Steal this book.

Ooh. Looky here. Shalom Auslander's NEW HARDCOVER book is half-price at The Strand. Cupcake looks out for you.

Go All the Way with Cupcake!

Okay, I'm not going to pretend I don't check my site-meter at least once a day, but even I was shocked that the Cupcake Mafia has surpassed 570 visits, especially since my friends frequently say things to me like, "I read your blog once. It was funny." Once?? You need to read my blog every day! So, I don't know who these 570 people are, or what they want from me (please note: no cash kept on premises), but God Bless You, my little Cupcake Voyeurs! Read on!

The Hooligan and I saw Sarah Vowell read from her new book at the New York Public Library last night, and it was as hilarious as anticipated. If you get a chance to see Vowell on her book tour, I highly encourage you to go. McSweeney's has a complete list of tour dates here. DC Cupcakes take note, Vowell will be appearing at Politics & Prose on April 18th with Shalom Auslander. You may have heard some of Auslander's stories on recent episodes of This American Life, his new book is called Beware of God. Surely this is a dorky NPR-lover's "two-for" not to be missed.

Note: We interrupt this post to bring you this topical meditation on interracial relations.

Scene: Smiley's Pizza, Brooklyn. 9:00pm

Hooligan: That guy was totally checking out your ass. He took a long look.

Cupcake: Well, my ass is mighty ... trails off. Was it a Brotha?

Hooligan: What?? Nancy! Did you just say, 'Was it a Brother?'

Cupcake: Wait, am I not supposed to say 'Brotha'?

Hooligan: No, it was one of your brethern, you idiot.

Cupcake: Ah. Guido.

Damn, It's a Nice Day.

If there is such a thing as seasonal depression, could there be such a thing as seasonal mania? I got off the subway at Rock Center this morning and decided to walk to Third Avenue in the lovely weather. I passed the hayseeds gathering around the Today Show Studio and briefly contemplated being an hour late to work to try to get on TV, just because I know my Pop would love that. Then I passed the windows at Saks, happy just to look in at all the clothes I'll never own. Of course, it probably only helps elevate your mood when Ryan Adams' "New York, New York" is blasting in your ears simultaneously to all this Springtime in NYC cheer.

Just Telling It Like It Is

The only thing we love more than a new Veiled Conceit post, is a Veiled Conceit post that makes fun of Smith College. And here we see the mysterious Zach does his research. From the footnote making fun of the announcement with a Smith Bride:

"I was checking out the Women's Studies program at Smith for an easy joke, but instead found the "Queer Studies" program. I suppose it'll help us all out to analyze "antinormative sexual identities, performances, discourses and representations in order ultimately to destabilize the notion of normative sexuality and gender," but one thing about the program made me laugh. Buried within courses titled "Queer Resistances," "Queer Globalizations," and "Lesbian Identity and Experience" was the curious "Contemporary Canadian Drama". Is there something about contemporary Canadian drama that I don't know? What are those Canucks up to up there, ya know? I'm serious."

Hail fair Alma Mata! Is this a good time to mention that my first year at Smith I was leaving the Celebration of Sisterhood (now known as the Celebration of Siblinghood to be more "trans-inclusive") a group was staging a protest that involved two people laying on the ground dressed like a corpse-like Bride and Groom while other members of the group shouted "Marriage equals death! Fight heteronormativity!"

Ah, good times. Good times, ladies.

I may be fat, but I'm not trans fat...

I was standing in line at one of those little cafeterias that populate Midtown today and I looked down at my little can of Pringles. The label on the top announced "0 grams of fat". Now, I'm not a rocket scientist, but even this did not sound right to me. No fat in Pringles? I don't think so. So I checked the Nutrition Label. Oh yeah, there's fat in there all right. I flipped back to the top of the can and reading more closesly it said "0 grams Trans fat". Now here is my question, what the hell is trans fat? And if it is not in Pringles, one of the most unnatural foods I can think of (I'm sorry, am I supposed to believe this was a potato at one point?), then how does a girl go about getting some? Suck on a pig? Sit in a butter sauna? And if Trans Fat is bad fat, does that mean there is good fat? Come on people, enlighten me.

Uno!

It was an odd morning in the the office today in that I had a convivial little meeting with Big Boss and Little Boss (approx. meeting duration 4 min.). (Big Boss is not big on chit chat). I was going over travel itineraries for the coming month. Big Boss learned that he and I would be on the same return flight from Mainz. Big Boss said,"Well we can share a cab to the airport." "Yes," I said. "And I'll bring UNO so we can play cards during the flight." Big Boss just looked at me. And looked. And looked. Although I have been here for four months now, he is still entirely unable to tell when I am joking, and it makes him very uncomfortable. Needless to say, I love it. Without addressing the topic, he went on to list all the ammenities I will enjoy in Singapore Air First Class, and truly, I wet my pants a little when I just think about it. But I'm still packing the UNO Cards. Oh snap! You got skipped, Boss!

