A Holiday Post and a Thank You

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First of all, thank you for all the kind words about my sister. I’m grateful for every kindness at a time like this.

Second, I plan to cook up a little treat for my family so we can have a little something while we open gifts on Christmas morning. Since my original copy of the recipe is not holding up all that well, I thought I’d post a(n altered) version of it here both for posterity and to share with all of you.

The original recipe called it an “Apple and Spice Dessert” but it’s really more of an apple cobbler with an especially tasty batter. Here it is:

Christmas Apple Cobbler

    • 1 1/2 lbs apples, peeled, cored and sliced
    • 1 tsp cinnamon
    • zest of one lemon
    • juice of one lemon
    • 1 1/4 cups AP flour
    • 1 tsp ginger powder
    • 1/2 tsp ground cinnamon
    • 1/2 tsp kosher salt
    • 1/4 tsp ground cloves
    • 1/2 cup butter
    • 1/3 cup sugar
    • 1 egg
    • 1/2 cup molasses
    • 1/2 tsp baking soda
    • 1/2 cup boiling water
    • Whipped cream for serving.

Preheat oven to 350F. Butter a 9×9 baking pan. (8×8 should work, too, but check that cooking time)

Mix the apple, cinnamon and lemon zest and juice, then spread it in the pan

Sift the next five ingredients into a medium-sized bowl

In a larger bowl, cream the butter and sugar. Add the egg and molasses. Beat until smooth

Dissolve the baking soda in the boiling water. Alternately add flour and hot water to the butter mixture, beating each to incorporate. Then pour resulting batter over the apples and bake for about 45 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean. Allow to cool somewhat.

Cut into squares and serve topped with whipped cream.

The original recipe had less apple, more sugar, less lemon, and less spice. It also called for margarine instead of butter, which no. Adjust it however you see fit. This is a big favorite around here, especially with my wife. I hope you give it a try and enjoy it yourselves.

Third and last, every year I post a link to my favorite version of A Christmas Carol, which is the 1971 animated version directed by the brilliant Richard Williams. The animation is amazing, dark, and genuinely scary. This version really earns its ending, scaring the shit out of Scrooge and little-kid me, turning him to good and me into a weird obsessive who searches out this show every year.

The good news is that you can watch a legit copy of it through the service Hoopla, which I can access through my public library. If you can’t do that for whatever reason, it’s still available on YouTube.

Either way, it’s the best and scariest Marley ever. Check it out.

Whatever you celebrate, I hope this holiday season has been gentle with you and that things get better in the new year.

New Feature: Quarantine Posts. Here’s QP1

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Author Mindy Klasky has been writing Coronavirus Diversion posts, highlighting interesting stuff on the internet for people stuck at home who need a pleasant diversion. I think that’s a brilliant idea, and I recommend everyone go ahead and click that link above to check out what she’s sharing.

I don’t want to copy what she’s doing, but I thought I’d try something similar-ish. A little music. A little cooking. Comics or shows or something. Who knows? Something mellow and casual. I can’t promise to post every day, but I’ll try not to let this space go fallow.

To start, today’s song.

My Twitter timeline is full of people talking about baking, and the grocery stores are sold out of flour, so it seems like a lot of folks have stocked up for baking. If that’s you, check out this episode of What’s Eating Dan:

Having made this recipe myself, I can say the results really are amazing. They’re so fluffy and light that they almost feel like they’ve been made by a machine or something. Maybe that doesn’t sound appealing, but it really is.

And now I’m thinking you must be wondering how a tangzhong works in a pizza crust recipe. Not well, it turns out, because of course I tried it. Tangzhong makes a soft interior rather than a chewy one, and that’s okay of the bones at the edge of your pizza are very small, but feels insubstantial if they’re large. I’d only use it (again) if I was planning to make a stuffed crust pizza.

Take care. Keep washing those hands. Don’t forget to check out Mindy Klasky’s posts linked above.

Randomness for 12/8

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1. Domestic abuse: Killers ‘follow eight-stage pattern’, study says.

2. The real reason hearing your own voice can make you cringe.

3. Water isn’t the most hydrating beverage according to new scientific study

4. Twenty Years Later and the Women of ANGEL Deserve More.

5. The Trajectory of Fear – or How to Use Horror Tropes Effectively in your [TTRPG]

6. What happens when you eat like the Queen of England for a week?

7. People Are Confused About the Usefulness of Buying Fancy Things

Long Time Readers Will Know What This Photo Means

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Arrogant Bastard

But damn… A can?

