a99kitten's Musings

I am pretty sure I could eat this a few times a week. When I go to Hawaii, I eat this and pineapple ALL the time. You cannot get better fish or pineapple than in Hawaii. Just tastes best there. I think it’s possible that I could survive solely on poke, spicy tuna hand rolls and pineapple! I don’t think the huskies would mind :)

Ingredients:

1lb. Sushi grade ahi – make sure very good fish.
Toasted sesame oil (1 tablespoon of sesame oil per 1 lb of fish – adjust accordingly if you use more fish)
Low sodium Soy Sauce
Crushed red pepper flakes
Pine nuts (You can also substitute chopped/crushed macadamia nuts for the pine nuts. Both are really good.)
Sesame seeds

The important thing about this recipe is cubing the fish in small pieces. This way it soaks the flavor. I put the fish in the freezer for about 30 minutes so that it firms up a bit. Then it’s easier to cut in little cubes. Rinse off the fish and pat dry.

Put the cubed fish in a medium to large bowl. Pour in the sesame oil and mix very well so it gets all over the fish. Even using your hands to do it is a good idea. Then flatten it out so it’s level, but not squish it down.

Slowly pour in enough soy sauce so it seeps down in the fish and monitor as your pour as you want it all over the fish and just at the level of the “fish line”, not soupy or drowning the fish. If too much, then you have to pour it out. Then mix the fish again and cover it and put in fridge. The best thing is to be able to let it marinate for hours. I left mine in yesterday for over 7 hours. The longer the better!

When you are ready to eat, take it out and add the pine nuts, sesame seeds and crushed red pepper. All of these things are added by taste and preference. I like a lot of pine nuts so I added 1.5 oz of pine nuts and a fair amount of sesame seeds. Mixing it a few times as I added to make sure it was getting in there but so you can judge if it’s enough/too much. I added the red pepper last. I am a baby when it comes to spicy so I only added a few shakes. But if you love spice – you can add more :) But not too much so it overpowers the flavor of the fish.

Now you are ready! I eat it with either baked pita chips or over some sticky rice. Either way is awesome in my opinion.

I’ve seen other recipes, and very typically in restaurants, that add onions (I hate onions) and other stuff. I do not. This is a simple recipe and should be kept simple. My husband perfected it to my tastes. Yesterday was the first time I made it myself! And now that I know, I think I will make it for myself a LOT!

Today I saw a Washington DC license plate with the motto “Taxation without Representation”

I know it’s for their own Congressional voting rights or whatever. But it actually says a lot more than that. To me it says Washington DC REPRESENTS Taxation without Representation. Much like Idaho plates say Famous Potatoes because well…they grow a lot of ’em. Florida’s say The Sunshine State because well…plenty of sunshine in that state. Hawaii? Aloha State. Get it?

So see…Washington DC means TAXATION WITHOUT REPRESENTATION. Perfect. Because those unethical idiotic fools do not represent me. Especially the ones we have been repeatedly sending from this once great state of California.

This guy is in charge of the union for federal employees. The employees who our taxes pay wages and benefits for. And because they are unionized can likely never be fired for incompetence like private sector, non-union workers. The same employees who feel they are entitled to life-long (likely under-funded) pensions and benefits paid for by…hmmm….who exactly?

And what could they possibly have to go on strike about? Are the coal mines they are working in unsafe? Are they exposed to toxic chemicals or fires or armed suspects as they sit behind their desks from 9-5? Forced child labor maybe? No. Nothing like that. They marched in Washington this week to protest the proposed freeze on federal wage spending. So basically because they probably won’t get an annual pay increase and have to pay a slightly higher portion of their health insurance premium. A pretty idiotic reason to strike when the nation has a 14 TRILLION dollar deficit and almost 10% unemployment. Feel free to quit guys and gals. Pretty sure there are plenty of people who would be happy to take your place.

http://www.usdebtclock.org/

And I really hope this putz gets the same media tongue-lashing that Britney Spears got when she said “retarded” in some article. Because you know with 100% certainty that if a Republican or a company CEO said this, all of PC-hell would rain down on him and it would be ad nauseum streaming headline news on CNN and MSNBC and make the front page of the New York Times.

Unions = entitled jackasses. Union Bosses – corrupt jackasses.

I just took down all of the balloons from my Super Bowl party. Boo :( I love balloons! But more boo is that it means football is over for the season. I used to have the Pro Bowl to ease it out but no longer since they changed the schedule and put that on the week before the Super Bowl (genius…) So now my football season ends with a Super Bowl bang. I’m sad.

