November Rain

Okay, rain has nothing to do with it, but I do love a good Guns n' Roses reference. Wow - I've been slacking off; the December issue of Cosmo is on the shelves, and I haven't even reviewed the November issue. Full disclosure: I've been busy trying to get my Cosmo Sex Ninja certification from the October issue, and I think I injured something. My self-respect, most likely.

Nicki Minaj is on the cover. She was a guest panelist on my favourite documentary show ("America's Next Top Model"), and she seems pretty ballsy and quite funny. But I only understand about every fourth word she sings and about every 10th outfit she wears. I don't have a clue what "Super Bass" is about, but I'd want Nicki to have my back in a bar fight. I would not, however, want her to do my hair.

Y'all know I've had my fill of "Cosmo Confessions", but hats off to poor Tim. Tim was walking by a store where a cute girl was handing out candy. Tim took one and popped it into his mouth. Except it was soap. Says Tim, "I was so embarrassed that I chewed it up and swallowed anyway." Isn't there a scene in Snow White where Dopey does the same thing?  You're an idiot, Tim, but good follow-through.

101 Things about Men. One of my favourite regular features. Newsflash:  it's a good idea to at least offer to foot or split the bill when you're out with a guy, or he may feel angry about being in an unfair money situation. I'd think he might also be surprised to find out he's on a date with a princess. It might be a little lonely up here on my feminist soapbox (sorry, Tim, no samples), but isn't this just polite? And normal? And how things should be done? Women who just want to be taken care of infuriate me. Mostly because they're the ones with full social calendars.

"Words He's Dying to Hear in the A.M". Cosmo suggests complimenting a guy in the morning so that your kind words stick with him all day. Sure; everyone likes to start their day on a high note.  They suggest "Your abs look so lickable right now".  Who says that? No one. "You have a sexy stomach", sure. "Is that an 8-pack?", kinda cute. But "lickable"?  I'm pretty sure the guy equivalent would be "Babe, your boobs are looking especially motorboat-able this morning". Okay, scratch that. Half the guys I know would totally say that.

I was quite excited to see "Kinky Sex - Tell your Inner Good Girl to Get Lost for the Night!" on the cover. My inner good girl defriended me on Facebook, so I'm going in without her. Turns out they may have oversold this a bit; it's actually "25 Kinky Things to Do With Your Undies". Number 5 suggests using your underwear as a scrunchie. Maybe it's partly because I have a pixie cut, but are a lot of women sitting around thinking "You know what? I paid $12 for these panties, and I just don't think I'm getting my money's worth. If only I could think of other things to do with them..."  My favourite suggestion is to use them as a blindfold on your guy. Given Cosmo's long-standing endorsement of the micro-thong, I'm trying to picture the physics of this. Is there even enough material to accomplish this? Unless you're dating a cyclops, I think you'd end up with, at best, more of a jaunty eye-patch, wouldn't you? Let me try it on the cat and report back.  And it's a moot point, but a quick mental inventory of my delicates reveals only a few blindfold worthy pairs. I do, however, have at least one pair that could probably function not only as a blindfold, but a full-on ski-mask. You know the ones - they're not in the regular drawer, they're super comfy, you wear them for "Bridget Jones" marathons. You do so have a pair.

48% of men polled in an online survey want to watch their partner "go at it solo". Only 48%? Seems low.  That's because 44 % got instant wood and couldn't finish the survey, 6% misheard it as "watch their partner go at it with Han Solo", and 2% are damn liars.

His 8 Biggest Sex Secrets. I would have thought "I Like to Dress Up as Red Riding Hood" or "Matt Isn't Just My Roommate" would be on there, but nope. Turns out guys worry about a lot of sensitive stuff when their pants are down: when they're going to finish, if we're going to finish and, when we do, if it's for real, if we think they're perverts...Gentlemen, relax. It's comforting to know that you're just as insecure as we are. We're wondering if that's a 40w or a 100w bulb, which underwear we grabbed in our mad dash this morning, and if that look just now means you're remembering the time your ex-girlfriend, the swimsuit model turned professional chef (whom you only broke up with when she left to do humanitarian work in the Sudan) looked at you and said "What's this cellulite I keep hearing about?"

