Expect nothing from me this week.

Instead, I give you awesome geeks.

The cats were excited to receive their loot from Amazon this week.

There was a whole lotta crinkling going on.

Here’s the sound that plays when I get a new mail message at work.

Today’s word: corrosive

So.

For the third time in a year (ie 12 month period, not since Jan 1 of this year) I’ve maxed out the anti-depressant I’m on.

Doc gave me a choice of holding where I am, switching meds, or adding a second med to the mix.

I talked about the fact that I feel as if most of this is external (as opposed to just my brain giving me a hard time) and said I thought I’d like to hold where I am for a bit, to see if the veritable shit storms taper off.

So that’s where I am. Still in a holding pattern. You probably noticed that from the fact I’ve hardly had the gumption to write much for about the past year, but on the bright side, I am holding on, and maintaining altitude is better than crash and burn.

So now you know what’s up, and I appreciate your continued patience with me.

This weekend I made two things: Italian bread and rice pudding.

I’ve been making Italian Bread every week, and learning about bread making with every loaf I make. Last week, when the loaf collapsed before going into the oven (tasted fine though) I had several insights as to what I was doing right and what I was doing wrong. So this week I tried a couple different things and voila!

Perfect rise, no collapse, and nice oven spring!

The biggest change was not using greased plastic wrap to cover the loaf–I used a floured towel instead, and it worked out much better. Next time I think I can reduce the amount of flour, and I’ll try the egg wash again.

Second recipe was rice pudding.

A couple months ago I picked up Sticky, Chewy, Messy, Gooey by Jill O’Connor and have been wanting to try several recipes since. The first problem was that these recipes use lots of eggs and butter and sugar (not surprisingly) and are something that I’d prefer to make for multiple people, instead of just us. The second problem was that Grandmom can’t eat a lot of the desserts, because they have nuts or dairy or something else she can’t eat.

Thus, I decided to try rice pudding, only I’d have to modify the recipe to make it non-dairy. I decided to substitute coconut milk for regular milk. Of course, the fact I’ve never made rice pudding before, and the first time trying a recipe isn’t always the best time for making major changes didn’t deter me in the slightest.

So how did it turn out?

Not bad. Grandmom really liked it (the fact she loves rice pudding was part of the impetus behind selecting that recipe) and Michael said it was good. I think that rice pudding isn’t really my thing, but it wasn’t gross or disgusting, so I’m assuming that means it turned out well.