Monkey Sea...Monkey Due

I don't know about you, but when I was a kid I got two presents a year if I was lucky. And most times I wasn't lucky and I got one combined "Birthday and Christmas Present"...the "luck" of being born ten days before Christmas. Sure, I saw my sisters and brother get TWO presents a year, but I would just sometimes get one. Sometimes it was a really nice present...like the year I got my purple Schwinn bike with the silver glitter banana seat with the purple and silver handlebar streamers...but mostly it was crap.

And speaking of crap...there are things we (people my age) always wanted but never could afford to get.

I remember wanting a Gumby and Pokey set in the worst way. Did I get one? No. Did I get something else I seriously didn't want? Yes.

That was the way things happened in those days...we didn't have Happy Meals, Gameboys, and unlimited parental funding every...single...time we went into some store. Nowadays kids don't look forward so much to Christmas, sad to say; as Christmas pretty much happens throughout the year for most kids in some shape or form.

And when I was a little kid I remember reading comic books. They weren't MY comic books as I never had comic books...I did, however have a "French-English Dr. Seuss Dictionary" book and a Barbie wedding set that's worth nearly millions now if only I kept them IN the box and never played with them.

But, again, as usual, I'm digressing.

In the very back of most comic books you'd see these marvelous things you could order for a few bucks...and a few bucks more for shipping and handling. You remember the things...if you are as old as me..."X-ray Specs"...guaranteed to allow you the superhuman ability to see thru clothing...but, for some reason, stopped at underwear. I don't know about you, but I never wore any lead-lined undies - but as the glasses were cheap, perhaps they only allowed you one layer of fabric before their power waned a bit.

So, when I ran across something I always wanted, in, of all places, TJ Maxx...well, I just had to get it.

Then I promptly rang up my friend and proclaimed, "I got something at TJ Maxx I always wanted as a kid! Three guesses what it is!"

"Uh...a bra."

"No...I have bras. C'mon, think um...something you wanted as a kid but you never bought it...they'd have them advertised in the back of comic books."

"Um...a Weenie Whistle?"

"No...but I watched 'The Santa Clause', too. I never wanted a Weenie Whistle ever. C'mon...you always knew someone who had a friend who had them...and they said they were bogus..."

"Seahorses."

"NO! You almost got it - SEA...???..."

"I said seahorses already."

"No! Sea Monkeys!"

(My son, by the way, guessed "Weenie Whistle, too - but did manage to get it right after the 2nd clue. Naturally, I had to call him up, risking life and limb talking on my cell phone in my car, as a monumental thing like Sea Monkeys...well, can't wait until you get home.)

Yes, I, a grown woman of - um - a certain age...plunked down $8.99 plus tax to finally get my dream present.

But, remember...in the ad they had a castle and a whole family and you could watch them grow and prosper and colonize a whole microcosm...right there in your own home! (You didn't need a whole pool. Oh...go read my second-to-last blog.) This wasn't just your run of the mill brine shrimp. No sirree..these were specialized "Sea Monkey" spawn, for cripes' sake. The ads...the ads wouldn't show little faces and tails and stuff if it wasn't so. I mean, this was one of those "money back if you're not satisfied" deals that guarantees this is the real McCoy. And, honestly, how would you even mail back a bunch of living, growing sea creatures, anyway?

Aha!

See???

So...I carefully laid out my instructions and three foil packets...and removed the paper which surrounded my Sea Monkey habitat...and laid that out as well. Sure, it read like a car or stereo manual...with pictographs and hieroglyphics and arrows and such...but since I have only one shot, I want to make sure I don't do anything wrong. There is, after all, freeze-dried life at stake here.

So, there I was, with my Sea Monkey paraphernalia strewn in front of me like Indiana Jones and a temple map...my eyes darting from one instruction bit to the next...making sure I wasn't going to screw up a crucial step and somehow upset the delicate balance of Sea Monkey-ness.

Everything I did would have to be carefully planned and carried out...plus double checked and rechecked...and rechecked again before I even started. Once I got that ball in motion, as in "Indiana Jones"...there's no stopping it and no turning back.

Day 1: Pour water into Sea Monkey container...let sit for 24 hours.

Damn, damn, damn, damn.

But I've waited for 40 years...another day won't make THAT big a difference.

Sure, that's what grown-ups tell you when you get all antsy and can't wait another minute...and, true to form...I felt like I couldn't wait an entire day. A whole day was light years away...and I was that little kid on Christmas Eve again.


("Monkey Sea...Monkey Blog Two" next time.)

Of Haggis and Owl...and Other Things Foul

I've recently been called out by a fellow blogger to participate in writing a poem. For those who don't exactly keep up here (at the Montgomery Advertiser blog section), mgb12345, who is very fond of writing poems, suggested I write one. Now, truth be told...I am not at all poem-y.

And I don't really like the ones which don't rhyme.

To me, if there's no rhyme...there's no reason. A poem without rhyme seems like a very short story with random line breaks. And I seriously don't get it.

But I wrote a silly poem the other day and I wrote to mgb12345 and told her about it. She wanted me to share...and I haven't, until now.

But, first I must confess that this is not my first foray into the poem realm. Long, long time ago, one of my online friends recruited the efforts of her group of online friends to attempt to win a radio contest in Scottsdale, Arizona. The gist of this contest was this: write a "funny" poem about haggis and win. Oh, wait, there's more...this was for the Arizona Renaissance Festival and the prize would be 10 free tickets (a small fortune, let me tell you - even in those days) and the "honour" of being crowned King (or Queen) of the Festival and all sorts of miscellaneous things being bestowed upon them.

So, I...a sucker for nearly any contest and downright pathetic whenever anything remotely challenging or competitive is put into the mix...set about writing a poem. Then I sent it to my friend. She culled all the ones sent to her (yeah, try to get the money back from her now, Renaissance Faire people) and submitted the one she considered her best bet.

As luck would have it, it was mine. And as further luck would have it...we (and when I say "we" I mean "I") won. Without further ado...I present my winning poem...from about 10-15 years ago:


The Minstrel's Ode to Haggis

Now gather ye maidens for a tale from our land...
Of the Scottish fare we eat that has gotten out of hand.
It's bits of the sheep innards that no one would eat...
Then boiled it its own stomach and WE call it a "treat".

So drink up and be merry for soon we will dine...
On a boiled tummy bag...ugh wench, fast, more wine.
If you think living now seems sometimes too dismal...
Just think of the Renaissance with no Pepto-Bismol.

Even Shakespeare wrote of haggis in a play called MacBeth...
With three witches a-cooking, a fate worse than death.
Listen close, heed my words, 'tis true in Scotland we tell...
That the something "rotten in Denmark" was the haggis smell.


So, as previously stated, she won all sorts of things...one of which was a real live (er...dead) haggis which she, in undoubtedly a grog-like induced state, decided a keen idea would be to ship this thing to me in the middle of summer, in a box surrounded by dry ice.

Dry ice, it seems, isn't necessarily "dry" when the bag it is encased in ruptures. And it isn't so much "icy" then, either. So, when I got this soggy box in the blistering heat of an Alabama summer...the first thing I did was say, "Ooooh a box." The second thing I said was, "Okay, the FBI will surely be coming to my door as whatever is inside this head-sized box...smells like...a severed head."

Okay, I've never actually smelled a severed head sent UPS, but chances are it's not too far off the mark from what I received. I, being the inquisitive sort...and not knowing what was inside the box...but really, really curious at this point, opened it.

All I can say is that the smell a sealed box of rotting, spoiled, decaying haggis emits pales in comparison with an opened box of rotting, spoiled, decaying haggis. Words like "vile" and (puntastically apropos) "gut-wrenching" come to mind. Also every single mob movie I've ever seen came to mind...and the "ear scene" from David Lynch's "Blue Velvet" as well...but mainly because I had recently watched it just prior to opening the box.

Yes, smell and memory are closely related because of the brain's limbic system. "Limbic" looks and sounds remarkably similar to the word "iambic", which, ironically is poem-related. In a strange way it's all very poetic really, right?

And that brings us to present day.

The other day I stumbled somehow upon a site which makes and sells "Hello Kitty" wine.

My online friend loves all things "Hello Kitty" so I forwarded the URL on to her. After she asked me which wine I would recommend, I perused their write-ups and came across this "tasty tidbit" for their Pinot Nero: "Best served with red meat, rabbit, lamb, roast beef, 'Zampone and Cotechino', wild owl and hard cheese."

