Ginger Snaps

Today I made ginger snaps which turned out BEAUTIFULLY!

I got the recipe here: http://allrecipes.com/Recipe/Moms-Ginger-Snaps/Detail.aspx

INGREDIENTS

• 1 cup packed brown sugar
• 3/4 cup vegetable oil
• 1/4 cup molasses
• 1 egg
• 2 cups all-purpose flour
• 2 teaspoons baking soda
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• 1/2 teaspoon ground cloves
• 1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
• 1 teaspoon ground ginger
• 1/3 cup white sugar for decoration

DIRECTIONS

1. Preheat oven to 375 degrees F (190 degrees C).
2. In a large bowl, mix together the brown sugar, oil, molasses, and egg. Combine the flour, baking soda, salt, cloves, cinnamon, and ginger; stir into the molasses mixture. Roll dough into 1 1/4 inch balls. Roll each ball in white sugar before placing 2 inches apart on ungreased cookie sheets.
3. Bake for 10 to 12 minutes in preheated oven, or until center is firm. Cool on wire racks.

Jessica the Hippo

Hungry Kitty

Myspace deleted this video for some reason but I found it on YouTube to repost. So cute.

Another one spotted...

Entryway to N dorm! Please send me any other pictures or locations that I could take pictures! I want to document this madness.

Sorry about the bad quality, I didn't have my camera with me, so I had to take this with my phone.

More cupcakes

Bonnie Butter Cake

1-3/4 cups sugar
2/3 cup margarine or butter, softened
2 eggs
1-1/2 teaspoons vanilla
2-3/4 cups all-purpose flour
2-1/2 teaspoons baking powder
1 teaspoon salt
1-3/4 cups milk

Heat oven to 350º. Mix sugar, margarine/butter, eggs and vanilla until fluffy. Beat on high speed, scraping bowl occasionally, 5 minutes. Beat in flour, baking powder and salt alternately with milk on low speed. Pour into pan(for cupcakes, into paper-lined cups, 2/3 full).
Bake until wooden toothpick inserted in center comes out clean, about 20 minutes for cupcakes.

Chocolate Butter Frosting
1/3 cup margarine or butter, softened
2 ounces unsweetened melted chocolate (cool)
2 cups powdered sugar
1-1/2 teaspoons vanilla
About 2 tablespoons milk

Mix margarine/butter and chocolate. Stir in powdered sugar. Beat in vanilla and milk until frosting is of spreading consistency.

I dunno. They turned out alright, but seem kind of bland to me. And just something about them seems off. Jessie likes them though. I'm going to try to the chocolate chip ones next, and hopefully pick up a new cookbook in Portland. This one just isn't doing it for me.

Damn you, Ben Michaelis

The graffiti continues and intensifies! Corbin blames Ben. I kinda do too.

This is in the entryway to R dorm.

This is on the side of S dorm.

Sad Star

I am in Olympia.

Ben is in Spokane.

This is a long way away.

Google Maps says 327 miles.

Ben left this morning. He should be returning on Sunday the 25th. Today is the 15th. That is ten days.

Star is a very sad little panda.

Ben's article in the CPJ (UPDATE!)

The Anarchist's response to Ben's article:

Notice how he painted over his previous work(Read page 11 of this week's CPJ!), highlighting the original article by Nicky Tiso, that Ben responded to, and replaced it with "FUCK COPS!", seemingly to echo part of Ben's article:

This makes Ben sad.

---------------------------------------------------------------------

So there's a lot of vandalism on campus lately. Most of it is just Anarchy symbols and things like "fuck cops." A guy wrote an opinion piece in the CPJ saying it's your own fault for misinterpreting what the graffiti "artist" is trying to say with these things. Ben could not keep quiet after that and wrote this lovely response. Enjoy!

Brownies

Last night Ben, Erik, and I took the bus to west Olympia and did some shopping. I got some baking chocolate and made brownies from scratch. I haven't tried them yet, they're still cooling. The recipe is from the package of Ghirardelli chocolate.

4 oz Ghirardelli Semi-Sweet Chocolate Baking Bar (1 bar)
1 cup brown sugar, packed
2 large eggs
1/4 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp salt
1 stick (1/2 cup) unsalted butter, cut into pieces
1 tsp vanilla
3/4 cup & 3 Tbsp all-purpose flour
1/3 cup Ghirardelli Semi-Sweet Chips (I used Nestle Milk Chocolate Chips!)

Preheat oven to 350ºF. Butter and flour an 8" X 8" pan. In a heavy 1-1/2 qt saucepan melt chocolate bar and butter over low heat, stirring until smooth. Remove pan from heat; let cool to room temperature. Stir in brown sugar and vanilla. Add eggs, mix well. In bowl, sift together flour, baking powder, and salt. Slowly fold in flour mixture; mix well. Stir in chips. Pour batter into pan. Bake for 25-30 minutes, or until a tester comes out clean.

Edit: The brownies were a hit! Everyone loved them. Only problem is I forgot I'm the only person I know who doesn't like Ghirardelli chocolate, so I didn't enjoy them as much. Still ate a few and liked the chocolate chips a lot and could tell they were good.

Strawberry Muffins!

I love baking after midnight. It makes me very calm and content and gets me in a sleepy frame of mind. I decided to try making muffins from scratch for the first time ever. They turned out beautifully. I modified the blueberry muffin recipe in Jessie's ancient Betty Crocker cookbook for strawberries since I still have a bunch from my garden in my freezer.

