Because it's personal, that's why.

Introducing Hell's Kitchen

2007-04-04T09:57:00.000-04:00

It's a cooking blog, managed jointly by myself and Antiprincess at at I Shame the Matriarchy (link over there in the blogroll---->)
Featuring recipes, cook-talk, complaints about the price of toys at Williams-Sonoma, and any other cooking-related stuff.

Feel free to ask questions, answer questions, leave recipes (which might even get tested if they look good), indulge in any sort of cooking related fun.

Hell's Kitchen

The News of My Demise May Be Premature

2007-04-04T08:12:00.000-04:00

Well...Wordpress appears to be on vacation. Maybe I'll keep posting here until further notice.

I'm Moving!

2007-04-03T16:16:00.000-04:00

I am moving to Wordpress. My new address will be:
Because It's Personal
That is: http://becauseitspersonal.wordpress.com
This is the last and final post here. Au Revoir! Auf Weidersehen! Sayonara!
Bye y'all!

The Toot Household Felines

2007-04-03T15:07:00.000-04:00

Molly isn't our only cat, she's just the only one #4 can play with, because for some inexplicable reason, he's not allergic to her like she is to our other 2 cats, Junior and Morgan.

Junior, aka BubbaKitty or "You sorry-assed cat do something to earn your keep!"
He is a laid-back nip-head (or pot-head, if the nip happens to be potted)with an inperterbable countenance and no tail. Yes, he has no tail. We have concluded that a cat's sense of ambition is centered in their tail, because Junior has none.

Junior, in an uncharacteristically noble pose

Hey..whuzzat?

Morgan is technically #1's cat, but since he has moved into town and Morgan is unfamiliar with traffic situations, and used to being outside most of the time, we kept her. She is different from Junior, being graceful and elegant, and imperious.
Her perch is atop a post on our patio, where she is out of reach of the dogs and can look down on her fiefdom with haughty disdain.

I'd always wanted a siamese cat. They're pretty and talkative and (theoretically) trainable. Junior's not trained, since he lacks the ambition to move more than 2 or 3 yards before flopping over and rolling in the dirt. He's like a 2 yr old that way. Because he's tailess, we got him at a significant discount. He's worth every penny too. He watches the birds to make sure they fly, he holds down the driveway to keep it from just folding up and rolling away. He informs us when the food bowl is empty, or when the food that is in the bowl is of inferior quality and needs replacing with lox and cream cheese. He fertilizes my flower bed with vigourous frequency,which makes weeding an adventure. He adores catnip. I always keep him a big nip plant available for him to roll on, nibble (or gnaw), or just be near for comfort and security. When he has been partaking of the nip, he gets goofy, all floppy and compliant.

Morgan is dignified. She has no patience for Junior and his redneck mannerisms. She, however, is also fond of the nip, and has been known to stand on her head in it. Not that anyone was watching, of course. She will occasionally sneak into the house and seek out the one spot where she is least welcome, and hide there for the entire day. This would be #4's bedroom, and she perches on his pillow, looking smug. Then I have to wash every single thing in his room. I oughta make her do it except she lacks opposable thumbs and would have trouble with the door of the washing machine.

Good cats, both of them. Each entertaining and worthy in their own special way.

I love it when things work out the way I planned.

2007-04-03T15:04:00.000-04:00

Remember this?

Now it's this:

And this:

2007-04-03T12:48:00.000-04:00

Wow..it's so quiet here.

2007-04-03T08:27:00.000-04:00

O! The Children! Think about the Children! or...not. I say not. They are ALL (Yes, I said ALL. All 3 of them!) With the grandparents for a few days ('Til Thursday, possibly Friday.) It's Spring Break week in East Bumfart, Georgia. Thanks to my mother's need for help doing spring yardwork, my father's desire to get that 200cc Honda engine installed in a self-manufactured go-cart, and #4's desire to fish, they are all 4 hours away in East Alabama. And I am here, just me, the dogs, and Sweet Daddio in the evenings. What to do!?

Well, the house is a mess. I'll clean it up. The carpet (in 2 rooms)despertely requires some sort of cleaning. I'll do that as well. Snow peas require picking.

Yes! I said snow peas require picking! They are needing to be picked! I have snow peas to pick! I must pick snow peas! And eat them! Yes!

I'm mulling over the OmegaMom concept with Northern Girl(whaling season). I'm also mullng over Hells Kitchen with Antiprincess (I shame the Matriarchy). Recipes, folks, and cooking/household advice. Soon the address and linkage will be up, and you can read and be amazed (or not).

Yesterday SD took the day off from work. It was also #1's first day on his new job, working in the mill where SD works, only SD isn't his immediate supervisor (which would be awkward if he were). SD advised #1 to call him "SD" or "Mr. Toot" instead of "Dad", to avoid tension amidst the other personel. #1 said he enjoyed his first day. They put him to work seaming rolls of fabric (it has to be done perfectly or the material will rip within the machine, and that is a very bad thing indeed) and he apparently caught on very quickly. THen they had him doing nasty dirty physical grunt work (probably a rite of passage sort of thing) and he cheerfully did that as well. Once you've worked on a high speed printing press, you tend to not be bothered by grunge.

SD and I played golf, on a most perfect day for such things. It was 80 degrees, partly cloudy, no one much was playing so we didn't hold anyone up without slow pace. There was no one to see me play badly so I wasn't embarrassed or self concious. SD played well, too. The one time someone was watching he drove the ball right up to the green, within about 6 feet of the hole. I just made absolutely sure no one was watching me at all. I can't drive a ball to save my life. The whole thing was fun, relaxing, and I got to spend 2-1/2 uninterrupted hours with my favorite person. And eat lunch at The Blue Moon. I had a rare filet sliced thin with horseradish-thyme cream, baby greens and tomatoes on grilled bread. Yum. I mean really. Yum.

So today, it's rainy and breezy and I'm going to stay inside (except for when I go pick SNOW PEAS!) and clean.

The Monday Melee

2007-04-02T07:59:00.000-04:00

The Monday Melee

1. The Misanthtropic: Name something (about humanity) you absolutely hate.
That's hard. I feeling fairly optimistic right now. Oh I know...the guy down the way with the huge chopper bike that gets off work at 11 pm and roars through the nieghborhood like he's the only one who can hear it.

2. The Meretricious: Expose something or someone that’s phony, fraudulent or bogus.
Awards ceremonies. When are they gonna have one (besides the Nobel Peace Prize and even that's dubious since giving it to Yasser Arafat) honoring someone for outrageous decency?

3. The Malcontent: Name something you’re unhappy with.
My right shoulder. It hurts.

4. The Meritorious: Give someone credit for something and name it if you can.
#1, for having the courage to step out and accept a job from his father.

5. The Mirror: See something good about yourself and name it.
Hm.This one's hard as well. Ok. I am creative. I can take an idea and totally run with it.

6. The Make-Believe: Name something you wish for.
New flooring in the living room and office. Currently it has white (!) carpet. Well, ok, carpet that is supposed to be white. I want it up and out and replaced with a light oak laminate. In fact, I want the whole downstairs with light oak laminate. now.

A Chicken Recipe for Vera...

2007-03-30T14:58:00.000-04:00

because you know you want it.

Chicken Fingers
however many chicken tenderloins you need (I fix 2-3 pounds, but then I house heathens)
Buttermilk- oh...2 cups or so, enough to cover the tenderloins in a bowl
flour,cornmeal, seasoning salt (like Lawry's or your favorite blend), black pepper

*cornmeal, not cornbread mix. Yellow cornmeal. Or white but yello's better because I say so.*

Put the chicken on to soak in the buttermilk, for an hour or so.
Mix together equal parts flour and cornmeal, season to taste (be generous, it takes more seasoning than you'd think. Like, a 2 teaspoons per cup of flour mix)

In a dutch oven, or deep skillet, melt 2 inches of shortening, and get it hot. You know it's the right temperature when you stick the handle of a wooden spoon in and bubbles foam out of it.

Pull each tenderloin out of the buttermilk and shake off the excess, then roll around in flour mix so it's well coated, and drop into the hot oil. Cook 5 or 6 tenderloins at a time, being careful not to overload the pan because it will bring the temperature of the oil down and make your tenders greasy.

Cook until nicely brown, and put on a roaster rack in a 300 degree oven, to keep them hot until you're done cooking them all. It's ok if they aren't done all the way through, because they will continue to cook in the oven.

Serve with honey mustard:
honey, mixed with mustard...about 1 pt honey to 3 parts mustard but you can play with it.

As for seasoning the flour mix- I never do it the same way twice. Sometimes I use seasoning salt and pepper. Sometimes I add ground red pepper to give it a kick. I'll rub dried oregano into it, or italian seasoning blend. Garlic powder, onion powder, once I used a package of taco seasoning mix. That was pretty good.

Omega Moms Untie!

2007-03-30T14:30:00.000-04:00

The Original Omega Mom over here has announced the beginnings of a New Wave of Motherhood. She, and I, and all who march with us, raise our sticky mitts in the air and announce NO MORE! No more competition! No more popularity contests! No more fretting because size 6 is dim memory and someone has a better haircut than we do!

Alpha Moms, you can have your SUV's and androgenously named children and Blackberries. You can blow your Talbot's wardrobe out your tight little Pilates ass. Take your charts and schedules and personal chefs and Go....A....Way.

We, the Omega Moms, will rejoice in our crock pot meals, our children's stained and wrinkled clothing, and our joyful and spontaneous approach to motherhood. We reject that Alpha philosophy of Junior High, and will debrief our husbands whenever we want.

You in?

Happy birthday #4!

2007-03-30T12:18:00.000-04:00

From the minute you were born, having you areound was the most natural thing in the world. You came into our lives peacefully, and have been making up for it ever since. When you get off the bus, you start hollering, all the way up the driveway and into the house MOM! I'M HOME! WHAT'S THERE TO EAT?

You have your favorites: That sheet, the one that's just barely hanging on, thin as gauze yet you maintain steadfastly that it's warmer than any blanket.
Chicken fingers. What do you want for dinner? "Chicken fingers." How about a hamburger? "chicken fingers." You must eat a vegetable. "Ok. carrots with ranch dressing and chicken fingers"
HotWheels and MatchBox cars. You must have a thousand of them. And no repeats! Go figure!
Old Loony Tunes cartoons. Yes indeed, those marvelously improper cartoons, especially since your brothers showed you the one where Bugs Bunny gets out of the shower and briefly drops his towel, showing the world that, in spite of his occasional dressing in drag, he is indeed a man bunny.
And, building toys: Legos, Magnetix, Duplos, Blocks, bricks, sticks, anything you can stick together to make something else.

I love to go into your room and smell that boy-smell. Part soap and part poop, part crayons and part...whatever the fuzzy stuff in the cup under you bed is.Fruit punch? I dunno.

Sometimes you ask for something, and it's never what you'd expect from an 8 yr old boy. "Mom, my room needs planets, lots of them, and a sun, and asteroids." Happy to oblige, thanks to NASA and their photos, a printer and some small sticks, there are planets in your room.

"Mom I want a birthday cake" Ok, happy to oblige. What kind? Ice cream cake? Chocolate? "I want a plain vanilla cake, with vanilla icing, only make the icing red and yellow." No ice cream cake? "Plain vanilla." I guess your life is so exciting you need something to settle you down a bit. Plain vanilla it is.

SOmetimes you talk too much, but you know this already because your teacher tells you on a very regular basis. "Mom, I can't help it! There's just so many words in my head and if I don't get them out my brains will fall out!" Honey, I know the feeling.

You are a remarkable reader. You like Calvin and Hobbes (which is a little scary), Hank the Cow Dog, Absolutely any science book you can find, even attempting my college biology text, bless your heart. They tested you for giftedness at the school. Of course, I'm the one who's gifted, for having you in my life, but alas, they said you weren't. I tried not to get my feelings hurt, because of course I think you're the smartest 8 yr old around, except for Kevin, who's parents make him do an hour of math every afternoon after school, but I'd rather see you roll in the dirt and eat crackers in the afternoon than sit at a table and do long division.

Your favorite new toy: That huge box.

Sometimes the best things in life really are free.
Happy Birthday, sweet boy.

Chicken for Vera

2007-03-29T15:24:00.000-04:00

Lemon chicken- can be baked but much better if grilled, or you can use the seasonings with a whole chicken to roast.

Take your chicken, breasts, legs, a whole chicken,rinse and dry very well, and rub the pieces (or whole chicken with the skin on)all over with olive oil

Slice a couple of lemons, fairly thin. Leave the peel on.
Chop a very generous handful of fresh oregano or marjoram- at least 1/4 cup
Chop very fine 4 or 5 cloves of garlic
Crack a couple tablespoons of black pepper
Kosher salt

For pieces: lay them on a pan, sprinkle generously with the oregano, garlic, salt and pepper. Then lay 1 or 2 slices of lemon on each piece, and leave it there for, oh...30 minutes or so, perhaps while you get the grill lit and hot. When the grill's hot, lay the chicken lemon side UP, grill for 8 minutes and turn, being careful not to let the lemon fall into the fire (they will be tasty), 8 minutes more. If you have a grill basket, this is a good way to keep from losing the lemons into the fire.
Alternately, you can broil, putting the rack low in the oven, turning after 8 minutes.

For whole:
Slip your fingers under the skin over the breasts, legs, and thighs, to loosen it but be careful not to rip it.
Mix the seasonings together, and stuff small amounts of it under the skin, rubbing it around so it's distributed evenly.
Slip lemon slices under the skin- figure on 1 for each thigh and leg, 2 for each breast. Any left over stuff up inside the body cavity. You can do this with leftover herb mix as well. Roast at 450 degrees for 18-20 minutes per pound of chicken. Let sit for 15 minutes before cutting up.

Food

2007-03-29T13:58:00.000-04:00

Great Bleeding Slab of Beef
you need 1 London Broil, 3 pounds or so,about 2 inches thick, because it makes amazing steak salad the next day.
Mash up 4-6 big cloves of garlic, good and smashed
Rough chop a good fistful of fresh rosemary. Get it from the produce section if you don't have a bush. 1/4 cup or so, after chopping
Lots of cracked pepper. If you don't have a grinder, buy whole black pepper and crush it between 2 skillets. Alot, like 1/4 cup or so. I guess you could buy coarse ground pepper, but it's got more flavor if you crush it yourself.
Kosher salt. you ought to have this in your pantry, so go ahead and get a box if you don't have one.

Smear the mashed garlic all over the beef, both sides. Sprinkle the rosemary, pepper and salt generously on both sides. For some reason, kosher salt isn't as salty as table salt, and it adds a nice crunchy texture, so be generous with it.

Grill over a medium hot fire, 7-9 minutes per side depending how thick the meat it, to get it medium rare. Let sit 10 minutes before slicing. It'll be juicier if you do.
If you don't have a grill, get a skillet really hot, and throw in a little olive oil. Then sear the meat about as long as you would if grilling it- 7 mins per side.

Twice baked potatoes are good with this, and you can fix them ahead of time:
Bake however many potatoes you need.
Cut off the top and carefully scoop out the middle, putting the stuff in a bowl.
Mash the potato stuff up with a fork, and add (per potato you baked):
1 heaping spoonful of sour cream
1 heaping spoonful of butter
2 heaping spoonfuls of shredded cheddar cheese
some garlic powder (1/4 tsp or so per potato, or however you want)
chopped chives
salt and pepper
Mix all this together and scoop back into the baked potato shells.
Then sprinkle them with ground red pepper (paprika, or cayenne, or chipotle, whatever) and baked for about 30 minutes.

Ren- summer dessert:
Peach cobbler- not as sweet as most Southerners make it
6-8 fresh peaches, peeled and cut into chunks (OR 2 cans of water-packed canned peaches, drained)
Toss the peaches with 1 tablespoon of sugar mixed with 1/2 teaspoon cinnamon (or not, if you don't want to)

Get your favorite biscuit mix (bisquick, whatever)
2 cups biscuit mix
1/4 cup sugar
1/2 teaspoon (more or less) cinnamon
1-1/2 cups milk
1 stick butter, melted

Put half the butter in a casserole dish, and stick it in the 400 degree oven to get hot while you do every thing else.
Mix the dry ingredients together, stir in the milk and half the butter, stir well to make a batter. If it's real thick add a bit more milk, if it's runny like pancake batter, add a bit more biscuit mix. It needs to be thick but pourable.

