cookiebutter.

biscoff biscuits are the SH!T!!
that's no joke.
so,
when they've been turned into a vegan peanut butter-style
spreadable cookie paste,
you know i'm all about it.
it's cookies turned into thick-as-heck frosting, neighbors.
maybe i'm not explaining it right-
it's cookies that you can spread on cookies!
or,
in today's instance,
cookie concentrate i can add to brownies.
yuuuuuuuuuuuup.
biscoff baby bunny brownie bites, for everybody.
mmmhmmm.
check the teleport:

woooohoooo.
chocolaty, biscoff-y, and totally expert.
i made 'em in two sizes, too.
look closer,
there's itty-bitty-minis,
and then just plain ol' ittty-bitties.
awwwwwwwwwww.
btw,
it's april already...
...and that means we put flowers on our treat plates.
mmhmm.
it's the little things, along with those little things, that make this a big deal.
i like my brownies like i like my income levels, neighbors-
rich.
and these small packages have got that big movie check taste.
even the frosting has extra butts,
and it's reppin' that biscoff butts in it, too.
it's so dense and decadent,
creamy. dreamy, and silky-smooth,
that it's almost as if there's a whole independent treat living on top
of the cakey biscuit battered brownie block on the bottom.
daaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaamn, it tastes good in the woodsly goodness today.
that's no joke.
and it's a day off.
and it's sunny.
and it's flippin' fuh-reeeeezing cold.
oh.
kinda lost it towards the end, there, huh?
no worries,
i've got ideas for sugary snacks,
and i'm thinking hard about a real foolish april dinner, too.
too much is the right amount,
and this wednesday is all about setting new standards in getting right.
***********
duders,
i'm spanning time,
and the expanses between the hours feel like they're shrinking.
i've been a hermit up here in the woodsly goodness for a good long while now-
so long, in fact,
that the people and the places that filled in the empty spaces are long gone
from my daily routine,
and it's all still really happening;
and what's more, it's somehow still going by too quickly.
too much to do, even when there's less going on?
that's a new one.
but,
the oven is baking away,
all damned day long,
and the longview is stacks on stacks on stacks of treats.
i got some new jams.
but really. though-
new jams.
like, with a hint of lemon in 'em an' that.
and i'm about to apply those jammies to some fresh new jauns.
i'm gonna try some thumbprints in muffin tins,
and see how that goes towards preventing overspread.
worst case scenario,
i'm about to pop off some jam-topped blops.
and that's definitely not such a bad thing.
what about a peanut butter mousse and chocolate creme tart?
sure.
i mean,
i've got ideas, all of a sudden, in a sugar-rushing flood tide of inspiration.
i want allllllll the sweetness,
before i let the bitter bite me to the bone.
yikes.
april fool's day,
and nobody is around to play tricks on me.
i s'pose i'll have to keep fooling myself into thinking that this Folk Life
is working out the way it was supposed to?
ew.
maybe i'll stick to making dinner and remaining delusional;
never quiet, never soft.....

rabbit, RABBIT!

it's the first of the month,
and i'm looking upwards towards clear skies.
oh, yes, neighbors,
i'm sure there will be plenty of doo-doo buttery deluge days,
and mud-puddling floods of rain and water everywhere....
today, however,
is devoid of those seasonally appropriate april showers.
yeah.
this is it.
today.
the first one of the month-
a brand new calendar page of days and days to fill with fresh wonders
and fresh-to-death treats,
and fresh hells of our own devising.
mmmhmmmm.
what sort of frozen pit am i creating today, you ask?
no need.
nature has done all the work for me.
yes.
it was a bitter fifteen fahrenheit degrees as i awoke-
the chill in my bones oh-snap cold-snap slapping me to my senses-
and the very first set of syllables to escape my blue-tinged lips
and chomp out of my big chattering tombstone teeth?
c'mon.
rules is rules,
and today is the day, duders-
i said what i always say,
y'know?
yup.
the magic word, again and again,
out loud,
in fact, VERY loud at that;
into the aether and echoing through infinity
to cultivate coincidences of a beneficial and barbarian nature.
that's what's up, and that's the bottom line:
rabbit, rabbit!
spoken like an attentive and inventive effective invective,
iterated and immediately reiterated for maximum magic spellcasting.
you go right on ahead and do what you do,
i'll just be over here on some other other really real superstitious sh!t.
*
did i chase away that muthaF*ing freeloading deer again?
i did.
i can't hang out with a beige b!tch borrowing my branches for a buffet.
she's NOT invited, y'heard?
i've had more than my fill of doe-eyed dopes feeling entitled to my stuff
without contributing much beyond a pile of crap in their wake.
word.
that's why i'm twice as excited about coming home to this last night:

whaaaaaaaaaaaat?!
ampy d got it poppin' in the Folk Life & Liberty Fortress
with a big ol' fancy plateful of pad-thai-type vegetables and tofu,
over cauliflower for even more nutrient-rich superpowers every hour!
heck yes.
you know i'm a lover of food.
i want lots of it, and i want that to always be happening.
honestly,
what's better than a heapin' helping of home-cooked hottness
ready and waiting for your hungry face when you walk i the door?
nothin'.
i mean it.
i had a decent day the the studio beforehand, too.
regular clients of mine, gettin' zip-zapped, and hanging out,
while we shared treats and tales of todays and tomorrows together,
and then i came back to my castle,
and there was my best friend making me the best food??
wordimus prime.
i recognize how lucky i am to have a good day once in a while,
and i'm grateful for the time i have to span along these paths.
today IS the day, duders-
but it just might not be as expert as yesterday.
real talk;
never quiet, never soft.....

in like a liar, out like a lame.

                  dear march,
                         
                             F* you in your big dumb face.
                            you started out pretty rotten,
                            and somehow managed to unerringly stay that course,
                            through thirty one chances not to be such a d!ck.
                            ....way to follow through on sucking all the balls.
                            i'm glad you're leaving,
                            and i promise i won't miss you
                                                                         
                                                                                 love,
                                                                                   albie
-
we all know that time passes too quickly,
and with nowhere near enough results to show for the daily ins and outs;
on top of that,
we've had a march that resembled a january freeze-out
so much more than any springtime hints and inklings
that we would've and could've expected and/or preferred.
damn.
we new englanders, especially us northern folks,
sure do win for hardest styles this time around.
i thought march was supposed to be a mild little baby on it's way out.
no way, neighbors.
we've got 'sgusting gusts of gale force gayness making our already
below-freezing airflow into a bitter icing bite of windy sh!ttiness.
it's just not cool, man.
snow and wind and cold, under crowded clouds,
as we're getting ready for april's (most likely snow) showers makes
all the woodsly goodness more of a contest of wills....
the very real struggle of man vs. nature has never once been about victory
for the victims of time and space, spirit and memory,
and the forces that the wild raging outdoor world has at her disposal
for use towards our disposal.
nature wins.
if not immediately, then eventually,
and there's no getting around it.
damn;
never quiet, never soft.....

FALAFEL!

yeeeeeaaahhhh!!!!
guys,
what's better than falafel?
ummmm,
MORE FALAFEL obviously!
yuuuuuuuup,
me and mine are riding the chick pea train all the way to valhalla.
believe it.
fun fact-
using canned chick peas makes your balls fall apart in hot oil.
that's real.
i learned that the hard way,
and the hard styles of melting falafel are some of the toughest to swallow.
...especially when you've got grease blarp blops of semi-cooked batter
and NO crispy round orbs of unruly excellence to ingest instead.
damn.
we persevere around here, though,
and make the most of what we've got.
sure,
that means fewer perfect spheres of garbanzo goodness this time around,
but i'll eat falafel every single evening if i have to until i get it all all the way right.
i'm serious.
falafel is my second favorite food,
and i'm not about to give sloppy globs a spot in the rotation, y'all.
i'm on a ball-contouring mission of mercy,
practicing that falafeljitsu until i've got the forms down pat.
wordimus prime.
however,
i've still gotta eat in the meantime-
so,
there's falafel on the menu...
...again.
check the cauliflower-couscous-type teleport:

kabooooooom.
diced cilantro and lime, soy sauce and agave,
all over that ground cauliflower-
that's a fantastic base layer for that garnished plate of greatness.
neighbors,
i GOT they.
i do.
all the elements of a clockwork circle of super-elite hottness,
all together in one magic mountain of mealtime magic.
mmmmmmmmm.
i doo-doo that forkfuls-of-freshness-for-my-face-style sh!t.
i loooooove food,
especially falafels.
and putting together perfectly balanced bites,
with a scoople of each piece of the puzzle,
one after another,
directly in my hungry maw is pretty much exactly how i want to span my time.
really.
**********
getting down with back-to-back falafel nights is expert.
freezing my b-hole off is not.
saying goodbye to march is happening,
and wondering where the F* springtime is hiding is too.
we're ending another 'nother month already,
and somehow,
there's only time for more food,
and less time, and tolerance, for everything else.
the objective for april is more of what's missing,
and more food, too.
too much is the right amount.
the truth is,
we want MORE;
never quiet, never soft.....

