recipe time!

One positive of having so much time to spend at home and wanting to save money is that I get to finally try out some recipes. I made this one tonight and it was incredibly tasty and easy (once I got used to folding the pie crust over). I know many people that would enjoy this dish as well, so I figured I'd put something that wasn't job related or me whining about not having a job on the ol' blog. I got this recipe out of this aaaaaamazing little magazine I picked up. David and I can usually come up with suggestions to change the recipe to make it better, but we couldn't really come up with anything.

Cheesy Corn and Chicken Turnovers
(Makes 8 turnovers)

2 cups chopped cooked chicken (about 2 chicken boneless breasts)
1 11 oz. can whole kernel corn with sweet peppers, drained
1 10.75 oz. can condensed cream of chicken and herbs soup
1 cup shredded Cheddar cheese (4 oz)
1 15 oz. package rolled refrigerated unbaked pie crusts (2 crusts)

1. Preheat oven to 400 degrees. In a medium sized bowl, mix together chicken, corn, soup and cheese.
2. Unfold pie crusts and place on a lightly floured surface. Roll each pie crust into a 13" circle, then cut into quarters. Spoon between 1/3 and 1/2 cup of chicken mixture along one straight side of each triangle, about 3/4" from edge. Brush edges with water & fold other straight side over. Seal, fold, do whatever you like to try and keep it closed. Prick pastry several times with a fork. Repeat with remainin pastry and filling, then place on a large baking sheet (or two small-medium ones, if your oven is tiny like mine).
3. Recipe says to bake 15 minutes, but mine took about 25-30 minutes to get brown around the edges and the crust baked enough to eat. Serve hot to warm.

The toughest part of this recipe is getting the hang of closing up the crust in a way that doesn't rip or tear the crust or make it become a totally different shape. We had two that had wonky crusts and became really strange looking turnovers, but they were still as delicious as the others. Oh! And make sure you put a good mixture in the turnover, I got one that was a lot of chicken and not so much of everything else.

job update

Interview #1: Got the feeling they didn't really want me.
Interview #2: What a mess. Scheduling misunderstanding and just... a mess.
Interview #3: I liked the school, the people, the philosophy, and I think I did pretty good. Still haven't heard back, though.

Today I called the HS a few blocks from our house. Left a message and the secretary for the principal said she'd call me back.

So... now I'm back to waiting and hoping. Great.

you were right

Remember how I was freaking out?
Well. Yeah. You were all right.
I have been called and emailed (FINALLY!). I have my preferences (HS>MS, less than 10 mi commute>30 mi commute) and I now have to figure out how to handle the more-than-one-interview situation, but I am no longer waiting to hear whether or not there are jobs. Yay!
I really suck at interviews, but hopefully I'll have at least one principal that wants me to work with them.

panic sets in

It's now August. August means only a few weeks until school. Three weeks until pre-service week. Four weeks until most schools start.

And I still have not heard from any of the places I've applied to. I've emailed. I gave my resume to someone that knows someone that works for Richmond's schools. I've heard nothing. Nothing!

I am now officially panicking. Yes. Full on panic. I've been telling myself that August will be The Month. The Month to Get the Job.
I don't care what job. I don't care where they send me, really. I'll make the best of it. I just. want. a. teaching. job. Please? Pretty please?
Then I start thinking: What if I did something wrong on my application? What if they don't think I'm qualified? I'm full of "What if".

(And the other part of my brain, not panicking and trying to be reasonable says: I'm sure I did everything okay on my application. I had all the info, all the references, but who knows? And on that note, if I don't get an interview or job because I screwed up on one small thing on the application, do I want to work for them anyway? Probably not. That's a small mistake on a mere formality, but it still bothers me. And about not being qualified: how is that possible? I don't know. I succeeded for 2 years already.)

The big "what if": What if I don't get a job? What happens?

