>A Chicken in Every Pot

>I told my friend on Facebook the other day, after asking for her roasted chicken recipe, that one of my goals for the summer is to “learn to cook like it’s the Depression.” Because with three boys and one-point-two incomes, we’re going to need to be creative in the kitchen. I’m starting with roasted chicken. At $0.85 a pound, it is less than a third of the price of breasts alone and Wes could really use the extra fat in the dark meat anyway. And after you eat the parts you want, you can boil the rest to make chicken stock and save even more money.

My parents came over for dinner last night, so I made them this recipe with a five-pound chicken I bought for approximately $4.75. After we carved it, found some uncooked places (Klassy! Also, grr broken meat thermometer!!), microwaved the uncooked pieces, and served it, it was delicious and moist! The potatoes were perfectly done too. I shall trademark my roasting/microwaving combo strategy and make millions!

After bedtime Ryan and I sat at the kitchen table and talked about our days while we picked the extra meat off the bones (ro-man-tic). Then I used the bones and skin to make ten cups of stock in the crockpot (OH the heated debate that occurred on my Facebook wall when I put up an innocent little appeal for stock-making tips!! Highly amusing. And informative!). TEN cups! Ten cups of stock at the store is $5! The same price I paid for the whole chicken! That we also got to eat for dinner! Bring on the Dust Bowl!

Tonight I’ll make chicken soup with the extra meat and four of the cups of stock. CHA-CHING!

(I attribute this little home cooking jag to the abrupt end to the semester and resulting directionless creative energy. For lunch yesterday the kids had organic black bean and Monterrey jack tacos while I enjoyed a mozzarella and tomato sandwich with fresh basil on ciabatta bread with a side of sliced fresh pears. I am not bragging. I’m just kind of amazed because usually lunch involves yogurt and peanut butter toast for the kids and a handful of Halloween candy and a side of guilt-induced fresh fruit for me. Bon appetit!)

It’s not all fun and chicken stock around here though. Do you know what your house smells like when you simmer a chicken carcass in a crock pot for ten hours over night? Like CHICKEN. Not chicken. CHICKEN. I woke up at 4:00 sure that someone had left a toy in the oven. Putting the stock away in the freezer has helped. But I’m going to make some peach cobbler too just to make sure the smell coming from my house doesn’t start attracting stray dogs.

Next we’ll move on to the Cold War and learn how to prepare dried beans in the crock pot. I’ll be off the grid in no time!

Now, if you’ll excuse me, I’ve got a sleeping baby and about ten hours worth of chicken smell to wash out of my hair.

>Messy Happy

>Usually clutter and chaos drives me crazy. You can imagine how much time I spend frustrated with the chaos given the current state of things. I’m told it won’t get better until James goes to college, so I’m trying to prioritize and clean up as we go and it’s helping, even though that whole shoveling the driveway while it’s still snowing analogy still applies. Big time.

But this morning I walked into my messy living room and just felt content and happy.

When we bought this house we knew we needed one big room for all of us to do things together. I used to think an “adult house” needed a living room and a family room, but this house just had one living room (and a small playroom that is more often used for toy storage because everyone likes the living room so damn much) and we fell in love with it and it’s been perfect.

This morning the coffee table was used as my office, with my grading and proposal budget still spread out where I left them late last night. They shared the table with Ryan’s and my dishes from dinner last night where we ate in front of The Office and 30 Rock, one of our favorite weekly rituals.

There are clothes all over the place, left behind after hasty mid-day clothing changes, which are now more frequent now that Charlie can turn on the sprinkler for himself.

I realize this is not *that* bad. Which might be contributing to my shiny happy feelings today. Or maybe it’s because I slept for six and a half continuous hours last night.

One of the protective pads from the dining room table houses the Island of Sodor and many happy afternoons of civil engineering (and violent property disputes).

The couch is a bookshelf, bed, and jungle gym (STOP DOING THAT TO THE COUCH! GO OUTSIDE IF YOU WANT TO CLIMB SOMETHING!).

Today I understand the empty nesters who have told me I’ll miss the messy house. I just wanted to get this down as a reminder for the next time I feel like greeting Ryan home from work with “Sorry the house is such a hellhole.” I don’t think he even notices.

>GET IN MY BELLY

>I gave James cereal during Charlie and Wes’s dinner ONE TIME and now he expects it. A four month old can EXPECT things. I did not know that. I just assumed that someone who becomes irrevocably trapped after rolling onto his stomach just kind of went with the flow. But apparently not. I tried to hold him in my lap at the table while Charlie and Wes ate dinner tonight and he wiggled and squawked and spit out his pacifier until I stuck him in his chair and gave him something to eat.

He doesn’t quite know what to do but he does know that he NEEDS MORE FOOD RIGHT NOW as soon as he swallows a bite.

Probably now would be a good time to join Costco.

>CSI: Kitchen Edition

>Everyone jokes that the leftovers in their fridge have been there so long as to be unrecognizable. But that never really happens, right? I mean, you might have a little trouble determining which green vegetable it was that has turned orange and liquidy in the bottom of the Corningware dish some well-intentioned relative gave you for your wedding. But usually with a little bit of thought, review of grocery store receipts, and laboratory analysis you can piece it together.

