Thanksgiving

So much to be thankful for! However you may be observing this day, I wish you a very happy one. Friends, food, family, love, life and liberty - and so much more. It is too easy sometimes to dwell upon frustrations, faults and losses - which are so much less than they seem. I continue to be the luckiest person I know, and for that I am both humble and grateful.

Delay and flexibility

The call came Friday evening. My friend had fallen and could not get up. I could not get her up, so she was carried off to North Hospital, where after a few days of evaluation, she was given her release papers on Tuesday. Yesterday I took her home, where she now is, based not on the doctor's recommendations, but on her insistence that she would not go anywhere else.

Last evening I thought, "I'll just leave on Friday as I planned," but after waking this morning about 4 a.m. stewing about what I needed to get done before I left and what had to be in place so I wouldn't worry about my friend while I am away, I concluded that a little more time here in the north country would be a good thing. Besides, I haven't seen snow here since October, so what's the hurry to leave?

Last Sunday we held our touching farewells, my choir and church friends and I, in an event that was also celebratory, given that it was my 71st birthday. Now, that I'm not leaving until Monday morning, I feel a little awkward. What if my friends had planned a celebration of my being finally out of their hair for a few months? What if they're disappointed that I've messed with their plans? That, of course, is juvenile thinking - isn't it? Don't you just love long farewells? Oh what some people will do to get more attention than they deserve.

Frivolous law suits?

"An Indian man is suing the makers of Axe body spray, claiming that in seven years of using the product he has yet to find a girlfriend. Vaibhav Bedi, 26, says that Axe's racy marketing campaign led him to believe the product had love-potion properties and is seeking around $40,000 in damages. 'The company cheated me,' said Bedi. 'It says women will be attracted to you if you use Axe. I used it for seven years but no girl came to me." The Week, November 13, 2009.

After reading this precious bit and laughing out loud, it occurred to me that perhaps we have something good going here. Other lawsuits one might imagine: Two close friends and/or sisters sue because they have been deprived of the bonding moment shown by the sisters/friends who share their experience with Osteoporosis. They seem so happy about it that everyone wants to have it.

Or, how about suing Jamie Lee Curtis because she insisted that you tell the world about your digestive issues, and even though you've eaten Activia for weeks, you still have bowel upsets?

I can envision a wife or girlfriend suing because she learned that her husband/boyfriend was taking Viagra, but did not sweep her off to a desert island retreat on his new motorcycle. She may suspect or have learned that he took someone else instead. But wait, I think that one has already been used.

Possibilities abound for folks who might think they should be able to weave through traffic, narrow roads or over rocks in their new vehicle because they saw this on TV. They could claim that the small print warning that these were professional drivers on closed courses was too hard to read or that "professional drivers" was not well defined, and they were sure their years of driving in and out of traffic lanes and other moving vehicles qualified them as professional too.

Possibly there is the man who sues because he has not had a four hour erection, even though he has been taking his Cialis daily and has spent hours sitting in a bath tub in the lake. He can claim the ad promised him this amazing experience, and he was fully prepared to seek medical care as soon as he had achieved this milestone.

Or perhaps there was the man who took Cialis, was "ready", but couldn't get out of the bathtub. That may be the most likely scenario of all.

I just realised that I like it

What is the difference between catsup and ketchup, besides that my dictionary attached to this Blog editor highlights the former version and says it's not a valid word. My mother always called it catsup, and I assumed that was the way the classy folks pronounced it. That other version, ketchup, was to me clearly a plebeian form, used only by the common folk - like me.

So, perhaps it was a sort of snobbery too that I always said I hate ketchup. I never eat at McDonald's in part because they have ketchup automatically slopped all over their disgusting, soggy, over rated burgers. I do rather like it with French Fries, which I seldom eat for self-explanatory dietary reasons.

So, hating ketchup as I do, I worried about what I would do with the leftover ketchup from my marinade recipe used at last Saturday's dinner party. Then last evening I had a true revelation. Finding that I had, as usual, badly overcooked my beef patty, a/k/a hamburger, I reached in some desperation for the leftover bottle of Heinz and squirted it on my meat. What to my wondering taste buds did I find? I liked it! Oh my goodness! Here I am nearly 71 years old, and I've just discovered that I actually like ketchup on hamburger.

What next, do you suppose? Will I suddenly discover that I also like turnips? Or broccoli? Or rutabagas? These are all vegetables as, I learned in the 1980's, is ketchup. My world expands! But I still refuse to eat at McDonald's.

Dinners must be planned

I realize now why I do not enjoy cooking contests on the Food Network, etc. The idea of getting a meal on the table in a rush, with timing imperative, is way, way, way too stressful for me. I've been preparing this dinner I'm having tonight for weeks, and have devoted the last three days to getting the house in shape, timing and preparing things ahead of time, making lists, then making more lists, then setting up time tables. And I love it. If I had to do it all in a short time, I'd hate it.

So, all is done or scheduled and I'm ready to shower, change and await my good friends. I hope everyone enjoys this as much as I do. I do think the food will be good - and worthy of the company.

Let's walk part 2

Next I walk the older crew,
Prince Albert and Victoria Sue,
One-eyed, flop-eared Princess too.

Had enough? Ok, I'll probably not do this to you again.

Someone pulled up to us at a corner and asked if any of them are for sale. Alas, I said no. I've had them too long and have become attached to them. Thought about it more. No amount of money would tempt me.

Let's walk

Walking with my dogs, reciting dumb poetry and thinking, surely I should share this: Let's go Ms Yo, If you will, Ms Lil, at a pace, Ms Grace. Share? Or not?

Let's see what I can do with Princess, Bert and Vickie - stay tuned or tune out, as you wish.

Group that Goes on Outings

Our last outing of the season to the Minneapolis Institute of Arts to see the Louvre Exhibit to get insight as to what makes a masterpiece. Deciding what is a masterpiece is an occupation for which I will never have any skill, but I did try to learn something yesterday. Those who make this determination have years of experience with art, which directs their judgments. This experience is supplemented by carbon dating and technology that places the item in time and place. I rely on the judgment of experts.

I am of the belief, however, that just because the art is a masterpiece does not mean I have to like it. I can be impressed, or not, and like it, or not. Its merit is not determined by my opinion. But you already knew that, didn't you?

Ick!

Caught one! Now I have to empty the trap. Ick!