Big Catch-up Post Part 1

I've been absent for a while. After Thanksgiving, my family and I went to Belize for 10 days. It was glorious except for one tiny horrible thing that happened the first day, the day we arrived, but that's being taken care of soon enough. But now I'm back. And I'm still unemployed. And things don't look too good on the job hunt but there are more important things to talk about.

Part I of this big catch up blog is about BREAD.

While I was in Belize, a crazy part of my brain decided that I should try to make bread there. Why not? Right? The weather is perfect for proofing (89 degrees in the shade). They have yeast there. I have nothing but time to wait for the flour to rise. Somehow, when I was waxing laconic about the beauties of baking fresh bread on a tropical island, I completely forgot about the part where I have to turn on the oven to 450 degrees and then bake it for an hour. That's two hours minimum of 450 degree heat added to the already pretty hot weather.

I went to the local Super Buy and got a bag of flour. It was "bulk" flour weighted out into smaller packets. Imported, pre-packaged stuff is expensive so this was a very affordable option. However, the bag stated the brand and the weight/price. It didn't state whether it was corn flour (??) or regular flour. This is a problem because on the island of Ambergris Caye, corn flour is used a lot. The pupusas are made of flour, tortillas are made of corn flour (as well as wheat), but to my inexperienced, slanty Asian eyes, I could not tell the difference. Oh well. What could go wrong?

I got some packets of yeast. The ingredients are ridiculously simple: flour, salt, yeast, water. The first attempt with the packet of yeast did not go quite as expected. It turned out like it had in the past, where I FORGOT TO ACTIVATE the yeast. There are so many different types of yeast now! Even among the familiar American brands: Active, rapid rise, bread machine, etc. The most simple recipe calls for mixing all the dry ingredients, then adding the warmed water, stirring it, then letting it proof for a while. DO NOT TRY THIS with unfamiliar yeast. Because, this is what I did. And the thing DID NOT RISE. It's ok. The bread turned out to be this kind of nice, dense, flat bread with a crispy crust. It smelled artisan and was much better than the bread on the island. Except creole bread, but that comes later. Creole Bread is so so YUM.

The second attempt at bread went more smoothly. First, I got a measuring cup of warm water. Remember, if you can't stick your hand in it without grimacing from the heat, the yeast won't like it either. If you wouldn't bathe a baby in it, don't activate your yeast in it. (I've got to come up with something more catchy). I sprinkled the yeast over the top to dissolve. Again, I was too lazy to really wait for it to "prove" to me that it was still alive by bubbling. Tropical weather makes anyone lazy. But, one thing to look for when "activating" yeast is the smell. After the yeast is sprinkled on top (sprinkled, dumped, casually tossed, it's all the same!), it should smell like a freshly cracked baguette, steaming hot out of the oven.

The rest of the recipe is the same. Mix. Let it sit. Let it rise. There will be gases that build up. So if your mixing bowl has a lid (like the one I used while on vacation), it may POP towards the end of the 1st hour of proofing and scare your mother who is fiddling around in the kitchen, cutting up pineapples and papaya. In that case, assure her that it was just the bread dough. Keep calm, and carry on vacationing.

The second batch of dough proofed nicely, but there was not as much oven rise. It might have been because the dough was too wet. I didn't have a measuring cup so I did everything by eyeball. It turned out to be a dense, flat bread that spread to all corners of the baking tray. But still tasty.

What I learned from trying to bake bread in Belize: Bread flour is really important. The dough just didn't have the same consistency when I was mixing it. It continued to stay pretty sticky and wet. It never developed the gluten veil that I've learned to look for. The ball of dough also kept spreading out like goo. This could have been because I used too much water. And I didn't end up using the last packet of yeast because the thought of turning on the oven again was too much.

Baking since I've been back from Belize.

Since I've been back, I have made 4 batches of dough (and 1 batch of vanilla cupcakes). I know, I get around when it comes to baking. First batch I made at my parents house with bread flour from Costco that comes in a 50 lbs bag. I don't remember the name but it is not a designer flour. Second batch was made at Rob's house with King Arthur brand bread flour. Third batch was made at Pearl's house with Gold Medal Flour's Better for Bread flour. Fourth batch was made at Rob's house again with King Arthur bread flour.

The first batch is still sitting in the ice box at home. I drizzled a bit of extra virgin olive oil on top for flavor. I also used fresh cake yeast. A lot of fresh cake yeast. I had bought 3 of them before going on vacation. They needed to be used. Thus, I read somewhere that cake flour = 3x granular yeast. Somehow, I translated this into using all 3 cakes in a 6 cup flour batch of bread. In hindsight, this might have been a bit excessive. After all, the "thing" I "read" somewhere was referring to converting the weight of yeast for cake to granular. Not necessarily the amount needed to replace the rising power of yeast. So I have an over-yeasty-excited batch of dough. It's not a big deal. I can split it up in to smaller batches and use it as a starter for about 5x the dough. I'm not concerned. The dough proofed beautifully, nearly busting out of its container.

Second batch was baked the very same day it was make. I used nearly 2 cups of water with much more than 3 cups of bread flour. Unfortunately I don't know the exact measurements because I was looking for a specific texture. This dough turned out beautifully. It was perfect. It was elastic, stretchy, not sticky. The flavor was wonderful. It had large, beautiful holes inside like artisan bread should. I also baked it slightly differently. I didn't use the steam pan. Instead I misted the top of the dough before putting it in the oven. I also put it on the lower rack of the oven rather than the top-middle rack. This change resulted in great oven rise. Some of the best oven rise I've gotten. Rob's oven is not convection. It seems to work better. I don't know why I got caught up in the convection hype but it is not worth it when it comes to baking bread and cupcakes. According to a bread baking book, the ideal situation is to put the dough on the lower rack for the first 15 mins for that oven rise, then to move it to the top rack for a crisp crust. I forgot about that second step so this bread spent its entire life on the bottom rack. This resulted in a slightly, slightly burnt bottom crust. Only slightly. And now I know not to keep it on the bottom rack. We put some sliced onions and ground up dried rosemary on the dough before baking it. It smelled like foccaccia. Yum. And then halfway through baking, when I should have moved the dough to the top half of the oven, I sprinkled some grated emmental and greyeur cheese on top. So delicious. We had it for dinner with some ridiculous Toscano Framani salami ($27.95 per pound! How is that possible?), some more greyuer cheese, late season tomatoes from my garden. I supplemented with some greek yogurt and salsa. I know it's a strange combination. But it's really nutritious, doesn't taste too terrible, and has helped me lose about 35 lbs. Of course, this high protein diet could secretly be growing kidney stones in my body, but so far, so good. I'm happy with losing weight.

Third batch of dough was made at Pearl's house. I made a sort of big fat mess in her kitchen because I accidentally ripped the paper bag of Gold Medal Better for Bread Flour. Not entirely ripped apart, but near the top, there is now an inconvenient hole. Pearl has the most darling measuring spoons. They are black ceramic and shaped like a cat's face. Knowing me, I would break the ceramic immediately by accident. But they were nice to use. I also used her orange colored Kitchenaid Mixer. It was not as big as mine. It has the flip up head and the screw on base. Typically, I'm not really fond of using the mixer for bread. The mixer tends to do things too uniformly and makes recognizing texture difficult. But in this case, we used the really slow "stir" setting and kept stopping it to touch the dough. The "stir" setting is suppose to be used for gentle incorporation, to prevent flour and ingredients from flying out of the bowl. Strangely enough, the "stir" setting kept throwing flour out of the bowl. Violently. And surprisingly. Every few revolutions, it would just toss out some flour. Willy-nilly.

After the dough reached the correct texture (about 4 cups of flour to nearly 2 cups of warm water and 2 tsp of salt), I wrapped it in a plastic bag and put a sweatshirt over it. I set the bowl over their counter top wine chiller where the hum of the electric motor made it a cozy and warm. Unfortunately I had to leave and pick Rob up from work so I was unable to finish this. I left instructions with Pearl on how to bake the bread. Olive oil imparts such a nice flavor. She told me that this nice quality brand of olive oil was on sale at Safeway. I'll have to go take a look soon.

The third batch of dough was just completed about 30 mins ago. Because it's been really cold in San Francisco, I turned on the broiler for a few minutes while mixing the dough. Then, after wrapping the mixing bowl in a plastic bag and towels, I put it into the still warm oven that was now turned off. We will see how this batch comes out. It looks promising because the texture was completely correct. However, I did use a different type of yeast. When will I learn to stay consistent with something that is not broken? Sigh. This is rapid rise yeast and is suppose to work where all the dry ingredients are mixed, then the warm wet ingredients are added. I just couldn't resist fiddling with the yeast! There were these three sad little packets sitting in the fridge, just saying "please don't neglect us!" So I used on. One packet is nearly a tablespoon. And that is close enough for science.

When I want to be really precise, such as baking cakes, I do weigh my ingredients. I will dust off the balance (not just a scale, but a balance!), calculate the conversions of volume to weight, and then weigh it out. This is likely the reason my cakes turn out much more reliable than my bread. Cake failures are much more catastrophic and disgusting than bread failures. Rob will nearly always eat bread. But no one wants to eat bitter cupcakes. That only happened once.

And this concludes Part I of the catchup post that covers my exciting experience with bread. I don't know why I get so excited about baking. It really gives me a warm fuzzy feeling when I see the dough rise, and then the bread baking and rising more. I will post pictures. I just need to get in sync with my camera. My camera and I, we used to be like this (cross fingers). But now, we are more like orbiting planets around the sun.

Happy Sunday Football!

Morning After

It turns out that while I dislike holidays that are centered around food and food consumption, I really really like gravy. And when I don't get my promised gallon of brown goo, I feel incomplete.

Yesterday, Thanksgiving, the BF fell ill. Two nights before, when we were at my parents house for a small pre-thanksgiving Japanese feast of wild mushroom miso soup, sashimi hand rolls and rib eye, the BF was sneezing and dripping. He blamed my cat of course. But it was not her. She hadn't been anywhere near his nose. I didn't want to say, "maybe you should put on a sweatshirt since you are wearing only a t-shirt." He is the type to cut off his nose to spite his face. I realize this. And if I were clever enough, I could get it to work for me, rather than against me. I need to reverse psyche him somehow.

