twenty minutes of hypnotically adorable

Here. My two half-finished posts aren't writing themselves so have twenty minutes of hypnotically adorable kittens to tide you over.

thanks for the liebster love; let's have some more!

Thanks to follower .breaking into blossom., I've been nominated for something called a liebster award: a sort of  blog-based chain letter which encourages small bloggers to give a shout-out to/for other small bloggers.

I don't normally do chain-letter type things, but 

a) it was sweet of blossom to think of me (thank you!),
b) I just got back from vacation and I'm bored,
c) I like that the Liebster Award shares the same first letter as Lesbian.

So here goes.

It seems there are multiple versions of this "award" going around, but the one blossom is following instructs me to:

a) nominate eleven blogs with under 200 followers (I honestly don't know how you'd determine that, so I'm just gonna take a stab at it by choosing from the "smallish personal blog" category in my Feedly list)
b) notify said bloggers they've been nominated (hey bloggers! thanks for existing!)
c) provide answers to the eleven questions blossom posed in her own Liebster post, and
d) ask eleven questions of my own nominees, to answer if they so choose, along with posting their own eleven nominees (excluding the blogger who nominated you).

My Nominees in Alphabetical Order are.... (drumroll) ... 

1. The Dirty Normal
2. Eat the Damn Cake
3. Fannie's Room
4. First the Egg
5. I'm Unschooled. Yes, I Can Write
6. The Lesbrary
7. New Porn By Women
8. Radical Doula
9. The Thang Blog
10. Undercover in the Suburbs
11. Walk the Ridgepole

My responses to blossom's questions...

1. What comforts you most when you’re sad? Touch, particularly from my wife (doesn't have to be sexual). And reading familiar books.
2. What would you do on a dream day where money and travel time were no object? Enjoy leisurely meals in the good company of friends and family (who are scattered across the continent), go walking in Cumbria in ideal weather, read intellectually engaging things in books, and enjoy unhurried sexytimes with my wife.
3. Favorite drink (with or without alcohol)? Summer: Elderflower gin & tonic, Winter: Goat's milk hot cocoa made with belgian chocolate.
4. What character trait (of yours) do you most struggle to accept about yourself? The fact that physical activity and exercise are not second nature to me.
5. How much water do you drink in a day? Typically not as much as I should.
6. If you’re a parent, what has surprised you the most about the gig? If you’re not, what do you like best about not having kids (right now or at all)? I feel uncomfortable framing non-parenting in terms of what's "best" about that aspect of our family life. In part, we're non-parents because we can't picture having enough hours in the day (around work) or emotional resources to parent adequately. So I guess I'd say, "it's good having enough sleep and down-time that we can function"? But I'd rather say that what's surprised me about non-parenting is that I'm okay with it. Growing up, I assumed I would be a mother. Life hasn't turned out that way, and it's surprising me that I'm as comfortable with that as I am.
7. What (if anything) makes you feel insecure about either being a parent or not being a parent? Insecurity may not be the right term...but I worry about how to maintain cross-generational connections in the absence of parenting, as that is the clearest model I know.
8. Top three four television shows of all time? Firefly. Mr. Rogers. Torchwood. The West Wing.
9. Specialty dish (or baked indulgence)? Something you’ve made time and again. Moosewood brownies.
10. Favorite thing about the person you’ve grown into? That I can always find something to be interested in and ask questions about.
11. One simple, happy memory. Stepping off the plane in Redmond, Oregon, en route to visiting my grandparents and smelling the scent of juniper and lava rock dust.

My questions for the Leibster nominees ... (should they choose to answer them) ... 

1. First library?
2. A favorite childhood book or movie you're now a bit cringe-y about having adored?
3. Earliest memory of the internet?
4. Food you disliked in childhood but appreciate now (and why)?
5. Books currently on your nightstand/active reading pile?
6. A might-have-been from your twenties (job not taken, relationship not pursued, trip aborted) that you find yourself wondering about?
7. Favored toothpaste, toothbrush?
8. Have you ever burned/shredded/junked a piece of personal history you now regret destroying (if so, what and why)?
9. Have you ever burned/shredded/junked a piece of personal history you have no regrets about (if so, what and why)?
10. A strong childhood memory of world events?
11. A project you hope to finish some day (but has currently fallen by the wayside)?

