In The Kitchen With Chris: Chicken & Asparagus Penne

I've done two of these "In the Kitchen With Chris" posts now, and as I was thinking of doing another one, it occurred to me that neither meal I prepared previously can really be considered all that healthy. I mean the first one had Doritos in it for crying out loud. It kind of negates the whole reason that I wanted to start cooking more meals myself to begin with. So this week I decided to try cooking something a little healthier (and maybe even get a vegetable in there).

I chose a recipe for Chicken & Asparagus Penne that I'd been eyeing on Pinterest for awhile. I love chicken, I love asparagus, and I love penne (and any other carb, really).

A few nights before I planned cooking I got into a discussion about it out at the bar. I'd gone out for drinks with a gentleman caller (who shall not be asked to call on me again), went to a friend's to share a few bottles of wine, and then ended up meeting people out at the bar for a few drinks (and a few shots). I'd let the night get away from me a bit, clearly. At about 1:30 in the morning I learned that I am completely willing to allow a conversation about cutting out pasta from my diet become heated (I hate ate cheesy potato wedges from Buffalo Wild Wings right afterward out of spite).

Their advice was solid, but I refuse to deprive myself of delicious things. I've seen people on super strict diets. People who have to figure points before they can eat (I will never go on a diet plan that involves long division). People who have cut out so much from their diets that picking a restaurant that serves what they can eat becomes a chore. It seems miserable. I mean, if it works for you, that's fantastic. I just don't have the will power to give up something I love without binging on it a week later. It's gotta be all about portion control for me.

If only I cared enough to learn what the right portions are.

The next day, my friend Julie and her almost unbelievably adorable son James were in town. I'd spent the entire day watching Orange is the New Black on my new Netflix account (Oh. Em. Gee. you guys, so good). While on the way to buy wine and an obscene amount of Chinese food (because I'd be eating healthy the next day), Julie called and asked if she could cook dinner for me at my place for me.

She wanted to make me a salad.

I'm usually really good thinking my feet, but after an entire day spent in my dimly lit apartment without any human contact, my typically savvy social skills weren't so sharp. We already had plans for the night, so I couldn't very well feign that I was too busy to eat salad. I tried talking up the Chinese food, but her mind seemed set. I briefly considered faking a car accident and subsequent hospital stay. I mean, bonus, the outpouring of support I'd receive from Facebook would no doubt cause my Klout score to skyrocket, but is being the kind of person who would fake a horrible tragedy to get attention (and get out of eating salad) really worth it?

...maybe.

I relented, mostly because I still felt a little guilty about the cheesy potato wedges the night before, and she met me at the grocery store for supplies. The evening ended up turning into a great learning experience for me. The salad she was preparing for me was spinach, apples, pears, chicken, and cashews with a honey mustard dressing. She taught me how to pick out a pear (the fresh food section causes me quite a bit of anxiety), we went over what seasonings a grown up should have in their cupboard (I had no clue that seasoning salt was a thing), and I ended up leaving the store kind of excited about this salad adventure!

Julie showed me how to season chicken and prepare it in a skillet (I'm pretty positive that's what the pan that she used is called). She had all kinds of fantastic tips for me, and even brought me a "One Pot Cookbook" (since starting this blog, my friends have doubled the number of cookbooks I own). The salad was amazing. I mean amazing! Totally something I could see myself eating regularly, and so much more filling than any salad I've ever made (dumped out of a bag). 

I had planned on taking photos to document the whole thing, but I was entertaining James while Julie cooked, but I was too busy dodging some rather aggressive blows to the head from the mixing spoon he was playing with.

On Sunday, with my new knowledge of preparing chicken, I was feeling more than confident about my abilities and got started cooking. The recipe was fairly simple, calling for: 

1lb of Chicken, Cooked and Cubed

1 Box of Penne pasta

2 Bags of Birdseye Steamfresh Asparagus Spears

Parsley Flakes 

1/4 Cup of Olive Oil

1/2 cup Shredded Parmesan 

After my guilt trip at the bar, I went with the Smart Taste pasta, because whole wheat sounded positively awful, and this had "Smart" in the name so... 