Right, yesterday, the BF sniffled, dripped and sneezed his way through the morning while I did my prep for the two dips and home made crusty bread. I was going to make a spinach and artichoke dip, then a hot crab dip. Oh, the joys of lump crab and cream cheese. The joy of which I have been denied. I have a whole pound of lump crab. The BF doesn't eat crab. I am not going to make a whole pound of crab dip to be eaten by myself. Well. I could. I have some nice Cambazola cheese in the fridge, with some crusty bread. It could be very nice. But if I ate all of that, I would die of over-stuff-ness. I would literally go blind from the happiness of eating a pound of lump crab. Only kings and emperors get to eat pounds of deshelled lump crab. And I am no king. Right around noon, the BF pulls the plug on our Thanksgiving plans. He calls up our friends and tells them we can't make it. No turkey. No mashed potatoes. NO GRAVY. Did you hear me? I said I don't get any gravy! All year long, I look forward to this stupid holiday so I can pour gravy over every thing on my plate. And this year, it's been pulled out from underneath my feet. I managed to pull together a spinach stuffed chicken breast with roasted oyster mushrooms, spinach stuffed mushrooms, and some wild mushroom ravioli made from scratch! No crab though. And no gravy. It was a mushroom themed mini thanksgiving. Which we ate while watching the pathetic sf v. baltimore game. LAME LAME LAME.

This morning, I wake up at 7am and get my jeans on. I hustle slowly down to Clement street to buy some gnarled ginger roots. My father and mother told me of an old wives remedy for the BF's cold. I have to hammer the gnarled ginger, simmer on low for an hour, then stir in some dark brown sugar to taste. Actually, this sounds like a delicious rice pudding recipe too.

While on Clement street, I cannot help but buy some dim sum. It's just there. Calling to me. Little packets of shrimp and pork. Savory, glistening bundles. But. Lately the MSG has really killed me. I get this wa-wa-wa headache and dry mouth and suddenly pass out from the MSG. It has made me very wary to eat anything from Clement street that is not a baked bread. Really, it's the only gripe I have with Chinese food. I can control my portions well enough so I don't accidentally on purpose eat my whole day's worth of calories in one meal. But I cannot control my portions so well that I escape the clutches of MSG. In order to accomplish that, I need to eat only 1 type of each dumpling, and no more than 2 overall. That is effing nuts. Especially when considering that each serving comes with 3. Sigh.

This morning, I got some fried shrimp dumplings, fresh out of the fryer. Oh gorgeous juicy fried ball. It was delicious. I snarfed two down before starting the car. And then I ate the 3rd one right before sitting down at the computer. Now, I feel the liquids draining from my mouth in the tell-tale (tale-tell? Tell-tell?) sign of MSG overload. Why must dim sum be so overloaded with MSG as to kill a small Asian girl? Why? I will try to give up dim sum. Really.

This weekend, I will eat cheese and bread and turn into a while man with a hairy belly. That will show the BF.

Happy Thanksgiving!

Hello World. Happy Thanksgiving tomorrow.

I'm a little behind the news. Bar results came out. I passed. It was stressful. I almost didn't check the website. My BF ended up checking for me. And the results page was cryptic so he had to read it twice before he was sure it meant anything.

A lot of people I know did not pass. The statistics for this exam are not yet out. But looking at past results, the pass rate has hovered around 50%. It has been even lower for the February bar. This past February, the pass rate was about 48%. The year before that, it was 38%. Rough.

It is a tough exam. My heart goes out to all those that did not pass. Don't give up. Don't talk yourself out of taking the exam in February. I don't know what to say exactly. But I believe in you!

I'm still unemployed. Today, I finished writing a cover letter for a grant. This grant is for people who are volunteering. That would be me. I am still volunteering at a government agency, in the public sector, as an advocate for public safety. That reminds me I need to reword something in that cover letter. The institution that is giving out this grant (my school) is very defense oriented. Therefore I need to align my objective with their goals. Some creative massaging of words. Massage. Massage.

It turns out that I accomplish very little work when I'm at home. Is it the cold? Is it the perpetual distraction of kitty? Or is it something else? I went to the BF's work today and punched out this cover letter. Yesterday I spent the whole day lousing around my house, accomplishing nothing. I did make some bread dough for thanksgiving tomorrow. And played tennis with my father. And bought some groceries. But none of my efforts went towards accomplishing the reason for taking the time off.

For lunch today (yes, it's come to that: describing what I had to eat, and how I ate it) I walked 0.3 miles to a mexican taco shop on Middlefield Road and bought two $1.25 tacos. The total cost came to $2.73. I walked away with a bag of food: two tacos on a plate, a bag of corn chips and a container of salsa. It was more than enough food for me. And the salsa. Was beautiful. It was a bright red color dotted with green flecks of cilantro. There were some translucent onions floating among the red tomato. And the spicy burn came from something I could not see. Invisible spice! The tacos were served on two corn tortillas each. I saw a woman in the back pressing handmade tortillas but I guess my order didn't deserve those. Or I have to ask for it specifically. And I don't speak Spanish AT ALL. The chicken atop the tacos was all white meat, diced. The quality of the meat was very good. I got about 3 oz of chicken total. It was served with a slice of lime and a disc of radish. I ate both tacos which was a bit too much for me because it was 1pm when I ate and I had about 8 oz of greek yogurt immediately prior to the tacos. And 16 oz of hot water.

I have been playing tennis these past few weeks. It's terrific exercise.

I got my computer back!

Yes! Apple has not failed me. I dropped off my dead computer on a Tuesday or Wednesday (I forget now, because brain failure is imminent) and by Friday of the same day, it was shipped back to me. From TEXAS! I have my computer back! Just in time to check BAR RESULTS!

There are 3 days until bar results are available. On November 18, 2011 at approximately 6pm, I will be able to access my results. Of course, please allow 45 minutes - 1 hour for the servers to catastrophically CRASH when 9,000 people try to access the website at the same time. The waiting. It drives us crazy. The closet full of post-bar interns at work (myself included) have been reduced to blobby pegs of meat, banging our heads against the wall. We sit and stare at the computer in front of us, occasionally touching the mouse pad, accomplishing not-very-much.

Random thought on BookFace. Some people need to have their mobile bookfacing devices taken away from them. Or they need to twitter. Because there is one person who keeps writing volumes and posting it on his bookface. Volumes of verbal garbage. Before he got his mobile updating device, he was limited to garbage only when he was at his computer. Now, he can garbage all the time. I'm talking about you. You know who you are. You who don't know about this blog because that would mean CATACLYSMIC implosion!

Tomorrow, I am going to back nearly 100 cupcakes for BHC (for work). It's graduation and I thought I'd do something nice for all the participants who have worked so hard towards their mental health and sobriety in various capacities. Also, because baking helps me to blow off steam. It's countdown time to the bar results.

Work has become so comatose that every time someone erroneously or inadvertently brings up the bar, I have to spout random facts in order to change the subject. For instance, my cat treats me the same way no matter how I do on the exam.

In the morning, I will play tennis and then bake.

Paying Back Loans of DOOOM

It's about 5.5 months since I graduated from that "learned" institution. It is about time to face that really big horrible elephant in the room: STUDENT LOANS. The really tricky thing about student loans is that when you first receive them, in your first tender year of school, they NEVER GIVE YOU THE SUM. The big sum. The sum that you will be looking at when you finish school. The one that you will be happily paying back for the next 30 years of your life. More like my life. If there was a rule that a person could not die until they paid back everything they owe, I would LIVE FOREVER.

On top of the impending student loan due date, my computer is broken. Yes. The brain of my computer is fried. At first I thought it was the hard drive. I was a little scared that I would lose all of my precious data. All 60 gigabytes. Actually, I have no precious data. Some of my data is rather dear to me. But, I'm not going to have a heart attack over loss of data. Data loss happened in college a few times, and I stopped having coronaries over it. Alright, I admit, I had a few sleepless nights this week when I worried about the fate of my computer. And it did not feel good. Life is already stressful, I didn't need to add on anticipated stress. Most of my worry had to do with the cost of replacement. Apple is not known for being budget-conscious. Or wallet-friendly. I was afraid that the cost of repairing my old computer would be the same or very close to the cost of a new computer. Sigh. Technology moves so fast.

It turns out that my computer was not suffering from a malfunctioning hard drive. Instead, it's the logic board. The brains of the computer. Basically, when I buy an Apply laptop, I'm buying the logic board. It is the meat of the computer. And it is dead. The replacement part is about $900. (Spits water out all over the monitor at this news). Yikes! Luckily Apple has this "flat rate" repair for $310 (excluding water damage). Wheew. I feel like $300 is a reasonable amount to pay to repair a perfectly good 4 year old computer. Yes, when I first got it, I thought I was going to be a photographer. Photoshop. Magic. Now, the most processing power I require is to run OpenOffice. And occasionally Word. But I try not to summon that evil djinn too often.

The weather has turned really cold these past two days. Cold and rainy. Yesterday, I re-weatherproofed my bedroom window. Does this mean that winter is really here? It's going to be rain and wind and cold from now on? More so than usual? My frugal nature (and sensitive skin) prevents me from turning on the little electric heater in my room except in dire circumstances. Occasionally, my wrists hurt from the cold and then I have to put on gloves or turn on the heater. I have been known to walk around looking like a bag lady, all bundled up.

It looks like the bag lady is going make a comeback. Now, hand me my woolies.

Computer's logic board fried, needs replacement. Can't type in the body of this post! I need a computer.

Tres Leches Cake

Good God, Charlie Brown, it's EARLY! It's about 6:50 am and I'm trying to slap myself awake to go play tennis with my father. We have been pretty good about it all week. I played on Wednesday and Thursday mornings. On Thursday, after an hour+ of tennis, we came back and repaved a bit of the walkway in the backyard. See these hands? They swung a sledge hammer and broke several hundred pounds of concrete. Then they moved the concrete, broke it into smaller pieces, extracted some dying zucchini plants, tilled the land, filled in the walkway with hardcore, and POURED 400 pounds of concrete. By hand.

My right hand has a beautiful blister. It doesn't have the fluid filled stuff yet. It's just at the stage where it's red and very upset. When I was playing yesterday, the skin squidged together as I held the racket. Then, as I opened my hand, I could hear the skin separating like two pieces of duct tape being ripped apart. Lovely. I've been looking up how to avoid hand trauma. Many people recommend taping it before it becomes a problem. But when it's a blister, super glue is suppose to be god's gift to tender skin.

