Happy Fathers Day

If my daddy was here, I'd tell him how much I love him, and thank him for everything he did for me.

My dad not only brought me into the world and gave me a home, he took care of me, gave me everything a little girl could want and always wanted the best for me. My dad was a great example of committment to promises, of hard work and of taking care of people.

If you still have your daddy around, be sure to love him today and let him know what you appreciate about him.

Happy Fathers Day, daddy.

I miss you every single day.

To my Mommy

Dear Mommy: We never went a week -- hardly ever went even a few days -- without talking, and now here it is, four years since I've heard your voice and your laugh, or seen your smile, even the tired one.

Except in my dreams.

So much has happened that I want to tell you about. I still think, all the time, I need to call mom. But you probably already know what's been going on, right?

Maybe from where you are you can see everything. That's what I hope, anyway.

I wish I could give you these flowers, but this will have to do.

I love you, Mommy.

Snow day!

Snow! We got snow at the beach! Of course, it's almost all melted off now, but it was gorgeous to watch it fall last night, the big, wet flakes.

It was a perfect day for it, too. I'm actually really beginning to feel better, except I still have this awful cough -- I've now coughed so hard I sprung a rib yesterday, and cannot bend or stretch or really do much with my right side. In fact, I've been coughing so hard my entire torso hurts. My left side hurt so much yesterday I wondered if it was my heart, but no. It's just muscle pain and the screwed up rib, which I heard/felt pop yesterday as I was standing at the sink, coughing.

But I managed to make some delicious "Chocolate Puddle" cookies yesterday, and Jen and I ate snacks and watched the Olympic opening ceremonies last night.

I thought about making orange slice cookies, which were one of my mom's great treats, in honor of my brother's birthday today. He would have been 57 today.

But he liked all kinds of cookies, and was a really good baker, so I feel like he would have appreciated these.

Want to try? They are easy. You don't even need a mixer -- just a big bowl and a wooden spoon. Here's the recipe:

2 cups chopped pecans (or any nuts you like)toasted and cooled completely
4 cups confectioners sugar
1/2 tsp fine grain sea salt
1/2 cup plus 3 TBSP. good quality unsweetened cocoa powder
4 egg whites, slightly beaten
1 TBSP real vanilla extract

Preheat the oven to 320 degrees, and place the racks in the top and bottom thirds of the oven.

Line two cookie sheets with parchment paper.

Sift together the sugar, cocoa and salt. Stir in the nuts. Stir in the egg whites and the vanilla. Mix until it forms a thick batter and all the sugar and cocoa is incorporated.

Spoon dough mounds onto the cookie sheets, about 2 TBSP each. Make sure there's plenty of room between the mounds -- don't try to fit more than 6 per cookie sheet -- because they spread.

Bake 12-15 minutes, until the tops of the cookies are shiny and somewhat cracked.

Carefully slide the parchment paper onto a cookie rack so the cookies can cool on it. The cookies are very fragile until cooled, so keeping them on the paper helps.

The finished cookies are delicious -- meringues meet brownies. The outsides are crispy and chewy at the same time, and the middles are soft and chewy like brownies.

Buon appetito, and happy birthday Drew. I miss you.

Seven days and counting

Still sick. Wish I had somethng substantial to say, but even if I did, it would be supplanted by coughing fits.

Hope everyone is well and avoiding the South Carolina Death Flu-Pneumonia.

Cheap Trick cures a bronchial infection...

... at least for a couple of hours.

I am sick as a dog, but my voice held out long enough to vocally show my appreciation for my favorite band, which still rocks hard after all these years.

They opened with "Way of the World," which I have never, in all my 43 shows, seen them perform live until tonight. They played "Heaven Tonight," which is a rarity, and "Baby Loves to Rock," also not usually on the set list. They looked great, sounded great and seemed like they were super energized.

It was truly an awesome, awesome show.

But it's freezing outside, and I'm freezing inside -- like to my bones -- and need some hot tea and cold meds.

Where, exactly, is that?

Usually I hate typoes, but once in a while, they are kind of funny. Oh sure, people always chuckle when someone leaves the "l" out of public or the "o" out of county, but those are pretty common.

Today's might have been the writer's opinion coming through subconsciously.

In a story about an Army unit learning about helping in Haiti after having been at war, the reporter wrote that the unit had been "in Iraq and Afghanisatan."

More flowers needed

For my Uncle Doug, who, I just learned, died a day ago. He was my dad's second cousin and a dear, sweet man who always treated me like his own daughter.

