Not sure what I was thinking.

I don't have much of an excuse for this shenanigan of a meal.


I cooked some quinoa on the stove, mixed in some leftover lentils, and somehow thought I could pull it all together with a bit of balsamic vinaigrette. I found a recipe online for a warm quinoa and lentil salad, but I didn't want to go shop for all the vegetables and spices. So instead I just, you know, cut out all of the ingredients that were intended to go well with the vinaigrette. It also didn't help that the dressing poured out of the bottle way too quickly, so my meal was sort of drowned in a balsamic sea.

Verdict: Well, it tasted like quinoa and lentils covered in balsamic vinaigrette. Not much else to say about that.

I've discovered that cooking random ingredients isn't so hard: it's putting them together in an flavorful and appetizing arrangement that gives me trouble. Like, I can cook the quinoa no problem, but then what do I do with it? I should reemphasize my unwillingness to go back to the grocery store. I was just there yesterday.

On a side note, I'm becoming quite fond of lentils. And asparagus. God, I love me some asparagus. I just wish it didn't make my pee smell so weird.

In other news, I'm about 30 pages from the end of The Fault in Our Stars, and I'm going to see John and Hank tomorrow!!!

I'm Learning to Cook

It's been a long time (long time). I shouldn't have left you (left you)
Without a dope beat to step to (step to, step-step to, step to, step to).

Alright, enough lyrically-relevant 90's jams. I haven't blogged in forever, and I'm not sure I'm going to try to catch up. I think I'll just start with right now and only provide backstory if it serves the blog.

So what am I up to right now? Well, today I slept 'til noon, went for a run around the LSU lakes (I love to run now!), and then I got groceries and cooked myself dinner. And THAT'S what I'm talkin' 'bout.

I decided today that I want to learn to cook for real. No more Lean Cuisine, no more pasta and canned veggies for every meal. It's going to be a trial-and-error process for sure, and it may not make the most interesting blogging. But if you'd like to follow me on this journey, you are more than welcome.

Tonight I started with something fairly simple: basmati rice with lentils.

(The asparagus came from a frozen steamer bag, so they don't count. And yes, I need to work on my portion control. One thing at a time!)

I cooked the rice and lentils in two separate pots. I was surprised at how easy it was to cook rice on the stove. I don't have a rice cooker at the moment, so I had to make do. I let them both cook for about 15 minutes, and then I just combined them on the plate and added a tiny bit of soy sauce.

Verdict: Not bad. Pretty tasty, very filling. I didn't quite mix the soy sauce evenly, so parts of it were a little dry. The parts with more soy sauce were great, though!

I want to explore new ways to cook this meal. Soy sauce is pretty heavy on the sodium, so I'd like to find a way around that. Next time I might try sautéing the cooked rice and lentils together with some olive oil and maybe some onions. I bet that would be fantastic.

So that's meal #1. This should be fun for me. For you, maybe not so much. We shall see.

In other news, I'm going to see John and Hank Green in New Orleans on Wednesday!!!! I'm pretty psyched. I'm about 2/3 of the way through The Fault in Our Stars, and I love it so much. I'm going to do my best to finish it before the event, so you may not hear from me again in the next few days. If you happen to be at the NOLA event, please find me and say hi!

I always forget there was a president called Zachary Taylor.

It rained today. It rained really, really hard today. It rained really, really hard ALL DAY, and I had a lot of places to go. But that's not the most horrible thing that happened today!

I went through the drive-thru at my beloved Yeero Yeero for lunch, and I decided to shake things up a little. I usually order a chicken gyro pita sandwich and add feta cheese. Today I ordered a chicken gyro platter instead, which is basically the sandwich in platter form with a side of vegetables and a drink. Well, the pouring rain and rushing wind must have made it difficult for the Greek kid in the headset to hear me, because I got home to find that my platter did not contain chicken. They gave me.........LAMB! *gasp* Oh, the horror.

Ok, it actually wasn't too terrible. It definitely wasn't as good as the chicken, though. So lunch today left me a little disappointed. Maybe it was sign from God that I should drop the feta and pick up an apple now and then. My bank account could definitely use the break. I'm supposed to be saving for a trip I may want to take this summer, and I haven't been doing so well with that lately. I need to get one of those design-your-own credit cards. The background image of mine would just be the words "INTERNATIONAL TRAVEL IS BETTER THAN GREEK FOOD AND NERFIGHTERLIKE T-SHIRTS."

In other news, ALL CAPS music has been stuck in my head all day, probably because I've been listening to it in the car all day.

---
Whew, ok. I'm back. I had to go pick up my roommate because her won't start. Hah, we really don't have good luck with cars around here, do we?

