TKOd by my Mom

Ok, so tell me if this has ever happened to you.

I was sleeping the other night and started having a weird dream. I was kneeling near the edge of the couch where my mother was sitting and suddenly, out of nowhere, she punches me in the head.

I look at her for a minute and then ask incredulously, "Did you just hit me in the head?"

To which she responds by pinching me repeatedly on the forearm. And it hurt. And she wasn't stopping. So I finally got fed up and thought, "I'm just going to squeeze her arm until she quits." And I did.

And that's when I woke up. Because I had done this. I had jabbed my fingernails into my skin and taken out a big bunch. Only this wasn't a dream. The reality was that I had a large slice of skin underneath my fingernails.

Needless to say, I called my mom in the morning and told her to quit beating me up in my dreams.

Did my man earn the prize?

Barack Obama today was awarded the Nobel Prize for Peace.

Huh?

Did he earn the prize? Ummm. No.

If someone can tell me exactly what peace he achieved, perhaps my mind will be swayed. Until then, the value of a Nobel Prize has gone done a few notches in my mind.

I Suck

This is a night-blooming cereus. AKA Star of Bethlehem. It's in my house. It's on my plant.

This is a spectaclar flower that blooms on an otherwise ugly plant. Seriously ugly plant. The only reason anyone keeps one of these plants in their house is that the flower, no matter how infrequent the blooms may come, is spectacular to behold.

Imagine my joy at learning that I had a bloom on my plant after only four years. (Some people have to wait much, much longer.)

Only there is one problem. I discovered the blossom after the plant had flowered.

Did I mention that the flower lasts only one night?

I must be the only botanist on Earth who gets a night-blooming cereus to bloom and then MISSES THE WHOLE FREAKIN' THING. So for your benefit and mine, I'm including a time lapse video from YouTube of what a night-blooming cereus is SUPPOSED to look like and why I keep this God-awful ugly plant in my house.

Enjoy. I wish I could.

Jake at 13 14

My dog. 13 years old. Still got the puppy attitude.

Sometimes I feel sorry for you

AKA Parmesan polenta stuffed fire-roasted poblano peppers with a black bean mole accompanied by jasmine rice and a roasted finger chili salsa.

Yes, I know what you're thinking. You're thinking, D, why didn't you just save yourself the trouble and make a black bean ragout? Call it whimsy. And why Parmesan? (Because I can't have soft cheeses, they don't agree with me.) Rice and polenta? Yes, I think it probably was a little heavy on the starch, but...darn it...those flavors were just meant to go together.

Just a little something I threw together after a particularly productive day at the Farmer's Market.

Yeah. Sometimes I feel sorry for you guys.