Tuesday, July 31, 2007

Two Month Shots

It had to happen sometime... Miss Sophie went in today for her first round of immunizations. Beforehand we set her up with some baby tylenol, which is essentially cherry flavored goo that you administer with an eyedropper. It was officially Sophie's first taste of flavor (besides formula) and while she didn't spit it out, she didn't seem too enthused by it either. Then she went in for among other things the infamous "diptet" shot (which is now diptheria, tetnus and pertussis), polio, rotavirus and a whole host of other things. She was not happy about the whole process but quickly regained her baby composure. I think the Husband and I did pretty good through the event, though I do think it was a cheap shot when the Husband remarked that Sophie has my tolerance for pain. First, I think the screaming was more that Sophie was upset that we had gotten her all dressed up and instead of going to some place fun like Sesame Place or even better yet, Saks Fifth Avenue, she found herself getting jabbed by a physician's assistant in East Windsor, NJ. And, about my pain threshold... Epidural or no epidural the baby was almost eight pounds at birth.

Sunday, July 29, 2007

Tour Winner Announced!

Dateline: Paris, France

In a surprising turn of events this afternoon in Paris, Miss Sophie was crowned winner of the Tour de France. After a doping scandal disqualified all of the other riders, Miss Sophie was awarded both the Malliot Jaune and was also named "King of the Mountains"!



When asked about her win, Miss Sophie was quoted as saying "I thought the Eiffel Tower would be bigger."

Saturday, July 28, 2007

NJ Festival of Ballooning...

Today the Mom and I got up at 5:30am to head to Readington for the Balloon fest...




Friday, July 27, 2007

P.W.S.

In an article about bottled water being not all its cracked up to be, the story says that bottled water is a matter of convenience, not taste or health concerns... stating: "Try walking up (New York City's) Third Avenue on a hot day and getting a glass of tap water." I guess this guy has never gone to a restaurant on Third Avenue.

Wednesday, July 25, 2007

Fill'er Up...

Today I needed to get gas in the wagon. It was one of those rare occasions where the "get gas now" light actually came on. There used to be a Mobil station at our corner but unfortunately it was sold to Valero and the Husband doesn't like us to get gas at either Valero or Lukoil. My only other local options are Exxon (which has really slow pumps) or Sunoco. I hit up the Sunoco on Harrison Street (alas, had I been able to fill up at the Valero we would have averted the "get gas now" light, but whatever...) I give the attendant my credit card and ask that he fill it up with 93. Moments later he hands me back my card and my receipt. I think to myself, wow, that was fast. I look at the receipt... approximately $35.00 and 10.5 gallons. I have a 16.6 gallon tank. I turn the car on-- the gauge reads 3/4 full. Let me ask you, exactly how hard is it to actually fill a car with gasoline???

Tuesday, July 24, 2007

More Real Time Blogging...

Sophie and I are at EWR waiting to pick up Grandma and Grandpa! Unfortunately we had a small biological haz mat situation which has caused us to abandon our original plan of having Sophie wear her onesie emblazoned with G and G's picture... Instead she's opted for a "Grandpa's Cutie" onesie. In another unfortunate turn, there is construction at Newark airport and much of the terminal B short term parking has been taken over by construction work... Hence we ended up having to be parked in the *very* last space. Ugh.

Monday, July 23, 2007

Dinner!

Tonight we had four cheese ravioli (Buitoni) tossed in olive oil and butter with ricotta, black pepper and grated pecorino romano. With it we had asparagus (steamed and then sauteed in garlic and olive oil) and caponata.

Caponata is a Sicilian eggplant salad, kind of like bruschetta (but with eggplant, rather than tomato as the main ingredient)... I sauteed in olive oil two medium graffiti eggplant (cut into cubes) and a quarter of a vidalia onion (chopped). Once the onion was translucent and the eggplant soft, I added a handful of sliced grape tomatoes and one chopped roasted red pepper. I added dried oregano, pepper and some salt as well as a good sprinkling of golden raisins. I continued cooking these items together on low heat and after a bit I added two teaspoons of sugar and 1/4 of a cup of red wine vinegar, as well as tablespoon of capers (drained). I kept these items cooking together (on low heat), stirring occasionally for about 20 minutes, until the mixture had thickened. It can be served hot, cold or room temperature and was great on bread!!

