High Winds on the Ravenel Bridge

Winds were blowing hard last night, and still at it when I woke up this morning. I got to Starbuck’s in North Charleston just before the storm blew in. One thing is for sure – storms in the south do not mess around. This thing was crazy. The doors to the building flew open and rain streamed inside as if the clouds were purposely tilting at an obscure angle to ensure proper water flow into the building.

The drive up to North Charleston was eerie enough, with high winds and random flashes of lightening in the darker than usual sky. I’m just glad I didn’t have to drive in that rain.

One thing that is good about southern storms though, that I’ve experienced to date, is that they don’t seem to last long. I mean – yes it is still rainy outside. But the vicious power of this morning’s downpour is long over. Not that I would mind a repeat now that I am safely inside. I love thunderstorms. Something about the rumbling and clashing of things you can’t control. Especially when you’re safe and cozy in your house. But things seem to have settled down for the time being. We’ll see how the rest of the day goes.

If I haven't said it before I'll say it now. PBR and Plantain Fritters and Fuel. Delicious. Satisfying. $4.75. What else could you ask for on a warm day with high winds?

Rainy days and comfort foods

So I failed, once again, at not using my credit card. But to be fair – I lost my debit card during the St. Patty’s disaster of 2011, and have absolutely no way to access cash because Bank of America is insane and charges a monthly fee if you use the tellers. Seems ridiculous and a little evil because I feel like they are trying to phase out the tellers completely and replace them with robots..but that’s another issue.

So I HAD to use the credit card! If for no other reason but to fight against the oncoming threat of robot bank attendants!

Friday was a wine soaked celebration for Petra’s new job! Yay! And a great night at Blind Tiger and The Rooftop. For those who have never been, both of these places are wonderful in their own right, but the Rooftop is a MUST SEE for people visiting Charleston. Especially if you can make it there to watch the sun go down. It illuminates the Charleston skyline and is absolutely beautiful. Not that we necessarily appreciated that fact on Friday, but I have in the past and I surely will again. But Friday was about celebrating! And celebrate we did. We actually celebrated right into Saturday which led to mass amounts of heavy foods and yummy mimosas to ward off the late night demons.

It was cold and rainy all weekend so we fought back with chili and fried chicken, and topped it all off with the most amazing macaroni and cheese known to man. I don’t know how he did it, but Mike managed to fit 87 pounds of cheddar, pepper jack, gouda with heavy cream, butter and bacon all in one measly baking dish to produce the most glorious cheesy goodness of all time. It was the comfort food of champions and the recipe (that I am improvising on because he cooked while the rest of us laid around the house) is listed below

1. Box of fun shaped noodles
2. 1 pound of bacon – cooked and diced
3. 1 pound of cheddar cheese – shredded
4. 16 ounces of gouda cheese – shredded
5. 8 ounces of pepper jack cheese – shredded
6. Heavy cream – lots
7. Butter – 2 sticks
8. Flour – to make a roué – look it up because I don’t know how it’s done
9. Milk – dash and a sprinkle
10. Bread crumbs

From what I could tell – he cooked the noodles as you normally would and then placed them in a large baking dish.

Then you make a roué using the butter and flour, like I said, look it up because every time I’ve tried to make a roué I’ve failed miserably because I’m never willing to use the appropriate amount of butter.

After the roué was finished there was heavy cream, milk and some of the cheese mixed in and stirred until it was uber creamy. And then in went the bacon. I know right. Wow.

This creamy cheesy bacony awesome mixture was dumped on top of the noodles and mixed. THEN the rest of the cheeses went on top and some sort of spicy yumminess that I don’t know what it was. I’m guessing some sort of cajun seasoning or red pepper.

Then some sliced tomatoes went on top and bread crumbs to finish it off.

The whole thing went into the oven without a timer and apparently he smelled its readiness because when it came out it was the most awesome meal of all time.

It is still raining and cold here, a disgusting 45 degrees. So I think I will rationalize eating the leftovers of this cheesy wonder tonight with a glass of wine or two. Then tomorrow it will be back to carrot sticks and salads. But there is just something about a rainy day with good friends, bad movies and delicious food that makes life great.

Life and Times of Three Young Professionals, Part 2

From: Emily Gibbons
Sent: Tuesday, February 08, 2011 1:09 PM
To: 'Tara.Garrett'
Subject: Question about excel

Hi TG,

Will you help me with something.

I want to repeat the same formula in different lines of an excel spreadsheet. Is there a way to copy and paste the formula even though the cell blocks are changing?

For example – one formula is (I26+I27)*(I28+I29)

So I want to transfer that same formula to rows A – H….make sense?

