Saturday, September 20, 2014

Cranberry Pecan Chicken Salad Recipe

So this particular recipe has some back story. Lately we have been loving Shari's...a lot. Now if you don't have a Shari's near you, or you haven't seen it on the menu, they have these lunch trios. One of our favorite things in the lunch trio options is cranberry pecan chicken salad. The problem is that it's just too expensive to go to a restaurant and eat a sandwich. so I decided it was time to make my own. Here was I (Courtney) came up with:




You will need:
- 1 stick of celery
- 2 chicken breasts
- 1 handful of cranberries (we sometimes add more)
- 1 handfull of chopped pecans
- 2- 3 Tablespoons Olive Oil Mayonnaise (or enough to evenly coat everything)
- Spices (I used poultry seasoning, fresh ground pepper, sea salt, garlic, and paprika to taste.)
- Bread of choice
Makes about 4 sandwiches (if you reeeallly like chicken)
1. After thawing chicken breasts, chop them into small chunks and fry in a fry pan, adding your choice of spices to taste. Set aside to cool.

2. Chop up a medium handful of pecan halves and one celery stick. Add this and a handful of cranberries to chicken. Add mayonnaise (I usually do this by sight. I want enough to coat everything but not so much that it gets runny)



3. Let cool in fridge in closed container. I let mine sit overnight, but a few hours will do just fine. (We used dried cranberries, so overnight allows the Mayo to slightly reconstitute the dried cranberries)




4. Spoon onto your choice of bread. I prefer ciabatta rolls or sourdough. Serve and Enjoy!



For an extra kick of flavor I like to eat this with garden fresh tomatoes on top..YUMMY!
I hope you like this fast simple recipe. The best part is that it only took about 20 minutes (not including thaw time) to make, then you can just pop it into the fridge and serve it whenever you are ready. I'm considering making this for our upcoming family reunion. I hope you enjoy this as much as I do.

Friday, August 29, 2014

Our thoughts on Man Academy

Alright so here it is! After many hours of pouring over the wonderful site known as Manhood101 or "Man Academy", as well as both the sister sight "Chick Academy" and the ebook "The Principles", it is finally time to post our dissection, opinion, and review of it all! There are so many places we could start, so let's dive right in.

Here we go! Let's open with the easiest one to pull apart, Chick Academy. At a single glance, you can tell right away that everything is about to go downhill. The categories down the side of the page include "Cooking" "Cleaning" "Conduct" "C**********" and "Quiet". Now one might think these are innocent at first glance, but upon clicking on any of the links the door opens to the world of wishful thinking. "Cooking" includes a brief summary or how a female should learn to make exactly what her man wants and then some, at whatever whim the male desires. "Cleaning" again includes such wisdom as

"Don't let your man's house become a pigsty. Stop your f****** nagging and start the vacuum. He invented the TV, the computer, the phone, and pretty much everything in society. The least you can do is keep your stupid mouth shut and show some appreciation by making sure the floors are clean enough to eat off of and the dishes are washed and put away. Get off your fat a** and get to work!" (Chick Academy)

The stunning way in which the creator of the site orders females to obey and submit to the every whim and desire of "their men", shows both the arrogance and idiocy with which he or she lives. Think it couldn't get much worse than that? Don't worry, there's more! Simply select the "Quiet" tab along the left side, and you'll find an entire page dedicated to the requirement of women to shut up and never argue with their men, as well as a chilling message near the end;

"Shutting up is an invaluable skill that will essentially become the backbone of any strong relationship. When you have mastered shutting up, you will have the ultimate tool for avoiding failed relationships and domestic violence.
This b**** hasn't learned to keep her mouth shut yet:

Have you?" (Photo credit: Chick Academy)

Overall the site is crude, offensive, and promotes violence despite the claims otherwise. It is terrifying to think that there are both men out there who agree with these ideals, and women who are forced to live by them.

Moving on to the second area of research, the e-book handed out masquerading as a guidance tool, known as "The Principles". It includes brilliant thoughts, well-worded arguments, and thought out- no, but seriously this book is full of crap. Let's begin with its explanation of feminism, specifically that it is a hidden agenda of women to help themselves to what men are rightfully entitled to, and claims of that it ruins the gender roles which humanity was meant to have, as well as corrupting the future generations of rightfully subservient women. If that wasn't bad enough to begin with, the writer criticizes feminists for absolving themselves of crimes and blaming men, though the entire book is based around the opposite, absolving men of all fault and blaming women. Not only is this quite hypocritical, but it is only the first of many flawed arguments contained within the digital pages.

It is said in one of the later chapters that order can only exists where there is fear of authority, yet at the same time that fear is present there is a fueled attraction for that which causes the fear. It states that without fear and submission there cannot be love or attraction, as the latter is fueled by the prior. Yet we see many times in society that this does not hold true, the most cited example being that the Jews, who feared and obeyed the Germans, do not show love or attraction for them. Love can be created without fear or submission, as an equality of two beings. Strange concept, hmm?

I mostly skimmed through the rest of the book, unable to stand the biased and flawed writing for long periods of time, but stopping on such chapters and subsections as "How much Pain to Apply", "Rewarding and Punishing", and "Dealing With a B****" though the site again claims to not encourage or condone abuse (Manhood Academy)

Turning back towards the beginning of the book, I found myself treated to an entire paragraph about how unfair it was that a woman could use her sexual appeal to rob a man of his hard-earned cash, but men were blamed for then following through with their sexual urges. It inferred that if there was a rape, the woman was to blame for tempting a man with the sexuality of her attitude and outfit.

