Average Jane

Author: Average Jane

  • Average Jane Cooks Dinner

    I’m a little short on time today, so why not share another recipe?  This one is really from Pharmgirl, who was kind enough to advise me on the ingredients list by phone as I strolled through the grocery store last night.

    8 ounces penne pasta (the low-carb kind is good in this)

    1/2 rotisserie chicken
    1 zucchini, cut into 1/2" chunks

    2 tablespoons olive oil

    1 yellow squash, cut into 1/2" chunks

    1 yellow or red pepper, diced

    1 bundle of asparagus, cut diagonally into 2" segments

    1-2 carrots, halved and sliced into thin ribbons

    1 jar Ragu Light Parmesan Alfredo sauce

    3 tablespoons pesto sauce

    Grated parmesan to taste

    Begin boiling water for noodles.  Heat olive oil in a good-sized frying pan, adding vegetables when ready. Remove bones and skin from chicken and tear into bite-sized chunks. Saute vegetables to desired tenderness, add pesto sauce and chicken, and continue sauteeing briefly.  Drain cooked noodles.  Add alfredo sauce to the vegetables and chicken and stir to warm sauce.  Combine sauce mixture with noodles, sprinkle with parmesan and serve.

    This dish was was a big hit with my husband, and he’s rather picky.  It makes enough to feed about four people, so we had leftovers.

  • Average Jane’s Action-Packed Weekend

    I jammed so many activites into last weekend that I’m having a difficult time deciding where to start.  I suppose I can begin with my weekend souvenir:  the first chigger bites of the season.  I hope Caladryl cuts the itching a little because I don’t think I can function at work with a bloodstream full of Benadryl.

    Let’s go back before the chigger bites to Saturday afternoon.  I auditioned for a band that I had found on an online message board and briefly met the previous Wednesday. (I think I needed to pass the "no fat chicks" test before they cared what I sounded like.)  So anyway, I brought my own mic, mic stand, music stand and the lyrics to the songs they’d specified and spent the afternoon singing heavy metal songs from my youth.

    This band has a lot of original material, too, but no lyrics or even names for the songs.  How convenient that I’m a writer!  I don’t have a lot of spare time, but I think I can come up with a song’s worth of lyrics per week if I’m disciplined about it.  It should be fun.  The band guys are younger than I am, but not by so much that it seems weird.

    On Saturday evening I went to the roller derby with a group of friends and had a great time as usual.  After that, we all went to a party not far from my neighborhood and that’s where the chigger bites come in.  I thought I’d sprayed bug repellant everywhere, but apparently "everywhere" did not include the middle of my lower spine and a couple of other places I’ll politely decline to specify.  I didn’t get home until almost 2:00 a.m., which is astoundingly late for me. 

    On Sunday I decided to assemble my early birthday present from my husband:  a hammock stand.  I have a hammock that I bought with some birthday money last year (the year before?), but had never put up because we don’t have two trees close enough together.   The stand went together easily and I took the hammock out of its box and prepared to hang it on the stand, only to discover that I still need rope or chain to put it up.  Grrr.  I guess I’ll take some extra clothesline and work on it later.

    Inside the hammock box was a blue, fabric bag with a sticker on it that read, "Turn storage bag right side out before using."  I couldn’t help wondering if someone had really calculated the economy of printing those labels and having someone stick them on every bag versus just having the same person quickly turn each bag right side out before shipment.

    My husband had an out of town drumming gig on Friday and Saturday night and drove through the night to get home early Sunday morning.  When he finally woke up, we skipped right past breakfast, had a 2:00 p.m. lunch and saw Mr. and Mrs. Smith at a nearby movie theater.  The rest of the day went by fairly quickly, then my husband headed off for a recording session not long before I turned in for the night.

    Next weekend I’m back to having nothing planned, and three days in which to make that nothing happen!  I’m taking suggestions…

  • Average Jane Goes to the Movies

    I wasn’t rushing to see Batman Begins until various co-workers started recommending it this week.  I saw it last night and it was AWESOME!  Awesome in a "nice try, Tim Burton, but you’ve been surpassed" kind of way.

    It was so good that it somehow even managed to expunge most of the resentment I have maintained all these years about wasting two hours of my life watching Batman and Robin.

    As its title suggests, "Batman Begins" starts with a lot of backstory to explain how and why Bruce Wayne became Batman.  It’s well cast with great but unintrusive special effects and sets that always seem realistic within the framework of the story.  (I hate to keep harping on "Batman and Robin," the worst movie I’ve ever seen, but I can’t resist pointing out the unlamented lack of day-glo paint and black light in the set design.)

    Since this is a recommendation, not a review, I’ll leave my description at that.  If you have a chance to see this movie and you’ve ever enjoyed the Batman story, I think you’ll like it.

