The Birds are BACK!



One of the  problems with using your garage as a storage shed is that there's nowhere to park your car.  The birds are back and our feeders are suspended over our driveway.  That causes lots of sunflower seed hulls to drop  below.  Some get tracked into the house and occasionally I shovel seeds out of my windshield wiper well but usually it's no big deal.

Last night was different because in addition to our sweet bluebirds, yellow and purple finches, tiny woodpeckers, Carolina wrens and cardinals, about fifty turkey vultures arrived.  I started wondering if they knew something about me that I didn't know yet and was relieved that they weren't circling.  Man, those birds are big!

It was shortly after the vultures were perched high above us in the trees that we realized it was raining bird poop.  (We must have been the vultures' second stop, right after some road-kill buffet.)  It was splattering everywhere and Jerry, whose newly repaired brand-new car was parked out in our driveway, ran outside and desperately started whacking two sticks together.  (Remember the stick scene in the movie  "The Parent Trap?"  It was kind of like that only louder.) 

Immediately the sky was black with birds. The jumbo avians swooped gracefully into the air and lit a few hundreds yards down into the woods where they remained undisturbed until they caught their collective breath and flew onward on their journey.

Before bed, Jerry covered his car with a couple of old sheets, just in case.
 

*  *  *

Even though it's going to be February tomorrow, I am still sweeping up Christmas needles in my living room every time I vacuum. The weird part is, our tree was artificial.

While Walking

Although being a "one car family" sounds good on paper, in reality it's no fun.  Jer's car is in the shop getting fixed from the Big Little Crash of 2012.  It was supposed to be finished on Wednesday so we thought if we gave it a couple of extra days, we'd be safe in picking it up this morning.  (Auto body repair men work on their own timetables and they are incomprehensible to laymen.)  Bright and early this morning we arrived.  It will be ready after noon,  they said.

Jer usually gets to work way, way before 'bright and early' and he was in a rush to get going.  I told him to drop me off past the major intersection and I'd walk home.  Truth be told, if I would have had the presence of mind to grab my cell phone on the way out the door, I might have called a friend to hitch a ride home but walking is my favorite form of exercise and it was a good day for it. I arrived at our driveway an hour and a half later.  Whew!

When I was little, our family had only one car.  When Mom wanted or needed to use it, she simply took Dad to work.  Most days the car sat in the parking lot of the company where Dad worked and we walked wherever we wanted to go.  If an emergency arose, some Mom in the neighborhood who had a car that day would drive us to the doctor's office or to the hospital, depending upon the amount of blood involved.  If Mom had the car and somebody else's kid ran the lawnmower over their foot (yes, really) Mom would return the favor.

We don't live in a village, town or city; we live in a residential community.  This means that we don't have any businesses nearby.   None. No grocery store, no post office, no library.  To get groceries, I'd have to walk almost five-and-a-half hours round trip and I wouldn't want to be carrying much.  Becoming a single-car family lost its charm roughly at the same time I realized this.

I met a lot of dogs on my walk today though.  One eleven-month-old beauty with red fur, aptly named Reba, really seemed to like me.  While she was enjoying my personal space, her owner told me that they were going to start a twelve-step program next week.

Not Reba but still a cute dog.

"Isn't that courageous," I thought, "to tell a perfect stranger about your alcohol abuse issues?"  (They do say that to admit you have a problem is the first step toward recovery.)  While I was forming a sensitive response to this admission, he clarified, "Reba will make an excellent nursing home dog."

How wonderful that the world contains people (and dogs) that are willing to share their love and their time with others.  While I'm not willing to abandon my vehicle quite yet, I enjoyed meeting Reba today and I am pretty sure the folks in the nursing home are going to feel the same way. 

Simplicity vs Frugality

This freebie makes me wish I had a Kindle. But then again, that's more "stuff," right?

Free e-book

http://www.amazon.com/Getting-Rid-Step---step-ebook/dp/B0068EMZ5K/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1327412621&sr=8-1#_

The idea of having less and enjoying it more keeps bubbling up from deep within me and, for the most part, it's one that I espouse. Yesterday I was kicking around the idea of going "discretionary spending-free" for the month of February.  When I mentioned it to Jer, he said, "But if we do that, what happens when we find a grill on sale?"

Frugality dictates that we buy "on sale" and we have been waiting to get a new grill for several seasons.  (For the last two summers we have been using a grill our neighbor threw away.  It was on its last legs when he discarded it and since then we have coaxed every bit of life out of it that was left.  That grill is seriously ready for the recycling center.)  All our neighbors are on the lookout for us and the big score is liable to hit in February.  Frugality or moratorium?  That is the dilemma!

A grocery store nearby is going out of business and tomorrow everything goes on sale for half-price.  What merchandise they have left will genuinely be bargain priced.  Do we buy enough deodorant to last four years?  An extra broom?  Toothpaste for a decade?  It's a slippery slope.  If I'm going to buy it anyway, should I buy it now?  Would that make me a smart shopper or a hoarder?

Never at a loss for reading material

It's easy to get rid of stuff that doesn't matter to you.  The real trick is culling things that you value.  Since I'm the Imelda Marcos of books, maybe I should focus on our  bookshelves.  Books around here seem to multiply faster than a proud third-grader. 

The baskets full of magazines are another possible target, too.  I have no clue where they come from!  I never buy check-out counter magazines and don't subscribe either yet, somehow, the piles grow at an alarming rate.

Maybe that Kindle isn't such a bad idea after all.

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? 



Warning!

[I'd like to thank my daughter Kate and her friend Naughty, Naughty Erik for helping me to remember me what it feels like to wait on tables for a living.]