If you (the nominees) choose to spread the liebster love, now or at some later date, please link the post you create back here in comments so others can enjoy!

Again, thank you all for thinking and writing and sharing.

pawtucket, rhode island [photo post]

Hanna's in California this weekend, attending a bridal shower and enjoying a few days with our friends Diana and Collin. I'm in Pawtucket, Rhode Island, kitten-sitting for a friend who inadvertently adopted a wee kitten she found in the engine well of her car about six weeks ago (!).

The kitten's name is Houdini because he is good at hiding and at getting out of enclosed spaces. He was deeply uncertain of me for the first twenty-four hours, but he is now willing to share the same couch and even sat on my lap for a few minutes, purring madly.

He's the loudest, most automatic purr-er I have ever seen. If you so much as look at him, he starts up like a little motor launch.

Hanna will be joining me on Tuesday, when she returns from the west coast, and we're going to enjoy a few days' midsummer getaway before heading back to Boston (although I'll also be experiencing the commuter life when I go into work Monday, Tuesday and Friday -- whee!

This morning I walked the length of Blackstone Boulevard from Pawtucket into Providence. Lots of really well-maintained early 20th-century homes en route for my architectural-history gene to geek out about.

In Providence, I made my way to the local independent grocers for a few supplies (you always forget something!). Though less proliferate than in Boston, there are really great food options here, including wildflour cafe where I got my morning's delicious coffee and a rosemary-onion savory scone, and three sisters where I went last night for kulfi ice cream (YUM).

I'd be lying if I said I hadn't gone on Craigslist last night to check out the rental market in Pawtucket. Though Hanna and I have enough friends who do the to-Boston-from-Elsewhere commute to know we won't be moving Elsewhere anytime soon.

Back to reading the draft of my friend Molly's parenting-while-feminist book project while the cat purrs at me from a suspicious distance!

post eleventy-hundred: nerd blessings

Today, after making a trek to Harvard's library privileges office in the middle of the first heat wave of the summer to apply for spousal library privileges (what could be nerdier than that?) I finally made the time to watch Wil Wheaton's message to a baby nerd, which Hanna sent to me several weeks ago via the Mary Sue.

I thought it was appropriate to share as my 1100th post here at the feminist librarian.

Stay cool, everyone, and spend some time this weekend loving your favorite things as hard as you can.

from the neighborhood: arnold arboretum

Me on a knit-bombed bench, Arnold Arboretum (photo by Joseph)

This weekend, my friend Joseph is in town from Michigan, where he works at Arrowhead Alpines and recently published a book on plant breeding at home (aka plantsex!). Obviously, we spent at least some of the weekend exploring plant-y things in the Boston area, including a glorious visit to Arnold Arboretum.

I hadn't been to the Arb since maybe 2008? I'm absolutely not going to leave it so long before I go back.

It was a perfect half-cloudy day to wander around experimenting with nature photography.

Next time, though, I'm gonna bring a book and a thermos of tea and settle in for a long afternoon of reading out-doors. Maybe in this tree ...

Joseph was super-excited to see this dove tree, planted in 1904; he says it's the oldest dove tree in the United States (the earliest tree we saw was a bonsai started in the late 1700s!)

The azaleas were blooming everywhere in all shades from white to deep fuschia. These were a salmon red, though the camera made them come out pink.

As were the lilacs...

I'm looking forward to chilling by this lake sometime soon with my wife and a picnic from the Harvest Co-op.

from the neighborhood: sunning cats & SCOTUS nailpolish

While Hanna was dozing in the bedroom this afternoon, and I was listening to Jeff Chu's interview on the Diane Rehm Show through their online streaming (have I mentioned how much public radio totally rocks and that we're proud supporters?), I decided to paint my fingernails in rainbow in anticipation of this coming week's oral arguments before the Supreme Court on the legality of bans on same-sex marriage.

