Dirty Diapers - December 31, 2021

 It was slow going yesterday morning, getting me and my BFF up and moving.  We'd stayed up late - well, late for me; the BFF stays up half the night every night - and it took a lot of coffee for our engines to idle smoothly.  We goofed around with music a little bit.  Made another pot of coffee.  Finally, about noon, I said, "We should get dressed and do something."  

BFF had been eyeing the little pond down the hill from the house.  She likes to fish but hasn't had much luck lately.  She had a rod & reel in the back of her Explorer.  No reason why she couldn't walk a few steps and wet a hook, so we walked down to the pond.  This pond doesn't see fishermen very often.  The edge is ringed with saplings and sawbriers, and knee deep in dead leaves.  There was no good place to rear back to cast a lure.   I came back to the house and got the loppers and whacked down some of the saplings so BFF could get some clearance but didn't do much good.  She hung her lure in an over-hanging limb on the second cast but couldn't get it loose.  Had to cut the line and leave the lure in the tree.  

There are a couple of lakes not far from my house, and although BFF didn't plan on fishing them this trip, we decided to take a drive so she could scope them out.  We ended up driving a huge loop around this part of the county, just sight-seeing.  

It was late afternoon by the time we came home.  Earlier in the day, I'd seen a recipe for an appetizer made with crescent rolls, sausage, cream cheese, and rotel tomatoes.  We actually found all the ingredients to make them.  The recipe said to cut each triangle into two triangles and roll up a bit of the meat/cheese/tomato mixture in each one.  Folded, they looked like a sheet pan full of dirty diapers.  

But they were tasty.  We had dirty diapers for breakfast this morning.  ;)

Our earlier sight-seeing trip put an itch to fish on the BFF, so she has gone fishing this morning wearing the lucky fishing shirt I made her for Christmas.  I hope it works!

BFF - December 30, 2021

 My BFF lives almost a whole day away, whether you're driving it or fooling with an airport.  She's always saying, "We should get together.  Have a craft summit.  Drink a bunch of margaritas."  All of this sounds mighty good, except for the distance problem.

Right before Christmas, she called me and said she might be coming up here for a visit after Christmas.  The day after Christmas, she called and said that her daughter, home from college, had tested positive for covid.  They had not been within six feet of each other for over a week, and my BFF felt pretty confident that she did not have covid.  Still, I told her, "Don't you bring covid up in my house.  I'll need a negative test 'fore I let you in."  

"I'll call you," she said.

She called Tuesday afternoon, more than halfway here.  She was feeling fine.  Her daughter had been quarantining at a friend's house since her diagnosis.  

I did not make her show me a negative covid test, but we didn't hug when she got here Tuesday afternoon.

We sat on the back porch in our pajamas, drinking coffee and chatting, all day yesterday.  Switched from coffee to martinis for happy hour.  When The Husband came home, we had dinner and retired to the living room for a jam session - she played the guitar, The Husband accompanied her on the ukulele, I noodled around with the mandolin but mostly listened and applauded.  It was late when we called it a night.

Maybe we'll put on some real clothes today and take a drive, or something.  

Yesterday The Husband and I were the laziest two people on the planet.  I fixed myself a nest on the couch and read all day.  He did a lot of recliner surfing.  If we hadn't had left-over sausage balls and pecan pie, we'd have starved, I reckon.

I got a new pair of comfy warm house pants for Christmas - you know, the kind you wear to Walmart - and slept in them that night and stayed in them most of yesterday.  Around noon, I got up and moved to the porch (it's still 70+ degrees here).  My knee brace (a story for another day) slipped as I walked, so when I sat down, I propped my foot on a nearby chair and pulled up my britches leg to adjust the brace.  

And my leg was about the weirdest-looking thing I ever saw.  It gave off an ethereal glow in the noonday light.  

Fur - a LOT of it - from the inside of the house pants was trapped in my leg hair.  Felted in it, you might say.

Shameful.  What if there's a wreck?

I took care of it.  I should be good until spring.  

* * * * * * * * * 

The book I read yesterday is #5 of Clayton Lindermuth's "Baer Creighton" series.  Baer is a badass, but you can't help but like him.  

Started #6 when I went to bed last night.  There's one more book in the series after this one.  When I'm done with these, I'll start reading a biography of Napoleon.  It probably won't be nearly as much fun as the Baer books.

* * * * * * * * 

I'm off from work for the whole week.  Don't know what I'm going to do with this time.  My BFF may visit for a few days, or she may not.  We'll see.  My embroidery machine needs servicing, but I'd sooner take a beating as drive to town.  I could work on the owl painting I started a month ago, but . . . nah, I ain't feelin' it today.  

We had a wonderful Christmas.

Thank goodness, it's over.

It was close to midnight before I made it to bed Christmas Eve.  The next thing on the agenda was breakfast at Nanny's at 9 a.m.  

We've been having breakfast at Nanny's ever since our first child's first Christmas.  As The Husband's siblings married and had children, the crowd grew bigger and bigger.  Now, Nanny has great-grandchildren coming to breakfast.  With the increase in numbers (and Nanny's years), we've divvied-up the cooking job.  My job is to bring the biscuits and cook the eggs.

I rolled out of bed at 5:30 a.m. to see to the biscuits.  I cheated and bought four packages of frozen biscuits.  (Don't frown; they're good.)  As I was opening the bags and putting the biscuits on the baking sheets, I discovered that only one package of biscuits contained full-size biscuits; the rest were "tea biscuits," a little bigger than fifty cent pieces, but there were twice as many of them.  Who cares how big they are as long as there are enough of them?  Slap 'em on the trays and get 'em in the oven.  The Husband and I opened our presents while the biscuits baked, then we loaded the rest of the gifts into the truck and went to Nanny's.

We had about an hour between the eating/gifting at Nanny's and the gifting at Son #2's house.  We came home and rested for a little while, and when it was time to hit the road again, we were so full and lazy that we could barely pry ourselves off the furniture.  But grandbabies awaited, so we loaded the rest of the presents into the truck and headed to their house.

The Little Rotten Baby was barely visible among the pile of toys and boxes.  I finally saw her head bobbing behind a toy ice cream stand that was taller than she was.  I called her name, and she peeped out from behind the toy, grinned, and started toward me.  But it was a hazardous obstacle course for one who was just learning to walk on tiny legs.  I met her halfway and plucked her to safety while her sisters helped their Poppy bring in their new gifts.

Sixteen-year-old Granddaughter #1 had asked us for a refrigerator for cosmetics.  (For real!  Who knew such things even existed?)  The refrigerator came with a couple of little roller thingies designed to massage the face.  One of them even vibrated.  When Granddaughter #1 got around to opening the rollers, she rubbed one across her own face and just about moaned in ecstasy.  She untangled herself from her pile of presents and tried it out on her mom, and since the LRB was sitting in her mom's lap, she tried to roll it across the baby's chubby cheek, as well.  At first, there was a bit of a tussle between the sisters for ownership of the device, but the big sister won and managed to hold down the baby's arms long enough to gently massage the baby's cheek.  And the baby fell back in her mother's arms in submission and, after a few seconds, turned her head in a silent, "Now, do this side."  It was hilarious.

About 4 p.m., with our breakfast wearing off, we packed up to come home.  After all the good, home-cooked food we'd eaten over the past couple of days, I wanted a hamburger, but the fast-food joints weren't open, so we came home and made sandwiches.  I put on my comfy new pajama pants and curled up on the couch with a book, longing for bedtime.  About 9 p.m., just as I was about to call it a night, my BFF called, and we spent 2 hours on the telephone, re-capping our Christmases.

It was a good day.  :)

Christmas Eve - December 24, 2021

 

The company - the kids and kinfolk from the hill - have come and gone.  We had a wonderful time.  Lots of good food, and a few martinis.  And a redneck version of wassail.  The kitchen is all cleaned up, and I'm on the back porch (70 degrees here!) trying to work up enough gumption to get up and go to bed.  There's a book on the nightstand that's calling my name.

Merry Christmas to all!

Elfing - December 23, 2021

For the past two days, the sewing/craft room has been operating at full capacity:  6 personalized coffee mugs, 4 heat-pressed t-shirts, 2 embroidered hand towels, 1 embroidered couch throw . . .  and a partridge in a pear treeeeee.  (Yeah, ok....no partridge.) 

As of yesterday morning, I still had two more gifts to make, and all of the presents needed to be wrapped.  I would have to go buy stuff to make those two more gifts, and I needed to go to the post office to mail (overnight!) one of the gifts.  And I'd need to cook supper.  While I drank my first cup of coffee, I made a mental list of things to be done.  I decided to start with the gift-wrapping.

