Orange Chicken With a Side of Burnt Plastic

I got home from the gym and I was exhausted. It was about 6:45 Wednesday night and I was ready for bed. But I had to eat something and since I was home alone, I was planning on making a quick burrito: low fat tortilla with fat free refried beans and fat free chedder cheese wrapped inside and microwaved for about a minute.

I'd just plopped my gym bag down in the middle of the floor and threw my coat over a chair and was rummaging through my "junk" drawer (they're all junk drawers with my organizational skills...) when I heard keys jingling outside of the front door to my apartment. I stopped and looked around to see Alex walking in the door. "Crap," I thought, "I'm all freaking smelly from the gym... and this place is a dump!" But I said, "Hey!" and walked over to give him a hug.

"I smell," I said. "I know," he said. I punched him in the arm and he hugged me again.

"Have you eaten yet?"

"No, I just got home from the gym... Do you want me to make something?"

He looked shocked and horrified at the possibility. I went on:

"I've got chicken in the fridge that I took out of the freezer last Thursday to make, but I haven't used it yet and I better use it before it goes bad..." and I set about moving things around in the fridge trying to get to the chicken which had settled in the back on the bottom shelf. I took out the chicken and set it on the counter and looked at it for a minute trying to assess if it was bad. Alex picked up the package and squinted at the date: "November 20th," he read and looked at me like I was trying to poison him. "I bought it then and it's been frozen since then... I just took it out of the freezer the other day," I explained. He didn't look convinced, but he put the package down.

I sliced through the plastic and sniffed at the chicken. It didn't smell bad, so I figured it must be good. I put the now opened package back down on the counter and turned to look at the recipe I'd pulled up on my computer screen when Alex rushed by me and snatched the chicken up from the counter and stuck it on the stove. "salmonella! You shouldn't put meat on the counter!" He flew into the bathroom to grab the Clorox Wipes and began wiping down the counter and when he was finished he scrubbed his hands. Meanwhile I oiled the pan and seasoned the chicken.

I think watching me cook was a stressful event for Alex. I kept dripping chicken juice and dropping things. He'd follow behind me and clean the "salmonella" off of whatever I'd dripped on. I have to admit, that I was very disorganized in my cooking attempt. I started the rice a little late and then forgot when I'd started it so I had no idea when to take it out (had to wing it... turned out fine). Then I misread the label on the can of mandarin oranges and accidentally opened two cans to make the orange chicken sauce and had to scoop half of the oranges into a container mid-sauce-making. I turned the chicken too late and ended up burning parts of it. And the string beans which I'd planned on making with the chicken had gone bad (though I didn't realize it right away and Alex, horrified, pointed out that there was mold on some of the beans).

Dinner was almost done when Alex came over to inspect... and picked up one of my new knives that I got for Christmas that I'd left on the stove apparently too close to one of the burners. "I knew I smelled something burning other than chicken!" he said as he held up the knife by the blade to show me that the black plastic handle had begun to melt. "Oh no!! That was one of my new knives!" I screetched. Alex quickly grabbed another knife and pushed the melting plastic pretty much back into shape: "See, good as new." He hugged me and told me I was cute when I was upset. Which made me feel better...

...until I walked into the living room with our plates of food and saw that there was smoke filling my apartment. "It's kind of hazy in here," Alex said as he opened one of the windows and stuck the fan in it. "Yeah..." I said as I sank down onto the sofa. "Why can't I do this! Why do I suck at cooking!" I whined. "Aw, you don't suck!" he said. And he put on a good show of eating the chicken. And I guess it wasn't actually too bad... if you could get past the smell of burnt plastic that lingered in the air.

So it was yet again another adventure in cooking for me. They say that practice makes perfect, but I'm afraid that one of these times I'm going to burn the place down...

