February's Hols

The past week has included three holidays (four, if you count Friday the 13th!)--all of which affected my daily life.

Now we're back to 'normal'--or, as normal as life is these days--and though this was fun, I'm glad to be calmed down.

Oh, wait. The Oscars are next weekend. Who am I KIDDING?? I need to Research!! I've seen zero of the nominated films in ANY category and I do not PLAN on seeing any! I think the last movie I saw in the theatres was "Juno"! I have a fiver in my wallet just BEGGING to represent me in the Oscars Betting Pool! I need to make a list of ironic message-cookies to present at our annual Oscars Bash!

Okay. But back to now. I have all week to prepare for the silly Academy Awards.

{ohmyGOD it is SO not silly.}

Thursday was Lincoln Day, and apparently the State Government does not subscribe to the "2-in-1" combo deal of Presidents' Day, observed yesterday, the 16th. (Bonus points to whoever can tell me, definitively, if it's PRESIDENTS' Day, PRESIDENTS Day, PRESIDENT'S Day, or something else entirely. I recall an observation from Claudia Kishi's annoyingly intelligent older sister in the first Babysitter's Club book about the same issue--in that case, if the "Babysitter's" portion of the club name was punctuated appropriately. She did not have an answer then, either.)

At any rate, I had Thursday off. Wait--I had Thursday "off."

Let me back up.

I am not really a Snack Day/Work Function/Forced Social Interaction type of gal. Even regular parties with friends unnerve me; I'd rather have a Game Night with the fam, or with one or two other couples. The idea of being at a party with nowhere to sit terrifies me. The State Library folks often plan these big to-dos, or even little to-dos, where we all gather in the big meeting area and admire the crap everyone's brought in and stand and eat on paper plates while musing about this and that.

It is not my bag.

I don't like to eat standing up. I do not like making small talk. I don't like people watching me while I look over the muffins they brought to make sure they don't have raisins (because in these things, everyone stands AROUND the big table eating, making a circle, so anyone who goes up to get anything is like on effing DISPLAY choosing what they want while all the eaters look on).

So, I don't generally partake, or bring in anything. And even though it usually means I'm labeled as "The One Who Doesn't Do Anything," I'm all right with that. I'm a private person, y'know? And no, I probably won't go out to Paddy Malone's (local Irish bar/restaurant) when my division arranges a Friday night post-work gathering there, or stop by a co-worker's house for a Holiday Party. I'm just not interested, and why waste my rare down-time being awkward and uncomfortable? Nope.

ANYWAY, so at our last reference librarians' meeting, we were talking about...I don't know, upcoming holidays or something, and I realized we'd have a Friday the 13th coming up. I may have even suggested we try a Subversive Snack Day, just our little group of a dozen or so, kind of an Anti-Valentine's Day/Scary Food presentation. I figured--it would give me a chance to provide something a little different, and not *always* be the one who you can always depend not to participate. And, since the point wasn't to Be Delicious (hey, that's the perfume I'm wearing today! Mmmm, green apples...), people wouldn't think "Who brought in these NEE-YASTEE brownies?" as much as "What a clever idea! Who cares how it tastes--LOOK at it!"

The idea was agreed upon; I began my research.

I soon stumbled upon a cute idea: big, sugar cookies, dough colored to echo the gaggy pastels of Conversation Hearts:

Except...lettered in icing to be the anti-Conversation Hearts. Instead of "Lets Kiss" (absence of apostrophe NOT MY FAULT), they put "Let's Not." "My Baby" translates to "Never Gonna Happen." Reply Hearts, in a way.

I didn't want to be up all night icing plain sugar cookies with pastel icing, so I really liked the idea of making the dough pastel-colored so I wouldn't have to do an all-over Frost (just noticed that two words use to describe this process are "ice" and "frost." Why? It's not like it's particularly cold. Wouldn't spread if it was cold, anyway). And I decided to see if I could find BLACK icing for the lettering! You know, to pump up the Subversion Level!

This was going to be GREAT, I thought. Dad has a nice big kitchen with peninsulas and islands and double ovens and cooling racks and flour and sugar that I don't even have to buy. Thursday I only have to work a little bit at Stephens, so I'd have almost all day to bake and letter-ice, and Sarah was planning on coming down after her satellite was hooked up. I found black icing and tiny round icing-tips at Hobby Lobby (remember my aforementioned errand? This was it!!), I had my Standing Mixer all packed and ready to take to Dad's (no smushing up butter and sugar for hours by hand for THIS girl!)...I had a list of Possible Sayings...a recipe from Cooks.com exactly FOR "Heart shaped sugar cookies"...I was good to go, you know?

I got up early Thursday morning, went to Dad's, and mixed the dough. And I am officially never ever making sugar cookies without a mixer AGAIN. Wowza. Like three minutes, folks, seriously--four sticks of COLD butter and three cups of powdered sugar. It was--apologies--like buttah. The rest of the mixing process went smoothly (how the hell long has it been since I've used a sifter? Forever!), the dough went into the fridge for the recommended 2-3 hours, and I left for Stephens for a two-hour shift.

