Happy Pumpkin Water Wednesday!

Happy Pumpkin Wednesday friends!  

While I have been away because of my internet problems, Pumpkin has been keeping herself out of trouble by spending the day at her office.

I can't promise that she has been doing as much work as she likes to claim, but she has been keeping notes about her blog ideas.  As you might know, Pumpkin hasn't always had the best track record with water (see tips for extending the life of your laptop #5 for the inside scoop), but she does know that water is an essential element in her diet and life.

The amount of water cats drink every day obviously varies, but a cat eating wet food may drink less water than those eating dry nuggets.  Wet food may contain up to 80% water, while dry food only provides 7-12% water.  Particularly if your pet is eating dry food, make sure they have access to enough water to keep them hydrated.

Step 1: Find Water Bowl

Step 2 and 3: Dip paw into bowl and drink water off paw

The amount that humans need to consume depends on lifestyle, body type, and daily activities.  You might be familiar with the old adage of eight, eight ounce glasses a day rule.  However, more recent research suggests that women need to drink about 9 glasses a day, and men closer to 12 or 13 glasses.

I think humans sometimes count beer as their water consumption

If you're hesitant to drink the water that comes out of your faucet, consider that most bottled water is missing fluoride.  Fluoride was added to drinking water en masse in the 1940's.  Studies in the last fifty years have shown that drinking fluorinated water reduces the risk of cavities.  Most bottled water does not have fluoride, so if you're trying to prevent cavities and keep those teeth razor sharp, try to get some tap water into your life.

Yikes! Sharp teeth!

Stay hydrated and stay well this week!

Looking forward to a wonderful Thursday!

Back to Blogging on Miscellaneous Monday

Hello friends, and welcome back to Everyday Domestic Diversions.  I certainly have been diverted in recent months and not spending as much time as I should sharing recipes, helpful house tips, and of course, pictures of Pumpkin.

While I know don't want to hear my excuses, I feel my some of the reasons for my absence are worth sharing on this Miscellaneous Monday.

Excuse/Reason #1 for Blog Hiatus: No Internet!

You know that you are too dependent on technology when a month of internet outage causes you serious distress.  Case in point: when the internet in my apartment stopped in early February.  At first I thought the menacing red light on my modem might go away on its own if I restarted the modem and my computer enough times.  However, after a week of reading and typing emails on my smartphone, it was obvious I would have to prepare myself for the dreaded customer service call in center.

Hello, Customer Service...Help!

What happened over the next three weeks can only be described as insanely frustrating.  One to three nights per week I would ring the customer service/technical support service for help.  I found kind people at the other end of the phone, but they lacked something very important, the ability to solve my problem.

I'm a solutions girl, and I knew that there was no sense getting angry with the person at technical support. I waited patiently through the phone tree, and would sit while they tested my modem and asked me if I had tried restarting my computer...

A new modem and one failed service appointment later I was still without internet.  As a last resort I called in to the customer service center right when I got home for work and unknowingly uttered the magic words: "I just need this internet to be fixed or I will have to cancel my service."

Bam! I had a customer service appointment scheduled and a wonderfully knowledgeable technician came out to my house.  He fixed the telephone jack (I have DSL), fixed the box on the outside of the house, and even fixed the connection at the end of the street.  Customer service at it's finest!

My takeaways from this experience are:

1) Try to call the customer service center between 9 AM and 6PM.  Although many companies have dedicated call centers for after hours problems, they are typically in a different part of the country or world.  You have a better chance at getting a more regional representative by calling during the day.

2) Be nice to the people on the other end of the phone line!  I really tried to relay that I just needed a solution and was not angry at them.  Even if it didn't help me in a tangible way, I feel better knowing that I never yelled, and last,

3) When in doubt, tell the appropriate customer service agent that you are thinking about canceling their service.  Particularly if you are a long time customer, they might be willing to speed things up to help make it right.

How did my internet break in the first place?  I'm not completely sure, but I have my suspicions...

No, I did not sabotage your internet, I just chewed on this cord!

Now that we're back I wanted to share with you a new recipe I tried this evening.  I've been experimenting with plant proteins and new grains and decided to use the chickpeas I had stashed in my cupboard.