Here's the recipe:

1 egg

3/4 cup milk

1/2 cup vegetable oil

2 cups all purpose or whole wheat flour

1/3 cup sugar

3 teaspoons baking powder

1 teaspoon salt

Heat oven to 400º. Grease bottoms only of about 12 medium muffin cups, 2 1/2 x 1 1/4 inches. Beat egg; stir in milk and oil. Stir in remaining ingredients all at once just until flour is moistened (batter will be lumpy). Fill muffin cups about 3/4 full. Bake until golden brown, about 20 minutes. Immediately remove from pan. Makes about 1 dozen muffins.

Blueberry Muffins (Strawberry in my case.)

Stir in 1 cup fresh or 3/4 cup frozen blueberries (thawed and well drained) with the milk.

I should also note that Corbin STRONGLY recommends replacing the milk with yogurt so the muffins are moister. These ones were a little dry. I'm also considering replacing the sugar with a combination of brown sugar and honey. 

Cookies!

Yesterday I baked cookies again. Blogger hates me still and doesn't want to upload my pictures. It pretty much sucks. But I managed to get it to upload one picture of the finished product. Here's the recipe I used, from the Quaker Oats container(best cookies ever):

1 cup (2 sticks) margarine or butter, softened (I use butter!)

1 cup firmly packed brown sugar

1/2 cup granulated sugar

2 eggs

1 teaspoon vanilla

1-1/2 cups all-purpose flour

1 teaspoon baking soda

1 teaspoon cinnamon

1/2 teaspoon salt (optional)

3 cups Quaker Oats (quick or old fashioned, uncooked)

1 cup raisins (I substitute chocolate chips!)

1. Heat oven to 350ºF.

2. Beat together margarine and sugars until creamy.

3. Add eggs and vanilla; beat well.

4. Add combined flour, baking soda, cinnamon, and salt; mix well.

5. Stir in oats and raisins/chocolate chips; mix well.

6. Drop by rounded tablespoonfuls onto ungreased cookie sheet.

7. Bake 10 to 12 minutes or until golden brown.

8. Cool 1 minute on cookie sheet; remove to wire rack.

Makes about 4 dozen.

Spam

So I get a lot of spam. I don't know who I gave my email address to to deserve this spam, but here are some samples:

If your girl cannot be satisfied with your weewee, you have to turn it into a schlong!

Tired of viewing explicit videos and wanking off,

because you cannot find a hottie, who would like to get laid by such a tiny phallus as yours?
Then our offer is definitely for you!
Our MegaDick will let you achieve the desired size of your penis and pick up any filly you wish!

And believe us, she will never stay dissapointed!

Massive rod is what you need to make your beloved lady adore you!

Do you believe in miracles? We guess you're likely to give a negative answer .
We hadn't believed, either...until the moment MegaDick was introduced!
The effect this remedy produces on a male dic'k cannot be called otherwise than a Miracle!
Only fancy, that your love stick suddenly becomes longer
and thicker and makes women tremble with desire!
It's fabulous!

Your girlfriend will be amazed at your new gigantic penis

Do you feel a great disappointment whenever you are reminded about the dimensions of your dic'k?
Take leave of your worries!
Now you are obtaining an excellent opportunity to improve your dic'k,
so that no girl in the world could resist you.
Your dreams of massive and powerful Dik will come true with MegaDick!

Purchases

Also I ordered this shirt from Threadless recently and am waiting for it to be shipped to me!

And my mom bought me this vacuum which works amazingly!

Happy days!

Loud Sex

Apparently someone was having VERY loud sex last night at about 4 in the morning. Loud enough it woke Jessie up and kept her awake. Speculation: who was it? It wasn't me, I was sleeping alone and had taken a bunch of melatonin to make myself sleep(which is why I didn't wake up). Was it Corbin's roommate? Was it Corbin hooking up with his roommate? Was it the woman who lives next door and works with EF students? (Ben thinks this sounds like I'm implying she is hooking up with a foreign student, ala "Let me teach you some English...first word, 'touch'.") Why does whoever the girl is feel the need to scream? 

Halloween Party 2007

Last night(Friday) there was a Halloween party at Katherine, Evan, and Paul's place(future home of Hannah). It was lovely, dancing, snacks, etc. Here's some lovely pictures.

Ben likes candy.

Peter was some sort of gay sailor? The point of this picture is really for the little face Ben is making.

I went as myself. Spooky!

This picture is glorious (Corbin, Ben, me, and Paul)

Steve went as a crazy guy? I thought jester, but crazy guy was what I was told. 

Harmony, Ben, Sean, and Joel tickle poor James.

Jessie is something, possibly winter, and Frannie is a purple unicorn.

Ben is a saucy doctor and Alex is Albert Einstein.

Frannie the unicorn.

Katherine is an old maid.

Corbin rapes Ben as usual.

Corbin went to the party as a homosexual. Because they look like everybody else.

Paul dances with his girlfriend, Ami.

Hollis was a cowboy and Maddie was a saloon girl.

Ashe and Freddy as raccoons?

Evan as Ivan.

Jessie and Joel's friend, Margaret was a fairy princess. Brian in the background is a hippie.

I love Hannah. This is my current desktop background. Stolen from her blog.