    An extra geek bonus was that I finally saw a trailer for Serenity.  With it, The Fantastic Four and Charlie and the Chocolate Factory all coming out soon, I think I’m going to be spending a lot more time at the movies this summer.

  • Average Jane’s Bridal Fighting Weight

    Toby at Diva Marketing brought my attention to the Wedding Gown Challenge that will be held on August 5th in New York.  The idea is for women to demonstrate their commitment to lifelong fitness by taking to the streets in their wedding gowns, proving that they still wear the same size as when they were brides.

    I don’t know about the rest of you married gals, but I vividly remember the deep seam grooves that my wedding dress left all over my upper body the day I got married.  Admittedly the wedding was in Las Vegas, a place that makes me retain water like a dish sponge, but still… 

    Do you think there’s any chance you’ll ever fit into your wedding garb again?  I don’t.  I wouldn’t say I’m all that overweight, but even when I’ve been working out regularly and keeping the Starbucks iced mochas to a bare minimum, I’m still a different shape in my 30s than I was in my 20s.  (And, seriously, I don’t eat as much ice cream as I made it sound in yesterday’s post.) 

    The Wedding Gown Challenge sounds like a worthy goal, but I’m not sure it’s one I could reasonably achieve.  How about you?

  • Average Jane’s Summer Weakness

    I’m not exactly a model of self-restraint when it comes to desserts and sweets anyway, but the instant the weather turns hot I start craving ice cream constantly.  I’m not all that discriminating about it either, as evidenced by my purchase of a McDonald’s "cone" yesterday. (McD’s chooses not to discuss the nature of the cone’s contents, which should strike all of us as suspicious.)

    I’ve become a connoisseur of various ice cream and frozen custard store chains’ offerings.  My favorites:

    • Baskin-Robbins – When I was growing up, we often had Baskin-Robbins ice cream cakes for our birthdays.  My favorite flavor, then and now, was Mint Chocolate Chip.  Everyone in my family thought it tasted like toothpaste, but I still got my Mint Chocolate Chip cake almost every year.  Other good Baskin-Robbins flavors:  Chocolate Almond and Butter Pecan.
    • Dairy Queen – It’s not fancy, but there’s something about a chocolate-dipped cone from Dairy Queen that really hits the spot on a hot day.  The little fragments of chocolate that fall off while you’re eating it often hit spots on your clothes, too.
    • Sonic – I live for the 99-cent Junior Banana Split, although I usually limit myself to one per summer.
    • Sheridan’s Frozen Custard – I have a love/hate relationship with them because their portion sizes are obscene, but I still enjoy their Strawberry Shortcake, even though I usually end up eating about 1/3 of it and throwing the rest away.

    There are some local shops that serve ice cream and custard treats I particularly enjoy, including:

    • An ice cream flavor called Cinnameg:  vanilla ice cream with cinnamon, nutmeg and clove
    • My favorite custard concrete flavor, Lemon Pie, with light vanilla custard, lemon pie filling and graham cracker crumbs
    • Any good chocolate malt (not milkshake)

    Finally, a cool party treat that combines ice cream and alcohol – what could be better?

    • Carton of orange sherbet/vanilla ice cream blend
    • Orange flavored vodka
    • Mix in blender and serve

    What are your favorite ice cream flavors and other frozen treats?

  • An Average Jane Book Review

    Yvonne DiVita of Lipsticking and A-ha! has asked me to provide an "Average Jane’s" perspective on one of her publishing company’s new books, Know Your Bones – Making Sense of Arthritis Medicine by Stephanie E. Siegrist, M.D.

    Know Your Bones is divided into self-contained chapters that explain what causes arthritis pain, what various medicines and remedies do to ease the pain, and what risks are associated with each remedy.  There are handy charts for comparing dosages and costs between different brands and varieties of medications, salves and supplements.

    The book is designed to give arthritis patients an easily understood, comprehensive guide to treatment options.  In her introduction, Dr. Siegrist says, "You and your doctor can only spend a few minutes together; what will you do to help yourself in the weeks between these brief appointments?"

    The first chapter covers the anatomical aspects of arthritis and much of this information pops up again in subsequent chapters.  It seems repetitive on a complete read-through, but for someone who is researching a single medication or other topic within the book, it is clearly valuable to have the whole story spelled out in each chapter. 

    Dr. Siegrist’s writing style is conversational and peppered with metaphors to explain some of the more esoteric medical concepts.  For example, "The rough surfaces within the joint act like a match head on flint.  Imagine a wobbly knee where every step causes the jagged surfaces to rub together, igniting a little fire.  The fire is the inflammation of painful arthritis."