Now, I don't know about you...but it's been virtually years since I've had any "wild owl" and frankly, if I can't get my hands on some prime grade "Spotted Owl"...I'm just going to say a resounding "No" to the whole owl species.

In the wee hours of the morning (all things are much funnier in the wee hours of the morning...hence my timely posting of this blog) my friend then asked her friends (on her forum) if people routinely eat "wild owl" in Britain. I figured it was probably just a typo and they indeed meant "wild fowl"...but, you have to admit..."wild owl" just reeks of the things a parody poem is made of.

So, I made one.

For further clarification of this poem's impetus - I must relay that someone from England replied at the forum saying they knew "gypsies who would cook up roadkill hedgehogs". Again...the things "memorable" poems are made of.

Please keep in mind my poem is in many different meters (at least I'm consistent in my inconsistency)...and I vehemently try to offend everyone equally across the board. :) Also, in my dealings and dabbling into the "world of poems" I've found out that I'm apparently very fond of the word "Ode"...and have used it in the title in all those I've penned. (Yes, all two of them.)


An Ode to All Things Eaten

Wild owls and guinea fowls and hedgehogs found as roadkill

These are the things that Brits do eat...as tasty as a duckbill.

When Americans eat...we like fresh meat...

We hunt it then it's skinless.

But in the UK they're drunk all day...On cheap rosé and Guinness.

Here in the South they like their deer, turkeys and some gator...

They boil them up in a big ole pot with carrots and po-tater.

I'm from New Jersey...we don't kill there, we just go to the market...

We point at things behind the case -- then pay from out the pocket.

Now I won't grab a gun to kill some meal...or a shovel for on-road scraping...

I don't have a pig, or a chicken or a cow...and no sheep here for raping.

So while I sit down with a store-bought snack and log on my computer...

...at some given point I will be drunk...but not with a guy named "Cooter".

You all have mgb12345 to thank for this...please feel free to direct all complaints directly to her. ;)

Ah...the Sweet Smell of Spring...on Venus!

In keeping with my monthly suggestion of a Montgomery Advertiser online theme (last month was "...Nature's Little...") - I read Liberty4USA's blog and she suggested others post their Spring memories...so I decided to go for it and do a Spring blog myself.

While Liberty let slide she's a closet pyromaniac...and heaven knows I've done my fair share of "setting things on fire for the 'sake' of science"...I won't divulge what horrors befell the unlucky specimens who got the hot end of the deal. Plus...I really don't want PETA putting my childhood photo on signs with a circle and red line through it. So, I'll just confess she's not the only one who found out that you can indeed set things on fire with a magnifying glass...altho I'll admit my infatuation with it stopped LONG ago. ;)



But...back to Spring.

Spring always conjures up imagery in my head of getting a brand spanking new matching pastel outfit to wear to church on Easter Sunday. This included "the works": hat, dress, a flimsy coat, and "shiny as a just minted penny" shoes. Photos were obligatory; gloves were optional...but as I grew up in the 1960s, they were still in vogue and I had to have them. I don't remember ever wearing the outfit more than once...but it was always an event - and fond memories are made of such events.

Spring, growing up in New Jersey...was a transitional thing. My son even remarked to me the other day, upon seeing the outside temperature while in the climate controlled atmosphere of my car, that Spring lasted about one day...and what was up with it going from freezing cold to blazing hot literally overnight.

It is true...I remember in Jersey how the flowers would herald the changing seasons. First the crocus would poke its clever blooms up and out thru the snow...then the narcissus and daffodils...giving way to the luxurious scent of lilac. If you've never smelled a real live, honest-to-goodness lilac bush...you really don't know what you're missing. Forget those Glade air fresheners...even Yankee Candle can't come close. A real Yankee knows lilacs don't reek of things like patchouli and cotton...or whatever combo they use to try to recreate the "lilac" experience. Real lilac hangs on the air as delicately as those lace-like structures etched on a dragonfly's wings...and darts off in the wind as effortlessly and quickly as well. It's there for a moment...and when you think you can hone in on it...it eludes you yet again.

Grabbing handfuls of the lovely blossoms and deeply burying my nose in them...ah...the thing that Spring memories again are made of - but are probably only as sweet as the remembrances of youth. I'm sure the flowers don't emit the same odour they once had. Time has a way of altering the senses and perceptions...and turning the most lovely memories into the mundane when you stray down that road again in another time. Some things are best left to memories...so perhaps it's a good thing I've never seen a lilac bush here in Alabama...and those waxy "effigies" the companies make - well, can't hold a candle to them.

But I'm waxing nostalgic (yes, that clearly was intentional)...

Spring in Alabama - what does it mean to me now?

Mosquitoes? Yeah, okay but they seem to find me year-round...so not that "Spring-like" really. Think, think, think...what do I remember most about this place in the Spring?

I know!

Primordial soup.

We have a swimming pool...or as they call it here in the South, a "cement pond". (Oh, c'mon...that was a joke.) Each year, instead of letting it run (via the pump)...we just let nature run its course...and then just drain it in the Spring, clean out the sludge which accumulated...and fill it back up again. Voila! Yankee ingenuity at its best. (Again...I'm jesting.)

But...in between the time we stop swimming and the time we start swimming...there is this interim period...a "Spring" of sorts if you will...which happens, coincidentally, between Winter and Summer. And in that time period - all kinds of things take up residence in my pool.

There are bugs...water bugs. I don't know how they find my pool...but they do. It's not like there's a little river which leads into my pool...but the water bugs find it anyway. Then the frogs and toads come. This is about the same time that the algae decides to go into hyperdrive. It begins to look like the scum on top of a soup...the stuff that you scoop off when it's simmering. Seriously...this stuff looks like it's just about to boil. There's some anaerobic activity going on I'm certain. Then...that's when "it" happens. Out of this bubbling cold cauldron - "things" begin to grow in this massive soup mixture.

Primordial things.

Primordial things begin to grow...and grow and grow. It's like a full-scale science experiment - my own little planet of life brewing...right in my backyard. We had these one-celled creatures you could SEE with the naked eye. You aren't supposed to SEE one-celled creatures like amoebas. But these were giant amoebas! I kid you not. I had giant microbial mutant life in my pool...and I will probably have it again. The abject lack of a transitional Springtime is probably to blame...certainly not due in any part with our lackadaisical approach to proper pool maintenance.

So while SETI and NASA are out there with their mass spectrometers, telescopes and space stations...searching the far distant skies for extraterrestrial life on other planets, I have intraterrestrial life in my pool each year. Life that I let slip down some drain.

On some grand cosmic scale this is probably terribly sad or terribly ironic...which it is I'm not really sure.

But it sure wouldn't be Spring in Alabama to me...without it.

Kudzu: Nature's Little Murderer

(This blog will make a lot more sense if you read this blog of mine first: Monthly Blog Theme Proposal)

Also known as "The Vine that Ate the South"...this horrendous horrible life-sucking force of nature does not exist outside a particular area.

I was from that area.

I am originally from kudzu-free New Jersey and when we moved to Alabama twenty years ago, we came from Springfield, Virginia...a place which also doesn't have the viral vine.

On the trip down from DC, once we hit a certain zone, these strange miraculous shapes were growing up telephone poles...they looked like abstract elephants...with their long trunks dangling and swaying in the breeze. They looked...utterly awesome.

I had never seen these things and really didn't pay them any mind...and when we bought the house I live in, I didn't know what those things looked like up close. As such, I was also totally oblivious to their cannibalistic ways.

Had I known...well, I would have turned tail and ran.

You here in the South know all about kudzu...you can stand outside (if you are prone to doing that kind of thing) and watch that vine grow. And it pulls down everything in its path, chokes the ever-loving life out of every living thing it grows over; it's like a chlorophyll Superman...but has no known kryptonite. Once it takes root you can't kill it short of arming yourself with an arsenal of pesticide and a lifetime of devotion.

Word has it someone brought it over from Japan, where it is controllable, as the plant dies down in winter all the way to the root system. But here in the South...well, it's much warmer than Japan and altho it will die back...the root system is alive, taking hold and spreading like a cancerous lesion. Yes, it doesn't die all the way back - and the powers that be decided it would be great at erosion control. Not only does kudzu not control erosion, I'm sure the South is paying millions every single year unsuccessfully "eradicating" this menace from the sides of highways where it was originally planted.

Elephantine it is...and it has grown to mammoth proportions.