Hello? Can I hear you now?

I can't hear out of my right ear. Should this concern me? It's like I've been swimming, but I haven't been swimming. I just went to sleep and woke up. Although, now that I think about it, it is possible that my roommates tried to submerge my head underwater while I slept. So what is this, doc? Ear infection? Sinus infection? Am I going deaf?? You know, I just watched Ray Saturday night, and this is how Ray Charles started going blind, one day things started to get a little fuzzy ... Thank God I took all those Sign-a-Song classes. I can sign "I drink Milk for Energy." Wait a minute, I don't drink milk. Well, I drink chocolate milk. Quick, how do you sign 'chocolate'? Do you think I've had too much coffee today???

I told you those Chairman Mao Onsies were a bad idea...

Sorry MommyCakes, looks like you hitched your wagon to the wrong pony. According to New York Magazine, the set that's smarter are teaching their babies Mandarin, as in, Chinese. Yep. And tony Prep Schools are accomodating by offering chinese language Pre-School Programs. The challenge is finding a good Mandarin speaking nanny. One father "had friends test [the prospective nanny's] Mandarin to find out 'whether she speaks gutter Mandarin or a queen's Mandarin.'
I don't want my daughter to grow up and suddenly start talking like a tramp at age 9," he says. Happily, this dad "is feeling good about his investment: 'Even if my little girl weren't very smart, she's always going to get a job because she'll be totally fluent in Chinese'".

Don't Cry for Me Philips-Andover ...

If you're like me, a product of the public schools, you probably share one of my favorite pastimes: making fun of kids who went to private school. And yet we were totally negligent in making fun of Prep School kids, probably because their universe was so far removed from our own; we might as well have tried our hand at lampooning those dweebs who live on Mars. Well, now there are no shortage of literary insights into the dumping grounds for elite dilettantes. New York Magazine reports on the new trend of the boardingsroman "written by people with ambisexual ... “family” names". Aparently a new crop of writers have quit their day jobs to work full time on these novels so that the rest of (non-Boarding School) America can feel their pain. "It’s such a secretive subculture,” says Jardine Libaire [aspiring writer] “but statistically, boarding schools produce many decision-makers. The story of boarding school is the story of our country.” Excuse me for one minute while I shove my finger down my throat and make gagging noises. Is this just another case of Cupcake being jealous of yet another moron who got a book deal before her? Perhaps. But in the mean time, if I want insight into the culture of exclusive schools, I'll stick to Stephen Fry's Revenge (published in the UK under the title The Tennis Balls of the Stars) or Tobias Wolff's Old School.

I'm begging you, send my Ground Packages UPS.

So the FedEx Guy, who has a very friendly relationship with me, comes bursting into my office this morning and says, "Can I ask you a question?"
This makes me a little nervous because questions FedEx Guy has asked me in the past include "How do you say Devil Dog in German?" and "Do you want to go to this great German restaurant in Queens with me?" (I swear, I am not making these up.) Remember, I do work at a German bank, so these questions are not totally out of left field, but pretty damn close. So, steadying myself, I say "Sure."

"That girl in a coma, how did she get in the coma? Was she in an accident or something?"

I am totally confused, because for some reason I assumed he was going to ask me about the Temp that had this job before me. Then I realize he means Terry Schiavo. "Oh, I don't know," I say. "I haven't really been following the story too closely."

FedEx Guy (real name unknown) now launches into a very long, involved story about his uncle, "he was a great guy, good father, good uncle, good father-in-law and then he got cancer, and I think the chemotherapy made him worse, they gave him radiation and they burned him, because when they give you radiation that's what they do, they burn you, and he was terminal, and I'm glad I didn't have to make the decision but I know my uncle and I know he woulda been like, 'I've had a good run, I gotta go now, I'm going to a better place' and I mean he was just too macho to be living in a coma like that, you know?" FedEx Guy is talking very fast and the only thing I can do is nod and cluck sympathetically hoping one of my bosses will pop out of their offices and rescuse me. No luck.

"And it's like in the paper, did you read the Post today? I want you to read it. They have this picture of her as a beautiful young woman and they're counting how many days it's been since she got food, and they're tricking you, cause you look at the photo and you think, 'Oh my God, they're not feeding her?' but they don't show you pictures of her now and her parents say she smilies when she sees a red balloon, but I don't know, unless you freeze her body or something and try to bring her back later ..."

Giving me a chance to speak, I can only say, "Yeah, I think the way the media is covering the story is pretty distasteful."

"It's like Renee Zellwenger. Zellwenger?"

