Only my boys can turn reading into a contact sport.

Recently, every time I step on the scale, I set a new personal record. This is not a good thing.  Not a good thing at all and today’s errands provide a clue as to why this expanding waistline is taking place.

Stopping off for an oil change, I settled into the waiting room and began enjoying some free popcorn and a beverage from their cappuccino machine. Soon the attendant said that my car was ready and I tootled out to pay.  As she rang up my bill, the attendant noted my impressive collection of “coffee stickers” on my car console.  Yes, indeed, it is an impressive collection of stickers.  Everything from Ladybugs to Footballs carpet the front of my car, as every latte provides a new decoration.  Looking down, however, everything made sense.  There I was holding a cappuccino and popcorn, while reflecting on my bountiful record of coffee beverage consumption.  Perhaps, my consumption habits were leading to my problems on the bathroom scale (surprise, surprise, tubby).

A photo of my car’s center console coffee sticker collection. Note, in the upper right corner is an action figure of my wife, Charlene.

Recognizing my old tendencies at the oil change shop did not prevent me from falling into old habits at the grocery store. You see, my youngest son Ben and I used to make the trip to the grocery store a walking celebration.  A latte on the way to the store?  Well, it is on the way.  Doughnut?  No problem.  Free cup of coffee?  Why, I would expect nothing less.  Yep, we were a calorie accruing caravan.  Any who, with Ben in Kindergarten, there I am at the store alone.  Somehow, the doughnut and multiple cups of coffee don’t quite taste the same, but I refused to let that stand in my way.  Traditions die hard.

Walking through the grocery store with my doughnut and coffee in hand, I saw something that brought back memories. Ready bake cookies.  You know the ones, Pillsbury Sugar Cookies with the Pumpkin Face in the center.  Certainly, I could allow myself one final trip down memory lane.

Even the dough for the ready bake cookies is cute.

You see, when I was first home with my oldest son Jacob, who was then only 2½-years-old, we would make similar trips to the grocery store. This was before I could bake anything.  Baking was a mystery.  Baking was an undiscovered country.  So when we happened to pass a display of ready bake pumpkin design cookies, I saw the potential for adventure.  I informed young Jacob that we were going to make cookies and that evening, Charlene, Jacob, and I enjoyed the ready bake sugar cookies.

A few days later, Charlene suggested to young Jacob that they bake cookies together. They would need flour, sugar, butter, eggs…  then Jacob stopped Charlene and said, “Mommy, cookies come from the store.”  Oh dear, I had taught my son that cookies are a pop in the oven type food.  No higher on the food complexity scale than frozen pizzas.  Ashamed, I decided to learn how to bake cookies and that, my friends, was the start of Cookie Dave.

Young Jacob showing off some of our early baking efforts in 2006.

Yes, many traditions are good.  Some old habits are worth keeping.  Not every snack should be avoided.  I just need to remember that old habits are especially bad, when they are shoveled into your mouth.

A current photo of the Paulsen Boys, with their mouths full of pumpkin face ready bake sugar cookies.

The other day, our home phone rang. Given the extraordinary amount of random junk phone calls we receive, I usually check the Caller ID first or let the answering machine pick up the call.  This call, however was very different.  It was me.

Staring at the Caller ID, I had trouble believing my eyes. There on the screen was my name and our home phone number, which was ringing on the very same home phone.  Creepy.  My mind jumped to the only logical conclusion, it was a future version of myself calling me in the past.  Oh, I could not wait to hear what I had to say.  Then, silence.  Nothing.  The phone stopped ringing and no message was left.  I would never know what my future self had to say.  Then my mind raced to other horrible conclusions.  What if future self was going to leave a message, but something happened where he was unable to speak?  What if it was not my future self?  After all I certainly would have left myself a message.  What if it was someone in the future posing as my future self?  Oh, dear.  I guess I may never know.  I do however know one thing now, when another version of you calls, pick up the phone.

As I barreled about the office, I nearly ran into coworkers on three separate occasions. Soon I fear that apologies will not be enough.  Soon I fear that I will be directed to place a tiny Bell of Shame around my neck, in order to know my whereabouts at all times.  Cats around the world, I feel your pain.

In September, the Willmar Public Library celebrated “National Library Card Sign-Up Month” by hosting a take-a-selfie-with-your-library-card contest. I just could not resist going a little overboard and as a result, I present to you (if you missed it on my Twitter feed @CookiesbyDave, which explains the bad grammar and spelling below), my narcissistic indulgence, “Out Around Town, Dave and his Library Card:  A Selfie Montage.”

