Sacrifice, as in Brownie

Today is the annual Christmas luncheon at work. I abandoned my usual Fish Eye Salad (which no one ever eats except me) in favor of BYU Mint Brownies*. This is the first time I've made them, and I'm sorry to report that the brownie itself is less than special. 

I think that with all the frosting, however, few will notice the inferior brownie.**

*The recipe I have includes the specifics for the chocolate frosting, which is essentially the same as the mint frosting, with the addition of 1/3 cup of cocoa and the deletion of the mint extract and 1/3 cup of sugar.

**While cutting the above sacrifice piece in my office, I learned that you can't cut these with a plastic knife. Fortunately, I have sturdier implements I'll use to cut the rest.

Crossing Over

Have you ever wondered what life would be like if your waking and dreaming lives crossed, like they sometimes do in the movies? Here's some background to the story: In my waking life, I just finished Joshua Mowll's Operation Red Jericho and I want to read the sequel. Alas, neither library in town owns a copy.

Last night I dreamed I was back at BYU. I was a bit miffed to find out that my roommates had oodles of free time to sit at home during the day while I pursued my usual 12-hour weekdays of work and seminary.

Anyway, my brother A-1 was at also at BYU (looking nothing like his actual self). We were both pretty sure that the BYU library would have the Mowll sequel (they actually do!). And the best thing is that A-1 said BYU's library now offers "counterless checkout." Through some wonder of modern technology, you walk out the front with a book and it's automatically charged to your account with an end-of-semester due date. OK, maybe that's not the best thing if you're security or privacy minded, but it sounded like a good idea in the dream. When I last saw him, A-1 was off to borrow the book for me.

In my waking life, I'll be relying on Interlibrary Loan to find me a copy of the book. But who knows, maybe A-1 will show up with the BYU copy tonight and I can dive right in!

photo: Gottscho-Schleisner, Inc. (19 Feb 1949). [photo of circulation desk at Lamont Library, Harvard University, Cambridge, Massachusetts]. Library of Congress, Prints and Photographs Division, Gottscho-Schleisner Collection, LC-G612-54563. Retrieved from Library of Congress American Memory.

One Man's Trash...

This story about college resale programs reminded me of the BYU Lost and Found sale, which I visited a few times. It also made me think about something I heard in Chattanooga a couple of weeks ago, where someone said that in the past several years (or at least the past 15-20), the student body at BYU has changed, and is much more affluent and upper-middle class, to the point where many students have cars and look at students who work on campus as being second-class citizens. Hmm. Don't know if that generalization is actually true, but it does make one think.

Time to Pay the Piper

My trip was fabulous. The journey home, on Frontier, went fine, but it was a bit long, and when I finally got home at 1:15 am, I was glad to be there.

More, much more, later in the week when I'm a bit more caught up with things at work and home.

In the meantime, my long-waisted female readers may be interested to see the camisoles I bought at the BYU Bookstore (for $9.99 a piece, a great deal if you've ever priced other brands). Granted, I myself am not long-waisted, but I have other figure flaws that require the wearing of such an item. Enough said.

I Told You So

I always tell my colleagues at other campuses how utterly beautiful and pristine the grounds are at BYU. Here's proof.


But I did lie about one thing--there is some gum on the sidewalks (not much, however).

A Boring Reminiscence

I wanted to take some pictures inside the Harold B. Lee Library, but I was too scared of the Secret Service lookalike security guard to risk it, so I only took this one, just to show you that even though they did a beautiful addition a while back, they preserved the old building, right down to the worn terrazzo steps in the stairwells.

Blogging on the Run

I'm blogging from the Information Commons at BYU's Harold B. Lee Library. Pretty awesome!

Yes, I'm here for a few days to attend the Utah Library Association Meeting. I got two hours of sleep last night before leaving my house at 4:30 to catch the plane, so I'm about to head off to find myself some caffeine (oops, did I say that out loud?). More later, but rest assured that the BYU Bookstore is nearly as awesome as ever, and the library, remodeled since I was a student XX years ago, is truly awe-inspiring.