Yum.

Tonight I'm going to brag.

Three days in, our diet is going fabulously, and I CAN COOK. You seriously have no concept of how worried I was about this. Saturday night we had grilled salmon with rosemary and asparagus and salad -- my very first experience cooking salmon and also preparing asparagus. We actually had a bit of a scare, which I will confess even though I will look incredibly dumb.

So I pull out the salmon, which we bought fresh at Harris Teeter, and I unwrap it, and voila! There is this shiny scaley stuff on one side! Well, I have no idea what to do. I tug at the skin a bit. It isn't going to come off. I consider getting a knife to cut it, but observe that the fish is not very thick and there is a strong chance I will hurt myself. I glance over at unsuspecting Matt, hanging out with the puppy in the living room. Do I ask him for help? I look back at my shiny salmon. I ask Matt for help. Matt proceeds to freak out and get very exasperated with Harris Teeter for not taking care of this for us. He then runs out the door -- he is going to try to find us a fish scaler. I think some more and decide that Harris Teeter would not screw us over like this, so I call my mother, who reveals that, in fact, the salmon IS supposed to have that skin, and it will come right off after the fish is grilled. So I call my husband and tell him to turn around and come home. I grill the fish as directed and sure enough, the skin comes right off! Amazing. Who knew?

Well. Lots of people knew. Just not me. But we both really enjoyed the end result, and even had the leftovers in a caesar salad for lunch today.

Last night was an Asian-style dish, ginger chicken with snow peas. This really had me worried after my last chicken attempt, but it was incredibly easy and delicious. Matt even enjoyed the snow peas because of the marinade of the dish. Success! One frustration: Our meat thermometer doesn't seem to work properly. We nearly burned down our kitchen, and definitely burned parts of the chicken, waiting for the thermometer to say it was warm enough. It was most certainly done, but the thermometer would have us believe that we ate half-raw chicken. Gah. Waste of money, that.

Tonight was another chicken dish, this time a balsamic chicken baked in the oven. My favorite so far. I probably could have eaten three whole chicken breasts, so it's good I only cooked two for me and hubby.

I realize it might be boring to read about our meals for the last three days; however, if you understood how worried we were that we really just could not cook, you would appreciate the enormity of this a bit more. Really. I promise. But, for your entertainment, a few fun facebook finds:

Type your name and the word needs in quotation marks into google (e.g. "Kira needs") and list the first ten results. (This one made me laugh. You will soon see why.)
- Kira needs to sleep with somebody
- Kira needs call screening so that when a lunatic Cardassian calls her up, she will know who it is so she doesn't have to take the call
- Kira needs money for a Personal Electronic Device
- KIRA NEEDS URGENT HOME
- Kira needs a life
- Kira needs a big lap
- Kira needs a middle name
- Kira needs to learn some table manners
- KIRA NEEDS CAKE TOO YOU KNOW!!!!! Y EARTH NOBODY GIVE ME CAKE!!! IWANTCAKESOGIVEITTOMEORELSEIWILLKILLUALL!!!!!!!
- Kira needs to stop changing her name

Number nine is by far my favorite. Number one is true - my hubby! Numbers two and three also cracked me up. The last one is rather accurate, actually. I recommend doing this if you're in need of a laugh.

One more:
Which of the seven deadly sins—sloth, greed, lust, gluttony, anger, envy, and pride—are you most likely to commit?
- The girl I stole this from said that because she is a college student she is "prone to sloth." I find that the opposite is true of me. In college I frequently would "veg out" for periods of time to give myself a break, but I was always doing something. Since graduating I've watched more tv, been less active, and have even read less. However, I'm trying to find more things to do (Washington School of Photography, volunteer opportunities, and adding a second job), which will automatically cut down on tv. I'm also starting to spend a LOT of time in the kitchen and Matt and I are planning to start exercising seriously, so that should help. And I've joined three - count 'em - book clubs, to force myself to read. Ha! Sloth = conquered. Or nearly, at least.
- I am often greedy. I just want things. Not stuff, so much. But I really want money, pretty much all of the time. Money for everyday things like groceries, money for big things like world travel... greedy, greedy, greedy. Gimme.
- I'm married, clearly I lust. For my HUSBAND, get your minds out of the gutter. I'd be worried if I didn't lust after him!
- Working on gluttony. See: South Beach Diet.
- Anger is a problem. I hate it, but I'm always angry at Indiana for something. We need a fence. We really need a fence. Alternatively, we need him to be totally healed so that we can let him run and play. He's just been awful this last week.
- I am occasionally envious of thinner, more attractive women, but usually I'm okay. My big stumbling block is people with purpose. I'm still trying to find mine, and while I think photography is definitely a good direction, I don't have the same sense of purpose yet that, say, my friends Karen or Adrienne have. And I want that.
- I am definitely a little bit vain, but I'm also realistic and fairly self-aware, I think. I'm mostly vain about my performing abilities, photography, and level of intelligence, and I think I have justifications for all of those. Unlike many of the people on American Idol.

I've been putting off dishes all night... time to clean before bed. Night night, everyone.