Oh right! I have a blog!

In fact, everyone has a blog these days. I, however, have two -- neither of which I regularly update. In fact, I don't even irregularly update them. Meh.

Tonight the B and I perused our streaming Netflix via Wii (um, coolest thing EVER) and decided to watch the movie Julie & Julia which I had thrown into the "Maybe to Watch at Some Point" folder.

I was excited. Mainly because over the past month (aka 2 years) I've been trying to figure out a way to enjoy cooking. I mean, I liked being a barista -- mixing up and creating drinks, but food and I have never seen eye to eye (on many levels, of course). However, I can appreciate that cooking can be an art form; my mother-in-law, for instance, is sinceriously passionate about cooking and I always assumed it's because she's German (as if there would be no other reason for anyone to love cooking other than that). She has (literally) a tower of blue pots and pans and French inscribed meat labels and cheese shaped like triangles, for fricks sake. Then she does things like "poach eggs", and "broil" shit, or pick out every single ingredient in a restaurant's meal just by taste (before going home to recreate it, add some German flare, and make it even better than the original). The first couple times I met her and my father-in-law I am pretty sure I was slack-jawed as I sat listening to them have a 20-minute conversation about how many different ways potatoes can be cooked (turns out there is more than fried, baked, and smashed.... I know! I was surprised, too!).

Now, I need to clarify that I l-o-v-e this about my in-laws. I'm simply saying that it was (and still is) a culture shock, especially when you consider the longest conversation my family ever had about food lasted about 10 seconds which involved Homer Simpson noises, flatulence, and something along the lines of, "Mom, that pie was a party in my mouth".

Needless to say, I've never made my mother-in-law a meal. I've suggested it to B a couple of times but, bless his soul, he would always talk me out of it.

"It's because I'm not a sassy cook like your Mom, huh?"
"No no, it's because my Mom would feel bad about you making her a meal."

Always with those brown, puppy-dog eyes, so I believe him against my will.

She would feel bad though.

I said bad, not sick.

Anyway, it's come to my attention that I need to eat "better". With my menagerie of health stuff, I can't afford to eat poorly balanced meals when I need as much nutrition and energy as I can get. In addition, my Fireman needs good eats so he can run into burning buildings, rescue cats from trees (or not), walk around in his bunker gear in slow motion, and carry me to bed when I fall asleep in random places.

SO, we watched Julie & Julia, and you could tell -- immediately -- that I was made to cook. What with questions like, "Who's Julia Childs?" and "What's a mortar and pestle do?" it was obvious a latent talent was emerging. It was, no doubt, finalized when I babbled about how mortar and pestles and our empty herb bottles make me feel like an apothecary.

Now, there's no way in hell I'm going to cook a new meal every day, especially one that has anything to do with French cuisine. In fact, anything that could be associated with the word "cuisine" immediately sends me into an anxiety attack.
I'm certainly not going to blog about everything I cook either because, well, I'm sure most of the stuff I'll wind up cooking will involve two ingredients and a pound of ground turkey. BUT, I am going to try to see what all the fuss is about -- with being in the kitchen and creating masterpiece meals and all that jazz. I'm going to try things with vegetables I've never tried before (perverts) like "saute" them and maybe, if I'm feeling REALLY crazy, I'll even eat them. I might try something with fish while my trusty Fireman is nearby in case my shellfish allergies extend to all seafood or (more likely) if I spit it all out and declare we should order some pizza.

In short, I do want to try cooking and I sincerely hope to find a way for it to be enjoyable.

At the very least, though, I've found one thing I can babble about here (now that I remember I have a blog and all). Oh oh! I'm starting grad school tomorrow, so that's a second thing I can address if cooking is so boring to me I can't even blog about it.

If all else fails, I will still have Scully's shoulder-pads to make fun of.