100th Post

Wow - truly a historic moment. Our 100th post on this blog. May the celebration and accolades commence.

But seriously, I figured when we started this thing that I would be a bloggin' phenom, cranking out insightful, witty and oh-so-helpful blog posts every day. Turns out, it's harder than it seemed at the start.

The great thing about blogs is that they go against virtually every journalistic principle I learned in my four years of college "edukashun." The who cares factor? Toss that aside. AP style? Forget that. The timeliness mandate? I can dig up old crap on the Internets from four years ago and if it's cool to me, I can write all about it.

But as there's no editor standing over me going "Got yer copy yet, fool?" and no looming deadlines, there's no pressure to write daily. Obviously since this blog is over a year old, if Scott and I have only posted a mere 100 times, there's absolutely no self-imposed rule for freshly squeezed posts. This ain't Perez Hilton, y'all. (But thank god, right? Imagine the obscene and libelous things he would do blogging about all things food.)

So, enough with the reasoning as to why we're such lazy bastards. Let's dish on Trader Joe's.

Though we said we'd hold off (like some kind of "True Love Waits" scenario, hee hee), our empty fridge and bare pantry (dried beans, a rotten bag of sweet potatoes, and some oyster crackers...yum) forced us to sail into Green Hills this past Saturday and seek out the wondrous new TJs.

To continue with the sailing metaphor, it was full speed ahead for most of the shopping experience, though parking was truly a biiiiiyatch. That lot must be doomed - the red light backs all the cars up into the parking lanes and no one can get in and it's all kinds of crazy. They need a multi-level garage situation like Whole Foods has. AND a TJ's wine shop, but that's another rant.

Scott and I behaved ourselves the entire time, with one dispatched to gather items from the aisles while the other manned the cart, trying to keep it in line and without banging the shins of every man, woman and child shopping. I really thought it would be pandemonium, but it wasn't that crowded.

We stocked up on about $150 of items, the best of the best being the dried and unsulphered mangoes, their laundry detergent (smells good and is decent on our Mother Earth), beer (Scott chose their Simpler Times (?) six-pack), organic yogurt, some really tasty chicken-sage breakfast sausages, and lots of great organic produce at nice prices. TJ's did let me down in one regard - no boxed quinoa, and I really was craving that quinoa. Yeah, it's pronounced "keen-wah" and it's loaded with protein, this super-food that I just love. Maybe they had a run on quinoa on opening day.

The next item I need to rave about is this lasagna that our book club hostess made last night. Count on Paula "Southern Cookin' at its Most Cholesterol and Fat Laden Goodness" Deen to create a dish like this. Cheesy flavor and texture abound - if you want someone to nearly orgasm over dairy products and pasta, this is the one you want to make. This is the Lady and Sons Lasagna recipe. You are welcome. Fair warning: hostess with the mostest said last night that the sauce part is fairly time intensive. How we toil for the things we love.

Hope everyone is doing well on this rainy day. If you know where I can get some quinoa, hook me up!


Addendum: How could I forget to mention the tastiest (though not healthiest) item gleaned from Trader Joe's - the holy dark chocolate-covered Oreos called JoJos. Complete and total awesomeness.