Monday Mirth :: two steps back

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Happy Monday

Februarying in fine fashion

Rhett wondered where the candy was

What have you been doing? you may be thinking.

What have we not been doing? Is this a race-to-the-finish year, even more than most years?

I suppose it remains to be seen, but for now, the pirate is of that persuasion.

It seems we are proceeding at an insane pace.

Last week, the Chericas -- consisting of our Erica, her husband Chad, and the boys, Rhett and Elliot -- were all sick with colds and other maladies.

I went over on Tuesday, when the worst was over, and took the ingredients to make Mari's Creamy Chicken Taco Soup for them.

And if you have not made that soup yet, I would like to know what you're waiting for.

Because it is delightful. I made it again last Friday, for my gang.

TG said I was to make sure I put that recipe into the rotation, meaning, make it again soon. It was truly delicious.

Oh and put two whole blocks of cream cheese in, instead of one and a half. Just saying.

In Columbia and need barbecue? Go to The War Mouth.

Speaking of last Friday, Dagny was here with me for most of the day.

Since she is home schooled, the first order of business was to spend a few hours on her lessons.

She had already done some of her work at home that morning.

Then we got busy, dividing duties, each with our own portable caddy of cleaning supplies.

Dagny is a diligent cleaner, having been trained by her mother. She is particularly good at dusting, and cleaning bathrooms.

But she does floors too.

Even with two of us, it took four-or-so hours to clean the house. Eventually we were done and I went to get ready for the evening.

Audrey arrived at about five o'clock with one of Dagny's little friends from when she attended the Christian school, which friend was going to spend the night at Audrey and Dagny's house.

We all ate the Creamy Chicken Taco Soup. I'd made cornbread muffin tops to go along with it.

Audrey's boyfriend Mike joined us, and later we all had coffee and chatted for about an hour.

Like McArthur, we shall return

The next day -- last Saturday -- in the afternoon, TG and I met Audrey and Mike at a new restaurant we wanted to try, and enjoyed a sumptuous barbecue lunch.

Dagny was spending a few hours at the home of her little friend who had spent the previous night with them.

Actually I would never have heard of the restaurant we went to, except for TG's and Chad's golf skills.

They played in a local tournament several months ago, and it was a team-play situation, and they were on the same team.

And their team did well enough that they each were given a generous gift card to The War Mouth in Cottontown, South Carolina.

Cottontown is a section of downtown Columbia described thusly by Historic Columbia: 

Established in the late 1890s, Cottontown is listed as the “Bellevue Historic District” in the National Register of Historic Places and is protected as an architectural conservation district by the City of Columbia. Bounded by Grace Avenue, Bull Street, Elmwood Avenue and Main Street, the neighborhood is remarkable as an intact example of one of Columbia’s earliest planned suburbs.

But wherever it was situated, The War Mouth would be an outstanding place to eat.

We weren't totally in the dark as to the quality of the restaurant, though; Cherica had already used their gift card a few weeks ago and declared the barbecue plentiful and exceptionally good.

Elliot only wanted home and hearth

We ordered plates heaped with luscious pulled pork, a bodacious serving of ribs, cole slaw, pickles, and a roll.

I gave my roll to TG and did my best to eat everything else but ended up giving Mike one of my ribs and taking about a third of my pulled pork home for later.

Spectacular. We will return to The War Mouth.

After that delightful experience, we repaired to a nearby Starbucks and, over coffee while sitting outside in the warm day, talked about a number of things.

The next day -- last Sunday -- was cloudy and overcast, but again warm, with highs near seventy. 

Rhett had been given a pair of glittery red heart-shaped paper glasses in his Sunday School sack, and I convinced him to model them for me.

He cooperated, although he was more interested in the candy and other treats to be found inside said Sunday School sack, than in peering through a pair of twee no-lens glasses.

Baby Elliot was over it by noon when church concluded, and had a mini-meltdown while Dagny attempted to console him.

He needed to go home to his lunch and an afternoon nap.

This past Monday we had a truly rainy day. It began raining late on Sunday night and rained steadily until Monday early evening.

New valentines Mike and Audrey

I was happy that I didn't have to go anywhere, as I love a rainy day and enjoyed every minute of it.

Except, I couldn't figure out why I was sneezing so much.

Then yesterday I woke up with a cold. Oh. Belay that!

Did I not just have a cold/flu in December? Was I not in fact sick twice in December? So this is not fair. And it is most unusual.