Like it's any secret, but I think my nails probably give my position on the matter away.

What with the wedding ring and all.

The cats were unimpressed with my politics and beauty regime, particularly since there was nothing edible in it for them.

They preferred to spend the afternoon sunbathing in our living room.

(Sometimes I suspect Teazle is a slinkie in disguise.)

(And also that one day she will figure out how to reach the hanging plants...)

Hope you all are having a restful weekend -- more coming later in the week on queer porn, queer families, sex and relationships, SCOTUS, DOMA, and all the rest!

international day of femslash!

Idris (the TARDIS) in "The Doctor's Wife"

A few months ago, I discovered there is such a thing in the world as an International Day of Femslash.

o_O

So naturally I had to participate, and my piece went live today over at Archive of Our Own:

Title: These Are The Days We Live Now
Author: ElizaJane
Fandom: Doctor Who
Pairing: Donna Noble/Idris (the TARDIS)
Rating: R / Explicit (AO3)
Length: 5,487 words
Summary: Idris stretches herself thin, across time, across space, threads of consciousness. Searching. A Donna Noble fix-it fic inspired by “The Doctor’s Wife.”
Tags: Loss, Memory Loss, Human/Non-Human Relationship, Pining, Dreams, Hurt/Comfort, Fix-It Fic, Homecoming

You can find it on AO3 (linked above) and eventually it will also be posted at Passion & Perfection and Shatterstorm Productions along with all the other entrants.

As part of the IDF challenge, I was paired with crumpledquill who created a fantastic video trailer for my story (squee!) which you will be able to view on her YouTube channel and as part of the IDF collections at Passion and Shatterstorm. I'll embed it here when I can!

four years ago today: "personal canon"

It's been awhile since we did one of the four years ago today flashback posts. So here's a fun one I pulled from the Gmail archive. My friend Joseph and his brother had generated lists of the top ten novels in their "personal canon" and Joseph emailed to ask what mine would be. After some thought, this is what I came up with. Looking it over today, I can't say there are any huge revisions to this list. 


From: Anna
To: Joseph
Date: Tue, Dec 11, 2007 at 10:22 PM
Subject: Re: Personal canon of books

Hiya,

My canon is decidedly more "lowbrow" and than yours, but I am squelching my impulse to apologise for it on Nick Hornby's firm orders (even though he loves Dickens' and writes tedious novels about men who refuse to grow up, so I am not sure how much I trust him . . .)

I have artificially controlled against all non-fiction and children's literature (well, below the teen level).  Not sure if that's quite what you had in mind, but there we are.  I discover my criteria are a) enduring "good read"--something I will go back to over and over again, as well as b) things that have had deep impact on how I answer the question, "how to live?" . . . these categories don't always overlap.  There are books that have had great impact on how I think about the world, but which I've only read once . . . and books that I read habitually, but that I don't really think of as life-shaping in any explicit way.  Maybe they're just sneaker at it? And of course these change over time . . . I was just thinking today how His Dark Materials has really grown on me over the years.  And even though I have issues with some of his didacticism, his theological imagery really speaks to me.  And, I mean, who could resist the idea of a reversal of the whole Genesis/Fall/Eve story? (Um . . . wait . . . that's right . . . a LOT of people ;) ).

via

That long introduction completed, here are my nominations. The top ten in a strictly alphabetical order. I figure once you make top-ten I'm not going to be judgmental. ALTHOUGH I do sometimes find myself paralyzed by the question of which book I would become if I were a character in Fahrenheit 451 . . . possibly a clear indication of how troubled I actually am :).

Top Ten:

1. E.M. Forester. A Room With a View.
2. Shirley Hazzard. The Great Fire.
3. Haven Kimmel. The Solace of Leaving Early.
4. Robin Lippincott. Our Arcadia.
5. Michelle Magorian. Not a Swan.
6. Robin McKinley. The Blue Sword, et al.
7. Audrey Niffinegger. The Time-Traveler's Wife.
8. Dorothy Sayers. Gaudy Night.
9. Martin Cruz Smith. Rose.
10. Tom Stoppard. Arcadia.

