Why the world needs S’meeps

Every year it happens.  Easter comes rolling in with its pastel sugar soaked goodness and yeilds the beginning of spring. Yah!   It also however, brings with it the harbinger of the holiday, Peeps.  I’ve never liked Peeps, there I said it.  It is possibly the underlying fear that the unused peeps just get recycled every year, either that or they taste gross.  That being said, they do look very festive in a Easter Basket.

Then I learned about s’meeps.  It is basically if s’mores and peeps had a baby.  It is possibly the best idea ever.  Who doesn’t like s’mores, and the peeps don’t have get tossed into the landfills and where they’ll hang around forever like styrofom.  The only glitch is umm, well someone apparently told the Peeps (see the picture above).  Check out both the recipe below and follow the links below to get in on the fun.

Happy Easter and don’t go waistin’ those Peeps!

L

S’meeps

- makes 4 s’meeps -

Adapted from Peeps: Recipes and Crafts to Make with Your Favorite Marshmallow Treat by Charity Ferreira.

Ingredients

4 Peeps (1 package)
4 graham crackers, separated into 8 halves
Four 1-ounce squares semisweet or dark chocolate (depending on preference)

Procedure

1. Preheat the oven or toaster oven to 350°F.

2. Place a 1-ounce square of chocolate on 4 of the graham cracker halves. Top each chocolate with a Peep. Say your goodbyes.

3. Put your Peep sacrifice laden graham crackers on an aluminum foil covered tray and pop them in the oven for 2 to 3 minutes. Watch them carefully as toasting Peeps can turn into burn victims beyond repair in the blink of an eye. Vigilance!

4. Once the Peeps are toasted to your liking, take them out of the oven and squish them with a graham cracker half. Feast.

http://www.seriouseats.com/2009/04/how-to-make-smeeps-smores-plus-peeps-easter-candy.html

http://www.seriouseats.com/2009/04/photo-of-the-day-peep-liberation-front.html

We need a little spring…

tulip, originally uploaded by lclea.

For some reason spring is having a tough time rolling itself out of bed this year. Blame it on the groundhog, or climate change or whatever, I’ve decided to push it along a little. Granted for me spring brings a lot of writing, but it also holds the promise of summer, and warmth and lower electric bills and no classes, all good things… In fact I propose spring is all good (except for some pesky flooding, sorry Fargo). Bring on the spring, I could use it right this very minute.

Guess the Ghost

Ghost, originally uploaded by lclea.

I just love Ghost signs. They are like a little peek into the past. I also love the way they just last. I doubt when people initially painted some of these advertisements really thought they would still be around so many years later. Whenever I see one and I have a camera handy I try to take a pic. This is one I took, at some point, guess where it is…

Top 10 Things I’m Over

gus tongue, originally uploaded by lclea.

10. Endless presidential news conferences, town halls, confabs, reports to Congress:  STOP TALKING AND JUST FIX THE COUNTRY

9. The Illinois budget, Oh sure let’s open up Lowden State Park for the 18 people who live in Oregon, and I guess we don’t care about  the universities, organizations and businesses that the state can’t pay

8. 8, 8 I forget what 8 was for

7. The glamor of “Green”, its everywhere, every magazine, every commercial, suddenly we’re drowning in green. I wonder how much resources are used up promoting the green?

6. The massive Sasquatch government cover up–the truth is out there

5. The Edge’s hat, is it really that cold everywhere?

4. The Bush bashing, he’s out, it’s over, move on people

3. Chain restaurants that are destroying the rich food culture in our country namely the small locally owned restaurant

2. Two and ½ Men, seriously how is this show still on the air?

1. Winter

Spring Tease

Spring Tease, originally uploaded by lclea.

Ah Spring, that little minx, she teased us this week. Where I’m at it got up to 60 degrees, the sun was out and the college kids broke out their shorts for the first time in 2009.

Ok, you can’t go by the college kids they will wear shorts at the drop of a hat, but I was fooled. I turned my heat down, played frisbee with the dog and started planning my garden. The snow is gone and the world seems like a sunnier happier place.

Well, until tomorrow when we get more snow.

Spring is a fickle mistress.

On why I’m killing the rain forest

IMG_2479, originally uploaded by lclea.

