Fondue Fun

I absolutely love fondue. There is just something fun about cooking your food at the table. Last night I had some co-workers over for an evening of fondue yummyness. We started out with dipping bread in a cheese fondue (thanks Camille!), enjoyed a dinner of salmon, chicken, steak, shrimp, sausage, and veggies on the raclette grill, and then topped off the evening with dipping cheesecake, pound cake, brownies, marshmallows, pretzels, apples, oranges, and bananas in chocolate and caramel sauces. Oh my word, I was so full at the end of the night! We had a great time reminiscing about the first concerts we attended, 1980's movies and hairstyles, and more. It was a fabulous evening!

Pet Peeve

I find it amazing the number of non-handicapped people who use the handicap door activation buttons. In fact, it drives me nuts. I can understand if your hands are full, and you can't actually open the door yourself, but typically I think people should just pull the handle open. This might sound totally petty, but here is my reasoning:

• Don't the switches ever wear out? Seems like a waste of money if able-bodied people require the button to be replaced because of their laziness.
• People that work in my building use this button when entering or leaving the bathroom. Hello people, I don't really want the bathroom door open when I'm using the restroom! This is potentially embarrassing!
• I seem to constantly get blasted with hot or cold air as I walk down the halls of my building - when I look to see why all of a sudden it's freezing inside (this time of year anyway), I see that someone just pushed the handicap button to enter the building. Of course, this means the doors swing wide open, and stay open for much longer than it takes the person to walk through the door. Thus, all that outside air comes inside, and the inside air conditioned or heated air escapes outside. So not only am I uncomfortable because of the change in temperature, but it's a definite waste of energy.
• I have heard justification from people saying they don't want the germs from the door handle. Well, don't you think there are germs on the handicap button? For heavens sake, use a paper towel or your sleeve to open the door, or keep some anti-bacterial gel handy.

Anyway, thanks for letting me rant. This seriously bugs me. I have NO problem when people who actually NEED to use the button use it... It's the people that can clearly open the door themselves that get me!

Congratulations Beki!

Just wanted to give a big shout out to my little sister Beki for getting accepted into her first choice college - Brigham Young University - Idaho. Congratulations! I know that you'll have tons of fun there and do well as a student. I'm so proud of you Beki!

I Love Google Reader

Google Reader is one of my very favorite tools on the computer. In fact, with the exception of checking my home email address, I think Google Reader is the only other tool I use on a daily basis. Basically what I do is "subscribe" to my friends' blogs, local and national news sites, recipe sites, home decorating sites, etc. Google Reader constantly "reads" all of those sites and makes it easy for me to see when something new is posted. I used to spend way too much time visiting all my favorite sites even if new content had not been added. Now, I can see at a glance when there is something new. Unfortunately, Google Reader doesn't read private blogs, but it has worked for every other site I have tried.Another reason I like Google Reader is that it allows me to easily share my favorite content with other people. There is an "email" icon at the end of each post if I want to email an article or blog post to a certain person. There is also a "Share" icon. I share articles that I find interesting and that I think others that I know read my Shared Items will find interesting. I also like the "tag" feature. At this time, I only use tag to tag recipes that I want to show up on my recipe blog, but it can also be used to organize the posts.

I'm stealing this next paragraph from Sally who recently posted about Reader too :-)
To start, go to Google Reader. Sign in with your Google account. Click the Add Subscription link in the green box on the left-hand side and type or paste a blog address. Click the gray "Add" button and away you go! You can even categorize your list if you click the blue "Manage Subscriptions" link in the lower right-hand corner of the left side bar.

I know this post was pretty long, but I hope that it is helpful! I love Google Reader!

I'm Finally...

... paying it forward! My pay it forward gift is this snowman :-) Mandy got hers yesterday. Jessica - I gave yours to your mom... Lisa and Heidi, you'll get yours when I see you both later this month! Enjoy, and don't forget to pay it forward!

Snow!

I woke up this morning to a thick blanket of snow covering my lawn. It was so beautiful... but that also meant I needed to shovel my walks. I have church at 9:00 now, and I didn't wake up super early, so I didn't have a lot of extra time for shoveling. I shoveled half of my driveway and one strip all the way down my sidewalk before leaving for church. This afternoon I decided to tackle the rest of the shoveling. I got all bundled up, grabbed my shovel, and headed out front, only to find that some wonderful person had finished shoveling for me. Thank you!

One More Reason to Love a Mac