Not much

I have started a new blog for vegetarians. vegetarianismfortheunadventurous.blogspot.com we'll see how long it lasts. This week's recipes are soups. I am listening to my new Jane Eyre Broadway Soundtrack. I have been cooking, cleaning, reading and listening to my new CDs all day. I have listened to Jane Eyre 3 times and put my two favorite songs on repeat for an hour. I still don't know the words perfectly. Had a TFD except for a few minutes when he came in to spray AXE, also known as human repellent, all over the place. Or maybe he was just wearing an entire bottle. I don't know, but it made my eyes sting and I never came within three yards of him. I've also been listening to my Flyleaf Memento Mori CD. I love This Close, Swept Away, Circle and Missing. And Have We Lost from the bonus Cd. I'm going to go read 'Do Hard Things' now. it's a Good book for Christian teens and maybe adults. Today is hard solid grey. Most of the songs from Memento Mori are on youtube with lyrics.

I had an excellent day. I was talking to James and Ginger about food, healthy eating, recipes, and foods that we don't like. James said that becoming a vegetarian (like me) would destroy his diet. So I decided to post some vegetarian recipes. This one is Cuban black bean and corn soup. We eat a lot of soups. This is my family's favorite. This is a good soup to make ahead because it freezes and thaws easily.
2 tablespoons olive oil
1 large onion
3 cloves garlic
1 red bell pepper
3 15 oz cans black beans, rinsed and drained
2 tbls. vegetable broth
1 1/2 tsp. dried oregano
1 tsp. ground cumin
1/4 tsp. salt
1/2 cup frozen corn kernels

In a large saucepan, heat the oil until hot over med. heat. fAdd onion and garlic and cook, stirring frequently, until the onion is softened. add pepper and cook until soft.
stir in beans and tomatoe paste and cook for 1 min. stir in broth, 2 cups of water, the oregano, cumin and salt and bring to a boil. reduce to a simmer, cover, and cook at least ten minutes. Can be kept at a simmer for up to two hours. Transfer 4 cups to a blender/food processor and puree. Return to pan and stir to blend. stir in the corn and cook until the corn is just warmed through, about four min. Don't forget the corn. That happens a lot.

Today I am listening to Something to Sing About from the Buffy the Vampire Slayer What You Feel soundtrack. http://www.youtube.com/watch/?v=pI_PLAlzWVs I've only watched the first episode of Buffy, but in searches at http://www.allmusicals.com/, (great website with lots of musical lyrics) I came across this episode. A 'dancing demon' comes to town and everyone starts singing as though they are in a musical. It is funny, but also serious. This is one of the serious songs. If you want to listen to a funny one, listen to 'I've got a Theory/Bunnies/If we're together'. Or find a clip of 'mustard'. Lyrics:
Buffy:
Life's a show
and we all play our part
and when the music starts
We open up out hearts

it's all right
if some things come out wrong
we'll sing a happy song
Where there's life
there's hope, everyday's a gift
wishes can come true
whistle while you work
so hard all day
to be like other girls
to fit in this glittering world

don't give me songs
don't give me songs

Give me something to sing about
I need something to sing about

life's a song
you don't get to rehearse
and every single verse
can make it that much worse

still my friends don't know why I ignore
the million things or more
I should be dancing for

all the joy life sends
family and friends
all the twists and bends
knowing that it ends
well, that depends
on if they let you go
on if they know enough to know
that when you've bowed
you leave the crowd

there was no pain
no fear, no doubt
till they pulled me out
of heaven
so that's my refrain
I live in hell
'cause I've been expelled
from heaven
I think I was
in heaven

so give me something to sing about
please
give me something

Spike:
Life's not a song
Life isn't bliss
Life is just this
You'll get along
the pain that you feel
you only can heal
by living
you have to go on living
so one of us is living

If I made a mistake, I apologize. I should have just posted a link. Obviously. Silly me.

