It’s Black Friday.

No, we don’t call it that because Obama got elected president. 

Today is a day when countless people shrug off their turkey-induced lethargy and get up phenomenally early to beat each other to the stores for the last doorbuster.  It’s a day when (hopefully) the retail market actually manages to turn a good profit.

Me, I’m not going to run out shopping.  No.  For me, the day after Thanksgiving is about one thing: leftovers.  And here’s a fun little tip for what to do with that same-old same-old turkey other than just a sandwich.

Thanksgiving Leftover Pizza

Yes, that’s right.  It’s a fun new way to use your leftovers that I picked up a few years back.  And it’s quite simple!  Start with a nice can of croissant roll dough.  (Okay, you can make the real thing from scratch if you want, but it’s really not necessary these days since we do have companies like Pillsbury willing to do the work for you.)  Lay the dough out flat, like a pizza dough.  Only if you got it in a can, lay it out square.  You really don’t need to cut it into a circle.

On a cookie sheet of course!

Then smear on a nice (but relatively thin) layer of gravy.  Think of it as the pizza’s sauce.

Then take those leftover mashed potatoes and add some instant mashed potatoes.  You want to thicken the potatoes up nicely.  Because these thickened potatoes are going to be your pizza’s cheese.  And nobody likes squishy cheese that runs everywhere when you try to pick up your slice.  So thicken it until you feel safe handling it balanced precariously on a thin bit of bread.

And then smear it on your Thanksgiving Leftover Pizza of course.

By now you have the base all done.  Next comes the fun part.  Chop up some turkey.  Sprinkle it on like a pizza topping.  Do the same with some stuffing.  Add some veggies.  Or whatever bits are left from your big Thanksgiving dinner that you think would go well with it all.

Then pop it in the oven, basically following the croissant cooking directions, because that’s the only uncooked part that needs cooking.  Watch carefully.  You don’t want to burn the pizza crust.

And now you’ve got something waaaaaay better than any old turkey sandwich.   You’ve got Thanksgiving Leftover Pizza!

You know, it’s been a while since I posted a pic.  Partly because I’m still waiting for my everyday wear to get here.  Target, in their infinite wisdom, decided to pretty much not ship anything I ordered for over a month because apparently one single item wasn’t in stock.  Bummer. But today I felt like doing something special, so I got over my misgivings and dove into my wife’s closet for some choice pics in regular wear.  Actually, the top she’d brought out of her “stuff I never wear” collection for me a while back because I’d commented on how I liked the sleeves on a similar top someone was wearing on TV.  And since then it’d just kind of sat there, waiting.  Why?  Because I have no skirt to wear it with. You see, my last pic with a skirt, wasn’t actually a skirt at all.  It was a black cami with the top tucked in. This time, it’s one of my wife’s whole two skirts.  Only the skirt goes all the way down to my ankles, and while sometimes that’s nice, I really wasn’t looking for that.  So I had to roll it up.  Which it was way too long to do that without looking funny.  So I experimented and found something that almost came out right. But hey.  At least it’s a nice little frilly outfit for me to enjoy the day in.  And of course I just had to go with some nice thigh-high black stockings with a lace top to them.  I started out borrowing a pair of my wife’s panties, a nice black satin pair with lace accents.  But they didn’t want to stay put very well and that got kind of annoying.  So I switch over to my own black lace thong.  I guess I’m a size smaller than my wife.  Who knew? And then just some simple black pumps.  I’m doing laundry, going up and down stairs a lot.  I don’t want to take any risks. I really don’t get why women complain about heels though.  I mean I’ve been walking around in heeled pumps and sandals and boots and whatnot and so far it’s been fun.  I haven’t really tripped.  But it’s not like I wear them daily or have lots of practice yet.  It’s just a breeze to me. But now I get why women walk with that sway.  Heels just kind of make you walk sexy.  At least for me it seems like you don’t even have a choice.  It’s walk sexy and smooth or walk with a lot of funny little steps and try not to fall.  So I just strut, and it works.  I dunno.  Maybe I was just born to it. So how are things?  Well, the chicken stock fell flat.  I boiled the bones too much and just didn’t like the consistancy or taste.  Oh well.  You gotta try.  At least the house smelled really good. But so the chicken pot pie casserole that it was meant for turned out just fine anyway.  I nailed it this time.  It was delish!  And full of good veggies like chopped asparagus, chopped snow pea pods, carrots, onion, celery, garlic, and of course the obligatory ordinary peas, corn, and potatoes.  Lots of veggies, which is good for you.  But what really made it great was the sauce.  Okay, so I used a whole stick of butter in the end, but I also used like about 8 cups of broth.  Maybe even a cup of heavy cream.  Maybe only half a cup.  I didn’t really measure that, just poured and stirred until it looked right.  And then a bunch of corn starch to thicken it up.  So it worked out like a treat.  It was absolutely wonderful.  It was the epitome of savory and comfort food.  The only thing missing was a little sage.  My wife kept raving.  Life is good. Speaking of life being good, so tomorrow I have a job interview.  Local even.  I hope it goes well.  I hope I like the company.  It’ll be nice to be back on a regular job again instead of being an independent contractor.  I miss just having that office environment with real live people.  I got an inflatable doll a while back and tried to dress her up like a secretary, but instead of her being a friendly face she just kinda got creepy.  Oh well.  You never know until you try.  But so I hope I have real live coworkers again soon.  That’ll be nice.  Wish me luck! I’d love to stay and chat more, but laundry calls.  Four loads today.  Unfortunately the clothes don’t wash themselves.  But have a good day, y’all!  I love you.  Each and every one!