Sure, I nod, thinking, Is Renee Zelweger in a coma? Did I miss this?

"You know, she can't even go shopping, Renee Zellwenger (presumably Terry Shiavo is also unable to go shopping), because the media follow her for two days. The paparazzi stalk her, you know, and then she trips on the sidewalk and they take a thousand photos."

I am silently begging that my phone will start ringing.

"I saw this interview with Carroll Burnett one time, and the talk host axed her what she thought about fame and she said like, she doesn't mind to give autographs but one time she was in the bathroom and someone slipped a piece of paper under the door for her to sign. Can you imagine? Then I think she like, lost it, and now she fights for stars' privacy."

"Yeah," I said looking around nervously, "there are lines you shouldn't cross." And now I'm thinking, what the hell, at least I can blog about this. I finally got FedEx Guy out of the office but not before he asked me how to say "Happy Easter" in German. Froehe Ostern, FedEx Guy. Froehe Ostern Everyone.

Nancy, Seth in Mary taking a break in Central Park during our Death March through The Gates. Now imagine these three crazy kids tearing up the South of France. Can we go stalk David Sedaris? Can we? Peekaw! 

Cupcakes Belong Together

A cupcake on the Upper East Side is looking for someone to replace her roommate who is moving out at the end of May. I haven't seen the place, but I hear it is an affordable, small share situation on the UES. Email if you'd like more details. Emma, you wouldn't be interested in taking The Princess of Darkness off our hands, would you? We'll even throw in a toaster to sweeten the deal....

DIY Cupcakes

Some cupcake recipies from a guerilla cupcake baker in San Francisco. Cupcake Bakery Recipies

Allow me to Go a Little Carrie Bradshaw Here...

I was having coffee with a good friend last night, and she was telling me about a new guy she just went out with. He sounded great; he was sweet, a good conversationalist, respected her self-proclaimed "quirky personal-space issues" AND told her that her hair looked pretty (Note: Guys, this is a great line. We never tire of hearing that our hair looks pretty). Still, GrahamCracker seemed a little hesitant about the guy, so I asked her, "So, what is wrong with him?". "Well, he wore this short-sleeve shirt and I was just thinking, 'You couldn't have put on a sweater? Because really, I don't need to be looking at your arms right now!'".

Nit-picking. With a lot of my friends it seems like the first time they meet someone new, the first thing they do is try to compile an extensive list of everything that is or could be wrong with him. And if the guy has no obvious flaws, well, we have to keep narrowing our purview until you find yourself saying, "I don't think I'll see him again, you know, he kind of walked on his toes." GrahamCracker later admitted to not meeting a different guy face to face because he used excessive emoticons in his e-mails. "I mean there was this one, he used a colon, a slash and three closed parenthesis marks. What does that mean? Is that a closed lip smile? A double chin? I have a B.A. in Art History and English, I should be able to figure out what he means!! And you know it was intentional, because he had to hold the Shift key down to make the closed parenthesis down!"

This behavior is widespread. MommyCakes once dumped a guy because his favorite movie was When Harry Met Sally. The Princess of Darkness wanted nothing more to do with a guy when he dropped the bomb that his favorite book was The DaVinci Code (granted we all know "my favorite book is The DaVinci Code" is itself secret code for "I don't read books", but let's give the guy a chance). Princess also refused to meet one guy because he "looked too much like my uncle." I don't want to imply that the Chief Cupcake is above this behavoir, by the way. I'll admit that I was once turned off by a guy when he told me that his father's name is Ralph, but it wasn't a deal breaker for me. So what's going on here? Why can't these guys catch any breaks while my friends sit at home wondering when they're finally going to meet a nice guy (who doesn't pronounce the "s" sound in that annoying way).

It's easy to assume that nit-picking is just a way to self-sabotage these relationships before they even begin. If you can find something wrong with the guy you can dismiss him, not take the risk, not open yourself up to any vulnerability and return to your comfortable, single life. Or maybe this is a preemptive strike against rejection. In case he's just "not that into you" you can console yourself with the thought, "Right, like I was really going to date a guy named Cody." But I fear that some people have just taken shows like Seinfeld and Sex in the City to heart. People, I know it's funny when Jerry doesn't want to date the chick with "man hands" but those shows were satires! Or are we simply projecting the hypercritical way we judge ourselves? I complimented one cupcake on a new photo she posted on Friendster and she said "My face is so wide!" Honnestly, she looks beautiful in the shot. So, what's it all about Alfie? Thoughts? Also, I'm curious if guys are as suceptable to this behavior or if there is some parallel self-sabotaging behavior they engage in. Honnest to God, it is amazing any two people ever get together. Now, discuss quietly amongst yourselves.