Below is my step by step picture guide (thanks Timmy!) for Curried Coconut Soup with Chickpeas (from Epicurious!):

First grab your ingredients, you will need:

1 tablespoon canola oil

1 medium onion, chopped

1 red bell pepper, chopped

1 jalapeno pepper, seeded and chopped

4 large cloves garlic, minced

2 cups low sodium broth (I used chicken, you can use Veggie Broth too)

1 15 ounce can chickpeas, rinsed and drained

1 14.5 ounce can diced tomatoes, drained

1/2 tablespoon curry powder

salt and pepper to taste

1 14 ounce can light coconut milk

1 cup cooked white or brown rice

Prepare your mise en place, i.e. chop up all your veggies:

I had a leftover half an onion and used another 3/4 of the new onion.

Clockwise from the onion, garlic, red bell pepper and jalapeno

I went outside the confines of the recipe and roasted the chickpeas before I put them in the soup.  I added a teaspoon of oil, salt, pepper and paprika and placed in the toaster oven at 400 degrees for about 25 minutes.  (If you're looking for another recipe for roasted chickpeas as a snack, check out the Lean Green Bean)

Chickpeas plus oil plus spices

Roasted Chickpeas

Now that you have all your ingredients prepared, get out a pot and put in the canola oil.  Add the onions, peppers and jalapeno and cook until the onion is sweated down, about 5 minutes.

Then, add the garlic, and stirring often, cook until fragrant, about one minute.  Then add in your liquids, the chicken stock, tomatoes,  and chickpeas.  Bring to a boil and cook for about 10 minutes.

Next add the coconut milk and rice and incorporate until warm.  Then serve with garnish, like cilantro. I diced some scallions very fine because that's the only real green garnish I had.

Has your latest meal been inspired by an item in your pantry?

So good to be back!  Looking forward to a lovely Tuesday!

Happy Pumpkin Wednesday! Celebrate Sleeping!

Happy Pumpkin Wednesday friends!  You are officially half way through the week and closer to the weekend.

But are you finding yourself longing to get to the weekend only so you can take a nap/get more sleep?  Tonight, Pumpkin, who is one of the foremost experts at sleeping shares a few tips with us so that you can spend more time awake this weekend, especially on Caturday...

Yes, that's right, I am an expert.

• Revert to your childhood and set a bed time.  Keeping yourself on a schedule will help your body get into a routine to get some shut eye.

I like to nap on the hour, every hour. 

• Drink less caffeine!  Especially at night.  The effects of caffeine can take hours to wear off, so even having a cup of coffee at 6:00 PM may cause you problems when you go to get in bed at 10 P.M. 

I had too much cat nip (which equals kitty caffeine!)

• If you want your bed to be more cozy, you can always add a mattress topper to your bed.  There are a variety of different types mattress toppers ranging in price and benefits.  I would recommend the feather topper as an inexpensive alternative for making your mattress feel more luxurious.

Sleeping on the human's blankets is also an option.

• 
  Allergy sufferers should take the time to wash your bed linens at the least once every two weeks.  Wash your linens in hot hot water to minimize the amount of dust and other particles that disrupt your breathing.  

Wash with water...don't wash the cat though.

How do you ensure you get some solid shut eye?

Looking forward to a lovely Thursday, and wishing yo all a good night's sleep!

Miscellaneous Monday: Superbowl Hangover

Hello friends!  I hope you are well settled into 2012, I can hardly believe that it is February!  If you were like the other 111.3 million people in America, you spent the first Sunday in February watching the Super Bowl.  If you were too busy staring at Tom Brady, or Madonna, you might have missed some of these highlights:

• Kelly Clarkson's rendition of the national anthem was rather speedy.  She clocked her performance in at 1 minute and 34 seconds.

Photo: Timothy A. Clary/Getty Images

• Another classic "prop bet" is to guess what color the gatorade is that will be dumped on the winning coach... the answer... Purple!

