Last night I decided to cook one of my favorite dishes that actually has vegetables in it make up for all of the horrible things I’ve been eating lately. My dad’s tomato asparagus pasta is delicious and really simple to make. Well, in theory. I’ve made it plenty of times before, but this time I accidentally added 1 Tbsp parsley and 1/4 cup oregano…instead of 1 Tbsp oregano and 1/4 cup parsley.

That is way too much fucking oregano.

It was so disgusting to attempt to eat, like munching on pure oregano, that I had to throw my pasta, veggies and all, back in the strainer and rinse it off. I know I was probably rinsing away all other sorts of seasonings and delicious juices, but it was better than oregano mulch. It’s decent now, but not as delicious as usual. Sigh.

Though as a perk, it seems my original terrifying run in with the pie was mostly a fluke. I took one for the team and ate most of the pie in the name of science, and I’ve yet to have a similar reaction. See, this is why it’s good to test your hypotheses! Otherwise I would have thrown away a perfectly good pie.

In case any of you are brave enough to try to pie yourself, here’s the recipe. I promise it won’t induce stomach aches as a long as you actually use unspoiled ingredients:

Jen’s Dangerous Peanut Butter Pie

1 prepared chocolate cookie pie crust
About 6 heaping spoonfuls of creamy peanut butter
8 oz. cream cheese (at room temperature)
½ cup sugar
12 oz. container of Cool Whip
1 11.75 oz jar Smucker’s Hot Fudge Ice Cream Topping

In a medium bowl, mix together the peanut butter, cream cheese and sugar. Gently fold in 3 cups whipped topping. Spoon mixture into the pie shell. Using a spatula, smooth mixture to edges of pie. Place hot fudge into microwave safe bowl or glass measuring cup. Microwave for 20 seconds (or maybe longer, depending on your microwave). Spread hot fudge over pie to cover the peanut butter layer. Place in freezer for about an hour, then refrigerate afterwards. If you want to make it look fancy, just before serving, spread the remaining whipped topping over hot fudge layer, being careful not to mix the two layers, and drizzle a design with left over hot fudge.

Note: I always tend to make too much filling, so then my hot fudge wants to overflow, so either make a little less filling or pour the hot fudge in first and then the peanut butter filling on top. Or create a delicious mess like me.

Last night I decided to cook one of my favorite dishes that actually has vegetables in it make up for all of the horrible things I’ve been eating lately. My dad’s tomato asparagus pasta is delicious and really simple to make. Well, in theory. I’ve made it plenty of times before, but this time I accidentally added 1 Tbsp parsley and 1/4 cup oregano…instead of 1 Tbsp oregano and 1/4 cup parsley.

That is way too much fucking oregano.

It was so disgusting to attempt to eat, like munching on pure oregano, that I had to throw my pasta, veggies and all, back in the strainer and rinse it off. I know I was probably rinsing away all other sorts of seasonings and delicious juices, but it was better than oregano mulch. It’s decent now, but not as delicious as usual. Sigh.

Though as a perk, it seems my original terrifying run in with the pie was mostly a fluke. I took one for the team and ate most of the pie in the name of science, and I’ve yet to have a similar reaction. See, this is why it’s good to test your hypotheses! Otherwise I would have thrown away a perfectly good pie.

In case any of you are brave enough to try to pie yourself, here’s the recipe. I promise it won’t induce stomach aches as a long as you actually use unspoiled ingredients:

Jen’s Dangerous Peanut Butter Pie

1 prepared chocolate cookie pie crust
About 6 heaping spoonfuls of creamy peanut butter
8 oz. cream cheese (at room temperature)
½ cup sugar
12 oz. container of Cool Whip
1 11.75 oz jar Smucker’s Hot Fudge Ice Cream Topping

In a medium bowl, mix together the peanut butter, cream cheese and sugar. Gently fold in 3 cups whipped topping. Spoon mixture into the pie shell. Using a spatula, smooth mixture to edges of pie. Place hot fudge into microwave safe bowl or glass measuring cup. Microwave for 20 seconds (or maybe longer, depending on your microwave). Spread hot fudge over pie to cover the peanut butter layer. Place in freezer for about an hour, then refrigerate afterwards. If you want to make it look fancy, just before serving, spread the remaining whipped topping over hot fudge layer, being careful not to mix the two layers, and drizzle a design with left over hot fudge.

Note: I always tend to make too much filling, so then my hot fudge wants to overflow, so either make a little less filling or pour the hot fudge in first and then the peanut butter filling on top. Or create a delicious mess like me.

As a poor college student, I cook by the “What’s about to expire and what can I make out of it?” method. This week the ingredients were cream cheese and an unused container of cool whip. Time for a delicious peanut butter pie, I thought! I had the peanut butter, but I went to the store for the pie crust and some chocolate sauce. I’ve made this recipe before, and it’s sooo delicious. I anxiously waited for it to solidify in the fridge before I snarfed down a (delicious) piece.

…

I’m pretty sure I just gave myself food poisoning.