Stuff Your Peep Hole

Thanks to our Cupcake in Rome and Daily Candy for news of this Amazing Discovery: the DIY Marshmellow Peeps Kit. No doubt CiaoBella sent me this link to commemorate my infamous Marshmellow Peeps Meltdown that occured in the Chase House Dining Room circa Easter 2003. However, as many of you know, I prefer my Peeps pleasantly stale (ie. the first thing I do when I get a box is remove them from the plastic and place them back in the cupboard to "mature"). So I'll start saving up now for the kit, so that I can make and age my Peeps to perfection in time for next Easter. The Peeps Kit and countless other treasures can be purchased from Fred Flare.

Yikes.

We knew this day was coming. Now you can betrothe your sweetheart with an official Lord of the Rings Wedding Band. Yes, for just $699 you can be the proud owner of a 18k Gold ring inscribed with Trademarked Lord of the Ring Cliches written in some language that looks like Sanskrit to me, but which I'm guessing is supposed to be Elfish or something (this is perhaps a good time to mention I've never actually see any of the Lord of the Rings movies). So after you've propsed to Sugar Lips on the JumboTron at your local minor league ice hockey game, why not continue with the subtle, classy theme and make the Big Day a LOTR Day. I know just what you can use to Top the Wedding Cake.

Fun Fact

Say Friends, did you know that if you click on the "View My Complete Profile" you can see my complete profile with a link to my Amazon.com Wishlist? Yes. Using this link you can see which books and CDs I want, then enter your credit card number and buy them for me. They will come right to my house! This is strongly encouraged. If you all do your part, we can have all of my book lust sated. Thank you. That is all.

From the "Things I didn't Need to Know" File

According to Land's End.com, this is what I look like in my underwear. The remarkable thing is ... this is amazingly close to what I look like in my underwear. I don't know how they did it, but I'm guessing math was involved.

Low-Grade B-List Celebrity Crush of the Month:

Martin Freeman, best known for playing loveable Mensch Tim Cantebury on The Office. No Tim, you do not look like The Fisher-Price Man. Will I ever tire of his deadpan roll-eyes-off-camera takes? No, never. Not ever. Also, he has a Martin Freeman Website run by one of his older brothers. If that is not adorable, I don't know what is. (Little Brother, if you're reading this, it's probably not too soon to start archiving material for my fan site...).

Sondheim's Passion at Lincoln Center

After being shut out of Symphony Space's Wall to Wall Sondheim Festival yesterday, I am determined to catch the performance of Stephen Sondheim's Passion (listen to clips from the soundtrack at Amazon.com) at Lincoln Center the end of this month. The performance will include Tony-Winners Patti LuPone, Michael Cerveris and Audra McDonald. The dates are March 29 - April 1, although I believe the Thursday evening show is already sold out, and I'm afraid the other shows will sell-out quickly as well. Anyone interested in attending with me?

Bring Out Your Red

Look, if you're Irish and you want to celebrate St. Patrick's Day, I have no beef with you. But if you're going pretend to be part of one Ethnic Group for the month of March, I'd like to suggest you join the Italians, unless of course famine, alcoholism and over-the-top poetry is really your thing. Here's the story about St. Patrick: he may or may not have driven the snakes out of Ireland. Big woop. Now let me tell you about a guy who came home one day to find out his fiance was knocked up, and not by him. When questioned, she tells him the father of her unborn baby is ... God. Did he cause a scene? Throw her out? Try to get the deposit on his Tux back? No, he married her anyway, and raised the baby as his own. And that baby grew up to be Jesus. Yes, we're talking about St. Joseph and his Festival Day is March 19th, as in tomorrow, as in Saturday. We Italians celebrate the day by wearing red and eating these delicious Cream-Puff -type things called Zeppoli. This site chronicles how the day is celebrated in Rhode Island, as in "See? I am not making this up". To get someone else's interpretation on the story of St. Joseph, although I think mine is quite brief and complete, click here for All Things St. Joesph.

The Coolest Thing that Happened to Me Today

Note: This is one of those stories (and I have a million of them) that is incredibly exciting to me but will be of interest to approx. 0.5% of the population at large.

It's Friday, and for some of us, that means a Two Martini Lunch, but in Cupcake Land, we decided to make it a two cupcake lunch. So I headed over to the Buttercup Bakeshop, just blocks from my office. I ordered a Golden Buttercup with Chocolate Icing, a Devil Dog Cupcake, and a small chocolate milk "to stay". So I settled in at a little table, and dug my paperback out of my bag. I just started reading Word Freak by Stefan Fatsis, which I happily picked up for Five bucks at The Strand a few weeks ago.

