RED STATE YEAH BABY!!!

I just saw the trailer for Kevin Smith's RED STATE, coming to Sundance this January. Holy shit BALLS, I cannot wait for this movie to gain distribution nationally!!! I haven't seen a movie in the theater since Avatar on Valentine's day, so I'm going to be fucking stoked when this comes out. Come on distributors!!! Go peep RED STATE at Sundance in January and give it a wide run!!!

Cocktail Caberet: Strawberry Comfort

I've been very naughty and haven't been keeping up with my 3x weekly Cocktail Cabaret posts like I said I was going to. See, this is what happens when it's not required of me by somebody else for content for a daily website. This is a personal blog, and as such, I am my own boss. And as a boss, I suck! LOL

Anyhow, since it's pretty much my bedtime, this is going to be a really quick post of Cocktail Cabaret. This Saturday, I went to Joe's Crab Shack in Old Sac with 3 fantastic girlfriends for a much needed Girl's Day Out. This is our bi-annual trip we arrange for the birthdays each of us have. The Stephanies in October, and Alexis and I in March/April. So we had some food and some drinks and the Stephanies had something called a Pomberry Sangria. It was very tasty and looked pretty, but I decided to have the Strawberry Comfort. These both came in these clear glass Mason jars and included in the price of the drink, you got to take the glasses home. They were awesome, see?

I got this recipe from a Yahoo Answer and the person said she'd gotten it straight from a Joe's Crab Shack bartender, so it should be on the up and up. So the way to make the Strawberry Comfort is like this:

1.5 Oz Southern Comfort
.5 Oz Bacardi Limon
3 oz Sprite
3 Oz Sweet&Sour
1 Oz Strawberry Puree
2 Lemons, squeeze, leave in glass


Squeeze lemon juice into a shaker. Put the lemons in the bottom of a large glass, then fill it with ice. They used Mason jars, you could just use a big glass. Stir all the rest of the ingredients into the lemon juice in the shaker. Pour over the ice and lemons in the Mason jar/large glass. Garnish with a slice of lemon and stick a nice big straw in for maximum drinkage.

This drink was so good and you totally can't taste the alcohol in it. And for those of you that can't stand Southern Comfort? You can't even taste it, BELIEVE ME. This drink tastes like strawberry lemonade, that's it. You could get unintentionally bombed on this drink, it's that good.

Epic Post of Rage

This is going to be a complete departure in topic of a post in comparison to what I've chosen for this blog to be. My choice of topics for this blog have been mommyhood and the trappings thereof, as well as fun or interesting pieces that I've come across and more recently my recipe sharing and Cocktail Cabaret posts that were previously over on Miaverse before it went on hiatus. But I can't contain my disgust and utter disdain for a company that is this corrupt and reprehensible any longer.

Pink Margarita and Breast Cancer Awareness

October is quickly coming to a close and it would be incredibly remiss of me not to acknowledge that October is Breast Cancer Awareness month. I'm the daughter of a two time breast cancer survivor and I even have a pink ribbon tattoo on my right breast, to honor the breast my mother lost the second time around. I shaved my head when she lost her hair to chemo and I donated the hair to Locks of Love. And when the hair finally grew back to close to an inch long, I bleached it and dyed it pink to support my mom even further. With that in mind, I bring to you the Pink Margarita, to honor Breast Cancer Awareness month! Also, a recipe to make some tasty sugar cookies and decorate them with pink ribbons. You can also purchase ribbon shaped cookie cutters and put pink icing on them instead of the instructions about cutting cookies out that come with the recipe if you like. That link is from The Pink Ribbon Shop. They promote breast cancer awareness with everything in that shop as well as using a portion of their sales of the products to fund research and donate to cancer organization. They also carry items from companies that donate additional money to breast cancer awareness and research. So getting anything from them is a plus.

Miaverse News

Miaverse is on hold right now, hopefully temporarily. As such, I'll be posting my Cocktail Cabaret, recipes, parenting and jewelry stuff here from now on. I'm also going to try to archive and back up my posts from Miaverse here. I'll be backdating them so hopefully they won't all bum rush my timeline, but I'm excited to have a place to continue on with the fun I've been having at Miaverse.

So keep watching my blog for more!