    I’m not sure I quite understood what arthritis was before I read this book, but now I have a much clearer grasp of it.  I have some grandparents with arthritis, so there’s a chance I’ll need to know this information someday.

    The majority of the book is given over to discussions of various arthritis treatments, including over-the-counter and prescription medications, topical pain relievers, nutritional supplements, injections and surgery.  Despite the book’s focus on medical treatments, Dr. Siegrist constantly urges the reader to make overall wellness, nutrition, exercise and healthy body weight important priorities.

    The newness of the book means that it takes into account last year’s much-publicized withdrawal of Vioxx® from the market.  The book’s explanation of the study results and FDA decisions are matter-of-fact and stand in contrast to the excitable media coverage that the story received at the time.

    I think anyone with osteoarthritis could benefit from the information in this book.  The newly-diagnosed would find a detailed overview of all of their treatment options;  someone who has been dealing with arthritis for a while may learn of some new remedies that could complement his or her existing treatments.

    It would be nice to see books like this on other medical topics.  If there had been a "Know Your Blood Sugar" book available when my husband was diagnosed with diabetes, I think we’d have been on better footing to start changing his diet and coping with the treatments.

  • Average Jane’s Summer Entertainment

    Now that the regular TV season is over, I no longer have quite so much trouble keeping up with the TiVo’s offerings.  I’ve also discovered how convenient it is to take advantage of summer reruns and catch shows that didn’t quite make the cut when they were originally pitted against other shows I like.

    Case in point, Veronica Mars.  I recently watched last season’s pilot and it was just as good as I’d heard:  well written, smart and intriguing.  My husband got sucked in, too, so we’ll definitely get caught up by the end of the summer.  If we’re lucky, it’ll stay on Wednesdays and not compete with anything else next season.

    All our other TV show faves this summer are on cable.  We’re greatly enjoying the second season of The 4400 on the SciFi Channel.  We also watched the premiere episode of Morgan Spurlock’s new series 30 Days on FX last week and thought it was a great premise.  I’m looking forward to seeing the other installments played out by different people.

    We finally saw the final Star Wars movie last night.  Great special effects, predictably tragic storyline.  I couldn’t help but agree with reviewers who have pointed out that Obi-Wan Kenobi and Luke’s aunt and uncle seemed to have aged way more between Episode III and Episode IV than one might reasonably expect in 16 years.  As for the critique that Obi-Wan should have recognized R2D2 when he saw him in Episode IV, my thought is that he’s more of an appliance than a character, quirky whistles notwithstanding.

    My husband and I both had an impulse to watch the original trilogy now that we’ve seen the prequels.  If only we weren’t on the bad list at Blockbuster…

    I haven’t even touched on my summer reading.  I just faked my way (not too convincingly, I imagine) through a book club discussion  about a book that I haven’t read in about five years and didn’t get around to revisiting.  I did a lot of cooking and baking this weekend, which gave me the chance to alternate articles from Archaeology Magazine and Entertainment Weekly while I waited for the timer to ring.  Leaping from Chumash canoes to brownie recipes to entertainment reviews is not for the faint of heart!

    Tomorrow:  a book review.  Have a great Monday!

  • Average Jane’s Childhood

    I found this “name 5 things about your childhood” meme on Kiwifruit, so I thought I’d take the easy way out today and just discuss the same topics.

    1. Games:  We played a lot of games when I was a child, but one of the most memorable for me was BINGO.  My grandmother had a BINGO set at her house and when we came to visit, she would be the BINGO caller and my sister and I would be the players.  She would wrap a collection of little prizes from around her house for us to choose and open each time we won.  After all these years, I still remember getting a tiny bottle of pikake perfume, which was probably a memento from a cruise my grandparents had taken.

    2. Television:  Like most children of the 1970s, I watched way too much TV.  I clearly remember Sesame Street and the Electric Company.  Later, I know I never missed an episode of The
    Muppet Show.  We watched Wonder Woman, the Six Million Dollar Man and the Bionic Woman, Charlie’s Angels (which my parents felt was a little inappropriate for us, but we got to watch it because they watched it), Happy Days, Laverne and Shirley (my first cat was named Boo Boo Kitty), and slightly older shows in reruns like Gilligan’s Island and the Beverly Hillbillies.  There are many, many more I could list, but you get the idea:  I was steeped in television as a kid.

    3. Fashion:  Could there have been a worse fashion era for a kid than the 70s?  I distinctly remember an outfit that can only be described as a "girl’s leisure suit" in pale yellow with appliqued fabric flowers all over it.  I also had an icky, pale blue polyester pantsuit with a vest.  I remember wearing a floor length "granny dress" made of pink and white gingham for my school photo one year.  Kids today don’t know how lucky they are!

