Free Time

Lately, work hasn't been keeping me as busy as I'd like, so I've had time to do other things. Some things are less pleasant than others (like cleaning up the basement to turn into a play area, that wasn't a lot of fun). But the fun parts have been around trying new things in the kithcen. I've gotten back to baking bread again. In addition to baking bread from a book my sister got me for Christmas last year, I've found a great recipe for Italian bread which I've made twice and has been gone in under 24 hours both times. I've also started making fresh ricotta, which is so stupidly easy I can't believe I haven't done it before. And today, I made my first batch of homemade butter, which is even more stupidly easy. I think that the next item on my list of things to try making is mozzarella, which seems slightly more complicated, but well within my ability to not screw things up. Yay for free time!

This Makes My Blood Boil

A Facebook friend posted this link, and the story makes my blood boil. I'm not sure what can be done, but posting it for a wider audience can't hurt as a start. Boost the signal.

More Casserole-y Goodness

I love lasagna (well, I love my mom's lasagna, no other, including my own, measures up). However, I'm lazy. The big lasagna noodles are clunky to work with, and all the layers is just too much work. So what's a lasagna lovin' guy supposed to do? He cheats, of course. This recipe is pretty close to my lasagna, I just switch up the noodles.

Baked Ziti

The Ingredients:

• 8 oz ziti
• 1 lb ground sausage
• 1/2 c finely chopped onions
• 3 cloves garlic, minced
• 2 c tomato sauce
• 12 oz ricotta
• 1 egg
• 1/4 c parmesan cheese, grated
• 2 tsp dried oregano
• 2 c mozzarella cheese, shredded

The Method:

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

Cook the pasta as per directions on the box.

Brown the sausage over medium-high heat in a 12" frying pan. Once browned, add the onions and garlic and cook until the onions are soft. Drain if necessary and return to the pan. Add the tomato sauce and cook over low heat for about 10 minutes. Combine this mixture thoroughly with the pasta, set aside.

In a medium bowl, combine the ricotta, egg, parmesan cheese and oregano.

Scoop about half of the pasta/sausage/sauce mixture into an 8x8" pan. Add the cheese mixture by the spoonful on top of the pasta and smooth out. Scoop the remaining pasta/sausage/sauce mixture on top, then top with mozzarella cheese. Cover with foil and bake for an hour at 350 degrees, removing the foil for the last 15 minutes.

Serves 4-6

Notes:

I didn't actually use ziti for my baked ziti, since it was literally double the price of mostaccioli. Since it was roughly the same size and shape, I didn't figure it mattered. I used sweet italian sausage, because Amy isn't a big fan of spicy sausage. I also made my own ricotta, but I'll post about that the next time I make it. All in all, this turned out well. Happy had seconds! Come to think of it, he had seconds the last time I made a casserole, too. Hrm, I'm sensing a pattern...

What's for Dinner?

I haven't posted a recipe in a loooooong time, so here's one that I've been working on for a while. I think I've got it down pretty well now, so I've stopped fiddling. Let me know how it comes out if you give it a try.

Chicken Soup Casserole á la Bald Man Tom

The Ingredients

• 2 large, boneless, skinless chicken breasts, cooked and diced or cubed (around 2 cups)
• 4 tbsp butter
• 4 oz frozen mirepoix mix (carrots, onions, celery)
• pinch of salt
• 4 tbsp flour
• 2-1/2 c milk
• 3-1/2 tsp chicken bouillon
• 2 tbsp poultry seasoning
• 1 tbsp garlic powder (not garlic salt!)
• 6 oz noodles, cooked
• water (for cooking the noodles)
• 1/2 cup bread crumbs
• 1 tbsp poultry seasoning
• 1 tsp olive oil

The Method

Preheat the oven to 375.

Place a skillet over medium-high heat and melt the butter. When melted, add the mirepoix mix and a pinch of salt and cook until softened, about 5 min. Lower the heat to medium, then add the flour and stir, cooking about another 2 min. Lower the heat to low. Add the milk, bouillon, garlic powder and 2 tbsp poultry seasoning to the pan and stir constantly while it thickens. Add the noodles and chicken, stir to combine everything. Transfer the mixture to a 9x9 or 8x8 baking dish. In a small bowl, combine the bread crumbs, 1 tbsp poultry seasoning and olive oil, then sprinkle over the casserole mixture. Bake for 45 minutes, let stand 5 minutes before serving.

Serves 4

This goes over pretty well at our house. Happy even had seconds tonight!

