Round Up

(Once again-I apologize for any wonky spacing problems in this post)

Love, love, love to bake. I don't bake very much anymore because of my sugar problems and A. doesn't eat sweets. I know-How can that be? My beautiful red Kitchen Aid mixer is so lonely.

So what do I do to quell the Baking fever. Read baking blogs and eye all of the gorgeous food porn that abounds in the blogosphere. I came across Bakespace-MySpace for bakers the other day.

And speaking of baking, look at this ginormous cupcake. One can purchase the giant cupcake pan from here. Popgadget actually shows a good image of the pan. Things like this just make me giggle a bit. I can't even imagine how one would go about cutting this or seriving it. I would think it would end up a big mess on the plate.

When I was a kid we had to make the approximately 80 mile round trip to Pittsburgh once a week to see my asthma doctor. This went on for a number of years because my asthma was so bad and I had suffered an atelectasis (collapsed lung). We would either go by or stop in Big Boys. Big Boys was a burger, fry, shake restaurant. It was very 1950's. Out front there was this giant, well, big boy. I loved him. Any sort of giant symbol I'm all for. He sort of looked like the one in Livonia, Michigan, but they didn't have him perched so high-this one's going to get a nose bleed.

Even though I'm not baking too much anymore a couple of weeks ago I did whip up one of my old favorites. No-Bake Oatmeal Cookies. You know the ones with the peanut butter, chocolate and oatmeal. A friend of mine asked me to make these for her, but I ended up altering the recipe. I found a recipe that uses Nutella. Oh, my, gosh. The recipe also called for Frangelica, but I left that out and used high quality vanilla. Here's the recipe for Nutella Oatmeal Cookies. I only ate two and of course cleaned out the bowl and got the cookies out of the house as soon as possible. I think I might try that yummy white chocolate peanut butter next time instead of nutella.

Blueprint magazine featured an article entitled 100 reason to get rid of it. It's also been bounced all over the web. I've seen it on a couple of blogs. I thought I would join in because they really cover everything.

For all of you Mike Rowe fans (of Dirty Jobs fame)-All About Mike Rowe.

Every evening we watch the BBC News. Last night they had a story about 4 mountain gorillas being killed in the Congo. I actually shrieked when they showed the slain gorillas. One was a mother gorilla and her baby was found alive. There's more about it here (be warned-photographs) and if you go to the BBC News website there's the video they showed last night.

On Wednesday night BBC News had a story about the what is thought to be the last river dolphin in China.

All I have to say about both the dolphin and the mountain gorillas is this-STUPID FREAKIN' HUMANS.

Last weekend A. and I went to see Becoming Jane. It was okay. A lot of liberties were taken with historical accuracy, but it was a nice way to spend a couple of hours. For some authentic Jane Austen check out Jane Austen Quote of the Day. .

Love this idea-The Historic Architecture Campus Project. I was very excited to see one of my alma maters listed.

Make sure to watch for the Perseids this weekend.

"This we know. . . the earth does not belong to man, man belongs to the earth. All things are connected, like the blood which connects one family. Whatever befalls the earth befalls the children of the earth. Man did not weave the web of life - he is merely a strand in it. Whatever he does to the web, he does to himself. " Chief Seattle (c. 1786 - 1866)