Firefly and Filo Shrimp Puffs

Ahh, it's Monday. Never fear my darlings, Cocktail Cabaret is here to save the day. I've found a really yummy drink called the Firefly to offer to you today. It's a type of martini, and even though it has rum instead of vodka or gin, it's incredibly good. It's ideal to drink in any weather. It's not a frozen slush, and the rum and cognac together make for a very warming drink. I chose to pair this cocktail with a delicious recipe for appetizers called filo shrimp puffs. These are delectable little savory pastries that are packed full of a spiced shrimp and coconut mixture.

Recipe: Cheesy Sausage and Egg Breakfast Bake

Now that the weather is getting cooler and you don't have to worry about heating up your house so much, I thought I'd put up a recipe you can make for a nice dinner, a leisurely brunch, or whip it up first thing in the morning and bake it up for breakfast. This egg bake has a little something for everyone in it. The tangy spice of the sausage, the smooth flavor of the tomatoes, the stringy goodness of the mozzarella cheese. It kind of reminds me of eating a pizza for breakfast, without all the doughy crust. Anyways, I haven't done a breakfast recipe yet, and I thought it was past time to do one. Especially since this one is so easy. It doesn't take a lot of culinary know how, it's just mixing ingredients, putting them in an oven and setting a timer. Even a cooking catastrophe, (like a good friend of mine) can make this recipe fairly easily. Although I would recommend having a chaperone in the kitchen if you're really that bad.

Promotions, OMG

So in the few short months that I've been working at miaverse.com, I have gone from being just a contributor to also being an editor then to being the head of editing then to also being an administrator! I've been having a blast over there and working my tail off so much that I haven't blogged here in like 2 months!

Which is totally sad but also really wicked cool. Anyways, I'm going to try to keep up with posting every so often here, but if you ever miss seeing anything I post, just head over to Miaverse. I've got a 3x weekly column about cocktails there, plus many other posts with recipes and parenting and jewelry and more. Come check it out! It's actually pretty awesome! All of our authors are super awesome.

Barbeque:Wayz Southern BBQ-Galt, CA

So I have discovered a new barbecue place locally and I'm going to be eating there a lot, if my wallet can afford it. We're mostly broke all the time, but this place isn't all that expensive. They offer fantastic barbecue at a fantastic price. If any of you guys are ever in Galt, check out Barbeque:Wayz Southern BBQ. They have a menu on the website and they've got a Facebook page, so go like them on Facebook!

Help for Schools

I'm going to share this thing with all of my readers. It's important. These two schools mean a lot to me. My son attends Lakewood and I graduated from Lodi High. Right now, Lodi High is only 75 spots away from being in the top 20 schools that will get a $500,000 gift from Kohl's. So if you have Facebook and don't already have a preference for schools, please help me vote for Lodi High.

Yay it's up!!

Miaverse.com went live today!!! Miaverse is a kick ass blogging community full of DIY's, tutorials, guides and info from around the web and around the world. Check it out!

Ahh, the joy of parodies.

One of my first posts on this blog was an embedded video of ok Go's video for "This Too Shall Pass", an inspired one take encompassing many traps and contraptions worked into a machine. It was wonderful. This video is a parody of it, and it's hilarious. I got this link courtesy of a tweet by @knitmeapony over on Twitter.com.

YAY!!!

I have officially been accepted to be a part of the major blog written by a Twitter friend of mine! I made my Google Adsense account and am beginning to write my blogs for filler so that when it goes live I can be a part of it!

I can't tell you how incredibly excited I am. Now to log onto my Google account, get my code, and send it to Mia!!!

2 posts in one day, OMG!

Okay, so I couldn't let the day pass without posting this video. Mostly because it reminded me of my brother...

Glee, I can hardly contain thee

So I've got this possible opportunity to be a contributor to a blog and I'm extremely excited about it but at the same time I'm apprehensive. I have a deadline for how many contributions I need to give per week and I dictated what I could contribute, so if I struggle with it, it's my own fault. But I'm a little anxious because aside from school papers, I've never had a deadline before. And this is going to be a weekly deadline basically. This will be ongoing, just like someone who has a job in magazines or newspapers.

Which scares the bejeezus out of me because it means this is the next step towards realizing my dream of becoming a writer. I'm full of fears that I won't be good enough, that I won't get enough done on time, that I'll disappoint someone or that I won't have any support. And there's the sneaking suspicion that I'll have to call it off at some point in time because I won't be able to handle the commitment, which is akin to failure to me. I just have to cross my fingers and hope that I can stick to my guns and get this done. I've started preparations to get my filler ready and I've begun research into the areas that I'll be writing about, so I have to trust that this will work out in the end.