When the pan is good and hot, pour the batter into it, on top of the butter. It will fry a bit around the edges. Put the peaches on top, spread evenly. Bake for 25-30 minutes, if it's turning really brown around the edges but the middle's not done, cover the edges with some foil.
The batter will puff up and cover the peaches. It's good with vanilla ice cream or (my preference)whipped cream.
It's also really good for breakfast the next day, warmed up and milk poured on top.

A question

2007-03-29T11:47:00.000-04:00

If I use a FedEx box to UPS something, will it explode? Or will they just charge extra?

I suppose it was inevitable...

2007-03-29T11:19:00.000-04:00

I've run out of things to say. Requests, anyone? Ask me anything you want, and if I want to, I'll answer.

I'm not a bee, or a wasp, I'm a snail

2007-03-28T07:22:00.000-04:00

Great. Just great. Just when I was starting feel comfortable in my own role as wife and mother and poop scooper, a new label comes out that only serves to highlight my inferiority.

Alpha Moms

We all know them. The last place I lived was slam full of them. These are the hyper organized, SUV driving mothers who's children are in soccer,ballet,flute and piano, karate,swim team. They are the moms who run home businesses, have a housekeeper and maybe even a personal chef, but not for baking brownies, that's their job as Alpha Mom. They are wealthy enough that their home business is just for 'fun money' to pay for trips to, you know, Those Places. Bermuda, Bahama (come on pretty mama) Key Largo, Montego,(baby why don't we go down to Kokomo, we'll get there fast and then we'll take it slow). They don't have jobs outside the home, usually, because they are far to busy being Alpha Mom, and hubby has a good job to pay the way.

I'm not an Alpha Mom. I'm not even Beta...Delta maybe. I have this hopelessly old fashioned idea that kids should have time to play. It's important, in my world, for 8 yr old boys to lay in the back yard and stare at the sky, or to cross the road into the woods to build a fort out of bits of dead trees and bark, and decorate it with found objects (a deer skull, advertising signs). I want my children to understand that being a driven individual isn't necessarily the healthiest lifestyle. Ambition is great, it gets you ahead and I'm all for that. But one does not have to be BUSY all the time. I also think the kids at the school would rather eat Oreos than homemade sugar cookies with little pink hearts drawn on with royal icing. (I know this, because I tried it. Trust me, they'd rather have Oreos.)

The concept of "playdates" kind of saddens me. I recognize the need to scheduling in advance, since often friends live across town or have both parents working, so I get that. But, whatever happened to running across the street to see if Bubba can come out for a game of dodgeball? I think it may have gone the way of aprons and family drives through the countryside (My parents called it "going out to join the Wild Bunch, and I despised those road trips with an all consuming passion)

Alpha Moms have always been around. They're the ones who make homemade cookies for school parties, who chair every committee, who run just about every event at the church. They have Daytimers and Blackberries to keep things straight, and their days are scheduled down to the last minute, from the time they get up (5 am, so they can get laundry started, dinner in the crock pot, cookies in the oven, and berries on their children's organic granola breakfast)to the time they wash down the xanax with a glass of mid-grade chardonnay (10 ish, or later).

I wonder when, if, they'll burn out, or if they're just that type-A personality who must must Succeed Or Die Trying. I worry that the media, who is marketing to these people (apparently they buy more than the average jane), are setting a standard that is unreachable for ordinary, middle class, just trying to keep their head above water type folk. Like they have for women physically. Now, we're supposed to be a size 6 AND spend all day flying around like a bee on speed?

Well, USA Today is acting as tho this is a new thing, these Alpha Moms. They're not new, they just have a name now. And more power to them, if that's what gives them a sense of accomplishment. I predict the pendulum will swing back the other way with their children. I have no intention of allowing their frenetic activity make me feel guilty for my apparent laziness.

Don't get me wrong, I admire (to a degree) their dedication to their children, their organizational skills, and their willingness to serve on committees. Someone has to do it. I just don't feel the need to go there. And, like with what size I'm supposed to be, I don't buy into the media hype that this is how I'm supposed to behave.

Pass the chardonnay, willya?

Must See

2007-03-27T16:05:00.000-04:00

Schocking
You must, truly. Just....Go.

I'm a guntoting Stepford Wife with Slipknot on my iPod (well, not really)

2007-03-27T13:00:00.000-04:00

SO I'm writing this new post and getting this flow of ideas down (Thank you Mrs. F, for teaching me to type), when I'm interrupted by the need to get #4 to the doctor (he has pinkeye...grrr). We go ,eat lunch at Chik Fil A, get eyedrops and come home. I read what-all I've written and boy howdy does it ever come across as sanctimonious. So I'm not going to post it because I sound like I'm pigeonholing everyone and I get the top spot. Gag.

The truth is, most of the time I am dazed and confused. I wander around in an intellectual wasteland populated by gun-toting children who listen to Slipknot...oo that sounds bad too. The guntoting child is not the same as the one with appalling taste in music. Plus all the ammunition is locked away in a safe. OK that's better. Anyway, my life is rich and full, well stocked with interesting, opinionated people, but I am so busy figuring out the best way to roast a chicken today or making sure I get the shirts out of the dryer before they become permanently wadded and have to be washed all over again, that I forget to think about loftier things.

I forget that women are suffering. I forget that I'm supposed to beat myself with a stick just for relying on a Man (of all things!). I mess up and shave my legs AND put fake tanning lotion on them. I enjoy myself. I'm not supposed to enjoy myself, not when I am oppressed, me being white and female and fairly wealthy. (Just the other day I asked SD to oppress me some more, and you know what? He did! He's taking a day off work and got us a tee time! Shocking!)

See, I'm so deluded I can't even take anything seriously. How could I possibly think serious thoughts whilst operating under such? I can't! I'm a Stepford Wife (only not thin). That reminds me...I'm not supposed to like thin people either, because they have Thin Privilege which I still haven't figured out. I've had no shortage of approving smiles from teh Patriarchy, and I'm anything BUT thin...so where's the privilege? Oh. Silly me. I'm not supposed to like approving smiles. They are Oppressive. (SD! Oppress me, you fool!)

I am bothered by some things I see. Renegade Evolution is constantly getting bashed over the head for her lifestyle/career choice. While I admit it's not the life for me, it works for her, on many levels, and it pains me to see her treated with such contempt. She has been nothing but gracious to me, and I have learned that if you treat her nice, she'll be nice back. She's quite willing to allow you your opinion (she knows how I feel about her line of work), if you allow her her's.She'll also be ready to put the smack-down on you if you cross her. Thing is,she's treated like some sort of posterchild for How Not To Act by the feministas. How she acts is her business. They say her porn is used to abuse women. Well. So are baseball bats. Why aren't they screaming about that? What about football games? Isn't SuperBowl Sunday supposed to be the day with highest domestic violence incidents? I guess it's easier to pick a target like RenEv, who's particular brand of pornography isn't exactly Miramax popular, that to take on the Real Patriarchy: NFL. Chickens.

The fact is, no one knows anyone in the blogosphere as well as they think they do. I've never met anyone (with the exception of JerseyChick, whom I've known since before Al Gore invented the Internet)that I 'talk' to in blogs. Chances are some of the folk who I like online, I'd not like at all in person. It doesn't matter, because I only know one bit of them, that one bit they are willing to expose. Same is true of everyone else. You don't know me except for what I choose to allow you to know. Some of you probably wouldn't like me one bit. So judging a person's life based on a tidbit of information that they choose to show is like that story of the blind people feeling the elephant "It's a tree. No it's a snake. No its a cowhide." No one has the complete picture about anyone, so condemning someone based on a fragment? That's silly and shortsided, not to mention immature.

Say it isn't so!

2007-03-27T07:25:00.000-04:00

Vera Venom is making noises about ceasing, quitting writing, because the whole backstabbing feminist thing is getting to her.

I understand her point. It is why I choose not to participate in such discussions, because strife causes pain, and I am opposed to pain.

Howver, Vera has a terrific voice. She writes well, she's interesting, and even though I don't agree with much of what she says, I always enjoy it. She's civil in an arena where civility has taken a back seat to inflammation.

Isn't that what it's about, getting alternative opinions, learning other folks' perspective and respecting their story?

The only problem I have with Vera is that she's on Wordpress. Wordpress dislikes me, and I dislike it. I try to logon, after jumping through their silly little hoops, and still Wordpress growls at me and spits sunflower seed husks on my shoes. How rude.

So Vera, if you're reading this, I will respect your decision should you choose to turn your attention elsewhere, but I won't like it.

Oh! Y'all! Yum!

2007-03-26T18:06:00.000-04:00

Chimmichurri sauce

1/2 cup rice vinegar
1/2 cup olive oil
1/3 cup chopped parsley
1/4 cup chopped fresh oregano
2 tablespoons lemon thyme
4 cloves garlic
1/2 teaspoon red pepper flakes
salt and pepper to taste

Whizz everything together in a food processor to make a thin paste.
Grill a steak, basting it a couple of times with a little bit of the sauce.
Serve the sauce with the steak. I'm telling you what. Yum

Expendable

2007-03-26T08:02:00.000-04:00

Autistic child killed
Disabled child killed 'out of love'
Thanks to Trinity for the links

Our culture has decided that happiness is the most important thing. We are supposed to have a career that always satisfies us, spouses/mates who always turn us on, a big house, a new car, the latest cell phone blah blah de blah. If we don't have all those things we might as well hang it up and die. According to the second article above, if we think someone we love won't have those things, they might as well die, too. Because, after all, all we are is what we are right here and now, right?

Wrong.

*Warning...Religious Content Ahead. You have been warned*

I believe each and every one of us has a soul. Everyone, from the baby born with no brain to the committed atheist who thinks once we die we're worm food and memories. The soul is a part of us, but seperate from us, in that the soul is the part of us most intimately connected to God (even if you don't believe in God, because God always believes in you), and it's here in this imperfect body to learn. I'm not sure what, precisely, the soul's supposed to learn, but I have a feeling the lessons involve compassion, an open mind, patience, stuff like that, because we don't start out that way. The soul is supposed to learn how to deal with whatever it's handed, whether it's hardship and strife, or a comfortable bed on a silver platter.

There's a saying: "To those whom much is given, much is expected" It's our job, as people with much (and yes, you have much, if you are reading this. You can read, you have access to a computer, chances are you have a place to live and food to eat), to look out for the ones who have little. (Understand, I am a capitalist extraordinaire, not a socialist, and I don't believe it's the state's responsibility to look out for folk, but rather the individual's. I also recognize that we individuals are relying on the state to do our job. But I'm not discussing that today.)

The point of all this is that by "euthenising" people because they are flawed, we are denying their soul the opportunity for growth. Who are we to say that a blind and deaf child has no need for life? Helen Keller, anyone? She was believed to be mentally retarded, yet the things she did for the advancement of blind people! Incredible. What would the world of the blind be like if she hadn't been taken in hand by Anne Sullivan?

And yet, this baby's parents ended his life because he wouldn't be able to hear.

I remember reading about a blind man, who'd been blind since birth. He had no concept of sight, since it was never part of his experience, so he didn't miss it. So it could have been with this baby. Except for his parents, who felt sad that he couldn't hear music.

It wasn't their call to make, whether that child lived or died. His soul did not belong to them. The woman with the autistic boy, sounds like she needed some help learning how to cope with a rambunctious child, yet it was easier for her to 'put him to sleep' than get help.

*ok, before you point out the inconsistancy, I can see it. I wrote about disliking state agencies, and yet, clearly, here is a woman who could have benefitted from some help through a state agency. Yes, I see the inconsistancy. Note the teeny sentence under my masthead*

My belief, in a (very large)nutshell, is this: We all have souls, in varying states of development. Our souls do not belong to us, but to God, who put us here to grow and learn from experience. It is not our place to take a life, no matter how deprived we may think that life is, due to physical or mental disability. To 'euthenise' a person is to play God. Where children are concerned, particularly, it is our responsibility to do everything within our power to ensure that child grows to an age where s/he can be accountible for hi/r own actions. We absolutely MUST teach that child that life is precious, not expendable, that hardships will happen, and by dealing with them they will learn and grow and be stronger for having endured. We do them no service by teaching them that happiness is the end goal. Strength is the end goal, and fortitude, and ultimately, peace, compassion, and a clear self-awareness.

I'm not gonna do it!

2007-03-26T07:20:00.000-04:00

I absolutely, positively, uncategorically, without reservation or forethought REFUSE to turn on the air conditioner before June 1. I won't do, I tell you! You can't make me!

It got up to 90 yesterday. May God richly bless the inventor of ceiling fans. And icemakers. And indoor showers. And whoever invented the Slush Puppy.

It's supposed to get that warm today.

Watch it rain next Monday, when SD and I have a 9 am tee time.

2007-03-25T19:29:00.000-04:00

Note: The PopOff Valve has returned. If you are interested in accessing it, email
Daddio64@gmail.com for more information.

Questions to be answered

2007-03-25T19:18:00.000-04:00

Krishanna:
1. What is your favorite medium to work with?
2. When did you realize you had a disability? (odd question, but I didn't realize I was different until middle school, when people started pointing it out)
3.What about humanity frustrates you (and conversely, delights you) the most?
4. What is the comfort food you go to when life is grinding at you?
5. If you had to choose 1 character quality you'd get rid of, which one would it be?

The Rude Guy:
1. At what point in your life were you completely comfortable with who you were (are)?
2. If you and your son could go anywhere in the world for 24 hours, where would you go?
3.Which would you prefer: A Grande mocha caramel latte whip or a cup of fresh brewed Kona? Or Earl Grey?
4. Describe the perfect meal-setting, food, and company.
5. When you are asked to perform some menial task, do you find a reason not to or do you do it just to be done with it?

Saturday Afternoon, Hard at Work

2007-03-24T15:58:00.000-04:00

I took a nap in SD's hammock today. I don't take naps, typically, but today, the combination of sunshine and spending the morning planting things made me tired. So, I laid in the hammock, listening to my iPod and the clock of badly hit golfballs striking the trees, and fell asleep. For a whole hour. Bliss.

Here's the view

More interview silliness, because I love this stuff!

2007-03-24T07:54:00.000-04:00

Leave me a comment saying, “Interview me.”
I respond by asking you five personal questions so I can get to know you better. If I already know you well, expect the questions may be a little more intimate!
You WILL update your journal/bloggy thing/whatever with the answers to the questions.
You will include this explanation and an offer to interview someone else in the post.
When others comment asking to be interviewed, you will ask them five questions.

Donna had some
questions for me:

1. Admit it, you had the hots for John Travolta in Saturday Night Fever! How long before you gave up looking for a sizzlin' Italian in a white suit with perfect hair and settled on Sweet Daddio? (No fair telling me I am projecting.)
You're projecting. I think I was in 7th(?) grade when SNF came out, and even then I thought he was kinda skinny. Disco was never my thing. I met SD some 7 yrs later, and decided he was Hawt when I saw him in those white tennis shorts he had.

2. Did you have a band or a DJ at your wedding, and did you pick a special song for you and SD to have your first dance as husband and wife? No band or DJ, but 2 friends who played classical guitar. Considering we were both Republicans, our wedding was charmingly flower-childish. As for Special Song, that didn't come until much later. "Blue Sky" By the Allman Bros. "You're my blue sky, you're my sunny day..."

3. Build the perfect bouquet, what flowers do you think look best together?
Lady of the Dawn roses (ivory with pink edged 5 petal with yellow centers), sun blushed callas, pale blue lace cap hydrangeas, butter yellow Comte du Champagne antique roses, in an antique silver coffee pot. That, or the fistful of dandelions and toadflax my son brings me about once a week.

4. Have you ever witnessed something where you wished you had a video camera because you know you would have won the $10,000/$100,000 on Funniest Home Videos?
Well, it seems like the most popular videos involve a man getting kicked (or bashed) in the crotch, and I've never thought that was funny. There was the time #3 decided to try bungee jumping (he was 7). He got the cords out of SD's truck and climbed 20 feet to the top of our huge old Japanese maple. He hooked one end of the cord to his belt and the other to a branch, and jumped. I got there as he started screeching, hanging upside down 10 feet above the (soft, ivy covered) ground, bouncing gently. All neighbors heard as well, and were looking out their doors with alarm, which forced me not to laugh and make fun of him. He eventually fell, unhurt, and has been unable to live the event down, lo, even these 8 years later.

5. Which came first, the chicken or the egg?
The egg. The chicken came about from a mutation of some sort, which manifested itself in the next generation, thus, the Not A Chicken laid an egg with A Chicken in it.

