lisah, that's awful. I'm so sorry.

As for me, I spent all day with my folks, and was really good about not bringing up difficult things until after lunch, and then it got unpleasant. Among other things, my mother announced that she'd rather stay miserable than do anything to address the situation (psych, meds, moving, support). Basically, even misery is preferable to any sort of change at all.

I just can't fathom it.

That said, new psychiatrist this week, since the current one has her on six, count them, six psychotropic drugs. Woot.

As for me, I spent all day with my folks, and was really good about not bringing up difficult things until after lunch, and then it got unpleasant. Among other things, my mother announced that she'd rather stay miserable than do anything to address the situation (psych, meds, moving, support). Basically, even misery is preferable to any sort of change at all.

It can be terrifying to move from a hell you've known to something new. I am so sorry. I can even understand a little. Change can be just that scary. It's unknown.

I really hope you can find something that works for everyone. Or anyone. Because that's miserable for her and you.

I made the muffins! And cleaned up the kitchen!

They are not the same as the magic "morningstar" muffins I get from the place near work (I want to just ask them who their bakery is), but they are nice-stronger pineapple taste, for one, and that's all good. And the work ones are bigger--is the standard commercial muffin size bigger than the 12 count tray I'd grab in Ralph's? I've never really thought about it.

I've told those guys I was going to reverse engineer their bakery's recipe--I feel tempted to bring them when I'm satisfied.

So--notes on the muffins:

• work ones are browner--investigate bran, whole wheat flour, possibly also brown sugar, but that alone can't account for the difference
• too sweet--for me, anyway. I did reduce the sugar by 1/8 of a cup. Next time maybe by as much as 1/3
• pineapple chunks--they may use chunks as well as crushed
• could stand more carrot and raisins per unit

I need to not gorge on these. I do have leftover dinner food in the fridge. But...muffins!

I didn't notice how much time had passed and called home in a bit of a panic. I'd thought I might call when they were out to birthday dinner or something, but instead I got them just as they were leaving for the theatre. At least I got the timely wishes in, even if conversation needs to wait until tomorrow. And, distracted daughter that I am, I forgot an e-card. There's really no excuse for that. I could have fucking teed that up a year ago. In fact, I'm now tempted to tee up next...no, that's bad juju.

--serial:

Consuela, I can't begin to imagine what you're going through here. The degree of immovable object is...I feel for you, and I wish I had some suggestion from some family member or another. But the best I can do is be on your side. For all that's worth...

That's a lot of meds for one person, Consuela. I hope the new psychiatrist can help.

lisah, I'm so sorry about your friend. That's horrifying.

And cleaned up the kitchen!

Ooh, that's the hardest part.

Ooh, that's the hardest part.

ITA!

We went apple picking today and had lunch at a place that had the most amazing crisp. I think they food processed the apples for like a milli-second because it had only the smallest chunks. Oh damn, it was good.

Apple crisp sounds delicious. Mmm.

Oh Suela, I'm sorry. My kneejerk reaction is that she may be free to insist on her own misery, but she doesn't get to demand yours too.

I'm still amazed by what the cleaning lady and her sister pulled off in not that much time, so I'm in that honeymoon period of cleaning up after myself. It's both not that hard, and doomed to failure. I suck that way.

I just skimmed the comments on the article about outing the Reddit troll. I gave up before I got to any surprising ones, though. You know, I don't think I've ever been to www.reddit.com. I mean, the front page. I've just followed other people's links to specific posts. And seeing all those stats laid out like that...whoa. I feel like I've been walking around the elephant in the room without even noticing it was there. Yeah, it's the place gawker ganks for its articles, but I've never gone to just link. I think I'm gonna, maybe.

While looking for a possible recipe for these muffins, I noticed that Google is content aware to recipes too, now. I like that it's parsing the results, and not my search terms--I didn't put recipe in, but that's primarily what I got back. Look down the left column, and where the options to restrict your image search by size would be, are options for ingredients and cooking times and calories. Dude.

I got a gushy fan letter to the provocateuse tumblr. She was all excited I was putting social media buttons on the pics, and wanted to know if I was planning to do that on all the sites, not just venus. I so very rarely see one-button-share link for Tumblr image posts--usually if they're there (which they're not), even if the source is an image, it will be creating a text post. So I'm glad I chose Tumblr first, even if just for that one woman. Now I just have to get the facebook button to line up with the rest...

Okay, CSI did a ridic piece of forensic. It's not as bad as picking out a reflection from an eyeball (I wish I could remember the details of that doozy...), but they zoomed and enhanced (natch) a digital photo (I don't recall the resolution, if they mentioned it) and caught a clear reflection of the Flatiron building in ridiculous clarity in a beer bottle. I mean, it would have to be in the same room as the victim to look like that, and the photo taken with a ... the Hubble telescope, clearly.

I just read this sentence in an article:

The Kindle dominates ebooks, a growing industry; the Kindle Fire is one of only two serious competitors to the iPad; and for a lot of people, "Amazon" has become to buying media what "Google" is to searching the web.

Does anyone know the Kindle/Nook/Kobo market breakdown? I have a sudden craving--I loves me some pie (charts). Also, if you were going to stipulate two iPad competitors, which is the other one? Colour Nook?

I was fondling tablets in Fry's the other day, and I get why the prices jump like they do, but I don't know the fancy e-readers. They only have one camera, they're heavy and awkward, you get the conviction they'l be on Android 2.2 forever But when you make the jump up to iPad-like prices--to the Asus Transformer, the Sony, Lenovo--they look and feel nice, and I'm assuming they have decent vendor support. They not catching on, or is it market fragmentation and there's no clear leader? I hope it's the latter, because there is some nice stuff out there. There should be brisk competition. It's good for the tech. But I can see where Kindle and Nook bring people in for their specific function, even though one can run both on on iOS or Android anyway. I don't know about B&N, but Amazon is selling at cost, and Apple and Samsung are clearly not.

Where were you apple (I initialy capitalised that...) picking, Kat?

I am going apple picking tomorrow!