Thursday, July 28, 2011

Lemons + Sugar Water = Heaven in a glass

I've managed to cross another one of my "40 by 40" items off of my list: #29 was to make homemade lemonade. No Country Time crap allowed. I'm not even sure why I really put this on my list other than the few times I have had homemade lemonade at street fairs, it was a gustatory orgasm. I guess that can be reason enough.

Who knew there was a recipe? Apparently what makes handmade lemonade taste so good is the ridiculous amount of sugar required. I thought it couldn't possible dissolve in the small amount of water the recipe stated, but, lo and behold, it worked.

See that kids? That's sugar water!
Next came the painstaking task of juicing the lemons. I say painstaking, because I don't own a juicer, not even the cheap little plastic ones that look like a baby's toy. I squeezed all of those suckers by hand. BY HAND!

But, damn, it was worth it!

Screw ambrosia! Lemonade is where it's at!
I wanted to cry, it was so damn good. I will never, ever drink the manufactured crap again. And honestly, the recipe was so easy. I got it off of Allrecipes.com. Click here if you want to create your own handmade, orgasmic lemonade!

Friday, July 22, 2011

Fresh, hot crabs & ditching Ellicottville

So my "40 by 40" list is progressing painfully slow. Painfully. Slow. Which is why I started it over two years before I turn 40...because I'm a procrastinator like that. But I have managed to cross a couple off of the list!

Number 8 was to eat fish caught that day from the ocean. Which I kind of did. Only they were crabs...tasty, tasty blue crabs. On vacation in Delaware, I had to opportunity to attack a mound of these babies, twice, with a little help from some friends.

Fresh, hot, crabs...mmmmmm
Eating these crabs was proof that the "food can be fun" experience can still be had when you're an adult. In addition to the crab, I had the best fresh salmon ever, and a fresh cod fillet. Considering I live in Buffalo, NY, I'm a little worried about the fact that fresh fish is hard to come by, and will be forced to resume eating the frozen kind once more.

Another item on the list was Number 9: Visit Ellicottville for the day. I had always heard others speak of Ellicottville as a great place to go have some fun. I drove through Ellicottville recently, on my way to another destination, and frankly, I was unimpressed. So I visited Ellicottville for the 45 seconds it took for me to drive through the main part of town, and I'm declaring that enough. Unless someone wants to show me the other side of Ellicottville, which makes it something special.

    Tuesday, July 19, 2011

    Proof you're never too old to act like a giggling 14 year old girl.

    I am way behind on my blog here. Waaaaay behind. Sorry about that. I wish I could say my absence was due to the fact that I rescued and rehabilitated a multitude of blind, three-legged puppies, but I was just being lazy. After the school year ended, I didn't want to do anything that required more thought than, say, breathing.

    But I have been having fun. I read a post by Johnny B. Truant which simultaneously reminded me that I am but a blip on the screen, and caused me to grow a pair of cojones for once. I may be a blip, but I was going to start doing epic shit.

    Enter The Lowest of the Low. I've mentioned them before, when I decided, if I was going to buy a Canadian, it would be Ron Hawkins. They were playing at Buffalo's Thursday in the Square, which was moved to the Central Wharf. That's Buffalo, always changing their minds.

    They were freaking awesome.

    Nice close up of Ron on the jumbo tron...
    After the concert ended, much too early, people slowly filed their way out of the wharf. My friends, Amy and Janine had enjoyed the concert with me, albeit, I don't think either one of them ever gave thought to actually buying Ron Hawkins. But I'm used to be the oddball, and frankly I don't want anyone else getting ideas about buying Ron, because then there would be a bidding war, and I am working with a teacher's salary here, people!

    So as we are slowly filing our way out, we see him. Amy and I start giggling like a couple of choir camp nerds running into Josh Grobin at the supermarket. OMG! It's Ron Hawkins! And because we can sometime be really, really lame, we first tried to do the "fake" pic with a celebrity thing. Notice Amy looking suave, trying to appear next to the blob that is Ron Hawkins' head.

    Very smooth.
    Looking at this pic on my phone, I began to feel disgraced. I was supposed to be doing epic shit. Not lame-ass shit. So I said what the hell...and actually spoke to Ron Hawkins, even if it was just to ask if he would take a pic with two middle-aged broads.

    He touched my back, y'all!!!
    Thank God we held it together until he was out of earshot, when we began shrieking like a couple of hormonal teenagers. But, we were epic, AND we had photographic evidence. Take that, universe!