We did not put up an actual Christmas tree this year.  We were both simply too lazy to get the tree out of the attic.  One of The Husband's vendors had given him a big gnome full of popcorn, candy, etc.  The gnome was cute, and Christmas-y.  And pointed on top, like a tree.  So he became the Christmas tree.  We had temporarily set him atop a stack of coloring books on a dusty, cluttered end table in the living room.  When I wrapped the first present and took it to the living room to put it under the "tree," I thought, I've got to do something about this awful mess.  I cleaned the table and searched the sewing room for some Christmas fabric to drape over it.  

The Gnome Tree

The Christmas fabric was in a Rubbermaid tub that has not been opened since last year's pre-Christmas crafting frenzy.  Besides fabric, the tub contained a finished Santa Claus table runner, a finished set of placemats and napkins, and a few other Christmas things that had been in the antique mall booth I'd closed down in the fall of 2019.  I also found a large piece of polar fleece fabric, just the right size to make a couch throw.  This polar fleece provided material for one of the two gifts I still needed to make.  It just needed to be trimmed, hemmed and embroidered.   I could run the fleece through the serger and trim and hem (overcast) it at the same time.  And I could finish the gift-wrapping while the embroidery machine was running.  GAME ON!

I got 1.5 sides of the polar fleece hemmed when the serger gave out.  The motor would run, but nothing would happen at the needle.  No time to investigate (my guess is that a belt is broken).  I switched to the sewing machine and set it to do an overcast stitch.  The stitches didn't come close to matching the serger's overcast stitching.  Plus, the feed dogs on this old sewing machine are about worn out; it has trouble pulling fabric evenly through the machine.  I had to push the polar fleece from the front and pull from the rear.  This resulted in uneven stitching.  Oh, well, maybe the gift recipient won't notice.  I hooped the ragged-ass couch throw and took it to the embroidery machine.

Aaaaaand the embroidery machine started breaking the thread.  

Every sewing machine in the room had revolted!

Finally, I got the embroidery going, and left the machine running while I went to the post office and to buy a sweatshirt for my brother-in-law, the last gift I intended to make.  

Well, guess what?  No sweatshirts out there in his size - not in our little town, anyway.  I ended up going to a t-shirt shop for a nice, long-sleeved t-shirt.  I'd texted my sister-in-law about what size he needed (he's lost a lot of weight this year).  She did not answer, so I made a guess and bought a shirt.  I was halfway home when she answered.  I'd bought the wrong size.  Turn around, go back to the t-shirt store, swap shirts. 

The rest of the day went pretty smoothly.  The remaining gifts got made and wrapped.  By dinnertime, there was a pot of creamy chicken corn chowder on the stove.  

The kids and the folks on the hill will be coming for dinner tomorrow night - nothing fancy - maybe chicken & dumplings and some nibbles, maybe some left-over corn chowder, maybe a banana pudding.  Tomorrow will be "cooking day."  

Today will be cleaning day and "what-did-I-forget?" day. 

I should get busy!

Babysitting - December 21, 2021

 The Little Rotten Baby showed up at my house about 9:30 yesterday morning, wearing her Christmas finery.  She'll be a year old next month.

I managed to position my decrepit self down on the floor with her, and we rolled a ball back and forth while her parents slipped out the door.  It took only a few minutes before she looked around and realized that her parents were not in the room, but I distracted her with the ball, and the expected hissy fit did not happen.

During most of her previous visits, she's been confined to our living room and kitchen.  It was time for a tour of the entire house.  We went into all of the bedrooms and bathrooms, looked at ourselves in mirrors, flicked light switches off and on.  As we went into each room, she looked around with something akin to wonder, and pointed at various objects that caught her attention.  Before the day was over, she acted like she owned the place, wandering from room to room at will.

We read every baby book in the house.  She loved the farm animal pop-up book.  As I made the noises for each animal ("Cock-a-doodle-DOOOOOO!"), she'd whirl around and look at me like I'd lost my mind.  But we learned, "Where's his nose?" with little taps on the animals' nose and her nose and mine.  By the time she went home, she knew where everybody's nose was.

I was scheduled to pick up a grocery order at 1 p.m., but I do not have an LRB-sized car seat.  To solve the problem, Granddaughter #1 (who can drive) and her younger sisters came over to babysit while I went to get the groceries.  After that, we made Rice Krispy treats.  Don't tell her parents, but I fed the LRB tiny bites of the treats.  She seemed to approve of them.  ;)

Her daddy came to get her about 4 p.m.  Before they left, I pulled out the farm animal book and showed her the cover.  "Where's his nose?"  She tapped the noses of all three animals on the cover.

The LRB is a genius.  :)

Christmas is Coming - December 20, 2021

 

For the past few years (and this year), the Best Boss in the World has given me time off before and after Christmas.  I typically use the time before Christmas to make a few extra Christmas gifts, buy the groceries to make Christmas goodies, and squeeze in a bit of last-minute shopping.  While I appreciate the time off before Christmas, the after-Christmas time off is absolutely wonderful.  

Today, none of the usual pre-Christmas stuff will get done, for I have the good fortune to babysit the Little Rotten Baby while her parents do some shopping.  We kept her for a little while last night while they wrapped presents.  She is such a joy, rotten-ness and all.  And such a FAKER!  She got a little fussy toward the end of the evening, and I laid her down to change her diaper.  As she was grumbling about it, I mocked her:  "Wah-wah-wahhhhhh."  And she grinned and went, "Wah-wah-wahhhhh."  Faker.

She loves books.  Last night, we read every book that had good pictures in it.  This morning, in preparation for her arrival, I busted open a set of pop-up books we bought her for Christmas and chose a farm animal book.  The first page has a giant rooster that pops up.  We'll be cock-a-doodle-dooing today!

  

Band Kids - December 15, 2021

 I have a confession to make:  I don't like Christmas music.

Except when my grandchildren are playing it.  :)

'T'is the season for Christmas concerts.  Granddaughter #1 plays the flute in her high school band.  Granddaughter #2 plays the trumpet in her middle school band.  We attended their concerts - #1 on Monday night, #2 last night.  It was marvelous (except that the gymnasiums were hot and crowded, and probably swimming with every kind of germ under the sun).

Band kids are just the best.  I was so proud of them all, not just my young'uns.  They were all dressed up, spit-shined, and eager to get down to business.  Even the sixth-graders, who had never held a horn, or a drumstick, or a mallet until August of this year, put on a great performance.  So did the 7th grade band, which started its music education in the throes of a pandemic.  The high school band was absolutely outstanding.  They sounded like a professional orchestra.  One young man did a 4-minute xylophone solo FROM MEMORY that was a joy to hear.

Statistically, band kids are among the top academic performers in schools.  This appears to include marching band students, as well, even though they have less free time to study.  

No other class in school - and probably no other group in any part of their lives - offers an opportunity to work in a large group composed of sub-groups (the individual sections - brass, woodwinds, percussion) at this stage of their lives.  Regardless of ethnicity or shape/size, band is a one-for-all and all-for-one enterprise.  

Both of my sons were in band, and all of my grandchildren - the ones who are old enough - either are or have been in band.  They've found long-term, enriching friendships with people whose moral compasses and interests mirror theirs.  Some of my most cherished times with them have been when someone has whipped out an instrument and started a family sing-along.  

Music is a good thing.  Even Christmas music.  ;)

Oh, what a night! - December 11, 2021

Last evening, as I was sitting on the porch, relaxing after our trip, Granddaughter #1 texted me a picture of a gray shirt featuring three Christmas-y gnomes wearing red/black buffalo plaid hats.  The message was, "Can you make this?  I have the shirts."

Of course, I said, "Sure."  

My first thought was to embroider the gnomes.  I already had an embroidery file for 3 Christmas gnomes, these wearing candy-striped hats and holding candy canes.  I texted a picture to the Granddaughter and asked if those gnomes would do, and she said they would.  It then occurred to me that the embroidery design might be too dense to put on t-shirts.  I asked her if the shirts she has are t-shirts or sweatshirts.  She said they're t-shirts.  

Nix the embroidery idea.  Move to heat-press vinyl.  

Long story short, I'm not all that experienced with heat-press vinyl or the tools to create the design, and the design is a hard one (for me).  I fooled around with various methods until almost midnight and never did get a vinyl design that will work.

Meanwhile, a digitizing customer sent a message requesting some edits to a machine embroidery file she bought from me.  She needs it right away to make Christmas gifts.  I stopped vinyl-ing and started the digitizing.

MEANWHILE, a terrific storm brewed.  We'd figured it was coming when we came home to 80-degree temperatures.  Sure enough, about 6 p.m., weather alerts sounded.  There was one tornado alert after another.

