Let it snow, let it snow, let it snow!

Preferably someplace else.

The weather forecasters claim it is going to snow tonight. It will be their first real snow of the season and they are all very excited. One would think that the inch they are predicting equals a blizzard.

I don't appreciate their excitement. They're adults now. They don't get snow days; they aren't getting a new sled for Christmas; they don't get to build a really keen snow fort. You can't even build a decent snowman with 1" of snow.

I use to be fairly skilled at creating snowmen. In my younger days. Before I realized that freezing my rear off isn't that much fun. As a matter of fact, many years ago I built a magical snowman.

I had a friend and two kids spending the night because of the snow and before supper we built a truly magnificent snowman in the apartment courtyard. When we got up the next morning, the snowman was gone without a trace.

There were paths in the snow where we had rolled the large snowballs that made up his body and the cleared circle where he had stood was still evident. But no piles of snow where his head or belly might have landed if he had been accosted by hooligans. No carrot nose, button eyes, or twig arms strewn around to show that he had ever existed. Not even his hat.

I ought to be in pictures

I have signed on for another writing class. This one is called "Your Screenwriting Career". That's right, boys and girls, in six short weeks I'm going to be in the movies, or maybe Broadway!

This doesn't mean that I'm giving up on writing the next great American novel. Au contraire, mon ami. I just want to be ready. After 52 weeks on the best sellers list, my public will be demanding the book become a movie. Who better than moi, the author, to write the screenplay?

I think, like Alfred Hitchcock, I will make a brief, understated appearance in each movie. Hopefully standing next to the handsome leading man. Or maybe in his arms. I've always wondered what it would feel like wrapped in Tom Selleck's arms.

Someday, while sitting in a movie theather, you'll be able to nudge your friends, point to the screen, and say loudly enough for all to hear, "Look! Look! That short, pudgey woman standing next to Tom! I knew her when."

Play your cards right, mon ami, and you, too, could find yourself on a casting director's couch someday. Hey, you might even be in the movie!

Penmanship

I just finished a course on Mystery Writing. The last assignment the instructor gave was to write something every day.

You all know I've been through that before. That's why I started this blog, but I'm too lazy or too busy or not motivated enough or I just don't have enough to say to write something every day. But as my new favorite old adage is, "I got off my butt and tried", I'm going to try to write something three or four times a week till the end of the year.

Julie just said, "Every other day would be half-a**ing it." Julie thinks she's funny.

A new old adage

I watched Little House on the Prairie today. There was one line in the show that caught my attention. It was profound without being preachy the way Little House characters can often be. Maybe because it was uttered by guest star Burl Ives instead of the usual goody-goody characters.

Mr. Ives played a crotchy old trapper, Sam Shelby, who had been blind for 5 years. For those 5 years he had stayed in his cabin, venturing forth only as far as the front yard or the outhouse. (That's what he said.)

Trapper Shelby had to get out of his comfort zone to help Laura save Pa. At first, he raved and ranted and refused to go, but nobody can really say no to Laura when she has to save Pa. After Shelby and Laura had crossed the mountain, fell over a downed tree, and waded two creeks, they found Mr. Edwards who fetched the doctor. While the doctor was doing his thing, the old coot was praying that God would help Laura by not letting her Pa die.

He had prayed for years that God would let him see again, but now he had something more important to pray about and he thought God should listen to him. He said, "I got off my butt and tried."

"I got off my butt and tried."

I'm going to have to embroider that one on a pillow.

Brunch

I fixed breakfast this morning. I don’t often do that on Saturday because it’s usually noon before I’m ready to eat, and by noon, you might as well eat lunch. It was a good Saturday morning breakfast. Eggs, bacon, and banana streusel muffins.

While I was watching the bacon fry, my mind was hopping from topic to topic like a drop of water in hot grease. Thinking about my manager’s bacon wrapped stuffed peppers led me to Ron Popeil’s rotisserie to Popeil’s canned hair.

In case you’ve never seen it, canned hair is a product that you spray on bald spots on your head to fool prying eyes into thinking you have hair. I’ve never known anyone who actually uses the stuff, or at least that admits to using the stuff and reportedly it looks and feels like real hair.

I couldn’t help but wonder if it actually worked and if you would have brown dye running down your face if you got caught in the rain.

Then the smoke alarm went off. Nothing burned. It just had to announce to the neighbors that I was in the kitchen. As I was fanning the alarm with a tea towel, it occurred to me that I might want to apologize to my neighbors for disturbing the peace and quiet of a Saturday morning.

About that time, the timer went off for the muffins and I decided there was a time and place for apologizing and when you have hot muffins coming out of the oven is not the right time. Not unless you want to share. And I don’t.

