Domestic Goddessing

After my Elizabeth Bishop brownie catastrophe, I felt a bit down in the dumps about this whole cooking thing. There's nothing like standing over your almond-y, greasy brownies and remembering that you have to keep yourself alive for the next four months. But today, the parental units were going out to dinner, and I was presented with a pack of frozen pork chops, instead of the pizza I was anticipating. And, hey presto, I made a pretty good dinner, if I do say so myself.

I covered the pork chops with, olive oil, salt, pepper, a little lemon pepper (because it was there), and oregano. Then I put it in the oven until it was cooked through. I also stewed some peaches to go with it. This past week mum bought a huge box of rock-solid peaches, so I cut about four up and put them in a covered saucepan with a little water and honey. I think the water may have been overkill because the peaches gave off a lot of juice, but I was afraid that they would burn to the pan at first. Then for desert I made brownies from this recipe. I thought that the raspberries were a nice touch, and they even turned out great. The only problem was that it took absolute ages to cook, but once they were done, they were
delicious!

Yummy brownies in the making!

In other news, I'm finally packing up to go back to school. It seems that all my clothes have been breeding in the back of the closet for the past couple months, and I'm having quite a time trying to shove them into my duffle. Sometimes I wonder why on earth clothes are so important. Why can't we all can't just be nudists? It would make life so much easier. Anyway, I've decided that this is not the semester to experiment with such things, so I've got a bulging suitcase that looks like it's packed for the end of the world.

Fortunately all my bedding and other random dormhold (like household, but more primitive) items are in storage in Texas, so I don't have to worry about bringing those down. I'm moving into a flat this semester with three friends, and we're having an interesting time figuring out what we're going to do about about cookware and what not. Personally, I own three plates, four mugs, a lot of spoons, and an electric kettle. I also picked up two pyrex dishes with plastic lids, which I am very pleased with, especially since I picked them up for $6 a piece. Gotta love T.J. Maxx!

Siiiigh.

I also have to admit that I'm cramming to finish all the seasons of my new favorite old show via amazon prime, As Time Goes By. Mum introduced it to me at the beginning of the summer, and we were watching it together, until I was gone for most of July and got way ahead. Now I'm forging through season 7 (of 9), while she and dad are still somewhere in season 4. I don't actually watch it all that much though, I usually just put it on while I work on blog posts and various other things. There's something really soothing about just listening to British TV. Maybe it's just because I grew up there, but I just like background noise with familiar accents. In honor of this bizarre quirk, here's a photo from my post-Rome trip to the UK. You're welcome.