Another Team Grondul Dinner Favorite

Here is another of our favorite recipes. This is actually a Weight Watchers recipe, but it's really good, I swear!

Turkey Meatloaf

Ingredients:

• 8 oz uncooked lean ground beef (7% fat)
• 12 oz lean ground turkey
• Note: These are the meats the recipe originally called for. I have used all bison, all ostrich, and all 4% fat ground turkey and all of them have come out quite well. In fact, last time I made this, I only had 1 lb of bison, not the required 20 oz, so I chopped up and threw in some crimini mushrooms I had on hand to make up for the extra meat and it came out great. This recipe is pretty forgiving.
  
• 1 medium onion, chopped
• ½ cup uncooked old-fashioned oats
• 8 oz canned tomato sauce
• 2 tblsp worchestershire sauce
• 1 tblsp hot pepper sauce
  
• I usually use the Tobasco chipotle sauce, which is a bit less hot than regular hot sauce, and it comes out great!
  
• 2 large egg whites or one whole egg
  
• ¼ tsp salt
• ¼ tsp black pepper
  

Directions:

Preheat oven to 350^o F. Spray loaf pan with cooking spray. Combine beef, turkey, onion and oats in a large bowl. Mix together tomato sauce, worchestershire sauce, hot pepper sauce, egg whites, salt and pepper. Add to meat mixture and mix well with hands. Press into pan and bake 60-70 mins.

Alternatively, you can place the meat mixture into a muffin pan (12 cups is usually what we get out of it) and make cup-meats! You will only need to bake them for 20-25 mins if you do them in muffin cups. We decided to try this one night when we wanted meatloaf, but we were starving and didn't want to wait an hour.

The cutest infestation ever....

...is, shockingly, NOT Koalas. It turns out it's Bichons! We went to a Bichon meetup last weekend and Newton had SO much fun. It was interesting...even though they all probably looked pretty much alike to most people, we had no problem picking Newton out of the crowd and it wasn't just by the color of his collar, either. ;) Clearly these dogs were not all show dogs...I kind of wondered if they would have all been much less distinguishable had they all been groomed the same way and perfect in terms of the breed standard, or if we still would have known which one was our Newton.

Anyway, enough of my random musings...on to the pictures! I must confess that I did not take these. There was a guy there who had a really nice camera and clearly knew how to use it as evidenced by these great pics! There were very few of Newton with all four feet on the ground. Enjoy!

Newton's patented quick direction changes help him win at chase!

Chase me! Chase me! C'mon....chase me!

I'm gonna get you! I can almost reach your tail!

Just runnin' around...

Two dogs to chase is even better than one!

PR: Fran

I set a new personal record on Fran last night: 5 minutes and 55 seconds, which is 20 seconds faster than my previous best. Once again, I achieved this new benchmark not through improved fitness but through greater determination. Given how near to vomiting I felt for the 1o minutes after this workout, it's going to be difficult for me to beat that time when this WOD next appears.

Omigod, I want to eat IT ALL!!

I made the most awesome thing in the world tonight...brace yourself...peanut butter ice cream topping. I found the recipe at allrecipies.com:

1 cup sugar
1/2 cup water
1/2 cup peanut butter

Combine sugar and water in a small saucepan and bring to a boil. Remove from heat and then stir in peanut butter. Use a stick blender until mixture is smooth and begins to thicken. Serve over vanilla ice cream and enjoy the awesomeness.

PR: Made-Up WOD

For various reasons, mostly relating to my recent illness, I've gotten off-track with respect to the CrossFit.com Workouts of the Day. So, today I decided to redo the first made-up WOD that I thought worthy of posting to this blog. I set a substantially faster time---and thus a new PR---of 18:56.

PR: CFT

I may have posted a new personal record for CrossFit Total a couple of weeks ago. I say "may" because I'm not sure that I descended all the way on my squats. Since Alison was out of town, and since I prefer to look slightly up, rather than directly into the mirror, I was unable to asses my own form. Here's how things broke down:

• Back squat: 285 pounds. That's a PR, and by 5 pounds.
• Shoulder press: 123 pounds. Not great.
• Deadlift: 317 pounds. A new PR, but only by 1 pound.

So, my new CrossFit Total score is 725, a 5-pound improvement.

I'm laughing so hard that I'm crying...

This is one of the funniest blogs ever! Enjoy!

He's Tricksy!

I figured as long as we're videoing the dog doing stuff, I might as well actually get a video of him doing the tricks we have taught him. Enjoy!

Revenge of the Howl

Remember the video I posted a while ago of Newton howling along with an ambulance? Although the audio was cute, it was dark and you couldn't actually see him. So, admittedly, it was more like an audio file.

Well, tonight I got actual video of Newton howling along with a police car. There was some kind of disturbance in our apartment complex that required the presence of a fire truck, at least one police car, and at least 2 ambulances. I did see one person get loaded into an ambulance while I was sitting out on the balcony with my dog and my camera. (Hmm...in retrospect, that might have looked kinda insensitive and/or creepily intrusive. No, no! I swear! I'm just trying to get video of my dog howling!) I'm guessing (and hoping) that it ended up not being too serious because nobody seemed to be in much of a rush and none of the ambulances left with their sirens on. Anyway, all of the siren activity when the emergency vehicles first arrived got Newton singing, so here he is...our little American Canine Idol!