When I went to bed at midnight, The Husband was snoring peacefully, storm or no storm.  Normally, I would've been doing the same thing, but I was hyped-up from all the unsuccessful craft attempts and could not go to sleep.  I lay there listening to the wind blow, to the emergency sirens wailing (audible from 5 miles away), to the rain pelting against the window.  There's a military base not far away, and the fly boys love to zoom around in storms (practicing, I guess), and they were hot at it last night about midnight.  Every time one flew over, I was sure it was a tornado.

This morning, I don't know if there were any tornadoes in our area.  Sadly, others north and west of us were not so lucky.  My heart aches for the people who lost lives and homes in the storm.

Heartache or no, I've got to get busy gnoming.

Home Again - December 10, 2021

Yesterday was our last day in Asheville.  Before we left town, we checked one thing off of my bucket list; we toured the Biltmore mansion.  The house is so awesome that any attempt by me to describe it would be a disservice.  

We parked our vehicle in Lot C, which has a shuttle up to the mansion.  The shuttle dropped us off not far from the door.  There was a long line waiting outside.  Groups enter in 15-minute increments.  Our tickets were for 11:15, and we were a little early, so we had time to look through the gift shops before our tour.  

The mansion was awesome, as I said earlier.  The house, the largest in the U.S., is over 150,000 square feet of living space.  It features a bowling alley and an indoor swimming pool.  I cannot fathom the kind of wealth it took to build the place, or to live there.  It was not a private residence for very long.

When we left the Biltmore, we hunted down a bbq joint called "Bear's Smokehouse." On Wednesday, an employee at another restaurant had told us that Bear's sells something called "Bear Balls."  Who could resist those?  We had to try them.  Turns out, they're a mixture of cornbread, macaroni & cheese, and chopped pork barbeque, rolled into balls and deep fried.  Think hushpuppies, only slightly larger, with meat and macaroni and cheese inside.  They were amazing.

Full of Bear Balls, we headed for home.  In Bear's parking lot, I set my mapping program to "avoid highways" and plotted a route to Cleveland, Tennessee, intending to take the backroads home.  Highway 64 runs almost all the way across the bottom edge of Tennessee.  We had to take some serious backroads to get to 64.  Highway 74, which we picked up outside of Asheville, turns into highway 19 and runs through Nantahalla Forest in North Carolina.  Parts of this road seemed like a death trap.  I wore the passenger brake out as we wound our way around the treacherous 2-lane road, past some of the most beautiful scenery you'd ever want to see.  I kept praying that we would get on a less curvy section of the road before dark, and we did, but then we entered the Cherokee National Forest.  By that time, it was dark, and the road, while not quite as narrow, was just as curvy and treacherous.  We reached Cleveland, Tennessee around 7 p.m.  Our nerves were about shot, and all we wanted to do was stretch out and relax.

Driving from Cleveland to home was not bad, even though it was foggy.  We did a short stretch of interstate from Chattanooga to Sewanee, got on highway 41A, and found 64 pretty soon.  It was smooth sailing after that.

Our total route took us from home to Nashville, to Knoxville, to Dandridge, TN, to Asheville, to Cleveland, to Sewanee, to Lawrenceburg, to Selmer, to Somerville, then home.  Well over 1,000 miles.

We arrived home to 80 degrees and a tornado watch.  

It's good to be home, tornado watch and all.

Asheville - December 8, 2021

For most of this week, we've been shacked up at the Grove Park Inn in Asheville, North Carolina, where The Husband has been attending a seminar.

Neither of us is too keen on airplane travel these days, so we drove.  Left home Sunday morning.  We stopped for lunch with a friend in Nashville, and then drove a couple more hours to Dandridge, TN, where we spent the night.  Since we did not have to be in Asheville until later in the day Monday, we did a little sight-seeing around Dandridge.  The Husband wanted to see Douglas Lake.  I was guiding us with the map program on my telephone.  When the map indicated that we were near the lake, I looked up and saw this:

I saw boat docks stranded on dry land, but there was no lake!  Come to find out, whatever outfit that's in charge of the lake lowers the water level in the fall to prepare for winter/spring rains.  The lake was just...gone.  So much for that sight-seeing trip!

We drove on to Asheville Monday afternoon.  Grove Park Inn is a nice place.  It was built in the early 1900s.  What you see in the picture below is the original part of the inn.  Modern wings have been added to each side.  It's weird - when we got on the elevator to go to our room, the elevator went DOWN instead of up.  I guess the wings are built into the side of the mountain.

Picture of the rear of the main building, viewed from our room.

Anyway . . . nothing in this place is cheap.  Our first lunch - a charcuterie board, two cups of chicken chowder, and two cocktails (needed them after the long drive, you know) cost us nearly $100.  Two hamburgers (with fries) for dinner the next night in the same restaurant, plus a "flight" of beer for The Husband:  $60, including the tip.  Tonight, we availed ourselves of the buffet in the Blue Ridge room.  $45.00 apiece, and the food was . . . meh . . . basically an assortment of mushy casserole-type dishes.  

I guess I'm just not cut out for fancy-schmancy places.  Give me a good old Holiday Inn Express with a free breakfast.  ;)

Our one delicious dining experience happened this afternoon in the town of Asheville.  We drove down to the River Arts District and strolled through the artisans' workshops, then we drove around looking for some place to eat.  As it turned out, we turned around in the parking lot of a restaurant outside the district and decided to just eat there.  (We have a rule when traveling:  no eating at chain restaurants we can find at home.)  It turned out to be a good choice.  The Husband had a Cuban sandwich, I had  mushrooms and caramelized onions on rye.  Best food we've had since we left home.  

  

Can't say a lot for the decor, but the folks were friendly

Can you see the sign through the window?  They make compost in the alley with paper and food scraps from the restaurant!  LOL

Tomorrow morning, we tour the Biltmore Estate, then start home.  

Glorious Day - December 2, 2021

Man, yesterday afternoon was glorious.  Seventy degrees.  Sunny.  I sat on the (now-winterized) back porch with both doors open, letting the breeze flow through, until dark.  

Yesterday morning on my way to work, it was very foggy.   I turned on my headlights to be better seen in the fog.  I am still driving my old Wrangler since my other car is still at the body shop.  The Wrangler doesn't have some of the conveniences of today's cars.  The headlights don't automatically come on when the engine is cranked.  Neither do they automatically go off.  

The Wrangler does have a chime that is supposed to sound when the driver door is open and the key is in the ignition or the headlights remain on.  This safety feature does not work if the fuse is blown or has been removed from its slot.  Why would the fuse have been removed from its slot? you might ask.  It might have been removed from its slot if a son had wanted to joy-ride in the Jeep with the doors off back in the summer when the weather was warm.  (The chime will sound constantly with the doors off and the engine running if the fuse is in place.)

So.

I rolled up in The Boss's driveway at 7:45 yesterday morning, and when I got out of the Jeep, it did not tell me that my headlights were on.  When I got back in the Jeep later that afternoon and turned the ignition key, the engine didn't even grunt. I had forgotten to turn off the headlights.  

Neither I nor The Boss had any jumper cables.  

It took 30 minutes to get a live person on the phone at AAA.  Finally, after 30 more minutes, a wrecker showed up with a battery charger.  

While I waited for the wrecker, I found the fuse in the glove compartment and put it back in its slot.

Today, one of my goals is to install the AAA app on my cell phone, if the ancient device will accept it.

Thanksgiving Weekend - November 29, 2021

 

I hope you had a perfect Thanksgiving holiday.  

Ours couldn't have been much better: lots of good food and family, with a little down-time over the weekend.

On Friday, after the cooking/eating/visiting was over, I got my covid booster shot.  My first vaccine was a J&J shot, but I got the Moderna booster after reading that it ramped up the immunity a little better.  After the J&J shot, I had a headache and felt kinda bad for about a day.  I didn't know what to expect with the Moderna shot, so I scheduled it for the long weekend to give me time to recover if it made me feel crappy.  I had a bit of a headache - not bad - and was a little draggy for a couple of hours on Saturday morning.  Overall, it was not bad at all.

Good thing, too, because Saturday afternoon, Granddaughter #1 texted me to ask if she and her sisters could spend the night.  I said, "Sure!"  They got here about suppertime.  We fed them pizza and left-over chicken & dumplings.  We made things in the sewing room.  The next morning, The Nugget woke me up pretty early and helped me make biscuits.  We made round biscuits and star-shaped biscuits and Christmas tree-shaped biscuits.  She wore flour on the end of her nose for the rest of the morning.  ;)

They went home around lunchtime.  

