I'm getting my chocolate molds back!!

I had loaned my chocolate molds to a chocolatier friend, because I wasn’t using them, but he dug them out of storage at my request and I’ll be able to play with them over Thanksgiving! These are really cool”¦not your usual cheap plastic molds that bend out of shape, these are the chocolate molds that professional chocolatiers use””solid, hard plastic, and damn near indestructible. I haven’t used them for years because they’re also rather fussy and require much more attention be paid to the chocolate, but since I’m doing smaller batches of chocolate this year I might be able to use them again. I’m really looking forward to it!

I’m really enjoying this year’s round of candymaking. Normally I pile everything up into four frenzied days at Thanksgiving””nothing but chocolate morning, noon, and night””and wind up being completely exhausted at the end of it all. This year, I’m doing it in stages, so all I should have left to do by Thanksgiving will be the truffles. Granted that truffles are still quite a bit of work, it’ll still be easier having all the other candies done up, put in little candy cups, and prepacked to save time later. I also have a few “extra” weekends so I can try some more exotic stuff””like, cinnamon candied orange peel? Quince fudge? Lots of ideas, so little time. Life is so short.

I’m getting started on interviewing a fresh batch of people for my book on AIDS Lifecycle. I don’t have quite enough stories at the moment, so I’m finding people who rode in AIDS Lifecycle 3 and interviewing them to get their stories. I’m still incredibly nervous about it””I wish I were writing about goldfish or computer manuals or some ordinary topic. It’s such a magnificent subject””and so personal for the people involved””that I don’t see how I can possibly do it justice. I’m amazed people ever manage to write books at all.

Fortunately, things *are* starting to get a little easier. Some days I even feel like I could do this.