Farmer's Market, Schmarmer's Market

In my small town, there is not much in way of activities, so when I was invited to brunch and the farmer's market on Saturday with a couple of colleagues, I quickly accepted.

Brunch was fab. We went to our favorite local bakery, Sugar Magnolia (could it be more sweetly Southern?) and we had sausage, egg, and cheese biscuits. The biscuit they put that egg and sausage on... was wickedly buttery. I should have known that the bakery would really shine when it came to the biscuit. Unngh. I'm drooling.

Anyway... The farmer's market was cute... but very (almost disappointingly) small. I did, however, get my blood pressure checked by a nursing student. And I found a mother and son team selling fresh herbs with little recipe cards attached.

Note to farmer's market sellers: Attached recipes are a brilliant idea.

I picked up some basil and rosemary, and, a day or so later, I set out to make the recipes.

WARNING: This blogpost is not for the feint of heart. It almost ruined me. I'd call it a comedy of errors if I were stable enough to be laughing at it.


I started out by assembling the ingredients for the Garden Vegetable Pesto. I had to make a trip to the store for tomatoes... but it was going to be worth it for some delish garden pesto.

Or was it?


It wasn't.

I forgot that my food processor is too small to handle life. Let me rephrase that... it's too small to handle one tomato. And this recipe calls for two tomatoes, one zucchini, cheese, basil, oil, blah blah blah.

So I dumped the tomato. And pulled out the recipe and ingredients for Rosemary Pasta Sauce. I didn't take a picture of the ingredients or the recipe because... well... I don't remember what happened exactly... but I think you can consider this moment the beginning of the end.


By this point, I was crazy hungry. At 7:23pm, I busted out the pita chips and hummus.


And while I enjoyed my appetizer, I melted 1/4 cup of butter over low heat and added onion. Do you know what happens to onions in butter over low heat? I'll tell you... nothing.


So... at 7:52pm, warm onions still warming, I made coffee and this happened to my new creamer. Really? REALLY?!


Ugh... so... no... I didn't wait for the onions to get "dark brown" before I tossed in the garlic, rosemary, and water (didn't have chicken stock, of course).


The sauce smelled good... but looked small. I followed the rest of the directions though and tossed the lb. of spaghetti with another 2 tbsp of butter and 1/4 cup of parmesan.

It was... okay. The sauce is very light in flavor but heavy in greasy butter.

And... it was about 9pm by the time I got to eat it.

So... much like I am right now, I was tired of the whole thing. Perhaps I'll invest in a food processor equal to the task of a tomato-filled pesto. But until then, I'll just stroll the farmer's market with friends, hit the nurses tent, try the "best pound cake ever" (sorry, kids, but it wasn't), and leave the cooking to someone else.

Thank God for Fall Break

Alright, I promised details of the UMaine M.A. in English Comprehensive Exam so here they are. In bullet and picture form.

Prep:
+ 30 text reading list (top shelf)














+ soothing craft to do the night before the exam (it's a necklace. of buttons. does this cement my quirky teacher persona once and for all?)














Test:
+ Essay 1: Tigger swirled yogurt, Paradise Lost, Phillis Wheatley, religious content's influence on literary form



















+ Essay 2: gay M&Ms, the Wife of Bath, Aurora Leigh, Judith Butler's theory of gender performance














+ Essay 3: ice water, burnt Dunkin Donuts coffee (large disappointment), New Negro anthology, part's importance to the whole



















+ Essay 4: vanilla chai tea (thanks, Beth!), Mary Rowlandson's captivity narrative, Frank O'Hara's poetry, Leslie Marmon Silko's Ceremony, and the notion of literary national history














As you can see, the exam was obnoxious and not something I'd care to repeat but it's done. I'll know in three weeks whether I passed or not.

Ugh. And, in order to reestablish my life as my own, I'm baking cupcakes as I type.

I may also cruise the Columbus Day sales. Just for kicks.

I should be back to normal by 10am Wednesday. Let's hope. :)

Comp Exam Finale

For those of you keeping score,



I'm done!!!!


However, my fingers refuse to type anything more at this moment.

omg. revision.

So...I've been at this for 28 hours now, and I've got a complete first draft. Success!

Now the ginormous task of revision lies before me, but, really, that is small beans compared to the massive project of writing 4, 5-page essays.

Goodnight, Comp Exam

14 hours and 3 essays later, I'm going to bed. Details tomorrow.

36 minutes and counting

This is the worst kind of waiting room.

What's before me:

1 exam between me and the Masters in English.
4 questions that I will choose from a list of 10.
5 page essays in response to each of the 4 questions.
30 texts at my disposal.
20 texts that I am prepared to use.
48 hours to use as I please.

I almost wish this were a math test. :)

What Comprehensive Exam?

The exam starts in 10 hours and 47 minutes, and I'm actually looking forward to it in a let's-get-this-over-with way.

I'll let you know how long this era of good feeling lasts.