joe randel's art dump

Today was baking day.  I made some of my annual mint chocolate pinwheel cookies and some orange chocolate cookies.  Mmmm tasty.

I think I’ll share with you one of those recipes.

CHOCOLATE ORANGE COOKIES

– 1 oz square of unsweetened chocolate or about a 1/4 cup of chocolate chips.
– 3/4 C. butter
– 3/4 C. sugar
– 1 egg
– 1 tsp vanilla
– 1 1/2 C. all purpose flower
– 1 tsp baking powder
– 1 medium orange

Preheat oven to 350F (175 C)

In medium bowl cream together the butter and sugar until smooth.  Beat in the egg and the vanilla.  In separate bowl combine the flower and the baking powder then add it to the creamed mixture.

Once the dough is well combined, pick it up and divide it in to two parts and put each part in separate bowls (use the bowl you used to mix the powder ingredients and your current one).  Zest the orange on to one of the half’s of dough and mix it in .  If you don’t have an orange zester you can use the small holes of a cheese grater.  Melt your chocolate (be careful not to scorch it) and add it to the other half mixing it in thoroughly.

Get your baking sheet ready (I generally bake with a sheet of parchment paper down to get a nice brown on the bottom of the cookies but that’s just me) and take a small amount from each mixture and roll it in to a 1 inch ball.  This will make neat white and chocolate patterns in your cookies.

Bake your cookies for about 8 min, checking at the 6 min mark to make sure they don’t burn.

Let cool and enjoy. ^_^

I took a pic of mine so you can get an idea of how they’ll look when they’re done.

Today I got the rest of the Christmas shopping done.  My daughter and I went out and bought gifts for Mommy at the mall.  It was a little crowded but everyone was nice and no one was pushy.  Actually, my wife and I are totally in the mind of “we don’t need anything so you don’t have to get me anything” but we also don’t our daughter to ask why we didn’t get anything for Christmas, so we get just each other a few small things and the kids help.

Now I just have to wrap it all.

If your one of the fools that buys gifts for people during the holidays, are you done yet?  Or are you a “I’ll get it done on the 24th” type of person?

I pass by a “gentleman’s club” on the way home every day and I just happened to notice this on their sign.

One has to wonder what happens at a strip club on customer appreciation night… one has to wonder indeed…

I’m sorry I missed it.

Hey everyone.  I just want to take time now to say thanks for all the comments you guys and gals leave for me on my posts and pics.  It means a lot to have so many people take interest in my fun little hobby.  I guess it means I’m doing something right. ^_^  Sorry that I don’t give replies to everyone that leaves a comment.  Especially now during the holiday season I find it really hard to even make the posts.  Recently there have been so many great comments on past posts, and I would have loved to go in to deeper conversations with the poster on what they had written… but alas… time is something that I lack in great amounts.

I also want to say that commissions are a bit slow right now but they are still being worked on.  I’m also doing portfolio pieces (folio as in my real job type folio) with the hopes of getting in to another studio in the new year.  But no worries, I still put time in on them when I can get it.

Oh and if you’ve sent me a note or an email lately and I haven’t gotten back to you on it, I apologize… I have read it and I will comment back.  I promise.

Well I think that’s it.  Just wanted to get all that out there.  So thanks again everyone.  It all just makes me want to draw more and more. ^_^

Later

Joe

The other day I posted about a dream I had.  Usually I’m left wondering… how cool would it be to view my dream in the waking world rather then just trying to remember it.  Well, the ability to do that is closer then you think.

Scientists from Japan have developed new brain analysis technology that allows images from the brain to be shown on a computer monitor.  How freak’n crazy is that?  Apparently it has something to do with monitoring the cerebral blood flow using a fancy MRI machine.  Subjects where shown 400 different 10×10 black and white pixel images all the while the MRI tracked the blood flow.  Later in anoher test the subjects where shown the letters N-E-U-R-O-N and well… see for yourself.

Right now the technology can only read black and white images but you know that they’re working towards colour images.  Infact, they’re suggesting that in about 10 years we might be able to see another persons thoughts.  This sort of technology is going to greatly benifit those in the Doctor fields when treating people with brain damage or psyological issues.  Artists will also benifit seeing as how what ever they thing in thier haed can just be displayed right in front of them.  Man, I’ve wished for that kind of gagetry on more then one occasion.

So once again we see science fiction become science fact.  One wonders what else we’ll see in our life time.

What’s the weather like where you are right now?

It’s currently snowing outside where I am and is -7C (19F).

Brrrr… but I love it ^_^

Oh and here’s a picture of Tinkerbell.