Shrimp Gumbo (sort of)

So, last night I made my first foray into cooking for a massive group of people. The plan was to make 60 servings for the Wednesday night church dinner. Carl had class till late so I thought, "What better way to entertain myself than cooking a huge meal?" Thankfully, my friend Xander was awesome enough to step in before I really got myself into trouble and offered to help me cook the dinner and shop for the groceries. There's no way I would have gotten it done otherwise! And, with God watchin' over, we did it! The food turned out great, everyone got fed (tho we ran out of green beans - don't underestimate people's love of veggies!), we made some people sweat, and the Wednesday night study was enlightening! All in all, a fabulous success :D

If anyone is interested, I've posted the recipe below. Turns out (thankfully) that it multiples well ;). The original recipe is from a (now defunct) magazine called EAT but I made a few "Cali" tweaks (those roots... they're hard to pull up)

Shrimp Gumbo (with Pasta) (and thereby, not real Southern gumbo, :) )

8 ou. bulk hot Italian sausage (if you can only find links, that's fine, just remove casings and break it up)

1 large onion, chopped

1 large green sweet pepper, chopped

2 stalks celery, thinly sliced

3 cloves garlic, chopped

2 14.5 ou cans stewed tomatoes, undrained

1 14 ou can chicken broth

1 tsp paprika

1/4 tsp ground black pepper

1/4 tsp cayenne pepper

1 lb frozen, uncooked, medium shrimp, thawed, peeled & deveined

?? pasta (I just judge by what looks like enough - rotini works well)

Cook sausage, onion, green pepper and celery until sausage is browned.

Drain, add garlic, tomatoes, broth, paprika, black pepper cayenne, and pasta.

Bring to boiling.

Reduce heat. Simmer, covered, for 10 minutes

Add shrimp, cook, covered 4 minutes or more until shrimp are opaque.

Remove from heat.

Cover, let stand 5 minutes.

Makes 6 servings

Per serving: 338 cal; 14g fat; 144mg chol; 971mg sodium; 28g carb; 4g fiber; 24g protein

Obedience School

So, Thib is starting his beginning obedience classes this week. Tonight was the first night but it was sans-doggie (just the "trainers" were supposed to attend). So I went and it was pretty boring for the most part, but one neat thing I learned is that it is a "clicker" training course. Apparently, clicker training is all the rage. It was derived from some lady named Karen something and she used to train marine mammals using whistles so she translated it to clicking for dogs. Anyway, I'm hoping by the end of at least the intermediate class that Thib will be able to push me around a pool using only his nose and little webbed paws as propellers... :)

Really though, I'm excited to do some structured training with him, though, I'm sort of disappointed he has to start in the beginner class as he already knows all of the tricks they're going to teach him. It's a benefit of being an only dog (less distractions) and me working at home (he's my main distraction) :).

I'll try to keep y'all updated on his progress!

Activities of Late

So, most people probably don't know this, but the week I got back from my visit to San Diego, I found out that I was being temporarily changed to part-time status. At first I was really freaking out - money, time, boredom, job security, etc. But honestly, looking back (and side to side I suppose, as I'm still part time) it's been quite the blessing. I'm so happy right now, it's amazing! It's like I'm on a life vacation. I get to take Thib to the park every day. I'm cooking up a storm. I'm getting the chance to volunteer. I'm building a new website for my mom. I'm even taking part in social groups here in NOLA. It's been absolutely awesome. The only thing I haven't done is use my extra time to work out. Gotta work on that self discipline :)

I told Carl I want to work part time for the rest of my life and he said I could as long as I made as much working part time as he did full time. And I reminded him I already was :) Ah, the student paycheck...

I'm sure that I will soon tire of little money and lots of extra time, but for now it's still novel.

By the way, I used some of my extra time to post a bunch of pics to Facebook. I just realized that I have 59 albums. That's gross. I apologize, though I probably won't do anything about it. ;)

Road Trip

So I'm backtracking a bit to give a quick rundown on what happened during our road trip. As most of you know, we safely arrived here in NOLA (New Orleans, LA) four months ago and I never published my blog, but in case you are curious, this is how it all began...

Carl and I and some of our spectacular friends all came out the day before we left to pack our ENORMOUS 18 wheeler in which we'd rented 8 cubic feet of space. We had that 8 feet packed floor to ceiling, wall to wall (it was really quite impressive). Our driver, Ronnie, gave great advice. Unfortunately, we learned from him that the truck would be arriving at the new place in NOLA on Thursday morning. Thing is, we weren't planning on getting there until Saturday morning. Oops! So that's really where the fun began.

After spending a great evening with my family in the Dido on Danny's birtday, we woke up at the booty-crack of dawn (5am) to call the moving company and find out if we could delay the delivery. No one answered (of course). While we waited we got the last few things ready, helped Grandma fill an Indian spice container (loose ends, right?), said bye to the doggies and hit the road right on schedule two hours late :)

We drove straight to Phoenix and arrived at about 1:30 pm. The moving company still had not called. We didn't know if we needed to drive to Texas that night (our next stop was Lubbock) or stay in Phoenix where we had friends to visit. Remember, we had to somehow cut two days off if they wouldn't change it. Finally, a few hours later, they called and agreed to one day earlier. So, a semi-stress relief, though it meant we had missed our Phoenix excursion (Arcosanti) and would have to miss our "fun day" in Austin. Boo hiss. All turned out well though as we got to hang out with Diep, Michael Ocean and their dog, Panda Bear, as well as go over to Jess Martin's place where she cooked us AMAZING homemade pizza! It was fantastic!

The next day we set out on our longest day - 12 hours. For all of you roadies who say that's not that long, bite me :). I hate driving, it was long. We had fun though. The entire trip we listened to Book 6 in the Harry Potter saga. It definitely kept us entertained! We arrived that evening in Lubbock, TX where we got to hang with the best of the Biggs - Stephani, Jason and their newborn (and I mean NEW born) Alexander. Oh, yeah, and their dog Sampson too!

The next morning, we got up bright and early (sensing a trend?) and drove on to Austin, TX. We stopped just outside of Austin at Lake Travis. A friend had suggested going to Hippie Hollows (a nudie beach) but due to time restraints (haha) Carl and I decided to pass and go to this awesome lakeside restaurant/bar called The Oasis. There we enjoyed delicious margaritas, an amazing view, some neat art, and the 103 degree weather. Okay, the temp was not enjoyable, but the rest was! Following this delightful excursion, we drove into town and met up with Carl's college buddy, Amanda. She helped us get the best of Austin including the Congress St bat bridge, a yummy Mexican restaurant, and a fleeting glance at the first-ever Whole Foods!

The next day, we took on the last leg of our trip. With only a few hours of HPot left, we knew we must end the journey soon! We got to stop in Crowley upon entering Louisiana where we got to see Carl's nephew, Ethan, who happened to be visiting his paternal grandparents. Then we continued on to our new home (with a short side trip to Target) arriving around midnight and slept soundly on an air mattress in the dining room :)

And that's the story of how we got to Louisiana...