I cleaned out the closet today, which actually means I went through the pile of discarded clothes in the clothesbasket and went through the stacks on my closet-hangy-stacker-things (highly technical term). Now I have a big ol’ pile of clothes I’d like to find *some* use for. Of course, I could donate them to Goodwill or the Salvation Army or someplace similar, but I feel a bit behind the times dropping off my collection of bubble-gum fashions from Aeropostale.
For the record, I fit in them. I just feel like a giant poser now that I’m a super mature woman of 27. I’m not very serious, but I do like it when people treat me like an adult. I know – you can’t have your cake and eat it, too, but what in hell is the point of having cake if it can’t be eaten?
Oh, look at that. I got off topic. Again.
So, yeah. What I don’t need. While taking my daily (hourly sometimes) cruise around blogville, I saw the perfect answer to what I should do with all those clothes on dooce.com. I should make a dog bed! Look, Coco loves hers!
So here I sit, staring at dog duvet covers on the Internet. I want one of these. They’re only $20 (it’s great to have a small dog and two cats), and I can stuff all those extra shirts in there. And since the clothes smell like me (and whew, buddy, do they smell! just kidding. or am i?), maybe, JUST MAYBE, my animals would choose that cozy bed that smells like me to my actual lap. I squirm. I shoo them off my lap frequently. I put books on top of them while they occupy my lap. Wouldn’t you take that cozy good-smelling bed over a squirmy lap that requires you to double as a book stand?
I would.
Too bad the husband will look at me like I’ve sprouted sparkly antlers if I suggest spending twenty very important dollars on a dog bed.
If only I could sew (or had anything but needles and thread to sew with – yes, I’m a spoiled modern type).
This is why I don’t shop online. Curses for being tricked by dooce!
Disclaimer: This entry contains information regarding our adventures with trouble trying to conceive. Feel free to skip over if you wish to avoid too much information regarding my reproductive parts. I won’t blame you. I’d rather skip this stuff, too.
Thanks to Goodreads and HarperCollins for my advance copy!
I don’t want to jump the gun and give the book a star rating before I make any of the recipes, but I anticipate a five-star rating on this one.
It just may be my favorite cookbook in my possession. Each recipe has several step-by-step photos. I’m a visual learner, and I’m forever second-guessing myself when trying a new recipe I’ve never seen done (either in the process or at the end) before.
Hey, cookbook people! Lots of pictures? Two thumbs up!
Along with my love for the multitude of food pictures, the book also comes full of personal photos and stories from The Pioneer Woman & Co. If the kitchen is the heart of the home and food is good for the soul, a cookbook that shares the author’s personality and stories behind the recipes is the next best thing to learning recipes first-hand from a loved one.
Too many cookbooks feel detached and cold, which doesn’t exactly make me excited to return to them.
Because of my current dietary circumstances, the amazing potato recipes and the entire section dedicated to sweets made my heart hurt. Everything looks so amazing that I might actually spend time adapting the recipes to meet my needs rather than skipping over them.
My one and only complaint thus far is that my eyes don’t understand the sequence in which the photographed steps are laid out. My natural instinct is to read from left to right, top to bottom. The book uses a top to bottom, left to right format. It isn’t a huge deal, but it definitely disrupts my reading flow.
The book goes on sale October 27. Make sure to also check out The Pioneer Woman online for more awesome recipes, photos and stories.
Now, which recipe do I start with?
It took me longer than it should to complete this book, whose title is actually, “Bitter is the New Black: Confessions of a Condescending, Egomaniacal, Self-Centered Smartass, Or, Why You Should Never Carry A Prada Bag to the Unemployment Office.”
I loved Lancaster’s voice and share a similar snarky opinion of my fellow humans, but the materialism and poor money decisions were hard for me to read because my eyes were too busy rolling.
Without giving too much away, I was able to get more into the book the closer I got to the end. The first half took me a week of constant picking up and putting down, but I flew through the second half in a day. It was refreshing to see the changes Jen finally realized she needed to make and the lessons those necessary changes taught her.
Overall, it was a funny book, and I’d definitely read something else of Lancaster’s in the future.
Up next: “Needful Things” by Stephen King
I’ve been doing a lot of thinking since my employment status was changed for me. A lot of that thinking is for myself, but I’d be lying if I said it didn’t have anything to do with figuring out how to answer the question everyone asks: What’s next?
I don’t really know.
I graduated in December of 2003 with a shiny new Bachelor of Science in Journalism (capital J because that’s what’s on my diploma, folks). I spent a whole two weeks looking for a job and landed one before I was a month past graduation.
I started off with a passion for editing and landed a job editing newspaper stories and designing newspaper pages. Then I moved onto a job editing online stories and some magazine elements. Antsy with editing and itching for more design experience, I moved to a job designing magazine pages and features. I started the job knowing I was far behind my co-workers in terms of graphic-design skills. Let’s just say I never caught up to them, and no one was happy with that – including me.
Looking back, I realize I should have tried to transfer positions in the company again, but I can’t say doing so would have helped my situation. I never did that because the world of journalism has been crumbling away fairly rapidly in the past year, and I didn’t want to put a target sign on my back as an unhappy employee. The company shelved entire publications, made pay cuts and cut back on staff. I watched that happen while other companies announced huge layoffs and killed publications. I was scared, so I kept my mouth shut and hoped to hold on for dear life.
Now I’m one of many unemployed journalists trying to figure out if it’s worth the fight to stay in journalism or if there’s another direction in which I should move.
At different points, I’ve considered turning my career path down the roads of education or library sciences. The time has never felt right before, but I find myself again pondering if this is the time to change gears.
While my brain is constantly chanting “journalist, teacher, librarian” in a style remniscent of the Finkle/Einhorn scene in “Ace Ventura: Pet Detective,” it’s also whispering “mother” in time with those job titles.
A competitive job market seems to be an ugly place for women starting a family. Many employers won’t hire pregnant women to begin with, and many employers find alternate, legal reasons to fire women when it’s actually because of pregnancy.
With all these considerations, I just don’t know if it’s a good time to make a major career change.
At least I have the lottery to fall back on.