However I will say, a fresh spate of winter cold illness seems to be "going around" in our area.

My plans for Valentine's Day were not complicated anyway, but now they are nonexistent except, tomorrow night, Audrey and Dagny and I are having dinner with our dear friend Marsha.

Of course I have a sweetheart treat bag for TG, and he is sure to come home today with something special for me. I hope there is a heart-shaped balloon.

On Saturday, we plan to drive up to Greenville and introduce Audrey's Mike to my sister and brother-in-law, Kay and Pierre-Philippe, and also to Henry.

Coffee cake and coffee will be involved.

Never stop valentining

I shall report faithfully on all of the pirate's peregrinations.

Meanwhile I am curious: what are your plans for Valentine's day and week? Do tell in the comments. Don't leave anything out.

Where is that box of Kleenex? I'm about to sneeze again.

And that is all for now.

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Happy Wednesday :: Happy Valentine's Day

Monday Mirth :: good question

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Happy Monday

Monday Mirth :: fetch

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Happy Monday

Love is the answer

Whatever the question, love is the answer

I guess it's about time I got you all caught up on what's to be caught up on.

Grab a can of Coke and a box of popcorn because there's a lot of ground to cover.

Shall we start at the beginning?

Audrey and her gentleman caller

That would be New Year's Eve of 2023, which you may recall was a Sunday.

It was on that Sunday, at the conclusion of the morning service, that a fine gentleman joined our church.

As he was alone when he joined -- as in, not accompanied by a female -- and looked to be of a certain age, and was a well-dressed and attractive man, when church was over I suggested to Audrey that we make it a point to greet him and welcome him to our congregation.

I've completed my February decorating

(Yes; I mounted a flagrant charm offensive. I have no shame and nothing to hide. My beautiful daughter is single.)

It turned out that the gentleman's name was Mike (still is), and that he is a widower whose wife of thirty-one years passed away in the summer of 2020.

They shared three now-adult children, none of whom live in South Carolina.

Dagny and Baby Elliot

Mike is an engineer in the tech field, and as such he travels extensively, all over the world.

But he was in town on that day, and as it happened, the next day too. I know because I invited him over to our house for New Year's Day festive party-type food.

It was a cold day when Rhett joined us at the Asheville Cracker Barrel

And he graciously accepted and, when he arrived, brought along several small manila envelopes containing foreign coins -- and even some folding money -- that he has collected on his travels, to give to my grandchildren.

Only, two-year-old Rhett was not at the party. He was mid-nap when it was time to come over, so Chad had offered to stay home with him. 

Hearts are active this winter

Elliot was there, but at four months he is too young to care about coins from any country, much less foreign ones.

But Dagny was present, and she is wild about anything international. Of the one-hundred ninety-five countries in the world today, she can identify on sight the flags of at least eighty percent of them.

Ember loved her purple backpack with matching triceratops

She was thrilled to receive the coins and has since been given even more for her collection.

So it was that we got to know Mike and it was a pleasant experience which all of us enjoyed, on the first day of the new year.

And now we are at Groundhog Day, and Punxsutawney Phil has predicted an early spring, and Mike has practically become one of the family.

The Kiss: Tiny book about a big subject

That's because over the past four weeks, he and Audrey have become what is called, in the parlance of relationships, an item.

As in, Audrey has a suitor in our friend Mike and I don't think he's going anywhere. Just last Friday night he took her out to dinner at Ruth's Chris Steak House.

Dagny had been hankering after this Stanley tumbler

(There is more but I cannot tell it right now. I just thought my readers would want to know this happy news.)

In fact Mike joined us when, on January thirteenth, we all drove up to Asheville, North Carolina, to meet our son Andrew and granddaughter Ember for a meal at Cracker Barrel.

The new LVP flooring ends at the new carpet in our bedroom

We had not seen Andrew and Brittany and Ember and Guy for Christmas because they usually spend that holiday with her family.

So we had not been able to exchange gifts with them, and we wanted to get that taken care of.

TG had balloons, presents, cards, and candy

Brittany and Baby Guy were absent because she was spending a few days out of town, with friends that she and Andrew made while in flight school.

Stephanie and her family were not with us either, so it was just TG and me, the Chericas (consisting of Chad, Erica, Rhett, and Elliot), and Mike, Audrey, and Dagny.

We had a wonderful time. 

