I have one guilty pleasure above all others: Chocolate Chip Cookies. There’s just something about the buttery dough and the interlaced chocolate and the…excuse me, my keyboard just shorted out from too much drooling.

I’m more of a chewy-cookie-fiend, though I’ve never turned away a crispy. I like them warm and choose not to destroy their integrity with dunking in milk (ugh! – though don’t tell my wife that I judge her on her dunking habits). Thicker is better than thinner. Milk chocolate is fine, dark is better, and white is an insult to the great-cookie-baker in the sky.

The best, bow-down chocolate chip cookies come from Specialty’sBakery (semi-sweet). They have something in there that’s derived from crack (you CAN’T stop eating them), and they’re baked in some Sci-Fi manner (how do they stay warm and gooey for HOURS?). These are the treats I allow myself after hitting a major milestone or a particularly hard day, because anything this decadent cannot be ethical.

My wife makes a ruddy good chocolate chip cookie too – which was a secret criterion of my wife-selection-checklist, since I’m not much of a baker. What I love is that (1) it makes 10-11 dozen (aka cookies for a year!!) and (2) with all the oatmeal/nuts/n’stuff they’ve got a texture that’s beyond-compare.

Here is her recipe *(not responsible for any weight gain you experience by reading onward):

1 pound butter

2 cups granulated sugar

2 cups brown sugar

4 eggs

2 teaspoons vanilla

2 teaspoons baking powder

2 teaspoons baking soda

4 ¼ cups flour

4 cups uncooked oatmeal

3 cups walnuts (or pecans, if you’re feeling southern)

2 x 12 oz bag of chocolate chips

1. Cream butter and sugar
2. Add eggs and vanilla, beat well.
3. Mix together baking powder, baking soda, and flour; then mix into sugar mixture
4. Sit in oatmeal, nuts, and chocolate chips
5. Make golf ball-sized dough balls (~ 2” diameter)
6. Place on ungreased cookie sheet and flatten.
7. Bake ~8 minutes @ 375^o
8. Transfer to cooling rack

Anyhow, I’m way too hungry to keep blogging. I need to go find the wife.

Honey, where are you?

Any of y’all have a smashing chocolate cookie recipe you wanna share?

Filling in this week for Veronica while she is on tour (I hope some of you have gotten a chance to meet her) is a wonderfully charming and talented debut author, Corrine Jackson.  She has not one, but two books headed our way this fall.  I was lucky enough to get my hands on an early copy of IF I LIE, and it blew me away (more on that in couple months).  So without further ado, I give you Corrine:

Guilty Pleasures

In December, my German publisher asked if I would make personalized cards for some promo kits they were sending out to bloggers. I happily agreed and made my way to Paper Source, a haven for people who want to decorate paper, wrap things in paper, or make things out of paper. I thought to buy some cards, handwrite some notes and be done with it. Instead, I walked around the store, wide-eyed and bemused by a sudden urge to take up origami and book binding, though neither activity had appealed to me before that moment. Sure I was in the grip of a paper-induced fever, I picked up a rubber stamp – one stamp, mind you – and my blank cards and prepared to buy my items. Then, it happened. A girl stopped to give me a demonstration of embossing with rubber stamps and embossing powder. 

MIND. BLOWN.

Needless to say, I exited the store with $150 worth of cards, stamps, embossing powder, a watermark inkpad and the very special dryer that magically melts the embossing powder. I went home and the paper euphoria cleared. But I set aside my buyer’s remorse and got to work. For four hours, I stamped and embossed. And the whole time I tried to convince myself that I wasn’t having fun because I suddenly felt like somebody’s scrapbooking Aunt Marge. Clearly, the writing deadlines were getting to me.

I decided to chalk up that day to insanity. Except I kept looking at the pretty embossed cards and remembering how relaxed I felt working on them. With my book deadline fast approaching, I needed to focus, though. I had no room for distractions. So of course, by the next week I’d ended up at TWO different craft stores where I purchased more stamps and supplies than a sane person could use. I’ve embossed cards and journals. I’ve recently confessed my new hobby to a friend, and it went like this.

“What did you do Friday night?”

“Bought stamps,” I confessed.

“Stamps,” she repeated.

I hung my head. “Kari, I stamp now. It’s a thing.” 

“Please tell me you mean collecting stamps because that would be so much cooler.”

“Do you even know me? Nope. I’ve taken up scrapbooking’s better looking cousin.”

“Nerd.”

I’ve since spread the embossing sickness to my sister, buying her the equipment and teaching her how to do it. I actually let loose with a battle cry of “STAMP!!” when we went to the craft store. What can I say? It relaxes me, and I am compiling a crap-load of custom-designed journals to give people. I get to be creative, while taking a break from writing. Minimal mess and commitment with maximum output. At least this is what I tell myself when I look around at all my supplies and wonder when I became this person who stamps things. If you would also like to catch this sickness, go here to see examples. [http://www.paper-source.com/cgi-bin/paper/howto/rubber-stamping-recipes.html]

Thanks to the YA Muses for having me!

Corrine Jackson lives in San Francisco, where she works at a top marketing agency managing campaigns for several Fortune 500 clients. She has bachelor and master degrees in English, and an MFA in Creative Writing from Spalding University. Visit her at CorrineJackson.com or on Twitter at @Cory_Jackson.

IF I LIE:

A dramatic and powerful novel that explores the gray space between truth and perception.

