Spam of the week

Oh, good lord. Really?

Contact me as soon as possible.
Calvary greetings,I am here because i read there are people here, to make a lot of difference in this life.i think you can make a lot of difference if we talk , become good friends in our lord , and see that with greater power , comes greater responsibility . You can make a change in the life of others,most especially the poor at heart , and the less privileged. first. I think i would start all with a proper introduction of myself .
I am Missionary Mary Singers , a widow to Late Paul Gaston Singers. I am 57 years old,suffering from long time cancer of the breast . From all indications , my condition is really deteriorating and is quite obvious that I may not live more than two months after my next surgery , because the cancer stage has gotten to a very severe stage . My personal physician told me that I may not live for more than 2 months and I am so scared about it . I have no child of mine , even though i wish i had . It is late now you know , since i can not get married again , and age is no longer on my side.
Psalms 119:116 Uphold me according unto thy word, that I may live, and let me not be ashamed of my hope.Psalms 138: 7 Though I walk in the midst of trouble, thou will revive me..Psalms 145:18Psalms 57: 7 My heart is fixed. O God my heart is fixed, I willsing & give praisePsalms51: 17 The sacrifices of God are broken spirit, a broken & contriteheart, O God thou will not despise.psalms 41: 1 Blessed is he that considereth the poor, the Lord will deliver himin time of trouble.
Two of my favorite verses: Philippians2:27: For indeed he was sick nigh unto death, but God had mercy on him & that on him only, but on me also,lest I should have sorrow upon sorrow.( I always say this in my mind)
So, I now decide to divide part of my wealth, by contributing to the development of the motherless baby homes, needy, poor, charity homes and widows too.i am willing to donate the sum of $5.000,000.00, which is still the major inheritance i have left.i wish you could be someone who i could trust with all my heart,to make this wish of mine come true.
Please note that, this fund is lying in a bank. so i need you to use the funds to help the poor . I know this is hard , and it take a very strong heart to get this done , but you should keep this saying in your heart , I am like Moses in the Bible . He came to the Red Sea and Pharaoh behind him and no way to turn but God delivered him all by a miraculous deliverance . It will be a miracle from God to be able to help all the dear people God has laid on our hearts .
This is why with God in my heart,i contact you,and i want you to contact me,so we be in contact with all the poor souls out there . Give new lives , hopes and days . I have come to find out that wealth acquisition without Christ is vanity and i hope you will agree with this also . I will be praying hard that Satan will not stop this effort . Do contact me and i will tell you more of what you wish to know .
God bless you.
Yours in Christ,
Mary Singers

Sorry, Mary. I already sent all my money to that nice Nigerian prince.

In the kitchen with Martha: Bacon jam

Martha Stewart's Slow-Cooker Bacon Jam

I used to not eat meat. I KNOW — how sad for me. (No offense, current vegetarians. I'm sure you're perfectly happy just as you are.) A lot of recovering vegetarians talk about how they used to crave bacon before they gave in and got back on the hog. Personally, I can't remember ever once longing for bacon during my near-decade of abstaining from meat, but I do think it's a delicious meat product that I now enjoy from time to time. And my favorite menu item at Burritoville when I lived in New York was the VLT, a wrap that included faux bacon and soy chipotle mayonnaise. (Although I notice it's not on the menu anymore, so maybe I was the only person who loved it.)

If I like bacon, though, MLB super loves it, and so do most of our friends, and consequently I've found I can't go wrong with a bacon-based appetizer when entertaining. Usually I stick to bacon-wrapped apricots with teriyaki sauce, but when we had a few people over last weekend I decided to branch out with Martha Stewart's recipe for bacon jam.

That's right. Jam of bacon.

I was drawn to this recipe initially not only because it is bacon jam (jam! of bacon!) but because it has the words "slow cooker" right there in the name, and the only thing I love more than making delicious food is making delicious food in the Crock Pot. I'm a big fan of dumping things in a pot, pushing a button, and walking away for eight hours, only to come back to hot, tasty dinner. (Side Note: Want to make chicken tacos? Put a package of chicken breasts in your Crock Pot with a jar of salsa and a packet of fajita seasoning. Eight hours on low. Shred with forks. WINNING.)