Here's how it looks going up the steps into the kitchen

We had a hearty supper and visited for a good long while and exchanged our Christmas gifts, and made some memories, before it was time to go.

The next big thing on the horizon was TG's birthday, which takes place exactly one month after Christmas.

All ready to tuck into that cheesecake

The whole gang, including Mike, plus our friend Andrea from church, assembled at Sun Ming, which is one of my favorite restaurants.

There were ten of us if you count Baby Elliot, even though he does not yet eat Chinese food.

We sat around a huge circular table with a massive Lazy Susan in the middle. 

This cheesecake is light, rich, and not too sweet

We ordered enough General Tsao Chicken, Sesame Beef, Beef Steak Kew, Orange Chicken, Bourbon Chicken, and Sweet and Sour Pork for everyone to share. There was a huge bowl of piping hot white rice which our server replenished once, and another of steamed broccoli.

I made sure there was an order of egg fried rice too. Chad and Erica enjoyed egg rolls for an appetizer.

We ate and talked and spun the Lazy Susan and ate and talked and spun it some more and pretty soon the delicious dishes were all but gone.

A few boxes with leftovers went home, but that's just because we weren't going to leave anything there.

Mike joined us for the party

Replete with TG's birthday dinner, we all went to our house for dessert.

My usual pattern is to make TG a German Chocolate cake, but this year I was too distracted.

It came to me in a dream that in lieu of TG's favorite dessert, I should get a cheesecake sampler from Costco.

I ended up reading this review of, and ultimately purchasing, a plain cheesecake from Costco.

And we will be doing that again, because that is one luscious cheesecake.

For toppings we had preserves and chocolate syrup

I swerved served it with four different kinds of jams and preserves -- Bonne Maman Four Fruits Preserves, Strawberry Preserves and Seedless Red Raspberry Jam by Smuckers, and Danish Choice Blackcurrant Preserves.

Several years ago Audrey gave me three crystal jam jars, all different designs, with their own matching spoons.

I used those to hold the jams and preserves, and also filled a small crystal cream pitcher with chocolate syrup.

The view of our new floor, from the kitchen

Everyone was able to decorate their slice of plain cheesecake with whatever topping struck their fancy.

I chose Bonne Maman Four Fruits Preserves and I did not regret it.

Take my word for it: store-bought cheesecake is a good option for a birthday party dessert. Especially if it's as delectable as this one.

There was ample reason to celebrate

Then TG opened his gifts and was pleased to see that his girls had bought him a new rangefinder for golf -- something he had been wanting.

Baby Elliot was so tired that he went fast asleep as I held him, facing forward.

All that there was to see was not enough to keep him awake.

They had to tell me that Elliot had fallen asleep

Even before TG's birthday I had embarked on a two-week saga that turned out to be both time-consuming and stressful. 

That involved choosing and having installed, new flooring for our TV room and a short hallway, closet, and laundry room that branch off from it.

At first when we decided to get rid of the butterscotch-colored carpet -- on the floor since 2016 -- I thought I wanted hardwood flooring.

I mean, I knew I wanted hardwood flooring.

We call this jam jar the grenade

But it turned out that I did not have the quality of subfloor that would take hardwood flooring while keeping any manufacturer warranty in force.

We could have rebuilt the subfloor but that was additional time and expense.

Since the laundry room was involved, i ultimately chose LVP and it was installed this past week.

I like it and so far I would recommend it. It looks nice and is one-hundred percent waterproof.

We're not expecting a flood but you never know when something is going to be spilled.

Fruit preserves on your plain cheesecake is a solid choice

We may install more of this NuCore Cortado Oak in our house -- in the kitchen, to be specific -- and if we do, I'll keep you updated. 

So now you are caught up. How does that make you feel? Do you love it?

Let me know in the comments.

And that is all for now.

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Happy Friday :: Happy Weekend :: Happy February

Monday Mirth :: don't be that guy

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Happy Monday

Monday Mirth :: true that

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Happy Monday

The owls are not what they seem

Coming to grips with grapes

Extra credit if you can name the cultural reference that informs the title of my post today.

Hint: You have to be extra weird to get it. But in a good way, like the pirate.

And the way it ties in today, is on the subject of grapes and at least one other thing.

Have you tried lately to buy a good grape?

You should know that for many years I have been more or less obsessed (overused word; forgive me but in this case it is accurate) with red grapes.