Some possible future candidates/honorable mentions:

Isabel Allende. Daughter of Fortune & Portrait in Sepia.
Jane Austen. Persuasion.
A.S. Byatt. Possession.
Sheryl Jordan. The Raging Quiet.
Laurie R. King. The Beekeeper's Apprentice, et al.
Barbara Kingsolver. Bean Trees.
David Levithan. The Realm of Possibility.
Gregory Maguire. Wicked, Son of a Witch
Philip Pullman. His Dark Materials.
Margaret Whelan Turner. The Thief, Queen of Attolia, King of Attolia.

Anna

nano update: week two

So they have the widgets up this week, but I'm not sure I'm all that thrilled with them. The color scheme is unimpressive. Still. Here ya go. As of this morning I have 13,880 words written toward the official goal of 50,000 and my personal goal of 25,000.

I like the screenshot a bit better. Perhaps I'm just vain?

This past weekend, I wrote a 3,300 word "plot? what plot?" bit of fan fiction at the request of a friend of mine, which accounts for a fairly large chunk of the total gain made. I'll probably edit it tomorrow evening and post it to AO3 if anyone is feeling deprived of Sybil/Gwen smut and wants something to look forward to for mid-week. It's about as plot-what-plot as I think I'll ever be capable of writing. Let's just say it involved doing some Google searching for the date upon which the zeppelin raids began on London (to ensure that leisurely morning sexytimes wasn't historically inaccurate) and to verify the name an inception date for Sylvia Pankhurst's East London Federation of Suffragists (yes, the acronym really was ELFS).

Happy writing everyone!

nano update: week one

The NaNo site doesn't have word count widgets this year, so I resorted to a screenshot this morning. I'm actually further along than I thought I'd be at this point -- so yay?

I've been working on two new installments of my How She Loved You series (posted at AO3), which is Sybil Crawley/Gwen fan fiction series building loosely on the events from season one of Downton Abbey and, you know, inventing liberally thereafter. I'm currently about 5K and three sections into a 5+1 fic ("Five times Sybil and Gwen parted before dawn and the first time they didn't have to"), a piece about Sybil painting Gwen's portrait, and a longish plottish piece filling in Gwen's back story (complete with Tragic First Love).

Hanna, as usual, has demanded there be orgasms at regular intervals for both main characters, so for those of you yearning after femslash rest assured that this is Porn With Plot and/or Plot With Porn on an installment-by-installment basis.

Any of you participating in National Novel Writing Month? How'd the first week go for y'all this year?

"The second vital smirch"

So last night I got a pingback on a book review I wrote earlier in the year at Harpyness of Stephanie Coontz' A Strange Stirring. Out of curiosity (who would be linking to a six-month-old post?) I clicked through. At first glance it appeared to be a book review of Judith Warner's Perfect Madness. At second glance it turned out to be a plagiarized version of my review of Judith Warner's Perfect Madness.

Well, sort of.

"mommy and baby are people of highly importance"
(click image to imbiggen)

As I started skimming the post, I realized that they hadn't quite plagiarized it ... they'd thrown it through a translation filter (or maybe several?) so that the result was complete gobbledygook. The whole site reads like it was put together by a robot with only a thin grasp of English.

It's just not worth going after them for stealing my post, because in actual fact their garbled version is much more colorful and entertaining than my own incisive analysis! I'm not going to link to the post because I'm philosophically opposed to sending traffic their way (though, *cough*cough*, you can find the ping-back on the Coontz review comment thread above ... they were foolish enough to leave the internal links intact from the original post ... bwahahahah!). However, I'm totally not above providing y'all with some Tuesday afternoon laughs.

