I tried to be domestic today. We had a bit of leftover baguette that was getting progressively harder by the minute, so I thought I'd make crostini out of it, to go with the hummus and cheese that we have. It didn't sound too hard.
Cut the bread thin, brush some butter on both sides so it doesn't stick, pop it in the oven for a few minutes.
I, however, did not have a way to finesse the butter step, and that was where things began to go terribly wrong. Since I had nothing with which to brush it on, I settled for dipping the pieces in the butter, and then putting them in the oven.
After about 15 minutes, a few of them were good, but most of them were still a bit too greasy. So I took them out of the oven, thinking that I would let them cool off a bit, then stick them in the toaster oven to dry them out the rest of the way.
But, it turns out, when you heat up butter again, it becomes a liquid. Go figure. And it melts and drips into the all wrong places, and starts a grease fire, making the end result of your domestic attempt at crostini this:
A possibly ruined toaster oven full of baking soda.
I did clean it out, so hopefully it's not ruined, but I'm too scared to turn it back on and try it.
I will never be domestic.
In other news, I've found a program that I think I might like a lot. We're not sure where we're going when we leave Phila in June, but Ben definitely wants out of here. Baltimore is an option, as there are no jobs back home to speak of, and Billy Mccomiskey is in Baltimore and he and Ben would both like for Ben to keep taking accordion lessons from him.
For me, the University of Baltimore (a school I know nothing about) has an MFA program that is a combination of Creative Writing and Publishing. It takes you through all the steps of writing the book, and the steps of getting it into print, which could be extremely useful if I want to really start my own publishing company. I'm definitely looking into it, because they claim that the MFA would qualify me to teach at the University level. I'm sure they mean as an adjunct, but I could get a PhD later if I wanted/needed to.
Also, I got a flyer about a Summer Seminar for Writers at Sarah Lawrence College. Our friend Erin went there for her undergrad, so I'm picking her brain about it. Sarah Lawrence is a great school for writing, but it is the most expensive school in the country. For a bachelor's, it's more expensive than Harvard. Which is insane. This program is expensive too- $800 in just tuition for a week long seminar/workshop. It's going to take some serious thought, but the application deadline isn't until the middle of April, so I have a little bit of time. I'll let you know how things progress.
On the writing front, I'm really obsessed with Letters to Myself again, and today my goal is to write out some extensive character sketches and start looking for ways to add subplots and such.
I also need to keep looking for a real job, since I NEED to go to Europe this summer! Bratslava and Prague are gorgeous! Although that giraffe doesn't look like he agrees- he looks bored. I certainly wouldn't be, especially with people in masks wandering around, and cheap opera tickets. I actually like the opera- I didn't think I would, but for the most part it holds my interest.
Also- we should definitely road trip around the US. I've never left the east coast, and Ben wants to show me all of the places he's been to- like Montana. And there's so much cool stuff in the desert that I want to see- his parents take their RV to Arizona for the winter, and their pictures are incredible.
I think that's everything. I'm off now to work on some character sketches and maybe munch on my few pieces of crostini that didn't go through the fire.
I'm still never cooking again.
-Lizz
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