tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30479732035188382832024-03-14T08:44:52.031+00:00Thoughts of CielThe musings, memories, random thoughts, opinions, stories, observations, creative genius and ramblings of a soul stranded between traditional western consumer culture and the role of a perpetual traveler in the universe.Unknownnoreply@blogger.comBlogger47125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3047973203518838283.post-22402711536352024372012-11-02T02:35:00.001+00:002012-11-02T02:35:30.162+00:00NaBloPoMoJust learned that this is the first day of NaBloPoMo - National Blog Posting Month. Blogging just for blogging's sake.<br />
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As I have been away from blogging since returning from our travels, I decided to give in to the urge to get back to writing. My fear has been that I have nothing of interest about which to write since I live the same day-to-day existence as everyone else. But, I have realized that interesting things happen to everyone every day and even if nothing interesting happens to me, the process of writing something for others to read can be cleansing,creative, rejuvenating and fun.<br />
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So here I go. As the description of my blog states I will be musing about life and all of its twists and turns - with a few meal plans and recipes thrown in for good measure.<br />
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I hope you will come along for what promises to be a challenging and hopefully at least somewhat intriguing ride. As the High Priestess of Fun, I hope to bring you some inspiration for making your own.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3047973203518838283.post-92152345417769953002011-08-31T16:25:00.000+01:002011-08-31T16:25:41.084+01:00The Rose Cousins Last Supper<div style="text-align: left;"><i>Written as part of an assignment for a course in Food and History that I am taking at USF this fall.</i></div><br />
The 11 PM update is just in from the National Asteroid Center and it looks pretty ominous. Forsaking any last minute fluctuations in the earth’s magnetic field, Asteroid 2026-A, numbered to denote its year and position, will hit the mid-Atlantic coast of the US just before midnight tomorrow. Asteroid forecaster Jim Cantore, Jr., bald and reporting from close to the center of impending disaster just like his dad always was, keeps reminding us that as the speed of an asteroid increases so does its mass as it nears the earth, projecting 2026-A to rise from a Cat 2 to a 5 as it enters our atmosphere. In short, we are doomed.<br />
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Since hearing of the approaching devastation, the Rose cousins have been doing what we do best, sharing lots of panicked WorldNet messages and gathering for a big meal with everyone making a contribution, The Rose Cousins Last Supper. We have cleared out our larders, mine filled with tomatoes, bread-and-butter pickes and pickled beets canned just last summer by an aunt who sadly died two months later taking her recipes with her. We pulled up the end of summer greens from our gardens and put them in a big tub of salt water to soak off the grit. My older male cousins dragged over the big, heavy, barbecue cooker, actually a large oil drum adapted for the purpose, blackened from use and covered in creosote smoked from wood sometimes a bit too green for its purpose, with a metal grate crusted with grease and bits of burned fat fitted inside, all attached atop a trailer for hauling from backyard to lakeside hooked up to one of those oversized pickups rigged for “huntin’ and towin.” Since early this morning, they’ve been stoking a fire of well-seasoned hickory and oak with a little apple wood added for sweetness. The smoke swirls memories through the air until a bed of coals is just about ready for the meat - memories of past birthdays, anniversaries, 4th of July celebrations, baptisms and even a wedding or two where barbecue was often considered more important than the guest of honor, A few pounds of dried black eyed peas, sorted one by one to remove any gravel, are covered with water in a big bean pot to soak all night for cooking in the morning.<br />
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The asteroid, as measured by the newly orbiting Hubble replacement, is about 100 miles across and is picking up speed. On the current course, 2026-A will crash into the Atlantic just off the east coast of the US, stir up a tsunami that could circle the earth for as long as 10 years and destroy all life on the planet.. So much for planned leftovers.<br />
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My family, the Roses, hails from Johnston County in the sandhills of southeastern NC where barbecue means pork. Period. No exceptions. Eastern North Carolina-style barbecue was first cooked, back long before our ancestors arrived, by new world settlers who thought tomatoes were poisonous. So, despite our Scottish heritage, Rose barbecue is basted with “English Catsup, ”a mixture of vinegar and peppers, hold the tomatoes. Usually the whole headless, eviscerated hog minus its trotters is cooked and the meat picked off the bones, often right on the rack of the cooker - definitely not a sight for vegetarians, those who proscribe ingestion of pork for religious or health reasons or the weak of stomach. <br />
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The secret to good barbecue is heat, smoke and time, time which we don‘t have - no time to find a hog and have it properly butchered or even to get the local meat merchant to specially order a whole picnic shoulder, the preferred alternative. So, several of my favorite cousins and I, after a couple of margaritas to drown our sorrows, raided three nearby superWalmarts (the only large food chain still in business) for all the pork shoulders, Boston butts and picnic hams we could carry. The guys are lugging the various pieces of pig out to the cooker now where it’ll rest in dense smoke all night until we are ready to feast on the deep, smoky, tangy/sweet results. Once it’s chopped and mixed together with a little extra sauce no one will know it’s not a whole hog anyway.<br />
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The young children, exhausted from chasing lightening bugs and playing post-midnight backyard games by flashlight, fell into a fitful sleep pierced with terrible dreams and frequent tear-filled awakenings as they clung to each other for solace under antique quilts handmade by great aunts from the remnants of all our past lives . The older males passed cold beer and George Dickel to younger cousins, some not yet of legal drinking age who quickly mixed the Tennessee Sour Mash Whiskey with Sundrop, the highly caffeinated, bright yellow, almost sickeningly sweet carbonated elixir of choice, as they kept the heat of the smoking fire constant. All the mothers, aunts and older female cousins gathered around the big oak kitchen table telling stories we had heard time and again of our history as a textile family, what is means to be a Scot and a Rose and of how some of the uncles, despite better upbringing, actually wore t-shirts or ties in public emblazoned with the names of politicians like George Wallace, Rick Perry or even the Bush brothers, whose grandsons now hold positions of power and who have no idea what constitutes good barbecue - all while smoking too many NC cigarettes, a family habit passed from generation to generation like the always filled pot of coffee poured into large glass mugs, each cup sweetened with exactly 1 ½ teaspoons of sugar and just enough cream to “bounce off the bottom” until just the correct caramel color is obtained. <br />
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Some of the more uber-religious Southern evangelical cousins among us have gathered in the living room to pray, hands held high, that this may be the Rapture for which they have all prepared and to wonder what will become of those of us who, rather than being lifted to the heaven, will be subject to the ravages created by the meteor’s crash. Sadly, the only thing we all know for sure is that our family’s traditions, beliefs, customs and rituals will not survive to be passed on and further molded by another generation.<br />
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Dawn came much too early and brighter than expected, not a cloud in the sky to foretell the impending disaster. Shortly after we awoke, I carefully placed whole sweet potatoes in the coals beneath the roasting pork while someone else chopped cabbage and mixed it with some of the barbecue sauce to marinate all day for barbecue slaw. My sister grated more cabbage very finely and stirred in mayonnaise, a little sugar and some vinegar poured off a jar of pickle relish to make sweet slaw for those that might prefer it.<br />
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Some of the younger cousins spent the morning sectioning oranges, tossing out the bitter peel, then squeezing all the juice from the remaining fan-shaped membranes over the supremes of fruit they mixed with sweetened coconut tinged pink by the red dye from added maraschino cherries. This desert cum salad, our uncles’ favorite ambrosia, was made from oranges transported from California in large trucks and is only slightly reminiscent of the juicy Florida valencias, navels and oh-so-sweet tangerines shipped up each winter in large green mesh bags by our grandparents while they fished the St. John’s River near Deland. We’d suck out the juice from a hole in the peel and then turn the whole fruit inside out to eat every luscious bit of those special seasonal snacks.<br />
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About an hour ago, the black-eyed peas were rinsed and covered with clean water and now those little gray and black pearls of goodness are simmering with seasoning of equal parts garlic, sugar and cider vinegar using our Best Ever Plain Ol’ Peas recipe that somebody found once in a Southern Living magazine. The washed collard greens have been coarsely chopped and boiled for several hours this morning, water gurgling around a big ham hock. Just a few minutes ago the ham was lifted out, chopped a bit and added back to the pot with the dark, bitter greens, now turned soft and almost sweet. We’ll serve a little hot pepper vinegar and some chopped sweet onions on the side for those who want to add them. <br />
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I sliced up some sticky okra pods and tossed them in cornmeal just like I was taught by our black housekeeper when I was a teenager. The sticky seeds ooze around the edges clinging to the breading and when the oil is hot and ready the okra is dropped in and fried until golden and crispy. When sprinkled with coarse salt, this okra will taste better than even the most perfectly cooked pommes frites, crunchy on the outside and soft, almost gooey inside, each piece popped into our mouths with our fingers. <br />
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The sweet potatoes, skins parched and rippled are moved from the smoker to a large platter and opened with a fork to loosen all the steamy goodness. The caramelized, orange, stringy insides are pulling away from the peels and butter is spooned around to melt, reminding me of my mother’s stories of taking baked sweet potatoes from her grandma’s warming oven and savoring them like candy treats.<br />
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Lumpy cornbread batter is mixed and poured into treasured hot cast iron skillets seasoned by years of cooking and now glistening with the drippings from a little fried fat back and melted butter. When removed from the oven, the resulting tender sweet innards surrounded by a crunchy brown crust will make the perfect accompaniment to our meal.<br />
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Using big wooden paddles my uncles designed just for the purpose, it takes two strong guys to lift the barbecue from the smoker and place it on the long wooden picnic table that has been covered with brown parchment paper. Large hunks of flesh and fat are pulled apart and then pushed aside to where a cleaver rocks back and forth until all the meat is chopped and the outer crunchy brown, almost burned, bits are mixed with moist, tender chucks of meat and soft fat, then doused with a little more sauce as it is all tossed together. Like I said before, no one will know the difference. Our few family vegetarians are standing off to one side with strained looks on their faces, and I almost laugh. At a good Southern meal there are always enough vegetables to satisfy even the most committed non-meat eaters.<br />
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My youngest cousin dumps freshly shucked oysters from a bowl into a stew of cream, milk and crumbled bacon with yellow melted butter floating on top. He tastes it and adds a bit more fresh cracked black pepper before ladling some soup into each of the bowls placed at the opposite end of the table from the meat. Over the years we’ve lost the taste for adding a little oyster liquor to the barbecue sauce as our ancestors did. There’s a basket of saltines set down next to the bowls for crumbling into the stew, no dainty oyster crackers for us. <br />
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We open an old rusted folding table and cover it with a white cloth to hold each of the side dishes being carried gingerly from the kitchen, many still in the pots or pans in which they were cooked. In the center of the table, I place my cherished heirloom relish dish filled with beets and pickles from my pantry and chow chow and corn relish contributed by some of my cousins. A large banana pudding is brought from the refrigerator, creamy and pale yellow, with now soggy vanilla wafers layered around soft bananas, crunchy cookie edges poking out of the secret recipe custard. One young cousin sneaks an empty bowl from beside the oyster stew and, remembering how often he has encountered a dish emptied of this gooey, sweet treat when he returns for a serving after the main meal is finished, he fills the bowl with pudding before reaching for a dinner plate.<br />
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A deep male voice begins to sing, “Bless this house, oh Lord, we pray,“ and we all join in, the verses memorized in childhood as we sang them at every family gathering. We hold hands and look around as though we are trying to create a permanent picture in our minds of this scene that will never again be repeated. As the singing ends, someone echoes the grace of an uncle long passed, “Good food, Good family, Good God, Let’s Eat.”<br />
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And we do. <br />
Unknownnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3047973203518838283.post-19598157653265231522010-05-11T15:03:00.000+01:002010-05-11T15:03:34.206+01:00I sure hope my friends and family don’t mind naked….One month until we leave Edinburgh and as David is ultra-organized (thank goodness one of us is or we would still be sitting in a train station somewhere in France trying to figure out how to negotiate the eurail-debacle and appease the Blonde British Border Bitch ) we are beginning to pack. Toby’s room is spic-n-span and David has laid out each of our hugemongous suitcases so that we may begin to put things in them that we aren’t planning to use before we go. Problem is, I am planning to use everything before we go so nothing seems to be moving toward the suitcases.<br />
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Please keep in mind that all l I have with me is clothes, shoes, some jewelry, makeup and toiletries, a corkscrew and several framed photographs of T&T (and a drawing of Madison) I guess I can pack the pictures - definitely not the corkscrew as the one provided in the flat may the worst corkscrew I have ever encountered. Since arriving here I have acquired a tiara, a wonderful pen and a small pin, a scarf and a few articles of clothing form a thrift store. I might need to wear the tiara again before June 15; one often never knows a bout those things until the last minute. We will leave behind the Scottish guidebooks just as we left the French ones in France and the Mexican ones in Mexico along with a great Rick Bayless cookbook that I thought would be of more use to the next residents of the casita than to me. Once I make a dish I rarely consult the recipe again but tend to improvise based on memory and taste - well, except for Jane’s Pork Tenderloin which I can never seem to remember and always have to call and ask how to make and oh yes, the corn pudding, also.<br />
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We sent a duffle filled with formal wear back to the States with a friend after the QM2 crossing and it now resides in a closet in West Virginia. I left things to donate in London and tossed a few things in France. When we left Florida in October we stashed two bags of summer clothes with David’s sister in Tallahassee. Hence the naked issue. <br />
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Today I look really cute in a black burnt-out velvet skirt, double layered shirts black over white, black tights, a drapey black Donna Karan wrap thingie and scrunchy short suede boots. Perfect for the 48* weather with rain predicted later. However, no matter how cute, this will not do in 80*+ NC and FL June weather. I know. I know, everyone is complaining that it has really cooled off there today but we all know that this is a tease and the heat and humidity will return before anyone is ready for it again. Unless of course they have beach reservations.<br />
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So I have with me -- one short khaki skirt, one jean skirt, two linen shirts and a pair of flip-flops. Otherwise everything is either wool, cashmere, long sleeve or corduroy. All my shoes are black and clearly designed for winter or boots - which people wear in Scotland year round but would look pretty stupid on the beach. And I plan to leave a lot of stuff here that I am just sick of looking at. There is a great Cat Rescue thrift shop just downstairs.<br />
