And still another kind of therapy

Bruce swears that he's silly now so that when he gets old and crazy and they're trying to take away his power of attorney, he can point to stuff like this and say .. "no, no, no, your honor .. I was always this way."

Here's your proof.

Another kind of therapy

Even when I'm dieting, the sight of this shelf in the grocery store sends me into little tailspins of happiness.  That's because, for the most part, two squares = 100 calories and dark chocolate does not cause my stomach to flipflop.  

My favorite is the mint.

Fur therapy

The world is more fun when you look at it upside down. That's Murray's philosophy.  Mr. Tippy's ideology involves high speed adventures around the living room, bouncing from floor to chair back, and sometimes, Bruce's back.

And this is why you can't sit in that chair, Brad.

A Foggy Day in January

This is what greeted us today out the front room window.  Surprisingly, its not as dark and gloomy as a normal rainy day.  Go figure.

I went for my workout a few blocks away where the sun was practically blazing (for this time of year).  Spreading tendrils of warm golden happiness throughout my workout, the fog had pushed it back by the time I rolled out of the doors an hour later.  But for a while, I found sunshine in winter.  It was glorious.

The people you meet

In our life, we sometimes get to rub shoulders with people who do amazing things daily.  Oh, they don't think of themselves that way, which invariably makes them even more of a delight to know.

I game with some really amazing folks from all over the world and some from right here in my city.

My pal Chris is from Nanaimo and is one of those muscular giants with a heart of mush.  Everyone has  confidence in his quiet ways; he's a leader.  He's also a listener and a man of action with a clear path to a prosperous future.  And he really doesn't know how to adequately clean a washroom; just ask his mom.

When that line was coined "your friends know when you're down and laugh at you anyway," they were talking about my buddy Eric who has a home in Montreal, but lives and breathes the information highway.  He's the one I trust when geekspeak is needed to clear things up.  I can also always trust him to shatter my far too serious demeanour when I'm being, well,  far too serious.

South America is home to more friends ... Luis, an international studies major in Cartegena, Colombia and his brother lawyer brother Cisco.  Luis and I have had ups and downs and go rounds galore over the years we've known each other, but in the end, we're still friends.  I guess history just makes the bond stronger.  Peique is a tall thin man with a heart of gold and an obsession for pizza who calls home Rio de Janeiro.  All of these men have a real zest for life and a flair for chasing the latin ladies.  Luis, though, can be convinced to do anything for a good brownie.

My pal Josh and I sometimes laugh about knowing a rocket scientist, but our other friend Josh is a physicist working for NASA in Texas, and we're not-so-secretly proud to know him.  He's got published works on nanocarbon tubes that I .. well, I can't say I would undertake it (or even understand it for that matter), but I'm glad there are folks like him out there working on dissembling the the inscrutable building blocks of our world.

The first Josh is a staff sergeant in the US air force and since I know not a single person in active duty in Canada, I find it interesting to know so many in the US.  Josh, though, is the first one I know who regularly gets to enter the doors of the Pentagon and sometimes the White House, and not at the side entrance for deliveries.  He was at the inauguration ceremonies tonight and I made him send me proof, so I share it with you.  Told him not to pass his cold to the leader of the free world.  I hope he listened.

Lonestar Deepwater

Every once in a while, I get a peek at something I consider pretty jaw dropping and it involves my brother in law, Kent.  And not to make light of the amazingness that is his family of drop dead gorgeous blondes, but has me impressed today is Kent's profession.  Kent is one of the guiding forces behind Lonestar Deepwater, a consulting service that specializes in building offshore platforms.

He sent this to us recently, to show us the project he's currently working on off the coast of Israel   As a result, some of the language you see looks suspiciously foreign.

In all the billions of people in this world, there are an amazingly small number who could interchange jobs with Kent.  He is .. impressive.  And so is this installation.  Enjoy.

Old Man 2012 limped out of the year, dropping off boxes of Kleenex and Neocitran, bottles of Benelyn and cups of tea.  I curled up on the sofa and indulged myself in mass amounts of sleeping .. I don't think I got out of of pajamas for a week. Yes, yes, I changed them daily, but still .. pjs!   The thing I recall mostly is that I couldn't breathe through my nose, but damn those jammies were comfy.

January is up and has been kicking ass for a couple of weeks, and I am still throwing off the aftereffects of what turned out to be the longest cold I've had in my memory.  A reminder that Bruce is right when he gets up to wash his hands after touching a menu.  I think that's where I picked it up .. and I hope our visitors from the US didn't take it home with them.