Green grapes are okay but I'm going for the resveratrol in the red kind.

For a long time, as soon as I bought my grapes, I froze them.

Then, when thawed for a certain length of time (about ten minutes), they were like round semi-mushy popsicles. Most delicious and fun to eat.

Best for summertime, but I look for grapes year round.

Here is the problem: It has become difficult to find good-tasting grapes.

And then there is the price, which is at times so outrageous that I won't buy the grapes no matter what they taste like.

But lets talk about taste. And texture! As those concepts apply to the red table grape.

Two things are paramount: a snap when you bite, and a tart-sweet flavor. Juicy of course, but not too juicy.

Naturally then, when I come upon the grapes in the produce department, I first look them over. I'm checking out their overall appearance, to include their size. And then if I think there is hope, I taste one or two.

If you put a grape in your mouth and bite down and there is a slight resistance, that's a good sign.

But then the taste which follows must be an ideal balance between sweet and tart.

It's a heady mix and more often than not, the grapes I encounter these days do not pass muster.

I've tried putting red grapes on my list when TG graciously goes to the store for me, and keeping my fingers crossed when he comes back and I find that he bought some.

Easy Candied Pecans cooling on the Silpat

It's not that he is ignorant of grape characteristics; it's just that he does not eat them, so it doesn't mean as much to him what they taste like.

He makes every attempt to bring me what I'm looking for in a grape, and often succeeds.

But a few months ago I had to tell him that what he'd brought home was not up to snuff in the least.

They were large round globe grapes.

I'm sorry and if you like this variety of grape, God bless you, but for me? Just no.

These grapes are, one, too big. Too round. And, two, they have seeds.

SEEDS! I mean, who wants a grape with seeds? Not the pirate.

You have to bite one -- they're huge, nearly ping-pong-ball sized, so you pretty much have to bite them in half anyway -- and those seeds (like, four of them) are in the middle.

Then you have a decision to make: either crunch on those, which is unpleasant, or tease them out with a fingernail and put them in your napkin.

Ugh.

It destroys the grape eating experience, I am here to tell you. But then there isn't much to eating that kind of grape to begin with.

There is no snap and there is no tartness. What's inside is mushy sweetish water, the flavor of which barely if at all resembles that of a red table grape.

I don't know what they're thinking by putting those on offer in the produce department because I cannot imagine who likes them.

So anyway last week, after New Year's celebrations had died down and become a thing of the recent past, I went to the store with a list.

By the way, normally on New Year's -- either Eve or Day -- we don't do anything special.

But this year, since I'd been sick at Christmas, I wanted to make some festive foods and have the family over.

We also invited a new friend from church, who accepted our invitation and it was nice getting to know him.

I served (again) Naughty Hammie Sammies. It will have to be a while before we have those again, because they are addictive.

Funeral Potatoes ready to go into the oven

(And I should tell you that instead of the three-fourths pound of shaved ham called for by the recipe, I use a full pound. Go thou and do likewise.)

In addition to the sammies we had Funeral Potatoes (recipe tweaked to include one cup of sautéed onion and a packet of Ranch dressing mix), a reprise of our Christmas Eve bacon-wrapped Lit'l Smokies with a BBQ dipping sauce, baked beans, deviled eggs, pirate cheese ball with cracker assortment, tortilla strips with salsa, Easy Candied Pecans, and Brownie Pie served with Reddi-wip, the price of which has gone through the proverbial roof.

(I mean, seven dollars for a can of whipped cream? Give me a break. We bought the store brand.)

Back to the grape story, which took place a couple of days after our congenial New Year's soirée.

Standing in front of the refrigerated grape area, said grapes already loaded into cellophane bags, not even having planned to buy any but noticing that they looked like the kind of grape I like, I tasted one.

It was perfect. That grape was just the right size -- not too small, not too large, about the size of a marble, Goldilocks in grape form -- and it had the snap. And it had the tart-sweet flavor.

We were there. We had arrived in beautiful downtown gorgeous got-to-have-some Grapeville.

Thrilled, I picked up a bag stuffed to the gills with grapes.

At the till I loaded not just my grapes but all of my purchases onto the conveyor belt. I know most of the cashiers at this particular store -- well I mean, at any given time there are only perhaps two cashiers ringing up groceries -- but I noticed that a young girl unfamiliar to me was working that day.

When I say young, I mean maybe eighteen years old. She was tallish and slender, but what stood out and was in fact impossible to ignore, was her hair.