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So I will wear one of my two outfits (actually they are not even outfits but with some jewelry I think I can make it work although I won‘t look as totally cute as usual)) with each different group of people I see once we arrive back in the good ole USofA. However, vanity prevents me from wearing the same thing twice with anyone within a week’s time and since my mother would be the first to complain about such a faux pas and she is the person likely to see me most often while I am in NC, it is the elderly residents and their visitors at Carillon Assisted Living who are most likely to see my naked body first. Yippee for me! That may be one of the few places on earth where I will have fewer wrinkles and less cellulite than the people staring at my naked sagging tushy and perky reconstructed ta-tas.<br />
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So here’s the warning. If between June 15 and 22, you have seen me twice since my arrival in the Old North State you may want to avoid seeing me again until my next visit. Understand? Wink wink. I’ll do laundry and then David and I will have two days in St Petersburg before we will be required to drive to Tallahassee to liberate my remaining summer clothing. As we leave the condo, I’ll wrap my naked self in a blanket to get down the elevator to the car for fear of someone seeing me in what I was wearing the day before. There are entirely too many 20-something tight tushys and flat tummys there for me to waddle around sans culottes.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3047973203518838283.post-8106360806543083112010-05-03T14:33:00.001+01:002010-05-03T15:14:42.959+01:00How Beltane got me to thinking about death<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"></div><i>Warning: If reading about death or funerals gives you the heebie-jeebies, you might want to skip this post.</i><br />
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For all sorts of reasons - my Mother’s failing health, the fact that I fell on Friday night and hit my head on a rock, all the weird health issues we both confront every day, attendance at a huge ancient and very spiritual Celtic/pagan ritual that had us both thinking about our heritage, and other things - David and I were discussing our personal funeral preferences on Saturday night. Weird I know.<br />
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It wasn’t morbid in any way, but a desire that someone understand each of our personal ideas about transition, death, and funerals so that whoever has the responsibility might try to implement them in the best way possible. Sort of funny when you think about it since neither of us holds a traditional Christian belief in the after-life or resurrection or any of that nonsense (yes, I called it nonsense for that it was I believe it is - no more factual than the belief of some cultures that I might come back as a cat or even more farcical that there is some great being that actually has the time and desire with all the vast universe out there to care what actually happens to little ol’ insignificant, dot of dust in the cosmos, me.)<br />
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Both of our most recent close experiences with death ritual, my father’s and David’s mother‘s funerals, were troubling, unsatisfactory and definitely not comforting for either of us. Well, except for David finally having an opportunity to say in public during his mother’s eulogy that she once threw a plate of spaghetti at him and then became angry when it hit the wall instead of his head and to tell the story of how she was braless in the photo of her high school softball team. Both good sharings of stories of her life and neither dwelling on whether her death had meaning and if so, what it was. Oh, but there was a lot of that on either side of the eulogy. It was like a visit to Southern Baptist heaven - definitely not a place I would want to spend eternity. <br />
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As we talked about it we both realized that the best funerals, if you will, that we had ever attended were celebrations with good memories, lots of laughter, sharing, caring, meaningful music ( which generally means music that had been meaningful to the person we were remembering) - in short, about our loved one rather than those left behind to mourn or about religious myths or beliefs that may or may not be shared by everyone sharing the death experience or concentration on what’s next other than wonderful memories, or anything like that. Certainly the lost friend or family member will be missed but wasn’t it great when they were around? Hey, do you remember when….? Those are the things that bring about true resurrection of the soul - those times that were shared that will be forever memories.<br />
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Our discussion got me to thinking about my Dad’s funeral and doing that always puts a knot in my stomach. I miss him very much and I think about him often. I haven’t had a desire to talk to him since I don’t believe there is anyone to talk to and I definitely don‘t want to go to the cemetery where his rotting body is entombed in concrete and some kind of once beautiful wood with brass handles that by now are certainly green. But I do often ask myself what his thoughts or advice would have been during his life. When I think back on his funeral all I remember is how very uncomfortable I was during the entire experience -- People filing past the flesh and bone casing that had held his soul, his energy, his spirit, looking down at that pasty, makeup covered face not knowing that beneath his clothes were bare spaces where bone and tissue had been removed, the only parts of his body we were able to donate, his organs too badly damaged by his stroke. People I had known all my life touching me in mourning , talking to my mother who was too confused to comprehend fully what was going on, most there because they truly respected my Dad , some there out of responsibility, some there from curiosity having heard stories of how emotionally difficult things had been in our family in the past few years. I hated it all. Nothing of what I think, feel or believe was represented in what for me was a grotesque ritual that did nothing to provide any true comfort to the living and sure as hell ain’t doin’ nothing’ for the already dead.<br />
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In fairness, there was one good point, the eulogy provided by the minister of the small church where I grew up, a church where my great-grandfather had been a stalwart member, where my dad still attended and where the board of trustees at the time was probably wondering what they were going to do to replace Dad’s rather substantial monetary contributions. The minister had been a friend of both my sister and me in college and she (what a hoot it was when dad found out he was going to have at one time not only a female minister, but a Black superintendent and a female Bishop. He must have felt that his soul was totally exposed to whatever forces of evil he might have believed were out there because he surely believed that none of those three second class citizens could do much to help him, being the superior Southern white male that he was.)<br />
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Despite that, the minister and Dad had developed a good relationship over time, often joking at coffee on a Thursday afternoon that having seen her he needn’t show up at services on Sunday to which she would remind him that would be OK if he just gave her his offering plate contribution then and there. Their relationship was not so unlike the one he had with me. Strong women, particularly if they had any direct intersection with his perceived perfect existence, made him nuts! I never doubted that he loved me dearly and that he would always be there for me if needed, but we had difficulty sitting in the same room without arguing, sometimes changing sides in the midst of things, just to keep from agreeing I think.<br />
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Anyway, at his funeral, the minister gave a wonderful description of my Dad. It was clear that she truly loved and respected him, as did so many others, and those words she said about him didn’t necessarily give me comfort, but made me proud to have had him in my life and helped me feel the sadness that he was gone. But that was all. Nothing about the scripture or the hokey, though beautiful, song about the streets of gold that my nephew sang made me anything but angry. I looked around and most everyone else seemed to be buying into what was going on - a celebration of my Dad’s ascension into heaven. All I wanted to do was get out of there as soon as possible.<br />
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So, now, we were discussing our own burials and I can’t seem to wrap my head around anything concrete - except that I know for sure that I DO NOT want what is left of my body placed in a concrete vault six feet under ground. I have not nor do I plan on committing any crimes that might require my exhumation for criminal analysis purposes and that is the only reason I can figure for that man-made cave. Nor do I want to be embalmed. After that it gets fuzzy. <br />
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David knows that he wants to be cremated and preferably have his ashes scattered on Doune Hill in Scotland. If that isn’t possible he wants his ashes sailed out into the Gulf Stream somewhere and left to float there until a big storm comes and the boat carrying them sinks. (Actually he wants a Viking funeral like in that movie with Burt Lancaster and McCauley Culkin where the kids shoot arrows to ignite a boat carrying the body, the flames turning it to ash as the boat sinks slowly on the horizon - but neither of our boys is very good at archery so I think the fire will have to come first)<br />
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As I work through my own ideas I keep coming back to one very troubling point. I know that my sister and the rest of my family will want a funeral for my Mom very similar to the one for my Dad - and I want no part of it, no part of it at all. It is already difficult as we lose Mom bit by bit to dementia but the thought of having her embalmed and laid out for people to stare at and then pretending that she is somewhere out there a whole person again makes me ill. I do not want to be there but I am not sure I am strong enough to endure the criticism and bad feelings I will create if I am not. Hopefully, I will have a lot more time to visit her in life before I have to deal with the death thing.<br />
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And, I’m thinking maybe I want to give my body for research at a medical school. Heaven knows (pun intended), that there is enough medically going on with me to make it interesting. Oh, I know the stories about how badly med students treat cadavers but it is only a shell, the energy that comprised my consciousness will have already merged back into the universe. Oh, and I want people to dance around a bonfire in both a clockwise and a counter-clockwise direction while having one hell of a good party. Getting naked and painting your bodies vibrant colors is optional.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3047973203518838283.post-5607644759131464382010-04-27T15:42:00.000+01:002010-04-27T15:42:34.259+01:00Toby's SpringToby is sleeping in the other room and like the mother of a newborn I keep quietly opening the door to check on him. I guess, really, to just look at him and take comfort that he is there. He leaves tomorrow, very early and I am trembling at the thought.<br />
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He and David will get up at 4 AM for the airport bus to arrive in time for the two-hour check-in required before an 8AM international flight. There is a 4 hour layover in Dublin before Toby re-boards with all the Irish folk returning from a visit to the homeland or headed to the US to see long-lost cousins or grandchildren not seen in at least a year. He is most excited about the layover and plans to have a couple of pints of Guinness for breakfast. The idea of drinking Guinness in Dublin inspires him as it would most 20 somethings - or his father. I almost wish David could travel along to share the experience except that I will probably be a slobbering mess when they leave and will be happy when David returns to the flat to keep me company. <br />
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Tavish, having studied in Dublin for a semester, has most certainly already had Guinness for breakfast, lunch, dinner and about any other time he could break away for one. Within hours of first arriving at the college there, the students were taken on a bus to the distillery for tours and tastes, most likely in an ill-conceived plan to get the desire out of their systems. I suspect it only threw gas on an already burning fire.<br />
<br />
From Dublin, Toby will fly directly to Chicago where he already understands all the twists and turns of the El and should easily, if not so quickly, make his way to the apartment on the north side of the city that he will share with 5 friends, all actors or students. He has a job to get started while he looks for something a bit better and has already arranged for some standup gigs. He is well on his way. And I am sitting here bursting at the seams with pride, filled with excitement for his adventure and feeling like I will collapse into tears at any minute.<br />
<br />
I feel all soft inside like the first time I held either of the boys. It is strange to feel this way having said goodbyes with both of them so often over the years - summer camp, boarding school, college, travels. Of course, I cried each of those times, usually big gasping sobs, but only always after I was out of their sight fearing that seeing their Mom in such a state night make them homesick. It was a silly worry as they each seemed to embrace every new experience with gusto. Oh, there were occasional difficult or teary times, of course, but many fewer than the norm I think. My boys are resilient, inquisitive and if nothing else, fearfully independent.<br />
<br />
But somehow this is different.<br />
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This time I know Toby is going out on his own and will never again live with us as our “little one” which I have always called him even though Tavish is much smaller. Toby is the youngest and therefore by default perceived to be the most fragile, Mama’s little boy. He is neither of those things.<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"></div> These six months, despite our almost constant disagreements, have been a gift. I have watched him continue to grow and change in ways I didn’t expect. And I have watched as he gained about 20 pounds, filled out, grew a beard and now looks much more like a man than a boy. Fortunately he still gives me hugs without which I would surely collapse. Perhaps that is what I most fear - losing the goodnight hugs, knowing he is safely home. I will never have that again. He is most surely now responsible for himself in ways I was not prepared to accept for another few years.<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgptDI-JxHeuS4vloRjOnlUHgetF5PINQCSy3t2M7wNR-kk37OK36OqakAt_cYP9ZSLf09gYxfT9rt8d8F2u9ejNzzPYz5BoCPIP2vuOWrp6pnQVO6F0eMeT-yNEISkwM6qCDmCYsLg9uWA/s1600/toby+buxton.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgptDI-JxHeuS4vloRjOnlUHgetF5PINQCSy3t2M7wNR-kk37OK36OqakAt_cYP9ZSLf09gYxfT9rt8d8F2u9ejNzzPYz5BoCPIP2vuOWrp6pnQVO6F0eMeT-yNEISkwM6qCDmCYsLg9uWA/s320/toby+buxton.jpg" /></a></div><br />
<br />
This is Toby’s spring. The air, nature, even the length of the days are drenched in hope for his future. I am in the late summer or perhaps even early fall of my own life - leaves a little droopy, too tired somedays to feel like doing very much other than just sitting and feeling the warm moist air around me. Toby is like a new bud popping out of the ground, looking around and screaming, “Yippee!! Look at all that room around me to grow into. Wow, smell that air. Hey, roots, let go. I’ve got things to do.” As Leo Tolstoy once wrote , he is “…a plant that has just opened and spread its leaves among all the other plants and is going to grow up simply, peacefully and joyfully…” Well, that is what I hope for him. There are sure to be some trials.<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhPqtDFviKP6iZPDjDdo7zf-nphceBgRbxSP5CKFQJjyobKrg2g1roV-7uMLxBl0WeXd6J5nMEVnuDDoAdeSSw5Hha7nsnj7KGteauoDzaN6dG1R27yx6I30BooN9SXmX9_116hdDHRPZxW/s1600/toby+in+London.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhPqtDFviKP6iZPDjDdo7zf-nphceBgRbxSP5CKFQJjyobKrg2g1roV-7uMLxBl0WeXd6J5nMEVnuDDoAdeSSw5Hha7nsnj7KGteauoDzaN6dG1R27yx6I30BooN9SXmX9_116hdDHRPZxW/s320/toby+in+London.jpg" /></a></div><br />
<br />
“Make way for this wonderful plant that is filling out its buds and growing in the spring” Look out world, her comes Toby. He is loved, and supported and will be missed terribly - but he’s got a lot of living to do!<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<b><span style="font-size: small;"><span class="UIStory_Message">"You should always be excited about the next chapter of your existence" </span></span></b><br />
<h3 class="UIIntentionalStory_Message" data-ft="{"type":"msg"}"><span class="UIStory_Message"> --- Toby McMullen</span></h3>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3047973203518838283.post-62061414769932520882010-04-25T20:34:00.004+01:002010-04-25T21:32:44.034+01:00Dear Banana - or birthday advice to a 15-year-old that a lot of us could use tooA few weeks ago, the Princess to whom I am Fairy godmother, celebrated her fifteenth birthday. I sent her a tiara. It is time for her to learn to wear one properly. Besides I spent nearly a year in Mexico watching many, many 15 year old girls celebrate their quincenearas and I learned a lot about the importance of a fifteenth birthday, and the tiara.<br />
<br />
In Mexico and many Latin cultures, the fifteenth birthday is a celebration of a young girl’s continuing growth from childhood to maturity. If only the young girls waited that long in the US. During a quincineara celebration, the father removes his daughter’s flat ballet-style slippers as replaces them with high heels in a symbolic gesture of her growing up. Unfortunately for my tastes, I’ve seen way too many twelve-year-olds already in high heels for the transition to have much American meaning.<br />
<br />
