Following Through on My Recipe Promise

So, I'm posting again just 2 days since my last post! Woo-hoo, er, I guess that's good. Who knows.....

In any event, before I get into any cooking details I'd like to provide some (unneeded) free advertising for the iPhone. Apple announced their new OS (that's an operating system to you and I.) that is going to be pushed out this summer. They claim to have over 100 new features / improvements. I looked through it and it mostly looked like obvious things that aren't earth-shattering (multi-media texts, copy/paste functionality, a map API that will let someone build a turn-by-turn GPS application, which I will immediately buy), but to me this just shows why the iPhone is so awesome. Apple comes up with a great idea, and then doesn't eff it up with stupidity. They make it easy for external developers to build applications so that they don't have to come up with all the great ideas on their own, and they add the stuff that people want. An iPhone will change your life. And that's coming from a guy that only has access to his phone about 6 hours a day (subtracting work and sleep).

Anyway, this is the 1st of 3 recipes I plan to provide shortly. One might call this the 'holy pork trilogy', or something dumb like that.....

Southern Peach Pork Chops

(This recipe comes from 'Grill It!' by Good Housekeeping)

(Technically the recipe also says you should cut 4 peaches in half, cover them in peach jam, and grill them for 5 minutes. In my opinion, this is a just great way to ruin a peach.)

What you need:

1 tbsp curry powder

1 tbsp brown sugar

1 tbsp olive oil

1/2 tsp salt

1/4 tsp ground cinnamon

pinch of black pepper

1 garlic clove (pressed)

4 pork chops

1/2 cup peach jam (or apricot jam)

1. Fire up your grill to medium heat
2. Stir curry powder, brown sugar, oil, salt cinnamon, pepper, and garlic in a bowl until blended. Rub this mixture onto both sides of each pork chop
3. Spread some of the peach jam onto ONE side of the pork chops
4. Place chops on the grill, jam side UP for ~5 minutes
5. Turn chops and then spread jam onto them - grill ~5 minutes
6. Repeat previous step, but only grill for another 2-3 minutes

Tips based on my experience:

• Go heavy on the '1 tbsp of olive oil'. That rub mixture is kinda hard to work with, in my opinion.
• Be quick on the 1st turn of the pork chops. 4 minutes is probably enough
• Be slow on the 2nd turn (~6 minutes). I think the fact that initially the bottom side has no jam makes it cook faster than after you make the turn.
• I'm not really sure that step #6 is even necessary. But in the end you're just putting more jam on, so I guess it's hard to make an argument that this is a bad thing.

Try it.

You're welcome. :-)

Re-thinking my Blog Posting Goals

I apparently am incapable of a weekly blog. Either my life moves too fast to make time each week, or my life is too boring to justify a weekly post. Anyway, I'm officially retracting any stated goal for timely publication. I'll just blog whenever the heck I manage to set aside 20 minutes AND have something reasonably interesting to say.....

Short Ramblings

• I spent the week in the Ft. Walton Beach, FL, area for work, and it was incredibly foggy. Being a midwesterner boy, I have no idea if this is normal beachfront behavior. But it was 80 degrees everyday, so that was nice.
• I spent an extra BONUS night in Atlanta because we (everyone that flies in the US) have an air traffic control problem. I have some choice words for the airline industry as a whole, but I'll hold back and just say "wowzy woo-woo, you guys should not suck so bad".
• I went to 2 different driving ranges today - BOTH CLOSED! (*confused*)
• My still unnamed sweeping slave (the iRobot Roomba) is an awesome gizmo. I eagerly await the arrival of my SlapChop....
• 'Spring' Oreos are, for some mysterious reason, noticeably tastier than normal Oreos
• I took my nerd-dom to another level this week and put a wood-grain skin on my trendy little netbook laptop. At least I'm amused by it....

My Bowling Career is Launching

I normally wouldn't share too many bowling details, as that's not what I'd call 'riveting material'. But since I already embarassed myself I might as well let you in on the fun too.