Hey, it is thrills and frills in this fun ensemble!

Last night I had fun for the first time in forever in my kitchen.  My wife made herself an omlet, and it smelled goooood.

You see, lately, I just haven’t been excited by anything, but especially by food.  I just eat because my stomach attacks me if I don’t.  (And I mean that literally.)  And though I try, I just cook to put food out.  Not because I love to cook.  Which is sad, because usually I love to cook.

I think it’s just one of the many facets of a continued mild depression.

So when something actually caught my attention, I had to follow my nose.

I ended up making what I call “Stuff”, and what my wife called “Everything But The Kitchen Sink”.  You at least need a finely diced potato.  Fry that in a skillet with lots of butter and a fair bit of seasoning.  Salt and pepper are good, onion and garlic powder added to that, even better.  Then when the potatoes are looking close to done, add in the rest.  Whatever you can find.  I did onions, garlic, honey ham (lunchmeat), and turkey breast (lunchmeat).  Just chop it up and toss it in and saute it in butter with the potatoes.

Then, when it’s all looking about done, pour in the eggs.  And scramble it up.

Mmmm mmm!

But it’s not done there!  Oh no.  Now you’d think this would sound gross, because this is obviously a savory flavor, but it’s actually what really makes this dish: maple syrup.

Oh yeah!  It’s sex on a plate.

And for the first time in a long time, I was actually happy to be in the kitchen chopping and dicing and frying and all that.  And my stomach thanked me.  Yum!

On the high of that lovely dinner, the wife and I then snuggled up in the bed, under nice warm blankets, and read.  There’s nothing like a nice warm snuggle while reading.

It was such a lovely night that the wife even topped it off by topping me off.  It doesn’t get much better than that.  (Though it could get a little better yet, as she wasn’t really in the mood herself.  She was just respecting that I was and so gave me a release.  It’s much more fun when we’re both in the mood.)

Then comes today.  I left some organic paint stripper on an overhang that badly needs painting.  It’s clearly never been stripped since the house was built.  Layer upon layer, all peeling as such do as the positively ancient first layer of paint starts to give, taking every succeeding layer of paint with it.  Why people are so lazy about painting like that, I’ll never know.  It’s obvious that former owners noticed this starting to happen, and instead of stripping the paint, they just painted over it.  Repeatedly.

So I go to scrape off the (hopefully) stripped paint.  Some of it came off, but it’s clearly going to need at least one more stripping.  Maybe two.  There’s that much paint caked on there.  And damn are my arms tired.  Scrape, scrape, scrape.  Get off the layers I can.  For hours.

Luckily, just as my arms were giving up any hope on a rest, it started raining.  It’s been cloudy for days, but today, the day I’m dealing with stripper on paint, it finally decides to rain.  Great.

Oh well.  At least I get a rest from scrape, scrape, scrape.  And at least the stripper is biodegradable.

Mmmm.  Stripper.  I could really enjoy watching a nice stripper right now. 

Okay, not really.  Actually, I’m kind of … blah.  Usually I actually like rain.  But right now I’m tired, still feeling a bit grimy even after a loooooong shower to get the paint flakes out, and kind of bummed since I Just payed all of my bills, so watched all of that money go bye bye out the window.  Mostly to a house that I don’t even live in and can’t manage to sell.  Fun.

Just to rant for a second, why do people take such bad care of their house?  Why am I having to strip so many layers of paint when it’s obvious that at least two former owners ago it should have been stripped?  I mean your house is most likely your most valuable asset.  It’s an incredibly expensive investment for one.  Given time and care it’ll usually go up quite a bit in value for two.  And it’s where you freaking live for three!  Why would you not take care of your house?  Why would you do the absolute minimum necessary to keep it functional?