Photo via Flickr

• You might not have been too busy, however, to eat a chicken wing or two.  Apparently, Americans consumed nearly 1.25 billion chicken wings yesterday, meaning, it is unlikely that most people were feeling very healthy today.  However, once you get over your food hangover and you're in the mood for homemade chicken wings, give the recipe for baked buffalo wings a try. 

Ingredients:

3 pounds chicken wings, split at the joints, tips removed

2 bay leaves

1 1/2 cups fat free low-sodium chicken broth

1 cup Frank's buffalo sauce

2 tablespoons paprika

1 tablespoon smoked paprika

1 dash of cayenne pepper

2 tablespoons unsalted butter

1 tablespoon honey

4 stalks celery

4 carrots, cut in half

Step 1. Preheat the oven to 425 degrees.  Get a large baking sheet and cover it with parchment paper (it helps to make for easy clean up).  Place the chicken wings in a deep skillet.  I ended up using two skillets to hold all three pounds of chicken wings.  Add two pieces of celery and two pieces of carrot in the skillet with the wings.

Step 2.  Add your liquids and spices: chicken broth, bay leaves, Frank's Buffalo Sauce, paprika (regular and smoked), honey, butter and cayenne pepper.

Step 3.  Bring the ingredients to a simmer over medium heat and continue to cook for about 18 minutes.  Transfer the wings to your prepared parchment paper lined baking sheet in a single layer.

Step 4.  Place the cooking sheet with the wings in the oven and leave the sauce in the skillet.  Bake the wings for 30 to 35 minutes, turning once.  

Step 5.  Discard the celery, carrots and bay leaves.  In the meantime, simmer the reserved sauce over medium-low heat until slightly thickened, for about 10-15 minutes.   Toss the wings in the skillet with the sauce to coat.

Step 6: Dip in blue cheese, or ranch, serve with carrot and celery sticks and enjoy!

How was your Super Bowl Sunday?  Did you have a favorite commercial?

Looking forward to a lovely Tuesday!

Happy Pumpkin Wednesday! Tips to Prolong Your Laptop's Life

Hello all and Happy Pumpkin Wednesday!  You are halfway through the work week, and only two days until the weekend!

While we are working during the day, Pumpkin spends some time resting and lounging,

I like to start the day by realxing

Eating,

Then Noms, so essential

Exercising/Jumping in and Out of Cardboard Boxes,

Jump in, Jump Out, Repeat.

and exploring the interwebs for things to blog about on her weekly post

What, no Wikipedia?

Pumpkin spends so much time on the laptop researching for the blog that she is very aware of how to best keep my laptop in tip top shape.

To make sure that she can use my computer without causing too many problems, she adheres to a few rules:

1. To maximize the battery life of the laptop, Pumpkin always unplugs the power cord once the battery reaches 100% charge.  Your laptop battery becomes weaker the more it charges and discharges, and keeping it plugged into the wall keeps your battery in a state of constant charge/recharge. 
2. Pumpkin keeps her fur out of the keyboard by cleaning it often.  Using a can of compressed air, she can clean between the keys without having to the keys off (paws make tasks like that difficult.) 
3. Pumpkin remembers to use the laptop on a hard surface, not on the couch or on the bed.  When you put the computer on a soft surface, it blocks the ventilation and cooling system for your laptop.
4. Just like with cell phone and smart phone screens as discussed in an earlier post here, you want to use designated computer screen wipes to clean your laptop screen.  Don't grab your household cleaners because they contain additional chemicals that can destroy parts of your screen.
5. Pumpkin knows better (don't make her tell you the story about how she ruined my first laptop) than to have any liquids around the computer.  Many warranties do not cover water damage, and even if you are an awesome liar, it's likely that your computer repair company will know when something has been damaged by water versus dropped or just broken.

How have you extended the life of your computer/laptop?

Looking forward to a lovely Thursday!

Miscellaneous Monday: Welcome Back, Welcome Back, Welcome Back

Hello friends!  I hope you all had a wonderful holiday season and have been nicely welcomed in 2012!

In an attempt to keep this blog from becoming all about my cat, I'm going to work on bringing you more helpful tips and recipes in 2012...