About that time, I put on a pot of white beans to soak.  We had a ham bone and some drippings left over from Thanksgiving; they made the beans tasty.  Nanny showed up for a few minutes about the time the beans got done, and I sent a bowl full of beans home with her to keep us from having to eat beans for the next four days.  Later, I made a pan of cornbread to go with the beans.  Home-made chili sauce on top of the beans rounded out our supper.  (Guess what we're having for supper tonight.)   ;)

Thanksgiving Eve - November 24, 2021

The Best Boss in the World, being female and smart, and understanding that the day before a big food event (such as Thanksgiving dinner) is as busy - if not busier - than the day of the event, has given me the day off to cook.  

My brother woke me up with a phone call about 7 a.m.  We'd talked a few days earlier about visiting over the holiday.  His daughter and her family have come from Texas in a rented camper/van, and I'd hoped to see them before they head home. This morning's call was to let me know that today would be the best day to visit.  I'd planned to see them Friday, but since we'd need to do our visiting on the front porch (due to covid concerns) and it was supposed to be warm today, I changed my plan.  The Niece was taking the kids to the zoo in the morning, but would be home around noon.  

I'd promised to bring candied yams, a pecan cobbler, and a baked ham to Thanksgiving dinner.  Before the visit with my brother's family, I had time to boil the yams and do some other prep work.  A little before noon, I headed to my brother's house.  His visitors weren't home yet, so he and I had some rare uninterrupted time to chat.  After a while, The Niece and her family came back from the zoo.  The kids were tired and hungry.  She fed them and put them to bed, and then we had some time to visit.  

I got home mid-afternoon and commenced the cooking. The cobbler and the yams went into the oven together.  The ham a few hours before the Thanksgiving dinner, so I didn't do anything with it.  And I had time to spare.  I wanted slaw with dinner, so I made some.  

My mother used to make lemon icebox pie for Thanksgiving and Christmas.  All that was in it was lemon juice, egg yolks and sweetened condensed milk.  We didn't even cook it, just mixed it all together and poured it in a pie shell.   The Husband (and most menfolk, it seems) loves this lemon pie.  I'd bought lemons and a graham cracker pie crust earlier in the week, contemplating the pie.  There was supposed to be a can of sweetened condensed milk already in my pantry . . . . 

And there was a can.  It expired in 2020.  

Now, I'm not much of a stickler for expiration dates.  As long as the milk ain't clumpy - even if it reeks just a tad around the rim - I'm drinkin' it.  So I opened the condensed milk.  The color was a little more "golden" than I remembered.  But it was "off-brand" milk; maybe it's normal for it to be that color.  It tasted okay.  

In gathering all the ingredients for the pie, I noticed that the pie shell said, "Two extra servings!"  Upon closer inspection, the pie shell did, indeed, seem larger than normal.  The problem was that the standard lemon ice box pie recipe doesn't make a very big pie.  I needed to either double the recipe or use a smaller pie shell.  There was not another can of condensed milk in the pantry, and if there had been, there's NO TELLING how old it would've been.  So to the store I went.

Got a small pie shell (in case my lemons did not produce double the amount of juice) and two more cans of condensed milk.  Dumped the old one down the sink and started fresh.  Even micro-planed some lemon zest to sprinkle over the meringue.

Although my mother never baked her pie, I baked this one.  I hope that didn't screw up the taste.

The early bird may get the worm, but . . . November 23, 2021

 The Granddaughters and I had a successful shopping trip Sunday afternoon.  We stopped at multiple stores, looking for fancy dresses.  Granddaughter #1 needed a dress for a masquerade party.  Granddaughter #2 needed a dress for her Christmas band concert.  Granddaughter #3 didn't especially need a dress but is old enough to feel left out if her older sisters had fancy new dresses and she didn't get one, so we bought one for her, too.  (The Little Rotten Baby didn't get one.)  Everybody was happy with the choices, and we made it back safely from the city.

* * * * * * * * 

Over the weekend, a mouse ran past my foot on the back porch and scampered behind the cabinet next to where I sit when I'm working at the computer.  I baited a trap with feta cheese and eased it into his path.  Come yesterday morning, I checked the trap.  It was upside-down atop a belly-up mouse.  GOT HIM!  

Since I was about to go to work, I did not want to fool with getting the mouse out of the trap, so I left it where it was.  And promptly forgot about it.

After work, when I went out to the porch, I heard the distinctive sound of the mouse trap rattling.  I thought, "Surely that mouse is not alive."  I peeked into the crack where I'd set the trap just in time to see another mouse run behind the cabinet.  THE SECOND MOUSE HAD GOTTEN THE CHEESE!

Disposing of dead, trapped mice is usually The Husband's job, but he wasn't here, so I steeled myself and freed the mouse carcass from the trap, then I re-baited it with nice, fresh feta.  

The trap hasn't been sprung this morning.  Come get it, little dude.  You know you want it.  ;)

Re-Raspberries - November 21, 2021

The raspberry syrup that I re-cooked yesterday morning turned out more like raspberry butter.  It is delicious.  

I spent most of the day on the back porch yesterday, painting boards that Cousin Roger had brought over here earlier in the week.  I'd said to him, "What do you want painted on them?"

He said, "Maybe some of them knolls."

"Knolls?"

"You know. . . them things like you painted on that other board with their hats down over their eyes."

"Oh.  GNOMES.  On all of the boards?"

"Naw.  Just put something Christmas on all of them."

Now, I never had an original idea in my life, so I hunted on Pinterest for something to paint.  

"Knolls."  Check.  

I found a board on which was painted a cow with a wreath around its neck.  Being a country boy, I figured Roger would like a cow.  So I commenced painting.  But I got my proportions wrong, and the cow turned into a calf.  He'll just have to be happy with a calf.

* * * * * * * * 

Two weeks ago or more, Roger brought over a pair of overalls for me to "fix."  There was nothing wrong with the overalls.  The problem was his belly.  It had grown outward, and his overall galluses wouldn't meet the buttons.  He wanted me to splice in a piece of fabric to lengthen them.  

I had other things to do, so I tossed them aside in the sewing room, and have been tossing them around the sewing room ever since.  This morning, I decided to get it done.  

I've draped them over the couch on the porch.  If he waits more than a day or two to come get them, he'll probably need to shake them for lizards.

* * * * * * * * 

Granddaughter #1 called a few minutes ago.  She needs a dress for a party (and/or her Christmas concert) on December 18.  She wanted me to take her shopping.

I hate shopping.  I hate driving in the city.  But I love The Granddaughters, so I said yes, but we have to go today, for next weekend is Black Friday, and after that there'll be Christmas traffic.

It's raining today.

Wish us luck.

Raspberries - November 20, 2021

Two days ago, Nanny showed up at our back door with two boxes - about 4 cups, altogether - of fresh raspberries that her sister had given her.  The berries were about to get too ripe.  Something had to be done with them soon.

I love raspberries, but I did not want to bake with them.  Raspberry syrup seemed like a good idea.

There are lots of raspberry syrup recipes online.  The general idea seems to be twice as many raspberries as sugar, and twice as much sugar as water.  So I washed the berries, measured out two cups of sugar and a cup of water, and set it to boiling on the stove.  When the sugar dissolved, I added the berries, cooked it for 10 minutes or so, strained out the seeds, and poured it into a jar, thinking I'd have some on a biscuit the next morning.

I had some on a biscuit this morning.  It tasted okay, but it was too thin and could've been a tad sweeter, so I poured it back into a pan, added 1/3 cup sugar, and boiled it another 10 minutes.  It still seemed to need something, so I added about 2 oz. of creme de cacao and cooked it a few minutes longer.  That did the trick.

Until it cools, I won't know if the syrup is the right consistency.  If not, it'll go back on the stove for a bit.

* * * * * * * * 

Yesterday, The Husband bought a kerosene heater for the back porch.  We already had a propane heater, but the fan won't work, and we've had to stand right next to it to keep from freezing.  We ran the new heater for a couple of hours on a low setting, and it warmed up the porch fairly well.  It might not knock off the chill when the outside temps are below freezing, but since we don't have too many of those days in these parts, this heater ought to do the job nicely on most days.  

Gold star for The Husband!

The pickin's in our kitchen pantry have been slim for the past couple of weeks.  Last week, I "made do" by pulling things out of the freezer for meals that could be re-cycled.  Chicken enchiladas held out for three nights.  Pork roast left-overs became vegetable soup that got us through the rest of the week.  This week, The Husband has been on a business trip, and my dinners have been cereal, peanut butter sandwiches, and toast with a side of M&Ms.  But he's coming home tonight, and so yesterday I placed a grocery order to be picked up between 3 and 4 p.m.  

