myself, however I found myself sneaking back every once in a while to get an extra slice. Tomorrow is my birthday and luckily I have the rest of that cheesecake with me to celebrate.

chinese food is my favorite food

My boss took me on a surprise lunch outing to an undisclosed restaurant. As we pulled into the Evanston city parking spot and got out of the car I was still unsure of where we were going. There were several restaurants across the street. I glanced at each and secretly hoped that we were going for Chinese. We entered Joy Yee's Noodle Kitchen to my delight. The modern dining room was filled with hexagonal metal chairs in a stunning gunmetal finish. The enormous menu was filled with multiple options and coordinating photos. It was overwhelming, but very exciting. We ordered "make your own" chicken spring rolls, Mongolian Beef, and Spicy Mongolian Green Beans. As we sipped our hot tea the food began coming out. The portions were huge but very enticing to the eye. The actual taste was even better. To top that all off our fortunes were very true:) On the ride home we took what I will call the scenic route back to the store. Enter Vertigo. All in all it was a delightful trip and I definitely recommend it if you are in the neighborhood.

TB

As often happens, Philip called me right as I was leaving work to let me know that he wanted some Taco Bell for dinner. When I started driving to work one small thing that made my day was a drive-thru Starbucks on the way to work. One small thing that made Philip excited was that I passed a Taco Bell every day. He soon began phoning every once in a while to request a quick pick up of a chalupa or gordita on my way home.

Recently we began trying to let go of the many extra calories that we ingested over the glutenous weeks between Thanksgiving and New Years by watching our calories and eating healthier. Thus, I was surprised when he wanted some TB... however he had prepared himself and chosen a few from their website with low calories. As I pulled up to the window I ordered what he wanted and a few things for myself not even thinking about how unhealthy there might be. When I got home and added them up, I realized that my three items made up 70% of my daily calorie allotment! Boy, did they taste good. So, farewell TB...I shall have no more of you during however long this health kick lasts.

work fury

My first day back to work after 4 long and tiring ones off was rough. I was out of sync and not quite ready to dive back into it. To make matters worse, I walked into what should have been a complete masterpiece but as I walked throughout realized that things had fallen short a bit. I remained calm on the outside but was a furious mess on the inside. I wanted to scream at someone and cry at the same time. There are far more important things to worry myself over, so I'm letting it go... until Monday at least.

driving home...

After a 7 hour journey, I made it home to Chicago today. With my handy new GPS, I had the authoritative voice of Samantha to comfort me every time I needed to continue route. A few hours in, I decided to see what other options were available and switched to a British male and later female voice. There's something very comforting that comes with the accent. The trip was fairly uneventful. There was a stop at a faulty ATM, then a good one that charged way too much, a foolish stop at McDonalds for a steak bagel and a hashbrown as well as Hardees for their Crispy Curls (there's something about deep fried potatoes that I simply cannot resist), and filling up with cheap (in relation to Chicago prices) gasoline. I even uneventfully made it through an intense lake effect snow band in NW Indiana that slowed traffic down to 20 mph with nothing in sight.

So here I am at home again with a messy house and two pets to mind. Back to reality.

snow, fudge, amish

I am currently sitting in a recliner in Ohio while visiting family. Today is supposed to be a day of relaxation before I head back to Chicago tomorrow. However, I constantly find that I cannot be completely relaxed for several reasons. One of them is the impending snow storm that I will have to drive through tomorrow. It just started snowing here and is supposed to be throughout the entire day today and most of tomorrow. I love snow, but seriously!

We are supposed to go out to lunch soon. I hear rumors that Wendy's is the first choice.

My mom bought sweetened condensed milk a while back to make Belizean Fudge, but didnt get around to it, so this morning I rrose to the sweet occasion. Turns out we didn't have sugar, so I had to go to the store across the street, "Town and Country". I spent many summers running in and out of that store renting videos and buying ice cream, but I completely forgot how country it really is. The sugar was twice the price it should have been and was rock hard and the check out screens (the most modern technology in the store) had flashing images of quilting books that you could buy from their quilting part of the store. Anyway, fudge making begins. 4 cans of sweetened condensed milk, 4 cups of sugar, 4 Tbs of butter and 45 minutes of stirring over a hot stove. Sounds easy, right? Well, turns out that it was supposed to be 2 cups of sugar and I forgot to mix the vanilla in towards the end. Oops! It is still deliciously edible, but you might need to drink a glass of water when you eat it to balance the sugar level.

There are lots of Amish around here and there is a wonderful little Amish store out in the country where you can buy bulk goods, meat, and cheese. I went this morning with my cousin and as always was thoroughly excited. As we were walking the aisles and I was beginning to fill my basket I asked, "They take credit cards, right?" and my cousin looked at me with an astonished face and said, "no". Luckily my mom had sent $11 dollars with me to get her something which I didn't get for her and used for myself. Some Swiss cheese, sweet bologna, and trail bologna. I think my outfit was a bit too worldly for the female Amish cashier as I noticed she kept looking at my shirt and scarf.
Interesting side note: On Facebook, you can choose Amish as your religion, so all you Amish using computers and the Internet.. there you go.