Note to those hateful diners who in any way abuse your serving staff (and you know who  you are):  Eating out could be hazardous to your health. 

Where your server would rather be...

Waiting on tables is hard work and many of those who do it are students who are also going to school full-time, especially if you live in a college town.  You might want to keep this in mind and cut them a little slack if they seem stressed or if they do not approach your table at the speed of light.  The kitchen  could be acres away from where you're sitting, there may be a long line at the bar, or that table with four adults and six kids could be requiring a little extra time. 

Before you become crabby, unkind, insulting, demanding, stiff your server, or are demeaning in any way at all, you might want to re-think your behavior and change your attitude.  If you are obnoxious enough, your server will remember you. 

In ten years, you might suffer a heart attack and that woman, your former waitress, could now be your cardiologist. 


"It's not tipping I believe in, it's over-tipping."  (~"My Blue Heaven")

Napkins

There are many reasons to use cloth napkins.  They dress up the table, they add an air of elegance, they're soft, they're washable, they're ecologically sensible, they're the green choice, they reduce landfill waste.  If you buy napkins during linen sales, you can usually get them for well under a dollar a piece.  If you sew, you can make them yourself for significantly less.  Over time, cloth napkins can be a frugal choice as well as a stylish one.

Several of my friends even have personalized napkin rings for everybody in their family so that they can use the same napkin all week long.  I don't think even I could use the same paper napkin for an entire day, let alone a week.  For me, cloth napkins are the obvious choice.

Here's my biggest reason for wanting to use them though.  Whenever I use paper napkins - even though I thoroughly check all my pockets before I take off my jeans at night and I also go through the pockets of every pair of pants I put in the washing machine - somehow one of those buggers always ends up getting laundered and then shreds to pieces in my dryer.  (I have no earthly idea why anyone would ever put a napkin in their pocket in the first place, but clearly sometimes they do.)

Catch of the Day

There are better things to do with my time than picking napkin shards off clean clothes.  (I'm not saying that I actually do better things with my time, just that I am aware that there are better ways to spend my time.  That's a small, but important distinction.)

If you are convinced that cloth napkins are superior, please mention it to Jerry next time you see him.  He prefers paper. 

Dirty Dishes

I love my dishwasher!

What I washed:


A skillet, a saute pan, a sauce pan, a stock pot, two spatulas, three serving bowls, a food processor, a mini-food processor, a blender, a can opener, a garlic press, two cutting boards, three Pyrex bowls with lids, two coffee mugs, four cups, six saucers, a dinner plate, six salad plates, six luncheon plates, six dessert plates, a measuring cup, a set of measuring spoons, a chef's knife, three serrated knives, six dessert bowls, six water glasses, four wine glasses, two iced-tea glasses, a cocktail glass, a pair of scissors, a ladle, all the silverware we own.

What I made:  Soup for six. 

Yes, really. 

The Big Little Crash of 2012

Have you ever noticed when you see a fender bender that usually one of the cars is brand new? When there's that new-car smell inside, there's danger lurking outside your door.

December 13th, Jer got a new Dodge Journey.  (The salesman, Julio Olivera, is Cuban and told a lot of highly entertaining stories which made the purchase way more fun than normal for me.  If you are a local and in the market for a new vehicle, you owe it to yourself to go see him at Stateline Dodge.  And remember to tell him "hi" from me, please.)  The car has a smooth, quiet ride which makes it a favorite from the get-go, in my book.  It was born in Mexico,
but since it's a Chrysler, we can call it American made, right?

Typical Charleston house

For the first few work days of the new year, Jer had business in Charleston.   What's not to love about Charleston?  It's on the ocean, every nook and cranny is packed with history, there is a huge shopping district, flowers are blossoming in January and we've never had a bad meal here.  So, of course, I have gone with him.  I'm not one to turn down a good time.

The Evil Column

Charleston only has one problem in my view.  There are too many cars and not enough parking spaces.  To remedy this, we always stay at the lovely Ashley Inn which has its own (miniature) parking lot, not to mention a friendly, friendly staff. (This means YOU Susan and Jan!)  We think of it as our "home away from home" and feel quite comfortable there.
  
When Jerry pulled in yesterday to drop me off, a panel van pulled in behind him.  As he was backing out, he saw the van in the right side of his rear-view mirror and a large palmetto tree on the left.  What he didn't see as he was maneuvering his way out of the tight space, was the brick column next to the tree. That was in his blind-spot.

Although he didn't see the column, he certainly heard the crunching sound that the bumper made when it came in contact with it.  What a way to start the new year!

The Damage

Jerry heard me mention his accident to Kate and he said that cracking a fender in a parking lot can't be considered an accident.  My  mom would agree with him.  She always told me, "That's what bumpers are for, Christine." Then she would add, "Don't bother to tell your Dad, dear."

T.V. Wars

When we were first married, I got a wild idea that watching television was a horrible waste of time.  (I believe this epiphany occurred during some episode of one of the soap operas I was hooked on.)  That day I unplugged the t.v., took a pair of wire cutters and clipped the cord in half.  It was a symbolic gesture, but the symbolism was lost on my husband who came home shortly thereafter with a larger, nicer television.  "Josh needs it to watch Sesame Street," he said.

Time goes by and eventually, I tried again.  I reasoned that if we had a smaller t.v. maybe we'd watch it less, so I traded the large color set with a friend who gave me a ten-inch black-and-white in return.   We were both thrilled with the exchange.  Jerry wasn't quite so excited about it when he got home that night.