I used to buy Arrogant Bastard Ale in a 22 oz bottle, but everything’s in cans now.

Maybe this makes me an old, but cans still feel cheap. The beer tastes fine, but it’s not as pleasurable to drink.

But yes, this means that my latest WIP is sitting in my agent’s inbox, after 8+ months of work.

It may seem that I haven’t released much new work in the last few years, and you’re not wrong. Since putting out The Great Way and Key/Egg in 2015, I’ve only released that new Twenty Palaces novella. One Man took nearly two years to write, and it floated from publisher to publisher for a year and a half before the submission process ended.

I have to give it another revision before I decide what to do with it, and it’s going to take at least as long as my revisions for the WIP. One Man just needs another polish, I think, but it’s also 50K words longer…

Plus, there’s a mystery that I need to polish and release. (This is going to sound weird, but I can’t remember the title for it. I’ve had so many they’ve become a blur.) It’s a good book, but I’m going to have to publish it myself.

Once those are done, I can pounce on the next Twenty Palaces novella, which exists as a rough idea in my head but needs a bit of work to tease out. And mixed in with all of that is the next draft of the WIP… based on my agent’s notes.

So, I’m busy and things have not been auspicious in my writing career. Still, it’s important to celebrate the little milestones.

But cans? Sheesh.

Randomness for 7/31

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1) The Legend of John Arthur, the Toughest Man in America.

2) Don’t Feed The Trolls and Other Hideous Lies.

3) What the Data Says About Producing Low-Budget Horror Movies.

4) Raising the barre: how science is saving ballet dancers.

5) What Happened When I Tried To Talk To My Twitter Abusers.

6) Ten Changes Made in the Lord of the Rings Novelization.

7) A ‘beer sommelier’ explains how pouring a beer the wrong way can give you a stomach ache. Video

Randomness for 3/23

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1) What happens when bookstore employees get bored. This is delightful.

2) The literal translation of every country name in the world.

3) Book Towns: small towns filled with bookstores.

4) Why is English such a weird language?

5) Peanut butter and mayo sandwiches were a thing in the ’60s so we tried it.

6) Telltale Games: creative endeavors in a corporate environment.

7) Beautiful murals from the last remaining Prohibition-era speakeasy in Seattle.

Randomness for 1/23

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1) Things restaurant workers wish you knew about being a patron in a restaurant.

2) The Beautiful Science of Cream Hitting Coffee.

3) The 50 Best Good/Bad Movies.

4) The New Republic on JRR Tolkien, circa 1956.

5)

6) Police give out thumb drives infected with malware as cybersecurity prizes.

7)

Randomness for the Holidays

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1. Interesting etymology of holiday terms. Video.

1a. The classic holiday story “The Little Match Girl” which I’d never read.

2. Feeding the Poop Log: A Catalan Christmas Tradition.

3. The Tiny Desk Holiday Special.

3a. More Music: Christmas carols performed by goats.

4. Nine Holiday-themed D&D enemies to throw at your players.

4a. Holiday beers.

5. Are poinsettias really poisonous, and other Christmas questions, answered by Science.

6. I judge adaptations of A Christmas Carol by the way they depict the ghosts, and this right here is the perennial winner:

7. Last (and you knew this was coming), if you need a last-minute gift, ebooks like my new Twenty Palaces novella, The Twisted Path, are cheap and easy to deliver.

Randomness for 11/8

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1) Why you should crack an egg in your coffee grounds.

2) “Why these all white paintings are in museums and why mine aren’t”

3) Dungeon Hobo Signs

4) Five Tips for Preventing Sexual Harassment We Apparently Need

5) An expanded list of Netflix genres, with links: “Dramas starring Virginia Madsen,” “Gritty Biographical Music and Concert Documentaries,” “Successful Korean Revenge Movies”

6) “Optimization is a form of calcification”: Cory Doctorow on a decade and a half of life-hacking.

7) Every Batman: the Animated Series Villain Ranked from Worst to Best.

Randomness for 7/17

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1) Innovative ancient weapons. It’s weird to discover at this late age that the “hand on a stick” from HAWK THE SLAYER was a real thing.

2) Which font should I use on my Kindle?

3) Joseph Heller’s extensive hand-written outline for Catch-22.

4) The Black Person’s Guide to Game of Thrones.

5) A leading happiness researcher says we’re giving our kids bad advice about how to succeed in life.

6) Improve your bowling game by noting the hidden oil patterns on the lanes. Video.

7) An Absurdly Complete Guide to Understanding Whiskey.