Music + Monday: STOP! In the...

...yeppers: this week's Music + Monday post is the totally awesome:

Because, you know. It's almost that day. And Diana Ross and The Supremes were kind of amazing.

Think it o-o-ver.

Valentine's Day? Challenge? What?

It occurred to me the other day, when thinking about the reasons that I think Valentine's Day is stupid, that there's one big reason I've always brushed off: the fact that I let it be disappointing. I mean, what was I expecting all these years? Some knight in shining armor to come cruising up to my school in a '50-something red Cadillac convertible, Hallmark cards flying out of the passenger seat, boxes of chocolates tied to the hood?

As awesome as that sounds, let's be realistic here: not only do I not know a single guy reasonably near my age who has a car like that... but who would be foolish enough to start a relationship on Valentine's Day? (Just in case there's someone out there planning on buying me a candy-gram, or a teddy-bear, or professing their love to me, I don't really mean that; please do.) There's just so much pointless hype, and amped-up expectations... it's almost scary when you think about it, because really, V-Day is just another day. And that, my dear readers, is the point.

There's this expectation that Valentine's Day is supposed to be special; that other people are supposed to make good things happen to us. But when has giving someone else all of the responsibility, and then waiting for them to do what you want them to do with it, ever really worked out?

The answer? Rarely, and it's not really fair to expect it to. If you're single, and you don't want to be, then DO something about it; don't just wait for someone else to somehow know you're tired of it, and act on it for you. You are responsible for what you do with your own feelings, and you alone... because after all, you're the only one who really knows them. And that brings me to the challenge.

I was reading an interview with a philosophy-trained professor at Boston College. She'd discovered that out of a large panel of "bright, intelligent and extroverted" students ("These were not kids with no game"), none of them had ever dated in college. Which kind of blew my mind, because I thought that was when things got serious. It turns out that our generation generally just doesn't know how to date. We know how to "hook up" (even if it's just as basic as one-time making out), but most members of Generation-Whatever-We-Are get stuck when it comes to the idea of asking someone they might like to go out on a date. Obviously that doesn't mean nobody knows how to be in a relationship, because I'm sure we all know people who are. What it does mean, however, is that the way people get into relationships has changed, since 'dates' have somehow become weird.

So this professor actually made an assignment of asking someone out on a date. All the students in her classes were really excited, but by the end of the semester... nobody had done it. She then said they would fail the class if they didn't figure it out, and suddenly people were signing up for her class just so she could force them to be brave enough to date. 


So here's the challenge:
Ask someone (in person) on a date before February 14th.

You don't have to go on this date by V-Day, you don't have to go out to dinner or anything serious like that; all you have to do is ask somebody you're interested in to hang out, just the two of you, doing something fun. Which is a date.

What's the point of this challenge? To stop Gen-Us from being complete wimps when it comes to liking someone. Why should you do it? Because if you ARE interested in somebody, then you know you want to anyway. And nobody ever got anywhere by being too much of chicken to try something risky. 

As an added incentive, I'm giving away 5 iTunes gift certificates to people who take the challenge... but really, this is just something you should do for you. After all, if the person doesn't want to go on a date, then you know they're not worth wasting your time with. And if they do, then hey! Who knows how long it would have taken you to find out otherwise? 

Either way, it'll make a pretty great story.

May the Force be with you.
xoxo

Me, Myself, and I: Etsy Love

Okay, so this post title might be slightly misleading; it's not actually going to be about me, myself, and I. It WILL, however, be about Etsy, how much I love Etsy, and why you should love Etsy, too.

It'll also be a shameless promotion of anti-Valentine's Day merchandise, but who doesn't want to see that?

Etsy, if you're not familiar with it, is kind of like eBay or Amazon, but for cool people*. Basically it's an online market where you can set up shop and sell whatever weird/awesome/interesting things you like to make, or collect, or something. You can also make an account to just save the weird/awesome/interesting things other have made that you might want to buy in the future. Because believe me, there will be a lot.

Etsy has something for Trekkies, Portal-junkies, Crafty-Crafters, Vintage Diner-Supply-Searchers (*cough*  who does that?); people who are looking for fun gifts, or old car memorabilia, or posters that say awesome things... pretty much everything anybody could ever want, you can find someone selling on Etsy. On the bright side, it's not sketchy like buying something from eBay, or Craigslist, or used on Amazon. On the even brighter side... it's awesomesauce-tastic.

