Day #6, Still No Orange Juice

And no sunshine, either.

I am spending my time racking the far regions of my enormous brain, in every last attempt to come up with the best April Fool's joke ever... I will think of a good one this year. I will.

So, the one highlight of my day was dinner. Which I just finished eating. When I tell you what I had, I pronounce that you will be insanely jealous. You really will....because I had............BACON.

We actually had a shortage of bacon in the Harbison household tonight, prompting what we call an EBR, or, in other words, an Emergency Bacon Run. Sometimes, bacon is a necessity. So, we booked it to the store and brought home the bacon. And we ate it with a side of french toast. Delish.

I have bigger news though.

Bigger.

Bolder.

At the store, while on said EBR, I spotted a new Ben & Jerry's ice cream flavor that I just had to give a whirl. And I usually reserve my whirling for Imagine Whirled Peace (oh heavenly ice cream flavor goodness), but this one sounded simply splendid. It's called Red Velvet Cake. My oh my. If you know me, you know that red velvet is my favorite flavor of cake, especially in the form of a cup, more commonly referred to as 'cupcakes'. So, with that in mind, I was super excited to try this flavor... There it was, on the shelf... Calling to me. So I bought it. And I ate it.... and let me tell you....

IT WAS HORRIBLE.

IT IS A DISGRACE TO ICE CREAM.

I couldn't even finish my bowl, and as someone who regularly eats a few pints of ice cream a day, that is really saying something... It does not taste like red velvet at all. It tasted fruity. And gross. Fruit + Ice Cream = WTF. Strawberry ice cream? No. Cherry Garcia? HELL NO. Fruit should be reserved for sorbet, and sorbet should be reserved for Haagen-Dazs. And I wouldn't complain, as I know that some people dig the whole fruity ice cream thing, except for the fact that NOTHING about Red Velvet Cake implies any sort of fruit involvement. I was expecting something far different. Something rich. Smooth. Like velvet. But NO. It is bitter. Fruity. And the cake batter has the consistency of a dish sponge. No thanks. Ben and Jerry, you have failed me for the first time. I am truly disappointed. B&J can SMD. LOL. Get it? OK.

Alright, I'm off to play a rousing game of Settlers of Catan. I will be back shortly. I have a list of must-blog-about topics piling up.

Aren't I being a good blogger lately?

x CK

Oh and headsup, I really don't post to Facebook anymore. So you're going to have to check back here yourself. Or subscribe. Whatever floats your boat. Ciao. =)

Day #5 Without Orange Juice...

...and I am suffering.

I swear there is a correlation. Every single time I don't drink orange juice, I literally have the WORST day ever. It's madness, I tell you. Madness. I also just looked at my bed and realized that my comforter is switched to the stripy side...shit. Maybe I'm paranoid, but seriously... not cool universe. Not cool.

I just ate 2 bowls of Great Grains and the rest of the pint of Late Night Snack ice cream. And a Diet Coke. I drank a sip, spit it out in disgust, and poured the rest down the drain. Where it belongs.

Sometimes, I feel like my life is a TV show, and every day is an episode. Some episodes are really repetitive, some are almost unbearable, some are hilarious, some go by way too fast, and some feel like they'll never end. Let me tell you though, if my life was a TV show, I would totally tune in every week.

Yeah, so, I'm pretty bummed right now. Without orange juice, my life is falling apart, I swear. I am going to grab some essential oils, play some techno music, and take a bath. Definitely sounds like a good plan. Techno solves all problems. Literally, I could be in the crappiest mood ever, turn my iPod on, close my eyes... and it's like... heaven. It's not even really techno music that I listen to (well, some of it is), I don't even know if it has a genre except awesomeness. It's like noisepop, electropop, straight-up house music. It's awesome. I should do a music post sometime in the near future and enlighten you all with my exquisite tastes.

Kbye. CK

Super Souflee!

Mission successful! The souffle turned out beautifully. I had a few misteps along the way (forgetting to turn the oven down to 375, spilling powdered sugar all over the floor), but in the end, it was peeeerfecto! Here are a few pics (sorry about the quality of the last two; they were taken with my cell phone camera because the digital camera died) :

My favorite part of the process, beating the egg

whites into blissful and puffy perfection:

Finished souffle:

It rose at least 4 inches above the rim...

it deflated a bit before my camera was ready!

And, let me tell you, it was absolutely delicious. Scrumptious. But, how could you not expect it coming from me, baker extraordinaire? Alright, that's a bit of an exaggeration, but hey. I've got talents.