TGIF

2007-03-23T09:02:00.000-04:00

Being Friday, I am faced with the same question I fail to answer every Friday. Do I bother picking up the house, only to have it destroyed over the weekend? Or do I just leave it 'til Monday, when I'll have to pick up again anyway?

I like my house neat and tidy, but I also like working outside. The backyard needs raking, pinecones need to be Dealt With Firmly, and I have flowerbeds to dig.

Oh, Rootie. How can you think such small-world thoughts in the face of rampant and insidious patriarchal oppression? There's Suffering.

Well, it helps to have a small mind. It's the "What I can't see doesn't bother me" syndrome.

Plus, my best friend might be moving as far away as one can get and still be on the same planet. I am very excited for her, but it will be impossible to get together for weekends, and that makes me sad. Tho I am happier for her than I am sad for me.

Maybe today, because it's Friday and I have just about decided that picking up the house is an exercise in futility, my camera and I will climb into Little Martha and go on a Photo Safari. The dogwoods are blooming, and the wisteria. Tractors are in the fields planting peanuts and cotton. Old River Road is pretty. Maybe SD could meet me at The Cedars and we can dine on fried chicken and stewed okra. The gas tank's full.

And, to justify the whole blow-off-the-housework sensibility, I will ponder the oppression of women everywhere. I will even summon up some rage...no...that's too strong a word...I will summon up some irritation (there we go)toward The Patriarchy and it's Henchpersons, for forcing me into a lifestyle that involves convertibles and sunny Friday photo safaris. Right. Yeah. Irritation. (or is it contentment? One has to have a Deep Mind to differentiate. I think I'll go rake now.)

The Allman Brothers Band - Jessica (Live)

2007-03-23T07:33:00.001-04:00

All right, y'all. I know you see a pattern here. This is the ultimate driving music for me. The album version is much longer and a tad faster.

Duane Allman

2007-03-22T20:11:00.001-04:00

Have you ever wondered where the name of my car came from?

Emeril Legasse has an appalling accent, and other chef reviews

2007-03-22T14:29:00.000-04:00

He's making "gaz-patch-o aspect", and veal cheeks with grits...or polenta...or maybe grits. He can't decide. (translation: gazpacho aspic)

Ok, so he's got talent in the kitchen, no denying that. We ate at Emeril's in Atlanta a while back and it was really good (except I thought the walnuts were a little strong flavored for the scallops. Pecans would have been a better choice)
It was there that I was introduced to rocinante cheese (golly...a Spanish sheeps milk cheese that's just...MM), and where I learned that a perfectly decent $12 bottle of wine can be every bit as tasty as a perfectly decent highly acclaimed $150 bottle of wine.

(Dang Rootie, why you so picky, huh?)

Giada de Laurentiis has good recipes, but she seems to cook for people with stomachs the size of peanuts. I am amused at her '4 servings' of grilled steak, that looks about like what I'd serve myself, for lunch. Once she made these turkey ravioli for herself and husband, and each serving had 4 ravioli. 4. Even the boys noticed, and made bets that her husband would come up with an 'errand' after supper and grab himself a burger.

Rachel Ray makes nice big portions, and she uses alot of cumin. I love cumin, and cilantro, and onion. She uses all those things with enthusiasm and I like that. I'm not usually interested in getting dinner cooked in 30 minutes, but a good idea's a good idea, right?

Today, Sandra Lee had her Wisteria menu. The way she changes out her kitchen to fit the theme amuses me. She must have every color of Kitchen Aid mixer stashed. She's always buying new dishes, too. Who does that? Not me. My dishes are clear and white. They go with everything. My napkins are white, and I don't use tablecloths. Seriously. If you had a gorgeous 150 year old oak dining table would you cover it up with a cloth? I didn't think so. I do like her cocktail recipes, even the silly ones. Today was a white sangria made with chardonnay, cognac, pink lemonade, and frozen blueberries. It cracks me up how she always pours herself a huge drink after she mixes it up.

The Barefoot Contessa annoys me. Is she really a Contessa, or is that a pretension? Is she aware that we don't all live in The Hamptons and have a gay friend with a flower shoppe to bring us huge bouquets of out-of-season ranunculus? How about A Staff? Do you have A Staff to set up the picnic on the beach for you? Beach picnics for me involve a cooler and a pack of bologna. She's also kinda sloppy in her delivery. For some reason it annoys me when people dump stuff in a food processor and get it on the top of the blade spindle. She also chops half a cup of herbs and uses about a third of it. How wasteful! Isn't she thinking of all those poor herbless children in the world, eating bland food? Tsk. waste not want not. She slings stuff all over, as if she has A Staff to clean up after her. tsk.

Yes, of course I love Paula Deen. Who couldn't? She fries everything, except when she doesn't, then she dumps butter cream sauce on it, or Southern Comfort. And, I know too many people who talk just like her to believe she's putting it on for show. She's also comfortably sized. "Never trust a skinny cook" I was told as a child. I've eaten at Lady and Son's once. I had a cup of crab stew-MM mm MM MM mm! and this weird sandwich that looked like someone got up at midnight and put it together from leftovers: pumpernickel bread with thousand island dressing, grilled asparagus, montery jack cheese, and red onion. It was really tasty, tho...kinda...Dagwoodish. It was apparent to me that the only folk who ate there were tourists, but it is an efficiently run outfit. There was a buffet with an obscene amount of fried chicken, but I didn't eat that. I've heard rumors from a reputable source that the fried chicken is the best in the South.

Ok that's all. For now.

Quiet, please!

2007-03-22T12:43:00.000-04:00

I am not what you'd call "passionate". I don't roar through life, on 8 cylinders, or go thrill-seeking, or look for experiences that excite or stimulate. I can't really, because I don't have brakes.

I learned many years ago, while thrill-seeking and roaring through life, that I could not trust passion. It tends to lead me down a path of anxiety and regret. I become eaten up with remorse, I self-flagellate, and eventually sink into despair. I don't believe it's the exciting experiences that cause depression, more likely it's a form of reflex, like a rubber band snapping back when pulled too tight.

So, instead of living a life that is vivid and filled with the red heat of passion, I live one of...Jordan Almonds. You know, those sweet nuts covered in pastel colors sitting placidly in a crystal bowl. I indulge in things that make me happy but don't particularly stimulate, gardening, visiting with old folks, making a new recipe.

I know it sounds kind of sad, pallid maybe, like I have an anemic emotional system, but it works for me. Intense emotions are frightening, uncontrollable. Peace is soothing, calm, manageable.

I want my family to experience things with more pepper on them than I do. They don't have the emotional shortcomings I contend with, so they can indulge in the kind of stimulus I avoid. Concerts (I don't mean the Atlanta Philharmonic, either), travel, stretching themselves physically, that good stuff.

So here I am, 41 years old and well settled. I prefer excitment secondhand, through books, music, and reading about other folk's lives. It's easier that way, less fallout.

Rootie's Random Restaurant Review

2007-03-21T18:30:00.000-04:00

This is my first ever restaurant review:

The Blue Moon in East Bumfart, Georgia
By day, it's soup, salad, and sandwiches. Tasty samiches on bread from the bakery across the street, real meats, not that weird salty deli sliced mess. Salads are adequate, far too much iceberg, but then what do you expect from a person who grows her own greens? The soups are really good- homemade tomato bisque with basil leaves in it, that's my favorite. I keep getting it even tho they have others so I can't tell you if they're any good. Lunches run $5-8

At night it transforms itself into a Fine Dining Establishment, with real cloth napkins and hand painted table accessories (from the ceramics shop next door). Tuna Tartar, on crispy wonton crackers, with sesame oil and fresh cilantro. Yum. I'll take 2, please. Seared scallops on creamy lemon risotto with fresh green peas. Yum. I'll take 2 please. I've had chicken there as well, crispy skin and juicy inside. Normally I don't order anything I make at home, but how well a chicken is prepared is a benchmark of restaurant adequacy for me. The chicken passed with an A-. I was too full for dessert, but there's only 1 person who make desserts for the trade in this town, and I know for a solid fact she uses margarine, so I didn't even bother.
Good wine selection, I had something crisp and white. Forget what, but it was good.
Dinner runs $30-40 per person, if you get wine and appetizer.

So, if you're ever in East Bumfart (and why you would be is a mystery to be solved), eat at the Blue Moon. It's Good.

The First Day of Spring and Lordy, Rootie's Turning Into a Baptist!

2007-03-21T16:12:00.000-04:00

and...
Stuff's blooming. Dogwoods, azaleas, redbuds, holly, oak trees (kerSNEEE!). Little Martha has taken on a chartreuse tint, thanks to the blooming oaks. So have the cats. Poor Junior goes through this every Spring, runny nose, sneezing, stuffy sounding "beaow". The snow peas and sugar snap peas are 3 feet tall and sport teeny buds. Squash is up, too. Darn global warming.

Here's what I'm thinking about today: Free Will.
Spiritually speaking, free will is that fabulous thing God gave each of us, that allows us to decide for ourselves what's right for us. Free will lets us choose between this road or that one. If God had not given us free will, then we'd just be so many puppets for Him to use as toys. Since when has a puppet ever loved you back? So, in order for His love for us and ours for Him to mean anything, we have to give it because we want to.

Free will can also be defined as personal autonomy. It's an opportunity to improve yourself, to follow the direction your mind leads you. It means that one person can take off her clothes and have sex in front of a camera, without implying that all people should do so. It means that another person can choose to stay home and run a household rather than leave for work every day, or that still another woman can put on a suit and be the one who runs things in a corporation. It's a wonderful thing, this free will.

It can also be scary as all get out. Sometimes, it really is easier to live your life following a prescribed method. It would be very easy for me, if I got up every morning and looked at a printout that said "wear the green dress. Today you do laundry and floors." Then I go to the store and whoever's wearing a green dress, I'd know they follow the same code I do. You could have entire towns of people in green dresses, all thinking alike, all planting their marigolds in circles around the trees, and all checking the mail at precisely 5 o'clock.

Inconvenient thinkers could be put in their own towns. There'd be Leather Towns, and Cross Dresser Towns, and Emo towns (that'd be a barrel of laughs...)Everyone would be happy and inoffensive with all the like-minded people.

Except for that inconvenient free will. I'd wake up one morning and say "Dadgummit! I wanna wear BLUE!" and I'd be branded a rebel and thrown out.

So, next time you feel like doing something On Your Own, thank God (or the deity of your choice)for giving you a brain and the ability to think with it.

Chicken, I did it My Way

2007-03-21T12:19:00.000-04:00

Last night, I wanted a chicken, roasted with potatoes and PUHLENTY of garlic. So I did, and the children rose up and applauded, because they do love garlic. Here's the recipe (as best I can remember, I made it up as I went along)

a bunch of redskin potatoes, cut into bite-sized chunks.(maybe 3 pounds?)
5 or 6 big cloves of garlic, minced up really fine
a small handful of fresh oregano, minced
a smaller handful of lemon thyme, minced
a couple of tablespoons(or so) of olive oil- a good drizzle
Toss all this together and put into a 9x13 baking dish. Bigger and flatter is better than smaller and deeper, you want each potato to be touching the bottom of the pan.

Then, clean and dry a whole 3 poundish chicken. Coat it lightly with olive oil, and sprinkle generously with coarse kosher salt and cracked pepper. Nestle the chicken down into the potatoes.

Roast at 450 degrees for 20 minutes per pound. Then remove it from the oven and let it sit 15 minutes or so before cutting into pieces. Do not share the salty, crispy roasted skin, as it is entirely too good for children, and there just isn't enough to go around. They can have potatoes.

Serve with a salad of (pardon while I get all smug) freshly picked from your garden mesclun tossed with the following dressing:

Heat 1/4 cup of olive oil in a small skillet or pot.
Smash vigorously 3 or 4 cloves of garlic, and toss into the hot oil. Let brown very lightly, and add about a teaspoon of coarse cracked pepper and a small handful of fresh basil, chopped. Then add 1/4 cup of white wine, 2 tablespoons of rice vinegar, and a spoonful of sugar. Bring this to a boil, then immediately take it off the heat and let it cool.

The potatoes roast to crispy brownness, and take a bit of flavor from the chicken. There's this brown goo along the edge of the pan that is both chicken and potato, and salty with pepper and galic, it's the kind of thing I'd like to put in a jar and sell, it's so yummy.

Don't be afraid of roasting the chicken at such a high heat. Your ovn might smoke, but as long as it's not actually on fire, don't turn the temperature down. I remember the first time I read about cooking a chicken like that and I was all "oh yeah, it'll be all black and gross and I will have wasted a chicken" but it wasn't! It's brown and crispy and marvelous Trust me! would I lead you wrong?

Of course I wouldn't.

Down to the River

2007-03-21T07:57:00.001-04:00

More on Feminine Desires Week

2007-03-21T07:43:00.000-04:00

It's frustrating, thinking about all this (to use AntiPrincess's term)peltage, long hairy legs and stuff, and not being able to do much about it.

TMI? Yeah, probably. I know my kids read this but they know me by now, and if they're embarrassed, then they should remember who cooks their meals.

SD has informed me that he's taking off monday the 2nd, and we are going to go play GOLF! YAY! #'s 3 and 4 will be with grandparents for the week, #2 is a big boy and can take care of himself. Therefore we are going to Heron Creek, a lovely course built along the edge of a huge mosquito and snake infested swamp, populated by all manner of interesting birds (herons, of course, as well as an osprey or two, and we even saw a golden eagle one time), interesting flora (water lilies, papyrus, cypress trees, swamp irises) Plus, it's FLAT, which means no strain on the Rootie Hip, especially when wearing those FootJoy shoes. One of my greatest (ok, that's an exageration) frustrations (occasionally) is that FootJoy only makes golf shoes. If I want pink and green saddle shoes, I can have them. If I want orange and blue saddle shoes, I can have those as well. For a price. Currently I have brown and white saddle shoes, exquisitely comfortable. My word those shoes are the best thing I ever put on my feet. Unfortunately, saddle shoes with cleats aren't where it's at, if you're off the golf course. So, for the 4 miles of course, my feet are humming a pretty tune, and I get to have SD all to myself. And, he never makes fun of my (lack of) golfing abilities.

I guess that's my feminine desire for right now, to spend time outside in perfect weather (if it rains on the 2nd I'll cry and throw things)with my favorite person

The Week of Feminine Desire

2007-03-20T17:46:00.000-04:00

So declared by http://cassandrasays.blogspot.com/ and when I figure out how to do a link I will.

So. I'm looking at everyone elses (females, generally) objects of desire, and who they consider hunky or what have you, and I'm thinking, yeah, he's pretty, I can see why they'd like him. But for me, I'm all...eh. I don't like pretty-boy rocker types (they look too much like they'd be my son), nor am I fond of huge muscledy dudes, because they make me think of the Stretch Armstrong doll my friend had when I was 11.

I came to the conclusion that my object(s) of desire have to be an entire package. Give me a man who looks like The Rock but wants to watch Monster Trucks all evening and I'm cold. I require conversation, like mindedness, and, frankly, body hair. Give me a 24 yr old skinny guitarist who can play like Segovia, and I'll listen all night, but beyond that, I have no interest.

*disclaimer* I am in no way implying that anyone who desires men such as these are in any way flawed, only that you can have them, because I don't want them.

I want a man who's tall, who can see over the heads of everyone in the Methodist Church congregation.

He must have hair, all over, plenty of it. I am not opposed to back hair. It is, in fact, sprinkles on the icing of the beefcake.

He MUST be able to tell jokes and stories, and have a healthy ability to laugh at himself. Men who take themselves seriously are BORING.

I like facial hair, especially if it's a bit prickly. A newly trimmed mustache with it's sharp edges is a remarkable sensory experience. I guess I like beards the way men like boobs. I see them as deliciously masculine. However, if someone incapable of growing a thick, full beard attempts one, it comes across as puerile. To me.

*disclaimer* I know, there are women with beards. There are also men with boobs. I'm just saying I like MEN with BEARDS and they scream of he-mannishness to me, in my experience.

Much of what makes a man sexy to me has nothing to do with physical attributes. Like I said before, sense of humor and all. An ability to fix things is a big plus. If he can bang out a short sword, tune the car, tie-dye eggs, and fall to pieces when handed a puppy, then I will look hard upon him with The Gaze(tm). If he can recognize angst, salve it with chocolate, and completely tune out The Gaze(tm) from another source, I will remain devoted, because he recognizes my insecurities and seeks to bolster my confidence.

