Posts Tagged ‘pictures’

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1991 Reunion

August 16th, 2011 by pladd

I think I’ve mentioned before about how my preschool BFF and I were unknowingly reunited in grad school last year, mostly through my mom noticing that my current friend had the same name as my preschool friend. We lost touch when we both moved away from Charleston at the age of 4 or 5 and unknowingly became friends again when we sat next to each other in the same class in grad school! Clearly I had amazing taste in friends even in preschool!!! Anyway, one of the relics of our long history together is this amazing picture Megan’s mom saved:

Note Thomas in the background, being a potato

We tried to recreate this at our recent 1991 reunion:

As you can imagine, this recreation was fraught with difficulty

Thomas manfully attempted to mash himself up into a little potato-like ball, and Megan and I pretended to be short, but the 20 intervening years have made the illusion somewhat less than perfect. Plus, my apartment doesn’t have a fireplace or a big pink chair.

Also we couldn’t stop laughing:
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Servery Challenge: Sushi Edition

February 14th, 2011 by pladd

To celebrate Rob’s extremely brief pass through Carrboro for an interview, we had a new Servery challenge last weekend!! Steven is a pro at making sushi rice, so we decided to see exactly how far you could push its deliciousness with a Sushi Servery Challenge! Unfortunately, I was too busy being outraged for a lot of the competition to remember what people named theirs, so I’ve had to make some up:

1. Mexican Roll–Patricia

Scrambled eggs, salsa, sushi rice, seaweed

I was legitimately shocked when this ended up tasting kind of good. Maybe because all you could really taste was the salsa. I would eat this again, actually.

2. Minimalist Roll–Joe

Craisins, Rice, Seaweed

Joe seemed to suffer from a fit of indecision while waiting to wrap his roll and ended up only putting dried cranberries in. So it tasted pretty much like sushi rice with a little sweetness. Luckily I love sushi rice!

3. Pantry Attack Roll–Rob

Pretzels, peanut butter, sprinkles, Heath Bar Shell ice cream topping, rice, seaweed, probably some other things

This roll was ridiculous. Also, didn’t really hold together so it was hard to eat. In consequence, the bite of it I got was mostly pretzel and heath bar ice cream topping, which tasted okay. I’m not sure what all ingredients tasted together would have been like.
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Christmas Bounty!

January 14th, 2011 by pladd

For once, I got some mail instead of sending it the other way! Exciting! Because Steven and I only brought one checked bag between us, we decided to ship a lot of the presents we got in H-Town to Carrboro instead of trying to get them all on the plane. The packages arrived today! It was like Christmas all over again!! Mostly because I’d forgotten a lot of what I got. Because some of it is ridic. Here are some pictures!

I wish I could show you the inside of this book but I would have to give you all PIRATE 3D GLASSES! It is mostly scenes from Pirates of the Caribbean

Oh my grosh you guys! I can now bake UP TO FOUR potatoes in the microwave now. Apparently.

Still kind of skeptical about this one.
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The Year In Pictures: 2010

December 31st, 2010 by pladd


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13 Adventures: #8 Raspberry Chocovine Challenge!

December 18th, 2010 by pladd

After the success of last year’s Chocovine Challenge it was only a matter of time before we tried the same with Chocovine’s new flavor: Raspberry Chocovine!

As per normal Servery Challenge rules: contestants have ten minutes to make a drink that utilizes at least one shot of Raspberry Chocovine and anything else found in the kitchen. Drinks will be judged based on Tastiness, Presentation, and Creativity. Since there are no celebrity guest judges easily accessible in my apartment, a winner is decided through popular vote.

As per normal Patricia Servery Challenge strategy, I decided not to taste Raspberry Chocovine or indeed the drink I made until the actual judging. I figured it would just dash my spirits. GOTTA BELIEVE IN YOURSELF.

The Entries:

Sprinkles!!!!! The only good part about this drink.

Contestant: Patricia
Drink Name: Cozy Winter Dream
Ingredients: Raspberry chocovine, milk, hot chocolate mix, raspberry vodka, whipped cream, sprinkles

Because it is so cold outside, I decided to go with a hot drink. This was a monumentally stupid idea. At first, all I could taste was whipped cream. Then, all I could taste was metal mixed with sugar. But at least it’s colorful!
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13 Adventures: #3 Servery Challenge: Orange Edition

December 12th, 2010 by pladd

When my parents came up for Thanksgiving, they brought two giant sacks filled with oranges and grapefruit. Even though I feel like I’ve been eating delicious Florida citrus with every meal, we still have so much left. Which is why today’s adventure was a Servery Challenge: Orange Edition in which each dish had to use up oranges.

As might be expected, I just messed around with the basics, and Steven tried to find the fanciest recipe possible. Sure, his took twice as long as mine, but it was also twice as spicy.

