muffin madness continued

when people have asked me about my pregnancy cravings, i didn't really know what to tell them...i suppose i crave c plus soda...or toast...or nutella, peanut butter and banana sandwiches...but it's not like i NEEDED to have them. now i know that muffins should top the list. because i need to have them on a regular basis.

my student happened to make banana wheat germ muffins without even knowing about my new addiction and gave me some at her last lesson. they were DIVINE!

then i made bran muffins that i remember making in my childhood with my mom...they were DIVINE!

and here is the recipe for the apple muffins i was talking about earlier...they are DIVINE!

apple buttermilk muffins

1 grated large apple
3/4 cup of white sugar
1/4 cup oil
1/2 cup buttermilk* or low-fat yogurt
1 egg
1.5 cups of flour (i found this may be a bit much myself, and used 1.25 cups instead when i made them a second time)
1 tbsp baking powder
1/2 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp salt
1/2 tsp cinnamon

topping (optional - i have never made it with the topping because they are already pretty sweet):
2 tbsp brown sugar
1/4 tsp cinnamon
2 tbsp finely chopped pecans

i mix all the wet ingredients separately from the dry, because that's what i've always done when making muffins, but the girl that gave me the recipe didn't say it was necessary. bake at 350 for 20 minutes. makes 12 muffins.

*instead of buttermilk, i substitute 1.5 tsp of vinegar with just under 1/2 a cup of regular milk...thanks to this site. who knew buttermilk is actually not rich and decadent, but actually low in fat and healthy??

re: that's me trying

okay, since i'm home alone and lonely, and i've caught myself up with the grey's blogs to date, i might as well get back on the wagon...

april and karev BETTER NOT hook up or i will be very upset. but i did love april in this episode. i don't want them to ruin it by having her lose her virginity to alex.

which has made me wonder which character on the show has slept with the most people? callie has slept with arizona, sloan, george and karev i think...but karev has slept with izzie, callie, addison, olivia (the nurse)...did he sleep with reid too? or was that just sloan who slept with reid? can someone help me out here, who wins the promiscuity contest?! i may lose sleep over this tonight.

i loved cristina and meredith's fight. i love that cristina is blaming her broken-ness on meredith, because it's true...she could have walked away if it were anyone else. something i didn't even consider - so good! i just hope she gets over it soon so they can all be friends again.

i forgot to mention this in my previous post, but i'm enjoying meredith's bangs.

and i heard on the radio that jessica capshaw (actress who plays arizona) is pregnant. no wonder she abruptly left the show, and no wonder we have only seen shots of her from the chest up...and also probably why they practically dedicated a whole episode to her having nice boobies. now will callie continue to be a lesbian or will she swing back the other way? i suppose only time will tell.

my closing thought: the one thing that kills me about this show is when characters need to vent or talk to someone, whoever they talk to, will respond by venting back about their own problems. no one actually helps one another, really - they just all complain together, it's like the sound of their own voice helps them solve their own problems. it's a wonder people even make friends in that place, everyone is so self-absorbed!

grey's round-up

i didn't promise i would keep up with blogging about grey's, but i do have a few things to say...by the way, this is not in chronological order, and i'm way too lazy to create separate posts for each episode, and to figure out which item falls into which episode, so i've listed them in order of importance:

1. derek is going to find meredith a cure for alzheimer's? derek is going to find meredith a cure for alzheimers. derek is going to find meredith a cure for alzheimer's!
   
   what has kris done for me lately?!?!
   
   just kidding...i love him very much and he does many wonderful things for me, including brightening my day every day just by existing (even if he's halfway across the world right now - hence the sudden surge in blogging)...but seriously...you just can't top that! how are regular husbands supposed to compete with that? add the spectacular hair (although i'll admit, it has been slightly disappointing thus far this season, far too flat and straight) and the goopy eyes, and it's grossly unfair for regular men to even stand a chance. and how he's so concerned every time she misplaces her keys? sighhhh. it's a good thing he's just a fictional character.
   