I bowled the series of my life 2 weeks ago - 710 (scratch)! I had a 235 the 1st game, then ALMOST bowled 300. I had a spare in the 2nd frame and strikes in every other frame........until the 3 ball of the 10th frame when I unceremoniously threw a gutter ball. Ouch. I think that seriously may have been the 1st time in the history of man that someone bowled a 270 and threw their last ball straight into the gutter. Apparently the pressure of the 'pizza and beer' league was more than I could handle. But I did recover to throw a 205 the 3rd game to reach my final tally.

I intended to post a grilling recipe on here, but got distracted by the drama of an eBay auction (I'm patiently stalking a playstation 3). I'll toss the recipe up next time I blog.

LISTS

BLOGGER NOTE - I went to Rome, NY, again this week, which some of you may remember was such a horribly boring place that it inspired me to start my blog this past fall. To commemorate this experience, I'm changin' up my blogging habits - FRIDAY is new blog day in Dayton, OH. Sundays are just bad news for me. Now, on to my blog, fully composed of lists.

LIST #1 - 6 Things I'm Thankful For (omitting the uber-obvious family / friends)

1. The US Government - "WHOA", you say, right??? The government is horrible and wastes money and doesn't get anything done, right? Well, yeah, that's sometimes true. BUT, our system is the no kidding real deal. We are inefficient because we have checks and balances (and because approximately 46% of civil servants are worthless), but we are incredibly stable even in this unprecedented economic downturn and still have the strongest military in the world. Next time you think it sucks here, ask Iceland (their government failed this year due to the economic problems). Or ask Zimbabwe (they suffer from hyper-inflation - a loaf of bread costs no kidding over a BILLION Zimbabwe dollars, and in the time it took me to type this the price probably doubled).
2. The internet - Its impact can hardly be overstated. Google it. (Fun fact - Google actually searches less than 10% of the internet. Holy IP addresses, batman!)
3. My career - I am probably part of the less than .01% of the population that is not concerned about losing their job, and is even thinking about a promotion. My job is solid, even if it pisses me off a fair amount of time. I really think I've noticed less whining about things at work because of the massive lay-offs and general job uncertainty in the population. And one consequence of my job is that I can PRACTICALLY transfer to anywhere in the country. I often wish I didn't live so far from home, and maybe sometime I will get a little closer.
4. The Human Psyche - I think that I've taken my math/science expertise as far as I care to (which isn't to say I'm some awesome expert. I've just lost the passion to proactively progress based on my own motivation.). But I am now much more intrigued by what motivates people, and how people make decisions, and other crap such as that. It's much more complicated than thermodynamic laws, cuz we (humans) still haven't really figured it out. If we ever knew how to predict human behavior we'd be done. Shut down the patent office!
5. Sports - Clearly I have spent an incredible amount of time honing my sports skills. Sports don't play a central role in my life anymore, but they are still a great way for me to relax and unwind. Watching Illinois basketball or Cardinals baseball is at the very least a great distraction from life stress. And I continue to play basketball, ominously awaiting the inevitable knee injury that will end that career. Volleyball has kind of turned into my high-action sport, because recreational basketball stinks (I'll complain about that in some other blog.) BUT, I'm also transitioning to 'old people' sports, like golf and bowling. Turns out these are a good time, and I think I can do them when I become fat from too many hours in front of the computer. Everybody wins! Well, everybody but my imaginary wife of the future. She'd better show her ass up quickly if she wants to make any bold requests like "don't get fat". That doesn't just not happen on its own.
   
6. Oliver - A dog? Seems trivial, but he's seriously one hell of a roommate.

This list is longer than I thought. I think I'll make 2 more (surprise) lists later in the weekend....

Note to Self

I owe Megan a '6 things' list next week. I forgot until I read Lou's blog....

A Week Late......

I missed last week (obviously). I blame my master's class and the Super Bowl. Now that that's out of the way.......



Last weekend seemse like a long time ago, so I'm a little short on details. I think maybe this is a good thing. If one can't remember it happening a week later it is probably unworthy of blog-dome. Maybe we should all wait a week before blogging. It might take our posts to the next level. Soon strangers will be reading our blogs because our lives sound so interesting!