Before 3, the store called and asked me to delay the pickup until 4:45.  I wasn't too thrilled by this - who wants to unload groceries in the dark? - but I showed up at the appointed time.  Most of the pickup parking slots were full, but I found one and called the number on the sign to let them know I'd arrived.  And then I waited.  And waited.  And waited.  The whole time I waited, I did not see one grocery order come out to another customer.  Finally, people started getting out of their cars and going inside for their own groceries.  I was about to do the same when my order came out.

I was driving my old two-door Wrangler since my other car is still in the shop.  In the summer when the top is down, it's not a bad grocery delivery vehicle; the bags can just be pitched in over the side.  But when the top is up, as it is now, loading and unloading a big grocery order is a bit tricky.  I told the attendant, "Pile as much as you can on the passenger floor and seat, then hand me the rest and I will stick them in the back seat." 

Bags, packed too heavy, tore open as the attendant lifted them into the car.  Inexplicably (and they do this ALL THE TIME), many of my items- a 2# can of coffee, a cabbage, eggs, bread - weren't bagged at all.  WTF?  

The attendant said, "I'll go back in the store and get you some bags for those that tore."  To save time (and help the other waiting customers), I followed her into the store and grabbed a handful of bags, myself.

At home (and it's dark by then), I re-bagged the items from the bags that tore and took them inside.  When I went back for the rest of the things, more bags tore, and canned goods rolled all over the driveway.  

Later, after I'd put the groceries away and sat down to check my email, there was an email from Kroger:  "Let us know how we did."  

Boy, did I ever let them know how they did.  Having started my work career as a teenage grocery store sacker back in the days when grocery bags were made of brown paper, I felt entitled to opine that someone had done a half-assed job on my order.

I felt better after venting.

Later, as I ate my peanut butter sandwich, I watched TV for the first time since The Husband has been gone.  Now, I don't even remember what I was watching, for as I sat there munching my extra-crunchy Jif and M&Ms sandwich, the front storm door began to rattle as if someone was trying desperately come in.  It was pushing 9 p.m. by then, and I wasn't expecting any visitors.  Before I could get up to see who was at the door, it felt as though the couch slid to the left and then slid back to the right.

I knew what that was:  EARTHQUAKE!  Magnitude 4.0, according to the web site.

I stopped at the hardware store yesterday after work and bought a big roll of white duct tape to secure the areas on the porch wrap where we overlapped the panels.  When I got home, I changed clothes and hurried outside to get to work.  It took less than 30 minutes to get the job done.

Cousin Roger motored over while I was taping.  He approved of the porch wrap.  He'd come over to talk to me about the wooden panel he'd laid on the porch table while I was at work.  He had pried the panel out of a coat rack that he'd found at a thrift store and intended to refurbish.  It appeared to be some kind of decal applied to a thin sheet of wood.  It was faded.  He wanted me to "spiff it up a little."

I was stumped about what to do with it.  Should I paint it?  The panel is slick and probably wouldn't hold paint.  Wood-burn it?  I'm not sure my wood-burning skills are sufficient.  I told him I might be able to paint a reasonable facsimile if I had some non-slick wood cut to the proper size.  He said, "I'll be right back," and 20 minutes later he came back with a blank panel.  

Since The Husband is out of town and I wasn't going to cook dinner, I went to work on it.  I tried to conjure Bob Ross.  Worked on it for an hour or so. 

It's not looking much like the original.  I think I might have summoned Picasso, instead.  ;)

Porch Wrap - November 14, 2021

Every fall and throughout the winter, The Husband and I have a running battle about "winterizing" the back porch.  The first winter after we built it, we stapled thick plastic around the outside of the porch.  It made the inside of the porch far warmer than the outside temp.  But the plastic was thick, and not very see-through, and every year since then, The Husband has said, "I don't like being unable to see out," and so we have not put up any plastic.

But we are about 5 years older now, and our bones are cold and brittle.  I spend a lot of time working out here, cold or not.  And the cold is misery now.  

This fall, I said, 'WE ARE GOING TO WRAP THE PORCH THIS YEAR."  

A couple of weeks ago, The Husband said he had an idea - a 10' x 30' wedding tent, with clear plastic windows.  We could use the size to wrap the porch, and sell or give away the roof and the tent poles.  He sent me a link to the tent he had seen.  I did a little calculating and determined that 80 feet (two 30' sides, and two 10' ends) would be enough to do the job, and ordered it immediately.  We used the frame and the top at Son #1's wedding reception two weekends ago.  Yesterday, I decided it was time to use the sides to wrap the porch.

The plan was to Velcro the sides to the porch to make it easy to take them off come spring and re-install them next fall.  Yesterday morning, I started applying the Velcro around the bottom of the porch while The Husband was across the road helping Nanny install Zoom on her laptop.  When he came home, he got out the ladder and helped me stick the Velcro around the top.  Piece of cake.

However, when we applied Velcro to the first tent panel and stuck it up, we discovered that the panel was about a foot too short to reach the bottom of the porch.  I wanted to scream.  And throw things.  Etc.

When the fit passed, I started thinking how we could remedy the problem.  My sewing room is full of an assortment of fabric and other craft-related things.  In one corner, there was a big roll of white vinyl.  Perhaps I could cut 12"-wide strips and sew them to the plastic tent sides.  This was a nightmare of a job, and there wasn't enough vinyl to do all the panels.  Thankfully, the two end panels of the tent (which did not have windows in them) provided enough plastic to lengthen the remaining side panels.

We finished putting the last panel in place just as the sun went down.  This plastic is thin - about like a tarp - and I am not sure it's going to hold in the heat like the plastic we first used.  Also, we're going to need to get some white duct tape to tape the panels together where they're overlapped so the wind doesn't whip them.

Admittedly, these panels look better than thick plastic.

Veteran's Day 2021

It's Veterans Day, and I have the day off.   Thank you to all the men and women who suited up and did the job of protecting our country.

My maternal grandfather was a Veteran.  According to family lore, he joined the Navy before he was legally old enough to do so.  In 1920, he was a cook on a Navy coal ship.  About all he ever told me about his service was that he peeled an awful lot of potatoes.  :)

Granddaughter #1 will shortly be suiting up with her high school band to play patriotic music as they march around the town square.  

One Veterans Day a few years ago, The Boss and I both forgot that we did not have to go to work.  Our office is one block off the square.  We were at our desks, doing our jobs, when suddenly we heard a big boom and a big shout.  We ran to the front door and opened it to discover this marching band (Granddaughter wasn't in it then) on the street in front of our office.  When the band is called to attention, the drummers hit their drums, and the whole band yells "COUGARS!" before they move into action.  This was what we had heard.  Until that moment we had not realized that it was Veterans Day, and we didn't have to be at work.  We laughed, and every Veterans Day Eve since then, we remind one another that we'll have the next day off.

The Husband has gone to work today, despite his office being closed for the holiday.  I was hoping that we could spend the day winterizing the porch with the wedding-tent panels we bought for the project, but it's drizzling rain and I don't want to tackle the job by myself.  The plan is to use Velcro to attach the tent panels to the outside of the screened porch.  There's about a mile of self-adhesive Velcro strips in a box on the porch, ready to be stuck onto the wood and the panels.  The panels are in a box in the shed.  If I had a little more get-up-and-go, I'd go get them and attach one side of the Velcro to the panels so that we can slap them up once we get the other side of the Velcro attached to the porch.  

Maybe another cup of coffee would help.

 This is how my work day started yesterday:

Three miles took about 20 minutes.  

Things kind of went downhill from there.

I spent TWO HOURS on the telephone with my insurance company and the other guy's insurance company.  Both companies blew up my phone with text messages the instant I gave them my telephone number.  They played the same freakin' "hold music."  The tune is permanently burned into my brain.

The other guy's insurance "accepted liability" for the wreck, thank goodness.  I made them send a wrecker for my car since the right rear wheel was wearing a donut tire, and the right from wheel had a substantial gash in it that might blow any minute.  This involved another blasts of texts, more automated phone calls, and 20 more minutes on hold.

Meanwhile, The Boss was pacing back and forth between my office and hers.  She is working on a class reunion scheduled to happen this weekend.  One of her jobs was to find a helium tank to inflate balloons for the party.  The local WalMart didn't have a helium tank.  She needed to go to the next town to find one, and wanted me to drive her.  Just as we were preparing to leave, I got another call from the wrecker company.  They were coming within the hour and needed the car key.  Of course, it was in my purse.  We made a 15-mile detour to my house so that I could leave the key in the seat.

The Boss scored a helium tank in the next town.  We stopped for lunch, then went back to the office until quittin' time.