falafel?!

ugh.
neighbors,
i was SO excited about falafel on saturday.
really.
so excited in fact,
that i brought pickles, and peppers, hummus, and ho' sauce
all with me to work, premeditated and prepared for getting fresh.
mmhmm.
that's no joke-
i brought the exxxtras so i could doctor up a standard storebought jauns
and make it behave like a fully-realized activational expert.
unfortunately,
the delivery spot that has 'em in my town F*ed up hard with their menu situation,
and is now officially all the way off the list.
they were already banned from pizza times, forever and ever,
but the filthy new addition of tzatziki on their already somewhat budget falafels
makes them completely superfluous to my dietary reality.
i don't play when it's falafel time, kids.
falafels are grown man business and that ain't no m-f'ing joke, y'heard?
it isn't just that they never use the same kind of wraps around them,
nor is it only that they eliminated the tabouleh from 'em,
and nevermind that i've heard rumors they're using a bucket of falafel mix....
i mean,
c'mon, now,
that's some total doo-doo butter shystiness,
even in a crackery craptard vacation town.
you know about the cardinal rule, don'tcha?
just be dope or F* right off.
so,
when we've already taken steps to maximize the marginal tolerability
of a convenience meal, and even managed to look forward to it-
well,
then what in the actual sunovab!tchin' heck is up with there being no tahini?
and worse,
how about the aftereffects on my overall optimism as a person
when there's just an unwarranted wet white 'sgustingness instead?
nope.
no way.
they're beat.
that's unforgivable.
i can't hang out with that yogurty crapola,
and no joke,
i think they're using mayonnaise instead.
they're off the falafel registry, friends, forever.
that's IT.
and once the off the list decree is passed,
there's no calling back and complaining. c'mon.
we won't negotiate with that sort of flawed and faulty falafel preparation.
rules is rules.
and now we hate them.
and also,
i didn't have any falafel.
awwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwww, MAN..
that really put the ruination on my day and my evening,
so much so that i didn't even have dinner;
i just digested my disappointment and chewed on my own ire.
however,
i'm not gonna let some weak sauce waterbabyish buttholes stop
the falafel rocket from launching as soon as possible, am i?
no way.
a slight delay in liftoff is normal for stratospherically fresh-to-death food.
that's a thing, sometimes.
and anyway,
last night, with my homegirl ampy d,
we made our own super-official expert falafel sandwiches,
and although you expected it,
and we expected it, too;
they were totally flippin' awesome.
check the open-face-b!tchslap-type teleport:

pan-fried flatbread!
peperoncinis!
watercress!
tahini!
sriracha AND sriracha hummus!
cabbage!
red onion!
and homemade non-box-mix real life real deal really real chick pea pattyboombatties.
mmmhmmmm.
it was a fat one.
teleport:

right?
duders, that bread was what's up.
i'm tellin' you, it had all the hottness up in it's sourdough thickness.
seriously.
i'm into that dry-fried hand-stretched dough toasted on both sides
on a very very hot griddle.
you see those fatbottom results right there?
that's majestic, y'all.
lesson learned.
nobody is ever gonna care as much as i do-
that's both a bummer and a boast.
that festy sh!tswamp delivery dungeon is o.t.l.,
but i'm still here doing it right.
louder, harder. faster, fresher, bigger, better, and more.
i care, a lot.
if i didn't none of this would even be happening,
and we all know it all really always is.
true stories about trivialities,
recounted records of real life unfolding:
molehills in the mountains;
big talk and small worlds;
the woodsly goodness and the way of the warrior poet.
all of it matters, all the time;
never quiet, never soft.....

browse.

