Organizing My Priorities

 I recently won another book from LibraryThing. This one is called The Beginner's Guide to Organize Your Life. Well, at this stage of life, I'm hardly a beginner, and up until not long ago, I was pretty good at organizing things.

This book seemed to arrive at the most opportune moment. My office/studio has just had a facelift. We had to move everything out of that room in order to repaint the walls and put down a new floor.  Let me make this clear. I live in a 900-square-foot home and this was the room with the most stuff in it. The hallway and every other room in the house soon had extra furniture, boxes and other piles of stuff anywhere we could find a place to set it down. Organization went completely out the window. While I will admit that the desks in that room were often cluttered, suddenly my whole house was a complete mess. I felt like I was living in a hoarder's house. Maybe I was, but usually, my hoarding was confined to just one room. And then, to make matters worse, we had a major storm that created a flood in the basement.  Where were we supposed to put the things that needed rescuing from down there?

As I began to read this book I found all the normal helpful hints about goal setting, building a routine and being consistent. We are told to plan ahead. I already had a list of things I wanted to get done today.  I was ahead of the book on that one. It did mention leaving time for things that might come up unexpectedly. One of my planned tasks did not get done because my hubby had his own agenda as he was reorganizing the contents in the basement now that it had dried out. He presented me with a couple more boxes to go through. That snowballed into making a few more messes than I expected today.

I am supposed to review the book so I need to read it first. I was trying to fit that in, in between other tasks. I sent an e-mail requesting a Kindle version as this book arrived as a pdf file. Every time I closed it or shut down my tablet the darn thing disappeared.  I would hunt it down and find I had to flip through the pages one by one to try to find where I left off. This is not how any previous books I have received in pdf format have behaved and I know the Kindle version is available. I found it on Amazon.  I was able to both forward it to my Kindle and open it in my Kindle app on my tablet, but it was basically useless.  I am now flipping through more than 40 pages.

I had received no response to my message and I cannot see myself flipping through the 109 pages to finish reading this book. I could likely have finished reading it by now if I had a proper Kindle version or a pdf file that was not apparently meant to be an audiobook. The audio part is only available in the UK and the US, not here in Canada. I am assuming that's why I'm having problems with the file.

Then I reached the chapter on time management and prioritizing your tasks.   I decided to take my cue from the book and prioritize my time. I have stopped fighting with the file and written a blog instead of a review.  I feel like I have accomplished something more worthwhile.

New Fangled Gadgets

 Recently I had a discussion with a group of ladies in my own age group about air fryers.  While the younger generation seems to love them, most of my group had a different opinion.  This kitchen gadget is all hype and not worth the counterspace. In fact mine is so big it took up entirely too much countespace so I found another place to keep it. Now it's even less handy and I maintain that if you can cook something in a frying pan then I don't see the point of using the air fryer. Not only would I have to move it into place but washing that big basket is rather awkward.  If I had a split sink, as seems popular these days, it would not even fit in there. Mind you, I do see it as an energy saver if the food would normally go in the oven.

I won a gift certificate for Home Hardware last year and finally decided to spend it on an air fryer. It wasn't something I would have bought for myself but they seem all the rage these days. When I got it I went through a lot of recipies I found online. I love using it to make  French toast and apple fritters. Cooking frozen French fries in there somehow stripped the product of any flavour they may have had so I roasted potatoes and made homemade fries. That worked.  I am the only one here that eats asparagus and this is a quick and easy way to cook that too but it certainly doesn't work for cauliflower. 

Everyone said the air fryer is great for meat but I was timid when it came to that. I didn't want to ruin something that costs so much these days. I don’t even hesitate to use my Instant Pot. I love that thing! The air fryer was beginning to go the way of my crock pot. That's something else I seldom use but will drag out for only certain things. I always cook beans in there, for instance. 

I finally decided to try it. My large basket has a divider that you can put in when you want to cook two things at the same time. I cooked chicken and potatoes and they turned out well. Then this week I put some honey garlic sausages in there. The air fryer now definitely has a use! I will never cook sausages any other way. You don’t have to watch them, or turn them and they come out beautiful and evenly cooked.  I might actually try some other meat now. Perhaps this gadget will grow on me yet.

What is your favorite thing to use your air fryer for?