Each time I've done something stupid like this, my husband has seen it as an opportunity to upgrade.  "Pee Wee's Play House doesn't look like as much fun in black-and-white." he said.  And, "You can't tell the Muppets apart without color. You know how much Jessica loves the Muppets."  Soon a new, improved t.v. would appear.

Eventually, we ended up with one of those monster consoles that were popular just before LED screens arrived on the scene.  It was the focal point of our living room.  By that time in our lives, even I rationalized that if our youngest had a good t.v., maybe she'd hang around our house watching it with her friends instead of going who-knows-where and doing who-knows-what.

Wrong!  We never broke down and got cable and so all Kate had to do to get a free pass out of our living room was fall in love with some series on HBO, which she did every season.  On the up side, if we had saved the money we didn't spend on cable, we could have bought our new car cash.  If.

When Kate's giant television went off with her to her first apartment, some friends gave us an old t.v. from their basement. We bought the $40 thingie for it when the government changed the signals, but we never took it out of its box.  By then we were watching mostly DVDs anyway. 

Around this time we also grew to love ("became addicted to" is probably more accurate) playing Tetris on our daughters' old Nintendo 64 which we rescued from the attic.  We played it a lot in the evenings until slowly it dawned upon us that you can't win Tetris.  All you can do is lose more slowly, if that makes sense.  Again, it would seem, I'd stumbled upon a giant time-waster. 

Now we watch movies and the occasional sporting event at our neighbor's house and that seems like enough.  A couple months ago, Jerry was cleaning out the basement and he donated our only television to Goodwill. 

It would appear that after thirty-five years, we are on the same team.  Yet every night when he comes home from work, I'm frightened by what I might find in his back seat.

An Honest Mistake

Christmas is a crazy busy time for lots of us.  With so much going on, we can sometimes get a little frazzled.  Because Christmas fell on a Sunday this year, it was a little more hectic than usual for our minister friends.  They held five services and delivered two different sermons within twenty-four hours.  Back-to-back Christmas Eve and Sunday services are a lot of preparation and a lot of talking, too.

Although our friend Gary is a healthy guy, his dog is taking antibiotics with his meals.  By Christmas morning, Gary was distracted and rushed as well as a little sleep-deprived.  He put the dog's pills on the counter, got out his own vitamins - and then took the dog's meds by mistake.

Ministers are human, too.

Our Computer Saavy Toddler

I used  to think that anyone under ten was a genius at technology.  Since I've been observing our grandson over the holidays, I've had to lower that age bracket significantly.  Brody has just started to take his first tentative steps but he's already a whiz kid at electronics.   

So it would seem that fourteen-months is the new age ten and my grandson can already do complicated things that I don't know how to do.  He's changed the screen saver on my computer twice since I've been here.  He does like to type a lot - so I chalked that up to chance.

Then I gave him my phone to play with.  The screen was locked and the phone was off.  I handed it to him upside down.  He turned it right-side up.  He turned it on.  He pushed a button to unlock it.  He slid open the screen.  He tapped the right icon to make a call.  Then he called his father. 

After that, he made a bunch of other phone calls.  Most of the time I was able to stop him before they went through, but he was pretty persistent.  Since it was December 24th, I figured any of the callees would just assume I wanted to wish them "Merry Christmas."

His other grandparents bought Brody a toy cell phone.  He looked at it carefully then tossed it aside and screamed.  His grandpa gave him an old flip phone.  That didn't cut it, either.  It was clear to me he knew the difference.

Jerry brought his new iPad with him but he hasn't been able to use it much because every time he flips open the cover, Brody crawls over and grabs it.  Katie had the presence of mind to take a video of him.  Watch it and decide for yourself if his actions are random or if they are calculated.

Even as I type this, my telephone is ringing and I hear my daughter laughing. "It's Brody calling Mom," she says.

Tough Choices

I got my hair cut short in late August.  I've had it trimmed again twice since then and already hair is just sticking out every which way. Some days it looks like I'm sprouting feathers and other days I appear to be molting.  Neither of these are the chic look that I was going for but I just can't bring myself to go back and get another trim so soon.  That simply seems like too much personal primping and I don't want to turn into a narcissist (although daffodils are one of my favorite flowers.) 

I bought myself a quality witch's hat back in October and I've only worn it the one time.  It really is a thing of beauty and Mom always said black goes with everything so I'm toying with the idea of wearing the hat until my hair grows out a bit and becomes more manageable.  Thank God I didn't buy a white one, which, obviously, could only be worn between Memorial Day and Labor Day.  Come to think of it, I've never even seen a white witch's hat available for purchase.  Truth be told, I'd actually prefer a purple velvet one because purple is my favorite color and velvet is the classiest of all fabrics known to man.  This is fact, not opinion, and therefore it is not open to debate. 

On the other hand, maybe I'd prefer to wear a tiara.  After all, it is the holiday season and a twinkly tiara might just distract the eye from a disastrous hair day.

I used to have a tiny tiara that I rescued from Kate's room after she'd finished wearing it to one prom or another.  It was so small that it could fit in the palm of my hand and it glittered when light hit it.  The thing was darling.  It enchanted me.  I liked it so much that ultimately I gave it to a special friend who was turning thirteen.  Of course it was the coolest gift she received (duh.)  Every teenage girl wants to be a princess, right?  Wearing this exquisite tiara is certainly the first step in perfecting the appropriate attitude to achieve that dream.

The problem was now I no longer owned a tiara to wear when I was feeling the need to be queenly.  My husband came to my rescue though when he presented me with a new (much larger) one for our anniversary.  It is perfect!  Since I am also the proud owner of a most excellent Harry Potter wand, I can now grant wishes on the spur of the moment if I want to, which befits a benevolent queen such as myself.