My review reads:

Suddenly, living in the Washington D.C. metropolitan area, Warner found herself with no critical distance on a culture that rewarded mothers for being entirely absorbed in, perfectionists at, a very particular type of mothering.

The plagiarized review reads:

Suddenly, vital in a Washington D.C. civil area, Warner found herself with no vicious stretch on a enlightenment that rewarded mothers for being wholly engrossed in, perfectionists at, a unequivocally sold form of mothering.

My review reads:

The second major flaw in Perfect Madness was the way Warner allows herself to make pretty harsh judgments about specific parenting choices.

The plagiarized review reads:

The second vital smirch in Perfect Madness was a proceed Warner allows herself to make flattering oppressive judgments about specific parenting choices.

My review reads:

Warner lays the blame for her sorrows at the feet of 'the culture wars' between social conservatives and feminists, whom she believes waste their energies on issues that are not of concern to the majority of Americans.

The plagiarized review reads:

Warner lays a censure for her sorrows at a feet of 'the enlightenment wars' between social conservatives and feminists, whom she believes waste their energies on issues that are not of regard to a infancy of Americans.

My review reads:

As a thirty-year-old woman in a lesbian relationship with no immediate plans to parent, I am not the demographic that Warner is writing about or writing for.  Even if I were to find myself a parent, the legacies of my own childhood in a fairly radical household and my own values system would preclude parenting the way the women in this book are parenting. Their values are, in many ways, decidedly not my values. And because of that, the experience of reading Perfect Madness felt voyeuristic at times. The study of lives and concerns at far remove from my own.

The plagiarized review reads (this might be my very favorite paragraph):

As a thirty-year-old lady in a lesbian attribute with no evident skeleton to parent, we am not a demographic that Warner is essay about or essay for.  Even if we were to find myself a parent, the legacies of my possess childhood in a sincerely radical domicile and my possess values complement would preclude parenting a proceed a women in this book are parenting. Their values are, in many ways, decidedly not my values. And given of that, a knowledge of reading Perfect Madness felt voyeuristic during times. The investigate of lives and concerns during distant mislay from my own.

My friend Lola has suggested that now she should qualify every introduction of me with "a lesbian attribute" as in, "this is Anna, a lesbian attribute." When we find out what I'm an attribute of you'll certainly be the first to know!

multimedia monday: doctor who's arctic adventure

Via ...fly over me, evil angel... via Neil Gaiman's twitter feed.

30 @ 30: body modification [#2]

or possibly a fourth earring?

I thought after my post last week that took on the fairly weighty question of identity, I'd turn to something comparatively lighter this week and talk about body modification. Why? Well, it's actually something about which my personal feelings have changed substantially over time ... in that as a child and young teenager I was pretty categorically opposed to any bodily alteration, and today I find myself trying to decide where exactly my second tattoo should go, and whether or not a nose or nipple piercing is a wise investment.

Mostly, my youthful opposition to such things was a pretty simple matter: I was not a fan of pain. I was not anti-girly things as a child (though I insisted they went hand-in-hand with traditionally unfeminine things; more on that later). I was in love with my grandmother's clip-on earring collection, for instance. But pierced ears sounded to me like the quintessential example of a bad time. Voluntarily allow someone to punch holes in your ears with a staple gun type thingy? I think not.

But the summer I was twelve this friend of mine visited from Canada, a fellow homeschooler from whom I learned a lot of worldly things. Such as what exactly a hickey was, and why it would be uncool to ask your mother what it was, or allow her to see that you'd received one from your boyfriend with the purple hair. Actually, the hickey-and-hair incident wouldn't happen until we were a year or two older. The summer of 1994 we were thirteen years old and still spending our lazy afternoons reading through the vast canon of L. M. Montgomery and arguing over which of the young men in the cast of Swing Kids made our hearts flutter most fervently (I had a soft spot for Arvid myself). The point, though, is that my friend was, to my mind, a more worldly adolescent. While I was not entirely sure I wanted to be more worldly myself, I also knew I wished to impress upon her the fact I was not un-worldly.

