That is the word that I have to use today, because people, today the universe has shown me a couple of times that I need to be very, very careful today.

Case in point:

Coming out of my house, driving towards the main intersection, I need to pass two streets that have stops signs. I have the right away.

Apparently the guy that ran the stop sign and ALMOST HIT ME did not get the memo!

Accident avoided – barely
(Point for me, suck it up universe!)

The cafeteria lady finally and I mean FINALLY (after months and months) got my café con leche order RIGHT.

There is hope for her yet  
(Point for me, suck it up universe!)

But then, then… I must have used up my points because at work the following events happen – ON REPEAT!

I usually take the café con leche from their container and pour it in my favorite work cup. While I was doing this, my coordination nerve ending decided to go haywire and I spilled half of the thing on me, soaking up my jeans.
(Point for the universe, suck it up me)

I’m presently walking around with a coffee stain on my jeans – Pretty! and sticky!

Then, THEN, by mid morning I wanted a coke. Walked over to the vending machine, put the money, press the COKE button and out comes out an orange soda. WTF?
(Point for the universe, suck it up me)

Decided to let it ride, and served my soda in my work glass, with tons of ice and place it inside my coffee cup (always do this). Waited a little (for the soda to get ice-cold) and when I grabbed the soda glass, out it comes dripping of coffee. ALL OVER THE PLACE, my desk, my pants (AGAIN) and my beloved iPod

DUH!! MOMENT (Slap forehead HERE)

Looked over the mess to the coffee cup and realized that I had not washed the cup and thus place the soda glass inside with the liquid STILL IN IT.
(Point for the universe, suck it up me)

Wiped up the mess on my desk and then went to the kitchen to wipe up the mess on my glass cozy, which sucked up most of the coffee liquid.

Now walking around with a BIGGER coffee stain on my jeans – ON A ROLL PEOPLE, ON.A.ROLL!

Came back to my desk with the soda glass, freshly washed cozy and place the glass inside the coffee cup

AGAIN….Which was STILL FILLED UP WITH liquid!
(Extra points for the universe, FAILED! FAILED for me)

I decided that I need to now find an excuse to get my ass home and hide in the corner, because the universe is up by 4 and coming up to bat

I’m screwed.

By this time next week we should be arriving in North Carolina in order to spend the Thanksgiving weekend with Tom’s family.

This is going to be interesting, at least for me, since this will be a bonofied thanksgiving for me.  Those that know me, know that I never celebrated Thanksgiving.  Past Thanksgiving were spent doing some major marathon watching on TV.

In the meantime these are the things that are in my mind and I need to worry about until we set off next week for the 10 hour drive:

I still want to watch a lot of marathon TV next week.

Sadly, I don’t see that happening.

Instead, I will be doing, god-knows what.  Since I’m not a host, but a “guest” and that term  is basically non-existent to me, since 99.9% of the time, I’m the host.

I’m going to be like a lost soul.

A lost soul freezing it’s ass, because I just checked the weather and that weekend is suppose to rain, and be in the low 40’s, with highs in the 50’s

HELL  NO!

Now, I have to look for the winter clothes

Where in the hell are the winter clothes?

Oh yeah, under the stairs, which totally freaks me out

its dark under there

and spooky

I wonder if I can still hide and watch a lot of marathon TV?

Damn it, the dogs need a bath before we go anywhere

Crap, its almost 5pm

what in the hell am I doing still at work?

Oh, yeah writting this post!

Not anymore, I need to go so I can think of ways to get Tom to tackled the task of getting to our winter clothes from under the dark stairs.

Because, I DID mention its spooky under there

Right?

You know when you think you finish your period

And you are confident that you finish it

So confident in fact that you do a little dance, get dress and go out to the world, feeling fresh and pain-free

And then, THEN somewhere during the day you start feeling, umm, how do I put this?

Icky

As in having a “oh-oh” moment

And you run to the restroom, because damn it IT.IS.FINISHED! IT IS!