Selfie #1

I luv my library card, but I would not recommend eating it for breakfast  #mostimportantmealoftheday

Selfie #2

Library cards are plenty useful, even when stuck to a decorated cactus #earlychristmasinthedesert

Selfie #3

The dog ate my homework, but not my library card. #letsleepingdogslie

Selfie #4

Library card back of head workplace selfie. #hattrick

Selfie #5

Selfie in front of selfies looking back 2 original selfie #deep #flotsambook

Selfie #6

“Citizen, get a library card, today.” – #Batman #DarkKnight #CapedCrusader

Selfie #7

“I stole Batman’s library card!” – #Joker #ClownPrinceofCrime

Selfie #8

Turns out, my head was reshelved next to “Jaws.” #Jaws  #PeterBenchley

Selfie #9

Take me out to the ballgame, take along a library card. #peanuts #crackerjack

Selfie #10

The family that reads books together, stays together. #ourfamilylovesbooks

Selfie #11

No cabin is complete without a good book. #endofsummer #finalswim #sadness

Now, you have a reason to be thankful that September only has 30 days.

Life was going fairly well at my fourth session of Spin Class. I had managed to adjust the bike’s seat, so that my knees no longer nearly hit my chin.  I had managed to avoid cutting my leg and was getting by with only minor scratches.  I had managed to keep breathing and cheat death, even though I had forgotten my water bottle.  Overall, things were going pretty well.

Then I began to be taken down by a nagging tendency, I like to know who is singing a particular song. Yep, there we were sweating and one of my primary thoughts other than “Stay alive and keep peddling” is “Who sings this song?”  Usually, if I politely ask the instructor my curiosity is satisfied and I manage to avoid being too annoying for everyone else in the class.  Then came on a stumper for me, a song from my youth that I could not place, “The Safety Dance.”  Glancing up at the much younger than me instructor, I asked “Is this the ‘Pet Shop Boys’?”  I did not think it was right, but I did not think it was a horrible guess.  Looking at her iPod, she said with a shrug, “Men without Hats.”  It was that shrug.  That shrug said it all.  It said, “Who cares?  This is old people music from before I was born.”  I was an old dude and to make matters worse, it showed.

More than the struggles of my physical excursion or musical taste, my age was showing in my clothes. Not the clothes themselves, but how they were reacting to my workout.  As air whisked across a bare patch of lower back, I realized that my belly was pushing down my shorts.  Hopefully (and I stress hopefully or else I owe all of the ladies behind me in spin class a big apology), it was not causing a rare form of plumber’s butt at the gym.  Yuck.  Adding to the yuck category, I also became aware of the gathering sweat.  My gray exercise shirt was beginning to reveal the extent of my workout and portions of fabric began to darken.  This was a good sign, a sign of a good workout.  Unfortunately, the sweat was revealing the most prominent feature of my upper body.  Not a well-defined chest.  Not a chiseled six-pack of abs.  Nope, it was my belly.  The belly of a sweating middle aged dude, all wet and yucky.  Not in any way shape or form a good wet t-shirt, but rather proof.  Proof of too many seconds at the dinner table.  Proof of too many late night snacks.  Proof that more trips to the gym are needed.  Many, many more trips to the gym in my future.

During this morning’s bombardment of elementary school aged stream of conscious banter, Kindergartener Ben piped up and said, “I know how to spell C-3PO.” Crunching up his face in a serious bout of concentration, Ben began spelling aloud, “C…  3…  O.”  Oh dear, time for some spelling early intervention.

—–

“This weekend, I embraced one of my old standbys, ‘Fudge Brownies.’ These brownies provide such a wonderful and rich chocolate flavor, in addition to a lovely subtle hint of coffee.  Enjoy with a cup of coffee and savor the moment.” – Cookie Dave

FUDGE BROWNIES

1 cup Butter

2¼ cups Sugar

4 Eggs

1¼ cups Cocoa Powder

1 teaspoon Salt

1 teaspoon Baking Powder

1 teaspoon Espresso Powder

1 tablespoon Vanilla Extract

1½ cups Flour

2 cups Semi-Sweet Chocolate Chips

Grease a 9”x13” pan and set aside (I prefer my glass baking pan, but they also turn out fine in a traditional metal baking pan.)

Use a 4-plus cup size bowl to melt the butter in a microwave.

Stir the sugar into the melted butter and heat some more in the microwave, until right before it begins to bubble. Careful, the butter/sugar mixture will be very hot.  Set aside.

