Emma’s Fantabulous Blog

SO, in moving to Boston & buying a house, we have to factor Fifi’s habitat into the equation. Currently Fifi lives in a small laundry room & is kept comfortable with humidifyers, a space heater and a variety of lights and basking levels. In our new home, we decided that it would be best if we got her an official enclosure. Looking around online, there were a couple of options, although many iguana owners choose to build their own…. Devon and I arn’t carpenters and we wanted something that wouldnt look like a 5th grade shop class assignment.

We came across the Rolls Royce of reptile enclosures. J. Worlds. Beautiful pieces that look nicer than many set ups that I’ve seen in zoos. There’s also a neat water feature with a sump pump that can be plumbed directly into you home. Super easy cleaning. Everything is hand-crafted, and it appears to be amazing quality. Also Jay, the craftsman, hand delivers the piece & sets it up for you & shows you how it works. Pretty rad, no?

After a brief consult with Jay, he said that he would be able to create a special set up to suit Fifi’s special needs. While he normal just puts vines in for reptiles, he would build some basking shelves for my balance-lacking 3 legged lizard-baby. He’d also put more vines in, so if she does happen to fall, she’ll have more chances to grab onto things to break her fall.

Basically we’re going with a model similar to this:

Fifi’s gonna be sooo excited!

We got hitched 3 years ago, today. We’ve made it through 3 blissful years of marriage & now we’re about to embark on our newest journey together: buying a house. It makes jumping off a cliff together seem like nothing, doesn’t it?

You make me insanely happy & I’m the luckiest woman ever, to find someone who balances me out so perfectly. You’ve put up with my “career woman” endeavors this summer & for that I’m so grateful…. Cuz man, was I a major pain in the ass. With me being either exhausted, depressed or angry every night when I came home. But you took wonderful care of me, like you always do. Cooking me dinner when I was nomb-y & exhausted. Letting me tell you about the day’s horribly depressing events when I needed to get it off my chest, even when I knew you REALLY didn’t want to hear it.

You’re a great man & a great husband & it’s been an amazing 3 years. I’m looking forward to the rest of our lives together. Jumping off more cliffs together & enjoying the ride. I love you, Devon.

With the eventual move back to Boston quickly approaching, I’ve found myself needing to go through closets & cupboards to get rid of stuff that we don’t want or need & also use stuff up that’s sitting around if we can. Like finally eating those canned peaches that I bought a year ago, or putting that half empty tub of risotto rice to good use.

On FoodAndWine.com you can type in ingredients that you have & the site will pop up recipes that use them. I was looking for a recipe that might use up some long grained basmati rice, a can of crushed tomatoes,  a can of unsweetened coconut milk and an onion. Low and behold, something actually popped up and it looked really yummy: Brazilian shrimp soup. I did some minor tweaking to their recipe & the result was delicious, easy and cleared out some cupboard space.

Brazilian Shrimp Soup (serves 4)

Ingredients:

2 TBSP Olive Oil
1 Onion, chopped
1 Green Bell Pepper, chopped
3 cloves Garlic, minced
3/4 cup long grain Rice
1/4 tsp Cayenne Pepper
1 28-ounce can of crushed Tomatoes (about 3 1/2 cups)
4 cups Water
1 cup canned unsweetened Coconut Milk
1 1/2 lbs medium Shrimp, shelled & cut in half horizontally
1/4 tsp Black Pepper
1 TBSP Lemon Juice
1/2 cup fresh Parsley, chopped

Directions:

In a large pot, heat the oil over moderately low heat. Add the onion, bell pepper and garlic, and cook, stirring occasionally, until the veggies start to soften, about 10 minutes.

Add the rice, cayenne pepper, salt, tomatoes and water to the pot. Bring to a boil and cook until rice is almost tender, about 10 minutes.

Stir the coconut milk into the soup. Bring back to a simmer and then stir in the shrimp. Simmer, stirring occasionally, until the shrimp are just done, 3 to 5 minutes. Stir in the black pepper, lemon juice and parsley. Serve.

Hey Gang. Sorry it’s been a while since I’ve posted. D & I are in the process of buying a house. We found a really rad looking modern home in Chelmsford, Mass. We placed an offer on it & flew back for 10 hrs to do a home inspection last weekend. As of today we’ve signed the Purchase & Sale agreement & have chosen a mortgage company. I believe we’re set to close September 20th?

It’s a really great house, although there is some 80’s chic-ness going on, but I’m looking forward to doing some fun improvements on it. Also, our new yard has lots of bunnies that like to munch on clover and dandelions greens.

Life’s been totally hectic, what with traveling back & forth & all the buying a home research stuff. Also I gave my 2 weeks notice to my job & my last day of work is this coming Tuesday. I’m excited. It will be nice to not be exhausted and grumpy all the time.

Now I just have a list of about 30 things to do before we can move….. Exciting!

Check out pics of the new house taken during the home inspection if you want…

So my commute home after work yesterday, may have been the most terrifying experience of my life. Ever. And as the title of this post suggests: Yes, part of the story involves my car facing the wrong way on I-5, one of the major highways.

