Author: Benford

Chicken Tortilla Soup

Meri Krause sent me this recipe recently so I thought I’d give it a try. Hope you enjoy it as much as we do! You’ll notice that I did make a few changes/additions…mostly in homage to other tortilla soups I love so much (Grin’s).

Meri Krause’s Chicken Tortilla Soup

1 tsp canola oil
1 onion
1 green bell pepper
2 garlic cloves minced
3 c. reduced-sodium chicken broth
1 can (14.5 oz) diced tomatoes with mild green chiles
1 10 oz. package frozen corn kernels, thawed
1 teaspoon chili seasoning mix
1 1/2 c. chopped cooked chicken breast
1/4 c coarsely chopped fresh cilanto

I cheated and used rotisserie chicken and boxed broth – I would normally make the broth by boiling a chicken and just taking the bones and skin out. That would take entirely too much time today. I also substituted the seasoning mix with seasonings I had in my spice cabinet. I also added hominy in honor of the Grin’s tortilla soup.

Heat the oil in a large nonstick saucepabn over medium-high heat. Add the onion, bell pepper, and garlic; cook, stirring frequently, until softened and lightly browned, about 5 min.

Add the broth, tomatoes, corn, and chili seasoning mix; bring to a boil over high heat.

Add the chicken and cilantro. Reduce the heat and simmer until heated through, about 2 min. Serve with tortilla chips.

Veronica approved!

Stars & Stripes, Muppet Style

I’m kinda glad the piccolo soli isn’t there done by Beaker. Thanks to Chester Phillips for sharing this video!

Pre-school wrap up

Oh my goodness, what a helluva week we had. When I started this week, the Stony Point Band had had two very productive weeks of Summer Band already. In week 1, we focused on marching and playing fundamentals as well as learning the wonderful music of our opener and in week 2, we applied the marching fundamentals to learning the opener of our wonderful drill. This week (3), we put music to our drill and performed it on Friday night at Dragon Stadium (I guess since we only play 2 games there, I’m not gonna call it Tiger/Dragon Stadium anymore. We’re in The Tiger Palace, baby!). My reaction to our performance? Awesome. For only having had a week of learning and a little cleaning, pretty darn good, I must say. I did video tape it but I haven’t had a chance to even get the camera out the bag…much less get it on the computer or online. I’ll get it done today, hopefully.

This week, we also had staff development as well. The speaker we had on Monday, Mychal Winn or something, was, well, alright – if you like being yelled at for motivation. What I learned from him? If you tell the students you teach that they’re going to college, they WILL!!! So all this week, I’ve been telling them that they’re “GOING TO COLLEGE!!!”. Let’s see how well that works. The rest of the week of staff development stuff hasn’t been too bad. Our principals seem to be quite efficient with their presentations (maybe someone practiced what they were gonna say) and we actually got done with many of the presentations several HOURS early! Woo hoo!!! And I got a few things done in my office this week, too. Quite exciting stuff.

Saturday was our annual Car Wash Extravaganza. My team and I were at the Firestone on Old Settlers and we washed a surprising 113 cars. There was never a moment we weren’t washing a car in the 4 hours we were there. When we were done, we even turned away 2 cars because we had to close at noon. Well, there were about 5 cars in line at noon so we went ahead and washed them – they were in line already! Thanks to some of my friends and Facebook fans (fans – LOL) who came out to get their cars washed. With the 8 sites we had going between the band and orchestra, I’m sure we washed over 600 cars. I mean, we made it rain for a few minutes, even! Unfortunately, we made it put more lightening in the sky than rain from it so we had to cancel our End of Summer Pool Party Saturday night. I stayed home and relaxed from an exhausting week so not all was lost.

Today is chore day. I’ve got a load of laundry in the wash, several more ready to go and the dishwasher is as filled as I can get it right now. I’m going to do some vaccuuming and hopefully, get the kitchen floor cleaned up a bit. Has anyone tried one of those Shark Steam Mops? I really think that might help get the grime out of my floor that I can’t seem to get up with anything else. But I’m not really willing to drop the cash on one (even with one of the many Bed Bath & Beyond coupons I have) unless I know it’s really gonna do the job.

School starts on Tuesday so my schedule should actually get a little easier starting this week. I’m convinced that UIL enforces the 8 hour rule more for the adults than the kids. I can only do so much! Okay, back to cleaning this joint!

Love you, mean it!
~C

Please comment on this…

…I really need to know what you think this means.

Today is Monday. On Saturday, at our TMEA Region Meeting, an old friend of 20 or so years told me he had a dream that I died by hanging due to a mistake in band I made. Today, one of my band parents told me she had a strange dream last night in which I died, too. Last night, I had a dream that I had have my right hand amputated and the first portion of the procedure was to score a cut to work from around my wrist.