Unfortunately, you guessed it -- it is also in my yard and barring someone making a better mousetrap or a way to economically desalinize water -- like a cure for that cancer...nothing has really been invented to literally nip this thing in the bud.

While it has been grown to make a concoction to curtail alcoholism (it has properties which will make you extremely sick if you drink alcohol after ingesting it)...and you can use it for other things, I see no one beating down my door to pay me good money to grow it.

Consequently, I have to pay good money to try to get rid of it...and it's a bear of a problem and nothing seems to put it in permanent hibernation.

Yes, I'm afraid "Nature's Little Murderer" is here to stay in the South and everyone who has run across this killer...can't stop grizzling about it.

A Different Type of Olympics

On the way home today I jokingly said to my daughter, "Well, you and Apolo Ohno have something in common." She replied, "What?" and I said, "Well, you both really screwed up in the Olympics."

It's no secret I adore Ohno...and, altho he did touch the one guy...eh, maybe a gentle nudge...but the Canadian guy did the same and he medalled - Apolo should have as well. Or, at the very least, they both should have been disqualified.

But I digress.

Today (Saturday) my daughter also was in an Olympiad competition: the Alabama Science Olympiad. If you don't know what that is, no problem...I'll enlighten you.

Kids from various schools study their butts off to take tests and build contraptions on their "off time" and trudge on up to venues in the wee hours of the morning; this time at the University of Alabama in Tuscaloosa, and compete for gold, silver and bronze...and the added glory of having their school place 1st, 2nd or 3rd overall.

All in all, it's an epic event and any child who participates, regardless of whether they win a medal or not...should be very, very proud indeed.

Oh, did I mention that their teachers expend countless hours of their own time and so do coaches? And parents quizzing their kids and helping their kids in between homework and regular tests and quizzes? Well, that, too.

The determination and the stamina of these kids really should be applauded. I went to the sprawling campus and watched as children (mostly of the high school variety) ran clear across campus in order to make it to the next event. Cell phones were employed to shuttle alternates to buildings which housed competitions which shut their doors to competitors who showed up after the designated hour. Scurrying around to get the proper paperwork (you can't get in to participate without your form) from students who were still shut in - in a prior event...because it was running late...knowing they were, in essence, forfeiting their own chance of medalling...all in the aspiration of teamwork and the overall good of their school.

No one wants to go home empty-handed...but everyone can't win. Even with 20-plus events, and three medals each...there's many more participants than places on the podium.

And I have to think back to the "real" Olympics. There are literally dozens upon dozens...I have no clue how many...countries which participate...and most walk away...empty-handed; but that doesn't stop them. I don't think I've seen anyone from Syria ever win anything (not saying they haven't)...or Vietnam...or Portugal. The top medal count always seems to have USA and Russia in it...but then again, they send like 200 athletes each - poor little Trinidad & Tobago probably have three.

Just like at the competition today...some schools had dozens and some had a couple...but that didn't deter their spirit. The cheers were just as loud...the glory just as great...and the defeat just as heart-breaking - and the perseverance just as prevalent.

And, no, in case you were wondering...my daughter didn't medal in her two events (she has, in the past, walked away with at least one in all the previous years she'd competed) - but I'm just as proud of her.

Sure, I would have been beaming from ear-to-ear had she whooped Montgomery's LAMP School Team 1 and Team 2 (geez...those kids were awesome...seriously awesome) - but, you know what...she shone, in my eyes, just as bright as any gold medal would have.

All the students did.

Apolo's got nothing on these kids. Ohno...yep...I said it. ;)

The Beauty of the Olympics

Okay, is it just me - or are a lot of these women in the Winter Olympics this year just drop dead gorgeous?

I've watched Olympics for years, and sure, there was the occasional pretty woman...like ice skating's Katarina Witt from Germany...but this year...wow!

USA's skiier, Lindsey Vonn, is just stunning:

Torah Bright looks more like Elle MacPherson's younger sister than an Australian snowboarder:



And Pre-Raphaelite beauty, Lindsey Jacobellis, also a snowboarder (from the USA)...is downright captivating:

I tell you, these women are SO hot...I don't know how the snow doesn't melt beneath their feet.

I'll be on the lookout for more "ice princesses" in the days and events to come. It's just too bad there's no real eye candy for the girls -- except for Apolo Ohno (who is still darned cute as a button) and Russian silver medalist ice skater, Evgeni Plushenko. Yeah...I've always been partial to Russian gymnasts and skaters in the Olympics...I don't know what that is about...but oooh - they could melt my little cold heart any day. ;)

All I'm saying is - if there isn't already a 2010 "Winter Olympics Women's Calendar"...there sure should have been. And, if I were a guy...I'd be buying me a snowboard right about now.

Olympic Musings III...aka "The Winter Games"

I am not sure how many people have been keeping up with my blogs...but for the sake of those who haven't -- I love the Olympics.

I always have and I probably always will.

I've been watching these things as far back as I can remember clearly - and that would be the 1968 Olympics (yes, I know I am old). And, as the games are on right now, I'm watching them as I write.

But there's a few things I have to mention regarding them before I go insane:

It's pronounced Biathlon...it's THREE syllables - not FOUR. See? http://www.merriam-webster.com/cgi-bin/audio.pl?biathl02=biathlon There's no second "a" in it to make it Biathalon...even though, I must say, it sounds better that way. But, if you MUST say it, oh, like in a newscast...um Montgomery newscasters...please, for the love of all things sacred AND the English language...at least go look it up first.

And while I pick on Montgomery (as I've heard them say it wrong each time) they're not the only guilty ones, as some commentators AT the Olympics have been saying it wrong as well. But then again, they've hired people like Pat O'Brien, who, even if you don't count his smarmy sex-scandal fiasco, was about as annoying as they come. Sometimes I wonder if the average IQ of their commentators is a 5.8...you know, if you throw out the low score (typically anyone talking during the ice dancing competition) and throw out the high score (Bob Costas).

In fact, if it wasn't for Bob Costas single-handedly saving the show with his immeasurable talent and genial appeal alone, we'd be left to such riveting commentary as:

"Ooooh, that's gonna hurt them." Said anytime anyone falls in any sport. Really? So, "screwing up" isn't yet an Olympic sport??

"You really don't want to do that in an Olympic competition." As if, sub-par performances are totally acceptable during the nationals...or the world championships.

And my personal favourite...

"Well, Jim, he really wants to win it this time." As opposed to NOT wanting to win all the other times he's competed. Ugh.

And, seriously, how much money does Morgan Freeman need? And is Visa really the only card accepted at any Olympic game? So, there are actually Lithuanian and Slovenian Visa cards? I always wondered about this.

Oh, I'll wonder about that later and Google it. But for now I must get back to watching the games and the athletes...which, by the way, is only a two-syllable word. ;)

Planning Your Super Bowl Party

I am a sucker for cookbooks.

I must have...oh a couple hundred; I've never counted them, but I know it has to be over 100...or close to it. I get the majority of them dirt cheap at TJ Maxx, the library here in town, or the Thrift Shop on base. I'd never pay regular price for them - these things are always outrageously priced, and to be honest with you, I use Epicurious.com for 98% of my recipes. I just must be hungry when I buy them I guess.

Take for instance my newest one: "Seriously Simple Holidays". It's a handful of recipes I'd probably never make - I don't have access to a bevy of duck legs and the odds of me getting 8-10 pounds of standing rib roast at like $8-10 a pound...is pretty nil. Plus it's just me and my two kids (if you don't count all the cats).

But, nonetheless I bought it - one recipe must have looked tasty and it was less than $4.00 and it had all these lovely photos, and did I mention I usually am hungry when I go into TJ Maxx?

Now, I've never hosted a Thanksgiving dinner - no one ever comes here and I have no friends within the driving vicinity and, even if I did, they probably have their own family. Anyway, this holiday feast preparation which they suggested seemed a bit excessive if you ask me...and I was likening it to hosting a Super Bowl party (which I've never done either). But my little gears started turning and I thought some side-by-side (or underneath-by-underneath as it were) comparisons might be fun. This is modified and condensed...as they have two pages devoted to proper hunting/gathering etiquette. And, just so there won't be any confusion, all comments in parenthesis for their "Thanksgiving" prep are mine, not theirs:

Thanksgiving: According to this book you should start preparing one MONTH prior - making pate, pie and turkey stock and then popping them all in the freezer.

Super Bowl: One month prior - still paying out bets you lost as your team didn't make it.

Thanksgiving: Two weeks before you should start planning your menu.

