Culinary adventures.

So, one of the things that I'm doing this summer is teaching myself how to cook. It's relatively safe; no one's died yet from food poisoning, and if I need help (and I need a lot of it) it's usually just a few feet away already helping me. Fridays have turned into designated cooking days, but it's been a lot of fun so far. A lot of extremely hard/hard to juggle prep, but the finished product usually looks great.

Last Friday I made a shepherd's pie recipe by Sunny Anderson (Food Network show host) and it was absolutely delicious. We'd tweak a few things in the recipe if we did it next time (you don't need ALL those spices in the ground beef, and you don't need heavy cream in the mashed potatoes), but it turned out delicious. J ate over that night.

I cooked a low-maintenance dinner last night, practically straight out of the freezer. Used to be a thing like that would freak me out, but didn't break a sweat this time. My dad was extremely thankful to come home at 9:30 to a plate of chicken, sweet potatoes, and green beans.

Tonight it was lasagna. And let me tell you, it was so, so much better than the frozen kind that you get. It was so much creamier, and sweeter because we used a basil-sweetened tomato sauce... We have leftovers. Too bad I can't send them electronically so that my friends can enjoy the fruits of my labors. My aunt and J both ate over tonight, and the recipe got glowing reviews. I also made these peanut butter brownie cupcakes, and they were delicious too. Also pretty easy; I'm a much better baker than cook, and cupcakes are easy and fun for me. I still have about 15, I'd bet... too bad I don't really have anyone to give them too. Guess I'll just have to eat them for breakfast 0:)

I finally upgraded: Today I got an iHome. While unpacking my stuff from college, I realized that I don't really listen to CDs any more. After all, every car has an aux jack that we use to plug in our iPods, and every CD I have is already in my computer/iPod. The only place I listened to CDs was in my room, and I still would make myself mixes to listen to. Why not just cut out that process? I'm really enjoying the upgrade. Now if only I can figure out how to turn the backlight down before I need to sleep tonight...

This is technically my last weekend off before I start working. My first shift at JCPenney is Monday night, and then I still have two more days of orientation. I still have plenty of time to relax, though, and really, what else was I planning on doing this summer except for working?

If you were in Dublin right now, you could tell that the Tournament was starting soon. That's right; Dublin is the host of one of the biggest golf tournaments on the PGA Tour. It's called the Memorial Tournament, because originally it was held on Memorial Day weekend, but I think today? might have been the day when Memorial Day was originally observed, or something like that. Tournament play doesn't start until next Thursday, but there's already been about a 300% increase in traffic. I can't pull out of my neighborhood, drivers are being erratic, and people are already swarming the course. This morning, while I was planting the front beds at our house, we could hear them testing the rain horns at the course, and we live about four miles away. Weekly renters are coming up, and it'll only get busier.

And of course, it's graduation party season again. I could have gone to one last week, but we decided not to go as a family. Tomorrow I'm going to meet one of my mom's close friend's daughters, since my mom talks about their family all the time. My brother, even though he's a junior, has about 20 parties to go to in the upcoming month. And graduation is tomorrow. On top of all the parties and all the Muirfield traffic (that's the golf course/neighborhood where the Tournament is held), there's also going to be traffic at the Schott (the Schottenstein Center, part of The Ohio State University's campus). Good grief.

Oh well. I sipped a cocktail tonight that tasted like blue Gummi Bears, so I'm happy. Ciao, all.

- Jen -

LOST.

I'm only about, what, four seasons behind, but even Season 1 was pretty good. I remembered watching at least 30 seconds of the season finale, when Walt gets taken by the others. It's a really good TV series and I'm glad J's making me watch it with him this summer. We start Season 2 tomorrow, hopefully.

(I can't believe I'm watching it now, instead of while it was going on. I kind of have a good excuse, though. What a great show. Bad part is, I only have J to talk with when I want to talk about the most recent episodes we've watched.)

J keeps telling me to 'wait until later' so I can find out what happens in some of the episodes from Season 1, but honestly, I have the patience of something that's not very patient, so I keep threatening to go onto the LOST Wiki. (Speaking of not being very patient, when's the next season of RvB coming out? I know you read this blog and I think you'd know the answer by now.)