This is not the first house I’ve owned that I’ve had to repair such poor treatment over the years/decades.  Am I the only person who thinks that in such an important investment as your home, if there’s something worth doing, it’s worth doing right?  I dunno.

I.  Just.  Don’t.  Get.  It.

Even when I didn’t have the money to fix my house, when something broke, I found the money to fix it right.  Even if it meant eating ramen noodles and spaghetti for a month.  It’s the roof over my head!  I don’t want it to burn down because some dipshit thought it’d be cute to wire a junction very badly.  Or to drip on my head because some cheapskate patched a sizable hole in the roof with the cheapest tar known to man.

There are right ways to do things, and there are wrong ways to do things.  You should never do the wrong way to your own home.  I mean you have to live there.  Why would you want to make a leaky ceiling or a fire hazard?  Or even an eyesore?

Anyway, little rant over.  I’m sure you get my point.

But so here I am, stuck indoors, when I’d been planning on being outside, fixing my house.  Blah.  Rain, rain, go away…

Well, I’ve cleaned and vaccuumed the living room, cleaned the bathroom, done the dishes, done loads of laundry, and gotten some shopping in.

I’m feeling a little better.

I also had a talk with my wife.  Not about anything in particular.  Just how we’re both pretty much battling the world right now and getting nowhere.  How we’re like the only good things in each other lives right now.  It didn’t really get anything solved, but at least we both admitted how shitty we’re feeling lately and how we’re so exhausted by life that we’re barely even connecting with each other anymore.

So then we purposefully had a real live dinner at the dinner table together.  With a ham steak and corn on the cob and cheesy mashed potatoes.  It helped.  We might have even gone and made love, but she’s got some medical problems that keep her out of the mood.

I’m still barely checking my email.  Mostly just clearing the junk and ignoring the rest.  Except for talking wiht my realtor about taking my house off of the market.  Not because I want to keep it.  (Though it would be nice to find a job there and move back.)  But because the economy has dropped like a rock and I’m just never going to be able to sell it at a price that I can afford.   No use wasting her or my time.  Close up shop.  But other than that, I’m just kind of ignoring the world.

I almost feel bad that I haven’t even really visited anyone’s blog lately.  Maybe today I’ll feel better and get on that.  Or maybe not.  I dunno.

But at least I haven’t offed myself yet.  I’m trying to keep a positive outlook.  I just need some time to recouperate.  Maybe a little escape into some video games wouldn’t be so bad.  So long as I keep myself under control.

You know things are bad when you’re not even masturbating.  I know, that sounds weird.  But I like sex.  And when I can’t get sex, well, anything is better than nothing.  So I probably tend to do it about daily, give or take, when the wife isn’t feeling amorous.  But lately?  I can’t even remember the last time I did it for myself.  And I really can’t remember the last time I did it with my wife.  I’ve been so out of sorts, even the simple pleasures of life have been eluding me.

Which is probably why I’ve also had such a hard time getting into the mood to cook lately.  I’ve lost my love for life, so I’ve also lost my love for food.  When I’m feeling well, I love to create.  I love to experiment.  I love to cook.  Lately?  Hot dogs.  Sandwiches.  Blah.

I’m definitely not better yet.  But I’m not as bad as I was.

For what it’s worth, world, I’m sorry that I’m ignoring you.

You know, it’s kind of funny, but I enjoy being a housewife.  I absolutely love to cook.  Last night’s chicken pot pie casserole actually almost worked.  I just should have used a little less mashed potatoes to thicken up the broth.  And this morning I had a lovely breakfast of freshly baked croissants.  (Or, technically, Pillsbury crescent rolls.)

And then there’s the dishes.  I really don’t mind doing the dishes.  And last light I cleaned out the fridge.  My wife even had a nice little science experiment going.  (Word to the wise, don’t leave steamed broccoli sprinkled with cheese sit for too long.)

I don’t mind cleaning.  I’d even dust and vacuum more often if I weren’t so allergic.  The last thing my sinuses and skin want are dust kicked up into the air.  (Maybe I should invest in SCUBA gear.)

And I do laundry fairly well, I think.  I’m good at separating colors and whites, using the right cycle and temperature settings.  My wife even got me into her habit of taking important things out of the drier after they’ve been warmed up and hanging them to dry on a clothes rack so that they don’t wrinkle.  (Plus it saves energy.)

Being home to do things like this is one of the perks of being an independent software contractor.

Is it strange to enjoy being a housewife?

Now if I just had some social interaction to perk up my day.  Friends would be nice.  The wife coming home for lunch for a nooner would be even better.  Hell, I’d even settle for a pool girl to fool around with.  Or a maid, since someone has to dust and vacuum every now and then.

Or a friend who I could play pretty pretty dress-up with.  Who would help me do my makeup and style my hair.