    4. Toys:  I had an extensive Barbie collection, but it was always a treat to visit my great-aunt and get to play with the Barbies that had belonged to her kids a generation earlier.  She had a Barbie that came with different wigs and that made her way better than my Barbies, even if she did have unusually pronounced, molded eyelashes.  At home, we had a set of Tinkertoys back when they were still made of wood, and I still remember how difficult it could be to connect them together.  The coolest toy we had but never really appreciated enough was the log cabin playhouse my dad built in our back yard.  He cut down all the logs and built a little house with windows that opened and a faux brick linoleum floor.  You’d think we’d have played it in constantly, but with the typical fickleness of children, we rarely used it after the novelty wore off.

    5. Food:  I’ve discussed some of my childhood favorites before, but there are plenty of others I can name.  For my birthday, I always asked my grandmother to serve hot-oil fondue.  These days it tries my patience to have a fondue meal and cook all my own food, but it’s pure fun when you’re a kid.  My mother had a recipe for beef stroganoff that I still make every now and then, even though the sauce is just steak, onions, mushrooms, tomato soup, sour cream and Worcestershire sauce.  I loved my grandmother’s lemon meringue pie and my mom’s cherry pie.  I’m fortunate to have kept most of the recipes from my childhood, so it’s not uncommon for me to break out an old recipe and enjoy a fondly-remembered treat such as the pound cake we often had.

    I’m not going to tag anyone to continue this, but feel free to take on the topic or add your two cents via a comment.  Have a great weekend!

    ****************
    For my U.K. readers, I thought you might like to know that gapingvoid is offering any British blogger with a regularly updated blog a free bottle of Stormhoek wine for the asking.

  • Average Jane’s Ancestors

    When I talked about kid-safe cuss words last week, Rozanne pointed out that some of the ones I picked up from my grandparents are more commonly heard in Great Britain.  Thanks to my maternal grandmother’s faithful recording of family history, I know that her paternal grandparents were from Pancras, England, so I suppose it’s possible that the family has carried forward some words and phrases from them all these generations.  How else would you explain the prevalence of the phrase "…and Bob’s your uncle" within an American family?

    On my father’s side of the family, the biggest geneaology buff is a monk in Luxembourg who has traced many branches of the family tree all over Scandinavia and across to the United States.  My paternal grandfather and grandmother (whom I never met), emigrated to the United States from Sweden in the early part of the last century. 

    Of course, when you take two sides of the family into account, it can be difficult to tell where various influences come into play.  You’d think that my excessively round pronunciation of the letter "o" might come from the Swedes on my dad’s side, but I think it’s really from all of my mother’s folks who settled in South Dakota.

    I’m always surprised when someone I meet doesn’t know the origin of his or her last name or ancestors.  I’m pleased to know little tidbits about the various English, Dutch, Swedish and German people whose genes I share.

    Do you know much about your geneaology?  What have you carried forward from your ancestors’ traditions, speech patterns, etc.?

  • Average Jane, Chameleon

    On Wednesday, I’m being installed as local president-elect of a community service organization.  It’s a club that’s been around since the 1920s, so you can imagine that it’s fairly traditional.  When I go to meetings, I try to dress in business attire even though my work dress code is very casual…and when I say "casual" I mean "stops short of requiring shoes."

    Last weekend I went to a going-away party for one of the club members who is moving out of the country and I decided not to change out of my weekend jeans, t-shirt and sandals.  One of the new club members introduced herself and said I looked very familiar.  Apparently I have Superman-like powers of disguise when I’m dressed down!

    I can clean up pretty well when I put my mind to it, but I’m pretty happy being able to sit cross-legged in my office chair while I work, and I don’t think that’s possible in a suit and pantyhose.

    Now that I’m starting to audition for rock bands again, there’s a strong possibility that I’ll soon add another category of surprising fashion to the mix.  I won’t be able to resurrect my stage clothes from days gone by (I doubt I’ll ever wear that size again), but if I end up singing heavy metal I’ll probably have some distinctive wardrobe pieces.

    For the most part, I keep my sartorially opposite lifestyle segments separate from one another.  The businesswomen probably won’t ever see me wearing leather stage clothes, and I’m unlikely to wear a suit and high heels to band practice.

    The most memorable "worlds colliding" moment I’ve ever had was when I in my late teens and played a gig at a science fiction convention.  Everyone in the band was dressed as a movie or TV character – I was Valeria from "Conan the Barbarian," complete with sword and body paint.

    On the way home from the gig, the keyboard player got in a traffic accident and had to be bailed out of jail.  Mad Max, an alien from "V", an Apollo XIII astronaut and I dug through the seat cushions of our cars to come up with the cash.  Naturally, the police didn’t blink an eye.

    It’s always seemed to me that women have an easier time making dramatic changes to their looks from one situation to another.   Do you agree?