Witch's hat or tiara?  Tough choice.  The hat will give me added height which is a plus, but I wore the tiara to the Home Depot the other night and I felt they treated me with just a little more respect than usual. 

Bailey the Wonderdog

Have you ever made a broad, sweeping statement that was so ridiculous that people who heard it brought it up again for years and laughed every time?

Here’s mine:  “Okay.  You can get a dog, but I will never love it.”

And that’s how the canine love of my life entered the picture.  She was supposed to be Jessica’s dog, but she had other ideas.  I can’t remember if it was love-at- first-sight or if it happened gradually, but somehow that mutt squirmed into my heart and taught me a thing or two about love in the process.  By the time Jerry told me that whenever I left the house Bailey would sit by the door and cry, I was totally hooked.  Truth be told, I didn’t like to be separated from her, either.

I learned about true optimism from this animal, too.  Every meal that we ate at home, Bailey would sit by Jerry's chair and watch each bite he ate with longing.  Although Jerry never once fed her a table scrap - not once - every meal, there she'd sit with this look on her face that seemed to say, "Maybe today will be the day!  I'm gonna sit right here just in case." 

When she was a pup we kennel trained her, but after she grew up and the girls were gone, she slept at the foot of our bed.  Jerry traveled a lot and having her there gave me a feeling of security.  My life was improved because Bailey was in it.

She lived a healthy life and when her time came to leave this earth, she died in my arms.  Sometimes though, when I'm distracted, something catches my eye in my peripheral vision and I think, just for a moment, that I see her sitting beside the door.

Recently, my friend Lee asked me why I don't get a dog?  The truth is that in my heart, I already have one.

My Dog Bailey

Winter in the South

The first picture came from Kate in Ohio.  It showed her parking lot full of snow and the caption was a frowny face.  No words were necessary.

Five minutes later Jessica texted me a picture from Michigan of the controls on her dashboard.  It said 29°.

It's official.  Up north, winter 2011 has begun.

Down south it's still tee-shirt weather.  Flowers are blooming and today I went for a walk without even wearing a sweater.  To see blue skies and sunshine in December is an added plus. 

In the summer, I called this place east of Hell.  In the winter, it's more like two degrees south of Wonderful.  No wonder people want to retire here.

The Perfect Dentist

For some people, a trip to the dentist is like tripping over a poisonous snake sunning on the sidewalk - or looking in the rear view mirror and seeing a giant spider sitting on your shoulder.  In other words, going to the dentist doesn't top the list of fun things to do.  My friend Kelly is like that. 

Kelly knew she had an aversion to dentists, so she took the bull by the horns and started searching for a dentist who'd be right for her.  Persistence pays off and she eventually found the perfect guy.  She used him for several years without incident until one day, she stepped through his door into the Dental Twilight Zone.

The first thing she noticed was that they were expanding the office.  Turns out Dr. Perfect's son was going to UCLA Dental School and would be joining the practice.  "Father and son working together.  Isn't that nice?" she thought.  

Turns out there was a second father-and-son team in the practice now, too.  Dr. Perfect's elderly father was also a dentist and had also been added to the staff.  He suffered from senile dementia so he was not allowed to do the drilling but he was able to make molds for teeth whitening and impressions for crowns.  To round out the family affair, there was the developmentally disabled daughter who was acting as sort of a dental hostess in the waiting room.

Shortly after that cleaning, Kelly swallowed half of one of her crowns.  "When I called the dental office, they didn't believe me," she said.  "They said, 'Are you sure it wasn't just a filling?'"  She was sure. That is how she ended up in the chair with the elderly father walking toward her, holding a gigantic dental plate that was obviously way too big to fit inside her mouth.  Already a bit skittish, Kelly was getting more and more frightened as he advanced toward her.  He had a bit of a tremor and the thing was clattering as he walked which did not add to her sense of well-being. Finally she burst out in nervous laughter which startled the old man, causing him to drop the plate on the floor.  "Don't you think that plate is a little too big for my mouth?" she asked when she had recovered herself.  As fortune would have it, Dr. Perfect was alerted by the ruckus, came in to investigate and remedied the problem.  Although the crisis was averted, the fear lingered.

The next visit she was to have the crown seated.  Kelly got situated in the dental chair and realized that the developmentally disabled daughter had been promoted to assistant.  She was now in the room, helping by handing Dad the instruments.  "It's wonderful," thought Kelly, "that she gets to spend the day helping her father." 

The crown was set in place and then the dentist left the room, leaving Kelly alone with his daughter.  Immediately Kelly's comfort level plummeted but she controlled herself and when she was told to tap-tap-tap on a piece of special paper, she did. Tap-tap-tap.  Thank God!  The crown was perfect.  No adjustments were necessary. 

Apparently "the assistant" had never seen a crown that fit perfectly before because the next thing that happened was that she took the crown out of Kelly's mouth anyway and started fiddling with it, drilling and sanding and doing other dental stuff to it.  When she re-inserted the crown, it no longer fit.  Now when Kelly closed her mouth, her teeth didn't even touch.  The crown was a quarter of an inch higher than the rest of her teeth. 

The daughter was confused.  She had Kelly tap-tap-tap again.  The girl was mystified.  Tap-tap-tap.  Tap-tap-tap.  Every time Kelly tapped, there was the same result.  The crown was so high that you could see sunshine between the top and bottom sets of teeth.  Tap-tap-tap.  Tap-tap-tap.  Our patient was getting a fatigued jaw just tapping on the special paper.  Each time, the results were the same.  Something was clearly wrong. 

