Blueberry Snickerdoodles

Snickerdoodles sounded like an amazing idea, so off to google I went. Usually when I'm looking for a recipe, I just click onto the 4th or 5th page and start there. So glad I did this. I found this post by Bakegirl, and it sounded delicious.I made a few modifications to the recipe to suit what was in the cupboard, and they still turned out amazing. Moist and chewy, and a crunchy sugar cinnamon coating. Nomnomnom.

Blueberry Snickerdoodles

1/4 c  Butter, softened
1/4 c Coconut Oil (room temp or melted is fine)
1 c sugar
1 Egg
1 c Flour (plus 2-4 T seperate)
1/4 t Baking Soda
1/4 t Cream of Tarter
1/8 t Salt
1/2 c Blueberries
1/8 t Cinnamon
2 T Sugar
2 T Raw Sugar (the big crystals, or you can sub in regular sugar)

1. Preheat oven to 375
2. Cream together butter, coconut oil, and 1 c sugar.
3. Mix in egg, salt, baking soda, and cream of tarter.
4. Stir in 1 c Flour, adding more if necessary to create a non-sticky dough.
5. Carefully fold in blueberries.
6. In a separate bowl, combine cinnamon, remaining sugar, and raw sugar.
7. Roll cookie dough into 1-1/2 inch balls, roll in cinnamon sugar, and place about 2 inches apart on greased cookie sheet.
8. Bake 11-13 minutes until edges are slightly browned, or until a toothpick inserted in center comes out clean.

Makes about 1 dozen cookies.

Grilled Salmon and Avocado Salad

This was just a last minute, walk through the grocery store, and pick up whatever looks good. I found avocados first, and have been seeing all sorts of stuff with grilled avocados on Pinterest. I figured it was about time to try it for myself. Not a fan of grilled avocado, but the salad was still really good.

Grilled Salmon and Avocado Salad
1/3 head Romaine lettuce
1 c Spinach, chopped roughly
4-6 oz Salmon fillet
1/4 Onion, chopped thinly
1/2 Avocado, leave in peel
1/4 c Bell Pepper, diced
1 t Seasoning salt (I use a saltless mix, recipe is coming soon)
1/8 t Chili Powder ( I use an Asian variety that is pretty much just ground dried peppers)
2 T Limeade (or 1 T lime juice + 1 T water)
2 T Vinaigrette (I use this Blush Wine Vinegrette)

Get a piece of foil, about a foot square. Lay out the onions in a layer about as big as your piece of salmon. This is so the fish won't stick to the foil. Sprinkle both sides of the salmon with the seasoning salt and chili powder. Lay the fish on top of the oil. Add the bell pepper on top of the fish. Start folding the fish up into a little envelope, before you close it completely, add the limeade. Finish closing up the foil.

Heat up the grill for about 5 minutes. Turn the heat down to medium. Over indirect heat, place the salmon foil  seam side up and the avocado cut side down. Close the lid and let cook for 5 minutes. Turn the avocado over, and rotate the salmon 90 degrees, keeping the seam up. Close the lid and let cook for 5 more minutes. Remove the avocado from the grill. Check the salmon, if not done, place foil pouch back on the grill for another 5 minutes. When fish easily flakes apart, remove fish from grill and turn off grill.

Mix together romaine and spinach and put into bowl. Cut the grilled avocado into a large dice, sprinkle over greens. Open the foil packet and using a fork gently flake the fish. Place contents of packet over salad. Drizle the vinaigrette over the salad.

Bridesmaid's Invites

So, even though the marriage is over a year away, I'm just getting all the little ends tied up early. And it's a distraction from midterms ;) Always a good thing.

 Here are all three of them. I want to say I changed the paper on purpose, but I ran out of the other paper. Oh well, it works for my junior bridesmaid just fine. Here's a close up on each.

 "Because to me you mean so much

I have one thing to say which I will phrase as such,

Nothing would give me more joy and pride,

Than to have you up there right by my side,

You've stood beside me through out thick and thin

And I want you to be there when I marry Him.

Many great memories I have shared with your smile,

So, I want you to meet me at the end of the aisle!

Will you be my Bridesmaid?"