With all these great summer vegetables, next up-- Zucchini bread!!!

Hot Ghetto Mess...

it sounded like such a good idea at the time...

Someone Has Seen

National Treasure one too many times...

People With Too Much Time On Their Hands...

This afternoon a flip through the channels brought us to "Knitty Gritty". Today's episode was focused on patterns for projects for "the elbows down" (i.e fingerless gloves, cable knit wrist warmers, etc. Need I say more?

Saturday, July 21, 2007

things change...

I haven't been in the city since May 22nd, and some things have changed and others have stayed the same... for starters Saks is now open till 8pm Monday through Friday (no longer is Thursday the late shopping day)... That's where my day began, after taking (eeek!) the train into the city.
Its the "second cut" sale and I hit up the children's department looking for bargains. It being Saks, compared to the sales on baby clothes at old navy and the Gap, "bargain" is a relative term... But still I managed to snag a few cute items. Then it was on to Frederic Fekkai. All I can say is if you're ever visiting FF at Bendel's be sure to ask for Lawrence to do your shampooing! I got a scalp and neck massage thrown in-- it was the first time a shampoo person truly earned their tip! Heads up people-- scalp massage (rather than trying to hawk hair products-- is the way to go!!)

Then I saw Julian. His rate has gone up but he had to dry my hair himself (he usually has an assistant). He also asked me about how my mother-in-law was doing-- nice sentiment, but I've never mentioned my mother-in-lsw to him. I think he had me confused with someone else. I guess he got too much sun in St. Barth's... I miss Ronald! We used to have such fun discussing the latest line-up on BBC America. Anyhoo, haircut is good, regardless. And, as a further update,the hairdresser who is an ebay fanatic is still trying hard to fit in-- now he has big gold plastic frame glasses and platinum blonde hair (but given the action figure collection, I still think he's straight).

Then it was on to lunch with 410e9th (Dave and Em were off to LI for a bar-be-que).Houston's service has gone down hill, but they claim that even though the "flying chicken fingers" aren't on the menu, they'll always have them. It is key lime pie season, but as we are stil trying to lose baby weight, I decided against it.
Then on to Barnes and Noble-- the old stomping grounds at 54th and 3rd. Picked up Harry Potter and an Olivia book for Miss S. I admit it, I've already read the epilogue. What can I say, I also read movie spoilers before I see movies-- it takes away any anxiety about the outcome.

Back on the train now and the woman next to me asked me how Harry ends so she can taunt her husband who's just started reading it, and I'm only in Elizabeth.

Friday, July 20, 2007

Things You Don't Often Find Yourself Saying...

I need three C batteries and a bucket.


Alas, our new Baby Einstein (drat!) bouncy-seat requires the batteries (god forbid it should take the D cell batteries that our other bouncy seat required...) and I need a bucket for some rit dye... stay tuned, I'm making a mini Maillot Jaune for Sophie!

Once Again, Leave It to New Jersey...

A missle launcher was found on the front lawn of a home in Jersey City today. At first this concerned people as the home happens to be in the flight path for Newark Airport, oh, but Fox 5 says, don't worry, the missle launcher was inoperative as it had previously been used for a training exercise. Yeah, that makes me feel much better!

Sensory Overload!

Wednesday, July 18, 2007

410e9th is up for Grabs!

Below is info about the Luekemia and Lymphoma Society's Bachelor and Bachelorette Auction which will include none other than 410e9th!

Please join us at Stout on July 27 for a party to benefit The Leukemia & Lymphoma Society. The highlight of the evening will be a Bachelor/ette date auction where dates will be auctioned off with several of NYC's finest ladies and gentlemen. The auction is to benefit the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society's Team in Training. The $15 donation will be a small price to pay for the fun night out and will be much appreciated to those who benefit from the services, education and research of the Society.

Who: NYC Bachelors and Bachelorettes including 410 and our friend Rina!