Now, give me all that, with the hair and the height and facial prickles, well. There we are.

*disclaimer* I will, however, admit that Tom Selleck is massively hot, even tho I have no idea if he knows how to tie dye an egg.

We live in a wonderful, wonderful age.

2007-03-20T15:42:00.000-04:00

*ring ring*

...hm...that's odd, the number on the ID is (X)'s, and I know for a solid fact he's at home.

"Hello?"

"Mom?"

"Yes?"

"Um. I made a critical error in judgement."

"Yes?"

"Um. I sat down before I checked if there was any toilet paper."

"er...*snort*phpphht..."

"Would you bring me some please?"

"er...*snort*ok phphht..."

God bless the inventor of cell phones.

Hey Trinity!

2007-03-20T07:02:00.000-04:00

Ok, I just realized you asked to be interviewed, because I'm slack sometimes and don't check the comments. So here's your 5 questions:

1. Where do you get the cartoons for your mood indicator?

2. How would you describe your upbringing (you can be as vague or specific as you're comfortable with)?

3.Leather's kinda hot in a Deep South summer, what would you wear if you lived South Georgia?

4.Describe the perfect meal-food, ambience,companionship (or not)

5.Why do you call yourself Trinity? (I've noticed the three-ring emblem on your site)

Dear Mom

2007-03-19T13:49:00.000-04:00

With my mother, when she calls, it's "How's everyone? OK great, here's what we're doing blahblahdeblahblah...(15 minutes later)...blahblahblahI me my we're I'm recognition blahblah famous now blah your father was given blah award ....(15 minutes later)...Your brother's wife has rudely arranged their lives so they can't come to the blah blah de blah...How is everyone there?OkI gotta cut it short we're blah blah I me my blah de blah...bye!"

My head hurts.

Dear Mom. I know you do alot. I'm proud of y'alls accomplishments. Did you know one of your grandsons is now doing commission artwork? Did you know another grandson is doing commission computer work? He's a hardware guru. At 17. Did you know another grandson has been offered work on one of the largest farms in the Southeast? Did you remember than another grandson will be 8 soon? Did you know that your daughter in law does NOT, actually, schedule their lives with the sole intention of pissing you off? That dance recitals are set by the instructor, not the student? That scout trips are set by the leader, not the scout? Does it occur to you that I am not interested that your silly little dog ate a whole baby rabbit head first and has been barfing hair and bones for 2 days? I am interested that Dad has about finished the front porch, and I am looking forward to seeing in on April 21.I am glad that your plum trees are so full of blooms. I am also happy that your brussel sprouts are getting taller, tho I am surprised that you've forgotten brussel sprouts are brassicas, which are a winter vegetable in the Deep South. Jut because I mention that I am picking 3 baskets a week of salad greens doesn't mean I look down on your for not growing salad greens. Y'all don't really eat salads. It would be a waste if you grew them.
Sigh.
Your Dutiful Daughter,
Rootietoot

Wynton Marsalis - Cornet Chop Suey

2007-03-19T11:40:00.001-04:00

If you aren't tapping your toes you're made of cold spaghetti

The Monday Melee

2007-03-19T07:09:00.000-04:00

Mondee Melee

1. The Misanthtropic: Name something you absolutely hate.
Body odor. I simply cannot take a person seriously if he/she stinks. A little personal smell, no problem, but the kind that comes from 4 days in the hot Georgia summer with no bath and no deodorant...sorry. Can't do it.

2. The Meretricious: Expose something or someone that’s phony, fraudulent or bogus.
Those diet pills! "Take this pill every day (with diet and exercise) and you'll lose weight" Well duh. Drink this glass of water every day (with diet and exercise) and you'll lose weight.

3. The Malcontent: Name something you’re unhappy with.
The way fried food tastes so much better than baked.

4. The Meritorious: Give someone credit for something and name it if you can.
Jerseychick, for her amazing way with her kids and the patience of...some Biblical female famous for her patience. (?)

5. The Mirror: See something good about yourself and name it.
I make really good vegetable soup.

6. The Make-Believe: Name something you wish for.
Someone local to talk to.

Antiprincess's answers

2007-03-17T11:27:00.000-04:00

1) what is your favorite part of working at the nursing home?
Getting to sit down with someone and have an adult conversation, just yesterday a man told me about his 5 years in China during WW2.

2) where do you see yourself in ten years?
Hoping for grandchildren.

3) how did you develop your even temper and open mind?
I don't know. Temper is a nature thing. The open mind came from parents who had no tolerance for closed minds.

4) do you have any regrets?
I wish I'd gotten treatment for my mental illness sooner. I don't remember my older children's young childhood because I spent it being crazy.

5) (and most important!) how do I convince my husband we should get a dog?
Tell it's a dog or a baby.

A Recipe or two

2007-03-17T11:19:00.000-04:00

Jerseychick's and kids are here for the weekend. Currently she's at the store with Sweet Daddio and the kids are hypnotized by Over The Hedge.

She made a couple of Roman appetizer things last night. Roman like 2000 yrs old. She learns this stuff because she teached Latin, and hosts a Roman meal at the end of each year. Here's what she made, and let me say this...Unusual, but YUMMMMMMM!

Stewed dates:
Take some whole dates, and stuff them with sunflower seeds (out of the shell, of course). Then put about a cup of red wine and about 2 tablespoons on honey in a pot, and simmer the dates until the skin curls.
Then eat them. Like wine-soaked candy. Yum

Deviled Eggs, Roman Style
Soak 1/2 cup of shelled sunflower seeds or pine nuts in 1/2 cup of mild vinegar (rice or white wine)for a couple of hours.
Boil half dozen eggs, peel, and cut in half
In a food processor, make a paste of the seeds and vinegar, the consistancy of coarse peanut butter. Then spoon about a teaspoon of the paste on top of each egg half. Sounds odd, but the mildness of the eggs with the piquancy of the vinegar and the meatiness of the nuts...amazing.

My answers to Belledame

2007-03-16T13:37:00.000-04:00

Belledame at Fetch Me My Axe (over on the link list) asked me these questions:

RT:

1) How'd you pick your handle?
In the 1920's there was a pop song called "Be my Rootietoot". My grandfather played clarinet in a Jazz band in the 20's and 30's, and when I was born that's what he called me, and still does today.

2) If you could live anywhere (real or fictional or composite), where would it be?
I'd live on the High Plains. Flat, windy, sky for miles, no one around. But I'd put them High Plains within driving distance of Atlanta and Manhattan, and the beach.

3) How and when did you first fall in love with daschunds?
SD had one as a teen, and would frequently talk about getting another one. When the opportunity presented itself, I gave him one for our Anniversary. She grew on me, and when she died, we got 2 more. Then when we moved, we got 2 more. Now I'm addicted. I've always liked them, they're so silly with those short little legs and imperious personality.

4) What color frame are your glasses?
They are rimless with kind of pink gold (whatever those side pieces are called)

5) What's the skill you're most proud of?
Cooking. It's probably the only thing I do with complete confidence.

Well, that was interesting

2007-03-16T13:07:00.000-04:00

You remember how I was whining a while back about having to go to (horrors!) A CLINIC to see a psychiatrist? Well, I went today, and it was a Clinic. Oh boys was it a clinic. Amidst the posters advertizing new HIV testing procedures, Family Planning aimed at the 14 yr old set, there were people leaned against the walls, muttering to themselves, 2 women shouting at Montel on the TV (turned up loud), humminahumminahummina. I felt, in all my WASP-y (That's White Anglo Saxon Protestant, not the feminist Wasp), quite out of place. But, being an open minded (har) egalitarian(humph) self, I stayed amidst the body odor and incomprehensible monologues. The people what work there are a dedicated sort, obviously not there for the money, but friendly and astonished by my organizational skills (I had my insurance card with me).

So, I'm giving them another chance. I meet the doctor in a month. If she's as sensible as the intake people, I may stick with it.

Li'l Martha was a bit out of place in the parking lot, too. Like a lily in a clover patch.

Questions for Vera

2007-03-15T15:31:00.000-04:00

Awrighty now...

1.If you could change one aspect of your character, what would it be?

2. Do these jeans make my ass look fat?

3.If a friend deeply offended you, how would you react? And, would you be likely to forgive...eventually?

4.If you could live anywhere in the world for 6 months, where and why?

5.Are you sure these jeans don't make my ass look fat? Just kidding...

5. (for real)I was born in Dallas and have family in Canyon. What's your favorite brisket? Chili: beans or no beans?

Get thee to a Youtube.

2007-03-15T14:57:00.001-04:00

Thou must see this. Rootie commandeth.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sHzdsFiBbFc

Brother Jed and Sister Cindy

2007-03-15T11:47:00.000-04:00

Doing research for Vera's questions, I remembered this:

SD and I attended a large university in the Deep South, as did Jerseychick (so she knows of which I speak). It was an attractive campus, with lawns and leafy trees and a central concourse. For some unaccountable reason (I say that becasue I can't figure out how they got permission to perfor..er...preach on campus) there was a pair of individuals known to the entire population of the town as Brother Jed and Sister Cindy. Once a year, for 6 weeks or so, they would appear on the concourse. Then they'd spend pretty much the entire day, every day, for 6 weeks, calling every woman a whore and every man a whoremonger. Even the married ones.

I know this because one day shortly after we married I met SD with a sack of sandwiches and a bottle of tea, for to enjoy his company and eat lunch together. We strolled across the concourse, holding hands and acting like newlyweds, when Brother Jed (a long, tall stick of a man, suitable for use as a fencepost but not much else)
jumped in front of us, screaming Biblical sounding imprecations, misquoting,spit flying, calling us all sorts of foul things.(Poor Jed was one of these folks who forget to swallow when they're riled) *uh!* Rude! SD and I rolled our collective eyes and went on to sit and eat, snickering at Bro. Jed's incoherence.

As we ate, another hand-holding whore-mongering couple walked by, and received the same treatment we did. However, the young man wasn't as even tempered or forgiving as SD, and he made about 4 of Bro. Jed, mass-wise. He gave Jed a righteous poke in the nose with his ham-sized fist. Jed fell over backwards like a felled sapling and lay there, not moving, blood pouring from his nose. Everyone else kind of stood around and looked pleased.

Last I heard, Bro. Jed and Sister Cindy were still at it, successfully shoving people as far away from the Gospel as East is from West.

These are the *headdesk* people, the ones I fear many people think of when they think of Christians. Let's say their efforts to 'save' people actually work on 1 person. That 1 person is made to think and consider and explore the option of a Christian life. How many people are chased away from it by their behavior? Is 1 person saved worth the loss of 100 others, who refuse to have anything to do with Christianity, thanks to the sledgehammer method of the Bro Jed's of this world?

Evangelism is a gift, bestowed upon a person when they receive the indwelling of the Holy Spirit. It's not the only gift, there's lots of them ,ranging from wisdom and interpretation to hospitality and teaching. No gift is more important than another, and all gifts are necessary to do God's work in this world. Some of them, like the talents people possess, are flashier than others. Singing is a talent. So is listening. But singers get more air time than listeners. Same with God's gifts. Evangelists are the draw. They are supposed to get people thinking so they'll go to church or seek spiritual guidance. Once the sinner is in the door, other people take over. The teachers, the counselors, etc. But because Evangelism is the sparkley shiny part, it's what everyone sees, and what people associate with The Church. And, sometimes, evangelists build their own importance up to a point that they lose perspective, and forget that they're just the point man, that the real work of bringing a person to a relationship with Christ goes on behind doors, sometimes even behind that individual's door, between them and God and no one else.

So, remember that. Evangelists are a necessary part of the functioning of the church, but they are not TEH CHURCH. They are also human, and make mistakes, and sometimes the glitter and glamour and powertrippy stuff gets the better of them and they forget their place in the scheme of things. But they are not the church.

2007-03-15T11:38:00.000-04:00

OOO! Vera! Well. Hm. I am definitely going to interview you, but after I ask this question and do some research and thinking (how to interview someone who probably isn't as diametrically opposed to you as you probably think):
How are you feeling?

Interview Questions

2007-03-15T06:51:00.000-04:00

Northern Girl:
1.Would you prefer to stay where you are, with familiar people and surroundings and all the security those things afford, or would you enjoy the chance to move you and family someplace TOTALLY different?

2.If you could change 1 thing about your daily routine, what would it be?

3.If you could eliminate, without consequence, 1 thing from your wardrobe, what would it be?

4. What's your favorite snack with beer?

5. In 20 words or less, sum up your basic philosophy.

Jerseychick:
1.If you could take your family anywhere in the world to live for a couple of years, housing and transportation provided, where would you go?

2. What's your favorite thing about having a Drill Sergeant for a mother?

3.What would you do with each one of your kids, individually just you and her/him, for an all expenses paid 24 hours?

4. What's your favorite beer?

5.If you and a friend could go anywhere in the US for 4-5 days, where would you go?

Because I love this sort of stuff!

2007-03-14T12:39:00.000-04:00

Leave me a comment saying, "Interview me."
I respond by asking you five personal questions so I can get to know you better. If I already know you well, expect the questions may be a little more intimate!
You WILL update your journal/bloggy thing/whatever with the answers to the questions.
You will include this explanation and an offer to interview someone else in the post.
When others comment asking to be interviewed, you will ask them five questions.

Amber asked me these questions:

1. Do you, technically, live below the gnat line?
Lord yes. It's called the South Georgia Salute, where you flap your hand in front of you face every 15 seconds or so. Then there's that stupid blow upward maneuver, and you can find Corkies at the local feed and seed (those hats with the dangly corks that Australians don't actually wear but everyone thinks they do)

2. What's your favorite alcohol concoction... this week?
Um...Rum and gingerale. Tho we are sliding towards Gin and Tonic season.

3. You just had your 2nd blog birthday! Why'd you start blogging in the first place? (I know, the generic question most bloggers hate... but I want to know!)
The idea of writing something down with the possibility that someone else somewhere else would read it, that was very enticing. Plus it's fun. Especially when you can piss off a complete stranger. I try not to do that too often, tho. I guess I'm a whatchacallit...Literary Exhibitionist.

4. Do you think Christianity and feminism are mutually exclusive?
Good heavens no. Did you know that Jesus Christ's primary benefactor was a woman who sold dyes and textiles? Her name was Lydia. Since she wasn't called Lydia, wife of Whoever, it is assumed that she was a single woman of significant financial means. Christianity today, it would depend on denomination and that gets too complicated. There are churches who preach the absolute submission, wear a dress, walk 2 feet behind concept, and there are churches with women pastors. So I think if you are thinking of modern day Christianity, you could find a church with any philosophy you like.

5. Why weiner dogs?
There's other options? (Ok, I know.. now I've annoyed all the peekapoo owners)

Where Rootie has a stressful day but lands on her feet anyway

2007-03-13T18:20:00.000-04:00

I'll start with the end. After arriving home, from spending hours and hours and hours and Fricken HOURS, I was tired, and hungry, and satisfied and relieved.
I slugged down 4 tall glasses of iced mint tea, and assuaged my hunger with a can of tuna lovingly garnished with several healthy dollops of Tabasco sauce. On crackers. Yum. I feel better now. Thanks.

Here's how it went down. Remember the IRS thing I mentioned earlier? More issues. Without violating anyone's privacy I'll say this:

My day involved several phone calls to several different IRS agencies. I was then given the number for the Credit Fraud and Identity Theft Hotline, where I bounced around, and then called Credit agencies, who advised me to spend a pleasant hour with the local police, who said I needed to contact the IRS before they could do anything, who referred me to the Credit Fraud and Identity Theft hotline...round and round we go, where we'll stop nobody knows.

HOWEVER! With just the right amount of Southern Charm and Steel Magnolia, not to mention the timely location of vital paperwork, the Worst Issue was resolved with nary a hurt feeling nor scratched knee.

There was, admittedly, much pulling of hair and gnashing of teeth during the process.

There is still the Other Issue, which has been semi-resolved, with the threat of the IRS Juggernaut looming over the head of a recalcitrant manager. I believe IRS agents are trained to write the most polite threats I've ever seen. "If this issue is not resolved within 10 days, please be prepared for an agent or agents to meet with you at this location." And I'll take that order to go, kthx

I'm tired. I want a drink but I'm in charge tonight because Sweet Daddio has to entertain someone.

Oh! This is funny. I called SD several times, leaving messages because he was in important meetings. When he did call back, we were sitting in a grim little room at the police station, talking to a detective. I said to SD "I can't talk just now, I'm at the police station with (X)." I could hear his hair standing up from 30 miles away.
"No no, it's ok! No one is in trouble! I'll call you back when we're done!"
I guess that probably took 2 years off his life. I shouldn't do that to him, should I. Tsk.