   
2. which leads me to my next point - i quite enjoyed the documentary-style episode. i didn't think i would, but it almost made me feel like i was getting a sneak peek (sneak peak?) into the characters' lives - as if they are actual people, and the documentary allowed me to see more into their "real" personality. i thought it was very well done, from the furtive glances at the camera, to the interviews, to the jerky camera shots a la the office...kudos, writers! i'm curious to know what you guys thought...you know who you all are.
   
   
3. alex in last week's episode (with lily, the trachea girl) was just about the most precious thing i've ever seen. i love him right now.
   
   
4. and i thought the episode where derek's sister came to visit was pretty good UNTIL I FOUND OUT SHE IS ON PRIVATE PRACTICE. then i felt cheated and then a little violated. i'm sure i would like private practice if i would only give it a chance and actually watch it, but i want it to be on my terms...not by them continuing to cross-over the characters and storylines, unbeknownst to me! how often did the cheers gang encroach on frasier's life? i don't actually know the answer to that question, but i'm sure it's not as many times as private practice and grey's have crossed over! now i refuse to watch private practice just out of principle.
   
   
5. i LOVE non-surgical, apathetic cristina. when she was late for surgery because there was a line-up in the cafeteria?? hahahaah!!!
   
   
6. arizona and torres are gone?! what?
   
   
7. why is april suddenly everyone's friend? i know her friends died and they all lived through a crisis, but a bit more lead-up and warning would have been nice.
   

punctuality

what is the proper way to punctuate after parentheses? i always thought it was like this:

(i love using parentheses).

but then i started noticing that some books would punctuate like this:

(but they can be confusing to punctuate.)

(and what about if there are exclamation or question marks??).

(like that or like this?!)

poor grammar really irks me so i'm quite bothered by this. google is no help because i keep getting conflicting answers. i refuse to use parentheses, at least when it's at the end of a sentence, until i figure out how to properly punctuate them.

while i'm ranting about grammar, i've noticed an enormous number of people misspelling "peek," as in "take a peek" lately. it's "peek-a-boo," not "peak-a-boo," right? so why would someone take a "peak"? is this another worldwide epidemic, similar to those who think "irregardless" is a word?

lastly, this comment was posted on someone's status on facebook: "her lose not yours your awesome !!"

...

there are sooo many things wrong with that sentence, i can't even begin! argh!

muffin madness

a co-worker of mine made some muffins and brought them to work. they didn't look particularly appetizing, but this was at the point where i was feeling queasy and didn't feel like eating anything except bread. so i tried one...it was pretty good...but once i was finished, i wanted another. so i had another. (i should have put that on my list of "pros" in my pregnancy round-up post - you can eat all the muffins you want without anyone judging you, at least to your face).

then the next week, she made them again and left them in the lounge...i took two right away...

then i started craving these muffins. so i asked her for the recipe...i went to go make them, then much to my chagrin, realized we got rid of our muffin tins when we moved because they were terrible, and we hadn't bought any since. so i went out at 9pm on a thursday night to buy some - YES, i missed the first part of grey's, only because of my precious PVR.

i happily made them, and they obviously didn't have enough flour in them. they tasted pretty good but they were definitely too fluffy. i searched online for the recipe, found one that had exactly the same ingredients, but different proportions. so i tried it...and it wasn't the same. i felt like izzie on grey's when she was trying to make the cupcakes from her childhood but was missing the coconut extract!

i asked my co-worker, and she realized she told me to use 3/4 cup of flour when it should have been 1.5 cups. oops? so i tried AGAIN (the third time in a week) and SUCCESS! sooo good. so good in fact, that i made them again yesterday...so that means i've made 4 batches of muffins in 10 days. i am definitely chalking this up to a pregnancy craving because there really is no other explanation for it.

i gave some to my neighbour who said they were the BEST muffins he's ever tasted. so it's not just me! they really are wonderful! oh muffins...how i love thee...