Bread Pudding in Paradise

Whoa. So much to write. So little time to write it. Wait, I am at work with NOTHING to do…I have PLENTY of time!

Before I begin the usual Monday ‘weekend recap,’ I figured I would make a list of MAY-vorites and unMAY-vorites (totally stole using ‘May’ in place of same sound in word to highlight time of year)…

MAY-VORITES:
1. Rainy nights
2. Cauliflower
3. Balsamic vinegar
4. Jimmy Buffett
5. the cute stuff BOY gave me for not drinking soda for a week
6. Nanette Lepore
7. cooking (okay, not actually cooking, but collecting recipes)
8. Bermuda shorts
9. Navy blue as the ultimate neutral
10. Not wearing makeup

unMAY-VORITES:
1. Rainy days
2. humidity
3. the way I feel (and have felt for the past 3 days) right now
4. the smell of New Orleans streets
5. hormonal blitzes and imbalances
6. people who use improper English while clearly trying to write using proper English
7. being bloated
8. the blister scars on my feet

Okay…first admission; I like mushrooms. Well not all mushrooms, but I know I like portabellas…yeah, I know…craziness. For so long they have been 1 of 2 items Stephie1010 just simply WOULD NOT eat. No no, she didn’t care if this particular mushroom tasted different or if you PROMISED she would like it. Icky. NO. it’s not like I didn’t like the taste of mushrooms; I have always liked the flavor they add when cooked into something…that meaty, thick, kind of musty taste. But the TEXTURE…oh caution. The texture absolutely killed me. the spongy, slimy, foamy chewiness of them. EWWWW. Same problem with shellfish. Gross-o maloso. Anyways…I will always try something once and I haven’t tried them in a while, so BOY convinced me to try a shitake that was cooked into his yaki soba on Thursday night. Icky. Couldn’t do it…texture still aversive. On Friday night, however, he convinced me to try a portabella mushroom because they are VERY different in texture and flavor…very meaty. Okay okay I have heard that before so I decide to give in and try it. OMG-it’s delish! The texture is NOTHING like other mushrooms, no foamy, chewy, ewy nastiness. It’s firm and very ‘meat’ like. and it had cheese and garlic and tomatoes on it. So I am a portabella convert. But don’t expect me to go around trying every other type of mushroom…liking one type is a big step for me.

Okay gotta back this train up for a minute. Since I didn’t post on Friday, will recap from Thursday night on. So had county commission meeting Thursday night…always a treat. Not really. Thank God it only lasted until 7. was craving sushi so BOY and I went out to sushi. It was AMAZING. I love sushi. Here’s a suggestion: get a side of ginger dressing and dip the rolls in that instead of soy and wasabi. And don’t knock it until you try it. It’s uber yummy.

Friday: can leave work early because of county commission meeting attendance, but not really because I have missed so much other random time during the past 2 weeks so have to stay until 4:30. boss, however, tells me to leave. Who am I to argue? He also assigns me to go to the Foundation office every Friday to help out with some payroll stuff (and then suggests that I go early afternoon so he doesn’t know what time I finish after that and I can just head out from there…he ROCKS!). so I leave around 2:30p and head to my favorite boutique; it’s closing and they are having a HUGE sale. I get some new jeans, a suit, and a few other goodies and then head to my cheerleaders’ uniform and campwear fitting session. HELLO CRAZINESS. Mothers asking questions about fit, wondering where things are, cheerleaders trying to be modest in front of us…come on…just change already! It was insanity. But we whipped through the fitting, then I went to work out, home to shower, then to a delish dinner at Portabella.

Portabella is one of my favorite restaurants in the Pensy. For a town our size, I must admit, we have a pretty good variety of dining options. So BOY and I get all pretty (I look REALLY cute by the way…a scarf shirt—which causes some ‘fun’ later on and black capris with slingbacks…so hot right now!) and head to the restaurant. Turns out our waiter was a guy I knew in high school so he treats us really well. Dinner was amazing (portabella app, tomato basil soup, pork with sweet potatoes and apple, mocha liquer mousse cake…and yummy vino); we start talking with the waiter about what he’s doing with himself and what I am doing with myself and BOY SURE DOES pull out a copy of the article I had in the newspaper and share it with the guy. Soooo like those people who, while you are talking about mergers and acquisitions or something totally NOT on the topic of them are like, ‘oh you want to see pictures of my kids?’ I both loved him for it and wanted to slap him at the same time. A bit embarrassing, but really cute. He pulled it out later while we were one of his friend’s houses too. He is such a silly billy. He also made me crazy by telling me he hadn’t thought about my surprise/reward for only drinking one soda a day at all either. But then he said he had. But he hadn’t really. But he had. Aaaaah! He did that just to make me CRAZY! And it worked.I love being crazy. It is sooo me.

