Help! I'm A Perfect Genius, But This Potential Employer Asked Me A Boring Interview Question!

One-Pot Macaroni Cheeseburger Soup – No Velveeta

Ingredients:

1 lb. ground beef

2 teaspoons dried oregano, divided

2 teaspoons dried thyme, divided

6 tablespoons butter

1 yellow onion, diced

1 cup sliced carrots

1 cup sliced celery

5 cloves garlic, minced

4 tablespoons flour

8 cups chicken broth

8 oz. uncooked elbow macaroni

1 cup heavy cream

8 oz. sharp cheddar cheese, shredded

1 teaspoon white balsamic vinegar

Kosher salt

Fresh cracked pepper

4 sesame seed buns, diced into 1-inch pieces

2 tablespoons olive oil

Garnish:

Sliced green onions

Shredded cheddar cheese

Instructions:

Step 1:

Preheat your oven to 400°F (200°C).

Arrange the diced sesame seed buns in a single layer on a parchment-lined baking sheet.

Drizzle with olive oil and toss to coat evenly.

Bake for about 10 minutes, or until they are crispy and golden.

Step 2:

In a large pot over medium heat, add the ground beef, 1 teaspoon of oregano, 1 teaspoon of thyme, and a few pinches of salt and pepper.

Cook the beef until it’s browned and crumbled, then remove it from the pot and set it aside.

Step 3:

In the same pot, melt the butter over medium heat (there’s no need to clean it out).

Add the diced onion, sliced carrots, sliced celery, and a generous pinch of salt and pepper.

Increase the heat to medium-high and cook for about 10 minutes, stirring occasionally.

Step 4:

Lower the heat to medium and add the minced garlic, along with the remaining 1 teaspoon of oregano and 1 teaspoon of thyme.

Cook for another minute.

Step 5:

Sprinkle in the flour and stir to coat the vegetables.

Cook for another minute while stirring frequently.

Step 6:

Add a splash of chicken broth to deglaze the pot, scraping up any delicious bits from the bottom.

Then pour in the rest of the chicken broth along with the uncooked macaroni and another pinch of salt and pepper.

Step 7:

Raise the heat to medium-high and bring the mixture to a simmer.

Once it simmers, reduce the heat to low and let it simmer for 5-7 minutes, or until the pasta is al dente.

Stir occasionally to prevent sticking.

Step 8:

Remove the pot from the heat and stir in the heavy cream and shredded cheese.

Then add the white balsamic vinegar.

Step 9:

Return the cooked ground beef to the pot and warm the soup over medium heat for a few minutes until everything is heated through.

Adjust the seasoning with salt and pepper as needed.

Step 10:

Serve the soup topped with the baked sesame seed bun croutons, garnished with sliced green onions and extra shredded cheddar cheese.

Enjoy!

Hi Neil!

I'll be in NYC next week with some free evenings. Do you have any bookstore recommendations?

Thanks for all that you do!

The Strand Bookstore is unique, and has improved in recent decades by being a regular bookshop AND an enormous second hand bookshop. The Mysterious Bookshop is a delight if you like mysteries.

Hi Zoey. Asking from a place of ignorance, could you please explain why Threads is dogshit?

Threads is the Hot New Garbagedump by Certified Scum Of The Earth and Facebook/Meta owner Zuckerburg. It is like if twitter was even worse.

There is ONLY a For You page, meaning you can never just see the posts from your followed accounts who, yknow, you followed for the purpose of seeing their posts.You can't see those. you have to see the algorithm's posts ONLY. You also require an instagram to get full access to all the features like Posting Images. You need a separate social media account to properly access this new social media. And once you've done so, the only way to delete your Threads account, is to delete you instagram account. The Whole Thing. For Some Fucking Reason. Not to mention, obviously since it's zuckerburg, the thing syphons your personal information like crazy, worse still than twitter.

Like ALL your data. as much as it can get. (Love that it says "Other Data" btw. Nice subtle way of saying "whatever else we want") ALSO wouldn't you know it? It's fucking banned in the EU because it violates a bunch of fucking privacy laws!! So it's DEFINITELY not safe to use!

It is as predatory and exploitative as can be, created by someone that we collectively agreed Sucks Shit and Has No Empathy For Human Life and Individuality, and nobody should be touching it with a ten foot pole let alone sign up for it. Not even to test the waters or because it's where everyone is heading, or to see how bad it is for yourself. It doesn't matter if you're joining to get an account ready in case the platform ends up the new big thing. You're feeding the statistics. Even if you're not using that account, Zuckerburg can show the number of signups to shareholders and investors to prove to them that it's viable. Instead of jumping on the bandwagon in case it succeeds, inform people why they shouldn't join, to reduce its chance of success! It's like strikes and protests; The more of us get the word out, the more effective it'll be!

This is my dog. I don't think I could have taken this photo intentionally. I'm very proud of having taken it accidentally.

I hear audio, like voices, in the backgrounds of a lot of their tracks if I'm listening with the right speaker. I didn't realized some of their songs had talking in the background and it freaked me out so much before I realized it was in the songs lol.

I was listening to Blossoms with the new headphones I got for Christmas (JBL Tour One M2) and I heard something I hadn't heard before.

I swear I can hear a faint but real gut-curling scream in the background at 3 minutes and 9 seconds, right when Joey sings 'scream out to the sky'.

My sibling was able to hear it too, but my mother and sister couldn't. Am I tweaking??

I see posts going "Okay, I'll vote for Kamala, I GUESS IF I HAVE TO" and "omg if that's the best we can do I suppose I'll support it" and I'm like...

What do you people fucking WANT?

Let's run down how she's rated politically by some organizations that we vibe with, kay?

ACLU = 93% on civil liberties

AFL-CIO = 100% on trade unions

Human Rights Campaign = 100% on queer rights

League of Conservation Voters = 91% on environmentalism

NARAL = 100% on reproductive rights

NRA Fund = 7% on gun rights (we LIKE a low score on this one)

NEA = 100% on education

Planned Parenthoos = 100% on reproductive rights

In addition, GovTrack (which is a nonpartisan tracker) places her in the MOST politically left-leaning categories of Senators. So we've got a very liberal, woman of color who's spent her career trying to mitigate draconian tough-on-crime laws to benefit the accused and keep black people out of prison and decrease recidivism and that's somehow...just barely tolerable.

So I ask again...what is that you're dissatisfied with? Is it Palestine? as recently as March she was calling for a ceasefire and demanding aid to Gaza. Keep in mind she's pretty constrained as to what's possible to do in this situation.

Is it just that she was a prosecutor? That is an important job that needs to be done and we WANT people doing it who aren't rah-rah tough-on-crime Gestapo types, which she is not. We need prosecutors who are addressing the root causes of crime and looking for ways to help people escape the cycle, which she has done to the point that she was often called SOFT on crime.

So what is your objection here? Is it that her politics aren't 100% aligned with a bunch of Tumblr socialists? I got news for you...we Tumblr socialists DO NOT REPRESENT THE ELECTORATE. If such a candidate existed, they would not win.

Democrats struggle sometimes because our tent is large. Republicans just want you if you're a straight white man and preferably rich. There's room for a lot more types in the lefty side, but sadly that means a lot of room also for dissention among the ranks. This is how they get us. Let's not let them, huh? Just a suggestion.

I'm so happy to discover I am not the only one absolutely bonkers over this group.

absolutely love that I have yet to see a single the amazing devil enjoyer who’s normal about that band. collectively fucking feral. we’re like a colony of feral cats yowling at the top of our lungs in the woods at night not a single one of us is sane about it