Please note the brand spankin' new hairdo (he was just groomed today). Also, I think my favorite part of the video is at the end when he looks back at me like, "Oh! Gosh! You're still there, huh?" It's like he was singing in the shower 'cause he thought he was alone and then realized he had an audience. Hee!

Godzilla vs. Bullet Train

The much-rumored Top Gear race between the Nissan GT-R and the Shinkansen is indeed on. And it airs this Sunday in the UK. Also, if you ever wondered how the camerafolks at TG managed to get such good coverage if the races are indeed real, you can read the answers here. Jeremy Clarkson addresses that same issue here.

Aqua Luna

There's water in that thar moon.

Whedon, Summarized

Here's the latest on Whedon's latest projects, including the ones that aren't going anywhere at the moment.

Oh, the Miatanity!

Poor wittle Miata.

PR: Angie

I eeked out a personal record on Angie today. At 7:14, it was just a second faster than last time, but I'll take it.

Miatamania!

I just registered for my first autocross competition, and I must say that the entry list for the C Stock class is consistent, to say the least. Here's the list of cars registered as it stands now, just an hour after registration opened:

• #26 1999 Miata (NB)
• #33 1999 Miata (NB)
• #36 2004 Mazdaspeed Miata (NB)
• #31 2004 Mazdaspeed Miata (NB)
• #68 2000 Miata (NB)
• #72 2006 Miata (NC)
  
• #133 1999 Miata (NB)
  
• #136 2004 Mazdaspeed Miata (NB)
  
• #144 2004 Mazdaspeed Miata (NB)

That's right, there's not a single non-Miata on the list. In fact, only one is even a non-NB. (In all honesty, I should point out that there are 2 pairs of people sharing cars---#33/#133 and #36/#136---so there aren't quite as many unique Miatas as I that list might lead you to believe. But still...)

Meahwile, E Stock is evenly split between older Miatas and MR-2s, while the C Street Prepared class currently has 7 NA and NB Miatas and a single CRX.

Popular Blogging: Nerf Modding, Alyson Hannigan, Mazdaspeed Miata

I looked over Industrial-Strength Science's hit history recently and several trends have emerged:

• One trend that is decidedly not new is that searches for phrases like "Nerf Maverick mod" produce the largest number of hits.
  
• Another trend is both new and surprising: We receive a lot of hits from Google Image searches for Alyson Hannigan. I find this surprising because no images of Ms. Hannigan appear on the blog, though I did link to numerous photos in this post.
• The third trend is also surprising. Searches for phrases like "Mazdaspeed Miata tire size" and "MX5 2004 tire 16 inch pressure" not only have pointed numerous folks at the blog, but also place us as the first result. Hunh.
  

PR: Pull-Up-Per-Minute Thing

For various reasons, I did Thursday's workout of the day on Friday. Thursday's WOD was one of the more unusual ones that show up frequently: you perform 1 pull-up during the first minute, 2 during the second, and so on, until you can't complete the prescribed number in 1 minute. Sadly, this workout doesn't have a name, so I call it the Pull-Up-Per-Minute Thing for concision.

As you can probably imagine, making "just" 1 minute of progress on this WOD is quite challenging, since each minute is more difficult than the last. That's why I feel quite proud that I managed to complete 19 minutes yesterday, just 1 more than my previous best. Unfortunately, I made that progress through improved tactis, rather than improved fitness. Pacing yourself if crucial to scoring highly.

Given how I felt at the end, I doubt I'll be able to do 20 minutes next time. Perhaps I'll shoot for 19 minutes plus 15 reps.

Update: That's 190 pull-ups, total. No wonder my biceps just wouldn't work the next day.

Dr. Horrible's Sing-Along Blog

Whedonites in the readership are probably aware that Joss Wehdon's next TV project, Dollhouse, will hit the air in January. Those same fans may not know that other audio-visual Whedony goodness will be available much sooner.

You see, during the writer's strike, Whedon wrote a story called Dr. Horrible's Sing-Along Blog. The cast and crew volunteered their services in the hopes that Joss would somehow figure out some way to make money off the project. The movie that resulted will be streamed live from its website in three parts on July 15, 17, and 19. After that, it will be available for download, then on a DVD with extra material.

By now, I hope, you are interested in the cast and storyline. The movie follows would-be supervillian Dr. Horrible (Neil Patrick Harris) as he is foiled by superhero Captain Hammer (Nathan "Captain Tightpants" Fillion) and works up the nerve to talk to a cute girl (Felecia Day). So, the hero is the villian, and the villian is the hero. Oh, and it's a musical.

So, I encourage you to check out the trailer, read the comic, and watch the full story once it becomes available.

Muzzle Puff! Today You are a Dog.

Today is the second anniversary of Newton's birth. Yep, he's all grown up now. I feel like I should throw him a bark mitzvah: "Newton, today you are a dog. Muzzle puff!"

We've had the fluffy little guy in our home for most of his life, and he's firmly a part of the family. On the rare occasions when I come home, and he's not there, because Alison has taken him for a walk or to play with the neighbors, I find the apartment eerily still. I miss him when I go on trips, too.

Not surprisingly, I don't believe in astrology. However, I was amused to discover, last night, that Newton's Chinese zodiacal sign is the dog. Hah!