Baking:
I have been making a lot of sweet breads lately. I made a true brioche loft (pretty good when fresh out of the oven but then got dry and too crusty/flaky), a cinnamon swirl bread and some monkey bread. With regular bread dough I made some dinner rolls of varying sizes in muffin/cupcake tins. There is another bucket of brioche/sweet dough in the fridge ready to be made into cinnamon swirl bread.

My excuse:
There are no pictures of the monkey bread because my parent's friends descended upon it like flying turtles in a pond. My parents had a little gathering on Wednesday. I made monkey bread that day. In the morning, I cut the dough into small pieces, rolled it into a ball shape and then covered it with brown sugar and cinnamon. I made a little too much because a few balls fell out of the loaf pan and onto the baking sheet. It was so delicious. There was none left at the end of the gathering. And I couldn't find the camera in time to take photos.

My mother has requested more monkey bread, which I am happy to oblige. The brown sugar caramelizes and turns the whole thing into a beautiful doughnut-like texture bite with sweetness and tender bread.

Current food obsession: Tres Leches Cake - good or bad?
Tres Leches cake is a traditional Mexican or Spanish cake. There are as many recipes as there are regions in Mexico, or taquerias in San Francisco. Each one is slightly different. In some, the sponge is more firm. In others, the sponge is like a cake. Some recipes use the three milks in a consistency like a syrup. Others have more liquid milk-like milks.

Do I like this kind of cake? Or do I not like the whole category? It seems to consistently give me a stomach ache if I eat too much of it (more than 3 spoonfuls). YET I CANNOT STOP MYSELF. Especially in the morning when my will power is at its lowest. Like now.

I want to make a tres leches cake to try it out. But if I make it, I'm committed to a certain volume of 3 milk mixture (at least 2 full cans of milk). And I think I would get really really sick of it way before I got through that. How to make a smaller, sized down version?

In the meantime, I've been buying it from panaderias. And I bought it once from a hippie dippie trendy deli location in San Francisco. Each time, it was really sweet. And gave me a stomach ache.

On to change into tennis clothing.

New Years Resolution (in October)

It's Sunday, the 49ers are on a "bye" week, and the weather is lovely in San Francisco.

Last night I had a great evening with an old friend from college whom I have not seen for over a year. Hayden stopped over in SF for about 12 hours as a layover from Singapore. Unfortunately he had not slept a wink on the plane, and promptly passed out in the spare room for an hour before dinner. The conversation was delightful, possibly because it comes only once every year. But maybe because Hayden is such a cheerful, optimistic person (without being annoyingly perky). Yes, Hayden is sans perky.

At the end of the night, I drove Hayden to the airport, and I reflected on my life. Since I speak to Hayden so infrequently, our conversations include topics that have been boiled down to salient points, without fluffy polite/modest hubris. If only more conversations could follow this pattern, a great deal could be accomplished in a short period of time. But maybe that is what confession is for? Insert your religious preference for atonement here.

Regarding this blog, I want to make certain changes that I hope translate into my daily life to produce something more. Some are simple resolutions. Others are akin to behavior modification that will require a lot of energy and mental gymnastics.
Resolutions:
1. I will post more photos on this blog. Since I have not posted any at all, this should be the most straight forward one. Hopefully. Hopefully.
2. I will take more photos of the stuff I bake. Baking has continued to fascinate me, and it satisfies the same part of my brain as eating the baked good. Thus, if I bake it, it will be psychologically as rewarding as eating it, without any of the calories.
3. In dealing with difficult decisions in my life, I will envision that I am helping out a client who has the same events occurring. This allows me to not get so caught up in my self-wallowing, self-denial, fear-of-rejection that I fail to do anything at all.
4. I accept that my health insurance situation is hopeless and I need to do something about it. I still believe there is a flaw in the system, but at this time, I am resigned to not be in the system. It's really just too expensive and I cannot afford this.
5. I will play tennis regularly.

Now, off to tennis. More posts later. Perhaps this time with photos!

Trifle. Custard. Yum.

I found a wonderful way to use up old cake. When I say "old cake" I mean cake that has not been decorated or gobbled up in a sleep-walking daze. I don't decorate cakes in my sleep except for that one instance and then never again. Chocolate ganache does not wash out. And in my sleep-walking daze, I was not very good at measuring. Nor was I wearing my glasses. You live, you learn.

Since I've been making different vanilla cakes (some with sprinkles, some with vanilla beans, some with both!), it makes the perfect sponge for the bottom of a trifle. What is a trifle? It's layered perfection! It has everything enjoyable about dessert: custard, whipped cream, fruit, jelly, and vanilla sponge cake. In England, everyone knows Marks and Spencer's trifle. It's a staple (stable?) for Sunday Roast. And while I love a bit of designer dessert, it was really really sweet. I'm trying to stop being so horse-shoe-on-its-side shaped, but trifles are truly the siren call of all desserts. I'm a sucker for fragrant vanilla cake, rich eggy custard, and some fruit.

Now, it's really quite simple to throw together if you've already made all the components. Vanilla cake requires mostly egg whites. The egg yolks are used to make custard. The custard is secretly low fat or non fat due to milk. The jelly is made with the juice from no-sugar-added canned mandarin oranges and pineapples. The whole thing tastes like dreamy vanilla pudding with bits of sponge cake and fruit. Nom nom nom.

Just remember that gelatine is NOT VEGETARIAN. When I brought 2 trifles to my friend's birthday party, one vegetarian, people were wondering what sort of meat-and-fruit was in the other trifle. Um. Ha. Gross.

Still There? I am

For those of you that unsubscribed the moment the Bar was over: excellent choice. No point in dwelling over spoiled milk. No use crying and clawing at the sun.

For those of you that are still there: life does go on after the Bar. For a few weeks, I was convinced that after the last day of the Bar, the earth would open up and swallow me whole. Existence would end because the earth would explode in a Rapture-like incident. Well. It didn't. I'm still here. And life does keep ticking along in a mundane fashion. Very mundane and very financially crippled fashion.

Outline:
1. New baking project: cupcakes - but how to ship???
2. Health Insurance is the new highway robbery.
3. Job search - like a square-wheeled cart rolling down a hill.

_____
1. New Baking Project: Cupcakes.

I would like to start a new kickstarter project. I would like to bake cupcakes. Well, I would like to bake regular cakes, it's just that cupcakes are so much more portable, easier to keep fresh, and portion controlled. Thus, it has been decided that cakes, baked in small circular paper, portion controlled, would be the obvious answer. Call it what you like: cupcake. Mini-cakes. Small tea cakes. It's not really a cupcake because I really don't like frosting. Especially not the hi-hat frosting that has 3 inches of buttercream sitting atop a 1 inch cake.

Frosting is also not easy to ship. That is a good reason to forgo the frosting. There has been a movement towards something called cupcake-in-a-jar. Thoughts? Initially, I thought: bbbbrrrrrppppth. Ridiculous. The concept requires shipping cupcakes in glass mason jars. Or glass canning jars. Or glass jars in general. Doesn't this concept seem very...heavy? Glass Jars. Being shipped. Yes, I have an unreasonable fear of broken glass. But this might be the best way to ship cupcakes.

I got some vanilla bean paste and have been making these delicious vanilla bean cupcakes. They are very nice with a dollop of dark chocolate ganache or some custard, or both. Also, I've been revisiting my make-believe childhood with confetti cake. White cake, colored sprinkles. Happiness flows from the sight of such festive treats.

2. Health Insurance is the new highway robbery.

While in school, we had a janky health insurance through K****r. It was expensive but I was too naive to realize that other health care was out there. I am really ignorant to the whole situation but perhaps there have been more options in the last 2 years because more people have lost their jobs? Just speculating. Well. While I was in school, I had this janky health insurance. It did the trick. But now that I'm grad-u-ma-cated, it's gone. And the continuation health coverage is nearly $500 per month!!! That is almost as much as rent! That's like a very low mortgage! That is way more than I have available as an unemployed, recent grad, waiting for my Bar results.

As I sat here this morning an looked for alternative means of health insurance, I came across one that required payment of the first month along with the application. Um. Sure? Luckily it's $83 per month so much much less than the janky one. But what kind of clause is that? My application may still be rejected. But is the monthly fee going to be refunded if it gets rejected? Or do they keep it? Where is the fine print on this? It is nothing like shopping around for car insurance where you get a quote and then you get to think about it. Here, you get a quote, then you fill in your medical record information and they tell you to pay this fee, then let you know if you made the cut.

Additionally, the janky medical insurance has a terrible website. Everything goes in circles. The website is a terrible mess. I could not navigate my way around to figure out when my coverage was suppose to end. When I finally sent in my paperwork for continuation, it turns out they retroactively charged me for the 2 months in between. I wasn't even in the country for part of the time! This means I currently have about 3 months to pay. If I had known it was retroactive, I would have used it. But I was so afraid of incurring hidden fees that I just stopped. Highway robbery. I am so confused.

I feel like that Geico commercial where the older gentleman trains guinea pigs to row a boat to generate electricity so he can surf the web.
"Row."
"Row."

3. Job Search: Bandersnatch.

This limbo period is terrible for the soul. It eats at the mind, sucks up confidence, shreds good night sleep and spits it out like a wood chipper. Colorado got bar results back. Go VAL! Congrats. But it does remind me of another thing to take care of: School Loans.

School loans. Wish it took years off the end of one's life. But instead it starts right away. Again, graduation seems so far away when a young, bright-eyed student signs the loan papers. There should be a surgeon general warning that states what the final loan amount will be. WAY MORE THAN YOU THINK! $500,000? $450,000? $20,000? Especially compared with the average salary for attorneys now, the amount was a shocker. How do educated people ever make enough money if you factor in rent, living expenses, car payment, school loan, health insurance, car insurance. I guess you could try to minimize living expenses by eating only free food (Costco on Sunday, Whole Foods cheese samples, networking meetings). Again. I'm back to being a starving actor.

I am going to be a starving actor. I am a starving actor. Sigh.