My fantasy team sucked this year. I almost made it into the play-offs. But that’s like almost winning Miss Congeniality at the beauty pageant. 10 teams in our league and 6 go to play-offs. I think I was 7. Whee! Meh. I was commissioner (have been for the past couple years) and I had one simple rule. You are not allowed to draft Michael Vick. He is off limits in my league. Don’t like it? Go play somewhere else. I’ll try not to cry over the loss of your team. So what happens? 2 different teams draft him at different points in the season. One of them the week they are playing me! Hellllooooooo. But both of those team managers had the good sense to realize their egregious error and not actually play him on game day.

Then the next genius to draft him (yes…a 3rd manager…what is wrong with you people?) does so on the weekend I was away in Florida dealing with the death of my little brother. I had other things on my mind than dealing with ass clowns so I didn’t do anything. I wish I did. The guy even sends a note saying how he will donate $5 to my favorite animal charity (I set that price last year…it will go up next year to $100) but it was worth the price to have the points. Hahaha. Yeah – that’s what he said. To me. One of the biggest dog/animal lovers he will ever know and the commissioner of the league. OK. Forever banned from my league. Seriously. Idget.

I did OK in the weekly picks. I think I won twice. Maybe 3 times but I think twice and tied another is correct. So I think I basically even out there? I am also the commissioner there and that is giant hassle as I have to collect the winnings each week and dole them out. I need to come up with a better system next year OR people pay a commissioner fee (other friends of mine who are league commissioners say their buy-in is paid by all the players for doing all of the accounting and work – wth?? I am being cheesed!)

Then we did the play-off/SuperBowl picks. Everyone had NE or ATL winning the Super Bowl. I had NE and GB in the Super Bowl as did one other person. We rule :) It came down to us and so we split the pot. My general personality is to let that money ride and winner take all. However, several years ago when PIT was the wild card 6th seed in the play-offs, that no one saw coming, they played Seattle in the SB. The pool was down to me and this same friend. I had SEA to win the SB and he had more points from previous play-off games (no one had PIT even going to the SB that year much like GB this year) so if SEA lost, he would win. He offered to just split the pot and said no – let it ride. Doh. I was not making that same mistake this year. Cash in hand is better than cash not in hand :)

Then we had Super Bowl Squares (no, we do not have any gambling problems, why do you ask?) I won the first quarter and Angelus won 3rd quarter. So I was even with my win there (versus the squares I bought) and Angelus will get some good treats with his winnings (that he will share with Storm!)

My Super Bowl party was super fun. It was a gorgeous day on the coast, all the windows and doors open, sun shining (and then beautifully setting), a super fun game and good friends. I made yummy food and people brought yummy stuff. We had bubbly flowing (I like that my friends go with the bubbly flow and don’t demand Bud!) One of my best friends, who knows me so well, brought food for the the buddies! Their own Super Bowl treats – giant ham bones! They got to eat them that night! Plus she bought other treats for them and me – a bottle of Veuve Clicquot Rose. Tasty!

Another friend brought a treat bag that I just took apart tonight – it’s filled with a bottle of Chandon Blanc de Noirs and Moet Chandon Imperial. Tasty X 2! Plus a bunch of Belgian truffles from Brugge (having just returned from Belgium and Romania that afternoon and coming over to watch the game.

And another friend brought a bottle of Prosecco that I can’t wait to try. It’s from the Famiglia Zonin and called DOC. When I saw the label I thought it said DOG and was like – WHOA! Best Prosecco ever! :) But not DOG – it’s DOC. But still excited to try it :)

So all in all a decent football season. I love the game and truly hope there is no strike. That will suck. What the heck will I do with my Sundays..and Mondays…and sometimes Thursdays from September through January??? :(

And now…well….time to stress about March Madness to take my mind off missing football :)

This morning the huskies and I had another excellent beach adventure! We wandered through the neighborhoods and then made our over to the beach. Storm’s friend Charlie was there and he seemed pretty happy to see her :)

I don’t let Storm play with just any dogs off-leash. I have to know them or watch them play for awhile. Storm needs the perfect mixture of just out-going enough to be fun and crazy but not aggressive or too alpha as that gets Storm going on his “need to prove I’m boss” (well…under boss really since everyone knows Angelus is the boss dog!) Plus we want to be nowhere near the bitey, agro dogs either. He definitely does better with girl dogs too. No need to be dominant at all.