I think I'm going to end this particular entry now anyway. Like I said, I did a bunch of things today, such as go to church and go to church orchestra rehearsal and sing a choir concert at a church (it is Sunday, after all), but nothing truly interesting happened. When I had a thought today, it was usually that I wanted to take a nap. I guess there was one awkward/funny moment to take from today, but I decided to make a video about it. I know, right? I actually made a video. Grrrrrr busyness and sleepiness keeping me from videoness!

Speaking of videoness, did anyone else notice that John Green left Gerald Ford out of his video about U.S. Presidents' last words? I did. Still, it's a pretty badassly nerdy video. I hope my last words are good. If not, tell them I said something worthy of being memorized by Pudge Halter.

And with that, I leave you. Goodnight, all!

Yeero Yeero indulgences this school year: 10
Pop-Tarts this school year: 10 (WHOA! A TIE!)
Subscribers: 1,142

Dumb Bitch Chronicles, Ep. 2

I'm not even in a bad mood today, but dumb bitch Andromeda has really been making the rounds lately. I just have to blog about it.

Every year my college choir does a big concert in late fall called Rhapsody. It's our biggest fundraiser, and every choir member is required to sell 15 tickets. If we don't sell them all, we have to pay for the ones we don't sell. It's pretty aggravating, not to mention a huge financial burden for the unlucky ones, but I usually don't have a problem. I also sing in a church choir, and almost everyone there wants Rhapsody tickets. A lot of them are alumni of the college choir. Should be easy for me, right? Normally, yes. This year, not so much.

Enter Andromeda. Two days after we receive our tickets, she takes it upon herself to go to church and sell FORTY TICKETS. Forty. Remember how I said we only have to sell fifteen? There is absolutely no fathomable reason for any one person to sell over double what is required when there are sixty more of us who need to sell tickets. Oh, and you want to know the best part? She's planning to use her excess sales to "help the other altos" at school, as opposed to those of us who actually go to this church. So basically, the rest of us are fucked because we don't sing alto. I have nowhere else to sell tickets. The injustice of the situation makes my blood pressure rise to a dangerous level.

One last point. This is a minor injustice in comparison, but it's the principle of the thing. Today our director asked us who could put up Rhapsody posters at their churches, and Andromeda remained conspicuously silent. What, you sell out the place, and you don't even have the decency to put up a damn poster to remind people of the dates of the concert? I'm not sure if I've been clear up to this point, but this girl really grinds my gears.

Uh...anyone out there in Internetland wanna buy a Rhapsody ticket? :-P

In other news, John Green's Paper Towns came out in paperback in America earlier this week. Sadly, neither of my ten-word comments were deemed good enough to win a copy from John. I thought they were pretty clever.

1. My bobble head arrived today! O frabjous day! Callooh! Callay!
2. I kicked a Hummer today. I can has Paper Towns?

Sure, the second one was lame, but the first one was a poetry reference!!! Haha. Oh, well. John Green apparently cannot be swayed even by the likes of Lewis Carroll.

And that's all I have for today, kids. My cortisone shot is starting to wear off, so I'm going to take some antibiotics and sleep off this crappy feeling. Cheerio!

Yeero Yeero indulgences this school year: 7
Pop-Tarts this school year: 6
Subscribers: 1,138

Sometimes I just shouldn't talk.

I may have mentioned before that I like the cover of the new American paperback edition of Paper Towns better than any other Paper Towns cover I've seen so far. I just don't see the point in buying it since I already have two different editions of the book (American hardcover Blue Margo and Australia paperback). Luckily, John is giving away one copy of the new edition every day for the next two weeks, as he stated in his latest video. That gives me fourteen chances to get the book without paying for it. To be eligible you just have to leave him a ten-word comment, and he picks his favorites. I officially entered myself into the mix just a few moments ago. I would tell you what my comment says, but I fear copyright infringement. I'll dish when the two weeks are over.

Anyway, today I took my first Biology 101 (yes, I'm in freshman biology) test of the semester. I think it went decently well. But that's not important right now. What's important was my professor's mention of a certain scientific tool during today's lab. It's a U-shaped tube. It's called a "U tube." He made the point of mentioning that it has nothing to doing with making videos. I cringed instinctively, as I always do when an unwelcome IRL acquaintance wants to talk about my YouTube life. I was waiting for some lovely classmate to shout something obnoxious about my videos. Then I remembered that this class is made up of mostly freshmen, none of whom are actually my friends. Crisis averted, but boy, you should've seen that split-second look of terror flash across my face.

Later, but still during that same class period, the professor asks why water does not completely change color the instant you put in a drop of food coloring. Out loud and for the world to hear I said, "Because it's not magic." And then I did an internal facepalm. I really shouldn't talk sometimes.

As further evidence that I spew embarrassing nerd far too often, check out this lovely exchange between a friend and me. It happened mere moments ago via the evil Facebook chat.