Mix the eggs together.

Mix the cocoa powder, salt, baking powder, espresso powder, and vanilla extract into the eggs.

Mix in the hot butter/sugar mixture.

Mix in the flour and 1 cup of chocolate chips. Set aside for 20 minutes to cool.

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

Stir in the remaining 1 cup of chocolate chips.

Pour the batter into the 9”x13” pan.

Bake for 30 minutes or until a knife inserted near the center comes out mostly clean.

Cool in the pan on a wire rack.

Makes about 24 brownies.

Revised Source: King Arthur Flour, “Fudge Brownies.”

The remnants of a pan of “Fudge Brownies.”

—–

“I was looking for a new recipe and this time, I went ‘Back to the Future,’ by digging out an old cookie cookbook from the early 1960s. The recipe calls for chopped cranberries, but I substituted Craisins, in an attempt to marry the 20^th and 21^st centuries in one delicious cookie.  So line your baking sheets with parchment paper and take a step back to the Kennedy Administration.  I truly believe that Camelot would have welcomed these cookies on their desert tray.  Enjoy.”  – Cookie Dave

CRANBERRY DROPS

½ cup Butter

1 cup Sugar

¾ cup Brown Sugar

¼ cup Milk

2 tablespoon Orange Juice

1 Egg

3 cups Flour

1 teaspoon Baking Powder

½ teaspoon Salt

¼ teaspoon Baking Soda

2½ cups Craisins

Cream together the butter, sugar, and brown sugar.

Mix in the milk, orange juice, and egg.

Mix in the flour, baking powder, salt, and baking soda.

Stir in the Craisins.

Chill dough in the refrigerator for one hour. Although not necessary, this step makes the dough a little easier to handle.

Preheat oven to 375 degrees.

Drop tablespoon size balls of dough onto parchment paper lined baking sheets.

Bake for 10 minutes. Cookies will be lightly browned on their tops.

Makes about 36 cookies.

Revised Source: Betty Crocker’s “Cooky Book” from 1963.  “Cranberry Drops.”

Our dear middle boy Sam has always had a certain style of his own. One of the manifestations of his uniqueness is Sam’s constant motion.  Honestly, in the time it takes him to answer what he would like to eat for breakfast, he has already walked three laps around me in the kitchen.

Well, this morning was no different and as we walked to church, I became gradually annoyed that Sam kept cutting me off and or pushing me to the edge of the sidewalk. All unintentional, but rather just the way God made his meandering soul (i.e. God made Sam to walk in the pattern of a sine curve, see below).

7-year-old Sam’s scoochiness continued in church and much to my surprise, as I sat down after communion, I landed on something hard and lumpy. For whatever reason, Sam’s hand/fist was resting in the space formerly occupied by my behind.  After overcoming that initial startled and frightened feeling, I was prepared to brush it aside as just another instance of Sam being Sam.  Sam however found an opportunity to have fun with the situation, “Hey, Jacob,” Sam called to his older brother across the church pew, “Dad sat on my hand!”  Sniffing his hand for effect, “Now, it smells!”

Thank you, son. I’m glad we had this chance to share this very precious church moment.  In fact, I wish Norman Rockwell were here to paint a picture.  Unfortunately, I will just have to make sure and be extra careful, next time I sit down by my middle son.

Heading back from closing the cabin, I was really, really looking forward to getting a big ice cream cone at one of my favorite stops. Yep, the ice cream was going to be my farewell to Summer, my “it’s okay that the cabin closed, life will still go on.”  Stopping at the Cherry Grove Market, a little Mennonite run grocery store, I perused the ice cream selection.  Butter Pecan, Strawberry Cheesecake, Maple Nut, nothing was making a connection with me.  Then I saw it, the perfect goodbye to Summer, “Campfire Crunch.”  Also, the perfect time to enjoy it, since my son, Jacob, who is allergic to nuts was not in the car, I could indulge in nuts, and oh I did.  “Campfire Crunch” features peanut butter ice cream with a swirl of marshmallow and chocolate covered graham crackers.  Two big scoops, equaling their small size.  “Is this Heaven?  No, it’s the Cherry Grove Market, south of Browerville, Minnesota.”

