I'm having a rather busy, but very pleasant weekend. I thought I'd take a short break to update the Goof before I head out to see the new Harry Potter flick with my kids.

My wife and I looked at a beautiful log home yesterday morning; it's custom-built out of cedar, and the logs were cut using the scandinavian chinkless method. It appears to be well-built home on a nice 3-acre lot, but it's way out in the country (with no cable-modem access) and there's a gravel-pit operation right next door, so I'm not sure we want to put in an offer until we do a lot more research.

One of my best friends is in town, so we threw a small dinner party last night. I marinated a pork roast overnight in Mojo Criollo, then cooked it for 7 hours in the smoker with mesquite chips. While the pork cooked, I baked this bittersweet chocolate pecan bourbon cake, modifying the recipe slightly by using Kahlua instead of bourbon. The frosting was a very simple glaze made of bittersweet chocolate and sweet cream. Here's what it looked like when I was done. Joyce made a salad with walnuts, strawberries, and bleu cheese crumbles, and we uncorked another bottle of that fine 2002 Red Knot Shiraz that I've gushed about here previously.

The pork came out perfectly done with a nice smoky Cuban flavor. We all had a lovely meal and a good chat afterwards. Here's a picture of all three dishes.

Today is Father's Day, hence the title of this post, so my kids got up early and made me pecan pancakes with bacon for breakfast. They also gave me a jar of gummi bears and a new wallet as well as a couple of funny cards. They're good-hearted little people, and I feel very lucky to be their dad.

I'm off to Hogwarts now.