It was a nice place. Lots of pros and cons. Tons of beautiful young men. Relatively smog-free. Beautiful mountains. Not a whole lot to do after 9pm. Tons of beautiful skinny women. Horrible post office service.
My first bad experience with the post office came on my 18th birthday. It was my first year of college and I was living in the dorms. I was incredibly homesick. I was so excited for my birthday because I knew I would get something from home. Except... when the day actually came, my mailbox stayed empty.
What had happened? Had they forgotten about me? Didn't they love me? I was officially an adult and living a billion miles away from home and my parents hadn't even sent me a card!
I spent a good hour bawling my eyes out that night. My poor boyfriend must have felt like a failure.
The card came the next day, along with a nice present. Turns out my parents had sent it with plenty of time to get there before my birthday. Provo just doesn't care about efficient mail delivery, so it got there late.
I lived the next four years in acceptance of slow postal service. I made do. I expected slow deliveries and worked around that schedule.
But this time they have gone TOO FAR.
I mean, okay Provo. I know you are out to make my life miserable. You have largely been unsuccessful due to my determination to enjoy the simple pleasures a small city has to offer. Like being friends with my neighbors. And lots of deer all over my campus. Singing along with my friends for half an hour to whatever is being blasted on the stereo while we drive half an hour for something exciting. Walks at night with no fear of being attacked.
But did you really need to go and stop delivering my mail?
This is what happened. One day a week or two ago I got a call from my gas company telling me that my bill had been returned to them because I didn't live at that address anymore. Hmm, I thought to myself. That would explain why I got just one graduation card (thanks Emily!), missed a bunch of packages from my mom, didn't get that letter from MKW, and stopped getting paystubs and credit card bills. I called the gas company to confirm my address and they said they would try to send out the bill again.
I went to the Post Office during my lunch break. After standing in line for about twenty minutes because there was only one clerk working, I find out that the post office has me as "Moved--Left No Address." And I had been listed that way since mid-February.
Are you kidding me?
The clerk asked if I had gone on vacation.
Nope.
Had I not picked up my mail for ten days or more?
No.
Even if I had done one of those things, I have three roommates who get the mail, also.
I hadn't realized something was wrong because I was used to flaky service and I was still getting some mail. So who knows what all else I haven't gotten!
My gas bill still hasn't come. So today I called the PO again and some lady told me that somebody would call me during the next business day to talk to me about it.
Grr.
This morning when I checked the mail I found a medieval museum replica catalog addressed to somebody in apartment 8. We do not live in apartment 8.
Our poor mailman is apparently having a hard time.
I'm sorry to be so negative.
Here's a really yummy cake recipe to make up for it! My mother posted it on her blog a couple of days ago. Once we discovered it last summer, there wasn't a week that went by when my parents didn't ask me to bake it! It's delectable!
This recipe is taken from David Lebovitz's book Room for Dessert. Elizabeth made it last summer and we thought it delicious. Lebovitz calls for huckleberries, but we substituted blackberries. Any berries but strawberries may be used.
Plum Berry Upside-Down Cake
(1 9"round cake or 1 10"square cake)
Preheat oven to 350 deg. with rack in the middle.
The dessert is best served warm.
Topping:
3 Tbls. butter
3/4 cup light brown sugar
1 cup berries (blueberries can be used, also)
6-8 medium plums, about 1#
Melt butter in a cake pan, directly on the stove top over low heat. Add the brown sugar and stir until sugar is thoroughly moistened. Remove from heat and cool briefly.
Sprinkle half the berries evenly over the moistened brown sugar. Cut the plums in half, remove the pits and cut the plum halves into 1/2" slices. Arrange the slices over the berries in a concentric, overlapping circle. You may also scatter them evenly. Strew the rest of the berries over the plum slices.
Cake:
1 stick butter at room temperature
3/4 cup sugar
1 tsp. vanilla
2 eggs
1 1/2 cup flour
1 1/2 tsp. baking powder
1/4 tsp. salt
1/2 cup milk at room temperature
Beat together the butter and sugar until light and fluffy, 3 to 5 minutes in a stand mixer. Stop the mixer once and scarpe down the sides of the bowl to make sure the butter is completely incorporated. Add the vanilla.
Beat in eggs, one at a time, until completely incorporated.
In a separate bowl, sift together the flour, baking powder and salt. Mix half of the flour mixture into the batter. Stir the milk into the batter, add the remaining dry ingredients and stir just until smooth; do not overmix. The batter will be quite thick.
Carefully spead the batter over the fruit in the cake pan, smoothing with a spatula. Bake the upside-cake for about 1 hour, until the top is golden brown and a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean.
Let the cake stand at least 20 minutes before unmolding. Run a knife around the edge of the cake to loosen it from the pan. Invert a serving plate over the cake and carefully flip over both cake and plate simultaneously. Lift off the cake pan and scrape any fruit that may have stuck to the pan back onto the cake.
Serve with whipped cream or ice cream.
Plum Berry Upside-Down Cake
(1 9"round cake or 1 10"square cake)
Preheat oven to 350 deg. with rack in the middle.
The dessert is best served warm.
Topping:
3 Tbls. butter
3/4 cup light brown sugar
1 cup berries (blueberries can be used, also)
6-8 medium plums, about 1#
Melt butter in a cake pan, directly on the stove top over low heat. Add the brown sugar and stir until sugar is thoroughly moistened. Remove from heat and cool briefly.
Sprinkle half the berries evenly over the moistened brown sugar. Cut the plums in half, remove the pits and cut the plum halves into 1/2" slices. Arrange the slices over the berries in a concentric, overlapping circle. You may also scatter them evenly. Strew the rest of the berries over the plum slices.
Cake:
1 stick butter at room temperature
3/4 cup sugar
1 tsp. vanilla
2 eggs
1 1/2 cup flour
1 1/2 tsp. baking powder
1/4 tsp. salt
1/2 cup milk at room temperature
Beat together the butter and sugar until light and fluffy, 3 to 5 minutes in a stand mixer. Stop the mixer once and scarpe down the sides of the bowl to make sure the butter is completely incorporated. Add the vanilla.
Beat in eggs, one at a time, until completely incorporated.
In a separate bowl, sift together the flour, baking powder and salt. Mix half of the flour mixture into the batter. Stir the milk into the batter, add the remaining dry ingredients and stir just until smooth; do not overmix. The batter will be quite thick.
Carefully spead the batter over the fruit in the cake pan, smoothing with a spatula. Bake the upside-cake for about 1 hour, until the top is golden brown and a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean.
Let the cake stand at least 20 minutes before unmolding. Run a knife around the edge of the cake to loosen it from the pan. Invert a serving plate over the cake and carefully flip over both cake and plate simultaneously. Lift off the cake pan and scrape any fruit that may have stuck to the pan back onto the cake.
Serve with whipped cream or ice cream.
2 comments:
that cake looks really good. sorry about the post office. i remember really slow mail when i lived in provo. it's a little better where we are now, but we still get other people's mail a lot of the time. it makes me wonder what mail of ours is going to our neighbors, adn if all of it eventually makes it to us. i hope your mail gets fixed soon - just in time for you to move. sigh.
Our Green Gage plums are just beginning to ripen; think I'll make that dessert Tuesday for dinner.
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