I should be writing. Instead, celebrating an important holiday.
National Make a Dog’s Day…
Essentials for the day:
–Donate to Senior Dog Rescue of Oregon.
–Follow through on the three daily walks.
–Hide treats around the house beneath stuffed animals or under well-worn yogurt containers. [Not exactly Martha Stewart Living material, but it keeps him entertained.]
And finally, give his highness time on his throne.
And let’s tie in the importance of dogs to writers with this post from Writer Unboxed.
I should be writing. Instead, prototyping cinnamon bun alternatives…
October 4 was National Cinnamon Bun Day in Sweden and clearly I had no choice but to honor the good folks from the way-up-north.
But ssshhhh, don’t tell them, I was too time-strapped [I.e. impatient, lazy, and disorganized] to use a yeast-based recipe.
And there it was–a lonely, neglected sheet of puff pastry in the freezer.
Time to experiment.
1. Thaw that baby out**.
2. Make up my own filling.
- Hydrated raisins
- Allspice
- Gobs of cinnamon [the appropriate unit for my favorite spice]
- Softened butter/vanilla shmear
- Chopped almonds
3. Use the Pepperidge Farm baking instructions for a cheese-and-spinach something-or-other as a general guide and hover.
Nope, not pretty. But the ratio of pastry-to-filling–goooood stuff.
I’ll try it again…and maybe even work on the aesthetics.
True, not exactly buns…
Will I be adopted by the Swedes anytime soon? Probably not. But I thank them for their special day.
**Writers and grammar-wonks, I probably should have juxtaposed ‘thaw’ and ‘out’, but it just wasn’t as pleasing to the ear. Sorry.
I should be writing. Instead, delivering comfort…
…in the form of Wor Wonton Soup.
L has been going toe-to-toe with a virus and nothing fortifies her better than this.
1. Shortcut: I didn’t actually make the won tons. I just cut the wrappers into strips and added them late in the process. [Okay, okay, it’s actually ‘wor wonton wrapper strips soup’.]
2. What’s the difference between wonton soup and wor wonton soup?
3. One definition of ‘wor’ in the Chinese language is ‘everything’. Works for me. Think ’empty the fridge and cupboards’.
4. One of my favorite parts of making soup: watching it grow…and grow…until “we’re gonna need a bigger pot”. Leftovers? Absolutely.
5. This recipe https://noshingwiththenolands.com/wor-won-ton-soup/ outclasses the broth from the local Chinese restaurants. It’s the ginger, I’d say, though the early addition of Chinese five-spice and elephant garlic in the sesame oil-infused heat didn’t hurt.
6. Why do I keep weaving cooking into my writing?
This piece https://writingcooperative.com/want-to-write-better-try-cooking-b918272b7025 helps explain.
Overwhelmed at the thought of writing?
Fast Company’s Art Markman has four suggestions:
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Break it down
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Make an outline
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Just get something down
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Write for five more minutes
If the list doesn’t tell you enough [and it doesn’t], here is the fleshed out version.
And I would add another suggestion.
Bake…[no, it doesn’t necessarily help you generate a bestseller, but it’s great for an afternoon coffee and who knows, the caramel experiment might just pay off in a fun blog post.]
- I added an amaretto caramel to the banana bread on the left. I added an Irish cream caramel to the banana bread on the right.
Whiteout Horoscope
Just playing around with words today…
But how do you find a ruler small enough to…
slap a bee’s wrist?
Bees are better at math when they’re punished for the wrong answer, a new study finds
Guys weekend!! My latest eCard
Passing this along from my other blog, retirerenew.com…
After completing a five-day ‘showing up’ challenge, I’m focusing these next four days just on my Incomplete Book of Retirement Wisdom**.
More on the challenge later…
**The book doubles as a collection of eCards.
Suggestions:
— Save/download the image above and send it to a retired/soon-to-retire friend.
— Better yet…
-
call it up in an image editing program [even a presentation program like PowerPoint will work]
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slap an even better caption on top of mine or add a personal comment
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export it as a JPG or PNG, and email/text message it to that friend.
Writers: Looking to suck some valuable time from your already busy day? Launch an all-out investigation into whether or not you should add an apostrophe between the ‘y’ and the ‘s’ in ‘guys weekend’. I skipped that annoying grammatical gnat–I figured ‘guys’ answers the question ‘what kind of weekend?’, which makes it an adjective, not a possessive. I’ve also been sticking to the ‘better done than perfect’ guideline. Now I can sleep peacefully…until the dog digs his shoulder into my solar plexus. [A writer’s day isn’t complete until he shoehorns ‘solar plexus’ somewhere into his digital blather.]
Writing Wisdom from Stephen King and Ray Bradbury
Three posters I’ve added to my teacher project and to ednotions.com…
Rants and Riffs Installment #12: Greeting cards, too-early calendars, and cable companies
Greeting card makers…since when did your product need that glued-down third ‘page’? The minute I pull a card from the case and feel that extra heft, I know that baby’s going to cost an extra buck.
Moving on…
A curious question from a snail mail donation plea…”How are you enjoying our 2020 calendar?” It’s September of 2019! Why would I have a calendar out three months ahead of time? And really, enjoying a calendar?
And finally…
Cable companies forcing you into ‘bundles’. All I want is fast Internet access! No, I do not want Keeping Up with the Kardashians, meaningless statistics spewed by sports networks, or some poor mosquito-bitten shlub relying on a palm frond [if we’re lucky] for warmth.