The first verse is interesting. The lyrics and body language are sarcastic for the second bit, but you would never be able to tell just by listening to her voice. I feel like that sometimes. Such a wonderful world we live in. People killing each other, people starving to death on one continent while warehouses of food rot away on another, people killing cildren before they even take their first breath. Then I wonder why that matters. Aren't they better off? But everyone deserves the chance to live. Even most of those with no freedom, can choose to live or die, right? Maybe I'm naive and have not truly experienced the bitterness of life yet, but I think that the taste of dove chocolate that I had earlier has been worth all of the life I've lived up until now. That stuff is divine. And there is still most of a bagful left... Back to the lyrics. Give me something to sing about. Dove chocolate, mountains, sunsets, lying on the bottom of a pool or lake and looking up through all of the water, turning somersaults in said water, the feeling of water running down your throat after a run, a student executing a perfect sidekick, chocolate, being quiet, being loud, singing at the top of your lungs when no one can hear you, I need to stop now. Despite all of these things, I still have to remind myself sometimes that life is so good. second verse: same idea of life being a show, a song, a game. Both inthe show and song, there is a feeling of destiny. Personally, I don't believe in destiny. Life could maybe be compared to a game though. We are given certain things at birth: talents, resources, and influences. It's up to us how we use them. We can also choose a goal: fame, wealth, a family, Christlikeness. There are many smaller goals on the way, and your goal may change. But you can't distill life down to a formula. Still, not much should truly be taken seriously in my opinion. In the fourth bit, we learn why Buffy does not love life. I can not even imagine how horrible it would be to be taken from heaven and dragged back to earth. By your friends. Anyway, even when I'm not thinking about all of this, I love this song. funny story of the day: The CD I got Gran was the fourth one. So It will be returned. But RuRu's gift card for Coldstone Creamery was liked. Today is black and peaceful. Like a certain machete... (drool) I will probably be posting again later. I foolishly took a nap, so now I'm wide awake. And just now eating supper: oatmeal with honey, raisens and three formerly frozen cherries. Delicious.

DD and ReRe have been awful all afternoon. Now it's just DD which is worse. I still have no Christmas presents for Ghost or Dad. The slideshow I have been working on insists on making me add transitions between 75 pictures manually. I have seen these slideshows so often that I know the exact order of the pictures. We finally got ReRe to do a serious video, but it took 3 tries. On the first try, he wasn't being serious. On the second, he was being serious, but it was terrible. I won't tell you what he said. On the third, we edited his thoughts beforehand and told him to keep it short. Mine was terrible and didn't make any sense. Nimrod's was perfect (he wrote it out before we filmed). Gertrude's was three words: Hi, popcorn, thanks. Unbelievably DD and Ghost had the cutest videos. MiniMotor was very cute (how could it be otherwise?) but she didn't mention Papa. We did have a lot of funn sleigh riding. Nimrod and I made a really curvy track in the woods. We were walking back up for the last time and realised that it was a pretty crazy track. You start out going down a short but very steep hill, then duck to go under a fallen tree, turn hard to the right to avoid another tree, grab another tree to swing you around in an almost-U-turn (hopefully avoiding another tree by inches) go down another steep hill and brake before you go into the creek. We made another track on the other side of the creek that involved dodging barbed wire, but it didn't work as well. Nimrod started down the path the first time and ran into a tree that was not in his way. He tried again with the same rsult. when he got back to the top, he threw down his sled which hit the roots of a pine tree who then dumped a lot of snow on him. I was laughing so hard that I fell over. I got Gran a susan Boyle CD, but couldn't find anything for Ruru in the twenty minutes I had to do all of my Christmas shopping. Had a nightmare for the first time in years last night. Monster got to Hunter and all I saw was blood splattering against the window. ? I haven't been watching anything gory, reading anything violent, or listening to 'death' music. Which is unusual for me. I have been thinking somewhat violent thoughts toward a certain person though... Huh. Hadn't thought about that. A lot of my dreams are violent and involve a small amount of blood, but not like that. And like I said, they haven't been nightmarish for years. Is it right to refer to dreams as a sickness? I'm sure there is some disorder. ARRRRGGGHHHHH I have to get back to work on my project. Peace! Merry Christmas. Today is artificial blue, like sprinkles on a Christmas cookie.

