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It's been a wild few weeks here at Bill of the Birds international corporate headquarters. Apologies for the mostly unavoidable dead air here on the blog. So, as an attempt at making this up to my patient readers, here's a much-needed Moment of Bliss for you and me.

The image above was taken yesterday morning along the road to the St. Marks lighthouse. The air was cool and humid, with that whiff of brackish marsh. Birds dotted the sky as though the heavens spilled its pepper mill and I took a moment to feel my feet on the ground, to fill my lungs with sweet morning air, to count the glory rays striking skyward from the rising sun. It was so peaceful. Life at that moment, well, it was very good.

Then my camera battery ran out.

More soon.

Lately almost every time I go to put an outfit together I'm faced with the reality that my wardrobe has begun to resemble what hung in my closet in the late 80's/90's.  Truth?  I'm not sure how I feel about it.  More often than not I'm tossing on a few outfits before finally settling on one, and somewhere in the process there is mumbling about Madonna.  Maybe some things are better left in the past?  The influence she had on fashion then--and consequently now--is undeniable.  When I see Lourdes running around in lace, droopy crotch pants and hightop sneakers it especially hits home.  Man it's crazy how fast time flies.

And with that I bid you farewell until Monday.  Oh.  And just wait until I tell you about how Target is refusing to allow me to return an online purchase or even print up the online receipt to provide EVIDENCE of purchase (aside from the box it was mailed in, all the packaging, and the packing slip with my name and address on it *cough cough*).  Does anyone have any contacts higher up over there?  I'm at the end of my rope and just want a refund.  Ugh!!

Prepare for a mad ramble.  Mayhem has struck at the bird.  I can't even remember what it was like to have daily posts planned a few days in advance.  What're those?

It's September and apparently what that means is people are serious about getting serious and that means I'm busy with work projects.  They come out of the blue.  One day I'm meandering around Target trying to figure out why the soccer moms had to buy up all of the darkest dark Ghirardelli chips, and the next I'm just grateful we managed not to eat every ounce of the cookie dough two days ago seeing as I'm now living on chocolate chip cookies as they're all I have the energy to make for dinner at 9pm.  And for breakfast at 7am.  True story.

Saturday night at, oh, 11pm I decided it was cookie time up in this dojo.  I had a big batch of gluten-free flour all  mixed up.  A refrigerator dive (like a closet dive only for frozen food) had produced a hidden bag of my fave Bernard Callebaut chips (hollar if you hear me Canadian peeps!) and it was go time.  Cut to scene and I'm passed out on the couch while the Chef rolls in asking why the oven's still on...woops! Dough's mixed, but in the fridge.  Sunday morning (or something) made for chocolate chip cookies for breakfast which is just fine by me.  And him too.  Jackpot.

Here's the thing though:  I didn't use all the dough at once.  I like a warm cookie.  Instead I make just enough (4 to 6 if I'm flying solo--fyi) and keep the rest in the fridge.  You know what this means though, right?  I'm all kinds of messed up eating warm cookies for breakfast, lunch and dinner.

Confession:  Yesterday I ate 3 cookies, a radish, a small taco, another radish, a baby cucumber, 4 more cookies, a couple more radishes, a small piece of lasagna and 3 final cookies that I totally needed because it was the Season Finale of Teen Mom.  Can Maci and Ryan just get back together already?!?

Notice how I deflected that right off my clearly spelled out cookie issue?

Anyway, I have to roll off to bed because it's 1am and I actually feel sick from all the cookies I ate.  Time to go sleep off the sugar rush and prepare for morning consumption.

If you want the most killer chocolate chip cookie recipe evah use this one and if you're gluten-free just substitute my flour mixture (here) in place of the regular flour.  You can't tell the difference at all.  Should you try the recipe I will await your arrival at the Cookie Rehab Center.  I'll be the one with chocolate smeared on my t-shirt and the Lap Band ad in my hand.

Not pretty.  Not pretty at all.

Here's a rare Saturday night post.  Not sure I've ever actually done one of these, but the Chef insists so here it is.  We were piecing through some Instagram pictures and came across this one taken on a super hot day a couple weeks ago.

Chef:  'Oh you have to put this one up for the Fringe Files.'

Me:  'Uh, okay.  Maybe this week.'

Chef:  'What do you mean this week?'

Me:  'I'm pretty sure no one wants to see me wearing the same fringe bag in every post.'

Chef:  'Hel-looo there's a fringe bag AND boots.' pause 'I mean, you have a fringy reputation to uphold.'

Who can argue with that logic?  You can tell there hasn't been a ton of time for snazzier pictures as of late.  Not that we ever had a fancier camera, but you know what I mean. These days it's a lot of hair in ponytail, Instagram on the fly and quality time spent together vs. la-de-da outfits and time spent on photos.  We're still getting in the groove of the whole restaurant schedule thing, but it's starting to get a little better every day.  Thanks for hanging in there.