Technically, in Battle Fern, it is Marn 1, Ferns 0.

Yep, this weekend I dug them out of the bed beside the woodshed and moved some new stuff in. Heck, while I was at it, I even dug the ferns out from in front of the wall.

But it was a Pyrrhic victory (is there anything nerdier than a link to a dictionary? I think not!) because that heavy digging mucked up my left knee (an old sports wound) and I'll be limping around for a few days.

So now, on top of being the Empress of Ennui, I have also assumed the mantle of Queen of Cranky. I had toyed with accepting the lesser title of Baroness Bitchery, but really, it just didn't seem worthy of my mood.

Misery enjoys company, so I've been stalking poor Fedward, who has a bad case of template troubles. I'm glad that I'm not the only person who gets a wedgie from HTML every time they redesign their page.

While commiserating, he also reminded me of the amazing powers of peanut butter cookies, so I think I'm going to make me a batch.

So, without further ado, Marn's Grandmother's Peanut Butter Cookies:

1/2 cup brown sugar
1/2 cup white sugar
1/2 cup butter
1/2 cup peanut butter
1 egg well beaten
1 1/2 cup flour
1 tsp. baking soda
1 tsp. vanilla
pinch of salt

Cream together the butter and sugar (if you plan in advance and have your butter at room temperature this is much easier to do. Like I've ever planned that far in advance. But I've heard it's true.)

Fold in the peanut butter and the egg, get it all mixed in well. Dump in everything else and you've got a thick gooey dough. Don't tell a soul, but I find this hard to mix with a fork, so once I've got the flour kind of mushed in with the fork, I get in there with my fingers and squish it all together until it's well mixed. It has a satisfyingly icky texture.

Roll the dough in little balls and put them on a lightly greased cookie sheet. Smush them flat with a fork. Bake at 325 for 12 to 15 minutes. You're looking for golden brown here, and if you have charred and black, well, you've overdone them.

Save them anyhow. It won't be long until hockey season and you can NEVER have too many pucks, eh.

Diaryland. The sort of place where you can weave together HTML, grief, peanut butter cookies and hockey and it doesn't seem weird at all.