In an attempt to keep up my momentum today, I waited until J got home from work and went to Target to pick up a new vaccuum cleaner. Ours was eaten about a month ago by the Demons Of Dog Hair, and upon the recommendation of several of my cleaner friends, I’d decided to splurge a bit in the vaccuum department and get something that was made for The Pet Hair Of Dooom (insert ominous-sounding music here).

I’d thought I’d pick up a different model of Dyson, one of the upper-level, sell-your-kidney-to-science-to-pay-for-it models, but when I got to the store, they were running a promotion on the little baby pictured above. It’s not top of the line, but it’s still a Dyson (and has a five-year warranty), and it’s PINK. Not only am I kind of a fan of pink, but Dyson is donating $40 to the Breast Cancer Reasearch Fund with every purchase. So I’m getting rid of my dog hair AND I’m helping women everywhere to have healthier breasts. I’m all for healthy breasts, since my own aren’t so healthy. (That’s a story for another day, though.)

Of course, I immediately came home, assembled it, and started vacuuming everything in the house. No surface with dust or hair is now safe — it even has an attachment that will work to brush and vacuum the dog hair…directly off the dog. This makes me happier than I really want to admit to anyone other than y’all. (I just keep imagining there are a handful of close friends out there reading this with me. So I’m talking to you.)

Also in the wifely “Exceedingly Geeky But Happy” department of purchasing, I thought I’d spend my 30% off coupon at Borders bookstore on another knitting book (my library is insane…), but I thought I’d look through the domestic arts types of sections in an attempt to further this Wife Project a little. Normally, I hit the magazines and the crafty-type area, and maybe get some coffee, but I found the cookbook sections today.

As I wandered into the aisle, my eye caught something a few shelves down that made me squeal a little. I wish I could say it had been an under the breath kind of squeal, too…but it wasn’t. I scared people in the diet section, the next aisle over.

What I found was this:

The Cooky Book, by the Betty Crocker Editors.

Seriously.

When I was growing up, my mom had this book.  The original, 1973 version, with the color inserts and the vintagey-looking recipes with the letterpress-type flourishes and illustrations and all.  I used to sit there at the kitchen table — the impeccably clean and dressed kitchen table, with its matching placemats and seasonal floral arrangements and not a speck of dust on the counters — and go through this book page by page, picking the things I would bake as soon as my mom would help me.  Our family’s favorite EVER sugar cookie recipe comes from this book, which I’d thought was out of print.  Apparently, the Betty Crocker folks brought it back this year, and is publishing it in its original form.  It even looks the same on the inside!

I beat tracks getting to the counter, clutching it to my chest like I’d found an abandoned puppy or something, and paid so quickly that I forgot to use my coupon.

I’m forseeing lots of cookys (sic) in my near future.  Which, of course, won’t help with the getting-in-shape part of my goals, but will definitely help me get in the kitchen more often, and has that whole Fifties Housewife feel about it.

I’ll make sure to take pictures.  If I’m not too busy baking or vacuuming, that is.