McBirdie`s Nest

Look, I know.  I KNOW.  I've been absolutely ghastly with my updates of late and there is no good excuse.  Well, actually, I've got a whole bucketful of excuses, I'm just not sure any of them are good.

 

The long and the short of it is that I've taken on too many projects and life-tweaks of late and not enough of them work well in blog format, so my site has been knocked way down on my priority list.  What I need to do is figure out a way to make some of my recent work link up to this site and finally get off of my figurative ass as it pertains to my writing.  I just haven't been feeling it of late.  I've been doing more gardening and jewellery making, which apparently sucks up all the need for a creative outlet, I guess.  

 

But!  No more excuses--there will be new content up on a more regular basis or my name isn't Tom Dinglemeyer Schmitline.  I have some SS365 blogs that still need to be moved over, some new recipes, and I'll get to work on some new journal posts just as soon as I knock out a couple of academic projects.  Apologies, apologies, and double apologies for not at least having a good story to cover my poor performance.  I'll work on that, too. 

 

Oh, and on the geekery side of things:  I've removed the Twitter feed in an attempt to stop this slow-loading problem that has been plaguing the front page.  Honestly, of late, I've been doing less 'static' tweeting, so it's just where all the updated links for new material goes anyway, which...if you're here, you probably already know what's new.  Except for the Etsy stuff--follow me on Twitter if you want to know when new jewellery is being listed.  You can follow me on Twitter here.  Alternately, you can RSS my Etsy feed here. 

 

I am also just now remembering that I never got around to fixing the stupid broken Login box (remember how it used to be a pretty compact slider that combined all the registered users' links in one convenient place?  yeah, I almost can't either), so I'll take a look at that as soon as I can. 

 

I'm on it, peeps.  I'm on it. 

This pie is one of the best I've had in awhile.  I took it in to the office so I wouldn't eat the whole thing by myself to show my appreciation to the ladies in the office, and I came home with a cleaned out pie plate.  That's fairly impressive considering I took in enough for two slices per woman.

 

I fiddled with the original recipe so that there is a bit more chocolate and added in the vanilla and a bit more sweetness to counter the flavour of the bourbon.  Not everyone likes to be whacked in the face with liquor, so I went for a more subtle hint this go round.  If you prefer the other way, just knock out the vanilla, take a bit of sugar out, and reduce your chips.  That should get you back to where you want to be, you big lush.  Enjoy. 

 

  

 

This is just a quick post to stick up the set of shots from my recent trip to Woodhorn.  I've never been and I have to say, it's quite enchanting.  It's a museum and outbuildings set up around an old colliery, with an attached country park.  The Dinks had a great time enjoying the great weather and I got a kick out of the museum--I need to go back and investigate some of the hidden buildings out back, but when you've got a dog waiting in the car, you only get so long to enjoy the inside sites.