How could I forget?

2007-03-13T09:24:00.000-04:00

I left out 1 very important place, the computer desk. All those brightly colored objects are origami stuff made by #2. That's a microscope upper right, assorted reference books on the left, baskets full of wired things and To Be Filed stuff, general officey mess and clutter. It's (other than #2 and 3's rooms), the messiest spot in the house, yet I can't figure out how to tidy it up without getting rid of things I don't want to get rid of.

Well. Whadya know.

2007-03-13T08:41:00.000-04:00

I had some personal dealings with the IRS yesterday. I was anticipating it like a spinal tap. But, know what? The woman on the phone? Really nice. She also said something to the effect of "Well, We would prefer if you not do that, but if, say, John Brown were to be in your situation he would have to put it on next year's return with an ammended 1482B form, which I will enclose with the cover letter so you'll know what it looks like if you ever need it in the distant future, like, a year from now or something."

That made me smile. Anyone who can balance that fine line between Allowed and Not Allowed is ok by me.

Shrines stuff I forgot to post

2007-03-13T07:04:00.000-04:00

Oh! The Shrines thing, go hear to see other people's personal stuff.

Kim's

Shrines

2007-03-12T20:03:00.000-04:00

Places that are significant to me, personally, in my house.

We start outside, with my teeny yet very satisfying garden. It's like having my own room outside.

On to the patio out back, where we eat whenever it's not raining. Dinner as a family, with silverware and cloth napkins, a blessing said over the food and non confrontational conversation. We do it whenever there's at least 3 of us home.

In to the kitchen, my domain. The whole place is important to me. It's not much cosmetically but it's where I do my most satisfying work.

Pictures of the kids are on the piano, another place where I find solace.

Ancestors

Each quilt was made by an ancestor. My grandmother made the 3 smaller ones, SD's great grandmother made the big one, in 1939, for the man SD was named after.

Upstair into my office/guest room. This desk is where I sculpt and paint.

My dresser. SD gave me each of the dolls and figurines at some small but special occasion. I got the troll doll when he learned that I'd always wanted one, but was not allowed to have one because my father thought they were ugly.

and finally, girly stuff. Lotions and potions and pomades and every sort of thing, including good smelling things.

Where Rootie gloats most unbecomingly

2007-03-12T14:24:00.000-04:00

Ha! Go ahead and throw something, I don't care! Because, it's 80 degrees outside! EIGHTY DEGREES FARENHEIT HAHAHAHAHAAAA!!!

I drove around all morning with the top down on Li'l Martha, garnering positive attention from men who smiled at me, and one woman glaring as she got into her Escalade. HAHAHA! *smugness*

Eighty! Degrees! Sunny! Birds Singing! Azaleas blooming and forsythia and dogwoods and every pretty thing except not the roses just yet.

Why, I might have to turn on the air conditioner if it gets any warmer. HAHAHHAAAA!

I believe tonight, I will grill. Center cut porkchops with a chili-lime marinade, cabbage slaw, baked beans with a bit of a kick re:bourbon, maybe. If we have any cheap. Lightening will strike me dead if I use HizzHonor's glenlivet.

Due to the untimely...(or maybe it was timely just not convenient timely...)demise of my 1967 Harvest Gold Tappan Wall Oven, I must grill. When I was whining about it to the appliance guy, he said "it's HOW OLD?" and said he thinks I got my moneys worth out of it. I never realized how much I baked until I couldn't.
Thanks to the Time Change (I hate it when that happens, but I like the longer evenings), we will eat outside, lounge around outside, live outside for the next 3 months. Yay!

Mondee Melee

2007-03-12T08:25:00.000-04:00

1. The Misanthtropic: Name something you absolutely hate.
People who think they're SPESHUL, and expect to be treated that way. Grow up, already.

2. The Meretricious: Expose something or someone that’s phony, fraudulent or bogus.
Disneyworld and Disneyland. I call them McDisney.

3. The Malcontent: Name something you’re unhappy with.
The way #1 was treated by his "friends". If I see them I will rip them each a new asshole.

4. The Meritorious: Give someone credit for something and name it if you can.
#1, for making it on his own, hardships and all. I'm proud of him.

5. The Mirror: See something good about yourself and name it.
I am organized. I have a system and it works.

6. The Make-Believe: Name something you wish for.
A full scholarship to study Psychology.

Questions and Answers

2007-03-10T09:13:00.000-05:00

I borrowed these questions from Thinking Girl at http://thinkinggirl.wordpress.com/ because they're good questions, and it's easier to answer someone else questions than come up with my own. It's not a meme, I guess. Don't feel obligated to cut and paste and play the game. I'm doing it because they're good questions and I'm too lazy to think up anything else to post right now.

Who are you? - I'm Peggy, Margaret, Mrs.(concealed identity)

What are you? -Wife, mother, Christian, friend, daughter,sister, chief cook and bottle washer.

What is your primary identity? - Wife and mother. They are intertwined to a degree that they can't be seperated.

What ethnic, racial, nation-state do you identify with? - American, WASP

How did you learn who you are/how to categorize yourself? Who I am is almost always in relation to who I'm with. I've learned the role of wife and mother over the last 20 years. As that role increased, my identity as daughter and sister has decreased.

How does having/maintaining an identity detract/support one being their authentic self? - What is authentic self? For me it's 'who I am' and that is based on my relationships. I don't know what I'd be if I stood alone, because I've never done that. My identity is as authentic as it can be, it is the outward expression of my inward (authentic) self.

When we confront people as labels or categories, how does that affect our ability to see them for who they are? When we first see someone, we have a first impression, and it is a very human thing to automatically put them in a catagory based on that impression. If a person has matured past the 10th grade, then they developed the ability to set aside that first impression and withhold judgement about them until conversation and time has allowed them to reshape their opinion. Hopefully, we can refuse to allow ourselves to make snap judgements about people, and get to know them better before we put them in a catagory. Blogs are amazing for that, because you generally have no idea what that person looks like,and can base your opinion on the content of their writing rather than the style of their hair.

Is having a simplistic, hand-me-down identity a form of ’security,’ and a strength or an ‘escape’ from the anxiety of growing into something beyond the flowerbox you were planted in? Or both? -Both, I think. Having a simplistic identity, developed through your life and growth, can be a touchpoint, and give you a safe place to return to when you are venturing out and experimenting with growth. It's like, growing up in Alabama, and moving to Arizona, and when things get scary in Arizona, you go back to Alabama for a week to get your bearings straight, and renew your strength so you can venture a little further out next time.

Do you ever ask yourself who and what you are, who and what you are supposed to be and whether you are being your truest self? -I am confident and comfortable with who I am. I know there is room for improvement, and that my life will change and I must grow with it. But I am certain that I am where I am supposed to be, physically and spiritually, right now.

I'm putting my armor on before I publish this.

2007-03-09T13:57:00.000-05:00

After reading through a whole bunch of blogs on the topic of Women of Color and White Privilege and such...

Am I supposed to feel bad for being white?
Is constant monitoring of my thoughts necessary, or is that being condescending?
Why is it required to say African American, but I am called white instead of Scottish-American?
Why is it cultural appropriation for me to own a sari, but not for an Indian woman to wear jeans and a polo shirt?
How come when I make a friend who is African (not African-American, she's Ethiopian), it's acceptable for the African American community to call her my 'token'?
For once in my life, I am not trying to be flip or trivialize the topic. I live in a community that is 40% black, 40% white, and 20% brown (am I allowed to put it that way? Do I need to say African American and Hispanic? Or is it Latino?) I really don't know what I'm supposed to think or say right now. Someone clue me in please?

I have BDD

2007-03-09T11:01:00.000-05:00

I was sitting in my car at the bank, waiting, and the thought occurred to me: "I miss babies." Then another thought: "I must be losing my mind."

When the boys were really small, all I could think about was how one day they'd be bigger, and not such a hassle. Isn't that an awful thing to think about your kids, that they're inconvenient?

Now that they're all big, driving cars, independent, all those wonderful things I looked so forward to when they were small, I miss having someone sit in my lap, reading Hop On Pop to them for the 1000th time. I miss being able to convince them that they Love chicken! Last time I gave you chicken you ate it like it was chocolate covered caramel! and they believed me, even if they'd never had it fixed that way before.

I miss that peculiar stinky little boy odor, the itty little clothes, all those little bitty blue jeans! T shirts with Thomas the Tank Engine were the pinnacle of fashion, as were high top sneakers in bright colors. And the way they're little dirt magnets. They could be playing on a squeaky clean mopped floor, and somehow dirt flies to their mouth and hands and they get sticky.

Little boy toys are cheap. A 97cent matchbox car is fantastic bribery for good behavior, even so, Bigger Is Better, so a 97cent plastic car that's 5 times the size of a matchbox car gives 5 times the thrill. Now, as teenagers, they want Krazrs and Chocolates and the latest video game. 97 cents is only good for a Checkers burger that lasts about 30 seconds.

I miss the constant stream of artwork for posting on the fridge. It follows a logical progression: scribbles first, then stick people with rainbows, then houses with rainbows, and then the testosterone kicks in and it's houses with bombs falling on them. After that, it's more fun to drop pinecone bombs on old matchbox cars than to draw pictures.

I guess I am (perish the thought!) gearing up for grandchildren. Logically, it could be not so far off. I was 22 when I had #1. He's 19 now. Mind you, he says he has no interest in marrying or having kids. He wants to be the "cool uncle" that teaches all the kids how to do things no one would approve of. #2 is 17, but has plans for all kinds of post-secondary education, so I can't see him providing me with grandaughters anytime soon. Maybe #3. He's 15. It would be like him to get married right out of high school, tho he has plans for a military stint, and if he enlists he won't be making enough to support a family. #4's only 8. I'm not even thinking about that.

Someone find me a baby to cuddle. Now.

Amber, this is for you

2007-03-09T07:02:00.000-05:00

I see more old people

2007-03-08T11:33:00.000-05:00

I'm liking this place, Willow Pond. Lily and I walked there today, since it's 70 outside, it would be a shame to waste all that sunshine in a car.

First person we met was Ms. J. She's quite senile, and has a round the clock assistant named Mildred. She does love the dog, tho, and asked several times what her name was, and did she do tricks. Mildred commented on how Ms J. perked up with the dog. Same with Ms. M. She doesn't need an aide, but she is very closed up, kind of folded in on herself, but she opened like a tulip when Lily got in her lap.

While Ms M was loving on Lily, I had a Rah Rah talk about college football with 2 women. One was a Georgia Bulldogs fan and the other Georgia Tech. You can imagine how it went when they learned of my Auburn affiliation. And both agreed that U of Alabama was just tacky. They agreed that Tommy Tuberville was a good thing to happen to Auburn, and asked if Pat Dye was still around. Yes, I said reluctantly. "Poor Auburn" they commiserated.

When Lily and I went to the sunroom lookng for people, I met Margaret, 90 years old and "ready to die, to be with my husband who has been dead these 20 years" Say that in an Old World Immigrant accent, with deeeep set eyes and a beak nose, and you have Margaret. We talked about all sorts of things, from premarital sex (We NEVER did NOTHING like that when I was a kid! Sex was for married people!) to children (I have such good boys)and inlaws (I don't mean to sound ugly but my daughter in law is a sonofabitch!). Some of the conversation was repeated a couple of times, but that's ok. She just wanted someone to talk to.

I finally got to meet the real director of the place, and she and I talked about what I would be able to do. She promised to call when they need a hand, and I told her my schedule is flexible, so whenever...I'll try to be there.

I tell you what. It feels good to have people to talk to. Honestly, I don't know who's going to benefit more from this endeavor- them or me.

To Sleep, Perchance To Dream

2007-03-08T07:33:00.000-05:00

I worry that I talk in my sleep. I fret over saying something straight out of my id and Sweet Daddio will hear it and misinterpret six ways to Sunday.

I have all kinds of dreams, but the ones I remember involved power of some sort. It could be a natural disaster, a flood or tornado ripping my family away from me. Sometimes it's those huge power lines that come out of the generating plant and carry all the electricity to a city. I dream of being caught in the middle of one, loose power lines snapping and popping around me, and I can't get out.

Sometimes, I'm the one with the power. I've led regiments of soldiers up hills into battle, I've been with a Special Forces team liberating prisoners a' la Jack Bauer. I've also been alone, building my enviroment, and surviving. Those are my favorite dreams. I wake up from them feeling strong and useful.

I always remember the power dreams, both kinds, with great clarity. I wish I could forget the one's where I'm helpless, no one likes to feel that way. SD and my therapist have a theory about those dreams. I have the powerless dreams when I am feeling out of control, when life is coming at me too hard and I am not sure what to do. It could be. The powerful dreams don't seem to happen at any particular time, I just have them, and ride the feeling for several days. Maybe my brain is telling me something.

A while back I read a chapter in a book called "The Three Pound Universe" (it's about the brain)that was about lucid dreaming. This is the ability to control your dreams, the outcome of them, and even carry them over from one night to the next. The chapter fascinated me because they were going on about how remarkable that was and I've been doing it since I was a teen. If I have a dream I like, I'll put a mental bookmark in and pick up where I left off. I thought everyone could do that. I still don't think it's as remarkable as the authors of the book make it out to be.

THe thing about dreams, I've never really held much stock in the notion that they actually mean anything. I've always believed that when you sleep, your brain keeps fitzing a bit, and in order to make sense of the fitz, it tries to piece things together to make a semi-coherent statement. That would explain the random, silly dreams that are entertaining as all get out but completely nonsensical. Like the one I had about a high school classmate flying a grocery cart to Costco. This was a classmate I didn't have alot to do with, and I'm not a member of Costco, so...it don't make no sense.

But, sometimes, dreams do solve problems, or provide needed bolstering, or even warn of something impending. Are those the dreams we remember? Does God speak to us in dreams sometimes? I don't know, but I don't want to rule it out.

I know many cultures put great stock in dreams. I wonder if we'd be better off doing that. It's an opportunity to listen to a part of your psyche that gets little air time. The problem is, here, we're all about the here and now, right in front of us. Dreams are nebulous, tricky things, not to be trusted. Don't know how one would go about changing that notion, without coming across as some New Age Aery-Faery Mystic.

Words come to mind...barbaric is one

2007-03-07T08:46:00.000-05:00

Saudi Kidnap, Rape Victim Faces Lashing for 'Crime' of Being Alone With Man Not Related to Her
Tuesday, March 06, 2007

A 19-year-old Saudi woman who was kidnapped, beaten and gang raped by seven men who then took photos of their victim and threatened to kill her, was sentenced under the country's Islamic-based law to 90 lashes for the "crime" of being alone with a man not related to her.
FoxNews

I read this and was...I don't know..."Bwuh?" came to mind.
If you read on, her rapists were given jail terms from 10 months to 5 years.
"Bwuh?"

I wonder if she could seek political asylum somewhere less...backward.

*This* is the sort of thing Feminism should be fighting. I don't know how, but when I read this kind of news, then I go around assorted feminists' blogs and read NOTHING about it, it damages their credibility in my eyes. Ok, so we're supposed to be all up at arms about havng to shave our pits, but no one says anything about a woman whipped for the crime of being in a car with her kidnapper?

No, I don't know what to do. I have no clue as to how one would go about changing the mind of the Saudi government, but awareness is a start. If you're aware, then when an opportunity presents itself, you'll be ready.

Free World women, we have it so incredibly good. I'll take having to shave my pits a couple times a week over being lashed for having the temerity (shocking!) to be in the same car as the people who kidnapped and raped me.

You just remember this woman the next time you grumble about being oppressed in this country.

Call me chicken little

2007-03-07T07:52:00.000-05:00

I was brought up with the Mind Over Matter philosophy. Not the silly spoon bending one, but the one that says if you want to be happy, you will be happy. If you're unhappy, it's your own damn fault and you need to just will youself to be happy.

I'm trying that. It's ingrained in me to think that way. And it's not working. Whenever I decide to will myself into happiness, I get this incapacitating headache, the kind that makes me throw up and crawl under the covers with the phone turned off. I seem to function better unhappy, and I don't like that. Who wants to be unhappy? Only sick people want that, and I AM NOT SICK.

Except that I am.

So I am wandering around the house, trying to keep busy with a mind-occupying task (and failing miserably), feeling tense and scared For No Apparent Reason and it's pissin' me off.

