Cookies for Dinner and What's in the Juice: Fly on the Wall

 

  

 

Welcome to a monthly Fly on the Wall group post. Today 4 bloggers are inviting you to catch a glimpse of what you’d see if you were a fly on the wall in our homes. Come on in and buzz around my house. At the end of my post you’ll find links to this month’s other participants’ posts.

This is the kind of situation that can only happen in the Covid induced blurring of days.

 

We'd had about 4 inches of snow, ending right around dinner time.

 

Me: After dinner you need to get out the snow blower.
Hubs: It's dark and it's freezing, I'll do it during the day tomorrow.

Me: You have to at least clear the sidewalk so the kids don't get hurt walking to school.
Hubs: OK, I guess I'll just get it all done tonight then.

Hubs bundles up, goes out and clears the snow from the driveway and walkway and sidewalks. He comes in freezing, his cheeks are bright red and there are icycles on his eyebrows.

Hubs: You know what I figured out while I was out there?
Me: No, what?

Hubs: Tomorrow's Saturday. There's no school.

Me: Oops. Never mind.

 

 

 

Only a week later we had a lot of snow. So much that the snow blower couldn't go through it all at once and Hubs had to do the driveway in 2 stages, first in the middle of the storm and later when it was over.

We have a step up to a small front porch. Hubs has to shovel that part. After the storm was over and he was outside working on the driveway, I decided to shovel the step and the porch for him. It only took a minute so, even though he could do it with the snowblower, I went to work on the short walkway to the porch.

Suddenly it was snowing again. Really hard. I was covered in a matter of seconds. I looked up and realized that Hubs, who was looking down at where he going, didn't realize I was there and was blowing the snow from the driveway onto me.

 

Here I am, living my best life . . . as one of the Three Stooges.

And it was on one of those freezing snowy morning that I had a defection in the house. You may have seen this posted to my Baking In A Tornado facebook page:

Never take the ones you love

as a given, or for granted.

When you least expected, they,

with you, are disenchanted.

Happened just today and I

discarded a morning love.

That now, in hindsight I can see,

had fit me like a glove.

"Cannot live without it," I

whined incessantly.

'Till Hubs knew that he had to get,

a replacement. Instantly!

When not only is Covid here,

and weekends suck for shopping,

how could it possibly choose this time?

It's snowing! And not stopping.

I want to boldly say this now,

for all the word to see,

"I promise to appreciate you,

new coffee maker, I love thee."

 

 

 

Given all that snow, this attempt on my part to escape should come at no surprise:
 

Me: My cell phone needs a vacation. I better take it to the beach.

Hubs: Your cell phone?

Me: Yes.
Hubs: What are you talking about?

Me: It' been giving me high wind warnings all day.

Hubs (looking out the window): It's completely calm out there, no wind at all.

Me: I know, I think it's having a breakdown. I'll take it to the beach, I'm sure a little time there will help. 

Hubs: You don't need to do that, we'll just mail your phone to your mom on Marco Island for a week.

 

Damn. He got me.

 

   

The past few years I'd only cooked 5 days a week. Hubs would work late twice a week and I'd just leave a plate of leftovers from earlier in the week for him to heat up when he got home.

Now that he's working from home and we rarely go out, I cook 7 days a week, and I'm not really loving it. One evening I was just completely exhausted and didn't feel like cooking. I had baked that afternoon and thought maybe I'd use that to my advantage.

Hubs: What's for dinner?
Me: I don't know, I'm not feeling great, I'm just exhausted.
Hubs: Why don't we just have something simple for dinner?
Me: What would you think about peanut butter and jelly?
Hubs: I guess I could have a couple of sandwiches for dinner.
Me (pushing a plate of cookies towards him): Perfect. Enjoy.

Hubs: Cookies?

Me: Peanut Butter Cookies with a jam filling. Take it or leave it.

Hubs: Sold.

Me: And since you're being such a good sport, I'll throw in a glass of milk.

Hubs: How did I ever get so lucky?
Me: If you're going to be sarcastic, I can take the cookies back, make you a bowl of spinach and beets or something.
Hubs (pulling the cookie dish closer): Nope. We're all good here.

 

And that, my friends, is how you do it.

 Blackberry Creme Filled Peanut Butter Cookies

Men are insensitive. There, I said it. You can go ahead and call me sexist if you want, but I lived with 3 of them for a lot of years so I've had a lot of experience with it.

 

Unfortunately, I'm very sensitive, get my feelings hurt very easily. It's not really the best combination.

Me: I had a bad day.

Hubs: What's wrong?

Me: Both of the boys hurt my feelings.

