The Ultimate

I've spent many a moment standing in the pasta aisle, staring at the wide assortments of pasta and having an internal debate as vicious and vigorous as Hillary vs. Barak. Oh, the things to contemplate when it comes to pasta. Egg noodles or semolina noodles? Quinoa noodles or whole wheat noodles? Store brand or "imported" brand? Organic or genetically modified? Cheap or more expensive? Most of these are a moot point when at Trader Joe's, but let's leave them out of this. Because the biggest debate of them all is - what is the ultimate noodle shape? My pasta book makes various arguments about surface area vs the types of sauce you are using, etc. etc. But I have never been convinced that ziti noodles make my chunky homemade Bolognese sauce taste better or richer, so I give them all an equal platform on which to impress me. I can now say, with unequivocal certainty, that I declare the elusive pinwheel pasta the best-in-class! Many other pastas are slippery and can be difficult to get many on your fork at one time while chunks of meet often find their way to the bottom of the bowl. Not with the pinwheel! Easy to load up, easy to eat, and easy to re-heat - just don't overcook them! Please, hold your applause and thank me later for this tip. Try it yourself - the Pasta Challenge.

In completely unrelated news, I spent the last three days doing two things: recovering from another bout of the cold (thanks to the changing weather everyday) and dreaming about the new keyboard that I ordered that arrived at my office on Friday, when I was home sick. And by keyboard, yes you guessed it, I mean computer keyboard, not the kind that requires coordination and that emits waves that our eardrums translate into music. Unless you consider the clatter of fingers on hard plastic to be music (as I do). Anyway, my new Logitech Wave keyboard arrived to give my hands some much needed respite from repetitive motions during my work day. And this keyboard is gorgeous (yes I was complimented on it by several people today, who will probably steal it out of envy)! And comfortable (oooh)! And ergonomic (ahhhh)! And quiet (gaaasp)! Yes I did think about this keyboard pretty much all weekend and would like to add the wireless Wave keyboard/mouse combination to my Christmas list for my home computer! Well, along with the hands-free Logitech blue-tooth headset that I can use for Skype! Or scrap it all and buy me an iPhone :)

J. Riley, I also spent part of Saturday rock-climbing in a gym downtown with volunteers and kids. I didn't climb due to forearm/hand issues and my cold, but I did spend an awful lot of the time thinking about that keyboard while the kids were flying up the walls with ease!