Friday, April 16, 2021

I’ve had a busy day but I’m ready to have a drink and sit in my chair until supper.

I spent all morning at my computer. I’m caught up on my Guild work, including some work on the archives. I caught up on my Hall work, including an e-mail to our membership. I caught up on my own paperwork too and went through a lot of my flagged e-mail messages.

This afternoon I spent almost three hours out in the yard. I cleared out the two beds on either side of the front door; the hostas there are both coming up. There was another area of the yard that I didn’t do much with last year and I wanted to get at it before the daisies got too thick. Pat confirmed that there were some hostas in that bed as well. I cleared out enough daisies that I found one of the hostas coming up out of the ground. I’m sure I’ll find the other two another day. The daisies, although I love them, are so thick they are like weeds.

I thought I was finished but decided to do one more smaller bed. It’s amazing how a bed looks small until you start work on it and find that it is bigger than you thought. It’s done now though. When that bed was finished I sat in the sun on the patio for a few minutes. I thought I might have a gin and tonic while I sat in the sun but that meant I was going to have to go upstairs to get it so decided just to sit.

I was doing a bit of an experiment today. Pat said he heard that allergy symptoms were down this year and they thought it was because people were wearing masks. I wore my mask while I was outside (it was really hot) so I’ll see if I’m coughing and sneezing tonight. While I had my Zoom meetings yesterday (one in the afternoon and one in the evening) I had the window open and I couldn’t stop sneezing, blowing my nose and scratching my eyes all evening. Hate the allergies but love the fresh air.

Thursday, April 15, 2021

Pat had requested a carrot cake for his birthday – the one with the pineapple in it. After my bread was in the bread maker I started on the cake. I was ready to mix everything up when I realized I hadn’t shred any carrots; three large carrots gave me the two cups I needed.

Once all the ingredients were in the mixer I thought it seemed dry. I reviewed the recipe and checked that I had put in the right number of eggs and the right amount of oil. I decided that everything was okay and this recipe must have been a different recipe than I used last time.

It wasn’t until the cake was out of the oven, cooled and ready for the cream cheese frosting that I realized what was missing – I’d forgotten the pineapple.

Pat suggested adding the pineapple into the icing so I gave that a try. He had also suggested cutting the cake in half and layering it; although the cake rose a bit it wasn’t very thick. I wasn’t too far into making the frosting when I realized that we’d be in sugar shock if I added enough icing sugar for a spreadable icing.

I tried layering it with some icing between the layers but the top layer just slid off. So back into the cake pan it went and I just poured the frosting over the top. It looks okay, but I don’t think it will taste very good.

On the other hand I seemed to get the laundry done without mishaps, the cleaning is done and the slice of cheesy bread I had after the cake disaster tasted fine.