Going to Willow Pond the other day helped, alot. Being around people and talking to them was a very good thing to do, and I'm going to do it again tomorrow. I've been taking everyone to the doctor this week (even me) for assorted pre-camp physicals and such. I look forward to going to the doctor. It's someone intelligent to talk to, and he likes to gripe at me about the state of insurance in this country. I gripe too.

But, when I'm not in the thick of something like Willow Pond or the Family Practice of East Bumfart, I am tense, nervous, anxious, bordering on panic attacks, and I deeply resent being at the mercy of something I never chose to have. It feels weak to me, helpless and all SouthernWhite Lady hand flappy nonsense, like Aunt Pittypat and her smelling salts. "Saints Preserve us! My smelling salts, Melly!" If I start wearing agressively ruffled dresses, go ahead and shoot me. Just put me out of everyone's misery.

I'm beyond nervous about going to this new doctor way out in the piney woods. I am convinced that I was unbelievably fortunate in my choice of The Good Dr. H., and I cannot possibly have the same good fortune twice. Not only that, she's a woman, and frankly, I don't like women doctors. They're condescending. They're all "Oh, I'm the educated physician and you're not so you just shut up and do what I tell you because I know more than you do." Male doctors are more "let me ask you questions O! You're smart! Let me ask you intelligent questions." Ok, I know, someon'es gonig to read this and they're going to be all "oh No! My female doctor is wonderful!" Well good for you. I am nearly 42 years old and have yet to meet a female doctor who didn't treat me like a dribbling idiot. Maybe I just have really bad luck. Maybe THIS ONE in the deep piney woods will be the exception. But I'm anxious nonetheless. SD said to call Blue Cross and see if Dr. P could authorize hospitalization, and would it be covered. If so, then I'll just see a local (male) doctor and foot the bill myself. So I will. But in the meantime, I'm going to have sweaty palms and no appetite and heart thumpings and the ridiculous notion that the sky is falling. I know it's not falling, but it sure feels that way.

Shrinks

2007-03-06T14:10:00.000-05:00

Y'know, this is just aggravating, irritating and stuff. I'm looking for a new psychiatrist. Not because there's anything wrong with the old one, he's great, but he's also 5-1/2 hours away, in another state, and he's not licensed to practice in Georgia, which means our insurance won't cover the visits, nor the cost of any prescriptions he writes. My GP, The Good Dr. P, has said he'd be happpy to write prescriptions for me, but is not comfortable dikking around with the doses should I need some chemical tweaking. So, he's referring me to someone who is, theoretically, in the next town, a 20 minute drive, but in reality is almost an hour away through the boondocks and deep piney woods into a town even smaller and more backwards than this one with the exception of the Nuclear Power Plant that's right there.

And, to see this new doctor,I have to go to a clinic. A. Clinic. So sue me. Call me an Upper Class White Snob. My only experience with a psychiatris office is via the Good Dr. H. and his tastefully decorated waiting room divided into pleasant little privacy areas by walls made of glass brick. He was, undoubtedly, a provider to the privileged. Now, I'm expected to go to a clinic where I'll be handled by an intake counselor? Criminy! I just want someone to take over where Dr. H. is leaving off, that's all! I don't want to see a counselor with limpid eyes and an understanding demeanor. I want a DOCTOR who will tell me I'm smart enough to manage my illness almost on my own. No Counselors! No! Back!

Of course, it might not even be like that. Once I get past the layers of paperwork and endless explanations of "no, I'm not having problems, I am just wanting to establish a relationship with a doctor in the event that problems do arise. No I was not abused as a child, no my husband does not throw beer cans at me or trade my car in for a bass boat." I'm building this whole thing up in my mind like I always do, so the reality will be far less than the imagined, and all will be well.

See, the reason I want a doctor who takes my insurance is this: If I do have to be hospitalized for going off the deep end, I don't want to bankrupt my family doing it. A psychiatric hospital costs an average of $1000 PER DAY.I would be in there for a minimum of 2 weeks, possibly as long as 2 months. Insurance is a must. If the doctor hospitalizing me isn't on my plan, then neither will the hospitalization be. Can't have that.

I guess I got really lucky with Dr. H. He has been treating me for 13 years, quite successfully. He and I have a good rapport, and he trusts my judgement. He's the first doctor I saw for my disorder, and he treated me like a thinking person right from the start. Hopefully I can find that again with another doctor, but a big part of me says that I was just fortunate, and shouldn't expect that to happen again.

The good news is, Freudian psychology is passe'. The thought of someone squinting at me and saying "Tell me about your faaaaatha" is daunting.

Feminism, from my perspective

2007-03-06T08:44:00.000-05:00

I admit right off that I do not live in a hotbed of feminist thought. Yes, there's a college here, and as with any college there is a feminists organization that sponsors The Vagina Monologues and such. But, this is the Deepest of the Deep South, and a most rural community as well, so feminism beyond the college takes on a decidedly different slant.

Because I am an anecdotal thinker, I'll use anecdotes to illustrate my point.

Event the First.
#3 (he's 15, see his picture below)has a pair of girlfriends. (Shocking! you say)Well, they're identical twins who are both very fond of him and he likes them both so hey...there he is. The parents of these young women like #3 very much, and he spends alot of time on their farm. I'll call the twins J1 and J2. Not long ago, J2 was going around the pond in her ATV, and got it stuck in the mud. Now, a typical Southern Girl would have played all helpless and cried and flapped her hands. J2, however, is not typical, and has been raised to solve her own problems. Southern Feminism at it's finest. So, she goes and fetches the tractor- an antique John Deere lovingly restored by her father-with which to pull the ATV out of the mud. Bear in mind this is a 14 yr old girl/woman. Only, she not only sinks the tractor in the mud, but it falls over into the pond. The point is, she sought to solve the problem herself. Granted, she created a bigger problem, but she had the mental capacity to think for herself, and do something many young women wouldn't have even conceived. (dad eventually got the tractor out, and she was grounded for the mess) These friends of #3 are like that, smart, savvy, and 'don't take no shit off no one'

Event the Second
There's been some discussion about if a man can be a feminist. I think so. Any time a man treats a woman based on her skills and not her anatomy, that's feminism in practice. SD hires women to do all sorts of things, ranging from forklift driver to chemical engineer. All he cares about is if she can show up on time, do the work expected, and stay til the job is done. His is a very masculine industry. There are women's roles and men's roles, and typically the two do not overlap. Women work in the spinning and weaving mills, doing jobs requiring manual dexterity but not body strength. Men do the grunt labor, lifting heavy rolls and working the complicated and smelly machinery. Typically. Women do not, under any circumstances, ever work in salaried/management positions. Clerks, yes. Lab manager, no. Wash tester, yes. Plant engineer, absolutely not. Until SD started hiring, and hired a chemical engineer who was higly qualified, with an advanced degree from the university SD graduated from, who knew what was what and how in a textile finishing plant, who knew wastewater treatment, and had a real knack for color and finishing processes. And was female. He doesn't hire women because they're women, that would be patronizing. He hires them because they know their stuff, and will be an asset to the company. That, to me, is femnism. Equality, being judged based on your knowledge, not your anatomy.

Feminism in practice is the place where we buy tires and have car work done. Look out into the shop, and there's 8 bays. 3 of them are 'manned' by women. The place where we get our oil changed? Owned by a man and staffed by his 2 daughters, who do the oil changing. Same at the feed store, young women hefting 50 bags of seed corn and peanuts into someone's truck.

Around here, it's a practical thing. People don't have the luxury of sitting on their duffs complaining that things aren't getting done, so they get done, no matter the gender of the doer. Sure, there are the occasional fluffy women with their kitten heel mules and breathy giggles, but no one takes them seriously (should they?). I suppose a True Feminist would take every person at face value, as an individual with desires and hopes and all, but really. Am I truly required to deeply consider the opinions of someone wearing a t-shirt that says 'PrincessBitch' spelled out in rhinestones? (don't answer that)

True feminism, for me, doesn't see one gender as morally superior to the other, any more than seeing one race as superior to another. Maybe someday it will happen that no one is startled by a person's occupation. A female NASCAR driver will be no more remarkable than a male Activities Director at a nursing home. Stranger things have happened!

2007-03-06T07:32:00.000-05:00

I do not like those little tools in the corner of each page element. They are cluttering up the view.

I call it a Lithium Moment.

2007-03-06T06:39:00.000-05:00

I've misplaced #4's pants. 3 pr of jeans, precisely. I washed them Sunday, and folded them, yet they are not in his dresser nor anywhere else. I've not gone to Goodwill to drop stuff off, so I know they aren't there. I clearly remember folding them, yet what happened after is a complete mystery.

And it really is a bit of a crisis, because he only owns 6 pr long pants. I'm one of these types that believes in keeping clothing to a minimum. And now, it's biting me on the arse. Where! O! Where are #4's pants! He resents being restricted to wearing 1 color (that being camoflauge).

'tis a puzzlement. Blame it on the medication.

30 minutes later. Ok, I found them. In his underwear drawer. Now, why didn't I think to look there first? Silly me.

I see old people...

2007-03-05T14:30:00.000-05:00

So Lily and I went to Willow Pond today, to meet old folks and stuff. It was nice! It's a smallish outfit, with about 25 residents, so hopefully it won't take long to learn names.

About 1/2 of the people were thrilled to pieces to meet us, and have a dog to pat. I was warned by several people about one woman, who would probably try to take Lily away from me. She was indeed tickled to meet Lily, and spent much time with her in her lap, patting her head and talking to her. The other 1/2 were either too senile to really understand what was going on(tho one woman talked to Lily as if she were a child), or asleep. A couple of people admitted that they weren't much for dogs, but they'd welcome my company any time. That suits. I'm looking forward to their company.

Lily was PERFECT. I figured she'd be pretty good, but she was an angel, calm and relaxed, trotting from room to room as if she owned the place.

I talked some to the Intern Activities person, and she filled me in on upcoming things that they might could use an extra set of hands for. When she discovered Little Martha, she decided that I might be good for taking people out for drives occasionally. Once the weather warms up.

The residents seemed nice- I'm comfortable with really old people because I've worked with them in the past.Some of them were quite warm, others were more reserved but seemed 'all there' and so I can see spending time with them.

The cool thing about old folks, is that they're pretty much past caring about the superficialities. Like really young children, all that matters to them is if you're nice to them, and you don't treat them like they're flawed for being old. I mean, really, isn't the whole goal to get old? One woman was looking through her 1942 yearbook when we arrived. I wish I'd had enough time to sit and let her tell me about it. Maybe next time. Today was just a meet and greet introductory thing.

Rootie Rants About Chil' Raisin'

2007-03-05T12:04:00.000-05:00

About the 'Barbie Bandits':
"I want [people] to know that her and Heather both are not bandits," Joy Miller told ABC's "Good Morning America" Monday." "They're little girls that made a bad choice."

Ok, it's time to quit calling it "a bad choice". and call it what it is. Wrong. It's Wrong. They did a bad,wrong thing. This girl's mother makes it sound like she chose to wear green socks with brown pants. That is a 'bad choice'. Mixing lemon and milk in your hot tea is a bad choice. So is renting The Jackass movie.

Another thing. Those young women (young WOMEN)are old enough to decide if they want to join the army, to vote, to have an abortion without parental consent. They are not little girls.

Making excuses for your children's bad behavior, especially your ADULT children, helps no one, especially not them. How on earth are they going to learn accountability, if their mommies and daddies keep trying to clean up their messes and making their life all sweetness and cupcakes?

I say, take those 2 young WOMEN and throw their privileged Upperclass white asses in jail. And you know what? I stopped calling it a 'bad choice' as soon as my kids were old enough to make a choice- like...3 yrs old.

It is high damn time we quit mollycoddling our kids, telling them every single thing they do is just the best thing EVAR, because now they're hitting college age with such an inflated sense of entitlement they can't handle getting a bad grade, but don't want to have to make the effort for a good one!

The fact is, not everything they do is The Best EVAR. I never did clap and hoot and say "Good job, Buddy!" when my kid wiped his butt, I just let him know that butt wiping was expected behavior. I didn't hoot and shout "way to go" when he dribbled a ball up toward third base. I reserved hoots and shouts for line drives and home runs. The big stuff.

Kids need to know that they can fail, that they really aren't The Be All to End All, that some people are more accomplished than they are. Because, when they get out there in the big mean world, they need to be able to handle it when someone gives them their arse on a platter. If we raise them to think they're All That, then the first time the platter lands on their desk, they just won't know what to do. And we are doing them no favors by raising them to think that the world adores them.

Holi! W00t!

2007-03-04T14:06:00.000-05:00

Holi is an excuse for Indians to shed inhibitions and caste differences for a day of spring fever and Big Fun. Teenagers spend the day flirting and misbehaving in the streets, adults extend the hand of peace, and everyone chases everyone else around, throwing brightly colored powder (gulal) and water over each other.

Sounds good to me!

Exactly at noon, the hilarity stops and everyone heads inside to eat candy and lay around.

Sounds good to me!

We are entirely too repressed in this country. so hell bent on being dignified that we forget how to have good clean, messy fun.

I require assistance...

2007-03-04T11:14:00.000-05:00

I'm trying to figure out how to post music clips, without the video a' la YouTube. I know it can be done, because I listen to them on other sites and yet, I remain silent.

Is there someone out there who can direct me to a place where I might find music all ready to imbed, or even a place where I can take something off a CD and imbed it (since most of the music I like isn't the type commonly played)?

My resident computer guru shrugs and wanders away in search of food.

I think the kind of music a person listens to says alot about them. I think. I don't know, because I'm not a psychologist. I don't even know what it says about them, only that it probably says something.

That's why I want to be able to put some music up occasionally. Without the video.

Help, please!

Because you asked

2007-03-03T16:20:00.000-05:00

Here's Little Martha.

More Culinary Adventures from Childhood

2007-03-03T14:52:00.000-05:00

I have in the past, alluded to my mother's cooking skills, and how they've influenced much of what I do today.

Understand, I love my mother. She's the one who taught me so many of those archaic skills. She and I used to do spinning demonstrations together, dressed in 18th century peasantry clothing, right down to eating lunches of a baked potato and a bit of cheese, wrapped in a handwoven piece of toweling. We'd converse in period slang and tell 18th century jokes that no one would understand. I don't remember the jokes, only the puzzled looks on the audience faces.

Ok anyway, Mom's cooking. Her favorite vegetable was (were?) English peas. We had them 3 or 4 nights a week. Her favorite method of cooking them was to drop them in a pot of hot water, count to 10, then pull them out. She used a similar method of cooking broccoli (her second favorite vegetable): she waved her hand over it while thinking of an equatorial nation. Cooked Vegetables Are Bad. That's her philosophy. Except for Okra, because she lets the grow until they're big and tough and have to be boiled until they're an olive green mucilaginous mass.

I hated peas as a child. I'm still not crazy for them unless they're in a salad with lots of mayonnaise. I hated broccoli as well. It was harder to deal with than peas. Peas were little pills, and I could load up a forkful and swallow the entire thing without ever having to chew. It turned into a useful skill, because now, at night when I have to take a handful of pills, I can just toss them all back at once, thanks to my practice peas. Broccoli could not be swallowed whole. We were not allowed to put anything on it to make it taste better, no lemon, no butter, no ketchup, no salt. It had to be chewed.

Under our dining table there was a massive braided rug. My brother and I developed the dexterity to be able to lift the edge of the rug with our toe, and flip bits of undesired food under the rug whenever the parents weren't paying attention (which was most of the time)Then we'd fold the rug back over and pretend as tho we enjoyed the meal "oh no, no seconds, thanks, I'm full. May I be excused?", and we'd leave, with plans for a peanut butter sandwich. That's the one thing my Mom did really right. She made homemade peanut butter that was out of this world.

Until one Fateful Day. Mom decided it was Spring and Warm and the Thing To Do would be to roll up the rug and take it outside for a good beating and a hosedown. Yeah. Dum dum DUUUUMMM The table is moved, the rug is rolled and Dad says "What in Sam Hill is THIS??" Little dessicated piles of very flat peas, little squarish chunks of something brown and unidentfiable, flat bits of (apparently) broccoli, and eggs. 4 or 5 whole, flat, formerly known as 'poached' eggs. A Smorgasbord of rejected food. Dad glares at us, makes us clean it up, threatens to feed it to us for supper. Mom has her back to the whole affair, shoulders shaking and making a sputting noise.

