Muse - Undisclosed Desires

I love this song right now! It's one of those I could listen to on repeat all night...

Dream Sequence

It's too bad I couldn't find these bigger. They're gorgeous as full pages in the latest issue of W Magazine.

Alfred Cheney Johnston

I absolutely adore these portraits. I haven't yet found a site that offers a large selection of his images, but maybe I'm not looking hard enough.

Ikea Room Planner

Being a desert dweller, it's hard to take advantage of the affordable luxuries offered by Ikea. For those of you that have an Ikea near you, I'm sure it's no big deal; for me, the nearest Ikea is six hours away, so when I finally make it out there, I must have a plan.

Last week I discovered the Ikea room planner. Even if you're not on Ikea fan, the program is a pretty nifty time passer. It installs onto your computer, then allows you to enter room dimensions, doors, windows, etc...You can then furnish the room with current catalog products, and create a 3D model to see how it looks. After that, you can save it to Ikea's server, pull it up at the store, and voila! You've got your shopping list! My only issue is that they don't offer living room furniture yet, only kitchen, office, and bedroom products. Still, it's been a big help in putting together the spare bedrooms. Here's an example:



Check out the program here!

Care and Feeding of a Mermaid

Banana Sour Cream Cake

I was in baking mode last night, so I decided to try out a new recipe:

Ingredients:
1 pkg. (2-layer size) yellow cake mix
3 eggs
1 cup mashed ripe bananas (about 3)
1 cup Sour Cream
1/4 cup oil
1 pkg. (8 oz.) Philadelphia Cream Cheese, softened
1/2 cup (1 stick) butter, softened
1 pkg. (16 oz.) powdered sugar
1 cup finely chopped Walnuts


Directions:

HEAT oven to 350°F.

BEAT first 5 ingredients with mixer on low speed just until moistened, stopping frequently to scrape bottom and side of bowl. Beat on medium speed 2 min. Pour into greased and floured 13x9-inch pan.

BAKE 35 min. or until toothpick inserted in center comes out clean. Cool completely.

BEAT cream cheese and butter with mixer until well blended. Gradually add sugar, beating well after each addition.

REMOVE cake from pan. Carefully cut cake crosswise in half using serrated knife. Place 1 cake half, top-side down, on plate; spread with some of the cream cheese frosting. Top with remaining cake half, top-side up. Spread top and sides with remaining frosting. Press nuts into sides. Keep refrigerated.

*****
I'm not a big fan of walnuts, so I decided to crush up some graham crackers for the cake sides. It came out pretty tasty! Also, I wasn't confident enough in my baking abilities to attempt halfing it, so I frosted it as it was. Next time I'm going to bake it in two round pans, then mix some strawberries into the frosting for the middle section. Yum!

For more quick and easy recipes, check out Kraft's website.

Bored to Death

A new HBO comedy starring Jason Schwartzman and Zach Galifianakis! It's too bad I don't have HBO. :( To see the preview that I'm too lazy to embed, please visit the show's official site.

Steven Kenny

Taken from his website:

"We humans are inclined to forget or ignore the principles of existence. They include: every action directly impacts our environment, change is unavoidable, stasis is unnatural, time is beyond our influence, conception is the commencement of death as well as life, and many others. Our challenge is to humbly accept Nature’s gifts and live by the lessons set before us without imposing our arrogant will upon each other and the planet.

As humans more fully embrace technology we feel an increasing sense of anxiety, disorientation and fear. To compensate, our desire for predictability and order ignites a voracious hunger for control that induces us to force Nature to relinquish her secrets. Once a trusted provider, she is now viewed as "shifty", inadequate, and needing improvement. We manipulate our surroundings in an attempt to manage time, eliminate unforeseen change, and establish a permanent sense of stability. We go to great lengths to surround ourselves with psychological, physical, spiritual, social, and cultural environments that we hope will last. The result is an increasingly artificial existence."

President Obama's Speech

I try not to bring many personal opinions or emotions into this blog, but I must say that I find the uproar surrounding President Obama's speech to our nation's youth pretty ridiculous. Our school districts are requiring signed parent permission slips in order to watch his speech, and if a parent is against it, that child is required to sit it out in the campus's library. One district is even pre-screening the speech, and if they approve of it's content, it will be distributed via tape.

This morning, a local radio station invited callers to voice their opinion, and I was appalled to hear what some people had to say. Do they honestly think that our President is capable of brainwashing children? Half of the kids in school these days are never even told by their parents that an education is important. Granted, not everyone will be an astronaut, not everyone will be a football star, but to hear encouragement from a person that has made something of himself does not strike me as cause for concern.

I've never really been big on politics, so whether this was George Washington or George Bush, I'd say the same thing. I just find it a waste of time to be so cautious about something so trivial...I mean, hell, my grandmother grew up in Nazi Germany, and no one ever gave them the option of sitting out Hitler's speeches. What's the big deal?