Super Bowl: Two weeks before you should start cleaning your house (you should; but you won't).

Thanksgiving: One week before - order turkey, plan your table settings and decorations, make grocery list, and shop for "essential holiday equipment" (whatever that means - I'm figuring a new turkey baster as you threw away the last one as there's no possible way to clean the bulb doohickey that you suck the raw turkey juices up with when you baste.)

Super Bowl: One week before - buy lots of chips and salsa. Last year there wasn't any on the shelf when you waited until the nite before.

Thanksgiving: The Saturday before - make caramel sauce for pie, choose dishes, glassware, tablecloths...blah blah Martha Stewartish crapola. Sharpen carving knife. (Seriously - it says that...heaven forbid you have to do that in front of your guests...big...BIG faux pas.)

Super Bowl: The Saturday before - You are too late to buy anything from Walmart. They already sold out seven days before to the people who knew better from last year. But for the purposes of this blog - we are going to assume the "Saturday before" really means whatever Thursday subtracted from Saturday is.

Thanksgiving: Monday - Complete shopping lists. (Apparently you need to pen in "cranberry sauce" because you forgot to add it to your list you made a few days earlier. Even if you don't like cranberry sauce...add it to your list. It's mandatory. Don't worry - you have a few days left to actually type up or hand-calligraphy your list. Perhaps you need to buy a new calligraphy set? Stupid you...it was right there NEXT to the turkey basters at Williams-Sonoma.) Begin shopping for produce, organize refrigerator - cleaning out to make extra room for turkey. Defrost turkey stock.

Super Bowl: Thursday before - buy more chips and salsa as you ate it all last nite. Eat everything in fridge to make room for beer.

Thanksgiving: Tuesday - Reheat stock, make gravy, cranberry relish (told you that you needed to add it to your list) and put it in glass jars (why? No clue - just do it - the book says so), chop all your vegetables and put them in zip-lock bags (this sentence brought to you by whoever makes zip-lock bags), clean and chop parsley (again - more kickbacks from the zip-lock people) then zip-lock it away. Remove chicken liver pate from freezer and transfer to fridge (you will later feed to cats as no one eats that pompous crap plus it already LOOKS like Fancy Feast cat food).

Super Bowl: Friday - buy lots of beer now that you have all that room in the fridge. Beer tip: Buy Budweiser, Miller Lite and Michelob...no one's going to drink those fancy beers with rabid dogs or old guys on the label (at least not in a room full of other guys)...plus they are expensive. Put stack of coasters on the table to appease your wife.

Thanksgiving Eve: Pick up turkey and then do dumb things like buy flowers, arrange flowers, chill wines and water, put more things in zip-lock bags, set the table already (unless you have cats...trust me on this one), put Post-it notes (yeah...another product placement book deal here) on each platter designating what it will hold (again, I kid you not - this book says this), organize coffee and tea, plan a schedule for the next day (typed or maybe you have time to get them embossed by a professional if you hurry).

Super Bowl Eve: Clean toilet. Pick up underwear from bathroom floor. Put out dainty hand towels no one will use anyway. Gather all the clutter lying all over the house and toss it in the back bedroom; close the door (remind people NOT to go in there). Get your football phone out of the closet ( you know...that you got free with your subscription to "Sports Illustrated" 10 years ago) and hook it up. Look at it fondly as it WILL go back into the closet tomorrow after the game because your wife will make you do it. She does every year. This year will be no exception. Buy chicken wings and hot sauce. Buy the hottest, bad-ass-est one you can find - look for words like "hotter than hell" and "butt burning" on the label. Call dog over...while wife isn't looking, toss coasters at dog, Frisbee-style, ensure dog chews up each one. When wife comes into earshot - reprimand dog loudly. Chuckle silently behind her back.

Thanksgiving Day: Unzip everything you put into zip-lock bags, cook turkey, fill water glasses, defrost pie, put out pate with crudités and water crackers, arrange the bar...yadda yadda...carve turkey with knife you sharpened the other day (thank God they reminded me). Laugh with an air of superiority at the fact you will use the word "crudités" 47 times during the course of the evening...when all they really are...are chopped raw vegetables you took out of zip-lock bags. Practice this sentence, "Help yourselves to some lovely crudités over there on our vintage Louis XVI sideboard we picked up in a quaint little shop on one of our shopping jaunts to Rouen, France."

Super Bowl Day: Put out dip in giant football platter you picked up when you bought salsa and chips. Put chips in plastic team helmet you also wasted $40 bucks on. Throw away burnt wings you forgot about. While you're in the kitchen, phone your house from your cell phone so you can pick up your football phone in front of your friends. Feign conversation, "Uh...you got the wrong number." Hang up, now use it to order pizza. Marvel at the look of awe on their collective faces...as all THEIR football phones are at home in their closets.

Let Them Eat Cake!

This is my second favourite time of the year.

I'm not talking Valentine's Day candies, cards or flowers...heck, I was married for 20some years and I never really got those things then, it's surely not gonna happen now. I'm talking about an absolutely fabulous tri-coloured sweet...official name: "The King Cake".

While this King Cake history goes back further than the New Orleans version, for the purposes of why they are sold in Montgomery, Alabama...I'm going out on a limb here and assuming it is for the New Orleans Mardi Gras festivities. The King Cake is traditionally a ring of twisted bread topped with icing made of melted sugar which hardens nicely then gets further topped with sprinkly sugar in the traditional Mardi Gras hues of gold, purple and green. They also toss in three coins; gold, purple and green...three strings of Mardi Gras beads...you got it: gold, purple and green, and lastly, a baby. Some believe the baby represents Jesus. I think Jesus wouldn't be gold, purple, or green-coloured...but that's my own personal belief. So, whatever the reason the baby is in there - the luck falls on the person who finds the baby (at one time traditionally baked inside...now they just toss him haphazardly on top with all the other trinkets) in their slice of cake. That "luck" just so happens they get the honour bestowed upon them to foot the bill for procuring next year's cake. Yeah...sounds awfully lucky to me, too.

So, off we trod to get one at my favourite store: Fresh Market. And as luck would have it they have them...and I'd actually be able to eat it the next day when my thyroid scan diet ends! Yes...I'm preparing my make-up feast of sorts one day in advance, and this cake is topping the list.

Well, imagine our outright shock when we open our clamshell cake container -- our lovely gold baby was missing an arm. Where's his little arm? Are we going to ingest the arm? What happens if you ingest a hard plastic fake gold-gilded arm? Will it pass all the way through?

Me? I'm thinking more of intestinal perforation...so I'm hoping the arm wasn't on the baby when he was tossed onto our lovely Cinnamon King Cake.

Still distraught that I have a package with a sub-par baby, my son picked up another the following day - one I've always wanted to try...the Sour Cream King Cake.

I throw open this cake container...wanting to get my baby out as I like to line them all up at the very top of my laptop ...their cheruby little multi-coloured shiny butts precariously balancing, faces looking at me while I type, and hands outstretched in their little "I love you THIS much" sentimentality. This always makes me feel happy this time of year.

But...this was worse...my baby had NO ARMS! My baby also had NO LEGS, NO HEAD and NO TORSO. Someone forgot to toss a baby onto my cake. Not only that - but my three shiny coins were missing as well! Well, I'm not feeling that great NOW...no row of shiny babies...which can also be turned so they moon me from the top of my laptop when I want to be in a real zany mood. But this won't happen now, and I just don't feel very happy at all...was it all because I was short changed 'my change and my baby'? Was that all to it??

No...it dawned on me it might be something a little bit more...sinister!

These trinkets...probably fresh off the lead-lined cargo bins on lead-lined boats in China...are probably themselves laden with high enough levels of lead to leach into the yummy warm icing goodness of my cake...and how would I ever know?

Well, I decided to go over to WebMD's site and check out what the symptoms of lead poisoning are...and frankly...I definitely see a connection:

Pain, numbness or tingling of the extremities: In other words, when I slap your hand or kick your shin for going for the last piece - you might feel some slight numbing or tingling sensation.

Muscular weakness: Okay, your shin I kicked MIGHT also cause you to limp for a few days...I'd keep pressure off it if I were you.

Headache: Did you drink all the alcohol BEFORE or AFTER you ate the cake? If it was before...chances are you probably will get a headache, dumbass.

Abdominal pain: How the heck did you manage to get a tummy ache from just one skinny sliver of King Cake?? Umm...what's
this whole other empty box in the trash?? You ate one King Cake ALL BY YOURSELF and didn't save any for me??? No wonder all you could eat was that scrawny slice...and to think I almost fell for that "diet" thing.

