Domestic Geek

Marcus and I had lunch at a place I think I've written about before called The Sub Stop. It's in the Hobby Lobby shopping center at 6th and Sable here in Aurora. The woman that runs or owns (not sure which) the place is awesome. She remembers her customers—a trait that is rare these days. Hey Mike, Nina and Sarah, she asked how you guys were doing since she hadn't seen you all in awhile! How cool is that? Oh, and they make awesome sweet tea there. I usually get something with roast beef in it—a french dip or a philly sub. They really pile on the ingredients, too. Go check it out!

Marcus got my some dinner from the New China Chef. Mmmm, I love crab cream cheese wontons. Yummay!

I tried making some a little while back. I didn't know you could buy canned crab meat like tuna. Anyway, I don't know if the wonton wrappers I bought at King Soopers sucked or whether I couldn't get an accurate temperature on the oil in the pan (my deep fat fryer bit the dust and I really need a new one), but they didn't turn out very good at all. One day I'll try them again with wrappers from somewhere else or I'll try making them from scratch. Bad wontons are yucky.

So, we're getting our first real snow of the season today here in Denver. Brrrrr. I stopped stalling and went to the grocery store to get chili fixins for dinner. Mmmmm-yummay! When I become among the employed, I'm going to start utilizing King Sooper's home delivery again. I HATE GROCERY SHOPPING WITH A PASSION! I always forget something I needed way over on the other side of the store, everybody is standing right in front of where I need to be, checkers with a line a mile long wanting to make small talk instead of ringing up my groceries...ugh! Marcus and I used to make a list of what meals we were going to have for the week, we'd add things to the shopping list as we thought of them and a couple of days before we needed them, we'd set up a delivery. The delivery driver brings all of the stuff in, it's bagged pretty well (none of this one item to a bag nonsense) and the shelves were stocked without having to deal with crowds of people. It cuts down on impulse spending, too. Those cookies can't call to you if you're not looking at them.

I check out Jenna Fischer's (aka Pam from The Office) myspace page once in awhile. Her cousin-in-law has invented a cool product I'd like to get called the Cupcake Courier. The price tag of $32.99 plus s/h is a little steep, but the thing holds 36 cupcakes or muffins and you won't smash the frosting or get the cupcakes all stuck to each other. One of the reasons I rarely make cupcakes anymore is because there is no good way to store them. When I'm rolling in money again, I'll definitely check this one out.

I read a Sneaky Sugars article on Discovery Health earlier this week that talked about the incredible amounts of sugar in our diets. It said that 7 grams of sugar (on the nutrition label) is approximately 1 Tablespoon! Not small t teaspoon, but large T Tablespoon. I was appalled. Out of curiosity, I looked at the label of the Dannon Frusion I've been buying for breakfast lately (thinking it was healthy). One little 10 oz. bottle of mixed berry flavor had 48 grams of sugar—almost 7 tablespoons! Don't even get me started that part of that sugar was High Fructose Corn Syrup. No wonder I don't lose weight. Then people have the audacity to wonder why our society is so overweight. I'm making a concerted effort to rid my diet of as much processed sugars as possible. I'll still have an occasional Starbucks or a coke for a treat, but no more white sugar in my tea, no more processed beverages daily, no more!

Today is the last day that The Tattered Cover Bookstore will be open in Cherry Creek. I'm heading over there to have one last wander around. It's kind of sad since it's been there so long, but at the same time, maybe i'll go more often now that it will be somewhere that has close free parking. Now I have to park in the Cherry Creek mall's parking garage or park in one of the neighborhoods several blocks away and walk over. I hope it's not overly busy, but I'm afraid it will be. I'll kick myself if I don't at least give it a try, though.