This week, I have to make 1 birthday cake for a friend and her husband, about a dozen cupcakes for the party, a small cake for a dinner and some cupcakes into which I can drown my sorrows. Maybe there's room for a trifle somewhere in there. Some frozen berries, custard, jelly, vanilla sponge cake, and it turns out delicious.

See, writing about food and food prep makes me optimistic! Writing and thinking about my life makes it go the other way. Maybe I will start a bakery after all.

Plugging In

Ah....the feeling of jacking in. I'm not talking about idling checking email on someone else's computer, even on my own iPad, checking email and idling browsing on a washed out version of a real browser. I'm talking about the feeling of pulling out the armada chest known as the personal laptop after a long trip overseas, plugging in the power, and booting up, all from the comfort of your space. The place where you sit to release your physical body from your mind's eye and dribble into the stream of digital community. To a place where you are no longer a passive viewer, but an interactive member that posts comments, checks messages, expresses your point of view and consumes content that pleases you.

That is the feeling that I didn't know I missed.

I've been away in England for 2.5 weeks. It was great. A little town in the middle of the East of England called Louth. A great little town with little butcher stores and bakeries and pork pies. It was just south of Grimsby, the Fish and Chips capital of the world. Oh fish and chips. Why can't anyone else do it like you?

Whilst in England, I had my iPad to check and delete spam email. But not much other than that. I was unplugged. I was off the grid. I used cash in transactions. Walked. Maybe "off the grid" is a little dramatic. I was carefree and unattached. It was unusual. My plans were unfettered by possibility of phone calls, text messages, communication in gross. I was living in the moment.

The weather was great too. Even on days when it rained, there was beautiful sun before and after the torrential downpour. While yoomping around the pastures filled with sheep tupping, the breeze was warm and spirits were high. No large chain stores to distract me. No ticky-tacky trinkets to buy. Just custard tarts and pork pies.

I cooked a fair bit in England. My ideal vacation would be to rent a small apartment in the heart of everything, go grocery shopping, cook my own meals and just live among the people. Live someone else's life. We were able to do this because Rob's father lived in the heart of the town and I could walk to everything. Not many asian people. I saw 3. That accounts for the people who run the Chinese take-aways.

Thus, I had simple breakfasts at home, greasy/fatty/fried delicious fish+chips for lunch or other unmentionables, and dinner at home. I might have lost weight on this trip because of the sensible eating and copious walking. Oh right. And I ate about 500 grams of greek yogurt a day.

I learned how to make trifle, custard (aka pastry cream, aka creme anglaise), bramble tart, sweetcrust pastry and interesting sandwiches with pork and gravy. I love gravy. It is so lucky that Americans do not eat fries with gravy. It's a nasty habit that I will indulge in every time I'm back in England but for now, I will endeavor to forget about it as quickly as possible. Good thing I was not exposed to it until the last week. The last half week. And then I ate it every chance I got. I learned to pack lunches for our outings that took us to different villages and towns. I learned that yogurt will not exactly go bad after a day out of the fridge. I learned that crisps in England are the most creative thing in the world! They have roast chicken flavored crisps that taste like roast chicken! And are suitable for vegetarians!

Now, for my first trick, I'm going to make....a short crust pastry for my custard tart. HOW MANY EGG YOLKS DO I NEED???

Ah....it feels good to be jacked in...

Grindy Grind

I'm finished! Yes. I survived. It felt a bit like the Rapture, where the anticipated day would bring forth unimaginable events signaling the end of the world, yet, it went by without incident. That is how my last day of testing went.

In the mornings, I still wake up with a slight headache from gnashing and grinding my teeth. Anxiety is not so easily left behind. But there is no longer an alarm nor a clock by my bed. That's right. We're on Christina Standard time. Which means, I still wake up around 6 or 7 and try to go back to sleep.

Today, I went to SF with my parents to pick up some housewarming presents for my British hosts. I'll be going to England for a few weeks, to shake off the oppressive American common law. And to eat buckets of Walker's Roast Chicken flavored crisps. Mostly to eat crisps. On the way back, we're going to overnight in Amsterdam. Don't get excited, it's just where the plane transfers. But we're going to take advantage of the 10 hours by walking, eating, drinking, eating, and seeing. This is likely the last time I will ever be able to do a break-neck sight-seeing adventure. It's like the high school back-packing trip. Endless energy. 10 hours to see how the Dutch live. And eat herring. Yes, I said it. I want to eat herring. And frites. So many dipping sauces, so little time.

Back to the SF part: we went into a shop on Clement street that had EVERYTHING. EVER. It had makeup, backpacks, knick-knacks, underwear, socks, batteries, phone chargers. And that was only the stuff I could identify. It was tranny-hooker heaven. My mother said she got flashbacks of Shanghai or Beijing. Or maybe just China. It felt like the variety shops in China that carry literally EVERYTHING. I got a Hello Kitty back-pack for Rob's niece. Some novelty socks for everyone. And some ticky-tacky capri length tights for England. I anticipate wearing some ridiculous clothing. Maybe a lot of skirts. But I also anticipate it being cold and rainy. Thus appropriate leg wear will be the difference between frostbite and merely blue.

At Sports Basement, I bought some beautiful waterproof weatherproof hard-core snow boots from North Face for $48. And lightweight hiking boots for $35. Wonder why it was so cheap? Because my tiny, diminutive feet fit into children's shoes. I bought size 6 girl's shoes and they were still a bit too big. The lightweight hiking boots are for romping around the highlands and mountains of England.

And finally, in true SF fashion, I picked up some incense for the British hosts. It reminds them of SF. Just novelty items, purely emotive.

After finishing the exam, my motivation to do anything at all has absolutely evaporated. I can hardly be asked to dress myself in the mornings. And collecting my Barbri books? It's really not that difficult. I just have to make sure there are no embarrassing pieces of paper stuck between the sheets, put in a box, return to the Barbri office for a small deposit returned. And believe me, I WANT MY MONEY BACK. Stupid pieces of horse-feathers. Totally not worth it at all. If I ever need to take this test again, please shoot me in the face with a nailgun. And then tar and feather me.

On that note, I have to take care of my granola that is baking in the oven. Ah, the aroma of nut allergy.
!!!

Like being slapped with a strip of bacon

The bar exam feels surreal and not entirely pleasant. It's like being slapped with something very familiar and common place, but used in an unexpected manner. Something typically not associated with violence.

Today must be my lucky day: I saw TWO Maserati cars! Whooohooo! It's unusual for me to see one, let alone two, in one day. It must mean something.

My kitty has been understanding and affectionate in light of my horrible ordeal. She immediately planted herself in front of me, splat on the table surface, and beseech-ed me to stroke her fluffy fur. She didn't care that I typed the equivalent of two lost worlds today. The only thing that mattered to her was that her petting quotient had not yet been filled.

Why is the weather so beautiful during this exam? It's effing freezing indoors, and then beautifully alive outside. It feels like frozen yogurt weather.

I need to take a nap. And some chocolate. And something spicy.

Bright, Shiny Faces

It's been a good day so far. It's 10:51 am. I've been up since 7am. I actually slept until the alarm went off even though I spent the hours between 4 and 6am doing multiple choice questions in bed. It's the best thing to put one to sleep, right? Can't read something interesting, might get too excited. The point being that I was asleep in the morning when my alarm went off.

The Bar Exam looms ahead. It is like going to war. Requires a lot of preparation and equipment and packing and deliberation. I've been focusing on strategy. Not just in the way I take the exam, but how I get there, the supplies I bring, my routine in the morning. I need to pack my lunch that contains minimum carbs, protein, fiber/veg, sugar/fruit, and soda. What am I going to do about tea in the morning? Gulp it all in one go and run to the bathroom a million times? I drink water like a fish. I drink so much of it I should have drowned in my sleep. No water permitted in the testing room. One must get up and go to a different part of the testing center for water. Sometimes, I imagine a boxing scene where the fighter is getting the pep talk, water squirt in the mouth, water squirt on the head, cold water all over his head to wake him up, wipe the blood from his eyes.

Stranger things are permitted in the exam: TENS units, paper clips, rulers (??), casts (prior to this permission, was the cast to come off in order to take the exam?), wallets, diabetic equipment. They fail to mention whether we could have a bag to carry all of this in. Or if we have to bring it in piece by piece? Unpack it from the bag and then discard the bag? Why do we need rulers? Should I bring it all just in case I need it all? Even things I don't need?

Yesterday whilst taking a multiple choice exam, the question used a very lofty word. It described the land as a "copse of trees." COPSE. How cultured, eloquent, refined, expressive, creative! I thought I was reading a Charlotte Bronte book for a split second. These little things make me smile.

I really really hope I get through this exam. I really really hope my wrists hold up and it doesn't hurt too bad the next day. I really really hope no trucks overturn on the highway and spill 100,000 cans of cream of mushroom soup on the asphalt.

Off with her Head!

Who was it that said, if the hand offends, cut it off? My head offends right now. I have a huge flipping headache. I try to sleep for the requisite 8+ hours but sometimes it's tough. Can't sleep through the night. And in the mornings, the beautiful weather brings with it some lovely, brilliant pollen that clogs up the rest of my senses. I look and smell like an old witch, huddled in the dark with my bottles of aromatherapy oils, trying to clear my sinuses, sipping on hot water.

The best advice I've been getting, and the most difficult one to remember is:
DON'T FLIP OUT. Stay calm.
Strangely enough, that's the most difficult thing to remember when you're in the middle of a downward spiral into the depths of hell.

I wish the stupid, massive construction across the street would SHUT the FRACK up. I hope they are putting in something really important that is going to serve the community. Something like a cyclotron. Or a wind tunnel.

4 days to go. 4 days. That's longer than some bugs live. Alright, enough jerking out, back to the grind. Turn off the internet. Turn off the phone. Turn the mirror to face the wall. Put on the gloves. And the hat. And try not to stain the furniture.

Massive Flipping Failure

Why do they do this? Why? I raise my fists and shake them in anger. Grr!

Today was the simulated exam. 100 questions. 3 hours. A very low score. Flipping failure. Failure. Not even 65%. Failure on astronomical levels. WHY? It's so contrary to what I was doing this weekend: taking practice exams, getting good scores, elevating spirits and morale, general feel-goodness.