Ice Storm From Hell

That doesn't even make any sense. It's hot there. Wherever that storm came from, it dumped a boatload of snow, then ice, then more snow on my little corner of the world in Dayton. We missed 2 days of work. Luckily the bowling alley stayed open, so the important part of my week was uninterrupted. :-)

Here's a picture (snapped from the iPhone) of deathly icicles hanging 3 stories above my condo last weekend. The photo doesn't seem to do them justice, as I am estimating the longest one at 9'. Monsters, seriously. They actually woke me up sunday morning when they fell. That wouldn't hold up in a court of law, but at the very least I was awakened by the shattering of ice outside, and when I took Oliver out to pee the icicles were gone. Thankfully my DirecTV dish was spared.

*flash forward to this week*

The Germ From Hell

Actually it's just a slight cold, but I'm stretching for a 'title theme' this week. I left work early monday, stayed home and slept all day tuesday, and left work early again on friday. I've been hitting the meth pretty hard to fight it off. That's what I call pseudoephedrine. It's an important ingredient for meth, and it's practically more difficult to purchase the stuff than it is to rob a bank. These precautions seems quite misguided, sort of like making me take my belt off before being allowed to board a plane. I think the people that make these rules have to know that we now have radars capable of looking through clothes. So why do I have to get down to my boxers to go through a metal detector? Why is the metal detector there at all anyway? Explosives aren't metal, and everybody puts 7 different electronic devices (GPS navigator, cell phone, watch, laptop, etc.) through the other scanning device. Any of these things could just as easily be a detonator. I think we're afraid to throw the metal detectors away because it would make people feel vulnerable. This paragraph was supposed to be about me being sick..............

The Season from Hell....

....is over! My 8th graders mercifully lost in the tournament this afternoon, ending a 2-10 campaign. Miraculously, we actually won in the 1st round of the tournament yesterday. It was a very dramatic and painful victory. Offense was difficult to identify for even the most focused observer. It was tied 13-13 at the end of regulation (yeah, really), but our offense caught fire in overtime, winning 17-13. Unfortunately reality came a-knocking today as we got beat down to the tune of 44-11 (-ish).

The Robot from Massachusetts

I got my iRobot Roomba in the mail this week. She needs a name. I'm not as blessed as many of you all in the creative names department, so please send inspired names to me. Here is a picture of her apparently eating Cap'n Crunch for breakfast, but this isn't at my house. Oliver would never allow that. As a matter of fact, Oliver needs to learn to respect *name here* a little more. He's been ran into by her no less than a dozen times. Each time Oliver reacts with subtle annoyance, if not full-blown disdain. This much is clear - "he's not frickin' movin' for no robot vacuum. Go around, *name here*!" I eagerly await my other recent (foolish) purchases, the SlapChop and ShamWows. But if you've seen the commercials, you know they are coming from Germany, so I wouldn't expect them for at least another week.

A Cautionary Tale for Body Hair

(Intriguing title, no?) First, I should say that I really appreciate all the fine gifts I received for Christmas. Sadly, one of them is torturing me daily. The fancy belt Megan bought me is reversible. The buckle side has a spring-loaded joint that lets you flip it around so that you can have either black or brown showing on the outside. It's genius. The downside is that it pulls out hair in the vicinity of the bellybutton with reckless abandon (specifically left of the belly button). The life lesson here is to keep your shirt tucked in, but I'm a slob sometimes. If I don't pull myself together I'm going to have assymetric body hair. Symmetry has been strongly tied to how attractive one is perceived by others, so if I ever plan to find a wife I'm gonna hafta address this situation before it's too late. If I'm 40 and still single, I will now blame Megan..........

:-)

A Week Worth Blogging About

Hooray, I actually did something this week that is blog-worthy. So I won't have to fill this one with junk just to say that I posted for the week.....

Burns' Supper

This friday was the annual Robert Burns' Supper formal event. This is an event orchestrated by the British guys stationed here, as a sort of token of appreciation for us hosting them and working closely on various projects. The other event they have is the British Open Golf Scramble, held the friday of the actual British Open tournament. Sadly that friday isn't coming up anytime soon as I look out the window at all the stupid snow that's back on the ground today....


