A brush with greatness

Or maybe just geekiness.

Today I spent the day building a couple of nightstands for a friend. Fussy finish work that is usually not my style, but it was an excuse to use my new Hitachi finish nailer, and any time I get to use something by Hitachi - and get paid for it - I'm a happy girl.

So I sputtered and puttered in the yard, compressor (also Hitachi) doing the compressing, nailer doing the nails, squares and clamps doing their things, and the sun is shining. It was a grand morning. After lunch I moseyed on over to the post office to pick up a package waiting there for me. I checked the mail yesterday and got a slip that said I had a package too big to fit into my wee little PO box, but the window where the people give you your mail was not open yet and I had things to do, so I had to get back to it today. I spent the whole day wondering what treasures might await me that could not fit into my PO box. I knew I had something coming, but no clue what it might be.

See, last week I helped a blog buddy, one Leo McCool over at butch girlcat through her very first home-done automotive oil change. It was an interesting thing to try to do over the phone. I tend to be a very visual, show-with-my-hands kind of gal, so I had to think really hard about which words I needed and how to arrange them to get across what we were doing. But it all worked out, Leo was as happy as a dyke covered in motor oil could be (which is quite happy, for the record), and life went on. A couple days later I got a note advising me that a gratuity of some sort was headed my way and I should expect it to arrive either Wednesday or Thursday and to check my mailbox. Well, so I did, and you heard the part about the slip saying come back to get your package when the window is open. Got it? Good. We're all up to speed now.

Well, I headed over there today. It was such a gorgeous day, I took Quinn the wonderpooch with me for the ride and she was most pleased to participate in the adventure. Only, when we got to the village Post Office, there was a sign on the door advising that only service animals were allowed inside. Well, phoo. As excited as Quinn was, there was going to be no convincing anyone that she was therapeutic in any kind of way. So I stood outside trying to figure out how to attach her leach to something sturdy when a white-haired gentleman came out of the lobby and asked if I'd like him to hold her leash while I went in for my mail.

I know this guy. He used to be my next door neighbor when we lived in that village, and I've seen him around at the library, town meeting, and at the Democratic caucus last year. Neat guy. "You don't mind?" I asked. Not at all, he assured me. I handed him her leash and dashed inside.

The lady handed over my prize and I went back outside to reclaim my pooch, who was busy being entertaining and adorable on the sidewalk out front. It's what she does. Thanks so much, I told him, and headed off down the sidewalk, box tucked under my arm and grinning like a maniac and stifling the giggles as I composed this in my head.

The guy who just watched my dog? That neat white-haired guy with the flowing beard and kind eyes? His name is Mr. Hansen. He was once a movie star. Of sorts. Now he writes and travels back and forth to Iceland (I think) writing and lecturing and whatnot.

I got home and opened the box and found a batch of home made chocolate chip cookies. They are (rapidly becoming were) delicious. I make cookies, as some of you know, but chocolate chip and I have issues. They're always too something - too dry, too hard, too flat, too gooey, too something not quite right. These were (are) perfect. If supper does not appeal, these may well be supper.

What?! They're a real meal. There's flour and eggs and butter - that's carbs and protein and dairy - what more do you need, really. We eat too much meat anyway. This will work.

Oh, and the movie star-cum-writer and dog-watcher? Guy's name is Gunnar Hansen. He was in a cheesy horror flick back in the day when cheesy horror flicks were new and scary. He never spoke a line (that I remember) an nobody ever saw his face. Not really. He carried a chainsaw and wore a mask made of human flesh. His character's name was Bubba Sawyer, but moviegoers for 34 years have called him something very different.

Yes, leatherface watched my dog this afternoon. Yes, that leatherface. The Texas Chainsaw Massacre Leatherface. Heh.

How cool is that?!

cookie time!

While something like two feet of snow fell outside yesterday, I baked cookies. What you see here is a tin I made up for an elderly lady I will see this morning when I go shovel out her house.

There are chocolate chip, sugar, ginger, macaroons, Russian Tea Cakes (the gumdrop ones) and baklava made with walnuts and baklava made with spiced dried apples, cranberries and raisins. The cookies I made yesterday, the baklava I made a few days ago.

Cookies for queer rights!

So there's a voting thing happening next week. Tuesday, in fact. Primary day in Maine. It is also the day when the Maine Christian Civic League plans to be out in force encouraging people to sign a petition to repeal discrimination laws protecting people based on their sexual orientation and to eliminate funding for school Civil Rights Teams, which have been wonderfully effective in reducing bullying and creating safe schools. It would also ban gay marriage in Maine. Which is already against the law, but what the hey, it's the CCL, so why should facts and laws get in the way?