Which is where pierced ears come in, insofar as she convinced me that to grow any older in our sophisticated day and age without pierced ears was simply not to be tolerated. And therefore, I screwed up my courage and we trouped down to a local jewelry shop to have the deed done. (The shop is still there on 8th street and still pierces ears, I saw the sign in the window when I was back in Holland last May). I wave brave, and it hurt less than I anticipated. Though I didn't repeat the process until the summer of 2009 when, almost completely on a whim, Hanna and I went into a Claire's in Downtown Crossing here in Boston and added to the collection (two more holes in my left ear, one additional one in the right). I can't say I do a lot with them, since I can't be bothered to change out the rings, but I do take pleasure in the fact that I'm a professional librarian with five ear piercings.

there will be a no. 2
I'm just not sure where, what or when

And now a tattoo. I'll be upfront and say I harbored, for way too long, social prejudice against tattoos as something tacky and faintly unhygienic and frighteningly permanent. In my early twenties a friend of a friend got an ankle tattoo for her sixtieth birthday and I thought that maybe I could picture something like that ... far into the future ... when I had a better sense of who I was, and what I might want to say with ink worked into the very fabric of my skin. Maybe.

But in my mid-to-late thirties, my opposition started to melt. In part due to exposure to some exceptionally gorgeous ink on friends and acquaintances. I won't lie: beautiful tats are much more visible here in Boston than they were in West Michigan. I see them on co-workers, professional colleagues, the coffee shop baristas, commuters on the T. When you see that much beautiful art around you, it's hard not to start thinking, "If I ever ... then I might ...".

I figured completing graduate school was as good a place as any to start. You can read all about why, what and how here.

Maybe I grew into myself faster than I used to imagine I would. Or perhaps I'm more comfortable with the notion that we are continually changing but that it's okay if our bodies carry the scars of our previous selves: joyful and visible ones as well as painful and/or invisible ones. Chosen as well as involuntarily acquired. Human-created rather than physiologically made.

I'm still wary of body modification, in part because I'm just not that into pain and also because I try to be as accepting as I can be of my body as it is, rather than attempting through intervention to make it conform to my own (or to societal) expectations of how a body should be.

But ink, particularly, is something I've grown to believe can serve to celebrate the body as it is. After all, it draws attention to one's physical presence, and insofar as it is a self-chosen form of visual symbolism communicates aspects of ourselves that go far beyond what we have been trained to assess when we visually assess our fellow human beings on the street. Tattoos demand that we be understood not just as bodies of a certain shape, skin color, weight. They also demand that we be understood as bodies. As physical presences that have been purposefully decorated in ways that are meaningful to the individual body in question. Tattoos are a way of tying our metaphysical, meaning-making selves to our corporeal, physical, taking-up-space selves. Much of their power, I would argue, comes from the fact that they are an art form that bridges that boundary between metaphysical and material being-in-the-world, and grounds that bridge-building in individual human flesh.

Not sure where I'll be inking (or piercing) myself next, but you'll likely hear about it on this blog. So stay tuned!

post-thesis thursday

So yesterday at 4:57pm Eastern Standard Time, I sent the following tweet to my twitter account:

And then Hanna and I put on our sneakers and sandals and walked out into the beautiful spring evening to visit our local Staples and print out two complete copies of my Master's thesis, "How to Live?: The Oregon Extension as Experiment in Living, 1964-1980."

I'll be presenting my work at the Simmons College History Department's graduate colloquium on May 9th. At some point shortly after that, I plan to post details over at my OE Oral History blog about acquiring a copy of the thesis and viewing the presentation online. I'll cross-post or link out from here, so those of you who are interested can stay tuned for further details.

Meanwhile, I offer this music video in self-congratulations for the past four years of work. I don't know why this was the song I found rattling around in my head during these final days of revision. I haven't listened to this album in ages -- not since shortly after I moved to Boston. Maybe it's my subconscious trying to come full circle. Anyhow. As someone who's always found her work to take longer than originally planned, and who has (as my mother wrote in a recent email) found myself living an "unexpected life," I like the underlying message of this song.