"Is the crown on backwards?" Kelly finally asked.  The girl was indignant.  "No!" she responded but she yanked the crown off anyway and found that a piece of dental debris had lodged itself on top of the original tooth, causing the problem.  When it was removed,the crown fit perfectly again.  Kelly heaved a sigh of relief and went on her way.

A couple of months later, Kelly went to have her routine cleaning. There was a new hygienist and she was very rough, poking and prodding with sharp instruments, making her gums bleed and generally causing Kelly's limited dental tolerance to vanish completely. She felt like the lady was using a jackhammer in there. By the time the ordeal was over, Kelly couldn't stand another minute in the chair and practically bolted out of the room. As she was leaving, she told the ladies at the front desk emphatically that she never wanted to have that hygienist again.

Back at home, she told her husband about her horrible dental experience. "What was the hygienist's name?" he asked. "Sally." she said. "That was the dentist's wife."



Update

There's no trump in poker.  Who knew?

The Poker Run

My neighbors are sponsoring a poker run tomorrow and they invited me!  At first I thought it was a mistake.  They don't really know me and my first name is Chris, so they probably figured I am the guy of the couple.  (It happens. I get plenty of mail addressed to "Mr. Chris" and the draft board actually thought I should register when I turned eighteen for the very same reason.)  A quick email verified that ladies are welcome too.  Jer's not interested but I am.

Here's how it works:  everybody piles in their golf carts and zooms to a pre-determined house.  When they get there, they jump out, rush inside and play a round of poker.  Then it's back to the carts, on to the next house where they do it all again.  It's kind of like a progressive dinner only with cards instead of food.  Sounds fun, right? 

I don't have a golf cart and I've never played poker but why quibble about details?  I am counting on beginner's luck to guide me right smack into the center of the winner's circle.  Won't Jerry will be so jealous when I come back with a fistful of fat cash?

I'll let ya know how that turns out.

Movie Night

Although we don't own a tv, once or twice a week we get a movie, take it to our friend Mary Ann's and watch it there.  We could just as easily stay home and pop it into our computer but all three of us enjoy movie night. It's a social thing, which is lucky because we've watched a run of bad movies lately, all chosen by me.

The worst one came from our neighbor Doug.  One morning I saw him painting his garage floor and went over to check it out.  He said he was doing half in Michigan blue and half in MSU green, that he is an equal opportunity Michigander.  While he was telling me this, I was scanning through a stack of DVDs.  It's a habit that seasoned garage-salers adopt - almost a reflex, really. 

I'm picky about what I watch.  I don't like gore, horror, violence, car chases or sad stories.  I gravitate toward the inspirational, romantic comedies, intrigue or dramas with happy endings.  I want to be entertained, not depressed.

A lot of the films in Doug's movie stash were family classics already but when I picked up a title that I'd never seen, he said, "It's good.  You'll like.  Take it."  It seemed like we had similar taste in movies, so I did.  I figured if it was in his garage, he probably wouldn't be needing it any time soon anyway. 

There was a decapitated body in the movie we watched that night and the head turned up in a cooler, too.  No need to say more.

The next evening we ran into Doug at the grocery store.  I told him he is never, ever allowed to recommend a movie to me again.  "What movie did you watch?" he asked.  "Shipping News."  "Oh.  I never saw that one.  I heard it got good reviews though."  As Mary Ann succinctly put it, "Well, that was an hour and a half of my life that I'll never get back."

For the entire month of December, all we're going to watch is Christmas Classics.  You can't go wrong watching Clark bumbling around trying to untangle his Christmas lights and no matter how many times we see Ralphie walk down the stairs in his bunny suit, we still laugh out loud.

Cleaning Lady

Katie overheard me telling her father that I function best in an ultra-clean environment.  She laughed a long time.  The sound of her laughter is beautiful;  joy bubbles over into the room.  It always lifts my spirits and I enjoyed hearing it, even though I knew she was not laughing with me.  The joke, in her mind, was that she's known me her whole life and has yet to see me achieve anything that could even creatively be described as "ultra clean."  That does not negate, however, the fact that I function best with surroundings that are orderly.

I spend a lot of time cleaning and get very little bang for my buck.  Because of my propensity to get distracted midway, it takes a long time and the threat that one cleaning day will bleed into the next is ever-present.  To be frank, I stink at this.  It's strangely liberating to write those words. Now whenever people just drop by, they will know in advance that they aren't going to find "hotel clean" when they step over our threshold.  I try to get there -- a lot -- I just fail most of the time.  Like right now, for example.  I stopped cleaning to write this post.

Minutes ago, as I was cleaning the house, I thought, "What if when I die, God yells at me?"  What if he says, "Christine, I gave you a gift and you squandered it by spending all your time dusting, cleaning toilets and swiffering?"  Then he might continue, saying,  "Meanwhile you denied someone whose true passion was cleanliness an opportunity to do what she does best.  How do you justify this?"  What will I say?

It is possible that one of my true gifts is rationalizing.  But what if??  Maybe I should consider getting a cleaning lady, just in case.  Covering all your bases, I think that's what the guys call it.

Thanksgiving

Naughty, Naughty Erik and Me!

I have three children and one of them even reads my blog, thank you very much Miss Kate. Her friend Naughty, Naughty Erik does too, so it was a pleasure to meet him during our last visit.  He's such a cutie but if you look closely, you can see a glint of fire in his eyes. Although he can be a man of mischief -- which we already know from my post aptly entitled "Naughty, Naughty Erik" --mostly he's just a nice guy. The world could use more of those.



