(the following was published today on    www.HesTheGayGourmet.blogspot.com)

The Gourmet Fabulous – A Long Overdue Thank You! The Gay Gourmet!™

Due to life being crazy – see previous blog post “Eating My Feelings” – I have, stupidly, let some things fall to the wayside and now I’m playing major catch up! So my first order of business is to discuss Jill Hickey…

Who is Jill Hickey you may ask… well when researching a bio this is all I found..

I would write something clever but my 2 year old son just pulled something down on himself and my 3 older daughters (13,12 & 9) were making up a dance to old Abba tunes and were mid grande jete’ and couldn’t help.

Meanwhile my husband of 16 years is on his Blackberry shouting businessspeak….

So I figure, my job is try and make this chaos sound funny— because it is a blast!

Please join me on Toginet.com radio, find me on YouTube, Facebook and Twitter (all under~~~wait for it~~~ NotSoSoccerMom) if you enjoy my musings.

~Jill Hickey

Jill is super! We were connected via twitter through twitter friends and now the love affair has started.

Mom of 4, ZUMBA teacher, wife, internet radio personality and much more, Jill is a renaissance woman if I do say so myself! She oh so graciously invited me for an interview during National Cookie Week, which just so happened to be when we captured Osama, and had so much on her roster that we had to cut the interview short. I was so honored and overjoyed that I got to spend 10 mins with her, I surely didn’t mind. Much to my surprise she invited me back for a full hour of co-hosting fun with her!

SAY WHAT?!?!?

Jill is funny, smart and knows how to get down to business with her guests! Speaking of…she’s had all sorts of fabulous people from myself (hehehe) to Melissa & Joe Gorga from the Real Housewives of NJ, to survivors of the Joplin tornados, and that’s just most recently!

I never got to publicly say thank you for inviting me to co-host and hopefully she will forgive me!

Follow her on twitter @NotSoSoccerMom listen to her show every Tuesday at 1pm on Toginet radio, check out her site www.notsosoccermom.com & send her lots of love from me!!!

You can listen to the day I joined her on the radio here - Fabulous People just search my show date is 5/13/11

And this blog wouldn’t be complete without a gourmet fabulous recipe!

Margarita Cheesecake Filled Strawberries!

This is Weight Watchers® friendly recipe inspired by summer, getting skinny, my quest to find foods that taste like they are full fat but not, my alcohol problem (which really isn’t a problem – I know De-Nile is not only a river in Egypt!), and fabulous people like Jill!

On to Ms. Rita Fromage

10oz fat free cream cheese (you can use low fat or full fat the WW points just go up accordingly)
.5 shot of good tequila
1/4 cup confectioners sugar
1.5 tsp Vanilla
1 TBS Lime Juice
1/4 tsp lemon juice
1 TBS Lime zest
2 Cartons of Strawberries
graham cracker crumbs

In a large bowl combine all ingredients (except strawberries and graham cracker crumbs) and whisk till combined and smooth.

Refrigerate for 30 mins till “cheesecake” mixture has firmed.

Wash and carefully cut out the centers of your strawberries.

Using a pastry bag or a large Ziplock, fill it with the cheesecake mixture and then cut off the point of the bag so you can start piping the filling into the strawberries

Pipe filling into strawberries and then garnish with a pinch of graham cracker crumbs!

Enjoy, as the entire bowl (if using fat free cream cheese) is only 10 points plus by my deduction! Which means you can eat a bunch of  filled strawberries for practically no points!!

Kisses and Love to my friend Jill! You’ve changed my life!

Deliciously Living,

Michael Muñoz
The Gay Gourmet!™

I love being 40.

I love being 40 and having all this new technology.

Like if it’s Flag Day 2011 and I’m cooking dinner and my sister texts me from 2300 miles away to say  simply, “You’re A Grand Old Flag.”

Celebrate Flag Day with me by going back in time…

The Scene:   Mari Sandoz Elemetary School  Omaha, Nebraska, Spring 1980.

The players:    Me, I’m in 3rd grade. Clearly, I’m awesome because I get to bring a CHAIR down the hallway from my homeroom to the assembly instead of sit on the floor like the shrimpy K, 1st & 2nd graders.  My sister is a player, too. She’s in the assembly.   Something about singing and baton twirling.