Can you help? Do you have any idea what I’m talking about :)

Xoxoxo Em


From: Emily Gibbons
Sent: Tuesday, February 08, 2011 12:11 PM
To: Tara.Garrett
Subject: FW: Question about excel

This is the actual formula… =SUM(H14+I14)*(J14+K14)

So what I actually want to do is just change the 14 so it works for rows 1 – 13…

From: Tara.Garrett
Sent: Tuesday, February 08, 2011 1:50 PM
To: Emily Gibbons
Subject: RE: Question about excel

Yea all you have to do is drag the bottom right box across the cells you want the formula copied to

Tara Garrett | Business Analyst | Seasonal and Stationery | Target.com | 612.304.5571

From: Emily Gibbons
Sent: Tuesday, February 08, 2011 1:48 PM
To: Tara.Garrett
Subject: RE: Question about excel

I don’t get it…

From: Tara.Garrett
Sent: Tuesday, February 08, 2011 2:53 PM
To: Emily Gibbons
Subject: RE: Question about excel

Click on the cell with the formula you want copied. On the bottom right of the box there is a black box that you can click on and drag across other cells…




From: Emily Gibbons
Sent: Tuesday, February 08, 2011 1:48 PM
To: Tara.Garrett
Subject: RE: Question about excel

Omg you are a genius.

A Plane Moment

“Are you from San Diego?” Her chin wobbled as she spoke.

“Originally.” He wasn’t interested in small talk with this woman whose body was a bit too large for her seat.

“I couldn’t be more excited,” she went on without encouragement. “I’ve never been past Arizona.”

He looked at her trying to hide his disgust. He could smell hotdogs and cigarettes on her breath. There was a blotch of dried mustard on her chest.

“It’s quite a sight,” he said.

“You been gone long?” Clearly she was not getting the hint. He grunted in response.

“My name’s Kristi.” She offered with a too wide grin.

“Of course it is.” He muttered at her and turned to the window.

“Don’t you love the runway?” She said.

“Sometimes I wish the whole plane could be made of glass so we could really see everything.” She offered again when he didn’t reply.

“It’s alright.” She said after a moment. “I agree with you really. A plane is the one place in the world you can think anymore. No phones ringing, no e-mails to be answered, televisions to watch. Just you with your thoughts for the whole flight. It’s something to be treasured really.”

At that moment the flip screen televisions came to life in front of them and he grinned as she groaned to herself and shut her eyes.

Pancake Protocol

People weren’t lying when they said that southerners were gracious. For the most part I’ve found people from this area to be polite, formal and kind in ways that you don’t find as often in the north. Not that I actually believe the people here are kinder than the people of the north. But I certainly believe that they’ve had manners bred into them from day one.

Where were our lessons? When did we learn which fork to use with which hand and when? When did the boys learn to open the door for their mothers, sisters, girlfriends and just random ladies on the street? I guess those lessons got lost during impromptu dinners at Fricker’s and surprise breakfasts at Café Marie where we stuffed our faces with chicken wings and giant pancakes, where manners and etiquette were not only unexpected, they were taboo. Proper etiquette for eating giant pancakes when you are four years old varied from rolling it up and eating it with your hands, slicing it up to create dunking sticks, taking a big bite out of the middle, or any other of the fun ways you could think up to consume such and monstrous item. Come to think of it, I would most likely fall back on that same etiquette if faced with a giant pancake today that was proportional to the pancakes of my childhood – but it seems that as I’ve gotten bigger, the pancakes have stayed the same size. There is just no room for etiquette in a face paced pancake eating world.

But should that be the case? It isn’t in the south. And living here now I find myself sometimes wishing I’d been instructed on the proper way to set a table or eat a fancy meal (or pancake). At the same time though, I don’t think 4 year-old Emily would have seen the point of learning such things. Not when the pancake could be eaten with such thoughtful ingenuity, and I certainly would not have agreed to be kept inside to learn about silly girl things. Not when there were fences to climb and lakes to swim in and other such adventures to be had. Come to think of it really, I doubt that 23 year old me would much like taking the time to master such skills either.

But here I am, at the heart of southern hospitality. Let’s just hope some of it rubs off on me while I am running across town from one job to another. If not, I guess I’ll just have to stick to wings and pancake restaurants for the rest of my life. Sounds good to me.

Zeroing in on 2011

There is a moment while I am driving home where I fly past some trees that always make me think I’m getting pulled over. Not because the trees are shaped as cop cars, but because the sun is always perfectly positioned behind them to make it look as if a cops lights are going off so close behind me that he couldn’t possibly be pulling over anyone but me.

The sun seems different here. Closer in a way, or just brighter I suppose. It’s really the clouds that make the difference. The sky is always so blue and the clouds somehow manage to catch the light of the sun and the water to create a wonderful shade of orange and blue that makes me feel as if I’m in a movie scene.