Oh yeah, I remember making green beans almondine for Thanksgiving now. What was it, 2009?

I’ve never truly had the “What the hell was THAT?” experience when cleaning out the fridge. No matter how badly deteriorated the contents of the bowl was, I could always sort of remember having bought it, prepared it, or brought it home from someone else’s house with the intention of eating it at some point.

Until today.

I came home from the store and opened the fridge to put the milk away only to have a medium sized enameled baking dish fall onto my foot, ejecting it’s blue, fuzzy contents all over the floor and my shoes.

I stood there for a moment, gallon of milk in hand, muttering unladylike things about the rest of my family and why I’m the only one who ever cleans the fridge before remembering how I went to yoga last night while Ryan put the big boys to bed then cleaned the kitchen before starting on the actual work he had still to do before going to bed and getting up with James several times between three and six in the morning. OK! Time to clean the fridge!

After putting the baking dish in some soapy water and cleaning all the blue fuzz off the floor I put on my lead apron and face shield and removed a covered Corningware dish from the lower shelf for inspection.

It was about the size of a softball and appeared to have been some kind of roast at one time. The last roast I bought I had cooked in the crockpot to make French Dips, so I am fairly certain this was not it. Whatever it was had been white meat and was covered with a creamy orange sauce with what appeared to have been bits of some kind of herb in it.

Whether or not the sauce was intended to be orange is a matter of uncertainty. The herbs looked tasty though. If they were actually herbs.

I stared at it for several minutes trying to remember when I had cooked it and what it had been but came up with nothing. I looked closer at it and noticed what might have been cheese back in 1997 when it was originally prepared, but this did not help either.

And then, and I cannot explain this behavior other than to remind you that James got up multiple times between three and six last night, I gave it a little sniff.

CRAP ON A CRACKER.

I am pretty sure that was not how it smelled originally when I cooked it to celebrate JFK’s inauguration.

Defeated, I scraped it into the trash and washed out the dish. Carefully. And then sterilized my hands in a paste made of isopropyl alcohol and pumice from a dormant volcano in Greece named for the Goddess of Botulism.

I am very unsettled not knowing what it was.

>Big Men on Campus

>I had to run an errand on campus today and while I was sending my students an email, the boys filled in some leftover course evaluations.

Let’s see, “Instructor demonstrates knowledge in course material… STRONGLY DISAGREE.”

In this one you can see the sand they spilled all the heck over the place a few weeks ago.

Just wants to go see the fish tank in the biology department.

The real hit is the ramp outside the building. Once I was teaching a lab in the classroom behind those windows on the right and I could hear them laughing and shrieking outside with their babysitter.

We had a great morning scootering all over campus and drinking chocolate milk in the student union, but things took a turn for the stubborn and unruly later in the afternoon. I gave Charlie a writing assignment after he refused the help me straighten up the playroom (I wrote, he traced. It was, apparently, very, very painful, so I let him stop after “I am sorry” and signing his name).

My final is written, my proposal is with the other PI, and I have a whole weekend to get my four senior’s grades done. Freedom feels GOOD. TGIF, right?

>Easter, now with 100% more pirates

>Even though they say mythical figures like the Easter Bunny and Santa don’t come when little boys don’t go to sleep, the Easter Bunny risked it all and came to our house last night despite the fact that James was awake for much of the night.

He brought pirate hats for the big boys. There was much ARRRGH-ing and CAPTAIN CHARLIE! And CAPTAIN WES! And NO, I’M THE CAPTAIN! NO ME!! And then they procured James’s Easter basket to use as a net to collect their GOLD (yellow Easter eggs).

James says “I swear I had a Reese Egg in here a few minutes ago. What gives?” (He’s going to HARRRR-VARRRRD)

EB also brought him a toy and a shovel and a new bowl just the right size for the mashed banana he will be enjoying in a couple of months. Can’t have too many shovels in this house. Also, he’s a roller! Mostly back to front with the occasional front to back thrown in just to keep us guessing.

When everyone was good and sugared up, we took them to church and made them sit quietly for an hour. It was packed for the holiday and we were so lucky to be squeezed into a pew with dear friends of ours. Wes made it through half the service before being shuttled to the nursery after I wouldn’t let him scribble in the attendance register and he bit me in retaliation (ARRRGH!).

After church we headed to my parents’ house for a wonderful Easter dinner on the porch. We had ham, homemade mac and cheese, asparagus, Chinese coleslaw, and Peep Cupcakes. The kids had an egg hunt and scavenger hunt inside and after dinner amused themselves by practicing their casting skills off the deck with the big cousins. I think there’s a Texas Country song in this somewhere. Or a Jeff Foxworthy joke.

Happy East-ARRRGGH!

>Probably the most interesting sales call of Peter’s day, so there’s that

>Today the four of us were outside on the school playground after school. I was at my usual place at the picnic table, talking shop with the other mothers while James slept in the carrier and Charlie and Wes ran and played and terrorized each other in the sand box.