The plot:      Stuff happens. Little kids sing.  Most likely some genious-y asian kid played a Suzuki method violin.

The plot thickens:    The Second to Last Number is Up.   My sister, a 1st grade shrimp is singing “You’re a Grand Old Flag” while twirling a baton.  I’m mildly proud.  From my chair.

UNTIL—

Her baton gets caught in her dress…showing her underpants… as she sings….. ‘and forever in peace may you wave…’   (like the dress).

Here’s me in my chair, the sea of shrimps and GASP—— the FOURTH AND FIFTH GRADERS!— seated right in front of me!

Jill

Patriotic holidays have never been the same at our house.   God love our little non-singing, non-baton twirling underpant-showing (before it was even IN!) patriot Aunt Kristin! She’s a Grand Old Flag.  She had the cutest dress on, too!

Damn, technology!  Where were phone cameras and YouTube at the time?  We coulda been the next “Charlie Bit My Finger!”

Somewhere Arnold Schwarzenegger, Tiger Woods & John Edwards are on a Skype conference call giggling about Anthony Weiner and his less-than-safe choice in Twitter passwords.

It’s about once a month that a scandal story like this arises.  We have the same debates & psycho-analyzation.  ”Why do some in the public eye gravitate toward the seedy?” “They seemingly have everything, do they need to fulfill some sort of living-on-the-edge thrills?”   “Can we separate someone’s ‘private life’ from their ‘public life’?”

(See: ‘NotSoSoccerMom Sits Down With The Three Johns’ http://notsosoccermom.com/2010/02/13/notsosoccermom-sits-down-with-the-3-johns/ )

I look at it through a different angle.    In recent years, Facebook & Twitter and texting have joined phonecalls, Email, & face-t0-face communication as acceptable means to communicate.

But, sometimes, you hear in :  ”It’s the Facebook & Twitter.”   People are quick to admonish all these new mediums as the culprit when said Congressman mis-uses Twitter or a Rutgers student mis-uses YouTube or a teen misuses texting.

I proudly stand up for Facebook and Twitter.  Many still view them as toys.   I won’t judge someone who says “I don’t have time for Facebook” or only gets on once or twice a month.  I do bet that they either A) haven’t moved in the last 5-8 years, B) work in an industry or business that is locally owned so they perceive there is no gain  C) Say “I don’t WANT to say HI to my  High School boyfriend, girlfriend, ex-husband’s hairdresser etc   or D) Think it’s ‘one more thing to keep up with.’

And that’s fine.

Over the last 3 years in being on Facebook, I’ve reconnected with college girlfriends to pray for an ailing sorority sister. We all felt as close as if it were 1992 at the Tri-Sigma house.  I started this very website as a result of a Facebook friend’s nudge.   Tomorrow I will dine with new friends and my new Friday am show co-host whom I met through Twitter.

It’s not just that: My husband’s Aunt can now see up to the minute pictures & video of her great-nieces and nephew.  You chat with friends from your gym about this morning’s Zumba class. A room is diffused at a 20 year reunion when old classmates already know each other’s ‘small-talk.’

You get me.

And Thanks to these new forms of communication we can all be aware of our NotSoSoccerMom.com’s business partner and close-friend Mr. Robert Barrett’s returning battle with cancer. And we can come together, if only virtually, to support and pray for him.

http://www.caringbridge.org/visit/robertbarrett

Jill

For everyone that thinks they are patently silly or only occasion check-ins, there are many of us that LOVE and live by these communication tools.   So, don’t NOT start a Twitter account because you think it’s all stupid celebrities or Congressmen being lewd.  And please jump on your Facebook.  We want to keep connecting with YOU.

Thank you for letting me share this.

Please visit Robert’s page.

*This blog is dedicated to Dina Clifford, my Twitter friend in Florida.*

We’re moving the Corporate Offices of NSSM, Inc soon.  So I spend a lot of time surfing Realtor.com

They don’t have an Advanced Search option for “Understated Tuscan Villa-ish, 5 bedroom but not more than 3200 sq feet b/c I can’t even clean 2000 sq feet with a flat lot, padded room for the toddler, great neighbors, by a gym, & Starbucks that includes a dance floor and customized 5 tier cherry wood makeup shelf.”