The body language experts at Cosmo share this little tidbit (which, it should be noted, caused me to spit coffee I laughed so hard): if a guy scratches his nose when he first sees you, it could very well mean he's into you. Turns out there's erectile tissue in the nose, and if he's excited to be near you, that tissue will enlarge, causing his nose to itch. Maybe Pinocchio wasn't lying; he was just turned on. Cut to me, emboldened by two glasses of pinot noir and this slam dunk piece of body language wisdom, approaching an attractive man, only to slink away when it turns out I'd mistaken his seasonal allergies for an invitation to chat him up.

It's that time of year again: Cosmo's Bachelor Contest. One contender from each state. Attractive, often shirtless (barely a chest hair between them: are they breeding it out of the young ones now? Is this to make them more hypo-allergenic?). They don't ask each bachelor the exact same questions, but a few themes emerged: they all seem to think it's hot when a girl goes commando, they like lap dances, and many of them don't like when a girl swears. Uh-oh. Good thing I'm Canadian, because that just ruled out dating in large parts of the continental US, including Arkansas, Idaho, Ohio and Vermont. Fuck - dating in Vermont sounds like fun. Shane from Nashville thinks sex on the first date is skanky, but a girl making the first hook-up move is sexy. Um, Shane, you're kind of sending me mixed messages there, dude. Are we dating already? And Ryan from Virginia. Ryan, Ryan, Ryan. He thinks the hottest sext a girl could send would be one "saying you're touching yourself while looking at a picture of me." Ryan, I must admit I actually did touch myself while looking at your picture. I was clutching my sides laughing. Who in the hell told you to pose like that? Be honest - it was the organizers of the gun show, wasn't it? And not to be a buzz kill, but I'm trying to work out how a girl could do that. If she's using one hand to touch herself and one hand to text you, she's not holding your picture. So is it framed on her nightstand? Propped against the pillow? Suspended above her? This attention to detail is what makes watching a movie with me difficult. And also, theoretically, phone sex. My side of the conversation:

"Mmm, that's hot. So... my hands are on the headboard...What do you mean I'm wearing an apron? I was just wearing a feather boa. Wait - are we in the kitchen now? Well, we must be in the kitchen, because I wouldn't have an apron upstairs. Well, I know it's a fantasy, but how'd you get your hands untied so fast? I double knotted them, so that doesn't make sense...Hello?"

"The Pippa Effect". This describes the friend (or sister) who always manages to outshine you. We all have one. I don't have a problem with that theory. But the author recounts her own experience with her Pippa-esque friend saving her morning-after bacon when she needed an "emergency banana bread recipe" for her still-sleeping overnight guest. I call bullshit. Sure, it's conceivable, if you're quiet, you could make banana muffins before he woke up. That's not my issue. My issue is this: who the fuck has a pile of overripe bananas at the ready, just in case. NO ONE. Unless you're Martha Stewart, you don't. Because they're revolting. So unless the dude in your bedroom is asleep for 3-5 days, you're not making him banana bread.

You can thank me later, but I skipped the article called "I Botoxed My Vagina". I'm pretty sure it had something to do with a nerve disorder, but I'd just be afraid I'd end up as expressionless as Nicole Kidman, only in my pants.

In "Lingerie He Can't Resist", I learned that maximum impact can be achieved with the following:  a sheer, red, matching set, ideally with a thong, plus thigh high stockings, revealed during some sort of slow striptease and at least partially left on during sex. Look, I get that men are visual, but the last time I wore thigh highs I nearly choked out my femoral artery, plus it's November, and my house is drafty. So I'll do red, I'll even do matching, but unless I can buy sheer flannel, that's all you get. And also - do you want sex, or do you want some sort of burlesque routine? Because I have to get up early, so you need to pick one.

Okay, November Cosmo, I'll hand it to you. I'm not likely to find too many extra uses for my underwear, and I'll very likely never get asked out in fucking Vermont, but you made me laugh my head off. Now if I could just get that damn blindfold off the cat.

Life at 350°

Chocolate espresso cookies. Rustic apple tart with salted caramel sauce. Gooey, chewy brownies. Cream cheese-stuffed pumpkin muffins with pecan streusel. Coconut chocolate chunk blondies. Most of us like to think we're good at something, great even. I'm good at baking. I even have two professional series ovens in my house. One is a stainless steel convection number. And thanks to a recent visit to my childhood bedroom, the other is avocado green, powered by a lightbulb, and 35 years old. But damn it, if I wanted to make teeny tiny cakes right now, my Easy-Bake Oven by Kenner is good to go. Seriously. It is. I tested it.