I'm sure he's with Aunt Clarice and Wendy now, and that would make him happy.

Happy birthday, Daddy

My dad loved the beautiful protea my brother raised in Hawaii, and today, Hawaii seems very far away because it's so cold and rainy here, so I thought it would be nice to remember the flowers and the warm Hawaiian breezes.

Today is my dad's 87th birthday. Not a day goes by that I don't think about him and my mom and wish they were still here.

But I hope my dad is surrounded by the flowers he loved, somewhere where he can work in a garden and watch things grow.

Happy birthday, Daddy!

Unfathomable

Haiti says it has recovered 72,000 bodies, post-earthquake, and estimates 200,000 people have died.

Can you even grasp 72,000 bodies? Or 200,000? I cannot.

If someone made a chart showing the amount of devastation, the amount of aid needed, it still wouldn't make sense to me. And there's no visual that can help us understand the limitless grief in Haiti now.

Oh, man...

When your vegetarian roommate calls and says your bedroom smells like beef, you know something has gone terribly wrong at home.

But this is reason the first why I love my roommate Claudia: She is OK with cleaning up hideous messes.

I will forego relating the exact ircumstances that led up to her having to clean up several mounds of cat vomit this evening. Suffice it to say Lucy the Shit-Snacker was involved, and the evening's tension apparently made my little Vivian feel she needed to gobble up every bit of dinner she could fit down her gullet.

A stress eater, just like her mama.

The additional stress, or perhaps the horfing of Friskies Beef and Gravy led to some insta-vomit -- in my bedroom, of course. Under the bed, at the foot of the bed and, oh joy, on my sweat pants.

Claudia called me at work to let me know that when I get home, I will find my window open and the fan on.

If I ever have to get rid of a body, Claudia will be first on my list of people to call.

Feeling frustrated

OK, yes, I know I'm 45, not 15, and yes, I know it's just a game, but there's another Team Trivia league team I am dying to beat because they are so rude and condescending.

Every week they beat us by one or two points, and I just want to kick their chairs out from underneath them.

Or something.

Also, I'm frustrated because my little cat just does not like me.

Vivian was my girl until I brought Lola home. Now, she wants everyone except me to pet her and hold her.

Tonight, I gave her a few licks of cherry ice cream, which she loves, and she tried to bite me when I picked her up.

I'm doing something wrong, I guess.

And I have a headache.

Just grumpy I guess. I'll be happier tomorrow.

Right?

Everyone's got their favorite snack

Jen's dog has a habit that I've only ever heard of, never lived with.

Lucy likes to eat some cat poop. With the crunchy litter coating.

She went into the cats' room tonight when we were at trivia and ate up the leftover cat food and had a little after-dinner poop snack.

Now, I don't get that, but equally as puzzling, Vivian decided she wanted to carry a pack of sewing needles around in her mouth.

Can't we all just make some popcorn and call it a day?

Heartbreak Hotel

My house has officially become Heartbreak Hotel.

We are a horrible, beach-read, chick-lit novel waiting to happen.

Jen moved in last weekend after a bad breakup, Claudia broke up with her b/f last fall, and I'm perpetually broken-hearted. Add to that my two girl kitties and Jen's Lucy the formerly abused dog, and you have the makings of an estrogen overload.

The most testosterone we get around here is when the hot pizza guy brings dinner.

A new start for 2010

Everyone makes New Year's resolutions, but I've decided to make lists instead.

I'm working on a list of things I want to let go of, and another list of things I want to bring into my life.

On that second list is "more personal writing."

And I remembered, "Oh yeah, I have a blog -- which I have utterly neglected for several months now."

So I'm going to begin again.

This is my first post for the new year. I hope 2010 is happy and healthy for everyone. It's got to be better than 2009, right?

Mine will start off right with a long weekend in Boston at the end of this month, including my first Cheap Trick show in more than four years.

It's time to get back to doing things I used to enjoy and see if I still enjoy them. If not, OK, but I am going to find things to be joyous about this year.

For the two weeks before a show, I listen to almost no other music than Cheap Trick -- don't know why, but I've done it for years now. It just gets me hyped up. Or at least it used to.

The pre-show ritual begins tomorrow. I've already decided what the selection of the day will be -- the newest live album, CT doing the Sgt. Peppers album. It's so good that I almost can't wait until tomorrow.

The CT show will be fun, but so will staying at Kevin and Dan's and hanging out with Felix the cat, playing Wii, going to see the science of Harry Potter exhibit and getting to see Kev and Dan when they return from their cruise.