When I shared this with some folks (or the people who heard the band parent tell her story), I was told not to worry because in Mexican folklore, it could mean a reverse of what it may seem like. I sure hope so. Just in case, say a little prayer and knock on some wood for/with me.

Any clue of what this could mean? Leave a comment, PLEASE!!!

Get in, the water’s fine!

If you haven’t heard (or read on Facebook), I’ve taken up swimming again. I say again – I’ve been swimming off and on since I was about 7 or 8 years old. I’ve been a lifeguard at Schlitterbahn as well as certified in SCUBA. I love being in and around water (but not so much on top of it, like water skiing). Last spring, I had this…urge? desire? hunger? for swim time. I don’t quite know what brought it on but I just had to swim. I joined a gym and got to swimming. A few days after I joined, my friend Catrina said she couldn’t do the entire Danskin after fracturing a bone in her left arm so I offered to be her relay swimmer and got to really swimming. I did the Danskin swim successfully (and with not bad of a time for only 2 weeks of training) and I’ve kept on swimming since.

When we went to Hawaii, I couldn’t wait to get in the water. Swimming at the North Shore was just amazing. I jetted right through the water with ease, thanks to the boyancy of the ocean. When we snorkled at Hanauma Bay, I kept getting water in my mask because I couldn’t stop smiling. When you wear a full mask and smile, your raised cheek bones breaks can cause whatever seal you have on your face to open…and I kept having little puddles of water in my mask. It was heavenly!

If you keep up with my Facebook, you see that I’ve been swimming regularly at Lake Pflugerville. Yes, Pflugerville has a man made lake and it’s been there for about 3 years or so. The water feeds into the treatment plant they have that serves P-ville with their water supply so if you go, don’t pee in the lake, okay? 😉 I’ve only been out there a handful of times but when I go, it’s always a nice swim. Over by the dam, there are a series of bouyes fixed to balloons (or something like balloons) that indicate a swimming path. I go out to the first blue bouy and back and that’s 500 meters. The first time I swam that, I did in around 25-27 minutes. Yesterday (Thursday, August 13) morning, I swam that 500 meters in about 20-22 minutes. I’m not too big on timing myself, except that I am a bit curious as to seeing how accurate my internal clock is as I’m doing an activity in which I’m engaged in something other than watching the clock. Anywho, I’m fairly excited that I have done some time cutting without even thinking about it! I just wanted a nice, easy swim when I went out there.

With this new/old hobby must come new gadgets. I mean, I am still me and I LOVE new gadgets!! First, I found a swim cap I can deal with. I was made to wear one as a kid once and absolutely HATED it. And the one they gave me (and made me wear) at Danskin wasn’t that great, either. But I do like how a cap keeps my hair from falling in my face as I swim (mostly freestyle) so I started asking and looking around at different types of caps. I found that I can deal with a Silicone cap and found one that is multi-colored. I was also having trouble keeping up with what lap I was on while at the gym, since I get to just thinking about random stuff when I swim, so I found a little lap counter that fits on my finger. I think my next purchase will be a waterproof housing for my iPod Shuffle and the underwater headphones. It all gets pretty pricey when you start getting all the equipment you’d want – why not just get an underwater MP3 player that comes with headphones? That would be one more thing to think about playlists for. I’m really not that great at putting together playlists I fully like. Thank goodness for iTunes Genius! (but that’s another story for another day). I am also seeing that Garmin has a lightweight, waterproof GPS system now in their Foretrex 101 & 201. It even helped certify a new world record in surfing. Not sure how that can help my personal swim thing but it’s a fun looking gadget!

I do have to say that I’m glad Lane Four Swim Shop is in North Austin. At first, I was worried they’d have their prices way jacked up, being a specialty store in town, but when I stopped by there, they were fairly helpful and the prices were about the same as various online stores. I might have been happier with a little more personalized attention, being as I’m kinda new again to the activity and have lots of questions, but there were several other people in the store and I heard talk about large dollar purchases (caps for an entire race and team equipment type conversation) so I would set me and my $40 purchase aside a bit, too!

Anywho, I’m just really at peace when I’m swimming. I’m glad to have the ability and venue to be able to do it because it really does help make me be a happier person. As Jeff always says after I talk about a swim, “she’s hooked”. If you’re in the North Austin area and want to come swim at Lake Pflugerville with me, let me know and we’ll go! I’m always looking for a swim buddy. Or, if you want to go there to do the running course while I swim, I’m up for that, too.