Doug's Sounding Board

Sampling the cake again today, the cake flavor isn’t so bland now so I guess if you make this cake you should make it the day before you intend to serve it.

It’s amazing how things turn out when you use the right amount of sugar. I even used standard baking instead of convection just to be sure I didn’t change any variables. Ok, instead of greasing and flouring the pan I greased and used powdered sugar. When I went to make the caramel glaze I found I had picked up sweetened condensed milk instead of evaporated milk so I had to make a quick trip to get evaporated milk.

So how is it? It’s very dense which makes it easy to slice and very filling. The texture is smooth, but the flavor of the cake itself is somewhat bland without the glaze. The glaze tastes a lot like a maple bar frosting. When eaten all together it’s a good combination, but probably not one I’ll be randomly wishing I had when I want cake.

Recently I needed to reduce my vacation time and with the current project load not wanting me to take a block of time off I decided to take off a number of Fridays in a row. Either I have a problem with 3-day weekends that begin on a Friday, or I need more mental notice that one is coming. Unlike normal 3-day weekends I lose track of what day it is and feel like I’m wandering aimlessly. On Friday I feel like it’s Saturday and on Saturday I have to keep reminding myself that it isn’t Sunday and I’m not really going to work the next day. I think next time I need to keep in mind a 3-day weekend is coming.

Oppenheimer opened and had a lot of fun songs, and really how can you go wrong when you have a song with an air-horn solo.

They Might Be Giants were tight, moving from one song to another with few breaks in between. There were a few mistakes which probably wouldn’t have been noticed had they not apologized for them. It’s still the beginning of their tour so I guess they’re still working out the kinks. One thing is for sure and that is they were getting better as the concert went one, finishing up with two encores.

This was my first time in the Rio Theater sice it stopped being a movie theater. One the whole it was the same, but cleaned up and about the first 20 rows removed to make room for a stage and floor space. It makes for a good concert space. I’m not crazy about whomever was doing the sound though. The vocals and mid range were great, but the bass tones were muddy which made hearing what the bass was playing very difficult.

 The plan was to wake up this morning and make a cake for Top Chef viewers tonight. ITwo weeks ago I saw a recipe I really wanted to try and everything was set to go.  I mixed it all up and put it in the oven with a timer set to check 25% short of the listed cook time since we have a convection oven. When I slid ou tthe rack to check the cake I noticed it sloshed a little and putting in a skewer confirmed it was still liquid so I put it back in. Then Nicole and I started talking about the ingredients and she asked if I put in too much brown sugar. I said it was a 1lb bag and I just put in the whole thing, no measuring required. Then I checked the other bag I got at the same time to be sure it was what I thought it was. No, I had purchased two-pound bags of brown sugar so my sugar was doubled.

I cooled the “cake” some and could see that the fluidity was not getting any better so I decided to turn it out to see just how bad it was. After rinsing the molten sugar goo (nicely insulated in the middle) off my finger before it could burn I could see there was probably about 1/3 uncooked. The cooked part was fairly tasty though and it might work well in ramikens or added to something else; Nicole suggested crumbs on ice cream.

Now the only question is: Will I try again before Top Chef tonight?

 Shoot ‘Em Up – Lots of guns, rediculous gun usage, not even trying on the physics. I was laughing pretty much from beginning to end. The trailer focuses on action and doesn’t show the humor. I don’t think it’ll be in theaters much longer, but maybe it’ll be on DVD by the end of the year. If it helps you get in the mood, drink a couple of beers first, but I don’t think it’s necessary.

Finally I’ve read the end of the Dune series, and unlike “Hunters of Dune”, I thought it was pretty good! The feel of it, the characters, the story, all feel like Frank Herbert and so I feel pretty comfortable in saying that this is the bulk of where his final outline and notes ended up. Hunters of Dune was the part of the story necessary for Brian Herbert and Kevin J. Anderson to tie in their prequel novels. In “Sandworms of Dune” it seems pretty clear where the added elements tie in which allows you to almost read it as if it were Frank Herbert’s story.