steppin' with santa

Right now I am listening to Bodhisattva Cathedral. This is one of the few songs that I like even without having a clue as to they are saying. I'm not even sure what language it is sung in. I love it though. It is divided into three parts. Maybe five if you are picky. DD had a concert tonight (he plays the trumpet), and his band did very well. The best part of the evening was definitely the santa though. The 7'th and 8'th grade chorus sang 'steppin' with santa' and had a dance all planned out. However, when the santa came out to dance with a girl, his stuffing started coming out and his pants tried to fall down. He persevered though, holding in plastic bags and his pants with one hand and doing a little shuffling while the girl did her part and tried not to fall down laughing. She did not succeed at one point when he did a little jig. It was hilarious. Dad could not stop laughing. The people who were singing could not see what was going on and looked a little bit disturbed. When he ran across the room after the concert with his concert in a bag, he lost his beard, belt (wonder where that was earlier) and hat. I have been baking for the past two days. I baked over 7 batches of cookies and 2 types of fudge in the last two days. I was very proud of myself. Now I realise that I still have more cookies to make. Dad and I are going to drive to ---- to see the screwtape letters tomorrow hopefully. I really hope we can go and go safely. I have been looking forward to this trip for a couple of months! Actually, I've been looking forward to it since 5 months ago. We even have front row seats. A very funny song: Jonathan Coultan's 'Skullcrusher mountain.' If you type in 'skullcrusher mountain', the first video on youtube is hilarious. Today is glowing straight blue. I like fireflies. Except on my teeth. Or crushed at all actually. Just a thought. According to P. Pete, Santa is a vampire. Google it. It makes sense. Which vampire 'type' makes more sense? Dracula's childishness? Devil's child evil? Or the modern vampire's lonely trek of boredom? And angst? I like Dracula. Though I don't like most of the book. The human characters (particularly females) keep falling to pieces. There are a lot of mythical soul-sucking and/or blood-drinking creatures in cultures around the world. Next time, I'll bring them. read rotten tomatoes on wikipedia. the first sentence is: for use of tomatoes against performers, see ''the cultural impact of tomatoes.' It made me laugh. I have no idea how I ended up on wikipedia from rottentomatoes.com

My cord came, and it works. That was written in a happy tone. Written words are sometimes better than spoken words but not usually when one is describing real life. With spoken words, the words themselves are usually simpler, but the tone and body language can make the words mean almost anything. I occasionally have conversations with friends consisting entirely of one repeated sentence (maybe a few variations). "I like this part." "This part?" "Noooo...." "ohh. That part?" "that part." "Yeah, that part." "and when?" "oh yeah." "me too." Contrary to popular belief, guys do have conversations like this. Not quite like that, but similar. Today, I am listening to Flyleaf's 'Arise' and 'Circles.' I had not heard of them before, but they are an amazing Christian rock group. Band. Thing. What is the difference between a 'group' and a 'band?' For example: David Crowder is a band. David Crowder is also a singer in a group. I do not understand, but I am told there is a difference. I just finished Pay the Piper, which is a decent book. I am not really a fan of Jane Yolen, but I love the story of the Pied Piper. It is one of many unwritten story ideas floating around in the back of my head. Maybe when I finish Rale, (based on beauty and the beast [not the disney version]) I can fill it out a little more. Although I think I have 6 stories in progress at the moment. I probably need to finish more than one to justify starting another. I just got back from the youth Christmas banquet at church. There were 9 people there including me and DD. Last year there were over 20 people. It was not what I expected, but we played 'Pounce' and 'Cheat,' which are card games, and I had a really good time. There are hairs stuck to my computer screen and they are distracting me. Good now they are in a triangle. That is much less distracting. I love the story of the Pied Piper. I've done some research and it seems that there are many versions of the legend. Some say that the children were taken on a crusade, some say that the town was infected with the black plague and the piper was really saving the children. Some say that he took them magically to Germany when they disappeared into the crack of the mountain. Some say that there was a child left behind who was crippled and he would stare out of the window and cry for the piper to come back with his beautiful, laughing music and take him away too. Some say that the children were taken to the land of the fairies, and this is the version that Jane Yolen uses. Some say that they were left hidden in the mountain cleft and remain there even today. They are forever young and wait for the spring when the piper always comes to visit them, playing his music. So is the piper a good guy? A bad guy? An impatient guy with a short temper? Is the piper the personification of some illlness that struck Hamelin's children? Is he human? Fairy? Piper? Rats, Rats, They fought the dogs and killed the cats, And bit the babies in the cradle, And ate the cheese out of the vat... That's all I know so far. Sorry. I don't like rats. killed the cats???!!! Big rats. Today is a dark fir against a pink and purple bruised sky. Evergreen.