Yes, it's true that I will drive (well, technically, ride) for over eight hours just to get a good meal at somebody else's house.  I will even stay with two other families in a one-bedroom apartment, as long as there's at least one grandbaby to play with. (Since at this writing I only have one, that will do for now.)

Thanksgiving is one of my favorite days; eating great food with people you love is right up there at the top of my list of happy things.

Two of my favorite guys

Kate had to work both the day before and the day after Thanksgiving this year so we decided she didn't have enough going on in her life and we'd let her host the holiday.  So we loaded up the car with card table and chairs, air mattresses, sheets, blankets, pillows, games, books, knitting, food, silverware, luggage and the food processor.  By the time we were finished we could have strapped a rocking chair on top and called ourselves the Clampetts we had crammed so much stuff in there. (Too bad I forgot the camera.)

The trip up was mercifully uneventful and it was weird not to be responsible for the cooking.  Weird, but I could get used to it!  Kate bought a fresh turkey, so the thawing business was no issue which simplified the process significantly. She also used her sister's crock pot to cook the green beans which was sheer genius. 

Everything was done at the same time and it was the first year in a decade that we didn't have to eat burned corn.  The food was delicious, the pies were phenomenal (thank you, Wendy!) and when it was over, I went for a walk.  When I got back, the dishes were done.  It was like an adult fairytale.  Not "adult" like porn, "adult" like a grown-up lady's fantasy.  Moms' ideas of happiness often center around having household help....if a man really wants to please a woman, he should try mopping the kitchen floor.  It would certainly work for me!

We played games and talked late into the night.  It was a pleasant, quiet day.  The next morning, it was back to normal and I had brought a spaghetti squash for lunch, knowing that Kate would be at work.  I'd zapped it in the microwave for about ten minutes but it still seemed a little hard, so I was adding a couple more minutes when my son-in-law said, "Won't it blow up in there?"  As I was answering him "no," the squash made a liar out of me by exploding in there.  The force of it caused the door to fly open and the entire inside was sticky with stringy goo hanging from everywhere. 

From this I surmised that the squash was cooked, so I put spaghetti sauce and cheese on what was left of it and served it with left-over green beans.  It wasn't an amazing meal like Thursday's, but every day isn't Thanksgiving either.

The Harvest

My Grandmother could grow anything.  Green thumb?  More like her whole hand was green!  She tended a massive garden, canned and froze their food from it and had exceptional luck with houseplants, too.  How it got there is lost to history, but one spring a banana tree appeared in her living room.  Gran was especially fond of that particular plant and it clearly returned the feeling because it grew so high that eventually the leaves touched the ceiling.  Even then it didn't stop.  Grandpa built a two-story greenhouse onto the front of their house, they moved the tree in there and it just kept on growing, growing and growing. 
      

I mention this for two reasons:  First, it's fun to remember things about my childhood and my grandparents.  Second, it proves that genetically, I should be endowed with at least a smidgen of gardening ability.  Should be. 

Friday evening Mary Ann brought down a handful of delicious cherry tomatoes and said, "It's the last of the harvest."  Last of the harvest?  You're kidding me, right?  My neighbor had a harvest! 


Last winter, I made Jerry rig me up grow lights because I was determined to grow everything from seed.  Much to my surprise, seeds actually germinated and I planted them in tiny pots and loved them, just like my Grandma used to do. 


After everything but the coleus died, I bought and planted fourteen tomato plants, four green peppers and so much basil that, by rights, I ought to be able to make pesto for our entire county about now.  I even brought three mint plants back from Ohio.  Mint, as you may know, is considered invasive and professional gardeners suggest that you plant it in a pot to contain it.  I did not do that because I was hoping it would spread across the hillside and I would have unlimited mint to cook with.  Well, one plant is still living - barely - and one cup of mint tea would decimate it.  I have never seen such tiny leaves on a grown-up mint plant before.


We do live in the woods and we do have the red clay soil that is so distinctive in the south.  To figure out the sunniest spots, I took golf balls and set them in the sun in the morning.  Every hour I looked out and if a golf ball was in the shade, I picked it up.  At the end of the day, there were only a few golf balls left, but I figured that these were the places with the sunniest places to plant.  That is how I chose our planting sites. 


To counteract the clay soil, when we planted (and by "we" I mean "Jerry") we added a mixture of topsoil, vermiculite and sphagnum moss.  We watered with miracle grow, too.  Throughout the brutal heat of summer, we watered faithfully.  We even hired a neighbor kid to water whenever we went out of town for the weekend.
 

And now it's fall, harvest time.  So far our loving efforts have yielded:  zero green peppers, one early tomato (from a blossom that was on the plant when we bought it) and  a week's worth of really good caprese salads, featuring tomatoes we bought and basil from our yard. 


Two of the basil plants actually grew!  Herb lore says that herbs prefer crummy soil so it's poetic that the ones that did well here were the ones I put in a container of potting soil.  The others look like dwarfs they are so small.  The bottom leaves have turned yellow and the top leaves are holey.

Things are looking up though.  About the time that it started to frost, one of the tomato plants decided to bear fruit, which I immediately picked.  We have nine small green tomatoes in our kitchen. 


So maybe our "harvest" this year will be in the form of fried green tomatoes.  If you want to be cruel, you could calculate the cost of the plants, the soil amendments, the teenager's watering fees, the time and the effort invested in that side-dish of (organic) fried green tomatoes.  You would tell me that next year I ought to save that money and buy the tomatoes at the farmer's market down the street.


I can't do that though. That Grandma gardening gene will tell me that next year will be different.  Or maybe it's not the gardening gene talking at all.  I inherited a pretty strong optimistic streak, too.


