(no subject)

I was going to go to the Leather Museum today (I KNOW RIGHT) but it was cold and snowing, so I made the executive decision to stay inside, make myself a huge breakfast, and spend the day drinking cocoa. I feel good about this decision.

YAY SNOW though. Tomorrow I get to crunch through it to the Music Box, where I have a ticket to see the Holiday Special, with White Christmas on the big screen. That should be 100% awesome. Especially since the seats for the Holiday Special are reserved, which means I don't have to show up early just to ensure I get "my" seat. Why yes, I am a little picky about seating...

Mum called tonight too, eager to hear the "Great Cupcake Caper" story I promised her via textmessage, which reminded me I haven't let you guys know how THAT panned out. I told my mum the story, complete with the phrase "And then I mentioned it to the internet" which never fails to make her LOL.

Soooo...Magnolia Bakery found my post about them. (Hi Magnolia Bakery!)

I got an email from someone at Magnolia (I don't know her title, and I won't give out her name, that's just mean) which I found in turns sweet and hilarious. She apologized for the customer service and said they'd be doing some staff retraining, which I very much appreciate. I mean, I've worked in food service and in retail, and at the holidays that job is especially trying, especially in a tourist-heavy area, so I get it. She also linked me to the cupcake calendar, which was nice.

On the other hand, she also explained to me how bakeries work, including this sentence:

Admittedly when we first opened, we were taken a little off guard and it took us a little while to understand that Chicagoans frequently order off menus.

You don't say.

New Yorkers, do you guys not have menus? Because menus are awesome, and I strongly recommend them. Maybe we could open some kind of midwestern-themed "menu restaurant" in New York. We could call it Menu-do.

Okay, I'm being mean, and I'm conscious of that because, since they're aware of the blog, the dialogue between us is not just in email but also here. So yes, that above was mostly to make you guys laugh and is totally unfair, because I know what she means -- that bakeries generally operate on a "what you see is what you can get" concept. That said, Chicagoans can't possibly be the only people who check a website for a menu before going somewhere to eat.

Anyway, I've written back with some suggestions for website improvement, which I think in turn would hugely improve the spirits of the counter staff (I cannot believe I wrote a page-long email about cupcakes, how is this my life).

And I will be going back some Saturday to try their caramel cupcake. I'll report back on how that goes.

(no subject)

Oh man, I just realised I'm living in a high-brow sitcom.

I have the wacky friends, the weird job full of slightly off-kilter people*, the glamorous crush, the crazy secret second job, the strange family, the improbably large apartment for the iconic urban area I live in, the built-in narrative device, and every day on my way to work I walk past a twenty-six-foot-tall homage to the upskirt panty shot. I'm currently arguing on the internet with someone about the cupcake industry.

In honour of my double life, I'm calling it Sam Squared.

And before you guys say you'd watch it, guess what: you're in it.

* When we got to the luncheon on Friday, each eight-person table had a plate of dessert nibbles as the centrepiece, clearly meant to be eaten after the meal. I looked around as the soup was being brought out and discovered our table was the only table that had done the sensible thing and eaten the dessert nibbles immediately.