Frog In North Georgia

We picked up Grandma and went to lunch where we ran into Uncle Hugh, who if anyone remembers outranks me because he was born sooner.  He is not really my uncle, but a long time family friend.  He’s (obviously) been around longer than me.

Hugh is my favorite Englishman.  I don’t actually know where he was born or when he and his mother, who married an American, came to America.  But he can affect any form of American or English accent, which is a good party trick.  And of course the accents come and go of their own free will.

We just ordered when he appeared.  He works very close by.  So this was a nice surprise to run into him.  DD is mad about him.  I suspect she is still not convinced that he is not Santa.  Every year around November he grows a shaggy beard.  I had thought it was just for warmth.  But he told me today that no, it’s because the kids think he’s Santa.  And he thinks that’s damn funny.  DD told me today she knows it is Uncle Hugh and not Santa.  But she doesn’t seem certain.  When she was two she was certain he was Santa.

Grandma announced that she saw the French Presidents wife on tv.

I said, “Oh yes, Carla Bruni.  She’s a pop star.”

Grandma is pleased that Carla is a modern woman who has not given up her singing just because she married the French President.

Photo by beyrouth

I like that Sarkozy is of Russian immigrant parentage; and Obama is just as American as I am with his international background. Wahoo, first generation like me.  Then I mentioned that DH got very annoyed with me when I told him that because I was stunned that he did not recognize Sarkozy as a Russian name.

Really?  You didn’t know Sarkozy is Russian?  He hissed at me something like it’s a foreign name baby.

Right, we weird children of immigrant people all have weird names and are all alike in our weirdness.  No offense taken.

Grandma said in a conspiratorial whisper, “We always have a lot of White Russians in France.”

When she says White Russians, she means those with royal lineage, and often money.  I said, “Well now you just have a lot of Russians.  The Wall fell in 1989.”

On the way home we passed the sitting area in front of her building.  It has nice big garden boxes and lawn chairs and is somewhat sheltered from the wind.  It was empty.  Grandma announced, “No Russians today.”

I said, “No Russians today?”

She said, “Yes, we have a lot of them living here.  They like this weather.”

I said, “You mean cold, like the motherland?”

She said she guesses.

I said “Don’t guess, most of their ports are north of the 70th parallel and freeze in the winter.  It’s an excellent reason to invade your southern neighbors.”

She said, “Well, they like to come to France.”

I said, “Grandma, everyone likes to come to France.  The food is good and the economy isn’t collapsing.”

Tags: carla bruni, grandma, russian immigrant, sarkozy is russian, white russians.

Grandma called and announced that it has been about three weeks since we last visited.  So we should come.  That means me and DD. 

We would visit her every week of course - but her calendar is too full for that.  I made sure that she can fit us in.  She doesn’t invite us.  She calls and announces that our presence is required.

This makes me laugh.  Because she thinks this is how invitation works.

Tags: full calendar, grandma, summoned.

UK courts convicted one terrorist and refused to release another today.

Belfast militant convicted of N.Ireland attack | ajc.com

A Belfast judge convicted a notorious Protestant militant Friday of trying to kill Catholic politicians during his bizarre — and internationally broadcast — attempt to attack the Northern Ireland Assembly two years ago.

UK court: No bail for cancer-hit Lockerbie bomber | ajc.com

A court refused Friday to release from prison a cancer-stricken Libyan man convicted of the 1988 bombing of Pan Am Flight 103 over the Scottish town of Lockerbie.

The Court of Criminal Appeal in Scotland acknowledged that Abdel Basset Ali al-Megrahi’s cancer was incurable, but it said he could not be freed on bail pending an appeal of his life sentence for the bombing that killed 270 people, most of them American.

Tags: belfast militant convicted, lockerbie bomber, UK court.

Photo by L. Marie

Something lovely has happened.  The local grocery store now carries Fol Epi cheese.  Yum! I love Fol Epi cheese.  It is sweet and nutty, somewhat similar to Swiss cheese.  But it has a much more creamy and buttery texture.

Yes, I know it is considered weird and snobbish here to have several different types of cheese in the refrigerator and get genuinely excited when another variety appears in the grocery.

Today was our second trip to the grocery this week.  DH has become a fan of Jacques Pépin and needed ingredients to try a new recipe.  Yum again.

Tags: cheese variety, fol epi cheese, Jacques Pepin.

Apparently, comedian Denis Leary has published a book that offends the autism community.  The idea that Leary might publish anything that doesn’t offend somebody is funny to me.  Isn’t that what Leary does - mock people?

