20 in my 20th: Make and record music with the people I love.

20. Make and record music with the people I love.

Some of my favorite memories of 2011 are of sitting in the "band room" or later, Kris' room at the house on Rosser where all my friends lived playing music together. A lot of the time it was less "playing music" and more everyone simultaneously singing/messing around on different instruments making up obscure harmonies while Linn made up hilarious lyrics. Sometimes there was a whole bunch of us, sometimes just a couple. Often we had had a bit to drink before hand which made it all the more ridiculous. Wonderwall was definitely played about 5 million times. There's video evidence of all of this on facebook and watching it again while writing this post made my heart feel like it was going to burst.

After Linn died there was less music, as he seemed to be the center around which the rest of us formed our parts. One day though, my best friend Kris and I decided to try singing some songs together while he played guitar. That turned into us attempting to record one of my favorite songs from one of my favorite movies ("got my list" from Dakota Skye) pretty much every night for quite a while until we finally managed to get through a recording without messing up, forgetting lyrics, laughing, getting distracted... yeah we sang that song a LOT. I think it was a way for both of us to express ourselves creatively in a time that we were both feeling pretty numb and uninspired, and I really cherish those hours (and hours and hours) spent singing and laughing in the middle of the night, probably annoying the hell out of our other roommates.

Here's what we ended up with:

Free Electronic Press Kits from ReverbNation.com

My favorite part is probably at the end where we finish the song, there's a few seconds of silence, and then Kris strums the guitar and I say "ahhh we did it!" and Kris says "We kinda sorta did it." It seriously took us forever to get through a recording.

I'm so happy for the videos on facebook of Linn singing nonsense into a fake microphone or making up rhythms on the drums while Kris plays the keyboard and the rest of us attempt harmonies or pick up other instruments.His essence is so incredibly alive and present in those videos, I can feel it when I watch them and it makes me want to cry and laugh and shout.

And I'm so, so, so happy for the time that Kris and I spent attempting and occasionally succeeding to make music together. It's like a wonderful, shiny happy memory that floats above an otherwise wholly dark and bleak time in my life and I am so unbelievably thankful for that. Love you Kris, thanks for letting me post this on here ;)

<3

20 in my 20th: #12 Summerhaven!

12. Go to Summerhaven at the top of Mt. Lemon, ride the ski-lift.
 
I did this just over a year ago! Spring is in full swing in Tucson around this time of year and it's wonderful. Down here on the desert floor its warm and breezy during the day (usually anywhere from 70-90 degrees) and slightly cool and mild at night, just enough for you to want a light cardigan. It also smells like honeysuckle all the time which is wonderful. That's going to go away soon I'm sure so I'm loving it while it lasts!

Tuscon is surrounded by big beautiful mountains, many of which are full of hiking trails, swimming holes, and campsites. Mt. Lemmon is the most popular mountain as it's the tallest point in the Santa Catalina mountains and has a tiny little town (Summerhaven) and the Mount Lemmon Ski Valley at the top. It happens to be the southernmost ski location in all of the continental United States, so that's pretty cool.Way up at the top of Mt Lemmon it's still pretty brisk and chilly, and there's even still snow on the ground. It warms up during summer but remains pretty mild- a stark contrast from the sweltering dessert heat. Hence the name 'Summerhaven'.

I have nice memories of visiting the Snow Bowl in Flagstaff with my Dad (where he and I went skiing last month) during fall and riding the ski lift. There was no snow at that time, but it was fun just to be up in the air and look at all the colorful changing leaves. Afterwards we got cups of gumbo soup in the ski restaurant. This memory, along with my curiosity and desire to get a mini vacation from the warm weather inspired me to visit Summerhaven and ride the ski lift up there. It's a decent drive up the mountain (about 45 mins-hr) so Colton and I made a day trip out of it last spring.

It was really fun! Except that between the time that I was 9 or 10, riding the ski lift, and when I was 20 life things happened and apparently I developed a fear of heights. That I didn't really realize I had until I was up in the air. So that was fun. I tried to distract myself by taking photos and trying not to imagine crashing to the frozen-solid snow and rocks 30 feet below me.

