The Odds: Word Counters

 

 

 

Counting my words again. 

Today my fellow Word Counters and I are sharing our monthly group post. Each month one group member picks  a number between 12 and 50. All participating bloggers are then challenged to write something (or a few somethings, as the case may be) using that exact number of words. Today we all share what we came up with. 

 This month's number is 22. 
It was chosen by Me.

As I've been doing in these Word Counters posts, I've chosen a theme and am using my word count multiple times in keeping with the theme. This month I've chosen the theme, The Odds. You'll see why.

 

~ Defying the odds can be a lot of things. Often shocking, frequently fun, and it always makes for an interesting story.

 

~ I've written about beating the odds before. Remember I said they make interesting stories, well, I've got one to tell today.

 

~ We're not talking even odds here, like if your recipe will come out. Understand the flavors, and you've got a fair chance.

Sweet Hot Orange Sauce

~ With IVF, I was the Luckiest. It took a village, took guts, and it took luck. But I've also been inordinately unlucky.

 

~ Like in Lightening Strikes, I talk about that old adage about lightening never striking (in the same place) twice. Defied that one.

 

~ And who'd have guessed that I'd ever say that TEN YEARS AGO today I published my first blog post, Can I Blog?

 

~ Here's the latest story. First let me remind you that College Boy, after many years of not skating, got a new board.

 

 

 

~ He often buys, sells, and trades albums (remember those?). In a grocery store, 3/4 of a mile away, there's a post office.

~ When he's here in the evening and has something to mail, he'll skate to the store carrying the package (ah, youthful balance).

 

~ The store is partway up a hill, so he turns off into the store parking lot, not pushing the whole way up.

~ But coming home, he cuts through a bank parking lot, taking him out to a sidewalk at the top of the hill. 

 

~ From there he takes the ride home, straight downhill. And that's exactly what he was intending to do when sidetracked by luck.

~ It was evening, the parking lot empty, when he saw something on the ground. Kinda mangled but looked like someone's credit card.

~ He skated to where he'd caught a glimpse of it, hoping to do the right thing and return it to its owner.

~ It was a license. I wish I'd been there when he picked it up and realized . . . it was his. What're the odds?

 

Here are links to the other Word Counters posts:

On the Border 

Messymimi’s Meanderings 

 

Sweet Hot Orange Sauce         
                                   ©www.BakingInATornado.com

Printable Recipe

Ingredients:

1/4 cup orange marmalade

1/4 cup sweet chili sauce

2 TBSP pepper jelly

2 tsp minced garlic

2 TBSP orange juice

2 TBSP soy sauce 

Directions:

*Whisk all the ingredients together.

*Microwave for 30 seconds. Whisk again.

*Microwave for another 30 seconds. Whisk.

*You can use this sauce to coat cooked beef or chicken nuggets, or serve as a dipping sauce with my Air Fryer Coconut Chicken Fingers.

Use Those Brain Cells Wisely

I just need to ask: seriously, who raises these people?

I used to, when the boys were little, scour the news for funny news stories. If the dinner conversation lagged, or got ugly (sorry, brothers a year apart, it happened), or recipe insults came out of those sweet young mouths, I'd bring up a story and we'd all have a few laughs. You may have been hearing about this strategy used a lot in lately, yeah, it's called deflection and we moms perfected it first. Probably all of us at the dinner table.

Tangy Horseradish Steak Sauce

Let me just tell you here that as a mom, I thought I'd heard it all. I mean when it comes to thinking up and trying to convince me of the most absurd excuses imaginable, I was pretty sure I could not be surprised by an excuse ever again.

And then I read the story of a young woman, a passenger in a car that was pulled over, who was found to be in the possession of cocaine. She told the police that she doesn't know anything about cocaine, it was a windy day and the drugs flew in the car window. 

Are you laughing? I did. But wait, I'm not done. Seems the cocaine not only flew into the car, but right into her purse.  

It's pretty clear to me that one of two things have happened in this woman's life. Either her mama smacked her upside the head one time too many, or one time too few. 

{{Side note: please do not leave me angry comments about child abuse, I'm kidding. Really.}}

But something went wrong with this young lady somewhere. I hope we can agree on that.

What I want to know is what exactly this woman thought the police were going to say to that. "Oh, that explains it, you're free to go." Or "driving in this wind is dangerous, ma'am, you should roll up your window or put on a helmet". Or maybe "well, finders keepers losers weepers, guess it's your lucky day". Or what? Really, what was she expecting to happen next?

Whatever her expectations were, I'm pretty sure I know exactly what happened next. I bet she was treated to a nice ride in a much less windy car, and then got to have her picture took. For free.

Think this is a one-off? Not hardly. More like an epidemic. Yet another story that recently caught my attention was that of a man pulled over because his car was weaving. He was suspected of being drunk. This particular genius, figuring that the cotton would soak up the alcohol in his stomach and allow him to beat the alcohol test, tried to eat his underwear. Yes, you read that right, he was caught by the police literally trying to eat his shorts.
 
Moral of the story: in regards to the operation, application, utilization of brain cells, choose wisely, my friends. In some circumstances there is just no "do over".

Tangy Horseradish Steak Sauce         
                                    ©www.BakingInATornado.com

Printable Recipe

Ingredients:
1/2 cup plain Greek yogurt
2 TBSP prepared horseradish
2 TBSP red wine vinegar
2 tsp sugar
2 tsp Worcestershire sauce
2 tsp dried chives
dash of salt and pepper

Directions:
*Whisk all ingredients together. 
*Cover and refrigerate for at least an hour before serving.
*Cover leftovers and store in refrigerator.