Books and Games

I was supposed to talk about two great books, right? They are actually 2 series. 'The Door Within' trilogy is an amazing series. I like the first and third better than the second. It is about a boy who discovers 'the door within' and travels to "The Realm" where he becomes a knight. You get the full backstory of the bad guy immediately, but that does not mean that the ending is a forgone conclusion. These books do a good job of keeping me interested because as soon as one question is solved, a new one is asked. It can be a bit predictable sometimes, but the story really draws you in. The second is the 'colors' circle by Ted Dekker. I'm just reading these for the first time. Occasionally I get bored and switch books for an hour or so, but I keep coming back and being drawn in again. i can't tell you as much about these because I haven't finished them yet. My computer is still sleeping peacefully (hopefully). Maybe tomorrow my new life support cord will come. Probably not. Today I am listening to Hello by Evanescence. And a bunch of disney songs. sometimes I like to listen to a bunch of songs at once. The usual combination is: Tainted Love, You Belong to Me, Running up that Hill, I Walk Alone, It's Just Me, and Alice Human Sacrifice. Alice Human Sacrifice is a very good song. I shall post a link! This is the AMV I like because it has lyrics. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1ZnXz1FMjMo&feature=related This song always makes me think of puppets. Maybe one day my cousins and I will do a music video. YR. YR is one of my favorite card games. It's also called BS, BC, and Yeah Right. Here is a link to the rules. http://card-games.suite101.com/article.cfm/rules_for_playing_i_doubt_it_card_game Another card game I like to play is Italian Noodle. Also known as Polish Rummy. Today is baby blue.

I hate the flu. When I woke up on Friday, I was sick with a fever and slept all day. That was the best day. I lived off of apples and the occasional yogurt until Monday. At which time I ate rice then threw it back up. along with medicine. My fever left Tuesday and I have just been left coughing. A raw throat and sore ribs feel like heaven. I am currently on Dad's computer because my power adapter died. Turns out it is a very important piece of the computer. Who knew? I went through all of the trouble of resetting my clock to the correct time and the power flickered. Now it is ten minutes behind. Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaggggggggggghhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I am lazy enough to just let it blink for another 3 months. I have new bookshelves! Finally! Now I can buy lots and lots of books to go in the now-empty corners! Actually I have already started. Dad took me to a used bookstore that I have never been to. It is three stories of books and bookshelves piled everywhere. It is wonderful. I got five books for under fifteen dollars. Including a dictionary. Am I the only person who goes into a bookstore with an open mind and comes out with a dictionary? I also paid my $40 library fine.
Today I am listening to "Shinkirou" by Loveholic. It is a great song. Here are the lyrics and a link.

The secrets in my dreams tell me
About the sorrows that I’ll come across
I must yearn for mercy
Your pained appearance and my greeting
A gaze that was shut as if tired
I don’t wish for anything more than these
The sickened promise is stinking and hidden; I never knew…

A dream that I can’t recover
My memories grew dim
My pains became dull and my heart cracked
My burnt out soul is simply a cooled mountain of ash
My tears are filled with pain, ha…

So tell me… tell me… the reason why…
How can you do this to me…
You break my heart…
And you make me cry…

In the expressionless, final moonlight
Covered in muddied excuses
The warmth that embraced you
Vanished without a trace; You’ll never know…

Within the endless pain
There’s the belated regret that was left behind
And the flowers of love that disappear meaninglessly…

So tell me… tell me… the reason why…
How can you do this to me…
You break my heart…
And you make me cry…

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KSg2U4DtAtw
warning, I have not watched the whole video. I can say nothing about the contents except that I liked the first three pictures...
This post is going to be ridiculously long. I had better stop here. Sleep is good. Tomorrow I will tell you about two wonderful books that I have been rereading. Tonight is small, red, contained. perhaps a rose petal in empty space. Or a deep red pearl.