Pathetic?

Does blogging late on a Saturday night make me pathetic?

Maybe I have insomnia?

Maybe I napped too much today?

If I wasn't so dragged out, I'd have spent time writing a haiku about that. Okay, I'll try...

...thinking...

Quiet night others sleep
Lonely Baglady blogging
Tylenol P.M.

Okay, now that came out wrong, because I've only had a Tylenol P.M. twice, but I probably sound like someone addicted to soft-core sleeping pills :P.

Going to make an attempt to go to bed now!

Green Spider

Green Spider, originally uploaded by baglady.

This spider was balanced on a cable in my grandparent's garden. It was actually more transparent than green and about 1.5" long. Despite being afraid of spiders ;), I managed to stand under it long enough for a picture.

Lunar Surface?

Lunar Surface?, originally uploaded by baglady.

No, it's the chocolate lava cake that I baked tonight. I did something really crazy. I put in the cake right after realizing I needed it first for dinner. Cooking fish in the oven at the same time as baked goods is a BAD idea, as the milder thing can take on the stronger's odor. I covered the salmon tightly and the cake was covered tightly in it's water bath. Miraculously both turned out great.

Pearl Jam Poetry

So what if they're a macho bunch of guys. Some of the lyrics are quite poetic:

I know someday you'll have a beautiful life, I know you'll be a sun
In somebody else's sky, but why
Why, why can't it be, why can't it be mine

Chocolate Lava Cake

This is what we call the flourless "Chocolate Orbit Cake" in Room for Dessert. The first time I baked it, I neglected to cover it and it looked like a flattened volcano on top. It's actually really easy to make and only has four ingredients: bittersweet chocolate, butter, eggs and sugar. You need to have parchment paper. The nice thing is that it keeps for at least a week in the fridge, tasting as good as the first day.

Visiting Iceland

I've been semi-obsessed with visiting Iceland and Greenland lately. It looks really beautiful and calm. Everyone I've mentioned this to is baffled.

I was interested in Antarctica, but it sounds kind of dangerous.

More Detail

More Detail, originally uploaded by baglady.

You can see the water in this picture better. These flowers were a rare treat this late in the season, when most of the flowers are gone and it's looking more like Fall.

Purple Flowers

Purple Flowers, originally uploaded by baglady.

If you look closely, you can see small water droplets on the leaves.

Apples

apples.JPG, originally uploaded by baglady.

Apples from my grandmother's apple tree.

Web Between Rose Buds

Web, originally uploaded by baglady92093.

I'm sure I could say something about great symbolism, but that wasn't why I took the photo. Nor is it any cheesy illusion to the world wide web, ug. There is something so amazing about spiders and spiderwebs. See for yourself.

More Blossoms

blossoms.JPG, originally uploaded by baglady92093.

I took this on a recent trip to see my grandparents. They have the most amazing garden or rather series of different gardens.

Blossoms

japanese_friendship_garden.JPG, originally uploaded by baglady92093.

This photo was taken on a really quiet and great day I spent at Balboa Park. The tree looked nice from a distance, but completely different up close.

Macro

When I'm not baking, I really like taking photos. I really enjoy using my macro lens. It's cool when you can show something in a photo that looks completely different than when you see it in real life. I'm not being very eloquent, so I'll post some pictures that prove my point.

Poppyseeds & Possums

I settled on the Cook's Illustrated recipe for Lemon Poppyseed Muffins. As with everything else I've made in the cookbook, it was an awesome recipe. I made a fatal mistake and I'm pretty sure the poppyseeds were rancid :O. No one has gotten sick and the muffins tasted good, so I guess all's well that ends well. The batter was yummy enough to eat without baking it. Using mini-bundt cake pans is harder than it looks. I don't know how you get the muffins to sit flat without slicing off the bottom.

After the last batch came out of the oven, I found a possum in a tree near my front door. I tried to scare it away, but it was quite content to stay put - despite me yelling menacing things like "shoe!" (or is that "shew!" or "shoo") and swatting the tree with a broom. Now I know what that sound out my window has been and whose been leaving all those half-eaten berries on my doorstep. I don't like possums. They look like big rats.

Weirdest Sinatra Lyric

From "I Won't Dance":

Heaven help us
I'm not made of asbestos

Well, me neither!

More Quotes for Buzzy

This past week when I think of my grandpa, I think of the Alun Lewis poem "Goodbye":

And all the countless things I shall remember
Lay mummy-cloths of silence round my head

David Gray Lyrics

I just discovered David Gray. I love these lyrics:

This Year's Love

Easy Way to Cry (I'm not depressed from one night stands though ;), so except that part :P.

Lemon Poppyseed Muffins

I need to find the mother of all recipes for lemon poppyseed muffins. I'm trying to decide between:

Mark Bittman's variation of pound cake
Cook's Illustrated's variation of their master muffin recipe
or just Lemon Duncan Hines cake mix with poppyseeds added.

I have these cool mini-bundt pans that I can't wait to use.

Lasagna

Back to baking after a short hiatus. Was working on other compulsive projects. I made lasagna from scratch, but used a no boil noodle recipe. It was really stressful. I had all of these good ingredients and worried it would all be surrounded with hard, gross noodles.

Sonic Chill was on the radio and I heard some songs I hadn't heard since they first came out - They Might Be Giants and Cocteau Twins. I'd link, but they only keep playlists online for a week:

10pm Hour

Last Broadcast - Doves
Pepper Tree - Cocteau Twins
Opened Once - Jeff Buckley
Sascha - Jolie Holland
All That I Have - Grant Lee Buffalo
Orbit of Me - Delerium
Obscurity Knocks - Trash Can Sinatras
In My Room - Everything But The Girl
Biological - Air
Inhaler - Hooverphonic
Track 3 - Sigur Ros

11pm Hour

Distractions - Zero 7
Try Whistling This - Neil Finn
Honestly OK - Dido
Anniversary - The Cure
Lit Up - Lush
Sail to the Moon - Radiohead
Venus as a Boy - Bjork
Smokey - Red House Painters
We Are Mice - Azure Ray
Fearless - American Music Club


This is a really boring post. I feel better having admitted that.

Roasted Tomatoes

I made this great recipe from Real Simple. I'd never roasted tomatoes before. I was really worried about a dish that wanted me to roast tomatoes at 450 degrees for 40 mins. The whole dish was roasted tomatoes with shrimp and feta. It was really good.