Open mouth, Insert foot

So last week, in one fell swoop, I totally ruined any hipster cred that I might have had. I went to see The Dark Knight last Thursday at the Somerville Theater with PunkRockMom, the Niblet, and PRM's friend Kevin. [I love the Somerville Theater. At $7 for a ticket and $3 for a popcorn, that is still less than the multiplexes, and you don't have to pay for parking (after 8pm).]

As we were walking back to the car after the movie was over, discussing the merits and drawbacks (on the whole, way more merits than drawbacks), Kevin asked me what I thought of the end of the film. I said that "I liked it, but it certainly wasn't canon." The words came out of my mouth faster than I could stop myself. DOH! Good thing those guys are a bit geeky themselves.

Rain, rain, go away

I thought I lived in Boston, but, apparently, I live in the rain forest. Or quite possibly, Florida.

It is not supposed to be so rain stormy, thunder and lightning-y in the northeast corner of the United States, oh ye weather gods. At least not in this vast quantity. It is too bad that the lightning can't be harvested and used for electricity, although that might be a little too Neil Gaimany for real life. ;)

Why do I bother?

Every time I go to the Dunkin Donuts at work, something is wrong with my order. Today, I ordered a jelly stick; I received a cruller. (I threw it out because it wasn't worth the calories as I am not a fan of crullers.) It also wasn't worth it to walk all the way back to complain.

Was this a sign from above that I shouldn't be eating the jelly stick? Because I really did want to eat it. From now on I am sticking with the Green Mountain Coffee downstairs.

Hitting the Glass Ceiling

In case anyone was wondering, yes, there is such a thing as too much salad.

I have to finish Tess of the D'Ubervilles by Sunday afternoon. The edition I have is 405 pages. I am on page 19. Can you say "challenge"?

Went to Pie in Newton Center for dinner last night. I had the turkey, broccoli and cheddar hand pie for my meal and a slice of the strawberry rhubarb for dessert. The hand pie was fab, although the crust was difficult to cut, but the strawberry rhubarb pie was not tart enough. My friend RJ got the chocolate cream pie (she had already eaten supper) and THAT, my dears, was FAB. I don't know if I would go back there to eat, but I think I might order that chocolate cream pie to take home.

Far too much information about my cookie addiction

My friend Ellen from work (I begin a lot of sentences in real life with "My friend Ellen from work" but I think that this might be the first time I have done that in my blog) is a fantastic human being. Seriously. Someone on her blog once commented: "Ellen, how America should be", and I think that is just about right. I want a tee shirt that says that. (It would be red because red is Ellen's signature color.)

ANYHOW, Ellen is the world's single greatest cookie baker (and trust me, I have tried a lot of cookies in my life. And if you don't believe me, take a look at the size of my bottom. That might remove any doubts you might have.) Ellen frequently bakes cookies and brings them into the office, much to the delight of her colleagues. My personal favorites: the chocolate chip cookies. Seriously, these are the best dang cookies you will ever taste. Each one has just the right amount of chips, the right amount of chewiness, and the bottoms are never even slightly darker than golden brown.

The other day, she took a stab at the New York Times recipe for chocolate chip cookies, and she brought them in today. Because that is what Ellen does: bakes and shares.(Check out her blog for a photo.) I tried the cookies out and felt that cookies that take over 24 hours to make deserved a serious taste test and review.

And this is what I have to say about the cookies as a cookie connoisseur:

• the cookies were a beautiful golden brown and looked like they could have come out of Mrs. Field's bakery; they also had some height to them


• the cookies were a nice texture, thicker than Ellen's traditional cookies, but not as chewy either


• at first, I wasn't a fan of the salt on the top, but after I had my coffee, I found that the salt was a nice compliment to the taste of the coffee


• the chocolate wasn't as sweet as I like. I know that darker chocolate is better for you, and it is being used more frequently now, but I like regular old chips in my cookies.

Ultimately, I think that these cookies are very good, but the fact that they took a lot of work and the batter had to chill a full 24 hours before they could be baked (no instant gratification here,) made me more inclined to favor Ellen's traditional chocolate chip cookies, which it turns out, ARE the Nestle's Toll House cookies. Hmmm, go figure. A classic, just like Ellen herself.

Downtown -- everything's waiting for you

Last week, I was out of the office, hanging out in town and then visiting my family in CT. I managed to get some awesome shots in historical downtown Boston on Monday, June 30th. I thought they turned out rather well.