This week I'll  start with a newsworthy item.  This morning, Zappos announced that hackers compromised the security of the website and the personal information of millions of its customers.  Luckily, there was no breach of the part of the website that stores credit card and financial information.

Photo by: Andres Rueda Used pursuant to creative commons license. 

Mulitple news articles are reminding you savvy online shoppers to take the time to make multiple, complex passwords on all sites where you input credit card information.  The danger with a hack at Zappos, is that your password information, if the same across multiple sites, could lead a hacker to easily determine your passwords and financial information at other sites.

Lock up your personal information with a high quality password

You can protect yourself by making a more complicated password.  One easy way to get a random password is to use a "pass phrase."  The pass phrase is a sentence you make up, and then you take the first letter of each word in that sentence to use as your password.  For example:  I was a law student and i drank too much coffee, becomes "iwalsaidtmc."  To the outside observer, its a completely nonsensical group of letters, but to you, an easy to remember phrase and a tough to guess password.

If you want to find out how tough a password is to guess, head to "How Secure is My Password" and give a password a test.  The phrase I just entered above would take 169 days to hack.  Add in a few numbers and symbols and you are in a good position to protect yourself online.  Just to complete the conspiracy theory, don't enter your real passwords on the site (who knows where it goes after all).



For all those times you aren't shopping online, or making up new passwords, you might be trying to come up with new recipes.  I did some traveling over New Years, and although it's not very thrifty, I always pick up a few magazines in the airport.  The latest issue of Cooking Light has 25 chicken recipes, something that is welcome in our house, where we eat a lot of bird.

One recipe I tried last week was the Mustard and Maple Glazed chicken.  It's a quick and easy recipe and although I don't have pictures, I can say it is delicious:

Who doesn't love syrup?  Photo by rasdourian under creative commons license.

Ingredients:

2 teaspoons olive oil

4 skinless boneless chicken breast halves

freshly ground black pepper

salt

1/4 cup low sodium chicken broth

1/4 cup maple syrup

2 teaspoons chopped fresh thyme

3 medium garlic cloves, thinly sliced

1 tablespoon cider vinegar

2 tablespoons stone ground mustard

1. Preheat your oven to 400 degrees.

2.  Heat a large oven ready skillet and add the oil to coat the pan.  Season the chicken breasts on both sides with salt and pepper and place them in the hot pan.  Cook the chicken until browned, about 2 minutes each side.

3.  Remove the chicken from the pan and set aside.  Add the chicken broth, syrup, thyme and garlic to the pan, and bring to a boil.  Scrape the pan to loosen any of the browned bits from the chicken.  Cook the syrup mixture for about 2 minutes, stirring frequently (syrup can burn!).  Add the vinegar and mustard and cook for one more minute, stirring constantly.

4.  Put the chicken back in the pan and spoon the mustard mixture over the chicken.  Place the skillet in the oven for 10 minutes or until the chciekn is done.  Remove the chicken from the pan and let stand 5 minutes.

5.  Be careful when grabbing the hot pan, but put the pan with the juices back on the stove.  Cook the mustard syrup mixture for 2 minutes or until it is syrupy.  Serve the sauce over the chicken.


What recipes are you adding to your rotation?  Have you changed your password so it's not your pet's name?

Looking forward to a lovely Tuesday!

Happy Pumpkin Wednesday! Holiday Animal Fun Time

Hello friends and Happy Pumpkin Wednesday!  I hope your gifts are bought and being wrapped and that you are getting ready for your holiday feasts!

Pumpkin has been helping me wrap presents

It is hard to wrap without opposable thumbs

She has also helped me unwrap a few presents

I cannot help myself, I love crinkly paper

Because Pumpkin is such a joy, I wanted to wrap her up and give her to Timmy as a gift.  I attempted to wrap Pumpkin like the cat in the video below:






But if you know Pumpkin, you know that she resisted the wrapping at all costs...

I am both uninterested and unwrappable

While we have been at work this week, Pumpkin has had some time to find a way for animals to wish you a Merry Christmas.

What do you have left to do before the holidays?  Pumpkin wishes you a Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays!

Looking forward to a lovely Thursday and Christmas!!