a new philosophy

mnmlist : less




Stop buying unnecessary things.

Toss half your stuff, learn contentedness.

Reduce half again.

List 4 essential things in your life,

stop doing non-essential things.

Do these essentials first each day, clear distractions

focus on each moment.

Let go of attachment to doing, having more.

Fall in love with less.

little gus gus, light of my life

feb. 26th pickle and i adopted a puppy. 4 months old, he started life a bit rough with parvo, uri, sarcoptic mange, and giardia. thank goodness for stacy, bruce and dawn at the barking lot foundation who saved him from being put to sleep at the la county shelter. stacy, had him running in her pack, in no time. i am so happy that there are people like her and that she was willing to take a chance on me and pickle, (who have never taken care of dog ourselves). we love him to pieces. he was potty trained after 2 days in our apt. and to be fair the 2nd day was pouring rain outside. he already knows sit. he loves his toy frog and stealing his cousin jack's toys. his favorite snack is peanut butter and those chicken jerky strips make his belly hurt (no more of those).

pickle and i gave him his first bath since we've had him the other day and he took it very well, he liked the bath, but the blow dryer noise scared him a little. after the doggy street festival were pickle and i volunteered, gus demonstrated some barking and growling that he had learned from the big dogs. pickle and me were not impressed (even though it is kinda funny). but he is still learning. we discovered a baseball field near our apt and gus loves going there to chase the ball and frisbee.

i feel like a whole world has opened up to me, full of dog lovers, dog stories, dog stores, dog food, dog toys, dog everything. it is very fun. but most of all i love when he comes up and licks my face and lays down in my lap. my social life is pretty much down to zero, because i only want to be with him, and only want to go places he can go. sorry friends, mommyhood is rough.

master's degree in something useful that can get me a decent paying job, hopefully

cold rainy winter days like this make me want to move to mexico. but at least it gives me time to write about the beginning of my latest academic adventure. on feb. 16th i received an email from sdsu informing me of their decision to admit me into the mba program of the college of business administration. excited, yes....scared, yes! the letter informed me in kind language that because of my creative background i may want to brush up on some real material. i was assigned statistics, economics, and managerial and financial accounting texts to review before my program starts in the fall. i have yet to get them.


i feel that i really want to succeed this time, not just get the degree but make valuable connections, network, and graduate at the top of my class. of course, we all start out with the best of intentions. we will see where i am come december????

in other news. bought a polaroid camera, and $100 worth of film. first pack, fail. on second pack...pictures to come.

ideas/goals/objectives

well this list is embarrassing. here are some things i would like to learn. yes some things on the list i maybe too old for, too young for, too busy for, too lazy for, too slow for, too untalented for. (i couldn't figure out how to write that grammatically correct--grammar fail)

photography
cooking
knitting
guitar
calligraphy
driving stick
surfing
spanish
paddle boarding
rock climbing
hiking
skateboarding
yoga



this is a photo composition from an art gallery i used to work at. (i use the word work loosely.) the artist is adam lewis smith, despite me thinking of him as a mediocre person (to be fair, who isn't though), some of his compositions are exceptional. this one i like very much.

potato, onion, veggie burger love

needed to feed me and pickle and have pretty close to no food in the apt. this was simple and delicious.

4 small russett potatoes (thinly sliced)
.5 white onion
pinch of cayenne pepper
vegetable oil (don't be stingy)
1 tsp of minced garlic
salt and pepper (shoop, shoop ba doop)

veggie patty (defrosted- cut up and added at end)
4 big flour tortillas

i put all top ingredients in skillet and cooked on high heat for about 12 min. put veggie burger for about a minute. served on warmed up tortillas with tapatio and ketchup.

so so so good. but,

when i do it all over again, i will put the onion in a few minutes after the potatoes.

amatuer photographer, amatuer cook

so... a few days ago i tried a couple recipes found on veggiebelly. i figured a blog post was necessary to document all the mistakes that were made.

http://www.veggiebelly.com/2009/09/ricotta-stuffed-tomatoes.html




stuffed tomatoes...need i say more, delicious! only mistake was only making 12.


http://www.veggiebelly.com/2008/10/pasta-with-seven-vegetable-sauce-curing-a-canned-food-obsession.html


seven veggie pasta

call me crazy but when i looked at that picture i did not realize i would be making the sauce.... i know amateur mistake. but what can i say, my mom raised me to believe that sauce came from a jar. also silly ol' me didn't realize i would need a blender to puree the cooked vegetables. do not ask me how i thought the vegetables would turn into a sauce, i suppose i thought some magic was involved.

so i set out to the store to buy ingredients and holy cow pine nuts are expensive. so i opted for the almond substitute that my recipe suggested (mistake numero uno). while i was cooking i realized this was going to be a lot of food. so i told dill pickle to invite some hungry former marines over (mistake numero dos). not that i don't enjoy the company of pickles entourage, but when you are experimenting in the kitchen, and it is almost certain that things will go terribly wrong, it is best to not have witnesses.

so, food is bought, guests have confirmed. i begin cooking around 3:oopm (keep in mind dinner sched. for 8:00pm), mostly because i was bored and because there was a lot of dicing in order. that was mistake numero tres. if something takes 5 hrs to make, it probably isn't worth it.

after tomatoes are stuffed with the heavenly concoction that is ricotta, pesto, corn, and garlic. i put those in the fridge and set to work on the pasta. that was when i realized that i needed a blender/ food processor and magic or positive thinking were not going to puree my veggies. pickle suggested to just have a chunky sauce. i pictured a stew atop penne noodles, and since that vision grossed me out, i told him he would have to find me a blender. he went to target and bought one. 20 dollars for blender+ 25 dollars on ingredients= a meal that better be worth 45 dollars

final product, not so great. kind of tasteless. but my awesome apt full of marines ate it up like it was the greatest thing to come out of le cordon bleu. i stole the pictures from the veggie belly website so you can see her polished version. i didn't think about it at the time, but my next culinary experiment will be photographed.

over and out.

Instant

montana tubbing aug. 2009- more polaroids to come...
taylor swift, floating beers, butts hitting rocks, water snakes

Seconds

nature photos; pickle @ iron mountain, ramona lookout
color photos taken with small square frame

yours truly

wild card on new years. double exposure with pink and reg. flash.

First Attempt- Black White

pickle doing big arms outside our apartment at dusk. weird the background is almost completely black.

lake murray at sunset; b&w photos taken without frames


expenses: 6$ on film- 20$ on development- 8$ on cds =34$ for 23 pictures. polariods don't seem so expensive now. considering getting the 35mm back for the diana in order to make my learning curve a little less expensive.