Dear Apple, give me my life back.

My iBook has been stuck in Memphis for a week, with a necessary part on hold.

This machine was manufactured in mid-2005. WHY THE HELL would it take THIS LONG for a part to be located? Was there a run on power ports? Logic boards?

I want my iBook, dammit. My email is piling up and I can't keep up with any of my internet addictions. Sure, I have other things to do, but I was researching stuff I need, like cloth diapering. I have pictures to edit, lists/groups to moderate, and time to waste. Tom's about to come in here and start work for the day, plus his workstation is really uncomfortable, anyhow.

mmm, chocolate

I normally only buy really good chocolate. I prefer Michel Cluizel, which is fairly hard to find. I'll happily eat Art Bar, Hachez, or Weiss, though. That said, the Whole Foods imported Swiss organic line isn't too bad. The bars are sorta the Hershey's of the good chocolate world. They're soy-free, though, which puts them several steps above all those pretenders who cheat. Lately, a few new bars have shown up at my local WFM.

The Whole Foods organic dark chocolate bar with mint "crisps" tastes kinda like a Thin Mint Girl Scout cookie. Yum. I have to eat it sparingly, since chocolate and mint are horrid for reflux. Still, though, soy-free and gluten-free yumminess!

The milk chocolate bar with crispy rice is also good. And it's brown rice, so we know the bar has to be ten kinds of healthy and stuff. Yep.

My local WFM also sells roasted cocoa nibs. Yes, they came home with me. Yes, they're tasty. They're great with sultanas. I expect they'll join my trail mix.

Other soy-free chocolate bought recently:
Theo. Boy loves the dark chocolate, including the limited edition 91% cacao bar from Venezuelan sourced chocolate. I believe Theo is all fair-trade, too. I've had the milk chocolate chai (spiced) bar, which was pretty good.

Don Puglisi. I've had a few of the Modicana Chocolate bars (vanilla, cinnamon). These are wonderful bars--very rustic, without a smooth temper. They're heavy and full of sugar granules. Very nice. These should make a wonderful drinking chocolate when melted into milk or water.

In other chocolatey news, I really like the Yachana nibs with macademia nuts I bought. No melting! Lives in the car! Yay!