What: An evening of fun, including a Bachelor/Bachelorette Auction

When : Friday, July 27 (Door opens at 6:30, Auction starts at 8:30)

Where: Stout (133 W. 33rd St)

Why: To raise money for The Leukemia & Lymphoma Society

Cost: $15 at the door

RSVP: Email LLSDateAuction7.27.07@gmail.com to add your name to the guest
list

Please spread the word about the party to all of your
friends and colleagues. Trust us, this is an event they will not want to miss.

I fully expect that 410 will break George Clooney's record.

Where's George Kellerman?

A steam pipe burst at 41st and Lex this afternoon during rush hour. As the Husband noted, a new episode of ER and Law and Order will be forthcoming.

But fear not, Bloomberg claims, surely with all the water that came out of the steam pipe any asbestos in the air would have been washed down!

Baby Mozart....

Yesterday we watched the Baby Einstein "Baby Mozart" DVD. This consisted mostly of more xylophone music (Lionel Hampton is rolling over in his grave) and hand puppets. How, exactly is it that the "Baby Einstein" founder has made millions?? Any boob could have created this! It's just like the person who decided to make a giant travel pillow and coin it the "Boppy"...

Tuesday, July 17, 2007

More Tour News...

NY Times Tour coverage!

Chicken of the Sea...

Interesting article in the Times about sushi.... regardless of what they say, I could totally use a spicy tuna roll!

More City Pictures....

In Soho...

5th and the Park

Soho

On 57th

5th and the Park

Madison, UES

50th and 5th/Steps of St. Patrick's

Lower East Side

Chinatown

Coney Island



copyright 2007

City Pictures...

Below are some pictures I took years ago, with a little black and white contrast doctoring thanks to the computer...






copyright 2007

The Devil Wears Prada

Two good lines (even if we hate Lauren Weisberger since she was Cornell class of 1999):

Every woman can relate to: "I'm just one stomach flu away from my goal weight" and a line that every law firm associate can relate to, vis-a-vis vague requests from partners: "Where is that piece of paper I had in my hand yesterday?"

Dollar is Down Against The Euro?

Then go outlet shopping.

Monday, July 16, 2007

Lunesta...

I saw a commercial earlier for Lunesta one of those prescription sleep aids. In the list of potential side effects the commercial indicated that sonambulism with amnesia of the event may occur. You don't hear that every day.

In other tv viewing news, Donald Trump was on the Tyra Banks show today. (Don't ask-- it was 12pm and nothing better was on) Tyra introduced The Donald and then told him that he "looked like a pimp... but in a good way."

Friday, July 13, 2007

Blog Rating, courtesy of Texas Jack

Online Dating

Mingle2 - Online Dating



Geesh. I guess I've gotten soft in my old age.

Dinner...

Last night we tried a recipe from Giada's Everyday Pasta cookbook, with some revisions. Giada's recipe is for penne with asparagus, proscuitto and smoked mozzarella-- we made farfalle with asparagus, proscuitto and mozzarella in a lemon cream sauce (because everything tastes better in a cream sauce). It was really easy-- first you boil the pasta and asparagus (chopped into one inch pieces) until the pasta is al dente. Saute garlic, olive oil and butter in a large sautee pan, switch the pasta and asparagus (and some of the pasta water) into the pan and toss with cream, lemon juice, fresh basil, salt, black pepper and a little white wine. The cream allows the sauce to thicken and once the pasta is cooked to your liking you can add some grated pecorino romano and then toss in proscuitto (cut in strips) and fresh mozzarella. Pretty easy for an evening dinner and tasty!

Thursday, July 12, 2007

News of the World...

A new report out today states that high seas piracy is on the rise, clearly because Johnny Depp makes it look so glamorous.

Ms. New Jersey will be allowed to keep her crown, all I can say is, when dealing with someone from New Jersey, if you're going to blackmail them you have to do better.

And, in travel news on MSNBC, 7 were gored in the 6th day of the running of the bulls in Pamplona. Should this really be travel news??

