It’s not me, it’s the oven. I swear. At first I was worried it was me, but after researching baking at high altitude, testing my baking powder, restraining myself from over-mixing, and wrapping damp strips of cloth around the pans, the cake is still only one inch tall. There’s no way I can slice each layer in half in order to assemble the four layer cake it was intended to be. How I wish it was just a simple error on my part – those types of things are so much easier to fix. Somehow I need to find a way to tame my oven; to make it obey.  I feel there is nothing left to do but irreparably break the oven in such a way that it appears to be a mechanical failure caused by the unfortunate events of time. Only then will our landlord get a new oven, and only then will my kitchen be at peace.