I posted a sister picture to this towards the end of last semester, and I thought this would better show how my pursuit of a PhD is single-handedly killing the rain forests. I try to be a good environmentally friendly entity, I really do. I recycle. I keep my house frigidly cold. However, I have begun to realize (after buying a new bi box of paper) that as progressive and forward thinking social work is, at least PhD work isn’t very environmentally friendly. I think I said this before, but this is for ONE paper. Yikes.

Now hopefully the good will outweigh the bad.   Hopefully I will help change the world or at least teach people who help change the world, but in the mean while…. Shhh, don’t tell Ed Begley, he might come after me.

Too Frackin’ Cold

IMG_1241, originally uploaded by lclea.

I’ve been busy getting started with school again, but isn’t it about time for spring?

Happy 2009

elkie winters, originally uploaded by lclea.

Now I know that everyone is bemoaning 2008, everyone is dissing it 6 ways to Sunday, and everyone is glad its 2009. Well, I for one had a decent 2008. I met some really cool people where I taught college classes for the first time (yah Concordia), I applied to and actually got into a PhD program which has been a dream of mine for a long time, and I bought a house. After years of being stuck, I got myself unstuck and moved into a life I’d only been dreaming about. So don’t go hating on 2008 too much, it was pretty good to me. 2009, well, we don’t know each other very well yet. Hopefully we’ll be buds.

What does an elk tush have to do with 2009? … um nothing. Its my gift to you.

Its the new 30

scan0306, originally uploaded by lclea.

…or the new black, I don’t know, but that’s what they are saying about 40 these days. I had really meant to post this like a couple of days ago, but c’est la vie.

People magazine usually has an issue like, 40 and fabulous or something like that, where they show stars that spend tons of time and money to not look their ages (sometimes a loosing battle). Well, I turned 40 this year and didn’t see a single age affirming issue or article, so I’m doing it.

This year I noticed a lot of people turned 40. I’m a dedicated Ipoder and listen to podcasts to pass the time driving. Lou Mongello of the WDW Radio show and Disney World Trivia turned 40 and blogged about his celebration, the Yarn Harlot, Stephanie Pearl-McPhee, the yarn godess who’s blog I love told about a 40th birthday/knitting party she hosted the day after my own 40th.  I started to see 40 year olds at every turn.  Its like when you buy a new car and suddenly see it everywhere, suddenly it seemed like everyone was turning 40. So after a bit of research, I have a list of others and since those slackers at People let me down, I’ll create my own little article: 2008 40 and FABULOUS!!

Breakfast Club’s Molly Ringwald AND Anthony Michael Hall, Lisa Marie Presley, Ashley Judd, Lost’s Daniel Dae Kim, Guy Ritchie, Hugh Jackman, Naomi Watts, Gillian “X Files” Anderson, Lucy Liu, DWTS Carrie Ann Inaba, Debra Messing, LL Cool J, Patricia Arquette, Celine frigging Dion, Lucy Lawless, Owen Wilson, and Will Smith.

So if the Wolverine, Ex-Mr. Madonna, Elvis’ little girl, Xena, and the Fresh Prince can all turn 40 and still look young and great, then so can I. True side note: Right before the holidays my mom treated me to a pedicure. The woman giving me the pedicure had just, you guessed it, turned 40. I think its catching…

Oh and Wednesday when I went to the store to get a bit of champagne for the New Year celebration, guess who got carded? Yup, little ol’ me, and it happened three other times this year, maybe 40 is the new 20? Either that or we need to get these people some glasses!

Happy New Year!

This is how I roll

IMG_2481, originally uploaded by lclea.

This is my process, my ugly, messy process. This is me writing a an 11 page policy paper. The huge stack of papers is my research and its laid out on my unfurled hide a bed. You can see my laptop in the upper left hand corner and those lights behind it are from my Christmas tree.

If this is what I do for 11 pages, what about 300 for my dissertation? I can’t go there yet. So far this year the longest paper I’ve written is around 23-24 pages without cover page, appendixes and references. I know there’s a lot of writing to come in the spring and I still have things to finish up towards the end of break.

Summing up my first semester of PhD life, I’d say its a lot of reading, a lot of writing and damn lot of talking, navigating new waters, meeting tons of new people and learning to be a student again. All in all good, there have been lessons learned and I think I’m finally getting into the rhythm of it.

I’ll have one or two more posts before the new year, and then off to 2009.