A woman walked by my table, pointed to Word Freak and said, "Hey, that's a great book."
"Yeah," I said, looking up. "Hey! You're the cupcake lady!" (I couldn't remember her name).
"Yes I am," she said.
"I was just looking at the Buttercup Bakeshop website the other day and I recognize you from the photo. Congratulations! Very yummy cupcakes."
"Thank you," she said. I'm guessing she doesn't often get recognized and treated like a celebrity, even within her own shop. Let me here point out that this woman, Jennifer Appel, is indeed famous. Co-founder of the famous Magnolia Bakery in Soho, she left Magnolia to open Buttercup in Midtown and is now in the process of franchising the company. Hey, if I had 400k I'd buy a franchise and open one in Brooklyn, adding the Match-Making component and thus realizing my dream of a Cup Cake/Date Bar in Brooklyn that I first began proposing last summer, to the derision of many friends (MommyCakes, I'm looking in your direction ... L'Ingenue, I seem to recall you were skeptical as well...). Also, Jennifer Appel has been on the Today Show, and if that's not fame, I don't know what is.

So, my new friend Jen says, "I met Stefan Fatsis. He's great."
"Really?"
"Yes, I'm good friends with one of the guys in the book. I went with him to a premiere of Word Wars, the new documentary about Scrabble. Stefan Fatsis was there with a bunch of the guys from the book, Matt Graham, [some others I forget now]."
'That's so cool. Who's your friend?"
"Jeremey Franks, he's just mentioned a couple of times. He's not a major character."
Anyway, this riveting discussion continued. I thought about asking her, now that we're friends, to spot me 400G to open a franchise, but maybe I'll wait until next time to run into her. Let's recap: I had a conversation with a low-level celebrity who hangs out with other low-level celebrities and Scrabble Freaks. Yes, you can touch me but it will cost you five bucks. How else am I going to raise 400k?

Really, Rosie.

Yet another Diva who beat me to the Blog scene: Rosie O'Donnell. Rosie's blog is, well, do you enjoy slowing down to look at car wrecks? That's about the only way I can describe this one. The blog is titled either "Formerly Rosie" or "Once Adored", still unsure. Whatever the hell it is called, Rosie O'Donnell's blog is here. The site features misspelled stream of consciousness free verse. It's painful, yet oddly compelling.

Okay, Cupcake slept 11 hours last night and now we're feeling much better. Time to review the Week in Cupcake News. Someone in Japan is crocheting these cupcake pin cushions. Of course, that's about all I could understand since this website was in, gasp, Japanese. I want a Cupcake Pin Cushion. Yeah, I know I don't sew but I need a place to store my pins for knitting ... and voodoo ... What? Nevermind. Also, Texas Law Makers Decide Not to Ban Cupcakes in the smartest move ever to come out of the Texas State Legislature (not that there is a lot of competition for good governance in Texas).  

I hope you aspirate on your green vomit.

No, we are not going to comment on this crappy sham of a holiday except to remark that an amazing confluence of factors have conspired to make this particular St. Pat's the worst crappy sham holiday ever. And lest you think I'm just being a party pooper, I am pleased to report that if you Google the phrase "I Hate St. Patrick's Day" you will be rewarded with 216 hits. Cupcake says watch this space for a primer in St. Joseph's Day, and we'll show you a real Saint worth celebrating.

Very Bad Good News

I just found a wonderful new cupcake joint. The cupcakes at Buttercup Bake Shop are a little more expensive than Sugar Sweet Sunshine ($1.75 per vs. $1.50 per), and the cafe is not quite as cozy, but the cupcakes are equally yummy! Also, Buttercup's chocolate buttercream icing is not flavored with Almond extract, so there is a truer chocolatey taste that I prefer. In addition to the cupcake standbys, Buttercup also makes Devil's Food, Lady Baltimore, German Chocolate and other baby cakes. Perhaps the biggest advantage is that the shop is located just blocks from my office, so you are all encouraged to buy me a cupcake and stop by for a visit.

I come from a magical land where there is a Dunkin Donuts every 500 ft. In this magical land, also known as Rhode Island, we all know what a Regular Coffee is, and know that iced coffee is not exclusively a summer drink. I consider my ability to muscle my way to the front of the counter and order a cool dozen one of my sexiest skills. Yeah, I know the donuts are crap, I'd take an Allie's Donut any day of the week over a Dunkie, but we're talking about a cultural experience, man. So I was delighted to find All Things Dunkin' Donuts , a blog devoted entirely to our favorite Pink and Orange blight on suburbia. Meanwhile, in local doughnut news, I am desperate to check out The Doughnut Plant on the Lower East Side who boast doughnuts as big as your head in flavors like Lime, Rosewater, Valrhona Chocolate and Malted Milk. Any takers?
 

What ever happened to my disability?