Failbook, ho.

I am quickly growing disenchanted with Facebook these days. They've changed the way it looks too many times to count and now with this last change, you actually have to opt out of them showing your private information to people, even if you have it set to friends only.

This is just a short rant because I don't have the time or energy to go on about it but readers? If you don't already have a Failbook page? Don't bother getting one. I've heard they're going to start charging at some point to top it all off. It's just not worth the trouble.

Tears and Laughter

I finally had the chance to catch the film Marley&Me tonight. I won't ruin it for anyone that hasn't seen it by pointing out any salient plot points, as I'm not a film critic or reviewer. I will say that I am glad I didn't peep this flick when it first came out. The inevitable storyline when you're writing about a dog would have been too traumatic for me.

As it was, I couldn't contain my tears through at least three portions of this movie and as such, I now have a stuffy nose, red eyes and a headache. But it was such a funny, delightful, poignant film and I'm glad I saw it.

Epic Pain

I am a procrastinator. That is a known fact. And I procrastinate to such great extents that I am living in god awful amounts of pain due to massive toothaches because I haven't made an appointment to see the dentist. Partially because I can't remember if I paid the last bill to that dentist or not, but also because I just plain forget to call them and find out, and/or make an appointment.

But I have vowed that either this week or next week, I will rectify that mistake and will call the dang dentist. Probably.

On the serious side...

I've come across a disturbing article that really paints a horrific picture of a gender washing network. Imagine if you will, a group of women with different hair colors, different styles, unique ideas of makeup usage. All endowed with intelligence, poise and confidence. Now imagine them working at Fox News. Review pictures of all the different female reporters. Pay attention to the commonalities between them. Gone are the nuances that made them different, original, unique. They are now all cookie cutter versions of the blonde, made up, blow dried reporter. As this article refers to them, they've been "Foxified". And what a shame that is.

The article can be found here. May you be as outraged and disgusted as I was.

Super Fantastic Free Song!!!

So the glorious Amanda Fucking Palmer is free from her previous record label and as a thank you to her fans has posted a free song. You don't have to pay anything to download it, it's gratis thanks to her. You can choose to pay/donate for it like I did (songs usually go for $0.99 or $1.99 on iTunes, I paid her $2.99 simply because I loved the song) or you can take it for free, you lazy cheap bitches.

The song is available at this website right here and I can tell you it's fantastic. I love AFP anyways, but this song really resonates with me about doing what you want because you can and not because anybody else has told you to or expects you to.

Anyhow, go to that website and check out her song. She plays ukelele and piano on it in addition to singing, and her partner in EvelynEvelyn, the incomparable Jason Webley, plays guitar. Another friend of hers by the name of Sam Kulik adds the beautiful sound of trombone to the song for an indelibly quirky, lyrically witty, musically brilliant piece of music. If you like her style of music, you will love this song. If you've never heard of Amanda Palmer or her band The Dresden Dolls you should go listen to this song. I thoroughly enjoyed it.

Holy Cow Awesomeness

My words shall be short but sweet today.

Enjoy the balloon and box awesomeness.

SO. MUCH. FAIL.

And my epic fail is ever more evident in the fact that I have not posted in more than a week. I did say that I wouldn't be berating myself over it though, didn't I? Well then, I shall refrain from self-flagellation with the bamboo whipping stick and I'll opine about the last week of spring break.

Last Saturday I took a trip to Reno with my husband and children. We spent four days being entertained by the Imperial Acrobats of China, the halfway decent buffet, and the never-ending stream of pink tickets on the midway inside of the Circus Circus hotel. We redeemed more than 10,000 tickets for a pile of useless and semi-useful crap for the kids and hauled it all home, not aware that half of it would fall to the wayside within minutes of walking through the front door.

Then came a trip to one of my favorite cities, San Francisco. We spent a couple of hours visiting the California Academy of Sciences before making our way back to our van, which was parked an incredibly long way from the Academy. From there we drove over to Fisherman's wharf to visit Pier 39. We ended up having dinner at one of my favorite, though overpriced restaurants, Bubba Gump's. We were able to sit at a window facing the bay and my kids giggled and pointed out every boat on the water that went by.