Anyway, if you aren't aware, Robert Burns was a Scottish poet in the 18th century. The event is to celebrate his birthday, which was January 25th. I'd never heard of him before I got invited to my first party in his honor 5 years ago, but I'm sure you've heard some of his work - he wrote Auld Lang Syne. And since it was written by a Scot and read first by Scots, it now makes sense to me why people just mumble through it, swaying back and forth looking drunk - that's the authentic replication of how Scots do it! :-)


This event is really just a prom for adults, which probably can be used to describe just about any event that requires a tuxedo. Burns Supper is the lone reason for me to own a tuxedo, and this is the 4th time I've worn it. Happily, this is the 1st time that I have truly grasped the black magic / art of tying a bowtie. That is no small task, and for the last 3 years I've probably stood in front of the mirror for over 2 hours trying to get that stupid thing to look reasonably close to normal. This year I unlocked a magical extra step that makes it work out in the end. I jokingly said that I might start wearing bowties to work just so I can stay in practice for next year.


My 'date' this year was Kacy, who has been a close friend since before high school, and lived over here in dayton for over a year (but is back in Illinois now). She came over thursday night, and we've goofed off all weekend, mostly playing Guitar Hero 4 (the one that's just like Rock Band2). It's amazing how much fun those dumb games are - they are real life-suckers. You'll look up and realize you've been playing for 4 hours. The Guitar Hero - like video games are probably the least advanced games that have come out in 15 years (from a graphics / technology standpoint), but no one had the awesome idea to make a guitar and drum-set into a video game at the time.

The only bad thing that happened this weekend occured early saturday morning. Following the LATE night (3 a.m.-ish before we got home) that always happens the night of Burns' Supper, I struggled out of bed before 7 a.m. to take my truck to get it's windshield replaced. Sadly, the guy who was supposed to do the work came back out of the shop after I sat in the waiting room for about 10 minutes and told me they had ordered the wrong seal. So I get to take it in next saturday for another 8 a.m. appointment. Bummer......but if that's the worst thing that happens in a weekend, then I'm doing OK.

My authentic Scottish friend in his authentic Scottish kilt

We pretended to act presentable and mature.....

...but then cleavage jokes ensued.

One Day Late - That's no SO Bad.....

OK, so I'm getting closer to this whole 'weekly' (-ish) blogging. It's been a very uneventful week. I really don't have much of anything to report. I didn't have to work today, and got lots of routine, boring crap done - called All-State to schedule for a new windshield to be installed in my truck, did the paperwork to get my transcripts from Rose-Hulman sent to Colorado State from my master's program, vacuumed my carpet and cleaned all the salt (from the sidewalks/roads) off of my hardwood floor. Yep, some readers are no doubt finding their eyes losing focus as I put them to sleep with random lame tasks.

So instead of talking about anything people legitimately care about, I'm going to make a couple of random commercial observations.

1. The latest Dodge truck commercials reach a new low
Really all the recent commercials from the main truck makers have gotten absurd. I'm ready for them to take Denis Leary (Ford), Howie Long (Chevy), and the dude with the stupidly deep voice (Toyota), and somehow make them part of these ridiculous tests. Maybe something will go wrong. Here's part of the Dodge commercial series, where four teams (identified as FIREMEN, MILITARY, COWBOYS, and CONTRACTORS - very tough, indeed) do stupid things with trucks and pretend that it's a good idea.



2. SlapChop - If you've been watching the national geographic channel you've probably seen the SlapChop commercial. If the guy doing the commercial wasn't such a terd I probably would've already bought one of these do-dads. It's safe to say I'm very intrigued.....I know, they never work like the commercial shows.

www.slapchop.com

Other Items to Fill my Blog

(whoa, my keyboard just went into 'Chinese' mode due to hitting Ctrl+something. I recovered....)

My 8th grade basketball team got beaten badly again this week - 28-7

I bowled quite poorly this week - 146/162/154. That'll hurt the ol' handicap

The Fightin' Illini basketball team looks WAY better than expected this year. I think this is a classic 'addition by subtraction' situation. It's amazing how much better we are NOT throwing the ball to Shaun Pruitt or watching Brian Randle turn the ball over.

Work has been very hectic the last 2 weeks. I'm hoping it slows down, but deep down I know it's going to be a hectic couple of months.

To keep this post from being a total stinker, I'll post the family pictures from Xmas. I'll try to be less boring next week.