So, Emily and her dad just came over, more than an hour before I was expecting them. Kind of wish I'd combed my hair earlier.

what happened to his foot?

He's had a long-standing chronic problem with it, and he just got surgery to remedy it. I suggested having you swing by and take him to Big Bear, since his GF is out of town, but he couldn't have handled the drive.

So when will you be getting a platinum credit card to flash us with on commercials?

With theatre salaries? No time soon.

We had thanksgiving with him anyway. There was a marathon on scifi.

But i can bring him a plate on Sunday when I get back.

There was a marathon on scifi.

Oh, cute!

His GF will be back Sunday, so he'll be taken care of then. I've told him to work the pity angle, but I know he won't even try.

Okay, back to the crack puzzle. After lots of help, I am down to only a handful of empty words. Who knows these:

In the Microsoft box, the one linking Red Forman and Microsoft, and the two linking boot to Windows.

In the drugs box, the two linking bomb to drugs.

In the spam box, the one linked just to spam that isn't phishing, and the one linked just to plastic surgery that isn't nip/tuck.

eta: If anyone wants some hints on any others, let me know.

No knead bread is out of the oven. [...] They say 12 hours is find. I did about 14. Next time, I'm going to do the full 18.

For fellow bread-freaks: My kneadless bread rose like whoa over, let's see, I started it at 3pm and shaped it at 8am, so that is 15 hours. Could the room temp have been an issue?

I do think that kneaded bread has smaller holes, on average, so a better bread for sandwich consistency; kneadless bread also doesn't tolerate as much shaping as kneaded bread does, so you can't break it up into baguettes or 2 loaves or anything.

Kneadless Bread Recipe:

3 C all-purpose unbleached flour (up to 0.5 C whole wheat OK)
1/4 teaspoon yeast
1 1/4 teaspoon salt
1 5/8 C water
handful of cornmeal

Mix flour, yeast, salt and water in a large bowl. (Add any sugar or spices you want at this time; I add a little sugar to give the recipe some taste.) The mixture will be very sticky. Cover it with plastic wrap and put it someplace where it will stay at or above 70 F. for 12+ hours. (I put it under a lamp on my bedside table, or on the back burner of the stove.

After 12 hours, the top of the mixture will look like a clam beach at low tide: little air holes all over. Cover your hands with flour, turn out the sticky blob onto a floured work-surface, and make a ball out of it. (Let me repeat: use flour.) Take a clean dishtowel and scatter some cornmeal into it in the middle; plop the ball of dough into the cornmealed part, scatter more cornmeal on top, and fold the towel loosely back over the dough. Leave enough room for the dough to souble in size.

That sits for 1.5 hours, after which you turn the oven on. Oven = 450 F., and put your pan into it when you start. I use a 6-qt. Le Creuset pot with a top; just make sure it's a bin-shape with high-enough walls and a top that is oven-safe. The pot will get wicked hot after 30 minutes, so remove the pot (carefully) and gently roll the dough blob into the pot. Shake the pot a little bit to even out the dough; don't try to poke it and risk burning your hands.

Put the pot o' dough (with top on) into the oven for 20 minutes. (This gives the crust its hardness; the original recipe called for 30 minutes, but I found the crust too hard that way.) Remove the top, and bake for another 30-40 minutes -- so that the dough is in the oven less than an hour, or the crust is a nice brown (preferably both).

The recipe says the loaf is 1.5 lb., but all I can say is, it is a big round artisan loaf with a hard crust and spongy insides.

for the link between microsoft and red forman , think of the other word connected to the blank and microsoft .

the two linking drugs and bomb are a song that quotes a major drug-related book, and the band that sings it .

the one linked only to plastic surgery is someone who's been surgeried to the point of sexual ambiguity and there are 3 that are exclusively linked to spam , so you'll have to be more specific.

Lee! I got more! Here or AIM?

Nicole, Here!

Thanks Thomas!