Personal

It was surprisingly sorrowful to learn yesterday that Martin Gardner died Saturday, 22 May, at age 95. Like many, many others, I was exposed to the joys of mathematics and serious study of games by his columns in Scientific American magazine when I was a teenager. His books (over 70) are still a magnet for impulse purchases whenever I am in a bookstore.

What a gift to share the joy of analytic thinking and playful mathematics and logic!

Farewell.

J. Randi (2010), "MY WORLD IS A LITTLE DARKER…", http://www.randi.org/site/index.php/swift-blog/995-my-world-is-a-little-darker.html

"Scholars and Others Pay Tribute to "Mathematical Games" Columnist Martin Gardner", http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=scholars-and-others-pay-t

P. Yam (2010), "Profile: Martin Gardner, the Mathematical Gamester (1914-2010)", http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=profile-of-martin-gardner

There is only one sitcom I'm watching now and its Better off Ted. This show is a wickedly funny sendup of corporate America. It is a total hoot from start to finish.



It is also being abused by ABC who are exiling the show to ratings hell with malicious scheduling...



If you don't want 10 more years of reality TV, save quality, but not serious, television.

A great episode from last season had the company saving money by using motion sensors to turn out the lights when no one was present. Unfortunately, the sensors did not sense black people (kind of like the news today).

...SPOILER ALERT - So, the company hired a bunch of white people to follow its black employees around... total hysterical madness.

Lego Brownie Wedding Cake.

7-Layer Lego Brownie Wedding Cake.

7-Layer Lego Brownie Wedding Cake topped with Indiana Jones and Marion Ravenwood (Karen Allen).




On this past Saturday, 5 September 2009, Eleanor Lewis and I were married at the beautiful San Mateo County History Museum. We were each "given away" by our parents, Alison and Sherman Lewis and Anita and Richard Davis. Our wedding party included Victoria Foster (writer, screenwriter, director, producer), Annabelle Chern (psychiatrist), Joe Price (attorney), David Heberling (airline pilot) and Cheryl Campbell (creator of amazing custom baby gates and pet gates), Kathleen Peterson (poet and professor), our junior bridesmaids (a category I didn't know existed until this summer) Amelia Davis Del Piccolo and Nicole Bakar, Jacqui Chang was our Master of Ceremonies, and the Rev. Robbie Cranch officiated. We had great food from Cafe NS (Nathan Schmidt), awesome photography by Andrew Kercher, a wonderful harpist, Shawna Spiteri, flowers by Harmonious Arrangements and Gifts (Marianne Parlette), great music and (unexpectedly wonderful child entertainment) from DJ Dave Patterson, and super logistics support from AM Rentals (Arnold Morales) and, finally, superb photo wrangling by my sister, Pam Bakar.

And a 7-Layer Lego Brownie Wedding Cake topped with Indiana Jones and Marion Ravenwood (Karen Allen).

Which happened almost purely by accident.

When Eleanor and I became engaged on 31 December 2009, we fairly rapidly moved towards planning our wedding and became immersed in the madness that is the Wedding Industrial Complex. Our wedding had to be scheduled after August 8th since Eleanor's brother Sherman (IV) was getting married to Alexandria on that date.

One thing we agreed on quite strongly was that we hated traditional wedding cakes. They often taste awful (fondant, the stuff that allows all of those crazy decorations) and are usually appallingly expensive (and some caterers charge cutting fees per slice, though ours, Cafe NS led by Nathan Schmidt, did not).

... on a whim, I suggested that we have a 10-Layer Brownie Cake with Godzilla on top... the concept being some sort of skyscraper being attacked or some such by our hero Godzilla... but it was all pretty vague.

Surprisingly, Eleanor did not call the whole thing off, but agreed.

... and we put the whole "cake thing" aside while we proceeded to plan the rest of the wedding... a task that seems to grow to consume all of the time that you have and beyond.

August rolled around and we were still in the concept stage of the cake.

Time to get serious.

The first problem was - How to create a absurdly multi-layer cake. I thought about PVC pipe, pieces of wood, etc. We did look at the standard cake risers, but they were rather expensive (if you are going to have a lot of layers).... after much thought, Legos sprang to mind... which seemed both inexpensive and fun.

... off to the Lego Store, where they have buckets and buckets of assorted Lego parts. So, I bought a large, custom bucket (around $15) of suitable bricks and stumbled upon the Indiana Jones Lego Minifigs in a small set with Indiana Jones, Marion Ravenwood, and Dr. Jones (Indiana's father).

