You always need your mother

There are some things in life I still depend on my mother to do for me. Reassure me that I won't bleed to death even though she's 3,000 miles away and can't see the cut? Yup. Call and make me hair appointments? For sure. (To be fair, I see the same hairdresser as she does, and I can never find the number. Although, I'd still have her call if I had the number. Okay, I have no good excuse.) And when you need to make baked beans for a BBQ at a friend's house, clearly you must use your Aunt Linda's famous recipe. There is no other option. And so you call your mom so she can call your aunt. And then your mom can call you back and relay the recipe all cryptic-like. "To taste" may be the worst phrase in the history of recipe writing. Especially when the years-old, family-fabled recipe only involves a list of ingredients. How much of this? How much of that? "To taste." That is not how I cook, people. I like precision. I follow instructions extremely well. (When it comes to cooking, at least.)

Luckily, the beans turned out great despite this lack of guidance. Sure, they weren't as good as my Aunt Linda's version, but no one at that BBQ had ever tasted my Aunt Linda's beans. (Except J.R., and he knew not say something like, "These are good, Jen, but no where near your aunt's beans." He wants to live.)

And you wonder why I don't cook more often

I was making dinner last night (part of a healthy eating challenge to myself -- not eating out/getting take-out every night), and things were going swimmingly until I remembered I needed to chop up some cilantro to put in at the end of my yummy Mexicali pasta and beans. So, I whip out the cilantro and start chopping away, when wham! I hack off a bit of my finger. Okay, it was more like a gouge? I really don't know how to describe it -- not a cut that could be stitched, but still hurt and bled like a bitch.

Of course, J.R. wasn't home -- it was just me and Max, so I tried to get the bleeding under control before I called to the boy. "Max, can you help me?" Mumble. Shuffle. Snort. "I cut myself!" And then there was movement. And he got the band-aids and dug out the hydrogen peroxide (couldn't find the Neosporin), and then he tried to hand them off to me. And then I patiently explained with the blood and the pain and all, he was going to have to actually help me. Which he did, though he wasn't super-excited about the blood. Gingerly holding my bandaged finger, I then calmly turned off all the burners, made sure dinner was going to survive until J.R. got home, and called my mommy. And even though she was 3,000 miles away, she still made it all better.

The geek is everywhere

Last night, J.R. and I went to a Windows 7 launch party. Now, to be fair, it was a party mocking the notion of a Windows 7 launch party, but still. I did make out with some swag (I'll be the chick at the grocery store loading my veggies into a Win7 bag), and we had a hilarious time watching Hitler's reaction to the idea. It turns out, whilst innocently making old-fashioned gingerbread to bring to the party, I discovered that what I was actually making was a Windows 7 launch cake. I'm telling you, people, if I had had some frosting in the house, I could have made something truly special. Alas, I did not, so I went with a powered sugar sprinkle on top, which I think looks classy, don't you?

Would you say that was doubled?

I made my very first yeast bread yesterday -- a delicious milk bread from the Joy of Cooking. Making bread is work, people. There's mixing and kneading and rising, and then there's punching, which was kind of my favorite part (except for the eating). I was so ridiculously proud of myself afterward, it was a little sad. Not as sad as how proud I get of my XBox achievements, but sad nonetheless. Bygones. The point is, I'm turning into Betty freakin' Crocker over here. Something must be done. Right after I make a cinnamon raisin bread next weekend.

Picky, picky, picky

I really need to go to the grocery store. I came home from work tonight, decided I needed to, I don't know, eat dinner, and looked in the cupboard. Yeah, it was bare, baby. Luckily, I had tuna on hand so I could make a sandwich. Problem 1: I had no bread. As chance would have it, I had buns from when I was going to make hamburgers, but didn't. Okay, problem 2: I had a teaspoon of Miracle Whip left. Before you go off on how disgusting Miracle Whip is, I will remind you that I'm from Ohio. This shit is haute cuisine to us. Plus, I don't like the taste of real mayonnaise. It's too...eggy. I had to use 2/3 real mayo to make up the difference. The sandwich was surprisingly good. But that may be attributed to the fact that I was a little hungry. Dinner at 10 pm will do that to you.

Second picky thing: Leigh's blog is getting as much traffic as I am. Not that I'm bitter.

Third picky thing: F'ing new Blogger appears to be giving the shaft to Mac users. Now, I'm used to this in general, but I resent using the "LoFi" version of anything 'cause y'all like MicrokissmyassSoft. Maybe I'm reading the release notes wrong. I don't like being mad at Blogger. I've gotten to like them in the last few months.

Fourth and final thing: I'm watching Catch Me If You Can tonight, and I'm really enjoying the extended opening credits. They're very cool -- very sixties, very smooth. At the same time I'm appreciating this old school methodology, I'm thinking, "Start the movie already!"

What can I say? I'm one impatient bitch.

The Vegan Challenge
So, it's Stone's birthday today, and he's a vegan. Which is cool for him and (it turns out) for me, because it presents me with The Vegan Challenge. AKA, how to make a birthday cake with no eggs, milk, or butter. Luckily, I have a vegetarian roommate who owns the Moosewood. I made their deep chocolate vegan cake, and it was yummy.

In fact, I just finished my second piece of it. Vegan cake is officially a good time.