My Space

I was looking around my old notes from Facebook and I had one that mentioned My Space. This, of course, was a really old note and naturally I headed over to My Space to see what I was referring to.
What I found was that I couldn't remember my login e-mail, let alone my login password. A few attempts later and an e-mail to retrieve my password I gained access again to my long-forgotten My Space account.
Everything had changed and what kinda hurt me the most was my profile: I had spent HOURS looking for a cool background and spent HOURS customizing it and making it my own. And now, none of it is available and none of it matters anymore. Sad.
I proceeded to look for my blog and what I had written there. After trying to sort through everything I had and trying to find ALL the posts I had made, I finally was able to transfer all of the previous blog posts here. A lot of nostalgia took over me, and I realized that my writing has since then declined to the point of ridiculousness. I have lost inspiration, I have lost vocabulary and overall... skill! >.<
Anyways, I will be posting some of my old stuff here now so I can re-share it, so people can maybe get to see it and hopefully somebody will like it.

Mr. Baby is not impressed. 

The 25 random things about me... just because... u know u wanna

I found this on one of my old notes from 2009 in Facebook. I forgot I had this and I thought it was funny. I should do a newer version of this and compare it to this old list. Should be fun! =D 


1. I say "LOL" in real life. 

2. I consider Ariel (from The little Mermaid) and Jasmine (from Aladdin) to be my personal heroes. 

3. I once started the rumor that I was the Queen of the Universe, and somehow, it spread like wildfire and now people actually call me this to the point I'm starting to believe it. 

4. I collect stuff: beads I find in the floor, little jewelry boxes and coins.

5. I have synesthesia. 

6. I am afraid of clowns because once, in a circus, one of them sat on my lap. 

7. I have always wanted to sew just so I can make my own clothes because I am a closet fashion designer. 

VIII. I can read ancient Egyptian hieroglyphs and runes. 

9. Gluttony is my sin... I love to eat. 

10. I have no sugar threshold. Nothing is too sweet for me.

11. I always joke that I will marry a nobleman who is a chef and also an orphan, so I can have a nobility title, do not need to cook and do not need to meet the in laws (this causes me terrible stress!)... also he is 6'6",an artist, has a gorgeous accent and blue eyes... I am a sucker for blue eyes! 

12. I have eaten boa.

13. I don't eat anything that swims. 

14. I love doing charity and volunteering makes me happy. 

15. I am afraid of microphones but I'm slowly conquering my fear of speaking in public.

16. I like animals like: unicorns (yes, I just said that), white tigers, pandas, elephants, manatees and dogs. 

17. I will live in India and do missionary work in the future. Oh yes. :) I'm dying to do this. 

XVIII. My computer has no number eight key because my dog Niko (RIP) jumped once on my laptop, and destroyed it, along with the F7 button... which I still don't know what it is for. 

19. Sometimes I think I'm a heretic. 

20. I'm very money-savvy... I do not go out and spend money just because.

21. I have heard some people say they like my eyes, yet I find absolutely NOTHING special about them, and I think that these people may just be pulling my leg. 

22. I have a thing for guys with long hair. I don't know what it is... it's just... awesome! =D

23. I will be 23 on June 23 and I wish I can celebrate it in Norway.

24. I'm tall, and I love wearing high-heels. You are shorter than I am? Deal with it! Most of my friends are only 5 feet tall, and though I look like their mother when we go out, I still wear 5 inch heels. :) 

25. I have no eye-hand coordination... whatsoever. I don't know how people hit a ball with the bat... I am amazed by this ability. 

26. Oops! :) My family and some of my friends call me Lola, even though I am not Dolores. The etymology comes from calling me Laura in English (sounds like Lora) and then... somehow Lola came to the picture. My dad calls me Pica, which also happens to be a symptom I possess because I am anemic. 

Twitter-ing

I'm trying to connect my blog to Twitter and somehow the "Gadget" is not working, so I went on Twitter and made a "widget"... I probably have no idea what I'm doing >.>

Instagram-ing

A couple of pictures from Instagram :) I finally decided to re-open the thing! You can follow me @littlelovelylily ;D

Adventures in the OR

Waking up at 5am in order to make it to the OR in time is really hard! Especially when you get there in time and realize you have to wait for the patient to be prepped and what it really means is that you could've slept another hour more. FML.

