On How to Bring St. Patrick's Day to School

With its oftentimes dismal weather, the month of March doesn't seem to offer too many reasons to celebrate. Perhaps this is why St. Patrick's Day has become so popular. Of course, for many college students (and plenty of grown adults) the holiday is primarily celebrated by consuming large amounts of alcoholic beverages, another tradition that is not nearly as often celebrated by college students is the traditional meal of corned beef and cabbage that has become characteristic of the holiday. As March 17th falls on a Tuesday this year, and (save for students celebrating their spring break at home,) most students will be at school, and won't have their mother or father to prepare the boiled dinner for them. But fear not, because in ten easy steps, you too can enjoy the tasty March meal in your own apartment or dorm room, without infringing on your busy schedule.


Before you start, be sure that you have all the necessary ingredients. In order to make this dinner, you will need: a packaged corned beef brisket with peppercorns, and as much cabbage, parsnips, carrots, and potatoes as you would like.




Step 1: Cut the brisket package open, and put it into a large pot. Be sure to squeeze the bag to get all the remaining juice into the pot. (Note DON'T wash the corned beef before putting it into the pot, this will remove some of the juices).




Step 2: Cut open the included packet of peppercorns, and sprinkle them evenly over the corned beef in the pot.






Step 3: Completely cover the corned beef with cold water, this will create a layer of foam on top of the brisket.






Step 4: Remove all of the foam from the top of the pot by using a skimmer or strainer.







Step 5: Put stove on high heat.







Step 6: Cover the pot, and bring it to a boil.







Step 7: Turn the stove off high heat, and put it on medium heat to simmer for about 3 1/2 hours.







Step 8: Every half hour the brisket is simmering, make sure to turn it over using a large fork.





Step 9: After the brisket boils for 3 1/2 hours, add the vegetables, continue to simmer corned beef with vegetables for an additional 20 minutes, or until the vegetables are tender.





Step 10: Remove ingredients from pot, and serve with rye bread and butter.





This will probably leave you with plenty of leftovers, and rather than just re-heating your St. Patrick's Day feast, here is a tasty recipe that has been a favorite in my family for years, especially after the holiday. http://www.cooks.com/rec/view/0,168,132189-251196,00.html

On Having the Oldest Computer Around

I have gotten to the point where I have almost become embarrassed to show my computer in public. Perhaps it comes from the fact that I may just be too good a person to have had enough "problems" to send it back to the Dell company (you all know who you are,) but I have kept my old D610 that I received back in August of '05 when we were instructed that everyone needed to purchase a computer- and a Dell D610 at that. In the company's effort to constantly update, it turned out that by the following year, new students had a new Dell computer, which was different, and cooler-looking than the ones that we all got. Then the next year, yet another new Dell came out, this time with (for better or for worse) Windows Vista. On top of that, there are seemingly hundreds of QU students with Macs who, whenever asked about them will hardly cease to explain all the virtues of having one, and more importantly, the inferiority of personal computers.
The bottom line is that when I come to class, I find myself rather embarrassed every time I have to pull out my 2005 PC that is covered in stickers, missing an "H" key, cannot run without AC power, and is in need of a good dusting. Of course, when we bought the D610's, they only came with a three-year warranty, and the aforementioned problems occurred conveniently just after the expiration date. I can count on one hand the number of people I know that still have their original Dell laptop, and most of them are not in class with me.
Of course my computer is a far cry from the early days of home computers that plugged into your television set and had less memory than many i-Tunes songs, but I know that I among my first purchases when I get a real job will be a new laptop computer. In this technological climate, it seems that four years is much too long to have any computer.