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Unicorn Pepper Mill Gun Grinder

Oh, I’ve been so tardy getting back to this blog, and have a lot of catching up to do. I’ll start with my shopping today. I am house sitting just a bit longer, and the Mook managed to break the Unicorn Pepper Gun.

I was unaware of the name when I started my search for a replacement. And being currently stranded on an island it wasn’t like I could go to the local CVS and just pick something up.

I scoured around Ebay, and my initial term for the search was Pepper Grinder. I don’t know if I was just brain dead or what but could not seem to find anything that even resembled what I was looking for. I’m pretty meticulous about wanting to match exactly what needs replacing.

I’ve never shopped there before, but decided to take a stroll around Amazon. Again, nothing resembling what I needed.

It wasn’t like it was something I had never seen before – I knew this was something I had not only seen but had actually used in past years.

Finally it dawned on me that I could search the term Pepper Mill, so back I went to ebay, and back over to Amazon – still no luck.

Well, finally it was off to Google. Yes, I could have started there but tend to be lucky in finding some great deals on Ebay. Finally realized I was looking for a Unicorn.  I ran to the kitchen to confirm – and yes, silly me, I could have just looked at the black raised lettering and saved about an hour. I found the main site online – http://www.unicornmills.com but in my earlier frenzy I got nervous and put in a bid on another one handed option – still awaiting the end of the auction and that will determine if Unicorn gets a full retail price.

I would like to think the one we had could be fixed, but appears the internal wire which gives it some friction has been dislodged. Another issue was the fact that someone (Mook) dropped it into the soup.

I asked Mr. Murphy if he would prefer to have one of those fancy battery operated pepper mills. That didn’t seem to tickle his fancy.

I am thinking I might get lucky with what I stumbled upon – looks truly like a one handed grinder and that I’m sure was the issue the Mook had while peppering his soup. Nothing to really grip.

So just remember – Mills, Guns, and Grinders. That should help your search.

Your Cell Phone Goes Public!

Passing on an email:

REMEMBER: Cell Phone Numbers Go Public next month.
REMINDER…. all cell phone numbers are being released to telemarketing companies and you will start to receive sale calls.

….. YOU WILL BE CHARGED FOR THESE CALLS

To prevent this, call the following number from your cell phone: 888-382-1222.
It is the National DO NOT CALL list. It will only take a minute of your time. It blocks your number for five (5) years. You must call from the cell phone number you want to have blocked. You cannot call from a different phone number.

HELP OTHERS BY PASSING THIS ON TO ALL YOUR FRIENDS.. It takes about 20 seconds.

Xanadu

Not much more I can say.

Ground Pork and Potatos, What to Do?

I’m house sitting right now, and have been separated from my “things” for quite some time. The majority of the stuff has been boxed up for over a year in storage. I used to have access to it – but I’ve somehow managed to get separated from it by several states.

So, I’m in a new town and in a new kitchen. The former lady of the house was more of a baker and I find many of the spices I was used to having around are not there at first glance.

I had found a great deal last week on ground pork – and while I’ve never cooked with it in that condition the price was just too good to pass up. I had thawed it out yesterday – but still had no clue what I was going to do with it.

I also had some potatos in the cupboard and the chilly air outside told my brain pork and potato would be just the thing. I am grateful to the internet and google. I am thankful that I could do something so simple as type in pork and potatos and there before me were many interesting options.

The one that really caught my eye was in a reply by Candy and More Bubbles who directed me kindly to a dish I had never had before but really sounded delicious.

Tourtiere – a kind of Pork Pie courtesy of Quebec. Sounded absolutely delicious to be served with some mashed potato. I began scrounging through the cupboard for the ingredients and was almost devistated to find there was no allspice. The recipe only calls for a quarter teaspoon – but if it’s there then it needs to be in it. Could there be any substitutes for allspice? What the heck is allspice anyway? Turns out it is from a fruit. It is just a one element spice but sounds like it should be several things with the word all in it.

Desperate to get what I did not have, I went to trusty google again and looked for substitutions for allspice. Angel sang from above, a light beamed down out of the sky and low and behold I found I could mix 4 things together: equal parts of ground cinnamon, cloves, blackpepper, and nutmeg. Eureka! I had them all! I ground them up in a bean grinder as the cloves were whole. Yes, a lot of work for just a quarter teaspoon – but a girls gotta do what a girls gotta do.

The final stumble was realizing I needed a pie crust. The baker of this house has not been here for quite some time and it appears she used to buy her pastry. Puzzling – I know. I am always in for the quick fix. I decided to make a bisquick pie crust. I had frozen butter which I cheated and thawed in the microwave – but amazingly it did the trick.

Oh – I almost forgot. I didn’t have the 3/4 chicken stock either. What I did have was lipton chicken noodle soup mix in the small packets. Desperate times call for desperate measures. I sifted the noodles from the mix and added water to the powdered bullion left behind to make my own chicken stock.

Now before the real chefs come in here and start throwing knives at me I know I came very close to the edge there on what is accecptable. But the end result was absolutely amazing.

Inside My Pork Pie

Tourtiere Top View

This was absolutely delicious, and I’d do it all again.

Inside My Pork Pie

A Year in the Making

I’m excited  that this old year is about to end. It is been one of the most challenging years for me. The entire year has been a learning process.

I will admit, the majority of the year, has been very undesirable. And yet, it has all been very necessary. As painful as it was, I wouldn’t take any of it back. Sometimes, you need to be thrown into the depths of hell, before you can rise out and feel normal again. When that happens, things become just a bit brighter.