Martha Stewart's Slow-Cooker Bacon Jam, however, is one of those tricky slow cooker recipes that requires just as much (or more) cooking outside the Crock Pot as it does in the actual slow cooker. First you cook your cut-up bacon. (I used good bacon. Why would you cheap out and use Safeway brand bacon? THIS IS BACON JAM.) Then you cook onions and garlic in the bacon fat. Then you cook brown sugar, vinegar, coffee and maple syrup in the onions and garlic. (Yes, this recipe has essentially everything that is delicious in it.) THEN you pop it all into the slow cooker, and then when it's all done you pulse it through your Cuisinart. The slow cooker is really just sort of a brief (four-hour) interlude; it might more properly be called Frying-Pan-And-Food-Processor Bacon Jam.

Naming conventions aside... this is delicious. I probably don't even need to say that; you saw the ingredients. It solidifies a bit in the fridge (all that bacon fat setting up), so I microwaved it on low power for a minute or two before serving. We ate it on baguettes, but honestly, you could eat it off recycled sawdust cardboard chips and it would still be delicious. We sent some home with a friend who said he ate it on leftover salmon and mashed potatoes, which was obviously also delicious.

It also makes a ton. When Martha says you should "send your guests home with a jar," she's not just giving a nod to hospitality. She's warning you that (a) this is amazing and (b) you will have a ton left over. So bust out those jars.

Jan. 15

Today on Martha's calendar: Clear fallen branches around property, split for firewood, and stack inside barn.

Today on Maia's calendar: Stare at Christmas tree needles still scattered around living room floor and think about vacuuming. Watch "Downton Abbey" instead.

Bucket list

#1: Stage "Starlight Express" in Anchorage. Outdoors. On ice skates. Because, you know... It's Alaska.

2012: The year of Living Marthalously

MLB and I recently celebrated six months of wedded bliss (which means we've been married now for about a third of the length of time we were engaged, but still, it's a milestone). Someone asked us recently how long it takes to recover from a wedding like ours, and the answer is: We don't know. We're still ordering albums and mailing off the final thank-you notes and believe it or not, gifts still trickle in from time to time. We just threw out the last of the top layer of our cake (I know you're supposed to keep it in the freezer to eat on your first anniversary, but after reviewing the state of what was left during a recent freezer purge, we decided it would be better to part ways. If we decide we want cake for our first anniversary, we'll buy a new one).

Still, we're definitely on the downhill side of wedding wind-down, which means that my thoroughly-documented full-time year-and-a-half-long obsession hobby has more or less come to an end. Now that wedding planning is over and I've started to get the hang of being married, it's time for a new project in a new year. (Besides, you know, my job and my eye shadow blog and learning to be a writer again.) 

I didn't have to think too long about what it would be.

I love Martha Stewart. I'm not ashamed to admit it. She's given me something to aspire to since I first picked up her magazine close to 20 years ago. Martha makes me believe it's possible to do everyday things beautifully. She validates me when I go through occasional fits of mania and want to do things like alphabetize my spices and sew dust bags for all my shoes. (Disclaimer: I have done only one of those things, and it was not recently.) And she provided me with a significant amount of much-needed moral support during the wedding planning process. 

Some people think Martha sets unrealistic standards that none of us can ever meet, and sure, there's some merit to that. I mean, looking at her monthly calendar in the magazine makes me break out in a cold sweat of inadequacy:

"Clean and oil saddles"? "Bring a bowl of fresh eggs to the office"? Where's the day for "Lie on the couch with a box of crackers and watch an entire 'America's Next Top Model' marathon"? Let's just say Maia's Month and Martha's Month bear little resemblance to one another.

On the other hand, there are lots of dreamy Martha Stewart projects that are attainable, or even deceptively easy. Like this cake topper, which appeared in Martha Stewart Weddings years ago, and which occupied the File Away For Future Wedding folder in my creative subconscious for years:

And which I then used as the basis for my own wedding cake topper, which turned out beautifully, if I do say so myself:

And now that I'm old and married and not working long, exhausting hours anymore, I'm ready to fully embrace Martha's influence. Throughout 2012, I'll be undertaking a variety of Martha Stewart projects — at least one from each issue of the magazine, and additional projects from MarthaStewart.com. (You can preview some of the possibilities on my Living Marthalously Pinterest board.) I expect that some of these projects will be epic fails, some will be raging successes, and many will have to be adapted to allow for the fact that I don't live in a Westport farmhouse with a full staff. And of course, I'll share the results here on Own The Sidewalk, where 2012 is the Year of Living Marthalously.