Corner of Bourbon & Division

For the record, coffee does NOT do to me what is has done to the cat in the icon. I often wish it did, because I feel like I'd be a lot more productive.

First off, in baking news, pdaughter made Valentine's cupcakes for her French class. We also got cupcakes. Look at this image and tell me you are not jealous. Yes, the chocolate heart is made by hand too, because she's just that awesome.



( More Valentine's Day stuff under the cut )

I was going to try my hand at granola bars today, thinking I had all the ingredients, and wouldn't that make a great snack for climbing a mountain? Except, looking through my pantry, I have no oats, and I am not sure about using oatmeal as a substitute —I'm worried about texture and consistency, and today doesn't seem right for experimentation. Sparing myself unnecessary stress is the name of the game, so no granola bars. I am disappointed. I also can't think where I would get just plain oats in this city that's so fond of processed foods.

The banana bread is in the oven, and the silver lining is that I now have time to go poke at the garden and see if any of the tomatoes have ripened. I am experimenting with the banana bread, and have put some of the mixture in a bundt pan, to see if it'll come out well that way. I will have to keep an eye on it to make sure I don't overcook it, but otherwise I can't see that it'll make a huge difference.

Then I have to dig out bedding for the guests tonight, put the beds together, and after that with any luck I'll be golden.

Now if only I had awoken at the time I'd wanted to, I might not be feeling quite as rushed.

I don't know why vacation time goes by so fast. It feels like it was Monday morning yesterday.

I am running late this morning. I am scheduled for a writing jam/hanging out session with toughlovemuse and owldaughter at 10:30, and I only just got my muffins in the oven, and I'm not even dressed or organized yet. Lucky for me, toughlovemuse is giving me a lift, otherwise I'd be in serious trouble.

:::ETA:::

Forgot to post this. Muffins are done, I am dressed, and it's 09:37. Not too bad. I'm not completely ready, but I should be ready in time, barring the unforeseen.

Today is shaping up to be another really good day. :)

I haven't had the time or energy to cook lately. I think I may remedy this next week, since I'll be working nights. That means I'll have some time in the evenings to do a bit of cooking. I might even bake, while the weather is still cool enough...

I've been too busy to post. I keep telling myself that I should write posts in here that aren't "here's what I did while I wasn't posting" entries, but I never seem to get around to writing those meaningful, insightful entries. I rather think that I don't have any to write. I've lost the knack of writing analytical text ever since I left university. Besides, I don't know that I'd want to inflict my essay-writing skills on my beleaguered flist, as I seem to recall that I bored myself silly with my own academic writing. I remembered wondering who would ever want to read such dry stuff as I was able to produce. It's not that it wasn't good —it was just really, really dry going.

Anyway, I've had a busy couple of weeks.
I saw an old friend of mine from high school last Saturday, although we didn't have much time to actually catch up as he had to go back to his office right after lunch (he's a lawyer). We did have a nice chat, and wandered through Atwater Market before he had to go, and it was really nice to see him again. Of all my friends in high school (of which there admittedly weren't many), he was the one with whom I got along the best. We're supposed to meet up again at some point in the near future, which ought to be nice. After that I got treated to a lovely private concert in the living room of some family friends, and spent the afternoon and better part of the evening making slightly awkward small talk with three roomfuls of people I didn't know and with whom I had nothing in common. Still, the concert was quite nice. The violinist was a young man, somewhere between nineteen and twenty-one, and he's quite promising. His playing was very adept, although it lacked depth and intonation, but with time I'm guessing he'll turn out quite well.

Sunday was spent hiding from the world recovering from that stupid migraine which started late on Saturday. Annoying in the extreme, as it was a gorgeous day out.

Monday was a writing jam with owldaughter, in which I got more writing done in one morning than I had in the past four weeks combined. I'm finally getting back into my ongoing YA novel, and I'd like to have it finished by the end of the year. I might "cheat" and make finishing it my NaNoWriMo project for this year. Either that or I'll write another horror novel, since they appear to write themselves for me.