The celebration includes religious customs, usually a church service, and extols the virtues of family traditions and social responsibility. highlighting God, family, friends, music, food and dance. The Quincineara is surrounded by a Court of Honor of her closest girlfriends and usually 8 boys, her Chambela’n or Escorte. In San Miguel de Allende, we would often see them all lined up for pictures on the church steps in their formal wear, the birthday girl looking like a bride, flowers and family all around just before climbing into limousines for the drive to the venue selected for the big party.<br />
<br />
There was no religious component to the Princess’s celebration , for which I was exceedingly glad (even though I was thousands of miles away at the time). I held her for her Christening 15 years ago after the priest, in his role as representative of the Church, had accepted my involvement as a non-Catholic. At that time, I personally accepted my role as her Godmother during the ceremony. However, as the years have passed my discomfort with the Church has increased and finally when the news broke about the Pope’s personal involvement in the sexual abuse scandal I felt I could no longer condone my involvement, implicitly or explicitly, in the Princess’s association with such a misogynistic, greedy, misdirected and blatantly un-Christian organization as the Catholic Church. <br />
<br />
So I resigned as the Princess’s Godmother. <br />
<br />
Whew! That really pissed off her Mom, my BFF and I definitely “had some ‘splainin’ to do” But as I said then, I can no longer in good conscience, or as an honest example, accept a role of encouraging the Princess to be part of the Church even if that is her parents’ wish, but I will always be her Fairy godmother (lower case ‘g’) with all rights, privileges and responsibilities thereto assigned.<br />
<br />
In other words, I gotta help her grow up right. And that includes how and when to wear a tiara --- and a lot of other things, as well. I will only talk about that church thing if she brings it up. That is my compromise with her mother because I really want to tell her all the reasons for my action. That will come in time. Anyway, all she really cares about at fifteen is the presents I send ( though invariably late), the summer vacation with me and that I am someone she can bitch to about her parents and know I won’t tell. I hope she also feels that way about talking to me about boys.<br />
<br />
I think as part of this growing up process it is time I begin to impart some wisdom. There will certainly be more throughout the years and some of what is here falls more into the think- about it, or plan-for-it realm than the do-it- now phase. More importantly, I want these to be some of the things we talk about while she is visiting in Florida this summer. Well, that and a lot of BASEBALL!!!!<br />
<br />
Oh ,and there is no rational order of these tidbits of wisdom and advice. Just how things popped into my head. Comments are welcome.<br />
<br />
Dear Banana, <br />
<br />
Happy birthday, again. Here are some things I want you to think about.<br />
<br />
You live in a man’s world and unless things change a whole hell of a lot over the next few decades, which certainly has not been the case over the past millennia, you will continue to do so. Just get over it. Men, for the most part, are not very bright when facing a cute woman so, if necessary, make him think it was his idea, but never hesitate to get what you want. As Maureen Down said, “I succeed in a man’s world living by man’s rules but I never forget that a woman’s first role is selecting the right shade of lipstick” (or something like that)<br />
<br />
Always own at least one tiara, and never be afraid to wear it.<br />
<br />
Always have your own money.<br />
<br />
Save at least 10% of every single dollar that comes your way. Starting today! Get a piggy-bank and always put all your coins in it. (Coins do not count as part of the 10%, they are “gimmes”)<br />
<br />
Wear gloves. Warm ones to keep your hands from getting chapped and classic ones on other occasions.<br />
<br />
Develop a personal style - classic, bohemian, preppy, fashionista, outdoorsy, girly, dressed-up, dressed-down - but NEVER only dress in that style. It is good to shake things up once in a while.<br />
<br />
Have one trademark item that if left at a crime scene would immediately implicate you<br />
- eyeglasses, a pen, a pin. a piece of jewelry, a hairclip, your gloves, a beautiful notebook, your phone, your wallet, a linen hanky you always carry - you’ll think of something. <br />
<br />
Know what colors are flattering to you and don’t bother buying anything else. This makes shopping easier and keeps you from standing in front of the mirror for hours in that really cute top that just doesn’t look right for some reason. Choose a basic “background” color and build around it -like black, brown, navy, ecru, white.<br />
<br />
Never wear white next to your face unless your teeth are at least as white as whatever you are wearing. <br />
<br />
Less makeup is always more.<br />
<br />
Whenever you leave the house - even if just for a quick errand - wear lip gloss and perfume.<br />
<br />
Choose two personal scents - one for every day and one for more dressed up. And be sure to re-evaluate every few years as your scent should grow up as you do. <br />
<br />
Take care of your hair. Don’t over process it and never change anything about it unless you are in a very good mood at the time.<br />
<br />
Take advantage of every learning opportunity you are given - school, theatre, music, lectures, travel - whatever - Soak it in!<br />
<br />
Never get bored and, even more importantly, never ACT bored. It is unbecoming.<br />
<br />
Volunteer!<br />
<br />
Find an activity that you enjoy and can do throughout your whole life - tennis, chess, backgammon, squash, cards, sewing, knitting, painting, drawing, photography, bird-watching…… <br />
<br />
Have at least one interesting topic of conversation for someone to whom you have just been introduced, your parents‘ friends or your friends’ parents.<br />
<br />
Swear only when you intend to and make it count. And always use good grammar unless you are making a point.<br />
<br />
If you don’t know how, learn how to play with kids.<br />
<br />
Don’t get drunk in public. A little tipsy can be charming but drunk is just ugly - and dangerous. Remember what Dorothy Parker said” One martini is nice, two at the very most, three I’m under the table, four I’m under the host.”<br />
<br />
ALWAYS have a glass of water after each drink before you start the next. This will allow you to “keep up with your friends” without getting sloppy or sick. And if you really do this you may never have a hangover.<br />
<br />
Never drink a lot of sweet alcoholic drinks of any type. Stick with beer or wine to be safe. One shot is safe - after that it gets sketchy.<br />
<br />
Get as much sleep as possible.<br />
<br />
Develop a good skincare regimen and never ever go to bed without cleaning your face.<br />
<br />
Wear comfortable shoes. They don’t have to be ugly. Remember no matter how cute a pair of shoes may be if you can’t stand up in them for an hour or walk comfortably for several blocks DO NOT BUY THEM.<br />
<br />
Buy trendy clothes in trendy inexpensive shops. Shop at thrift stores and consignment shops - especially for day-to-day things or the one- time wear stuff. Save the big bucks for investment purchases.<br />
<br />
If you shop wisely and take care of handbags and shoes they will last for years!!! <br />
<br />
Know how to do your own manicure and pedicure but pay for one when you can.<br />
<br />
If your budget permits choose waxing over shaving and laser over waxing.<br />
<br />
Get your eyebrows shaped by a very good professional.<br />
<br />
Eat your vegetables. Skip bread and dessert whenever possible. Women have eaten that way for centuries and stayed thin.<br />
<br />
Get over over-consuming. Want and waste is a bad model to set for your self and even worse for the world. The less you can live with the more you can enjoy life. Really, Trust me on this one.<br />
<br />
Always have at least one outfit, a hairstyle and quick makeup routine that will have you dressed and looking cute in a flash. A famous designer once said that the difference between true beauty and just too-high-maintenance was the ability to get drop dead gorgeous in less than 15 minutes.<br />
<br />
Don’t have sex until you are ready. That means the first time should not happen just because everything gets hot and heavy and you are convinced he is the love of your life or definitely not because he tells you that is how to prove you love him (tell that guy to fuck off!) When you feel like you can’t stand it unless it happens right now, STOP! If you wake up tomorrow and still feel the same way then the two of you should plan a perfect time and place.<br />
<br />
As soon as you even start thinking that you might be gonna have sex get on birth control. Do not pass go, do not collect $200. Your fairy godmother has been pregnant 4 times and these were the ONLY times I did it without birth control and your mother got pregnant on her honeymoon. This is not something you should mess around with. Being smart should never be embarrassing. Ask me for help if you need it.<br />
<br />
Always, always, always use a condom. Get together with your friends and practice putting one on a banana. Seriously. If he won’t use one - lose him!<br />
<br />
Do not do drugs. Period. They make you stupid and vulnerable.<br />
Also, understand that I do not consider marijuana a drug. It does however reduce your inhibitions so be very careful when, where and how if you choose to use it.<br />
<br />
NEVER NEVER get into a car driven by someone who has been drinking, smoking weed or doing drugs. This includes family members and yourself.<br />
<br />
Keep your “space” - room, desk, handbag, book bag, whatever - neat and orderly. It reduces stress in your life in so many ways,<br />
<br />
Learn to meditate. Seriously. Look for a teacher.<br />
<br />
Learn to appreciate different kinds of music and art. Study it. Read about it.<br />
<br />
Learn to dance both popularly and properly.<br />
<br />
Look people in the eye and speak up!<br />
<br />
Stand up straight. Nothing exudes confidence more than good posture. And this includes sitting properly too.<br />
<br />
Learn how to properly use a fork and knife and what the other utensils are for.<br />
<br />
Avoid any group or activity that purports to make you more popular. It is always bullshit. No exceptions. Popularity is over-rated anyway. I mean, do you even like those people that everyone is trying to be like? You are so much nicer as yourself.<br />
<br />
Depend on your parents. They are your allies and always have your best interests at heart.<br />
<br />
Do risky stuff like drinking or smoking weed with you sister and/or brother first. They will look out for you. They will also laugh at you if you over do and never let you forget it.<br />
<br />
Learn to plan an amazing party. I am EXCELLENT at this.<br />
<br />
Learn to cook. I mean really learn to cook. It is fun and everyone always appreciates it.<br />
<br />
Read good books - not just junk fiction (although junk fiction is also good too, just not as the only thing you read)<br />
<br />
Read a newspaper every day - and on Sundays, meet some friends at Starbucks and share the New York Times.<br />
<br />
Learn how to properly order a drink, a beer and most importantly wine. You can drink legally at 16 in many European countries and it is awful to look like either a stupid American or an unsophisticated clod.<br />
<br />
Learn to read menus in French, Spanish and Italian - and ,of course, English.<br />
<br />
Travel everywhere you can. Each new place will teach you something about the world and something about yourself.<br />
<br />
<br />
More will come as the time goes by. I love you.<br />
<br />
Your Fairy godmotherUnknownnoreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3047973203518838283.post-33996015182108878582010-04-24T19:06:00.000+01:002010-04-24T19:06:59.355+01:00I Should Be an Upper Class Brit…..I love hats.<br />
<br />
Haves you ever seen a good British, or better yet, Scottish, wedding? ALL the women wear hats whether or not they are in the bridal party. Of course, the bridesmaids will all be wearing head coverings ranging from huge and patently absurd to small and dainty depending on the location and the time of day. Like in many American weddings, shoes will be died to match dresses which will be matched in color with hats.<br />
<br />
Stand outside the church, hotel or hall and observe the guests as they exit the venue to stand around waiting for the bride and groom. Yes, stand and observe, it is part of the custom. The wedding is like a well orchestrated show for all to see, even those that weren’t invited. Feel free to gawk, make quiet comments or even snap a few pictures. I think this is all the result of years of practice observing royals do various things.<br />
<br />
As the guests emerge it looks like a box of crayons -all brightly hued, mostly solids, in jewel tones. Even the female guests are dressed in ensembles of matching shoes, frocks and hats, standing in contrast to the dark suits or dinner jackets of the men. Often , the hats are HUGE, with veils or other embellishments as though at Ascot or a Derby party where a prize will be given for best chapeau. One wonders if these hats will be worn only once as they are so striking as to be noticeable should they reappear at the next function. Perhaps there is a “Great Hat Exchange” that I have yet to stumble upon. In any case, the guests create the peacock’s plumage around the bride dressed in white or ecru ,a meringue of tulle and lace or yards and yards of soft flowing embroidered silk, wearing a tiara and elaborate full, fluffy veil or a graceful hat cocked to one side to which a veil is attached.<br />
<br />
Only at a full Scottish wedding is there competition - from the groom and his men in kilts with proper cravats and chalk striped morning coats or short black Prince Charlie coatees with silver buttons catching the light. Even the bride can sometimes pale by comparison.<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg9NVrB8TKh26JAEnf1111PAH96ZNwIDsFNHqhRIXv6uZ6VfNRCjMLWeC2wLi0Up1I9aLQXBtfW4ssiJwA4CETMoinsGMhN2SLxTsOnWhgMZ8NHzJTl7HfNqb5BQ41XE1OkPoaPsSEir-xi/s1600/chris+hoy.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg9NVrB8TKh26JAEnf1111PAH96ZNwIDsFNHqhRIXv6uZ6VfNRCjMLWeC2wLi0Up1I9aLQXBtfW4ssiJwA4CETMoinsGMhN2SLxTsOnWhgMZ8NHzJTl7HfNqb5BQ41XE1OkPoaPsSEir-xi/s320/chris+hoy.jpg" /></a></div><br />
<br />
Once back from the honeymoon the bride and groom take up residence in their new home. Although more often than not these days they would have been living there together for months or even years prior to the wedding. Each will have his or her own room and this is where I think upper class Brits have really got it right.<br />
<br />
David and I have often discussed the relative merits of separate bedrooms. Now let’s be realistic people. We have been married for almost 30 years and are way past the fucking like rabbits stage, so sleep is the goal here. It is easy enough when planning sex to decide in whose room it should take place - if not on the kitchen table any longer. We do like to cuddle or spoon but inevitably as soon as one of us begins to drift off, the other moves away and rolls to the other side facing away.<br />
<br />
We have friends who never had a particular side of the bed on which each slept. They had been married for years and each night whichever got to the bed first just took the side that seemed most comfortable. I think that is weird! This couple is now divorced and I have to believe that this is at least part of the reason. I mean if you haven’t even staked out your side of the bed how in the world can you negotiate anything else in the relationship?<br />
<br />
But I ramble…<br />
<br />
I sleep on the left side of the bed (right if you are facing from the foot) even when I sleep alone. If I am on my left side I expect to be facing the wall or door. On my right, I either have a vast expanse of bed available to me, if alone, which is rare. or I can feel David’s breath on my face.<br />
<br />
Now here’s the rub. He snores.<br />
<br />
I know lots of people snore and lots of others sleep though it but I am a well-tuned Mama-Machine and since the birth of my first child 25 years ago I startle at the slightest noise during the night. And after the 1:30 AM call from Detective Fazio of the New York City Police Department while Toby was living alone in NYC when he was 17, it has only gotten worse. So every time David huffs, or snorts, or blows out a long sigh, I wake and have to try again to sleep. Last night I did not sleep at all. That tends to happen at least once a week these days.<br />
<br />
At this age sleep evades most women on a regular basis. We do not need the added disruption of a snoring bedmate to disturb our precious, coveted ZZZZZZs. So when David and I arrive at the comfortable 2 bedroom, 2 bath condo in Florida that our dear, wonderful, amazingly generous, awesome, spectacular (you get the point) friends are letting us use from late June through November, I will be claiming one of the bedroom as my own. David can choose the other room or the sofa, whichever he prefers. If this works out, where we go next will be required to have two bedrooms. A second bath is optional - I like double showers. Besides it saves water.<br />
<br />
Oh, and Madison will be sleeping with me. I actually prefer not to sleep alone and, like a good, well-bred, upper class, wee thing, she doesn’t snore.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3047973203518838283.post-77780833394442812782010-04-15T16:17:00.000+01:002010-04-15T16:17:42.518+01:00Daffodils<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgUCaH5onEp8eOLbiQuSZBvIvxULcxHJgGZnUHt4dnSXGrKBuV_qudv0hqHIEaHvUdYVvpTGV534KLlE3sSuvIdDPM4J85lLBm46XANJWqQetYDRiDVggpg3_be0DxaR-Onfq5O3XIL0A6r/s1600/DSCN3535.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgUCaH5onEp8eOLbiQuSZBvIvxULcxHJgGZnUHt4dnSXGrKBuV_qudv0hqHIEaHvUdYVvpTGV534KLlE3sSuvIdDPM4J85lLBm46XANJWqQetYDRiDVggpg3_be0DxaR-Onfq5O3XIL0A6r/s320/DSCN3535.JPG" /></a></div><br />
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</td> <td style="font-family: Georgia,'Times New Roman',serif; font-size: 13px; margin: 0pt; padding: 0pt;" width="403px"><div style="text-align: center;"><h2><span id="goog_1233058424"></span><span id="goog_1233058425"></span> </h2><h2>I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud</h2>by <a href="http://www.elabs7.com/c.html?rtr=on&s=fj6,l1fj,dv,b4d,4lm8,7vty,ehfq" target="_blank">William Wordsworth</a><br />
