As noted here, I have a thing for butter and sadly, we’re not talking toast. I tell you, sometimes I pop butter directly with brown sugar and my mouth thinks why bother baking? It’s all here. Back in bakery years, working all day near 64-pound butter blocks was torture, a special brand of wafting, yellow, [...]
Posted in books, Chicagoland on Sep 25th, 2009
One breezy Chicago summer, my brother and I built a treehouse. Isn’t that nice? But before my mother objects, let’s rephrase: one sweaty Chicago summer, my brother and I nearly killed each other nailing two boards into a tree. We pounded rows of crooked nails into little boards for steps, and as high as we [...]
Posted in blogging, books, friends, Josie, sketchbook on Jul 12th, 2009
Why are we detouring into the nursery? Well. When Josie was very small, and I was very tired but she was not, I’d walk the floors with her in the dark, and make stuff up. Nonsense murmuring stuff, like this – a rhyming stream of bakery talk. Yes. I was one whacked-out sleepy caterer. Why [...]
Posted in books, Chicagoland, friends on May 13th, 2009
{ A Mother’s Day tale } In 1978 just three types of contraband existed for me and my pal Andie Lerner: shoplifted Bonne Bell makeup, those curious magazines in our brothers’ rooms, and Judy Blume’s teen sex novel, Forever. But I was a fearful eleven-year-old who declined the five-finger discount – and despite many examinations [...]
Josie put in a rabid special request. In honor of the teen vampire movie “Twilight,” which she hasn’t seen yet and will surely expire if she doesn’t, she requested that I re-run her favorite post, in which we discuss Stephenie Meyer’s books and I make a few meatballs. I am still a little hazy on [...]
