Bah...

I am tired. I am tired like a tired thing.

First off, my apologies for apparently falling off the face of the planet for a few days. Blame Sympatico, not me. Okay, partly me, because I didn't touch the computer until Sunday, which is when I discovered that my internet was down because "the remote side is not responding correctly" or somesuch nonsense.

A few futile phone calls to tech support (yes, I unplugged and re-plugged the modem, yes, I restarted the computer, yes, yes, yes...), it seems to have spontaneously healed itself today.

*shrug*

Go figure.

Anyway, took Pukey to the vet yesterday. That would be my big fat orange cat Gretzky, for those of you who don't follow this chronicle regularly. We are currently continuing the Saga of the World's Most Expensive Ear Infection.

Faithful readers may recall that I took her to the vet for this two weeks ago (it's a chronic thing due to a growth in her ear which would cost in the neighbourhood of $600 to remove, thankyouverymuch). Not only did it not clear up —well, it did, but then it flared up again— but she now seems to have done something to her eye on the same side. I don't know if it's directly related to the ear infection (the two are pretty closely-linked, after all), or whether it's because she's been grooming herself excessively on that side due to the antibiotic gunk I have to put in her ear twice a day, or whether George scratched her accidentally in a particularly aggressive bout of mutual grooming (which they do often and without pulling any punches, either). End Run-on-Sentence of Doom.

Anyhow, the eye is inflamed and, well, leaking. So, off to the vet we went. One hundred and fifty dollars later (owie), I now have to put antibiotics in her ear, different drops in her eye, and give her a pill, all twice a day for ten days.

Joy.

Have you ever tried to give a pill to a cat? Those of you who have will understand my pain. Luckily, Gretzky is pretty docile as cats go, so I can just shove her between my knees, pry open her mouth and, after about three or maybe four tries, she consents to swallow the thing. The vet gave me a neat trick: once the pill is in the cat's mouth, rub kitty's nose. That'll make the cat lick it's nose and in the process force it to swallow the pill.

Minimum fuss.

In other news, The Serial is, once again, late. Everything is late.

In mostly-unrelated news (yes, more news, isn't this just thrilling?), I had to work overtime yesterday, and nearly an hour and a half today. Did I mention we're nearing the end of the fiscal year? So now I have to chase after people in order to be able to get my records in order before next Wednesday.

Gah.

I foresee lots of overtime in the near future. On the plus side, that does mean more money.

Supervisor is being an asshat and still refuses to tell me whether or not I'll be hired permanently. Am seriously irked.


On a final, far more uplifting note, I think "sexing the crouton" is just about the funniest thing I've heard in weeks. :)

I think I'll go pass out now.

Oh, no, wait!

*hugs* To all you snowed-in folks in Halifax. Hope everyone's okay! I heard there were massive power-outages and all. So, yeah. If you still have power and can see this, then that's good. ;)

Oh, yeah, casserole and other cooking-related goodness

I made another casserole on Sunday. This time it rocked even more than the first one.

I started out by cooking about half a pound of ground beef with onion and garlic, then sauteed a whole bunch of mushrooms in butter, which I added to the beef once they were almost completely cooked.

Added this to a base of macaroni, along with cream of mushroom soup as a sauce, and carrots and broccoli (steamed in advance).

Seasoned to taste with onion and garlic salt (yes, I splurged and bought both over the weekend), as well as parsley, basil and a dash of pepper.

It was pretty spectacular when I finished it, and even reheated it's still pretty damned amazing.

The funny part of the story is, of course, when the bag of macaroni ripped, spilling about half its contents into the pot. I saved more than half of that for another time this week, when I'll make macaroni and cheese. See, I got more macaroni since my last batch was invaded by weevils. I think I have the weevil infestation under control now (everything that was contaminated has been thrown away, and everything else kept away from the contaminated areas), which is a good thing. Nothing grosser than finding dead weevils in your food. Or live ones, for that matter.

My mother has this great macaroni and cheeserecipe, where you start with a white sauce and melt cheese into it (cheese of your choice, of course) and pour that over the macaroni. Season to taste with garlic salt and pepper. Then grate more cheese (again your choice) over the top and set it in the oven for a while. Set the oven at broil for about five minutes or until the top turns a gorgeous golden brown.

Serve hot. :)

Oh, and before I forget: TACKLEGLOMP OF DOOM to karine for sending me a boatload of delicious-looking recipes. I'm all a-quiver now to try them out.

...

o_O The neighbours are listening to weird music. I can't even tell what it is, except that it's discordant. Am annoyed. This is the same neigbour who left me a note with more swearwords than anything else in my mailbox complaining that my alarm clock is too loud in the morning. I kid you not.

Sheesh. "Hello Kettle? This is the pot. I am calling to inform you that you are black."

Meh.

Going to bed now.