Along those lines, it was discussed many times that a woman should feel privileged to have sex with her man, and that a woman should use sex to show her thankfulness for gifts and the provisions provided to her by her man. It claimed that women not reciprocating gifts with sex was a corrupt and dysfunctional social belief, like welfare, tipping, and women wanting to achieve social status.

One example which the author provided of the "proper" way to handle a woman, was when his girlfriend at the time texted him saying she was changing her plans and they wouldn't be able to hang out today. He responded by calling her a b**** repeatedly, claiming full control over her and her actions and stating to her that he was more important than any of her friends. In the end the girl submitted to his will, but more than sounding like he had her affection, it read as if she was terrified of him, a classic example of battered-woman syndrome. With the way he believes women should be treated, is that any real surprise?

And yet it seems quite flawed, that though a woman should submit to a man and a child should submit to a parent, a single mother raising a male child is incapable of raising him correctly and the fault for that lays completely with her. If she holds power over him then it is a woman over a man, but if he holds power over her it is a child over an adult, and the one to blame for this is never in any case the absent father or the child, but in fact the single mother.

The e-book describes how a man is supposed to treat his woman like a subservient pet, a female in her rightful place below her owner. It spoke of how women, like children, lacked the foresight or knowledge to make any important decisions (such as voting or raising male children), and generalized that women themselves admitted this. It was sickening at the best of times, a horrendous twisted view of a world caught in the past.

But despite all of this, there was still worse to come. The Man Academy website included a forum, and within that forum was a category called "Critic's Corner" it was a place for people such as ourselves to go and argue the ideals and thoughts of the site, and (according to the 'Professor') be proven wrong. The "Professor" as he called himself, challenged 'keyboard warriors' to face him in live debates over webcam where he could attempt to humiliate whatever unfortunate being stood in his way. In many of these debates he states that manhood academy "Welcomes Haters and Critics", yet if you have seen our previous post not only have we proved this to be false, but also that the moderator seems to have the maturity level of a six-year-old.

After exchanging a few emails and being called some sadly unoriginal insults, Courtney and I challenged the professor to a debate with a few stipulations: only that we could redistribute the full content of the debate, and that he show his face during the discussion. He refused, and after a few more unoriginal insults were thrown our way we gave up arguing and decided instead to prove him wrong by ripping apart his site here, as we have done.

Believe it or not, the Man Academy is not only a website, but a fully functioning business! For only $21 dollars a month, any man can join the classes and learn the "correct" way to live his life. If you can't afford that, there are scholarships available so you can still join!

So now that we've had the chance to look through and attempt to understand the delusional thoughts which the so-called "Professor" posts and markets, I think both Courtney and I can confidently say that not only do we strongly disagree with the existence and ideals of this site, but I think we have more than enough reasoning to fight whatever expectedly childish retorts both the site and its creator have to offer. With that being said, our challenge to the site still stands, and should it be accepted we will post the full debate on our site.

Until next time,
John and Courtney

Sources:
Man Academy
Chick Academy
The Principles

Thursday, August 28, 2014

The Scoop On Manhood 101

Now we don't know if you've heard about this site, but John ran across it one night during a random internet search. He sent it to me and you will never guess what we found out...

Photo Credit: http://manhood101.com/

First off can I just mention that this guy sounds like he's twelve. Like listen to any of his debates or interviews, he seriously sounds pre-pubescent. [adult language warning. NSFW] At this point he has not only called women stupid and unintelligent, but also compares women to having the mindset and managing abilities of children. Now the girl is obviously trying to give her opinion and being completely ignored by a man who can't seem to say anything other than that she is an idiot. But can we focus on the twelve year old thing for a minute? They swear that nothing is edited on the videos, but after watching a few it becomes apparent that that he changes everyone's voices, which begs the question: What else does he change?

Now we're not saying that anyone's opinions are wrong. Everyone has one regardless of how informed or misinformed they are. But seriously there comes a point that you just have to learn to accept it for what it is [in this case a large pile of bull excrement] and move on with your life.

Buuuuuuuuut come on, you can't go saying that because a woman dresses a certain way or is dating/married/engaged to you that it's alright to rape her. Rape by anyone's standards is wrong isn't it? Well according to this guy it's not.

So naturally John went to challenge this guy. Keep in mind that the site states that it "Openly welcomes haters and critics" yet somehow they refused to publish John's comments for the following reason: "cry harder ******* ****** ****** lololol!" Followed by "Warm regards, Manhood Academy". Now the words used within the reply were not something I felt needed to be repeated, we just wanted you all to see that he acts like a child.

There are a few other things that bothered me, but you can read up on those yourself, and while you're at it you can research being the perfect woman at this website. (Sarcasm, in case you couldn't tell)

So now that we have established that this man [or whichever of his students/moderators runs the forums] possesses absolutely no adult qualities, much less the qualities of a man, we can get to the end of this post.

A note for "Professor Plum"

After refusing to post John's comment on the webpage, you challenged him to a live debate. Well challenge one of us, then you challenge us both. Prepare to be ripped to shreds. But since you require us to have a webcam, we have one stipulation. SHOW YOUR FACE! We have heard your voice, and we see things you write. But you are still acting like what you call a "keyboard warrior". We aren't afraid for the world to know our opinions, but you seem to be.  So what do you say? Do you have the balls?

If you accept our stipulations for the challenge the link will be posted here. :)

--UPDATE--
After sending in the "proper" request for a challenge on the site, it would seem that he's too scared to have someone challenge him and his beliefs and let the world know who he is. It's a shame. But he's just shown us more by changing John's username that he really is a sorry excuse of a man. Please note that neither of us were intentionally trying to be mean or rude to anyone who shares these opinions, we simply disagree very strongly.

-John and Courtney