A few days ago, we were presented with lovely Lindt Santas at CB's house (where we also had the very best cheesecake we've ever had).  Ben won't let me eat Santa, but he will let me pose him in the snow:)

We went to see a show tonight!  It was fun (despite the fact that it was solely based on sexual humor), but a LONG day.  We also got to see fabulous friends O and E, which was really quite lovely.

(In the interest on honesty, I must tell you that this picture was actually taken tomorrow. How is that possible?  Magic!)

Today, I went for a nice walk with my mom by the lake.  We walked to the lake, by the lake, and home from the lake, which is a few good miles, with a lot of hilliness.  The downhill really got my shins, but it was fun:)

Today, I ate the most french fries that anyone has ever eaten.  They were amazing.  More importantly, we have fabulous friends who give us fabulous gifts.  Here's us, ready to go to sleep with our new gift!  (Getting us in the shot with the blanket took some fancy camera work.)

We met my dad today for a lovely lunch in Princeton.  We requested Princeton as the town to meet in because we REALLY wanted to go to the best ice cream place in the world: The Bent Spoon.  After trying a few flavors, I settled on Bourbon Sea Salt Caramel and Dark Chocolate Chestnut and Ben got Bourbon Sea Salt Caramel with an amazing chocolate flavor - Dark Philosophy, made with Three Philosophers beer.Then, Ben and I went to scope out the new residential college, which I've only seen as a work in progress.  It was really pretty and looked as if it belonged there, but it felt weird to me because there were like a million buildings where there used to be some tennis courts...  This was my favorite part: Hargadon Hall.  Afterwards, we spent a really fun night with my family to celebrate Chanukah, went home, played a few rounds of Bananagrams, and watched a pretty stupid movie.   

This is mini-teacher. He's spent around two years just above my glove compartment.  His face is a little broken, he has no arms, and his pants are no longer attached to him, but we love him still.  He was actually part of a shoe box diorama that one of my former students made for another teacher's class and then decided to give to me instead of throwing out... Mini-teacher spent a couple days co-teaching my classes and has been in my car since then.  I don't know what we would do without him.

CHRISTMAS MORNING!!!  (it looks much smaller than some other years have, but it was a great one:))

This was my candy cane, and I seem to have turned it into some sort of weapon.  I poked myself with it to see if it was sharp and it was (VERY)!

We had to clean and pack before we left today.  So Ben finished up the cleaning we started in the kitchen yesterday and I folded clothes in the bedroom... But what really happened was that Ben was watching Season 6 of The West Wing in the kitchen, so I'd pick up a piece of clothing, walk to the kitchen, fold it, go to the bedroom, put it away, pick up another piece of clothing, repeat until done.  I hadn't taken a shower yet, and my hair was gross, so I ended up doing this with it, which I thought would amuse you all. 

Tonight was a 3 vegetable dinner.  For lunch, we each had a pretzel at BJ's while we Christmas shopped rather unsuccessfully, and then we had an afternoon snack of mostly vegetables, so we weren't very hungry and I had bought string beans, butternut squash, and brussel sprouts to cook before we go away (tomorrow).  So here's dinner.  It was actually EXCELLENT.  I cooked the brussel sprouts with butter, onions, toasted hazelnuts and then put a little lemon juice, salt, and pepper on them, and they were amazing.  Butternut squash with butter and brown sugar, and string beans, well, I don't really want to talk about how my string bean plan fell through, but they ended up just with butter and were quite nice.  Unfortunately, Ben doesn't eat brussel sprouts, so I had to eat them all on my own, but they were definitely the highlight.  

Sad thing of the day: My very favorite pajama pants, which are many many years old are all done.  I finally had to put them in the trash after I stepped on the bottom and the rip that had been developing in the ankle area spread to my upper thigh :(  

Happy thing of the day:

Happy first night of Chanukah!  (I thought I didn't have candles and it's a snow storm so I couldn't really go out in search of them, but due to a Chanukah miracle (or the fact that I didn't look in the obvious place in the first place), I finally found enough for all eight nights!!!)

Have any of you experienced a period of life when you have sudden urges to reproduce your grandmothers' standards?  It's been happening to me more and more lately.  From my mom's mom: I now can make pretty good msoki, prella (a spinach, beef, and bean dish whose name I have butchered), and my own version of chakchouka.  These links are not to her recipes.  The ones I can find online are all very similar to hers, but they all include spices like cinnamon, cloves, coriander, and cilantro, which I use in my every day cooking, but I don't recall her ever having used.  Interesting....  Anyway, from my dad's mom, we have the traditional Jewish foods.  I can now make a pretty excellent version of matzo ball soup.  I made kugel, challah, and latkes last week, and today I had the biggest urge to make my grandmother's brisket.  Unfortunately, I couldn't find anyone who knew what she put in it.  I'll have to dig a little deeper, I guess.  But for today, I got out the slow cooker and put in the things I knew went in it (beef brisket (though all I could find at the supermarket was corned beef brisket and I have no idea how that'll be different besides it being pretty expensive), carrots, onions, celery?, tomato paste) and added a couple other things (a little bit of bbq sauce, some beef broth, onion soup mix, fresh garlic...) and I'm hoping something yummy comes out in a bunch of hours....