Since I am all about pineapple on pizza (although sadly I find Canadian bacon gross), I thought it would be interesting to try orange on pizza! I wasn’t able to find any examples of this online to make sure I wasn’t crazy, but this was an adventure(!) so I was not to be dissuaded. Besides, I know how to make pizza already, so whatever.
The easiest recipe I know is one for this pizza crust/flatbread that I got out of a teen cooking book. I love teen cookbooks because they try to be accommodating, not pretentious, and usually have awesome pictures. I like this recipe because you don’t even have to let the dough rise:

2 cups flour
2 tsp. baking powder
1/2 cup olive oil
3/4 cup milk

Mix together until a dough! Then spread on a flat pan! Top with things! Bake at 425 degrees for 15-22 minutes until done! Cook length will depend on dough’s thinness.

I don’t remember if the original recipe was written in entirely exclamation marks like that, but it should have been. I chose to top my pizza with: two oranges and 1/4 of a red onion, cut up, feta cheese, walnuts, and spinach. It looked like this:

Next time I would probably put the spinach on top after cooking

Steven made a fancy Persian rice dish whose recipe I can’t remember because it was extremely complicated. However, it had a lot of tasty spices, including ginger and curry, and two kinds of nuts: almonds and pistachios. It used up at least 3 oranges! Yay!

The orange peel ended up being almost candied and way tasty!

Competitive cooking is the best kind of cooking!!

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13 Adventures: #2 Trimming the… Stairs

December 11th, 2010 by pladd

For my second adventure, I decided it was time to decorate for Christmas! I think the summer I moved to North Carolina, my mom got kind of weepy and put together this Christmas box of a few Christmas decorations, mostly ornaments that were “mine” and some new ones too. She gave me this big speech about how now I would have to decorate my own house and have Christmas for myself etc. For about a month, I thought this meant I was not allowed to come home for Christmas anymore because Now I Was An Adult or something, which seemed weird. But then I ended up going home for Christmas anyway, so the Christmas box never got opened last year. This year I decided I would use my decorations, especially since we’ll be here till practically Christmas itself! Plus, it would totally count as an adventure without leaving the house and venturing in the freezing rain.

I am not really big on Christmas trees. It feels weird having a tree in the house and the strong smell often makes my allergies freak out. Plus, this one time in Florida, there were fly eggs in our tree and I spent all of Christmas killing forty-seven flies (I counted them as they fought a battle of wits with my fly swatter and lost). Plus, messy and small apartment. So we decided to decorate the stairs!

I wish I had taken a before shot, because then you would see why “let’s decorate the stairs” wasn’t even really a choice we made–it was so obvious that we didn’t even discuss it. When we moved in, the stair banister was ugly and white and large. That very day–before we even had a bed–I decorated it with all of the scarves I own (it looked like a rainbow caterpillar)–and giant light strands were the first thing I bought at Target to further bling it out. And to add light to our dark living room. Anyway, the stairs have always been a crazy work of art, and if anything they look slightly more dignified now.

I had some rope Christmas lights–which I’ve discovered BLINK AT VARYING SPEEDS, you have no idea how happy this makes me–plus the things in my Christmas box. And some scarves I left on because they were the right colors! Here are some badly lit pictures! Read the rest of this entry »

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13 Adventures: #1 Visiting Steven at Work!

December 10th, 2010 by pladd

So I know lately I have been kind of MIA and have broken my WITHOUT FAIL promise yet again (which, let’s face it, has been broken so often it’s pretty much just made of masking tape and hope now). My one excuse is: exams. But now they are over and I am relatively free until flying to Houston for Christmas! I have therefore decided to have an adventure EVERY DAY for the next 13 days!

This is less of an ambitious promise than it sounds, if you know anything about my personal definition of “adventure”. It’s all in how you tell it. I’m pretty sure I could describe a trip to the grocery store in such a way that you would be just waiting for the movie deal. And maybe I will sometime in the next 13 days if I run out of ideas.

Today’s adventure: visiting Steven at work! This isn’t something I do often at all, mostly because I have no time and because it’s an hour away. It’s a very pretty drive though, through the middle of nowhere and over Jordan Lake, which was really calm and clear today. The road snakes through the woods; the speed limit is pretty high but there are lots of turns so I always end up pretending to be The Stig1. Plus, a small amount of snow from last weekend is still hanging around in shady parts:

Not enough for a snowman, but enough to look nice!

Steven’s work is in the tiny–unbelievably tiny–town of Holly Springs, whose main claim to fame is that it also has the closest Sonic to our house. This is Steven’s office!

In Holly Springs, everything tries to look like your great aunt's house, even if it is a web design company!

And here is Steven’s personal office!

Notice the blank screen. I'm pretty sure he only pretends to work.

Then I took him to the only place to eat (besides Sonic) in Holly Springs, My Way Tavern! They have tasty “Cajun Fried Potato Slices”, which turned out to just be fancy potato chips! Things always taste better when they have fancy names.

And Steven always takes forever to decide!

It’s okay, it’s not his 13 Adventures. In fact, whenever I go to a restaurant this week, I’m just going to tell the waiter “BRING ME THE MOST ADVENTUROUS THING!” Definitely the only way to go. I will have to find an adventuring hat to wear tomorrow. What will tomorrow’s adventure be? EVEN I DON’T KNOW YET. I’m that adventurous, you have no idea.

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