Thursday

nothing really exciting today, today was a busy day, I took Aiko to the vet, it's looking like she will need Soft Palate surgery. basically with the short (snub) nose breeds sometimes the roof of the mouth extends back into the throat, it's really more of a birth defect. and sometimes it affects her breathing, like when she gets really excited, usually when playing with other dogs she makes this heaving snort noise, and she sometimes starts to panic and that makes it worse, I grew more concerned when she woke up a few times in the middle of the night doing it. that's what brought us to the vet, but nothing major, we were told it's pretty routine. I just worry because she is my baby, and they will have to do it while Paul is still here, because I said so. 

as for my green today, i made a TON of Spinach Basil pesto with all that freaking basil i have out back, i filled a big plastic bowl with fresh basil while picking and you cant even tell by looking at my plants, i think it's the fertilizer i'm using. nothing like fresh cow shit to make your plants grow happy! 

my tomatoes are slowly recovering, i dont know if i mentioned but i transplanted mature tomato plants even though my mom told me not to, it was a bad idea by the way incase you were wondering, i think if it wernt for my seemingly good soil mixture i've got going on (the one making the monstrous basil) that they surely would have died.  but they are hanging on, it's been about 5 days and they still appear to be in shock, and are still droopy during the day but they perk up a bit at night, actually one is perked up most of the time, unless it gets really hot, we've had a lot of rain so i'm not watering them much, i dont want them to drown. and i have a little bit of bokashi liquid in my bokashi so i put some in the watering can a few days ago, i havnt seen much of an improvement yet but we'll see. 

thats it, sorry no pictures. maybe tomorrow.

I missed Yesterday!

i'm so sorry i missed yesterday's earth week post! and yesterday was actually Earth Day!

so this is all i have for you, my green cleaning stuff. 

i'll make another post this afternoon i promise!

Happy Earth Week Tuesday

Today for Earth Day Week I present more garden pictures

That there's gonna be an eggplant

cute eggplant bloom

and that's another cucumber 

there's my first cuke getting big, it's almost two inches long!

and some itty bitty tomatoes!

they are so cute!

let's see if I can make a green post every day!

Happy Earth Day Week!!!

In Honor of Earth Day Week i'm gonna tell you all about my Bokashi and my Door Mat!

i have a lovely door mat with two happy kitties on it

it's been raining so much and i cant keep it dry, and now it's growing

in honor of earth day week i am not going to kill these cute little growths, for now at least.

and now my Bokashi. 

(no dad i didn't say the other word)

Bokashi Composting is an intensive form of composting that, more or less, pickles the things you are composting and greatly reduces stench. I keep a bowl on my countertop for my scraps, i can put in nearly anything except liquid and bones. everything from meat to eggshells, vegie cuttings to leftover rice. i even put some stale dry cereal in their the other morning. every time you add something you sprinkle this compost magic dust that looks like saw dust and that is what makes it pickle, it contains some kind of micro organisms. or something. The bucket also produces a liquid (see the nozzle at the bottom) that can be diluted and put on plants because it contains lots of yummy stuff that helps them grow happy! 

Once the Bokashi is full i will dig a hole in the back yard and dump the contents into it, and in a few weeks i will have lush compost fertilizer for my garden! 

i dont totally understand how it works, but it keeps my trash from stinking up so i'm not complaining!

lets go upstairs

okay i've held out on you long enough. 

on the top floor we have a tiny bathroom and two rooms. 

not much to see here, some tacky wall paper, a little sink, and  a toilet.

Then we have our bedroom:

taco, on the scale. some of our favorite books, and vitamins.

the bed and night stands, and a little closet, we use that for our towels and linens. 

the super cool dresser paul bought me for christmas and the cat house. 

you cant see behind me is another closet, a big walk in one. but you dont need to see all my shirts. 

here's a sneak peak for the next room:

it'll be a few days before i get this room published, i'll try to post some randomness between now and then.

Bagels

Sad to say but until 2 weeks ago I hadnt had a good, fresh bagel since I lived in Arizona, almost 5 years ago. 

Cactus Eatrip (dont ask me what it means, I have no clue)

it's a little boho cafe with great fresh bagels and awesome bagel sandwiches 

(i love how they have to explain hummus, apparently it's not part of japanese cuisine)

i've been there thrice and each time had the smoked salmon sandwich it's so good!

i'll try to do first house post this weekend, i just dont feel good and i dont feel like doing it right now. 