Last but not least, this past Saturday we decided to take a drive up to Bear Valley. It was a beautiful warm, sunny day. Since the weather is becoming so nice and warm, we thought it would be a good idea to take the kids sledding in the snow one last time before it all melts. We headed up in the morning, spending a peaceful 2 hours enjoying the scenery and parked on the street in Bear Valley Village. After getting all decked out in our snow boots and beanies and gloves, we headed across the street to the sledding and tubing hills, run by the good people of Bear Valley Cross Country. They've been operating a their business for many years now and the people that helped us out at the hills were just fantastic.

If these trips aren't a good enough reason for having missed blogging this past week, then I don't know what would possibly work.

La La La Fail.

Right, so that 3 a week concept? EPIC FAIL already. It's Thursday, and unless I crank out another entry tomorrow and one Saturday morning before I go to Reno, (haha right, like hubby will dig that) my big plan bites the dust.

But hey, I DID say that I wouldn't beat myself up over not making it. So...


Anyways! I have used my fabulous Green-Pan two or three times now and I fucking LOVE it. I barely have to touch it with the soft side of a sponge and EVERYTHING comes off of it. KICK ASS. I'm so investing in more of these pans if this one keeps up at this rate.

Also, I'm going to Reno this weekend! We'll be gone for 4, count 'em 4 days. Fun times will be had by all! My niece Stephanie (who's 25, I'm a young aunt [by marriage] who's not even 32 yet!) is bringing her friend Alexis and they're going to watch my kids for me while the hubby and I head out for adult time. When we get back, they're free to do whatever they want. So that leaves the day to spend with our kids on the Midway playing games and watching acrobats. Hopefully we'll go to the Scheel's sporting goods store too. It's going to be EPICSAUCE.

A Tale of Two Links.

I have two links to share today, and they are completely unrelated. The first one is a link to a youtube video that a young London high school girl made to honor her mother, who died of cervical cancer. That in and of itself isn't why I'm sharing this link. The first reason is because it's a very well done touching tribute and I was touched by it, but the second reason is because in the video, the young girl sang the song herself, and it was hauntingly beautiful.

The video can be found here.

The second link I'm sharing will help you shake off the sadness you felt from the first one. It's the red band trailer for the new Kevin Smith film COP OUT. For those of you that don't know what red band is, it means it's the rated R trailer. When previews come out, they put up a green screen that says this preview has been approved for all audiences. But for a redband trailer, it's only been approved for restricted audiences 17 and older. So you have to put in a birthday that proves you're 17 or older to view it, but I'm sure you all know how to count back 17 years.
This movie is going to be hilarious. I can't wait to see it!

The trailer for COP OUT can be found here.

Case of the Fucked up Frying Pan

Post one for this week:

I got a new saute pan today. My lovely expensive Pampered Chef one has shit the bed, so to speak. It's supposed to be guaranteed for life that the teflon won't scratch. BULLSHIT. Less than a week after I had it, shit started sticking to it.

So I got a new one. And it's GREEN. I don't mean the color green, I mean ecologically green. I got a 12 inch skillet from the GreenPan company, website here: http://www.green-pan.com/cookware/intro.asp

I haven't used it yet, but it looks pretty awesome. So we'll see how it goes when I fry potatoes in it next time.

And I'm sending the Pampered Chef one back. It's supposed to have a lifetime warranty that they'll replace it so even though it's been a few years, they have to replace it. I've never used metal on it, only wood and plastic and I'll swear in court if I have to.

I knew this wouldn't be as easy as I thought...

So my intention was to write one blog a day. Doesn't matter what the content is, I just wanted to get one blog a day out.

That concept crashed and burned.

So I'm gonna shoot for 3 a week. If I get more than that, awesome. If not, I won't beat myself up over it.

That being said, here's a link to a funny website just to take up some of your time:

Praise the Lord and Pass the Ammunition!

So for my very first post on my very first actual "blog" outside of the greatest/live/insane-journal genre, I shall be doing something I've been dying to do for awhile now. Sharing an EMBEDDED VIDEO *GASP*! ok go finally found a way around EMI's bullshit deal with Youtube/the Google juggernaut and got a sponsor to cover the assumed profits lost from embedding. So before someone finds out and puts the kibosh on the whole shebang, here's the video! It is AWESOME.