Another one tumbles into BK

CIT files for bankruptcy, according to the New York Times. Plans to emerge from BK by year’s end.

$20/ an hour in the kitchen…

Economic gravity got you down? Of course it does. But there’s a way to save a bundle, eat healthy meals and help stave off the economic blues: Get cooking.

After tending one of my regular Sunday morning chores, cooking, I did a little math. And concluded that, in effect, I made $20 an hour for my two hours of cooking. Two hours is on the high end end of my Sunday culinary endeavors, but this morning it included making chicken broth as well as chicken soup, so my kitchen time was doubled. But here’s how it breaks down, and compares with store-bought. (Figure eating out into the comparison would be off the charts.) Even better, at least in my world, it’s all preservative and additive free.

1 whole chicken, on sale for 69 cents per pound, $3.80

6 Carrots, (three for broth, three for soup), about 40 cents

6  Celery stalks (three for broth, three for soup), about 40 cents

6 Red potatoes, about 50 cents

Garden vegetables, blanched and frozen, free

1 cup of milk, 40 cents

Total cost: $5.50

 

The broth yielded 12 cups (froze half in freezer bags)

Half of the chicken was used to make a chicken soup, the remainder was packaged into two freezer bags and frozen for later use. (The chicken liver and skin became pug chow.)

A pot of chicken soup yields about eight to 10 servings.

To buy this in the grocery store would break out as follows:

12 cups broth @ $1.20 per can: $14.4

10 servings of chicken soup @ $2 per serving: $20

Two packages of cooked, chopped and deboned chicken, which will be used for dishes at a later date: $10

Total to buy packaged goods: $44.40

Total of ingredients: $5.50

The difference, or how much I made by working in the kitchen: $39.

Forget home ec as something from yesteryear. It’s a must for these economic times.

-Christy

 

 

Scary times

Had way too much fun with the haunted house story for The Columbian. But Steven Lane made the package with artwork and the vid. (Think “Blair Witch”)
-Christy

more about “Scary times“, posted with vodpod

 

Of course it is…

Besides the day marking my older-than-dirt-break-out-the-purple-coffin descension into middleagedom — and don’t try to cheer me w/ 40 is the new 30 blather; I WANT to wallow — today is National Oatmeal Day. Of course it is. I’ll bet there’s a ribbon in the works, too.

-Christy

I’m longing for some James Taylor.

More grinding news from the publishing world:

Forbes to dismiss one in four from its editorial staff, according to David Carr of the New York Times. An excerpt:

It is a riddle of modern magazining that during a period when staffs are expected to file early and often to the Web to make sure that publications have a significant digital presence, all the while still making the print product, that they are now confronted by dramatic cuts in staff that raise practical issues of getting the work done.

Executives at Time Inc. announced that the frequency of Fortune would be cut to 18 issues a year from 25. So far, there are no indications that Forbes will drop in frequency.