Monthly Archives: October 2009
Zack’s Pumpkin Spice Birthday Cake
| October 9, 2009 | Posted by thatgrrl under Uncategorized |
This is the original recipe. Of course, I had to fiddle with it.
First, no pecans cause my brother is allergic to any nuts except peanuts. He may not even be here for the cake but you never know if plans will change or he could be by and hope for leftover cake the next day.
Other changes: added some vanilla (real vanilla not extract), added cocoa powder and did not have ground cloves. Also, because it’s Thanksgiving we have lots of pumpkin all cooked from fresh pumpkin so I did not use any pumpkin out of a can for this recipe.
I probably won’t serve it with a brick of cream cheese and fruit. It’s a birthday cake! We have candles and I have icing sugar, butter and cocoa powder to make some chocolate icing.
Serve with a brick of cream cheese (soft, for spreading) and fruit.
1/2 cup soft butter
1 1/2 cup sugar
2 eggs
1 2/3 cup unsifted flour
3/4 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/4 teaspoon baking powder
2 teaspoon ground ginger
1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon ground nutmeg
1/4 teaspoon ground cloves
1/3 cup water
1 cup cooked, mashed pumpkin
1/2 cup finely chopped pecansCream together butter and sugar with electric mixer. Add eggs, one at a time, and beat until mixture is light and fluffy.
Sift together dry ingredients, add to creamed mixture alternately with water. Beat well after each addition. Add pumpkin and beat until well blended. Stir in chopped pecans. Turn into greased 9x5x3 inch loaf pan and spread smooth.
Bake in moderate oven (350°F) 60 to 70 minutes, or until toothpick inserted in center comes out clean. Cool in pan 10 minutes, then turn out on rack to cool thoroughly.
Makes 1 loaf.
Hermitized!
| October 5, 2009 | Posted by thatgrrl under Uncategorized |
When you really think about it some of the stuff we cook/ bake is really kind of odd. Who ever got the idea to wrap fruit up in sugar and dough and then bake it for an hour? If you had never eaten a pie, would that sound just great and delicious to you?
We will be doing the Canadian Thanksgiving this coming weekend. The pie baking has begun. From Friday until sometime late on Sunday the house will be full of people. Times like these make me wonder if I was really meant to be a hermit. I know I’m not the social butterfly type. But, I never feel more like disappearing through a crack in the floor than when I am surrounded by family. Mostly they mean well. Mostly they don’t feel any need to censor themselves. Mostly they seem to look at me as if I’m the goodie goodie version of the black sheep of the family.
Anyway, enough about that.
Would you like to be a hermit? I think I would not like the grubby part of it. I’d rather have a shower, a hot one. I’d rather have lovely scented soap and shampoo. But it would be nice to be alone. There is something about being alone that makes me feel myself.
How Addicted to Twitter and Facebook are You?
| October 3, 2009 | Posted by thatgrrl under Uncategorized |
As seen on Lady Banana‘s blog:
Created by The Oatmeal
Created by The Oatmeal
Created by WhatsMyTwitterAccountWorth.com
A Technorati Author
| October 3, 2009 | Posted by thatgrrl under Uncategorized |
Looks like I’m going to be a Technorati author. I had an email from them today saying they would send more information, including how to officially sign up. I’m not sure how it will work out but it will be interesting. 
| October 1, 2009 | Posted by ThatGrrl at StumbleUpon under Writing |
http://www.spacecast.com/Blogs/Post.aspx?PostID=954
I just found Primeval, still trying to figure out the plot. Glad it’s going to be back. Not till 2011 but at least it’s not canned like so many other sci fi shows I start to like and then never get to see again.
I applied to 9Rules for Word Grrls
| October 1, 2009 | Posted by thatgrrl under Uncategorized |
Word Grrls is about creative writing inspiration with the focus on writing prompts/ exercises. I’ve been writing on the web since 1998. I admit I can be opinionated (some claim eccentric and some are kind and say I’m wise) but I love web writing and publishing, particularly blogging. To me blogging is still about free writing and creativity.
I have been publishing Word Grrls with a daily entry since November 2007. Before that it was weekly. I’m used to having a publishing schedule and I like the discipline of having that schedule to stick to.
I would very much like to be part of 9Rules and the community here. Not only as a help in promoting Word Grrls but to be part of something bigger again. I miss working within a larger network of sites. People get a lot of feedback and push to keep going in an active community. I also like to be part of building something. I was an active editor at Dmoz.org for over ten years cause I enjoyed tidying and adding to the categories and finding new ideas and hobbies for myself.
I can’t pick a favourite post. In a blog each post should be able to stand on it’s own. Most people only skim the first post before they decide to read more or click off. I like my current post about the goldfish. It may be a bit dorky but it was what I thought about at the time I saw the baby goldfish in the backyard pond.
I don’t know what else to babble on about. I’ve done more than a few sentences. I would appreciate to hear back from someone. I applied March 8th 2009 and was pretty disappointed when nothing happened and there were no updates on the 9Rules blog. I really hope 9Rules is going to revamp and start up again. Being part of 9Rules was one of the goals I had for this blog at the time I started it.
My Comment is Inappropriate???
I do not like comment moderation, especially the automatic kind. I have had to resort to using it on my WordPress blog because WordPress is a target in itself. Here I get almost zero comment spam. On Word Grrls I get about a hundred a day. It’s bonkers. Still, I moderate and watch for anything missed by the bot. I do not use word or other verification or CAPTCHA’s.
Tonight I tried to leave a comment on another site, Never Say Diet. I came to the site from a post on Twitter. I read the blog post and clicked in to leave a comment. I gave my name, email address and website. Then I did the math question to verify my comment and then I was given this lovely note:
So my comment is inappropriate? In what way would that be?
Maybe the sales woman was shorter and didn’t understand the idea of taller women needing larger sizes. If she only looked at you for fit versus flab she could have goofed up. I like Skinny Large. It’s like me when I order a large latte with skim milk.
Ooooh Yeah. Just highly toxic, nearly pornographic in nature! Remove the children from the room!
I sent the automated reply note to the admin, it asked me to justify myself. To prove that I’m not a spammer. I chose not to.
What is really annoying is that they may be passing my IP address to spam watch lists now. That really does piss me off. I’ve never left a spam comment and now I am being painted with that brush for some pissy site who can’t be bothered to moderate their own comments.
If a site doesn’t want comments they should just say so upfront, or turn them off.Why piss off readers, especially the readers who choose to leave comments.