Red Red Wine

Had a fun little "chocolate and wine" social with my SWE group today. The purported reason for the gathering was to have someone from the Regional board come out and give us an overview of how the larger society structure works and what resources we can command from it. I decided to take both chocolate and wine. The chocolate being cookies with chili powder and the wine a red from Chili. I made the cookies last night in the little top oven which preheated in roughly 3 minutes. The cookies were great. The wine was grape juicy.

First I picked up the kitchen and ran the dishwasher to get stuff out of the sink. I run it once or twice a week depending on how often I eat at home. I scrubbed a little grout in the countertops that was looking grotty. I cleaned everything up. Then, I proceeded to fling chocolate cookie dough over half the kitchen in the process of making the cookies. At some point during sifting the dry ingredients went whumpf and scattered about a teaspoon of flour, cocoa, and ancho and chipotle chili mix over a 3 square foot area with lots of recently cleaned grout.

Then I chose a bowl for mixing that was small enough to get some good creaming going. It was great for that. It was not as great when I added in the melted chocolate and the recalcitrant flour mix. Then mini-chocolate chips and pecans? Fuggedaboudit. Small miscalclulations with the blender sent about 2 cookie's worth of dough flying in various directions. But I didn't overcook them and they came out GREAT. I would post a picture, but being dark brown they don't photograph well and the dough looks like something you'd rather not eat. Trust me though, they're the best chocolate cookies evah. I have the recipe in text or .doc format if you want a copy. Or just come to a cookie party.

It was a pretty good day.

• Another engineer and I were able to walk to lunch where I ate a tasty avocado hamburger. It was nice to be out in the fresh-ish air (we crossed the freeway) and sun.
• I have permission from the finance guy to buy a high value consumable this quarter and do not have to beg and finagle for the timing I want, but will actually get it early.
• My antibiotics seem to finally be beating my infection into submission and the cramping has stopped.
• Wine and chocolate and hanging out with friends.
• I got all my laundry done, including the guest sheets.
  
• My mom is coming tomorrow for a quick weekend in the sun. Due to the nature of things related to my mom and vacation weather, we can use any and all prayers and good wishes for no frost. On her first visit out here, it snowed in Malibu and the oranges died. Hopefully the warm weather will hold long enough to raid the neighbors trees for fresh fruit.