  

Things aren't always what they seem

I was vacuuming in our basement when out of the corner of my eye, I saw what appeared to be a four-inch-long string bean.  That seemed oddly out of place, especially since now there are but two people living in this house and one of them is me.  The other is Felix Unger, so there's no way that bean came from him.  I admit to being a mess-maker (I have to because it's obvious now that the children are grown and the place is still messy) but I generally do follow my own rule about dining at the table.  That is to say, I don't wander around the house eating off a dainty plate like I'm the only guest at a cocktail party.  Has this green bean been on the floor since the last neighborhood barbecue in early October?

Things aren't always what they seem.  As I bend down to pick it up I can see that it's not a green bean at all.   It's a slender leaf from an aloe plant which lives happily on a nearby window sill.  I'm still not sure how it got here, but it doesn't disturb me like the thought of a green bean on the floor.  My day has improved -  I'm not a bigger slob than I imagine myself to be and I am remembering another time I bent to pick up something that wasn't what I thought it was either. 

I was a wedding coordinator at the Romeo United Methodist Church in Michigan, a job that I relished - in part because it was tons of fun and I was good at it and in part because the church was a half a block away so I could walk there.  This historic church was not air conditioned and summers can be scorchers, even in Michigan.  To remedy this, I'd go over at night, open all the windows in the sanctuary and then return at dawn to close them again in an effort to keep the building as cool as possible.  It was never truly cool, but it also wasn't as hot as it might have been, at least that's what I told myself.

Now I'm not a morning person, but this was a small sacrifice and I was willing to make it.   Not having an attendant faint from the heat was the goal here, so I'd do my part by dragging myself out of bed, sleep-walking next door, closing the windows, returning home and crawling back into bed again.  The whole process was maybe 15 minutes from opening my eyes to closing them again.  It was a minor thing, no big deal.

This particular wedding was in August and in the middle of a brutal heat wave.  I opened all the windows that night, just like normal.  At the break of dawn I went over to close them. Since this was far from my first rodeo, I didn't even bother to turn the lights on.  The sanctuary was in semi-darkness but I was just closing the windows and I wanted to stay in that drowsy state so I could go back to sleep easily.  As I was turning to leave, I saw what appeared to be a black washcloth on the floor, directly in front of the altar.  I was thinking evil thoughts about who might have left it as I bent over to pick it up and realized that it wasn't a washcloth at all, but sleeping bat. 

Since removing rodents with wings wasn't in my job description, I called Reverend Gary and asked him to do it.  He said he would be over shortly and hung up.  He lived next door, so I expected him in a flash but when he didn't arrive quickly I sat down to wait.  I looked over and  saw a second bat snoozing in the pew beside me.  That creeped me out - and woke me up. 

Now fully awake, I assessed the situation and as I looked around the bat count grew.  Bats were lying on pews, on the carpet under pews, one was even on the organ bench. There were seven in all.  The heat must have driven them to search for somewhere cool and the sanctuary must have seemed like a refrigerator in comparison to the attic where they probably normally hung out.  

Time ticked by and still no Gary.  I toyed with the idea of turning on the lights, but discarded the notion because I felt sleeping bats would be easier to address than flying ones.  Finally I heard someone fumbling around in the dark downstairs and then coming slowly up the back staircase.  I knew it wasn't the minister (because he was used to coming up that way) but lots of other people had keys to the building.  Then one person I didn't expect -- my husband Jerry -- stepped into the room, carrying a pool skimmer.  He had been called for back-up but he is a man of action so he scooped up one bat at a time and took each and every one outside. 

Just as he was finishing up, in walks Gary - wearing long pants, a long-sleeved shirt, giant quilted kitchen mitts and, to top off his ensemble, he had on a pith helmet with netting over it.  Jerry and I both laughed out loud, which was the reaction he was going for.  Even though he'd given significant  thought to the question of what constituted proper bat-removal attire, I think he secretly was pleased that the bats, all seven of them, had already been removed by a man wearing nothing but pajama bottoms.  I know I sure was.

I've always wondered though, where do you get a netted pith helmet on such short notice?

That Awkward Stage

Whenever anyone says, "I'm having a bad hair day." I feel a twinge of envy - not because I wish to look worse than I do but because they are able to quantify their bad hair into days.  To say "I'm having a bad hair week ...or month ...or year" just doesn't sound as cute.  If I were honest, I'd have to say "I'm having a bad hair decade" which knocks me into the realm of the whiny now, doesn't it?  Whiny for sure but honest, too.

I first became aware of hair issues when I looked at my sixth-grade class picture.  Sixth grade is an awkward age anyway and this picture is painful to see.  My bangs sort of made this horrifying swoop across my forehead (and beyond) that caused me to want to swear off bangs forever.  (And the sparkly blue glasses?  Let's not go there either.)

I am blessed with thick, heavy hair.  The only time it looks good is on the day when I have it professionally cut.  When beauticians see me come through their door, they all either go on break or scurry to the back to try to look busy, hoping to avoid being the unlucky one to give me my haircut.  It is painfully obvious to them that this is going to be more than just a mere haircut - it's going to be a project.  It will take far too long for what they are going to be able to charge me.  (By simply glancing at me, they can see I'm the kind of patron who is carrying that $7.95 coupon wadded up in the pocket of my ratty blue jeans.) 

When I was a newlywed, my mother-in-law said, "I prefer your hair short, Chris." Because she was my mother-in-law, I ignored her and started growing my hair out.  It was the era of frazzled or stringy hair days.  Sometimes frazzled and stringy hair days.  Not my best look. 