All these little shops (aside from the informational one where you buy lift tickets) were closed when we went. I bet in winter when there's lots of fresh snow they're really fun to check out!

pretty view from the top

this is windy point, a lookout spot about half way up the mountain that people like to check out and climb around. Great views of the desert below from here!

I didn't take any pics of Summerhaven sadly, but there wasn't much to it aside from some reaaaally nice cabins and a general store. Pretty cute though! Looked a lot like the neighborhood you drive through right before you get to Frog Falls, Prescott people.

Even though the ski lift ride induced more anxiety than I was expecting, it was a fun day trip and a nice chance to get out of the desert for a bit. Maybe next winter I'll try out some actual skiing, now that I kind of know how (22 in 22? maybe!)

<3

20 in my 20th: Eat a Habanero

1. Eat a habanero. This could be raw, whole, or cooked in some dish. No ditching the seeds though.

For literally months, I would buy one habanero every so often while grocery shopping. For months they would one by one shrivel up, start to get funky dark spots, and get thrown into the garbage. 

Finally, one night (apparently last April 10th, according to the time stamp for this photo in my phone), while hanging out watching netflix by myself at my apartment, I convinced myself to just do it.

I grabbed the pepper, sized it up for a moment, and then took a big bite.

crappy phone pic

It was hot.
It made my eyes water.
It had surprisingly nice flavor.
It was really, really hot.
It made my belly hurt.
I wouldn't recommend it.

Yeah, it was pretty much crazy hot. Not anaphylactic-shock-inducing hot, but definitely oh-god-do-we-have-milk-in-the-house?! hot. If you're going to eat a habanero raw I hope you have tastebuds and intestines of steel.

They are pretty nice when used sparingly though, like in salsa or to spice up a marinade or something. They have kind of a fruity, mellow flavor beneath the heat.

I do kind of feel like a badass for having done this though. Way to go, year-ago me!

20 in my 20th: Make Ina Garten's Mac n Cheese

Back in May of 2011, a few days after I turned 20, I had the idea to make a list of 20 things I wanted to do in my 20th year. I did a handful and blogged about them, and then I stopped blogging when life got crazy. I actually still did a few more before my 21st birthday last May though, about half in total. I even have pictures, I just never blogged about it. So, over the next few weeks I'm going to be posting a few 20 in my 20ths that never got their rightful post back when I did them.

#15. Make this mac and cheese

I wanted to make this mac and cheese ever since I saw the Barefoot Contessa episode where Ina Garten makes it. I only have three distinct memories of Ina Garten. An episode of BC where she put a tbsp of butter inside each hamburger patty,  the episode of 30 rock where Liz Lemon fantasizes about Ina inviting over for a bruschetta and a bottle of white wine, and the episode in which she made this macaroni and cheese.

Ina's recipes are always kind of over-the-top decadent, but where Paula Dean's zealous misuse of butter seems startling and unwarranted, Ina is so sweet and soft-spoken that all your calorie woes are easily forgotten.

Enter this mac and cheese.

It has a full pound each of pasta and cheese, a quart of whole milk, sherry, and yeah, a sh*tload of butter. But it also has mushrooms, so.. yeah.

I made this probably like a year ago and it was a. expensive (10 dollars for 3 oz of truffle butter, not to mention the 12 oz of gruyere....) b. time consuming (shopping for all the obscure ingredients, chopping a pound of mushrooms, etc) and c. one of the best thing's I've EVER cooked or tasted. I seriously remember the night I made it, sitting at home by myself with a plate of it in front of me and marveling at how out of this world amazing it was. It was quite a moment. I haven't made it since... mostly because it's hard for me to ever justify making mac and cheese (even though it's one of my favorite things to cook), let alone one that will set me back 60$. But IF the right time should arise again... say for a holiday, or if I could somehow get people to pay me for it... I would gladly do so.

This recipe is pretty much copied and pasted from foodnetwork.com, just with some of my pictures added. I made no variations to the recipe when I made it.

Also forgive the quality of these photos... they were taken in my old, old apartment complex (Lantana). I have since lived in two different homes, both of which have much better lighting. better pretty much everything actually.

