I don't normally post serious things all to often... but I saw this today and liked it a lot...

“I believe in God like I believe in the sun, not because I can see it, but because of it all things are seen.”

- C.S. Lewis

Merry Christmas

I made this in highschool when I wanted to figure out photoshop (it didn’t happen)

but Merry Christmas everyone!

PaPaw Cookies

Every year for Christmas my Grandpa (Papaw) always buy the grandkids these cookies...

It's happened for so long that we call them Papaw cookies...

Anyways... I bought a tin of them for the Access Volunteer Christmas Party for a game and took the left overs home a few weeks back... and devoured them...

I couldn't stand for that so I did the only logical thing I could think of...

Merry Christmas!

Holga

Just got this guy for Christmas… I got it on Saturday and have ready gone through a whole roll of film… It’s so fun…

Only problem… The whole first roll came out HORRIBLE! but it still has that Holga charm… It’s going to be fun figuring this thing out.

It's ok to be alone.

Sometimes I have a problem with not being constantly entertained or not being surrounded by noise and CRAZINESS!

Now I don't 100% agree with everything this girl says... it's beautiful and worth a watch.

Hugh Gallagher

The following is a guy named Hugh Gallagher's answer for admittance into NYU. I LOVE IT!

Question...

3A. ESSAY: IN ORDER FOR THE ADMISSIONS STAFF OF OUR COLLEGE TO GET TO KNOW YOU, THE APPLICANT, BETTER, WE ASK THAT YOU ANSWER THE FOLLOWING QUESTION: ARE THERE ANY SIGNIFICANT EXPERIENCES YOU HAVE HAD, OR ACCOMPLISHMENTS YOU HAVE REALIZED, THAT HAVE HELPED TO DEFINE YOU AS A PERSON?

Here is how he responded...

I am a dynamic figure, often seen scaling walls and crushing ice. I have been known to remodel train stations on my lunch breaks, making them more efficient in the area of heat retention. I translate ethnic slurs for Cuban refugees, I write award-winning operas, I manage time efficiently. Occasionally, I tread water for three days in a row.

I woo women with my sensuous and godlike trombone playing, I can pilot bicycles up severe inclines with unflagging speed, and I cook Thirty-Minute Brownies in twenty minutes. I am an expert in stucco, a veteran in love, and an outlaw in Peru.

Using only a hoe and a large glass of water, I once single-handedly defended a small village in the Amazon Basin from a horde of ferocious army ants. I play bluegrass cello, I was scouted by the Mets, I am the subject of numerous documentaries. When I'm bored, I build large suspension bridges in my yard. I enjoy urban hang gliding. On Wednesdays, after school, I repair electrical appliances free of charge.

I am an abstract artist, a concrete analyst, and a ruthless bookie. Critics worldwide swoon over my original line of corduroy evening wear. I don't perspire. I am a private citizen, yet I receive fan mail. I have been caller number nine and have won the weekend passes. Last summer I toured New Jersey with a traveling centrifugal-force demonstration. I bat 400. My deft floral arrangements have earned me fame in international botany circles. Children trust me.

I can hurl tennis rackets at small moving objects with deadly accuracy. I once read Paradise Lost, Moby Dick, and David Copperfield in one day and still had time to refurbish an entire dining room that evening. I know the exact location of every food item in the supermarket. I have performed several covert operations for the CIA. I sleep once a week; when I do sleep, I sleep in a chair. While on vacation in Canada, I successfully negotiated with a group of terrorists who had seized a small bakery. The laws of physics do not apply to me.

I balance, I weave, I dodge, I frolic, and my bills are all paid. On weekends, to let off steam, I participate in full-contact origami. Years ago I discovered the meaning of life but forgot to write it down. I have made extraordinary four course meals using only a mouli and a toaster oven. I breed prizewinning clams. I have won bullfights in San Juan, cliff-diving competitions in Sri Lanka, and spelling bees at the Kremlin. I have played Hamlet, I have performed open-heart surgery, and I have spoken with Elvis.

But I have not yet gone to college.

If you don't smile...

My Next Project

It's been a while since I've gotten around to making my next great creation. (I've been focused on Christmas!) It's been a few months since I've put on the old apron though... The Chicken Parm was good... it really was... but I think its time to step it up... because... why not?

I was watching the Today show the other day and they had this 100 layer lasagna... And it looks delicious! I'm not sure I'm going to go with this recipe but I'm going to give lasagna a try... my way. I'll look around and try to find something that fits me...

My goal with it though is to make it 100% from scratch. Noodles, sauce everything! I like this challenge!

This is the Today show four star lasagna... Its beautiful!

Zach Anner

This guy gives me hope. Team Anner.

I quote this a lot...

"Dear Readers, for most of you, this is my first column in your paper. In the future, I will be answering your questions, but today I want to break from my usual format and talk to you about the subject of plans. Not so much my plan for this column, but life plans, and how we all make them. And how we hope that our kids make good, smart, safe plans of their own. But if we're really honest with ourselves, our plans usually don't work out as we had hoped. So instead of asking our young people "What are you plans? What do you plan to do with your life?" maybe we should tell them this: Plan to be surprised." - Dan

I told you I would...