I wasn't super sure how many chicken tenderloins made a pound so I just guessed that a bunch of them would be fine. I got the pasta boiling, cubed (well cubed-ish) and cooked up the chicken (seasoned to perfection), microwaved the asparagus, and preheated the broiler. Full disclosure, I had to Google what the broiler was. I was always pretty positive it was that little drawer under the oven, but turns out it's in the inside too.

So the mystery of the little drawer remains.

Once all that business is cooked you basically just throw it all in a 9" x 12" pan. Asparagus and pasta first, drizzle on the olive oil, add the chicken and sprinkle some parsley on. Mix it up and sprinkle the cheese on top and throw it under the broiler for about 5 minutes.

If you're looking for a bit of expert advice (what I learned by burning the shit out of my hand), use a real oven mitt and not just your dishtowel, that broiler isn't f#%!ing around. I apologize for the blurry picture of the finished product, but I was focusing more on creative profanities to yell at the top of my lungs and less on focusing the camera.

You can view the recipe here. Or if you're interested in following me on Pinterest you can view my entire food board here. It turned out beautifully, and it was super delicious! The asparagus was kind of mushy, fresh probably would have been better (I'm gonna need someone to come teach me how to steam veggies, kthnx). I was pretty sure I'd read somewhere that this was a healthy meal too, but I definitely can't find where I saw that now (my imagination probably?). It's supposed to serve 6 with about 383 calories a serving, but I'm a bit of a pig, I guess, and got it split up into five servings. That's still not terrible though, right? 

Right?

I didn't move the rest of the night.

It'd probably be like super good with Cool Ranch Doritos crunched up on top.

Like I'm 22

I take issue with Taylor Swift. On one hand, I'm a grown ass man who shouldn't be affected by the music written for the screaming teen masses. On the other, the bitch gets it. I was completely obsessed when her first album came out. I was pretty positive Invisible was written about the boy I loved in High School and still hadn't quite gotten over, I hate cried to Teardrops on my Guitar more times than I should really admit to publicly, and I'm sure my roommates at the time probably found my daily shower performance of Picture to Burn pretty tiresome.

Out of shame, I resisted the second and third albums pretty hard (but I'll be damned if I don't still choke up to Love Story). I bought the fourth album in a moment of weakness, blinded by my infatuation with I Knew You Were Trouble. I of course fell head over heels for every single song on the album, but none more than 22. That's where the trouble started.

I talk a lot about how I'm a bad grown up, but the one thing that has definitely (thankfully) matured as I've gotten older is my drinking and partying habits. That's not to say I don't go out and get drunk still, but I do it a hell of a lot smarter, and I have different goals in mind when I do.

Class.

That is until I added 22 to my "Gettin' Pumped" playlist. It comes on, everything shifts, and all of a sudden I do start feeling like I'm 22, and my plans for the night shift.

Klass.

Here's the thing, 22 year old Chris didn't always make the smartest decisions. In fact, if we're being completely honest, he was a f#%!ing idiot. He took us to sketchy after bar parties that someone else had to then try to get us home from. He got us cut off by bartenders. He had no qualms about aggressively making out with people in public, and he was pretty sure that we knew all of the choreography to Avril Lavigne's Girlfriend (we didn't).

However, the lessons he's taught me have helped me become the well adjusted, fun loving, life of the party (attention whoring, kind of selfish, bossypants) that I am today! I recently started looking back at these lessons learned, and am hoping that I can help some of my younger friends avoid embarassment and shame by sharing some of the drinking rules I've developed.

- If you feel like you're going to puke, you're probably going to puke. Find a bathroom.

For some reason, every time 22 Year Old Chris thought he was going to be sick he thought he could talk himself out of it. Here's a thought, moron, try talking yourself out of it while leaning over the toilet. I learned this lesson the hard way, and on more than one occasion ended up covered in my own vomit. The most epic of which happened at a house party full of friends from work.

We had partied pretty hard the entire night, I had learned of a hidden talent for flippy cup, and I'd finished almost an entire bottle of cheap coconut rum. I don't have much recollection of how it happened, but I'm told that one second I was lively and engaged in the conversation, and then suddenly I was quiet and withdrawn for about five minutes before I puked all over the kitchen floor we were sitting on. I of course then crawled through it to get to the sink to finish the job (are you proud of me, Mom?). 

The next morning we sat in the dimly lit living room for a few hours before deciding we needed sustenance and heading out to Old Country Buffet. It wasn't until we'd gotten out of the car and were walking into the restaurant in the harsh light of day that I looked down and noticed I was wearing the same pants I wore last night, you know, the ones I'd drug through the puddle of my own sick. 

