Jesus, the spelling bee is still going on. I think they're down to three kids.

Color commentary on a spelling bee is a little weird.

So I'm going to a party tonight and I made a lemon pudding pie (sort of a lemon meringue pie except you fold the meringue into the lemon pudding and bake it like that). And it looks like it will be great -- except I was experimenting with using vodka in my pie crust so it would roll out more neatly.

And I tasted the raw pastry, and a bit of cooked pastry, and there's definitely a vague bitter aftertaste. I suspect I used waaaay too much vodka.

So. The pie's in the oven. What do I do? Bring it to the party and put a sign on it that says it's a Vodka Lemon Pie? Or set it aside and feed it to my nieces tomorrow?

I would bring it to the party and assume that you are the only person who is actually going to critique the pie crust because everyone else will be all NOM NOM NOM.

You just tasted the pastry on its own? If so, anyone who eats it along with the filling won't even notice.

Hah! well, the issue is temporarily moot. I am chastened for not reading the entire recipe in advance, because when you take it out of the oven it has to cool completely, and then spend six hours in the refrigerator.

So it's Sunday dinner dessert after all. Well, Dad will love it, and won't notice the faint flavor of vodka...

I guess I'll just bring a nice bottle of wine to the party. Damn it.

I would think six hours of cooling just means thoroughly cooled, so there could be a way around that, if you want one.

I'm on my way home from the conference, so tired. But it was good I went.

I would think six hours of cooling just means thoroughly cooled, so there could be a way around that, if you want one.

Tempting, but I suspect it has to do with keeping the pudding from weeping, which it could do if chilled too fast and incurring a temperature variation between the interior & exterior.

OTOH, it doesn't look like the crust slumped, so yay for that.

I can wait 24 hours to see how it came out. And probably better to experiment on family, anyway...

And now off to the partay.

That's cool, Connie.

Oh, hey, forgot to tell you. We MIGHT be staying at the house of a client of my realtor's from 4/9 to 5/1. He doesn't care about the pets, we can put our furniture there, he pays utilities, no deposit, new credit check, and we pro-rate the rent. It's NICE; it's about 2.6 miles from our now house, a little further than New House. Oh, they'd be showing the house, but NOTHING like the volume of the showings on our house.

We talk in person and see the house tomorrow. I talked to him and he seemed really nice.

Check it!: [link]

If I'd been That Kind of person, I could have been an extension-having fool, I think, because everyone always wanted to show that they were cool with me and what they were always calling "...your situation" or "under the circumstances..." I took some, and I don't feel badly about them, but it's good that I learned to play through so I didn't really get a BA in pity-fucking. Burrell, yes, I get that you really couldn't confront Business Major sociopath about how he ain't right, but he ain't. (that's weird, too, usually when I read more about things they concern me more, not less, but that will be a matter for his ex-wife and disaffected children to work out, not his English teacher.

The one time I asked for an extension was on the day a paper was due but it was because my memory typewriter (!) gave up the ghost as I finished writing the paper the night before it was due. I had the all-nighter paper writing down to a science in undergrad but when that happened there was no way for me to recover the data and I was in no shape to start over at that hour. I think I managed to turn it in a day late but it certainly wasn't as good as the first attempt. Actually, I'm not sure I got the extension. I may have gotten a grade lower as a late penalty.

Another professor offered me an incomplete so I could finish a missing element of a particular assignment. It was the difference between an A and a B in the class. I think it surprised him that I took the B. I can't say I've ever regretted that.

I have to decide whether or not to move. I just got my lease renewal form a couple of days ago and yesterday a banner went up over the parking lot across the street proclaiming new lofts "Coming Soon!". Do I want to live with a year of construction directly across the street or do I want to go through the tsuris of moving?