So some friends of mine are working with the great folks over at Equality Maine to staff the polling places with a sort of "Truth Squad" of volunteers. To my dismay, the volunteers will not be causing any kind of a ruckus or stink. They are merely going to let people know what exactly they are being asked to sign and ask them to please decline. They are not going to confront the CCL folks, not going to badger them, not shout at them, call them names or in any way be unpleasant.

Obviously not a job suited to my personality.

I was asked to volunteer for a shift, but after considering it with the local organizer, we agreed that I would not be the best person to represent EQME as a volunteer. So we figured out a way I can help out, but that will not require me to be nice or polite to anyone I don't feel inclined to be nice or polite to. I'm going to bake cookies for the volunteers.

K, the local organizer, asked if I would make little boxes of cookies for the volunteers and I readily agreed. Great! She said. I need 20. Oh shit.

That's a lot of cookies. Even if the boxes are small, that's a LOT of cookies.

Well, it's getting to be about that time of the year anyway, so I fired up the home cookie factory and got crankin'. At the end of the first day, I had two full batches of ginger cookies ready to be made into ohmigods, a full double batch of sugar cookies a quadruple-batch of chocolate-peanut butter no-bakes, and two triple batches of coconut macaroons. I am nearly up to my ass in cookies.

Today I cleaned the living room with my friend D, and took a vacation from cookies. Tomorrow, though, I plan to make some chocolate chip cookies, some Russian Tea Cakes, and possibly some peanut butter cookies. It depends. Peanut butter cookies and I have issues. It has to do with power and control and burned edges.

As you can see from the picture, I have a variety of tools for the job, but very little counter space. In my home kitchen, I use a plank laid across my double sink as a work-space. There is very little room. So, in order to make a little extra, I lay the board you see across the top of the open drawer to create a little more work area and to provide easy access to the things I am going to need. It ain't perfect, but it works pretty slick.

I just made a batch of macaroons for a friend of mine who is in town for the weekend. This will put me up the list of most-favored-friend status and may even garner some bribery points for favors later on. I'm hopin' anyway. My triple batch of macaroons makes 12 large cookies about the size of a half a tennis ball, plus about 50 about the size of half a golf ball. After quality control, the true yield is usually something less than that, but it's about right.

cookies and cellars

It's almost time to start up the home-based cookie factory for the summer. I made some macaroons tonight for a customer/friend I met at craft fairs last fall. We're trading a bunch of macaroons for her and her booth buddy plus the recipe (its from a book, really) in exchange for some cash and a recipe for her white chocolate fudge with dried cranberries. I am looking forward to trying that recipe.

Meanwhile, I have a couple dozen leftover macaroons sitting here calling my name. Either that or I have to put them away in a container, and that sounds like work after a long day. Bleah. It might be easier to just eat them.

Today was hot and muggy and the bugs are starting to come out. We're cleaning out a cellar for a woman here on the island, and it is hot, dirty, sweaty, heavy work. I am trying to find a home for a big old metal teacher's desk. The thing must weigh a ton, and it's got to come up out of that cellar through the bulkhead. Ugh. Today we tried it with a hand truck rolling up some planks laid over the stairs, but that didn't work. Tomorrow, I think I may try thumping it up one step at a time and see how that goes. There is no room to get a vehicle into position to tie a rope around it and haul it up that way. We'll have to see how it goes. Perhaps a lever of some kind could lift it where it needs to go. I have to say, this is way better than building another screen porch. The worst I have to come up with is how to get a heavy thing up and out, not how to weave shingles or flashing or hang doors or whatever. This is much, much easier on the brain. Tougher on the back, but easier on the gray matter.

I think some people don't understand how I can welcome the brawn-over-brains work like this sometimes. I used to work on an assembly line in a factory, and there is a real rhythm that I can get into doing mindless work. There is a simplicity to it that reminds me that some things do not need to be figured out, they just need to be shoveled. I pick up a load of stuff, carry it to its new place and go back for anther. It can almost approach a zen-like state if I let it. Lift, walk, place, walk, lift, walk place.... I can unplug my brain, let it float and keep on keepin' on. Before I know it, things are looking really good and I cam feeling good about ow much has been accomplished. It is sort of like mowing the grass or shoveling the driveway. There's nothing to do for it really but pick up the shovel and get started. With this cellar, there is nothing to do but pick up the first pile of boxes and get started. I'll post pictures tomorrow when we finish up.