Approaching the checkout, with my mega “small” waffle cone, I saw a display of chocolate covered nut candies. Oh, it was perfect.  Pecans, peanuts, cashews!  Amazingly, I stopped at only three extra chocolates.  I’m sure that the teen girl behind the checkout was impressed by my unabashed indulgence in junk food.  It was probably amazing that I still had teeth.  Holding the chocolates and my ice cream cone, I snuck a lick or two and began digging for the keys in my pocket.  Perhaps, it was my continued attempts to get an extra lick.  Perhaps, it was the digging for keys.  Whatever the reason, I lost balance of the cone.  In a split second, joy turned into sadness.  My ice cream cone fell toward the ground.  Its size gave the cone ball-like properties that you would not anticipate, the ability to bounce and roll.  Bounce and roll it did, across the asphalt and well under my car.

Shocked and devastated, I quickly reviewed my options. Perhaps, if I used the cone’s napkin, inexplicably still in my hand, and acted fast enough, I could still save it.  I could wipe away the dirt and enjoy it.  Setting down the chocolates, I got down on the parking lot (I mean fully “belly on the ground” down) and reached as far as I could under the car.  I barely could reach the cone, but managed to roll it back fully into my grasp.  Standing up again, I surveyed the damage.  The rolling/bouncing action of the cone had fully coated the ice cream in gravel and dirt.  The filth was almost indistinguishable from the chocolate covered graham crackers.  Still, I was not going to give up that easy.  I went to wipe away some dirt with the napkin, when the final domino fell.  I guess it was the fall that caused a hairline crack in the waffle cone, because when I went to clean away the dirt, the entire cone collapsed in my hand.  One big ice cream mess.  My farewell to Summer treat crushed in my paws.

Considering that maybe it was a sign from above that I should not be eating such a sinful treat, I brushed the thoughts aside. This was not gluttony, it was a farewell to Summer tribute.  Not a sin, but rather a sign of love.  Embarrassed by my accident, I threw the ice cream disaster in the trash and reentered the store.  That is when I committed the true sin.  I lied.  I deserved a special punishment, an ice cream type of damnation.  Instead of saying, “I am a knucklehead and cannot hold my ice cream,” I outright lied.  “My wife wanted one, too,” I said to the same teen behind the checkout.  Her suspicious look turned to acceptance.  Did this make the lie okay?  No!  Bad man!  Bad man buying more ice cream!

As I drove away, eating my pint of ice cream on a cone, I enjoyed every last lick, even though I knew it was wrong. Finishing the cone, I began on the chocolate covered nuts and reaffirmed my sinful nature.  Then without warning, I stopped and considered the situation.  I could begin to make this right.  I could be redeemed.  I looked at the remaining two chocolates and left them alone.  This evening, my wife and I could enjoy them together.  I could indeed begin to make things right again.

As I completed my journey home, an act of divine confirmation occurred. I opened the back door and found my wife making her cookie specialty, M&M Cookies (featured on page 239 of my cookie cookbook, available for free download at www.CookiesbyDave.com).  Her smile and kindness awaited me, after a long journey.  The goodness of cookies were there for me.  The universe had forgiven me, plus I was blessed with the knowledge of a new truth:  ice cream can bounce.

  Charlene and her M&M Cookies

Recently, I set new personal records each time I step on the bathroom scale. This is not a good thing.  As a result, my wife has been encouraging me to cross train.  Perhaps, my normal running schedule can no longer keep up with my food consumption levels and I need to ramp up the exercise a tad.

Okay, fine, but the main problem is that running is the only type of exercise I actually enjoy. Unfortunately, this leads to overuse of certain muscles, which brings me back once again to the unwelcome prospect of cross training.

Charlene is big into her morning spin classes and has been encouraging me to try one. I have resisted, because (1) the bike is not one of my favorite things to do at the gym, since I only have one favorite thing, the treadmill, and (2) the prospect of taking a class, where I actually sweat around other people, just does not sound fun.  Unfortunately, my personal weight records necessitate action.  Desperate times call for desperate measures.

Wandering into my first class, I was warmly welcomed and they accepted that I was a complete newby. As a result of being a newby, I also learned several things, like this workout uses muscles I was unaware that I had and I may be the only person on the planet that needs to wear a helmet, while riding a stationary bike.  My balance is that bad.  Oh well, I gave it a try.  Give me credit for at least trying to maintain the temple.

Yesterday, entering my third (yes, I have actually made it up to three) spin class, I was feeling a little better about myself… until two things happened.  First, during the workout, we took our pulse and according to the Age/Pulse chart on the wall, I should have been dead.  Yep, I was really working it.  Second, during the workout, I noticed that my knee was actually bleeding.  Yep, I may be the only person who can injure himself, while sitting in place.  Good Lord, this is going to be a long road back, especially trying to get there on a stationary bike.