David BECOMES Goliath?!

Postin' a little e-mail humor...

Apparently, the statue of David is about to be returned to Florence after spending some time in America...
And his sponsors?...

Giving THANKS a Little Early

We had a pretty scary day here today. After a few weeks of a low-grade fever and flu-like symptoms, Katie brought 3-year-old Sophie to the doctor yesterday to see what was wrong. The doc did a blood test that came back looking odd. He brought Sophie in this morning for a bone marrow biopsy, as he was afraid she had leukemia. Katie and Sophie spent the day at Children's Hospital with poor little Sophie getting poked and prodded all day, and mom Katie lovin' her up.

The tests from the biopsy came back early this evening and are NEGATIVE for leukemia!!! They think that she just has a really bad virus that is finally getting better -- her blood cell counts looked better today than yesterday even. They also did a test to see if she has Mono, and that will come back in a few days. But, NO LEUKEMIA!!! Definitely reason to give early THANKS.

(Now I have to sign off, as we're celebrating with sparkling apple grape cider!
Or, as Sophie says, "Sparkling apple spider!")

How Cute is This?!

Woulda Been a Nightmare

A friend sent this video to me prior to the election ... Thank goodness this didn't happen!

YES WE DID!!!

Now, that's a First Family.

Better than the Cooking Channel

My family has a tradition of cooking Chinese food when we get together; I think it started when my oldest brother, Bill, came home from college at some point with a wok and a Chinese cookbook. Of course, we use a Sunset Magazine Chinese cookbook, so my guess is that it's not traditional Chinese food, but it's always been tasty.

Yesterday, though, I had the opportunity to learn to cook some REAL Chinese food, as Lizhu came over and taught Katie and me to make dumplings -- or potstickers as they're often called. Lizhu is from the city of Lanzhou, which is the capital of the Gansu province in the northwest part of China. She definitely knows how to cook real Chinese food, and shared her secrets with us, which I'll reveal here.

First, we learned that we were not supposed to use this type of ground pork. Silly Americans. Katie had to go back to the store and when she couldn't find plain old ground pork, we settled for ground turkey. (Lizhu said we could use ground pork, turkey, or chicken.)Next, Lizhu cut some Napa cabbage (milder than regular cabbage) and put it in a bowl. She sprinkled a bunch of salt on it and let it sit. The salt draws water out of the cabbage. After it sat for awhile, we squeezed the water out of it -- and there was a bunch!
We added the water-free cabbage to the ground turkey in another bowl. No, that's not all the cabbage. It's just one fistful from squeezing the water out.
Then Lizhu mixed up the cabbage along with about a tablespoon of ginger and about 3 chopped scallions.
Then she taught us how to wrap! We used small round wonton skins. You put a ball of the filling in the middle, fold the skin over and hold it up like a taco, pinching the top middle part of the skin together. Then, working from first one outside edge and then the other, you pinch the two sides together in little pleats until it's closed. It's harder than it looks (and sounds), and there was a significant difference between the aesthetic appeal of the dumplings made by the newbies (Katie and me) and Lizhu!
Lizhu did the one on the far right, and I think we did the other ones. Ours looked more like apple turnovers than potstickers...
Once they were all folded, Lizhu started frying them while Sophie looked on. She coated a fry pan with a little oil, letting them brown on one side and then the other. To make sure the insides were cooked, she put a bit of water in the pan and then covered it; they were finished when the water had cooked away.
And voila! (Is there a Chinese equivalent of "voila"?) Homemade authentic potstickers!
Of course, the best part was eating them!

Happy Halloween!

In my department at work, there is intense peer pressure to dress up for Halloween...so intense that I had to break out my 24-(gulp!)year-old high school cheerleading uniform today. It fit! (Ok, so I had to use a large safety pin to close the top of the skirt because I couldn't button it, but for gosh sakes, it's 24 years old!!!)
Katie was a little more creative than me, and she transformed into Cleopatra.
We had a potluck at the office. What a crazy bunch, huh?
And another shot when a petite Hannah Montana showed up.
Tonight, Alma invited us all to her house to hang out while hundreds (yes, hundreds) of kids came by her house to trick-or-treat. She lives in an area of Fresno where people from all over bring their kids, and it was a hoot. Lizhu sat at the door for hours handing out candy. Dean, her husband, handed out candy like I would: "One for you...two for me..."
Colleague Rich didn't make it to the office today, but showed up at Alma's in quite the outfit...
...and let Katie's kids know that if they ate all their Halloween candy, their teeth would look like his.
Gary brought Laura, and they were the best looking hippy couple there.
Bullwinkle hung out with Ranger R for a bit.
Until next year .... Happy Halloween!