Sunshine on a Cloudy Day

We adopted Sunny!

Since she apparently never had a name before coming to the Oregon Humane Society, we decided to change her name up a bit - to Sunshine on a Cloudy Day. Sunny for short. Rapper name: Sunny D.

The first night we brought her home, she spent the whole evening pacing. And eating our blinds. All of them.

So I made some drapes.

She then proceeded to spend the next week hiding under Crayon's mini staircase. Coming out only occasionally to pace worriedly.

It's been nearly 3 weeks now, and she's made a lot of progress. She still cringes every time we look in her direction, but she has fallen madly in love with Crayon, and takes his lead on everything. So walks are a great deal less chaotic. And the cute factor in the house has risen exponentially.

This Dog.

I can't stop staring at this dog.

Please, someone give her a home! Poor Sunny was apparently held captive in a puppy mill her entire life. She needs someone to show her what it's like to be a pampered snuggle-monkey!

I'm strongly considering taking her home myself (I'm a sucker for a dog with a hard-luck story), and I'm already sponsoring her, but I really just want to see her in a cozy home with plenty of laps as soon as possible! Preferably close to my neighborhood, so I can continue staring at that face.

UPDATE: 3/05/2011

We adopted her! She and Crayon seem to get a long fine, but other than that she is very scared and anxious. And quite the climber!

New Scooter Fun Times

Recently, our 90-something Chevy Lumina had its tires slashed. It was nothing personal, just someone with a horrible sense of humor decided to slash the tires on every car parked on a quiet residential street near 82nd. Nonetheless, it amounted to 2 flat tires and only 1 spare.

So it sat, sad and alone, in our driveway for a week or so - until Boyfriend had the time to get the tires replaced. No sooner did he do so, than the battery died. As did the starter (double-punch!).

And again, it sits, sad and alone in our driveway. We've decided to donate it, most likely to the Oregon Humane Society, and instead get a couple of scooters!

We decided on this course of action for a number of reasons:

-Cars are expensive gas-hogs
-I feel like a douche driving the car for a distance less than 5 miles
-We are too lazy to ride bikes for distances over 2 miles (especially when cold and/or rainy)
-Also, we like animals and tax deductions

I've already purchased mine (I've got a good amount of low-interest credit). A super cute 49 cc 2005 Honda Metropolitan. From everything I've read, they're supposedly very reliable, with ridiculous mileage (around 90-100 mpg), cheap to insure and best of all: A-DOR-A-BUHLS.

Exhibit A:



Exhibit B:



Exhibit C:
(for reference purposes)

Andama!

For a dinner party last night, I decided to make the last bread that my bread machine ruined: Andama. Judging from the amount of unsolicited compliments it received, it's official: Humans rule, Bread Machines drool.

Andama is a delicious easy way to use up that molasses that's been sitting in your cabinet for ages. This time my recipe came wholesale from McCall's Home Baked Breads, c1965, no changes or additions needed.

McCall's Andama

3/4 c boiling water
1/2 c yellow cornmeal
2 tsp salt
3 tsp butter
1/4 c molasses

First, lightly grease a loaf pan.

In the bowl you plan to be mixing in, mix boiling water, cornmeal, butter, molasses and salt. Stir until all melty and combined. Set aside and allow to cool to lukewarm.

1/4 c warm water (105-115 F)
1 pkg or 2 1/4 tsp yeast

Sprinkle yeast over warm water in a bowl or measuring cup. Stir until dissolved. Add to warm molasses mixture.

1 3/4 c sifted all-purpose flour
1 egg

Add flour and egg to yeasty molasses mix. With a wooden spoon or fancy mixer, stir until smooth.

1 c sifted all-purpose flour

Gradually add the rest of the flour while stirring. Continue mixing until dough is thick enough that it no longer sticks to the sides of the bowl.

Place dough in your pre-greased loaf pan, smoothing with a greased spatula (or your clean hands, like I did) so that it fills the pan evenly with the dough touching the sides of the pan Cover and place somewhere warm, like the oven with the light on.

Forget all about your bread for about 1 hour 30 minutes
(Or until double in bulk)

Sprinkle the top of your bread with salt and cornmeal.

Preheat oven to 375F

Bake 50 to 55 minutes, or until bread is solid enough to rap with your knuckles without giving.

Remove from pans immediately and cool on wire racks. Brush tops with butter (I used olive oil).

Eat as you will!

v-day

Crayon Takes a Bath

Crayon hates baths. I think he partially likes being smelly, but it's mostly that he hates being wet and cold. And for such a tiny dog he takes an amazing amount of time to get dry. This is why, in the winter, Crayon doesn't get many baths.

But recently, Crayon has become increasingly pungent. So today, despite the low temperatures and lack of sunshine, Crayon got the full spa treatment.

You can't tell how smelly he is in the above picture, but trust me, it's pretty gnar. His beard is also matted and his mane is showing serious signs of bed-body.

The first step was to brush and comb his mop. Since I estimate his surface area to be 1 square foot, this took all of 3 minutes. And already what a difference!

Step two involved a hair cut. This, he did not enjoy. He kept wriggling and sneezing and trying to make me pet him instead. He helped a little, though. Every time he wriggled loose he shook off all the excess hair clippings, which made it easier for me to get to the rest of him.

And the result: A very handsome dog.

As a reward we went for a walk, before I had to begin the soapy water torture.

But it was all worth it! Because now he smells of lavender and his beard is once again well manicured. In 8 hours when he finally dries off, he'll be the handsomest dog on the block.

Yep. He's a real Ladies' Man.

Nut Teas and Nutella

I've had a pretty bakey week. I didn't make any bread this weekend, because we're still working on that Spiced Honey Wheat Bread (another advantage of making it by hand over using a bread machine : 2 loaves!)

However, I volunteered to host the February board meeting of the Northwest History Network, which meant I had to bake to impress! Or, at least, I wanted to. So I made cookies: LeChuck Chips and Nut Teas. (Every battery in the house was dead, so no pictures. Sorry.)

LeChuck Chips (so named because when I first made them, I was playing a lot of Monkey Island) are basically Chocolate Chip cookies with coconut flakes added, and coconut extract instead of vanilla extract. One could go even further and use coconut oil instead of butter - but I'm much too cheap for that.

I found the recipe for Nut Teas in a cookbook by the Overlook Women's Club from the 1950s - although I can't imagine anyone thinking that "Nut Teas" was a good name for food back then either. The cookbook also didn't think it necessary to give many actual directions beyond a temperature and an ingredient list, but I managed to wing it ok:

Nut Teas
from the Overlook Cookbook ca. 1950
submitted by Mrs. G. A. Baley

1 c firmly packed brown sugar
1 c ground nuts (measure after grinding)
1 unbeaten egg white
pinch salt

Preheat oven to 275F. Mash lumps in brown sugar. Add egg and salt. Add nuts and form into balls. Bake 30 minutes.

What the recipe doesn't tell you is that since these cookies contain no butter and only egg whites, you need to be sure to heavily grease your cookie sheet and be VERY careful removing them after they're done. Make sure to allow them to cool completely on the sheets before chipping them carefully off. Several of mine fell apart because I didn't know this. But they were still delicious, and soon disappeared.

Since I used hazelnuts in the above recipe, and I had a great many of them all ground up and leftover, I decided to attempt to make my own nutella (Recipe found here).

Seen here on my delicious Spiced Honey Wheat Bread (now that batteries have been recharged):

Warning: if you attempt this at home, this recipe is a little too sweet for my taste. I'd recommend using more cocoa powder and less powdered sugar.