For example, Etsy can read my mind. Do you know how I know that? Because I got an email today for my daily Etsy-emails that started off with this:

Me, Myself, and I

In case you haven't noticed, you're awesome. If you're dreading the approach of next month's celebration of love, fear not. Take the day to appreciate your amazing self and your incredible friends.

It then proceeded to give me loads of awesome gift ideas for myself. And for my friends. Like these:

NO Love for Valentine's Day Hair Clip!



Anti Valentine Lip Balm - Love Stinks



Hand Embroidered Vintage Hanky - 
he loves me not

Anti-Valentines Day card 
for people who like gloomy things

I mean, how much cooler can some of those things get? (Part of the product description for the one above goes like this: A card about a long walk home in the rain. For sad people and couples with a sense of humor. Or maybe people looking for a creative way to break up? "Here, this is you, ten minutes from now.") 

But that's not all! In fact, Etsy has an entire label for Anti-Valentine gifts. A recent Etsy-blog entry even very intelligently says, "Does anyone, except new lovers, actually enjoy Saint Valentine’s Day? Some years I should have celebrated Saint Jude, Patron Saint of Fools and Lost Causes, instead." It's basically the best thing ever, but don't take my word for it; go check all of that stuff out.

I'm even a big enough person to admit that Etsy has some pretty awesome Pro-Valentine stuff too... for those of you out there who are actually looking forward to V-Day and all of its cutesy-cute things, instead of looking backwards and hoping you won't have to see it. And I'll admit there's some really adorable stuff that you might want to look at. If you're one of those people**. For example:

I (Really) Like You Card

hipster love shirt

Yeah... I'm not obsessed or anything. 

So if you're looking for a gift for that special someone (like yourself), check out the greatness Etsy has to offer; because it's Miss Morgan-approved.


xoxo

*Cool people being people who read this blog, of course.
**Shame on you. Just kidding. I love you.

P.S. Sorry for all the major linkage.
P.P.S. While I'm at it, sorry for the never-ending hate on Valentine's Day.
P.P.P.S. February is just a dangerous month to be around my blog. And me.
P.P.P.P.S. Etsy didn't hire me to promote them, but they should have, because I LOVE THEM.
P.P.P.P.P.S. Peace.

Music + Monday: It's Almost...

Valentine's Day!

That awful day of the year that is adorable for people in couples, but is basically depression on a chocolate-heart-shaped lollipop's stick for singles. What exactly is the point of Valentine's Day again? Oh, right... to celebrate the clubbing and beheading of Saint Valentine; how could I forget!

"Alas! My death will grow to signify a multi-billion dollar commercial holiday... I should have just become a hermit."

I ranted about this holiday a year ago, and you can read all about it here. You can probably also read more about it in the weeks leading up to it, because I won't be able to help myself; I just have a lot to say about Valentine's Day.

But that's not the purpose of this post! Today's a Music + Monday day, so here's a playlist I found for you.

(It's happy, just like Valentine's Day.)

Out on your corner in the pouring rain.. from overmyhead on 8tracks.

xoxo

Red Velvet Cake-Donut Adventure

I decided that even though I thoroughly love baking, it might be fun to try something that didn't involve an oven... NEVER AGAIN.  Just kidding. But seriously...

Red Velvet Cake Donuts  were a seemingly simple enough Baking (Frying) Adventure; make the dough, cut out the shapes, put them in hot oil. Little did I know that it was going to be ranking up there with my original failed Cupcake Baking Adventure in that everything would seem to be going great, would suddenly start going horribly wrong, would cause me to believe I wasted hours of my life, and then everybody I fed them to would like them well enough in the end. But before I even got to that point, there was dough.

If you didn't notice before, I said these were supposed to be Red Velvet Cake-Donuts. And as you can probably see, they went from pink to chocolate-looking. It's most likely a bad omen when things are going wrong so early in the game, but I ignored that.
Then came the time-consuming part: taking a gazillion pictures of the donut-hearts.

I spared you most of them, because they begin to look the same after a while. But here's one more, just for grins.

I LOVE IT. I'm going to make Valentines with this picture on them. You might get one.