My love of baking can be traced to my grandmother. She was like Yoda with a rolling pin; she'd show me the way, but I had to find the baking force within myself. As a "that's not what the book says to do" kind of kid, I couldn't in good conscience just go all freestyle in the kitchen. Could I? Nanny showed me I could. She'd say "oh you know - just mix it until it's ready" or "add a little more". But how much more? " Some," said Nanny. She taught me to follow the rules, but to have the confidence to break them. I know experts say baking is scientific and all about precision, but I don't remember her ever owning actual measuring spoons - a tablespoon was the big spoon, a teaspoon, the little one. And even with her imprecise, often arbitrary, way with a recipe, everything came out wonderfully.  Nanny was an alchemist in an apron, but science be damned, she did it by instinct. And my kitchen is the better for it.

I've been on a bit of a baking bender these last few months. Not sure why. It's either boredom, some sort of mixing bowl-centric OCD or, according to the internet,  a batter-based substitute for the kids I haven't had. Care for a brownie, Mr. Freud? It figures I'd pick a hobby that can expand my ass. I bet those guys who make sci-fi monster models in their basements don't have to worry about that; they worry about whether they have enough snacks for the "Battlestar Galactica" marathon and whether they're ever going to get laid. Hey - wait a second...

As confident as I now am when it comes to going off (cook) book, it hasn't all been smooth sailing. There were the blueberry muffins that resembled nothing so much as little purple hockey pucks. Who swaps the salt and sugar canisters around after months of them being in the same order? Who?! There was the sour cream banana bread that just did not play by the rules. I'd made this recipe dozens of times. But this particular loaf just would NOT cook in the middle. For someone with a serious overripe banana issue, the thought that I'd touched them for nothing was inconceivable.  I kept baking and testing, testing and baking. And still, still this bitch stayed nearly raw in the middle. It would have taken an act of nuclear fission to finish it off.  Then, just last weekend, there were the tiny, seemingly perfect, mini apple pies. It was my first time making pie dough from scratch, and they showed such promise - the top crust was a beautiful, glistening, flaky gold, the filling was a cinnamon/butter/apple symphony. But then, then there was the traitorous bottom crust. Still doughy, too thick,  not completely cooked through. Disappointment, with an egg wash. I knew, instantly, the reason, and I learned a valuable lesson: don't drink wine with the neighbours and then come home and expect to roll out perfect 1/8 inch pie dough. But you know what?  Eating just the tops of three tiny apple pies is still a pretty successful way to spend a Sunday evening.

There are so many things I want to try. On my short list: chocolate blackout cake, cinnamon pull-apart bread, a coconut chiffon concoction so tall I'll need a step-stool to frost it, a lemon meringue pie for my Dad.  I'd also like to try my hand, just once, at baking without the kitchen looking like a sugar-coated crime scene afterwards. On apple pie weekend, you'd swear the Pillsbury Doughboy had met his end is some sort of ritualistic killing. There did seem to be a LOT of Saran Wrap, so maybe Dexter did it.  I don't know what happens; I get all my ingredients out ahead of time, I  have those little prep bowls, I have a cookbook stand. And then, before you can say "beat until smooth", it happens. Cream cheese on my glasses, a nutmeg-scented cat, melted chocolate on the ceiling. Every damn time, it's like Flour-pocalypse Now...

Despite my less than Martha-esque methods, I've still learned many things over the years. Sometimes, I don't even realize I know how to do something until I'm doing it, and then it's as though Nanny's hands are there, on the rolling pin or the wooden spoon along with mine, reminding me of a lesson long ago. And while I'll always tweak and change and try new things, when it comes to baking, some things will always be true: it's vital to turn off the mixer before you lift it out of the bowl, even the worst day can be made a little bit better with the smell of vanilla and brown sugar, and my colleagues will eat just about any baked good I can come up with. Oh, and not only does the Easy Bake Oven make excellent teeny tiny cakes, it's a stylish avocado green addition to any kitchen.