1 lb turkey
1 sweet Mayan onion
1 pepper. Not sure what type, but it was a little larger than a jalapeno and it was white in color. Doesn't seem very hot
1 large bottle of Newcastle Brown Ale (not really specific, it was just the cheapest single bottle of non-crap beer I could find)
2 cans black beans
1 can yellow corn
About 2/3rds a jar of Trader Joe's red mole sauce (this largely because i forgot to buy tomato sauce)
Some garlic hot sauce (since I forgot garlic)
Cumin, New Mexico chili powder, salt, and pepper for seasoning

Brow the turkey, slightly grill the onions and pepper in the same pan. Mix in pot with beans, corn, and beer. Stir in mole sauce, season as needed. Cooked in oven on 250 for about 4 hours covered. Cooked uncovered for about 30 minutes. Raised heat to 400 and cooked another 20-30 minutes.

Oh so filling. And I think the mole sauce is what I've been looking for to give the chili the depth of flavor. I also didn't use vinegar this time, which may have helped.

Eaten with cornbread and tortilla chips, this is near perfect.

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I took advantage of some after Christmas sales on Amazon and Barnes & Noble which gives me a bit of reading material but (more importantly) also takes care of a good number of Christmas gifts.

The day I got back, Jesse treated all of us to one of his Christmas gifts: The Bobs concert. I think I'd heard a track or two of theirs before in Jesse's car, but the concert experience was quite good. Despite my warnings that I might fall unconcious at any moment, I was enraptured and entertained throughout. Good a capella music and some well done humor. As an added bonus, they did a drawing, and I got a CD.

Since then, things have continued apace in trying to make this feel like home. I've bought a new vaccuum, a new computer chair, and done some slight rearrangement in my room. A friend's given me his old 27 inch TV (soon to be moved into my room and hooked up to the computer.) My computer still is lacking in stability, but it's not failing me critically at the moment.

I've been giving a more critical look at laptops with a mind towards buying one in the next couple of months. It will probably happen around the end of February or early in March. I'm strongly leaning towards buying a MacBook. Given the capabilties, cost, and support it's the strongest offering out there. I'm just not sure which one to get. There's about an $800 difference between my two choices, of which the biggest change is screen size. While I normally wouldn't consider screen size as that important, it can make a bit difference comfort-wise.

I've made a major plunge into declaring myself an adult. I opened a mutual fund for investment. It's a small amount, now, but I'd like to see if it can become enough for a down payment on a house in a few years. I'm also looking to get myself health insurance. I'm finding a bit of a stumbling point at the moment, though, because I don't really have any basis for how much regular (as opposed to critical) medical care costs which is pretty important to determine whether or not I'm going to hit the annual deductable. It's also important, because I'd like to get myself evaluated by a psychologist. I've noted over the past few years that I have had more difficulty keeping with a train of thought and focusing on a topic. Given that I'd like to a) write novels and b) attend graduate school, both of these are somewhat worrisome. I'll probably look more at this later.

I need to get back into writing more regularly. Besides the novel-in-progress, I want to start working on an historic mystery (or series of historic mysteries) set in the late 1800s with Lillian Francis Smith as the main character.

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And I turn a milestone this year. While it's less personally relevant than age 28 (my cyclical birthday), 30 tends to appeal to the masses. As such I'm going to try and hold a big-ish celebration. Plans are still tentative, but I'm going to look at getting an area with a pool table and projection TVs (for video games). Not sure if dinner will be a separate affair or combined, yet. A movie might be part of the package, likely 300.

Date is tentatively set as March 17.


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I've been writing this entry for about 4 hours... I'm -still- stuffed from the chili.