Ingredients

2 tablespoons unsalted butter
Good olive oil
1/2 pound shiitake mushrooms
1/2 pound cremini mushrooms

3 tablespoons cream sherry
Kosher salt
1 pound pasta, such as cavatappi
3 ounces white truffle butter (recommended: D'Artagnan)
1/2 cup all-purpose flour
1 quart whole milk, scalded
12 ounces Gruyere cheese, grated (4 cups)
8 ounces extra-sharp Cheddar, grated (2 1/2 to 3 cups)
1 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
1/2 teaspoon ground nutmeg
2 garlic cloves, chopped
3 tablespoons freshly chopped parsley leaves
1 1/2 cups fresh white bread crumbs

Directions

Preheat the oven to 375 degrees F.

Remove caps from mushrooms and slice into 1/4-1/2 inch slices. (I sliced mine 1/2 inch but found that some of the bigger shiitake pieces were a little overwhelming and difficult to eat)

that's a lot of mushrooms..

 Heat the butter and 2 tablespoons of olive oil in a large (12-inch) saute pan, add the mushrooms, and cook over medium heat for 3 to 5 minutes, until they are tender. Add the sherry and continue to saute for a few more minutes, until the sherry is absorbed. Set aside. (I did this in two batches. seriously, sooo many mushrooms)

doesn't look that appetizing... but just the mushrooms cooked in butter, olive oil, and sherry were so yummy

 Bring a large pot of water to a boil and add a splash of olive oil and a pinch of salt. Add the pasta and cook for 6 to 8 minutes, until al dente. Drain well.

Meanwhile, melt the truffle butter in a large (4-quart) saucepan and whisk in the flour.

Cook for 2 minutes over low heat, stirring constantly with a whisk. Slowly whisk in the hot milk and cook for 2 minutes, stirring constantly with a wooden spoon, until the white sauce is thickened and creamy. Off the heat, add the Gruyere, Cheddar, 1 1/2 tablespoons salt, the pepper, and nutmeg.

Combine the pasta, sauce, and mushrooms in a large bowl and pour them into a 10 by 13 by 2-inch baking dish.

Place the garlic and parsley in the bowl of a food processor fitted with the steel blade and pulse until they're minced. Add the bread crumbs and pulse to combine. Sprinkle the crumbs over the pasta and bake for 35 to 45 minutes, until the sauce is bubbly and the crumbs are golden brown. Serve hot. 

I have no idea why I didn't take a picture of it actually served. Hm. Anyways... This was crazy decadent, delicious, and hands down the best mac and cheese I've ever made or eaten. Glad I got the important things done in my 20th year ;)

Love,

Em

20 in my 20th: #16 Learn to play a new song on the piano- a recent, alt-folk song which I will also sing to.

The quality on this vid is kind of bad, and it's certainly not my best work- but I was pretty proud that I learned this song on the piano! The song is "40 Day Dream" by Edward Sharpe and the Magnetic Zeros. I don't actually have sheet music or anything for it... I just looked up the guitar tabs online and then converted it to work for the piano. I think it counts for #16 of my 20 things to do in my 20s though :) hopefully I'll just keep improving as I practice it a bit more.

enjoy!

and don't mind the pups wandering around in the background :)

<3 Em

20 in my 20th: #4 Get a Puppy

I'm on a roll with these 20 things, guys. I signed up for home ec last week and got my sewing machine tuned up to make sure it's in perfect working order, and I'm just finalizing a couple songs I've been working on on the piano- one that i wrote and one that i didn't write but i love. thats 3 more things that'll be coming at you all in the next few weeks! it's been really fun working towards these different goals and writing up these posts :)

Onto the thing you all really want to hear about- this adorable little love muffin!

Name: Clementine, as in Kate Winslet's character in Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind- one of my top three favorite movies. 

Age: 5 months

Breed: Terrier mutt, but she definitely has some border terrier and some wire-hair in there. She also must have some kind of small breed terrier in there because she's tiny and she probably won't get much bigger.

Color: white, with beige-ish wiry top coat in some places

Eyes: beautiful golden brown

Where I got her: Phoenix, AZ- some guy owned her mama and daddy and I guess had to get rid of all the little pups. She was the last one left.