More soon!

friday fun: shaun the sheep

This week, as a buffer between us and some stressful stuff that's accompanied the start of the new year -- not to mention the need to watch something that was diametrically opposite Torchwood's "Children of Earth" -- Hanna and I have been watching episodes of Nick Park's stop-motion animated series "Shaun the Sheep."



Lots of full 20-minute episodes are available on Netflix instant and YouTube also has a bevy of clips ... if you feel your day might be brightened by some claymation sheep. I particularly recommend anything involving Timmy (the lamb) and green aliens.

$1 reviews: tassajara bread book (in pictures)

Last week, while on our winter vacation, Hanna and I went down to the Brattle and picked up a whole stack of books from the $1 cart. One of them was a much-used paperback copy of the 1970s classic Tassajara Bread Book, published by the San Francisco Zen Center.  This is a cookbook along the lines of the Moosewood cookbooks or Diet for a Small Planet: the hand-drawn illustrations are whimsical and the descriptions all sound vaguely as if they were written while the authors were slightly high. A recipe for alfalfa ice cream: "Take it like you find it, or leave it like it is." For "Oriental" spice muffins: "Inscrutable." For unkneaded unyeasted bread: "Never made this, but it must be all right."

And all of the quantities would feed an army. The recipe we ended up making (bagels) we halved and still ended up with two dozen fist-sized bagels.

None of this detracts from the tastyness of the recipes therein, at least to judge by the two we have made thus far: Egg Bagels (#55) and Cheesecake Bar Cookies (#83).  The bagels don't have a very springy bagel texture on the inside, but are a lovely bread regardless -- and fairly easy to boil and bake. They also taste nice reheated in oven or toaster for breakfast or teatime.

TASSAJARA EGG BAGELS

Halved from original; makes 24 small bagels

Sponge:
1 1/2 cups warm water
1/2 Tbl yeast
1/4 cup sugar or honey
3 whole eggs, well beaten
3 cups flour (I used 1 cup white, 2 cups multigrain)

Stage two ingredients:
2-3 cups flour
1/2 cup oil
1/2 Tbl salt

1. Whisk together warm water, yeast and sugar until dissolved. Add in eggs and flour to make a thick muddy "sponge."

2. Cover the sponge with another 1-2 cups flour (from "stage two" ingredients) and cover the bowl with a towl. Place in a warm, sheltered location (i.e. inside an unheated oven) for about 50 minutes so yeast can ferment.

3. After rising, fold in oil, salt, and work in remaining flour, kneading well until dough comes together away from the sides of the bowl.

4. Cover and let rise for 50 minutes. Punch down and knead lightly.

5. Let rise 20 minutes.

6. Punch down, knead lightly and cut in half. Set half the dough aside and divide the remaining half into half again, then each half into six equal pieces for a total of twelve lumps of dough. Roll each lump into a worm and then pinch the ends together to form rings. (The wider the rings, the more likely you'll end up with bagel shapes rather than buns!)

7. Boil the rings of dough in water for 10 seconds each (the bagels will float to the top of the water, making it easier to scoop them out) and place on a pan either greased or dusted with cornmeal to reduce sticking.

8. Rest bagels for 20 minutes under a towl while oven heats to 425 degrees (Fahrenheit).

9. Bake bagels for 20 minutes or until the tops are golden brown.

new favorite thing: vegan peanut butter chocolate pillows

Vegan Peanut Butter Chocolate Pillows
image pulled from Diary of a Vegan

About a year ago, Hanna and I bought the amazing Vegan Cookies Invade Your Cookie Jar cookbook by Isa Chandra Moskowitz and Terry Hope Romero. I do not exaggerate when I say we have loved every single cookie recipe we've made out of Vegan Cookies. Since neither of us are vegan, we occasionally substitute dairy products (butter, milk) for the nondairy ingredients, but we've had equally good luck with nondairy alternatives such as soy milk.

