My Penn Foster Career School Experience

Things are looking up

2009-11-07T18:26:00Z

When people ask me "what have you been up to?" I can honestly reply, "I've got a new look on life." The look I have is from a completely different angle than most, it's from a wheelchair.

Not long ago my husband and I did our yearly naval reunion, and towards the end of it I noticed that my right foot hurt terribly. I did go to the doctor for it, but we didn't think it was anything major. I then went on a trip to California to visit some old friends and family and by the time I came back I knew that my foot was getting worse. After 48 hours of no sleep from pain I finally caved in and went to the ER (which referred me back to my podiatrist) and now I'm in the process of going through test after test to see whether or not I'll be needing an operation on it. In the meantime I'm in a wheelchair because there can be absolutely no weight put on my right foot.

Not being able to stand up in a house that's not handicap accessible makes it difficult to prepare any sort of food. On occasion I'll use one crutch and grab a bowl of cereal (if no one is awake to get it for me), but other than that... let's just say we've had a lot of takeout and insta-food.

I miss being in my kitchen and chopping up veggies, meats and creating new and exciting recipes. I truly miss studying and learning about things I never knew before, but most of all I miss being independent. Being able to just walk from my bedroom to my living room without pain or a crutch has become my new fantasy.

For all of you out there that believe, I ask that you say a little prayer for a quick and speedy recovery. For those of you that don't believe....what could it hurt to just say, "Hey....I hope Cat gets better soon." My family and I could use all the help we can get.

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Overworked and Underpaid!!!!

2009-09-29T16:43:00Z

These past couple of month’s life has been too busy. There was a navy reunion to finish planning and attending. Then I had to make sure that everything ran smoothly while I was stricken with a respiratory infection on the first day we arrived in Rhode Island. There’s the typical stuff, like running your household, grocery shopping, home schooling, vet visits, doctor’s offices and then, IF you can find a moment, you try to study. Since I didn’t even find time to bathe every day, I guess you could say studying was the lowest priority there was for me.

Between all of these wonderful domestic goddess chores something happened to me. I got hit in my back (my arthritic back) with an extremely large flat of canned goods at Sam’s Club. The pain that I normally suffer with seemed to multiply by a thousand. It truly immobilized me for almost two weeks. I was on medications that made basic things seem like a three hour workout and my brain just wasn’t functioning properly.Needless to say studying was completely out of the question.

As I was dealing with the representatives from Sam’s to settle my claim I used the salary.com site which calculates what a stay at home mom is worth. When I presented this number to the agent she proceeded to tell me that I was “worthless” because I didn’t have a job outside of the home. Eventually we came to an agreement, but I cannot even express how angry I was at being called worthless.

The work that I do each day (well it’s like that old Army commercial, “We do more by 9am than most people do all day”) is endless. It’s not 9 to 5, its 24/7/365. And no, I don’t get a paycheck, but I get something more than money, I get the knowledge that I am doing something for my child that will benefit his future.

I’m feeling better now and will resume my studies by the end of next week, but until then may I make a suggestion to you. Thank your wife or your husband for doing the little things around the house that make your life easier and make sure your partner knows that they’re not "worthless," but priceless.

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I love my homework assignments.

2009-08-07T16:25:00Z

My current assignment was to pick a salad recipe out of my text book, The Professional Chef, and make it. I chose to make a spinach salad with warm bacon vinaigrette. It seemed easy enough and it had everything I love about food in it – fresh spinach and mushrooms, onions and bacon. Other than picking out a salad you had to change up the recipe and (in the words of Simon Cowell, Randy Jackson and Paula Abdul) “make it your own.” Since I do this with almost every recipe I make, that was the easy part.

The recipe called for fresh spinach, mushrooms, red onions, bacon, hard cooked eggs, croutons, shallots, garlic, vegetable oil, brown sugar and apple cider vinegar. I changed this up by reducing the brown sugar, adding chopped grape tomatoes and using sweet onions instead of shallots (simply because I forgot to pick up the shallots at the market). I have to say, my husband and I were more than pleased with this salad.