All this talk about Mary-Kate (or possibly Ashely) got me wondering: just what the hell was that word in the first line of the Full House Theme Song? As a kid, I swore I thought the lyrics were "What ever happened to my Disability? The Milkman, the Paperboy, the evening TV...". So, I spent the morning (sorry boss) in search of the lyrics and I proudly present them here:

Full House Theme Song
What ever happened to predictibility?
The milkman, the paperboy, evening TV.
Everywhere you look , everywhere you go (there's a heart).
There's a heart
A hand to hold onto.
Everywhere you look, everywhere you go.
There's a face Of somebody who needs you.
Eveywhere you look,
When you're lost out there and you're all alone,
A light is waiting to carry you home,
Everywhere you look. Everywhere you look.

It turns out, I am not the first person to have Misheard TV Theme Song Lyrics. Many sites promise lyrics to your favorite TV shows, but I found that few deliver. The Classic TV site is not very extensive, but it has some of the greatest hits from our TV Childhoods, and in an emergency situation you can easily find lyrics here for Growing Pains, Cheers, Family Ties, My Two Dads, Who's the Boss?, Perfect Strangers and others.

Everywhere you go, everywhere you look...

When do you know you have become a true New Yorker? Does this enlightenment dawn the first time an old lady gives you the finger? Or is the the first time you see something run across the kitchen floor out of the corner of you eye and find yourself wondering, "Was that a small rat or a large roach'? Well, I'd like to believe you are truly a New Yorker when you have your first Olsen Twin sighting. Today, I come to you as a veritable New Yorker, reporting that I saw one of the Olsen Twins eating brunch at Balthazar three tables down from me on Sunday. Of course the first question everyone asks is, "Was it the anorexic one?" How the hell should I know? Neither one of them is particulary large. Let's make an analogy. Say a friend of yours bumps into you and gushes, "I just saw that chick from the Simple Life!" You ask, "The dumb one?". "Yeah." Only after you walk away do you wonder, wait, were we talking about Paris or Nicole...?

The nicest thing that has ever happened to me on an elevator.

Oh quit blushing. I'm not Steven Tyler, for Christ's sake. I was returning from my lunch hour and I got into an elevator with another woman. "Wow," she said. "You have red hair and a red coat. I'm envious of both." I think I actually looked around the elevator just to make sure she was talking to me. I was totally taken aback by this random compliment. "Oh. Thank you," I said.
"Most people have black hair and black coats." I noticed that the woman had dark hair and was wearing a black coat.
"I just wanted something different." I was still totally bewildered by the fact that a total stranger had just said something nice to me. This is New York City after all. (Just yesterday a guy came running out of his store and began banging on the hood and roof of the car I was riding in, accusing us of stealing his friend's parking space. Kinda scary). I watched the floor numbers. I was feeling a little awkward. I told her to have a nice day, I hope she knows that I really meant it.

Deep Thought for the Day

Hell hath no fury like a paper cut incurred by a 54-page appraisal of a Luxury Parisian Hotel.

Thumbing through O Magazine (please no cracks, it is a free trial subscription, I swear) I came across a blurb on the Pajama Program. This program is the outgrowth of one woman's efforts to distribute new pajamas to children in homeles shelters in Harlem. Today the program collects warm pajamas and children's books to distribute to children all over the country, and they have also sent pajamas to Columbia, Brazil, Armenia, The Ukraine and other nations. To make a donation of pajamas, books, cash, or your time click here. 

They made a sequel to Miss Congeniality. Why? Seriously, why? Candace Bergen, please tell me you passed on this one. All in all, it is a sad week for the movies. In addition to the fact that there is nothing in the thearter that I want to see (The Jacket? The Pacifier? The Lame-Ass Travolta/Thurman Marketing Ploy?) we have two sad deaths to report. The Horse That Played Seabiscut Died as well as The Chick who took a volleyball to the face in Meet the Parents 

Music mix the Bourgeoisie and the Rebel

Where can you find The Barenaked Ladies, Pearl Jam, Smokey Robinson, Ben Folds, Duke Ellington and the Indigo Girls not only peacefully coexhisting but downright getting down? Only one place I know of, and that is my personal Launchcast Internet Radio Station. Warning, Cupcake's Music is intended for dorks only. Should this odd assortment of pop/folk/motown fall upon cool ears, you may experience the uncontrollable urge to throw yourself off a building. But come on, you know you want to.

Perhaps Marty would like to come to Brooklyn and teach me how to make a cheesecake in my microwave?

On her last night in prision, fellow inmates including former North Carolina Agriculture Commissionar Meg Scott Philips, threw a potluck dinner celebration for soon-to-be-sprung Martha Stewart. Scott's father told reporters his daughter used a microwave and ingredients bought at the prison commissary to make a pineapple cheesecake. "Martha, soon after she got there, took the microwave and showed [the other inmates] how they could use it to maybe improve on some of the food or fix snacks," Scott said. Aparently the women resorted to Pineapple Cheesecake because the pastry torch for the Creme Brulee was on the fritz.