GROSS!!!!  (also, still in pajamas at 3 pm.  today's plan to visit my old school got snowed out. sad...)  

makeshift double boiler

First real snow!  Since my car was busy getting new tires so that it'll function for the winter, we used Ben's car, which is red, like all our puffy coats.  

Here I am, ready for my internship meeting again (which will hopefully really happen today) - same outfit, makeupy again, didn't do my hair as nicely as yesterday.... but I decided to go with contacts today!!! (it might be the first time since the wedding that I'm wearing them...)  Wish me luck!  

Here's me all dressed up and makeupy for my meeting at my internship site.  I had a little self-photo shoot, and then included Ben.  As you can see, Ben had decided that my new scarf and hat were his, though they're clearly too small.  Anyway, I should have been checking school closings instead of taking pictures.  I had called and emailed the person I was meeting with to confirm it, but didn't get her, so figured I should just go. I got there to a closed, dark, and very empty school.  Blech.  An hour wasted coming and going, lots of time wasted getting pretty, and I wore my only clean nice looking clothes!!!    Later in the day I got a call and rescheduled the meeting for tomorrow, which is good because it REALLY needs to happen before Christmas break at the school....  But grrr.... I don't want to do laundry!!! 

Our power came back on at around 4:30 yesterday afternoon.  We got home in the evening to a toasty house, and light switches which actually did something!  Anyway, today, Ben had a million articles to read and annotate.  Meanwhile, I started and finished a super-secret christmas project, and afterwards, I took out a half crocheted scarf from a couple years ago and finished it and made a hat to go with it.  They were kind of meant to be for Ben, until I realized that the scarf was too short for him, and there was exactly enough yarn for a Janine-sized hat.  Here we are.  Now it's time for me to do some writing too....  

So, no power still when we woke up this morning.  Temperature in the house is around 63, which is still not so bad.  We tried to go to the cafe we go to every weekend, but it was too crowded, so we went to the library on campus.  Since there wasn't any wireless internet still, I finished my take-home final that is due Monday fairly quickly, and then as soon as I finished, wireless came on!  It was like a reward for (kind of) being done with the semester.  In truth, this semester will blend right into next semester since I'm finishing the work for two of my four classes over break.  So, that is all to say, around 160 pages written so this semester, and about 160 more to go....  Anyway, this is a picture of me celebrating.

Dear readers, 

You may or may not know this, but my part of the world lost power on Thursday night.  The lights first flickered just after our guests left and when my computer was 3/4 of the way through downloading this week's Pushing Daisies, the power all died.  We realized it was still off when we woke up Friday morning, but really kind of thought it was just our little area.  Just as we were on our way out the door (because I had an 11:00 triad scheduled), one of my triad partners showed up at our door to let us know that the power was down EVERYWHERE and the university was closed.... Word was that there was a big "ice storm" that caused all the power outages and I kept thinking, "Storm? There was no storm!"  Then I asked Ben what an ice storm actually is and he said it's when the trees and power lines and stuff get so heavy from the ice that's coating them that they fall down and do lots of damage.  Then I was like "Oh! That's what happened here!"

So, after a very helpful text message from a friend, we found one of the only cafes in Dover with internet and power, where we did work for the bulk of the day.  It was right next to the town hall and some other stuff, so apparently that area had backup generators... We went back home to check in at around 4:00 pm, and the power was on in most of Newmarket, but not in our apartment complex.  Luckily, our apartment stays nicely insulated, so the temperature was still around 67.  We went for free grad student dinner back in Durham, where much of the power had come back on.  (Free food was actually really perfect, because of the inability to cook on our electric stove, and unwillingness to open the refrigerator and increase the likelihood that all our food will spoil.)  

