Randomness

[mereilin]

I've been feeling pretty good -- almost smug -- about the whole Feeding the Family thing this week. We're still working on that one chicken. There was roasted chicken with stuffing, potatoes and gravy; chicken chunks in gravy over rice; two different batches of Italian wedding soup with enough concentrated broth left over for several days' worth of soup to order for lunch; a chicken pot pie with potatoes, carrots and peas in a pastry that I can state with absolute certainty is one of the best I've ever come up with; and there's enough chicken, gravy and vegetables left over for stew with dumplings tonight (or another pie if I feel like pastry again) and enough broth left for another batch of soup or a couple days' worth of lunches. In fact, there's been such a bounty of leftover food that it may be a near thing for us to finish using it all before it goes bad -- and for a change, it won't be because we forgot about those containers!

It doesn't really make up for the fact that we've been housebound every day of school vacation week, or how generally lousy the kids have been feeling, but it's been nice to have a fridge full of comfort food and nothing to worry about. Best of all, there are two more chickens in the freezer downstairs. If we didn't keep going through milk and bread we could probably stop shopping until April.

Too bad we can't manage this kind of economy across the board. We don't live extravagantly, but it's definitely a challenge to make ends meet. I'm going to blame the high cost of gasoline and the number of miles Jon has to commute. There are other factors, but I'm pretty sure that's our biggest single expense after our mortgage. Ouch.

In general health news, I got the vaporizer going in Sadie's room on Thursday night, and for the first time all week she actually slept without coughing herself awake. It was wonderful. Danny's ear has improved to the point where it's no longer agonizing to have the drops put in it, and he seems much more like himself. Both kids are coughing a lot, though.

The laptop is up and running again, and I think I've reinstalled and reconfigured everything the way I need it. It's a slightly different version of Windows from what I was using, I think, owing to the fact that I forgot to give the Geek Squad the disk that came with my computer, and they forgot to ask me for it until I'd already left the store. By the time I picked up the message they'd already helped themselves to a disk from a similar computer that happened to be in for service ("Gateway doesn't care what disk you use," he told me) and reinstalled everything.

For one thing, my computer no longer hibernates, and I don't know if I can make it hibernate. If I snap it shut while I'm working, it just sits there; the old system automatically went into hibernation. Also the menu that comes up when I click "start" is slightly different -- more like the one on the desktop, which would have been fine if I hadn't got used to the new configuration and decided I liked it.

Oh well. Small stuff; at least I have a working computer and it didn't cost me a penny to have it fixed.

As for the weather, it looks like we got about a foot of snow from the latest storm. It's really light and powdery, but the bank left by the plows at the end of our driveway was thick and heavy as usual. Jon spent an hour digging out his car so he could get to work this morning; I'm debating whether there's anywhere I need to go badly enough to make digging out the van worthwhile. Probably not.

Okay. Back to sorting through the paperwork I've been ignoring for the last month.

Comments

[carise.livejournal.com]

If you right click on your powerplug/battery icon in the lower right corner, there should be a 'Adjust Power Settings' or something like that. The fourth tab is advanced, and the 5th is hibernation. Assuming the 'enable hibernation' box is checked on the 5th tab, You should be able to change it so when you close your lid, it hibernates, via the 4th tab. :)

And the start menu layout should be fixable by right clicking on the start bar, doing Properties, and on the 'Start Menu' tab, switching the style. :)

[mereilin.livejournal.com]

Thank you so much! I had no idea that would be so easy. I'm such a technotard. ;)

[htnatch.livejournal.com]

I always figured that we had February vacation when we did because there is a large chance that that particular week will be horrid, weather-wise. Many a February vacation was spent inside with books and boredom. I don't know anywhere else that does February vacation outside New England. I missed it when my kids were in school.

I'm very glad that Danny is feeling better.

Are you going to share that pastry recipe? ;)

[mereilin.livejournal.com]

It's not really a special recipe, just the basic one from the Better Homes and Gardens cookbook. Pastry is always hit-or-miss for me, though, but this one came out fantastic. I used the food processor.

[luvszoe.livejournal.com]

Why a school vacation week now?

[mereilin.livejournal.com]

Because it's February in Massachusetts, of course. Actually, it makes zero sense to me (I grew up in PA). Schools here get a week off in February and a week off in April and summer vacation doesn't start until nearly July. Weird.