<br />
</div><div>I wandered lonely as a cloud<br />
That floats on high o'er vales and hills,<br />
When all at once I saw a crowd,<br />
A host, of golden daffodils;<br />
Beside the lake, beneath the trees,<br />
Fluttering and dancing in the breeze.<br />
<br />
Continuous as the stars that shine<br />
And twinkle on the milky way,<br />
They stretched in never-ending line<br />
Along the margin of a bay:<br />
<br />
Ten thousand saw I at a glance,<br />
Tossing their heads in sprightly dance.<br />
<br />
The waves beside them danced; but they<br />
Out-did the sparkling waves in glee:<br />
A poet could not but be gay,<br />
In such a jocund company:<br />
I gazed—and gazed—but little thought<br />
What wealth the show to me had brought:<br />
<br />
For oft, when on my couch I lie<br />
In vacant or in pensive mood,<br />
<br />
They flash upon that inward eye<br />
Which is the bliss of solitude;<br />
And then my heart with pleasure fills,<br />
And dances with the daffodils. </div></td></tr>
</tbody></table>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3047973203518838283.post-31347546990982988612010-04-05T15:49:00.001+01:002010-04-05T16:14:23.884+01:00To Infinity and Beyond.....<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiQmeYDeo1fMLUbhqV8hn9gDm-FX9SdgznwNIF3Ik9aBzd61275hQQYOkynh7zG4sHeZG4kFq5ni9-Lh0Swq0jzB4aLEdElPYeH6Lvpph7gwa6_wq9BO1dzuq25DBciWNsLnXOVgzfk6rx7/s1600/buzz.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiQmeYDeo1fMLUbhqV8hn9gDm-FX9SdgznwNIF3Ik9aBzd61275hQQYOkynh7zG4sHeZG4kFq5ni9-Lh0Swq0jzB4aLEdElPYeH6Lvpph7gwa6_wq9BO1dzuq25DBciWNsLnXOVgzfk6rx7/s320/buzz.jpg" /></a></div><br />
The Space Shuttle Discovery blasted off this morning with seven astronauts aboard.<br />
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As a life-long space junkie, I was watching for the story and barely found it mentioned on NPR. However, the BBC carried a video of the blast-off with a story alongside that Soyuz had lifted off from Kazakhstan on Friday. Both stories. Hmmm, must be space envy.<br />
<br />
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<br />
Discovery is hauling equipment and supplies to the International Space Station in one of its last missions before the program is shut down at the end of the year. In a rare and wonderful sight, the space station passed over the launch site about 15 minutes before launch and was easily visible as a bright star passing by the moon. I am so sorry that I wasn't there to see that. David and I have observed several shuttle launches from our balcony in St Petersburg all the way on the other side of the state from the Space Center. It is is a chilling experience every time.<br />
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Soyuz docked with the ISS yesterday and apparently three astronauts, including one American, have transferred to the station for several months where among other things they are working on experiments left there by the Japanese. Apparently, two of Japans three astronauts are in space at this time.<br />
<b> I find it interesting how we can cooperate on the exploration of space and yet seem to have so much difficulty working together on the problems of earth.</b><br />
<br />
There are no plans for what to do after the shuttles are parked for the last time - no proposals, no budget, not even much discussion. POTUS is planning a trip to Florida while the shuttle is still in orbit to look things over and discuss options, but he is pretty much already on record that this is waaaay down on his priority list. His trip is most likely related to addressing the 6000 jobs that will be lost when the program is ended.<br />
<br />
Too bad no one has considered expanding the program and inviting say, Iran, North Korea and Pakistan to participate. Maybe if we were all working on the space program together we could start a dialogue that would teach us how to talk to one another about other things. I mean if it worked with the Russians, who knows? And hasn't anyone in charge of all this ever watched Star Trek?<br />
<br />
For the first time ever there are three women on this shuttle flight that will rendezvous with a fourth woman on the ISS That is quite a change from the days of Neal Armstrong and Buzz Aldren or even Sally Ride, and the sad loss of Christa McAuliffe and the astronauts on Challenger and Columbia.<br />
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<br />
A few nights ago I watched a documentary about the wives of the Apollo astronauts. I had forgotten that the disaster that took the lives of Gus Grissom, Ed White and Roger Chafee was the <i>first </i>planned three man mission in a series designed to take man to the moon.<br />
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The fire occurred during a pre-flight test. Subsequent investigations indicated that the accident was likely preventable but much was learned that allowed NASA to meet JFK‘s call for putting a man on the moon within the decade of the 1960‘s. If you are interested in how truly screwed up all the planning and processes around space flight have been and continue to be I recommend reading<i> The Challenger Disaster.</i> If Obama is putting off further funding until the problems with the system are fixed then he is correct and I hope we can re-instate a well planned and expertly run program soon.<br />
<br />
Did I tell you that I have always been a space flight junkie? <br />
<br />
I remember watching breathlessly as John Glenn circled the globe for the first time and cheering when it was announced that he was going up again in his 70s. I wish I had grown up even 10 years later when someone might have encouraged my math and science capabilities and suggested that I could strive to be an astronaut rather than just an astronaut’s wife (although the latter was never on my wish list either). Or at least a flight controller or meteorologist who helped plan the launches. Yeah, that is what I should have been - a way to combine my fascinations with weather and space.<br />
<br />
Roger Chaffee’s widow was one of the women interviewed for the documentary (her first name was never shown) She was amazingly supportive of the other wives and space travel in general considering that her husband had been turned into toast in the capsule before his mission even got off the ground.<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjJC9UUMGRWZt5MofY9s7a2XQMAjlE_GeH-fVHOuX8REWeGevNFFi9kCKfhUqtGYLj1z7VBTIBxYCydF0OBlowM3SrMuEEFMTcy_NkDYK-XdgS-_gGy-U-lQYw9OIJMPIeDxrDrfNLVbGcM/s1600/apollo+capsule.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjJC9UUMGRWZt5MofY9s7a2XQMAjlE_GeH-fVHOuX8REWeGevNFFi9kCKfhUqtGYLj1z7VBTIBxYCydF0OBlowM3SrMuEEFMTcy_NkDYK-XdgS-_gGy-U-lQYw9OIJMPIeDxrDrfNLVbGcM/s320/apollo+capsule.jpg" /></a></div>This was all that was left after the 100% oxygen environment ignited . The remains of the capsule have never been displayed and are warehoused near the launch site at the Cape. The launchpad itself still stands, deserted, as a grim reminder of the terrible events of that day. There is some discussion of burying the capsule there.<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"></div>As I watched and listened to the film of these strong women I kept thinking how much the success of the space program had depended on their commitment to the program and to their husbands. Before the end of the Apollo program more than 75% of the astronauts’ marriages had ended in divorce, generally with the men leaving their wives for younger women.<br />
<br />
Those were heady times for the space cowboys and many chose to take advantage of the women and even men who offered up themselves for the cause - if you know what I mean. Apparently the high oxygen filled atmosphere around all the training centers fueled lives of partying , fast cars, sex, and high risk. And through it all the wives stayed home, raised the children and kept themselves looking just right for the many TV interviews that they were expected to perform. They were even given instructions on just how they should appear at all times. No running out for milk and eggs unless your hair was done and you were wearing makeup and nice shoes.<br />
<br />
The Apollo wives lived at a time when men could be men because the women were women in a defined, accepted and expected way. I can’t even imagine standing six miles away and watching as my husband sat atop a bomb and was blasted to god knows where while I held the hands of our children - children who by the way were afforded only standard military pay, benefits and pensions regardless of consequence. But the wives knew they had each other and that the American people were behind the extraordinary efforts that they and their husbands were making.<br />
<br />
Those early space wives stuck by each other, providing support during the long months of training and the anguishing days when the men were in space. Americans held ticker tape parades and greeted the men as heroes and applauded the sacrifices of the wives. And today I can’t even tell you the names of the seven astronauts that are hurling through space much less whether they are married, single, gay, or divorced. In the early days knowing all of that and more was always a part of the package and after what I can only assume was space insanity that drove what’s-her-name-the-astronaut-in-diapers to drive all night to hunt down her husband’s lover, it continues to fascinate. It points out how truly stressful preparing for going into space is for both the women and men whether you are the one training to be shot into the darkness of space while strapped aside a fuel-filled rocket in an airplane covered with faulty heat- resistant tiles that are as likely to fly off as to do the job for which they were intended - or you are the one staying home to help re-pack the suitcase upon your partner’s return.<br />
<br />
Too much has been invested and sacrificed for the space program to just S.T.O.P.<br />
<br />
It has filled the imaginations of millions. led to amazing discoveries and holds promise for so much more. We need to go back to the moon, and beyond, and if our recently-proved- to-be-totally-stupid-Congress can’t understand it from that perspective, perhaps they could be persuaded to fund NASA out of the inflated Defense Department budget with the idea of promoting peaceful cooperation among partners on earth toward a mutual goal in space. Maybe it is time that Obama proposed a “Prime Directive"<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhBhNrHHR2G9H72k0kZ2LmNa5aIAZnYNJMcWfIHjo3umg4agnjOPMwCwsAL0yOiMzCbashFbj5yj2BY3v31TSnXNdBgACIvIZmiMjPbsGc-Zt6H1x4sQ5NGTx3ZItcPzlUMRTuwkbGCPZTW/s1600/star_trek_vi.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhBhNrHHR2G9H72k0kZ2LmNa5aIAZnYNJMcWfIHjo3umg4agnjOPMwCwsAL0yOiMzCbashFbj5yj2BY3v31TSnXNdBgACIvIZmiMjPbsGc-Zt6H1x4sQ5NGTx3ZItcPzlUMRTuwkbGCPZTW/s320/star_trek_vi.jpg" /></a></div><br />
<br />
In words similar to those of the mission director this morning,<br />
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<div style="text-align: center;"><b>"It is time for [us] to rise to orbit. Good luck and Godspeed."</b></div><div style="text-align: center;"><br />
</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"></div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3047973203518838283.post-30078231033378894922010-03-30T21:30:00.000+01:002010-03-30T21:30:25.200+01:00Bangled, Tangled, Spangled and Spaghettied!<div style="text-align: center;"><br />
Gimme a head with hair, Long beautiful hair<br />
Shining, gleaming. steaming, flaxen, waxen</div><div style="text-align: center;">Gimme down to there hair<br />
Shoulder length or longer<br />
Here baby, there Mama, everywhere Daddy Daddy<br />
<br />
Hair, hair, hair, hair, hair, hair, hair<br />
Flow it. .Show it.<br />
Long as God can grow it! My Hair!</div><br />
The revival of Hair is moving from Broadway to the West End next week and I so want to see it. Reviews indicate that it has survived the years and seems particularly relevant today even though the few seconds of nudity are no longer shocking.<br />
<br />
I saw the original production in New York sometime around 1970. I thought I was so cool. I went to a Broadway theatre in my ragged bellbottoms, a t-shirt with no bra (not that it mattered that much), my hair in braids and barefoot. EEWWW!!!! Barefoot on the streets of New York. Even at 15, what was I thinking??<br />
<br />
When the cast entered from the rear of the theatre and tumbled, jumped and swung from scaffolds into the audience and then onto the stage, one of the cast members stopped in front of my seat and handed me a daisy. Obviously he did that because I was clearly one of the coolest people in the room. At least I was able to hold on to that fantasy for oh a couple of days until I returned home from Model UN and realized how totally impossible it was to be cool when living in a small Southern town and leaving three days later for church camp and going into 11th grade in a school that didn’t even require that we read Catcher in the Rye or anything by Kurt Vonnegut. I bought a book of poems by Lawrence Ferlingetti while I was in NYC and that was the only tiny little element of coolness I retained. I pressed the daisy between the pages of that book.<br />
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Since we’re talking about hair I must admit that I have never had cool hair. The closest I ever came was not too many years ago when I cut it off very very short and died it red. That sort of spiky look appealed to the slight personal rebellion I was trying to mount after leaving my job. But when we started traveling, David asked that I grow it out. I tried for a while and then cut it again and he asked again. <br />
<br />
What is it with men and long hair? I would suggest some sort of connection with short hair and homophobia if I hadn’t started writing this post about a bunch of long haired hippy freaks - and the fact that David sued the Commandant of the Marine Corps over the hair regulations - and lived to tell about it (He won the lawsuit BTW) and I have photos of him with long hair in the 1070’s so it must be some sort of hangover from that time which probably also explains why I gave in and let it grow. Well, that and I have always thought grandmothers with hair long enough for their grandchildren to braid were kind of cool in an 80-year-old gray-haired sort of way. But Toby swears he is never having kids and Tavish has too many things to do before he even starts to think about it (and I think those are good and proper attitudes for both of them) And my hair is growing so slowly that it may never reach my shoulders much less hang down my back in a braid.<br />
<br />
In the meantime, my hair is thin, fine, stringy, styless and as far as I’m concerned, just plain ugly. David compliments me on it frequently, I think more to keep me from cutting it than because he really thinks it looks good just now - or perhaps he looks at me through the memories of our early years together when my hair was long, my face was a lot less wrinkled, my butt was a lot, well, narrower and I still had my real boobs.<br />
<br />
While, as I said, my hair has never been my best feature, I think some of my current hair issues are related to living in Scotland. There is a commercial on the telly with a woman in a red dress wearing 5-inch stilettos that she clearly can’t walk in. I know she can’t walk in those shoes because she is photographed lying on her stomach with her feet kicked up in the air behind her, never standing - of course, this also provides a nice view of her ample cleavage and she is talking in a posh Scottish accent about how when you live in Scotland your hair is dull, limp and lifeless. Apparently the water is very soft and certain expensive hair products are required if I want my hair to look like hers. <br />
<br />
I am sorry but ever since I read an interview with Kristin Chenoweth where she admitted she never appears in public unless she has at least THREE hairpieces pinned in because apparently she has dull, limp and lifeless Scottish hair, even though she lives in the US… anyway, ever since I read that I do not believe for one minute that the women in hair product ads have hair that looks at all in real life like it does in the commercials. I want to see one of those women just after she has walked in out of the rain or, better yet, when she first wakes up in the morning.<br />
<br />
I stood in front of the mirror this afternoon and contemplated cutting my hair again. I had just showered, shampooed and completed the blow dry and my hair still hung there - dull, limp and lifeless - but I decided that at least it was there since very short, dull, limp and lifeless hair would only make me look like a crazy old lady who doesn‘t care anymore. SO, tomorrow I am going to buy some of that stuff the “we girls in Scotland need to have full, beautiful, bouncy hair.” I hope it works without the stilettos.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com8tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3047973203518838283.post-7832207778062287862010-03-29T20:49:00.000+01:002010-03-29T20:49:12.906+01:00Eat More Lunch.If there is one thing I have learned while traveling in Mexico, France and the UK during the past two years, it is that the locals do things right at midday. Lunch is a time to be enjoyed. A great respite in the middle of the day. In Mexico, the kids take two hours off from school for it. In France, even the most humble of local bistros serves a three or four course affair that everyone from workers in muddy boots to the local ladies enjoy with a free flowing bottle of wine that is placed on the table when you arrive. In Britain, weekday lunch is just as likely as in the US to be a pre-wrapped sandwich or a take-away carried back to your desk from the local fast food shop but it can also be a relaxed time at a pub with friends over cottage pie or fish and chips and a pint , or a nice business oriented sit-down affair in Edinburg or The City of London with wine and all the trimmings. And Sunday lunch, particularly the traditional Sunday Roast, is almost sacrosanct. The point is that in most cases lunch is still taken seriously.<br />
<br />
My grandmother began cooking lunch just as soon as the breakfast dishes were cleared. There was generally a main course of some sort of meat, and potatoes or sweet potatoes, sometimes both, or maybe beans, at least one green vegetable and usually some stewed fruit or a Jell-O salad ,and maybe even macaroni and cheese or chicken and dumplings. A big pot of vegetable soup filled with chunks of beef was always a favorite. Homemade biscuits were alongside with butter and molasses, an extra one often serving as dessert. <br />