So, I have to search the hard way.

Dear Real Estate agents, I see you’re still sticking with the Glamour Shots….

Dear Real Estate agents who only share 4 pictures of your precious listing. YOU SUCK.   You’re not tricking me to come physically in the door by only giving a sneak preview. I find you lazy and not in possesion of internet skills or a good camera or BOTH. In which case, you should be in a different industry. See you in the shoe department at JC Penny.

Dear Real Estate agents, if you don’t put ANY pictures of the inside of the house, it’s okay. We can just picture the dead bodies, asbestos & flocked wall paper ourselves.

Dear Wink- Wink Marketing Guy who named the server f0r virtual tours JustSnooping.com.  Very droll.    Your’re damn right I am.

Dear EVERYONE trying to sell a house without an ‘open floor plan’, island & huge kitchen right now.   I’m gonna put you on the prayer list.

Dear Builder who chose that icy pale blue tone for the entirety of that one house.  You know who you are. Is BLUE even relevant these days?  We had  Southwesterny corals and turquoises for the early 90′s which led to the Forest Green Craze of late 90′s which gave birth to Yellows with Reds (‘ The Tuscan McDonald’s look’, I call it.) But where does sea spray artic BLUE fit in????? Blue hasn’t been around since the 60′s when it cropped up with chamois-gold & avocado.  I guess someone used to have a crush on their robin’s egg blue refrigerator ….or the Smurfs?

Jill

Don’t pee on my leg and tell me it’s raining.

=

Don’t try and tell me your cornflower blue shoebox is the Taj Mahal.

Where have I been!?   Well planning 1002 things!    (… and a GIGANTIC Forever 21 opened in our mall)

Coming Soon:

* This website will soon be BRAND NEW!  A cleaner look and more  ’quick hits’.  LESS READING!  Okay, NOT less reading but I GET THAT staring down barrel of a 400 word essay can set off ADD feelings. Shoot, I can barely make it through a 3 minute YouTube video. And those are the ones with ME in them.  Tune in soon to get more NotSoSoccerMom-isms, Top Tens, Vlogs, Zumba chat, merchandise & special segments along with the BLOGS that made the NotSoSoccerMom a household name.  (what!? I say it around MY house ALL DAY.)

And

* A BRAND NEW RADIO SHOW!!!!

The NotSoSoccerMom solo show remains Toginet.com Online

Radio on Tuesday afternoons at 1pmEST.

Here’s THIS week’s show with Special Guest Co-Host Singer/ Actor/ Dancer Collin Marrero

Click Below Jill’s Tuesday show Co-Hosted by Collin Marrero with SPECIAL GUEST Melissa Gorga of REAL HOUSEWIVES OF NEW JERSEY:

Not So Soccer Mom Co-Host Collin Marrero & Guest MELISSA GORGA! var so = new SWFObject(‘/includes/jwplayer.swf’,'mpl’,’210′,’20′,’9′); so.addParam(‘allowscriptaccess’,'always’); so.addParam(‘allowfullscreen’,'true’); so.addParam(‘flashvars’,'&duration=3501&file=podcast_dump/notsosoccermom/NotSoSoccerMomLIVE_2011-05-31.mp3&frontcolor=548dba&backcolor=ffffff&lightcolor=45779e&screencolor=45779e&plugins=yourlytics-1&yourlytics.callback=http://toginet.com/includes/playerstatlogger.php’); so.write(‘flashPlayer4588′);

Coming FRIDAYS on Toginet.com:

A collaboration between Joshua Estrin of Popmuncher.com & me!  We’ll be bringing you a different spin on celebrity life/ pop culture trends & general fabulousness

Joshua Estrin, a regular on CNN, CNBC, E! XM and just about every other magazine imaginable. Writing about the world where entertainment, music, fashion and human behavior collide. He revels in the results, a delicious mix of chaos and mayhem. Wrap this all up in a “look ma’ no braces” package and the Little Engine that never shoulda’, coulda’, or woulda’ has formed strong friendships with a veritable Who’s Who of celebrities.