Kirk: I've found that the only way I can communicate with people anymore is via internet chat...
Kirk: damn my schedule
Kaitlyn: i know, me too
Kaitlyn: it sucks'
Kaitlyn: lol @ my accidental apostrophe
Kaitlyn: sucks is in possession of something

Siiiiiiiiiigh. Goodnight, everybody.

Days 'til PRAXIS: 4
Subscribers: 1,133

Books for the Summer

It's been my tradition for the past few summers to set a reading goal for myself. This goal-setting extravaganza began the summer after my freshman year of college - the first summer in an insanely long time that I didn't have any school-assigned summer reading. That first summer's goal was simply "read books this summer." That one I achieved. The next summer's goal was to re-read Harry Potters 1-6, as book 7 was coming out that summer. It took me until about October to get through the whole series, though. Then last summer I said I would read 10 books before school started, and, again, I didn't finish all ten until about October. Did I mention I'm a really slow reader? Always have been. Intense love for reading crossed with an inability to read a normal speed - it's just one of the crosses I bear.

THIS YEAR I'm setting the ten-book goal again, but, as usual, don't expect me to finish on time. Here's my tentative list of choices (in a sort-of-but-not-really particular order):

-The Bermudez Triangle by Maureen Johnson (check)
-Harry, A History by Melissa Anelli
-Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince by J.K. Rowling (re-read - must prepare for the movie release!)
-Invisible Monsters by Chuck Palahniuk
-The Book Thief by Marcus Zusak
-Paper Towns by John Green (the Australian version that I bought in Australia)
-Bridget Jones' Diary by Helen Fielding
-The Astonishing Life of Octavian Nothing, Traitor to a Nation, Vol. 1: The Pox Party by M.T. Anderson
-The DaVinci Code by Dan Brown
-Lullaby by Chuck Palahniuk

Yeah.....I'm never gonna finish that. I'll try, though. I want to re-read An Abundance of Katherines too, but alas, I'm currently letting someone borrow it.

Subscribers: 1,094

Back in the USA

I haven't had this blog for very long, and I've already gotten out of the habit of writing in it. I suppose this is to be expected since I had no (free) internet for nearly two weeks. Also, these past two weeks have been so FANTASTIC that I just don't know how to talk about them. I guess I could just make a bulleted list of the greatest moments:

-Surviving a 12-hour flight from L.A. to Auckland, New Zealand
-Arriving in New Zealand so early in the morning that we get to watch the sun rise
-Avoiding taking pictures of myself the first day in Auckland since we had to go nearly 36 hours without a shower
-Having to dance with a creepy, unattractive guy at a pub so that he wouldn't creep on my super-hot married friend and get her in trouble
-Seeing South Pole penguins at an underground aquarium
-Getting in FREE to the Minus 5 Ice Lounge - a bar made entirely of ice! - which normally has a $35 cover
-Seeing sheep being shorn in Rotorua, NZ
-Seeing ridiculously huge geysers and live kiwi birds
-ZORBING!!!
-Christopher and I ditching our group when we landed in Australia and navigating Sydney on our own in search of Kinokuniya bookstore and JOHN GREEN!!!!
-Being the only Americans at John Green's Sydney event other than John and his wife
-Arriving super early and sitting on the second row!
-Meeting communitychannel Natalie Tran!!!
-Seeing/petting/feeding kangaroos and koalas!
-Going on a harbor cruise
-Working with Dr. Eric Nelson of Emory University
-My friend Ashley's boyfriend flew all the way to Sydney to propose to her!
-SINGING THE MOZART REQUIEM IN THE SYDNEY OPERA HOUSE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
-Being on the same plane as Bernadette Peters for the 13-hour flight from Sydney back to L.A.

It was such an amazing trip. I miss it. I'm still jet-lagged. I can't fall asleep until 5 AM, and sometimes I accidentally sleep all day.

On a sadder note, I had to say goodbye to one of my best friends in L.A. My friend Lindsey (whom you may have seen here) moved to Guam to be with her husband. He's in the Navy and was recently stationed there. They'll be in Guam for at least 3 years. I know that long-distance communication is easier now than ever, but she's SO far away! And with this next school year promising to be my busiest ever, I'm afraid I'll never get a chance to talk to her. Either way, I've started saving for a flight to Guam next summer.

On a happier note, I went to my first wizard rock show a few days ago! Justin Finch-Fletchley and the Sugar Quills, The Whomping Willows, and The Moaning Myrtles came to the library by my house. I finally met Lauren!!!! We hugged. We took pictures. It was so exciting. The audience was awkward for Ben and me (tons of kids and a few awkward adults), but the show was great!

Finally, this trip helped me to discover my "type." Turns out I like New Zealand-Asian guys with crazy hair who play the guitar and wear thick-framed glasses. It's really very simple.

I'm ending with a few of my favorite pictures:


























Heroes re-watching status: Season 1, Disc 5
Currently reading: Harry, A History by Melissa Anelli
Subscribers: 1,054