And it turns out that you in FACT have not finished your period

And your sit there, cursing GOD for the fact that you are a woman and STILL have to go through these types of moments

Even at this age

Because apparently you are God cosmic joke, and he likes to remind you once in a while he still the boss of you

And you curse some more, because of COURSE the dispenser in your office restroom is out of what you need to make it a bit better

And you curse some more, and maybe give the finger to the man

Because, well you can

And now you get pissed, because you had to use your lunch hour to go to the nearest drug store to hunt down some much needed women stuff to get your through the rest of the day

Instead of sitting at your desk, doing your Christmas shopping working

Yes, it has been THAT kind of day

This past weekend we did what I love to do.

Eat, Drink and play.

Which translated having  friends over, who consumed huge amount of food and drinks and played pictionary.

Have you even drank and played Pictionary? No? Well, I highly recommended it, because drinking and pictionary equals hilarious behavior by people.

Don’t believe me?

Start planning your very own pictionary party now, and then come back here, to pat me on the back for making you (and your guest) laugh until you pee in your pants.

I love playing games, any type of games that you get to act silly and shout out stupid answers and then totally blame it on the bottle of liquor you have in your hand is totally up my alley.

This weekend we decided to go all out, invite a couple of Tom’s friends and see who could take the heat play a friendly game of pictionary.

Now, I’m going to plug a new version of pictionary here because the folks over in Mattel have taken it to another level and turned this favorite board game into a 3D Electronic experience (it was a matter of time folks). May I present you the Pictionary Man – Ta da!

Aren't you a cute little bunny?

Yes, it looks sort of basic and blah, but,  people, two words:

FUN TIME!

The rules of the games are pretty much the same.  The Pictionary “Man” which is a blank human shaped figure made of, what seems to be, a dry erase board type material.  On the bottom of the foot of the “Man” one finds an on/off switch, an LED display and two buttons (labeled 1 and 2, respectively). Once you press it, it will spit out the clue that you will need to draw.  The twist, is that you draw on the man, and use the props to convey the clues.  If one’s teammates guess the subject successfully, then the team gets a point. The first team to reach 15 points wins.

While Tom and the other couple had never played the “regular” pictionary before, they were able to pick up on this pretty fast. For me it took me a while to get the hang of it, since I was so use to doing it the old way. But, eventually I got it and it was not long before we were jumping up and getting more creative with our role playing.  Because in this game,  you role play A LOT! The need to use the props makes you become very inventive. When one of us got “Smuggler”, it was hysterical to see the interpretation using the man and one of the props.  Think about it – a man, a square and you need to translate that into “smuggler”.

It was such a great night, we are totally going to try to have them happen more often, trying out more games along the way, but for now Pictionary Man will go into rotation with other favorites.  Plus, Tom’s friend are a total blast and personally I would like to have them around more – hi guys – (We totally DIG YOU!)

As far as the food, for those wondering (Hi Mo!), it was a total hit, with numerous requests of the recipes, which I will be posting over in Sweet Bites (click your way over there) as the weeks go by, but you can get a feel of it with this visual:

Makes you want to dig in, right?

The menu was composed of Spinach Dip, Asparagus in a blanket, Chicken Quesadillas, Rajas, Bean Dip and last but not least (and a total hit) a wheel of Brie en Croute (Pastry Crust) and of course for a sweet ending a Tres Leche cake.

Hungry yet?

Because when your recently posted recipe is feature in this awesome place and recommended by this woman who has a  brand new cookbook that has hit the number 1 spot of the New York Times Bestseller list, and has thousands of followers (Her comment section always has over 10,00+ comments!)

You know that I must be doing something right around these parts.

Damn! I’m sort of patting myself on the back right now

DAMN!

This past weekend I worked.  Very, very hard.

Oh hell, who am I kidding.  It was a sunny, crisp Florida day, the kind that you want to lay back in a hammock and rock yourself to sleep, soaking up the rays and maybe listening to some music in the background.  If of course, you have someone who can bring you a drink even better!   But, instead I settled for the sunny, crisp day surrounded by this type of cuteness:

Yes, I want one, as soon as I get rid of the ones that I have at home

Yep, don’t you want one?