I really don’t feel there is much holding me back now. Several times, I kept saying to myself,   “it just can’t get any worse than this”  and it was almost self  sabotage as something even worse would happen every time.

It wasn’t so much the physical challenges I have faced, and I know a lot of people with much more serious issues. It is my mental mind shift that had to do a complete 180.

While it is true that you cannot run away from your problems, once you have faced those problems or — resolved issues for yourself in a way that you are satisfied with, an actual physical move to a new location can do wondrous things for you.

I recently made that move myself. During the course of the past year, I really didn’t stay in touch with my many of my friends. After making my physical move, I felt suddenly prompted to contact them again and reconnect. One friend in particular laughed hysterically when I told her the events of the past year. Listening to myself telling her the story, I couldn’t help but laugh myself. It is a friend that I’ve had for over 20 years. My mind raced back thinking to when she and I had first met, and it was just amazing everything that had transpired since then.

It is ironic that 2008 holds the last digit eight which when one props sideways is an eternity symbol. While I’m glad that 2008 will not last for eternity the lessons I have learned in 2008 will be with me forever.

I have some big plans for 2009. Not just plans, but a real desire to implement them. In particular, the next four months will be a truth test of my persistence. I have been given an opportunity, a window of time, where I literally have everything before me that I have ever asked for.

During the past few new years, I had no desire to even stay up to the stroke of midnight. Finally, this year there is renewed feeling to watch the ball drop. I will be staying up late, and will have my own  celebration to say goodbye to 2008 and hello to 2009 with open arms.

To all my friends who I have spent endless hours of conversations with online in this past year, I would like to wish you all the best and a happy new year. May you all get at the very least a glimmer of the peace of mind that I have finally found.

Snow on Nantucket

It snowed last night and we lost power. I went to a nice ham dinner out.

It may snow again.

1. it snowed
2. I ate ham
3. tonight I’ll chicken

Now, I’m sitting with the captain.

How do I Look?

I added a blavatar. How do I look?

I’m kind of curious as to why the blavatar is not considered a favicon. Like a favicon, it shows up in the address bar and on the tabs.

I finally changed the theme here, and will look around to customize the header.  Need to spruce the place up a bit.

I’m moving in all kinds of directions now.

Getting Sued? Why so Glum?

There is such a negative connotation with getting sued. Not everyone getting sued has done something wrong. In fact, I’m currently getting sued for doing something right!

What did I do?

I fought back as an activist. I saw something going terribly wrong and decided to do what I could to stop it.

Here comes the rant.

First off, Heidi Diaz the owner of Kimkins lied to me and portrayed herself as a lady in a lawn chair who had lost 198 lbs in 11 months. Later she used a picture taken from a Russian brides website claiming that was her. There are a plethora of lies this woman has told, but in a nutshell she lied about who she was to sell a bankrupt diet and make over a million dollars in 2007.

Some of us outraged consumers who were banned from the site decided to expose this woman for the fraud that she is. A class action lawsuit was filed, and some activists have been working very hard to spread the word on the atrocities performed by Heidi Diaz.

I personally have never sued anyone before in my life, but I decided I needed to join this lawsuit. I even made a little video to help and show my friends how to join a lawsuit.

Kimmer (Heidi Diaz) now claims we have caused her some kind of economic interference and has decided to sue some of us. Actually, she has roughly 100 “does” listed just to be sure she doesn’t leave anyone important out. Her frivolous lawsuit has been filed as an intimidation tactic to shut some of us up.

There appear to be some people who have gone into hiding and do feel intimidated. This makes me furious! Do they not understand they are not helping the cause by keeping quiet? In this particular case there is absolutely nothing wrong with being sued. The suit will most likely be thrown out very soon.

While I do not enjoy talking about Kimkins on my personal site here, it is unfortunately a big part of things going on in my life right now. I have been actually encouraged by my lawyer John Tiedt to discuss the matter – and so I will. He says we are getting sued and there is nothing to be ashamed of and nothing to hide. I think he is right.

In the long haul, this will only show the true colors of Heidi Diaz.

Today I’d like to shout it from the hill tops, I’m getting sued!

I'm Not Big on the Cold

I’m really not a big fan of cold weather. Here in the North East just a couple of hours travel can make a huge difference.

This year I have been spending a considerable amount of time in the Adirondack region of New York. While the summer is okay, it is not nearly as nice as it is near the coast. Something else strange seems to happen on my arrival to the area. I get very tired for a couple of days. The other night I slept fifteen hours. I’m not sure if it’s the air and the altitude, but something is seriously different.

I am partial to living on the coast and near the ocean. Most recently I’ve been investigating a move to Nantucket. I’ve been looking up things like population, and found a site that actually has a live web cam set up in a couple of places. You can watch a couple of cars pull in and out of parking spots. Not sure what else you might see. It snaps a new shot every 3 seconds or so, so the movement is a bit jumpy.

I initially thought for some reason the winter on Nantucket would be as cold as it is here near the Canadian border, but actually it looks to be quite mild. With temperatures in the 30 degree range, that really isn’t so bad. I have seen the term blustery used a bit, so I have to wonder if wind chill is a factor.

The summers in Nantucket on the other hand have me upset. I like 80 and 90 degree weather, and it looks like there is a fairly consistent 70ish degrees across the summer months. Some would call me crazy and tell me to move to Florida, but people are very different in the south. I am definitely a New England type of girl.

I think I can handle a year in Nantucket. We may soon find out.