And of course I had to make a special one for my awesome Maid of Honor. She doesn't know it yet, but hers is in the mail on its way. ;)

"I realize just how special you've always been with friendship,

love and guidance and a shoulder there to lend.

Not a mother or a sister but a blending of the two,

A good friend in my life always when I've needed you.

You can make me laugh on any given day.

You listen with your heart and know just what to say.

Soon I will be married and I still look forward to the friendship,

Love and guidance that has always come from you.

Will you be my Maid of Honor?"

Things I Hate About Working Customer Service Part 1

1. Customer's that blame you for their lack of research. I recently had several over privileged teenagers email in, I'm calling them teenagers because any actual adult would not act like they do. Here's a short ad-lib of how the conversation went:
CUST: you suck! I sold all of my previous models and all attachments that I thought would come with the new one, also you moved to an SD card and didn't tell. You owe me all the mounts and a new memory card.
ME: *facepalm* All of the information was available on our website prior to you ordering.
CUST: I didn't see it. You owe me x$ worth of stuff because I didn't see it.
ME: Let's go to the store, and select the product. Yeah, scroll down, all the way down. There's all the information that would have saved you a lot of trouble.*
CUST: your company owes me!

It just degrades from there, but you get the point. Before you spend a significant amount of money on something, do even just 5 min of research about what comes with it, any additional products you need to purchase, and the compatibility with your existing equipment. Really, 5 minutes saves you time, money and frustration.

*Not actually what I said, I just told him a generic "all of your "x" are still compatible with our new product".

2. Sending multiple emails within a short amount of time to the company. Really, we got the first one, we'll get to it when we get to it.

Our company sends out a generic email response after you email in letting you know that we usually answer emails within 1 to 2 days. Just because you didn't get a response in 5 minutes doesn't mean we are ignoring you. You may think I'm joking, but this happens.

Email 1: my camera no work! 12.25 pm
Email 2: ????? 12.27 pm
Email 3: hello??? 12.28 pm
Email 4: y u ignoring me?!?!?!!?!?!??!?! ANSWAR ME!!!!! 12.30 pm
Email 5: ......... ***** customer service. ANSWARME ALREADY CAMERA NO WORKING!! 12.35
Our response 1: We need some more information about your camera. Is it not turning on? Is it not taking videos? What is going on with your camera? 2.45 pm

The response is either helpful or a long rant about how horrible we are we took forever to answer the email, even though it was less than 3 hours >.< . Really, tell your kids they aren't that special and they get to sit in line sometimes. There is no magic way to get to the front of the line, and annoying us with excessive emails just means it's going to take longer to get back to you because we won't respond until the end of our shift, dragging the whole process out for several days longer than it needs to take.

Mideaval Shoes

So in recent digging around on the internets for the purpose of not wearing tennis shoes at uprising again, I ran across this:
http://tangibledaydreams.blogspot.com/2011/06/making-viking-leather-slipper.html
In short, a simple pattern for a pair of shoes, based on extant pieces.

Here's the first attempt out of pleather. The pattern needs to be wider at the toes, something about me having ginormous feet. They're actually super comfy, so these will probably come camping with me, because I'm too lazy to find sandals.

Pizza Phone Commandments

1. Thou shalt never use a speakerphone while ordering pizza. I can't hear you, and you'll just get pissed off. Save us both some trouble.

2. Thou shalt leave the room if your kids are screaming. I can't hear you, and you can't hear me. Bellowing into the phone at your kids is a stupid thing to do.

3. Thou shalt say thy phone number slowly and enunciate.
"Yeah. My number is six eight seven eigsevnien."
"Can you repeat that?"
"Six eiven eigsevnien."
"One more time please?"
*sigh* "six ... eight ... seven ... eighty ... sevien."
"Was that 687-8017."
"NO!!!!!!! Why can't you understand? It's not that hard! 6... 8...7... 8... 0... 7... 9...
"It's loud in the store, and if we can't understand your phone number, we'll just give you a generic phone number and write in your name. Usually wrong. You'll come to pick up your pizza, and we can't find it because you couldn't be bothered to slow down when you're talking.

4. When you come in to pick up your pizza, it could be under several names, usually not your last name. Last names are hard to spell, so it's usually your first name. Sometimes it's under something close, don't get pissed off at us. Spelling it doesn't help, as it is over the phone and we have other things to get to, like the next phone call or the customer that doesn't want to wait.

