frothy

I went up this morning for my blood draw, and it took 7 sticks for the poor techs to finally find a vein they could draw from. Note: there's a nice juncture of veins about an inch or so below the elbow crease, towards the inside of the arm. It's where the tech finally drew from me, after the vein in my hand blew out and my ankles were rejected(!). He told me this is a good spot to hit something because there's so much going on there, and if I ran into this problem again to suggest it.

After that ordeal, I went to the mall and exchanged the necklace for beautiful diamond stud earrings. I will wear them every day. That makes me happy.

Then I schmoozed around a bit and replaced the Christmas things that DD had broken (her stocking hanger, and the pickle ornament), at deep discount. Yay! good timing, too, because there were not many stocking holders left. Then I picked out new calendars for the kids (Star Wars, Strawberry Shortcake, and William Wegman puppies) and me (overize antique botanical prints).

Then I had lunch at California Pizza Kitchen. I had never been there before, so I plunked myself down at the bar and had an awesome salad and then these little crispy things they call "tortilla spring rolls", which were insanely delicious. And then I splurged and got a cafe mocha for dessert, which brings us 'round, finally, to the topic at hand.

The waitress made my mocha with a ton of froth, and it was so delicious and had such a lovely texture, it inspired me. After dinner, I excavated my own ancient Krups Il Primo from the way-back kitchen cupboard. Further rummaging on high shelves turned up the carafe and the steaming pitcher. A bit of searching in my old file cabinet turned up the instruction manual, and we were in business.



This isn't exactly the same model, but it's about what mine cost, and has the same features. It is a bit of a fuss, but not too much of one, and it makes a fine, fine cup of espresso, and froths quite well, too. My Il Primo is at least 12 years old now, and I haven't used it in at least 5 years -- you'd never know. I'd forgotten how wonderful my own capuccino could be.

Silly, I know -- but it's almost like I got another Christmas present today.