Category: food

our dinner with jax

our dinner with jax

Posted on by wrekehavoc

my dear friend jax, who i don’t see as often as i’d like, cooked an amazing dinner in honor of my birthday. (for those of you new here, jax is a friend who works at the same place as BS and who was assigned to be our “daycare buddy” when her DD, a few months younger than BC, started at daycare. over the years, we’ve realized that we are basically the same person; she is the long island italian version, and i am the new jersey jewish version.) what’s especially amazing is that she did this after being on travel for work last week out on the west coast and had just returned on friday. while she knew that chocolate is the flavor i favor in cake, she psychically knew i especially love a chocolate cake with gushy pudding in the middle.
i cannot say thank you enough about that.

i must say, though, that the show that came just before dinner, though, was priceless. earlier, BS and jax’s DH took the kids for a walk to the nearby river, where they collected shells and even found a horseshoe crab shell. you know, it was almost the stuff of norman rockwell. (jax and i sat and drank wine. oh yeah, she cooked. i did nothing.) our four kids were playing together in the house — BC and anya (8, 7.5), jools (3.5) and katie (just turned three — happy birthday fellow march b-day girl!), and we thought they were happily doing something harmless. i’m not quite sure when we realized it, but someone went downstairs to check on the quiet kids. in short, they were covered in paint. jools and katie both had purple paint in their hair (jools had a purple mohawk); anya and BC were also covered. although none of us were particularly happy about the situation, it was incredibly difficult not to laugh. we swooped up the kids, washed everyone off, and jax threw their clothes in the laundry. the paint won’t come off the clothes, and we didn’t take pictures (!), but who cares. at least no one ate the paint.

so a big shout out to my lungisland friend who busted her butt last night and who i suspect is busting it even more, now that there’s a ton of paint on her basement floor. i wish i could help you clean up.

smiling jools said to jax as we were leaving: “next time, you can come over and destroy OUR house!”

that’s assuming our house isn’t already close to being condemned, dude 😉

the bitch is back

the bitch is back

Posted on by wrekehavoc

i remember when i was a smug singleton… even a smug, married, non-parent, i’d add. i would look at people who had children in upscale restaurants and wonder why these noisy little screamers were ruining my meal. i vowed that when i had children, i would not take them to restaurants until they were good and ready to go. and i sure as hell wasn’t going to ruin anyone’s upscale dinner unless i knew for certain that my kids would behave. i was as good as my word, and i still get bent when i see parents bringing kids to really nice restaurants who are not ready to behave in said places. i figure, shoot, i did my time for society and ate at lots of places with kiddy menus; why can’t they make the short-term sacrifice, too?

fast forward to today.

we had a yummy dinner at nam viet, one of the last surviving vietnamese restaurants in the area formerly known as little hanoi tonight. as we walked in (my kids actually behaving perfectly for once), i saw a late 20-early 30-something woman and man grimace as we were seated next to their table. i then overheard the woman say to the waiter, “you probably should move us, as i don’t think they are going to move.” needless to say, i didn’t like what i heard. it isn’t like my kids came in screaming or shouting, running amok and sticking chopsticks up their snoots. they were behaving better than a lot of adults i know. so of course, i did what any jersey-girl mother would do. i hissed.

i looked right at the lady, and i said, “i hope your uterus dries up.”

around these parts, i am known as a class act.

slurpees gone wild

slurpees gone wild

Posted on by wrekehavoc

for those of you who can manage to scroll back all the way to nov. 21st (you can DO it!), you might recall that i promised mr. jools a slurpee should he keep his pants dry and clean all day. ok, so he had a slight mishap on thanksgiving day; otherwise, he has been a superchamp. so today, after school, we piled into the car, and the three of us had a slurpee party. nevermind we all had coke (ok, i had diet pepsi, which i secretly loathe but which was the only thing edible that fit in with my new food regime) slurpees, and as newly-caffeinated citizens, we will all be up until 3am tonight.

we brought aforementioned slurpees home in time to watch the humungus leaf sucker truck (as it is known in these parts) eat up the leaves in the street. jools at first was afraid the giant hose would suck him up, too. BC, meanwhile, wanted to get as close as possible to the hose to see inside it, making me very nervous. (it’s always feast or famine, huh.) and we sat and watched them as they slowly moved down our sleep. after our leaves were sucked up, we had the good fortune of seeing the men take the truck apart, as the truck broke down — someone put a plastic bag in the pile, which felled the giant machine.

in these parts, that makes for good theater. sadly, we had to break up the fun because it was time to pick up DH at the metro. but we had us some good fun, we did.

while my tub of pudding gently weeps

while my tub of pudding gently weeps

Posted on by wrekehavoc

so today was my first day on body for life, or BFL as it is known by the fitness congnoscenti/freaks. i did 30 minutes on my elliptical and ate pretty well. i had a wonderful lunch with a former colleague and dear friend of mine who is going back to her home country (a country she has lived in for apparently 2 minutes, as she has lived most of her life in the UK) — and while we were at nooshi, i managed to avoid all my favorite noodle dishes and instead get a little cup of tom yum kha and a lettuce salad with lots of plain chicken (which i dipped in plum sauce — lightly). ok, ok, so it wasn’t perfect, but for me, it was one quantum leap into behaving.

but i noticed now, at day’s end, that i cheated myself and didn’t eat all i could eat. i could have ::drum roll:: chocolate pudding. ok, so sugar free chocolate pudding. but still. i started to mix up a jello pudding package, only to discover that the skim milk had spoilt. (i’m refraining from a favorite little rascals routine here regarding not drinking the milk.) DH, in a mood of sincere valor (and realizing i would go through heavy withdrawal with literally no chocolate under my belt for the day) volunteered to go to the supermarket at 8pm to get my milk (plus a few other things for himself.)

so i’m sitting here: fat, dumb, but happy. i got my pudding. my half-cup of sugar free pudding (with a dollop of low fat cool whip in it). it ain’t a Reeses’, but i’ll take it.

today is the last day of my old life. i hope.

today is the last day of my old life. i hope.