Over the weekend, I had promised The Grandson that I would take him to have his phone and i-pad repaired.  Both screens were cracked and had been cracked for months.  I don't know why his parents had not taken care of this.  In any case, I went to pick him up.  He came out of the house empty-handed and came around to the driver's side of my car. 

"Can I drive?"  

He is 14.

I said, "No.  Where's your stuff?"

"Oh."  He went back in the house and got his phone and i-pad.  He is his grandmother's child.  <sigh>

We went to the repair store.  On the way home, I let him drive the last few miles.

O.M.G.

"Slow down."

"Get on your side of the road."

"Use your blinker."

"SLOW DOWN!"

The Husband was already home by the time I made it home.

I said, "After the harrowing ride I just had, I need to smoke a bunch of dope AND drink a bunch of liquor!"

I didn't do either.  But I wanted to.

Crazy Day - November 9, 2021

Yesterday was a frustrating day.  

Since my everyday car is not drive-able after Saturday's wreck, my plan was to drive the old Wrangler to work.  Before The Husband left for work, he said, "The Wrangler's tags are expired."  I could hardly believe it, for I had driven the Wrangler earlier in the summer while my everyday car was in the shop after the tree limb rear-ended me; if the tags had been expired then, I would have renewed them.  But I checked the license plate before I left for work and, sure enough, the latest tag was September '21.  I drove the Wrangler to work, anyway, intending to go straight to the Clerk's office to renew the tags, figuring that I could sweet-talk my way out of a ticket in the unlikely event a law-enforcement official stopped me.  

At the Clerk's office, the clerk at the drive-thru window said that the tags had already been renewed.  (Hah!  I knew it!)  Figuring that I'd bought the tags but forgot to put them on, I pulled out of the line and parked, and rummaged through the junk in the glove compartment.  No tags.  No renewal slip.  Curious. 

While I was rummaging through the glove compartment, my cell phone rang.  It was an HVAC repairmen whom I'd called last Friday after discovering that the heat was not working in our office.  He was already in our parking lot and needed to be let inside the office.  "I'll be there in 5 minutes," I said.  I bought went back to the drive-thru window and bought a $3 replacement tag, then went to let in HVAC guy in the office.  Since The Boss was holding court, I called to let them know I'd be late.

It didn't take the HVAC guy long to discover the problem - a burned-out thingy inside the unit on the roof.  He'd have to go look for a replacement part, he said, but he wouldn't need back in the building. 

I headed for the courthouse.  When I got there, before I could even take my coat off, The Boss said, "I need you to follow me to the oil-change place."  We dropped off her car and went back to the courthouse.  

While she went back to the courtroom, I sat down to answer e-mails.  One e-mail was from Amazon.  They'd tried to deliver a case of formula for the Little Rotten Baby, but said it was "undeliverable."  WTF?  UPS has been leaving the formula on the porch ever since the LRB has been in the world.  Come to find out, it was not UPS, but USPS that had been the delivery agent.  Dear God.  Considering the state of the US mail delivery service since DeJoy's 2020 shenanigans, there was no telling where the formula was.

But I didn't have time to follow up on it right then, for I had a doctor's appointment (yearly physical) after lunch and had other stuff to do.

Yesterday's court docket was a short one, and before I left for my doctor's appointment, I took The Boss back to the oil-change place to pick up her car.  

While I was at the doctor's office, the LRB's mother called to ask about the formula.  Her stash was low.  I said I'd work on it.  I sat in the doc's parking lot and tried to locate the package electronically with my #(@! out-of-date cell phone.  Finally, I drove to the local post office.  They didn't have the package, they said.  I'd have to go online and . . . .   Yeah, yeah, yeah.  

Between the auto-insurance company, AAA, and the USPS, I've about had enough of this online sh*t.

From the post office, I went to the LRB's house, both to deliver some jackets her sisters had left at my house over the weekend and to see if the formula had arrived during the afternoon.  It had not.

I started for home.  When I passed the drug store, I remembered that The Husband had been fighting with the store and the insurance company about some of his prescriptions.  I called him to see if he'd won the battle.  He had.  I turned around and went back to the drug store, waited in line for about 30 minutes, got the prescriptions, headed home.

It was almost dinnertime.  Thankfully, there were left-over chicken enchiladas in the refrigerator, so I didn't have to cook.  I took my laptop out to the porch to work on the formula problem, but before I could get anywhere, the LRB's mom called to say the formula had arrived.  Whew.  One thing off my list.

Today's chore is to work on the car-wreck problem.  The adjustor has not called.  Looks like I'm going to have to nudge somebody.

Saturday when The Husband inspected the damage to my car, he noticed that the front passenger tire had a big slit in it from a gouge from the truck dude's front bumper.  Looks like I was lucky to make it home after the wreck without a second flat tire.  If that had happened, as mad as I was that Roadside Assistance had not come to the wreck, I'd probably be in jail by now.

   

I was driving on the highway about 8 o'clock yesterday morning, in the left lane, contemplating getting some breakfast at a drive-thru window, when suddenly - BOOM!  It sounded like a cannon went off.  

I looked in my rear-view mirror and saw an 18-wheeler behind me, smoke rolling from under his wheels.  The traffic in the right-hand lane was slowing, too.  My first thought was that the 18-wheeler had had a blow-out.

Then I noticed that my car was steering crazily, and that a small pickup truck was scraping its left front fender down the entire passenger side of my car.

All of this happened in about a nano-second.

The little pickup truck pulled into a parking lot on the right, and I followed him.  I don't know how the on-coming traffic behind us managed not to hit one of us.

When we came to a stop, I hopped out of my car and hollered, "Are you hurt?"  He was climbing out of his truck.  He shook his head.  "No.' 

"What happened?" I asked.

He explained that he had been working since 2:30 p.m. the previous day and fell asleep at the wheel.  

Thus began a three-hour ordeal of trying to get home.

Not only was the passenger side of my car jacked up, my tire was flat, and the rim was bent.  

I called 911, then called my insurance company.  While I was on the phone with the insurance company, my cell phone went dead.  I had a phone charger with me, but the "cigar lighter" wasn't working.  I'd known this for a month, but had not looked into why it was not working since I seldom had a need to use it. 

The policeman who came to work the accident let me use his phone charger long enough to finish calling the insurance company for roadside assistance.  Instead of getting a live person on the phone, the call sent a text that directed me to a web site.  My hands were so cold I could barely press the keys.  The policeman stayed long enough to let me finish the job of summoning roadside assistance, then he went on his way (after ticketing the young man in the truck).  

An hour passed, and then my phone rang.  It was some guy with a wrecker service, letting me know that he wasn't coming.  

My phone went dead again before I could make another call.

The young man in the truck let me use his phone charger.  I called AAA, which also tried to direct me to a web site.  I finally got a live person on the phone, who said help was on the way.

Another hour passed.

Meanwhile, the young man had summoned some friends.  They offered to change my tire, but by this time I was feeling sorry for the young man (who said he had a baby on the way in two weeks).  I told the young men to take their friend home and put him to bed, but they would not leave me until help arrived. 

Finally, they insisted on changing my tire.  They pulled my spare tire out of the car, but there was no jack.  None of them had a jack that would work with my car, so they summoned another friend. When he arrived with a jack, they changed my tire and got me back on the road.  "Don't drive over 50," one of them cautioned.  

I waved as I drove away, grateful that nobody was hurt, and grateful that the person who hit me had not been an a-hole.

But I was pissed for the rest of the day.

It's a little nippy on the back porch this morning.  I don't like it.  This porch is my work space and my refuge, and I don't want to give it up for the winter.  Fortunately, we have a plan.

The first year we built this porch, we wrapped it with thick clear(-ish) plastic come winter.  The plastic kept the porch far warmer than the outdoor temperature.  But The Husband didn't like it because he couldn't "see out."  So we didn't wrap it for the next several years.  A couple of weeks ago, The Husband came up with a plan.  We bought a 10' x 30' wedding tent.  It has windows in it.  We are going to staple the side panels to the porch.  He can "see out," and I can stay warm.  Win-win.

Since we're supposed to get a frost in the next few days, I went down to the garden yesterday to salvage the last of the tomatoes.  Had to fight my way through the  spider webs between the rows.  Most of the tomatoes were spotty, and many had seen their best days a long time ago, but a few were usable.  

There was also one serrano pepper plant so full of ripe peppers that it looked like a Christmas tree. I should have pulled up the whole plant and brought it home to make pepper jelly.  This year, I planted a lot of pepper plants, and most of them performed well.  However, something ate the leaves off of the six jalapeno pepper plants, which I planted especially for pepper jelly, and they never did recover.  We won't have jalapeno pepper jelly this year, unless I use grocery store peppers.