The Day After

Just so you know, according to the National Turkey Federation, the top five most popular ways to serve leftover Thanksgiving turkey are:
* Sandwich
* Soup or Stew
* Casserole
* Stir-fry
* Salad

My favorite way is in a Turkey Pastie, which is a turnover filled with turkey, mixed vegetables, and cheese sauce. They freeze well and can be reheated in a microwave then eaten out of hand. A perfect meal - all the food groups in one disposable container and no clean up.

Happy Thanksgiving!

I put a turkey on to cook this morning then got on the internet to look up something, but as soon as I got connected, I forgot what. Silly me!

I'm cooking the turkey in a crock-pot this year. I'm going to assume that this will be the only Thanksgiving that I do that. A crock-pot turkey has real appeal for those who don't need a large turkey, are satisfied with just white meat, and only have one oven. I fit all those.

But, it's just won't be the same as a picturesque, golden brown, overstuffed turkey sitting on a platter in all its glory. I know that only lasts about 15 minutes before it's a half eaten carcass surrounded by overstuffed diners, but it's tradition.

Why bother having a turkey at all if you can't follow tradition? And you have to have turkey for Thanksgiving. It's ok to have goose or a rib roast at Christmas. Even an eggplant casserole if you eschew meat, but you gotta have turkey for Thanksgiving.


Did you know that Americans consume over 675 million pounds of turkey on Thanksgiving Day? The National Turkey Federation claims 95% of Americans eat turkey on Thanksgiving.

Did you know that turkey contains an amino acid called tryptophan that sets off a chemical reaction that calms you down and makes you sleepy? The National Turkey Federation claims that's a lie. It was the large helping of mashed potatoes, two helpings of corn, three rolls, and four pieces of pie (pumpkin, apple, peanut butter, and sweet potato) that made you sleepy last year.

FOR THE BIRDS

Mr Carlson to Andy: As God is my witness, I thought turkeys could fly. (For those of you too young to recognize it, this quote comes from a Thanksgiving episode of the TV show WKRP in Cincinnati.)


Fowlospophy

Life’s like a bird. It’s pretty cute till it craps on your head.

A bird in the hand makes blowing your nose difficult.

A bird in the hand is kind of messy.

It’s hard to soar like an eagle in the morning when you roost with the buzzards at night.

Eagles may soar, but weasels don’t get sucked into jet engines.

Fowl Language

Question: Why did the gum cross the road?
Answer: It was stuck to the chicken’s foot.

Question: Why did the chicken cross the road?
Answer: To prove to the Opossum that it could be done!

Question: What does a 1,000 lb. canary say?
Answer: Here kitty, kitty, kitty!

Question: What did one baby bird say to the other after finding an orange in their nest?
Answer: Hey! Look at the orange marmalade! (mama laid, get it?)

Did you ever notice that when ducks migrate in their V- formation, one side of the line is longer than the other? Know why that is? There's more ducks in that line.

Say what? Chicken squat, that's what! (I know it makes no sense, but kids used to say it when somebody said, "What?")

From the late Red Skelton: Two seagulls, Gertude and Heathcliff are flying around watching the traffic. Gertrude asks, "Have you seen the new 2005 cars?" Heathcliff replied, "Yeah, I just spotted one!"

Sitting on a branch overlooking the parking lot, the pigeons watched as a Mercedes pulled in below them. "What do you think?" one bird said to the other. "Should we put a deposit on that car?"

A duck walked into a drug store and bought a tube of lipstick. The clerk inquired, "Will that be cash or charge?" The duck replied, "Just put it on my bill!"

I first heard this one on the TV show MASH. Trust me, it's funnier the way I tell it. (In case you missed that episode, Hawkeye was trying to prove he could make more people laugh with this joke than BJ.)

A man walked into the office of a talent agent on the 72nd floor of a skyscraper. "I've got a great act," he tells the agent. "Just watch this." The man opens the window, perches on the ledge and starts flapping his arms. Then he pushes off and flys around outside the window executing intricate aerobatic maneuvers. Having finished his demonstration, the man flaps in to a perfect landing on the window sill and steps back into the agent's office.

"What do you think of that?" he asked the agent.

The talent agent yawned. "Is that all you can do? Bird imitations?"


Bird Duty

Mac had worked at the local zoo for so long, he had only two responsibilities. The first was to care for the zoo's male lion and the second was to feed the zoo's porpoise.

The lion was so magnificent that the Governor had proclaimed it “The State Lion”. The porpoise had lived at the zoo for years. In fact, nobody knew exactly how old the porpoise was, and everyone simply called it “The Immortal Porpoise”. It was thought that the secret to the porpoise's long life was its daily diet of young gulls.

