I tried, I swear!

I was really going to cook last night. I had plans and everything.

See, several months ago, O.'s mother gave me a cookbook called Fat Free, Flavor Full, which led to the following exchange:

Me: Is your mother saying I'm fat?
O.: I told her I was going to get in trouble for this.

Anyway, I've made a few soups from it, but there was a recipe for an eggplant, bean and tomato casserole that looked like it could be really good, but also potentially disgusting. I bought a couple of eggplants at the food co-op over a week ago and had been putting off the actual cooking part ever since.

So, O., who had expressed a decided lack of enthusiasm for this particular recipe, had plans last night, so I thought it would be a great time to try it. I called Tracy and Jackie to invite them to dinner, figuring that if I had guests coming I'd have to actually cook something. They both accepted, though upon hearing the menu, Jackie said "...I'll stop at Chipotle on the way over."

So I was ready to go. I put my beans on the stove to cook and started cutting up my onion.

Hmm. Tracy's allergic to onion.

Well, she's ok as long as there's not much and it's cooked, so we should be all right. Next ingredient! Garlic.

Hmm. Tracy's allergic to garlic.

Ok. We'll leave the garlic out. Next ingredient! Green pepper.

Hmm. I know I had a green pepper around here somewhere...

I called O. He told me that he'd tossed the green pepper three days ago because it liquefied in the bag. Hmm. Perhaps I procrastinated too much?

...Sigh. Plan B.

So I intended to really cook, but instead made Chicken Tikka Masala from a jar. Is it any wonder I don't bother most days? Thank God O. does most of the cooking around here.

Back to school...

Frankly, I'm too exhausted to write anything of substance right now. So instead, I'm posting pictures.

In case you ever wondered where I work:


This is the reading circle, the picture book section and our brand new mural.


This is the other side of the library, and the other new mural. In the back we have the fiction section, and to the right part of the nonfiction section.

And to toot my own horn a bit, here are some of the displays I put together this year.


This is the bulletin board right outside the library, where my students can record the books they're reading.


And this one is also in the hall. The words read "Read a book...meet interesting people!" Can you name them all?

What I did on my summer vacation.

First, I went here:


Then I went here:


Now I have to go back here:


Don't get me wrong, I love my job. But I would also dearly love to have another week or so of summer.

Paris for President?

It would be an understatement to say that I am no fan of Paris Hilton. So when I heard about her spoof campaign ad, I was prepared to be annoyed and unamused.

Instead, I found it hilarious.

I mean, there were parts I found annoying and unfunny. It is Paris Hilton, after all. But mostly I just laughed.

I am a little concerned about the fact that her energy plan seems to make a lot of sense...