Why would I come to that conclusion? Well, an hour later experiencing violent stomach pain resulting to running to the bathroom and being very sad (I’ll spare you the details) were my main hints. I was a bit confused, since most of my ingredients were still a month away from the expiration date. That was, until I looked at the cool whip container.

Um…apparently it was supposed to be frozen this whole time. Not in the fridge. For like four months. My mind kind of didn’t make the connection that it’s a dairy product, since it seems more like a fake plastic filling thing than real food.

Well, that’s my hypothesis at least. Being the scientist (and masochist) I am, I’ll probably eat another slice tomorrow to see if it was just a fluke, or if I really am killing myself. Because the pie is just that fucking good that I will suffer through my stomach exploding for another piece.

Insert normal person vs. scientist comic here. Sigh.

Don’t have any super insightful post today, sorry. It’s that time of the year when the semester is winding to an end, and all of your classes decide to go crazy at once. I’m just trying to finish my programming project (hooray for Python…) tonight so I can go to Miss Gay IU tomorrow. Fabulous drag shows >>> programming!

I also have to hurry up and start planning my trip to Fairbanks, Alaska for this summer. I won an undergraduate honorarium for the American Society of Mammalogist conference to help fund my trip there, woo! I need to actually buy the plane tickets and reserve hotel rooms and all that jazz. I also need to figure out what site seeing I want to do while I’m there, since who knows if I’ll ever get the chance to go to Alaska again! I know I’m definitely going to try and see Denali, but any other suggestions? Unfortunately I’m going alone, so I’m not sure how much I want to hike around the Alaskan wilderness. I’d kind of like to avoid being mauled by bears or shot by Sarah Palin while I’m there. My advisor wants me coming back in one piece, mainly because I have a manuscript to finish, ha. I’m just kidding though – he’s a great advisor. He’s loning me his fancy expensive camera that has a nifty telephoto lens so I can actually do some good nature photography, and he’s going to let me take off as much time as I want, basically.

So, anyone ever been to Alaska before? What are the “must see” places, preferably around Fairbanks?

I like to consider myself a rational person, but I’m not perfect. Case and point, me earlier today:

“You know, I’ve gained a couple pounds recently. I should really try to eat healthier. Maybe I’ll try cutting pop out of my diet again, that definitely worked freshman year. And I should really reduce the amount of meat I eat. It’s not good for you, and it hurts the environment. I’ll look up some vegetarian recipes so I can eat better.”

Compare this to me ten minutes ago:

“OMG Insomnia Cookies is giving away six free cookies? Yes!! What, I need a five dollar minimum to order? Well I guess 11 cookies isn’t that bad, especially when more than half of them are free. Maybe I can just spread them out and only eat one a day, that’s not that bad right? Wooohooooo, the cookies are here! Om nom nom nom. Ooops, I just ate three in about twelve seconds.”

What can I say, delicious cookies are my kryptonite =(

So last night after midnight I checked my Google Analytics page like I compulsively do every night (I have a weird thing for data…mmm, data!). I thought I’d have a couple more hits since my book review seemed to be fairly popular. I was getting about 100 a day, then 500 the day Pharyngula linked to me about the urban dictionary entry. I was thinking maybe it would be 800 now or something.

Holy shit.

10,000 hits yesterday! I went from 20 sites referring to my blog to 155. What the hell? I totally didn’t expect that to happen. I honestly thought the only people who’d read that post were my friends who had been listening to me whine about the book while I was reading it. Especially since it was so gigantic, and most internet people scream “tl;dr” at anything more than three paragraphs. Hell, I wasn’t even trying to be funny. I just needed to rant in my ranty way, which apparently is amusing?

Wow. Well…uh, hello random internet people!

The only scary part is that 90% of the Google searches that led people here involved the now infamous phrase “gobbler of whangs.” I’m not so sure how I feel being so closely associated with that…hmmm…

Friend: you’re close to being a D-list internet celebrity now
Me: yay

Me: I’m terrified that when the author finds my review, he’s going to email me crying and threatening to kill himself or something
Friend: If he does, post it!

Don’t you hate it when you realize you’re injured in some way, and you have no idea what caused it? Like waking up with a mysterious bruise and not remembering bumping into anything?

I woke up this morning with a weird mark under my chin, the kind a little kid gets when he falls of his bike and skins his knee (or chin, apparently) on concrete. What the hell? Did I join a roller derby team while sleepwalking or something? Actually that would be kind of neat, but I wish my subconscious would let me in on these things.

Wow, spring break has been so crazy that I haven’t posted since Tuesday! …Oh wait, that’s right, I post when I’m procrastinating doing other things, so since I haven’t had anything to do, I haven’t posted! Amazing how that works. Luckily for anyone who’s reading this, most of the time I’m busy out of my mind…which means frequent posting!

But…yeah, actually, I don’t have much of an update. I’ve basically been sleeping all week. Today I attempted to make shepherd’s pie…key word, attempt. It wasn’t bad, but I had spent days fantasizing about out, so it didn’t quite live up to my mind’s expectations. Damn you Rachel Ray for giving me false hope! You may be able to make delicious food in thirty minutes, but it takes me an hour and a half to make something mediocre. Le sigh.