And somehow I was still not the worst dressed person at the OCB that day.

Now if I feel like I'm going to be sick, I peace out and go home where I stand over the toilet and spit out that metallic taste that always comes before you puke. If I'm not close to home or a bathroom I find the nearest spot that will require the least clean up. Like the street.

TCD in the VOB 2011

- If your friends say they don't want anymore drinks, leave them the hell alone.

I don't know what it is about being 22 and thinking everyone can drink on the same level as you, but when you're a 6' 3" 200lb man, odds are your much smaller girlfriends aren't going to be keeping up (my friend Chelsea will always, always, always be the exception to this rule). 

"Be my girl, get on my level!"

This lesson was learned after an especially horrible game of Shot Glass Checkers. I won (but we were all losers that night). My tiny waif of a friend took every shot of butterscotch schnapps (wtf?) that I put in front of her and four hours later lost her McDonalds #3 on the carpet next to my futon. So at 4am I was stumbling down the aisles of Wal-Mart shopping for carpet cleaner and air fresheners that I took home, dropped next to my still vomiting friend, and said, "Here, take care of it." before going back to bed. 

We're seriously lucky she didn't asphyxiate from the 30 Glade air fresheners I insisted she put out.

- Drink clear drinks, and don't wear white.

This one is a tough one for me because two of my favorite things are pastel colored beverages and getting super tan (like crazy, stupid, tan) and wearing light colors. I woke up one too many mornings to find my shirt looking like Monet's Water Lilies, however, and made the switch to dark colors or prints that will hide whatever drink I slop all over myself while waving my arms emphatically on the dance floor.

Don't ever get that haircut again, either.

The colorful drinks were a harder habit to break. The stains weren't quite enough to stop me, I've got Shout that will take care of that. No, to learn that lesson I had to vomit blue from 2/3 a bottle of UV Blue imbibed in an hour and a half (the last time I touched the stuff). I switched to vodka soda and never looked back. Fewer stains, less gut rot, and I just feel classier asking, "Stoli, soda, lime wedge?" 

Plus all the calories I saved cutting out flavored vodka, sugary mixers, and grenadine I get to use to use on mini tacos at 3am. 

- Give no f#%!s.

Going into predominately straight bars, in a small community, as an obviously gay man (I've never been able to hide that shit) used to cause me quite a bit of anxiety. I kept quiet, kept to myself, and kept a watchful eye. It was exhausting. After a few years of this, I realized how much more fun I could be having and decided to quit giving a shit what people thought. So now every time I walk into a bar I hear RuPaul's voice:

I've had a few idiots shout things at me, but they usually back down quickly when they realize I'm not just going to slink away. Mostly I just get a lot of straight guys walking up to me, asking me if I'm gay, and then offering to hook me up with every. single. gay guy they know (and insisting that I look at Facebook pictures of them all).

As if I'll be interested in any other gay man they can find (Wait, how much money does he make?). 

- Giving a few f#%!s might not hurt, you still want people to like you in the morning.

My poor, poor friends have put up with a lot of shit, mostly perpetrated by 22 year old Chris. I've puked in a friend's car. I've thrown a drink in a friend's face. I've invited friend's out solely for the ride home (and I've not invited friend's out but still expected the ride home). The thing I became known for, though, was leaving  without telling anyone else about it. 

I did this a lot...I mean a lot. Like 3/4 times that we went out, I would either walk home or get picked up halfway home when my friend's realized I was gone. 

"No, I'm fine, you guys keep partying, I'll just walk home. If I take this spooky alley it'll get me back in no time. Don't worry about me. Who's that up there? Does he have a hook for a hand? No worries, guys, you go back and just have a blast." 

It usually happened at about one in the morning when I started feeling like I wasn't being paid nearly enough attention, so I'd wait until no one was looking and just leave (sometimes I had to tell them I was going to the bathroom to extricate myself from the group). If they didn't want to pay attention to me, they can search the bar for an hour for me while I go back to the hotel room and eat fettuccine with my fingers (true story). 

It's amazing people still talk to me.

- Don't drink out of anything you need two hands to hold.