Cold and Snowy Day in Central OH

One of the great things about living in the Central Ohio area is the Columbus Zoo. This is our second year with a family subscription, and I can say that it is easily the best money we spend each year. The zoo itself is awesome, one of the best in the country, but for those inclement days when you just have got to get the family out of the house before complete insanity sets in, there's an aquarium and manatee rehabilitation center. During the winter, both are nearly deserted, so there's plenty of room for the family to wander and explore.

Today, we got to the manatees at feeding time. Poet and Happy were more interested in the diver than the manatees. Especially Happy, since the diver who was anchoring the lettuce was a young woman. Sigh. He's going to be trouble...

Three Items

Item the first: my kids asked for mashed potatoes for dinner tonight. OK, that's not quite true, I offered them rice, noodles or mashed potatoes, and they chose mashed potatoes. This is significant because until a month ago, neither would touch a potato if it wasn't julienned and deep fried. Color me happy, that means we can re-introduce potatoes to the menu.

Item the second: my parents got me one of these for Christmas. I've used it pretty extensively for the last week, and I think I like it. This is my first ceramic knife, so I wasn't quite sure what to expect. It's nice and sharp, and the handle on this one is a nice fit for my oversized hand. It's a little light for my preference, but I'm getting used to it. I have to use a little more force to get through things like potatoes and carrots, but that might just be that I'm used to using an 8" blade. Anyhow, I like it well enough that I'm half tempted to get a larger ceramic knife for my knife block.

Item the third: we gave Poet and Happy their first introduction to Star Wars tonight. They didn't watch much, just enough to see C3PO and R2D2, which they know from a t-shirt Happy had over the summer. They were completely rapt during their few minutes with one of my favorite movies. I'm eagerly anticipating them getting a little older so we can watch it and the rest of the series all the way through.

A Brief Moment of Happy-ness

Life with Happy has been less than happy for the last few months. His "two" started pretty mild, but picked up around 2-1/2 and has intensified into a pretty attitudinal start to "three". There's mischievous taunting of Poet, punctuated by a lot of "NO!!!" shouted at Mommy and Daddy, all wrapped around lots of crying when he doesn't get his way.

But through all that, there are some small glimmers of the wonderful little boy who normally inhabits our house. For instance, today we were driving home from visiting Amy's folks. While flitting through one of a dozen small towns on our back-roads trip, Happy woke from his nap:

• Happy: DADDY, DADDY!!! (because sometimes shouting "DADDY" only once isn't enough to wake everyone in the car)
Me, while adjusting the rear view mirror so I could see him: Yeah buddy?
• Happy, smiling that sweet, beautiful smile that will someday get him in a WHOLE LOT of trouble: I love you very much!

He's never said that to me before, and certainly never unbidden. Made me want to grab him out of his seat and give him a big hug and kiss right there. Of course by night's end, he'd done something that again made me want to leave him with Grandma for a few years, but there, in that moment, he was my wonderful Happy boy again.

Merry Christmas, After All

Following yesterday's adventure, I got a phone call from the mechanic this morning. The initial guess from the shop was that I'd destroyed my car's clutch, which was the repair that was to have cost $1300. As luck would have it, it wasn't the clutch, but the CV shaft which bought the big one. And happily, the estimated cost for this repair is more in the $400 neigborhood.

Cue MAJOR sigh of relief :)

Blended Family

You may or may not know this, but ours is a blended family. That's right: Amy's car is automatic, mine is manual. Hers is a little bigger and more family-friendly, so we usually take it when we go places as a family. Since I work from home, mine doesn't get driven all that much.

Having a blended family does occasionally cause problems. Most often, the problems stem from me remembering which car I'm currently driving. I'll often try to downshift in Amy's car when I'm turning a corner, or I forget to put the car in park before shutting off the engine, which a) makes Amy nuts and b) causes the doors to remain locked (her car has this fancy feature that unlocks the doors when the car is shifted into park, but it only works, for whatever reason, if the engine is on). Once in a while, I'll forget that I'm driving my own car, and after putting on the parking brake I'll simply take my foot off the clutch, stalling the car. Today, I did a little worse than stall the car, I blew out my clutch. As I was backing into the drive today, I noticed the neighbors trash cans in the drive, so I wanted to be sporting and move them rather than run them over. When I took my foot off the clutch, instead of the usual lurch and then silence, there was a very loud WHA-BAAM! and the engine kept running. When I put the car into gear and tried driving, the engine revved, but the car didn't move.