What started off as a great day (beautiful weather, high energy, good night's sleep without dreams of Nazi baby-killing conspiracy involving everyone near and dear) coasted me through until lunch. After 3 hours of continuous beating-my-head against a sharp and jagged rock, my sensibilities were a bit shaken. I tried to take a break by looking at advertisements that had arrived in the mail. Even pretty, useless pictures failed to entertain me. Worse off, I couldn't focus my eyes enough to see them. A bit of lunch would help.

As my food was warming in the microwave, I decided to correct my exam now and know the score rather than be ignorantly blissful. What a big flipping mistake. I am a big flipping loser. I can't score higher than a monkey pushing random buttons. I can't score higher than a rhino tossing his snuff. There's a higher probability of dolphins standing up on their tails and taking over the world than of me passing this exam. I'm doomed.

In less than 15 minutes, I had turned an otherwise lovely, brilliant day in to a self-loathing, moping, excrement-laced day. Excrement? I mean expletive. It was an expletive-laced day. My head was a dirty bomb of expletives, triggered by innocent inquires from my father. Though I did not show it on the outside other than a mopey face and slightly hunched over posture, in my head, I was walking around STOMPING-STOMPING-STOMPING like a ragged teenager.

The simulated full day exam was suppose to be extra hard to whip us into shape. But was this one too? Please say this one was super-duper hard and everyone got low scores. Please.

Let me not be the stupidest piece of concrete.

ConLaw is Horrible, so is Wills

There are times when I wish we lived under the rule of an emperor. All hail the emperor. All law is the emperor's desire. Because then there would be no Constitution and no Equal Protection Anal(ysis) and no First Amendment Anal(ysis) and I would not have to fret about this.

And when people died, all property belongs to the emperor again.

The past two nights I've dozed off while doing restorative yoga. It has been very very helpful in un-knotting my back. I have posture like a "?" where my hips jut out like an emo kid, and my shoulders are hunched over like a hipster, you probably haven't heard of it.

I just can't understand how things like interest rates, waste disposal and newspaper dispensers all get litigated under Constitutional Law. It's the biggest catch-all for whiny entitled people who need to be heard. If it doesn't put you in jail for life or cut off your hands and feet, it's really not so bad. Stop making up this law that I need to learn!

Oh, to be a lawyer about 90 years ago. First, women were not allowed, so moot point. Second, there was far fewer rules to learn. More judicial activism, but still, easier to make a Cardozo impact. And this was before the Civil Rights Acts which stirred up a whole different bunch of litigation (public accommodations, any one?)

Life's Alternatives....Curve balls

Not to sound really dramatic, but the title is about baking, and not another indication of how I'm surely losing my ever-loving marbles due to the Bar. (5 days to go!) I haven't forced a countdown on you and I will not start now. Well, maybe in the margins or something.

The day started off really early and with itchy, dry eyes. Terrific. Then my backyard neighbor decided to play some funky deep beats. I couldn't hear the music through the ear plugs, but I could hear the bass. It was so deep I could feel the bass in Jamaica. Against my better, less confrontational, inner monologue, I went outside and politely lost my sh*t at him. Just kidding. Nothing was lost. But I did ask him to not play music so loudly since I'm STUDYING FOR THE FRACKING BAR and I'm THIS close to turning myself inside out. He was surprisingly sympathetic and nice, and I felt very embarrassed when I was done. Lots of apologising, lots of thank-yous, really appreciate it. Heh. This exam is making me act all sorts of ridiculous.

I'm baking. I'm making something that I thought I knew really well. It's a tried and true recipe. Yes, there was a small adjustment. Recently, I've gotten over my fear of baking powder.
Backstory: There was a period in early 2011/late 2010 when I really liked baking cupcakes. And I got sort of cheeky with the baking. Thinking I knew everything there was to know. And one day, I decided to make a brownie recipe that I found on the side of a box. Since I was so good at baking, I could modify any recipe and make it work! Well, that turned out to be really really false. I ended up with a batch of beautiful, dark-chocolate brownie-cupcakes that were moist and perfect looking. But tasted like BITTER CHALK. It didn't hit you until you'd swallowed. It was an aftertaste, something left on the tongue. A bitter, choking, drying, terrible, swallowed-my-tongue sensation. After this event, I never put more than 1/2 tsp in any recipe.
Last Week: I got over that fear with the lovely chocolate cake that tasted NOT bitter. Yay.
Today: I'm making Blondies. And they are looking a bit different. I added the requisite amount of baking powder and reduced the amount of sugar. Maybe that is where my defeat lies. In reducing the amount of sugar.

In August, I'm thinking of toying with a sugar-free month of baking. What do you think? They say, it barely tastes different. Sugar free treats. J doesn't think healthy alternatives are worth it because they usually taste highly inferior. Typically I agree. But there's a diabetic in mind that I want to impress.

Taking risks in the last week

I've been acting a bit risky. Yesterday, I ran around an uneven field full of holes, chasing a soccer ball. And almost broke my ankle 5 times. Then, I tried to hit the soccer ball with my hand/arm/wrist. And almost broke it. Volley ball, soccer, I get the two mixed up sometimes. With one week before the bar, it's probably not a great idea to break both ankles and my writing hand. But the exercise was great! Running, puffing, panting, chasing after the ball in the sun. I got a bit of color, and some exercise. It was a good weekend. Took my mind off the exam. Sort of.

The weather has warmed up again. This is both good and bad because I tend to get very sleepy in the warm weather, though I am more motivated and have the best intentions. My kitty has been acting like a cat would. Lying on every available cool surface. Alternating between cement, soil, tabletop, tile, whatever I'm working on at the moment for maximum interruption. I envy lower life forms. The toughest thing she has had to worry about: which side of her tummy to sun first. Oh, the life of a cat.

Since I've been more stressed out in the past 10 weeks than an ordinary person, I've had to adapt my coping mechanisms. Looking at pictures of cats is a great way to relieve stress short term. But the effects wear off after the pictures are gone. Working out is a good stress-reliever. It is especially helpful that working out is preferred over continuing to study. This way, a rigorous 45 min session can pass relatively eagerly. The last method is not advisable. It involves an epilator. And the hair on your legs. Or other body parts, but that can go south really quickly. An epilator is about the most ineffective way of remove hair, short of tweezing individual hairs with point tweezers. It uses the tweezing action, and slowly, repeatedly, attempts to yank hair out by the roots. Why would anyone use this? It's less messy than waxing and can be done by oneself. While it hurts, a lot, it's actually a bit amusing to watch. If you don't mind the pain.

I'm just kidding, the epilator is a terrible way to relieve stress!

Is "MALICE" even a word?

It's time to take a break from studying when you can't remember what "malice" means. Or the difference between 1º and 2º murder.

Sure, Rape, Burglary, Robbery, Kidnapping, Arson. Gotcha. But Murder? Um. The deliberate and intentionally killing of a human with malice aforethought. And 2º is without malice aforethought. But how can anyone deliberately and intentionally kill a person without malice? What is malice exactly? Is it like baking soda? Or allergies?

I was doing Contracts essays earlier. Rescission, Reformation, Modification, Mistake. It all sounds so similar.

Just remember to run down the escalator towards the offeree shouting, "REVOKE, REVOKE!!" at the top of your lungs. And if you are in a car accident, NEVER SAY you are sorry. You can say it silently, to god, while you pray, in church or to your friend-that-lives-in-your-head. But never say it out loud where someone might hear you and it can be used to impeach you.

As soon as I get employment, I'm going to start a tradition. I'm going to give weird hot sauce as presents for xmas. Or birthdays. Mostly xmas. Because I was looking at various hot sauces online and there are some with very funny names. I suspect they are mostly novelty hot sauces but there were also some very legitimate ones too. For instance, Marie Sharpe's Belizean hot sauce: a-MAZE-ing. It gives me tingles up my scalp and down my spine. I shiver just thinking about how wonderful that sauce makes me feel. Hot sauce causes endorphins to be released in one's body.

Birth of Athena

Zeus had a headache that was mighty powerful. It bothered him and pained him for days until finally he asked the blacksmith to split his head apart. And from forth the cleaved halves of Zeus' head sprung Athena, fully grown and armored, carrying a shield and spear. Some stories leave out the part about the blacksmith. Zeus' headache split his skull from the pressure alone.

My dentist put in a filling. Not a temporary one. A possibly permanent one so long as I don't break it within the next 24 hours before it sets. Soft foods for me. But also a splitting headache. Because as this filling sets, it EXPANDS a little. Yeah. It feels like there's a battleaxe buried hilt deep in the left side of my face. It feels great.

Certainly, this must be the best way to de-stress: get hurt in some other tangible, physical manifestation upon which all your energies can focus. My face hurts.

What the hell?

My filling fell out. Again. It's 10 pm. The night before a "simulated" written exam. AND THERE'S A HOLE IN MY TOOTH.

Should I ignore it for 2 weeks until after the bar?

Should I get a quick temporary patch (again)?

Should I just suck it up and get it fixed for real?

I feel sick to my stomach.

I'm up, I'm down. Sine Wave.

Two days ago, I reported an upswing of the Multiple Choice Question score (hereinafter MCQ). Today, the score went back down. And the average score on that particular practice test was 10% higher than mine. All because of 5 lousy questions. But in all fairness, the questions were pretty fracking stupid.

For instance:
A landowner invited some friends, including his neighbor, to a party in his backyard. A friend who showed up produced a large, dangerous-looking skyrocket and lit it. The skyrocket did not make it up into the sky, instead, it went to the neighbor's yard, hit the garage and burned the garage to the ground. The neighbor sues the landowner. Under what theory is the neighbor most likely to prevail? (NOTE: this is a paraphrase because I don't want to get SUED for copyright infringement, even if it is a very very thin copyright, thus NO exact copying.)
A) landowner failed to exercise due care in controlling the acts of his guests
B) landowner is strictly liable for harm from abnormally dangerous activities on his land
C) not important
D) not important

Which answer do you think it would be? Well, it wasn't. It was answer A.

This is typical of the MCQ. Sometimes, when it comes to Constitutional Law questions, it gets really hairy during the explanation of the answers. I did one a few days ago that pretty much had no reason, but exists just because. In a small infinitely dense ConLaw spot in the Universe. Unattached to anything else.