I got some hopeful news last week.  I believe I've told you that The Boss is retiring next year, and I will be out of a job.  Ever since she made her coming retirement public, I've been bugging lawyers' ears - "If you need a legal assistant, I'm your girl!"  Last week, one of the attorneys, a Public Defender, slid into a chair beside me and said, "Send me your resume.  I think we've got something for you."  One of their assistants is retiring next year about the same time as The Boss plans to wind down her work.  The timing would be perfect.  I sent him my resume the next day, and also sent it to the D.A.  The D.A. and P.D. assistants make a LOT more money than I make.  If I can get a job with one of their offices, it should significantly boost my retirement pay.  My fingers are crossed!  

The down-side is that I might actually have to work.  ;)

Busy - October 31, 2021

 As I was writing the previous post (while the lasagna sauce was simmering on the stove), Son #2 called.  The Little Rotten Baby was running a fever, and her mom was taking her to the doctor.  Could I pick up their 7-year-old from school at 3?  Of course I said yes.  About 15 minutes later, Son #2 called back.  Could I pick up their grocery store order between 3 and 4?  Certainly, I could.  At 2:45, I turned off the stove and went to get The Nugget.  She rode to the grocery store with me, and then I took her and the groceries home.  Mom and the LRB were home by then.  The doctor had said the baby had a virus.

It was after 5 by the time I came back home.  I immediately re-started the stove.  Boiled the noodles and assembled the lasagna, then started on the ice cream custard.  I cooked the brown sugar a bit too long, and so the Butter-Pecan ice cream custard turned into Caramel-Pecan custard.  But it was mighty tasty, so I ran with it.  Next, I made the meat/cheese filling for the hanky pankies.  It was nearly 8:00 by the time I finished.

Yesterday morning, I had to make a grocery store run for things I'd forgotten the day before.  When I got home, I started the ice cream freezer, and began assembling the hanky pankies.  While I did this, The Husband went to the place where we were having the 2 p.m. "do" to help set up tables.  About noon, I loaded all the food into my car and headed to the party site.  About 2, the guests started rolling in.  

It was a nice party.  Food galore.  Everybody was relaxed and happy.  About 6:30, I threw in the towel and came home.

Granddaughter #1 was participating in a band competition and was scheduled to march at 7 p.m.  I rushed home just in time to set up my laptop on the back porch and see "our" band take the field.  By this time, it was dark and a bit chilly.  When The Husband came home a few minutes later, we decided it was too cold to stay on the porch, so we went inside and started trying to figure out how to get the band competition to stream on the television.  

Two old people trying to work a television that takes FOUR remote controls to operate was a mess.  During the process, I couldn't help but giggle about The Nugget's comment the last time she was here and wanted to watch cartoons:  "Grandmama, why are old people's TVs SO HARD TO WORK."  And then she quickly added, "But I'm not saying you're old."

We finally got the band competition on the TV.  

We came in second.

In the Kitchen - October 29, 2021

There's a family pot-luck "do" happening this weekend.  I decided to take home-made lasagna and maybe home-made butter pecan ice cream.  Over the past couple of days, I've had a couple of other requests; one wants pecan cobbler, and one wants "hanky-pankies."  

The ice cream may not get made, but it sure would be good with pecan cobbler, wouldn't it?

On the other hand, the ice cream might have to be an emergency substitution.  This pecan cobbler is crawling of the pan. 

I see an oven-cleaning in my future.

It might be my fault.  I doubled the recipe.  Well, kinda doubled it.

I've made this cobbler several times.  It is good, and easy to make - one of those "DO NOT STIR" recipes that goes in the pan in layers.  The weird thing about it is that the very last ingredient is 1.5 cups of hot water, poured over the whole she-bang.  This hot water, poured over 1.5 cups of brown sugar, makes a lovely, slightly crispy topping.  Yum.  

I doubled everything - butter, pecans, batter, brown sugar - until I got to the hot water.  Did I really need to pour THREE CUPS of hot water on top?  

I stopped at two, and put it in the oven.

When the buzzer went off after 35 minutes - well, see the picture.

It was kind of jiggly.  But an un-doubled recipe is generally jiggly after 35 minutes, too.

I baked it another 8 minutes.  It's still a little jiggly.  I don't know whether to cook it a little more, or leave it alone.  I pinched off the stuff dripping down the side; it's pleasantly chewy.  

Maybe I'll wait and see how it's acting tomorrow.

Maybe I ought to be finding that ice cream recipe, too.  The custard will have to cool before it's used, so I'd better do that tonight, if I'm going to do it.

Lasagna sauce is simmering on the stove.

Hanky pankies might have to wait until tomorrow morning.

Wedding Day - October 25, 2021

 Yesterday was a lovely day for a wedding - sunny and pleasantly cool- and Son #1 took advantage of it and married his sweetheart.  The ceremony took place in a lovely Chapel in the Woods.  Son #2 played his guitar and sang a sweet song written by the Bride as she came down the aisle on the arm of her father.  The Husband served as the Groom's Best Man, and patted his pockets when it came time to exchange rings, eliciting a chuckle from the guests.  There was cake and punch and pictures.  Afterward, the entire wedding party and a few special guests went out to eat.  It was a good day.  :)

Purple Hull Peas - October 21, 2021

 Yesterday afternoon, I had just settled down on the porch to do some digitizing when the telephone rang.

Nanny:  "Want to shell some peas?"

Me:  "Not really."

She said she had picked two big grocery sacks full of peas that morning.  

These were my "late crop," which I had planted before I came down with a sinus/ear infection that lasted two months and caused me to abandon the garden altogether.  I felt bad for sluffing off the shelling work  on Nanny, so I went down to her house to get one of the bags of peas.

While I was there, I checked to see if the butterbeans were ready.  They were not ready, but they were crawling with thousands of tiny army-helmet-looking bugs.  (I don't even know what to call them.)   I mixed up a sprayer full of bug spray and let 'em have it.  

It took me two hours to shell the peas, and another 30 minutes to wash, blanch, and freeze them.  They made about two quarts.

I don't even like purple hull peas, but my daughter-in-law loves them.  This afternoon I'll take them to her, along with a jar of "pea relish" that she likes.  It'll give me a chance to smooch on the Rotten Little Baby.  ;)

Back to the Grind - October 19, 2021

It was back to the regular grind yesterday for The Husband and me.  The Boss is away at a seminar for the rest of this week, so it's boring and lonely in my office.  Yesterday, I stuck it out until noon, then high-tailed it out of there.  Might do the same thing today.

When I got home, I set up the laptop on the back porch to do some digitizing.  It wasn't long before I heard Cousin Roger crank up his lawnmower and head this way.  He'd been banned from the porch ever since I found out his girlfriend had covid, and then he came down with it, so it's been a while since we've had an opportunity to "talk shop" about his wood-working projects.  He'd been busy while we were in Gatlinburg and had a lot to tell me.

Before he left, he said, "Hey, I wanted to ask if you would work on my overalls."  

"What's wrong with 'em?"

"The straps ain't long enough."  

Once upon a time, Cousin Roger was a terrific athlete, tall and lean.  In the last few years, with his health problems and lack of exercise, he's grown an impressive paunch.  The extra girth has created a gap between his overall bib and its galluses.

I said, "Well, let 'em out some."

He said, "I done let 'em out all the way!"

He wants me to cut the galluses and splice them with fabric strips.  I said I'd give it a shot.

He also said that he is having trouble putting on his boots - the paunch is in the way (plus he's still not breathing quite right since covid) - but he has engineered a way around the problem.  He has affixed two S-hooks to two lengths of rope, which he has tied to a sturdy stick.  The S-hooks go into the holes at the top of his boots and - well, you probably get the idea.

He's a genius in his own way.  ;)

Gatlinburg - October 16, 2021

 

The Husband had to go to a seminar in Gatlinburg at the end of this week.  It is nearly 400 miles from our house to there, and I did not want him to make the drive by himself, so I went along for the ride.  I don't like Gatlinburg.  Too many people.  Too many cars.  Nothing but touristy junk in the shops.  But I went.

We left Wednesday morning, planning a leisurely drive down the backroads, an overnight stay on the way, and the rest of the drive the next day.  We drove farther than we had intended - stopped in some little town called Harriman, just east of the "time change" line.  We had dinner at a Mexican restaurant up the street from the hotel.  They were having a margarita drink special; we had two apiece.  Mistake.  I had heartburn all night long.

We drove on to Gatlinburg the next morning, arrived around noon.  Our hotel room wasn't ready, so we had to kill 2 hours before we could stash our luggage.  I don't even remember what we did for those 2 hours - hung out around the lobby, I reckon.  Registration for the seminar was that evening, with dinner and entertainment following.  

