Happy National Applesauce Cake Day!

So I have been trying not to freak out about this whole, not knowing what i am supposed to be talking about at the first non-Penn, expert in the field Meeting that I will be presenting at on Tuesday. I have emailed Nina, I have spent more time walking to see if she is in her office than doing anything else. But you know what, I can pull a presentation together right? I mean most likely she is expected me to be talking about either 1) my project for which I have no data or 2) the mouse project for which we have nothing really interesting to say. So I kept thinking. It is fine. Thursday or Friday morning, I will meet with her. She will give me an outline of what I should be presenting, how I should spin it, how long the talk is supposed to be. You know, take 10 minutes to put me on the right track and I would be all set. I would have all day Friday to work on it. Work on it over the weekend. have all day Monday. Well Thursday came and went. She locked herself in her office, did not return my emails and then disappeared sometime between my 2:45 and 3pm door checks. Ok, no problem. Still have all day Friday. I came in 45 minutes earlier than normal, checking her door every 10 minutes (yes, I set a timer), sent her another email, just asking if she had submitted a title for my talk yet and oh yeah, what is it. Well it is 20 of 3. She isnt here. She hasnt been here. She is not answering her email. Sooooo . . . . I am winging it I guess. I decided to talk about what I have the most data for and what she will be able to answer the most questions for. She doesnt let me answer questions. It isnt anything personal. She doesnt let anyone else answer questions either. So I put together the crappiest presentation I have done since college, I will work on it a little this weekend. I will have a talk ready to go on Monday and pray that she will be able to spare 30 seconds to at least email me to let me know that it is at least kinda ok. Frees up my weekend right? I mean if she doesnt care enough to tell me what I should be talking about, why should I care enough to put together a good talk? It looks worse on her than on me. It is her lab.

Last night I made Cauliflower with Spicy Tomato Sauce from my Indian cookbook. It was AWESOME! I will give anyone the recipes if you want. Basically I steamed frozen cauliflower and then made a tomato based sauce. Start with canola oil, brown some microplaned ginger, microplaned garlic and tumeric. Add a can of diced tomatoes, bring to a boil, add cumin, coriander, cayenne and a serrano chile (from our garden!). Cook down until tomatoes are cooked. Add minced cilantro. Cook another few minutes. Toss with cauliflower. I served it over Texmati (domestic basmati) with vegetable samosas (Trader Joes).

Alphabet Soup: How many common English words can you make from the letters below, using all five letters once in each word? We found four words.
A E N R S