About Me
Hi there. I’m Mara. I live in MA. I started this blog in 2008 under very different circumstances than which I’m updating this bio in 2021. I’ll focus on the genesis of this blog.
The first thought was to make this a blog about pictures of adorable cats. That didn’t happen. Then I was going to make a website talking about toys. That started to happen. Then I realized that I wanted to post recipes and other crap. Hooray! For the most part, I’ve talked about the things that were most important in my life at the time, like stuff I’ve cooked or places I’ve eaten and whatnot.
One of the things that I’m very passionate about is food. My mother and grandmother used to let me help cook, and when I got old enough to be trusted with the stove, I would try cooking my own stuff. I never really liked sticking by the methods my mom used for stuff on its own, and I would doctor things up out of curiousity. My dad would get fairly pissed off when sirloin steak would be served with onions, mushrooms, and canned tomato sauce, all stuff that it’d been braised in. There were other dumb things I’d do with food out of curiousity and my parents and sister became kind of hesitant to eat things that I’d made. I started using my mom’s cookbooks a bit more often than not, realized that there were Certain Things one does and does not do with certain ingredients, and that’s about it. When I moved out of my parents’ home, I had to cook for myself, and when my roommates caught on that I didn’t cook things in the sense that I’d add water to a ramen cup or put a frozen dinner in the microwave, I would share my food with them. As I got older and my time became more of a premium, I got familiar with the value of a really excellent prepared food item, like as in food from a restaurant or cheese or charcuterie and such. In the past couple years, I’ve started to enjoy craft beers, ciders, and cocktails.
In 2003, I found out that I was hospitalized in 2002 because I had multiple sclerosis. In this blog, I speak pretty frankly about my health issues as well. Apart from having multiple sclerosis, I don’t use my left eye to see and thus have no depth perception. Beyond that, I’ve had issues with my weight for a while, although I lost 100+ pounds in the past few years, a feat that I’m pretty proud of doing! I’ve managed to keep it off for a while, too. I’m still looking to lose a bit more.
As you might have guessed by the name of this blog, I really like cats especially, but I love animals in general. I have tried/failed to go vegetarian many times over the years, so I’ve come to accept that I am going to eat meat, but lately I try to be conscientious about where my meat comes from. The best I feel that I can do for animals is support them charitably, and I am a supporter of both the MSPCA and volunteer for the Animal Rescue League of Boston. If you love animals but need to find a way to express that love without having an animal in your home, I find giving your time and money (or physical donations) to be a pretty good way to do that.
In addition to my big-girl interests, I have weird-girl interests (tarot, crystals, and witchy things), nerdy-girl interests (anime and sci-fi), and classy-girl interests (visual art and music). I read books and follow the news as best as I can. I give money to charitable causes, I recycle, and I drive an environmentally-friendly car because I’d like to have a world that I’d like to live in when I retire. I love drawing, embroidering, and playing Japanese mobile phone games such as Love Live School Idol Festival All-Stars and Revue Starlight Re LIVE! Yay!
