Day 289 - more chocolate, less stubble

What better way to start your day than with a smooth chin? I'm one of those people who only shave now and again as stubble is so sparse that but doesn't become noticeable for a few days. As today was No Beard Day though I thought it wise to get rid of what little there was. I'm not aware of any reason behind No Beard Day, other than being something to do. Maybe someone was fed up with not being able to grow decent facial hair so celebrated the lack of it instead?

Next I celebrated Chocolate Cupcake Day. Nobody in the office noticed my lack of stubble but the tub of cakes was picked up on. I cooked them last night using a Mary Berry recipe. I must say that I was a little underwhelmed by it. Usually I'd cream the butter with the sugar, add the eggs then the flour and cocoa. Mary however favours the chuck it all in and mix approach. She said to make a pasta with the cocoa by adding 4 tbsps of water then add the rest. 4 tbsps wasn't enough though and not just turned it lumpy. The butter also didn't mix well so I ended up with a lumpy batter with cocoa crumbs which wouldn't mix in. I also forgot the baking powder. Oops. They baked alright,  and tasted OK but the cocoa lumps were still visible. The final outcome was quite decent but I think I'll stick with the creaming method in the future. Anyway, I passed them amongst those colleagues who were not on sone sort of fitness programme, or vegan, and they went down quite well. I left three for the kids but I don't know whether they liked them or not yet.

One holiday which nearly passed me by was Alaska Day, it is the anniversary of when Alaska was bought by America for less than the price of a premier league football second choice squad player ( not accounting for inflation).  I wad obsessed with Alaska as a teenager as I used to watch Northern Exposure which is set there. It was, and still is, on my bucket list of places to visit,  although I subsequently discovered that it was actually filmed in Washington as the real location was too cold. To celebrate I found some old clips on YouTube to watch and reminisce. 

After I got home I found that only one of the three cupcakes got eaten. 2 of the kids didn't like chocolate cupcakes! Something is wrong with the world!