Yeah, me too.  Tom had to hold me down and make me swear that I was not bringing anything like that home.

And were was this cuteness? My sister’s company was celebrating its 2 year anniversary and well, I had to drag myself to a park, right off an island on Saturday morning to play and roll around with puppies and dogs of all breeds and sizes.  Dude, how can you say no to spending time with something like this:

Feel the breeze, the sun

Look at that face, I’m still wondering how they keep him all nice and white!

But nothing can prepare you for this  type of awesome:

Sun and surf people, that is all you need

Yeah, that’s right people, that is how aw-some the day was, that face tells you all you need to know!

Afterward I went home to prepare for Tom’s mom birthday lunch.  Lasagna and Quesillo were the players  in the Birthday menu and I need to get going in doing some mixing and filing and baking.  If you mossy over to the Sweet Bites tab, you will find the step by step of making a Quesillo, which is made with eggs, condensed milk and dark rich caramel sauce, similar to crème caramel. ridiculous super easy dessert that will wow everyone and looks amazing.

And if you are like me and Tom, will not last past a day in your refrigerator.

]]> http://eusmaca.wordpress.com/2009/11/09/sun-and-surf-and-a-couple-of-4-legged-friends/feed/ 0 eusmaca Cocker White dog funky dog http://eusmaca.wordpress.com/2009/11/06/the-magic-number-is-three-thousand-eight-hundred-and-twenty/ http://eusmaca.wordpress.com/2009/11/06/the-magic-number-is-three-thousand-eight-hundred-and-twenty/#comments Fri, 06 Nov 2009 14:49:02 +0000 eusmaca http://eusmaca.wordpress.com/?p=1461 ]]>

I don’t track who comes and goes on this here blog. Because, well, the goal of having this blog was for me to have a place to vent, shout, and write inconsistent topics to keep my small circle of friends’ updated on what is happening with me and my life.

Oh, yeah, who am I kidding? I started it so I did not have to repeat the same dating story over and over and over again. Uh, you know back when I was dating. Because, now it’s just a place to talk about living in not so, since he has not asked yet, blissful matrimony with the boyfriend.

I promise you this is going somewhere.

So, yeah, the stats were really never that important to me. My word press would show them to me, there in my dashboard. I would take a look at the lines and go “uh”.

Until yesterday. When I saw this:

D-Day, November 2nd

Yeah, see the SPIKE UP line?? See it?

And when I clicked on the top of the spike line this BIG number came up:

3,820, as in Three thousand eight hundred and twenty! Hell-O!

Then I had this thought. ok, these multiple thoughts:

Dude, people are READING THE BLOG!

Holy shit!

I need to up my game, I need to stop procrastinating and make sure there is a post daily! Shit, Shit, Shit! Actual people, people who DON’T know me are coming here and hoping to find something whitty to read and to keep coming back for more.

I’m screwed!

How do I make those people stay?, maybe I can bride them? Oh, no that will not work, or maybe it will?

I have no idea how to make those people STAY?  WHAT am I going to do? I need to get a more interesting life! Because, my life is BORING! I work, I live with a funny, artistic guy, his kid (from time to time), 2 dogs, 2 cats, I cook, and I’m a paper engineer! I travel, I take pictures (not so good pictures) and I decorate with the help of very talented friends.

IM.IN.TROUBLE!

Because, oh boy, I like those numbers, I want those numbers back, I need those numbers!!!!

See, total off the wall CRAZY! (Maybe THAT’S reason enough to have those readers stay!).

I then took the time to learn to use the stats menu in WordPress and found out that I owe most of those number to the post that was done in that favorite blog I spoke about here.  If I did not love them enough then, I TOTALLY LOVE THEM NOW!

But, Now I still have to put forth my own effort and make those Three thousand eight hundred and twenty reader to COME BACK! And have them bring more readers and we can totally have a pyramid blog going! Hey, I’m on to something!

