Cute or Deadly?

Geez-o-Pete, we've been busy lately!  Not only am I deep into writing test preparation essay grading hell, but we've been actually doing stuff every weekend lately.  Usually, when people ask about our weekend plans I reply, "Nothing.  Absolutely nothing."  But lately we've been doing stuff--fantastic stuff, but stuff nonetheless.

Which means that I am tired.

This weekend we drove down to Ft. Lauderdale to visit with friends, and spent about 16 or so hours in the car.  I spent about five of those hours grading essays, and exactly zero of those hours sleeping.  For the record, sleeping is much more enjoyable than grading essays.  You can quote me on that.

While we were in Ft. Lauderdale, I took pictures, but apparently only of animals that are either extremely cute, extremely deadly, or some combination of the two.

Let's start with the extremely cute.

OH MY GOD BABY DUCKS.

 If Matt would have let me, I would have taken all of these babies home with us where they would have lived in the bathtub until I built a pond in the back yard where they would swim and do other duck things until I trained them to do quacking and dance routines a la the Huxtable children.

But Matt said no.  And he said that our friends Chandler and Joey tried that once and it was way more annoying than they thought it would be.

Plus, I'm not sure the grown-up ducks (which were the opposite of cute, by the way) were too keen on my ducknapping plan.

Maybe this one tried to kill me with its ugly red poison face?  (That's what my face looked like this summer when I was a poison ivy monster.)

Moving on, look at this gross baby dinosaur I saw when I was with Tanya.  Disgustment.  I followed it around a parking lot trying to get a picture until I climbed into a tree and moved around, and I got the willies and finally ran away screaming.  That's what happens when you chase a baby dinosaur.

Then we encountered this rare creature, Tanya's pug, Daphne.  Daphne is both cute and deadly, as she demonstrated with little funny howls and her look of death.  Daphne has killed three alligators in her South Florida neighborhood, and it's even gotten her on the news a couple of times.*

Finally, I returned home to find this creature, legs a' tangled, resting in its natural habitat.

*That did not happen.

Stay Classy, San Diego.

So, here's a funny story.  A month or so ago, I got this email from BlogHer saying that they were doing this promotion with Knorr and asking if I'd be interested in getting some chicken stock samples and making up a recipe using the stock.  Sure, why not?  Hell, we use chicken stock all the time, and worst case scenerio, I have some extra, right?

The recipe was supposed to be entered in this contest with like 200 recipes and then 8 finalists would win a trip to San Diego, where they'd then have some kind of cook-off competition thing and then maybe be selected to represent Knorr in other promotional stuff.  When I told Matt about the whole thing, he said, "Sounds like you're a little out of your league here."  I agreed, but decided that it would be fun to give it a shot.

And so I signed up, got the samples in the mail and was then kind of conflicted about what to make. I decided that it should be simple, basic, and accessible, you know, like a recipe that could go on the package or something.  This was not, I thought, a time to show off my culinary prowess (plus, who really wants to eat chicken stock ice cream, anyway?)  After some hemming and hawing, I decided to make spicy pork carnitas.  So I made them, and here's what they looked like.

But for some reason I wasn't over the moon for the recipe, and I was a little reluctant to submit it.  As the deadline was fast approaching and I was filling my days with other things like Fourth of July festivities and elliptical injuries and general slothfulness, I decided to just go ahead and submit it to fulfill my end of the bargain.

And then a couple of days ago I got an email saying that I am one of the eight finalists and that I'm going to San Diego for the BlogHer conference in a couple of weeks!  Shoot yeah!  I'm still a little bit in shock, and a lot excited, and totally looking forward to visiting the San Diego Zoo.  I'm nervous, too, because I can kind of clam up in situations where I'm expected to perform or to be charming or to meet new people.  But that's what wine's for, right?

And I've totally sized up my competition, and Matt was right--I'm totally out of my league.  But that's cool, because I have a free trip to California and I'm going to meet this guy.

[source]

Oh, and I guess I should share that recipe with you, too, huh?

Here goes it.

Spicy Pork Carnitas

1 ½-2 pounds pork tenderloin

2 tablespoons olive oil

½ teaspoon crushed red pepper

1 teaspoon kosher salt

½ teaspoon black pepper

1 small onion, chopped

1 clove garlic, minced

1 jalapeno, minced (with seeds for more spice, without for less)

1 lime, cut into quarter wedges

3 ½ cups Knorr chicken stock, made from concentrate

Directions

1. Rub pork tenderloin on all sides with salt, pepper, and crushed red pepper.  Heat olive oil in dutch oven on medium-high.  Brown meat on all sides in dutch oven, then remove.
2. Add onion and cook for three minutes.  Add jalapeno and garlic and cook for another two minutes, or until onion is translucent. 
3. Add Knorr chicken stock to pan, bring to a simmer.
4. Meanwhile, nestle lime wedges into the pork.  Return pork to pan and cover.  Cook on medium-low heat for 90 minutes.
5. When the pork is tender enough, shred with two forks. 

Serve on tortillas with sour cream, shredded lettuce, cheese, and avocado.

Three cheers for zoo fun!  And carnitas!  And all expense paid trips to San Diego!  

Hey, Sneezers!

I'm getting Mitch a bear cub brother.



Should make for an interesting summer. Can I buy a bear cub at the Bass Pro Shop?

Thanks for sharing, Andrew Sullivan.

Smarty Pants

Me: Why are baby animals so cute?
Matt: Evolution.

Why does he have to be so smart all the time?

Oh, and if you are reading this, it means that I have successfully managed to post from my phone. In other words, DANGER!