Sassy Black Friend

Look Ma, a recipe!

We have a couple of people visiting for the Rally for Sanity, but I’m not feeling well so I decided to stay home. I figured they’d be tired and cold when they got back, so I made a big early dinner. I actually made the beef stew yesterday, but dessert is freshly baked. I actually wrote down the recipe I cobbled together, and you should try it because yum yum yum.

Apple and Pear Galette

Ingredients:
1 pie crust (make your own or use one of the refrigerated ones – they’re much better than the fronzen)
2 apples (peeled, cored and sliced 1/4 inch thick – I used one Fuji and one Granny Smith)
2 pears (peeled, cored and sliced 1/4 inch think – I used Barletts)
Juice and zest of 1 lemon
1 tbsp all purpose flour
1/4 cup brown sugar (light or dark)
2 tsp cinnamon (use less if it’s freshly grated)
1/2 tsp nutmeg
1/2 tsp ground ginger (not fresh)
2 tbsp unsalted butter (softened)
2 tbsp granulated sugar
1 egg (beaten with a splash of water) Read more »

Vote, y’all

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Sleep plans

Since my recent bout with insomnia, I’ve been obsessed with making my bedroom as inviting and comfortable as possible. When we moved in together the boyfriend and I bought a new, fancy orthopedic mattress. We have a couple of nice sets of sheets, and buy new pillows once a year.

The only thing that doesn’t encourage sleep in our room is something I have no control over – our neighbors. Our bedroom window points right at their backyard. Where they keep three dogs who are apparently nocturnal, but very upset about it. They start barking around 11:30, and don’t stop until 4 or 5 am. I know this because they usually wake me up a couple of times every night.

Last night was particularly bad. We’ve complained, to no avail. They just take them inside for a night or two, then back to the yard. At least the weather is getting colder.

Scaring myself to death

One of many bad habits I blame J for is my need to spend as much time as possible watching scary movies around Halloween. Unfortunately, unlike J, horror movies actually scare me. A lot. It’s embarrassing. We just watched The Strangers, and I’m seriously freaked out.

The boyfriend thinks this is hilarious, of course. He loves to watch me panic. But when I’m too scared (see now), he has to help talk me down. So we’ve been chatting about plans for my family’s Orlando vacations, Thanksgiving menu ideas, and whether or not to send the dog to obedience school.

Today in Crazy Land

Wow. I had a fantastic experience today. I was closing out my storage unit that I’ve had for about a year. I’ve become fond of the guy who runs the place, so I spent a few minutes with him after turning in the keys. He’s always been funny and nice, and more importantly, not even remotely insane. Until today.

We talked about the weather like always, and then he lets loose with these two nuggets of wacko wisdom. First he asks if I’ve noticed more jet trails in the sky recently. No, but that’s not something I pay attention to. He says that the increase is because the government is shooting chemicals out of planes into the atmosphere. For experimentation purposes I guess.

He said “they’re also setting off all kind of bombs on the moon, all the time now.” Er, not really. I assume he’s talking about this, not some band of pyromaniacs blowing up all the nothing on the moon.

So, apparently, these two things are causing the weird weather we’ve been having this week. I heard it was just a warm front, but what do I know.

Shoo!

I woke up this morning, went down to make coffee and discovered my dear sweet boyfriend typing away at the kitchen table – on my computer. Now, we have three and a half computers in the house. A laptop each, a desktop that we basically use as a file server/backup storage, and some pieces of an old computer that may or may not ever get put back together again.

So why was he using my computer to look at Ferrari parts at 7 am? Because he left his laptop upstairs and didn’t feel like going to get it. What a freak. I mean, how is walking up a flight of stairs too much work? Especially when he had to turn on my computer, remember my password and fiddle around with all my settings that he says are wrong? Weirdo. But at least he made the coffee.