Yummy Things Come in Small Packages

So there I was, just sitting around minding my own business monitoring my social media accounts when up pops a tweet from Cristy, someone I don’t know, asking if I’d like to try some tomatoes.

I was a bit dumbfounded but I knew just what to do. Jump onto Google and start asking questions:
“what is “try some tomatoes” innuendo for?”
“what does it mean if someone asks you to try their tomatoes?”

Either I stumped Google {{gasp}}, or sometimes a tomato is just a tomato.

But I’m extremely skeptical (to say the least) about people I “meet” online. You never really know if they are who they say they are.

Through some back and forth and me stalking checking out the name she was using (I said EXTREMELY skeptical, right?) with my old friend Google, it seemed that Cristy’s a Media Specialist in Blogger Relations for a PR firm. OK, so what’s the catch . . .

I asked specifically and was assured that if I sent her my name and address, Tuttorosso Tomatoes would send me a kit. Although they’d love for me to post a recipe, there is no expectation.

I do not give out my full name and location. It’s a commitment I made to my kids when I started bitching kvetching writing about them way back when I first started this blog. I’ve also had my blog stalked and my content stolen many times, who knows what someone could do if I started sending out personal information to strangers. But I admit I was intrigued.

It took me 4 days but I finally sent her my name and address . . . and waited for my identity to be stolen, my bank accounts to be cleaned out and credit cards to be opened in my name all over the planet.

And I remained vigilant until two weeks later when I was sitting on my couch and got ding-dong-ditched. You know, someone rings your doorbell, runs, and there’s no one there when you answer.  Well, there was on one there when I answered. There WAS a box, though.

Let me tell you something: good things, in fact yummy things, do come in small packages. In mine there was a 28 oz can of crushed tomatoes with basil, a 28 oz can of peeled plum tomatoes, a 28 oz can of tomato sauce, a 6 oz can of tomato paste, an apron, a Martha magazine and a cool carry bag (perfect size for wine bottles, just sayin’).

I did exactly what you know I’d do, logged out of my on-line bank account and headed straight for the kitchen.

I thought and I plotted. I worked and I toiled. I boiled, breaded, sauteed, simmered and baked.

And when night fell . . . behold . . . there was Chicken Pasta Bake. And it was glorious. Yes, even College Boy liked it. He actually had seconds. Can I get an “amen”?’

I started with pasta. Not only was that going to be the best way to win College Boy over but, well, tomatoes and pasta, duh!

I had bought some thinly sliced chicken breasts on sale that I knew I wanted to use so I breaded them and sauteed them in olive oil.

I put the chicken on top of the cooked pasta in my baking pan and moved on to the veggies I had in the fridge. For the chicken, then the veggies and finally the sauce, I used the same skillet. When in doubt, always opt for less to clean up.

For the sauce I chose to use the can of crushed tomatoes with basil and the tomato paste. I kept the other ingredients to a minimum, wanting to let the flavor of the tomatoes shine.

And they did. This simple chicken, veggie and pasta recipe baked in the tomato sauce was absolutely delicious.

NOTE: As described in this post, I did receive free product from Tuttorosso Tomatoes. I made sure the gift came with no expectations so the development of this recipe and this resulting post was my choice. The assessment of the product is my honest opinion.

 

Chicken Pasta Bake

                                                                          ©www.BakingInATornado.com
 
Printable Recipe
 
Ingredients:
16 oz package rigatoni
1 cup cold water
2 ½ # boneless, skinless, thin sliced chicken breast
1 egg, whisked with 2 TBSP cold water
1 – 1 ½ cups seasoned bread crumbs
4 TBSP olive oil, divided
1 medium green pepper, sliced
1 medium red pepper, sliced
8 oz mushrooms, cleaned and sliced
1 large onion, sliced
 
¼ cup olive oil
2 cloves minced garlic
1 can (28 oz) crushed tomatoes with basil
1 can (6 oz) tomato paste
¼ cup white wine
½ tsp salt
¼ tsp pepper
¼ tsp crushed red pepper flakes
1 tsp dried oregano
2 tsp brown sugar
 
Directions:
*Spray a large baking dish with no-stick spray. I used a 15 X 10. Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
*Cook the rigatoni to al dente. Spread out into the prepared baking dish. Pour a cup of cold water over the pasta. This will help it to steam and keep it moist while baking,
*Cut chicken slices into medallions. Individually dip each one in the egg mixture, then coat completely with bread crumbs.
*Heat 2 TBSP olive oil in a large skillet on medium heat until hot. Place as many chicken pieces in the pan as you can without crowding. Brown the bottom, flip over and brown the other side. Place onto a paper towel, gently pat and put into the prepared pan on top of the rigatoni. Add another TBSP of oil to the pan and repeat with the rest of the chicken pieces.
*In the same skillet, add another TBSP olive oil with the onion, both  peppers, and mushrooms. Cook until the vegetables soften. Place over the chicken in the baking pan.
*In the same skillet heat the ¼ cup of oil. Add the garlic and stir for one minute. Add the rest of the sauce ingredients and bring just to a boil. Reduce heat and simmer for about 20 minutes. Carefully pour the sauce over the vegetables in the baking pan.
*Cover tightly with heavy foil. Place in the oven and cook for one hour.