And then:

This is what I've decided is my worst enemy. It burned some of my precious donut-hearts, undercooked the rest of them, and forced me to then re-cook the undercooked ones until they almost looked as burnt as the burnt ones.
I've decided that when it comes to the oven, I'm all set. I can bake things. I want to only ever have to bake things, because I can even bake non-sweet things in an oven!
The problems start when I move it up to the stove.

So I have no final-product pictures, since it was such a traumatic experience that I forgot. And then everybody ate them, so I guess it wasn't a total failure in then end... but I think I'm going to stick with cupcakes and baking and ovens.

Happy Weekend!
xoxo

Wednesday Wileys and Fridge-Cat

Initially, Wiley wasn't so happy about having his picture taken. He crawled right into my lap until the camera came out, when he promptly crawled very quickly away. But eventually he decided he was okay with it...

...until something happened with his ears:

That's right. He was struck with weird-ears syndrome, which usually for Wiley means "OHMYGOSH TAKE ME OUT RIGHT NOW OR BAD THINGS WILL HAPPEN ALL OVER YOUR FLOOR."

Meanwhile, in the kitchen...

... a cat was sniffing my head when I walked through the door. You may be wondering how this would be possible, but that can be easily explained.

Fridge-cat has struck again.

xoxo,

P.S. And because I have a gazillion tests tomorrow and think you probably need something to de-stress you too, here's a link to some fuzzy-aww-ness. And remember: everything will be okay! Because there will be a baking adventure happening soon (as in tomorrow)! And we all know what that means...

Music + Monday

Ol' Blue Eyes, The Voice, The Sultan of Swoon; 

Frank Sinatra was certainly a king in his day, and as far as I'm concerned, he still is. As the SINATRA website so very accurately states, 

"He left an example of living it up, never backing down, holding on to that swagger through love and loss." 

It is this legacy that makes Sinatra and his music timeless, and it is this timelessness that makes both inspirational. So to all who are stressed out, worried, disappointed, just trying to make it through the day, or somewhere in between; here's a little something to get you by this upcoming week.

xoxo,

P.S. Thanks goes out to Jessep for posting this elsewhere... and giving me the opportunity to steal it.

5 Reasons I Love Fridays

1. Tomorrow is Saturday. And if you ever have a hard time remembering that, there's a great song by this girl Rebecca Black...

2. Everything looks warm. Seriously: Fridays just kind of have an orange glow to them. They're brighter than every other day of the week, and it never rains or is foggy or snows on a Friday. Ever. And I'm promoting that on my blog, so you know it's true.

3. I have free time to go out and take pictures of palm trees and planes.

4. I can relax, because there is NO. HOMEWORK. (Due the next day).

5.  ...they're just awesome.

   

xoxo

What Time Is It?

...CUPCAKE TIME!!

With the proper supplies (vintage apron, 37-song doo-wop playlist, recipes...), last night turned into Morgan-being-a-baking-diva-or-at-least-attempting-to Wednesday. This baking adventure was kind of a redo, since I basically used the same recipe as last time but fixed the things that made them weird. This go-round, they actually seemed like cupcakes! But first: pictures of swirly batter. Because it's so pretty.

And then...

MAGIC! 

They were so gorgeous that this is currently my favorite picture EVER. I completely understand if it's now yours, too.

See the red thing? That's a cupcake carrier.

Cool, right? Totally something you would want to put on your Christmas list, I'm sure.

Speaking of Christmas lists... I also asked for pastry bags and tips. (I am such a baking nerd.) But hey! See how nice that frosting looks? Yeah. I know.

If you're reading this (because the Blogger-stats SWEAR that people actually do), you just might have been one of the people I forced my cupcakes on today. If so: I really like you, because you probably said nice things about them. So expect the question "Do you want one?" again in the near future, and note: the right answer is yes. Because, after all, I like being your friend. You eat my baking adventures. You are cool. 

And you probably don't want to be the person who makes me do a modified Godfather impression.

Do you think my answer will be yes? 

Well... if you've seen the Godfather, you know it will be. BUT THEN SOMEDAY (and that day may never come), I'll call upon you to do a service for me.

And who wants a debt to the Godbaker?

xoxo

P.S. I often look for excuses to quote that scene, so if by some misfortune, you DO manage to be the person who leads me to stuff tissues in my mouth and talk with a fake Italian accent... it's really not your fault. I'm sorry. Forgive me. Have a cupcake.