Memory loss: Since they are so incredibly tasty...you might go back for seconds and thirds...and in the morning when your significant other wants a piece and all they find is another empty box sitting there on the counter, your "Uh, I forgot" excuse will
probably render you with more pain, numbness and tingling of the extremities.

Mood disorders: You've never seen someone with more mood disorders than someone who is denied their LAST piece of King Cake. Once the piece is gone...they could never truly savour that "Last Piece" euphoric feeling one gets. Without that feeling, mood disorders will probably find ways to rear their ugly heads...and those ugly heads will probably have even uglier words coming out of those flapping lips.

Fatigue: Yeah...polishing off a whole King Cake and a few brewskies will undoubtedly make you loosen up your pants and stretch out on the sofa with the remote. This one might further substantiate the fact you ingested tainted products by someone telling you to get the lead out. Again, this might also be followed by muscular weakness by someone physically kicking your lazy Super Bowl-watching butt OFF the sofa to help clean up in the kitchen. They didn't invent half-time for nothing, you know!

So, yes, I am convinced these little trinkets should be kept separately in a little plastic bag and positioned off to the side of the cake in the container. I don't know about you - but I seriously don't want to clean up the kitchen after I just ate one of these...plus I bet they don't wash them first...ugh...that's a whole other blog waiting to be written right there. But not now...I'm way too fatigued.

(Yes, I know real lead poisoning isn't funny...but I bet these things actually have lead in them...and honestly, I love the cakes, but I'd rather have the trinkets off to the side.)

Being Scanned

I am on a diet.

I know what you're probably thinking, "Oh, little whiney thing...boo hoo...just eat less and exercise, that's all there is to it."

No, it's not that type of diet. I don't even want to do this diet. This one is doctor-ordered.

I go to the doctor the other day and he wants me to get my thyroid checked. In order to get the best results, according to them, I have to be on a diet for three weeks. Three weeks...altho the paper they give me says "TWO". So, I begrudgingly take my sheet of paper and shuffle out the door.

Now I don't know how many of you are on specific diets - I am sure there are Diabetic diets that are no fun...and people without gall bladders and spleens and people without the ability to swallow...and while I don't discount any of these - this diet is pretty darned severe.

First off it states I can't eat iodized salt or sea salt.

I don't typically add much salt to my food, if any, and when I do, it's sea salt. It's tasty and comes in pretty colours like pink, red and black - all the way from far off magical places like France, Australia and Hawaiian volcanoes...which, when added to the food I make, make me think I'm a much better cook than I am. So, no biggie really. I can deal with this.

- No dairy.

Um...okay, you just took away my salt, now you're telling me I can't eat any cereal? How about some lovely oatmeal from Ireland? I make it with water! Nope...contains salt.

Dang.

- No eggs.

So, wait...I can't eat bland horrible Irish oatmeal...now I can't eat an egg? I can make egg salad sandwiches without salt - I can do that! But you've taken away my ability to eat eggs!

Doesn't matter, they also took away my God-given right to eat bread. No bread??? Wait! This is pathetic...but, there's a catch, I can eat WHEAT bread.

Now, I don't know about you - but I recently became very versed in reading the labels on everything in the store. White bread contains salt...wheat bread contains salt. Am I to believe the salt somehow loses its salinity if combined WITH wheat? The ingredients are the same - only the wheat bread also contains WHEAT!

I can't eat seafood, algae or soy. By reading this list so far, it seemed by the process of elimination, the only thing left FOR me to eat was going to be salmon or soymon or a nice dollop of tasteless white rice on a slab of seaweed. But no can do.

Okay...the list goes on and on - let's just cut to the chase and tell me what I CAN eat!

Fresh meat
Poultry
Potatoes or rice
Wheat or rye bread
Fresh or frozen vegetables
Fresh or frozen fruit

Great! I know what I'll do - I'll make a baked potato for dinner. I'm almost as happy as a clam...because I know that I can't be eaten! Ha! Clams ARE seafood. (Yes, starvation apparently effects the brain first.)

Ding! My microwave goes off. I reach for my potato about the same time it dawns on me that: 1) Butter is dairy; 2) Sour cream is dairy; and 3) The only salt I have in my house contains iodine.

Have you ever eaten a baked potato with nothing on it? It's like eating a rice cake...but without the flavour.

Oh...I know all about rice cakes. I bought a package. Then I threw away the rice cakes and ate the package (sorry, old joke - I had to). Seriously, rice cakes rank right up there. Wait, let me rephrase that last sentence: rice cakes are rank.

Can I eat olive oil? I could eat wheat bread if I had it - but would I be able to dip it in some olive oil? What am I going to cook my saltless vegetables in? I can't use butter...can I use oil?? So, I call the doctor's office the next day as it makes no mention whatsoever about oils.

"Hello."
"Uh, I'm on the thyroid diet and there's things that I'd like to eat that aren't on the list, can you tell me if I'm allowed to eat them?"
"Eat the things on the list."
"This isn't ON the list...can I eat it?"
"What does the list say?"
"Uh...it doesn't address it."
"Then I'd stick with what's on the list."

Yes, this is getting nowhere fast. A last ditch effort on my part - I decide to be assertive, I'm starving - the only thing I ate all day (and that was yesterday) was a bland potato...

"Can you possibly let me talk to someone who can tell me if certain things that aren't on the list...are okay to eat?"
"I don't have the list in front of me."
"Can you maybe let me talk to someone who has a list in front of them?"
"Well, call up the people at the thyroid scan place, they'd be able to tell you better than we can."

So, I call them up.

"Hello...um...my thyroid doctor place told me to ask you if I can eat some things for my scan - I don't want to mess my scan up and have to start all over."
"Well, as far as I know, and I've done this for 30 years, the only thing we ask you not to eat are shellfish and iodized salt."
"You mean I can eat an egg?"
"Are you serious, eggs are on that list?"
"And all dairy, and bread...except wheat and rye. And all already prepared food - because they all contain salt."
"I never heard of such a thing."
"Really?"
"We get people all the time from that office and this is the first I heard anyone ask about this stuff."
"Seriously?"
"Yes."

Then I decide to look online.

Depending on which site you go to...I can eat potatoes but I can't eat rice. No mention of rice cakes and I can see why. There's really not much to talk about when it comes to rice cakes...but if you are hungry enough, putting sliced pears and honey on a rice cake...after you take your Ambien...is remotely bearable. Edible? Eh...the verdict is still out on that one.

But, I have to get this test done on the 1st and I want to do everything in my power to not get disqualified; can you imagine starting all over again? So I'm sticking with my bland "sheet of paper" diet...which, I found out, if you are creative enough, you actually can eat tasty things. You just have to use your noodle.

Which, by the way, aren't listed "for" OR "against" on my list...so I'm eating them!

________________

Like this blog? Maybe you also liked my last blog enough to vote for me in Knucklehead's "Blogger Idol" contest...I'd really appreciate it if you would take the time to do so - I need all the votes I can get: Vote Here!

Thank you!

History - It Is What You Make It: Blogger Idol - Round 4

Damn you, Philip Marder!

Mr. Marder was my eighth grade History teacher...and while I am cursing him right now...he is no way to blame. Let me elucidate...

I loved Mr. Marder. He was this dark-haired guy who always wore a burgundy suit on Friday, and sported mutton-chop sideburns...sideburns invented (or at least made famous) by Ambrose Burnside (don't believe me, look it up)...and thanks to Mr. Marder I remember silly historical trivial tidbits like those. (I'll be doing a lot of "thanking" later on, by the way.)

He'd come up with all sorts of gimmicks which we thought were just plain stupid to get us to remember facts and figures. We'd roll our eyes at such "beauties" as this one...

"Where are we going?"
"Bearing straight."
"Get it 'Bering Strait'?"

Silly perhaps, but I still remember those idiotic mnemonic devices after all these years. And I still remember he had a friend who worked in the Archives and History Department in Washington, DC, who would smuggle out all kinds of films to him in 1974 that any school system nowadays would get sued over watching. They were...in a word...fascinating. Shocking, in your face realism...but it was history and you couldn't deny it...there it was...in black and white archival format...and I sat there mesmerized.

With a flick of the lights and a flip of a film projector switch, he did something no other teacher before him...or after...could manage to do...until The History Channel came along: he made history interesting.