Ducks Behaving Badly

If it's a story about homosexual necrophiliac ducks, it could only be a story brought to us by the Princess of Darkness. I am going to refrain from editorializing, and just quote directly from the story in Tuesday's The Guardian (British Newspaper):

"It is not so much that up to one in 10 of mallard couples are homosexual ... but they regularly indulge in "attempted rape flights" when they pursue other ducks with a view to forcible mating."

Hey, Ducks will be Ducks you're saying. But wait until you hear this report from a Dutch Scientist who wrote about the preceeding phenomenon after witnessing this scene outside his office window: "The unfortunate duck apparently had hit the building in full flight at a height of about three metres from the ground. Next to the obviously dead duck, another male mallard (in full adult plumage without any visible traces of moult) was present. He forcibly picked into the back, the base of the bill and mostly into the back of the head of the dead mallard for about two minutes, then mounted the corpse and started to copulate, with great force, almost continuously picking the side of the head. "

And you thought the pincale of sexual deviancy in ducks was Donald's steadfast refusal to wear pants ...

Garrett Graff. Unlike other friends who could potentially make it big and disavow ever knowing me, far too much photographic evidence exists confirming that Garrett and I are indeed friends
 

Opperating on the assumption that it is easier to ask for forgiveness than ask for permission, we have this story from a Washington Cupcake. Bizzy was spending the weekend with family way out in the Virginian countryside when her cousin's cat had kittens. Bizz decided that she needed to take not one but two kittens back to live in her one bedroom appartment. Of course, she neglected to ask her live-in boyfriend, MrNoFork, about his feelings on the subject. She did, however, leave him a voicemail to give him a heads up that she would be returning plus two. Now, the Chief Cupcake hates cats. Hates 'em. But even we have to agree this kitten is pretty freaking cute. As of now, the ankle-biters have no names, and are being called "Cat 1" and "Cat 2". We are accepting suggestions for names for the kittens. Bizz, perhaps you would like to enlighten us as to the genders?
 

Could It Be I'm Falling in Love?

Fresh Direct. For nearly a year now, I've seen your advertisements. "Our Food is Fresh, our Customers are Spoiled." And who doesn't want to be spoiled? I've even seen your discarded boxes stacking up outside Park Slope Brownstones. But like Middle School Hearthrob Jeff Van der Veer, I just assumed you were out of my league. But that night at Lexi's the other weekend, when she pulled out that tray of chocolate bread pudding, and swore that your prices were cheaper than the grocery stores ... well, I think we all knew it was only a matter of time before I surfed over to you.

Fresh Direct, I think about you all the time now. I can't get any work done because it is too tempting to explore all you have to offer and fantasize about our future together. Just looking at your naked game birds tressed up just for me makes me blush. And yet, I can't seem to actually go ahead and make a committment. Am I afraid of the potential dammage your Single Serving Size Portions of Potatoes Gratin and Four-Packs of Double-Dipped Chocolate Cupcakes could wreck on my waistline and my Discover Card Bill? No, I think I'm finally in the right place with all that. I suppose my biggest fear is that it isn't really you I'm attracted to at all, just the potentially better version of myself you seem to promise. How easily I can envision spending Sunday afternoons massaging meat rub into the pork chops, decanting organic apple sauce while the Bretzel Rolls warm in the oven. How I long to be the hostess who never fears unexpected company because she knows the Key Lime Mousse Cheesecake will take less than an hour to defrost! I want to spend more time planning meals than just deciding whether to pop a bag of Butter Light or Kettle Corn for dinner. And all this food for one person would be absurd. Surely there is someone else in the picture, to preheat the oven while I'm at the gym and help me choose which sides should accompany the Rotisserie Chicken Dinner.

Oh Fresh Direct, I know this level of personal/nutritional fulfillment and domestic bliss is a lot to ask of a food delivery service, but you seem so different than all the others. It's nothing at all like when I had Key Foods deliver the booze for my birthday party. Or maybe it is just that I want so badly to believe in us, that we crazy kids could make this thing work. For the moment I will continue to try to resist, but afterall I am just a woman, a woman with serious needs and I can only wonder how long I will be able to hold out before I seek solace in the embrace of your pre-baked pie/quiche shell...

He Don't Look Like This No More.

We had our second confirmed mouse kill this morning. Thank you Victor Pest, for your quality Mice and Rat Control solutions. And thank you Princess of Darkness for warning me, so I did not have to encounter the the mouse corpse unexpectedly this morning in the late-dawn light of the kitchen.

