Yesterday was Eric & Marie’s pot luck dinner. It was a great get together and all the food was delicious. I played video games all night, had some beer and ate all kinds of delicious food, couldn’t have gotten any better.

I spent two days thinking what to make for this dinner. I didn’t want to do chicken since I figured everyone else would, so I planned to go with beef or pork but I was stuck between stir fry or something else I didn’t think of yet. I surfed a few recipe sites for pot luck dinner ideas and came across one for some nice spareribs. I instantly printed out the recipe and headed to the supermarket.

The ribs are easy to cook and the sauce is fun to make. Everyone liked the ribs so this is a definite keeper in the recipe book and I will be making them again soon.

I enjoyed all the dishes at the dinner. There was sesame chicken, curry chicken, chicken pot pie (see what I meant about the chicken!), a bunch of stuff crammed in pizza dough (can’t remember name but they were good), some salads, fruit, and chocolate cake for dessert. Sorry if I forgot anything. I can’t wait until we do this again. Marie mentioned something about maybe every month we do this, could be fun.

In case you want it, here’s the recipe I followed:

Potluck Spareribs

Ingredients

• 6 pounds pork spareribs
• 1 1/2 cups ketchup
• 3/4 cup packed brown sugar
• 1/2 cup vinegar
• 1/2 cup honey
• 1/3 cup soy sauce
• 1 1/2 teaspoons ground ginger
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 3/4 teaspoon ground mustard
• 1/2 teaspoon garlic powder
• 1/4 teaspoon pepper

Directions

1. Cut ribs into serving-size pieces; place with the meaty side up on racks in two greased 13-in. x 9-in. x 2-in. baking pans. Cover tightly with foil. Bake at 350 degrees F for 1-1/4 hours or until meat is tender.
2. Drain; remove racks and return ribs to pans. Combine remaining ingredients; pour over ribs. Return to the oven, uncovered, for 35 minutes or until sauce coats ribs, basting occasionally. Ribs can also be grilled over medium-hot heat for the last 35 minutes instead of baking.

I haven’t had anything to post about in the past few months and it’s starting to bug me! Unfortunately that means that I haven’t done anything besides the normal which saddens me even more.

Luckily there is plenty coming up for me to post about. Now I just need to make notes to ensure I remember to post about them, like the Christmas post that I still haven’t compiled yet.

Lets see we have a part to go to in early February, Valentine’s Day, Jamie and a friend’s birthday on the same day, soon after my birthday, a hockey game, and the start of the MLS season which we have season tickets for!

On the birthday subject, Jamie and our friend Missy having the same birth date is pretty funny, no one actually ever realized it until a few days ago so it should be fun come that weekend celebrating both.

So yeah, here’s just a little reminder for me what to post about and a hint for what you will be reading next, enjoy.

A little late in posting this but I just wanted to congratulate Jamie on getting her new job as a patient care technician in a local hospital. She did love her old job but since she wants to work in a hospital once she’s a nurse this is a great step for her. Now she’ll have the benefit of already being in the hospital when she wants to move up, which they always prefer to move people in house around before hiring new people. She’s excited and been working there a few weeks now and enjoys it. They pay well and the hours work out with school.

Congrats Jamie!

As we get pummeled with snow all weekend long I just wanted to say

HAPPY NEW YEAR!

Last year Jamie really wanted a remote car starter for Christmas but I never got around to it. This year she kept reminding me like a kid looking at the Toys ‘R Us catalog each night.

Last Friday I had one installed for her and I let her have the remote to use since it was about 15 degrees outside. I did want to keep the remotes from her but just couldn’t do it since it was so cold.

I went to Solar Shades on Route 9 in Poughkeepsie. I chose them because they have been there for awhile and haven’t gone out of business like most places around here. That gave me some confidence that they must be good or they wouldn’t keep getting business to stay open. I also did a Google search for “remote car starter poughkeepsie” and boom they came up first, so it was a sign from Google that I should go with my gut and use them.

They did a great job on the install, very clean and neat. No wires showing or any paneling damaged during install. The starter works just as its supposed to with no glitches or issues. I do recommend them, I am very impressed with the quality of the job.

I had an Autopage CS-RS-603 remote starter installed. Well actually I just asked for a basic remote starter and that’s what they installed. Didn’t need any fancy remote lowering the windows or other “toys”. The system can remote start/stop the car, leave it running while you go in the store with the key, lock/unlock, and start from about 1,000 feet away.

I’ve had a remote starter in my car for a few years now, but it only worked for the first year. I think I kicked some wiring loose and it hasn’t worked for about two years now. I’m going back to Solar Shades after the holiday to get it fixed.

Solar Shades also offers window tinting (hence the name), detailing, vinyl graphics, and vehicle accessories.

Yesterday was Jamie and I’s five year anniversary. Can’t believe its been that long already, but there are many more years to come. And for all of you out there that keep asking, NO, I don’t know when I will “pop the question”. We both need to get a few things in line before that happen but don’t worry it’ll happen.

We weren’t supposed to give gifts this year to try and save some money for Christmas but I don’t listen and got Jamie this nice ring from Tiffany that she happened to like in their holiday catalog.  Amazing how women just love that little blue box. I gave her the gift outside the restaurant, didn’t want anyone in there to see me giving her a ring and think that it was an engagement ring and start a big hoopla.

I took her out to Shadows on the Hudson in Poughkeepsie. We haven’t eaten there before and always heard good things about the place. Shadows was surprisingly busy for a Monday night in this economy, but that is probably because the place is very nice. The food was delicious and the choices bountiful. I couldn’t get enough of this raspberry mojito drink they made there, very tasty. I opted for the duck and Jamie had some prime rib, the girl does lover her steak. Somehow we made it to dessert and ordered the berry shortcake. Boy was it huge and delicious. We barely ate half of it, but it was by far the best shortcake dessert that we have ever had.

So here’s to many more years of her somehow putting up with me….

Today marks the first snow fall of the season for our area. Hopefully it continues not to stick to the sidewalks and roads so that things don’t get messy and I don’t have to go out and shovel. Seems like it’s a bit earlier this year.