Four Cat Pile Up

We are having our winter fog season where pile ups are a frequent occurence.



My house stinks this morning. Not because of the cats, because I just turned on the self cleaner on the oven and whatever happens during self cleaning stinks up the house. I have the vent fan above the stove going full blast and the kitchen window open but it still stinks. I haven't run the self cleaner since I can't even remember because cleaning the oven is one of those things you don't ever think about doing except when your oven starts to smoke because of all the spilled food in the bottom burning away. Which is what happened the other day and made me remember that the oven hasn't been cleaned in years, probably.

We stunk up the house a different way yesterday. We got a new fancy crock pot for Christmas so have been experimenting with it. Yesterday I put some pork rib things in it with a sauce made out of ketchup and soy sauce and vinegar and brown sugar and stuff and the all day cooking permeated the house with weird soy sauce and vinegar smells. The pork ribs were just okay, nothing to write home about and the recipe was not a keeper, but edible. Keith was trying to sleep in the bedroom last night and had to get up and spray air freshener around because all he could smell was pork and vinegar and soy sauce. Cooking smells really permeate our bedroom and bathroom for some reason.

Speaking of crock pots, I am liking the whole throw the food in and let it cook all day thing, but the part I'm enjoying the best is the plastic crock pot liner bags that we found at Winco. They're made by Reynolds (makers of fine aluminum foil) and are AMAZING! Put the liner in, throw the food in, let it cook all day, and then just throw the liner and all the mess away. NO SCRUBBING!

Well, short break there as all the smoke alarms went off because of the smoke from my self cleaning oven. The cats were all running around in a panic OMG! WHAT'S HAPPENING!?! and I'm running around in a panic opening windows and doors and how the hell do I turn these things off? I had to call Keith at work to find out how to turn them off and find the big ladder out in the garage to get to the smoke alarm in the living room because the ceiling is so high, and I was just barely able to reach it to yank that thing down. I guess we know that our smoke alarms work now.

Well, that was enough excitement for one day and since the smoke alarms are disabled I'll turn the self cleaner back on now.