Then Daisy comes to live with us. Daisy was a mixed breed dog with Labrador Retriever somewhere in her heritage. She possessed the patience and fortitude of a well trained lab, and would sit very quietly under the table, happily complicit in culinary subterfuge as my brother and I would flick bits to her. She learned not to make smacky noises, or to lick her lips, so as to not alert Mom and Dad to her presence. Daisy was a Godsend, because she dearly loved to eat anything that came off the table, and she made is possible for me to avoid Liver and Onions until I was a senior in High School.

The Swiss Incident

2007-03-03T07:27:00.000-05:00

Swiss Troops Accidentally Invade Liechtenstein
Friday, March 02, 2007

ZURICH, Switzerland — What began as a routine training exercise almost ended in an embarrassing diplomatic incident after a company of Swiss soldiers got lost at night and marched into neighboring Liechtenstein.

According to Swiss daily Blick, the 170 infantry soldiers from the neutral country wandered more than a mile across an unmarked border into the tiny principality early Thursday before realizing their mistake and turning back.
FoxNews

This amuses me. This is the kind of thing that makes me happy to be human, because...
well, because it does.

SD and I were discussing this last night, me playing the part of Liechtenstein to his Switzerland.
Me:" oh! Oh! The Swiss are invading! Run Away!"
Him: "Yeah you better! We have Multi-purpose Knives and some chocolate, and we're not afraid to use them!"

Update on the Gut Wrenching Experience

2007-03-02T11:45:00.000-05:00

So, I dress carefully in modest, and colorful clothing, fix my hair, put on a touch of makeup. Makeup is, for me, like donning a mask. If I have it on I can pretty much act my way through any situation. Ok. I look nice, not sexy, unassuming, and cheerful. Practice smiling. Ok.

I go up to Willow Pond, the assisted living place. It's 10. When I go to the frnot desk, no one's there, but there is an aide sitting with a woman in the lobby, and she asks if she can help. She tells me the dirctor will be in soon, if I didn't mind waiting.

This young woman, maybe 12, 14 years old, comes bouncing in and the aide tells her I'm there. I'm like...(um...they let 12 yr olds direct nursing homes now?) and I tell her what I'm wanting to do.

She looks at me. *blink blink* OH! FABULOUS! sez she. When can you come? Any day? What can you do? Can you come every day or just sometimes?

Then I told her I had a dog. *blink blink* OH! FABULOUS! When can you bring her? Any day? Does she do tricks? You don't even have to tell us you're coming, just show up!

SO I'm like...well. Ok. Cool. I'll start on Monday.

How cool is that.

After all that fuss...

2007-03-02T08:18:00.000-05:00

I ask you, is that a dorky haircut? No it is not. It is the same haircut he's been getting these many, many years, that he's been perfectly happy with, until now. When someone tells him he HAS to get it cut that way, instead of it being his own idea.

Men. *snort*

Dear Lord, put steel in my spine...

2007-03-02T07:16:00.000-05:00

SD left at 4:30 this morning, to go to NC to look at equipment. He's building another range at work. $3 million project, meaning more 14 hour days and 6 day weeks. It's good, I'm glad he's working and now he's got this amazing reputation for being able to do the impossible. I'm proud of him. But, I wish he could be home in time for supper, and early enough that he'd actually have a little down time before going to bed and getting up to do it all again.

The problem, for me, with him working so much is that often he's the only adult I get to talk to. But when he gets home, he's talked out, having spent the past 14 hours giving orders, soothing egos, and trying to keep a straight face during interviews. Mostly he just wants a glass of scotch and a cigar.

And there I am *yacketyyacketyyacketyyapyaptrivialnonsenseandstupidstuff* desperately wanting companionship.

So, today, if I can get my meager courage up, I'm going to be proactive. Yes indeed. There is an assisted living facility a short walk away, on Pretentious Road. If I can get my courage up (and for all my ability to write, I am basically terrified of people and new situations), I am going to approach the director about volunteer opportunities. I'm going to offer the use of one of my dogs (Lily, she's soft, gentle, and dumb enough to not get worked up about strangers), and my own services for anything they need. I can read to people, fix their hair, work a puzzle with them, take them for a stroll in the sunshine and spring air. Whatever.

I like old people, I really do. I worked a couple of years in a similar facility 20 years ago, and because terribly fond of many of the residents there. I had to leave because I had a difficult time dealing with their deaths. My grandmother (of whom I am extremely fond)lives in just such a place, but since she's 1800 miles away, I'm thinking, maybe I can do with someone here what I'd be doing with her.

Getting up the courage is the hard thing. I go through the litany that my therapist taught me: What's the worst thing that could possibly happen if you do this? They could pull out a gun and shoot me in the head but that's not likely.
What's the next worst thing?They could laugh at me. Do people laugh at volunteers at places like this? No. They love volunteers. But on the outside chance, what would happen if they did laugh at you?I would curl up and die. Really?
No. I'd probably just leave and hope I never saw that person ever again. Then you'd be in no worse of a position than you are now.

Paper or plastic?

2007-03-01T18:18:00.000-05:00

So, #3, who's in ROTC, said he needed a haircut before tomorrow, because it was too long and sideburns weren't allowed.
OK, I said, I can give you a buzz cut.
Thanks, Mom, he said.

SO I do. Bzzz bzzz, clippety clip, bzzzz clippety bzzz.Trim trim.

Then, let the wails commence.

I LOOK LIKE A DORK! I'M RUINED! I MIGHT AS WELL RUN AWAY AND...

what...join the army?

WHAT IS THIS?(points to neck, ears, and back to neck)

It's off your collar, like you said. You said no sideburns.

I'M RUINED! I MIGHT AS WELL GO TO SCHOOL WITH A BAG OVER MY HEAD!

Paper or plastic?

When one is a mother, one learns to suppress anything resembling sympathy. It would only be taken as a sign of weakness.

What a great way to start the day. Part 2

2007-03-01T14:13:00.000-05:00

Tire fixed, but not without Much Heroism and Fortitude on the part of Sweet Daddio.
Y'know how I said it needed a fancy lil allen wrench that I couldn't find? Well, ok. He goes to Lowes (I go with, for Moral Support) and spends $40 on a long handle and a certain metric socket with a hex thing on one end. Because if he doesn't I'll need it, and if he does I'll never have a flat ever again.

Then, we get to my car (after a side trip to Subway for provisions and sustenance), and discover...those little lug nuts with the hex thing? That he spent $40 to be able to remove? Care to guess? No? Plastic covers. Popum off with a screwdriver to uncover the VERY STANDARD lug nuts underneath. I coulda done it myself. I coulda. But instead, at the first sign of trouble I go screaming to the nearest cellphone and turn into a girl and stuff. How embarassing.

However, it made SD feel like The Man, which is always a fine thing. It got him out of the mill for a couple of hours, it let me answer his cell phone and tell the person on the other end that He Was Busy, he'd call back if it wasn't a life threatening emergency. No, no emergency, just needed to hear his voice because we miss him so, here at the mill.

In the meantime, SD calls the Tire Place, and orders Li'l Martha a new set of shoes. She's so petite and lightweight that she tends to hydroplane, so, he got me some Fine and Dandy Aquatreds, making the excuse for buying The Good Ones instead of The Cheap Ones by saying "you'll be driving her 10 more years, at least. Might as well have good tires."

SO, I'll take her in tomorrow, plunk down a painful amount of money, and get my bald tires replaces. I didn't realize how bald they were until we (yes 'we', I helped by holding the lugnuts and handing him things)put the spare on. I'll give Volkswagen credit- they use full size spares and they're the same tire as all the other ones, only not bald.

No title comes to mind.

2007-03-01T09:25:00.000-05:00

You know, all those things I've learned to do, all that archaic stuff, I would never have learned if I didn't have weird parents. They taught me all those good things, and everyone says Oh! I'm coming to you when the End Is Near. Yeah, that's great. It gives me confidence knowing I can do these things.

However, I never learned social skills. I never learned the fine art of conversation, or the right way to dress. I have zero confidence, outside that set of skills. Being in a group of more than 4 makes me unhappy. I was taught by my family that social skills were silly and secondary. Better to know how to skin a squirrel than how to converse without offending. More important to know the difference between Saxony wheel and a High wheel than which fork to use.

The point is this (I think). When you slap your hands to your cheeks and go "Holy Cow! Look at what YOU can do!" remember that I, in my homemade squirrel skin boots, am standing off to the side, watching in awe as you, Normal Person, walk into a room full of strangers and make friends, don't slop your drink on your blouse, and host a party of 30 people without having to medicate yourself.

And right now, living in this new town, my amazing skills are a cold comfort when I'm lonely and having a difficult time meeting people. I'd trade them for social confidence, in a New York minute.

What a great way to start the day.

2007-03-01T08:16:00.000-05:00

I got myself all dressed and ready by 7am. 7am! Not quite a record for me, but not the Usual Thing. The cable guy is coming back (hopefully, he'll remember his shorts this time)to fiddle with something that's not right, and he is due here specifically between 9 am and noon. Because I have an errand to run (the sink's clogged, SD's knees ache, and we're out of bread)I decided to be all industrious and stuff, and go at 7.

I turn off our street onto Pretentious Road and hear a funny noise. Just up the way is a gas station, so I turn in and get out of Li'l Martha to inspect and O! What do mine eyes perceive?! A FLAT!

aHAH! I say to meself, time to prove my mettle, time to show that I'm not some wimpy hyperdependent female who Can't Make It Without A Man. I am going to Change My Tire, then I'm going to take the flat to the Tire Guy and get it fixed. Because I know what to do.

So I dig out the owners manual, that tells where and how. It says look in the "luggage compartment" (I'm assuming they meant the "trunk") for a tool kit and do X with it. Only. There's no tool kit. feel feel, flashlight, crawl into the trunk (no small feat for this Plump, perimenopausal housewife and Li'l Martha's rudimentary "luggage compartment"), look around, feel, curse softly. Call Sweet Daddio. "I can do this! Just tell me where the stuff is!" I cried. "Lift the floor and look under. Do you see a lug wrench?" he calmly said. "YES! I DO!"...ok, look at the lug nuts on the tires. Do you see an allen wrench that will fit those "....no. I don't." "OK, I'll come help you on my lunch break. Just walk home and I'll take care of it."

So much for self sufficiency. On the other hand, maybe self sufficiency means knowing who to call.

So here it is, 8:30 am, and I'm pecking on the computer. Li'l Martha is sitting, lonely and forlorn, at the Chevron station at the corner of Pretentious Road and Confusion Bypass. They guy at the counter was very nice. "Please sir, I have a flat and am waiting for a White Knight in a tan minivan to be my salvation and succor, but he has meetings to meet and dragons to slay and won't be here until noon, please may I leave Li'l Martha under your tender care until then?" Well, that's not exactly what I said, but it was my intent. He said sure, no problem.

2007-02-28T20:04:00.000-05:00

I'm gonna be perfectly honest with you.
There just aren't alot of problems that a couple of glasses of chardonnay won't shrink to managable size.

I would totally wear these.

2007-02-28T16:20:00.000-05:00

Aren't those great? With a mid-calf A-line suede skirt and a kinda gathered yoke blouse a' la 1870's Annie Oakley kinda thang. Oh yes indeed. If I had $275 for a pair of boots. I would.

#2 has a mind of his own

2007-02-28T12:42:00.000-05:00

He's a bit of a computer geek, owning 2, that he has modified and deified and quantified and emulsified so much so that no one can use them but him. He's changed operating systems as often as he's changed his sheets. More, even. Whenever I have issues with a program or download, he can fix it. He Knows What To Do. He earns pocket money (beyond what he makes at Dairy Queen)fixing other people's computers, Because he can!

Computers aren't all he does. Oh no! He's got mad origami skills. He's not interested in making cranes or elephants, but 3 dimensional polyhedra. He makes big ones, little ones, shiny and multicolored ones. I firmly believe our Christmas tree next year will be covered up with little colored shapes made from fancy paper.

He's happy, insoucient, determined, and determined. He plans to graduate with a 3.8 and go either to Georgia Tech for a degree in engineering, or to UGA for a degree in economics. He loves math, can you tell?

AS a little knot, he was a real pill. Sick all the time with sore throats and sinus infections, he was Unpleasant to be around. When he was 2-1/2, we took him to the doctor for yet another round of antibiotics for his infections (I am so squirrely about antibiotics, but if he wasn't on them, he was sick). The doctor told us that he believed #2 was mentally retarded, and would probably need to go into a group home instead of us taking care of him. Hello???! What???!! So we went toanother doctor, who took one look at him and said "see those dark circles under his eyes? He has allergies. Get rid of your carpet and upholstery. Now." So we did and...it was a miracle. For the first time in his life, 4 days after everything was gone, he woke up with a sunny smile. Amazing.

And he hasn't quit since.

SD has a theory, that is that children have X amount of trouble inside them. Then can blow it all off as a little kid, and be easygoing and pleasant as a teen, or sort of let it out at an even pace throughout life (like #3 is doing) or be an easy, happy young child and hellish as a teen (like another child of mine who shall remain unumbered)

That's #2. the Boy in the Tin Foil Hat.

The Popoff Valve

2007-02-28T07:28:00.000-05:00

Sweet Daddio now has his very own blog! Yes! He writes about shi...uh...stuff that happens at work, frustrations of being a manager, hiring people, firing other people, all that. Do you want to know the inner workings of the mind of a Capitalist and Oppressor? Read on. The link is the first one over there-----> (below my profile))

Even tho my name's not Laura.

2007-02-27T09:12:00.000-05:00

I have a collection of rare and formerly useful talents. Formerly, because they were useful 150 years ago. today, not so much. I started learning to do these things at the tender age of 8, because my parents believed I was ready to learn. Here they are, in no particular order.

I can spin, as in spinning wheel making yarn. Dad made Mom a spinning wheel in 1972, and I learned how to use it. I will one day inheret that wheel, tho I'd like it right now. I can spin wool and flax on it (it's a Saxony wheel), and I can spin cotton on a high wheel. I've spun mohair, alpaca, different varieties of wool, and with my mother, grown flax and treated it for spinning (letting it rot, essentially).

I can weave. I can use a 4,6, and 12 harness loom for making simple twills and complex tapestries. I can thread a warp, design a weave, and execute it. I have a jacket that I designed from the yarn up. Unfortunately, it's wool ,which is not terribly practical around here.

I know how to make soap. I can render tallow and lard, and leach oak ashes to make lye. I can grow lavendar, mint, and other herbs to scent the soap.

I know basic herbal medicine, and I use it all the time. I don't dabble in the potent stuff, sticking basically to mint, horehound, ginger, catnip and the like, for teas to aid digestion (or help upset stomachs), soothe a cough and sore throat, or make a poltice for poison ivy.

I know how to make tallow candles, and how to render wax myrtle berries for candle wax. I know what kind of clay to use to make oil lamps.

I shoulda been born 150 years ago. really, I shoulda.

I am fairly mechanical, and can diagnose simple problems with a car based on the sound. SD (who is excessively mechanical) can draw a diagram, explain a problem, and I can solve the problem, if it's not too complicated.

I can grow just about anything, from lemongrass to antique roses. It's one of my greatest pleasures, to be able to pick a bouquet of flowers from my garden and bring it in the house.

I can sew. When SD and I married, I had a thriving small business designing and contructing custom clothing. I made those boofy square-dance outfits (matching dresses and shirts), including designing one for a wedding. I also made Medieval and Renaissance clothing, making my own patterns based on pictures from historical documents. I made special needs clothing- I had a client who was a dwarf, another with a humped back. It's been a while since I've done that.

I can cook. I can build a fire and light it without a match. I know what's edible and what's not, in the woods, and can pull together a tasty meal from foraged stuff. I stay away from mushrooms, tho. except morels, because they're obvious, but the other ones, there's poisonous ones that look almost like edible ones and I'm not willing to risk it. I know how to make a venison roast tender and less gamey (soak in buttermilk for 24 hours), and how to make butter starting with milk fresh from the cow. I do not, however, know how to make cheese.

I know how to build a soddy (a house made from squares of sod, stacked like bricks to make thick walls. The sides and corners are braced, and the roof is made of small poles laid side by side and covered with more sod). I made a small one when I was 16, with the permission of the landowner.

I know how to tan a hide, how to use horse hair to make a crest for a roman officer's helmet (yeah, that comes in really handy. You just never know when Octavious is going to knock on the door and demand a new crest).

