The Request

My daughter texted me asking if she could bring a friend to Thanksgiving dinner.

"Sure," I said and I meant it.  The more, the merrier.

Then she texted me instructions.  She said, "Be normal and don't wear something too weird." 

Yeah, good-luck with that, Kate. 

Milk

Growing up, I was a feisty, stubborn little thing and I hated milk.  HATED!
My folks ascribed to the "clean plate" school of parenting (and that included liquids) which is how I ended up sitting alone at the dinner table one evening while my mother cleaned the kitchen.

I knew that children were starving in China but couldn't connect how my drinking this milk could help them.  Finally, I snapped.  When Mom had her back turned, I poured the milk into the trash can which was lined with a brown paper bag.

 "My milk's gone."

"You may be excused."

I went off to play while my mother finished up the dishes.  When she lifted the brown paper sack out of the wastebasket to take it outside to the garbage, the bottom fell out. 

My parents also believed in corporal punishment, so I got spanked.  I secretly felt things worked out well for me though - because nobody thought to pour me another glass of milk.

Another Charleston Story

Just livin' the dream...

We are back in Charleston again this week and we took the opportunity to do a little kayaking in Shem Creek last evening.  It was a bit choppy but still so relaxing and peaceful.  After Jer had loaded the kayaks back on our car-top carrier, we headed back to the city to meet friends for supper.

As I've said before, Charleston is:    a) a fabulous place to be 

                                                    b) a horrible place to find parking

 

We were running a bit late because of our kayaking and traffic was stressing Jerry out.  Finally he found a parking lot, turning in only to find that it had "employee parking only" signs in every single spot.  Tension was mounting.  Meanwhile I (ever helpful) tried to tell him about a place to park I knew of, but by now he was too annoyed to really hear me. 

There was a parking garage almost directly across the street from the lot that we were currently sitting in so a grumpy Jerry maneuvered the car out into traffic, got in the left-hand lane, positioned himself to turn and waited for an opening in traffic.  While we waited, the traffic situation became unbearable.  The man in the vehicle behind us was laying on his horn over and over and every time he honked, Jer got angrier and angrier.

"I'm not a fighting man, but the traffic in Charleston just gets to me," he said.  "I'd like to just get out and punch that guy behind me right in the nose!" he continued. (He doesn't usually talk like this but the cars and the noise were crazy bad.)

Right then there was a break in traffic and as we turned to pull into the parking garage the man behind us moved on and the honking stopped.  We sighed with relief and at that exact moment heard a loud crunching noise.  It was then that we realized that we'd tried to enter a parking garage with two kayaks strapped to the roof of our car.

Jerry burst out laughing because he realized that the jerk behind him honking was really just a nice guy trying to warn him about what was going to happen.  "I wish I could find that man and apologize for what I was thinking about him" he said.

Our faith in humanity restored, we backed into traffic once again, drove around the corner, parked in a metered spot on the street and walked to our destination, laughing all the way.

Life is an adventure.

                                                   *    *    *          

(To read about the first time we tried the tricky drive-into-the-parking-garage-with-kayaks-on-the-roof maneuver, go to the right side bar, click 2011, click July, click the the post entitled "A Story of Skill, Not Stupidity.")

This is me floating in my pretty blue kayak (which is
now a little scratched up but otherwise unharmed.)

Meat

You may have an image in your mind of a vegetarian as a skinny little emaciated person.  Well, I've been a vegetarian for thirty-five years now and I'm here to tell ya I haven't been able to wear my skinny jeans since early '76.  What motivated me to make this choice?  Eating meat seems icky to me so I don't do it.  End of story. 

For this - and other off-beat decisions - my family and friends may think I am a weirdo, but they tolerate me anyway so it's all good.  Over the last decade vegetarianism has become more mainstream, but its popularity hasn't made it any easier to get untainted food.


Beef broth lurks in vegetable soup

Meat lurks everywhere.  Tomato basil soup?  Chicken stock.  Cheddar broccoli soup?  Ditto. The artichoke dip has crab meat in it.  The spinach balls are made with sausage, the mushrooms are stuffed with ground beef. Get the picture?  In Spain they even put ham in their potato chips.  Meat.  Meat.  Meat.  Meat.  It's everywhere, in
everything.  Argh!!

Even after all this time, my decision remains a social challenge.  We went to dinner at the home of very close friends and our hostess proudly served us homemade beef stew. "You can just pick the meat out," she said.  I hear that a lot.   

Yesterday I went to a luncheon where I offered to "brown bag" it.  I was assured this would not be necessary because there would be a salad served.  This not being my first rodeo, I specifically asked if there would be bacon bits in it and was told not to worry.  Indeed, there was no need for concern.  There was no bacon in the salad.  It did, however, come with two inches of shredded turkey on top.
After thirty-five years, salad isn't all that thrilling anyway.  Too bad there wasn't dessert.  You can't go wrong with a good dessert!  This attitude might explain the reason why I haven't ever been able to fit back into those skinny jeans.

Anyone for rocky road ice cream or perhaps a brownie à la mode?