Hubs: Whatever they said, you know they didn't mean it.

Me: You're half right.

Hubs: You mean they partially meant it?
Me: No, I mean PurDude didn't mean it, unless I spell it out for him, he's clueless. 

Hubs: And?

Me: College Boy? He knows exactly what he's doing. 

 

   

It had been my sister's birthday and I was not going out to stores. I really wanted to send her a card, but in this wide open state where masks were never mandated, I knew it just wasn't safe.

 

I often keep a few cards in the house but when I looked I was down to pretty much nothing. Both of the ones I had were not appropriate, but I came really close to using one. Then I did find a card with just flowers on the outside, nothing inside. That would work, I'd write her a note inside. Along with the birthday message, this is what I said:

 

"I rarely go to stores in this wide open state, so this was the best I could do for a card. In my defense, although I'd ruled out the sympathy card I had, I came very close to sending you my other option, a "Congratulations, it's a boy" card. Fortunately I found this card before I mailed the other one. Maybe next year though . . ."

   

I was working on the shopping list and had a question for Hubs, who was downstairs in the man cave. I didn't feel like either yelling or going down there, so I texted him. 

Hubs (coming up the stairs looking at his phone): What the hell have you been giving me?
Me: Huh?

Hubs: Your text.

Me: My text? I was asking if you wanted the same juice this week that I bought you last week.

Hubs: What kind of juice exactly did you buy me?
Me: V8.

Hubs: What kind?

Me: Low sodium.

Hubs (heading back down the stairs): Get your phone. Look at the text.

I grab my cell and see what he was so concerned about.

Me (texted to Hubs): Do you think you need more low scrotum juice this week?

   

 

Hubs comes into the room and I'm watching, as I often do, a true crime show on the ID network about a gruesome murder.

Hubs: You're always watching shows about people trying to get away with murder. I'm worried about you.

Me: You should be more worried about you.

Hubs: Maybe I'd be better off if you changed the channel for a little while.
Me: I was watching a different channel, but it was too violent.

Hubs: Too violent for you?
Me: Yes.

Hubs: What were you watching that could possibly have been more violent than people murdering innocent people?

Me: The news.

   

PurDude wanted a PS5 and they were impossible to get your hands on, I wrote recently about trying to get one and what we went through in my post Big Game Huntress.

Because the sellers' websites were so overwhelmed when there was a drop (almost all sales were online), they would sell out within seconds. Often the sites would crash or not be able to keep up with the orders. Even worse, people who got their orders placed would later get order cancellations. When I finally was able to get an order in during one of the drops, we then had to hold our breath hoping the order wouldn't be canceled.

 

My order showed "preparing for store pick up on Thursday" for 5 days. At 6:00 pm the Tuesday before, I got an email and my heart stopped. But what it said was that my order was ready for pickup (I sent it to a Colorado store with PurDude as the pickup person). I was so excited! I called PurDude. And I called him again. And I sent a PM. And I texted. Nothing. 

I know my son. He was either working (he'd still answer the phone), skiing (not this day), or sleeping (this kid is, I'm sure, eligible for his doctorate in napping). I knew he was sleeping and I was beside myself.

45 minutes later he called me back.

PurDude: Mom.

Me: DON'T YOU EVER GO TO SLEEP AGAIN. NEVER. EVER.

 

Funny truth is, now that he finally has a PS5 and some new games, chances are he actually won't be sleeping again for a long time.

Now click on the links below for a peek into some other homes:

Never Ever Give Up Hope  

Menopausal Mother 

Wandering Web Designer 

Blackberry Creme Filled Peanut Butter Cookies

                                                                       ©www.BakingInATornado.com

Printable Recipe

Ingredients:
1 cup reduced fat or regular creamy peanut butter

1 cup brown sugar

1 egg

1 cup flour

1/4 cup marshmallow creme

1/4 cup sugar free seedless blackberry jam (can substitute jam flavor of your choice)

1 TBSP powdered sugar

Directions:

*Preheat oven to 375 degrees. Cover baking sheets with parchment paper.
*Beat the peanut butter, brown sugar, and egg until smooth. Carefully beat in the flour.

*Roll the dough into 30 balls. Place on the baking sheets. Press the dough balls down slightly with the heel of your hand or the bottom of a glass.

*Bake for 10 minutes. Remove from baking sheets and cool completely.

*Whisk together the blackberry jam, marshmallow creme and powdered sugar. Turn the cookies upside down, pipe or spoon the cream into the center of half of the cookie bottoms. Top with the remaining cookies to form a sandwich. Refrigerate to thicken the center.