McCarthy calls Leary ‘obviously stupid’ - Access Hollywood - msnbc.com

Autism activist Jenny McCarthy has a few words for Denis Leary’s recent categorization that those diagnosed with autism are, “… stupid. Or lazy. Or both” in his new book, “Why We Suck: A Feel-Good Guide to Staying Fat, Loud, Lazy and Stupid.”

Attacking the health concerns of small children is never a good plan.  But Leary says his intent was actually to make fun of grown men who imagine they have autism and use it to explain away their stupidity.  I haven’t read the book.  But of course, now I must read it.

Denis Leary

My favorite Christmas movie, The Ref, stars Denis Leary and Kevin Spacey.  Yes, that is my favorite Christmas movie.  It’s sarcastic and filled with dark humor.  I love it.  I get to  put in a dvd and go to somebody else’s dysfunctional Christmas celebration for ninety minutes.

My very favorite part is when Kevin Spacey’s character says “Mother, I know what I’ll get you for Christmas next year, a big wooden cross.  So whenever you feel underappreciated, you can climb up there and nail yourself to it.”

Oh yeah.  That’s a Christmas that could have been had with my family.

A close second favorite is Denis Leary saying, “I’ve hijacked my fucking parents.”

Bizarrely, I thought that the VHS version of the movie was a gift from my first ex-husband.  I have only two fond memories of him, I think.  And that is one.  The other is when he called my brother couch-boy.  Anyway, the VHS version wore out.  I threw it and the VHS away and got a dvd player and backordered The Ref, and waited and waited for it to come out on dvd.

Now that I’ve linked to The Ref on IMDB I see the movie dated 1994, which means it probably could not be a gift from first ex-husband.  Excellent.  I have no idea where I got that original VHS.  It’s a mystery.

Tags: autism community, Denis Leary, Jenny McCarthy, Kevin Spacey, The Ref, why we suck.

Socks

I have decided that my SIL has an amazing talent for choosing socks.  It could be her superpower even.  That probably doesn’t sound like the compliment that I mean it to be.  But I’m a practical person, and therefore a huge fan of talents that are useful.

Last year, or possibly the year before (I suck at chronology) she and BIL went to visit her family in great white North as I like to call it (Minnesota) or as DH says, on the frozen tundra, then returned to not as cold Georgia with socks as gifts for everybody.  I thought it was cute.  Until I wore the socks.  Now I think it is terrific.  I had absolutely no idea that socks could function this well as a foot warming device.

I could also be exaggerating her sock choosing talent because I might suck at choosing socks just as much as I do at telling time.  I’ve been a slow learner about dressing in layers and other techniques of keeping oneself warm.  It’s from years of living in warm climates I’m certain.

Whatever, at least one year later I am ridiculously pleased with these two pairs of socks.  I ended up with two by accident.  One pair was given to DH, but are too small for him.  So I have two pair, lucky me.

Tags: choosing socks, dressing in layers, foot warming.

Gingrich wants to end adolescence.  I just want to end the tired cycle of American women on the male professional track.  Really, now that we know the way women’s bodies work who thinks it is a good idea to graduate high school at eighteen, undergraduate education at twenty-two, grad school around twenty-four or maybe twenty-six, work for say four years and then think about having children if they desire careers?

Not me.  I graduated college at twenty-seven, wondering how many years I should spend working before children, and how many years until biology caught up with me.  I don’t wish that kind of mental and emotional ping-pong on anybody.

Do I think women should get pregnant at sixteen, become dependent on men and stay barefoot?  No, let’s not go there either.

I do think there should be respected vocational and collegiate school tracks available in high schools.  And that Gingrich has a real point about expecting young people to work and be responsible.  But it isn’t going to happen overnight.  Our laws don’t allow work until the age of sixteen, and that is restricted.  And the law doesn’t recognize individuals as adults until the age of eighteen, making it impossible for warehouses and many other types of business to hire younger teens.

And what insurance companies are going to cover younger employees and their families?

And families need to have access to good, affordable childcare prior to their children reaching school age. Otherwise, who will be minding their children while they work?  Entering the professional world at sixteen, rather than twenty-six would mean younger parents.  Would these younger graduates earn enough to support themselves, and possibly a young family?

Nothing can stop the natural occurrence of raging teen hormones that marks adolescence.  But why compound the problem with idleness?

I’m not a grandparent.  And I’m not going to go off on a tangent about how our grandparents or even parents may have married young, had children young, and still worked and may have gone to school.  I don’t think the American social model of the 50s, 60s, or 70s was better than what exists today.  Except maybe conscription - but that’s another blog post.

