Heathen

I must be a terrible person. I just received yet another email forward — I've lost count of how many I've gotten — from a friend that urges me to forward this on if I love Jesus, if I want to be part of the 7 percent of the special people who will forward it. But I won't forward it. I don't delete it either, I don't even have enough care to do that.

Do I really need to forward an email to show people I love Jesus? Do you really need that from me to show you I love Jesus? I like to think people can tell from the way I live my life rather than emails I've forwarded that state such and feature poignant pictures of bursting rays of light and rainbows.

Now that you think me a terrible heathen, I can say this: Next time you think about sending me one of those Godly forwards, don't. You're making me feel guilty.

Big bag theory

Keep up people, two posts in two days! And in this one, I need your help. (But make sure you read the one from yesterday cause it's one of my faves in a while.)

This past weekend, I bought a bag. Not a duffle bag. Not a grocery bag. A bag bag. Like a purse on steroids. Here's the problem: I'm scared of carrying it. I never even carried a purse until I got married and had a real job and I couldn't fit everything I needed to in my pockets anymore. But since we moved to New York and I have a ways to walk to work, I've had to carry things the nine blocks and I've thought I should just get a bag to hold all this stuff that won't fit in a purse (umbrella, sweater, a cute pair of shoes so I can walk in comfy ones). So I'd been keeping my eyes open, and when we were at Target this past weekend, I saw this one. I really like this bag. It's got tons of pockets and stuff inside, and even has a padded area to carry a laptop. And it's a nice-looking bag. Red faux leather. It looks feminine and professional all at once. But I'm still trying to convince myself to carry it. I took a few pictures so you can see. What do you guys think? Like it? Hate it? Keep it? Carry it?




















Sorry about this one, I pushed down the plastic on the straps

Church in a bar

Yes, you read that correctly. On Sunday, we had the day off because we didn't print papers Monday. Our church search has been going very slowly; we've only been to one we'd go back to. We've found a few others we're interested in, but their location or schedule precludes us from attending regularly, or even visiting, because of our Sunday work schedule. But anyway, I digress. Since we came from a Vineyard church in Philly, we were curious to try the ones here. We've been to The River, which is right near work, and honestly, the church we'll probably end up at. But we were curious to try the North Brooklyn Vineyard, and we may visit a morning service one of these days, but yesterday, we visited their evening service, held in a place called The Trash Bar. Now, if you know me at all, you know I like drinking alcohol about as much as I like drinking Robitussin, and I stick out like a sore thumb in a place called The Trash Bar. Needless to say, I was pretty uncomfortable when we first got there. The front room is your typical small bar. Pool table. All the seating is old seats out of cars. One of them could've been out of my mom's '80-something minvan. We got there around 5:30 and the "service" didn't start until 6. So we sat in the front room for a bit until we watched enough people go behind the curtain to figure out the service was back there.

Behind the curtain (no, no wizard of Oz), it was dark and cool. The people were friendly and they gave me a free pen and a Butterfinger, which made me happy. But there was a bar behind the curtain, and a bartender there to serve. You can literally drink during the service. Now, the church we were members of in Philly had this thing called Faith On Tap where they'd meet in a bar once a week to talk about faith in a non-threatening environment, so I was sorta familiar with the idea of a church meeting in a bar. But that wasn't actually a church service like this was. They had a time of worship, then they did announcements, then the guy spoke. Prayer, more music. A real, true church service, which we both enjoyed. Our late breakfast of cinnamon rolls had worn off by the end though so we jetted pretty quickly after it was over to find some food.

Never thought I'd go to church in a bar. Where did you find God today?

Danger zone

Every once in a while, it's nice to have a rainy day. Cools it off a little bit; washes away the pollen clogging your lungs. The only problem is when you're walking to work in a city filled with millions of other people crowding the streets, umbrellas can become quite dangerous. It's a bit like bumper cars, only with tiny metal points sticking out precariously close to your eyeballs. I would recommend a poncho and some really cute galoshes instead, but it really won't help, seeing as how the other 5.9 million people are still carrying ninja throwing stars over their heads for minimal wetness protection, so you might as well carry one too, so you can deflect the attacks. Stay dry, kids.