Whoops...

So, Merry Christmas, Mr. Mechanic, as you are the beneficiary of my estimated $1300 repair.

Question For the Masses

Can someone please explain to me why everyone is in such a lather about Yuengling? I bought some of their lager today. I can't say I think it's all that exceptional. Yes, it's better than the mass produced swill that's out there, but I'd much prefer Great Lakes Brewery Dortmunder Gold. Heck, I think Sam Adams is better. What am I missing?

Family Time

We participated in a family tradition today: we took the kids bowling for the very first time. I know that many of you may scoff about bowling, but I have many fond memories of bowling while growing up. My first league was an adult/junior league in which I bowled with my dad, and I bowled in leagues nearly every year through high school. It's a big part of my family. So today, we introduced Poet and Happy. They were very excited and really had a blast. As a bonus, they behaved well enough that we want to do it again!

Thoughts in Space

(I know, I know... this poor blog has been neglected.)

Just a small post but one that I have been thinking about all day. This morning during our wake up snuggle Happy was babbling and kept mentioning we were on a space ship. Where he came up with that I don't know but it was fun pretending with him. It also made me think of the cartoon I saw earlier this week. The shuttle program is ending and there goes my boy's dream of space ships. I am sad that he (or his sister) will not get to experience the joy and pride of remembering a shuttle launch. I could go on but it is bedtime and this a just a random post.

What? Is this really a post to TftC?

Yes, we're still here. Yes, it's been a very long time.

Some of you may know that I recently had a birthday. Those who do probably know that I don't usually feel inclined to celebrate such an event, but honestly, since I have such an awesome wife, I didn't mind this year. What did she do this year that was so cool? Here, lemme show you what she got me:

That's right. She got me a towel. For my 42nd birthday. Now I have no need to panic, and I'll always know where my towel is.

I love my geeky wife :)

Grumpedy Grumpedy

Today was rainy-ish, cold-ish and very, very blah here in central OH, and, not wanting to have the kids running around outside, we took the younguns to a local mall which has an indoor play area. We got there before all the stores opened so it wasn't too crowded, but the bad behavior of the other kids more than made up for it. Poet and Happy and a lot of little kids kept getting knocked around the play area, cut in front of, and shoved off whatever they were climbing by kids bigger than they were. Now, Amy and I followed our kids around to make sure that they played nice, waited their turns and were gentle with kids smaller than themselves. Where the heck were the parents of these bigger kids? Obviously not worried about what they were doing or how they were behaving, that's for sure. If my kids behaved the way these bigger kids did, they'd have been scolded, put in time out, and or taken home. Am I just being over sensitive because it was my kids this happened to? Or should I have some expectation that parents teach their kids how to behave appropriately and play nice?

Grocery Shopping In Central Ohio

I found something unusual at our local grocery store tonight:

Now, where would you find something like this in a grocery store?

Wonder what the message is here?

Bare Butt!

... well, actually, it's "bear butt." Or maybe "bare bear butt." You get the idea :)

We spent much of the day at the Columbus Zoo. We have passes this year, and have really putting them to good use. The polar bears are this years "hot new exhibit," with viewing above ground and from a new underwater area. We'd been there twice before and both times the bears just lolled around on rocks out of the water. When we got there today, one of the workers had just thrown several toys in the water, and the bears jumped in and were swimming around playing. It was very, very cool.

Today's visit was prompted by the appearance of a little hispanic cartoon girl, who both of the kids love. There was a breakfast meetup, which we skipped, several "drive through the zoo on a golf cart" tours, and several scheduled photo ops where the kids could get their picture taken with the little adventurer. We managed to get in on the last photo op of the day, and, lo and behold, our kids actually didn't freak out, and managed to stand still long enough for us to take a few pictures. They even got to give her a hug and high five. Good times were had by all.

What's the Bald Man Been Up To?

You might have noticed that I really don't talk much about work online. I just think that things can get a little... weird. Well, today, I'm going to go ahead and ignore that, because what I've been working on has been so cool, I really want to share.