there's too much snow.
still.
so much snow, in fact,
that the animals are getting grumpy, and taking it to the streets.
that's real.
neighbors,
the wild is encroaching,
and it's sending mixed messages.
check the good-morning-deer-type teleport:

yup.
and before you start with your animal-friendly 'awwwwww' sh!t...
save those sappy stoopid sentiments for a second and look a little closer...
ew.
so gross.
that little jerk is eating my bushes.
oh, yeah,
she's a hungry, desperate A*-hole, for sure,
but,
i still don't recall inviting any living creatures over for a spring sprig buffet.
i'm sure it's not her first choice, either,
but what the heck else is she gonna munch up?
i'm sayin',
it's all still snow everywhere up here.
ma nature just put too damned much of a blizzardly batch of
overstayed and unwelcome arctic sauce on the woodsly goodness,
and the shoots and sprouts are all still sleeping under the frozen earth.
i mean, it's eleven degrees.
and that's actually not that awesome, y'know?
still,
why do those dirty brown F*ers have to come up in MY spot,
and start crackin' off some property damage?
guys,
for real,
why not wreck some of the other other homes on the hill?
nobody even lives in most of 'em.
it's like the animals around here all know that the vacation-style mansions
and manors of my neighborhood are obviously off-limits,
since those are where a better group of people
i've got such suckier people occasionally living nearby,
and they'd probably not even notice the nibbles on their nasturtiums or whatever.
instead,
i have to wake up to nature trying to wreck all the new growth in my backyard.
nature wins by eating itself?
that's true, i s'pose.
i just don't want to eat a deer.
.....maybe i'll just throw a rock at her tomorrow.
not that i haven't done that every year already,
and she's still here snacking on the flora of the Folk Life & Liberty Fortress.
huh?
yep.
i throw stones, frequently.
my house isn't all glass, after all-
despite the panoramic picture window situation
through which i view the woodsly goodness.
mmmhmmm.
*
i don't like looking at animals.
that's a true story.
i'm glad they feel safe here with me,
and that they want to snow white scamper through the snow white acres....
however,
they're not invited to dinner.
i'm not running a charity over here.
nobody eats for free.
remember that;
never quiet, never soft.....

six in a row.

so,
i did six tattoos yesterday.
yep.
in a row.
no breaks.
just steady grinding through a fast-paced sh!t-salad slalom
to the bottom of the barrel.
huh?
well, c'mon, neighbors,
think about it.
if i can do six tattoos,
and still leave work at the regular quittin' time?
mmmhmmmm,.
there's no WAY those zips and zaps were ever gonna be awe-inspiring
fast-track at-attackin' career-makers, if you catch my meaning.
however,
the three tandem walk-up afficionados of boku big drinkies
who took up the empty middle space between tattoo appointments
were totally expert.
yuuuuuuup.
i love duders who hate stuff i love,
and love stuff i hate.
that's not a joke, either.
if i can connect, converse, combat and conquer those folks,
well,
then that's a worthwhile span of time.
you do what you do to get through the doo-doo buttery bits of your workday,
and i do what i've got to to endure mine.
word up.
jaw-bones making sounds that make sense is how i get my funtimes in
when i'm tattooing.
it keeps me and my clients occupied,
and it gives me an opportunity to interact with people i'd otherwise
almost never ever encounter in my day-to-day-doings.
i s'pose that's a way for the secret universal plans of interconnected
and overlapping spirit and memory to test my resolve....
can i hold back from my lyrical attack long enough to make some loot,
OR will i power through an opposing viewpoint and somehow still
bulldoze all the initial resistance to the steady stream of fire-spat filibustering
bluster i blister their ears with???
haha.
i know that's complicated,
but it's the truth.
i'm not about to pretend i can hang out with anyone.
we all know better than that.
but,
can i score points with my adversarial opinionated pinions
and get a grudging laugh from a hostile audience,
all while screaming through some middling mamby-pamb'd ideas on skin?
ummm,
.....yes.
*
......also,
i made muffins.
nothing fancy to look at,
but top-notch in the taste and texture departments.
teleport:

chunky brown blops.
with chocolate-style chips,
and yet, so much more than that.
sour cream and yogurt, veganized and activated,
mixed into a batch of coffee crumb cakey batter,
and risen like cthulu from r'lyeh-
which is to say-
ugly, but dope, unless you're an unbeliever.
...in that case, you're proper F*ed.
ha!
*
it's not a great day,
but it could become one.
that's right.
and i'm thinking about ordering a falafel.
actually,
i'm thinking about ordering TWO.
it is friday after all,
and that's the day i'm in love...
...with falafel.
i'll take my victories where i can find them.
i'm doing a tazmanian devil tattoo today.
i swear that's true.
friends,
i only deal with hard styles,
because that's the type of stylist i am;
never quiet, never soft.....