New Year’s Eve was a disaster this year. Although a good way to start a year of working toward zeros. Sticking to my newly discovered workaholic tendencies I decided to work an event at the aquarium. I figured, hey two birds with one stone. I’ll get to drink for free and see the aquarium then get out in time to meet up with some people downtown to bring in the new year. WRONG.

Drinking was possible but futile because I was climbing stairs all night long carrying giant sandwiches to feed to the increasingly intoxicated masses. And this was a site to be seen in itself because this party was one of the more expensive in town and black tie at that but everyone in attendance seemed to be under 22 years old. Honestly a lot of them seemed to be under 21. They were all wearing ball gowns and tuxedos and puking all over the aquarium. At one point the project manager ran past me and said “Oh God, there is puke everywhere out there.” In another eventful turn several of the guests decided to remove some of the animals (turtles) from their displays and race them on the (very sticky) floor of the party.

Security was called. As were the turtle experts. I imagine it went something like this when they called it in.

“Code Green. Code Green. We have turtles out of ponds.” “I repeat. We have displaced turtles on the loose.” “Evacuate the area for incoming turtle experts.” “Code Green. Code Green. Turtle experts are on their way.”

Not that removing a turtle for a little racing is not something I would put past myself in a state of New Year’s Eve inebriation. Let’s not forget the T.I. incident of 2009. Or the Red Headed Ravaging of 2006. It’s New Year’s, things get a little crazy. Which is why it rubbed salt in my already irritated cut of being trapped working on such a day. But I brought it on myself. Why? Because this is 2011. The year of zero’s.

By this time next year I hope to be the proud owner of:
1.Two credit cards with a balance of ZERO.
2.One 2008 Ford Focus on which the remaining balance is ZERO.
3.A student loan payment on which I owe ZERO.
4.Another student loan payment on which there are less ZEROs.
5.ZERO car accidents or traffic tickets.
6.And ZERO regret about the fact that I didn’t save up enough money to go to Europe this summer

So here we go, a year of zero’s. But next New Year’s Eve, watch out turtles. Because here I come.

You can't take it with you: Kaminsky's, Charleston SC

I should have known something was up after the server left our table the first time.

He was too nice. He was just too happy. It wasn't normal.

And it wasn't an insincere happiness either. This man was genuinely thrilled to be there. When I decided to order the berry cobbler his face lit up with pure and unfiltered joy. I should have known then.

A ceramic bowl was placed before me. I could barely make out the crust of cobbler or blue berries beneath the mound of ice cream topped with whipped cream and raspberry sauce. The heat from the cobbler created a steam when it met with the frosty cold ice cream that was smothering it from above.

After the first bite it all made sense.

Who couldn’t be happy here? Who wouldn’t want to live their life serving the most amazing deserts known to man in a tiny room with exposed brick and warm lighting. Why would that server ever want to leave this place. Why would I for that matter?

Once I was able to collect myself I glanced across the table. Nick was staring at me. Wonder and amazement in his eyes.

“What,” I said. Nervous that I’d made some sort of unconscious exclamation that I would die happy now I’d tasted this miraculous cobbler.

“That was the most delicious bite of cake I’ve ever had,” he said. “I’m afraid to take another bite because there is no way anything could ever be better than that bite.”



For the first time I noticed that he had a large slice of white cake sitting in front of him. Our buy one get one free coupon put to good use. His plate was covered in a caramel drizzle. The cake looked as if it had some sort of caramel mixed within the batter. As Anna would say, “the intrinsic nature of the cake was caramelized.” It looked delicious. I couldn’t think about anything but my cobbler.

As I gazed lovingly at my plate, I cursed the delicious dinner we’d just had at a fancy pants restaurant down the street. How dare those oysters and flounder take up room for this masterpiece of a cobbler? What had I been thinking when I ever ate anything but this cobbler. In a sugar induced craze, Nick and I began to make promises we knew we couldn’t keep.

“I’ll never eat anything but this cobbler ever again,” I swore. “If I died now I’d be happy because this cake is all that matters in the world,” he wept.

It was too good. We didn’t even eat it quickly. We savored each bite. Sucked the essence out of every particle of each dish. Neither of us even came close to finishing. And then we realized. We couldn’t take it home. Not only would it prove to be a logistical nightmare. The consistency of both dishes were not suitable for travel. But there was no way to transport the atmosphere and the flavor of that tiny place. It wouldn’t be the same. It would ruin the most delicious thing either of us had ever had. We didn’t want a reheated version of heaven. Not when it was sitting right in front of us.

A delirious laughter took over. We were filled with the simple joy and remorse that comes with the knowledge that you’ve tasted the best, and nothing will ever be as good ever again.

Now, in the light of day, I realize that there is a reason to go on living. Because I can have my slice of heaven again. In fact, it only costs $5.75.