kirabug’s idea files

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Another fan art from ideaphile Plantnerd. I’ve owed her my recipe for barbecue rub for ages and ages now, so we’re trading fan art for recipes.

Anne’s Barbecue Rub Recipe:

1 cup brown sugar
1/3 cup kosher salt (a heavy 1/3 cup)
2 tbsp chili powder
1 tsp ground cumin
1 tsp cayenne pepper
1/2 tsp cinnamon
1/2 tsp ginger
1 tsp thyme
1 tsp garlic powder
1/2 tsp ground black pepper
1/2 tsp old bay

How to make: Mix all the stuff together and then mix until blended. I use a whisk.

When to use: You have a slab of meat? Put meat in dish, cover with rub, cook. Or, put meat on aluminum foil, cover with rub, wrap foil around meat, cook. How to cook? Bake, broil, grill, doesn’t matter. What to cook? Beef, pork, fish, chicken, any critter will do. A spoonful in the Kraft Macaroni & Cheese you added that can of tuna to will make a decent lunch.

Store extra in a relatively large airtight container. The brown sugar, if moist, tends to make it kind of clumpy. I tend to shake the whole container before reopening.

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And a last-minute bailout by ideaphile Plantnerd saves us from overall comic lateness, huzzah! I received this awesome goat painting (I think for a shirt?) a few moments after posting today’s Help, my hard drive is full! missive, which is good because the comic I was working on is still less than 1/3 complete.

We will get back to the Get Outta My Head plot in progress as soon as I can. Thanks!

My cousin flew in last night and we went to my parents’ for dinner. Had lots of cheeseteak and hoagies and such, and a very good time. We went home and crashed at my place.

This morning we got up around nine-ish, packed, packed the car, and my cousin and I drove the six and a half (I was taking my time and we stopped for lunch) hours from Pennsylvania to Virginia Beach. It was very very foggy through Delaware, and patchy all the way through the first branch of the Chesapeake Bay Bridge/Tunnel. We went down the first tunnel, came back up, and aha! there is in fact a sun in the sky.

We pulled into the hotel around 5:30 this evening and found a parking spot across from the Oscar Meyer Weinermobile that’s touring all the local military bases. Yes, we got pictures. No, I can’t post them - they’re on my cousin’s camera and besides, I forgot the card reader.

Anyway, we tried to check in, but the folks in front of us had asked to be reserved in this hotel, and they’d been told they’d been reserved at this address, but they were actually reserved in the Fairfield Inn a few blocks down, and while there were rooms here that they could book, very easily, they had to go through Reservations to use their rewards certificate for a free stay…. yadda yadda yadda…. anyway, I’m pretty sure they worked it out because I’m pretty sure the woman from the party was down in the hot tub later… but that’s getting ahead of myself.

So after about a half hour we checked in, came upstairs, deposited our stuff, and immediately walked out to the beach. It was the first time Plantnerd had seen the Atlantic in about ten years, so touching it - even just with our fingertips - was required.

We then walked up about four blocks to my aunt’s house, met up with my aunt and uncle, and we joined my aunt on a walk along the beach with Moose, their massive Irish setter. Upon returning, we drove out to the Twysted Fish where we were treated to wonderful seafood.

When we got back to the hotel, we hit the hot tub for about a half an hour, and that knocked the knots out of my back. I’ve done more driving than I’ve done in a very long time (if ever) and I’ve done more walking than I’ve done in weeks, and I’m full, happy, and exhausted.

–and I miss my husband something awful, but, you know, I kind of expected that.

Tomorrow: whale watching (hopefully) and more hanging out with relatives. Cool!

I tried about a half dozen times tonight to write a post expressing how incredibly weird it is to be home alone overnight. (Nighthawk is at a sleep study. It’s a good thing.) Tonight marks the first night in almost five and a half years that we weren’t in the same building overnight. (There have been nights that one of us was out late, or busy, and didn’t come to bed until almost morning, but never a night that I didn’t go to sleep knowing that he’d be here when I awoke.)

The dog’s been driving me bonkers. She finally stopped looking for him and whining around eleven thirty.

I talked to my cousin on the phone for quite a while. That and the completion of my first game of Civilization IV (I won the space race! whoo!) kept me busy enough not to go absolutely stir-crazy, but still…

Sometimes you take a person for granted when they’re there with you every day. I try to tell him how much I love him every day, and still on days like today I surprise myself by realizing how much he’s a part of my life. I can’t wait for him to come home.

A few days ago, a friend and I were discussing life being hell sometimes, and I comforted her by pointing out that if her life was hell, at least it was a corner office in hell - she at least had windows and could see a way out. She suggested that such a concept would make a good teeshirt, so over the past few days I threw some stuff together and put it in the store.

While I was at it, I made myself a design — it’s long-sleeved tee time, at least to me, and I wanted something to confirm that yes, it’s too freakin’ cold. I don’t care if you’re still in shorts. It’s too freakin’ cold. I had a lot of fun with that one.

When I get mine, I’ll throw some pics up for you. You’re welcome to check them out in the meantime. Oh, and if you like the designs but not on a shirt, let me know - it’s only a few minutes’ work for me to turn them into hats or coasters or mugs or mousepads or whatever.