So I’m driving home last night on southbound I-5. In one spot there’s a HOV lane on the left, 3 regular travel lanes and an on ramp merging onto the highway. I was in the middle regular travel lane. A guy in an SUV is on the on ramp, merging onto the right lane. And then continues to merge into my lane: into my car. Immediately I lay on my horn, but he showed no signs of stopping, so I swerve into the left lane to avoid being sideswiped. Thank god, there was noone in that lane! Unfortunately since I had to swerve so sharply, I was heading into the HOV lane & the concrete barrier, so I quickly tried to correct my car towards the right. Unfortunately that along with stepping on the break put me into a skid and I ended up skidding towards the right, back to the across ALL the lanes of traffic and turning my car around backwards in the process. I remember looking head on at the guy in the SUV who had started this whole mess, and thinking “What an interesting perspective of seeing all of the cars speeding towards me”. At this point I go into Fight or Flight mode and while all of my senses heightened, my memory is a little hazy. But remember hearing Devon’s voice saying that if I’m ever in a slide, first thing I need to do is take my foot off the break to get some traction back. So I did exactly that, and some how managed to get control of my car, and pointed southbound & driving forward again. I immediately pull over to the side of the road, and turn off my car. It felt very: “Thank you for playing, but you lose!”. But actually I had won, because I wasn’t in a twisted pile of metal.

I started shaking like a leaf. I must have had truckloads of adrenaline pumping through my system. Surprisingly, the guy in the SUV who had almost tanked into my car, pulled over as well to make sure that I was ok. He apologized profusely, and said that he’d never seen any driving like mine out side of stunts in Hollywood movies. He was shocked that I hadn’t rolled my car, or driven into the left or right hand barriers. I stayed in my car trying to settle down and stop shaking, while he went around my car to make sure that my tires weren’t damaged and apologized some more. Eventually when I stopped shaking, I continued on my way home. However, after I pulled into the garage, I turned off the car and then started sobbing uncontrollably. Devon came out & thought that someone had died. All I could get out between sobs was “I-5″ and “backwards”.

But yeah. I’m safe and sound & my car looks unscathed. But seriously: Holy shit. I’m a fantastic stunt driver. (In addition to being insanely lucky that there wern’t more cars on the highway that I could have collided into.)

Also, Seattle drivers who merge without looking suck.

At the risk of providing too much information, I share this with you:

Pic “borrowed” from: IcanHasCheezBurger.com

Today was a medicore day at work. Only 3 people threatened to get their gun out & shoot various animals before they hung up on me mid-sentence.

And people wonder why there aren’t 24 hr wildlife hospitals in every town. It’s incredibly rare that someone would want to put up with BS like this on a regular basis. I can understand if I was being an asshole, but I was being polite, trying to help them come up with solutions to their problems without the callers getting hurt. 

I can’t wait till my seasonal gig is up.

So last night, while we were cooking dinner, I stepped outside to check for Christmas present deliveries….(Whatever, it’s just a “thing” I do.) I hear 2 kids rough-housing & one ends up falling through our fence. (Granted it’s a really old, decrepit, rotting fence…. But it is usually vertical!)

Since I’d been at work all day, and my job basically consists of yelling at kids & adults, I don’t want to have to deal with that. So I tell Devon: “Those little bastards broke our fence.” Devon looks out, surveys the damage and hears the kids talking about taking off and car doors slamming. Quick like lightning, Devon throws on his flip flops (his ensemble was completed by gym shorts, a ratty t-shirt and his glasses) and takes off around the corner to where the kids are.

Immediately I hear a teenage boy’s cracking voice say:”I’m really sorry sir, that was all my fault!” And the kid’s apparent Dad say “Go grab a hammer and fix it. No, I mean run!”

Devon comes back in the house with a big smile on his face. We were both totally amused that he could be so intimidating in his flip-flops.

This made me totally crack up in giggles. From a Facebook group called “I hate when people say they’re from Boston, but really aren’t”, a tongue in cheek post:

Newsflash!

The city of Boston is extending residency to all citizens of Massachusetts, Rhode Island, and New Hampshire. Also included in this inundation of newly christened Bostonians will be all members of the “Nation” which of course is all fans, coast to coast, of Boston’s sports teams. This decision handed down by Mayor Thomas M. Menino is somewhat controversial, but it is something that Menino felt “had to be done.” Menino, Maureen Feeney, and Ted Kennedy have been under immense pressure from the “wanna-be-Bostonians” to bestow citizenship upon them. And after months of “careful” debate and deliberation, Menino and his state associates have succumbed to this mounting pressure and will implement this plan effective January 2009.

Read the rest of this entry »

Yeay! It’s my weekend!!!

Today I spent my day off cleaning the house, doing laundry, house hunting online & running errands such as going to the dentist. (BTW, I have a chipped bond, a cracked super-old filling & the tiniest beginning of a new cavity, all of which need to be repaired.) I need to start chugging fluoride. God, this day has been lame so far.

I just made a pitcher of Sangria with white wine, peaches & mango, so hopefully my weekend should start improving shortly.