One day Mac came into work and went down to the dock to collect the gulls to feed the porpoise. At the dock, he saw the lion had escaped from his cage during the night and now lay stretched out across the dock, asleep. Mac decided the best course of action was to creep quietly across the lion, get the gulls, feed the porpoise, and then get help to capture the beast. So, he carefully stepped over the lion and filled his bucket full of the young gulls. As Mac carefully crossed back over the lion.....he was arrested!!!!

The charge? Crossing the state lion with young gulls for an immortal porpoise!!

Starting Salary

My co-workers and I are looking for new jobs because our jobs are going to another company in the spring. Wes is always advising us to ask for a higher salary than offered. I hope he finds this story as funny as I do. I re-wrote it just for him.

Reaching the end of a job interview, the Manager asked the young Data Analyst, "And what starting salary were you looking for?"

The candidate confidently replied, "In the neighborhood of $125,000 a year, depending on the benefits package."

The interviewer mulled this over for a few moments and asked, "Well, what would you say to a package of 5-weeks vacation, 14 paid holidays, full medical and dental, company matching retirement fund to 50% of salary, and a company car leased every 2 years - say, a red T-Bird to start?"

The Analyst sat up straight and said, "Wow!!! Are you kidding?"

And the Manager replied, "Certainly, ...but you started it."

http://www.ahajokes.com/off31.html

To my nephew

Happy Birthday, Jeramy!

ZZZZZzzzzzzz

I took a 3 hour nap today. (That is suppose to explain why I haven't blogged for a week.)

Sunday Morning Breakfast

This morning I fixed waffles and pancakes for breakfast. More specifically, "milled flax seed and soy" waffles and pancakes.

I have been trying to eat more whole grains and less meat so a few months ago I bought a heart-healthy pancake mix. This morning I decided to try it. At first, I was going to make pancakes, but the instructions included the directions for waffles and I remembered that I had a waffle iron that had never been used.

So I decided to make waffles and made the batter accordingly. It looked awfully thin to stay on a waffle iron. I re-read the instructions. Hmmm, the last step said "Let set 5 minutes". I unplugged the waffle iron and set the timer.

Five minutes later, the batter had thickened a little. Milled flax seed and soy batter doesn't look like regular pancake batter. The phrases cow fodder and horse feed come to mind.

I heated up the waffle iron for its maiden voyage and poured the right amount of batter onto each square. Then I waited.

And waited. And waited some more. The waffle iron was taking FOREVER so I heated up the griddle to make pancakes. I burned the first one, of course. It's tradition in my house. I threw that one out, adjusted the heat, and started another. While the second one was cooking, I decided the waffle MUST be done so I took it off the grill and put more batter on.

The waffle looked done, but one taste said otherwise. I threw that one away. In the meantime, the second pancake looked burned so I threw that one out, adjusted the heat, and started another.

That's when the smoke alarm when off. When I'm cooking, that's also traditional.

The second waffle was still cooking, but by the time I got the alarm to stop screaming, the third pancake was done. Hunh, apparently milled flax seed and soy pancakes look burnt when they're done. I put another pancake on.

The fourth pancake finished cooking so I stuck them both on a plate and served them with lots of syrup. With enough syrup, they actually tasted pretty good.

The waffle was still cooking.

Eventually, the waffle got done, dark golden brown and crisp. Tasted a lot like the pancakes.

In summary, for 2 pancakes and 1 waffle, I have to wash a waffle iron, a skillet, 3 measuring cups, a measuring spoon, a bowl, 2 plates, 3 forks, 2 spoons, a spatula, the stove top, the counter top, and my nightgown where I dribbled syrup. Makes frozen waffles sound reallllly good.

Halloween Leftovers

Did you hear about the cannibal who was expelled from school? He was buttering up his teacher.

What did the cannibal do when he saw an "All you can eat" restaurant? He had 2 waiters and a busboy.

Do zombies eat popcorn with their fingers? No, silly, they eat the fingers separately.

What does a skeleton order at a restaurant? Spare ribs.

What do little ghosts drink? Evaporated milk. (That's why they can evaporate into thin air - get it?)

What do ghosts put on top of an ice cream sundae? Whipped scream.

What does a vampire never order at a restaurant? A stake sandwich.

HALLOWEEN TRAGEDY

I am not scared of goblins or ghouls
and things that go bump in the night

Werewolves and bats and witches and such
do not give me much of a fright.

But there is this one thing that scares me to death
and only this one thing I fear

And that's to open my fridge at night
and find that I'm all out of beer.