South Florida Girls' Guide to Hurricane Preparation

Move over, Mayor Bloomberg. The Krause girls know how to get this town ready for Sandy. We've successfully battled several of Sandy's cousins: Andrew, Rita, Katrina, and so on. Follow this simple 5 step process and you will be ready to welcome Sandy with open arms.

1. Bake a funfetti cake. Everyone knows that all natural disasters fear rainbow sprinkles. Also, this cake incorporates at least half of the food groups: eggs, milk, and frosting. According to Buddy the Elf, frosting closely aligns with the food groups, which is almost the same.

We elves try to stick to the four main food groups:candy, candy canes, candy corns and syrup. 

2. Watch 8 episodes of White Collar or some other series you have never seen. One important part of hurricane preparation is being occupied, especially when the power is out. This way you can discuss plot lines, the characters....more about the characters. Speaking of which, have you seen this guy?? You would watch 8 or 98 episodes of his show too. Pretty solid choice for the last tv (not unlike the last meal).

3. For every person in a home, purchase one gallon of water and one bottle of wine. Ideally you should have more wine than water but this is not mandatory...unless you have little children. In this case, you may need two bottles of wine per adult.

4. If you live in NYC, you know that everything you own is Barbie-sized to fit in compact living spaces. Flashlights do not deviate from this rule. Still, you should have them.

5. Disregard the majority of this advice and don't be a hero. Stay safe, obey evacuation mandates, and TAKE YOUR PETS WITH YOU wherever you go. Good luck, NYC.

Sliding on my meteorologist cap, I will also take a moment to warn Florida about potential blizzards coming your way for winter. I moved from FL to NY (with a 10 yr TX detour) and am facing Frankenstorm. Given that NY hurricanes are not terribly common (save for Irene) Florida, you and New York may have traded weather patterns. I don't even know what to tell you to expect but it sounds pretty cold and gray. Everyone is telling me to purchase a sleeping bag with arms for a coat so maybe that will help you, too.

Grammie- isms

We (Ashley, Jason, Jaimie, AND Colby) got to visit Grammie and Auntie Karen in Springfield, MA over the Oct. 12-14 weekend. We had a wonderful time but the best moments were capturing what I am terming Grammie-isms. She is chockfull of one-liners! Pretty spry for a 95 year old.

I got older without knowing it.
I enjoy looking at George Clooney just as much as you do.
So you're teaching adults how to get old?
Why do you want to take a picture of me? I look the same as last time.
I've been known to walk right out of here when they don't have my pie.
You mean you don't eat chicken? I've never heard of a vegetarian who doesn't at least eat chicken.

I also requested that she sit for a quick interview for my Adulthood and Aging class. They loved it!

Here are some pics from the trip:

September Stuff

It's been a little too long in between posts. The fact is, I've been really busy and not that busy at the same time. Graduate students achieve a new dimension of busy. Now that I have been out of school for  a little over five months (yikes!) I think I am settling into the "busy for a normal person" mode. Also, Ashley is finally here (here as in NY and here as in appearing in my blog as a New Yorker). Hi Ash! As you can see, Colby is here too. They are both super stoked about it.

I dare you to find a cuter pic. So sweet!

So, here's what we've all been up to lately...

We've obtained more furniture and hung up some art. Our place is starting to resemble a home albeit a home with Barbie-sized everything. Forgive me, but I still crack up watching Jason carry furniture in a subway.

Carrying our newly acquired Craig's List purchase home...

Down the subway steps...

Keeping it safe on the subway

And we're almost home!

Here she is, all settled in.

We've had some incredibly delicious food...a long time ago and also more recently. This is from September. We dined at my cousin Alyssa's restaurant and it was so incredibly good. Also, something I learned in NY - you may never eat a fry again because many places serving food have to post the calories you are about to pile on. Honestly, I don't want to know. That's why I asked you to cook this and not me. Add 35 sticks of butter...just don't tell me about it! Incidentally, this food weighed in at like 5 calories. Presenting the vegetable soup and watermelon cooler from Le Pain Quotidien.










