Sharing is NOT Always Caring

Let me start this post off by clarifying that I am not a saint. I have been known to curse like a sailor when having general conversations with people - even at work - without thinking twice. I will drop the F bomb around folks without batting an eyelash - and sometimes I will apologize for the same - if I'm speaking with someone I'm not extremely familiar with. However, I will never direct my foul language at someone, using it to call someone an inappropriate name, nor will I talk about someone using foul language unless I'm in a closed office or conference room with a very select few individuals, who I know believe that the language I'm using is appropriate, and who I also know wouldn't be offended by my use of such language. Let me demonstrate:

The following is appropriate for a general office conversation in my book - which I know is going to be vastly different from other people's books. Especially my Mom's book - just in case she reads this, I will clarify - I would never use any of these sentences in front of my Mom - not because I'm ashamed of my foul mouth, but because I like the back of my head sufficiently unbruised, thank you very much.

Ahem - back to the point.

Appropriate
Co-worker: Today they're giving out free ice cream in the cafeteria
Me: Why the hell are we sitting around here then? Let's get our asses to that cafeteria, stat!

Porch Progress

Lots has happened on our front porch since my last post related to our renovation.  Greg and I have spent pretty much every weekend working on the dang thing, but at least we're making progress.  Totally worth it, right??

Here's a picture from last weekend, sometime on Saturday evening when we had finished installing roughly 60% of the deck joists (notice the nicely re-faced and re-supported piers that the framing is resting on -- those were a bear and took a lot of time, making it look like we had made no progress for several weeks).  Also, you can't see it too well here, but we also re-surfaced the exterior concrete foundation wall that is below the porch, and also replaced the window that lets us see out under the porch from our laundry room area.

Frustration

Things at work are kind of blah at the moment.  There's a lot of work going on, but I don't have a great handle on it, and every time I talk to one of my bosses, I get directed in a path that varies greatly from the one set by the boss I spoke with previously.  And, yes, I mean bosses, plural.  And, no, it's not strange that they have differing opinions.  It's just the way it is right now, and I end up being stuck in the middle, fledgling, not really understanding what I should or should not be pursuing.  Makes for very long days in the office, and time wasted trying to figure out who to talk to about what aspects of what projects I'm working on.

It all makes going to work every day not at all exciting, and, in fact, something I dread.  As I'm currently in my working prime - where I'm trying to really bolster my career and get moving in the right direction to move up in my organization, I'm lacking the support of a leader I can work with and share a vision with, who will nurture what little talent I have to make me a greater asset for them.

On a slightly more positive note, Greg and I made some great progress on our front porch renovation this weekend, as in we finished the main framing portion of the work.  It was a really tough weekend in that we moved lots of lumber and I ended up with some pretty badly bruised forearms and a sore back, but I'm proud of what we accomplished.  I wish I could stay home all the time to work on that project rather than come to actual work...if only I could figure out a way to get paid to do that.  I need to get some pictures of our progress posted here...we've taken some, but of course, I have access to none of them because downloading stuff hasn't really been a priority for me.  Maybe I'll change that.

My sister Lindsay is coming home from Kuwait this weekend, and I absolutely can't wait to see her.  She's the sister that all of my other sisters gets along with - she's genuinely non-judgemental, and is only difficult to deal with when she lacks sleep and gets an attitude - but it doesn't happen often, and I think we are all looking forward to her coming home and hanging out.  Let's hope for a short work week people!

Hooray for Hot Dogs!

Strangest thing happened to me last week...I was driving home from a half day of work and was contemplating what to have for lunch.  Unfortunately, and oddly out of character for me, the first thing that came to mind was hot dogs.  I wanted a hot dog for lunch.  How bizarre.  I never really eat hot dogs.  Even when I'm at a barbecue, I choose chicken or burgers over franks.  It's not because I don't like them, they're OK as far as food goes, but I'm not overly obsessed with them, nor have I ever once had a craving for them.  But, lo and behold, there I was, driving home, figuring out where to go to purchase some dogs.

I decided to be economical and go to the grocery store to purchase a package of hot dogs rather than find a take out place with the same, hoping to somehow control the number of calories I would be inhaling for lunch.

I ended up getting two kinds of hot dogs - one Applegate Farms "The Super Natural Beef Hotdogs", and one Oscar Mayer "Selects Turkey Hotdogs".  Both met my criteria for "Healthier" hot dogs in that they had less than 200 calories per dog, and they were free of nitrates -- as a bonus both were under 10 grams of fat per dog!  All of the other hot dog products I considered purchasing that day were full of calories - most were over 200 per frank, all had no less than 15 grams of total fat, and they were all packed full of nitrates to keep them preserved.

As usual, when I purchase more healthy options for a food I'm craving, I expected to be a bit disappointed, but satisified enough to get past my craving and move on with life.  Well...these dogs were way better than I anticipated they would be.  Seriously.  The Applegate Farms hotdog, in particular, was delicious, without having to be such a huge sacrifice calorie and fat-wise.

In fact, the hot dogs were so good that I had them for lunch on Friday then again for lunch on Saturday...and I'm even freezing the ones I haven't cooked yet to have at a later time.

