Toilet Fudge

I travel a lot, and I like to cook. For several years, with the living-in-hotel-rooms component of my job, i had limited opportunities to cook. So, whenever I went home, back to MN for Christmas, I was very excited to do some holiday cooking.

I was at my sister's apartment, just a couple days before the holiday, and we really wanted to make some fudge. We had a recipe, which has produced some great confections in the past, but what we didn't have was an appropriately stocked kitchen. My sister has never been one for cooking and had just done an apartment purge. No double-boiler, to be sure, but really, she had almost nothing to cook with. There was one large glass kettle and her fondue pot.

I try to be industrious. I thought, really, what's the difference between a double-boiler and a small kettle, boiling in a larger one? My sister was in the other room, and i wanted to be creative. And more importantly, I wanted some fudge.  So, I started the water to boil in the big glass kettle and put all the fudge-fixin's in the fondue pot. I set the fondue pot on the ledge of the boiler, stirring the chocolate chips and marshmallows, waiting patiently for the melting to begin. It had just started to look like a pre-fudgey liquid and then the fondue pot fell into the boiling water. "Whoops," I said. This was my sister's first clue that i was doing anything unusual in her kitchen. I didn't elaborate.

It didn't just fall into the water, it promptly sunk to the bottom of the lake. The fudge was ruined, and all our ingredients were used up.  Merde! I was also embarrassed. I fancy myself quite the domestic goddess, so I was ashamed at how horribly awry this experiment had gone. I couldn't just throw the mess away; she'd see that.  A garbage disposal would have been an easy way to dispose of my dirty little secret; but this apartment was ill-equipped. Ugh, what other option did I have?

Yeah, I walked the kettle of hot liquid into the bathroom. When things go amuck, what better place to dispose of food that you can't eat than down the loo, right? Its usually the best course of action . . . but I forgot one tiny little detail. Hot marshmallows, cold, cold water. Marshmallows congeal. Who knew?  So, I had to clean it out and come clean.  Ugh.

So, yeah, failed kitchen experiment. Its important to share your failures, right? So, no fudge for us that day. Or, since, for me. Maybe I should remedy that this weekend.

Pet Peeves

Let's start with the big one; I hate that this is late. I am trying to become more consistent and here we are, 1 week in and I miss a blog. But, to be fair, I wasn't feeling well last night and rather than write, I took some Advil PM and went off to a blissful slumber.

Second, I was going to write about how people react to celebrity deaths, with the breaking news that Paul Walker died and how many people are boo-hooing it on FB. Seriously, you didn't know him, Get over it. Oh, wait . . . you did know him? Then and only then can you have my condolences. I'm sure you'll miss his ever-present talent or whatever. Couldn't act his way out of a wet paper bag, but a fiery car crash isn't something i'd wish on anyone. And I feel bad for his daughter who has to spend the rest of her life, sans father. But, this happens every time a celebrity dies. You didn't know them, make your meme and move on.

OK, now for the real list of pet peeves. I have things that annoy me, to be sure. But not many of them bother me so much that I can extemporize about them. Took me a little while to create a list

, but here goes:

1.

2. Why are all the tastiest food so hard to work with?  Lookin' at you, Pomegranate, butternut squash and pineapple. Surely, I could buy them pre-peeled and shucked, but what's the point of that? it usually costs twice as much for the convenience, and frankly, no convenience is worth that. 

3. People who shout at me when I am following the bicycle laws; and the people who don't follow them. I'm in the bike lane, this is where I am supposed to be. See that over there? It's called a sideWALK not a sideBIKE. So, no, I should not be biking on it. And neither should anyone else. So, instead of shouting at me to get off the road, when I am exactly where I am supposed to be, kindly cram it!

4. People who don't accept the right of way. If you are supposed to go, go. Don't wait for me to cross in front of you. I've already stopped moving and it takes a lot of energy to get started again. I was looking at this street crossing or red light as a much needed reprieve from moving, but when you stop in the middle of the intersection, waiting for me to go, you just took that reprieve away from me. And annoyed all the drivers behind you. And all those people are going to give me the death stare, as if I asked you to wait for me to go. I did not, people behind Skippy McDumbass who can't accept his right of way. I was waiting for my very own right of way. Its how I roll.

5. My fingernails grow straight, I want them to curve. And I have this deep wrinkle that goes all the way across my forehead. It sits right where my helmets sit, so I think it looks as if I wore my helmet too tight. And its always there. I'm obsessed with it. It's not these imperfections that pet-peeve me, its that I worry about them. I want to be one of those people who celebrates imperfections as marks of uniqueness. Imperfections are beautiful, sure and I try to think that, when it comes to other people. But then I become obsessed with this forehead wrinkle or my straight nails or my excess facial hair and I am forced to face the fact that I am just as superficial as everyone else. Everyone is a little more concerned about the look of things than they want to admit. And I hate that. Time for some personal growth, I guess.