Deep fried alcoholic cake balls

There's this recipe going around Pinterest where people take angel food cake and cut it into cubes, then soak them in tequila and deepfry them.  Well, it works!  And it is dead simple and pretty fool proof.

INGREDIENTS
1 box mixed up cake mix
1 cup coordinating booze
2" frying oil

I got a Baby Cakes Cake Ball Maker a few years ago that I never use that came in very handy!  I mixed a box of Duncan Hines Devils Food Cake and mixed according to the instructions, then spooned in to the ball maker.

Once cooked, the balls were soaked in amaretto or Captain Morgan, or both, and toss in a tall pot with 2" of hot peanut oil that was left over from the turkey.

Fry until crispy!

Let drip and cool, and then devour.

Rocky Horror Tail Coat

Tail coats aren't normally shaped for people shaped like Dan.  Since he was playing the narrator at this year's Rocky, I got him a 1940's french tuxedo pattern.  The pattern isn't difficult, per sé, but definitely different.  It came with three small squares and a bunch of "tape measures" that correspond to chest circumferences so that the same pattern can be scaled to any size, including dolls.

You anchor the small square on to your craft paper and draw points at certain distances marked on the schematic, then connect all the points.  The pattern does not come with seam allowances or markers of any type, so it took me a bit of staring to figure out which piece was which and how they were all linked.

After transferring to the muslin, I laid out the body pieces to figure out which seams are which and lined them up.

I had to take out four inches on either side of the back instead of the minor darts it requested.

The outside was a cotton blend and the lining was a linen blend in order to have a bit of stretch and not over heat.  Herb was helping me transfer.

Most of the body together.

Of course I forgot to take good pictures once I was done.

While I was at it, I made Riff Raff some wrap around pants for his stilts.

Skate Plate Mounting

I got a new pair of Riedell 195 redlines and mounted my Arius plates to them.  This was a beautiful decision.

There wasn't much space on the boot for the plates, so I pretty much just centered them and tried to avoid the stitching.

I chose to use the same holes that had been used to mount to the Bont boots and traced them.

I first drilled a pilot hole with a smaller drill bit.

Second pass was with a bit close to the size of the screw's core.

After that, I just screwed them in.  I had to get some odd tee nuts to put inside the boot because I couldn't find any bolts with a flat enough head.

All in all, I'm happy with my work.  I love my riedells.

Keto progress notes, the third

So, after six straight weeks of keeping strict keto, I'd finally managed to inch down to 161.8 saturday before my bout.  In celebration (and because the waitress gave us a free beer (and it was Dave's birthday on monday)), I decided to take sunday off.  This resulted with me waking up at 167.8 on tuesday.  I was less than pleased, but figured it was just bloat from going off sunday and a really intense three hour practice monday night.  Today I was only down to 165.8...  I'm going to continue and watch if there was any permanent damage, but there were some important observations I made as to what I like and don't like anymore.

- Beer is the nectar of gods.  A good beer will probably be worth breaking keto for after parties, which will happen about once a month.

- Ice Cream is also perfect.

- Pop corn is really good, but much better if it comes from the movie theater.

- There was no pizza this weekend, but I think I can safely put it on the MUST EAT list.

- Fruits and corn will also forever be a favorite of mine.

- The "apple nachos a la mode" from Quaker Steak fall into both the fruit and ice cream clauses.

- Baked sweets, though, I'm pretty indifferent towards.  I had a couple of cookies that I enjoyed, but was done after just a couple.  I didn't even want to try the cupcakes, or anything glazed/frosted.

- A good sourdough and olive oil (or grilled cheese) should fall under the pretty cool category, but were not tested in this round.

- Kildare's "irish nachos" with home made potato chips were down right not worth it.  If you put sour cream ruffles in front of me, though, all bets are off.

So yeah, there is a remarkable trend in things I'm just not interested in anymore after not having them in my regular diet.  I still want fat with everything, especially if it is creamy, but there are very few instances of sugar I really care about, and only then when associated with milk fat.  HFCS is definitely out of the question.  Wheat I could give or take, but I will shank a bitch for corn.

More keto progress notes!

It's been 26 days since I went back on keto.  The first week or so was ABSOLUTE HELL, but it was pretty even with the debloating and stabilized around the 10th.  Now, I've been weighing pretty much the same for the past 21 days; 164.6 lbs.  I had a three pound dip the weekend of the 20th, though, but that was due to the flu and being dehydrated and in bed all day.

Skating is decent.  I've had a couple of days where I get tired, but it is mostly sunday mornings when I forget to eat before 10 am class.  Last night we did 1-8-1 pyramid sprints that I was able to survive without getting winded thanks to a very hefty cauliflower, cheese and bacon dinner, and more cream than I should have in my tea.