What is left of a person when you take away everything that they know? Everything they understand? And then give them one giant acidic stomach? How things have changed me. In this current state, I would not say I like food. Or eating. Or want to think about food. Neither cookie, nor cake nor tasty morsel excites my appetite. In fact, I tend to cough a bit whenever I get really nervous. Google tells me that it could be acid reflux causing the cough. It burns a bit in the back of my throat right before and after I cough.

I wrote a flashcard today that said: In other words, the Defendant was making world-saving goo and it got onto your property. Tough sh*t for you. Private nuisance action DENIED.

Don't beat the dead horse.

Last week, with 24 days to go until the bar, I radically changed my study strategy. I radically changed my review procedure. I also radically changed my outlook on Barbri. I'm not going to keep doing something if it's not working for me. And in my heart, with every angry little Asian sigh, I knew that the stupid Interactive Paced Program was not for me. Worse yet, I knew that listening to lectures was not for me. I have dyslexia of the hearing, if that's possible. Maybe it's more like autism. Maybe, after all this time, it turns out I'm autistic? That would be something.

I continued to listen to the lectures out of fear. Fear that they are going to say something equivalent to the Holy Grail and I'm going to miss it. Turns out, since I slept, worked out, baked and generally spaced out during the lectures, I missed it anyway! It's difficult to pick up on the tidbits of existence when one is asleep. So the first thing to go was pretending to listen to the lectures. The second thing to go was everyone's suggestion that I outline, then condense, then condense, then lather-rinse-repeat. Um. No. My typing is limited in duration. I'm not going to waste precious keystrokes on outlining. Third thing was NOT spending a whole day on a single subject, without really doing anything. Now that I look back on bar study, I had a lot of free time in the first 3 weeks. What was I doing that made me feel so overwhelmed? Certainly not what I'm doing now. I was pretty much not doing anything other than what they told me to do on Paced and it amounted to very very little retained. Very little retained. I vividly remember a lot of anger.

Oh, somewhere in between shedding my fear of the lecture and spending too long on one topic, I also learned to HATE the Conviser. It is stupid. It is useless. It was like stabbing bamboo splinters under my fingernails. Well, no, let me take back some. For topics like Contracts, it was useful. And for something else, hopefully. But for some topics? I would believe it if you told me that some 1L law student wrote it over the summer without understanding the topic.

And I made a delicious chocolate cake. Failed miserably on the frosting. Tried to make a milk chocolate ganache. Instead, I had a chocolate syrup/milk underneath a layer of milk chocolate ganache. It didn't detract from the cake (yes, I frosted it even though only the top half-inch solidified). It was a little bit runny. But still delicious. And yes, I have a tendency to sleep-walk, sleep-frost, and sleep-manicure/pedicure. Those are all things that I have done in my sleep. I wake up with a full set of pedicured toes. This morning I woke up to find that I had frosted the cake in my sleep. This cake was a traditional circular cake so unfortunately, I'm going to have to eat the whole thing. Maybe share with the parents.

Oh, back to the bar study switch-er-roo. I feel rewarded for switching my strategy because in one week, I raised my scores by 25%. Yes. I am golden on Criminal law and Evidence. GOLDEN. One short of Gold on Torts. Still suck at ConLaw and Real Property and Contracts. But. This is a definite upswing.

I will reward myself with going to sleep before 11pm. Time to start the winding down routine of hot foot soak, restorative yoga, reading Professional Responsibilities while TENS-ing my wrists. Did I mention I love my TENS machine? Love. I would not be able to get through this without it. I write my hands ragged during the day, electrocute them, and wake up freshly-nearly-without-soreness.

Now with more Magic

I've been a frazzled bundle of nerves. July 4th marks some insidious, amorphous milestone in a Bar Taker's study. It previously wouldn't have bothered me if I had not listened to a friend that likes to bring up these scary markers. Let's call her Twiggy. Twiggy tends to ask other people about this experience. Call it what you will: gossip, recon, research; it's all heading down a bad path of psych outs. It can get to your head. And Twiggy likes to tell me about it. Is it because misery loves company? Or that she's trying to be a good friend and warn me about dangers? Or is she trying to EFF with my head? I genuinely believe that she is sharing her experience of being down and working really hard without payoff. But the things she says still EFFs with my head.

It must be done. I must get rid of this. I can't have these superstitious milestones if it keeps throwing me off my game. It's not even freaking me out in the proper manner to get me motivated, as Anthony would characterize it. I get caught up in this rat race. Twiggy tells me: "this is about the time when everyone freaks out." I think, "I should start freaking out. Why am I not freaking out? I'm freaking out about not freaking out enough." Then I work myself up into a small dust storm of uselessness and anxiety.

Even if Twiggy means everything in good faith and without a bone of malice, it's still unnerving. I never like superstitions.

Today I made Magic Bars. Now with more magic. No, I didn't take pictures. But I have some photos from previous baking attempts. My mother really likes the Magic Bars. The funny thing about Magic Bars is that even though it takes relatively little magic to make, they are expensive! The ingredients are top shelf. Things that I cannot make from ordinary general groceries. I have to purchase them special. I have not had any. One day I will make a version without nuts. But until that day, I hope everyone enjoys them. Baking Magic Bars is a bit like a chemistry experiment. Converting sugar!

(After looking at my most recent mixed subject multiple choice practice exam)
Ohgodohgodohgodohgod.
Um. Snarf. Um.
I need something. I need chocolate cake. With frosting. I need a slice of chocolate cake right now. Tonight. I don't know if I should break out the cupcake pan and make chocolate cake in that. For easy service and divisibility?
WHY AM I fussing about divisibility during this moment of psychosis? WHAT is wrong with me?

Yesterday I watched this British TV show called Inbetweeners. It was really funny in a coarse, crude, anti-high school musical, anti-Twilight way. There was one episode where one of the fellows was studying for his final exams. He freaked out in one scene. Exactly the same way that I freaked out last week. And this week. And will do again tomorrow. But silently and alone.

Happy 4th Weekend!

Though the 4th may be a bank holiday and the cause for much rejoice, it's the point-of-no-return for many bar students. At least that's what I keep being told. Everyone cruises along at their own slightly indifferent speed until the 4th weekend. And then. It all hits the proverbial fan. Some say that the realization of the impending exam gets pressed directly in our collective faces. Others say that the 4th symbolizes the time when things get really serious. And finally, a small separate group tend to agree because they cannot make up their own mind and like to be part of the larger decision-making process.

The weather has been very very fine these past few days with a high of 79 tomorrow. For San Francisco! Short shorts weather and tiny tops. Hula-hoop lessons in the park. Strollers out in force. And of course, Barbri. Because nothing completes your ensemble better than a huge, 900 page book full of insane scribbles and mutterings.

I finally got a really good day's worth of work in on Wednesday or Thursday. It was really productive. I nearly hurt myself on the typing but luckily stopped short of permanent injury. It's nowhere near completion but I feel as though I know the whole game plan now. Previously, I didn't know or understand what was the start, end, middle, scope, depth, etc. But now, I'm better informed. I'm making choices about how to study, what works for me. Most importantly, I'm discarding that stuff that does not work and trying something different.

As always, I'm still doing my restorative yoga at night before bed to help relax my hunched over body and rabid mind. I'm also starting to cocoon myself in many pillows when I sleep. It creates the comforting sensation of being supported. Maybe it also creates a sensation of being smothered because I have trouble getting up now. And when I do, I'm radically thirsty. But no night sweats. That's good.

Last night I resisted the urge to eat some deliciously spiced Indian food before going to bed. Very wise choice since the last time I made that mistake, I had cookie-monster dreams for the whole night. This morning, I woke up and had a few spoonfuls of the rice, with generous habanero hot sauce sprinkled on top. It created a delicious burn in my mouth, a tingle down my spine, and a general sense of well being. Endorphins. Cheap thrills! I've been telling people about this mood enhancer/endorphin rush from chili peppers. Some think I'm crazy. Crazier. Others are desperate to try anything to relieve the stress and anxiety (bar takers and other students, can't you guess by now?).

I've also been eating copious amounts of light yogurt. Studies have shown that yogurt contains a high percentage of tryptophans which encourage a calm sensation. Like turkey. And healthy bacteria for digestion. Sometimes when I eat yogurt, I feel a bit like the Cheesy Potato Freaky Eater on TLC. I think my only saving grace is that I'm not consuming 8000 calories a day via yogurt. Otherwise, I would turn into the Cheesy Potato Eater.

In other carb-filled news, yesterday, I ate nearly a whole baguette of bread. That's more bread than I normally eat in a month. With butter. Lots and lots of butter. I can't make up my mind whether I like bread or not. It's both really good sometimes, and not at all exciting.

Truth is, I'm trying to figure out what is causing my tummy troubles.
(Warning: don't read these next few sentences if you don't want to know anything remotely gross. It's not obscene. But it's normal polite conversation. You wouldn't discuss this with your boss. Or the Duchess of Cambridge.)
I've been suffering from acid reflux as of late. It occurs when I eat cookies. At first I thought it was the coffee I put in some of my cookies. So I took that out. Then I thought it might be the chocolate. So I took that out. But I've still been getting this horrible bitter taste in the back of my mouth. It makes my throat a little sore, and I cough occasionally. This bitter taste only happens when I eat sweet baked goods. Or cookie-dough. I finished up a batch of spiced chocolate chip bars and licked the batter off a spatula as I was washing up. Just one small lick. The majority of the batter was already in the pan, in the oven, baking. This was merely a smear of batter. And within 5 mins, I had that horrible bitter taste in my mouth. Part of the reason I ate so much butter yesterday was to test whether it was the butter. It's not. Was it the egg? I ate hard boiled eggs and was ok. Was it the gluten? I ate bread and was ok. Everything seems to point towards sugar. Or baking soda? It's some kind of cosmic joke on me. Taking away everything I love, one by one. Until I cannot enjoy anything.
(End of grossness)

Back to Corporations. Anyone need help drawing up Articles of Incorporation? I've never done it before, and I'll give you a great rate. Plus, I promise to devote all of my time to it if you hire me because you are my ONE client. Singular devotion. Absolute attention. That's me.