Charlie is great! She loves to run and play but is super sweet and fairly submissive. So I let him play off-leash with her. This video is the first couple minutes of what was about 40 minutes of them playing today, along with Angelus and their other friend Pearl. Vry happy to see him wanting to play more and more with other dogs and being back to his happy self. :)

Woke up, fed the huskies and took them on their walk at 7am. Already a gorgeous sunshiney day here and the huskies and I had a great walk! I knew I had to get back by 8:50am though!!! Before I left, I set up my laptop and put my wallet next to it so I could run in and be ready! We ended up getting back at 8:45am so I made some coffee – figured it was a good idea to add some caffeine to my already amped up mood! Had the reg page all up and ready to push go. And at 8:59am…it crashed. Doh….here we go again…

Was on chat with my friend so we could collude on getting passes – whoever got in first had the marching orders to purchase! Kept refreshing and finally got the order page after 45 minutes. Then it timed out again. NO!!!!!! (all Darth Vader style!) Husband texts me (from downstairs) “what are you doing?” (yes, I did actually yell out NOOOOOO!) I don’t have time to text you back, I have to keep hitting refresh!!! But the URL did say checkout so I had hope that I was in a different part of the website! Finally I got to the credit card and registration info page! YAY! Enter all the info and then…timed out again. GAH! But it said order review in the URL so again…HOPE! And then after refreshing lots more – CONFIRMATION!

The order was confirmed and I saved a screen shot of my confirmation page! They aren’t sending confirmation emails out until (starting) 2/8 so I wanted to be sure I had the info! Hopefully, it is not screwed up somehow. The system basically sucked but at least it worked this time. Ah….the good ol’ days (like 5 years ago) of faxing in my registration and getting my pass sent to me in the mail are long gone….Now it’s hit refresh and yell at my screen for an hour, hope the order actually went through and then wait in a 2-hour long line to pick up my ticket in San Diego. Improvement of modernization? Notsomuch….

BUT…the point is I got them!! YAY!!!! 4 day pass for me and my friend! And a day pass for husband so he can pop in if he wants but not be forced to endure 4 straight days of geeks and lines :) And the Chewbacca backpack gets another San Diego adventure!

This was as I left for the airport to SDCC laat year!

Now I just need to figure out the lodging. Details, details…

The last 2 times they started registration and put tickets on sale, and the systems crashed, I remember having it on my calendar and being excited but between Storm health issues and family troubles, I was unable to try and get them. Life wasn’t cooperating. But then neither could anyone else. I put this date on my calendar and hoped I’d be able to get tickets. So I like to think that I was meant to go to Comic Con this year and have a blast like last year :)

Plus, the main guy star in these types of movies always has his funny best pal so Chewie should get some air time :)

Went through my recipes and I am thinking…

Buffalo Chicken dip (Hungry Girl version) w/pita chips
Sour cream onion dip and Ruffles (my annual allowance)
Cheesy pigs in bacon blankets (they were big hits last year)
Bayless Mac and Cheese

and….I’m not sure….maybe Shepherd’s Pie? Turkey chili….Hmm…

Someone is bringing stuffed mushrooms and someone else cheeses and chips and salsas. Not sure what else is coming or from whom. I will have bubbly for me. Various beers for others of course. Will be a smaller crowd this year. But of closer friends so that’s better :) I need to get all the shopping done after work tomorrow as Saturday is a Napa wine day.

I don’t really care about either team this year but I have a bet on the Packers! And Aaron Rodgers is a good story/kid. Plus it’s kind of hard to root for a team with Ben R. on it. I find it rather funny (in that funny like a clown way) that the NFL welcomes a sociopath, dog-murdering felon back with open arms and celebrates him. Let’s a twice-accused rapist off with a 5 game suspension and yet Eddie DeBartolo still can’t own/actively manage an NFL team. Stupid.

But anyway – GO PACK! I do love cheese….

Fed the huskies
Had a super fun beach walk (2 beaches and about 8 new doggie friends!) for almost 2 hours with the huskies
Checked and answered work and personal email
Had some coffee and tweeted and facebooked
Cleaned Gypsy’s (kitty) house and water fountain
Swept back deck from mass wind/tree carnage
Removed spider webs from front of house (waiting for the spider’s revenge…)
Cut some tree branches on front and back trees that were knocking into the house last night and today from wind (and waking me up last night!)
Did 3 loads of laundry
Washed all of my make-up brushes
Put away my new La Mer stuff :)
Removed stuff and cleaned up spare bedroom since husband decided to use it for his piles (wrong pal)
Cleaned up garage just enough to put that stuff there. Garage is husband’s mess – not mine – to deal with.
Swept garage – sand is mine and the huskies :)
Paid bills
Balanced mine and husbands’ various checking accounts
Put stuff away that was in small piles around the house. I hate piles. Might kill husband for piles some day.
Hung up my coat from yesterday that was still in car which led to me cleaning out coat closet and taking out 4 coats to donate. Ahhh…room.

That’s enough for now. Time for reading in the sun with absolutely no lazy guilt…will attack all of our tax stuff for Monday’s accountant meeting tonight or tomorrow. When it’s not prime sun….and I don’t have a new Vanity Fair and Vogue staring at me to read them :)

Love the color! A splash of bright candy :)

70% off retail! I’m supposed to turn that down?!?