So...if you find yourself in a mood for hotdogs, I fully suggest you try out either one of the hotdogs I mentioned above.  I'm not being paid for this post nor do I have any interest in either Oscar Mayer or Applegate Farms - I just love food, especially when it feels like it's such an unhealthy choice that turns out to be not so terrible after all.

I slapped some mustard, ketchup and coleslaw on top (I know, strange combo -- thanks to the preferences of my Canadian husband I'm now actually keen on coleslaw as a hotdog topping...don't judge me until you try it yourself) and had myself an awesome lunch.

Renovation Nation

Since we bought our house in 2009, the front has looked kind of like the picture below.  OK, so we re-did the roof, and it's a bit darker now.  We've also gotten rid of most of the small bushes around the front, and the large tree limb hanging down across the front yard was cut down to let in some sunshine.

Even with these minor changes, the front of our house leaves a lot to be desired.  Honestly, I have never been a fan of our screened in porch.  Some people (ie. my in-laws and my grandmother) seemed pretty fond of it - and tried convincing me more than once to consider keeping it intact.  But the awkwardly large roman-esque columns seemed very out of place for our small, relatively simple bungalow-style house, and if I was taking those down, I was definitely NOT going to keep the screen.  Yes, it can be argued that screens are good for deterring critters, but really, all it did for me the past three years was make hanging Christmas lights on the house a challenge (which I won by simply cutting an access hole in the screen, therefore rendering the critter shield pretty much useless).  But I digress (as usual).

Ever since we moved in I've been telling Greg that we need to renovate the front completely, open up the porch, and give our home a little bit of curb appeal.

No Bad Days For You!

Today I had a training class geared toward defining your leadership style, motivating others, and keeping momentum in a not so positive environment.  One of my classmates, who I have nothing but the utmost respect for, revealed that one of her strategies for dealing with frustrations of her staff includes hanging positive statements on her office walls that help her to remember that she needs to maintain a positive outlook on her work and our organization if she wants to be a positive influence.  Specifically, she said she has one statement typed in bold, large print hanging on her wall that reads:

"Managers CANNOT Have Bad Days."  

Her basic managing principal is that she does not let her frustration, stress, aggravation, or unhappiness show to her staff.  She was quick to clarify that she does, in fact, have bad days, but she makes a conscious decision NOT to let her staff know when she is having one such day.

Simple Dinner Deliciousness

On a whim last night, I put together a simple dinner that ended up being quite tasty.  Greg was out of town for work, and I was on my own.  Typically, when he's away, I will just eat through whatever we have in our cabinets/fridge, and usually I end up eating things that are (to normal people) considered breakfast fare - cereal, oatmeal, egg sandwiches, etc.  However, yesterday I HAD to go to the grocery store because we had no milk left, and I absolutely need milk in the house at all times - so that I can munch on cereal whenever my little heart desires to do so.

So...in addition to milk, I bought a bevy of produce including fresh basil...which is absolutely divine when added to anything...and decided I would make SOMETHING that had fresh basil included.  When I got home, I decided to make a salad and a panini for dinner.  Having no thawed meat on hand (yes, all of our chicken, sausage, and random steaks are currently frozen, just waiting for the day they get to sit in the fridge for thawing and eventual grilling if the weather would just cooperate!) and having a desire to add some protein to the mix, I pulled out a can of white cannelleni beans and then began creating things.

First, I chopped up some lettuce, celery, cucumber, tomatoes, avocado, and red onion for my salad.  I added some shredded carrot also, and was done with that part of my meal.  For the main event (i.e. the part with carbs, hence my favorite part of the meal), I sliced a whole wheat ciabbata roll to use as the outter most part of my panini.  For the filling, I chopped up some fresh basil, sliced a tomato, and shredded some mozzarella cheese.  Then, I chopped some red onions and sauteed them in a tiny bit of olive oil to bring out the sweet flavor.  I set that aside, then put some minced garlic into my frying pan with some olive oil, sauteed just a short bit, then added a handful of the beans (rinsed and drained, of course!).  While it was warming up, I smooshed the beans into the garlic, making a kind of bean paste.  I added some extra virgin olive oil to this to get the mix a bit smoother, but it was still pretty chunky, which I was OK with.  I ground some black pepper into the whole thing then took it off the heat.

To build my panini, I spread the white bean mix on the bottom of my sliced roll.  On top of that I put my sauteed onion.  Then I placed my tomato slices down, followed by a LOT of chopped basil, and then the mozzarella cheese.  I topped this with my second half of the ciabbata, then put the whole thing into my George Forman grill for about 5 minutes.  The cheese got all melty, and the outside of the roll was crisp while the inside remained a bit soft.  And the flavors of all came together to make an all over awesome simple dinner.

I was going to take a pic of my creation, but couldn't wait to just dig in and eat.  The panini idea is simple though, you really can use whatever ingredients you like - I've made them with pesto, chicken, and sundried tomatoes before - and that's a totally awesome combo.  One of these days I plan to incorporate black beans and salsa into one of these bad boys and see how that goes.

The best thing about paninis is that you are able to really get creative with fillings - even with the bread you choose to use.

*If you don't have a George Forman (or similar) grill, you can use a non-stick frying pan with something heavy placed on top of the sandwich to "press" the panini - you'll have to flip it midway to get the crispiness on both sides of your sandwich, but trust me, it will be sooo worth it!