Lifting has also been good.  I've been able to work up to 105 lb squat, mostly focusing on form, and did 115 lb deadlift on my first time back.  Bench press was 50 last week and I hope to up it tonight.  I can easily bring a 35 lb plate up from my knees to over my head, and a 25 lb plate if I arc it.  And then I did weighted incline situps and haven't been able to move for a week -_-;;

I've reached that point where I'm half way to my goal and EXTREMELY BITCHY.  There's no real progress other than the initial debloat, and I have no faith that I'll ever be lean.  Tryouts for the travel team will be this sunday and next, so I'm sticking to it for the next two weeks.  I'll still probably follow through until the end of february as I initially declared, because I'm stubborn.  But I have no faith in the slightest.

Colder than Mars

Well, not in PA, but it was in Canada last monday!  It was a frekin' -17F here, and I was not amused.  So, in the effort to convince myself to get out of bed and go to work, I dolled myself up.

I used a Covergirl pencil I didn't really like because it was too weak to draw a cat eye/shadow hybrid (Flamed Out Shadow Pencil in Red-Hot Flame).  I really liked the shape and how it barely peeked out the side, so I just covered it with BH Cosmetics Galaxy Chic in Jupiter and some Saturn all around.

Yep, still totally not worth going in to work.

Keto progress notes

Six days doing keto and I am luckily back to the weight I was at Thanksgiving.  This is very refreshing because I'd just gotten a really cute wool jacket from Express that was too tight during the holidays.  And now that the weather WARMED UP TO FREEZING, I am happy I can wear it ^_^  And I'm glad it wasn't a permanent 10 lb gain like it was Holiday Season 2012.

I was flipping through MFP and I was only able to recover up to a year's worth of data, so I figured I should start keeping a log of mentionable experiences here when it comes to keto, taking advantage of me going back on after several months and actually being able to focus on the effects.

Day 1) Sunday I was cranky, but mostly because I really wanted leftover candycane marshmallows and potato chips.  I didn't feel anything keto-flu-like. 

Day 2) Monday was -17F.  Fuck That Shit.

Day 3) Tuesday was my first day back at the gym.  I killed it on the 10 minute elliptical breaks I had between lifting sets.

Day 4) Wednesday's Derby wasn't painful out of the ordinary.  I finally got the unquenchable thirst back!  That's one thing that annoyed me about being out of keto: I was never thirsty and drinking anything was a chore.

Day 5) Thursday I started to feel weak and tired.  I woke up with four really bad nerve pinches in my spine.  I'm glad that Dan managed to walk them out that night.  Went to bed with a mild headache I had most of the night.

Day 6) Friday I woke up feeling really weak.  I have a faint haze all over my body, like as if my muscles were about to fall asleep.  Not feeling too excited for the gym tonight.

I've been making an effort to try to keep to the numbers we calculated a few days ago.  The hardest thing for me has been managing to eat a minimum of 80 grams of protein.  I've been forcing myself to start the day with a protein shake and then eat some eggs or ALL OF THE BACON for dinner.

New Year's Calculations

At my lowest weight, I went from 185 to 145 lbs. A year ago, I gained 10 lbs during the holidays and maintained myself between 155-165 all year. Today, after two months off of keto, I weighed in at 168.8 (but managed to hit 172 last week). So, new year == new goals. I am telling myself (once again) that I will actually exercise five times a week and not cheat on keto and I WILL FUCKING LIFT GODDAMNIT IF IT KILLS ME. These are the numbers Dan helped me crunch:

essential fatty acids (std female and male numbers)

- alpha-linolenic acid 1.1gr (1.6)

- linoleic acid 12gr (17)

- docosahexaenoic acid 250mg-2g (blend DHA/EHA 500 mg fish oil capsules) 

- gamma-linolenic acid

protein 80-170 grams (one scoop powder ~24 gr)

125 gr protein (5 scoops powder, 6 chicken breasts) = 500 cals

up to a maximum of 80 additional grams of protein before damage

Hemp oil contains:

20% alpha 5.5-8 gr

60% linoleic 20-28 gr

1 TBS hemp oil ~ 200 cals

500-860 calories come from minimum protein and essential fatty acids

--------

Basal Metabolic Rate

Exercise None Light Moderate

Kc at 168lbs 1,560 1,872 2,145

Kc at 140lbs 1,440 1,728 1,980

1000 calories left over:

fat = 111 g fat max (10 tbs butter)

fibrous plant matter (total net carbs < 15 - 20g/day)