happy easter

when i celebrated easter growing up, we'd typically have a huge store-bought honey glazed ham and all kinds of delicious dishes to accompany it. neighborhood kids would come over for an egg hunt in our backyard, and some of them held money inside and some chocolate. some had nothing inside because i guess the adults wanted to approximate what real life would be like: that sometimes even when you try really, really hard and get up close with gross cicadas while searching under the magnolia tree, your prize can turn out to be empty and people laugh at you. kinda like when you want to be with someone really badly & you do all kinds of dirty things to nab them, but then they give you herpes, and the nurses snicker at the public health center behind your back.... maybe not.

this year is the first time i wanted to celebrate remembered easter, and it wasn't until i saw this cute bunny-shaped pasta in my supervisor's office on friday. after work, i bought some & was excited to have my own little carb celebration for jesus.

but then i got really ambitious and wanted to make mexican barbacoa, which entails simmering meat and spices overnight until the roast is fall-off-the-bone tender and infused with the tastes and smells of cinammon, cumin, ancho chiles, onions, garlic, red chile arbol, bay leaves, tamarind, and black peppercorn. i cooked this phenomenon for 19 hours and made homemade guacamole, fresh tomato salsa, and cilantro-lime basmati rice. just my luck, however, i came down with a wicked bad cough and sore throat over the weekend so trying to eat this spicy meal almost caused me to vomit whilst dining. so my easter dessert was buckley's, a disgusting canadian decongestant that might as well have been like allowing myself to puke and then swallowing it back down.