Cheater. Traitor. Slut.

Quinn’s done the unthinkable: she kissed a guy who is not Carey, her boyfriend. And she got caught. Shunned by everyone she knows, Quinn loses her friends, her reputation, and her identity. Because Carey’s not just any guy—he’s a Marine who’s serving overseas, and beloved by everyone in their small, military town.

But Quinn didn’t cheat. She could clear her name, but that would mean revealing secrets she’s vowed to keep—secrets that aren’t hers to share. So she stays silent, and waits for Carey to come home.
Then Carey goes MIA, and Quinn must decide how far she’ll go to protect her boyfriend…and her promise.

Maybe I'm shameless, because I know I should feel guilty, but I am not ashamed of my guilty pleasures.  Nope.  My guilty pleasures are just my pleasures.  And while there are probably more productive things I could do with my time, like I don't know, work 60 hours a week or write a novel or something, I am still a sucker for escapist entertainment.  And I don't mind saying so.

When I was a teen, I read everything ever written by Jackie Collins.  Those books had glamor, sex and scandal, and I ate it up.  My creative writing professor in college kept commenting that all my stories were about people who were rich or beautiful or both.  And I remember thinking, so?  Jackie Collins knew what Hollywood casting directors have known for decades: glamor sells.  And it wasn't like their lives were perfect, they had problems, deep dark secrets from their pasts that came back to haunt them at the worst possible moments. There were things to learn from these books. Sometimes my stories are big, over the top even, but hopefully, they are entertaining.

Later, I developed a taste for regency romance novels.  Give me a handsome man with a title and heart of gold beneath that roguish exterior and I am in.  Yep, I love me some British lords.  You won't have to look far to find this influence in my writing.  The love interest in Spies is based on Mr. Darcy, and there is a hot (and possibly titled) British boy in both Silver and its sequel.

Eventually I stumbled on the guilty pleasure of all guilty pleasures- the Twilight series. I loved the first book especially.  I read it through in one weekend, and then immediately bought the rest of the series and consumed it in a week. I have no idea if the writing was any good or not. I analyzed nothing and just let the story carry me through. This is what every writer should strive for, not perfect prose or airtight plotting, but a story with characters that reach people on an emotional level and makes them part of your world.  Whether you loved it or hated it, there's no question that Twilight resonated with a lot of readers.

Lest you think my love of escapist entertainment is limited to books, I can assure you that I am an equal opportunity escapist.  I love reality shows like Survivor and American Idol, cheesy musical drama like Glee and Smash,and romantic comedies, especially when accompanied by large tubs of buttered popcorn.

Like Katy, I don't think I'll mind if readers consider my books to be guilty pleasures.  I want people to be entertained.  I just hope they don't feel too guilty.

I don't.

I love it when a reviewer calls GILT a guilty pleasure.  I didn't intend to write it that way.  But there's something deliciously decadent about such a pleasure.  The term indicates something we should feel badly about - guilty - but in reality, it makes us feel better.  Like Donna's naps.  A guilty pleasure is a good thing because it brings delight, relief, escape.  Maybe it gives us a reason to laugh at ourselves.

Like my first guilty pleasure this week.  I don't watch a lot of TV.  In fact, our television does not receive signals.  At all.  No cable.  No bunny ears.  No Netflix.  Nothing.  We have a DVD player that we use sometimes to play discs we check out of the library.  Mostly, we read.

Which is why I have this hidden guilty pleasure.  Sometimes, when I'm alone in the house, I watch Hulu. And not just any program.  I watch SMASH.  The concept hooked me right away -- musical theater, backstage shenanigans, and Marilyn Monroe?  Sign me up!  I missed a few episodes while I was revising (damn that Hulu Plus), but that didn't really matter.  I watch for the stage numbers.  For the schmaltzy sentimental soap opera.  For the character interactions.  Yeah, but mostly for the theater.  It's probably the closest I'll ever get to backstage Broadway, to seeing how a script is put into production, to imagine.

(Side note: the only other show I ever watch on Hulu is Grey's Anatomy.  Those writers really know how to raise the stakes.  Plus, I always feel better when I watch that show, even if I'm crying, because even my worst day doesn't come close to what some of those people go through.)

My second guilty pleasure?  Trader Joe's dark chocolate peanut butter cups.  'Nuf said.

We are getting very close to a major YAMuse event--the release of GILT by Katherine Longshore into the world on May 15!  We're evidently not the only ones excited.  Amazon selected GILT as an editor's pick for best books of the month!

To get us all in the mood, this week we turn out attention to the topic of guilty pleasures.

One of my favorite guilty pleasures comes from years of teaching kindergarten.  Right after lunch, I'd turn down the lights and turn on some soft music.  They would all get out their mats and we... I mean they... would NAP. There's nothing better than a good, deep, "forget the rest of the world", dream-inducing nap right smack in the middle of a Spring afternoon.

Sunday afternoons are the best for napping.  Open up the bedroom windows so the curtains can blow back into the room.  Crawl under the covers.  Listen for awhile to the dogs in the neighborhood barking... the kids playing...the birds.  Forget about the fact it's graduation week at the university, and the video shoot you need to do for your publisher, and the deadline you have for book two.

Close your eyes.

Sleep.

This is what I saw when I opened my eyes today

The guilt may come when you wake up.

(Perhaps in the form of a very judgmental cat whose bowl is evidently empty)

But in my opinion this guilty pleasure is so worth it.