a while ago       boo!       (Shock! Horror! She's alive!)             lol             Yes, I am indeed alive, and kicking. No, I haven't been kidnapd by aliens, somehow transported to the distant future (or past), and indeed, I have not moved again.       However, the internet has taken a distinct dislike to this computer. (Or, the modem has taken a distinct dislike to the internet...) So, sadly, my quality internet time (not to mention quantity) has been drasticly reduced. The only time I can get online is when Step-Mom and Dad are both at work. The rest of the time I'm downstairs.       So, little update time.       Summer is almost over. I'm probably not going to get a job. Sorry to all those nice references... maybe next year. Driving is all over, actual driving lessons and the driving classes. I have to get 50 hours of driving, with ten at night, logged. I've got the log with me, it's pritty thuro.       It's rather obvious that I've been offline far to long... my spelling is horrible...       Last night I had to make dinner. This is, indeed, the very best way to totally stress me out. Lesse... Erika once thought I was stressing over driving. That wasn't stressing. That was worring. Major, major diference. Step-Mom and Dad have been discusising it for a while now, and one day (last sunday) Dad says, why don't you cook dinner this week. I'd cook it on Wednsday, but Dad'll be at work then, so I make it Tuesday. Yesterday. I rummaged through all the recipie books Step-Mom has, and find four good recipies. I settle on two recipies. I make the Terkki Beef because Step-mom didn't get all the ingredients for the Sausage in Apricot-Mustard glaze.       So, I've got a big thing of steak. I start slicing it into thin strips, get the pan warmed up, and then realize that the pan is too small. So I pull out the big pan, start heating that up, and start cooking the strips on the small pan. I might as well get it started. So lots and lots of smoke is going up, because I've apparently got the pans too hot. The book SAID medium high heat! It Said that! So Dad came in because I was smoking up the house and turned down the heat. The other pan got hot, and I transfered all the steak to that. Dad offered to stir the steak strips so I could make the terakki sauce. I was planning to let them just cook while I made it, but you had to move them constantly to make sure they didn't burn. So I was making the sauce and Dad tells me the strips are all done. He takes them off the fire. Any longer and they'll start burning for real. By this time I'm chopping the vegies. The recipie called for a big bag of frozen brocoly, carrots, and water chestnuts. I've got a head of brocoly, a bag of carrots, and a little can of water chestnuts. So I get them all chopped up, and put the pan back on the fire and wait for it to heat up. Then I dump everything in, and bring the sauce to a boil. Step-mom comes in (the house is smelling very yummy by now) suggests covering the pan, turning it down to low, and let it cook while we wait for the rice to finish.       It's perfectly possible to eat this without rice, but the rice will make it more varied, or something. I totally forgot about the rice, so it gets started around the same time Dad says the strips are done. He makes it. It's very easy. Add rice to cooker, add water to cooker, cover, turn on, wait for it to turn off. So I have a few minutes to try an calm down in. The rice gets finished, we all serve ourselves, and I'm still far to stressed to be very hungry. It took several hours and a large bowl of ice cream (mmmmm... mint chocolate chip....) for me to calm down. Now all I'm worried about... is cooking dinner going to be a weekly thing, or monthly? I really don't think I could handle this happening every week.             /back one/  |big list|  /on y va/