On Sundays there was always a special cake or pie as well. Dinner was that big meal served on Sunday and supper each night was whatever was leftover from lunch Lunch was often referred to as dinner even on the weekdays. Only on Saturday might a sandwich be considered adequate at noon. And then supper might be oyster stew or fried fish or a time out at my grandfather’s club.<br />
<br />
In the Sunday London Times, AA Gill, wrote in his regular “Table Talk” column that “We are all remembered and revitalised by food.” Having just attended the funeral of a restaurateur friend, Gill posited about food that is comforting, satisfying and evokes memories, particularly a good lunch, and he got me to thinking.<br />
<br />
Food is all about memories for me - my grandmother’s table, the recipes my family shares, how can I adapt something I loved as a kid to fit my new healthier and perhaps even vegetarian eating preferences. Food is emotional. Just like Jews set a place at Passover for the prophet, so are each of us joined by those who came before when we sit at table. Shared food is communion. And during this week called Holy Week, Christians the world over celebrate the sharing of food at “The Last Supper” in many ways - festivals, feasts, sacraments, pageants, family dinners. Everything we take the time to put on our table says something about our heritage, our ancestors and even what we want to pass on to those who follow. Food is our history and our legacy. It is emotional, and metaphysical as well as sustaining.<br />
<br />
So, as Gill says ,we should all “Eat more lunch.” Take that time to stop and savor what is going on around us. Listen carefully to what that co-worker or friend is really saying, Hell, give yourself time to hear what you are really thinking.<br />
<br />
Personally, I won’t go as far as Dr. David and advocate the return of the three martini lunch. Although I do love a good martini - or two. Based on the thoughts of James M Schlessinger, Jr, “A martini is the staff of life.“ And former president Gerald Ford once said that, “The three martini lunch is the epitome of American efficiency. Where else can you get an earful, a belly full and a snoot full a the same time.”<br />
<br />
Personally I would be more likely to end up like Dorothy Parker if I had martinis at lunch, <br />
<br />
I like to have a martini,<br />
Two at the most.<br />
After three I’m under the table,<br />
After four I’m under the host.<br />
<br />
But I do advocate a nice glass of wine, or even sharing a bottle with your lunch companion as a way of better enjoying the food, opening up the conversation and perhaps lingering a bit longer at table.<br />
<br />
Think of how much better all our lives would be if we took those two hours midday to unwind, breathe, relax and eat lunch.<br />
<br />
As I continue to develop my new blog <i>Ciel’s Vegetarian Pantry</i>, I hope to concentrate on making food a memorable and important part of every day. Give it a try and let me know how it goes.<br />
www.cielspantry.blogspot.comUnknownnoreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3047973203518838283.post-37252644076983489682010-03-27T16:33:00.000+00:002010-03-27T16:33:23.612+00:00It is all Marie Antoinette’s fault --or, Why I cannot be a vegan<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">I do not like breakfast. Well, not at breakfast time anyway. This is at least partly my Mom’s fault because she doesn’t like breakfast right after she wakes up. She rarely cooked what most would consider a “proper” breakfast except occasionally on Sunday night for supper. My Dad liked breakfast but he also liked having it in a local restaurant with some friends where he ate things like livermush, grits and eggs and they discussed sports and politics, or after a few hours of driving at the start of a vacation, which was OK with us kids and Mom because that usually meant pancakes or waffles and chocolate milk after we’d been awake and arguing for several hours as siblings do on car rides. <br />
<br />
On the rare occasions when we kids were younger and my mother escaped from home for a few days on a trip to the beach or some church women’s conference and we were left with my Dad, all he knew how to cook was scrambled eggs - and fried baloney (When fried. it is definitely baloNEY and not boloGNA even if Oscar Meyer made it and quite frankly except for how cute that song is when little kids sing it in commercials I think Congress should officially change the spelling to baloney since even in the commercials for B-O-L-O-G-N-A, the words are “My BALONEY has a first name…..” couldn’t some hot shot advertising exec find a word to rhyme with ‘Y’?)<br />
<br />
But I ramble…..<br />
<br />
On school days I preferred a few minutes of extra sleep to even a bowl of cereal and truth be told I’ve never really liked eggs unless hardboiled and mixed with exactly the correct amount of Hellmann’s mayonnaise and made into a sandwich on really good wholegrain bread with lots of seeds - and maybe a little lettuce. Because my Mom didn’t care for breakfast either she was quite satisfied if we made a glass of Carnation Instant Breakfast or carried a fresh out of the toaster Pop Tart in the car on the ride to school. We had to eat something! No good mother would allow her children to go to school with an empty stomach no matter how much I might protest that if she made me eat something I was going to throw up in the car , or on the ball field during 10th grade when I had PE for first period. <br />
<br />
How stupid is that for a 15 year old girl? Gotta get up, get dressed, including hair and makeup and then go to school and change into a gross awful smelly gym suit that we were only allowed to take home to wash once a week and then get all sweaty playing some stupid sport that I always hated and then get dressed all over again in a steamy stinky locker room. I really did want to throw up then.<br />
<br />
But on test days - achievements tests, IQ tests, PSAT, SAT, things like that, - Mom always made us a full cooked breakfast of eggs, bacon, grits, toast, juice, and milk. I probably associate breakfast with the terrible stress caused by those tests and that is why as soon as I got to college I gave it up all together. It was only after I was out of graduate school and could pick up a coffee and danish on my way into the office in Manahttan that I started eating anything again before noon.<br />
<br />
But what does all this have to do with being a vegan you ask? Well, I have just completed the 21 Day Vegan Kick Start sponsored by Physicians for Responsible Medicine. They do this several times a year and put helpful hints, menus, recipes nutritional information, doctor’s suggestions and the requisite celeb pointers (I just ignored those because I. Hate. Celeb. Pointers. - especially when they don’t know one iota more about the subject than I do.) Anyway, I think the next challenge is in September if you are interested. I am pretty damn proud of myself for making it through the 21 days. I only slipped twice and on one of those times it was because how was I to know that vegetarian chicken strips have eggs in them (well, I guess I could have read the label before I ate them but who woulda thought it? I mean, what do eggs have to do with chickens? Oh… well… now, that is part of the problem.<br />
<br />
As I have mentioned before, living with Toby who has been a vegetarian for over 7 years convinced me that I should give it a try again. And reading all about it convinced me that if I was going to make a commitment to not eating animals I should really let them off the hook entirely for my food production and should forego eggs, milk, butter and cheese as well. Most of my friends predicted a difficulty with cheese, which surprisingly has not been the case. The problem my friends is eggs, butter and milk. <br />
<br />
Actually, the problem is CAKE.<br />
<br />
I am not a baker. Believe me when I tell you that Marie Antoinette did not mean that even starving peasants should ever be forced to eat a cake that I baked. (It is not relevant to this argument whether or not M.A. ever really said anything about cake or bread or even realized there were peasants outside the palace, it just makes a good point OK? So let the historical accuracy slide Dr. David) <br />
<br />
If you want cake you should get may sister to make it for you, or her mother-in-law or any one of my friends Mary, Carol or Sarah, fabulous cake bakers all. I just like to eat it. For breakfast.<br />
<br />
When I wake up I want a large cup of very strong (preferably Italian Roast) black coffee and a little slice of something sweet. I do not like croissants unless they are pain au chocolate and in that case I’ll have deux, s’il vous plait, and while good toast with excellent marmalade will do in a pinch it is never my first choice. </div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br />
</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"> The best breakfast cake in the world is either Scottish Dundee Cake</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br />
</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"> <a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh0sbk0RS5E8GyBr4myOoISXZEWVVHhSNb7mbs5Z2wt6wsAp2Sv4pWwQc0hE-FuSC_D290RGxjXRXXyi3AsrVltdoHXQ5PRe9C27DNUPw1M8GquqbZjy1rwbvNjNCUY28mmeC2r16GB00LI/s1600/dundee+cake.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh0sbk0RS5E8GyBr4myOoISXZEWVVHhSNb7mbs5Z2wt6wsAp2Sv4pWwQc0hE-FuSC_D290RGxjXRXXyi3AsrVltdoHXQ5PRe9C27DNUPw1M8GquqbZjy1rwbvNjNCUY28mmeC2r16GB00LI/s320/dundee+cake.jpg" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiusS6ML96PJ2Yydw45CkCrGs7QL_V8kzIPPuVahyMO_Oq4w2jzXMR5iS-dJ_GyhWasry4MfYG6MOFl4zDInBpf77oNOS4ZvWIoHfgqg8v4mDaoJAQdJJ-ZhFh8fr_mZD3A81uv86HGcUQ3/s1600/Claxton+Fruit+cake.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiusS6ML96PJ2Yydw45CkCrGs7QL_V8kzIPPuVahyMO_Oq4w2jzXMR5iS-dJ_GyhWasry4MfYG6MOFl4zDInBpf77oNOS4ZvWIoHfgqg8v4mDaoJAQdJJ-ZhFh8fr_mZD3A81uv86HGcUQ3/s320/Claxton+Fruit+cake.jpg" /></a> or Claxton Fruit Cake </div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br />
</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br />
</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br />
</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"> - well that is if you can’t get someone who really loves you to make you a chocolate cake with chocolate frosting using Flossie Harwell’s recipe. </div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"> <a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgADoRbNYusRkzbu7dr-1vLzpZKGHKSB2RDexjBYpoBdZ3tAHe-fduRMVcm1YvdZtpjYLPiFw5QbYiU5cvTtizfC4uZjjvifF5HLH8ZwWU8RrNnsGE8dJCL6YR4I316PqZ9D6BOXWKuJfUS/s1600/chocolate-cake-recipe-19.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgADoRbNYusRkzbu7dr-1vLzpZKGHKSB2RDexjBYpoBdZ3tAHe-fduRMVcm1YvdZtpjYLPiFw5QbYiU5cvTtizfC4uZjjvifF5HLH8ZwWU8RrNnsGE8dJCL6YR4I316PqZ9D6BOXWKuJfUS/s320/chocolate-cake-recipe-19.jpg" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"> Now that my peeps, is pure chocolate heaven!<br />
<br />
So you see my problem. I can’t be a vegan and have cake for breakfast and I can’t be a happy person eating something else - and as I have pointed out I am a disaster at baking regular cakes so trying to hobble something together without milk, eggs or butter is just wrong. So I will be a happy vegetarian, but not a vegan. Do not misunderstand me. I. Will. Never. Eat. Meat. (or any other animal) Ever. Again. We’ll have to chat a bit about all of that at a later time.<br />
<br />
But I will have cake for breakfast and every day I will thank the chickens and cows for their contributions.<br />
<br />
<br />
</div><div style="text-align: left;"><br />
</div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com6tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3047973203518838283.post-47753538550201830652010-03-26T18:35:00.001+00:002010-03-26T18:36:05.182+00:00My Recovery PlanI am in a 12 -step program to overcome the stress created by the health insurance reform process or whatever this debacle we have just been through is called and invite you to join me in my move toward greater sanity.<br />
<br />
Step 1: Admit that I have a problem over which I have no control<br />
<br />
Damn right, I have a problem and it is called idiots who listen to and watch political pundits on Fox News and similar outlets and actually believe what they hear. Didn’t these people go to school somewhere that taught them how to evaluate information and form their own conclusions?<br />
<br />
Step 2: I believe a power greater than myself can restore sanity.<br />
<br />
And that power is the POTUS - Barack Hussein Obama. If people will just shut up and listen to the man. He is well- educated, brilliant, lucid and peace-maker. They gave him a prize for that. Remember:?<br />
<br />
Step 3: I have decided to turn my will over to “God” as I understand “him”<br />
<br />
This is a little tough because I don’t believe there a God that is a him. However, I do think there is a lot of energy out there that is a lot bigger than me and I am spending as much time as I can focused on meditation and trying to pull in positive forces and push away the negative ones. Take that Bill O’Reilly.<br />
<br />
Step 4: I have made a searching and fearless moral inventory of myself.<br />
<br />
Yes, and I have discovered that my opinions on this issue are correct. We need a single payer health care system, health insurance companies are run by greedy bastards and the basis of all our current problems is capitalism run amok.<br />
<br />
Step 5: I have admitted to “god”, to myself and to another human being the exact nature of the problem<br />
<br />
See #3 above re: the god thing, #1 as to what the problem is and as for telling someone else, well you’re reading this.<br />
<br />
Step 6: I am entirely ready to have someone remove all these defects.<br />
<br />
Absolutely, and if Rush Limbaugh will just keep his promise and get the hell out of the country -- and take with him Glenn Beck, Sarah, “Death Squad” Palin, that blonde crazy, what’s her name ,oh yea, Anne Coulter and while they’re at it, Dick Cheney and Jeb Bush (in case he gets some hair brained idea about running in 2012) then we’ll be started in the right direction.<br />
<br />
Step 7: I humbly ask that the shortcomings be removed<br />
<br />
See #6 above<br />
<br />
Step 8: There is a list of all that have been harmed and I am more than wiling to do my part to make amends to them.<br />
<br />
As I understand it, people who could not afford or be approved for health insurance can now get it and I think that is a great use for some of my tax dollars.<br />
<br />
Step 9: I will make direct amends to those that are injured except where to do so would hurt others<br />
<br />
So, here it is. I will put Tavish and Toby back on my insurance as soon as the Bank of America will let me. I will pay my taxes and will contribute to the political campaigns of candidates who support a single payer health insurance plan, and I will work diligently to defeat candidates who represent and cater to the ill-formed wrongly directed religious right, or the tea baggers and who take bribes in the form of contributions from lobbyists for Big Pharma.. <br />
<br />
Step 10: I will continue to take personal inventory and admit when I am wrong<br />
<br />
Yes, because I pride myself in exploring all sides of an issue before taking a stand and in a willingness to change my opinion when I have been proved incorrect through equally logical argument.<br />
<br />
Step 11: I will meditate as often as possible, at least daily, to improve my clarity and develop a clear mind so that I can carry out the appropriate actions as needed in a calm and thoughtful manner ,<br />
<br />
‘Nuf said.<br />
<br />
Step 12: Having had a clear acknowledgement through all these steps that the idiots are still uninformed and acting and speaking in an irrational manner I will do my best not to hunt them down and try to change their minds because, obviously peeps, stupid and uninformed is incurable.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3047973203518838283.post-16923865573927720502010-03-23T19:09:00.001+00:002010-03-23T19:13:16.233+00:00I only have one spoon left today......<i> </i>I have started several new blog posts this past week but have been unable to finish any due to distractions caused by the healthcare vote - we all know it took almost every hour to keep up with that - finishing reading a couple of books I had started simultaneously, being told David and I have no place to live this summer - three times! and having an extreme shortage of spoons.<br />
Spoons you say. What does that have to do with anything?<br />
<br />
Christine Miserandino, who suffers with Lupus, developed The Spoon Theory and I credit her with brilliance in describing silent illness in a way that others can understand. Below is an excerpt of her theory with a few edits to make it appropriate for MS. (<i>Christine's writing is in italics</i> and my additions are not. Bold is also mine)<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjm9xOFzLZHGAAq6wFUwmaxJnF4F2aR0R-UXF-LzaHfrqCY5mIjQKcyLk8nDHuykr_q-nsfr1z4vhLqavxkf71s1oNzPuOc3cBo88HmrBducuakbK7ESetwRVuvupUl5tSkfMATHDl0AAsF/s1600-h/spoons.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjm9xOFzLZHGAAq6wFUwmaxJnF4F2aR0R-UXF-LzaHfrqCY5mIjQKcyLk8nDHuykr_q-nsfr1z4vhLqavxkf71s1oNzPuOc3cBo88HmrBducuakbK7ESetwRVuvupUl5tSkfMATHDl0AAsF/s320/spoons.JPG" /></a></div><br />
I am carrying around just one spoon today folks.<br />
<br />
<br />
Christine was sitting in a diner with a friend and in trying to discuss how her energy level works,<i> the spoon theory was born.</i><br />
<i> I quickly grabbed every spoon on the table; hell I grabbed spoons off of the other tables. I looked at her in the eyes and said “Here you go, you have</i> [MS]<i>”. She looked at me slightly confused, as anyone would when they are being handed a bouquet of spoons. The cold metal spoons clanked in my hands, as I grouped them together and shoved them into her hands.</i><br />
<br />
<i>I explained that the difference in being sick and being healthy is having to make choices or to consciously think about things when the rest of the world doesn’t have to. The healthy have the luxury of a life without choices, a gift most people take for granted.</i><br />
<br />
<i>Most people start the day with unli</i><i>mited amount of possibilities, and energy to do whatever they desire, especially young people.</i> [Please all my sleep deprived friends, understand that I know that you start the day with fewer spoons than most as well<i>] For the most part, they do not need to worry about the effects of their actions. So for my explanation, I used spoons to convey this point. I wanted something for her to actually hold, for me to then take away, since most people who get sick feel a “loss” of a life they once knew. If I was in control of taking away the spoons, then she would know what it feels like to have someone or something else, in this case </i>[MS],<i> being in control.</i><br />
<br />
<i>I asked her to count her spoons. She asked why, and I explained that when you are healthy you expect to have a never-ending supply of “spoons”. But when you have to now plan your day, you need to know exactly how many “spoons” you are starting with. It doesn’t guarantee that you might not lose some along the way, but at least it helps to know where you are starting. She counted out 12 spoons. She laughed and said she wanted more. I said no, and I knew right away that this little game would work, when she looked disappointed, and we hadn’t even started yet. <b>I’ve wanted more “spoons” for years and haven’t found a way yet to get more, </b>why should she? I also told her to always be conscious of how many she had, and not to drop them because she can never forget she has </i>[MS and might not be able to pick them up]<br />
<br />
<i>I asked her to list off the tasks of her day, including the most simple. As, she rattled off daily chores, or just fun things to do; I explained how each one would cost her a spoon. When she jumped right into getting ready for work as her first task of the morning, I cut her off and took away a spoon. I practically jumped down her throat. I said ” No! You don’t just get up. You have to crack open your eyes, and then realize you are late. You didn’t sleep well the night before. You have to crawl out of bed, and then you have to make your self something to eat before you can do anything else, because if you don’t, you can’t take your medicine, and if you don’t take your medicine you might as well give up all your spoons for today and tomorrow too.” I quickly took away a spoon and she realized she hasn’t even gotten dressed yet. Showering cost her spoon, just for washing her hair and shaving her legs. Reaching high and low that early in the morning could actually cost more than one spoon</i> [a BIG problem for me]<i>, but I figured I would give her a break; I didn’t want to scare her right away. Getting dressed was worth another spoon. </i>[see my blog post on the issue]<i>I stopped her and broke down every task to show her how<b> every little detail needs to be thought about.</b> You cannot simply just throw clothes on when you </i>[have MS]<i>. </i>I explained that I have to see what clothes I can physically put on and what I can tolerate. If my skin is tingling I will want tights or something firmly against my body. If my hands are weak that day buttons may be out of the question. If my balalnce is off I will need to wear something that looks OK with sneakers - so much for cute shoes. If it is hot I surely don't want to wear long sleeves, and if I have a fever from taking interferon the night before I may need a sweater to stay ward off chills and so on. If my hair is dirty and I don't have energy to wash it or I have dark circles under my eyes, <i>I need to spend more time to look presentable, and then you need to factor in another 5 minutes for feeling badly that it took you 2 hours to do all this.</i><br />
<br />
<i>I think she was starting to understand when she theoretically didn’t even get </i>[out of her bedroom]<i>, and she was left with 6 spoons. I then explained to her that she needed to choose the rest of her day wisely, since when your “spoons” are gone, they are gone. Sometimes you can borrow against tomorrow’s “spoons”, but just think how hard tomorrow will be with less “spoons”. I also needed to explain that a person who is sick always lives with the looming thought that tomorrow may be the day that a cold comes, or an infection, or any number of things that could be very dangerous. So you do not want to run low on “spoons”, because you never know when you truly will need them. I didn’t want to depress her, but I needed to be realistic, and unfortunately being prepared for the worst is part of a real day for me.</i><br />
<br />
<i>We went through the rest of the day, and she slowly learned that skipping lunch would cost her a spoon, </i>eating might give her one back if she selected her food carefully<i>.</i> Driving could cost two spoons if there was traffic or she might lose a spoon for<i> standing </i>on a bus <i>or train, or even typing at her computer </i>[or reading a book]<i> too long. She was forced to make choices and think about things differently. Hypothetically, she had to choose not to run errands, so that she could eat dinner that night.</i> Let's hope there is food in the cupboard.<i><br />
</i><br />
<br />
<i>When we got to the end of her pretend day, she said she was hungry. I summarized that she had to eat dinner but she only had one spoon left. If she cooked, she wouldn’t have enough energy to clean the pots. If she went out for dinner, she might be too tired to travel home safely. Then I also explained, that I didn’t even bother to add into this game, that she was so nauseous </i>[from MS related fatigue]<i>, that cooking was probably out of the question anyway. So she decided to make soup, it was easy. I then said it is only 7pm, you have the rest of the night but maybe end up with one spoon, so you can do something fun, or clean your apartment, or do chores, but you can’t do it all.</i> You are probably so tired that you will just fall asleep in front of the TV - often in your clothes . No spoon left to wash your face and brush your teeth<i>.</i><br />
<br />
<i>I explained that some days are worse then others; some days I have more spoons. But I can never make it go away and I can’t forget about it, I always have to think about it. I handed her a spoon I had been holding in reserve. I said simply, “I have learned to live life with an extra spoon in my pocket, in reserve. You need to always be prepared.”</i><br />
<br />
The hardest thing I ever had to learn is to slow down, and not do everything I want. I fight this every day. Just ask David, he is a better observer of how many spoons I have in reserve than I am.<i> I hate feeling left out, having to choose to stay home, or to not get things done that I want to...I need to think about the weather, my temperature that day, and the whole day’s plans before I can attack any one given thing. When other people can simply do things, </i>I sometimes feel angry and I hate myself for that.<i>. I miss the freedom of never having to count “spoons”.</i><br />
<br />
I do not see this as a blessing<i> </i>as some people would say -"Oh but don't you appreciate everything more." NO! <i>I have been forced to think about everything I do. Do you know how many spoons people waste everyday? I don’t have room for wasted time, or wasted “spoons”</i><br />
<br />
<i> Once people understand the spoon theory they seem to understand me better, but I also think they live their life a little differently too. I think it isn’t just good for understanding </i>[MS]<i>, but anyone dealing with any disability or illness</i> or even a tough time in their life.<i> Hopefully, they don’t take so much for granted or their life in general. </i><br />
<br />
In the next few weeks as David and I will plan what's next in this adventure we are on. I will probably call on some of you for advice, ideas or even assistance. Please do not think of me as lazy, incompetent or otherwise lame. If I ask it is because I know that if I share one of my spoons with you I will get much much more in return.<i> </i><br />
<br />
<i><br />
</i>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3047973203518838283.post-9097749559395349632010-03-14T14:46:00.001+00:002010-03-14T14:50:44.703+00:00The Day the Earth MovedWhen I turn on my computer each morning it tells me the time - the time in the Eastern US, that is. David’s is set to tell Greenwich Mean Time, or the actual time shown on the clocks here in Scotland. Typically that serves us well and those of you who receive telephone calls from us, however infrequent, must certainly appreciate that it discourages us from calling you before the sun is awake in NC, FL, NY AZ or CA. But this morning is different. Does anybody really know what time it is?<br />
<br />
Sometime during the night I can only assume that the United States drifted 600 miles to the east, making it 1 hour closer to us than when I went to bed a 11PM GMT (6PM EST) last night. <br />
<br />
When I awoke, the 5 hour time difference had somehow magically been reduced to 4 as if by divine legislation or something. EXCEPT, I find that AZ was left behind during the shift remaining 7 hours earlier than here. California however was dragged along and now there is only a 7 hour difference where once there was 8. All very strange.<br />
<br />
I wonder if expensive waterfront property suddenly appeared overnight in AZ?<br />
<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiFSnv_oX31xZf6UnaFBkQhtP_U-FZdpaqpJ_u9oeKXZsy9JUqQ_oKjpe48bYZ5sigWnt7r9_DHm6yRX07b_tnNDlsnvZkAEybkZTMs3cKaPAtAa8BynXRAUe7XYMZd_6HP9Wu7Yd4KYeeM/s1600-h/pi+pie.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiFSnv_oX31xZf6UnaFBkQhtP_U-FZdpaqpJ_u9oeKXZsy9JUqQ_oKjpe48bYZ5sigWnt7r9_DHm6yRX07b_tnNDlsnvZkAEybkZTMs3cKaPAtAa8BynXRAUe7XYMZd_6HP9Wu7Yd4KYeeM/s320/pi+pie.jpg" /></a></div><br />
Having also realized that this is Pi Day I must wonder if there is some irrational numerical explanation for this phenomenon. Perhaps we should all spend the day writing poetry in Pilish as a way to appease the time gods. Such poems are constructed so that the number of letters in each successive word is equal to the digits of pi. One of the most famous of Pilish poems was written by an English (cough, cough) physicist. Sir James Jeans (oh, perhaps we should all wear jeans while writing poems )<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;"><i>How I need a drink<br />
Alcoholic in nature<br />
After the heavy lectures<br />
Involving Quantum mechanics</i></div><br />
Oh how I need a drink, alcoholic in nature, after hurting my brain, thinking about all of this (don’t bother to count the letters, it is not Pilish. I can only do that AFTER the drink!)<br />
<br />
Or perhaps we should all bake pies (while wearing jeans, of course) after which we can calculate their imprecise circumference as a ratio of their diameter. You can never determine the precise circumference, your know - unless, of course, you just get out a tape and measure the damn thing! And even then it is confusing as hell because as we all remember the answer to the quiz question is that “pies are square” when we all know they are round and perhaps that is part of the problem we are wrestling with here today.<br />
<br />
Square pies must cause the earth to shift. This information might be a great help to the new Chilean president who should get his people out looking for the square pie baker -- pronto. Perhaps he could send some help to Haiti for that purpose as well.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3047973203518838283.post-74698165006624808652010-03-13T20:16:00.002+00:002010-03-13T20:30:01.621+00:00Be aware! Be very aware!!!<table border="0" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0"><tbody>
<tr><td>This past week has been MS Awareness Week. I am pleased that the well-run and most helpful National Multiple Sclerosis Society (NMSS) conducts this week each year in an attempt to spread the word about this dreadful disease. <br />
<br />
(BTW - there are several MS organizations out there but only the NMSS is legitimate. The others are poorly run and spend little of the money that is raised on research or client assistance. The NMSS is consistently rated as an excellent charity. So give generously but be sure you give to NMSS)<br />
<br />
Multiple Sclerosis is the most common degenerative neurological disease in the US and Western Europe. MS primarily strikes people between the ages of 15 and 55 - the so-called prime of life and after 10 years with the disease, half of all victims are severely disabled. I was diagnosed in 1983 at the age of 29 although now that I understand the symptoms I know I was sick in high school. <br />
<br />
After cheering at a football game, my feet would feel like they were on fire. Mom would rub and rub trying to relieve the discomfort. Once, during a game I just spaced out completely. I didn’t have the energy to jump up and down, couldn’t remember the words to the cheers and couldn’t concentrate enough to even know what was going on in the game. I just stood there sort of staring into space. I didn’t even realize anything was wrong. The following week the Pep Club gave me hell, all but calling for the forfeit of my varsity cheerleading letter because I wasn’t ‘engaged” in the game. On an intellectual level I know it is silly but I still harbor an intense level of anger about that incident that eats at me. I want to go up to the major critics and yell, “ I have MS and you were a jerk! Apologize, dammit!’<br />
<br />
Multiple Sclerosis means “many scars”. Perhaps this is one of them. <br />
<br />
Actually, the disease is characterized by multiple lesions on the brain, spinal cord or nerves. The lesions heal and are replaced by scar tissue, hence the name, and the affected nerve function is severely impaired or stops completely. Symptoms range from numbness and tingling to complete loss of use of limbs, loss of bladder control, vision impairment or even loss, loss of cognitive function, fatigue - a loss of energy so severe that it has to be experienced to be understood. Loss, loss, loss. It is all about loss. <br />
<br />
For me it has involved loss of my ability to run outside and play with my boys when they were little, loss of vision (once completely in my left eye), loss of bladder control, loss of the joy of sitting in the hot sun (heat causes an increase in symptoms which for me means it gets really really hard to walk) loss of the strength required to get the milk jug out of the frig, loss of the ability to process multiple stimuli which severely limits my ability to drive, loss of a job I loved, loss of the ability to concentrate, loss of the ability to be a 10 in bed, loss of cognitive function that was once good enough to get me classified, along with a bunch of wonderful NC friends, as “gifted and/or talented” and to get me admitted to MENSA, loss of access to the rolodex of names and words that used to be easily available in my brain, loss of energy to the extent that I can plan only one event a day and then hope that I will not be too fatigued to do it, loss of emotional control and EXTREME LOSS OF PATIENCE WITH THIS RIDICULOUS UNPREDICTABLE DISEASE.</td><td></td><td><br />
<br />
<br />
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</tbody></table>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3047973203518838283.post-63739070175722182902010-03-07T15:36:00.000+00:002010-03-07T15:36:36.956+00:00It’s All About the Tatties<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjvoy6GgsTycAQ8aCsDfvQiXXEHQBj_YdCT9A-M-PGJJ-r7C7V4PbKMo2z-6_pu_mwtQu9ho350lIsC2T6HpVlFWBs77Dn-vXghHmKoEjyZJPV0bUF9z1RHiwEa_Xm-hNHKH32PZAtPHS9R/s1600-h/british-chips-650.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjvoy6GgsTycAQ8aCsDfvQiXXEHQBj_YdCT9A-M-PGJJ-r7C7V4PbKMo2z-6_pu_mwtQu9ho350lIsC2T6HpVlFWBs77Dn-vXghHmKoEjyZJPV0bUF9z1RHiwEa_Xm-hNHKH32PZAtPHS9R/s320/british-chips-650.jpg" /></a></div><span>In Scotland, everything is served with chips - well almost. A few things come standard with a good mash but mostly, it’s chips. And I don’t mean those thin crispy things Americans call “chips.” In Scotland, those are properly called “crisps” and come in flavors you’ve never thought of before - prawn cocktail, tomato ketchup (no more need to dip), olive oil and balsamic, sweet chili, sea salt and garlic - this list goes on and on. Everyone’s favorite, of course, is “salt and vinny.”<br />
<br />
But I’m talking about chips here - proper thick cut slices, not wedges, crispy on the outside, fluffy on the inside, perfectly cooked fried potatoes.<br />
<br />
Order a pizza - comes with chips. Fancy a curry? Expect some chips on the side to dip in the sauce. Breakfast? Well, in addition to the bacon, bangers, haggis, eggs, beans, tomatoes, mushrooms, toast, butter and marmalade that are standard with a “full Scottish” you’ll generally find some chips or if not you’ll most certainly be asked if you would like some. Chinese food, Mexican food, even Italian food, comes with chips.<br />
<br />
David and I were dining in a rather posh Italian restaurant last Saturday. At the table next to us a couple had mussels and soup as starters followed by a large shared salad (I always watch what other diners are eating for fear that I may be missing out on something wonderful) Then one had a pasta dish and the other risotto and, sure enough, there on the table between them was a huge bowl of chips. (David and I shared a cold antipasto and a risotto de la mare filled with all sort of shellfish, plum tomatoes and chiles)<br />
<br />
Go to a pub. Order a pint. The bartender is likely to ask if you’d like some chips as a snack. While I waited for take-away Chinese one night, four teenagers came in. Each placed an order for chips with a different sauce for dipping - one sweet and sour, ane sweet/hot chili, one brown sauce and one garlic/chile sauce. Ah, Scottish/ Chinese food. Chips and Chinese-style sauce.<br />
<br />
In the grocery there are likely to be more types of frozen chips than anything else in the freezer. More chips than ice cream! That is just wrong. Even though, I place chips/French fries, pommes frites, whatever there are called in whatever country I happen to be, right up there with the foods of the gods, one of my absolute favorites and when on offer I can never turn them down.<br />
<br />
(I feel in the interest of honesty here I must say that I DO NOT eat FREEDOM fries under any circumstances! - coming up with that name was just one step past ridiculous . Instead , the French should have stopped eating anything American because we were the idiots who were out of line. Oh wait. The French do not eat American food. They eat wonderful fresh beautifully prepared luscious French food. Sorry. I still DO NOT EAT FREEDOM FRIES - and have been known on two occasions to walk out of establishments that called them that.)<br />
But I ramble..<br />
<br />
Perfect chips must be cooked three times. First, peel the potatoes and boil them until just tender. Drain, cool and dry well, then slice into thick finger-sized pieces (sort of like really thick steak fries in the US). Heat some good non-flavored oil until hot. If you want to pretend to make these healthier, use expeller pressed canola oil. Actually, any good vegetable oil will do. It is best to cook the potatoes in a deep pot or deep fat fryer but they can also be cooked in a deep skillet in a single layer - but be sure if you choose this method not to overlap the potatoes or they will become soggy. Cook the potatoes just until they just start to color. Remove potatoes from fat, drain well on paper towels and allow to cool. Discard the fat. <br />
<br />
At this point you may finish the cooking (see below) or store the potatoes. They will keep in the frig for 24 hours. Any longer and they oil will go rancid. Or you can freeze them.<br />
<br />
To finish the cooking - heat some fresh oil and add the cooled or frozen potatoes (be careful of popping). Cook until golden and crispy. I like them really brown. Remove to paper towels to drain and season with coarse salt. Serve with ketchup, HP sauce, malt vinegar, garlic mayonnaise or salsa.<br />
<br />
Guaranteed to be the best “chips” you’ve ever eaten.<br />
<br />
<br />
</span><strong><br />
</strong>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3047973203518838283.post-22206196725345018672010-03-04T17:32:00.000+00:002010-03-06T13:32:39.473+00:00Let us all stand and recite together......It’s that glorious time of year again, peeps. That time when “the boys of summer” take to the fields even though it is not quite Spring and the NCAA (read that ACC) is still paying basketball. That time when the young guns can strut their stuff ( did you see that homer by S-Rod yesterday?) and the old guys can find out if they still have what it takes. It’s that time when the proven stars get to sit it out a lot and only play when really needed to help the team avoid embarrassment, when the press has been called out to take photos and do interviews or when the fans are there in full force cheering against an arch rival ( Can you spell Yankees or Red Sox?)<br />
It's that time of year when fans of my two favorite teams, the Rays and the Cubs, still dream of a pennant.<br />
<br />
It’s that time of year when we all oil our gloves, fill our cups with beer, stand and recite our Creed:<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;"><i>I believe in the Church of baseball.<br />
I’ve tried all the major religions<br />
And most of the minor ones.<br />
I’ve worshipped Buddha, Allah, Brahma,<br />
Vishnu, Siva, trees, mushrooms,<br />
And Isadora Duncan.<br />
<br />
I know things, for instance:<br />
<br />
There are a hundred and eight beads in a Catholic rosary<br />
And there are a hundred and eight stitches in a baseball.<br />
….<br />
I prefer metaphysics to theology.<br />
You see, there is no guilt in baseball.<br />
And it’s never boring.<br />
Which makes it like sex.<br />
…<br />
Making love is like hitting a baseball.<br />
You’ve got tot relax and concentrate.<br />
…<br />
It’s a long season and you’ve got to trust it.<br />
I’ve tried them all, I really have.<br />
And the only church that truly feeds the soul<br />
- day in, day out - is the <b>Church of Baseball.</b></i> <br />
<span style="font-size: x-small;"> As adapted from “Bull Durham”<br />
By Ron Shelton</span><br />
</div> <span style="font-size: large;"><b> PLAY BALL!!</b></span>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3047973203518838283.post-90498463333113151462010-03-03T17:24:00.000+00:002010-03-06T13:32:21.173+00:00Bacon is calorie free, right?If, like me, you grew up in the South, you know that bacon is a seasoning and therefore has no calories. If you feel that you must, you can remove the pancetta/parma/prosciutto and set it aside from your portion after the fish is cooked. But I dare you to try leave it there and not tuck in. <br />
<br />
<b>Stuffed Roasted Salmon Wrapped in Bacon</b><br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
2 large filets of salmon, skinned and pin bones removed (If you know how to filet and skin a fish it is best to do it yourself and use halves of the same fish)<br />
8 oz prosciutto, thinly sliced (pancetta or parma ham will work as well)<br />
6 cloves garlic roasted in their skins and then skin removed <br />
Extra virgin olive oil<br />
Salt and coarse ground black pepper<br />
8 oz fresh or jarred pesto (drain off a bit of the oil before stirring into some chopped fresh tarragon and flat-leaf parsley to taste)<br />
Jarred roasted red peppers, sliced into julienne strips (one of those things that just aren't worth doing yourself unless you have grown your own peppers)<br />
<br />
<br />
Pre-heat the oven to 375 F<br />
Cut or tear a large square of plastic and cover with overlapping pieces of prosciutto (this needs to be wide enough to wrap around the salmon filets)<br />
Place one piece of salmon, skin-side down, in the centre of the prosciutto and cover the top with the pesto mixture being sure to keep it off the sides and the prosciutto.<br />
Lay a line of peppers and the garlic cloves along the filet over the pesto and then lay the other fillet skin-side up on top of it.<br />
Using the plastic wrap, wrap the fish in the prosciutto, by lifting one side and then the other and overlapping it on top and peeling the film away as the prosciutto clings to the fish and itself. You should have a fish completely wrapped in prosciutto sitting on an open square of plastic wrap.<br />
Gently lift the fish using the wrap and roll it into a roasting pan so that the seam of prociutto is down<br />
Dribble with olive oil and roast for 25-35 minutes. The fish should feel firm to the touch. Allow to cool.<br />
Cut into large slices and serve with a leafy salad.<br />
<br />
Let me know if you can actually avoid eating the bacon. I think it is impossible.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3047973203518838283.post-60445257836939657932010-02-26T15:06:00.000+00:002010-03-06T13:37:39.903+00:00Blogging and Booking …and BookingI’m thinking that it is not possible to write a blog and a book at the same time - particularly while also proofreading someone else’s work and trying to make travel plans.<br />
<br />
One of the most difficult aspects of a traveling lifestyle is deciding where to go next. Number two is booking the travel and accommodations, though rarely in that order.<br />
<br />
Because we take advantage of space that is available when academics are on sabbatical, we are at the mercy of university budgets, grant approvals, travel costs and all sorts of things that aren’t even about us - well, until we try to book the house on offer. Fortunately we never book the actual travel until the housing arrangements are firmed up. Well, usually we don’t. We booked flights back to the States this morning with nowhere to stay. Do not be surprised if you receive a phone call asking that you make up the quest room.<br />
<br />
I say it is fortunate that we generally don’t book the travel until we have secured a bed because all of our plans for the summer have fallen through in the past three days and I would hate to be stuck with the train, plane and ferry fares. No house in Greece, Italy, Spain or Ireland. Nada. Zilch. At least not in our price range or on our schedule.<br />
Boo-hoo!<br />
<br />
I am disappointed because as I have written before, the most expensive part of travel is the travel. Because we are already in Europe I wanted to stay as long as possible but that is not to be. We will be flying from Edinburgh to Amsterdam to New York to Charlotte on June 15.<br />
<br />
The good side of this plan is that I will see my Mom and Tavish and get my wonderful Madison back. I am very excited about all of that.<br />
<br />
There are two, or maybe three, downsides. <br />
<br />
David thinks this is a good plan because he is very worried about my health. Hmmm, he must be reading my blog - or perhaps experiencing things first hand. Poor thing. Having health that needs to be worried about by anyone is not a good thing, I am concerned that he is concerned.. Others often notice things before we do ourselves, particularly negative things that we would prefer to deny. He thinks I need to reassess my stamina, my meds and my expectations. The stamina and meds I’m OK with but don’t mess with my reality - whether real or not.<br />
<br />
I am afraid that once we get off the traveling train we won’t get back on. There are always excuses to be made for not traveling. I am going to have to fight hard to keep them from getting in the way. So I need to start making a plan for the next phase now and let the docs know that it is non-negotiable and their job is to get me fit to play. Athletes do that all the time, right? Just tape me up and put me in coach. (“Put me in coach, I’m ready to play, today.” Sing along. It is almost time for BASEBALL!!! And my annual sing-along showing of Bull Durham. It‘s a religious thing and red toenails are required)<br />
<br />
But I DEFINITELY ramble….<br />
<br />
So I am booking and planning travel, proofing the galleys for David’s book and trying to write one of my own - while attempting to separate some thoughts for this blog as well. Too much at once - particularly for my addled brain. One thing I know I need is a schedule - - and sleep. I guess that is two things. Lack of sleep can impair counting.<br />
<br />
When the weather warms up there will be more travel stories and less about me, me, me. Until then, if I go away for awhile just know I am working on other things and I’ll definitely be back. Eventually.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3047973203518838283.post-85761522327933716472010-02-25T13:56:00.002+00:002010-03-06T13:33:08.596+00:00Stuck!Just Stuck!!Unknownnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3047973203518838283.post-43715110929882282432010-02-21T15:31:00.000+00:002010-03-06T13:37:39.903+00:00Despite What You May Think, I Am Not Bi-polarI have lived with diagnosed multiple sclerosis since 1983. (although I know now that the disease was active even when I was in high school) According to the doctors that made the diagnosis I should have been unable to walk for at least the past 5 years. Thanks to medical advances in the mid-1990’s, when I was showing definite signs of neurological deterioration, I am still mobile and functioning. On many days, unless you know me well, you would have no idea I have MS by watching me walk or move. My hands shake and I drop things a lot but still, it is not an obvious thing. Of course, there are also days when I stay in bed. I plan my life very carefully to avoid fatigue and those advances of the ‘90s require that I take intramuscular injections of interferon on a regular basis and several pills a day to keep me up and going. I’ve had rounds of chemotherapy and more intravenous sessions with high dose steroids (1200 mg/day) than I can count.<br />
<br />
If I am careful and take my meds I can manage most of my physical symptoms fairly well. My cognitive dysfunction is another matter entirely. For me, the most worrying and debilitating aspect of MS has been the decrease in my brain’s ability to process information properly. That, not physical limitations, is what forced me to leave my interesting and lucrative job. I could no longer process information in a linear fashion which for a project manager in the financial services industry is a big liability. Both project plans and financial statements became illegible to me. They might as well have been written in Greek. At the time I had an amazing ,brilliant, nurturing assistant who kept my head above water. She should have been receiving half my salary. When I could no longer organize things or keep information or appointments in my head she gave me notes, reminders and most importantly encouragement. To this day I owe her a huge debt of gratitude. Sometimes when I become too demanding of David or T&T they remind me they are not Mary.<br />
<br />
Recently, David has noticed, as have I, that my speech is slowing a bit and I seem to have more periods of confusion. I do not go out alone for fear that I will be unable to find my way home. In my cooking class last week I kept losing my place, I forgot to turn off burners, I became frightened and nervous. I wanted someone I could trust to be there with me. Next time I will enroll with a patient friend. Fortunately David and I are best friends and typically make plans together. He seems to still enjoy being with me despite my limitations and he is an amazing man who helps more than any partner should be expected to.<br />
<br />
Tests before I left the US showed that my brain function had declined to 65% of what it had been in my prime. My former boss said that just made me easier to take. Apparently in the past when I reached conclusions before others in the room it could be annoying. Imagine that. I never was good at sitting on my hands and keeping my mouth shut.<br />
That’s not really surprising. In high school I was obnoxious like that, always a step ahead, sometimes getting to the conclusion even faster than the teacher. I thought I would live forever in a state of not fitting into the norm until I had the wonderful amazing experience of attending The Governor’s School of NC in the summer of 1971. There I learned that there were lots of people out there a lot smarter and quicker than me but most of all that what I was capable of was not something I should try to overcome but something I should learn to utilize. Now, I can’t keep up and it is driving me mad!<br />
<br />
David’s oldest friend stutters. When they are together and he gets stuck on a word David just says it and the conversation moves on as if nothing has happened. Those years of practice are coming in handy. Now when I can’t find a word in the rolodex in my brain, if David has been paying attention, he can often fill in the blank just as quickly as he does for his friend.<br />
<br />
I know you are thinking that we all slow down and are more forgetful and such as we age and that is definitely true. I do not want to belittle the difficulties that we all face after 50, but peeps, this is different. I space out and can’t get the concentration back. My brain just shorts out. It is not just a brain fart or a senior moment, it is a periodic blackout.<br />
<br />
But there is something I am finding even more distressing recently. Before we left Florida I was diagnosed with pseudo-bulbar affect (Google it). I thought it was one of those things invented by drug companies to sell a medicine that didn’t work out for its original function, but I was wrong. This is the well-documented problem of emotional lability apparently repackaged to raise awareness that it crosses many neurological disorders and can be misdiagnosed as depression. There is no treatment. (Expletive!!!)<br />
<br />
And for me it appears to be worsening and I am frightened. I do not want to alienate people, embarrass myself or anyone else in public, or be carried away by men in white coats who have no idea that PBA exists. You see, I will sit and stare into space until someone asks what I am thinking about. I will stop in mid-sentence and then just not continue with whatever I was saying (those of you who have known me for years know this was an early sign - and you all just thought I was scatter brained). My penchant for non-sequiter is a symptom. My thanks to all of you who continue to try to carry on a logical conversation with me when I jump from subject to subject for no apparent reason.<br />
<br />
But the biggest problem is that I do not have control over my emotions. I will cry for no apparent reason. Not just little tears, but big gasping sobs. When I am angered my reaction is way over the top. Poor Toby must think that his Mom is totally whacko when I completely over-react to what is a normal disagreement. I yell. I even scream sometimes. If I am ready and you are late I can’t tolerate it. No I am not just the world’s biggest bitch. I cannot stop this. Even when I know my actions are out of proportion with the situation it will not stop. It happens with laughter too. I’m too loud, carry a joke too far, don’t understand. My brain is on overload and just keeps on going. And I am embarrassed. <br />
<br />
I feel myself retreating. Surely those who have known me for ages will go, “Well that explains a lot.” and may still be willing to stick around. But this shit makes making new friends a real challenge and when you move from place to place like we are, it becomes debilitating. <br />
<br />
I have fought MS, this ridiculous, unpredictable disease, with all I’ve got for 27 years. All in all I have won a lot of battles. But this one is getting me. If this is “pseudo“- bulbar I’d hate to see actual bulbar. This one is causing me to question what is next, what I can handle. This one has me listening to David when he suggests we buy a house in Maiden, just in case we need it. I imagine the unspoken part of that is “just in case he needs some help with me.” I need a new battle plan and my MS fried, pseudo-bulbar affected brain doesn’t seem capable of coming up with one.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3047973203518838283.post-86933927202093036502010-02-20T17:44:00.000+00:002010-03-06T13:37:39.904+00:00We Don’t Have a Place in Italy for JulyAs I sat surfing for a house on a Greek Island where David and I might spend the late summer, he was looking at real estate in Maiden, NC, the tiny town where I grew up. This wasn’t just incongruous it was ludicrous. Neither of us had ever considered living in Maiden, in fact we had moved from North Carolina for what we thought was the last time in 2005. What was going on?<br />
<br />
We’re travelers, vagabonds. One friend described this as my bohemian phase. I like the concept although I don’t think I quite live up to it. We are moving from place to place to experience life, to learn about how things work outside of the US consumer bubble, And we love it!<br />
<br />
But now I was hit in the face with the knowledge that I agreed with what he was doing. The idea of moving to Maiden would take some real brain adjustment for me but I understood his desire to identify a retirement location that could be paid for and ready for us should we decide to get off the road or if our tentative health decides to knock either of us flat. I know that could happen at any time but I live in total denial of it.<br />
<br />
We look wistfully at photos of San Miguel de Allende where we spent most of a year and wonder if we should head back. We write about and organize pictures from our time in France and know that it was a good experience but not one we would like to repeat. We plan for what to do during the remainder of out stay in Scotland - travel to the Isle of Mull, visit friends in Thornhill and Aberdeen, spend a day in Glasgow, eat some Loch Fyne oysters before the end of April when the months no longer have an “r”.<br />
<br />
We must leave Britain by the end of our visa on June 23 or the British Border Bitch will surely have her minions out searching for us. We might be staying over to put liquid explosives in excess of 4 oz in our shoes or something. We can reenter the Schengen visa territory of the EU (basically everywhere in Europe except the UK, Ireland, Bulgaria and other eastern European countries that I can’t remember) after that date but can only stay for 90 days. Because we would like to travel back to the US on a repositioning cruise that leaves on Oct 4 we must identify somewhere to park ourselves for a little over three weeks either at the beginning or the end of our time in mainland Europe.<br />
<br />
We are staying on because we are here and the most costly part of traveling is, well, the traveling part. Basically, wherever you go, there you are and we are here and would like stay until we are forced by ridiculous regulations to give up playing the system and just get the hell out of Dodge for awhile.<br />
<br />
So we’re thinking of going to Ireland for a few weeks before we head back across the Channel and then spending a week in Istanbul on the back end before we fly to London to get the boat. In between we were planning to train across France and down the coast of Italy where we had located a lovely flat overlooking the Mediterranean in Salerno. And then last night I got an email that the flat wouldn’t be available after all. (Expletive!!!)<br />
<br />
There is still the villa on the Greek island of Thassos for August and September but we are waiting for final confirmation on that and now I am nervous that our summer plans will just fall apart. That is how my brain works. I’ve learned to live in perpetual white water so I must always be prepared for the worst and then enjoy the best when it emerges.. <br />
<br />
Time for Plan B, a backup plan, a do-over, something that sticks. But I’m not sure it is moving to Maiden.<br />
<br />
I love the idea of coming full-circle, spending time with my Mom, getting to know my soon-to-arrive baby niece, nephew and cousin, being there to help out with all those family things that need helping out with -- but I am equally nervous about boredom, getting stuck in a rut, having religion pushed in my face, not having enough intellectual challenge, being surrounded by conservative thought and being made fun of for thinking differently - the things that pushed me away from there in the first place. <br />
<br />
My sister said that nothing I could do would surprise her anymore. I didn’t like hearing that. She did not intend it kindly and she lumped me in with my brother which is not a place where anyone would want to reside. But it is also where I have landed by intention as much as by default.<br />
<br />
I am reading “Eat, Pray, Love” by Elizabeth Gilbert. I must be the last female in the western world to do this. She is getting divorced and as a result is assessing her feelings about family and children and her life. As I read I totally identified with what she was saying . Hope she will forgive that I have made a few changes to fit my situation.<br />
<i><br />
</i><br />
<div style="text-align: center;"><i>[It is the potential] shock of stepping off the track of a conventional lifestyle and losing all the embracing comforts that keep so many people on that track forever…. I discover this truth every time I go to a big reunion of my mother’s family in [North Carolina] and I see how everyone is so reassuringly in their position over the years. First you are a child, then you are a teenager, then you are a young married person, then you are a parent [although not always in that order in my family in recent years], then you are a grandparent, then you are retired - at every stage you know who you are, you know what your duty is, and you know where to sit at the reunion. You sit with the other children. or teenagers or young parents or retirees. Until at last you are sitting with the [75] year-olds in the shade, watching over your progeny with satisfaction. Who are you? No problem, you are the one that created all of this. The satisfaction of this knowledge is immediate and what’s more, it’s universally recognized.</i></div><br />
At our reunions someone often tells the story of my grandfather as he sat looking at all of us and said to my grandmother, “Bertha, can you believe we started all of this”<br />
<br />
But I chose to live outside that circle of continuity and certainty. Oh, I return from time to time to dip my foot back in and observe the world my grandparents created. But that world of tradition and orderly disorder with controlling rules and expectations frightens me away every time. I prefer a little chaos. Perpetual white water is easier for me to manage than a comfortable life of convention. I need adventure, change, excitement. I crave an interesting existence.<br />
<br />
But I can’t be foolish and ignore health and long term financial considerations and as another good friend has said, I probably need a place for centering. Yes, a place where I am grounded and understand what is going on around me. A comfort zone. But can I find that in the place I rejected so vehemently when I was younger. The place that in all senses pushed me away. I have changed and mellowed somewhat. Has the same happened there?<br />
<br />
So I will continue to look for the next travel destination while David peruses real estate. We’ve expanded our search a bit but keep being pulled back to Maiden. Wherever we travel we search out a quiet existence. We are no longer party animals. Age is slowing us down and we spend more time in quiet pursuits - writing, reading, listening to music, watching movies, sewing, crocheting . Perhaps we should add a little gardening to that. Perhaps we can create our own quiet island in that sea of extra baggage that would surely haunt me there.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3047973203518838283.post-35784704202928067172010-02-18T15:14:00.000+00:002010-03-06T13:39:59.923+00:00For Lent - I am giving up Being FatLent is about rising from the old and embracing the new. The Rule of Benedict says Lent is the time for trimming the soul and scrapping the sludge (I’ve got a lot of that)off a life turned slipshod, taking stock of time. Lent is about exercising the control that enables us to say no to ourselves so that when life turns hard of its own accord we have the stamina to say yes to its twists and turns with hope. Hmmm, sounds like a diet to me.<br />
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I was raised in the United Methodist Church where Lent meant changing the church vestments to my favorite purple ( I think - or maybe that was Advent - I always get them confused - or maybe it was both) and filling up a slotted card with pennies and later dimes and quarters (inflation) to give to some mission or charity. I guess the money was supposed to come out of my allowance or something but I just remember my Dad giving me the coin to insert each week, no real sacrifice. There must have been a lesson in there somewhere, right? All in all it was just a run up to Easter which meant a new dress and shoes (and until I was old enough to win the protests, a ridiculous hat) and a huge basket full of candy deposited in our living room (right where Santa always left the presents) by some giant furry animal that by all rights should have scared the be-jeezus out of kids.<br />
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We were never asked to make a Lenten sacrifice by giving up something significant like I learned later in life was a big thing in the Catholic families of many of my friends. And even my Jewish friends make sacrifices during Passover- which interestingly coincides.<br />
( That is a whole discussion on religion that I do not want to get into just now. Suffice it to say that there are way too many similarities in all the major religions for it to be a coincidence. Someone is borrowing traditions :)<br />
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Actually, I love the Lenten season. Early spring! It is all about fresh starts and rebirth and new growth and hope and light. Imagine way back when and the earth had grown darker and darker each day and suddenly people began to notice that it was getting lighter and crocuses, jonquils and hyacinths began to peek through the melting snow and buds appeared on the trees and they realized that perhaps they were being given a second chance, a new opportunity. So they made a sacrifice to the gods to say thanks for letting us off this time or they celebrated that whatever sacrifice they may have made a few weeks earlier was paying off. In some cultures the sacrifice was a personal one, like we do no chocolate or alcohol (although it would more likely have been a piece of gold or an animal that would otherwise have been a much needed dinner) In other cultures, it was very personal for the one young male or female that was sacrificed for the good of the community. Thank goodness most cultures in the world today are past that one - although many still make a pretty big deal out of some of those earlier sacrifices with religious ceremonies and even re-enactments, but where no one living is actually hung from a cross or anything.<br />
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I have noticed in recent years that like many religious observances - Christmas, Easter, New Moon, Super Bowl, Opening Day of Major League Baseball - the Lenten sacrifice has become secularized and even people who have never darkened the door of a church are participating. I’m sure we all have at least one friend who is giving up alcohol or chocolate or whatever they want to abstain from for awhile and most are motivated not by religious conviction but by a desire to do something good for themselves - not a bad thing all in all. I just wish we were a bit more honest about it with ourselves and others. Well, you know me so I know that you know ( that I know that you know……) at least one such person because I am giving up Being Fat for Lent.<br />
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I’m not celebrating Lent exactly, it is just that a prescribed 40 day period with a designated start and end date seems doable <br />
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(and BTW why are all the Easters of different religious sects and Passover on a different date each year? You’d think we could come to some compromise solution ,like President’s Day, that would really simplify all our lives and make school calendars much easier to plan)<br />
But I ramble….<br />
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Doable for what, you ask? For doing everything I possibly can to start the scales trending in the other direction. And let me tell you that starting this on the day after I just paid beaucoup bucks to take an amazing cooking class is a REAL SACRIFICE!!!<br />
So I am devising the Lenten Diet (are you listening Mark Herman?) which I will publish, probably weekly. It is a bastardized Atkins ( my past successful weight loss and something David can live with) , Kimkins, Weight-watchers, Scarsdale, Slimfast, non-starvation but definitely controlled eating plan for 40 days only - lo-carb, lo-fat, lo-sugar, lo-calorie, and no doubt with a high bitchiness factor.<br />
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If you read it and think, this is not a healthy eating plan, you are right. (too much cheese and not enough dessert ) But please don’t feel compelled to lecture me about it. It is for 40. Days. Only. And it is a DIET intended to cause my body to get angry at parts of itself and start sending them away, not a life-long healthy eating plan which hopefully I can return to in April.<br />
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I will NOT be drinking alcohol and instead drinking more water (mostly sparkling), herbal tea, and my morning coffee and eating the following (including a small Activia yogurt each day - I need the calcium J) and snacking on carrots, celery, and lo-fat cheese sticks:*<br />
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Day 1 (W 2/17) - that was actually yesterday when I ate what I cooked at Cook School and probably put myself farther behind than ahead ( see upcoming post about that remarkable day)<br />
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Day 2 - protein smoothie (fat free)<br />
Chicken/veggie chili, coleslaw with light dressing<br />
Roasted chicken, sautéed spinach, cumin carrots<br />
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Day 3 - Eggy w/w French toast with no-sugar jam<br />
Tuna salad on lots of lettuce with tomatoes and cucumber<br />
Chicken broccoli bake (chicken and cheese - no pasta), garlic greens<br />
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Day 4 -Eggy “blintzes“ filled with cottage cheese and no sugar jam<br />
Vegetable soup, salad<br />
Stuffed peppers (mince, veggies and cheese), salad<br />
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Day 5 - Cheesy eggs, veggie sausage<br />
Chopped chicken ,lettuce, carrot, celery salad<br />
Roast Turkey breast, cauliflower mash, spinach salad<br />
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Day 6 -. Denver omelet w/ turkey<br />
Taco salad w/ veggie mince & lo-fat cheese<br />
Salmon w/ lemon-dill sauce.. coleslaw, broccoli<br />
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Day 7. Smoothie<br />
Broccoli soup, salad<br />
Chicken breast on tomato & cucumber, romaine salad<br />
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* No that I look at it, it is not so unhealthy if I keep the fat low, but it is really BORING!!! for someone who just learned to cook a perfectly medium-rare duck breast with a veal marrow sauce, wild mushrooms and pancetta.<br />
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I feel a bit like Oprah having it all out there in front of all of you. So if two days from now I change my mind, just don’t give me a hard time about it OK? It’s not like it is some religious thing.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3047973203518838283.post-52853352118745204852010-02-17T16:58:00.000+00:002010-03-06T13:30:31.519+00:00OMG - The Things I Learned in Cook SchoolI am not yet down from the mountaintop, having just spent the day at the Martin Wishart Cook School. I learned so much that I am busily making notes even as I write so that I don’t forget. Here are a few of the takeaways from the day:<br />
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To make a creamy soup lighter, yet more satisfying in smaller quantities, like you might serve as a first course or an amuse bouche, whip it with a wire whisk or immersion blender until frothy and serve in a tea cup for a first course or a demitasse cup as an amuse bouche.<br />
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To cook anything in butter, heat the pan slowly first then add the butter and melt until foamy, do not let separate, keep at an even temp<br />
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The best general cooking oil is pumiced olive oil - generally sold as light olive oil - it is made from an additional pressing after the virgin and regular oils have been extracted. It heats to the perfect temp and won’t add flavor to the food<br />
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For the best scallops you will ever eat, try whenever possible to get them in the shell and hand dived to eliminate the grit in dredged ones or the white preservative in frozen or shelled ones - but in any case, halve them across the grain and a salt the cut side. Cook them in foaming butter in a hot skillet cut side down until caramelization starts to show around the edges, turn just briefly and then remove to blotting paper, squeeze lemon over. <br />
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Chicken stock: Ask the butcher for about 8 chicken carcasses or buy a lot of wings on sale. Fill a stock pot cramming in as much chicken as will fit. Fill pot with water to cover chicken. Bring to a boil and cook for 40 minutes skimming constantly until reduced by 1/3. Strain and store in frig or freeze in small quantities until ready to use (add no seasonings or aromatics!)<br />
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Veal or beef stock: Ask butcher for marrow bones and roast in 375 F oven for one hour; sauté mirapoix (celery, carrot and onion) in pumiced oil until just starting to turn color; deglaze pan with red wine; add bones and tomato puree; cover with water; bring to boil and skim several times until broth starts to clear; Lower heat to lowest setting or put in slow over and cook for 24 hours until reduced by 2/3; Strain and store. Put veggies and bones back in pot, cover with water and repeat to make second batch<br />
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Any meat of poultry should rest for 50% of the cooking time before carving ( so a turkey cooked for 4 hours should rest for 2 hours or a 2” thick filet steak cooked for 5 minutes on each side to perfect medium rare should rest for 5 minutes) Don’t fear it getting cold. If served on a warm plate with a warm sauce it should be perfect eating temp.<br />
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For a wonderful, easy dessert, make sweetened French toast with a good loaf cake of any type, sprinkle a few berries about, drizzle with warmed honey butter, dust with powdered sugar and top with a dollop of crème fraiche<br />
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Always use a warm spoon to serve whipped cream or cream fraiche<br />
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There is so much more that my head is spinning. I will write all about the menu, how to cook a perfect duck breast and good inexpensive wines after I come down off this cloud of wonderfulness.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com1