I work for a small company called Brand Thunder. We make customized themes for the Firefox and Internet Explorer web browsers. Recently, we completed a project that will not only change the way we create our Firefox themes, it also provides benefits to people who use and develop Personas for Firefox. Original Personas have one background image which is anchored top-right in the browser and cannot repeat. With Personas Interactive, a Persona designer can use multiple images which can be anchored left, right or center, and can be repeated. I think that this creates more interesting experiences for you, the users. With original Personas, designers were required to submit their Personas to Mozilla to be hosted so that persona previewing could be enabled. With Personas Interactive, anyone can host a Personas gallery and grant permission for sites to allow persona previewing, which gives the designer more flexibility, and you the users more places to go to find personas (once this catches on). There's more but you can read more about it at the Personas Interactive website, or on the blog of our Firefox developer here, here, here and here. It's pretty heady stuff, mostly aimed at personas developers, but if you're interested in how it's done and want to give it a go yourself, have a read. If all you want to do is see examples of how things work, I have a very small gallery put together over at my Personas site. Fair warning, I'm no artist, seeing what I've done may make your eyes bleed.

I hope you give our stuff a try. Another fair warning: Brand Thunder's primary revenue source is via our search partners, Bing and Ask. When you install Personas Interactive, Bing Search will be set as the default search engine. Please give Bing a try. It'll help feed the kids...

Give Us This Day...

Lately, our family has been on a bread kick. Amy found this recipe online and it has been a huge hit around here (the actual recipe is a good way down the page, past the whole part about how the author's four-year-old makes the bread). I'd encourage you to give it a try as is. If you're less of a "rustic" type and more of a "make me a gosh-darned sammich" type like me, try the following:

No Knead Bread Recipe - Perfect for Sammiches

Adapted from this recipe, you can read about all the different adaptations her recipe went through to get to where hers currently sits.

Ingredients

• 3 cups bread flour
• 1/4 tsp instant yeast
• 3/4 Tbsp kosher salt (or 1 tsp table salt)
• 1-1/2 cups warm water
• butter

The Hardware

• the largest mixing bowl you can find
• a silicone spoon or spatula
• plastic wrap
• bread loaf pan
• cooling rack

The Method

1. Mix all the ingredients in the large mixing bowl. Get as much of the flour incorporated as you can. The dough won't look all smooth like you've probably seen on TV, but that's perfectly OK.
2. Cover the bowl with plastic wrap, stuff in a warm dry place for 12-24 hours.
3. Dust a work surface lightly with flour, turn out the dough onto the work surface, and turn the dough over on itself a few times. You're not kneading, just some gentle folding. Don't overdo it.
4. Liberally butter the inside of a bread loaf pan, then dump the dough into the pan. I like to press the dough into the pan to get it more evenly distributed. Let the dough sit for 2 hours.
5. Preheat your oven to 350. Bake the dough for 50-55 minutes.
6. After pulling from the oven, remove the bread from the loaf pan and place on a cooling rack. While still rocket hot, smear butter over the top (yummmm)
7. VERY IMPORTANT Allow the bread to cool for at least an hour, or you may end up killing your bread. No, it won't be easy. Maybe you should go for a drive or something, because the yummy smell will drive you bonkers
8. Slice, butter up, and consume. Or slice, make yourself a gosh-darned sammich, and comsume. Whatever. Just eat it. It's good!

I hope you all enjoy as much as we have.

10 on Tuesday

Hi, Long time no post! A quick recap of life from the couch:

1) Thanks mom for the spontaneous offer to watch the kids overnight. It was a wonderful break and chance to recharge and get some stuff done around the house.

2) Happy's favorite color- blue. I think he likes to say the word.

3) Part of our weekend projects- a "big girl" bed for Poet. She is very proud.

4) Poet's tear duct tubes were removed this morning. Every thing looks fine.

5) Happy is a passionate eater- 5 Q-tips were needed to clean the tomato sauce out of his ear.

6) Our garden this year consists of 2 tomato plants hanging from a topsy turvy ... do they really work?

7) Happy is 18 months this week- where has the time gone?

8) Home grown strawberries- yummy

9) Kona and Sid went for their yearly vet check last week. It is hard to believe they are turning 6 this year.

10) Lost is over- what else is there to watch?

First (?) Sign * I'm Getting Old

Got new glasses on Friday, these were different. Because, you see, I got my first pair of bifocals. Now, I knew it was only a matter of time before I ended up with bifocals, as both of my parents wear them (actually, I think one or the other are technically farther up the multi-focal range). And over the last six months or so, I started to notice that I had to hold things I was reading farther away than I previously did.

All in all, the bifocals aren't too bad. I can see much more clearly near and at distance. I was warned about distortion at the sides of my vision, but so far I haven't seen any. After the first few minutes of "woogyvision," my eyes settled in and I haven't had any problems.

* no, going bald isn't a sign of getting old...