Sarah was held up by the wicked Satellite Men, so after work and a couple errands, I went back to bake. I figured--no problem. I'll split the dough into five parts, color each section by kneading food coloring into the dough, roll it out, cut out varied sizes of hearts, bake it up super-quick because of the double oven, and be done in no time, ready to letter.

And, I mean, that's how it went. It's just that each one of those steps took an INORDINATE amount of time. I have no idea the proper way to color dough, and getting a consistent shade of pastel was difficult using only my hands. I'm sure a big batch would be easier to color using the mixer, but 1/5th of a double batch isn't much. Also, by the time I was done, my hands looked like Rainbow Brite had puked on them. I had to keep washing bowls and hands over and over so I wouldn't transfer the just-used colors onto the next section of dough and it just took FOREVER!!

The rolling-out-and-baking part was tedious and sticky and floury and frustrating, and even moreso when I got the sheets out of the oven and SOME batches would spread out so the hearts were unrecognizable and others were absolutely, positively perfect. I NEED CONSISTENCY!! That is ALL I ask from life!! I think I made eight batches, and by the time I was done, it was well past dinnertime. Poor Sarah was stuck with Satellite Guy until almost 8 that night, so she never got a chance to come down--a rotten day off for her, poor thing. :(

I decided to ice at home, so I wouldn't have to transport newly-lettered cookies, and so I could watch "The Office" while doing so (P.S. Um, Holly? Don't tease us with your presence, saying you'll be returning, and then not show up when we need you. I miss you, girl.).

And I did get it done...I was reasonably happy with my efforts, and the cookies turned out surprisingly good, thin and chewy (I don't like hard/crispy cookies much), but substantial and, for the most part, shapely. Lettering took me the better part of three hours. The icing, thank goodness, dried so I could stack the cookies, so I only had to deal with two large-ish Gladwares to tote into work the next day.

Here is the display, in our little meeting-area at the office:

And here:

{This tray includes one of my favorites, texted to me by Sarah: "Loathe Ya!"...but the "A!" fell off, so it's not as effective. I tried to hide it underneath others so you don't notice the flaws, but it makes me sad that it never really got a chance to shine.}

And the last:

Another one of my personal favorites here...Aim Lower.

My co-worker Abs (Abbey, but I like nicknaming people, so she got "Abs") brought in Voodoo Doll Tea Sandwiches. Absolutely adorable, and multi-cultural! Different skin tones!

It was a fun morning. And, guess what? I put my food on a paper plate and put it in my cube for later. This way, I wouldn't have to eat standing up AND make small talk. One out of two ain't bad, right?

Okay, so I got through that. Neil went to "Friday the 13th" that night, so I watched "The Bachelor" (I am so behind but I am SUCH a Jason-fan) and had a rare evening off.

The next morning, Valentine's Day, Dad came by at 8:30. He drove us to Kansas City to my favorite museum ever: The Nelson-Atkins. Come on--who doesn't love the shuttlecocks?

We had a wonderful lunch in their courtyard, I saw the new expansion I'd been aching to visit, and I had some absolutely fulfilling moments in their Cloisters exhibit. I can't explain how I feel when I'm in there. I just can't.

After five hours or so, pleasantly exhausted, we drove back home. A real day off!

That night, Neil and I cooked the heart-shaped Papa Murphy's pizza I'd picked up the day before and watched "Forgetting Sarah Marshall"--I knew it would not disappoint, and it didn't. But don't get me started on how hypocritical it is that they could only have a very, very limited number of shots of Jason Segel's wang in order to keep the film's rating. And HOW many boobs are in Wedding Crashers?? GRR!!! When the MPAA rating in the beginning said "Rated R for graphic nudity," Neil was all "Aw yeah!" and I told him it wasn't the nudity he thought it was going to be...

At any rate...it was a very, very pleasant February 14th.

But the weekend was not over!

Sunday night, after work, I went home to change. For tonight, my friends...tonight, was a Night At The Theatre.

We met Roger, Amanda, and Brad at Jesse, for the Bestest Show Ever On Earth Ever, "The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee."

{Now...I don't mean to say that it's *specifically* my favorite. I just consider it to be, all around and in general, the best show. The most entertaining, if you will. There aren't any songs that I'm dying to hear, no breaking into the titular song that gives me chills all over, a la "How do you document real life..." It just keeps you laughing, for a solid hour and three-quarters. What other show can do that for ya?}

I was worried that after two spectacular performances in Chicago, that this cast wouldn't be as good. And they weren't, in every sense. William Barfee wasn't big, and I think it's his graceful "big-ness" that makes his character such fun to watch. The vice-principal looked more like David Cross than Sam Lloyd (the lawyer on Scrubs), but it didn't not work. It was just different.

Best of all, everyone really loved it. And what's the point of taking a few friends to the theatre, if not to say "SEE? I told you!! I told you how good it was!" at the end?

Monday was also a day off...I guess for Washington's birthday? I don't know. Anyway, I worked at Stephens...but I did get to sleep in a bit. And I got home before five.

So now, it's back to the grind, and back to normal.

YAY Oscars eeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!!!!