In fact, thanks to him I owe a debt of gratitude...I love documentaries. I eat them up. Give me anything on Egypt, mummies (peat bog or regular), Kennedy conspiracy theories, Tunguska, UFOs, icebergs melting, global warming, the history of distilling (hey, I'm still fond of all things distilled), the Romanovs, Newton, Einstein, Euclid, and Copernicus. The list literally goes on and on.

I am like a deer in headlights. I love them. And for a long time I went without.

Then came things like NOVA and Carl Sagan's Cosmos Series. Oh, how I loved Carl when I was young. Then there was nothing...there was a void...and then came A&E's "Biography"...and I was again hooked. Discovery Channel had pyramids and The History Channel had bi-planes and Hitler. Well, those last two I could do without -- but the first couple years, that's all The History Channel had to offer. Then it graduated to Civil War...which wasn't very civil, by the way...but it somehow it piqued my interest again.

History, I found, could indeed be interesting again.

Mr. Marder you have now met your match!

For years, between episodes of Seinfeld and Frasier, I was enraptured. I could always tune into A&E for a show like "Cold Case Files" (years before CSI, there was Cold Case Files) - and I could watch...until the wee hours of the night...all sorts of things. Jack the Ripper theories abounded. So did Tutankhamen ones. Who killed Kennedy? Who killed Rasputin? Who killed Marilyn?

The field was wide open...and so were my eyes.

Then, just when it started to get really good...

...it ended.

A&E's "Biography" ran out of people it seemed. They started doing biographies about...people I didn't care about. They went from the guy who invented Ford's assembly line...to the guy who invented the straws they put on juice drink packages. What the??

Then it was the Discovery Channel. My channel about diseases and medical things and scientific paraphernalia...was tanking. Slowly I was discovering it was turning into the reality show channel.

"Engineering an Empire"...went more to engineering a gang...when "Gangland" started up...and I still haven't a clue what "The Dog Whisperer" does...nor do I care. And I have no idea how many "Dirty Jobs" they can do...I think they exhausted their supply and are now down to "the guy who picks the straws up off the floor on the juice box assembly line".

"Ice Road Truckers"? Let me guess. Truckers who drive on ice? How many different variations on this theme can we get? Okay...there's a lot of ice...there's a big truck. Episode One: Battery doesn't start. Episode Two: Truck slides off road. Episode Three: Truck falls through ice. Episode Four: Um...truck slides off road AND his battery doesn't start...ad infinitum...ad nauseum.

"Monster Quest"? About as entertaining as when I saw it all before...IN 1979! "Nothing new ever happens here...move along people."

But I had hope. "Mythbusters" still survived...until it went from being the "Jamie and Adam" show to the "Three Other People No One Cares About" show. All I can remember is that one year they went from interesting topics like "Can you really get your tongue stuck on a pole like in "A Christmas Story"? and "Can you get your butt stuck on a toilet at 30,000 feet?" to totally far-fetched, cockamamie ideas like "Can you actually eat just one Lays potato chip?" and "Can thunking a watermelon predict doneness?" Oh yeah...myth busted! I'm sooooo glad I watched Cary Grant and Tory this time around. (Yes, I know it's "Kari, Grant and Tory" - I just always think of Cary Grant when they say that and how livid he would be if he saw one of these episodes.) I'd like to see more episodes where logical myth things are blown up, and less other stupid stuff...oh, wait, I've got something really stupid for them to blow up: Kari, Grant and Tory! Now that's a show I'd watch for sure.

And I don't know if any of you have noticed...but The History Channel now makes up their own history. It's true. That show "Life After People" isn't even ABOUT history. It's just a play-by-play "as we see it" pre-historical fabrication we're hoping no one will be around in 2013 to dispute. Yes...they are obsessed with the 21 December 2012 Mayan Calendar and everyone's eventual death on that day; and you thought Conan had high ratings...tune in on 20 December 2012 for this "final" episode.

You know - it's bad enough I read Nostradamus' quatrains when I was 14 (thank you, Al Stewart)...and (thanks to a library book on paranormal activity) worried unduly about my premature demise by Spontaneous Human Combustion...but to have to be reminded that I'm going to turn into some Pompeiian-ish cinder right before Christmas two years from now...every single day??? That's a bit much...so thank you, Mayan Calendar Apocalyptical shows...I can't wait until the next 24-hour marathon you've got planned. I'll be there with my remote in one hand and a noose in the other.

Sigh...whatever happened to the good old days where the most you'd have to worry about from watching some documentary is some crop circle in your yard and a sore butt from an alien probing the night before?

So, thank you, interesting history and science documentary channels for morphing your line-ups into some asinine reality show pabulum, and, in essence, giving us "Human Death Race 2012".

And thank you, Mr. Marder for getting me interested in all of this in the first place. While most of these channels stink right now...at least they're not extinct; and there's always hope that "History" (and A&E, and Discovery) will repeat itself.


Seriously, I promised when I first started blogging that I would dedicate one to Mr. Philip Marder. This is it. I don't know if he's still around...but he was the 7th/8th grade History teacher at Laurel Hill School in Browns Mills, New Jersey. If you know him...or ARE him...I'd love to thank you personally. You've instilled a love of history in me that I am forever indebted to you for.

If you liked this blog...please vote for it at Knucklehead's Blog site (link in the image above). Please read all the other contenders as well. If you still like mine, great! Thank you for your vote and your time to read it. I hope my blog was, at the very least, entertaining for everyone. Thank you!

A Small Slimmer of Taupe: Blogger Idol - Round 3

This is my parody of a late-nite infomercial my son and I have had the "delightful misfortune" to catch...twice. I could not find the original airing of what I've seen...this is a close proximity of it, although this is the first time I've seen it offered in two colours. My blog does not reflect that (and other things) as I'm making fun of the "original"...and the concept in general. Here is the video clip first in case you are curious (although you do not need to view it in my opinion): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4JfgFXEnvhk

How many times has this happened to you?

You are just drunk enough to possibly get horizontal with that hot guy at the bar when you realize you have a Kymaro Body Shaper on. It took you two friggen hours to wiggle your fat ass into that puppy...and if you remember how great your legs always feel after they're finally released from your pantyhose...well, you're in for a good 10 minutes of making orgasmic noises by self-scratching alone.

So...you have to think this one out carefully, girls.

Now, granted...it just "magically" erased 13 inches off your waist and 20 pounds off your body (where the weight goes is anyone's guess - but the infomercial said it - and they should know, right?) - but, even though it is "flesh" coloured, and by "flesh" we mean a pasty "Pillsbury Doughboy" white; it really doesn't blend in with any skin tone known to mankind unless you're sitting by candlelight with someone who recently underwent double cataract surgery.

But, don't let that detract you...some guys can't see either at 3:00 a.m. Perhaps he's one of them.

Does he just want to get into your pants? Probably. It IS 3:00 a.m. after all...but you'll have to get them OFF first.

How will you explain excusing yourself for 15 minutes while you try to break out of your Kymaro-cocoon in the adjacent room? No one can listen to Barry White for that long without expecting something to happen NOW, and if you put on Ravel's "Bolero" -- he'll figure out how old you really are and run like hell.

So you ask yourself "WWBJD"? What Would Bridget Jones Do? She supposedly had a weight issue - and was played by a woman on the big screen who had neither an actual English accent NOR a weight issue...but that didn't matter. And she had two hot guys fighting over her. Okay, in real life, one did have sex with a skank ho and the other was Hugh Grant (shout out to Craig Ferguson for that)...but, seriously...men ARE pigdogs, right?

Right.

So why bother buying one of our shape-altering body slimmers?

There IS no reason. We prey upon people who have just taken Ambien or who have just realized the highpoint of their life this past month was getting a rutabaga to sprout and selling a gallon of milk to the local dairy via their virtual cows on FarmVille.

Will you buy a taupe body stocking at 3:00 in the morning and expect to look like the hot skinny woman in our infomercial who is a size 2 if she's a day.

Yes.

Do we care if your ass is now where your knees are? And do we care if your bustline can now be counted as one of your chins?

No.

We sold a ton of these and we know you aren't going to return them...

...'cause you "can't take them OFF!"

(Taupe, by the way, was never a Crayola crayon colour...and based on that fact alone...I am extremely suspicious of all things "taupe".)

____________________

Please feel free to vote for this blog at: www.knuckleheadhumor.com - and while I'd love to get your vote...please take time to read all the other blogs as well.

