Learning How to do Thanksgiving, Part 3: The Dressing
I’m staying home for Thanksgiving this year. My husband and I decided to do some projects around the house and to simultaneously try our hands at cooking a Thanksgiving meal this year. We aren’t spending the holiday with extended family, but we are spending it with family (because two people who are married, even if they don’t have children, still count as a family). Item #3 on the list: the dressing. Anyone who makes bad dressing (read: runny, dry, crumbly, tasteless) is talked about on the way home from grandma’s house. In the South,...
Learning How to do Thanksgiving, Part 2: Smoking a Turkey
I’m staying home for Thanksgiving this year. My husband and I decided to do some projects around the house and to simultaneously try our hands at cooking a Thanksgiving meal this year. We aren’t spending the holiday with extended family, but we are spending it with family (because two people who are married, even if they don’t have children, still count as a family). Item #2 on the list: still the turkey. We successfully smoked a turkey, and I was right about my hunch that you can throw anything in the brine. Our turkey was...
Learning How to do Thanksgiving, Part 1: Brining a Turkey
I’m staying home for Thanksgiving this year. My husband and I decided to do some projects around the house and to simultaneously try our hands at cooking a Thanksgiving meal. We aren’t spending the holiday with extended family, but we are spending it with family (because two people who are married, even if they don’t have children, still count as a family). Item #1 on the list: the turkey. We have cooked turkeys before, but nothing of this magnitude. Usually we buy a 3-6 lb. turkey breast to cook in the oven for sandwich meat. This...
Matchy-Matchy or Mix-and-Matchy?
Filed under: Consignment Furniture, Design, Furniture, Salvage Furniture
Having to no longer save every penny for application fees and moving expenses for grad school, I have been doing some furniture shopping. I’ve learned that furniture is hard to buy—it is either too expensive or doesn’t match anything I already have. Nonetheless, I have acquired quite a few pieces in the last several months. I originally took the feel-good approach by buying what I liked when I saw it and hoping to somehow make it fit in the room when I got it home. The results of this experiment have been hit and miss, but collectively a miss. I’ve...
Learning Over Grad School
After graduating with an M.A. in English, I promptly started my year-and-a-half-long trek to the Ph.D. I had time to get my ducks in a row, and in a row they were. I did it all. I read countless books strictly for educational reasons. I read books to figure out what I wanted to write a dissertation on; I read books to familiarize myself with the time period I wanted to study; and I read books that I supposedly should have read in college just in case one measly question showed up on the Subject Test. I can authoritatively say...
Now Reading
Planned books:
None
Current books:
-
The Western Intellectual Tradition, from Leonardo to Hegel by Jacob Bronowski
-
The Botany of Desire: A Plant’s-Eye View of the World by Michael Pollan
Recent books:
- The Help by Kathryn Stockett
- Wandering Star (Lannan Translation Selection Series) by J.M.G. Le Clézio
-