Speaking of things I've got, I've also got a craving for Late Night Snack. It's the Ben & Jerry's flavor, and let me tell you... Deeeeeeelicious. I had a cone of it at the local scoop shop, and I was immediately infatuated. Love at first sight. If I had to choose between a pint of Late Night Snack and Rupert Grint, I would choose the ice cream every single time. That's a HUGE deal, if you know me and my obsession with British men. And gingers. And specifically with Rupert Grint, who is glorious in all forms. So, back to the ice cream. Ever since I first tasted it, I have been searching high and low for it in stores, to no avail. It's nowhere. Sold out. For good reason. Obviously, I'm not the only one under its spell.

So, today, I stopped into a local convenience store to get some butter for the souffle, and to my surprise I saw it there, in the freezer... Only one left in the whole store, and it was looking at me with this sly expression. I knew I had to have it. I rushed it over to the cashier. I only had 5 bucks with me, so forget the butter, I'm getting some Late Night Snack! (My mom was NOT happy about me returning without the necessary food supplies.) To the point, to the point. I ate it for dessert and now I'm just craving more. So. Delicious.

The container describes it as "Vanilla bean ice cream with a salty caramel swirl & fudge covered potato chip clusters", but I can sum it all up into one word: PERFECTION. You'd think potato chips in ice cream would be weird, but let me tell you... The saltiness is like the perfect balance... Whoever created it is genius. Absolutely genius. Sent from above. (Jeez, now I'm going to be singing Britney Spears.)

So, the point of this entire rant (more of a rave) is that Late Night Snack has OFFICIALLY joined the ranks of Coca-Cola, Beef Jerky, Mojitos, French Onion Soup and Snickers bars. Delish. It has also replaced Karmel Sutra as my favorite B&J's ice cream flavor. (Though I still prefer Haagen-Dazs Mango Sorbet. It's on a whole other level.) So there.

I'm trying to be healthier. After learning that I consume over 300 carbs a day just in Coca-Cola, not to mention like 1000000 grams of sugar, I decided it was necessary to change my ways. So, I've been trying to train myself to like Diet Coke... but let me tell you. It is hard. I almost puked the first time, I swear to God. I can't even bring myself to drink it; I have to plug my nose. It's really horrible. But I keep forcing myself to drink it anyway, hoping that eventually I will become numb to the taste.

I also am trying to switch out other unhealthy things with healthier ones. I'm starting with a few things, and then eventually I am going to try and cancel out all the bad foods in my life. So, apart from soda, I'm trying to change my cereal habits. I'm an all-things-Fruity-Pebbles-and-Lucky-Charms addict, so it was definitely a challenge to start eating Great Grains... But now, after a week, I have to tell you... it's not so bad. In fact, I find myself craving Great Grains almost as much as beef jerky, and that is a lot. Those crunchy clusters, they just get me, you know?

Alriiight, I will post more later about food habits, etc. Have a good week, everyone. (I hope mine's better, but I doubt it- my mom didn't get the right kind of orange juice at the grocery. People these days....)

CK (:

Mac Attack!!!

GUESS WHAT!

I'm blogging from a Mac right now. Given, it's my ten year old sisters and not mine, but... who cares. It's a glorious Mac, truly. Anyway, we are having a dinner party shortly, and so we've been getting ready all day. I'm making a souffle a la Julia Child for dessert, so I will post pics of the process for sure!

Everything is aaaabsolutely perfect right now. I have solved all of the major crises in my life, give or take a few. I'm glad the past week is over, because it's been pretty horrible. I think my misfortunes were mostly due to the lack of orange juice in the house. It always seems to cause me bad luck when I don't drink my orange juice. Also, when I sleep with my reversible duvet flipped to the stripy side. I will comment more on that later.

SO. I'll get back to you later tonight.

x CK

Books and... (No clever rhyme coming to mind....)

Hiii guys! Wow, I am starting to get behind on blogging...again. Well, you know, quarter closing, lots of work to do. I can't keep making these excused, though. I always say that I'm busy, but I'm not. I'm really not. Honestly, I do absolutely nothing. I pretty much sit around watching nerdy movies, reading even nerdier books, and playing still nerdier single-player card games. (Think Solitaire, though I prefer Freecell.) I'm not even going to say what books I've been reading. It's honestly TOO nerdy.

Though, I am reading a REALLY good book right now, which I am not ashamed to mention. Because it's just SO GREAT. Water for Elephants. They're making it into a movie, which I am super-pumped about because it's seriously the best book...ever. Though, it's a bit racy for silent reading in school... I always get to the awkward parts when my humanities teacher is peering over my shoulder..... Here's the movie trailer:

So, yeah. That's all for now. Life is good. Dreams are better. See you on the flip side. CK

3/16

I have the WORST sinus headache in the universe right now. So I can't sleep, and have resorted to blogging. (Though I should actually be doing my homework...) I also took the time to completely makeover my blog- let me know what you think! I think I'm likin' it!

