CC's Stuff and Things

So I decided to throw my hat in the proverbial dating ring recently.  The impetus behind this--aside from my regular loneliness--revolved around a close friend essentially being led on by someone and after it was all said and done, I found myself saying to him "Don't give up on finding a meaningful relationship.  There's someone out there."  And it made me reflect on my own single situation and I thought "Why am I not taking my own advice?"  I decided to try online dating--again--despite multiple failures in the past.  I figured I had nothing to lose because I know the kinds of people to avoid based on their messages, and I also banked on the fact that I wouldn't get many responses because I lay out the fact that I am crazy busy right now attending school and working--both full time. I had about 7 people respond almost as soon as I put up my profile, so that was encouraging.  But they were mediocre responses save for one.  I am a polite person, so I m

I'm always a bit sad when my birthday rolls around as I get older.  Well, my birthday and New Years Eve. It has to do with being in limbo these last, shoot... 7 years, or maybe I could just say my entire adult life.  And it has to do with what one of my professor's called the "Ideal Life Trajectory."  You know what that is, right? It's essentially life taking place in this order:  Birth, Elementary, Junior High, High school, followed by College, marriage/career, children, being promoted further in your career, retirement/grandchildren, die old. Irritating, right?  And I know that more people probably do NOT follow that life trajectory than do, I get that.  I mean, they may add a divorce in there, or not go to college, or have a child during their high school years.  I get that the majority of people do not follow that trajectory.  I can even say that generally speaking, I do not regret not continuing college right out of high school.  I had no idea what I wanted t

The semester is wrapping up, just one more exam to take and I can call it done.  I've been going to school since Spring of 2010.  I started at Ohio Dominican University in Columbus and then transferred to the University of Akron for two reasons.  One, ODU was too expensive, and two, they didn't offer many night classes and my employer would not work around an altered schedule so I could take morning classes.  In fact, they told me "maybe you should transfer to a different school."  So I did.  And I moved.  And got a new job. But I digress.  I'm just going to say this:  until this semester, I have always found most traditional students really annoying.  First and foremost, they are very laissez faire about their schoolwork, which annoys me. They have this attitude that it's not cool to care about their classes.  Fall of 2013, I listened to a male student brag about how little he did for the class we were in together, and others participating in the conversati

Since I'm going to become a teacher, and it's somewhat up in the air what grade I will teach, I'm always interested in new crafts that would be fairly simple to do with kids.  I also just plain like to craft, let's be honest here.  The place I work offers a craft for employees as well as patients, parents and visitors for almost every holiday, and since yesterday was Valentine's Day, they had this paper heart craft.  I didn't get to actually GO to do the craft because I work evening shift, but a couple of my coworkers went and they showed me how to do it as well as gave me the "pattern" for it.   Here's what you need:  two colors of construction paper, tape, a pattern (can be found on bing images pretty easily), scissors. I have two pair of scissors in the picture, because I used a pair of fun edged scissors for the lines in the center of the heart.  When you first do this craft, I recommend as practice to do it with straight edge

Let me first say, I am not a big fan of poetry or "poe" as my friend Mark often refers to it.  As a favor for Mark, and also to make some extra cash, occasionally, I would go to a University on a weekend and judge a "forensics tournament."  This was not a bunch of criminal investigators lined up at microscopes solving crimes, it was public speaking.  One of the categories was Poetry or "Poe" as I'm used to calling it now.  One of my least favorite things to judge was Poe because hearing it aloud, I don't really "Get" it.  I was always just winging it when I chose a winner of that event. Anyway, for my Intro to Education class, one of the assigned books for the semester is this (so far) great book called "Letters to a New Teacher."  It is comprised literally of letters a very experienced teacher wrote in response to questions posed by a brand new teacher, and it is a really good read if you want a glimpse into the mind of a gre

 So, I feel like doing a "favorite things" post, a la Oprah without the free giveaways (sorry). First off:  Chocolate.  I have become a chocolate snob.  I am no longer a fan of Hershey's or any of those common chocolate bars you can get anywhere.  I want Ghirardelli.  In fact, I have figured out that I'm not a fan of Nestle products either.  I've been baking a lot of the chocolate chip cookie recipe I posted awhile back, and I've found that the cookies made with Ghirardelli Semi sweet chocolate chips are just plain better. I have actually been to Ghirardelli square, though I've never taken the tour.  They do have a fabulous ice cream shop, and it's a favorite of my family to visit when we're there together. I do, however, have a close 2nd favorite, which I generally buy because it's cheaper, and you get more in a bag for the price... and that is....  A friend of mine back in the 00's turned me onto Dove Promises, and those prom

This week has been long with both school and work.  I like all my classes but I am pretty darn exhausted tonight.  And this week my days have gone as follows:  Class to work to home to bed to dream about class to get up to go to class, to work to home to bed to dream about my ed tech class.... etc.. you get the picture. I think I've dreamed about sitting in my ed tech class the last three nights.  My other issue is that I've also done homework every day during my lunch break and two nights after work as well.  So I literally have had no time to myself to blog, knit (at work lunch--not that I even bothered taking my knitting stuff), keep up with my friends, etc. My mantra is "This is temporary" and I hope it is.  :)  I know this particular semester only lasts 13 more weeks after today, but next year should be much of the same.  I wish a fairy would come and clean the condo and stock the fridge with homemade food. Also, it is freaking cold here right now! Walking t