I was in the middle of a deep thought about how bad I wanted an iced vanilla latte when Wes came over to sit at my feet and throw rocks at my legs.

I had just opened my mouth to reprimand Wes for the rock throwing when my phone began to ring. The caller ID indicated an unknown number from Massachusetts so as I was leading Wes through the cost-benefit analysis of continuing with the rock throwing I was answering the phone at the same time.

My mind raced through a list of potential people who might be calling me from Massachusetts as I answered and between the rock throwing, the unexpected phone call, the other people around me still talking to one another, I was totally flustered.

An unfamiliar voice asked to speak to Dr. Academomia and then I was even MORE flustered.

“This is Dr. Academomia” I replied with concern. Heads swiveled my direction and women began shuttling young children away from the area. Obviously this was very important. Also, DOCTOR? WTH?

He had just begun his introduction “This is Peter from Mathworks calling about the Matlab quote you requested…” when Wes defiantly flung a handful of rocks at my legs. Several landed in the carrier with James and I had a violent and visceral reaction to protect him that manifested himself in an angry, loud “HEY!!!!” shouted in Wes’s direction, but also directly into my phone.

Oh good God.

I apologized immediately and profusely.

He laughed and said “It sounds like you have your hands full!”

“Oh, yes. My two year old is throwing rocks at me. Hahaha!”

He sympathized, “Yeah, well, my teenager throws rocks at me!”

Okey dokey!

I scooped Wes up onto my hip and discussed my Language of Technical Computing Needs with Peter, thanked him, and said goodbye. And apologized again.

>Phew

>I have been BUSY you guys.

I have been working non-stop all semester on my new class. But then I decided to get fancy and submit an NSF proposal while I was at it. And also care for a newborn. In my free time.

My self-imposed deadline for the proposal was Sunday night. It was more like my millionth self-imposed deadline, but since it’s due May 26 and I know it’s going to have to go through a lot of edits (slash REWRITES) it needed to be done a lot sooner than that (like two weeks ago would have been perfect). I also had to write up some notes on my last three lectures for my students because (once again) I got fancy and used a different textbook for those lectures to supplement our textbook which lumped mid-latitude cyclones, severe thunderstorms, tornadoes, and hurricanes into one totally inadequate chapter.

(Nine chapters about rocks and ONE CHAPTER about severe thunderstorms, tornadoes, and hurricanes. REALLY?)

I don’t regret that decision because those lectures were BY FAR the most fun I had all semester and the students were either really into it or really amused by the way I was stalking back and forth in front of the board ranting about updrafts and mesocyclones and eyewalls and storm surge damage.

So I had the notes to make, and I had to make a lecture for Thursday and for today. And I had to write my third exam also for today so someone could take it before leaving for a track meet. And the proposal.

And my work day pretty much starts at nine once everyone is in bed, the kitchen has been straightened, and I’ve spent five minutes talking to Ryan.

I worked all day on Saturday and all afternoon on Sunday. I worked every night until one o’clock. I sent the draft of the proposal off late on Sunday night. I finished the last chapter of lecture notes Monday afternoon while the kids (all three) watched Toy Story. I wrote the exam yesterday evening while our babysitter took the boys to the dining hall for dinner (They also went to a dorm. When I asked what the dorm was like Charlie’s only comment was that “it smelled kind of funny”).

And then, in a spectacular demonstration of just how well caring for preschoolers prepares you for teaching twenty-year-olds, I scrapped today’s lecture, put on a Hurricane Katrina documentary, and passed out homemade cookies. After a little break everyone was ready to play nicely with the Playdoh again.

Add to that the way James sleep habits have been trending in the absolute WRONG direction and we’ve been taking turns getting up three or four times a night.

An unforseen benefit of all this? The lack of sleep has made me just bitchy enough to finally drive home the message that “we all pick up our own messes because there is too much work for just Mama to do.”

When I came downstairs after putting James down tonight everyone was putting toys away and wiping counters down and I got so inspired I mopped the kitchen floor. Then spent several minutes walking around barefoot and marveling at the way my feet don’t stick anymore.

Tomorrow I have to finally address the laundry situation and finish the proposal’s budget. And possibly take a shower.

>How was that only four years ago?

>Just came across this picture of my group of grad school girlfriends at our friend A’s (on the left) going-away party when she and her husband got real jobs and moved. This picture was taken after all the husbands had gone home and we had an impromptu dance party in the living room.

Charlie was a baby then, the only one. Now there are NINE babies represented in that picture and EIGHT OF THEM ARE BOYS. The most recent two were born in the last six weeks.

I miss you guys so much! Though I’m sure our late night french onion dip, wine, and Sex and the City nights would take on a much different character now.

>Poor, Immobile Baby

>
My toys: so close, yet so far away. Also, delicious, delicious coffee. Someone has unceremoniously put me on the floor so she could attend to some important matter, like unloading the dishwasher. If only I knew how to move.

Maybe if I point at the toys, she’ll know what I need.

Am pitiful and unable to help myself. Will just play with own hands. Hands amuse me.

Haha! Success!