Since I’ve finally ripped (most of) my CD collection, I’m rediscovering all this music I used to love.

I’ve also made a fabulous playlist for the gym, and as I listen to it, I keep going, “Ooh! I love this song! Oooh! I love this song too!”

It’s strange how my brain classifies some music automatically as “music to play in the car while driving really fast with all the windows down” which is different from “music that is good to dance to” or “music I love to sing along to” or any other category my brain can come up with.

But I was really thinking about “music to play in the car while driving really fast with all the windows down.”

Here are some of my favorites in that category.

Whitesnake – Here I Go Again
Don Henley – Boys of Summer
Sugar – Good Idea
Green Day – Welcome to Paradise
Replacements – Alex Chilton
Pearl Jam – Alive
Smashing Pumpkins – Cherub Rock
Faith No More – Epic
Red Hot Chili Peppers – Taste the Pain
White Zombie – Black Sunshine
Cowboy Junkies – To Live Is to Fly
No Doubt – Just a Girl
ZZ Top – La Grange
Tina Turner – What You Get Is What You See
Urge Overkill – Positive Bleeding
Smiths – How Soon Is Now?
Rage Against the Machine – Killing in the Name
U2 – Pride (in the Name of Love)
Cracker – Lonesome Johnny Blues
Dada – Dizz Knee Land
Toadies – Possum Kingdom
Proclaimers – 500 Miles
Posies – My Big Mouth or Definite Door
L7 – Shitlist
Masters of Reality – Doraldina’s Prophecies
Yes – the entire 90215 album
Prince – the entire Purple Rain album
Tom Petty – the entire Southern Accents album

I know there are lots more I’m missing–I had lots of lots of tapes, which are all gone, and they included almost all my heavy metal. And really, what’s better than heavy metal for driving fast?

Now, just to clarify, I do NOT listen to these songs while driving anymore. I listen to public radio.

And I haven’t gotten a ticket in more than a decade.

One of the things I did over the holidays was try new recipes.

I tried a lot of new recipes over the past month.

Most of the recipes I found by flipping through my (multiple) baking cookbooks and looking for things I thought I (or everyone else) would like. But after making pumpkin walnut bread (very delicious–I’m eating part of the third loaf I made as I type) I decided I wanted some cranberry walnut bread.

Now this is a bit of a problem, because Grandmom can’t have nuts or cranberries, which means that if I make baked goods with those ingredients, she can’t have any. But as I also made challah and Italian bread, I figured Grandmom could just suffer, because I really wanted cranberry walnut bread.

Knowing precisely what I wanted, I started going through my cookbooks.

And I kept coming up short. I found a couple recipes for cranberry walnut quick breads, but I wanted a yeast bread, and not one of my cookbooks had anything close.

So I then googled, and discovered that Rose Levy Beranbaum has a blog, and on that blog she had a recipe for cranberry walnut bread (made with yeast).

I glanced at the recipe, then continued looking. I mean, that is a VERY long recipe. But, I couldn’t find anything else that looked like what I wanted, so I printed out the recipe and decided to try it.

I have to admit she uses a layout for her recipes I don’t particularly like–she lists the ingredients as they are added. Yes, that forces me to read through everything before starting, but I like to do my mis en place before starting to make sure I have everything I need, and I prefer having everything I need on a single page.

Be that as it may, I started the recipe and then discovered I did not have a back-up container of bread flour. Two bags of white wheat, plenty of all purpose, but no bags of bread flour. So I had to sub all purpose for much of the recipe.

Despite my lack of proper ingredients (I also don’t have malt powder [because I don’t like malt]) the bread turned out extremely well–in fact, I ended up making the recipe again (the second time with bread flour).

The only thing I didn’t like, is this recipe makes a humongous loaf. The second time around I made two loaves, and put one loaf in the freezer, because that is a LOT of bread, especially if there are only two people eating the bread.

And we’re back to work.

It was an exciting vacation. I baked–a lot. And I branched out from cookies and made breads as well: challah, Italian bread, pumpkin bread, and cranberry walnut bread.

We had the family Christmas gathering which was insane and chaotic but also a lot of fun. (We made Lithuanian cookies again, which added to the insanity–and the mess.)

And I got some fun loot. I learned my lesson this year, and picked out my large gifts myself, so Michael gave me a wonderful new pair of boots. I had wanted a new pair of snow boots, but couldn’t find any, and found these instead.

They are incredibly comfortable. I love them!

And of course I got books. Amusingly, my brother and Michael both got me the same books (well, Brian got me more books, but every book Michael got me, Brian also got me).

We did have some excitement: Kat (who is declawed mind you) got pissy with Grandmom and swatted her with enough force to break the skin. So that eventually led to a trip to Urgent Care and antibiotics.

And Kat in the dog house (so to speak).

All in all, the holidays were enjoyable, and I am very glad I took the full two weeks off. Back to work today, but luckily it’s another week before the students come back, so I can ease into things.

Then the little children would heat copper coins on the stove and press them against the glass until the roundest of holes would melt in the ice; through each of these peeped the lovelies little eye: one belonged to a little boy and the other to a little girl. His name was Kai and hers was Gerda.

Plans for today: Watch the Rose Bowl Parade. Watch the Gator Bowl. Read. Nap. Read.

Happy New Year Everyone!