I suppose its just as well that I didn't have a chance to finish off that bottle of liqueur in the fridge or cook up and eat all those delectables I had envisioned before beginning the traditional January diet.  Instead,  Bruce was a real trooper, taking on all the meals.  Its amazing how much guilt I felt over that, but I'm over that too.

I've talked to a few members of my family and have some news to share or gossip to spread.  Ian and Nikki have parted, but Ian is in good spirits and is seeing a woman from southern Saskatchewan.  His daughter Angelina may stay with Ian when Nikki moves either down east or to BC with a new fellow she met online.  At any rate, Ian reports that he is happier now than he has ever been, so I guess the new year is one full of promise.

Ralph and Debbie called to say hello and impart News from the North Pole.  Seems my Dad was down with a cold on the day he came to visit, so I imagine Debbie kicked into nurturing mode, which is so very like her.   I caught Dad on Christmas Day as he was about to do something, so we're overdue for a chat now.

Aunts Sandy and Brenda have been in touch and I got the Christmas letters, which I do appreciate.  I had thought to do one myself and even bought the cards, but ... December got away from me like a slippery trout in streams of spring glacial melt.

During the ecoli outbreak in the Fall with the  Brooks packing plant debacle, Bruce and I stopped eating beef and switched to a rotation of pork, chicken and fish.   Funny, but even now, we just haven't redeveloped a tolerance for what beef does to our bodies, so we're eating it sparingly.  Still, slap a nice rib steak on the grill .. we'll be there!

Each year, I try to embrace a new food.  2012 was the year of honeydew melons and pomegranate   I won't say 'never,' but I don't think cantaloupe will ever be a choice for my plate.  This year, I'm trying to eliminate dairy and wheat .. so who knows where that will take me.  I'll keep you posted, but for now .. quinoa looks interesting.  If you have recipes to share, I'd love to have them.

I'm back to my workouts and my trainer Simone delighted in testing my limits yesterday ... I found them some much sooner than I had hoped, but there was an increase in weights in a couple of exercises, so I"m hopeful that I'll be in fighting form soon.

I know this post isn't so very newsy and I don't even have interesting photos to share, but I did create an amazing breakfast one day in December for Bruce's outrigger team.   I'm sharing the recipe for Cinnamon Roll pancakes below.  This came from a member of the guild in one of the online games I play, and they were truly something to write home about.

Cinnamon Roll Pancakes!

A little bit involved, as there are three parts, but I'll be as detailed as I can. First time giving this a whirl, so it was a little iffy on parts, but end result was great.  

Things to note:
This recipe yields about 8 4-inch diameter pancakes. If making for a group, I'd suggest doubling.
Also beware: They're tasty.

I'll do this in sections - The Filling, The Glaze, The Cakes

The Filling

Ingredients: 
1/4 c butter (it called for unsalted, I used salted because that's all I had) 
1/4 cup + 2 tbsp brown sugar
1/2 tbsp cinnamon

Prep:
First off, melt the butter down. In a medium/small bowl, mix the melted butter with the b. sugar and cinnamon. Put it in a ziplock baggy and set it aside. (Yes, there'll be a bit of melted butter that separates from it, but that's ok. Let it cool to room temperature while you move onto the next part - The Glaze) [Mo's note:  I put about 2 Tbsp more brown sugar in and it solved the extra butter issue]

The Glaze

Ingredients:
1/4 cup butter
2 oz cream cheese (room temperature)
3/4 cup powdered sugar
1/2 tsp vanilla extract

Prep:
In a small pan, heat the butter on low until it's all the way melted. Once it's nice and melty, turn off the heat and whisk in the cream cheese until it's pretty smooth. (Takes a bit; also I left my heat on low while I whisked just maintain heat to help the cream cheese get its groove on.) Now when you've got the mixture nice and smooth, sift in the powdered sugar and whisk that in. Also add the vanilla. Whisk away until smooth. (Probably best to add the p.sugar in batches as to maintain a consistency.) Set that aside for the time being and move onto The Cakes!

The Cakes

Use your favorite recipe or batter mix.

While the first side is cooking, take your filling bag and snip one corner just a little. Squeeze the filling into the open corner and apply it from the center outward in a swirl. Don't get too close to the edge or it'll seep out the side... which really wasn't a bad thing, but I would recommend a quick wipe with a paper towel, as suggested, in between pancakes to control the excess mess and prevent sticky overload. Cooking time on each side was about 2 or 3 minutes give or take. 
If you need, rewarm the glaze just a bit. (I kept stirring occasionally while I made the pancakes) Drizzle it over the top and devour!

It's a bit of putzing around, but overall not too bad. Below are some of the pictures of the procedure and final product. Good luck! 

Swirl example:


Finished: