Short and Sweet

We do not have a mall here in Brookings but we do have Fred Meyers. I wonder if I could talk them into putting in a slide like this. Just think of the fun everyone would have. The powers that be are getting ready to build a new medical facility, small, but so needed. I was looking around for some news that you might find of interest, but hearing about my chills isn't going to do it. I think it is a flu, but so far nothing has developed...a headache hovers and stalks me. As Katrina the Great I usually get a cold or a flu and it doesn't hang on long but this one has been very strange to say the least, zaps all the energy. . . maybe that is what daughter Christine was talking about when she spent a week in bed during the Christmas holiday. Anyway it is about to spoil a birthday celebration for Dee and I will have to forgo the dinner out and the festivities. I can't go play a few pennies, I can't clean house . . . now isn't that a shame!!! I am off to sit in my chair wrapped in my blanket and sipping my tea playing lady of the manor as I watch the latest movies . . . too bad I don't have a few folks around so I could snap my fingers and ask for a Tid- bit or too, maybe I'll order one of those little bells and invite someone in who already has had the flu. I don't like being sick! I don't like it at all.

So get yourself out in the fresh air, bundle up, eat well, drink lots of fluids, stay away from sickies like me and enjoy your day. Just stay well and take good care of you.

Shiver me timbers!

This was not an easy puzzle to do. It took more than a week to separate the pieces and all four orange cats looked alike as did the two Maltese ones. Friend Sharon brought this down as a Christmas gift and didn't get back to find a piece or two. My new rule, here at the house, is whomever comes in cannot leave until they find a piece of the puzzle. There is nothing stingy about me, I am always ready to share hard work. I had another one given to me which has to do with quilt squares and I have a feeling I am not going to do this one. Garish colors all mixed up within squares and nothing makes sense. I guess I am not in the mood to tackle it now.

I woke up at four a.m. freezing and shaking. I have never had that happen before unless I had a bad case of flu. I am not sure if it was the awful food we had for lunch yesterday, which made Pat sick, although I had no reaction . We had soup and salad. the soup was okay but a bit salty, which most restaurant soups are, . . . and the salad was down to the tale end of the bowls and the beets were tangy and sour. The casino has a three dollar lunch for seniors. . . that should tell us something!

A friend sent an e-mail yesterday telling me he was going to send me two of the puzzles he had finished. A nice thought, but I have ten puzzles in my front closet. I told him I thought they were multiplying as they waited for attention. I sent a quick reply and a big hug and told him to give them to the senior centers where the folks do puzzles all the time and in some places they glue them together and hang them along the corridors. A fitting picture to admire after all that work.

Now, with the weather rainy or snowing in most of the country, it seems to me this would be fun for the family and friends to get together and put a jig saw puzzle together. It is like eating peanuts and you can't stop. Years ago when we couldn't afford pictures for our walls we did puzzles and glued them and hung them up for all to see. Some were truly beautiful. The paintings of Beverly Doolittle are now puzzles are a real challenge but the big one we did or the balloon festival in Reno was the piece de-resistance as it took months to finish it. It was a double poster size and every balloon was fired up and in the sky, colors the like I had never seen before. It took my friend and I a good three months to get the last piece in and owner of the small casino framed it and hung it out for everyone to enjoy. So sort the pieces, take your time and enjoy the hunt. And Thank YOU . . . NO . . . I don't need another puzzle.

A ViewFrom My Porch

I went outside on my porch to check my winter garden which, as you can imagine, is looking pretty sad. The unexpected cold has taken a toll and several plants look like they may not come back. Our wonderful garden guru writes a column in our local newspaper and she tells us not to worry and not to cut anything back because spring will come and the plants will come back. I hope she is right because right now they look as dead as a door nail. I gazed up at the sky and saw this beautiful sight so had to go and get my camera and show you our storm clouds. The trees are in an open field leading to the ocean, and that tiny strip of deep blue just above the tree line is my view of the ocean from my porch. Those wires are where the birds come and settle hoping for bird seed to be put into the bird houses in the yard. On the left is smoke reaching for the sky and that comes from the mill that is making plywood twenty-four seven. They tell us that there is no residue in that smoke, but we all know better as we sneeze and cough and see little green spittle from the large chip piles in the open field. Look at that cloud, it was massive and it dropped a whole lot of rain, no complaints, the garden can only prosper from the gift from heaven.

Storm Clouds. Have you ever seen a storm come in/above the ocean wide/the pale blue skies begin to hide/behind a long bleak cloud/turning gray and partly black/whipping up the tide.
The drenching rain begins to fall/and brings a howling wind/frothy waves build up tall/stirring up the sea/hiding floating buoys and fishing boats/ beneath the swells so high/the fishermen batten down/the lines they have to tie/
The horizon line seems missing/as the clouds descend the sky/leaving misty/eerie shadows/on the sea so wide.

I hope you have a storm or two to make your gardens grow. There is nothing like a good storm to clean the air. Put on your raincoat, galoshes too, then take a walk in the break of a storm and feel the softness of the air and the God given aroma of life. Make this day a soft day, relax and enjoy.

Fire Up The Grill

I used to look like that once upon a time when we had a big back yard, a grill and loved to eat out of doors. I don't remember my aprons having frills though, more like a complete coverall that took care of everything from hot handles to wiping up a quick spill. We used to have a garden and grew red radishes that were crisp and spicy. My family ignores radishes in any dish and turn up their noses, but I think they are missing out, three of those crunchy radishes a day and you get all the vitamin 'A' you can handle.

Many years ago, my Rhode Island neighbors would drive home from the hot city, after working all day, and be greeted by me holding a spatula in the air inviting them to 'dine' with us. Hobo, as we called our friend Hobart, grew every vegetable and flower imaginable and we were always first on their give-away list. Minnie Mouse as we called Minnie Florence, invited us over on Sunday mornings to home made pancakes and we became family. Whenever I write my novellas they are in it somewhere . . . see what a picture of radishes can do . . . memories . . . right where they belong. I hope you have some favorite foods that bring along memories to make you smile.

I was checking out some other blogs yesterday and was amazed to find so many cooks out there. The pictures are mouth watering and the recipes read like a master chef is in the kitchen. It is so good to know that there are so many interested in cooking from scratch, a far cry from the chemical eating that goes on with some of the younger crowd. I wonder how expensive they are to make as the recipes call for ingredients I've never heard of. I have been a pinch and snip cook all my life and find that I'm losing my touch now that I no longer have a family to cook for. Eating alone is a challenge and it has taken me a long time to cut the recipes down to size. I love spaghetti and still make enough sauce to feed a family of six. A good thing there is a freezer to put the excess in. I wonder if it is wishful thinking when we don't cut our recipes down to size, but then left overs do have a special place in the refrigerator and sometimes sit a whole week before going down the garbage disposal. One area of a store I used to shop in had special packages in the meat department for one or two people. It was so easy to find something to fix for a dinner. They do not have it at Fred Meyers here but they do have a butcher counter and the lady is really great about picking out a special pork chop or a tiny steak for me. so I'll stick to my pinch and snip cooking and continue to buy my fifty cent bunch of radishes and cut them up in my salad and enjoy and leave the large scale cooking to the lucky ones with families to eat it all up.

I hope you have favorite vegetables to add to your salad and stay healthy and happy. Pull out the grill, put on your apron and cook up a storm. Don't forget to invite a couple of friends over and who knows they may bring along something crispy in red, hopefully in a bottle. I think I know where the cork screw is.

A Photographer In The Family

I just went onto Facebook and found that Erin, my granddaughter, the photographer, the snowboard whiz and a very personable, delectable and delightful young lady, had posted albums on her page. She and her friend, Jessica, went snowboarding up in the Tahoe area and was greeted by a ten foot snowstorm. Needless to say they were in their element and had so much fun as you can see from the pictures I 'borrowed' from her collection. While there it happened a jazz band or two were playing and Erin got to photograph them . I'll have to get details next time I see her. She has hundreds of photographs to see, but I didn't want to borrow too many so you can go into Facebook and see them for yourselves.

"He loves me, he loves me not." She had three pictures of the dandy lion flower to see, one in full bloom, one as I show it here and a last lonely nub that told a story as you blew the fine tiny white pixels up to the sky. I bet you looked for dandy lions to tell if your first love was true or not. Ah, the small treasures in life that make it all worth while. Spring will be coming along in a few months so we will be able to find lots of dandelions to spread around . . . wonder if that is why we have so many.

It was pretty clever to take pictures within the sunglasses. What a novel idea and a good one as it makes it much more interesting to get a peek at the view the skier is surrounded by. The drive up to Lake Tahoe from Carson City is awesome and I'd like to have a nickel for every trip I made up over the summits in the years I lived in Sacramento and Nevada. The bus always made it no matter how big a storm was brewing as those snow plow folks and the 'chain gang' were always at the ready to send you on your way. In my mind I can see the vistas and the views and one that remains is the train route up over the mountains when the snow has blanketed the area and it looks pristine and so beautiful. I always wanted to take that train ride but just never got around to it. I think it took too many hours to get up there and I was always in a hurry to play my nickels in the slots. Those were the days when a jackpot was thirty-five dollars and it was considered a big win. Today it takes thirty-five dollars to play the penny machines and no win, but still fun to try.

So if you have a camera and love to take pictures, today is a good day to go outside and look for people, places and things to put on your blog or in Facebook if that is where you like to be. Breathe in the fresh air, check the clouds for pictures, hike out and about and work up an appetite for some hot clam chowder or a bowl of chicken soup. . . although Amy's lentil is tops on my list. Consider yourself hugged and go out and share one.

After all the rain the river is high so fishing should be great. It is time to go out for those steel heads and my taste buds are at the ready, all I need is for Pat and her friend Jock to go fishing and bring some home. They are willing to go fishing but it looks like the weather is acting up and the cold persists along with rain and wind,so I may have to wait awhile longer. That shouldn't be a problem as I should go on a very strict diet and give my system a chance to regroup from all the rich foods of the holiday season. I don't know about you, but there was little or nothing missed around here from the stuffed turkey to the prime rib and all the trimmings and deserts. Oh, I almost forgot the spiral ham which was so tasty and we will be eating if for the next month. Our Fred Meyer managers were right on target with all those coupons to help defray some of the cost. It's a good thing they had them in the newspaper for us to use or we wouldn't have been able to buy their expensive meats. Thirty dollars or more for a ham is ridiculous, ten dollars off makes it sound much more reasonable, but in the long run, although I cannot fault the ham, I can't imagine why it has to be priced so high on the hog as they make their way to the bank and we head for the poorhouse. I know, I know, they did not twist my arm to buy it, but they just made it look so good I couldn't resist and now I am trying to find new recipes to help me find appetizing ways to get rid of it . . . ham casserole, ham salad, ham and eggs, pea soup from the bone, if I ever get to the center of the piece I have. Um . . . I have an idea, why don't you stop in and have a ham sandwich or two. I'll put the coffee on.

Make today a good one, enjoy the rain, or the snow, or the wind that blows, plan a fishing trip when you can.

Charge

We had high waves coming at us yesterday when we went over to Sport haven beach with a beef sandwich from Quezno (I never can pronounce it, so how can I spell it) . . . way too much, although it was tasty. The whales must be going by but we cannot see the spouts as the mist lies on the water and the wind makes a lovely spray which looks exactly like the whale's spout. There were a lot of folks out walking their dogs and watching the incoming tide. I already did a blog this morning but it got lost in the shuffle . . . I have no idea where it went. I likened 'charge' to the little cards we use during the holiday season with such aplomb and yesterday when the mail came along with it came the bills to pay. I spent a little time trying to find out why I didn't balance my account only to find I forgot to enter one item. I was lucky as it was a small amount. I am not very friendly with myself when I am dumb enough to make mistakes not in my favor. I was hoping to give my little card a rest but I see that Valentines are poking their little hearts out especially in the candy department. I'm not over the holiday peppermints yet. I suppose Easter bunnies will be out peeking through the cellophane in their big baskets begging for a home....well, not this one, I'm having an early lent and giving up sweets so I can move some of the extra calories I added during the holidays. We had fresh crab, right from the ocean given to us last evening as we sat with our left overs and swore we wouldn't eat another dinner. I'm back to simple meals, well, after John leaves for his job, then I'll be back to simple eating, well, maybe after one or two more left over meals. I think Pat bought a ham to feed the hungry and I have half of it in my refrigerator, one of those spiral deals that melts in your mouth. How I am ever going to get to that "Oh, Jean, you look so thin!" is still the biggest mystery around here.

I hope your mailman doesn't bring too many of those envelopes that require an instant slice of your income; but at least,I hope you had fun shopping and gifting those you love. I did. Make today a Sunday to remember, go shopping for next weeks groceries, salad makings, fresh fruit, and a loaf of pumpernickel bread . . . now that I'd buy in a heart beat. Stay healthy and happy.