So Saturday I wake up and drive to NOLA…in about 2.5 hours. I was flying. Get to the hotel, see the girls (YAY!) and then head down to Jazzfest 2006. driving into the city was heartbreaking…east NOLA looks AWFUL! I didn’t expect that part of the city to be so destitute…no one has come back; it’s like a ghost town. The quarter and downtown actually look pretty good; they got it restored pretty quickly for the most part…gotta get us tourists back! Still some remnants of the news coverage…busted windows, abandoned cars, spraypainted body counts on buildings. Driving over to the fairgrounds, we saw a lot more devastation…trash everywhere, cars stacked on each other, roofs collapsed, water lines…devastation everywhere. Once at Jazzfest we HAVE TO partake in festival food so I get this spinach/artichoke casserole, sweet potato bread, au gratin combination plate and the girlies get shrimp poboys. At about 1:15p, we head over to check the stage buffett is going to play at at 5:30p to check it out and HOLY CRAP it was already packed. So we decide to claim our spot and camp out there for the next 4 hours. It looked like it was going to pour all day, but thank God it didn’t and also that it wasn’t sunny and disgustingly hot. It was actually perfect weather. We drink some frozen bevs, grab some sweets, and wait for the jimster. He was AWESOME! Too bad I felt like crap, but we got to dance and frolic about and watch people smoke weed and be very drunk for 2 hours. Then we headed back to the hotel and got ready for dinner and the night out. Dinner was soooooooo good (walnut and blue cheese salad, yummy bread and wine, chicken with eggplant, asparagus, potatoes and bacon glaze, and bread pudding…YUM!) and then we walked to Margaritaville bc MK had a sneaking suspicion JB would make an appearance there. Sure enough, a tour bus was outside and it was closed for a private party. She is such a smart pants. We head to Pat O’s but we are tired girlies and can barely stay out until 1. walking up and down Bourbon looking for the exact bar/atmosphere you want is not so productive, but I still had fun just being stupid with the chicas.

Wake up Sunday, feel LIKE CRAP, toilet overflows, get ready for brunch…SO GOOD! It made me feel a lot better (yummy sweet potatoes, chicken salad, omelettes, pastas, fruit concoctions, breakfast meats, bananas foster, cakes, desserts in general); for a while there early morning I thought I was going to chunder everywhere. Neither one of the girls felt well either; we think it’s because we ate crazy rich food all weekend and not one of us is used to that normally. So brunch was delish and we boutique it for a while and get rained into a boutique for a few minutes. Good afternoon all in all. I go a little crazy at a store that carries a lot of Nanette Lepore, but hey, I need work shirts that are appropriate for summer because GOD KNOWS I am not wearing long sleeved button downs or thin sweaters under suits when it is 80 gabillion degrees outside. After the shopping, I feel like crap again and head home. Stop to get a DC on the way home and that makes me feel better. Arrive at BOY’s house to flowers, a card, a can of DCVDP (Diet Cherry Vanilla Dr. Pepper), and…bananas foster cheesecake. Oh yeah, and a pot of delish gumbalaya brewing in the kitchen. And dogs humping my legs. And BOY with freshly cut hair (so cute!). And an admission that he was going to write a poem but couldn’t come up with rhyming words (it was true; the thesaurus was out and everything), but he still decides to draw me pictures and put ‘happy words’ on a pink poster-y thing anyways. The flowers are gorgy…he made a bouquet of a rose, gerber daisies, and wildflowers all by himself (he might just be a frustrated florist…hmmmm). Love it. So we hang out, eat, he studies and I watch TV and then…IT’S GREY’S ANATOMY TIME!

So you see my friends, I had a wonderful weekend full of most of my favorite people (there were a few key players missing!) and lots of good times. Life is good.
Am including a quote Meredith said last night on the GA because I think it’s HILARY…and kind of true in an ‘in your face mcdreamy’ way!

Meredith: You don't get to call me a whore. When I met you, I thought I had found the person that I was going to spend the rest of my life with. I was done. So all the boys and all the bars and all the obvious daddy issues, who cared, because I was done. You left me. You chose Addison. I'm all glued back together now. I make no apologies for how I chose to repair what you broke. You don't get to call me a whore.
Derek: This thing with us is finished. It's over.
Meredith: Finally.
Derek:Yea it's done.
Meredith: It is done.


But we all know IT’S SO NOT DONE!!! AAAAAAAAAAH!