Over the Christmas weekend we made a new recipe from the book, the Peanut Butter Chocolate Pillows. Neither Hanna nor I are big into peanut butter cookies, so we hadn't tried them before. But for some reason they sounded good on Sunday so I made them.

This quite possibly was a mistake.

Because they were AWESOME.

Here's the recipe.

VEGAN PEANUT BUTTER CHOCOLATE PILLOWS

Makes 2 dozen (24) cookies

For the Chocolate Dough:

1/2 cup canola oil

1 cup sugar

1/4 cup pure maple syrup

3 tablespoons nondairy milk

1/2 teaspoon pure vanilla extract

1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour

1/3 cup unsweetened cocoa powder

2 tablespoons black unsweetened cocoa powder or more regular unsweetened cocoa powder

1/2 teaspoon baking soda

1/4 teaspoon salt

For the Filling:

3/4 cup natural salted peanut butter, crunchy or creamy style [or any other nut butter that strikes your fancy]

2/3 cup powdered sugar

2 to 3 tablespoons soy creamer or nondairy milk

1/4 teaspoon pure vanilla extract

1. In a large mixing bowl, combine oil, sugar, maple syrup, nondairy milk, and vanilla and mix until smooth. Sift in flour, cocoa powder, black cocoa powder if using, baking soda, and salt. Mix to form a moist dough.

2. Make the peanut butter filling: In another mixing bowl, use a hand mixer to beat together peanut butter, powdered sugar, 2 tablespoons of the soy creamer, and vanilla to form a moist but firm dough. If peanut butter dough is dry and crumbly (natural peanut butters have varying moisture contents), stir in the remaining tablespoon of nondairy milk. If dough is too wet knead in a little extra powdered sugar.

3. Preheat oven to 350°F. Line two baking sheets with parchment paper [or tinfoil].

Shape the Cookies:

1. Create the centers of the cookies by rolling the peanut butter dough into twenty-four balls (try dividing dough in half, then each part in half again and roll each portion into six balls). Scoop a generous tablespoon of chocolate dough, flat¬ten into a thin disc, and place a peanut butter ball in the center. Fold the sides of the chocolate dough up and around the peanut butter center and roll into a smooth ball between your palms. Place on a sheet of waxed paper and repeat with remaining dough. If desired, gently flatten cookies slightly, but this is not necessary.

2. Place the dough balls on lined baking sheets about 2 inches apart and bake for 10 minutes. Remove the sheet from the oven and let the cookies stand for 5 minutes before moving them to wire racks to complete cooling. Store cookies in tightly covered container.

sunday smut: much-delayed women of who no. 2

I promised more Women of Dr. Who pictures a few weeks ago and then got busy with other things -- plus Tumblr kinda failed me for a bit, not posting any inspiring stuff. But now I'm back with more lovelies for your Sunday viewing pleasure.



Leela (Louise Jameson)



Romana (Mary Tamm) with the Doctor (Tom Baker)
in The Armageddon Factor.



Rose (Billy Piper) in The Long Game.



Agatha Christie (Fanella Wollgar) in
"The Unicorn and the Wasp" (new series 4.7)

Freema Agyeman (Martha Jones)
and David Tennant (10th Dr.)

Jackie Tyler (Camille Coduri) and Mickey Smith (Noel Clarke) in
"Aliens of London" (new series 1.4)

Lucy Saxon (Alexandra Moen)

Toshiko Sato (Naoko Mori) from Torchwood

Amy Pond (Karen Gillan) with fiance Rory Williams (Arthur Darvill)
in "The Vampires of Venice" (new series 5.6)

All photos drawn from whoniverse, fuckyeahdrwho, karengillanlover, aimeesgonnaaim and whospam tumblr blogs.

You can see last week's installment here.
I couldn't find any satisfactory pictures of River Song ... but the minute I do I'll add them to the queue for the next installment.

Have a lovely Sunday ... Hanna and I and a few of our fellow Whovians are off to the Brattle Theater in Cambridge tonight for a big-screen viewing of "The End of Time." Hooray!