I had a lot of homework to do tonight, but I didn't get much done. I spent the evening doing what I like to call productive procrastination. Instead of doing my homework, I completely cleaned and organized my loft. Counts for something, right? Hey, at least you can't say I was being lazy. That was hard work! It's my sewing studio combined with my writing studio combined with my art studio combined with my reading nook. Therefore, it gets messy... really messy. It was basically strewn with countless books, drafts of novels, journals, shredded up poetry, tubes of paint, half-finished drawings, sketchbooks, scraps of fabric, and a good amount of sewing needles. I stepped on about 10 of those. Not fun. Not fun at all.

It was worth it, though. I wish I'd taken some before & after pictures, because it was quite the ordeal. It literally took me about 6 hours to clean. Talk about a nightmare.

I should probably go. My chariot awaits. And by chariot, I mean bed. It's looking very enticing at the moment. Alright, I'll update again soon!

-Curiosity Kills. Dylan (=

Oh yeah, and DONATE!

I strongly urge everyone to give in the wake of recent events. I know I will. The Red Cross, as well as numerous other charities, are accepting donations.

HERE'S HOW:

You can text REDCROSS to 90999 to donate $10. 100% will go to disaster relief for the 3/11 Earthquake and resulting tsunami, aftershocks, etc.

You can also donate to the Red Cross via their website.

Or, donate via phone by dialing 1-800-REDCROSS

Some other charities are also accepting donations via SMS, and via the web/phone.

The Salvation Army- Text JAPAN to 80888 to donate $10, or visit their website.

GlobalGiving- You can text JAPAN to 50555 to donate $10, or visit their website.

Save the Children- Text JAPAN to 20222 to donate $10, or call 800-728-3843, or visit their website.

MercyCorps- You can call 888-747-7440 or visit their website.

I hope you guys will join me in making a donation.

In wake of recent events....

I have a cold. Really bad one. I hate being sick. So. Much. I left school early today because I literally felt death creeping up on me, and I came home, plopped down in front of the TV, and on came the news.

SURPRISE!

Holy.

Shit.

O.

M.

G.

I don't really know what to say. I literally sat there, eyes glued to the TV, for 3-4 hours. Eating chocolate cake.

Every time a natural disaster occurs, we think "How can something of this magnitude happen?" It's really hard for me to wrap my head around the statistics. You see numbers on the screen. 245,000 dead. 1 million dead. 345,000 dead. 88,000 missing. Hundreds. Thousands. Millions. It's hard to imagine that each and every number in that statistic is actually an individual person with a story. With a life. It's almost inconceivable that so many people can just die. These numbers are huge.

It was Stalin who said that "When one dies, it's a tragedy. When a million die, it's a statistic." This quote is haunting, and utterly true. If I see a news story about a person who dies, it feels deeply personal somehow. A murder, a suicide, what have you. It's truly upsetting, because it gives you a name, a photograph, a story. When I see a nu

mber that huge, it's hard to wrap my head around the fact that it isn't JUST a number. So even though the deaths of millions is more tragic t

hat the death of one, it feels somehow less heartbreaking.

The other thing I find is that these disasters happen so out-of-the-blue. And each time one happens, I think, this is the worst thing that could ever happen. This is the absolute most horrible thing that will ever occur. And then, 6 months later, something worse happens. So where do we go from here? What can poss

ibly outdo the past few years? We had 9-11, Katrina, Thailand, Haiti... We tell ourselves that the worst is over, but it just keeps happening.

Perhaps the best, but also the most haunting, thing to come out of this is the massive surges of spectacular photojournalism, mostly coming in from Tokyo and other parts of Japan. I mean, the photography is truly surreal. I think that photographs are probably the most important aspect of news media. They capture moments in time, and they completely change the world. I mean, after seeing a great piece of photojournalism, who can forget it? There's the Man on the Moon, and then there's the Burning Monk in Vietnam, and of course who can forget the Afghan Girl? Or what about the Falling Man?

I don't know if it's only me, but photography leaves these imprints in my mind, in my heart. It's haunting. It can portray the most horrible moments in history in these beautiful, yet still dark, ways. It captures moments. Moments in history. The final moments of people's lives. Groundbreaking events- monumental, yet only momentary. Thin

gs that happened in the blink of an eye. How difficult was i

t to capture these moments in history? I mean, these photographers were in the middle of wars, disasters. They put themselves in the line of fire, for art. Fearless.

Here are some of my favorite photographs, to end this post.

I love this photo because it was such an important event, and this just captures to glory.