How I found her: craigslist, baby!

Personality: so very  sweet and shy- when i first met her she tried to high-tail it into the guy's kitchen- but she quickly warmed up to me and now thinks I'm her new mama. she follows me everywhere i go, and when I have to leave and then come home she sees me and wags her tail so hard her whole back half wiggles back and forth. She's very quiet, except for if she sees a dog and feels threatened by it- then she'll growl and potentially bark. usually this happens when she's sitting on me or on the couch and the dog comes into the room, so i put her on the floor so she and the dog are at the same level. I'm working on socializing her (which should have been done when she was younger, but i guess the dude didn't take care of that) so that when she's a bit older she can be nice and friendly with other dogs and people. she's very, very smart and seems pretty willing to be submissive- i haven't had to teach her how to heel at all, she just naturally walks next to or behind me on a slack leash when i take her out for walks. unlike the dog i grew up with (that my parents still own), clover, she doesn't have an endless appetite and bottomless stomach- she's generally uninterested in food, although i have gotten her to finish her meals the last two times. this means food will be cheap and I won't have to deal with her being all over me for it, but it's also made it hard to be successful with starting her training commands- like sit, stay, etc- since she doesn't really care about the treat reward in my hand that usually captures a training pup's attention. 

She's such a little cutie, and I've been trying to take her lots of places so she can get more comfortable with the world. she's already doing so well! she doesn't flinch or tuck her tail between her legs when she sees people or other dogs, which she certainly did the first day or two i had her. We've gone down to the downtown square a lot, as well as to other friends' houses, the vet, around the neighborhood, and to the barkery. she's getting more sociable every day! she's such a little sweet heart, and I know she's going to grow up to be such a well-mannered, sweet little companion.

<3

Em

20 in my 20th: #3 Drink Ouzo in Greece

Hooray for accomplishing the first of 20 things I wanted to do before next May 10th! Unfortunately I did not get a picture of this event- you see, I drank ouzo a couple times but I was waiting for the perfect moment to really "count" it- and when that moment came my phone was dead and I didn't have my DSLR! the unjustness of it all... anyways, I can describe what I considered the best ouzo drinking occasion in Greece to be.

For those of you who don't know, Ouzo is a clear Greek Liquor with a 40% alcohol content, like most other hard alcohols. It's made from anise seed and so it has a distinct black licorice-y flavor, similar to that of Jagermeister and Absinthe. I'm not a huge fan of black licorice-y alcohols... or candies... or anything, really, but I figured hell, I'm in Greece and I might as well do as the Greeks do ;)

You can shoot ouzo like you would any other hard alcohol, which is what we did before we went clubbing in Mykonos (THAT's a whole other story altogether...), but the more proper way to consume it is in a tumbler poured over ice cubes, which slowly melt and chill/dilute the ouzo.

Anyways, It was July 2nd, if I remember correctly- we were in Santorini, an absolutely gorgeous crescent shaped island with lots of beaches named for the colors of their sand. We spent the first half of the day at the archeological site of Ancient Thera, which was interesting, although by this, the 27th day of our trip, we were all kind of site-ed out.

 Anyways, we then wandered our way down the mountain to the black beach, where we bought 2 euro gyros and half liters of amstel or mythos and strolled down the boardwalk in search of a good place to lay out and enjoy the beach.

  I was with two of the boys I spent the most time with on this trip, Trevor and Kellner. We wound up finding a spot under the shade of a tree, where the black sand was warm but not scalding like it was in the sun. We laid out our towels and spent a while reading our various books for a while before Trevor eventually decided he wanted to get some ouzo. He and Kellner went off in search for a bottle, cups, and ice while I watched their stuff. It wasn't terribly classy, laying on the beach drinking ouzo from flimsy plastic cups which got sand all over them from the condensation, but it was wonderfully fun and relaxing sitting there with the boys, laughing and chatting and joking and people watching and getting just a little tipsy. It was great :)

I'm on the verge of completing a few other things from my 20 in my 20th list, like writing a song and getting a puppy- so look for a few more of these posts coming up in the next few weeks!