I am continually astounded (and a little frightened) by all the information out there, and how easily accessible it all is. I can't tell you how many times I've wondered about something really random, something about which I am sure I am the only one who would wonder, and then I Google it and find out there are 1,080 other people also wondering about it.

This weekend, I had a hankering for a breakfast recipe I had read months ago in a magazine and had been meaning to try. But for the life of me, I could not find it in my totally disorganized clippings file. A quick visit to Google and "baked oatmeal Sunset" typed into the search box, and the recipe was mine (top result, no less).

Then, as I began to compose a blog post about the yumtastitude of this recipe, a seemingly random memory popped into my head. "Remember those commercials that Wilford Brimley did for Quaker Oats in the '80s and '90s?" I asked Byrne. "What was that line that he always said at the end?"

Byrne couldn't remember, either. So I asked Google: "wilford brimley quaker oats commercials"? Et voila: The ads not only get two Wikipedia mentions (one in Brimley's bio, one in a history of the Quaker Oats Company), but also a 1991 Brimley/Quaker commercial is available on YouTube.

(I realize now that I just could have asked my friend Dori, who has an almost freakishly comprehensive mental catalog of commercials and sitcom theme songs from the '80s. How she also has the bandwidth to think about "An Empirical Validation of Social Action Theory: Applications for Children Affected by HIV", I have no idea.)

Anyway, the baked oatmeal: Yum. I made some substitutions based on what I had on hand: pecans instead of almonds, apple instead of pear. We gilded the lily with just a teensy drizzle of pure maple syrup and a dollop of yogurt from Straus Family Creamery. Accompanied by veggie sausage and a hot cuppa Earl Grey from David Rio, it was a perfect, delicious start to a chilly fall Sunday.