The Singing Bee

Did any of you watch The Singing Bee? I love that the back up singers are dressed like Bees. I guess NBC had some left over costumes from the SNL days. I won't be happy until Joey Fatone is in a Bee suit too.

Temper Tantrum?

The BBC claims that the Queen didn't really "storm" out of a photo shoot with Annie Leibovitz, but if you ask me she still looks pretty well pissed. Maybe its still that whole Helen Mirren thing??

Wednesday, July 11, 2007

Standard of Perfection: Show Cats

Tonight our local PBS station broadcast "Standard of Perfection: Show Cats", right after a special on Synchronized Swimming, ah, PBS at its finest. If you follow the link above, the review of the show from the NY Times (back in 2006), likens it to Best in Show, which is pretty accurate. It's great when a cat named Nicole Kidman wins best in shorthair breed, shortly thereafter, while being inspected by a judge, another cat freaks out, flips backwards off of the inspection table and runs through the audience. You hear in the background the show announcer saying: "If you see the cat, please don't grab for it." Of course one of the spectators grabs the cat, it hisses, fur flies and off it goes again. Reasons why cats shouldn't do shows.

Tuesday, July 10, 2007

Baby Einstein....

Why is it that all music featured in the Baby Einstein line (whether their CDs, DVDs or musical toy products) feature the xylophone so prominently?

Monday, July 09, 2007

Brain Cloud...

On June 21st I bought two tickets to see Chris Isaak at the Beacon Theater (you may recall an earlier post where I noted that he was playing the Potowatomi Bingo Casino in Milwaukee but not visiting the tri-state, well, since then new tour dates have been added and my choices were the Beacon or the Borgata.) The show is in August and at this point it's still not clear how we'll be seeing the show given that it may be a little loud for Miss S., but that will be figured out at a later date.

Regardless, I bought the tickets. After having lost (a) prior Chris Isaak tickets (which were later found, mysteriously, on the toile ottoman) and (b) our Chorus Line tickets (which were never found...) I opted to have the tickets emailed to me.

Did I open the email? Did I move the email to my "saved messages" folder on AOL? Of course not! Do I think about any of these things? Not until I'm watching the fifth replay of the "Concert for Diana" on VH1 at 1:15am this evening. As I'm sitting in our overpriced, undercomfortable Pottery Barn Kids Glider rocking Miss S. to sleep while watching Duran Duran belt out Rio I think to myself-- "those tickets never came in the mail, wait, sratch that, I had them emailed.... e-mailed...wait, did I delete the email? Did I even get an email?" Thus causing me to have to head down to the kitchen, fire up the computer and frantically search for my ticket email.

Luckily, for some reason AOL is now allowing you to keep four months worth of email in your in-box. I found the message-- from June 21st, still unopened (thank goodness I hadn't deleted it figuring it for junk mail...) it is now safely tucked into my "saved messages" folder-- one of these days I'll print out the tickets (but even then, I'll have to do what I did with our Westminster Kennel Club tickets-- print out multiple copies and store them in various locations in case I lose any of them, and then still print out new ones the day of). Geesh.

Saturday, July 07, 2007

A Few Things...

The Tour de France has started again! This means every evening will be filled with replay hosted by naked Bob on the Versus channel. (I liked it better when it was known as OLN-- the Outdoor Living Network). Today's event started with the prologue in London. Tomorrow coverage begins at 8am with Stage 1 going to Canterbury. Needless to say we'll watch a replay later in the day.

In honor of the Tour (actually, it was mere coincidence) we made Tour-tilla Soup. I started by sauteeing chopped green pepper, chopped onion and diced jalepeno in a bit of olive oil. Once the onions were translucent, I added to the stock pot almost an entire box of low sodium chicken broth. I brought the broth and the vegetables to a boil and then added one small package of Bear Creek Tortilla Soup Mix. Then I added a small can of diced tomatoes (with jalepenos), a can of diced green chiles and a can of Southwest Black Beans (in lime juice and also with jalepenos). I added a bit of cumin and chili powder. I also added a bit of heavy cream, lime juice and fresh chopped cilantro. I then boiled two chicken breasts and once the chicken was cooked I shredded it and added it to the soup. Once the soup was thickened I cut up three flour tortillas into strips and fried them in a bit of olive oil. I served the soup with some monterrey jack cheese on top, a dollop of sour cream and some of the fried tortilla strips. Overall it was pretty tasty.

