madermouse's Diaryland Diary ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- July 11, 2001 You know, my calves are killing me!! Ouch. That step aerobics is murder on my calves! I�ve even been stretching before the workout, along with a mile walk afterwards, to cool down. I guess I need to do this every OTHER day instead of every day until my sad little calf muscles can take the pain. I must say, however, that the workout is great! I do a 10-minute light warm up step routine and 12 minutes of aerobics on the step. I sound like a herd of elephants doing the jig, but since I�m on the bottom floor of my apartment building - I�m probably not driving anyone crazy. Although, the other night my upstairs neighbor says, �Hey, have you been exercising?�. I told him I had, for about 7 months. His reply was �Well be sure to drink plenty of water in this kind of heat!� I thanked him for the advice, and handed him 7 bottles of beer. (Well I didn�t have any use for it, and it was just taking up space in the fridge where vegetables needed to go!) But the question remains in my mind is, why did he ask if I�d been exercising? My husband thinks he may have noticed my weight loss, and was commenting the way a man would. Instead of saying, �Have you lost weight?� which sounds like �You were fatter before, and you are thinner now.� He instead asked if I�d been working out. My theory, of course, is a bit different. I think he heard me doing my step aerobics and wondered what the hell was going on down there. My dear readers, I have included a bit of a baking fiasco in my journal today. If you don�t care to hear about baking fiascos, or if they hold no interest to you - then my suggestion is to stop reading right here. :) I spent last night baking a beautiful cake for my friend�s birthday tonight. Happy Birthday Krystee!! The first cake I ever made her, was about 2 feet tall and had 8 layers - it literally swayed when I brought it to the table....You know that yummy stuff that is on the top of a pineapple upside-down cake? Well I make that pineapple stuff and fill a yellow cake with it. Then I frost the whole thing with whipped cream, and plaster it with freshly toasted coconut. It is her favorite cake, and I am happy to make it for her. Or, at least, I�m usually happy to make it for her. But dammit if her birthday has to be in July - one of the hottest months of the year! There�s nothing better than turning on the oven for 4 hours while I bake fillings, toast coconut, and bake cakes while its 95 degrees outside. Let�s not forget the dirty looks and nasty comments I�m getting from my husband the whole time about the damned heat and whatever else he�s saying about me under his breath. It�s a real treat. So I had this grand idea to do the actual baking part in my neighbor�s apartment which is now vacant. (He moved to Japan a few weeks ago) I was totally psyched, thinking that this was perfect timing. I could make Krystee�s cake, and please my husband by not generating any heat in the house. I go into the empty apartment, preheat the oven, make the batter - from scratch mind you - (yes, butter, eggs, flour, sugar, the works), pour it into the greased 14 inch round cake pan, and gingerly place it in the oven. I go back into my apartment to grab a few things, answer the phone, set the timer etc....when I smell something burning. I look at the clock: 15 minutes has passed. No way should that cake be even close to done - it�s a 14 inch round cake, the size of a large pizza. I swing open the apartment door and the smell of burning overpowers me. I immediately think �Shit!� and swing open the door to the oven. The cake is heavily browned on the top, and nowhere near done on the bottom. I close the door, adjust the heat down by 100 degrees, and wait. Now I can�t leave the oven�s side, I must continually check and re-check the cake. I must babysit it. This oven must have a bad element or something, because the heat seems to fluctuate no matter what the temperature is set at. My mind is racing....I must find a way to combat the dryness that will inevitably result from the initial high heat. I flash on the reserved pineapple juice that I just happened to save when making the filling. I immediately get a pan, set it over high heat, and boil the juice with a 1/4 cup of brown sugar. I�ll reduce the pineapple to a thick brown syrup, slice the top of the cake off with a leveler, and brush the syrup all over the cake. That should add some moisture, but how will I compensate for the � inch of over-browned cake that I had to remove? There will be at least 25 people at this party, and everyone simply must have cake.... I look at the layer I�ve now leveled and syruped and realize there is no way it will feed this many. I must bake another layer. And there is no way in hell I can bake it in THAT oven again. The clock reads 11:00pm. I race to the store, 2 miles away. I�m out of eggs and butter, and my eyes are heavy with sleep. I walk through the isles of the Safeway in a daze. The voices in my head are urging me to just buy a couple of yellow cake mixes and get it over with. The clock says 11:20pm, and I�m starting to agree with those voices. I get the carton of eggs, and spend a moment lingering in the coolness of the refrigerator. Then I beeline it to the baking isle, say �fuck it� and grab two yellow box cakes. I finally get home, weary and blurry-eyed. The clock flashes 11:35pm. I make the mistake of sitting down on the couch, just for a moment.... I should�ve never done that. I wake up, disoriented. Its 12:30pm and my neck is killing me. I�m laying in a half-sitting, half- lying down contorted position with the cake mixes still in my lap. I accept defeat and head to bed, it all has to work out in the end. My alarm woke me up bright an early this morning, 6:00am. I groaned, shut it off, and rolled over. Could it really be that early already? The thought of Krystee�s cake made its way into my cloudy consciousness, I had to get up. I opened all the doors of my apartment and turned on the oven. I greased and floured the pans with fumbly morning hands, and dumped the box cakes into the mixer. Add eggs, water, oil.....I didn�t have enough oil. Crap. I thought of olive oil - too green, too olive-y. I scanned the fridge for anything I could use in place of oil. Aaahhh, real mayo! In goes two tablespoons and the no sooner the cake was in the oven. I exercised, came back, and the cake was golden brown and beautiful. I filled the bottom layer and set the fresh baked layer upon it then wrapped the whole thing in plastic. I used the So, let�s see....party starts at 7pm. I get off work at 6:30pm. I�ll drive home, make the whipped cream, frost the cake, plaster it with coconut & head out the door. E.T.A.- 7:30pm to the party. 30 minutes late, but what are they going to do, start without me? All was right with the world. This baking fiasco was brought to you by my friend Krystee, who�s birthday will always be in July, and who I love a whole damn lot! 12:29 p.m. - July 11, 2001 ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
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