I told you I'd post pictures of my first cooking experiment in the real world... and here it is...

Chicken Parmesan

First things first: The Sauce. It was a simple sauce with a diced tomatoes, onions and garlic and let that sit for a long time to work together... it turned out really well...

Next was the Pasta... It was a just thin spaghetti... I boiled water... no big accomplishment here...

Next was the Chicken parts... I didn't document a ton of this... my hands were kinda tied up at that moment...

The basic process was this... dry the chicken breast (I think cutlets would've been a better cut of chicken... more on that in a second)... dredge it in flour then egg then bread crumbs... Fry it in oil on each side to brown it and solidify the breading... From there, throw it in a pan add the sauce (see above), basil leaves, parmesan and romano cheese and top it with baby tomatoes... throw it in the oven till the cheese is melted and the chicken is cooked through.

The final product...

It looks messy... but it was delicious.

Pro's: For a first time thing... it turned out really well...

Con's: I'll use chicken cutlets next time so the consistency is the same throughout... and make more sauce than I did this time...

All in all it was a great experience and am looking forward to my next challenge... Any Ideas?

Making time for dreams...

I've been thinking a lot about priorities recently... I'm still on track with the things I want to be doing (sort of) and trying to keep the things I need to do in check as well. And only to add to that the priorities of my friends family and my girlfriend... things can get hectic.

You know how it goes...

Monday through Friday come and go each day saying you'll get X done... but Y at work totally throws you off for the entire day and you come home totally exhausted or if you have a good day something else just pops up out of no where... You finally get to your weekend and you're so beat down from your week you can't even find time to get what you need done much less what you want done... so you compromise what you want for what you need and in the end you've got the important stuff under wraps but your heart is still longing for something more! This keeps going on and on and on and on until you find yourself burnt out wishing for something different.

I'm not complaining here... I just know how it goes... I've been there... Sometimes I feel like I am there still... But that can't be it! This can't be all things are cracked up to be! I've got dreams in my dreams and plans for years!

So I've decided recently to get to my dreams... Or at least things that make me feel alive and happy... just for fun... To keep me actually living... and some things to keep me healthy.

So far so.... well... not bad but not great... back to the whole priorities thing... I made those goals a few weeks back... and did 2 of the 3... and did all three... just not in the timeline I wanted... But I got them done.

All this to say, things come up and can get in the way. But in my heart, dreams are worth spending some time on... worth saving energy towards... dreams are worth living.

Changing the way I do things...

Life Motto: If you wait till the last minute, it only takes a minute to do.

I'm not the king of procrastinators, but I'm pretty close... In college I prided myself on my ability to work, have friends and still stay up with my classes. I'd usually wait until the very last minute to get things done and for the most part it worked out... I'm even one of those people who says they feel like they do their best work under the deadline pressure...

This has carried over to my current life... I need to set myself deadlines on things... everything...

I have these ambitions of cooking and being so creative in life but I never get myself around to doing those things... so here are a few short term goals:

1. I am going to cook something brand new on Thursday (tomorrow) from my book I bought recently. (pictures soon)

2. I am going to finish my video project for this week by Friday morning.

3. I am going to finish my set goal reading tonight.

Three should be enough for now... one for everyday till the weekend. Good.

Here's to making it all happen!

"NOBODY IN LIFE GETS EXACTLY WHAT THEY THOUGHT THEY WERE GOING TO GET. BUT IF YOU WORK REALLY HARD, AND YOU’RE KIND, AMAZING THINGS WILL HAPPEN.”

— CONAN O’BRIEN

I believe that I will change the whole world one day.

(I'm going to do it too!)

People that actually follow their dreams...

I love this picture... I suppose part of finding out who I am creatively is looking at other creative people...

It's always good to look out and see people who have done what everyone else dreams of doing... Not everyone wants to be a puppeteer... but everyone has a dream... I want to be one of those people that actually does it.

This is just the beginning.

October Resolutions!

This is a little late in the year (or a lot early) but here are my (what I'm calling) October Resolutions:

1. I want to learn to cook! and I don't want to cook I want to learn to cook well! Not just TopChef food but good food that I actually enjoy. I want to learn new cooking techniques. I want to get the feel for making great food out of ordinary ingredients! Here is my starting point. I just bought "How To Cook Everything" by Mark Bittman. I got to check it out at a Barnes and Nobel the other weekend and loved the way the guy laid things out... It's going to be a fun start to things.

2. I'm going to start couponing... Not super seriously... but I'll figure out how to do it my own way and save myself some money so I can actually cook the things I want to.

3. I am going to get in some sort of better shape... with all this food I need to be doing things that help me not gain a billion pounds! I don't want to just eat better I want to live better! Exercise, less junk food, the whole nine yards!

4. I want to read more. I got a knack for reading at the beginning of the year... then somewhere in the middle of everything i lost it... so I'm gonna pick it up again!

It's only 4 things. But they could be revolutionary for me! Here we go...

So it begins...

Alright... I've recently been saying I want to get a ton of things done... I hardly ever follow through with these types of things... but the things i want to do are things that could be beneficial for a good healthy life! And it's all got to begin somewhere! So here it is... the beginning!