Now mind you I had not stared directly at the young lady; I was busy with my stuff and I don't stare anyway.

But I could not help but notice the constant, near-obsessive relationship the young cashier had with her hair.

The hair was long -- to the middle of her back -- and stick-straight. It was mouse-brown in color, unexceptional in that way but nevertheless clean and soft and well cared for.

It was hair that gets a great deal of attention from the one upon whose head it lives. Hair that has frequent contact with shampoos and conditioners, not to mention styling tools and a hairbrush.

Because of its length and texture, and the fact that it was unrestrained, the hair hung like a soft curtain over the girl's face.

It wasn't just in her face; it was all around her face, in fact obscuring her face unless she touched and moved the hair every six to eight seconds.

Which she did. 

In my peripheral vision I could see that she would first run her hand across the top of her head to reposition the hair, a useless gesture because it immediately fell right back into her face.

Deep Dish Brownie Pie is one hundred percent legit

She would then toss her head before sweeping the hair across the back of her neck and over onto one shoulder so that if she held her head at an awkward angle, for a few seconds at least the hair hung across only one side of her face.

There was no scrunchie lodged on her wrist, to use when she'd gotten enough of incessantly fooling with the hair. She did not anchor the hair behind her ears or make any attempt other than constantly moving it around, to keep the hair out of her face.

At about that time I was up. It was my turn and I needed to hand the girl a can of cut green beans and say I have twelve of these (Rizzo eats green beans every day at three o'clock), so that I didn't have to haul the whole cardboard tray of them up onto the belt.

And the cashier kindly and efficiently dealt with that, and when she did, I noticed something.

I realized with what I admit was a jolt, that she was a he.

My cashier was a young man and not a young lady, as I had supposed for the past several minutes.

He was a person of gentle features and as I said, slender. And then there was the abundance of hair, and what seemed to me to be a distinctly feminine preoccupation with it.

As the young man continued to struggle with his luxuriant hair between scanning each item -- a situation which must have been exhausting to deal with throughout a multi-hour shift -- I wondered why someone in management had not told him that he needed to pull his hair back and secure it somehow.

Because if he got careless and leaned down three inches while the conveyor belt was running, bringing an order close enough for him to scan the items, it would have grabbed his hair. The potential liability for the store was clear -- at least to me.

And if that had happened, there would have been a kerfuffle resulting in some hair having to be cut, if not an even worse scenario unfolding.

Not to mention the distraction of a grocery cashier constantly touching and flipping and sweeping and obsessing about the hair on their head, in a setting where food is being handled.

Was this a case of someone in authority not wanting to risk offending an employee seeming to display a certain identity, even though under the circumstances it was a clear dereliction of duty not to do so?

Even though by not saying something, in my opinion the management was at the very least ignoring common-sense protocol, and at the worst, putting the young man at risk, at least marginally, of injury?

I have an uneasy feeling that if the cashier had been a female, the directive would have been issued forthwith: hair should be secured so that it does not fall into the face and have to be constantly touched, especially when worn at a length that makes it a hazard when working near a conveyor belt.

At any rate, we'll never know.

The young man rang up my groceries the rest of the way and said he hoped I'd have a good day, and I thanked him and since I always say I appreciate you (because I do), I said that and walked away.

When I got home, I was so excited to have some really good grapes. I washed and tasted one or two more as I put my groceries away.

Rhett at Aunt Audrey's, fixing to pray over his dinner

Only, later -- the next day, to be exact -- I realized something.

In the bag I had purchased, a quantity of good grapes -- the kind I like, the kind I look for, the kind I love -- had been placed on top of a quantity of those huge round watery seed-laden globe grapes that I hate.

The ones with no taste and no texture but no dearth of utter nonsense.

It was only then that I saw clearly marked on the cellophane bag:

RED GLOBE GRAPES WITH SEEDS

Because a completely different type of grapes were present in impressive numbers when I checked them out visually, and reached inside the bag for a taste, I had not noticed that what lay beneath them was the opposite of what I thought I was getting.

Even though the bag was clearly marked, there reigned confusion.

Guess I'll have to look more closely next time instead of making assumptions based upon information gleaned at first glance. And plan what I buy into, accordingly.

Lesson learned.

And that is all for now except to wish you a Happy New Year.

Oh, and to say that today and always, I appreciate you.

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Happy Tuesday