October 4, 2010

Vertical Pear Salad

I have a little black brother that hates me. Ok wait, that sounds wrong. My Mom has a black miniature Schnauzer, named Oscar, that she says is my brother. It has taken me years to come to terms with her love of her dog and the fact that she considers him my brother. But I have. And Oscar and I have really gotten along for the past few years. Lately when I come over to my parents house he is even nice to me. He wants me to pay attention to him and likes me to rub his paw, but just one, and only when he wants it (seriously, I’m not kidding).

Quick backstory: We got Oscar when I was a freshman in highschool. And he never liked me. Now to be fair, at the time I was not a big dog person…and he knew it. A couple of years after getting him, we went on a family vacation and took the family dog, Oscar. Our family vacations included my extended family as well (grandparents, aunt, uncle, and cousin/bff). As you would imagine with all those people, we had a packed car. So Oscar was forced to sit in the back with me. Neither of us were happy about it. The ride generally went fine….it really did. No problems, just a nice family car ride. Until we got to the beach house. And I went to help Oscar get out of the car. And he whipped around and bit my ear! Not just a little, he actually drew blood! And the whole time my Mom is saying “Oh he doesn’t like his back touched Jessie! Don’t touch his back!”. Ya…cause that’s why he bit me. ::eyeroll::

Ok now back to the present, my Mom and Dad have abandoned me and my sister taken a quick little mini vacation down to the Keys. And while they are gone they asked me to come stay with my baby sister, Haley. So I got here yesterday and everything went fine. No incidents. Honestly, for the last probably 4 years that I have not lived here Oscar has actually pretended to like me. I had forgotten our old feud and thought we were friends! He would let me pet him and acted like he wanted to be BFF’s. But now, I know that to all be a lie. This morning I woke up at the ungodly time of 6am and took the dogs for a quick walk and then to play fetch in the backyard. Oscar does not play fetch, but my dog, Brody, LOVES to play. So I was playing fetch with Brody…not really paying attention to Oscar…and I eventually realized Oscar was gone. HE NEVER LEAVES. Seriously! He never goes anywhere. He always stays right on the back porch, so there was no reason for me to have to keep my eye on him. So I start calling his name. And calling, and calling, and pissing off the neighbors, and calling. No Oscar. So I go inside and get the baby sister and we start searching. Apparently he took off, crossed the street, and was hiding in a neighbors front yard. In other words, the jerk hates me so much that he waited years for this opportunity to make me look bad in front of my Mom. He figured he would hide until she got home and then come limping out from across the street…to prove what a horrible person I am. But don’t worry, I showed him. He is currently hog tied and shoved in a closet. Think he can make it for another two days without food and water? Guess we will find out.

*This was a joke. Ok not the biting my ear part, or the part where the jerk ran off….or the part about how my Mom calls him my brother. But the part about me hog tying him and shoving him in a closet is what I would really like to do an exaggeration. He is fine, eating breakfast, and giving me the evil eye for ruining his master plan.

As for this Vertical Pear Salad…I choose it for my Fall Dinner Party for Challenge #3 of Project Food Blog because it is impressive looking! But it is actually very easy to do! You can put any salad you wish inside of it, just follow the same steps for the pear!