So I have planning to do! And marketing to do! and while a procrastinate a bit on those task, I, for now, would like to enjoy the part where Three thousand eight hundred and twenty readers came and stayed and commented and gave me praises and totally made my DAY!

And for that person that found me by typing this “will maca stop me sleeping”  and finding me:

I totatlly would STOP you from sleeping! 

Remember my new obsession?

And the hard time I had with it?

Well it turns out that all I needed was to search a bit around the Internet and find tips from someone that knew what they were talking about.  After Google came back with hit after hit, apparently paper toys is bigger than I previously mentioned.  I hit the mother-load and found myself  a paper engineer, who took the time to write it all down step by step and teach  to do it right.

Apparently I was using the wrong tools.  Wrong scissors, wrong glue, wrong process, wrong, wrong wrong!

Wow, I feel better already!

Hi, my name is Monica and I’m a paper ENGINEER!

Where was I? oh, uh, yeah wrong everything.  So I got with the program and returned the “wrong” stuff, go the “right” stuff and started more determine than ever that I was going to do this and they were going to come out bea-u-TIFUL!

or at least what they were meant to look like.

The paper WAS not the BOSS OF ME!

So, the goal was this:

I started cutting:

and folding, and scoring and glueing and LORDY, LORD behold the end product….

Drum roll please….

I present you with the end product

TA DA!!!!!

Not bad eh?  I liked it so much that I built another one:

And another one:

Yes, you are very, very sweet

I had to stop myself, I was on a roll but they are cute and boy do they relax my ass down from a long day at work.

What to do them? Go here and download the templates and be one with paper!

Or better yet a PAPER ENGINEER!

I have decided to add a new addition to the blog.  If you are detailed oriented, you probably caught it by now.  If not, I’m not going to make you work for it.

You are all busy, people. 

Plus, I hate it when people make me guess for things.

Those that know me well, also know that one of my greatest passion (besides cake) is cooking.  I love to cook, I will be a happy camper in a kitchen cooking up a storm for everyone that wish to stop by our house. 

For a while I been wanting to create a cooking blog, but I just had not had the time, or the space or the direction in how to go about it.

In other words, I been procrastinating

But, no more!

I have added another page (see the menu on top) called “Sweet Bites”.  I will start to post once a week a favorite recipe that I have tried from my own cookbook or tried from others (cookbooks, friends, family, restaurant, magazines, etc) and modify to our taste buds over at our house (we have big eaters over here!).

I hope you enjoy it and if you have ideas to make it better and easier for you to follow along, drop me a note.

Yes, there in the comment section, because you all know how I love a comment.

First up: Picadillo

In 22 days we will be packing up Tom’s mom car with 3 adults, 1 eight-year old and 2 dogs, one which weights the same amount as me (and I’m not kidding). We will then hit the I-95 north and work out way out of Florida, past Georgia, all of South Carolina and parts of North Carolina.

So we can spend 3 days stuffing ourselves full of Thanksgiving food and family fun.  I’m looking forward to this trip because

1) I don’t have to cook
2) I don’t have to host and
3) I don’t have to do anything at.all, except relax and let others do everything.

Heaven… I’m in heaven (well NOT YET, but in TWENTY-TWO DAYS I will be)

But, there is something I’m NOT looking forward to, and that is the ACTUAL car trip because, well simply put people, its Ten hours! Let me repeat that for those in back of the room – TEN HOURS.IN.A.CAR with a 8-year old, my boyfriend’s mom, 2 dogs and the actual boyfriend.

LORD.HELP.ME

So, since I know myself and I know that I will probably want to jump off the car (and my skin) in the first half-hour of the drive, I decided to convince Tom, that the best course of action for me all of us would be to split this trip up and do it in a 2-part, 5 hour drive.

Which means that I have to find a hotel, on the way, to take us ALL in.

Including the 2 dogs

Did I mention that Rufus weights what I weight?

Yeah, I thought so.

This is going to be hard

I have 22 days to stress over it.