I've seen more laparoscopic cholecystectomy than I care for, and the one surgery I saw that I liked the most, was not even part of my program: an awake craneotomy to remove a glioblastoma multiforme. Fancy words for saying that they open the skull, expose the brain and take out the tumor. All the while, you are awake.

And what a wonder it was walking in there, seeing the brain exposed in all its glory and what fascinated me the most was how the brain was moving in the skull, full of blood pumping through it and full of life. It seemed almost alien like, almost as if it wasn't really happening. And, it completely knocked the breath out of me. The patient was talking as if nothing was happening and I stood there, completely mesmerized, unable to move, to say anything, to think anything! Here was the command center, the brain, in all its glory and we were messing around with it, to save someone's life.

Who wants to go back to taking out gallbladders after this?

Sugar Free Marzipan Walnut Blondies

Ok, so the name may or may not be a bit of a misnomer. I am sure this is not entirely sugar free, so you have been warned! But, it is as sugar free as it can possibly be and retain the desired consistency. I guess there are other ways of making this involving garbanzo beans and sweetened with agave or God-knows-what... but I don't know any of these methods and I probably can't find any of those ingredients anywhere in this small island. But, here it goes... 

"Sugar Free" Marzipan Walnut Blondies

1 stick butter, softened

1/2 cup Splenda Blend brown sugar

1 egg

1/2 tablespoon vanilla

1 cup flour

1/4 teaspoon salt

1/2 teaspoon baking powder

1/2 cup chocolate chips, 1/4 cup reserved

3/4 cup chopped walnuts, 1/4 cup reserved

2 oz. marzipan

Preheat: 350F. 

Line: 8x8 pan with parchment paper

Directions:

Beat the butter, marzipan and vanilla until smooth and creamy. Add the sugar and salt and continue whisking until it’s fluffy. Then pour in half of the cup of flour, whisk and then pour in the remaining flour. Add the walnuts and chocolate chips and combine them together until they look like basically cookie dough.

After it is all combined, pour it into the pan that is already lined with the parchment paper and then finally sprinkle on top the reserved walnuts and chocolate chips and press them down on the dough. 

Bake: 25 min or until done. I like them a bit gooey so I take them out before they are completely done and let them cook in their own heat. Yummy. I would tell you to let them cool but you know and I know that you can’t really wait for that. But I guess you should do so and then lift the blondies up by the parchment paper. 

I think that they are best served warm with a big ball of ice cream. =D 

I adapted the recipe from here.

Pecan Pie Bars

I like Pecan Pie everything, and I decided this time to try Pecan Pie Bars for the first time, I mean, it's a no-brainer if you like Pecan Pies. This is using a shortbread crust, maybe I will switch it up next time for something else. I don't know why but maybe the butter I used was the light version and it was more like a cracker. Also, what I like about Pecan Pie is the filling and here it's distributed in a 13 x 9 pan so that means less filling per bite. It was kinda sad, but at the same time it was not so heavy on the sugar. My parents really liked it. Next time I think I will double on the filling portions because I want a more "pie" feel to it. They were good though! A couple of notes though, get a good vanilla. All I had at my parent's place was this vanilla from Costco and it's kinda alcohol-y and I prefer the vanilla from the Dominican Republic. I need MOAR! Use real butter, don't be like me, and I ran out of butter for the filling so I used a vegetable spread and I think that altered the taste too. I may be nitpicking though. 

Crust: 

1 1/2 cup all purpose flour

1 stick butter

1/2 cup brown sugar

1/2 teaspoon salt

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

Filling: 

2 cups pecans

3 eggs

3/4 cup brown sugar

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

2 tablespoons of melted butter

1 cup corn syrup

1/2 teaspoon salt 

Preheat: 350F

Grease: 13 x 9 inch pan 

Crust: With pastry cutter or a fork, cut butter, sugar, flour, salt and vanilla extract until crumbly and pea sized pieces. Press into baking pan and bake for 15 min until light brown.

Filling: Whisk corn syrup, sugar, salt and vanilla extract until combined. Add the eggs and the melted butter and mix thoroughly. Finally stir in the pecans and pour evenly over the crust after it has cooled for a few minutes. 

Bake: 30 to 40 min until set. 

Allow to cool completely (or don’t, like I did and ate like half of it still warm!), cut into bars and gobble. :)