Including, but not limited to, fishbowls, comically large wine glasses, directly from the bottle, buckets, mixing bowls, any drink with the word "mega" in its name, etc. 

This is the face of someone who will be breaking his phone and passing out in an alleyway.

- Vomiting and passing out are your body's ways of saving it's own life. Pay attention.

This was probably the most important thing I learned in my Sociology of Courtship, Marriage, and Family class. The professor stopped class one day and told us that if we didn't learn anything else in her class she wanted us to remember this bit of advice. It was completely unrelated to the topic we were speaking about, but it stuck in my brain, and anytime I feel like I'm getting sleepy or pukey, I get a sandwich and then get my ass the f#%! to bed.

So after all this progress I've made growing into a responsible 27 year old who knows how to drink, it's a little frustrating that all it takes is a ridiculous pop song to put me back in that terrible mindset. It happened last Thursday when a friend and I were going to have a nice chill night at The Wine Cafe doing karaoke. We would normally have a few drinks and then go home by midnight. I listened to 22 on the way to pick her up, however, and the night took a dramatic turn.

The trouble started as we were leaving the apartment to walk to karaoke. My friend casually mentioned that she knew some people going out to celebrate a 21st birthday who were starting at The Underground. My reaction was of course, "There's 2-for-1's there..." Stopping for one drink turned into 4, which turned into shots, which turned into a trip to The Haze (I reject the name change), more shots, a return to my favorite pink drinks, and so. much. dancing. 

It was the funnest relapse I've ever experienced, but I'm just not sure it was worth the shame (and the hangover) I felt the next morning.

I'll hand it to Relapse Chris, he danced like he was the best dancer in that place.

The morning brought a better perspective on what the reality of the situation probably was.

Werk.

Gettin' Crafty: The Bachelorette Party

When I look back at the year 2013, it will without a doubt be remembered as the year that all of my friends decided to get married. I mean, I had a few people that I'm close with tie the knot in my early to mid twenties, but not nearly as many as some of my other friends it seems. I've seen planners with every summer weekend jam packed with showers, dress shopping trips, rehearsal dinners, bach. parties, ceremonies, and every other wedding related event you could imagine, but somehow I had managed to avoid the insanity. While everyone else I knew was getting fitted for tuxes and taffeta covered monstrosities, I was mostly just hanging out at my place having weekend long Battlestar Galactica marathons.


And loving every fracking second of it.

That's all ended now though. In the past year I've had 8 friends get engaged, been asked to stand up in 2 of the ceremonies, and been invited to join on one destination bachelor party (more on that to come).

Now don't get me wrong, I'm thrilled about all of these engagements, and I'm honored to be a part of the preparation and celebration in any way I'm needed...but, let's be real, I get exhausted if I have go to go the post office and the grocery store in the same day (I just did something, and now I have to do another thing?!). The responsibility of it all is making me seriously consider just not having friends anymore.

My first wedding related event was last weekend. I was invited to my friend, and old roommate, Amanda's bachelorette party. I was thrilled to be asked to join, and even more thrilled to be experiencing my first party bus (with a stripper pole...I mean come on)! It wasn't until about four days before the party, though, that I remembered bachelorette parties are gift events. I'm going to be expected to do more than show up and embarrass the family name (or make them proud, considering it's the "Roberts" family name that I carry).

I racked my brain trying to think of what I could bring. I've never been to one of these things, but from what I've seen on TV, something lacy, vibrating, or alcoholic is the standards gift. Other than my uncanny (and ultimately useless) talent for unhooking a bra through a shirt, I know nothing about lingerie, so that was out. I was pretty sure the vibrating gift was being handled by someone else, so that left booze (which is really more in my comfort zone anyway).

As I'm always now looking for ways to work my life into a blog post, I decided to do a bachelorette party gift on a budget post. I'd seen a Pinterest project that I'd been wanting to try that would be perfect, but it meant I'd be working with possibly the most volatile and dangerous of all craft supplies.

Glitter.

The instructions are fairly simple. Coat the base of the glass with Mod Podge, add glitter, allow to dry, spray on protective sealant. I decided to go with martini glasses (because it just seemed more bachelorette-y). I'd pair them up with a bottle of drink mix and a few little bottles of liquor. I originally planned to get the glasses from a thrift store, before I remembered that this wasn't a bachelorette party for a hobo (I totally plan on doing this again with some wine glasses for myself, and will be buying them from the thrift store, but it seemed super tacky for gifting purposes). I was going to do bright pink glitter, a bottle of cosmopolitan mix, and tiny bottles of Kinky pink vodka. 

