Hello and welcome to my first newsletter! Today I am on location at the Barnes & Noble in Devon, Pennsylvania drinking a coffee. I count nineteen people here (excluding me and employees) in the mid-sized cafe area on a Saturday night at 8:01 p.m. This is to say: It is packed in here. It is lit. (Does anyone still say that? Did anyone ever say that?) Last weekend I was at the Starbucks down the street—same time, same day—and there were only three other patrons/probable derelicts seated besides myself. How is this possible? Why have all these people congregated at B&N? Do they know each other? Did their power go out? Have they given up drinking? Is it actually Saturday? Is this an AA spot?
Better question: What am I doing here? Well, I don’t have the internet at home—by choice; I canceled service over a year ago—so I’m forced to venture out if I want to go online. Otherwise I will hole up and never leave my apartment until I’m down to condiments. B&N has Wi-Fi, and I wanted to type this newsletter—though, admittedly, I don’t need an internet connection to write. But I did want to get out for a couple of hours, and this is one of the few places relatively quiet places with free seating that’s open at this hour. For the record: I don’t like going to B&N—I prefer Starbucks, which is also open late, for evening web-doings—but I haven’t been here in ages and I wanted to see I’ve been missing out on anything.
Also, I should note, for posterity: There is a twentieth person, a man, lying supine in the middle of a carpeted aisle ahead of me. He’s been there for about five minutes. Seating is limited.
I don’t know where I’m going with this newsletter (THIS IS THE FIRST ONE) so for now, for each issue, I’m going to share a recipe that I’ve made with Taylor recently that’s turned out particularly well. The following has been breakfast and dessert for the past couple of weeks. Snap, crackle, pop—
Ingredients
Directions
Melt butter in 3-quart (or larger) saucepan over very low heat. Add marshmallows, stir to coat in butter, and stir periodically until mixture is homogenous. Add Rice Krispies—with heat still on—and stir to coat evenly in marshmallow batter (as best as possible, using a wooden spatula). Pour into 13×9” glass baking dish (ditto) taking care avoid packing down the batter (the treats are best when light and airy). Cover with Cling Wrap and let cool. Slice into small quadrangles. Inhale.
Overhead during the evening, from real people:
Recently, on my blog (in case you’ve missed anything):