Yesterday was Rib-o-Rama X at John's house and guests were encouraged to bring salads and/or desserts to augment the piles of delicious smoked meats that are always served. Inspired by Janet, I decided I would attempt to make baklava to bring as my contribution.
Baklava is extremely time-consuming to make as it requires you to lay out ~40 sheets of phyllo pastry one at a time, brushing each with clarified butter as you go. I messed up the syrup a bit so the baklava wasn't as moist as I would have liked it, but it still tasted just fine. The nice thing about Janet's recipe is that it is much less sweet than baklava you might pick up at a bakery or wherever which means it's easier to eat lots all at once.
Also yesterday the thermostat in our apartment decided to finally die (it seemed like it was about to die when we moved in, but then it clung to life for almost three more years). Generally I would call the landlord to get it fixed, but he has a new baby and I thought it would be good practice to try to replace it myself. So I picked one up from Canadian Tire that looked similar to the old one and installed it this afternoon in about 30 minutes. It was super easy and our apartment is nice and air conditioned again.
