an ordered list helps order the mind

More bullet points:

* Writing happened yesterday. A little. Yay!

* We bought a tree *and* put up the lights. Ornaments come tonight. The house smells like pine. I want to leave the lights up all the time, but I guess in the day it doesn't make much sense.

* The cats have shown almost no interest in the tree at all. Weird.

* Also, we have mistletoe.

(no subject)

P.S. There are some photos of me over at black_pearl_10's place again. You can see my pants-clad ass and my wall o' porn, and elsewhere in his Flickr stream is a group shot from Saturday night.

Even good cooks make mistakes. Sort of.

When I am stressed, as I have been lately, I become a poorer cook. I get distracted a lot and I make mistakes.

Last night, for example. I was going to make roast chicken. I'd salted the chicken the night before -- it's like brining only less messy. But I forgot to tell G. to wash the salt off the chicken before he put it in the oven. I was rushing out the door to buy a tree, see. So I came back home a half-hour later and the chicken was halfway done already, and there was nothing to be done but wait.

So instead I concentrated on the soup, which was going to take the white beans that I was afraid I overcooked over the weekend. But they didn't go in until the end; in the meantime, I sauteed some sausage (linguica) and carrot and leek, and then the last of the chicken broth in the house and some water to stretch. At the end came some blanched escarole and the beans, and salt and pepper.

The soup was OK, a little underseasoned but entirely edible. Which was good, because I had a feeling the chicken was going to be inedible. Too salty by far. The soup was my backup.

I was wrong.

The skin was a little on the salty side, but only a little. The meat was fine. We ate it all up. there are no leftovers this morning.

(I wouldn't want to taste the pan drippings, though. No gravy this time!)

Tonight, though, I will pay more attention and try to take things slow.

(no subject)

I am craving cinnamon toast.

I am so disappointed.

Rachel Kramer Bussel edited a book called Glamour Girls: Femme-Femme Erotica. I have a story published in it. It's a sordid little tale of a young lady in the early part of this century, who learns the art of womanly love from her nanny -- who is also her father's mistress. Yes, that kind of tawdry. Loosely based on "Diary of a Lost Girl," as it happens, only more sapphic and degenerate. It was great fun to write.

It just got called out in the New Criterion. As "soul-sickening," no less!

But did the author of the article even mention my story? No!

I guess I will have to take my glory in reflected form. Soul-sickening! How delicious!

(Rachel's take on the whole thing is here.)