This picture was taken on the way.  Ben still had his headlamp on for our pitch black walk down the hallway, and he had decided to wear his sunglasses because his hair was so gross that he decided they would help make it look ok if he took his sunglasses off.  After free dinner, Ben took a shower at campus rec and I got some work done there (where I could charge my computer and phone!).  Then we went home, watched a dvd on my computer and fell asleep.  Apparently the moon was bright because I kept thinking that the lights in the parking lot had come back on.

today started out totally chaotic - i had to take part in 4 unplanned panels this morning, and then afterwards had a video review with my prof for our triad counseling sessions, which is totally nerve-racking, but all turned out ok...    

then, this evening, we co-opted this week's thursday night dinner, which unfortunately got a little "iced out" and a bunch of people couldn't come.  this added to the "jew it up proper"-ness of the evening.  (i had made matzo ball soup, noodle kugel, and challah, and ben and i made latkes, but the fact that lots people couldn't come made the quantities i had made of some of these foods a little ridiculous...)  but it really was lovely - we played wii with the two other couple who came (which could only be done with our christmas tree turned off since the lights interfered with the sensors in the wii) and ate much too much.  the pictures above were taken during the pre-guest hour, the apron was necessary because of the extreme messiness of kugel liquids and liquids draining from shredded potatoes.  isn't it cute, though?  got it at ben's mom's shop and this was the first time i actually felt the need to use it.  sorry for the disjointed nature of this post... trying to do many things at once.

rainy day. lots of jackets. bag got wet.  actually, when i was walking to class, the strap of my bag was so soaked that the water ran down one of the legs of my pants and i that leg became completely soaked from top to bottom, while the other remained almost completely dry... also, took a crappy final.  

Dear readers, 

  Something pretty exciting happened today, which came as a result of something pretty exciting that happened around a week ago.  Shirt Woot had random shirt day and I bought one for me and one for my sister.  I wanted to get a bunch for a bunch of different people, because what's better than a totally randomly selected shirt?  But by the time I bought them, they only had women's small left, so she and I are the only lucky recipients.  So, here they are.  Which one do you want, Joelle?  I'm happy with either.

so, during my last class session tonight, which was not really as informative as many class sessions are, i took a lot of photo booth pictures of people around me (until they started noticing and ducking and it got too distracting).  but since i didn't check in with them about this bloggy thing, i decided not to post them this time.  so.... here's what i did while studying after class.  yes, that is pink wine. i didn't buy it.  it was brought to our house.  but i'll admit that i drank it.  

So, I woke up before 8 this morning and started writing.  When Ben got up, I was about to go the library, and he asked me if I had looked outside yet, because he didn't think I'd want to drive to campus.  It was snowing!!!!   First snow!  Yayayay! So I made his latte to go, and he drove me to the library, I ran around picking up books that I would not actually end up using later today, and went home to write like a crazy woman.  (The picture is the view as we left the library. I was so excited about the snow.  I feel like it HAD TO have looked like more than that at the time.  Anyway, it's gone now...)  Sooo... I wrote all day, finished the full draft of today's paper before dinner, like I had hoped.  Then we went out to dinner and I came home, edited all 3 papers that I've written since Thursday, emailed them to my professor, and now I'm trying to figure out what to do next.  I think it might be a glass of wine and a take home final (I can get a 15/30 on the final and still get an A in the class, so I think it's a good plan:))  Right now, I feel a little like a rockstar.

Study/snacking session for Tuesday's exam: 1:30 pm- 7:45 pm.  Maybe more fun than it should have been, but I definitely think we're all experiencing our fair shares of anxiety (a convenient place to start our journey?)  We're hoping that following our greatest anxiety will lead us to our greatest happiness.  

(And if you're not in our class, you probably think I'm just saying silly corny stuff. The truth is, I'm saying important silly corny stuff that comes from our lectures...)

Christmas Tree Day!  First, we bought it, which is quite a process for us (no pictures, sorry.).  We got our very wide bottomed tree into the house (we had decided that we would get a little tree this year because we've got a lot to do and not so much space in our living room... whoops!)

Then I got all the stuff out of the closet, which was much harder than it sounds.  

We decorated together, then Ben vacuumed, 'cause he's a good kid.  

FINAL PRODUCT!!! 

(for tonight. tinsel and presents will come later) 

So many things happened today. I went to class, then worked on a paper from noon until five, and actually kind of finished it.  (Thanks to M, who sat in a tiny room with me also writing, playing music, and yelling at me when I talked to her.)  Afterwards, I was exhausted, but we had planned to go to the new Outdoor Ed. climbing wall unveiling party for free pizza and a little bit of climbing.  The pizza was amazing.  It was nice to climb, though the climbing wasn't great and I'm so weak right now that my arms felt like Popeye arms after two climbs.  Then afterwards, we went for $.25 wings at a place we used to go every Thursday last semester.  Now, there's a story behind $.25 wings, but I'll tell the very brief version:

One week we went out for some food and drinks after Ben and his friend N got out of class.  They had already been there a while by the time I got there, but we ordered more food and noticed that it said Thursdays: $.25 wings on the blackboard.  Ben didn't think that was so great, since he had gone to school in New York, and wings had sometimes been things like $.10 there, but we decided to get some and started calculating how many we should get based on their price.  The waitress interrupted us to tell us that they were, in fact, $.25 a plate.  When we asked her how many wings were on a plate, she told us that it could be as many as we wanted, as long as they fit.  We had her check to make sure she wasn't wrong, because $.25 for a plate of wings sounded ridiculous.  She came back and was sure.  So, we kept coming back for many weeks, each time checking to make sure that this RIDICULOUS deal was really legitimite.  There were a couple of occasions in which there were so many of us there that there were hundreds of wings at the table.  We'd bring home boxes of wings because had ordered too many.  I think we may have even ordered boxes of wings to go!  (I seem to not be telling the short version of this story.)  Anyway, this went on until the semester was over, and before N went away for the summer, he and Ben and I went on one last Thursday.  We got 25 wings and the bill came out to $6.50.  $6.25 would have been $.25 each (they probably just added a little wrong), so that was.... well, $.25 a wing, not $.25 a plate.  So we asked the waiter, who had already told us that he hadn't worked there since last summer, and he said of course it was $.25 a wing, because $.25 a plate would be ridiculous.  We agreed that it was ridiculous, telling him that we had checked in with at least three different waitresses over at least six weeks.  He told us to ask the owner, who might honor that, even though it wasn't legit.  So N asked the owner, starting with "We don't want to get anybody fired, but..." and the owner, of course, said "$.25 a plate?  That's crazy!" to which we all said, "We know!"  Needless to say that now wings are $.25 a wing, and a plate of 25 wings for $6.25 is not bad (unless you've had the same plate of wings for $.25).  Today was only the first or second time we've been back since and N has since become a vegetarian (as were half the people at the table), so we ordered 24 wings.... Not quite like last semester, but it was fun and I think the wings were just what I needed....

2 more papers this weekend....   

I can tell it's winter-ish because Ben's bike is now set on on its trainer.  Soon mine will be too!  It's not that I've been riding it outside all this time. It's just that it's gotten to that point that's far enough past the summer when I say, "Wow. I really should do some kind of exercise...."

Our new toy came in the mail today (thanks to those who gave us Macy's gift cards, and Macy's for having a big sale...) and we used it to make chocolate mousse.  Yay and yum.  

p.s. This almost made up for the fire alarm going off in our apartment building for the second day in a row.  We went to the cafe when it happened this time.  And at least today we weren't still sleeping when it happened....

This is what my computer gets to see, all day every day.  

So we left the house for a while today (went to the cafe and did work then) and when we came back, we saw this little guy in our hallway.  It's unclear to me whether he's out in the hall to spread holiday cheer or by accident.  This is the very same door that I knocked on to let the resident know that she had left her massive set of keys in the door.  Later that week, I realized that she does that at least a few days a week.  

another good paper writing and photo booth day...

I know you guys are checking, but you might as well leave comments to let me know that you care :-P  

Once again, I really do love playing with Photo Booth, especially the Comic Book effect on a day that would otherwise be comprised of nothing but work.  We almost took a walk today, but then we had Thanksgiving Round 3 (probably the penultimate turkey eating  of the weekend) and it got really dark and cold outside.  Maybe we'll go outside for a few minutes tomorrow - it'll be Ben's birthday!  Make sure to wish him a happy one.  He likes that. :)

Thanksgiving Part 1

In the morning, I woke up, started our 3 lb turkey breast brining, and wrote for a little while.  When Ben woke up, he worked on baking the apple pie (notice the B + J?  we're cute.) and I sat at the edge of the kitchen writing papers and reading him recipes.  Then we made the best stuffing ever (made with chicken sausage instead of real sausage 'cause I don't eat piggies), working on the paper every time I could let things cook themselves for a few minutes.

When that was done, we ate our first course (chicken soup I made a few days ago, and peanut butter and jelly).  I wrote and Ben printed articles for a couple hours, then we put the turkey breast in the oven. 

About an hour and a half later, I put the stuffing and mashed potatoes (store bought) in the oven and dropped some pine nuts, almonds, and frozen string beans into a pan, which worked out beautifully.

In the 10 post turkey roasting minutes, we popped some Pillsbury rolls in the oven, I made some mushroom gravy, we put our two cans of cranberry sauce in two separate bowls (I like berries. Ben likes no berries.)....

Thanksgiving Part 2

....and Ben set everything on the table.

I got out of my pajamas and into a dress and Ben got changed into some fancy clothes too and we had a lovely Thanksgiving together.  We missed our families, but were glad to have been able to make it such a memorable, romantic night, despite the crazy amounts of work we have to do...

When we finished eating, we took a series of silly pictures, which resulted in the breaking of a chair.  I mean, we knew that they were not the sturdiest chairs, but it was still a little bit of a surprise.