Posted on by wrekehavoc

i know, i know. everyone says they’ll start their diets tomorrow. and it is probably somewhat insane to start a new food-related regime at the start of the holiday season. but that’s just the kind of chick i am.

i’ve been doing lots of reading about body for life; and while i sincerely doubt i will ever look as amazingly toned as these folks, i like the somewhat sane concept of eating carefully, eating more meals, more protein, fewer carbs, and doing cardio and weights (i hate doing weights, so maybe this will grow on me). when i was younger, it was all about looking good in clothing. i was a bit more vain than i am at present. now, at my advanced age of jesus + 8 (as my friend maren and i like to say), i am simply sick of feeling huge thanks to bad eating habits, bearing two children, and an extended period on steroids. i simply want to feel better. period.

yep. i’ll probably be boring you with information on this scintillating topic now, too. i can just feel the joy.

i want candy

i want candy

Posted on by wrekehavoc

so, in a move that will guarantee me a spot in mommy hell, i told jools that if he kept his pants dry all day long, he could choose a piece of candy from his halloween stash. until he kept his pants dry all day long, though, he wasn’t have any sweets. i’ll be damned. the boy kept his pants dry. all day. even went potty voluntarily several times.

yep. my kids are motivated by sugar.

good things come in threes. so do bad things.

good things come in threes. so do bad things.

Posted on by wrekehavoc

so yesterday, when we last left our hero (me), i was covered in beer. it stood to reason that i would spend the rest of the week wondering when i (or things that required cleaning) would be covered in other substances.

wonder no more.

today, i have indulged in a happy cake-baking marathon. a very special little friend of ours is turning 4; another special little one is turning one; and BS is turning, well, older than 4 + 1 combined, for sure. the parents of the first two parties are having one giant party tomorrow and have asked me to bake. i am honored. of course, the cakes may not end up looking like a professional made them (especially since there are little folks here who are d y i n g to help decorate, so please forgive me now, alanna and kelly, wherever you are), but hopefully, they will be tasty enough to please the folks who are eating them. (besides, we all know everyone cares mostly about the frosting, anyway, right?)

but i am covered in flour. substance #2.

so you say, well, that’s only two. where’s three, little miss can’t be wrong?

i got #3 for ya. in spades.

last night, left to his own devices, jools got hold of a BIG bottle of baby powder. mind you, we seldom ever used baby powder on either kids as babies, so this was a gift that we’d had since jools was born. to make a long story short, he poured all of exhibit A on his library books and CDs; on his furniture; in his BOOMBOX, in his drawers; and basically everywhere his little hands could go. i asked him later: why did you pour powder everywhere?

he informed me that he was sprinkling powder to scare away the skeletons. jools is afraid of skeletons. i don’t have the heart to tell him that there’s a skeleton inside of him at all times for fear he will never sleep again.

suffice to say that we’ll be living with the baby powder for awhile, or at least until we move him to his new room.

yep. beer. flour. powder. good things come in threes. yahoo.

the demise of fudgie the whale

the demise of fudgie the whale

Posted on by wrekehavoc

BS’s birthday is saturday. and most every year since we’ve been together (which includes dating, so it’s 19), i have gotten him a Fudgie the whale cake. there’s nothing behind the whole whale thing; it’s just so darn yummy. and fudgy.

and besides. he’s a whale of a guy. (yuk, yuk.)

anyway, in previous years, i drove all the way out to what i thought was a carvel, as they made the best darn fudgie cake ever (and for $22, cash or check only please). but last year, i inadvertantly created what BS refers to as Fudgiegate. you see, an actual carvel opened here in our town. when i went there and found out that they charge close to $40 for said Fudgie, i said, “wow, the carvel out in falls church sells them for $22!) thus began many calls from the owner of the carvel, asking me to make a statement about my experiences with the falls church carvel imposter. i was bummed; you see, i really liked the place out in falls church.

i ended up with a Fudgie from our local carvel, which was not half as tasty (and was somehow smaller!) than the pretender Fudgie. i vowed that this year, i would go back to the place in falls church.

so today, i called up to order a Fudgie the Whale from the place in falls church. seems that they are under new management now. and no one knows what the hell i mean by Fudgie the Whale. so now, i either go to our local carvel for a less-than-wonderful cake, or i punt on a tradition that is nearly two decades strong.

ah, Fudgie. we hardly knew ye.

at the playground

at the playground

Posted on by wrekehavoc

we took a jaunt to a new playground this evening, BC, jools, BS, and BC’s pal, Alison. the kids all started to create a restaurant with some sandy mud and various sticks and acorns. so jools comes toddling over with a bucket first, filled with sand, and announces, “do you want some hamburgers and creme brulee?”

BS and i didn’t know he had ever heard of creme brulee. the fanciest we get is vanilla pudding.

a few minutes later, Alison comes over to collect some more sand near us. another mom is neaby with her little one, who is looking on wistfully, waiting to join in the restaurant biz. “what are you making?” i ask Al.

“Julian says he wants us to bring him a six-pack next.” jools learned this term from the adventures of zak and cody, where the heroes ask for a six-pack of soda. but it’s too long to explain that.

the other mother looks at us. we shrug. we wait for her to pick up her cell and call the authorities. fortunately, she just takes her son and walks over to the kids.

for anyone concerned, my kids seldom drink soda. and that’s about the hardest stuff they’ll get around here.