5. Thou shalt have patience. It's not the person at the front counter's fault if there's something wrong with your pizza. Don't yell at them please.

6. Be nice to the managers. It will get you more than being an asshole ever will. We're more willing to give the nice guy free stuff than the guy that sits and bitches at us. In fact, we'll do everything we can to not give the assholes frees stuff.

7. If there's a problem, let the right people know. Be nice about it. We understand being frustrated, but it's usually not just you that has a problem in one night.

8. Yes, we do have retards working for us. We do our best to not let it interfere with your pizza.

9. No, I'm not going to read off the entire menu to you. Go online if you have no clue what you want. The entire menu is up there, and you won't be wasting my time.

10. Know your address before you call in. Most annoying thing in the world is to ask a customer for their address, then to hear them bellow "hey, what's the address here?". Just get it written down before hand.

11. Telling me what you ordered won't help me find it faster. It will just make me hate you more. Telling me your name usually helps. If you gave us the right phone number, that helps a lot more. I can't look up your order by using what you ordered or your name. I can look it up from your phone number, and that's it.

12. Actually wait for your order to be repeated for you. Don't call in and say "I want a pepperoni pizza and I want it delivered to my house at 999 somewhere street. *click*". You do this, and all I do is move on to the next call. If you call back wondering where your pizza is, answer is, you didn't order a pizza, you screwed yourself over.

13. Staring at us from the counter won't make your pizza come faster, it just annoys us.

14. Thou shalt tip thy driver. Doesn't have to be much. It's usually only a 10% tip. They get paid below minimum wage when they're out on deliveries. The drivers have a list of houses they won't deliver to because the owners never tip them.

Yes, all of these have happened to me. At least twice in the last week alone. Be nice to your pizza guys.

A year in review....

This year has been a huge growing point in my life. A lot has happened. I really mean a lot.

First thing that happened, I left a relationship with a man I still love. It was the hardest thing to do, but it needed to happen. I've grown up so much since then. I used to think that everything was wrong with that relationship because of him, but looking back, both of us just kind of let it all go. I then spent the next several months making him miserable, then finally stopped after he broke up with his girlfriend. We're now good friends again, but I really don't know if I will ever date him again. Maybe it's better to just leave things in the past.

The next major event, I got engaged to a good friend of mine. I thought he was a really awesome guy. I even started going back to church and everything for him. After talking he decided that he just couldn't marry me. Why? Because he believed that the sole purpose of marriage was to have kids. I disagree completely. Kids are a part of marriage, but should not be the sole factor in who you marry.

I then figured out how much fun getting drunk could be.

I left a job that I despised. I wouldn't mind doing catering again, I just didn't get along with my bosses at all. Best day of my life was the last day at work.

I got a dog. He has been the biggest blessing in my life. I couldn't get over my recent failed relationships. Wookie taught me that I can ignore myself and take care of someone else. He also helped get me off of my butt and moving again, instead of wallowing in self pity all day. I love him, and wouldn't trade him for the world.

Moving out to the middle of nowhere was an adventure. And more of a lesson in learning to be happy with who I was. It was out here in the middle of nowhere that I realized that I was still sexy, and that what other people thought didn't matter. Now that I believe that I am a sexy woman, it shows. I've never had so much attention from guys before, and most of it is in a good way. Confidence is sexier than being a size 5 will ever be.

I started an awesome job. Pizza Hut may seem like a terrible place to be, but it's enjoyable. I'd rather be poor and happy with my job, then be rich and despise my job. I work with awesome people.

I moved out. For the last time. It's been... Well, it hasn't gone all that well.

Ignoring your gut is a bad thing. It left me out over $3000 because I ignored my gut and trusted someone too much.

I met an awesome guy. I'd love to date him, but he keeps saying he's too busy. I'm hoping one day he may just change his mind. One can always hope, right?

Last of all, just when you think life couldn't get any worse, it does. Then something comes along to make it all better. Wookie brought me back from the depths of depression. He gives me someone to come home to every night. He doesn't care how bad the day was or how late I am, he's always there wagging his tail, waiting for me to come home. Wookie taught me how to love again. Wookie taught me how to forgive again.