I can use power tools. Big ones, too. Dad taught me when I was 12, starting with the radial arm saw, drill press, and scroll saw. Then, the next year, he taught me to use the table saw, router (I don't like that one, unless it's mounted in a table. Scary), and the power hand tools like skil saw and various drills and such. Why he taught me the big stuff before the small stuff I don't know. But he did.

I can dissect just about any animal, and identify the parts. Dad taught anatomy, after all. When I was 15, he started giving me the exams he would give his students, so he's have something to compare to. If I made, say, a 70 on his test, he'd tell the class, and give them something to measure up (and over) to. If I made a 90 on his test, he'd know it was too easy and toughen it up.

I, for being so nearsighted, am a really good shot. Especially with my dainty little Remington lever action .22 rifle. Not too bad with the revolver, either.

Now, because I sound so incredibly full of myself, here's a list of stuff I can't to.
1. I can't make conversation at a party.
2.I have only very rudimentary computer skills.
3.I can't hold my liquor.
4.I can't dance. I REALLY can't dance.
5.I don't know how to flirt.
6.I'm not very good at dressing myself. The default dress code is jeans and a polo shirt. And keds.
7.I can't knit or crochet. Go figure. I just never learned how.
8.I am too blunt, much of the time. Diplomacy is not natural for me.
9. I can only speak one language. I can't even reomtely understand any other languages.

Rootie waxes philosophic

2007-02-27T08:50:00.000-05:00

I know it goes with the territory. I realize it's all part of the job. It could be worse.

Sweet Daddio is starting to Travel. Not just a day jaunt to a mill in North Carolina, either. He's got to fly to Chicago for a couple of days. Then he's got to go to England for a week,come right home and jet-lag be damned, be home 1 day and start right back at work again. It's part of the job. I know that. I tell myself, that week he's in England, I can go to bed early and hog all the pillows.

But i'll have to set the alarm and get myself up instead of relying on him. And I won't have a grownup to talk to in the evenings. That stinks.

It could be worse. We have a friend who has to go to Pakistan for 2 months, and he and his wife have very young children. She's not happy. Neither would I be.

It's times that he's gone I wish he worked as a car mechanic, we had a comfortable double-wide in the country, and life was low-maintenance. Stress was deciding to stay home and watch the race or go to the river and fish.

He's too ambitious for that sort of life, tho. As appealing as it sounds. He's doing it all for me, to give me the house and lifestyle that's comfortable. He's doing it for himself as well. He grew up in a very small house- 900 square feet, and to him, a big house and the ability to own stuff and do things is important. It's a sign of success. I like it to, I'll admit that. I have a materialistic streak and I dearly love such necessities as my state-of-the-art photo printer, ipod, and Kitchen Aid stand mixer. I like having a yard that backs up to a golf course, a convertible, and pedigreed dogs. I know it, I'm a snob.

But, I also know these are all just things. If I had to choose between the things and life with SD, I'd live in a teepee in Macon County with him and give up all the trappings. (I had a friend who lived in a teepee in Macon County with her husband, for several years, no running water, no electrics, just a pump well and a fire ring). I would move back into a housetrailer next to a peanut field.

Life without the stuff, would still be life. Life without SD, and the boys, well. I'd probably go on living, but I wouldn't be happy about it.

Why I Love Boys

2007-02-27T08:15:00.000-05:00

1. They make laundry for me to do so I won't be bored during the day.

2.They poop and stink up the bathroom for an hour. And so proud of it they are, too. And you know what they're up to in there.

3.They eat all the Doritoes when I'm not looking. Even the ones I was saving for lunch tomorrow. I didn't need them anyway. Bad for the thighs. So thoughtful.

4. They can explain the intricacies of Death Metal, and why Slipknot is preferable to Cannibal Corpse.

5. Decorating their room is easy- just staple some dead animals to the wall.

6.Dressing them is easy- Walmart blue jeans and a couple of 3-packs of Hanes t-shirts.

7.Feeding them is easy- just put alot of it on the table and stand back.

8 Manipulating them is easy- just start mentioning female problems and they'll do anything you ask to make you stop.

9.Finding an interesting tv show for them ,(so you can take a bath or read a book) is a breeze- put it on the Speed channel and let them watch monster trucks and drag races. They instantly go into fly-catching mode (you know, slack mouth hanging open, glazed eyes)and are on stand-by for at least an hour.

10.Getting them to do schoolwork is easy. Just withhold food and the Speed channel.

snort ~snicker~ phhht...haw

2007-02-26T11:38:00.000-05:00

The cable guy was just here. Nice enough fellow, kinda chatty about the weather and such. He's wearing a worn pair of loose jeans, ok, no problem, til he turns around and there's a hole where the pocket has ripped loose. He's either wearing a thong or no shorts at all, because his pink lil behind was shining through. *phhht!* harhar.

I love it when stuff like that happens because I get to try and keep a straight face and he's all "wow, she's a happy sort."

The Monday Melee

2007-02-26T09:40:00.000-05:00

1. The Misanthtropic: Name something (about humanity) you absolutely hate.
The way they insist on stopping in the middle of the aisle at StuffMart, blocking traffic and acting all oblivious.

2. The Meretricious: Expose something or someone that’s phony, fraudulent or bogus.
Cheetoes. They are NOT cheesier than a block of extra sharp cheddar. Therefore they are NOT the Cheesiest.

3. The Malcontent: Name something you’re unhappy with.
My daffodils. Everyone elses are up and blooming, and mine are just starting to poke through the ground.

4. The Meritorious: Give someone credit for something and name it if you can.
Sweet Daddio's parents. They are terrific grandparents.

5. The Mirror: See something good about yourself and name it.
My eyes that are gray when I'm angry and green when I'm happy.

6. The Make-Believe: Name something you wish for.
The ability to tango. With Sweet Daddio. Alas, we both have 2 left feet, and I have one leg onger than the other, and he's a foot taller than me, so...only in my dreams.

Dear tiny yet cherished readership,

2007-02-25T17:44:00.000-05:00

This is my blog. Note the name: Because It's Personal. I've named it that because what I write about has personal meaning to me. It may be something that happened to me, or something I've seen, or something I worry about or celebrate. Everything I write about is real, to me, unless I tell you it's not. Sometimes it's a fantasy. If so, it's mine, from my mind.

If I am ranting about something, it's because something real (not imagined) has happened to spark that train of thought, and I am responding to it. When I complani about someone's behavior, it's not because I imagine someone is acting that way somewhere, it's because I witnessed that behavior firsthand, and I am reacting to it.

Sometimes my reactions come across as crass or unformed, but they are still my real reaction to a real event. Because It's Personal is my place to say exactly what I think, whether you are offended by it or not.

Perhaps because I am prone to putting up pretty pictures or writing sweet nothings about my dogs, you are surprised when I say something unladylike, or offensive. And yet, I'll say them anyway. Because this is my blog, and It's Personal.

I don't like having my ideas and opinions challenged, because I tend to take that challenge as a sign of your disdain or contempt for me. I don't want to be held in anyone's contempt. I also know that it's impossible to please everyone. Perhaps if you were to let me know ahead of time that, while you disagree with what I say, you don't hate me for saying it. That would be nice.

Would that I had a thicker skin, that I reveled in controversy. I'd give anything to feel comfortable saying exactly what I think about all sorts of things, and be able to handle the inevitable flak that would ensue. But that's not me, it's not my way.

I'm not trying to pass myself off as the next great Public Broadcasting Commentator, with the Daniel Shore conviction that every pearl that spills from my fingers is Right and To Be Believed and Anyone Who Doesn't Believe Is A Dribbling Rube.

However, what I do write is based on my experience, perception, and (sometimes) gut reaction. Anyone who thinks I am taking all this with utmost seriousness, or that I believe myself to be flawless in perception, doesn't know me AT ALL.

so...let me say what I think, and allow me to operate under the happy illusion that no one really reads this, and that I have absolutely no impact on anyone. Because if I did, Lord...that would be scary.

Rootie Fusses

2007-02-25T16:00:00.000-05:00

I (surprise surprise) am not a gratuitous curser (or, here in the Deep South, "cusser). No indeed, the small handful of generally considered rude words don't come out of my mouth except in the most dire of circumstances. Like when that woman in her silver Camry rearended me going 65 mph in a 35 zone, and totalled my car. I really let fly with choice words then, excoriating her, her husband, and their future children with every sort of commination and abuse. But it was deserved, because she totalled my car. I later wrote her a letter (once insurance had paid us), forgiving her. But at the time, I was grateful for a vocabulary that included such maledictions.

See, my feelings about the assortment of 4 letter words is this: They are overused and have lost their punch. When I was a kid (Lord, I sound like my mother, "Why, back when I was a kid we didn't do such things!")anyway, when I was a kid, we kids cussed. Not often, and it felt "bad" and gave us a frisson of forbidden delight. And there were the kids, you know the ones, when I was young they wore black motorcycle jackets with zippers, and spent half the school day behind the shop building smoking weed and making out, had shaggy hair and an insouciant attitude that made the teachers foam at the mouth when they walked by. Anyway, those guys (and girls) cursed with aplomb, dropping the f-bomb and the s-word with the same ease I used to push up my glasses.

Now, it seems, everyone does it. I hear conversations at StuffMart that go something like this : "Hey did you hear Bubba f%$*&ng tanked his f%$*&ng truck, and his piece of s%$t girlfriend and her stupid c*&t sister wouldn't even go get him! He was f%$*&ing pissed!" And this, in a normal conversational tone of voice.

Tsk. Get that young man a bar of octagon soap.

See, by using all these colorful words with such regularity, we are left without the option of having something dramatic to say when something exciting really happens. My string of colorful invectives had little effect on the woman who hit my car, because she's a teacher, and such language is de rigeur in the schools. They meant alot to me, and to my kids who were with me (their eyes were big at hearing their normally mild mannered mother use language better suited to a stevedore or roughneck). It was cathartic for me as well, like a popoff valve blowing steam, rather than doing something really inappropriate, like cold-cocking the woman.

It also seems, to me, to be indicative of a slackening of behavioral standards. It's like, we're all sinking to the lowest standard, rather than keeping expectations high, and requiring people to behave with civility and couthe.

Is it any more difficult to behave well than it is to behave badly? I don't think so. If you are accustomed to behaving a certain way (whatever that way may be), it's easy. If using foul language is something you dont make a habit of, then it doesn't occur to you to insert it into your language just whenever. You learn to reserve it for a time when your words need added emphasis. There's a reason why it's called "salty" language. You use it sparingly, and only when necessary. Like salt.

Good Things Come In Small Packages

2007-02-24T10:10:00.000-05:00

There's not much blooming this time of year, but if you look hard enough, you can still find pretty things.

Have a wonderful weekend, full and interesting!
Love, Rootie

A Lace Gauntlet

2007-02-24T08:21:00.000-05:00

I have a confession to make.
That last post was written as much to myself as it was to anyone else. I am as fond of a latte as the next person, and prone to running out (in my German sports car) to fetch me one as anyone else.

I don't do enough. I'm not going to tell you what I do, because that's none of your business.

"Be careful not to do your 'acts of righteousness' before men, to be seen by men. If you doyou will have no reward from your Father in heaven. So when you give to the needy, do not announce it with trumpets, as the hypocrits do in the synagogues and on the streets, to be honored by men. I tell you the truth, they have received their reward in full. But when you give to the needy, do not let your left hand know what your right hand is doing, so that your giving may be in secret. Then your Father, who sees what is done in secret, will reward you." Matthew 6:1-3 NIV

So, if you'd like to hold my feet to the fire, I welcome it. I need some fire.
And here's a challenge, a ladylike crocheted lace Easter gauntlet thrown down, if you will.

Find a cause involving women, something that uplifts women, maybe something local, maybe something international, that speaks to your concience. Pick a method of contribution, it could be financial, or time, or (if you're a Believer)prayer, make some sort of committment that is doable for you and your circumstances, and Do It.
If you can have an impact on 1 woman's life, that is positive and helps enable her to improve the lives of her and hers, imagine that...

Obviously, I have causes I support, because they speak to me and the way I like to do things. The whole idea of private free enterprise excites me. If that's not your thing- that's fine, find something that is. But, do it.

A special thanks to the commentors who make me think. And a hot latte c(_)~
to Jerseychick, who never fails to make me think, ever. Not in 23 years have you failed to make me think.

Warning: Rootie Rants

2007-02-23T11:18:00.000-05:00

You know what, there's more to helping women than sitting around bashing men, complaining about men, blaming men for the ills of the world. Really!

Heifer Project and Gender Equity

Girls and Education

Women for Women International

Evangelical and Ecumenical Women's Caucus

Habitat for Humanity: A Hand up, Not a Handout

A Greater Gift: Funky Fair Trade Goods

Here are links to some organizations who's mandate is to BUILD and ENCOURAGE and EDUCATE. Why? Why this instead of whining and complaining? Well, when has whining and complaining ever accomplished anything? I mean, other than to give everyone around you a headache.

We know from study after study that there is no tool for development more effective than the education of girls and women.

—Kofi Annan, marking the launch of the United Nations Literacy Decade

Ok, admittedly, these organizations have Christian origins. Naturally, they are the ones I'm most familiar with. They are also ecumenical.

*ec·u·men·i·cal adj.
Of worldwide scope or applicability; universal.

Of or relating to the worldwide Christian church.
Concerned with establishing or promoting unity among churches or religions.

So, seems to me, instead of spending $4 at the local independent coffee house every day, to get together with your Sisters and plot how to stick it to the menz, why don't you consider putting that $4 in a jar, and at the end of every month, buy an animal for Heifer Project, that will allow a woman to become independent, to send her daughters to school, and to feed her family. Why don't you use the money to buy a funky hand made bit of jewelry from Servv International, that encourages free enterprise and small cottage industry, so women can work for themselves instead of sending their 6 yr old child to the coal mines in Congo.

It's not hard, and I guarentee once you start thinking hard about giving a woman a genuine and literal hand up, allowing her self determination and reward for her effort, the headache and tension from this constant stewing over how oppressed you are..

excuse me? OPPRESSED?? Do you have a place to live? with a ROOF? a COMPUTER? Do you have shoes and food and more than 1 thing to wear? You do? Then honey, you only think you know oppression. Do you genuinely worry that the local military is going to burn your house, kill your husband and rape you repeatedly for the next 2 weeks until they bore of you and shoot you as well? No? Then take your oppression and blow it out your ass. You don't know jack shit about oppression and should be ashamed of yourself for setting youself up as the spokesperson. You want oppression? Sell your computer, buy a ticket to Somalia and live in Darfur for a year. Then, maybe, you'll have a right to whine about men.

*whew* sorry- it's something I feel rawther strongly about.

So, if you really, really want to really help women, for real, start out by looking at an organization that does more than pats them on the back and says "I feel your pain". Look at an outfit that says "You, woman, are worthy and useful, and smart enough to control your own destiny. Let me help you kick start that destiny now."

Atilla the Mom, it's all your fault.

2007-02-23T08:17:00.000-05:00

Last night about 6, Sweet Daddio called and announced "I want sushi for supper." I'm never one to turn down down sushi, especially if I don't have to make it.

90 minutes, 2 bowls of miso soup, 2 crunch rolls, 2 spicy tuna rolls and a california roll later, we were full and happy. I had my pickled ginger and green tea (and convinced the waitress that green tea was tasty iced. I had a strong feeling that she was of the Hamburger Helper school of culinary delight), SD had his sinuses cleared with a blob of wasabi, and we went to Lowes to pick out paint chips for the bathroom.

The Bathroom in question has the original wall paper and ceramic fixtures installed in 1967. The ceramic sink and tub are...well...this sort of aqua green, almost like a bright celery green. One of those colors that goes with NOTHING. SO we picked up a huge handful of paint chips, mostly varying shades of tan. It is, after all, a boys bathroom. The tiles around the tub are almond, fortunately, so doable. My budget on this bathroom redo is $100. Paint, maybe a new towel bar (tho why, I don't know, they never use it) Maybe a new countertop (that would take it over $100, but perhaps in the summer). SD's eyeballing one of the marblemaster counters- that has the sink molded into it. The vanity cabinet is an odd size, so we'd have to get a new vanity if we did that. We'd also have to special order a counter if we kept the vanity, and they won't let you special order less than 12 feet. I don't need a 12 foot countertop. The bathroom is only 9 feet.

So for now, paint and maybe a new towel bar. Some kind of tan. I'm thinking I could get reproduction prints of shaving soap and pomade and guy stuff to hang on the wall. Or would that be too twee?