Thank you -

Mariann

Two Guys, a Girl and a Tube Tester: Blogger Idol - Round 2

Back when I was a kid, it would've been pretty standard procedure to have had the television repairman on speed dial...had there been speed dial back then.

Like clockwork, and always right before something great was about to come on one of the three channels that were out there, the television would go on the fritz. No amount of aluminum foil on the antennas or adjusting the horizontal hold was going to fix it.

The repairman would come over and he'd always be some guy my family knew, although for the life of me I don't ever remember my parents having friends over and we never went to anyone's house. How we knew these guys on a first name basis is still a mystery to me and always will be.

But he'd come around lugging a giant suitcase rivaling the size of our television cabinet and pull out tube after tube and systematically "trial and error" them until one magically turned our black and white behemoth on again.

There'd be some exchange of money and we'd all converge back around the set, me on the floor right up close enough to get a good megawatt dose of electronic exposure (I was, after all, the family-designated remote control) but back then we were oblivious to the perils of such things...and such things probably made us much stronger anyway. Yes, Nietzsche probably owned a really big television as a kid.

Then one day the television didn't work and to save a buck...as heaven knows how much it cost for a TV house call back then, my father decided he'd try a new angle. A newfangled machine was at the local "Two Guys" department store...and when I say "local" I mean a good 45-minute drive. All stores in Jersey were a good 45-minute drive away. I swear no one ever lived close to anything there...going to the grocery store was pretty much an all-day event...so when we'd pile into the car to go to "Two Guys", well it was akin to an expedition to the Himalayas...we'd be gone for hours. Hours to a kid is like days to a grown-up...and as usual, no drive would be complete without my sister and I asking the never-ending series of "Are we there yet?"'s.

"Are we there yet?" my sister would eventually ask.

"No." my father would grumble back.

Ever the smartass, I'd quip, "How about NOW?" two minutes later.

In another two minutes, I'd do it again. Antics such as these are why my father invented such "awe-inspiring" games such as "For every Volvo you see I'll give you a nickel. For every red Volvo, you'll get a quarter."

Now, I don't know about you, but back in my childhood, a quarter was a big deal. I never got an allowance so the value of a coin, any silver coin...was astronomical to me. It didn't matter much to me that in 1967 they probably sold 11,000 Volvos in the whole country...and probably only 10 were in the state of New Jersey. There was serious money to be had and all questioning of when we were getting there ceased. 'Hell, take the long way around, Dad. Go on the Turnpike!'

But, we'd end up at our destination in no time after that - and I'd be no richer.

And back in those carefree days of my youth, you were given free reign in the stores. Sure, I'd start out with my mother...but I'd go off and always manage to get lost and found again -- and this time was no exception. Only this time I was going with my father.

He had an assortment of tubes he plucked haphazardly from the back of the television set and standing right smack in the middle of the store -- was an amazing thing. A thing I'd never seen before. A tube tester.

It was wonderful. It had lights and I think it made a slight buzzing sound...and a set of needles would go to and fro when you placed a tube on one of two metal discs that shone like...well, like shiny quarters. The buzzing would raise in pitch and I believe some clicking noises were involved somehow. This indeed was something special - I knew it was. My father let me place a tube on one of the discs. Like magic, the needles flicked. I got to do it again. And again. Some tubes made them flick with lightning speed into the green and some just slightly budged as if in a slow-motion sequence on television itself.

Then it, like the "Volvo game", ended all too soon. We packed all the tubes back up and walked away from it; the buzz getting fainter and fainter with each step.

Oh, it was all too much...the allure of the machine beckoned me to come back to it. As soon as I was left to my own devices, I found my way back over...probably through my astute hearing...honing in on the buzz like a bee back to the hive.

I carried out the motions exactly as my father did: Flip the switch on. Check. Needles spiking left to right and back down again. Check. Tubes? Hmmmm...what can I do?? I have no tubes! Fingers. I have fingers! Left index finger on the left shiny disc...right index finger on the right shiny di...

"Oh, what the HELL!"

I swear to God I was zapped with enough wattage to power up two electric chairs. I was thrown back about 10 feet and if there would've been a weight-bearing pillar in back of me I would have been knocked unconscious for sure. In fact I'm not sure that I WASN'T knocked unconscious. All I know is that my fingers, hand, arm and pretty much the whole side of me was numb and tingling.

I got up and ran off.

"Where were you? We were looking all over the place. What were you doing all this time?" my mother half-chidingly inquired.

"Um...nothing."

Well, it wasn't like I could really tell her I was zapped within an inch of my life and was probably unconscious for the last half hour. I envisioned the loudspeaker lady blurting out, "Clean-up in aisle 7!" Nah...best I keep this little incident all to myself.

And it's nothing that a couple orange-flavoured St. Joseph Baby Aspirins couldn't cure when I got home...ah, the good old-fashioned taste treat from my youth.

It's not like they could kill you or anything like the tube tester...

This is my blog entry for Round 2 of the Blogger Idol competition. Please go HERE (or click the image below) to vote. Voting ends Wednesday, 13 Jan 10 at 8:00 p.m CT...so, please, get your vote in. Thank you!

"Chocolate Milk"ing It For All It's Worth: Blogger Idol Round 1

Not since President Reagan declared ketchup a vegetable in 1981 have school lunches caused such an uproar.

But, it's happening again...only this time the culprit is something that can pack on the pounds...or so Ann Cooper (Boulder Valley, Colorado's school district nutritionist) claims.

If visions of "Super Size Me" are swirling around in your head about now you're probably not alone...but it's not greasy fries or double cheeseburgers at work here, it's milk. Chocolate milk - to be precise. And to hear it from Ms Cooper, it really contributes to the childhood obesity crisis.

But wait, just how much more will "little Johnny" weigh if he pushes back a pint of the chocolatey goodness on a daily basis? Are you sitting down for this? Do you have your congressman's number all dialed up and ready??

Ms Cooper's heart-stopping, earth-moving, staggering caloric figure count is the astronomical sum total of THREE pounds a year! Oh, the humanity! NOW I see why all those kids out there look like Ralphie's brother, Randy, in the snowsuit...only they're not wearing any snowsuits. It's all because of chocolate milk! So I guess you shouldn't buy any more Ovaltine for home consumption, either...decoder rings be damned.

Now before we start killing the fatted calf before it can be milked, let's put this in a little "practical" perspective here: My son was stuck in his lousy car booster seat until he managed to reach the magical weight of 40 lbs. He was also stuck at 36 pounds for, I swear, about three years. Oh, he got taller...but never weighed more. Had I known all I had to do was have him throw back a few chocolate milks at school...well, I would have insisted he drink TWO of those with his lunch. But, alas, he had to make due with the healthier "2% regular white" version...and that's why he stayed in that chair until his head nearly touched the inside roof. We ended up tossing the booster seat before he hit 40...we were afraid he'd be dating and STILL in that damn thing. All for the lack of drinking chocolate milk...what were we thinking? Where was Ms Cooper when I needed her??

And don't even get me started on kids not exercising, recess being banished from every single school system I've run across since my kids have been in school...and the fact that getting ANY calcium into ANY child's body USED to be a good thing.

Back in my day...and that's quite a long time ago (certainly pre-ketchup administration days), school lunches were made with only one thing in mind: Getting kids to eat them. Nobody cared how they got you to...and as long as the 350 pound, 7-foot tall lunch lady put one healthy food on that compartmentalized tray a day...no one complained; no one dared to. And we'd get healthy things alright...things like whole apples, green beans straight from those 55-gallon drum-sized dented cans, peach halves floating in juice so sweet you could feel your molars disintegrating...and the dreaded "stewed tomatoes" that only one kid in any cafeteria would eat (and he was probably the same kid who ate paste). No one ever ate any of these things; sure, we impaled the apples with our forks, spoon-plonked the beans at each other...and jiggled the tomatoes to and fro...but that was about it.

What we went after...were on the other squares of our trays...something guaranteed to get our kid "fix" as it were: spaghetti, beefaroni, tacos, pizza, and, if you were really lucky...an overflowing, messy Sloppy Joe. Things our mothers never made us at home as we were too busy eating "healthy" things.

The "salad"-like substance would usually make its debut on our trays in high school. And it was only doled out in a portion to fit the smallest square...and for good reason: 200 small squares take less time to empty out into the trash can when the bell rings. I don't think anyone ever tasted the salad...it was, in essence, the older kid's version of "stewed tomatoes".

While I can see it's very admirable for school systems to jump on the nutrition bandwagon...common sense dictates having to throw out much more than one lousy square's worth of food isn't doing the environment any good...and certainly isn't doing "little Johnny" any good, either.