Kind of missing hanging out with my college friends, even if all we did was grab dinner every once in a while. Kinda hard to do that when you're stranded in a different state. Ah well. I'll be back soon enough, and the Internet is marvelous for keeping in touch. Speaking of, should call J, it's getting late and I have to be up before the crack of noon tomorrow.

- Jen -

So, I totally have a job now.

I don't start training until June 1, which means that I still have more than a week of 'summer' before I officially start working. I'm working 'Sales Support' at JCPenney's. Talk about corporate slave: my job is to basically constantly restock the floor. And it's $7.50 an hour. Good news: If I actually work 40 hours a week like I originally intended, that means I'll still probably make over $4k this summer. And that's REALLY good news, because otherwise I don't know if I'd have been able to afford traveling or, um, food abroad.

Ugh. I wake up this morning at the crack of noon to a huge hullabaloo in my house. Had to settle my accounts with everyone... my dad's calling himself a forensic accountant now. Riiiiiiiiiiiiight.

Spent some time at UDF last night, hanging out with Justin's friends DavidandKellie. (Yes, they get smushed together like that.) Quite amusing, laughed until my sides burst.

Now I need to clean/play DS until I bust. Ciao, y'all.

-Jen-

New information

Apparently, my friend going abroad with me has also started a travelogue blog! I'm really excited that he's joining the phenomenon. Here it is; enjoy!

Got a mailing today, express air mail from Oxford. Forms that we need to fill out so that they can get us the correct visa letters in June. I'm trying to send mine back in as soon as possible. It's strange when a two-page form has five pages' worth of instructions in order to fill it out...

I had a job interview today. I think it went well; I'm on the callback list. I know retail is suffering right now with the economy, but I was planning on earning a lot of money this summer so I could travel abroad. As long as we're on the topic, took my first practice LSAT tonight and I feel like it kicked my butt. Hello, a summer's worth of studying. Also, there are probably books in at the library for me to start reading.

And now, back to your regularly scheduled programming.

- Jen -

F1RST P0ST!!!

I know, it's terrible, but hey, I need a placekeeper until this blog really gets started up. (Also reminds me of an old XKCD...)

Um, hi. I'm Jen. I'm a University of Notre Dame rising junior, double-majoring in English and philosophy. I have the privilege of representing Notre Dame abroad when I travel to New College, Oxford in the UK. My studies will begin in October 2009 and will end in June 2010. This is going to be my travelogue while I travel and my day-to-day blog while I'm at school during terms.

Why dublin2oxford? Well, my hometown is Dublin, Ohio. It's a town of about 150,000 people. We have a few things that have made it famous over the years. For example, we have the world's largest Irish festival, which occurs every year over the first weekend in August. We are also home to the international headquarters of Wendy's, and we have one of the world's 10 worst monuments as mentioned on late night television (the Field of Concrete Corn; I'll make sure to post pictures sometime during the summer). Another thing that people at ND would recognize: I graduated from the same high school as Brady Quinn and Chris Quinn. No, they're not related. No, I didn't actually attend school with them; they graduated in 2003, I graduated in 2007. If you want to find Dublin on a map, take a look at the United States and find Ohio. Then find the star in the middle; that's Columbus. We're a smidge to the northwest. (Any further than us and you get into corn country, har har.)

Want to know a little bit more about me? Well, I classify myself as a supernerd. I love playing games on my Nintendo DS, and I intend on eventually beating Halo on Heroic sometime over the summer before I leave. Some of my favorite TV shows are House, MD and Mythbusters. Over the summer, I'm going to watch every episode of LOST, and I'll also be studying to take the September LSAT. I'm an avid reader, and I'll be putting that to the test as I start reading through Slavic literature canon (think War and Peace and Anna Karenina).

I also have a boyfriend of two and a half years. To protect his anonymity, I'll be referring to him as J. We're very close; he's my best friend, and I really enjoy hanging out with him during the summers. During the academic year, we're long-distance (he doesn't go to ND like I do, but to a university in Ohio), but that hasn't stopped us yet.

I think that's enough about me for now. I'll probably start blogging again as I go through some of the processes needed to go abroad. The next step right now will probably happen around July, when I get the information I'll need to start filling out a student visa. I'll also most likely get my tutorial information around that time. So, if you don't see any more posts for a while, it's because all's quiet on the eastern front. (I'm also going to prod a few friends going abroad with me to start their own blogs here on Blogspot, just to create a blog ring for other people's entertainment.)

- Jen -