I loved the warm vinaigrette, but I did think it was a touch too sweet. I couldn’t imagine what it would’ve tasted like had I added all of the brown sugar. This could be because of my diabetes and my sensitivity to sugary products, but then again, it could be because it was just too sweet. Next time I make this salad dressing I’m going to try adding a brown sugar substitute and see how that works out.

The thing that really pulled this salad together was the bacon. The instructions call for rendered bacon pieces, and I will say if you don’t render the bacon (cook on a very low temperature) you probably won’t get the proper texture. Rendering your bacon gives it a crisp yet chewy texture and it slowly melts away the fat. I wouldn’t cook bacon any other way.

All in all, it was a successful assignment and once again I must say…. I LOVE MY HOMEWORK!!!!

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Preparing Eggplant (Step by step photos included)

2009-08-04T05:26:00Z

This past week I took my oldest son out to lunch. Since he lives on Budget Gourmets I thought it would be nice to take him somewhere without a drive thru. My choice of restaurant was a local Italian place which we normally order pizza from. I thought it would be nice to try something other than their pizza (which is the best…and closest thing you’ll find to New York Pizza in Oklahoma) so I chose their eggplant rollitini. It had been years since I’d had this dish and it fit perfectly into the section I’m currently studying with Penn Foster… not to mention it tasted amazing. It tasted so good that I wanted to go home and make a batch of it right away. It took me a few days but I finally got around to it and I have to say it didn’t disappoint.

Eggplant can be a funny food to cook and if you don’t make it correctly it’s going to be either soggy or too hard. Growing up the only way I would eat my eggplant was after it had been dipped in flour, egg, breadcrumbs and then fried. As I got older I realized that the parmesan version of eggplant was fantastic and then I discovered eggplant rollitini. Eggplant Rollitini is thinly sliced eggplant, stuffed with ricotta cheese then topped with tomato sauce and mozzarella.

Making this dish gave me a chance to practice many of the topics I’m currently studying so I thought I’d take the opportunity and share it with you. And hey…if you feel like making the recipe…go right ahead.

Cut the top off of a ripe eggplant, then peel.

Cut peeled eggplant into very thin slices.

Blanch eggplant slices.

Shock blanched eggplant in some ice water, then place on paper towel to dry.

Spoon ricotta cheese onto the eggplant then roll up.

Spread some sauce (I used a prepared spaghetti sauce that was described as zesty and spicy) onto the bottom of a baking dish, then place the rolled up eggplant in the baking dish.

Top it off with a little more sauce then some fresh mozzarella.

Bake until eggplants are tender and cheese is bubbly.

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Tips On How To Keep Your Computer Healthy PT. 3

2009-07-31T11:29:00Z

If your computer is running slow while you’re using it, it’s quite possible you have too many programs running in the background. Take a look at the bottom right hand corner of your computer. If you have a bunch of little program icons there then you have too many things running. My father used to have about twenty different things running at the same time, even though he didn’t open those programs up they were still hiding in the background while he tried to use his computer. Many programs will automatically do this when you download them, so read those instructions carefully before clicking I Agree. If it asks you do you want to have a short cut, say no! You can always click on your programs and find it, or put your own shortcut on the desktop. In order to stop the programs you’re not using you need to right click the icon (in the bottom right hand corner of your screen) and there should be an option to stop it. If there isn’t then you must go into the program’s preferences and change the settings.

Your computer gets used a lot, and if you don’t clean it up after each use, I can hop on there and see exactly where you have been and what you’ve been doing. That’s were CCLeaner comes in again. Simply open up the program and click the Run Cleaner button in the bottom right hand corner. This will remove your history, clean your temp files and get rid of your cookies. Be careful though, prior to cleaning up your system you want to make sure you have the proper boxes checked off. For example: I uncheck my Desktop Shortcuts and Start Menu Shortcuts because I want to keep these.

Emails are another problem. If you are using a program like Windows Mail, Outlook and certain other computer based email programs, you could very well be filling up your computer with a bunch of needless trash. Make sure you’re deleting your old emails and that your email program doesn’t automatically save them. I once cleaned over a thousand emails off of a friend’s computer and she didn’t even know they were there.

Basic maintenance on your computer is a necessity in this day and age. If you want your computer system to last...protect it, clean it, defragment it, don't keep clicking I Agree every time you download something unless you know what you're agreeing to and take good care of it.

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