A few of my favorite things...

For no particular reason, I felt the need to share some of my favorite things. :-)

1. On the rare occasion that I have time to read, some of my favorite books are ones that present normal ideas in a different light. One example is from Outliers, in which the author explains why professional hockey players in Canada all tend to have January/February birthdays. The reason that author Malcolm Gladwell noticed was because children's hockey leagues' age cutoffs are in December. Hence, the oldest, most developed children are the ones with Jan/Feb birthdays. Each chapter follows a different phenomenon. All of Gladwell's books follow similar topics. Freakonomics is another book in the same vein.

2. I am a faithful coupon clipper, (though I'm not quite as much of a genius as some) and I LOVE getting a good deal. I've discovered that you have to know how to work the system in the right places in order to get the best deal. My best recent example of this was last week when I got a pint of Starbucks ice cream (usually $4.49) and I had three coupons for it that took off $4 of the price. Luckily, I had a great checker at Safeway who ignored the fact that all the coupons were expired AND let me use multiple coupons for one thing :-) Can't beat $0.49 ice cream :-)

3. Since I've been on fall break, I've worked out every day, trying to get outside as much as possible. To keep my head busy while I'm working out, I've been catching up on my favorite podcast, Stuff You Should Know. A smattering of interesting facts of learned from it recently: employer-based health care started as a method of pre-paying for pregnancy/birth care for female teachers in the 20s; sarcopenia (or some of the physical effects of aging-stooping, drooping, some pain, etc.) can be reversed and prevented with physical exercise; and that the original Muppet Show characters can be directly correlated to characters on 30 Rock. :-)

4. Also, on fall break, I've baked bread a LOT. My goal has been to bake every day :-) So far, I've made zwiebach, pizza crust, bagels, and hopefully pumpkin chocolate chip bread from Simply in Season before the week is out :-) It does my heart good to see dough rising (I'm never sure it actually will) and then the smell of baking bread is unbeatable!

5. Finally, the most relaxing part of fall break has been catching up on my favorite TV shows (I LOVE the DVR) including The Office ("R is a very threatening letter. That's why it's called murrrderr and not muckduck."), Ugly Betty (Tu mama scared the living jesús out of me!), It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia ("What do you want Frank, you fascist meat hog?"), Parks and Recreation ("Viva Mayor John Gunderson!") and Glee ("Not everyone has the walnuts to take a pro-littering stance, but I will not rest until every square inch of our state is covered in trash. That's why I pay taxes. It keeps garbage men earning a living, so they can buy tacos for their family.") Laughter is the best medicine, right? :-)

And, an added bonus favorite thing, one of my favorite blogs to read is 1000awesomethings.com, which is dead on, and so funny!!

What are some of your favorites?

You Right to Jail!

After a discussion at supper group tonight about the ridiculous situation the economy in, and how much responsibility the banks hold, we decided that the only thing that would make us feel better is if they went to jail. Which reminded me of this clip from last week's Parks and Recreation, which is a great show, by the way. (Especially if you like The Office.)

By the way, this is the recipe for the cookies I made for dessert, a great fall cookie :-)

Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Cookies

1 cup canned pumpkin

1 cup white sugar

1/2 cup vegetable oil

1 egg

2 cups all-purpose flour

2 teaspoons baking powder

2 teaspoons ground cinnamon

1/2 teaspoon salt

1 teaspoon baking soda

1 teaspoon milk

1 tablespoon vanilla extract

2 cups semisweet chocolate chips

1/2 cup chopped walnuts (optional)

Combine pumpkin, sugar, vegetable oil, and egg. In a separate bowl, stir together flour, baking powder, ground cinnamon, and salt. Dissolve the baking soda with the milk and stir in. Add flour mixture to pumpkin mixture and mix well.

Add vanilla, chocolate chips and nuts.

Drop by spoonful on greased cookie sheet and bake at 350 degrees for approximately 10 minutes or until lightly brown and firm.