Will the Real Jennie Menke Please Stand Up

Now GET TO WORK!

This is an entry to myself. It is born of unmotivated, sloth-like behavior.

It is raining.

It has been raining for — I haven’t kept track — nine days? It certainly has not been sunny in at least seven days, that I am certain of. We have received over 6 inches of rain. My garden is growing mushrooms instead of vegetables and fruit. I am growing mushrooms.

It is dank.

I should be working. Because I am broke. (Thanks all you bright-eyed graduates.) That’s quite a gig you got going: your parents pay for school, then all your parents friends pay for your social life.

I was going to write about the Meatless Monday side dish that never was. But I’m not even motivated to do that. But I will! I will!

Right after I go have another latte…

I’m back. I’m here to tell you about my cooking failures. I will tell it like it is. I suppose I always tell it like it is, but sometimes I suppress information when I deem it might reflect on me in a negative light.

Take Meatless Monday Twenty Three, for example. The one I haven’t written about yet. We had it, oh yes, indeed. I took pictures of part of it. Then I ran out of time and never finished it. I intended to finish making it and sort of infer that it all went together. I wouldn’t have lied, mind you, I just wouldn’t have told the whole truth that they were spread out a few days.

But I never actually finished the side dish. It’s still sitting in my refrigerator. I don’t even know when I made it. I have to go to Aperture to see when the photos were taken. Hang on a sec…

6/2/2010. It is now 6/11/2010 6/14/10. That was nine twelve days ago. It’s still in my fridge. I was still planning on finishing it. I’m coming to grips with the fact that I’m going to have to give it to my chickens. But I’m not quite there yet. I’m still not quite there yet. Yesterday, Dave deemed it chicken-fare. He took it out there without even taking a picture for this post. (I swear it still smelled just fine.) The nerve! Then, making matters even worse, when questioned about it, he had this to say:

Me: “Did you give it to the chicks?”

Dave: “What do you mean?”

Me: “I wanted to give it to the chicks and not the rooster… (silence) You know, did you put it in the new coop?… (silence) The small coop. The one with the fence your dad made… (silence) DAVE! Come ON! Did you give it to the rooster or the chicks? It’s a simple question!”

Dave: “I don’t even know what you’re talking about.”

Me: (raising voice) “HOW CAN YOU NOT KNOW WHAT I AM TALKING ABOUT? The rooster is in the OLD coop. The one in the big fenced in area! The chicks are in the NEW coop. They are still SEPARATED!”

Dave: “New coop, old coop. I don’t know what you are talking about.”

Charlie: (can’t restrain himself any longer listening to two idiots) “Dad. The playhouse is the new coop. The old coop is inside the big fence with the electric wire around it.”

Dave: “Oooooh. Why didn’t you just say that?”

Jennie: (has lost all control. Is screaming now.) “We’ve had chickens in this set up for YEARS. How can you not know there is a new coop and an old coop?”

Dave: “I hate the chickens. I don’t pay attention.”

Jennie: … speechless. Because, he’s right. And since that almost never happens, she wisely decides to be quiet. Which also almost never happens.

(about 60 seconds pass)

Dave: “Do you want a beer?”

Jennie: “Sure!”

So it goes.

It (the side dish) was Israeli Cous Cous with Kale. I planned to make a cold salad with vinaigrette (I had NO idea vinaigrette was spelled that way. Absolutely no idea… I was spelling it vinegarette. That’s your spelling-lesson-betterment for the day)

I got my new rice cooker for mothers day and have been wanting to stretch myself beyond the norm and use it to its full potential. I did it all in the rice cooker:

When it was done, it looked like this:

No wonder we gave it to the chickens.