Cold Season

It's cold season, and unfortunately grad students are not immune. It's a good thing I made a large vat of Dad's chicken soup this weekend - it seems to have healing properties.

POTAGE DE POULET

8 Cups water
1 Whole chicken
1 T Salt

Combine above, bring to boil, simmer for a couple of hours
Remove chicken and set aside to cool
Add whatever you like, but the following are (strongly) suggested:

1 Leek, sliced across about every 3/8", wash the leaves individually
1 Onion, sliced or diced
1 Carrot, peeled and sliced
parsley, fresh is good
spinach leaves work well also
celery stalks, sliced across, (smaller leaves are good big leaves are bitter)
bit of ground pepper

Simmer in broth till veggies are soft
De-bone and remove skin from chicken and break up into spoon size pieces, add to broth.

Not such an angel

It would seem that our little angel is not such an angel afterall. When putting on my fleece vest this morning, I found a chunk had been taken out of the arm hole - right in the front!!!

Guess that'll teach me to pick up the living room more often.

Life and Puppies

It may seem that all we talk about these days relates to the puppy. Well, that's probably true. Her energy and thirst for attention certainly keep us on our toes. Cici does play a role in most parts of our lives now. For instance, she currently helps Derrick study, and occasionally helps me with my homework, too. She's also very good about helping to clean the dishes as they are loaded into the dishwasher and does a great job washing the kitchen floor. If we let her, she's also capable of scrubbing toilets, killing insects, and scrubbing the walls (with her tongue).

We're currently debating whether or not she actually has any German Shorthair in her, or if she's really a lab and dachshund mix. She's essentially a black dachshund with longer legs and an incredible ability to jump. She periodically jumps and misses the futons completely. It would be great to catch that on video sometime, but we've had no such luck.

For things non-puppy related, we're finishing up our Fall"Break" tomorrow and start back to work on Wednesday. At a Newman Center tailgate, Derrick was lucky enough to win some great Husker volleyball tickets so we'll be going to a game Wednesday evening. I have always wanted to go to one so here's my chance!

Recent Happenings

Fall is here and the semester is in full-swing. Between making presentations, writing proposals, taking (or giving) exams, problem sets, and lab assignments, Derrick and I are busy bodies. It's a good thing I relieve stress in the kitchen, otherwise we'd never have anything to eat!

A new HyVee was built just down the street from us and we went yesterday to check out the grand opening. We found some great sales and are thrilled to have a nice grocery store so close to home! The store was clean and had fantastic samples, especially around the meat counter. Tonight we will have a pork loin roast and Mediterranean risotto.

Other than graduate school and kitchen adventures, this little monster had been occupying the rest of our time. :)



She looks so calm in pictures, too...