Killing Floor by Lee Child

New thing today, finished Killing Floor by Lee Child. I watched the Jack Reacher movie and was interested in the character and thought the book series would be interesting. It was alright. I'd give it maybe a 7 out of 10. Definitely a mystery action thriller. His descriptive style is a little dry and monotonous, but it's the way his character is, very objective and detached. I sort of like how realistic this action hero is. He talks about strategy and fighting in a more realistic, gritty and unheroic way. I learned a few things about fighting that were interesting. Also, it's a little gory in the fight scenes, not much, just a bit. 

It was a good mystery thriller. I wasn't as hooked on it as other books. I'm not really dying to read the next book. There are other authors who are a lot more unstoppable page turners. Overall though the adventure and story were fairly interesting and I always like learning a little bit, and in this book I learned a bit about the scam they were uncovering and such. Don't want to give anything away.

Try it? If you're not hooked in the first 5 chapters, put it down. But overall it has a nice slow build and a fairly good ride. He is a pretty good character too. I think I might enjoy the series as it is long and there are a ton of books in this character's life. 

Linguine with Clam Sauce - Chi Chi's

New thing today, tried the clam Linguine with Clam Sauce with the White Cream sauce from Chi Chi's. This was delicious and a new favorite! Saucy, clammy and seafood goodness! Mmmmmm.

Griddle and Angus Grass Fed Beef

New thing today, two things actually, cooked with an iron skillet griddle and had grass fed beef. I was craving meat. Decided to get a cast iron griddle and some meat, rather than buy steak from a restaurant. Got the delicious meat from Pavilions, and I've always wanted to try grass fed beef. Got the griddle from Cost Plus.

Seasoned the skillet and put the steak on. Accidentally undercooked it, but the skillet was still warm so I was able to keep cooking some undercooked pieces. Overall it was a success. The grass fed beef was darker in color, and I found it tasty! Will be getting it again :) I also liked cooking on the skillet.

Yeay new things that work out! I will also cook it better next time too :) 

Teavanna Teas

New thing today, decided to try some new Teavanna teas - Dragonfruit Devotion, Cococaramel Sea Salt and Chocolate Bananas Foster. They were very fragrant in the store, and the guy oversold me as well, but they're pretty good. My favorite is the sea salt coco caramel one surprisingly. I will enjoy mixing and matching these :) 

Turkey Bacon wrapped Chicken

New thing today, decided to try some turkey bacon wrapped around chicken, fried in a skillet. Turned out alright. Didn't love it but the husband did. Didn't turn out horrible and it was edible and good. Success overall :) 

The Tell by Matthew Hertenstein

New thing today, finished The Tell by Matthew Hertenstein. I finished this book pretty quickly. I saw it at the library around a "Mentalist" flyer - a mentalist was coming to the library branch so they had books on predicting lies, reading tells and other such topics. This one looked interesting. Overall it was completely different than I thought it would be but it was still interesting.

I thought it would be about how to read people, but it ended up being a book based on psychology studies and how certain traits about people seem to correlate or be associated with seemingly unrelated things. It's not really a book on being able to "Tell" things about people, but more of our reactions or associations with things, people's looks and other traits.

If you're not interested by chapter 2 or 3, don't go any further. The entire book is very similar in tone. I was interested, even though it was different from what I expected. He's a little wordy, so I skimmed a lot of it, and he talks about some stuff I already knew so it was just sort of an elaboration of some of that stuff as well. 

It also talks about some of our instinctual gut reactions to things, and some of our superficial assumptions about things and people being pretty accurate - a sort of super intuition on people or things.  It also talks about how some of that can be completely wrong or biased. I did learn quite a few new interesting things. :) Lovely how books can do that!

Overall good :)

Mini Loaf Pan & Pumpkin Bread & Muffin Mix - Trader Joe's

New thing today, tried my mini loaf pan for the first time and made Pumpkin Bread & Muffin Mix from Trader Joe's. Using both for the first time, they turned out excellent! The muffins turned out delish, moist and firm in the pan, and the mix was easy and yummy. A win!