Somewhere along the way to my 50s, I learned of Locks of Love, an organization that takes donated hair and makes wigs, primarily for children stricken with cancer or alopecia.  You grow your hair out to nine inches below the nape of your neck, put it in a pony tail, cut it off, put it in an envelope and mail it.  Simple.  Elegant.  Worthwhile.  I did that.  It felt really good, so I decided to start growing it again.  My hair grows really fast and it got to be mid-back length in only a couple of years. 

Around this time, our daughter Katie was a senior in high schol.  On her spring break all her friends went on exotic vacations and she was stuck at home, bored.  I have mentioned before in this blog that she has a Svengali-like effect on me and I am therefore powerless to exert my own will when under her spell (see the post entitled "I'm Being Dressed by Barbie" for further proof.)  When she suggested that she dye my hair red, I said, "Why not?"  Off to the drug store we went. 

There was an amazing array of products to choose from but our goal was specific.  We were not going for clown hair here, just something to add a little pizazz to my natural mouse brown.  We skipped burgundy and even auburn and settled "medium reddish brown." 

At home, we were giddy with excitement. Kate started working in the coloring foam when she realized that I had way too much hair or not enough dye, same diff.  She left me sitting there and went back to the store to get more.  Now I'm no Einstein but I do understand basic chemistry (not really) enough to know this was a recipe for disaster.  I ended up with circles of hair that didn't take the color and other parts that were super-saturated.  This was permanent hair coloring. What was I thinking? 

And so it was that I decided to cut my long hair again, only to find out that Locks of Love does not accept color-treated hair. I was disappointed but hair grows and in the blink of an eye it was shoulder length again but now there were strands of silver in it.  Locks of Love does not want gray hair, either.  Both colored and gray hair do not accept color the same as hair with natural coloring in it and, after all, they are making wigs for children.  I don't even want gray hair, why would they? 

This summer I was on my way to my class reunion and stopped in Cleveland to visit Kate, who took one look at me and dragged me off the the closest Cut and Curl.  She hovered over the stylist, telling her every hair to cut, how long to cut it and basically micromanaging the experience in every way she could.  They got to the front and I put my foot down.  "No bangs." I declared.  Katie thought I'd look good in bangs. "No."  I insisted.  She insisted.  I left with bangs.

Whenever I look in the mirror now, the awkward sixth-grade me peeks out through the wrinkles in the form of a weird swoop of bangs.  "I can kind of see what you mean." Katie admits.  The funny thing is, I don't mind it as much as I did the first time.  I think I've finally grown into being comfortable with who I am, no matter what I look like on the outside.  Considering that time is speeding by at an alarming rate, this is probably a very,very good thing.

The Red Doors

In times of economic uncertainty, women's magazines change the flavor of their articles from "Designing your New Home" to "Fixing up Your Current Home."  It was one of these "Add Pizazz to your Place" type articles that Mary Ann was reading when she stumbled upon the idea to add punch to her house by painting her front door.  Paint the front door?  Hmmm.... How hard can that be?  So she went off to Home Depot, brought back paint chips and chose one.

When she had the paint mixed, the color was electric pink, not the raspberry she'd been expecting.  "Don't worry," said the paint clerk, "It will dry darker."  So she went home and painted three coats on her door.  Of course, it didn't dry darker and now she had a hot pink door.  Electric pink.  So pink that it almost vibrates.  "It's like a big kiss." said our friend Dee.  Yeah - a big kiss by a girl whose color-blind boyfriend chose her shade of lipstick! 

Mary Ann asked me my opinion and I said, "Yick."  She so totally agreed that she took her paint back to have the clerk darken it.  He cheerfully did so which, I might add, was a nice surprise -  and she came back home and painted two more coats of the new color.  She still thought it was too pinky so she went back again and the clerk mixed her a new, darker color - gratis.  I think he knew how horrible that first color truly was and didn't want his conscience to bother him.  Back at home, she painted two more coats of the third color, then just stopped.  The thrill of a new colored door was gone.

One of her closest friends popped over and said, "I'm going to be blunt with you, this door needs another coat of paint."  I guess when they took the VOCs out of paint, they took some of the effectiveness out of it too because after seven coats, you can still see the original door color.  Mary Ann says she's finished for now and maybe she'll just buy a new door all together.

Meanwhile, Jerry was looking for a small project and I said, "Has this door ever been painted?" and that's how we ended up at Home Depot buying paint for our front door.  I wanted a royal purple because I love that color and also because I thought it would look good with our beige siding.  Jerry, whose mother always had a fire-engine red front door, wanted cranberry.  I deferred to him because a rich, dark cranberry sounded mighty appealing too.  I went off to look at bushes while Jer had the paint mixed.

When he met up with me he said, "The paint color looked almost fuchsia, but the clerk said not to worry because it will dry darker."  He could feel my nervousness so he whipped out the paint chip and showed me where the guy had painted part of it to prove it was the same color.  It was.  I still was a little antsy -- because, as we all know by now, paint is not refundable.

Back at home, Jerry had already painted two coats on the door when I looked at it.  It seemed strangely familiar.  While he was putting on coat number three, I snuck up the hill with the paint can lid.  Yep.  We have painted our front door the exact same color as our next-door-neighbor's.  Our cranberry door is actually the same as Mary Ann's raspberry door.  It's a cheerful color though and, like Mary Ann, I'm so done with it.

Choosing a paint color from a chip the size of a postage stamp - or even of an index card for that matter - is a risky business and it is not an activity I would recommend for the faint of heart.  On the other hand, I heartily recommend choosing a community, like ours, where you can paint your door any color you want, even if that color's raspberry.