7 Quick(er) Takes Friday, Number 3

1.) Um, so, we got pre-approved for a home loan. Which is crazy, if you consider that just a few months ago, we got turned down for a Best Buy card. Really? Explain to me how that makes any kind of sense! We had even found a house we liked (huge, foreclosed on, very cheap, nice neighborhood) that was in our supposed price range. But the monthly payments of property taxes, come to find out, were THIS HIGH. No really, all the way up to there. So now we are looking at houses that are much farther BELOW our price range. We'll see, you guys. We'll see.


2.) I told my students that I was Expecting (so that I could give them a lecture about how if I have to rush out of the room to throw up, they had better behave and keep working. Because if not, I will just throw up on the random sink that graces my classroom, and NO ONE WANTS THAT) and one of the older classes was very surprised. They'd had me last year when I was pregnant, and their comment was, "Really, Mrs. V? You sure? Cause you haven't been ACTING pregnant." "I haven't?" I asked. "Oh no! You've even been kind of nice lately!"

What can I say, I'm a terror! It might also have something to do with the fact that Joey would have all the kids before me last year, and he would scare them into behaving for me by widening his eyes and informing them to "just don't get her riled up today, guys, TRUST ME, it won't be worth it!"


3.) The only flaw I have found with Gone With The Wind so far is how Scarlett doesn't seem to care at all about her child. I can easily get past all the other selfish things she does, and for the most part I really like her, but that one thing makes me think we probably couldn't be friends. I'm hoping she gets it together in this area before it is Tragically Too Late, but I don't know. Don't spoil it for me, though!!!


4.) We went to Red Lobster last night for dinner with Joey's parents. I remember when I was little that I thought Red Lobster must be the ultimate fine dining experience. Someday I would eat at Red Lobster, and then drive away in my limo and go home to my TEN STORY mansion to count my diamonds and rubies. Ah, fond childhood dreams! Even so, we don't often treat ourselves, thanks to le budget. But it was fun, and Ariel had a WONDERFUL time flirting with everyone she saw and sucking on lemon wedges.


5.) She does not, however, enjoy having her face wiped. I don't understand this! She gets a lot of food on her sweet little face, and I am physically incapable of leaving it there to crust over. But she hates it! She instantly starts shrieking and writhing and pushing my hands away and clawing at my arms. Nothing I've tried has made any difference in this, so usually I just settle for scrubbing quickly and promising that it is in fact, just a wet wipe, not a sheet of sandpaper soaked in acid. She remains unconvinced.


6.) Someone at work asked me this week if it was true that I am pregnant. When I answered yes, her face fell and she wailed, "But your POOR DAUGHTER! She won't have any chance to be a BABY!!!"
What exactly she proposed I DO about this tragedy, I don't know, because I refrained from asking. I'm TRYING to be Nice Pregnant Lady this time, so I just responded brightly something about yes, but she'll always have someone to play with!

I OUGHT to know better than to worry about people making silly comments about pregnancy and babies and all. I think mothers are just magnets for People Who Blurt. I'll admit that it nettled me a little though. Joey and I have made it a joke now, that Ariel better enjoy all this being a baby stuff now, because in a few months it'll be time to stop mooching and go get a job, preferably one with benefits, because we don't have any.
All in all, though, I think I preferred the (also work originated!) comment of "Do you two EVER get out of the bedroom?" The answer to which is no, no we don't. So there.


7.) One of my literature classes has finished the works of Lewis Caroll, so I have been planning to cook a bunch of the food mentioned in the books, so they could have a feast while watching the Disney movie. Cooking food out of books for my students is one of my favorite things to do. This is how I discovered I can make some AMAZING Indian food (too bad Joey hates it, but everyone else agrees it was good) and that I CANNOT make Turkish Delight, not if my life depended on it.

So I made a list of the foods they had in Alice, and one of those items was Mock Turtle Soup. They made it back then because turtles were expensive, and people make it now because it is illegal to eat turtles. I didn't want to make any of the clearly fake and inauthentic recipes I found, so I discovered that to make REAL Mock Turtle Soup, like Alice Lidell would have eaten, the first thing you have to do is either boil an entire calves head, or else several oxtails.

!!!

My classroom aide informed me that I could find oxtails at any Asian market, and if not a calves head, she knew she had seen pig's heads there before.
"I couldn't boil a HEAD, though!" I protested. "It would be LOOKING at me!" "Oh no," She said calmly. "You close the eyes first."

Suffice it to say, my literature class will just have to make do with some treacle tarts and some tea. Even Julie Powell didn't have to boil any heads or tails, and then serve them to unsuspecting ninth graders. Like I have a cooking pot big enough to accommodate a whole HEAD anyway!


Now, go to Conversion Diary for more quick takes.