A change will do you good

I was messing around with the template for the blog and somehow all the stuff on the sidebar ended up at the bottom. I didn't want to spend too much time figuring out how to fix it, and I thought a new look would be kind of fun. I find this one very soothing. Let me know what you think.

Princesses was a fun show, without much substance to it. I'm not sure I would be willing to pay more than the $36 we paid for our tickets. The songs were ok, with a couple of good pop-flavored tunes, like "Success is the Best Revenge". The sets and lighting were impressive. On the whole, though, it didn't even come close to being as good as Jesus Christ Superstar (my all-time favorite musical EVER), and I'm definitely not willing to see it again. I think Leslie and Yamini have maxed out their musical quota for the year. But I appreciate their willingness to go with me!

Our dinner at Andaluca was YUM. We ordered a lot of small plates and shared. The only bad thing we had was one of the items on the calamari plate - it seemed like it was calamari swimming in ketchup and mustard. I'm sure it was far more sophisticated than that, but I couldn't get past the way it looked and I think that tainted its taste as well. The service was great, and I'm totally impressed that our waitress remembered all of the things (7+) that we ordered without writing them down.

I spent this morning in a frenzy of cooking. The last box I got from Pioneer Organics, unfortunately, mostly went to waste as I didn't properly *plan* what I was going to do with the vegetables. By the time I got around to cooking, a lot of the stuff had gone bad.

So this week, I was determined to be on top of it. I made a savory, slightly spicy coleslaw and curried couscous with broccoli and feta from the Cooking Light 2005 cookbook, baked eggplant slices with light mayonnaise and parmesan from the Weight Watchers website, and roasted red potatoes with Italian seasoning (my own recipe).

I usually hate eggplant and was dismayed to find one in my box this week (I forgot to list it as an exclusion on the Pioneer Organics website). However, this recipe was great! I guess you can put mayo and cheese on anything and it'll taste good. Kind of like deep frying, only healthier. It also helped that I remembered the trick of sprinkling the eggplant slices with salt to get some of the water out, and forgot about the slices in the oven, so they cooked until they became very thin and soft, almost like eggplant chips. Even TJ agreed that they tasted good! Incidentally, when I showed TJ the whole eggplant, he didn't know what it was. Shocking!

Oddly enough, after all that cooking, I'm not at all hungry, and it's not because I snacked while I was cooking. This always happens. I guess I know what I'm having for dinner, though. Yay! Staying on track with my healthy eating plan should be a snap this week!

I got my letter saying I got into UW Bothell's CSS program yesterday. I'm really torn now. For some reason, actually getting the letter has made me want to start school again, despite my previous resolution. (How quickly we forget!). I have to decide by Sept 6 what I'm going to do. Wish me luck.