In other news, everytime I read a horoscope for Gemini (Miss Sophie's sign) it always has the following phrase (regardless of where the particular horoscope is found): "like fellow Gemini, Heidi Klum", as in: "like fellow Gemini, Heidi Klum, you've got all the right moves" or "like fellow Gemini, Heidi Klum you've got what it takes"... really, I'd rather they be a bit more specific, for instance: "like fellow Gemini, Heidi Klum, you'll find yourself insulting top American designer Michael Kors on Bravo!" or "like fellow Gemini, Heidi Klum you'll be working on your line of gummi bears and designer Birkenstocks this weekend while losing baby weight in order to headline the next Victoria's Secret runway show on CBS!" that would be much more interesting.

Friday, July 06, 2007

Toasted Ravioli Alfredo...

Back during my days at Cornell (1994-2000), the big restaurant to go to in town was Joe's. It was quite a sad occurrence when I went back for the five year reunion and Joe's was no longer (apparently though, it reopened, under new management, in December of 2005). This evening in a bit of nostalgia, I made a Joe's signature favorite-- Toasted Ravioli Alfredo, thanks to Giada's "Everyday Pasta" cookbook. On Page 33 Giada has a recipe for fried ravioli. I was excited when I first saw this! This is the pasta dish that I would get practically every time I went to Joe's (or more often, Little Joe's in Collegetown), the toasted ravioli, with the bottomless salad and breadsticks could a meal make for about $10!

Anyway, according to Giada it's pretty simple-- just get some store-bought refrigerated ravioli (I chose Buitoni), dip the ravioli in buttermilk and then bread with italian seasoned breadcrumbs and then fry in olive oil. Giada suggests serving these with marinara sauce (as the reinvented Joe's does these days), but that is far too healthy-- instead I made alfredo sauce and served the fried ravioli sitting on top of it, just like they used to do at the old Joe's and as an accompaniment we had artichoke sauteed in garlic and olive oil. Who knew, all these years I could have been making this at home (though in the long run my waistline may regret that I have now discovered this information!)

Thursday, July 05, 2007

Did Somebody Say Something About a Pot and a Kettle?

Love Tony Snow's response. Really, should any of these people have been pardoned, Clinton friends included??

The Simpsons!


You too can make your own Simpsons character!

Wednesday, July 04, 2007

Williams-Sonoma

Who, exactly, is it that writes catalogue text? Back in the eighties and nineties I know that the folks at J. Peterman elevated catalogue authorship to an artform, but just regular, old catalogue writing-- who actually has this job and is it that they assume no one is reading the descriptions underneath all the colorful pictures? Case in point, the July 2007 Williams-Sonoma catalogue. On page 76 they are offering up "Personalized Silicone Spatulas" for $22.50 for a set of three (now really, who doesn't want their name embossed on three spatulas? but that's besides the point).

The text for the item states:

"Molded from the finest-quality silicone, the heads are heatproof to 800 degrees Fahrenheit and stand up to the most punishing work. Hand-wash."

So let me get this straight, they can withstand 800 degree temperatures and "punishing" work but can't go in the dishwasher?

Then there's the White Mountain ice cream maker on page 81. "Churning ice cream by hand is a wonderful experience that's never forgotten." Doesn't really sound like a selling point, especially in light of the next entry which is for the White Mountain ice cream maker with electric motor, "for effortless hands-free churning." clearly meant for those looking for a more forgettable ice cream making experience.

Tuesday, July 03, 2007

Gettysburg

In honor of the Fourth of July we're watching all four hours of Gettysburg. Sophie is asleep, the cat is passed out, but we're all in agreement that Martin Sheen was a poor choice to play Robert E. Lee. What, is he like five foot four or something?

Monday, July 02, 2007

Restaurant Week...

Thanks to David for finding this... I guess we'll never go back to the Bombay Palace again!