tea biscuits.

matcha.
that's expert.
yup.
delicate and light,
subtle, but distinct,
and with a happy disposition.
that's a thing.
matcha!!
green tea powder,
all color and flavor,
dusty and dope,
and just what i'm lookin' for on a cool spring morning.
mmmhmmmm.
i made cookies, and i made 'em right.
like, righteously correct, even.
buttery, sweet, crispy, and fully-activated with that well-matched
mix in of matcha to make 'em more magical than ever.
that's real.
check the teleport, and then i'll tell you more about 'em:

awwwww.
so kyoooooot!
green tea biscuits,
stacked,
with orange icing in the middle.
and a goobieblop swirl on top,
with the cutest little crawnchy spring flower on top.
i mean, c'mon, neighbors,
have i got my baked greats on point or what?
i'm sayin',
and that frosty frosting filling, friends?
so good, so creamy, so balanced with those cookie circles....
you know how i get down, don'tcha?
i got 'em going with orange juice, freshly squeezed from the orb,
after a tight little zest session,
with a splash of vanilla,
and a dash of orange oil essence extract!
what happens when that gets added to a whipped-up wondrous
whirling bettercremey cyclone of sugary elemental fury?
you get a dose of sweet citrus at it's best,
and it damn if it doesn't make those cookies taste twice as rad.
ha.
oh, yes, it does, duders.
for serious.
-
i don't always get it right,
in fact, i sh!t the bed on those brownies,
and the bad taste of defeat is lingering at the edges of my mouth, a little bit.
but,
these jauns are spot on,
and they go down so smoothly.
a little too smoothly, maybe.
i may demolish the whole tray before anybody else even gets one.
ah, well, that's the danger of doing things to eleven.
exponential interactive indulgence is a serious side effect,
when participation and appreciation collide.
mmmhmmmmm.
i'll be a fat pig, but i'll be happy while it's happening.
(it's the aftermath of overdoing it that fades faster from memory)
consequences aren't ever as discouraging as rewards are encouraging, are they?
ew.
pleasure-seeking behavior in the woodsly goodness,
for your favorite hard-hearted hermit,
is generally restricted to books and baked goods.
i s'pose the ramifications of an expanded mind and an expanded waistline
are relatively benign, in the bigger picture.
the short term goals of green tea and vitamin c,
however,
are to be inside me right this very instant.
i think i can achieve that pretty easily,
so the real question becomes-
should i?
too much is the right amount,
so i guess we'll have to see where the line gets crossed.
here we go;
never quiet, never soft.....

a hill of beans.

neighbors!!!
what's better than when a meal is all compliments and harmony?
like,
when all the food goes together like a mutha-effin' symphony
of textures and flavors and colors an' that?
huh?
that's right!
NOTHIN' is better than that,
or, at least,
nothing is better than that in the moment when you're sitting down
and munching up on whatever perfect storm of kaleidoscopic
rainbow expert flavor magic you've prepared.
...that's real talk right there, y'all.
last night,
hot on the heels of hard-styled day-wastin' time-escapin' slipstream slippage,
i brought out the big action,
and made more than a little magic start poppin' in the pots and pans
of my Folk Life & Liberty Fortress's fancy kitchen.
word.
colors?
i got 'em.
flavors?
holy sh!t......i got 'em to eleven.
guac?
damn, duders-
them jauns ain't exxxtra over here, i told you that already.
check the elite-beans-on-beans-on-beans-type teleport:

