After years of lusting after Gavin’s fine old Portland house, with its spacious, clean kitchen and bright hardwood floors, I have finally established residence there. Apparently Gavin has long thought about inviting Thomas and I to move in, but he is a long-term thinker… it took much poking and prodding to finally get a stack of paperwork that ended with a very reasonable rent and a bright shiny room. For once I’m not the most OCD person around (I should say ‘for twice’, as I expect my mom could contend with Gavin and myself for neatest).

And already I’ve made liberal use of the kitchen: first Gavin ran into some computer trouble, and to soothe his broken robot heart, we made (supposedly violet-infused) cupcakes. Mainly they tasted like chocolate souffle, or how I imagine such an egg-based concoction would taste like, all melty and gooey. Basically a fluffy, warm ganache. I had two, plus liberal lickings, over the course of the afternoon, and despite being sweetened with agave nectar, I was buzzing around with the most tremendous sugar-high I have ever had. My head was fizzing like soda pop and I was rolling on the floor spouting silly nonsense when Gavin and Thomas sent me outside to run around the block. Several times. What a rush! What a headache…

Thanks to Twitter, when Gavin’s friend Suz came over for dinner, she already knew I was the one jacked up on sugar. Fortunately I was calm enough not to make a fool of myself by way of introduction, and we hit it off right away. We made the most wonderful pair of Indian dishes, full of spices without the heaviness of North-Indian curry sauces. Chickpea, eggplant, spinach stew, and spiced cauliflower and potatoes. It was wonderful having all of us working together in the kitchen, producing a scrumptious dinner and great conversation. I even have another job opportunity, using my OCD powers to help Suz organize her basement! Is helping people find bliss in clean, beautiful environments design? Does this count as making the world a better place?

This morning I made pattypan muffins from a summer squash I found down the street — thank you, free piles! I basically took this recipe and used pattypan puree, nixing the spices, and using a processed combination of rolled oats, shredded coconut, and Bob’s Red Mill gluten-free mix in place of standard flour (250 grams’ worth). I was also super-cool and made my own baking powder out of bicarb and cream of tartar. The end result of this ridiculous experiment? Scrumptious! Even has Thomas’s seal of approval! And you know it’s good when he turned down a bacony invitation to quit his “vegetarian at home” experiment with hardly a hint of regret in his voice — all that muffin in the way, you see. Got that? These muffins beat bacon.

Okay, so it wasn’t a fair fight. But as I try to cobble enough income together to scratch the surface of my monthly expenses, a muffin (or two) topped with jam is darned comforting.