Tequila!

Interesting how a lot of my posts are about food... Anyway...

So a while back, Scott and I found these tasty little tequila lime chicken wings by Tyson. I always made him get the honey barbecue, because I knew I'd like that, but he finally talked me into trying them way back when, and found we both really liked them. But after having them only a few times, they disappeared from the stores. Looked EVERYWHERE. Any supermarket we were in, any retail store that had a freezer section. Nowhere to be found. But last weekend, we decided to walk to Target to pick up a few things. They have a freezer section but we were prepared to once again be let down. But lo and behold...


Tequila!! Finally, success! We had them for lunch the next day, and although they are still really good, unfortunately the new "anytizers" aren't as good as they were in the family pack. Oh well.

And another thing. Target is just genious if you ask me. Why didn't I think of this?

Resealable bag! Duh. Kudos to the person that thought that up. AND the Target brand chips (Archer Farms) are pretty good, too.

OK. Maybe that will be my last food post for a while...

Foodgasm

26 isn't so bad when you set it off with amazing food. My wonderful husband made dinner reservations at a place called Lupa, one of the Italian restaurants owned by chef Mario Batali (and if you watch the Food Network, you know he's an Iron Chef). Since I'm such a picky eater, I was a little worried when he finally told me the restaurant, but after spending some time with the menu (and its glossary of terms), I found a few dishes I thought I'd enjoy.

Since neither of us are fans of wine, we decided to each try two dishes (might as well run the bill up somehow!). But first, they brought out the bread. Oh, the bread. It was really light and fluffy, topped with sea salt and rosemary, and of course served with a little Italian butter, aka, olive oil. It was fantastic. For our first course, I had the Bavette Cacio & Pepe, which is basically handmade linguini, pecorino cheese and cracked black pepper. I had read that it sounds simple, but when done right, can be amazing. And boy was it amazing!! SO good. Scott tried a special of the day, some sort of lamb ravioli. Also really good, although mine was better.

For our second course, I tried the Saltimbocca, according to their glossary: Literally, "jumps in the mouth." Veal, prosciutto and sage. When they brought the thing out, it was like a meat pancake as big as the 12-inch plate it was sitting on. It was huge! And very good. Scott had the Pork Shoulder with Treviso and Aceto, which is radicchio soaked in some sort of vinaigrette. My Saltimbocca was good, but that pork is one of their specialties and man was that stuff good. Just fell apart and melted in the mouth. And I'm not big on pork unless it's in bacon form. But it was fantastic. Honestly, this was some of, if not the best food I have ever eaten. I highly recommend it.

We already had dessert plans, so we opted out at Lupa, even though they had caramel gelatto. Both being happily full, we had a few blocks to walk to our dessert destination, so we took a few little detours, checking out Greenwich Village and walking through Washington Square. Once our dinner had settled, we beelined for Crumbs, where I knew we'd find gourmet cupcakes bigger than your fist. We got half a dozen (they're big, but still not as bad as two people eating an entire cake). My three: Snickerdoodle (Snickers bar), Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough, and Reese's Peanut Butter Cup. Scott's three: Vanilla buttercream, Cappuccino, and Raspberry swirl. I took pictures so you can be jealous.



For size comparison

I had the chocolate chip cookie dough tonight, which had a chocolate icing center. Scott had the raspberry swirl, which has a — surprise — raspberry center.

So now we're just sitting around, enjoying the evening, watching the Mets game because OnDemand is being stupid, or I'd be forcing Scott to watch a movie I couldn't normally get him to watch.

Thanks to all for the birthday wishes :)

Getting older

So today's the day. I'm closer to 30 than 20. This is the first birthday I can honestly say I've freaked out a little about. Not that there ever was any going back, but I just feel like there's no going back. Somehow, 26 is ADULT. No more young adult. No more recent college grad. I'm a full-fledged, tax-paying, 5-day-a-week working ADULT. Not that I haven't been some of these things for a while, but I'm making a point here. So to all of you younger than me, watch out, 26/closer to 30 than 20/ADULThood is coming. To all of you older than me ... sucks for you!* (But I still love you anyways.)**

*Does not include parental units.
** Does include parental units.