Stopping the Insanity

Just trying it on. What are you doing, asks you.
Well.
For the past 4 weeks, it's been pushing, pushing, pushing and enduring through the horrible experiences for 4 hour long lectures, on my computer, told by spastic lunatics that tell the same story day after day. Really, it's the definition of insanity: doing the same thing over and over, hoping for a different result. I kept telling myself, just push on through. Just a few more weeks. Just a few more lectures. Just keep your head down and you will come out the other side. Friends and family have been expressing sympathy, and also the same message: you'll get through this.
But. Today, I had a breakthrough. Well, yesterday, but today was the beta testing.
What if, the whole reason Barbri and the bar study is a traumatic horrifying experience because of these lectures? I'm deathly afraid to watch anything on YouTube. I can't stand any video. I can't watch my Battlestar Galactica.
I'm not an auditory learner. You can talk at me all you want, it's not getting through. I like looking. I like seeing the whole big picture, all at once, before narrowing in on the details. It's something I do. It helps that the pseudo-photographic memory necessitates total recall before it can parse through the small stuff. Memory is a strange strange thing. I have to have seen it if I am to remember it. I need to see the information to memorize it. This might explain why I SUCK at coding. Too many lines, can't tell one page from the next. In sum, I like looking at information rather than hearing it. I see words a pictures. Freaky.
As a solution, perhaps having an old animated man yell information at me is not the most soothing, retentive manner to obtain information. It's a big gamble, but I'm so deep in self-loathing and self-hatred that it's eating me from the inside. So I stopped listening to the lectures today. I just looked at the handouts and and answers and from that I'm going to study. I'm not going to subject myself to the torture of these lectures. I'm not going to keep doing the same thing over and over and hope for a different result.
Taking matters into my own hands.

As a bonus feature, this week has proven to be a boon in the baking arena. I've done too much. This week will have 2 packages going out. I understand this addiction now. It's as though if I can bake the perfect treat, then this longing will go away. I crave something to soothe the daemons inside, to calm the fire that burns away at my belly, some comforting snack/treat/edible that takes me back to that safe place. I'm looking for my cheat food. I don't have one. That's not right. I should have a cheat food. Something that I always order, that I'm slightly ashamed of, that defines me as a person by pointing out my flaws and weaknesses. I don't know what my cheat food is! Not knowing my weaknesses is really scary. When am I going to crack? How do I prevent it? What food will I turn to during bouts of insecurity and self-esteem fall-outs?

When am I going to learn how to use the semi-colon correctly?

Reaction Sequence Offline

My mother asked me which brownie mix I used when I gave her a piece of my latest and greatest incarnation of the fudgy chewy brownie. I don't know how to take that comment? Of course I made it from scratch! My whole LIFE IS MADE FROM SCRATCH. Ahem. Just over-reacting.

I felt like I really got the hang of making the chocolate from cocoa powder, butter, sugar and eggs. It looked and tasted like chocolate sauce. Legitimate chocolate sauce. No separating like it did last time. Last two times. But this new oven? Still have not quite got the hang of it! What is so fundamentally different about convection baking? I tried reducing the bake time. Maybe I should just reduce the bake temperature.

Either way, it looks gorgeous. Brownie mix. Ha. If only Betty Crocker added this much cocoa. I've got cocoa in places I can't see, there's so much in the air.

Completed my first Performance Test today. What. A. Pain. In. The KEESTER! For a few nerve-wracking hours, I was hunched over the keyboard, typing away like my life depended on it (which it did). It was a marathon of keystrokes! Clickity-clickity-clickity-click! But. Secretly? I love performance test. Because? I don't have to know any law. It's given to me. Only have to compute and spit out something. But don't need to know anything going in. Luckily? It's worth 40% of the written portion. It's worth 4 essay exams! Whoo! I can completely bomb the areas of substantive law and still get by with the skin of my teeth using the fake law provided in the Performance Test.

And now? Back to the Agency and Partnership lecture. A lisping little troll. I've never had heartburn or acid indigestion like these past two nights. It's quite, um, effervescent. Or something. Anyone know what to do for this? I'm slightly afraid of Tums after last time when I ate so many, my tongue dried out for the rest of the day.

Exhausted. Halfway. One Month to Go. No water

I am exhausted. I didn't realize how exhausted I really was until this morning. I didn't really do anything yesterday except go to pub quiz (which we arrived late bc I couldn't remember when it started. Idiot). Didn't drink. Yesterday was exhausting too. I tried to keep up my energy. Tried to put on a brave face and just work through it. But that's been the same story for nearly 5 weeks now. And it's the halfway point. It's exactly one month before the bar. I am so scared and so tired.

Yesterday there was a party for the Yelp Elite and company. Purportedly the largest event in Yelp history. I had tickets. I had RSVPs. I didn't have the energy to go. I am so lame.

This morning there is a slight overcast. It's cold. I have run out of eggs. I cannot bake anything until I get more eggs. Woe is me. Worst yet, I've run out of drive. Mondays. It's all a perpetual Monday from now on. It's always this feeling of dread in getting out of bed. The motivating factor is fear. The fear of never catching up.

Barbri has this Interactive Paced program that sets the daily routine for the entire period of study. It's like boot camp. Every day there is 6 hours of streaming video to watch (why can't we download into mp3?) and about 200 pages to read, outline, analyze, write. Then, there is "review" or memorization. I've watched so many really really long videos that I hate watching anything on my computer. If it's a video, I don't want to see it. I'm afraid it'll be a 3 hour long video of an old man standing at a podium, talking at me.

It's time to start taking it really seriously. It's time to start condensing the outlines and memorizing. It's a tedious job. At least I better understand how to condense. Each topic is condensed differently. And when I initially started with Real Property, I didn't have any idea how to do it, still don't, but it made outlining really really difficult. Like drawing an escape plan through a building and town you are not familiar with. Like trying to find your way through a maze while only being about to see one corner ahead of you. Some of the other topics are more straight forward. Dense, dry, and painful, but somehow more straightforward.

Must stop procrastinating. Must focus.

Eagle Bars have no Eggs

Oh, I'm being facetious. I'm trying to be cute. I'm trying to bring smiles to my otherwise joyless existence. Just kidding again! My life is full of smiles.

Today, I read so many bar essays on Constitutional Law that I feel full of civil liberties. I feel like a whole contingent of civil liberties. It's especially confusing when the fact patterns use waste collection as the conflicting interest in Constitutional Law. Waste collection is a fundamental right. And NO ONE should be discriminate against when it comes to waste collection. Your waste has just as much right to be dumped in the land fill as my waste. Even if your waste is green. Don't discriminate the waste! Treat all waste equally! Respect my waste's fundamental Constitutional Rights!

Wha-t-ever.

The only worst fact patterns are the ones that involve Civil Procedure. Luckily the analysis for Civil Procedure questions incorporate all the knowledge needed. Perhaps "luckily" is not the correct preceding word for that previous sentence. I'm all mixed up.

Rob was able to fix the faucet in my parent's kitchen this afternoon. Good boy. He's earned his keep for the month. It turns out that there was a buildup of lime and impurities clogging up the faucet, right where the faucet connects to the hose under the sink. Rob disconnected the water, took off the faucet fixture and took it apart piece by piece. When he came to that spigot/plug/bottleneck/thing, there were small white things blocking the flow of water. After rinsing that out, the water flowed freely! This is a great relief because for nearly a year, the kitchen sink's water pressure has been similar to a trickling brook nearing the end of summer. Barely there. Almost vapors. It would take FOREVER to wash the dishes because there was no water. Filling a glass of water to drink would necessitate planning ahead in order to not DIE OF THIRST first.

The best part of Rob's faucet fixing is that he confirmed my suspicions for why the water disappeared. It made me look good, it made him look good. Everyone looked good!

I made Eagle Bars yesterday. They contain pecans. Thus I have not tried them. But they smell fracking-fantastic! I don't have very much to say about them other than that. I think I will make a batch without nuts so I can eat them and rejoice in the glory that is caramel, chocolate chips, white chocolate, caramel, graham crackers and caramel. It looks almost like a candy bar. I sliced them very very generously since they are slightly thinner than my usual bar cookie. But be warned, it's very rich.

Who has 12 hours the next 2 days?

I took a 200 question long mock MBE (multi-state bar exam) yesterday. It was 6 hours long not including lunch. I felt so numb. And when I got home, I got to see how many I got wrong.

But the most exciting part was after that. Theoretically today. Or last night. Depends on how motivated you are (I'm not).

There are 12 exciting hours of lecture that go over each 200 question in excruciating detail! I'm all for learning from my mistakes. But. This length of lecture? Um. It's not even in the course schedule. It's a do-on-your-own-time. WHAT TIME? WHY? WHY am I the butt of some cosmic joke? WHY?

And then the baking thing today did not go as planned. I don't like to work with nuts since I'm allergic and won't be able to taste it. But against my better judgment due to extremely toxic levels of stress, I used 1.5 cups of chopped pecans. I almost can't swallow. A-hem.

My life. Is like an emo blog. Useless. Self-pity. Non-sensical. Riddled with misspellings. And fake tears. (shakes fist at sky) I need to go epilate my legs now.

From Banging my head Against the Wall

Today. Sucked. Sure, the lecture was exciting enough. It was a good Civ Pro lecture overall. He is a good instructor and it's difficult to hate him for long. But the rest of the day? Stupid, worthless, idiotic, stupid, stupid stupid! Typing at this computer hurts my wrists further. And writing has been a bit less painful. But I NEED TO WRITE TO LEARN. And when my writing is broken, I am broken.

I did several practice exams today. The most exciting of which was the mixed subject. I am going to fail. Real property has folded me up like a paperclip and thrown me into a pond. Con Law is full of nooks and crannies that are STUPID. Mostly, my beef is with Con Law and Real Property. I HATE this. Today was an endless game of shooting myself in the foot. Every time I thought I knew something, BOOM. It was wrong. I am so wrong. EVERYTHING is wrong.

I miss my friend in TX. We had a little phone chat. It made the distance between seem so much more. It was separation of time and space. Studying for the bar is suppose to be lonely, that much I've heard. But today, I actually felt the psychic solitude. My heart wanted to reach out. To know that I wasn't alone. To sense that there were other things, better places, hopes and achievements. But I feel like I'm observing the world without actually being part of the world. I get these messages of lives passing and going. It's mostly a one-directional communication. And then, I suddenly get the strange sensation that I'm in a bell jar, and that all my communications are fabricated. My experience is of a world I cannot understand. Because so long as I am under the scrutiny and spell of the Bar Study, I can be made to dance, cry and sing with the jerk of strings and the puppeteer's will.

