What a small world this is! The person who left a comment after mine under The Great Interview Experiment (thereby making her my interview subject), went to college in Greenville, SC!
Alex of The Roaming Southerner (now on my blogroll) is a sweet, funny girl now living in Michigan. I told her if she were still single and living in Greenville, I’d totally try to set her up with my brother. She was a great person to interview, and here are my questions and her answers.
1. When I first visited your site, I saw those yummy pictures of that chicken pasta, and I thought, “Now, here’s someone I can get along with… a fellow foodie!” So tell me, what are your favorite things to cook? Are you by-the-recipe in the kitchen or do you just experiment with different ingredients and sometimes just throw stuff together because it sounds good?
Okay, so I am a closet foodie. My hubs does not like spending money on food (he thinks that a can of tuna and a spoonful of peanut butter are good enough). So when I get the chance (aka. company) or I see something great on sale, I will make “nicer” food. On normal days, I just try to put spins on classics (sausage, beans, and rice…chili (all kinds white, spicy, beany, etc.)…and different spaghetti recipes (I am in a quest to make the perfect sauce). I never go by the recipe, usually because I don’t have all the ingredients and I love to taste the food as I season and think about what is missing. I have made some things that are not spectacular before but, in my book, almost any dish can be saved by more garlic and pepper. But I love to experiment with fancy foods from cookbooks and Food network shows.
2. You’ve moved several times. What’s your coping strategy for adjusting to a new place and for living farther away from family?
I didn’t cope at ALL with moving when I first got married. We moved the day after we got married (great honeymoon, huh?)…so I never had time to worry about moving. I was more concerned with getting my marriage off to a good start and finishing the wedding nonsense. My husband is a true adventurer…he gets antsy if he stay in one spot too long. So I’ve had to learn that adventures are good…to put down the book I’m currently reading and get out and explore. After our second move, I became less paranoid (but leaving DC will do that)…more open…less concerned on how I was perceived…because we could move if I didn’t like it (after a few years at least). And when I became more open, I made more friends. And that is what makes moving good…you get to expand and make new friends without as much fear. The blog has helped me cope with change…more on that below!
3. Who or what inspired you to start blogging? How’s your experience been so far?
My best friend from college started blogging when she got pregnant…she was cataloguing her life and I thought that it was a good idea even though I didn’t have a kid to catalogue. The blog was great because it helped me stay connected from the friends I just moved away from in the south, helped me vent frustrations, and find a community that was more like me (rather than the people I went to graduate school–to say I was strange because I was southern, conservative, married, and not snotty is an understatement). I have loved blogging…I will admit that when times get tough (bad job, strained friendships, dealing with seasonal depression) I go into myself and leave blogging behind, which is counterproductive. I love finding people that I relate to when I am far away from those that know me. Even reading the momblogs that scare me to celibacy make me laugh and smile when my husband is studying till midnight for law school finals and/or feeling lonely.
4. Give us a current and all-time favorite entertainment rundown:
The CD/artist that’s currently on repeat and your all-time fave: I am not a music gal, but I have found a new obsession at work: Pandora. Online Radio that you pick. I vary it up from Beyonce (for energy), Rap (when I’m frustrated), Toby Keith (when I want to be driving home to Atlanta), and Dolly Parton (whenever I want a smile).
The last movie you saw and your all-time fave flick: In the theater: 27 Dresses (very cute)…but I just finished watching Pride & Prejudice (BBC version) for the 50th time last night and caught the last part of Wayne’s World …party time, excellent.
The book your currently reading and your all-time fave: Current Read, Anna Karenina and another Philipa Gregory, Virign’s Lover (about Elizabeth I). All time fav: anything related to Pride & Prejudice, Harry Potters, and John Irving’s Prayer for Owen Meany (You will finish this book and think that the world is a great place that makes sense).
The TV show you MUST watch each week and the one that’s (you guessed it) your all-time fave: I will watch every rerun of Gilmore Girls in existence so that might be for both answers… but new shows I love: Chuck, The Office, My Name is Earl, Project Runway/Top Chef. Oh, and all things Alton Brown/Ina Garten and House Hunters. I watch too much TV.
5. What’s the best advice you’ve ever gotten?
My mom always says to me, “Include everyone, it is the best way to make friends rather than enemies.”
6. Another thing we have in common: We both like to entertain! Your post on your recent Ave friend party hit home because sometimes I go through that same dilemma. (Want to keep the party small but not leave anyone out as well!) What’s been your most memorable get-together?
HA! I just touched on that with my mom’s quote. But I will tell you, it has been the best way for me to meet new people when I’ve moved to a new place. People automatically will make a connection with you coming into your house, and they will feel your friendliness because you invited them. (They also usually ask you to do something back, which is good for a girl who is home with a studying husband a lot). My most memorable get-together would be my first: New Year’s 2005, a year after we were married. My mom let me host it at her house (she was going to another party)…all my college friends and their boyfriends/fiances/husbands came dressed up…we used my fancy china and silver. We stayed up late…drank WAY too much…and I made brunch for people in the morning… It was a LOT of work, but one of the most fun times I’ve had with my friends. Sidenote: also the first time my mother ever saw me drunk/I was ever drunk at my mom’s house (I was 23)…she was less than thrilled.
7. So being a southern girl, what’s your reaction when you get the “Oh, I LOVE your accent!”? Have you lost any of the drawl living up north?
Sadly, I’ve never had a thick accent. My mom worked hard to lose hers when she moved from (what she terms) “the armpit of the South” and my dad grew up in ATL…now that being said…my accent comes out crazy for two things: talking about Southern things or food. When my friends with southern accents talk, I start slinging the lingo full force. I start preaching to yankees about “FrIEd Peeckls” or the allure of “Geohrgah Rehd ClaAy.” They say my southern is showing. The weirdest thing is southern phrases I never new were southern. Like my favorite: “I get lost trying to get out of a paper sack.” Someone said, what is a paper sack? HOW DO YOU EXPLAIN PAPER SACK TO A YANKEE? Grocery bag.
8. What’s a hobby/skill that you haven’t quite been able to pick up yet that you wish you could do?
I tried knitting last year…my friend tried to teach me…and I learned something about myself. If I have to follow directions, do things precise, then it isn’t for me. I love to throw pottery (on a wheel not at my husband)…but I’m not very good at it. If I could get better at that I would love it. My other skill I would love to pick up without work would be organization and shower cleaning–not a sport I’m good at. Oh, and I am learning to run (I know I know…you think that you just move your legs fast, but my chubchubs just won’t go for long and evidently I breathe badly–my friend is trying to teach me the ways to run correctly!).
9. You’ve just accidentally banged your pinky toe on your bed frame. The first thing out of your mouth is “________!”
You don’t know how many times I actually do this…scary, you have been spying on me! Usually, after stubbing my toe, you will find me rolling on the bed in pain shouting “FRACKIN A! OUCH” or jumping around while my husband is taking up my bed rolling space saying “F*ckin’ jimminies, that hurt.” My ease at dropping the f* bomb is becoming a little more proficient…I need to work on that.
10. What’s your all-time favorite quote?
“Everywhere you go, there you are” - Susanne Sugarbaker from Designing Women. And while I liked that first because it is just silly…there is some truth to it…you can’t run from yourself. The things you do, the stuff you mess up, the qualities you don’t like in yourself can not be solved by running away or moving…you have to look at yourself objectively, make the hard to decision to change/rectify the wrongs, and then DO IT. This is easier said than done, but it is a truth I’ve learned.
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