use real butter

Recipe: lemon petits fours

lemon petits fours glacés

The last time I participated in a cancer-related food blogging event was for the Boobie Bake Off. I hate the color pink. I really do. All of my life I have fought the girly-girl look and pink was pretty central to being a girly-girl in my mind. But I could overlook that aversion for a good cause. What a hoot when a month after the Boobie Bake Off, I was diagnosed with… you guessed it – Boobie Cancer aka breast cancer at age 36. WTF, right?

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Recipe: lentil soup

Congratulations to Reema T. Bhakta! You’ve won the Menu for Hope raffle for the prize offered here on Use Real Butter! If you are Reema, you need to send me an email so we can discuss your choice of prize and where the heck you are so I can ship it to your hot little hands pronto! Thanks to everyone else who bid for such a terrific cause. If you really had your heart set on a print, drop me a line and we can make arrangements.

This morning a kind, portly dude knocked on the door at 7:55. I was in my bike shorts, ready to ride for an hour because these guys weren’t scheduled to arrive until 10 am to 2 pm. But here they were, not necessarily bright-eyed and bushy-tailed either. It was snowing, and the fellows in Denver aren’t too keen on the lovely mountain weather I cherish.

from my office perch – the snow conditions

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I love Peabody. She’s got the right attitude about life as far as I’m concerned and that earns my respect (along with the fact that she generally kicks ass). I’ve thought a lot about life and the lemons and how some make lemonade and others just turn into sniveling messes as if a giant lemon has fallen from the sky and pinned them to the ground. In times of crisis, the true nature of an individual emerges. Sometimes it will surprise you for the better, and many times it will disappoint you. I pride myself in rolling with the punches through shitty times, and I do mean shitty times.

I have seen people wallow in self-pity or let their tragedies define who they are and dictate their lives. Not my cuppa, kids. My friend’s mother has a terrific saying: If you look up, there is no limit, and if you look down, there also is no limit. Life always could be better, or worse. Get over yourself and make the best of what you’ve got.

It’s very likely I will be losing my hair in the next several weeks. My surgeon delivered this news with what I detected was a hint of sympathy last month. I neither need nor want pity. It’s just hair and it will grow back. I understand it’s not the hair, but the condition that elicits this response in people. I am a rock and I am so gonna own this. Rather than feel blue, I went and lopped my hair off and dyed it blue.

grab life by the hojos

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