Thursday, July 30, 2009

I am not feeling it

I'm just not feeling the funny tonight. I have to work tomorrow and then I am off for 9 days. I imagine I'll be in a much better mood with much better thoughts tomorrow.

Oh, I do think I have a good name for my grocery store though. Petite's Eats. Thoughts?

Wednesday, July 29, 2009

Singles in the Kitchen

I live alone and as an aloner, I rarely cook a big dinner. I can't remember when I started helping in the kitchen. I know Mema (my grandmother, who I miss so much) would pull a chair up to the stove so I could stir the boiling pot of chicken broth and PET milk for the dumplins she was dropping in. I'm not sure letting a kid that couldn't see over the stove near an open flame was such a good idea, but it worked out for me. I was cooking easy dinners for the family by the time I was 12. Jarred spaghetti sauce and noodles? I can do that! Tacos? Done!

So, when I cook dinner now, I make way too much food. I buy way too many groceries to make one meal and I end up throwing a lot of food away. I can only eat Mexican casserole so many times before I'm sick of it. I will sometimes throw it in the freezer, but it just stays there for a few months until I toss it. I don't know why, but I never eat leftovers out of the freezer.

Even when I do cook a meal for myself, I have to buy more of things than I need. I don't need a whole bag of carrots to make chicken noodle soup. Same thing goes for celery ribs (mmm, ribs ... oh sorry, I got distracted).

So, if I had the money to do it and I wasn't a lazy ass -- I mean, seriously, I'm almost too lazy to post on this blog every day -- I'd open a chain of grocery stores for singles and people that don't buy for more than two.

I throw away sleeves of crackers and half-boxes of cereal all the time. I'm not a big ice cream person, so if I buy a half gallon of Blue Bell, I end up tossing at least half of it because it gets freezer burn. (I know, you're all thinking, a fat girl doesn't throw ice cream away. I would rather have an appetizer than a dessert. So I do throw ice cream away)

So, my propsal is this: The anti-Costco. While toilet paper (only Ultra Plush Quilted Northern for my hiney, please) by the ton is a good idea, food by the ton isn't a good idea for a single gal. I can't eat 25 pounds of carrots before they go bad. This anti-Costo needs a name. Dinky's? Pint Size? ooh, maybe PintCo. Mini Market? Petitez? Desparation? I like Petiez so far but maybe I'll come up with something awesomer.

Anyway, this grocery store would only sell the small size of things and you could buy a single carrot or a single chicken breast. Need a tiny amount of cliantro? We've got it. Need just one serving of Cookie Crisp and one cup of soy milk? We've got it. Got a late night craving for a grilled cheese? Come by Petitez and grap a couple slices of bread and a couple slices of cheese. Need one egg and a cup of flour to make cookies?

All of these items would be around the same price per oz/lb as items you buy in "bulk" at the grocery store now. If Ritz crackers are $2.59 for 4 sleeves of crackers, one sleeve would be about 75 cents. A carrot would be like 20 cents. An chicken breast would be $2.

I know I'm not the only singleton with issues like this. According to recent numbers from the Census bureau, there are 92 million single people above the age of 18 in the US. Which is 42% of aged 18 and up Americans.

Plus, when a you see a woman in a regular grocery store with a cart full of cat food, boxes of wine, chocolate bars and Lean Cuisine, you know she is most likely single. If you shopped at store for singles, maybe you wouldn't be the only one wheeling around the cart of hope and desperation.

(BTW, I'm sure everyone caught the sarcasm in that last line, but if not, I like being single and never feel desperate.)

Tuesday, July 28, 2009

Memories, misty water colored ... (see, I have a problem) ..

I'm going to Atlanta next week to visit some amazing people and it turns out they have Orange Juliuses (Juli?) there. Back when you could only get Chick-fil-A at the mall food court, there was an Orange Julius a couple of stalls down at the mall we frequented. (Willowbrook Mall was the only one close, so that's where we went. Nothing was really close to Magnolia).

If you aren't familiar with Orange Julius, it's basically a smoothie place. Think Jamba Juice but in the 1980s. Their famous drink is made from orange juice, ice and the eyelashes of a unicorn. OK, so I don't know what is in it. I do know that it was delicious. I'm not sure when OJ left Willowbrook Mall but it's been a very long time. So I'm really looking foward to stopping in for one. I wonder if the people who run OJ and the Coffee Bean get pissed off any time they see someone holding a Jamba Juice cup or a Starbucks' Frappucino.
I kind of wonder though, if it'll be as good as I remeber or if it'll taint the awesome memories I have of the mall food court and it's delicious concoction. Seeing New Kids on the Block did not taint the memories of the Astrodome 1990 show. I just made some great new memories involving NKOTB. Good company goes a long way, so I think that even if the drink isn't as good as I remember, something memorable and meaningful will happen.

Monday, July 27, 2009

Sandpaper pedicure

Can someone explain to me why my cat likes to lick my feet? Because Katanna does. And if I move my foot under the blanket to make her stop, she crawls under there and continues licking. Anyone that knows me very well knows I hate feet. HATE.THEM. So the fact that she likes licking them grosses me out. Even more than the fact that she licks her own butt. But not as much as the fact that if she barfs, Pan will try to eat it before I can grab paper towels to clean it up.

And while I’m on the subject …when do you know you’re a crazy cat lady? Do the old women with 30 cats living in their house know they are crazy cat ladies? Or are they in denial. I joke around that I have a crazy cat lady starter kit, but what if the people laughing when I say that are just laughing AT me and not WITH me. I might be a few Facebook photos uploaded away from owning fuzzy sweaters with pictures of cats chasing yarn on them and no one has told me.
It’s one day (er, not even 24 full hours) since I started this blog and I’m already not sure who I should share it with. Do I really want everyone I know to know that I sometimes eat queso cold, straight out of the fridge and that I once peed on the floor a little because a giant tree roach was crawling on the bathroom wall and I was mid-stream? (TMI?)

Hmmmm.

We'll see how it goes the next few days.

Sunday, July 26, 2009

Welcome.

When you’re 15 and envision what your adult life, I don’t think anyone plans on being 30, single, overweight and living with two cats in the ‘burbs. I sure as shit didn’t. But that’s what happened. And it’s not like I’m unhappy with the way things turned out, they are just different. And I might be unhappy if it weren’t for the lovely medication brought to by the letters G, K and S. Thank you GlaxoKlineSmith.

So I thought I’d start a blog because I’m self absorbed enough to think I’m hilarious. And if no one else laughs, well then that just goes to show you that everyone else’s sense of humor sucks. I went to sign up for a blog and I had a great idea for a name: Houston, I am the problem. Turns out some bitch - that doesn’t even live IN Houston - already took that name. Boo. So, maybe I have a problem instead of knowing I do? And by problem, I mean problems, plural. Oh, maybe that one is available. Sweet. So, now I have a blog. With a name. And it needs some TLC but I’m lazy so we’ll see how that goes.

So, the name. And the blog. I have been reading all of Jen Lancaster’s books (which you should read if you haven’t. They are hilarious). She’s inspired me to actually write down the funny shit I think of while I’m home alone. I went into the kitchen a little bit ago and decided on chips and queso for dinner. With a mimosa. What? It’s not like I don’t have 100 lbs to lose or that I am reading a book about a fat girl trying to lose weight (Such A Pretty Fat). So I decided that I'd like to incorporate the name of the city I live in (and love) and the fact that I have issues. Plural.

So once again, I’m going to start tomorrow.

Hopefully I stick with the blogging and the dieting.