I agree that our present educational system needs improvement and the social model isn’t working.

Newt Gingrich: Let’s End Adolescence - BusinessWeek

The solution is dramatic and unavoidable: We have to end adolescence as a social experiment. We tried it. It failed. It’s time to move on. Returning to an earlier, more successful model of children rapidly assuming the roles and responsibilities of adults would yield enormous benefit to society.

Prior to the 19th century, it’s fair to say that adolescence did not exist. Instead, there was virtually universal acceptance that puberty marked the transition from childhood to young adulthood. Whether with the Bar Mitzvah and Bat Mitzvah ceremony of the Jewish faith or confirmation in the Catholic Church or any hundreds of rites of passage in societies around the planet, it was understood you were either a child or a young adult.

Tags: adolescence, biology, BusinessWeek, education, Gingrich.

Blog advertising can go too far.  Really.  It is annoying to visit what appears to be a personal blog only to discover that not one post on the front page, but three out of four appear to be paid posts.  And there is a banner ad that is unrelated to the content.  And 125×125 ads also completely irrelevant to the theme.

There’s a nice welcome to the splog (spam blog).  You can see that I surfed onto several of them today.

I’m not anti-advertising or anti-commerce. In fact, I really like targeted ads on some of the software sites that I visit.  Some of them save me a separate search for things I need anyway.  So nobody start flaming me about how advertising keeps many websites free to consumers.  I get that.  I do.  And I don’t mind people funding their blogs with relevant ads.  Turn a profit even.  Long live capitalism.

But for the love of all that is good and holy don’t insult me by asking me to refer readers to a splog filled with irrelevant crap.

If your blog is about humor; have humor ads. If you have a personal blog, general ads (but not 60 of them all unrelated).  Clearly, I’m no advertising genius.  It’s just common sense.

Obviously, I don’t make any money with entrecard.  But I do try to approve entrecards that link to sites about humor, cooking, parenting, writing - stuff that gets mentioned on this blog.  In other words, things that if you’re reading here, might be enjoyable to also read somewhere else.  Even things that never come up here, but are nicely done.  Not crap.

Ok, deep breath.  Rant off.

Tags: advertising, capitalism, common sense, consumers, content, entrecard, Money, personal blog, post, relevant ads, spam, splog, theme.

This is one of my favorite recipes, Shrimp and Andouille Sausage with Mustard Sauce - Allrecipes.

1. Bring a large pot of lightly salted water to a boil. Add angel hair pasta, and
   cook for 5 to 6 minutes or until al dente. Drain, and set aside.
2. Place sausage in a large, heavy skillet over medium heat. Cook and stir
   until evenly browned; drain. Mix in shrimp, green onions, mushrooms,
   and garlic. Cook about 1 minute, until shrimp are opaque. Remove
   mixture from skillet, and set aside.
3. Pour wine into the skillet, and scrape up browned bits. Cook until
   reduced by about 1/2. Mix in heavy cream, and continue cooking until
   reduced by about 1/3. Stir in mustard and Worcestershire sauce. Season
   with salt and pepper.
4. Return sausage mixture to the skillet, and blend into the wine mixture.
   Cook and stir until heated through. Serve over angel hair pasta.

I have tried making it without the cream.  We liked it so much in the first place, that the cream didn’t seem important.  But it is. It’s what keeps the mouth from catching fire.  Using one cup of cream works out fine, however.

Also, I like Allrecipes because it’ll make a grocery list for me.  And I’m lazy that way.  I also use a whole package of andouille because the kids have boycotted shrimp.  Stepson doesn’t eat shrimp unless it is fried.  DD doesn’t eat shrimp because of the Little Mermaid and Finding Nemo.  It’s an ethical decision.

Oh, and I’m told by DH that angel hair is not manly enough pasta.  The thinnest pasta that he is willing to consume is vermicelli.  None of that fairy pasta.

Tags: andouille, angel hair pasta, favorite recipes, finding nemo, grocery list, little mermaid, shrimp, stepson.

I found some tablecloths on sale.  It seems as though I have just purchased table linens.  But actually, the last time I purchased tablecloths was when we moved into our house - in 2000.

Cotton Tablecloth

I was able to find a nice gold Provencal pattern.

Provencal Pattern

Oh, and I found complimentary chair cushions too. Yeah.

New Linen

Tags: chair cushions, Cotton, gold, provencal, table linens, tablecloths.