All Too Human

Yay! An email from Mass(hole) Cupcake EdithVed has included a link to her blog, Halfway to Human. Now, as a good cupcake friend we are happy that Ali is happy in The Bay State, but secretly we wish she were back in Brooklyn, just because she is so cool. My only complaint with her blog is that there are no photos of her, which is a shame, because to behold her White Girl 'Fro is to truly experience joy.

Stupid Things I Have Done Today

Bearing in mind that my day is just more than three hours-old:

To the Lady at the 7th Avenue F Train Stop: I am sorry. I thought I recognized you. You have the same haircut and eyes as my friend Hooly's roommate, beyond that I cannot say, as your face was obscured by a Kleenex. The face I made at you was meant to suggest, "Hey Lara, fancy meeting you underground at 7:30am, which is odd because I'm here everyday at this time and I've never seen you here before." My mouth was open, not to convey repulsion, but because I was about to say something along those very lines. I see now that my facial expression could have been interpreted as shocked disguist. Really, there was no booger hanging off your chin. Sorry for the confusion.

To the Lady getting out of the Elevator in my office building this morning: I am sorry. An Elevator is a means of transportation. Just because I am confronted with a large shiny surface does not mean I am alone in the dressing room at Ann Taylor and can explore possible areas of fat expansion in private. No one wants to have the elevator doors open and find themselves inches from me, grabbing my own ass, and making concerned faces, even if it is 10am and you have managed to get a few cups of coffee down already. Thank you for averting your eyes and scurrying off.

We are proud and humbled.

Here in Cupcake Land, we are so proud, we could spit. I almost wet my pants last Friday when I saw that Garrett Graff, hot new blogger and my best friend, was mentioned in Salon.com Imagine my loss of control over bodily functions when I arrived in the office this morning and saw that the New York Times has a story about Garrett! We believe this is our first friend to make it into The Gray Lady (not appearing in the Police Blotter or as "unidentified protestor", of course, if we are wrong, please correct us). Check out the story here .

Purchase German Language Books online from the German Book Center

The German Book Center has materials for teaching/learning German, Children's Books and Music, and German-Language Literature. In addition to the big names like Günther Grass and Thomas Mann, they carry many works by Austrian Writers like Peter Hanke, Ingeborg Bachmann, Robert Musil, Stefan Zweig and others I read once upon a time in another life.

Body Count

After five months of sharing our apartment with a family of mice, many failed attempts including the use of poisons, cheap traps, and one large Peruvian Kickboxer, we are finally on the path the The Mousey Final Solution we have been searching for. Behold the Victor Quick Trap . We had our first kill this morning. I say bait it up and set it again. Die Mousey, Die!
The Victor Pest Quicktrap

You Kiss your Baby with that Mouth?

Here in Cupcake Land, we love to get feedback on our blog, so we are reprinting the following comments from MommyCakes, my former employer who is shaping up to be a lifetime friend/archrival:

"Oh, and I suppose that a Martha-loving, cupcake-cafe-scheming, Billy-Joel-worshipping hipster like you is more likely to know what a blog is than yours truly. Gimme a break, Martira. I was reading blogs before you were of drinking age."

Sure, she can be a pill sometimes, but what can I do? Afterall she is keeper of the Baby, and can therefore decide how often I get to see Most Favorite Person. In the meantime I'm counting on the fact that as a working mother she's much too busy to start her own blog and therefore is not likely to publicly reveal all the sheer stupidity and odd behaviors of mine she has discovered.

Damien Rice

Currently, my pick for song-of-the-moment is "Cannonball" by Damien Rice. I love it and was happy to find that Rice has posted the lyrics to the song on his website. PS Is it just me, or does this guy look a little bit like Hooly?

More on Jeanne-Claude and Christo, Those Crazy Cats

We have finally gotten to the bottom of the pressing issue of Christo's birth name. Christo, who considers himself American, was born Christo Vladimirov Javacheff in Bulgaria. He shares the same exact birthday, June 13, 1935 with his wife, who was born Jeanne-Claude Denat de Guillebon in Casablanca. For a complete biographical timeline, click here. The couple is rather particular about their names and explain the whole spiel in the Common Errors section of their website. They have one son named Cyril, who took his father's first name as his last name (ie Cyril Christo); he is a poet and seems to be following in the family tradition by collaborating artistically with his wife. Let us imagine for a moment having Jeanne-Claude as your mother-in-law... Okay. Their next prjoect for the couple preternaturally fond of "wrapping" is titled Over the River and will take place in Colorado, date unknown.

And because inquiring minds want to know, here's a final tidbit for you:

There are 3 things Christo and Jeanne-Claude do not do together:
They never fly in the same aircraft.
Jeanne-Claude does not make drawings, she was not trained for that. Christo puts their ideas on paper, he never had an assistant in his studio.
Christo never had the pleasure of talking to their tax accountant.