Less dinner blogging

Joe is back now, and with his return, I will probably be cooking less. Or, I'll just be making buffalo chicken nachos, so there's no need to blog about dinner again. Since I've been posting a lot about food lately, you might be concerned that I will not be updating the blog as frequently. Fear not, dear reader(s?), for on December 1, I will be starting a 25 day series entitled, "Is the chocolate in my Advent calendar worth eating?" In that series, I will tell you daily whether the chocolate in my Advent calendar is worth eating.

Joe and I were getting beer one evening last week, and saw a bunch of Advent calendars filled with chocolate. He asked if we should get one, to which I responded with an emphatic "No!," with the reasoning that the quality of the chocolate in a cardboard calendar is not going to be stellar. Joe returned from his weekend trip with a gift for me from the Newtster and Newtstress of a chocolate-filled Advent calendar. They bought this one for me, reasoning that the package says "high quality milk chocolate."

Here is a picture of my new Advent calendar riding a rollercoaster.


Thanks Newtons!

I did notice the nutritional information on the back of the calendar. A serving size of Advent calendar chocolate is 12 pieces, and there are two servings in my calendar. I was under the impression that you are supposed to open the calendar one day at a time. Perhaps this chocolate is just so delicious that I will not be able to resist eating twelve days' worth at once? Tune in on December 1 to find out!

Joe is out of town, so Mandy is cooking dinner and stuff

Joe is gone for the weekend, leaving me to fend for myself in the kitchen.  This is actually a good thing in terms of my sense of adventure in the kitchen, because I prefer to be unsupervised while cooking.  I can be particularly self-conscious while cooking things like chicken, because I can't stand touching chicken. The only way I'll touch it is if I'm wearing gloves, which now that I think about it, is pretty weird, because I don't wear gloves to ride the NY subway, and that's probably a lot dirtier than any chicken I might touch. Anyway, I don't think I've actually cooked chicken myself since living with Joe.  Until tonight.  I was feeling particularly carnivorous on my way home from a long day studying at the library, so I stopped and got some chicken.  I got home, and got out the rubber gloves, and got to it.  

Actually, before putting on my chicken gloves, I got out all of the ingredients I would need to make buffalo chicken nachos. Then I put on my chicken gloves, and used Joe's ginormous knife (which coincidentally, I also don't like to use while being supervised. Turns out, it's pretty fun to use though) to cut the chicken into small pieces. I threw them in a small frying pan with just a tiny bit of olive oil, and cooked it until it looked done. Then I threw in a bunch of buffalo sauce, and let it simmer while I grated some cheese. I threw the cheese and chicken on some chips, threw it all in the oven for about 5 minutes, and voila!


Photos may not look super appetizing since I used the camera in my MacBook. But trust me, they were buffalicious!

Tales from the Subway, Installment #1

Given that there are over eight million people living in New York, I'm bound to run into some interesting folks on my daily subway commute. I recently purchased a new phone, which has a camera that can take very inconspicuous pictures. Starting with today's entry, I will begin to document the things that my fellow commuters do that annoy, amuse, or invoke any other emotion in me. After I took the picture for this first installment, I realized I have no way to get it off my camera and onto my blog. Don't worry, I immediately ordered a data cable, and I will show you the first offender posthaste.

The first thing about today's unsuspecting commuter that caught my attention was that he was doing what I like to call the Three Seat Spread. Some men are more considerate and will opt for the Two Seat Spread. Either way, it's a common move among men on the subway. They sit down in one seat, and immediately spread their legs as wide as they can so that they're now occupying two to three seats. I'm not sure if they're trying to air out the groin or what, but trains would be a lot less crowded if you guys would just close your legs, or if MTA could just post some of these signs:

image from Gothamist, logo designed by Catherine Weaver.

So, this dude was doing an impressive Three Seat Spread, and was talking on his cell phone. He was talking at a volume which made it impossible not to eavesdrop, and I think he was secretly hoping that everyone around him would overhear the conversation. He was telling his poor friend (if there was actually anyone on the other end of the line) that he was just returning from an audition for the show 30 Rock. He was auditioning for the part of a writer called Asif, who the other cast members refer to as "As if"......right, I'm sure it'll be funny when the episode airs. Three Seat felt pretty good about the casting, because he got to read about three scenes, and was there for awhile. He's also auditioned for 30 Rock before, and the casting director brought him back for this audition, so he thinks they like him. However, when he was waiting to be called in, there was another guy in the room who looked exactly like him, and who was talking twice as loud as he could (Doubtful, Three Seat, I won't believe it until I hear it). Three Seat was a little concerned while he was waiting that there was no way he would get the part over this guy, but feels good after the audition.