We visited The Met on a lovely rainy Friday afternoon!! We hadn't been as official New Yorkers. I'll be honest, there are about a trillion things I sort of hate about New York (i.e. lugging laundry and groceries all over town = not fun), but access to places like The Met makes it a lot better. I love a lot of things too. NY and I have a love/hate relationship.

We visited the Egyptian exhibit. If you have seen the
Neverending Story...RUNNNNNN!

Tell me you don't think he is about to
shoot lasers at you!

And then we saw some medieval stuff...

Like this medieval unicorn!!!!!!!

And a medieval Teletubby.

And then I had an epiphany...in impressionist paintings. Remember the cult classic (can we call this a cult classic yet?) Clueless? Remember Cher's line to Tai about the girl being a total Monet? It's like all of the sudden - bam! I get it! From far away... but from close up she's all blurry and water-colored. And it took a trip to The Met to help me connect dots from the 90's.

No, that didn't happen. But do you think someone didn't know Monet and had to stare at his work to figure it out? And maybe still didn't get it? I wonder about things like that.








Here's some more awesomeness. My art tastes are neither sophisticated nor pretentious. Honestly, I like the well-known masters. And I sat there in awe for about thirty minutes admiring these. So sue me.

After making through many of the exhibits, one painting took me by surprise. Just look at this man for a while. What do you notice about him that you've maybe never seen on another man from his era?

He is wearing glasses! Actually, it appears someone graffitied the painting. Those do not look real!

Okay, what else? Ah, Ashley and I went salsa dancing and it was the kind of night that left me (not Ash) green and dying for the next 24 hours. I wish I were being hyperbolic but no...I even rejected Chinese food. And by rejected I mean I ate nearly a quart of vegetable lo mein, but I did not enjoy it. When we were reviewing the aftermath, Ash says:
A: "Let's look at the pics from last night."
J: "What pics? I just took one of my amazing Mexican martini."
A: "Ha....hahahahha. You are not serious."
J: "Um."

Who is this man?
Check out my Michael Jordan tongue-out focus, though.

Who is this man?
Why am I wearing this hat?

Needless to say, I have no idea what happened that night. Except I think I learned (or tried really intently to learn) to salsa dance incredibly drunk and have since forgotten everything. Good grief.

Some other fun things: 1. Game night. It gets a little wild with Nick and Dave, but they serve a mean cocktail and host the best game nights. I always learn a new game and new things. For example, have you ever played Cards Against Humanity, the worst and most terrible version of Apples to Apples that you could imagine? You can run and you can try to hide, but you will be offended. See Exhibit A.

I don't know how well you can read this but it says:
"In Rome there are whisperings that the Vatican
has a secret room devoted to..."

In another game, David is blindfolded and guessing the sound of Sarah's plucked pantyhose
("I'm not wearin' pantyhose.")

2. We had a semi-legit Rosh Hashanah dinner.
Should I admit I had to Google the spelling of our New Year? Fail.
Check out Ash rolling the matzo balls. She makes the most delicious soup from scratch.

Eating on the makeshift dining room table/coffee shop office table for Jason/Jaimie

3. The drink that got me in a world of hurt but it was so utterly delicious.

4. Have you ever wondered what the view from Roosevelt Island looks like
on an overcast late afternoon?
Have you even heard about Roosevelt Island? Yeah, me either.
We went on a table hunt and all we got was this picture.

Okay, that sums it up for now. Also, (#5) sometimes the students at my school break out into spontaneous dance parties. The students are pretty amazing.

On an unrelated note, here's what Jason looks like when he's not carrying furniture. If you aren't my Facebook friend, you may not have seen the epic photo bomb by this unfortunate naked sculpture over his right shoulder.

Maybe I'll blog again in January when I am a snow(wo)man.