The cabinet in my work cubicle was making an odd noise. As I closed its door, the sound was somewhat haunting. Certainly out of place. Digging deep in my memory, I found it. A match. My cabinet was singing the song of a Humpback Whale. Certainly odd, but somewhat calming.

I closed my eyes. I heard the underwater echo. Then suddenly, I opened my eyes in fear, perhaps I had been beached. Oh, an unexpected work hazard, indeed. That and whaling ships disguised as interoffice mail.

Editor’s Note: Okay, sure this post is a bit of a stretch, but feel free to chalk it up to “not all of them can be gems.” That and the sound of the cabinet was pretty spot on for a gentle-plankton-eating-underwater-giant-of-a-mammal. #ExaggerationWorthy

I was rocking it.  There was smoke coming out of my cubicle.  I was a “Process Review Machine.” Post-It notes were sticking.  Papers were flying.  I was proud of myself.

Then I remembered the timeless words of folk singer Pete Seeger, “Any damn fool can make something complex, but it takes genius to make something simple.” Humph.  I guess tomorrow, I’ll be genius.

CARROT CAKE COOKIES

“I had a hankering for carrot cake and these cookies fit the bill. A sandwich cookie named after a veggie based desert.  Almost sounds healthy.  Almost.  Enjoy!”

½ cup Butter

1/3 cup, plus 2 Tablespoons, Sugar

1/3 cup, plus 2 Tablespoons, Brown Sugar

1 Egg

½ teaspoon Vanilla Extract

1¼ cups Flour

1 teaspoon Cinnamon

½ teaspoon Baking Soda

½ teaspoon Salt

1 cup Grated Carrots

½ cup Raisins

8 ounces Cream Cheese, softened

¼ cup Honey
Preheat oven to 375 degrees.

Cream the butter, sugar, and brown sugar.

Mix in the egg and vanilla extract.

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

Mix in the carrots and raisins.

Drop Tablespoon sized balls of dough onto a parchment paper lined baking sheet.

Bake for 10 minutes or until lightly browned.

Cool for 1 minute on baking sheets and remove to wire racks to cool completely.

Mix together the cream cheese and honey until smooth.

Take two cooled cookies and place a teaspoon of the cream cheese mixture in the middle to form a cookie sandwich.

Makes about 16 cookies.

Revised Source: “Inside-Out Carrot Cake Cookies” recipe on www.epicurious.com.

Well, it’s time for the blog post of the day, but the thing is, I haven’t got much to say. Really.  Sure there is stuff I could write about, but nothing really “bloggy.”  Although, seeing a big container of cheese balls sitting alone on a neighbor’s lawn was kind of odd, but just not “bloggy” enough.  I have standards you know.  Ha!  Well, I could have talked about how I was tempted to eat a few of the cheese balls.  I could have talked about how we speculated that they were intended to catch critters.  Nope, not gonna do it.  It’s just not blog worthy.

The problem is that I have a streak going. Yep, 550 straight days of blog posts.  Sure, they weren’t all gems, but that’s a good run.  On October 27, 2014, I did not feel much like blogging, but since then, whew, you go Tiger!  Pretty nice run, indeed.

But what about tonight? Do I just trot out some drivel, just to keep the streak going?  Did Cal Ripken ever wonder if he should go out and play, even when he wasn’t catching up to the fastball and the likelihood of an 0-4 night was looming large?  Nope, he just got out there and played.  That’s what I should do, just do it!

Hey, look at that. I authored a blog post and it was pretty much about not authoring a blog post.  Very Seinfeldian of me.  The streak lives on!  Wally Pipp would be proud.

Dateline: Yesterday

Enough was enough. No more.  My right dress sock had lost its will to be high.  No more did it want to approach my thigh.  As it rested way down on my ankle, I vowed that this must never take place again.  When I got home, I tossed it in the trash (gasp!).

Dateline: This morning

As I pulled up my right dress sock, I uttered a curse. Didn’t you see what happened to your friend?  I vowed to toss the copycat “Sock of Drop.”

Suddenly my anger was replaced with concern. Perhaps the problem was not my sock, not today, not yesterday, never.  Perhaps the problem was much worse.  Perhaps it was my leg.  A leg that couldn’t hold its sock.  Ever.