This is probably my favorite depiction of the

9/11 Attacks. It doesn't show the explosions. This man looks so peaceful, just falling. It's the last seconds of his life captured in

time.

Absolute favorite. Ever. I think it's called The Kiss, but I'm not totally sure. Supposedly, this soldier was actually just running around making out with any and every female person he could find on V-J Day. Even so, it basically captures the whole essence of the end of the war.

How NOT to fall and make a fool of yourself in social situations

The past few days have been rather unlucky, in the respect that I am feeling rather banged up today. Injured, I mean. I tend to get hurt quite frequently, to my and my parents' dismay. But the past couple days have been... well, extreme.

Yesterday, after taking a series of slips and trips, I decided to take a long bath in my jacuzzi tub. Relaxing, eh? So, I put some towels next to the heater, turned on some Northern Soul, and added some essential oils to the piping hot bath water. Well, let's just say that everything did not go as planned. First, I couldn't get the heat right... I like my baths basically scalding, and I just couldn't get the water hot enough. It kept going all lukewarm on me, which is definitely not okay. Eventually, I got that dilemma worked out and was able to mostly relieve my soreness with the jets.

But, when I woke up this morning, I realized I wasn't quite cured after all. I'm allergic to bubble bath and several soaps and oils, and I accidentally added one of those to my bath, it seems. I got a pretty bad allergic reaction on the palms of my hands and soles of my feet... So, I decided it would be a good idea to lotion them.... Well, it may have been a good idea except for the next idea I had... to wear rubber shoes. I'm an idiot, I really am. I was slipping and sliding around all day long in my shoes.

Then, as I went to leave school, I found a new enemy: the snow. I managed to fall several times in my rubber shoes and, as they are flats, my feet became completely numb. I had to actually take my shoes off and book home, it was so bad. I couldn't feel my feet at all, and it seems that on the way home I stepped on several shards of rock and glass, which dug into my feet... I didn't realize that there were several pieces of glass sticking out of my foot, though, because I couldn't feel a damn thing thanks to the almost-frostbite I acquired. I was walking around my house when suddenly the sensation in my feet came back and I got quite a shock...

I got the glass out and slipped into some comfy socks... Then I decided to disinfect the tweezers I used to take out the glass using a pot of boiling water. Well, not only did I spill the boiling water on myself, I also set my elbow down on the stove burner and gave myself burns, which I think are only first-degree but who the hell knows.

After all of these crises had passed, I managed to go about the rest of my afternoon routinely. I thought I was finally done with my series of accidents, but then I took one more tumble... I was just walking out the door when a huge patch of ice spun me in all directions. It was a pretty bad fall and I totally landed on my ass, which was embarrassing to say the least.

Now, I have retreated to my bedroom where I figure no one and nothing can injure me. As long as I'm alone. And not moving.

I do have a bit of a rep for getting hurt, I suppose. It's not my fault, really. I'm just... a bit clumsy, I suppose? I have a bad habit of falling and tripping over things, which usually makes me look like a complete idiot. I also tend to drop things and knock things over and break things, usually valuable, and I also have a habit of losing things and forgetting things and just plain not doing things.

I suppose that's all. I'm in a pretty grumpy mood at the mo'. It's probably accountable to the fact that every part of my body is bruised, burned, cut, or injured in some other way.

So, children. There's a lesson to be learned here. Don't wear rubber flats in March. Don't lotion your feet and then wear rubber flats, no matter what time of year it is. Don't put oils in your bath that will cause your feet to need to be lotioned so that you can't wear your brand new rubber flats. Don't get hurt in the first place, that way you won't need to take a bath that will cause an allergic reaction which will cause your feet to need lotion and ruin your chances of wearing your favorite rubber flats, even if it is March and snowy. Additionally, if you end up wearing your rubber flats, don't fall in the snow, causing them to get soaking wet and leave you unable to walk in them, resulting in no other option except to run home barefoot on the cold, barren concrete, which will probably result in cutting your feet on shards of glass which happen to be carelessly strewn about the road. You can probably also try to avoid spilling boiling water on yourself, setting your arm down on a stove burner set to High, and slipping on ice (even though the walkway was supposed to be "salted").

Also, you may want to avoid ever trusting me to hold onto your favorite necklace. And absolutely do not let me borrow your car. Because with me, everything that can possibly go wrong will most certainly go wrong.

This all started with me just wanted to take a bath. A measly little bath, because I was sore from falling down the stairs. But, of course, it escalated into a chronicle of misfortunes which only resulted in more injuries.

I think one of those YouTube people should come and just film me. No more filming at random moments to see if you happen to catch someone getting hurt. I'm a guarantee.

=)

CK