As an aside to
Pop Tart Tuesday, wherein Saucy debated the merits of teenagers dumping each other via
Facebook, email and the least impersonal method of all,
text message... she would like to share one more bee that is festering under her hair extensions about a disturbing trend that she witnessed a few years ago on vacation with Buddy
Budderson:
Allow Saucy to set the stage: It was a weekend night in Toronto, she and Buddy decided to visit the entertainment and video game emporium known as Playdium. For the uninitiated, this is by far the mecca of video gaming. Imagine every single game known to man - under one roof.
And Saucy says "known to man" when she really means "known to boy" because it was apparent upon entering the establishment the demographic within was predominantly boys aged 12 to 20.
It was crowded, noisy and for Buddy, it was like heaven. He'd been promised this sojourn and there he was. Saucy obtained a game card and they set out to have some good, new-fangled fun.
Everywhere Saucy looked, she saw young teenagers taking part in the fun.
Until... Saucy began observing a disturbing trend throughout the arcade. Teenage boys everywhere were playing games. Teenage girls were everywhere, standing in lineups. At first, Saucy brushed this off as coincidence, as surely the concept of chivalry - while it is covered in the middle years Social History curriculum - is all but dead to this generation, reasonably she did not expect the young men to surrender their place in line to allow a young lady to play ahead of them.
That would be... asking entirely too much. Instead, Saucy assumed that the girls were simply waiting their turns to play the games.
But, no. Upon further observation, Saucy noted:
This was the part that really
chapped Saucy's hide. The girls scattered about the arcade, standing in long lineups and "holding" spots for their boyfriends. When boyfriend finished the game he was playing, he jumped into his warmed up spot - and directed girlfriend which game to scope out and get a spot for next.
Saucy began to wander the Playdium and did some quick calculations. Approximately 95% of the people playing the games were teenage boys. Approximately 95% of the people standing in line were teenage girls.
And let Saucy just say, the girls were not making the best of it. They did not seem to interact with each other, as in "we're here in a group and this is how it goes, the girls hang out and the boys catch up after they play." The girls looked sad, forlorn and lonely. The closeted-anthropologist that Saucy is was deeply intrigued and she began to study the behaviour in earnest.
The girls did not even seem to know each other. It was apparent that they were there on dates. As in, "hey, would you like to come out with me on the weekend, hold my drink and save me places in line at the arcade?"
Oh, but wait... it gets better: some of the girls also held the boys coats. Thus freeing up their hands for all sorts of high scoring fun.
You guessed it. Catered to their every whim, ran errands for them, fetched them drinks from the concession and even took pictures of them on the more interactive games. Later to be posted on
Facebook one can only assume with a caption like "my man owning this game."
You don't even want to know how wound up Saucy was over this situation. Reminiscent of the great
Kindergarten photo debacle of 1999, her first instinct was to rally the girls to attention by standing on a table
a 'la Sally Field in Norma Rae:
Until she realized that a) although she packs a Sharpie marker on her person at all times, she was lacking the poster board needed to start a simple revolution, right there and then, and;
b) it appeared to be a trend that was more far-reaching that even Saucy could imagine.
Saucy decided that right then and there, a chill was probably going up Gloria Steinem's spine because somehow, this generation of young women is simply allowing boys to get away with this junk. Saucy could feel the chill run up her spine and her only thought was to point the whole mess out to Buddy Budderson in an attempt to thwart this ongoing trend at a grassroots level.
Reader, surely you must be concerned about the denigration of civility and manners between the genders in our youthful population. Even Loopy makes observations about what she sees in school: boys slamming doors in girls' faces, boyfriends loping ahead of their girlfriends who are hobbling on crutches and trying to balance unwieldy backpacks, and the everyday use of words that shouldn't be repeated on a family blog that denigrate women... you get Saucy's drift.
Enough already. Saucy is {this close} to launching some sort of activist program for girls under the age of eighteen to stand up for themselves and say, with baked goods:
"I'm mad as hell and I'm not going to take it anymore!"
Rabble-rousing takes a lot out of Saucy. She needs to replenish with hearty baked goods, and today was no exception. She whipped up two lemon-poppyseed loaves in order to deliver one to Pepper tomorrow as a small condolence for the loss of her Grandma.
You haven't had lemon loaf until you've had Saucy's Lemon Poppyseed Loaf
1/2 cup butter
1 cup sugar
2 eggs at room temperature
1/2 cup milk at room temperature
1 and 1/2 cups flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
grated rind of one lemon
1/4 cup poppy seeds (optional)
save the juice of the lemon
1/4 cup white sugar
Using the whisk attachment on your mixer, cream butter and sugar until fluffy. Add eggs, one at a time, beating well after each addition. Mix in the milk at medium speed until just blended.
Sift together the remaining dry ingredients with the lemon rind and blend into the egg mixture on medium speed. Turn speed to high for about thirty seconds after it is all blended.
Throw in the poppy seeds and stir them in by hand.
Pour batter into a lightly greased loaf pan... a small loaf pan is best here but if you like, this recipe is easily doubled and baked in a longer loaf pan.
Bake at 350 degrees for 45 minutes and test for doneness. The top should be slightly golden with a small crack.
Remove from oven and allow to cool for ten minutes on a rack - in the pan.
In the meantime, stir together the lemon juice (seeds strained out) with the sugar in a saucepan on top of the stove over low heat. When the sugar is completely melted and the mixture has thickened to become a glaze, remove from heat.
Remove the loaf from the pan, set it on the cooling rack and before it is completely cool, use a pastry brush to apply the glaze to the top - and the bottom - of the loaf.
When the loaf is completely cool, use a serrated knife to slice it into lovely equal pieces. It slices up beautifully, or if you need to freeze it, wrap it in a good amount of plastic wrap uncut.
There now, Peeps. Don't we feel better about things already?
For total amplification (which Saucy adores... big hair means you're closer to heaven) try Osis+ Dust It, a chalky powder that can be applied sparingly to your roots when your hair is dry. If flat hair troubles you, a little of this dusting powder does the trick and fluffs up your roots, adding texture and body. Perfect if say, you like to do a little back-combing like Saucy does. Just a note: Loopy doesn't care for the chalky feeling near her scalp so if you think that will bother you, skip this one. But if you struggle with limp or flat roots: go for it.
Since Saucy is really struggling with feeling like her hair is thinning right now, she was thrilled to find that Living Proof haircare is now being sold at Sephora. This whole line smells just delicious and the Full Thickening Cream applied to slightly damp hair before blowdrying works wonders adding a nice thickening effect without feeling greasy or adding any buildup. A little goes a long way with this stuff, so get the small bottle. 
Saucy's loving every single morsel of these Praeventia mini granola bites. After sampling them at Costco, she thought it would be the Cherry & Pomegranate to crave but the Apple & Almond is absolutely yummy. The best part? It's not just that they're only 100 calories each, or that they're sweetened with natural agave extract... it's the dark chocolate and red wine extract.