My Job & My School

So I failed to mention, I have a job. I work for SMI and started in March.  It's a company that has other companies pay them to take care of their stuff in stores (AAFES), things like Loreal, 3M, Twin Lab, Scotts, Ortho, Bicycle (the playing cards), T-Fal, Caphalon, Sony, all kinds of stuff. Each line (company) tells SMI "well this store has X amount of our product so we will pay you (SMI) X amount of dollars and we want someone to work X amount of hours in this store on our product, making sure that its on the sales floor, making sure the display is nice, prices correctly, clean, and so on". Then SMI tells me "Alana we are assigning you Citizen (watches), Precious Moments, Sony and a few other small ones and we pay you so much an hour and you get X amount of hours for each line, make sure it looks nice" 

it's perfect because for the most part I set my own hours, I only work part time (16 hours a week) and the people I work for are pretty cool.  The only days I HAVE to work are Tuesday's because I do Sony's new releases, where if Sony has a new release I go to all the stores in the area and make sure the product is out and you can see it, and I take pictures and send them to Head Quarters so they know that things are being done right by the store employees. I also do Cooking demos for Caphalon, which is fun as hell because i get paid to stand and cook and tell people how great the pans are. (which they are, if your looking for pans to last you a life time, with a lifetime guarantee get yourself some!)

So thats about it for Job, school is much less exciting. I'm Attending University of Maryland University College~Asia, which actually has several campuses on several military bases all through  Europe and the Pacific.  I settled on a major, I'm working towards my Bachelors History & Environmental Management (yeah I'm cool, I'm double majoring) with a minor in English. I havnt started any of the EM classes yet, I will have to take them on line because they arn't offered here, neither are any of the upper level History classes. If we stay here long enough (and i can pull at least 2 classes a term) I should be done with it in about 5 years and i can knock a few years off if for some reason i choose to drop a major.

if you made it through this you will be excited because my next post i promise will contain much fewer words and many more pictures. 

Apperantly my blog misses me

Today my mom notified me that my blog misses me, so I guess I need to tend to it. 

(by the way mom, you can comment here just click the comment button and you can put your name in and i will get an e-mail saying that you were here, anyone can do that you dont have to be on blogger, so Carol, Mom, Mary, any other stalkers i have, let me know your out there, tell me what you want to see, hear, know!!!)

I have not been a bump on a log though, I have been tending to other things, work, school, garden. infact I have school in about an hour so I better make this quick

I am going to try to do a series of posts the next week or so showing off the house, since we've lived here over 2 months and have yet to show you what it looks like. I'll start that maybe tomorrow, I don't have much going on. 

today we'll do a quick blow through of my life:

The House 

The Stairs

The Pretty Flower

The Aiko, caught digging in a flower

Half the Garden 

(this half is mostly cucumber and basil)

The other Half, those are my Tomatoes, overshadowing my Eggplant

that in the middle there, thats gonna be a cucumber when it grows up

those, are my cute little Hello Kitty Toes 

(yeah so maybe the obsession is getting a little unhealthy)

that is me at work, doing a cooking demo, I made Chicken Fried Rice with Bok Choy

that is my set up

and thats it for today, i gotta go or i'll be late for math! yay math! (sarcasm)

i didnt mention

oohhh loook at the pretty flowers:

okay any way, last week i cut my hair even shorter, i so love short hair.

These are a few of my favorite things.

as we speak (type?) LaFujiMama is holding a giveaway for some cool measuring spoons, all you need to do is post in her comments your favorite kitchen tool. This gave me an awesome idea for a blog post (since i've totally been slacking) run home to your blog and post your favorite kitchen things, Comment me if you do so i can check it out too!

my #1 is a tie between this:

which is a cool slicer thing i got at Nitori, a little target/pier one type store out here that sells cool stuff for not too much money. it's a slicer chopper, there's a thing that holds the whatever your slicing too but i forgot to grab it.
next for #1 we have the Vidalia onion wizard which is excellent for making salsa, everything but the cilantro can go into this thing. no more crying over onions!

and #2 (3?)

also i have my bopper chopper which is great for mincing garlic, pickles, onions, or anything you want minced, you just put it in and beat (bop) it repeatedly. (FYI it's real name isnt the bopper chopper, i have no idea what it's real name is but i like bopper chopper so thats what i'll call it)
and finally we have what every good kitchen needs and excellent cookbook (stolen from mom's house i think, sorry mom) this guy lives permanently on my countertop. i reference it several times a week for substitutes, seasonings, all kinds of stuff, this folks is my kind of cookbook!

so run off and make your post, with pictures of course! and then run over to FujiMama and tell her your fav by Sunday, April 5th for a chance to win! (and if you try her chocolate cake in a coffee mug, tell me how it is, because i am positive that isnt allowed in my diet. it'll be a few more pounds before i can try that one)