I think we've reached the halfway point in bar review. Halfway down to hell.

(Oh, go cry, emo kid.)

(Shutupshutupshutupshutup! My point is incredibly valid. I'm entitled to bouts of emo-ness.)

The Layer of Caramel gives them Power

A few things have become clear to me while I bake my way through bar study. First and foremost is that "spreading batter in buttered pan" is a lot harder than it sounds. The batter likes to stick to the spatula. A lot. The butter likes to release the batter from the pan. Frequently. I end up having to use ninja wrist flicks in order to get the batter into the corners of the pan.

Second is that bars with layers sound infinitely cooler. But are a devil harder to make. This week I have blondies with a caramel layer (no oats, got distracted). And they are beautiful. But they were difficult to make. I had to bake the first layer for 8 minutes first. That way the caramel wouldn't sink to the bottom and turn into a black, burned mess.

Combine these two truthiness doctrines and you have twice the difficulty of getting the batter to do something predictable. Spreading batter on top of the caramel layer was so frustrating. I made it on the hottest day this week (genius, I know) so I was really warm from babysitting the melting caramel and the oven, and then I had to hold everything just so in order to pour the bubbly hot caramel into the pan. On top of that, I had to spread batter evenly over melted caramel. Not an easy task. But they turned out lovely. A very very even layer, perfectly perfect between layers of blondie.

And then there is bar study. The baking has been doing wonders to relieve stress, cut down on impulsively purchased pastries, and time management. It even helps me pay attention to lectures as I weigh and measure out all the ingredients. Not an auditory learner. Maybe part kinestetic learner and mostly visual/written learner? Ha HA. This baking thing is working like MAGIC. As I gain confidence in baking, my movements have become fluid, practiced, reliable. Like a fattening Tai Chi. In the evenings, I wrap up my creations in some wax paper. The routine of cutting the paper, taking each piece and wrapping it up, taping down the flaps is soothing and slightly mindless. An alternative is shelling fava beans which I also do.

I've been infatuated with the idea of white chocolate brownies with dark chocolate chunks. It just looks so cool. Perhaps I'll try it tomorrow. Perhaps I'll wait until next week. I will do something with nuts. Probably not an independent recipe, more likely a nut topping/garnish/mix-in. I have bags of pecans that want to be used.

And cereal bars? I love them. Especially with the dark chocolate marshmallow that I made. It gives it an extra special something. Anthony says "Nay" and to abandon that endeavor entirely. But I rather like them. I don't think I'll do the crushed chocolate cream cookies on top because it's so messy. I nearly had a meltdown while trying to slather and dip the cereal bars in melted chocolate and then the crushed cookies. Can't get the sensation of melted chocolate and crumbs out of my mind. Shudder. I know, I have a hard life.

A burger sounds really good right now. Something rare, with a sharp cheese, on a toasted bun. No onions. A slice of tomato. Dijon mustard. Maybe horseradish too. I read on a burger-devoted blog that a properly cooked burger must rest for a few minutes to release the juices. Sounds good to me. But right now, I'm so hungry. I won't mind drippy, oily elbows as I eat my eager burger.

Oh, Anthony? I'll totally go to that Super Duper burger place on Market with you. Sorry I made a snarky comment when we walked past it several weeks ago. Upon further inspection, it looks like a place that has good burgers. At least that's what the Mayor claims. Or something. I'm getting my sources mixed up. It's time for another practice test.

The pacing Chimerinsky

The wind has been taken out of my sails. My small, tattered, mis-matched, and generally in disrepair sails have been completely deflated. This Constitutional Law lecture was suppose to be the Snap. It was suppose to be the lecture that ended all expectations of lectures. After all, Erwin is the foremost expert in all things SCOTUS. He wrote these not too terrible textbooks and accompanying slightly better treatise on his textbooks. But this lecture is just unremarkable. Unlike the other lectures, he has no podium. He prefers to sway back and forth with his hands in his pockets. Occasionally, he will take a step to the left. And then another small step to the left. Followed by two short shuffle steps to the right. Is he doing the foxtrot?

His outlines/lecture hand outs are sparse. Deceptively sparse, and he speaks really slowly. Does this mean that it's the black letter law that we need to memorize? Or is it merely nonsensical statements that require some kind of insight? Insight that I am suppose to extract from this dry lecture? He's memorized his own outline down to the very numerical prompts. Has he been doing this too long? Does he have a photographic memory? Or is the outline just that dumb? The day class had Erwin in one 8 hour block of lecture, live.

I feel dumb after listening to this. He is speaking some elfin language that is foreign. And his jokes? The puns that he is infamous for? Haven't caught a single one. He told a story about his kids, the same story every law prof tells about their kids when teaching about the 1st Amendment freedom of speech. Namely, each kid will go through a stage in their life when they learn about freedom of speech and try to use that as an excuse to not follow parent's instructions. Unfortunately, their parents are not the government and thus that defense is unavailable to the kids. Clever, yet so misguided. It's like every Yelp talk that gets slightly out of control. Someone starts off with "I have the right to say this, I have freedom of speech, you can't make me stop." Except I CAN. It's not a free pass to sound off on how McDonalds ran out of Nuggets. It's not a reason to call 911 to report that McDonalds has run out of Nuggets. Who thinks to do that?

In the mean time, I've been utilizing the powers of multi-tasking to stay focused on the lecture. I have it playing loudly with the lecture handout next to it. And I'm measuring out ingredients for cookies at the same time. Yesterday, when I was just plopped in front of the computer, I ended up surfing the web. I found out that Paris Hilton currently weighs 115 lbs and is 5'8" or something like that. Even less productive than I previously hoped.

This week, I feel like making dulce du leches blondies and something else. With chocolate. One of the two must contain chocolate to balance out the evils. Would it be too much to have chocolate and caramel in the blondies? And then the second one would be either brownies with caramel, or just brownies, or just snickerdoodles. What's on the menu? I forgot. Let me check and get back.

Oh, the lecture is starting again. Gotta go.

Tennis Elbow from Typing. That's talent.

How does one manage to get tennis-elbow-like symptoms from typing? I don't know. I thought tennis elbow was the result of over-use of the elbow as a fulcrum. The bendy part of a lever. The excessive stress of relying on a ligament for those backhands. Not something that can develop from typing. And yet, I have these sore, painful, streaks of tension that go up the back/underside of my arms, starting with the elbow. I first noticed it when I leaned on my elbows about a week ago and one elbow experienced pain and soreness, and the other did not. The right elbow is also slightly inflamed around the elbow joint. I know it's not from baking. Thank you, Edwin.

Edwin is my mixer. His name reminds me of a Royal British Safari guide who has a big white mustache and a pith helmet, dressed in khaki. And his socks are pulled up to his knees. He does the majority of my heavy mixing. I only scrape down the sides every once in a while. Do I always name my inanimate objects? Yes. Don't you? But only machines or objects that I have to work with on a steady basis. For instance: my car is named Cassandra. Not the Prius. The Prius is named Slow or something to that effect. Maybe "Annoying Beeping Backup Camera." And my computer is named Quantum Unified Field Theory. Hm. Maybe that was one of those things I should have kept to myself. People must not know that I am such a dork.

One of the jokes in college was this "spy test" to see how good of a spy you would be. First you get really rather drunk. Then you change all the vital passwords on your computer. After you sober up, try to figure out what the new passwords are. If you were smart, you'd write them down somewhere, maybe encrypted, with a cipher. Or backwards. Or in pig latin or whatever else high school girls do when they think they are being particularly clever and secretive. If you can't figure it out, be sure to have the factory original boot disk in order to bypass the security login for a Mac.

This week was a baking-heavy week. For the mail patrons, I hope the current shipment has arrived according to plan. I shipped one to Texas for my friend who is also in the throes of studying for the Colorado bar while living in Austin. There was a little concern about melting in the hot Texas sun. But I think it'll be fine. What could happen? I just don't know when it would arrive exactly. It's priority post. Which means less than a week.

Overall, there were Oatmeal Rum Raisins on Monday. Shipment on Wednesday. Wednesday evening was the Chocolate Marshmallow cereal bars. Thursday was Goldilocks snickerdoodles. Let's back up a bit and talk about the Chocolate Marshmallow cereal bars. In order to make these special and different and also really really satisfying, I used a plethora of semi-sweet and unsweetened dark chocolate. It turned the marshmallows into this gooey, fragrant, chocolate cream sauce that was not too sweet. After the bars were cooled and cut up, I painted one side of the bar with either white chocolate or milk chocolate and dipped them into crushed chocolate creme cookies. I learned something really important from this experience. I do not like to get my hands covered in gooey, melted chocolate and dusty cookie crumbs. It felt really weird and I had to keep washing my hands like Lady Macbeth. So I had to work really quickly to finish the toppings. I tried to pack on as much as the chocolate could hold. I'm limited in height by the size of the shipping boxes. And there was a little snafu with the wrapping of the wax paper since the sharp edges of the chocolate wafer cookies STAB STAB STAB through the wax paper.

And then yesterday, I was inspired to make my Goldilocks bars rather than wait for Friday. They smell divine. My mother said it smelled like cookies she used to eat when she was a little child growing up in Taiwan. My father grew up on a farm in Taiwan and they didn't have cookies. But it reminded him of something much more simple and comforting, something unadulterated by commercial bakeries. And this is what I go for. This smell-memory thing. I don't know what you call it but it is really important. With one whiff, a slight taste, and the mind transports you back to some happy memory associated with that scent. It is powerful and evocative. It can trigger memories in great detail, of events that were long forgotten.

On a positive note, I am addicted to Battlestar Galactica (re-imagined series) but sometimes I will read the episode recaps on Television Without Pity. I watched the whole series in a rushed marathon last month but now I'm going through and savoring the moments. The writer of the recaps used to be someone named Strega who wrote well. The writing style was dynamic, colloquial but restrained. A different writer took over midway through the second season and he is completely different. More rambling. The writing is very descriptive and he displays vast knowledge of relevant philosophical topics. But he writes in such long sentences. Such long sentences. It makes the recaps difficult to read because the sentences go everywhere! I wish he showed just a little bit more restraint. I would give him a dollar for every period he used and take away a dollar for every comma he used. That is all. Remedies calls.