Friday was the first day of the seminar.  They fed us a breakfast of rubbery scrambled eggs, sausage, and grits.  Yum.  There was a Craftsmen's Fair at the Convention Center.  I strolled through that after breakfast (didn't buy a thing), then went back to the hotel for the rest of the day.  Did some digitizing while I waited for the seminar to be over.

Several of The Husband's board members were on the trip, having gone in their separate cars.  One of them is pushing 90 years old, and will probably retire when his term is up.  He likes to eat at a steakhouse that's less than 1/2 mile from the hotel.  Having been there before, I knew we were in for a long wait, so I started trying to make reservations.  Well, they don't take reservations.  But they do take "call-ahead seating."  What is the difference?  It didn't matter, because they weren't answering the phone, anyway.  I pulled up the web site, which acknowledged that they didn't answer the phone, but they said to "come see us" and they'd put us on a list.  So I got in the truck and started toward the restaurant.  Bumper-to-bumper traffic.  Aggressive pedestrians.  Took me 20 minutes to go less than 1/2 mile.

We needed a table for at least 8.  There were 2 more board members on the trip, but they were not sure whether they would be joining us for dinner.  I tried to reserve a table to 10, but they said it would be between 9 p.m. and 10 p.m. before one was available.  Since seating was limited, I reserved 2 tables for 4, and wouldn't you know, about 10 minutes before we were seated, the other 2 people called and said they were joining us.  Another scramble, but we managed to find them a seat.

Today's seminar was very short.  We were out of there by 11.  Intended to do another back-roads trip, but I had turned off the "avoid highways" setting, and about an hour into the trip, it sent us to the interstate.  We said, "What the hell," and tore out down I-40.  Drove all the way home, instead of making it a 2-day trip as planned.

I'm glad we did.

It's good to be home.

Camping calamities - October 11, 2021

When our sons were little, The Husband and I were so broke that we could not afford family vacations to the beach, to theme parks, or virtually anywhere else.  The best we could do was tent camping in state parks, and we did a lot of that.  In the process, we instilled in our boys a love for camping. 

When the boys were teenagers, we bought a pop-up camper.  It was air-conditioned, but not heated, but it was a big step up from sleeping on the ground in a tent.  I remember the first time we took it out, our younger son sat on the edge of the bed, soaking up the cool air blowing in his direction at the end of a hot day, and said, "Now, THIS is camping!"

We sold the pop-up and graduated to a "regular" camper.  A few years later, after the boys were grown and married, we traded campers again, but instead of selling the old camper, we gave it to the boys to share.  They did some repairs, spiffed it up, outfitted it with pots, pans, dishes, and linens.  Son #2 took it on the road for the first time on the same day that we took our new camper out for the first time.  We'd all been on the road for about an hour, going in separate directions, when our son called.  While driving down the interstate in Arkansas, one whole side of the camper sheathing peeled loose and flapped in the wind.  The Husband and I, traveling down some state highway in Tennessee, both felt like crying.  We'd tried to do something nice for the kids, and it had gone downhill.  

Fast forward to three weeks ago.  Son #2 and his wife bought a new camper.  On their first trip, when they got ready to come home, the truck wouldn't start.  

This weekend, Son #2 and his family headed out with the camper to Mountain View, Arkansas, one of the places we had tent camped when the boys were little.  An hour or two into the trip, they texted us:  they'd had a tire blow out on their van (they have so many kids that they can't get them all in the truck that pulls the camper, so they have to have a "chase car").  They were in Harrisburg, Arkansas - not much in the way of car repairs to be had there on a Sunday morning.  The Son put the "donut" on the van, and they made it on to Mountain View without further incident.

We are beginning to think that Son #2 needs a different hobby.  ;)

Baby Faces - October 9, 2021

Granddaughters 2-4 came to visit today (#1 was at a competition with her high school band).  I snagged #4 (she's almost 9 months old), sat her in my lap facing me, and had a short conversation with her.  She laughs at all my jokes.  ;)

After a while, I put her down on the floor, and she crawled around, exploring.  When one of her sisters went to the sewing room, #4 tried to follow.  The sewing room is not fit for human habitation, and is especially off limits to babies who would eat straight pins off the floor.  When the baby put it in high gear and headed toward the sewing room, I called her name, and she stopped, sat down, turned around and looked up at me and - 

Oh, my god - it was her daddy staring up at me from 37+ years ago.

On any given day, I have a hard time summoning clear memories of my sons' infant faces.  Maybe that's because the babies' faces changed so fast in that first year that I didn't have time to get used to them.  

But I remembered today!

"Worse than the Flu" - October 7, 2021

Cousin Roger motored over on his lawnmower Wednesday afternoon.  He turned off the engine and just sat there for a minute or two, seemingly looking off into the distance, but more likely trying to work up the energy to get off the lawnmower.  Finally, he climbed off and headed toward the porch.

As he got about 20 feet away, I hollered, "Roger, don't you bring your covid-infested ass up on my porch.  I mean it."

He stopped in his tracks.  "Man, I'll tell you what . . . this shit is worse than the flu."

He's managed to keep moving, still puttering in his workshop, through sheer force of will.   But he's coughed so much that he's thrown his back out.

He just brought over another box of stuff for me to paint.

Ima spray it with Lysol. 

Big, dumb, dawg - October 6, 2021

My cell phone rang this morning before I'd had my first sip of coffee.  Nobody but my sister dials my phone that early.  I had a mild sense of alarm when I saw that the caller was Son #1.  

Son #1 has a Rottweiler the size of an Angus bull.  His name is Axel.  He weighs about 160 pounds.  He's a sweet-natured dog, and he's pretty smart, but he does what he wants.

Axel had gotten out of the house this morning and had run off and wouldn't come back.  My son's finance had to get to work and couldn't spare the time to go looking for him.  My son wanted to know if I could go over to his house, find the dog, and put him inside the house.  

I understood my son's concern.  A neighbor had threatened to shoot Axel if he caught him on his property.  The same neighbor had shot Axel's girlfriend a year ago when she ventured into his yard.

I quickly put on some clothes, grabbed my coffee cup, and headed to my son's house (four miles away), hoping that Axel's big, dumb ass would be stretched out on the porch when I got there.

He was no where in sight.

I called and called and called.  He did not come.

I got in the car and drove down the road, looking for him, calling his name.  Nothing.

I drove up and down the highway, turned down the side roads.  No Axel.

I went back to my son's house, hoping the dog might have come home while I was driving.  I got out of the car and called some more.  No sign of the dog.

My phone rang as I was getting back in the car to drive around some more.  I figured it was my son, calling to see if I'd found Axel, and I was dreading having to tell him that I had not found the dog.  At  the same time the phone rang, it also beeped with the sound it makes for incoming text messages.  There was a whole stack of them.  

The caller was The Husband, wondering if I'd found Axel.  While I talked to him, I put on my glasses and read the text messages.  Twenty-two minutes earlier, my son had texted, "She found him."  

Axel had been inside the house the whole time.  

Peddling - October 5, 2021

When I came home from work yesterday, there was a big, taped-up box on my back porch.  I knew where it came from:  Cousin Roger.  There were also two camouflage wall sconces on a table.  Since I knew that there's someone in Roger's house who has covid, I sprayed the box and the sconces with disinfectant and left them alone while I did some digitizing work.  Later, I opened the box.  Inside it were the 9 wooden lanterns that I'd sold to a flower shop.  He'd done a good job on them.

As for the sconces, Roger had tried to stencil deer heads on them.  He'd used day-glo orange spray paint, and there was over-spray all around the deer, making them look like they'd been head shot.  I re-painted the deer (with tan paint) and tried to cover up the over-spray with smears of black paint.  

Today I will be taking this stuff - and all the other stuff he's left on my back porch in the last couple of weeks - to the flower shop to see if I can peddle it.  Roger's nervous.  He had made the lanterns an inch shorter than the prototype that I'd shown the flower shop, and I'd given him a butt-chewing over it.  Hopefully, he won't make that mistake again.  

Back porch findings

He has been wearing me out with texts and phone calls since I gave him my cell number.  I'm about ready to block him.  When I said this to The Husband (who is Roger's blood relative), he said, "Aw, don't do that.  Roger's quarantined, and doesn't have anybody to talk to."  I said, "YOU talk to him."

Roger called yesterday about 5 minutes after I got home.  I hadn't even had time to pee.  He sounded stopped-up, and when I asked after his health, he confessed that he now has covid.  He said he feels like he has a sinus infection, and can't smell or taste, but otherwise he's not too bad.  He says he still feels like working in his shop.  

When I come home with his money for the lanterns, I'm going to leave it on his porch and run!