So, I have a coworker who is a little bit... snooty.  There, I said it.  She's courteous but never really nice.  Never really open or relaxed.  She's been a little better lately, and she is the person I currently work with the most.  She's there until 8pm, and I leave around 10:30-11, depending on the day. She's also one of those people who doesn't like to make mistakes, which is a good thing in my line of work, but she also doesn't like you to tell her she's made a mistake.  I have been assigned to review her work, and she reviews mine.  There's a system of checks and balances in every medical office for scanned records.  Out of the blue today, she says pleasantly, "Hey, C, if you run across any mistakes I've made, can  you give them back to me?  I want to know if I'm making any mistakes so I can learn." Now, I knew this was a lie.  She wants to think that she does everything right.  This has been an issue in the past, and everyone

Here are the supplies you'll need for this wreath.  One 14 inch wire wreath which you can get at Pat Catans, 2 boxes of 100 ct LED lights.  You can pick out your own light types... but these ones are the coolest. Here are two cute photo bombers who wouldn't look at the camera. Bella Dog Abby Cat  This should be a given, but make sure to test the lights.  I bought these lights at Kmart on clearance just after Christmas.  I'm kind of bummed because I didn't realize they were smaller than the ones I used in the original wreath I made that got a lot of feed back, but it turns out pretty cute anyway.   Yay! They work! Magic button control thingy Press the button to change white lights to colored lights or make them alternate. I really love white lights.  That's just me.  But I know a lot of people prefer colored lights.  My grandma had a white Christmas tree with red shiny bulbs on it, and I have carried on that traditio

Okay, so one of my favorite movies that came out in 2013 is Warm Bodies, which stars some fairly unknown actors in it.  John  Malkovich has a small part in it, but the lead guy on it was in another one of my favorite movies called "About a Boy" back when he was a preteen.  His name is Nicholas Holt seen in this picture in a red hoodie. The first time I saw this was actually on the way home from Emerald Isle last year.  I rented it to watch on my NookHD, and ended up watching it twice before it magically disappeared.  Let me just say, I am not one who is usually into zombie pictures.  I mean, of course I've seen "Shaun of the Dead" (who hasn't? and if you haven't, you should).  I haven't seen World War Z.  I haven't watched The Walking Dead on AMC, though I've been told I NEED to see that.  I'm not even really into "scary" movies.  But this isn't scary. The best thing in this movie is the narrative by the lead characte

This little doll baby is my dog, Bella.  An older picture, I think I took this two years ago, but she still looks this cute, let's be honest.  I feel pretty guilty about the fact that she's alone for most of the day Monday-Thursday (and occasionally other days).  I come home and she is the happiest dog ever and full of energy and joy to see me... and all I want to do is collapse in bed.  We do have what I call "quality time" where she lays on my chest in bed and I pet her and talk to her for about fifteen to twenty minutes.  But 20 minutes after a long day in the laundry room, oy.  I feel bad. So last night, in the middle of the night, while in a deep sleep, I dreamed that I awoke from a nap to find Bella's butt hovering just over my face and a piece of poo dangling from it.  This startled me awake out of my dead sleep, my arms whipping the covers off of me as if I was going to push her back.  She was as startled as I, and I saw her little face give me this l

I didn't sleep well last night.  I was messaging with a friend of mine and he said "If you say so..." which annoyed me.  Doesn't that just imply that there's a lack of trust there?  Or is that just me? Anyway, it woke my mind up a little too much so I tossed and turned in annoyance, berating myself for having read that one last message that I only knew about because I saw my little text notification light blinking on my phone.  I prefer not to have my ringer on at all.  Like, ever.  So, like a deaf person, I rely on the flashing light to tell me when I have a text.  I do turn the ringer on during weekends, etc, but the rest of the time, I'm in class or work and can't answer it anyway, so why bother with the ringer? All that to say, I woke up out of a dead sleep when my alarm went off and decided that this semester, since Tuesdays and Thursdays are essentially the same schedule-wise, that maybe Thursdays and I won't be friends for the next 15 we

I have sent mini wreaths to a friend that lives in Texas for her cubicle.  A cubicle should be defined as a depressed 3 1/2 walled corporate wasteland.  I realized recently that I've sent her one for Christmas, summertime, fall,  and spring but I haven't sent her a Valentine's Day wreath.  Stay tuned for when I do a flag wreath for her, which is one of my favorites to make. Here are the supplies.  I had all of this yarn here already, I think I got it all at Pat Catan's, which is where I purchased the heart shaped mini wreath.  I got the XOXO sign at Pat Catan's as well.  One thing nice about these mini wreaths is that I haven't had to hand make the decorations for them. Pat Catan's usually has something in their seasonal section that I can use, which is nice. I decided that I didn't want to do a monotone wreath, I wanted to use more than one color.  I started out with the idea of doing a chevron stripe across the wreath, but I couldn't find som

So, after years of trying to find a recipe of chocolate chip cookies that don't go flat, I finally found one via Pinterest.  Here's the blog I found it on  http://sallysbakingaddiction.com/2013/05/13/chewy-chocolate-chunk-cookies/ .  But I want to try this whole cooking blog thing (not that I have a lot of free time with which to do so).  So I'm stealing this recipe to start with.  :)  These cookies are quite tasty and easy to make.  I also like this recipe because you don't need a mixer to make them. I forgot to put the Baking Soda in this picture, but here are the ingredients.  :) 2 1/4 cups all-purpose flour 1 teaspoon baking soda 1 and 1/2 teaspoon of cornstarch 1/2 teaspoon salt 3/4 cup unsalted butter, melted 3/4 light brown sugar, loosely packed 1/2 cup granulated sugar 1 large egg and 1 egg yolk 2 teaspoons vanilla extract 1 cup chocolate chips or chocolate chunks So, mix up the dry ingredients (flour, baking soda, cornstarch and salt) and set as