Chocolate Cake and the Big Dance

I am watching the Northwestern vs. Vanderbilt NCCA basketball tournament game. There are 6:40 minutes left in the second half. This game will probably end before I finish writing this post. The score is 48-55. I missed the first half (not that I mind) because I was at lunch with a friend. I know this woman through mutual friends, and we are looking for a job together. We discussed all of the horrible shit that ever happened to us. It was one of those lunches.

I normally don't watch television during the day because it makes me suicidal, but this is the first year the Wildcats made it to the Big Dance and the television stations need to broadcast thirty-two games in three days, so the Cats get the Thursday afternoon slot. They are the last major conference team to make it. Their drought isn't as long as the Cubs winning the World Series, but still, this is a big deal. When I was a freshman, I was at the game where NU beat Bobby Knight's Hoosiers.

I tried to find friends to watch the game with, but everyone had to work or had other obligations. A group of NU Alums is meeting at a Bell Town bar, but I already had plans to meet this friend for lunch. I also didn't want to drink during the day, and I'd be more than tempted to have a Manny's or two while watching the game. Or maybe a Goose Island IPA in honor of Chicago.

Instead, I am sitting at home with Fox. Instead of drinking beer, I am eating microwave chocolate cake in a mug with espresso ice cream. The Boy and the Girlfriend re-introduced microwave mug cakes into our home. Claire Adele ate them before, but I never had one. The Boy made me one the other night from the first recipe he found on Google, and now I am addicted. It is probably worse for me to eat sugar in the middle of the day than to drink beer, as sugar will make me want to take a nap. Beer will give me a hangover around eight o'clock tonight, and I don't want that, either.

Yes! Vandy just missed a free throw. Less than two minutes left and a two-point game with NU in the lead. Argh. Now Vandy is in the lead. Doug Collins might have a heart attack watching his son coach. Julia Louis-Dreyfus is also going to have a heart attack.

Did I mention it is sunny in Seattle today? For the first time in months and I am inside, eating chocolate cake and watching television? I feel like I need to watch the game. What if they don't make it again for another 78 years or whatever? I'll be dead by then.

More about microwave cake. When I was a kid, my friend Missy's family had a microwave way before anyone else did. Her mom worked, and Julie, Missy, Vicki and I would try to bake stuff in the microwave when her parents weren't home. We would melt chocolate chips with stuff like peanut butter. We were like alchemists trying to make dessert instead of gold, but we never made anything worth eating. If I had a time machine, I would use my one trip to go back and visit the three of us and hand them a recipe for microwave cake. Our minds would have been blown, and I would have been the coolest adult they ever met. It is very easy -- three tablespoons of flour, sugar, milk, and vegetable oil, plus two tablespoons of cocoa powder, 1/4 teaspoon of baking powder, a pinch of salt and a splash of vanilla. Mix and bake

WOOHOO!!! Cats win!!

Bake for 90 seconds in the microwave. Cool for two minutes. Top with ice cream. Check the Food Network website for the recipe and complete instructions. I might have made a typo while watching the last two minutes of the game. There are dozens of recipes for this type of thing online.

Oh, God. The Cats have to play Gonzaga next, a number 1 seed. Oy. For the next game, I might need to make a chocolate microwave cake soaked in Bailey's.