So I weighed in last night for the first time since I started WW last week, and I lost 3.2 lbs! Rock! :)

More fun with my sprint camera...
So I left my Fruit2O in the car last night and it was frozen today and I've been drinking it as it melts and I just noticed that the ice inside the bottle looks very, um... phallic. I don't know if you can tell, but here's a picture:

I wish it would break... It's kind of embarrassing every time I drink it... ;)

oh, and i figured out what the ghetto writing on my car says. it says "sars 2012". perhaps it's an evil fortune cookie of death and it's predicting that I will die of sars in the year 2012. god, i hope not. i'd only be 33...

yeah. i totally forgot to wash my car after the gym tonight, so that's still on my car. damn. i hope it rains soon.

There's a spider above the kitchen cabinets. I'm terrified that he'll fall on me. I've tried to kill it, but I'm afraid I'll miss and he'll fall on me. ugh. Why can't I get over my fear of spiders? ew ew ew ew ew ew ew.

so i've been watching oxygen tonight. i got sucked in by this episode of "the knot: real weddings" (or something like that) with this sort of psycho bride. she was very cheerleader. like, i really believe she was a cheerleader in high school/college. she was very controlling at her rehearsal... she had this voiceover going where she was saying something like, "i really want to relax and not worry about everything because in a few weeks people won't remember the dinner, all they'll remember is if they had a good time or not." but while the voiceover was going she was on screen screaming at people to get in line and rolling her eyes at her family members and just being pretty much a psycho. then on the big day she drove herself to her wedding (which was sort of depressing to me) and she was in the car alone with the camera guy and she was drinking a glass of wine as she was driving. and they showed her drinking at home before she left. and it was pretty apparent that she was buzzed trying to drive this car. i was shocked. yeah. but it was a beautiful wedding... ;)

yeah. and now i'm watching the ellen degeneres show. she's freaking hysterical. :) I need to go to bed though... sleepy...

So it was Dan's birthday yesterday and Meredith and I went out on lunch with $ that we collected from our coworkers to get him a cake. Then I saw these hot pink cupcakes and decided that we must get them. So we got some blue ones too (because he's a boy). But I just had to share my joy that is the hot pink cupcake:

(today is fun with my camera for my phone day, can you tell?)

I walked out to my car after lunch and was greeted with this:

I had ghetto writing on my car. It totally must've happened last night while it was parked on the street outside of my apartment... and I live in a nice neighborhood! GhettoBeetle. I'm so kind of embarrassed that I drove to work like that! Like I was advertising whatever the ghetto writing says... I totally have to wash the car after the gym tonight. It's a good thing my sister paid me back partially in quarters... now I won't have to get change before I wash the car! :)
I'm so kind of skeeved that someone touched my car though...

Friday night I got home from the gym to find Alex waiting for me. I showered and he made me pick where to go for dinner. When I couldn't come up with anything, he suggested that we go to El Loco Mexican Cafe on Madison Ave. I had, like, a billion points left for the day and was totally in the mood for Mexican food so that's where we went.

We got to El Loco Mexican and it was packed. The cafe is very small, with four-seater booths along one wall, two seater rectangular tables in the middle that can be pushed together for larger parties, and two seater small circular tables along the other wall. There's a bar in the back right corner that is just basically an opening in the wall to the kitchen area with no seats in front of it. The hostess suggested that we stand by the bar and said that it should only be a few minutes. We stood at the bar and ordered our drinks (I had a sangria - which was very good - and Alex had a Corona). Then two women walked in and also stood by the bar, and we were annoyed to see them seated before us. The hostess bitchily explained that the two women had another person in their party that was parking the car and they were seated at a table to handle three and we needed to wait for a two seater table. What was annoying was there were at least two 2 seater tables that were already open but not cleaned and at least 3 other four seaters. Annoying. Whatever. We got seated a few minutes later and ordered chips with two types of salsa for dipping. The salsa there was awesome! We tried to figure out what to order but the menu was so big and there was a couple behind Alex that was very distracting, so it took us a bit... The couple behind Alex was apparently going through a divorce. Alex gave me the play-by-play as they fought. And then he didn't have to because they got loud. How embarrassing! They finally left... they got very quiet before they left and then they hurried out of there. I wonder who paid for dinner? Anyway. By the time they left we'd been served our dinners. I got a spinach burrito and Alex got the burrito grande. The food was fabulous! I'd definitely go back (even though the service was a little sucky).