Do I go back to working jobs I worked before I was a teacher? That's a scary thought. I didn't hate those jobs, but it's embarrassing and depressing to think that I go from being a teacher to a barista again.

I miss my students. I miss the other teachers. I miss being employed and having a paycheck and something to do.

What if I don't get a job? What if I don't hear at all? Crap. I am in full-on panic mode and every second, I'm staring at my phone, willing it to ring. This is horrible.

in which I refer you to my flickr photostream...

Pictures of our apartment with stuff in it are up on my flickr.
You'll also find a few (no, really, like less than 5) pictures from Tye's visit. We went to a really cute place called Comfort, but my camera's battery was dying, so I didn't take a lot of pictures.
(picture taken by Leanne's wonderful camera. I am trying not to laugh at the guy taking the picture, who said "You look like ducks!" or something along those lines, because we were in a V formation. Also, a prize to the first person that notices what's different about this picture. Here's a hint: I learned a valuable lesson this week about keeping track of how long I use one pair of contacts.)
You'll also find really blurry, hard to understand pictures from the night I went out with Leanne, Diana, Shannon and Rebecca and had a ridiculous amount of fun. My camera was on its last little bit of energy, but I tried to take a few good pictures (uhh, they're "artsy"??).

There is a hilarious story behind this picture. I wish I could tell you, but 1) it's really Diana's story and 2) it's probably one of those "you had to be there (especially after a few cucumber mojitos)" stories.
There are also pictures (and videos) of when David and I went to the Gone to the Birds festival to see the Purple Martins. It was crazy to see! The picture above is a shot of the huge flock we saw first.
This hawk snatched a Purple Martin out of the air, plucked it, tenderized it with its claws and then ate it whole. Someone in the crowd called it a Republican, which got a lot of laughs. It then flew into a tree full of Martins to try and get another. What a jerk.

completely & totally not dead

It's weird being in a city again. I keep remembering there's lots of stuff to do!

What we've done so far:

• Unpacked, cleaned, and went to Ikea to get some important things (like a sofa, chair and wardrobe)
• Figured out how to function in a smaller apartment
• Remembered what it was like to live in an apartment with no central air and no dishwasher again (that wasn't too difficult, it was only 2 years that we lived with those luxuries)
• Celebrated our 2 year anniversary by walking over to a wonderful restaurant called Kuba Kuba
• Many walks. One of those walks was to Plan 9, which I knew was a bad idea to begin with because I saw their vinyl collection when I was there with the family, and ended up finding a few good things.
• Got my moped running!!
  
• Got David a Schwinn Varsity for $50. Considering we spent about $200 on my female Varsity, his was a steal. It's a pretty green one that
  
• Went to see The Dark Knight with two lovely ladies. It was awesome, even though I was hungry and had to pee really bad by the end of it (TMI? I'm sorry).
• Met most of the people in the building.

Not much, but I've been trying to not spend too much since I still don't have a job. I know I'll probably have one by the time school starts, but I really don't want to chance our finally-somewhat-stable financial situation just in case I don't hear from anybody or get an offer.
But that's enough of that. Thinking about that just makes me anxious.
Plus, it's my summer vacation. I'm not going to worry about finding a back up job (positive thinking: because I won't need one) until school starts, so I've been enjoying that thing called sleeping in. I've also been trying to read The Pillars of the Earth--that thing is a beast! Since I don't teach during the summer, and my day to day activities of sleep in-read a little-check email-slide on the wood floors to Bikini Kill because I just moved to this lovely city and lack friends, places to go, a job, etc. isn't really interesting to anyone but me, I've been thinking about all the things I've been meaning to sit down and write all year. Being a second year teacher actually gave me a second or two to remember: oh yeah, I actually had other stuff that I did before I was swamped with planning, grading, giving a crap, etc. So, I'll try and get some of that down and hopefully some of it will be interesting.

two years!

Happy Anniversary, babe!
I can't believe it's been two years. It's gone so fast!