kaBOOMfire.
red beans, red onions, scallions, jalapeno, poblano, green pepper, garlic,
lime juice, black pepper, and parsley.
that's what's up.
sweated out and wilted up,
sauteed and married together in an amicably arranged situation.
yup.
that's dope.
what're they're sittin' on?
shredded scallion and parsely white corn polenta!
c'mon, kids. that's the hot grain hominy right there.
are those grilled leeks?
you know it.
all those green onions are great,
and grilled jammies are twice as good.
with all that blackened flavor,
and all that light onion essence,
activated with olive oil like abracadabra an' that.
can y'feel it?
i know you can.
how about that tofu?
stripper-cut into straight stixxx,
rolled in cornstarch and g.p.o.p., and baked enough to firm it up fully.
then, pan-seared with cayenne and cholula, a little mustard powder, and coriander.
das IT!
topped with a tsp. of cafe noche salsa.
all the heat, all the spice, all the hottness, and twice the flavor.
mmmmhmmmmm.
and how about that low fat crawnch style we're reppin'?
huh?
cucumber chips for that elite guac.
(and my guacamole game is officially gone all the way to eleven)
the triple pepper blend, green bell, poblano, and jalapeno, is key.
lots and lots of cilantrio,
fresh crushed garlic,
red onion, scallions,
black pepper, salt, lemon AND lime juice,
and perfect avocados, mashed up chunky as F*.
when it's too smooth, it's trying to rep that store-bought bullsh!t,
and i can't hang out with that at all.
believe it.
what?
what's that orange blop?
it's sriracha hummus, my friend.
yup.
homemade.
chick peas, olive oil, garlic, spices on spices on spices,
and whipped up by my dinnertime companion, ampy d.
it's nice to have professional appreciators around when there's deliciousness
waiting to be professionally appreciated, y'heard?
yup.
guys,
i'm 'BOUT that food love,
i'm 'BOUT that food life,
and i'm 'BOUT that Folk Life just as much, and maybe even a bit more.
i'm cookin'.
i'm eatin'.
i'm plannin' and preparin',
and i'm doo-dooin' it all to the best of my ability.
there's usually room for improvement,
but this one was flawless.
it all went together the way it was ,meant to,
and i couldn't have been any happier.....
unless there were somehow third helpings available.
secondsies were molto filling, however,
so i s'pose it's for the best that my shark-gluttony didn't get the best of me.
mmmmmmmm.
***********
so,
the highlight of my day off was food.
the low point was too.
i think my world is shrinking,
but it's becoming more concentrated.
like an ocean becoming a sea becoming a lake becoming a puddle,
i'm F*ing salty enough to turn all the rain in the world into tears.
THAT'S a hard style,
but that's how it goes.
my focus is shifting,
and my lenses are complex, convex, and concave, magnifying, inverting,
and channeling all the unbearable lightness of waiting
into heavyweight dark spots in my vision
and black-and-white distinctions in my grey matter.
damn.
real life unfolds, continuously,
and while i'm feeling like there's less of it,
what there is certainly feels more intense.
when you lose one sense, the others purportedly overcompensate.
so, maybe my lack of good sense, and my long lost innocence
are being replaced by nonsense and in equal but opposite quantity?
c'mon.
you like it.
heck,
i do too.
but liking it or not doesn't ever matter,
because it's really happening regardless.
salty, salty, and salty,
i'm with that hyperactive tension,
and i've got some blood-boiling pressure to expand
beyond the surface of my self-contained self-imposed boundaries.
...damn.
today is the day;
never quiet, never soft.....

for the birds.

ugh.
neighbors,
every once in a while,
i get ahead of myself,
or i get too full of myself,
or maybe the secret universal plans have a typo-
y'know?
like,
the day slips away,
the accomplishments are few if any,
and even the things i've got relative proficiency in take a hot sh!t.
as in- yesterday.
ew.
i started the day off with brownie squares,
figuring i had an easy win with a tried and true recipe.
boy oh boy was i wrong.
duders,
i made some of the suckiest suckbombs that ever sucked,
and they somehow kept getting worse.
that's no joke.
the crawnchy outsides became bricks of ironclad, impenetrable crap,
and the insides were denser than the woodboogery necktards that
i deal with at the tattbomb studio.
do you understand what i'm sayin'?
i F*ed up.
and that is not a good beginning to any day,
let alone my only day off.
gross.
anyway,
check the missteps-and-slip-ups-type teleport:

awwwwwwww, MAN.
these doo-doo blocks are all-the-way-'sgusting.
all my attempts at repairwork only worsened a preexisting condition,
which is to say, they aren't very good.
at all.
what the heck happened?
i'm pretty sure it was the ganache what undermined my freeform concocting.
mmmhmmm.
ganache is basically soft chocolate chip material,
and when it lives inside of a brownie, IN the batter,
it only stays as soft as the temperature stays high.
....really.
so it crisped up on the edges,
and it stiffened up in the middle,
and it basically made the cake in them taste amazing,
if you could only somehow crack into one without cracking your teeth first.
laaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaame.
it only got worse from there.....
for instance, that beige, blarpity caramel filling?
yeah-
that's that melty, formless, house-of-wax-in-the-summertime-lookin' sh!t.
the best and worst part of it?
it just tasted like frosting.
boooooooooo.
it's brown enough to fool your eyes,
and there's definitely homemade caramel sauce IN it;
but buttery sugar mixed with buttery sugar doesn't do much to deliver a better flavor,
the pow-powdered sweetness was overpow-powering to the cooked bits,
and together, the warm and the cool sure as sh!t didn't do one damned thing
about improving the consistency.
hmmmmmmm?
oh, it's okay.
i mean,
everybody effs up once in a while, i suppose.
except,
i'm still salty about that poop-brown glass-like caramel icing on top.
hard styles plagued this project from the jump off.
that s'posed-to-be sticky jaunswas harder than diamonds,
heavier than lead,
and wholly unrewarding.
one bad morning's worth of failure can undermine a week's worth of success.
believe it.
but,
i didn't let myself get too bummed out.
after all,
whatever else i make is gonna seem even MORE expert after this debacle.
where are they now?
i sailed 'em across the muddy, semi-melted swampy snowmush surrounding
the Folk Life & Liberty Fortress, so the crows can have a go at 'em.
they're always down to chow on some filthy business,
and i figure it can't hurt to have a murder of those muthas
hovering around the grounds of my haunted castle.
right?
right!
so, i'm turning my mistakes into birdfood,
and i'm letting myself learn a lesson or two from this failure.
no ganache in stuff,
and no more caramel frosting.
got it?
good.
it's ALL really happening.
that's the whole point.
true stories, told truly, even when they don't have happy endings;
never quiet, never soft.....

good one.

awwwwwwwwww.
neighbors,
i have been complaining about blarping out lately.
yup.
too many burritos,
not enough exercise, i guess.
the thing is,
my solution is usually to bake up a cake or something,
and it turns out, that's not really actually a solution.
it's pretty much exactly the opposite.
ugh.
but, i LOVE food,
and i want it in my hands and in my mouth;
i want to crush it between my teeth;
hell,
i just need piles of warm, tasty, salty, sweet, spicy hottness in my life,
all the time, every minute, until i explode.
jeez.
yeah...um,
that doesn't sound healthy, does it?
uh-oh.
don't worry, though-
even in the face of severe shark-gluttony,
this is where the situation improves drastically and dramatically.
we all know i'm into cooking up some stuff.
however,
did you know that my homegirl ampy-d gets busy in the kitchen, too?
yup.
on that healthy low-fat jauns, even.
that's real.
i came home from work to a pretty flippin' fancy dinner,
and i'll tell you what, kids-
it put the D in delicious for sure.
check the teleport:

home-cookin' from the future!
that's chopped up cauliflower 'rice';
with lime and cilantro and tamari an' stuff;
with spicy baked tofu steaks;
and cinnamony refried beans;
avocado;
and baby kale salad;
all garnished with scallion sprankz.
expert.
mmmmmmmmmmmmmm.
who was the luckiest one yesterday?
huh?
ew, no-
i think it was me, actually.
c'mon.
healthy choices for my face,
and possibly a considerate woman showing growing concern for my growing waistline.
dang.
i'll take the gesture at face value- kind and caring,
and i'll take the food in huge mouthfuls- because i'm always so hungry.
you gotta be wary when you're a food lover, y'know?
it's true.
especially when you aren't a great big fat person already.
mmhmm.
blarping out is a hard style when you're skinny.
what?
oh.
well, no-
it's not getting fat, exactly,
it's what it sounds like- blarping.
shapes that aren't specifically human,
bulging off of your frame, in shaky, sloppy slabs of flesh.
filthy.
-
it all costs something, kids.
cake is great, but a slice don't come for free.
that's the nature of the beast,
and beasts and nature both seem to win every time.
that's tough, but fair.
y'feel me?
you want some cake?
you should get some cake.
you want to avoid the blarp?
you'd better do WORK, son.
you know the rules,
and that's an advantage;
never quiet, never soft.....