Snow Day

I think all adults deserve a snow day now and then. Not one of those days where you have to take a vacation day or pay a sitter to deal with the kids, but a real day when offices close due to the weather and you get a bonus. Yesterday was just that kind of day. For me, that is. Steve worked from home because, well, he’s a computer guy and the Internet didn’t shut down for him.

In the almost 35 years The Harem has been in business, Kathi has never closed the store due to the weather. I was prepared to go in, even though Steve found the whole idea absurd. I assured him that the store hadn’t closed during the ice storm so I was assuming it wouldn’t close for blizzard-like conditions, but an early morning text from Kathi said we were closed. Hooray! I could lounge around in my jammies and drink coffee as long as I wanted! Screw you, snow! I didn’t have to leave the house!

After lunch, I decided it needed to be productive so I spent a few hours in the studio working on my current pieces and polishing some work I’m planning on having photographed next week. A phone call from a friend told me that I should be baking because that’s what everyone else was doing, so I decided to make some chocolate chip cookies. This is a Kirks family recipe that makes the best chocolate chip cookies you’ve ever eaten. Really. They are awesome. I assembled the dough and preheated the oven while Steve went outside to attempt to shovel the driveway (even though snow was still coming down). The first batch came out of the oven and fell completely flat. Hmm. Weird. That had never happened, but I wondered if my dough was too warm. Since I’d put the bowl in the ‘fridge between batches, I figured the second round would fare better. Nope, still flat. I sent a picture to my father-in-law who diagnosed the problem as expired baking soda. He said it wouldn’t affect the taste, and he was correct. But they look really crappy so I threatened to throw them away. Steve said he’d take them to the office, but would assure everyone that I did know how to bake and this was a fluke batch. Whew! Reputation as a good baker will still be intact!

After the Great Cookie Fail of 2011, I decided it was my duty to park myself in front of a roaring fire and watch TV until bedtime. Which is what I did and I loved it. My snow day was fun, a little productive and wonderfully lazy, but I admit I got a little antsy today. I wandered out just long enough to know that the world still existed. Tomorrow it’s back to the routine. The gym is open and I’m going to make up some hours at work, but the weekend is just a day away!