As I was buying supplies is occurred to me that I was making these according to what I would want, and hadn't even bothered to check on Amanda's favorite color (bad friend). After a few text messages, the color was changed to lime green, the drink mix to appletini, but I already had bought the Kinky (so that color scheme was f#%!ed).

I was almost a little disappointed by how easy the whole process was. I'm concerned that people won't be interested in reading about my life if it's not a hot damn mess. Other than the fact that my kitchen is literally covered in green glitter (the box I used to contain the mess didn't do shit), it was a relatively painless process. I did one coat of Mod Podge and glitter, but it seemed to look a little patchy, so after it dried I added another which helped a lot.

I SUPER overestimated the amount of glitter I'd need.

The only hiccup I ran into was when applying the sealant. The instructions stressed the importance of doing this in a well ventilated open area. I considered taking it down to my parking lot, but then I thought of all of the trips I'd have to take up and down the stairs for the repeated coats and quickly decided against it. My stuffy tiny little kitchen would probably be fine if I lay down some garbage bags to protect the floor. I mean it's not like I have any solid evidence that the kitchen isn't well ventilated (oh yeah...). 

I survived with a few less brain cells and a hellvua headache, but it was worth it. How adorable are these things (the glass stems mimicking the shape of the drink mix was a super happy accident)?!

You may remember the original theme for this blog was going to be "Bachelorette party Gift on a budget," but I'm pretty sure I didn't save any money at all by the time I bought all the crap needed for this (holy cow glitter is expensive!). Now that I have all of the supplies for it though, I want to glitter the shit out of everything I own. My current idea is to do that Pinterest fan project where you paint each of the blades a primary color and then you have a rainbow fan when you turn it on, but I'd do it with glitter. The explosion of glitter that would no doubt happen every time the fan gets turned on is the only thing stopping me (and also the only thing fueling my obsession with the idea).



I had planned on doing a whole section on the events of the Bachelorette Party, but it can all really just be summed up by this picture (taken shockingly early in the night).

Shit, Becky. 

Grown Up Sad

A few weeks ago shit was really starting to get to me: work stresses, dating, money, one of the windows in my car wasn't rolling up, I had a repeat of the button incident with yet another pair of shorts (followed by a trip to the scale with less than ideal results), my internet connection was getting super unreliable (just seeing the word "buffering" makes me feel a little stabby), and I was listening to way too much Patty Griffin. It was getting to be a bit too much. I realized I was at a breaking point when I found myself full on crying during a trailer for Free Willy 4: Escape From Pirates Cove starring Bindi Irwin.

My Life.

I get this way from time to time. Sad, and completely irrational about it. It usually happens every few months, and the solution is to just stay home one night and have what I refer to as "Wallow Night." The exact events vary each time I do it, but the theme of the night is always the same. I embrace the sadness, let it take over for one night, purge it from my system, and get the hell over it.

While elbow deep in a family sized bag of cheesy popcorn, I got to thinking about how I deal with my feelings, and how much it has changed as I've grown up. While cleaning out my closet in preparation for "The Desk", I found my journal from my Freshman and Sophomore years of college. The contents kind of terrified me. It reminded me of just how low I'd been at that time.

I don't think I was going through anything that every other young gay kid, freshly out on their own wasn't also going through, but I definitely didn't know how to deal with it in a healthy way. I was sullen, I took it out on my friends, and I was self-destructive. Upon finding the journal, I thought it would be fun to post pictures of the entries to show how crazy and irrational I had been, after reading them I realized that it wasn't funny at all. I had been in a dark place, and the reminder of it was shocking. I was suddenly very grateful that I came out unscathed.

I remember it taking awhile to get to the point where having a bad week didn't feel like the world was ending. I'm sure there were many things that added up to me being able to deal, but there was one moment that I remember as a turning point. My computer was broken, and I was using a friend's while it was getting repaired. A string of Facebook messages had been left up, and I noticed my name on one of them. I opened it and found a group message pertaining to my birthday party. The message started with, "Hey everyone, I know Chris hasn't necessarily been a ton of fun to be around lately, but that's why we've got to make this birthday a fun one."