You can bet those extra three pounds the kids are putting on...aren't coming from their lunches - I've sat in lunchrooms...I see what the kids eat...and I see what they toss. Someone in the school nutrition division is doing the math...but they aren't doing their homework. The pounds are being put on when the kids get home...famished from not eating those mandatory "healthy" things 98% of people would balk at; they ravenously consume anything and everything in the house before dinner. Then for a lot of these kids, dinner comes in buckets and in microwaveable containers. NOT from cows.

I drive past houses and playgrounds and more developments and even more houses...and not one kid is ever outside riding a bike, throwing a ball, running around the block or jumping rope...and even if they were getting some exercise, more than likely, they'd be inside using their Wii to get it. But even more likely than that...is that they're plopped in front of the television or computer with a bag of Doritos or a package of Oreos and a half liter of Pepsi or Mountain Dew.

Yet, innocent little Vitamin D milk gets slammed...just because of its colour...and that's not fair.

It's time kids nowadays learn a lesson from us old people. Let's bring back the swing sets with the one metal leg that was always enclosed in a chunk of cement that "ka-klumps" out of the ground and "flump-thuds" back into the ground with the back-dislocating jolt when you swung on it. And the monkey bars with absolutely no cushion of six-inch mulch beneath...if you fell off...there was always good strong Mercurochrome which served a dual purpose: it cleaned out your cuts AND worked like a skin Sharpie...you'll remember what boneheaded thing you did for a long time afterwards with that tell-tale orange mark. And last, but not least...the rusted-out geo-shaped dome which most kids managed to get on...but not all could figure out how to get back off again. They'd stay up there...frozen in their contorted "Twister"-like state, afraid to move their foot or hand lest they plummet head-first onto the very hard, very compacted dirt...where once grew thick, lovely grass that cows once probably grazed upon.

And now their ancestor cows stand accused of being indirectly responsible for fattening up kids...ironic really, as we fatten them up first.

But these archaic things called "playgrounds" that we once spent a good 30 minutes of our school days on...are the things which slim your kids down. There's nothing that will make you loose weight faster than good old-fashioned running away from kids who are threatening to beat you up (to take away your lunch money) and that "scared to death to move your arm or leg one centimeter" total body shaking and heavy perspiring you do when you're the one stuck up on the geo-dome. These things worked great for our school system back in Jersey when I grew up...and no one ever died from getting a wedgie on the playground (as far as I know) when they finally did get caught.

Obese kids in my class? I can only remember a couple "chubby" kids in the whole entire school...so you can bet if there had been chocolate milk in our lunches...we still would have maintained an "ideal" weight.

As a side note, I say "enough of the chocolate milk ban" clan...let's focus on people who can't get enough of it...or apparently can: Largest cup of cocoa unveiled

This is also my blog entry which is up against nine others at my friend, Chris', blog site...in his "blog off" competition. Click the link I just provided as voting is now taking place (but only until Wednesday); please take the time to read all the blogs in contention...and vote for the ONE (you can only vote for one) you enjoy the most. If it happens to be mine...I won't complain; if I end up last, you'll probably be forced to read about it in an upcoming blog of mine.

Thank you,

Mariann

It's "Auld Lang Syne" Time!

It's no big news that it's New Year's Eve tonite...and that, since it's also heralding in a whole new decade, sites all over the Internet have been doing their "biggest headlines of the past ten years" stories. I swear one guy wrote this up on his little-read blog a month ago...and all the bigger entities just copied his story, changing a word or two. Internet is after all...the school bully's ultimate wimp he can target. Any blogger or reporter can just go sign on and steal an idea or two...or three...or four...hundred thousand. Ah...the days when someone had to know things and be imaginative and come up with their own words...in the order they put them in. Gone are those days I'm sure...as those "end of decade" lists all have the same things in them...

...so, naturally, I'm going to do something else...

...but...I'm going to copy off a master. ;)

I was lying in bed before I got up at much too late an hour to actually confess to...thinking about a task that has been placed upon me. My friend, Chris, who is an awesome writer (one of the best I've ever read, dammit) - has bestowed upon me a great honour...and a great burden.

He invited me to be one of ten bloggers he thinks very highly of as far as writing goes - to do a "Blog-Off" of sorts. He gives us a list of topics, one per week...each week we do a blog within the specifications of said topic...we post them up...and readers are to vote on which they like the best. This, of course means that each week...a couple will be "voted off the island"...the remainder get to write again another day - until the final winner is announced and they will have major bragging rights and a gift certificate provided by the mastermind behind all this...aka Chris.

But, while I had that dilemma looming in the back of my brain...another one zapped to the forefront: I can't leave 2009 - the whole decade...without putting up a blog about New Year's Eve (whine whine boo hoo...chalk up yet another dateless event for me)...or doing some sort of list - but that's been done too many times and who wants to read what some lonely, depressed cat-lady in an Alabama living room is thinking anyway.

So...I had an idea.

There in my depressed state I likened myself to Capra's protagonist, George Bailey, who also was pretty darned distraught...distraught enough to entertain thoughts of taking a leap to end it all...and to wish he hadn't been born at all. Now, everyone knows George, in the end, finds out that he did indeed have "a wonderful life"...and all was right in the world and Clarence got his wings.

But...how would my ordinary life...clearly not written and rewritten by Hollywood's finest...stack up against George's?

Let's find out, shall we? Just what would it have been like had I never been born?



Other than the obvious...I wouldn't have had my two children...let's take it systematically...main character by main character:

Harry Bailey: I never saved anyone from the frozen pond. I did once drive on the ice going to work...did a 180...and nearly smashed the back-end of my car into a tree...and upon realizing I was now pointed in the direction of my house and not my workplace...I decided to take it as an omen...and went back home that day. Perhaps, by not going into work...I unknowingly saved someone's life. Yes...yes, I did. I saved two people's lives actually. (Hey...I'm writing this "script" - I am allowed to have "writer's embellishment".)

Mr. Gower: We had "Mr. Bowen" as the druggist in the town I grew up in...but I never worked there - and as hard as I'm thinking...I can't see any other similarity here than their name's sounding remotely alike. But...I did once look at my son's pills in his vial when they handed them to me at the drug store...and they weren't his pills. Upon asking - the pharmacy clerk who filled it...put my son's pills in some elderly man's vial and my son ended up with his heart medication. So...there ya go! Another life saved by me! (Sssssh! You aren't supposed to point out the anachronism that my son wouldn't have been born, therefore the man wouldn't have gotten his pills anyway.)

Ma Bailey: My mother never ran a boarding house...altho when she would get frustrated she would remark, "This is NOT a restaurant I'm running here!" Now, granted my mother always said I was her guardian angel...so, I guess in a way...this also takes care of Clarence. I'd figure that my life did indeed make a difference to my mother as she would say I was the one who "kept her young". She was quite old when she had me...and kids have a way of making you run after them...and running is an aerobic activity...so, in a way, I helped my mother in that regard as well.

Violet: Let's see...I never helped a loose woman as far as I know. But when I was working at the school, after school...a woman let her daughter back out of a parking space when she didn't have her license yet...and she hooked up her right front bumper with my left back one...and she begged me not to call the police as this infraction was an automatic "can't get your license until you are 21" kind of thing. So, I ended up jumping up and down on my Volkswagen's bumper while they did the same on their car until we managed to get them loose. (For the purpose of this blog...I'm going to heretofore refer to this girl as "Violet"...I mean, I have no proof that wasn't her name anyway.) She was very appreciative and I changed her life for sure. (Again...ixnay on the anachronismway - if I wouldn't have been born she wouldn't have entangled her car in mine...I KNOW this...ssssh!)

Mary: Oh, I'm sure my husband would have loved me never being born. This is not a good character to look at from any POV...so, I'd have to write him out of the script. But, on a positive note...he would [undoubtedly] have had a wonderful life if not for me.

Okay...enough with the Capra-corn...I just got myself much more depressed and pissed off and I'm feeling like Mr. Potter right now.

But that's not the way I want to feel....so, I think I'll go sign onto Facebook to find out if I have an "Uncle Billy" out there somewhere. We can both get drunk and forget everything we did...and isn't that the way you really want to "remember" New Year's Eve, anyway?

Happy New Year, everyone!


(Chris' blog, btw, is listed as "Knucklehead!" in my sidebar to the right...seriously, he's a fantastic writer - you should check his blog out.)