I forget what I did on Tuesday, but I do remember that I had to be out of the house stupidly early to do it. That's probably why I don't remember: I was still half-asleep. ;)

I met up with ai731 on Wednesday morning, and she taught me the mysteries of canning. It's a really fun process, I assume more fun because there were two of us. We went through about three-quarters of the 20lb bag of apples I'd picked, and made apple sauce, apple butter (so very yummmy!) and an apple cake based on her grandmother's recipe, which was so very very delicious that I brought it to work with me so that I wouldn't be tempted to eat the entire thing by myself. I brought half to work, and ai731 kept the other half, naturally. I had to abandon ship just before the end of the session, as I had to go to work, and I just received the last three jars of apple sauce last night. I am very pleased with how the whole thing turned out.

Thursday was spent driving my mother around so she could get some errands done without spending the whole day doing it. Since she doesn't drive, and generally gets around pretty slowly anyway, it's easier for her if I occasionally spend a morning driving her around, and I don't mind doing it in the slightest. I tend to lose my mind if I spend too much time with my parents, but a couple of times a week is enough for me to keep my sanity.

Friday's Ubisoft lunch got canceled for me due to the (not unexpected) passing of my great-aunt Margot at the age of 93. I have very fond memories of her, and of going to her apartment in the Linton for a New Year's Day luncheon every year until I was about eight or nine. After that she moved to a smaller place (I believe it was a residence for relatively independent retired folk who only needed minimal amounts of help to get through the day), and she became a little too frail to be able to put on the spread she really wanted to. None of her three daughters ever kept up with the tradition, and so I sort of lost track of her for a while. We still saw her at the larger family gatherings, but it wasn't really the same.

The funeral itself was interrupted when my cousin Ophelie (the youngest of all the cousins, and one of the two cousins near my age with whom I actually keep up and get along) suffered some kind of seizure or syncope in the middle of the service. She was sitting right next to my father, and the next thing we knew she had turned a horrid shade of green, her eyes rolled back in her head, and she slumped forward. Luckily my aunt (not Ophelie's mother, but another aunt) is a nurse and took over immediately. I was rather grateful not to have to step in and apply my limited first aid skills to the situation. Someone produced a cell phone (a blackberry, I think) and called 911. I spent most of the time keeping people from crowding around, and reassuring people that no, it wasn't taking as long as they thought for the ambulance to get there. I timed it, see, and it took nine minutes from the moment the call was placed to the time the paramedics got there. In times of crisis, people's perception of how quickly time elapses gets seriously distorted.

My mother spoke to my cousin yesterday, as well as my aunt. Ophelie is doing okay, as it turns out, but she's going to have to see a neurologist, as her symptoms were quite alarming (swelling in the throat, stiffening of the extremities, extremely elevated heartrate, etc.). My mother, in true keeping with her nature, has invited her to dinner next Sunday.

After the funeral I took my mother to Juliette & Chocolat for lunch. Egads, it should be illegal to make chocolate that good. I have rarely had anything quite that sinful. I must go back.

Yesterday I got shanghaied by my parents into helping them shop for appliances. God help me. The less said about that, the better. The day improved immeasurably by the time I got to luvenditti's for dinner, and had a wonderful time with all my friends, chatting about movies and books and games and food and all the usual things we end up talking about at these events. I borrowed the movie "Clue" and watched it last night: it's a great deal of fun.

All right, the rest of my day beckons. More updates when I have something to say. ;)

This whole getting-up-really-early thing is starting to wear on me a bit. The excitement of the first week has worn off, and so now I have in front of me a slightly uphill slog to get used to getting up at Oh-My-God!o'clock.

Today wasn't so bad. Set the alarm for 5am and managed to haul myself out of bed at 5:20.

I made bran muffins. They are in the oven now. I'm following karine's recipe, but I realised a little too late that I have no baking powder, so I'm hoping they'll still turn out okay.

Thank goodness for the fact that ashforestwalker is giving me a lift to work today. Otherwise, there would be no muffins and I would as of right now be running exceedingly late. If I'm taking the bus to work then I have to be outta here by 6:20 at the very latest. As it is, when I get a lift, I can laze around for a whole extra 40 minutes. Long enough, in fact, to make muffins.

Okay. I have to go prepare my sandwich and finish getting dressed. Oh, and take my vitamins. I forgot yesterday.

Have a good one, folks!