Dateline: Tomorrow

Call to a personal trainer. Help wanted.  An exercise plan designed exclusively to build right leg sock holding capacity.  No longer shall my socks live in fear.  Their names have been cleared.  The hose knows exoneration.

“My cubicle was so cold today.”

“How cold was it?”

“It was so cold that I began carpooling with a penguin.”

“It was so cold that the forecast was for 32 degrees and flurries, inside.”

“It was so cold that my work space was officially designated as an ‘ice cubicle.'”

“Thank you.  Goodnight everyone.”

Hey kids, you know that team of magical fairies that visit the house at night? You know the ones.  Those kind and helpful little creatures that undertake the thankless task of correcting inside out clothes, sorting them by color, applying gallons of stain remover, undertaking hours of washing, drying, folding, and returning those same clothes to your dresser drawers.  Then they repeat the task seemingly the next day.  Some legends have it that this is their only purpose in life until they wither and die.  Yep, those kind little fairies.

Spoiler Alert! They are really just your mother and me.  That is all.  Goodnight.

There I was, chugging up a hill.  Jogging as best as my middleage legs could carry me.  I was doing my best to attack a Winter’s worth of belly.  I could do it!  I chugged on.

THE COOKIES FORMERLY KNOWN AS SNICKERDOODLES

“As a resident of the Twin Cities and with the passing of their native son, Prince, I thought it only fitting to channel my inner muse and honor the purple one with the ‘Cookie of the Week.’  First of all, the photo.  Why are the cookies in a ‘7?’  Well with all of the Prince tributes on the radio, I found that my favorite song was ‘7.’  Why did I know all of the words?  Why did it make me smile?  Then it hit me, ‘7’ came out when I was in college.  It would have been on the radio.  I would have been singing it in the carefree days of my youth.  That’s why I loved ‘7’ (plus, it is also a solid song front to back) and that’s why I would like to thank Prince.  He brought a smile to my face and carried me to another time and whenever that happens, it’s certainly worth a cookie tribute.

So there you have it, purple cookies that are formerly known as Snickerdoodles, with just a ‘Kiss’ of nutmeg (edgy, plus nutmeg is after all ‘The Baker’s Aphrodisiac’).  A cookie worthy of royalty.”

½ cup Butter
¾ cup Sugar
1 Egg
1 teaspoon Clear Vanilla Extract
8 drops Blue food coloring
6 drops Red food coloring
1 3/8 cups Flour
½ teaspoon Baking Powder (because Prince would not make Snickerdoodles the usual way with Cream of Tartar, he would make them special)
½ teaspoon Nutmeg
½ teaspoon Cinnamon
1/8 teaspoon Salt
½ teaspoon Nutmeg
½ teaspoon Cinnamon
¼ cup Sugar

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
Cream butter and ¾ cup sugar.
Mix in the egg.
Mix in the food coloring (feel free to play with the food coloring ratio to achieve your desired level of purple…  Let it rain!)
Mix in the flour, baking powder, ½ teaspoon nutmeg, ½ teaspoon cinnamon, and salt.
Take tablespoons of dough and roll in a combination of the ½ teaspoon nutmeg, ½ teaspoon cinnamon, and ¼ cup sugar.
Place on parchment paper lined baking sheets.
Bake 10 minutes or until the edges are lightly browned.

Makes about 24 cookies.

Revised Source:  “Snickerdoodles Sans Cream of Tartar” recipe on page 19 of my cookie cookbook “Today is a Great Day for a Cookie,” which as always is available for free download at www.CookiesbyDave.com.

Earlier this evening, my 9-year-old son Sam asked me the following question, “If you had a website, what would you call it?”

Smirking, I answered, “CookiesbyDave.com.”

Sam’s response, “No, I mean a real website.  Not a Facebook thing.”

Ouch!  I’ll have you know that even though I only have four or five actual readers (hey and I love each and every one of you), you don’t need actual views to qualify as a “Fancy Pants Real Website.”  Indeed this begs the question, if a website is active and no one reads it, is it really a website?  Well, I am here to proudly say that yes it is still a real website.  I am a proud owner of my own little chunk of the World Wide Web.  How do I know?  I read it on the Internet.