Autumn in Little Romania

Not to be outdone by other bloggers who also take pictures of fall foliage, I brought the sub-par digital camera along on our outing to the farmers' market last weekend to capture some fall colors. This first one is a picture of the street perpendicular to ours.



Not only do we have colorful fall trees, but once you walk out of our building and go about 20 yards to the corner, you can also see big buildings and stuff.


Now most of the leaves have fallen off the trees, and to be truthful, our block doesn't really have a lot of plant life on it. On gray and rainy days, sometimes I pretend I'm living in an eastern bloc country while I walk home. I refer to our neighborhood as little Romania to Joe, due to the new Bucharestian (?) restaurant that opened a few doors down, and the abundance of other Romanian shops and restaurants nearby. So, come visit us in NY, and save yourself the cost of a plane ticket to Europe!

I'll tell you what I want....

There is an unfortunate development to report about the residents of apartment 6N.  When their baby is screaming non-stop from 12 a.m. until 1:30 a.m. on a Monday morning, they use the well-known song of a well-known British band to calm the baby down. Sadly, not the Beatles.


That's right, the Spice Girls.

I can cook dinner and prepare supper and stuff and things, too

I complained to my favorite food blogger that he doesn't post often enough.  Since he's not fulfilling my request, I'll just blog about food myself.  I am known to be a very picky eater.  I stopped eating meat completely when I was about 11, and only started again when I was 21.  The decision to be a vegetarian had nothing to do with any morals or ethics on my part, I just didn't like the taste or texture of meat.  I started eating chicken again at 21 while studying abroad.  I was getting irritated that my vegetarian meal was taking so long to prepare, and there was already fried chicken on the table, so.....  Now I also eat bacon, pepperoni, turkey, and....I think that's it?  Anyway, for a good portion of my life, I survived on Cheerios, raw vegetables, fruit, PB&J, and grilled cheese, and that's about it.  I still like all of those, too.  Now I have also incorporated pizza, pasta, and chicken in there.  It's a miracle that I'm alive.  

Anyway, here is the beautiful lunch that I made myself last weekend:

While it looks daunting, this is really quite simple to re-create.  Just get some bread, cheddar cheese, tomatoes, and lettuce, and BOOM!!  It's a sandwich.  Goes well with Octoberfest beer.  

More wine

I bought this $5.99 beauty at the local wine store:

I really tried to rotate this picture, but it'll just be faster if you tilt your head for a second.

There was a two for $9.99 special on this bottle, but I wasn't ready to commit to two.  This is a pinot noir, from Georges DuBoeuf.  I took a few years of French in high school, so I know that Georges DuBoeuf loosely translates to "George of the beef."  I enjoyed this much less than any red variety of three buck Chuck.  It was a fairly non-descript, unoffensive wine, but my one complaint was that due to the "pretty" design, it was impossible to tell how much wine remained in the bottle.  

Sunday sounds

It's been a lazy day underneath apartment 6N, but upstairs, it's been quite the exciting day. My best guesses indicate the following activities:

• three-on-three basketball tournament (the hardwood floors in our building are pretty sweet)
• jam session involving some drums. This was no match for the likes of Androewood, but definitely a vast improvement over past repeat performances of The Verve Pipe's "The Freshman."
• foot races, including preliminary heats, and then finals. Perhaps inspired by the marathon today, the residents of 6N decided to have their own races. The course seemed to be a loop running through the living room, up the hall into the bedroom, a quick lap around the bedroom, through the kitchen, and back into the living room. The catch to this short course was that they were all wearing high heels. Tripping and falling to the ground ensued.
• roach stomping contest. Roaches move quickly, can't always get them on the first stomp.

Joe and I had the luxury of living on the top floor in our last apartment building, so we have been spoiled by not having upstairs neighbors. I've wondered sometimes if the walls in our new building are just really thin, and that maybe the residents of apartment 4N think that Joe and I are really loud. To test this theory, I just used The Google to search for "Tales from below apartment 5N" and found nothing, so obviously we are the superior upstairs neighbors. Since thin walls are clearly not the issue, we'll just keep using our roller skates to get from one end of the apartment to the other just a little bit faster.