That was the moment that I realized just how amazing my friends are (seriously. WAY better than yours). I realized that I have a group of supporters around me that will be there for me no matter what, even when I'm behaving like a self centered, moody, little bitch (especially then). So my sad months turned into sad weeks, which became sad days, and eventually I was able to get it down to a night that I could reasonably schedule six hours to sit in a Snuggie, with the lights dimmed, and have some feelings.

My "Wallow Nights" have sort of become a "Greatest Hits" version of the dark times. I know what works, and I've created a formula that is close to 100% effective.

1. Red Wine 

I'm not really sure what it is, but red wine has always been sad wine in my mind (something to do with the purple stained teeth when you're done). I stop and get two bottles on the way home from work, the cheaper the better. I uncork the first bottle pretty much immediately after getting home (but usually start feeling guilty about drinking alone and call it quits when I finish it).

2. Sad TV

I've tried movies, but it takes so much longer to get to the payoff when watching The Bridges of Madison County or Brokeback Mountain. I've got shit to do tonight. I need to get this done and move on. I've got a few tried and true, go-to episodes of my favorite shows that hit the sadness fast and hard.

The Buffy Prom Episode

The Veronica Mars Prom Episode

The Dawson's Creek Prom Episode

And now I'm thinking maybe there are some issues that I need to unpack and deal with...

3. Sad Music

I've always thought my taste in music was pretty good, albeit a little melancholy. I adore Patty Griffin, Aimee Mann, Lissie, Greg Laswell, and pretty much anyone else who knows how to write a sad song. It's not these songs that I turn to on "Wallow Night," however. I go for the real awful stuff. Songs that have nothing to do with what I'm going through usually, but nonetheless just speak to me in the moment. 

One night, for instance, I walked around my apartment with a glass of wine in my hand singing Hopelessly Devoted from the Grease Soundtrack for probably a good solid 45 minutes. Everytime by Britney Spears is another favorite. I also have a weird thing about Cruise, the Florida Georgia Line feat. Nelly remix. It makes me cry every time I hear it (no, seriously).

I tried to break this habit last time and create a go-to Spotify "Sad Songs" Playlist.

F#%! it. Good enough.

4. The Internet

There's all kinds of things available on the internet when you're feeling bad about yourself. A favorite is Thought Catalog. Lots of overwrought essays by other twenty somethings who somehow just get it when I'm sad. 

YouTube is also positively brimming with sadness if you know where to look. I hesitate to even share the video I frequent when sad, because it's quite possibly the most depressing thing in the world. It's called The Existential Crisis of a Penguin, and you can see it...if you really want to...against my recommendations...here. It's about a penguin who leaves the pack and wanders towards the mountains by itself, knowing that it will mean his inevitable demise. Shit, man.

I also one time Googled "Adele Crying." I don't know why I did it, but oh boy do I regret it.

5. That other bottle of wine

Aww, screw it.

6. Junk Food

I don't keep a ton of junk food in the house. Not because I don't buy it, but because I can't not eat it, so it lasts about twenty minutes after I get it home. So I usually have to walk over to HyVee at this point. I'm concerned that the cashiers at the HyVee across the street are starting to recognize me. I'm concerned because I'm not sure that they've seen me with my hair brushed, possibly ever. 

A few months ago I was in there buying a frozen pizza, a giant chocolate bar, and a bag of off brand Doritos. I was wearing paint stained athletic shorts, a promotional True Blood t-shirt that I'd gotten for free with the DVD set, and flip flops from 2005. When I got to the checkout the cashier looked at me, and with a giant grin he asked me, "So, any big plans for the night?" 

7. Realization

At some point (usually around one or two in the morning), after exhausting myself emotionally, annoying my neighbors with the same song on repeat, and staining my teeth purple and my fingers orange, it occurs to me that I don't even really remember why I was upset in the first place. 

Or maybe that's just a blackout.

Maybe it's all a little unhealthy, and maybe I should figure out a better way to deal with my feelings, but I just don't really want to. I actually kind of love "Wallow Night." There's something super liberating about not feeling bad about accepting that sometimes life can kick your ass. And by giving myself one night to get it all out without guilt, I'm not allowing sadness to own me.

And seriously, being in a "What the f#%! is wrong with that guy?!" good mood is just more fun.