The authors wrote in things that are references to books they have not yet written. I don’t plan on reading those because I don’t think the time between “Dune” and “Dune: Messiah” is a story that needs to be told.

Spoilers coming – how I see what Frank Herbert intended:

I don’t think the final enemy is meant to be a machine intelligence. In “Children of Dune” when Paul and Leto confront one another about the future it is just mentioned that the nuclear arsenal is meant for hostile intelligences. I believe the final enemy is how it appears to be set up in “Chapterhouse: Dune” which is face dancers that rule themselves. Throughout “Sandworms of Dune” the machines hardly play a role while the face dancers have infiltrated every top level of human society and are preparing to take over through sabotage and politics within.

I do believe that Duncan was meant to be the Kwisatz Haderach and that’s why he can see the old man and woman, which should be advanced face dancers. I believe part of the God-Emperor’s ghola program for Duncan was that some connection to the face dancers be put in place. The advanced face dancers have a sort of hive mind and I believe that power is what eventually is manifested in Duncan in Frank Herbert’s original outline and notes to allow the defeat or control of the face dancers.

Superbad – It started off fairly slow but after the first 15 minutes I thought it was pretty funny and it just got funnier as it went on. I also liked the unusual response to alcohol consumption.

The Treasure of the Sierra Madre – This movie is all over the place. At times it’s fantastic, at times the acting is horrible, the fight scene isn’t very good. But those good moments far outweigh the bad and every scene with Walter Huston was movie stealing awesome. While I was watching it I was thinking about how much it reminded me of Tresspass and looking up the Trespass trivia I found that Treasure is what it was loosely based on.

 The Great New Wonderful – An odd collection of post-911 stories. Some of them work and some you just wait for the more interesting ones to return. Stephen Colbert has the best line which I’m putting in here because it’s cool and you probably won’t see the movie: “No, actually he’s a selfish, incorrigible monster with a heart made of shit and splinters.”

Balls of Fury – I’m not sure I’d want to own a copy of this but it’s the kind of movie that I’d watch whenever I happened across it on cable. On second thought maybe I do want to own a copy; I certainly want to see it again.

I’ve watched some first episodes of  shows and here’s what we’ve found that we might pursue further:

•  Californication – The first thing that’s made me not think of David Duchovny in an X-Files kind of way. It’s entertaining so far.
• Chuck – An odd spy comedy with occasional good action. It has a Greatest American Hero feel to it and I can’t see it lasting long.
• Pushing Daisies – An Addams Family level of dark comedy that’s a lot of fun. I hope this manages to stay around.
• Lipstick Jungle – The stories of three driven career women and how they deal written by Candace Bushnell. I don’t think it’s quite found its rhythm yet. Nicole liked it but doesn’t think it’ll last long.
• The Big Bang Theory – The first sit-com I’ve watched in forever. It’s about two two ultra-nerdy physicists trying to make friends with the new (female) neighbor.  I don’t think this constant level of nerdiness has been shown before and while it was pretty funny, I don’t know how long it’ll continue to be on tv.

The only series we’re currently watching is Mad Men, about Maddison Avenue ad men in the early 1960s. I originally saw part of an episode at Jeanne’s house and decided to give it a shot. At first the misogynistic sentiments and level of cigarette smoke set the stage for the time well but are hard to get past. Once you accept that as the environment for the show you can start appreciating the story going on.

Finally, since we now have a region-free DVD player Nicole was able to bring me back the Spaced  definitive collectors’ edition box set from her UK visit complete with homage-o-meter for seeing all the references in a given scene.

I went to sleep at 1AM and the sky was perfectly clear so I set my alarm for the appropriate Aurigids time and when I woke up there was endless fog. Stupid weather!

I wanted to see the eclipse last night but I didn’t want to set an alarm, which would wake up Nicole. So I told the dogs to wake me up between 3 and 4. Grover woke me up at 3:36AM! It was hard to find the moon at first since it was fairly dim out and it was dimmed further by the fog, but I managed to locate it and observe for a few minutes. Thanks, Grover!