Fat Tuesday

As I write this, I just finished a walkjog and I'm eating some Greek yogurt, but I haven't been adhering quite as closely to the Smackdown as I was last month. I'm still managing to show up at yoga once or twice a week, and I even (gasp!) jogged on the treadmill the other day when it was raining, but otherwise, I've been eating tons of super delicious food. My SLH is both willing and able to make dinner (I know!) so who am I to stop him? His projects primarily involve pounding meat and cooking it with fire (I mean "fahre") and I've been too busy stuffing my face to get any pics. But sometimes, we work as a culinary team in our teeny tiny kitchen and the results are (usually) pret-ty pret-ty great. Two recent examples are this chowder, from The Homesick Texan cookbook we got for Christmas (and Hey Mom! I also got to use my new hand blender on this one).

It doesn't look like much in this photo, but Y.U.M.

 And these beer-braised short ribs with thyme roasted sweet potatoes. We did a little interweb research on rib braising and then just winged it: meat, carrots, onion, celery, can of tomatoes, chick broth, beer, and of course a jalapeno. SO good. For the sweet potatoes I used this recipe. The next day we threw it all into the crockpot and stewified it. Mmmmm...meat.

Meat and taters

It also didn't help that the first two weeks of February are "festival of love" (sorry, hope you're not eating), another in a series of my made-up holidays. This one is similar to Hanukkah in that it celebrates a miracle: John's transformation from random guy hitting on me at a Super Bowl party to guy I would actually date and eventually marry. We don't celebrate Valentine's Day since our "special day" is February 15 (our first date). This year for FOL finale we had dinner at Justine's. (Here is the Chronicle Review which is tame and nice, and here is the restaurant website which is slightly disconcerting and has some pleasingly racy video) We ate snails! They were surprisingly tasty, but isn't anything tasty when soaked in wine, butter, and garlic? Thumbs up.
 Did y'all know we're moving? Woohoo! For the first time in six years I will live less than 25 minutes from everything I want/need to do. As my NW peeps would say, I'm hella stoked. To say goodbye to our uncool 78729 zip code, we visited a few of our favorite spots and a new, very silly place called Senorita's Cantina. Klassy indeed. Giant Margaritas,

The hub looks a little silly in this one, but it was the better one of me, so...

 and the most insane restaurant mural I've ever encountered. JS described these mermaids as being "explosively breasted". Hee hee. You must click to enlarge. Wouldn't this be awesome airbrushed on your truck or van?

This is the most ridiculous mural I've ever seen

The rest of the most choice photos from that evening are on the FB, and if you're not on there, you're lucky (and smart!)
Guess I should comb my hair and stuff but before I go I'd like to send a shout out of C&D love to our uncle, a Dallas Police officer who was injured in the line of duty last week. We're so very happy that you're on the mend. Hope to see you soon. You can read about what happened here. Let me remind you again- love your people, enjoy every day (even the walkjog parts).

The Bitch is Back

Oh yeah, I have a blog. Seeing as how it's the first day of the month, seems like a good time to crank 'er up and see if she still runs. It's times like this we need a photo essay.

OCTOBER

First of Rocktober with my ladies

Stark puts the "rock" in Rocktober

Oktoberfest at Anhalt Hall

Anniversary at the fair

HALLOWEEN as Lionel the Lion Faced Boy and The Bearded Lady

NOVEMBER 

Wurstfest with the voluntary family

Carnival o' Pizza
(can you spot Adriane?)

Fried turkey, y'all

New packable jacket

Packable jacket, packed

DECEMBER 

Tiny Christmas tree

Decorations? Yes, that is my apartment

Crafty Christmas card clips

Baby Christmas cupcakes made with my new baby cupcake machine. Thanks, MIL! I mean, Mrs. Claus

Freezing on the ferry. Look, my adorable Mommy has her own packable jacket!

I'll take one second (which is one second more than it deserves) to mention that 2011 was a hell of a year. Illness and worry and sadness and anxiety and regret and tragedy and The Thing Which Shall Not Be Blogged About and all that, but also love and fun and happiness and sunshine and beer and delicious food and people who have your back. My sweet husband and I celebrated a very full first year of marriage at The State Fair of Texas (Full photo coverage on the flickr), we had a dee-licious Thanksgiving warm-up dinner with the voluntary fam (fried turkey!), then another yummy dinner on real Thanksgiving with The Starks, pleasantly low-key pre-Christmas in Denton, and a super fun Die Hard watching Christmas party at the Wilson's. We spent a jet-lagged New Year's Eve with our dear friend Adriane at one of our classic hangouts.  Everyone agreed that 2012 would be better. 

Well, 2012 has so far proved to be much of the same but in the spirit of my Don't Give A Shit Summer, I've decided to feel good anyway. I'm back to yoga and the infamous Smackdown walk/jog, I've read three books, and much to the delight of my friend the Ultra Runner , I got an iPhone y'all!

I took this picture on my new iPhone last Sunday during a much needed Stark Nature Nerd Out trip to the Pedernales River. At the park they have a fantastic bird blind which we got to see right at feeding time. Super super cool for a couple of bird nerds like us. But, while the iPhone takes lovely pictures of the river, you can't zoom in on little birds. I was so excited about my new phone that I forgot to bring the regular camera. Guess we'll just have to go again.

Oops, if I want this to actually post on the first of the month I'd better get on it. More later, maybe. 

eta

Demo Derby pics are up!  

September, I remember (most of it)

Twenty-six days since last post. Yikes. Looks like we might need some bullet lists. 

SEPTEMBER, IN RANDOM BULLET LISTS

Celebrations:

• My baby sister got married. Some pictures are on the flickr. She honeymooned at Disney World and brought me some super awesome souvenirs. Thanks Amy!
• My baby brother and my husband had Birthdays at The Ballpark. Pictures of this are also on the flickr. 
• Knitting/Football Season started! We had a Second Sunday party with the voluntary family and it was fantastic (football cake pops were involved) but I don't have any pictures of that. Too busy stuffing my face. I mean, watching the football. 
• I celebrated my sixth Texaversary at a demolition derby, y'all!! Inexplicably, I didn't put the pictures of that on the flickr. I'll get right on it. Promise. 

Wildlife:

Just before this he was banging a lizard on the ground, prepping his lunch.

So cute!

• I saw my first Roadrunner in the Howells' driveway. Of course I was too slow on the camera trigger so I got a picture of him after he swallowed the lizard. Still cool, though. 
• Last Friday we played hooky from work for John's Birthday Weekend kickoff. He wanted to go to Schlitterbahn, but sadly it was already closed for the season so we went to the San Marcos river. While my SLH went solo tubin' I hung out with a cute little turtle. 

Entertainment:

oops...

• I went to see Colin and Carson at Bookpeople. They are so adorable. You were allowed to bring one piece of Decemberists stuff, so I took my King CD and of course promptly smeared the autograph. Typical. 
• We finished watching (one-season-behind style) Breaking Bad. I understand if you don't have the Netflix anymore, but if you do, this show is now on instant watch. Watch it! It's the best show on tv. 
• Speaking of the teevee, Knitting/Football season is also new tv time! Woo Hoo! Sadly my two fave shows are on Thursdays when I get home too late. Enter the hulu. I luv the hulu. Yes, I have the pay for it one, but it is so worth it to be able to watch my craptastic favorite show in my lounge pants on Friday mornings. And they also have Parks and Rec, which is really good, for real. Don't worry, I found a new bad show to watch when it is actually on the television: Revenge. Pure garbage. Love. 
• If you know me you know of my mad passion for local radio personality Charlie Hodge. His show was recently cancelled and I cried myself to sleep until I found out about the new podcast. You can listen here, or download on the itunes if you're into that. 

Yarncraft:

The first finished thing of the new season

How I learned to love football

• I took a bit of a break from knitting this summer, partially to crochet because I want to be the master of all yarn arts, and partially because it is hard to find the motivation to knit something when it is a thousand degrees outside. I know, it would seem like crochet is the same thing, but I think of knitting as a means to produce something to wear and crochet as a means to keep from going insane. I only crochet random squares. I finished a cowl which I may never wear, and I'm working on a football scarf which I can do without looking (in case there's an exciting football play or something). 
• I bought some new yarn, even though I could probably knit for a few years on the stash I have. Does it make it better that I had to use up the other half of my GC from Weaving Works? 

Guess that brings us up to the present day. Yesterday I watched bad shows on the hulu, went to work for a bit, and went to Billy's to knit and watch football. Today, so far, I did this. All caught up. I'm off to get the demolition derby pics posted. Later!

In which Jennifer gets stupid excited about a book

Hey y'all. Yes, my thigh injury has healed up quite nicely, thanks. Nothin' a little A&D couldn't fix.
So I finally, finally finished this book.

I seem to have read it so well that the cover popped right off. Or maybe that was from taking it along on so many water-related activities. (Remember when I was on the boat? I had it with me way back then) Oh yeah, how was it? My dear friend Rachel aptly described it as "medieval soap opera". It wasn't bad, but it may not have been worth spending my entire summer reading it. I do enjoy how carrying around a big book makes me look smart though. I am proud of myself for actually finishing a book since that has been a wee bit of a challenge for me lately, and by lately I mean the past few years.
AND THEN (triumphant fanfare) I found out about this:

That's right! It's a book by Colin Meloy. Illustrated by his adorable wife Carson Ellis. I know. It is technically for children ("middle-grade fantasy") and I have always expressed disdain for adult women reading books for kids (sorry Adriane) but y'all. This is Colin Meloy. I hurried down to Book People on the day it came out (yesterday) and they hadn't even put them on the shelf yet. I took it off the cart. As a bonus, I got this super cool old school "badge maker" style button for my backpack. Sweet! I haven't been this giddy about a book since The Green Mile came out in little chapbooks. Remember that? It was awesome. I still have them. In other, equally if not more exciting news, The Cutest Band in The World (otherwise known as Downtube Shifter) spent this past weekend in the studio working on a record. Woo Hoo! They were sweet enough to let me hang around and take pictures of them, which are on the flickr.

I love them so much. If you have the means, I highly recommend checking them out.

Walk till you run and don't look back

It was tax-free weekend here in rain-free TX last week so I followed the droves of Texans into Academy and got myself these here runnin' shoes. And of course by "runnin'" I mean jogging for a bit until I feel like I might die, then walking, then trying to jog a bit more. People who know me are all too familiar with my "smackdown" phases, but this one could potentially last more than the traditional two weeks. I luv these shoes. They're bouncy and obnoxious hot pink! I took them out on their first trip Tuesday and they performed like champs. I was feeling good despite my beer-laden lazy summer. It wasn't too hot since I managed to get out before the 7:30am outdoor activity curfew, a few people had their sprinklers going so I got some spritzes along the way, and I didn't feel any of my normal exercise rage thanks to my return to fall schedule and my beloved yoga. But then, (cue the ominous music) The Attack of the Thigh Chafe!!! Needless to say this threw me into a horrible negative body image vortex. Yes, yes, I know that even skinny people can chafe, and it is 500 degrees outside, and I was wearing cutoff sweatpants that bunched up (stupid! stupid!) but the fact remains: my big fat thighs were rubbing together so much that the skin rubbed off!!! Gross gross gross.

Normally this sort of vortex leads straight to Sonic for a sack of corndogs, but this time (again I credit the yoga) I walked gingerly with my legs slightly apart into Central Market for an $8 salad. Take that Universe!

So yesterday I ventured out again- this time with (looking embarrassed) diaper ointment on my affected leg, vaseline on the rest of the chafe risk area, and moisture wicking shorts. Success!! I was able to complete Week 1 (again) of the start running plan I got off the internets at the beginning of the last smackdown episode and I didn't feel like dying once.

WTF? Salad? Running? What is this, some kind of health blog now? What about teevee and food trailers?

Ok ok. Sorry. I have discovered a new-to-me tv show, meaning I think it has been off the air since 2007 or something, but it's British so I couldn't have watched it anyway. You remember my mad passion for brit-coms right? This one is fantastic, but in its usual giveth and taketh away fashion, the Netflix instant watch only has season one. (Shaking fist at Netflix, again) Or as they say, series one. Lame. I did however find a way to watch the other series in very poor video quality somewhere else on the webs. You can google it if you want since of course I don't remember what it's called.

We finally went to the third ESK trailer location last night. I had the eel buns. I just like how that sounds. They were yummy, but the Liberty location is definitely #1. SO GOOD. Go there if you can. Call me and I'll come down there and meet you.

In other entertainment news, I finally got around to watching Biutiful. It's even more depressing than it sounds and you have to read it, but I liked it. I guess reading one movie a day isn't enough because then Saturday night we got all brainiac and went to see some old French movies at the Paramount. Every now and again I can understand what they're saying without reading-thank you three years of French in high school!-but you know the idea: super pretty girls smoke a lot and talk about stuff. Men cheat on their wives. The most entertaining part of this double feature was that both movies ended with someone being shot. BANG BANG! FIN.

Tasty and gentle food

Here in the ATX there are tons and tons (and tons) of food trailers. While I've only managed to eat at a tiny fraction of them, my favorite by far are the Japanese ones. The best are the two East Side King locations, one of which I tried for the first time only yesterday! A close runner-up is Love Balls. (You may remember an adorable picture of me stuffing my face with Love Balls on the flickr.) A prominent ingredient used at these trailers is Kewpie Mayo, perhaps my newest Favorite Thing!(Don't skip clicking on that link, it's great) I can't get enough of the Japanese and their love of cuteness and wacky food.

As long as we're on the subject of cuteness and food, I'll show you these guys:

They're forever rowing on the wall of Cooper's BBQ. We've been to Cooper's before, but not this location. A review? These 'coons were the best part. Yes, I guess we've been spoiled by super super amazing BBQ lately, but still. Skip it.

This past weekend we took a mini-vacation to Junction and it was just what we needed. Despite Texas' desert conditions as of late, we were able to tube at South Llano River State Park. It was very beautiful, but I don't have any photos because I was in a tube, y'all.

After a grueling day of floating down the river, we recharged with some classic Tex-Mex at La Familia . The food is pretty good and cheap but my favorite part is this:
The owner told us that people always want to buy this painting from her but she won't sell "her man." If you happen to be driving through Junction, TX, definitely give this place a visit.

On Sunday we went to the LBJ Ranch, a very very Texan thing that for some reason we haven't done before. If you know the Starks you know that we LOVE to do nerdy activities and the LBJ ranch delivered. I didn't take many pictures, mostly because they won't let you but also because I figured they would be easy to find on the internets. I was right, there's a cute slideshow on the website. I did take a few of the trees and sky, two of my favorite things about my Texas.