No Shoes Required

There is something special about a place when you can spend seven consecutive days sans shoes. Even those comfy Danskos would feel like a burden on your sun-swathed and sand-laden feet. So, you go without. It is as simple as that. I am considering making this a key criteria for all future vacations.

Trailer Trash Haute Cuisine

If you are a vegetarian, stop reading now. The fine delicacy that I am about to give you a recipe for definitely includes my old friend, ground chuck. If you want a healthier alternative, you could always use ground turkey but that really falls into the 'why bother' category in this particular case.

The delicious recipe that I am referring to is the Old Fashioned Sloppy Joe. In two occasions in the past month EJ and I have mixed up the following ingredients and delighted in it's simplicity, easy clean up, delicious taste and most of all, an efficiency that saves time for other fun weeknight events like strolling the street of Madison Park checking out all the beautiful spring gardens. As it turns out, this is much more satisfying than a $100 grocery bill at Red Apple and 30 minutes of clean up after dinner. Now, for you overzealous types, I am not suggesting that this is a wholesome and healthy meal more than a couple times a month, but hell, it is so delicious, you must try it sometime soon, if only so you can report back to yours truly.

On to the recipe. All you need is the premade spice packet for Sloppy Joes and the rest of the recipe is on the back. It includes ground beef, one small can of tomato paste, one and one quarter cups of water and the mentioned spice pack. Be sure to drain the fat regardless of the meat you choose and the crucial step here is the bun selection. The best bun I have tried is a sesame roll which toasts up nicely under the broiler. The key here is that the bun is fresh so even when you have a crispy outside, the meat of the bun is still nice and soft. No better way to ruin a 'SJ', or a hamburger for that matter, than to scrimp on the bun.

So, call me trailer trash if you must (not that I am so fond of that) but this is an incredibly easy meal that never disappoints. Cheers to the rise of the Sloppy Joe! Just remember who you heard it from first.

Generation Y, does not feel like a good thing...

We are the generation that is labeled as those who crave instant gratification, peer acceptance and having been born on the tail end of GenY, this also makes us borderline GenZ, the internet obsessed and socially detached generation. Ouch, that does not feel good does it? But hey, who is to argue?

I bring this up because I am currently wrestling with my newfound affinity for Facebook. It is like a drug, or the drug dealer more specifically, when work is slow and I have already browsed through Etsy 100 times. It is fascinating to see photos of old friends and oftentimes now, their families. Seems to bring back memories of happy times back on the original Island, a place where the warm breeze always blows and the summers seem to last forever. How can that not be addicting when you are sitting in your windowless office answering the daily barrage of email and feeling that your MightyMouse is your best friend? Not that my office is a bad place to be, trust me. But the windows into old friends lives is a welcome reprieve and every so often you come across an old friend that lives in your city and the chance to reconnect is actually real. Pretty cool really. See, there I go, slowly devolving into GenY, or the iGeneration as some like to say. Our folks generation says things like, 'you could be reading a book or planting your herb garden,' which at the time always feels like 'but there are starving children in Africa, so finish that dinner roll.' But, they are right, our time could be better spent. We could be writing letters in cursive (a lost art), calling our grandparents, knitting gifts for friends, or simply getting an early night and giving our eyes a rest. Sounds pretty good to me, so why it is so hard to unplug?