After dinner we went to Crossgates to see Big Fish. The theater was packed and we ended up sitting in the very front section on the floor where the seats tilt back so that you can see the screen. The leaning of the seats made it easy to lean on Alex at the same time, so I was able to watch the movie pretty comfortably. The move was great. I really enjoyed it and so did Alex. The ending was kind of sad and I totally cried. But yeah, the movie was very enjoyable and I'm glad we went to see it.

Saturday night I went to HOTD at Revolution Hall with Beck and Dodi. I'm ass, ass poor, so the girls had to convince me to come out with them and that it was ok that they paid for me because that's what friends do. As of Friday I was down to $100 until I get paid again (2 weeks), because I had to renew my gym membership and I was charged fees that I wasn't expecting. So blow. But yeah, the girls wanted me to come out with them and so I went (even though I felt like a ghetto-poor tool). I remembered that my sister owed me $13, so after I talked to her and she told me she'd give me the $13 on Sunday, I let myself go to the bank and get out $20. So after Beck paid my way in, I used my $20 to buy us the first round of Guinness. We got the last table on the lower level which was right up front and center. It so rocked that we got a table, and we could totally pull off sitting right front and center because we're all so familiar with the band. We had an awesome time. Kevin and his friends showed up after a little bit and they seemed to enjoy the band as well. Dodi was totally flirting with the big guy in HOTD (he told her she was beautiful at the last show) so I told her to ask him to sing "The Parting Glass" at the end and he totally did (which rocked because I love that song and I haven't heard him sing it in forever because lately he doesn't sing it unless they're at the Parting Glass. So yeah. I had an awesome time (but I totally missed Alex because HOTD always reminds me of him and he couldn't come out because he had to be at work at 7 the next morning for a 24 hr shift). After HOTD I went home and Beck and Dodi headed up to CP. Beck, unfortunately, got harrassed all night. The rebound guy from last year kept drunk dialing her. She didn't want to talk to him, he should have just gotten the picture and stopped calling. How embarassing for him.

Today was quiet. I woke up at 8 when Alex came walking into my bedroom and scared the crap out of me :) He needed to drop by and grab his work shirt, which he left here Thursday night. He gave me a quick hug and a kiss and went back to work. I layed there and could only think, "God, how bad must I look?!" I checked myself out in the mirror in the bathroom and determined that I didn't look too bad. Then I read for about an hour but then decided that sleep ruled and went back to sleep until 11. I got up and pretty much sat around the house until about 3 when I finally got my act together and went grocery shopping. So now I have food (hopefully enough for 2 weeks) and about $50 left. Sigh. I'm sure I'll survive though ;) My sister came by for a little bit and dropped of the $13 but she soon left to go hang out with one of her friends. That was ok, because Beck had called and was about to head back to Poughkeepsie and wanted to meet for coffee. So we met at the Starbuck's in Stuyvesant Plaza. I had a tall black coffee, and I think my buzz is just wearing off now... :) I came home to watch SATC and I've been watching TV all night. I rule. It was a nice, relaxing day. I'd totally forgotten until a few minutes ago that our new "flex hours" start at work tomorrow, and I don't have to be there until 8:30, so that rocks!! So it's ok that it's 11 and I'm still up, because I don't have to get up until like 7/715 and I'll totally get 8 hours of sleep if I go to sleep now. Rock!

So yeah. Boring post, sorry. I'll try and come up with some interesting stuff this week instead of just recaps of my days...