Good bye, Godzilla. Hello, George Lucas and Stephen Spielberg. (and, probably, a lot of relief for Eleanor)

I did note that there was a set with Indiana in a tuxedo (which could have been appropriate for a wedding), but without the hat and whip, no one would have known who he was.

Testing - Phase 1: The first question was whether the Legos could work as a structural element in a cake. My test was to create my columns out of 9 high brick stacks and stack up books.

8 Layers, no problem.

With some big hardbacks (Harry Potter, the Bible, some cookbooks, etc.).

We thought we had solved the hard problem.

Next, the brownies.

Testing Phase 2: Hey, we were going to make brownies, we thought we should get some good ones. Eleanor offered to make some from scratch (as she is a serious cook), which we did, but we also tasted a wide range of mixes.

We suffered through around 8 different brownie mixes.

And went with Trader Joe's Brownie Truffle Mix. Eleanor purchased 6 packages as we thought we would have a traditional pyramidal structure and so would meet our initial objective of 8 layers (don't ask me why we decided on 8 layers once we abandoned Godzilla).

Along the way, we had spent a fair amount of time looking for cardboard cake sheets and finally found a number of 8 inch round ones.

Wednesday, 2 September - The Baking Begins

Since I am blessed (or cursed) with a consulting job that allows me to work at home (or not work at home), I had the time to begin the grand baking project. 2 Brownie batches on Wednesday. I had made most, but not all, of the test batches, so I was used to adding some water, oil, and an egg to the mix.

Not with Trader Joe's Brownie Truffle Mix.

2 Eggs and 1 STICK of Butter!

(Time to go to the store for extra butter... though we keep a fair amount of butter around for cooking, we don't keep 2 pounds in the fridge).

I had the ingredients for the initial batch, so I mix things up, throw them in the oven, set the timer... get on with work and pop them out when the timer goes off at the minimum time.

They look done.

I swear.

The recipe also calls for you to leave them in the pan for 30 minutes, so I figure, SURELY, they will be done by then.

I do not do THE TOOTHPICK TEST (go ahead, laugh now).

When I try to take them out of pan... (small) disaster.

The first one cracks in the middle (annoying, not fatal).

The second one's middle dissolves into a pile of chocolaty goo.

Quite tasty, but not suitable for a wedding cake.

My confidence as a chef collapses with the second brownie pan.

Eleanor consoles me.

Thursday, 3 September

No baking or cake activities.

Friday, 4 September

Confidence somewhat restored.

Eleanor and I bake the brownies together. She DOES the toothpick test and we make the remaining batches. Eleanor also makes an extra batch of brownies from scratch (total, 7).

We busily do all of those other last minute wedding things. We think we are in good shape as we move on to the rehearsal and rehearsal dinner. We have a bit of trouble printing out our programs on my laser printer, but, we go to the Copy Shop just before they close for Labor Day, they graciously do a great job of printing the invitations

We get home and collapse.

Saturday, 5 September - 'W' Day

Eleanor and I think things are under control. We do some last minute prep. Eleanor goes off for Hair & Makeup. I think I've got "Tons of Time" to put together the cake. I'd been a pretty hardcore Lego kid (cough - more than 30 years ago, long before Bionicles and such).

What could go wrong?

So, I start putting together the top of the cake at 12:30 (I am planning to be at the venue at 3).

Plenty of time.

The top went together quite well. I'd gone back to the Lego Store and picked up a bunch of extra pieces (lots of white and some columns). I wanted to keep the "Lego-ness" of the whole thing, but still look nice.

1 PM... Structural assembly begins.

We had discussed just cutting holes for the vertical columns to support the layers, but Eleanor and I settled on pre-cutting the brownies. This allowed us to place the columns easily and made serving a snap.

Problem 1. 2 Eggs and Butter.

There was a lot of oil in the brownies. They are rich and tasty and rich.

Oil is not easy on cardboard from a structural perspective.

Fortunately, I started with the really moist (OK, least done)... remember the brownie with a (tasty) hole in the middle?

I used it to make a smaller top brownie layer of only 8 pieces (smaller 1x1s).

Whew!

The next problem, and one that I didn't solve, was that I had to cut the cardboard bases down to size for each layer.

I couldn't get the edges very neat, though apparently I was the only one who noticed (much).

So, my groomsman Joe came over, helped with the wrapping of the cake layers (each one had the columns to support the next layer up) and stacking them in boxes to take to the wedding.

I showered, dressed, headed to the wedding, off we went.

Everything went off without a hitch.

We cut the cake with my Dad's ceremonial sword from the Navy.

... everyone loved the brownies.

And, the most frequently asked question was...

Who is the girl figure on the cake?

Karen Allen

... oh, ya.

If you were there and have more pictures, please email me!!!