Herban Sprawl

It is a balmy 75 degrees here in the Star City. While I am feeling grumpy and out of sorts about the shift to daylight savings time (what a waste…), it is still a good thing to be outside. Those pesky, but cute, little weeds with the white flowers have proliferated. In no time, the flowers will wither and the seed pods will shoot seeds everywhere. I want to pull them before they get to that stage.

I’ve made a pact with myself. I’ve decided to ignore my aches and pains. The tendonitis in my elbow has subsided enough to allow me to pick up  bag of weeds and haul it to the curb. If I aggravate it, so what? I’ve eaten enough aspirin this winter to keep the entire regiment pain free!

Last year The House Goddess remarked that our hillside is ideal for a water feature. I’ve always thought so, but I’m not sure I want that level of maintenance. And that seems to be the issue for me. I am great at installing, but come those dog days of summer, my resolve withers along with my plants as they gasp for water.  As I’ve been weeding, I’ve come to the conclusion I need to take a different approach. it is really a two parter.

First off, I read a great book called The Gin and Tonic Gardener. The idea is to garden in such a way that one creates places to hang out with a book and a gin and tonic. A water feature would greatly enhance that kind of experience in the yard, but I’m still not sure I’m up for the maintenance. So I’m taking a “nip it in the bud” approach to the bad stuff that comes up every year. That is part one.

For part two, I want to finish up some of the projects that have been staring at me for a few years now. They are unsightly and they are bugging me. They don’t live up to my Fine Gardening standards!
The thing is, I’m not in the mood to spend a lot of money on my yard.  I did better last year, but this year I don’t really want to do more than add to the herbs. The thing that always breaks the bank is what to do with the hayracks. annuals get to be expensive, and quite frankly, I’m tired of watering the damn things. They add so much to the curb appeal of our house that year after year I plant them up and tend them, and come August I am S-I-C-K of dealing with them. Even Clarice pointed out that I wasn’t doing much of a maintenance job on them. And he was right. Burn out is a tough disease to get over.

We need to attend to painting this year, like it or not, so I’m thinking that cleaning up things and cutting back on the high maintenance ideas is the best course of action for this year. And the hayracks might just become nasturtium planters, which is not a bad thing, actually.

Enough of a rest period. It’s time to return to those cute little weeds!

It’s that time of year, as the song goes. I have the makings of two kinds of cookie in the fridge, ready for assembly and baking. I love cookies and the neat thing about this season is that the food magazines are burgeoning with new recipes.

Most of us have the idea that Christmas cookies should be the ones that take effort. They must be something special and we should have spent a lot of time making them look like the ones food stylists trot out for magazine cover art. I’m afraid I’m not into that. I don’t even like to make plain old cut-out cookies. On the other hand, a few of the ones I like a lot do involve some dough manipulation, so maybe I’m not so big a slouch after all.

Years ago my sister and I were each working our way through a cookie cookbook and after having discovered a cookie press in the dark corner of my mother’s pantry, I tried the spritz recipe. My sister went gaga over those and they’ve been a staple of our Christmas baking ever since. She also had the cut-out cookie recipe from a friend’s mother that she loved. I made those, too, but I never really like the flavor. They had sour cream in them and I finally realized I prefer a less acidic cookie. When they head to Chicago to spend Christmas with the kids, I’m sure Grammie and the itty bitties will be making those recipes. There are certain traditions in her family that are not to be altered. Period.

Last year I made a recipe from an old Gourmet. They had some odd name like Polish cookies, and I am here to tell you, a kolacky by any other name is still a kolacky. (You pronounce it koe-loch-key.) It’s a divine creation of cream cheese dough with a filling of apricot honey goo. Another season offered a little thing of butter cookie pressed into a mini muffin pan and filled with a pignoli mixture. (pine nuts for you non-wops) Also heavenly. The basics parts to those are in the fridge as I type.

There is another one I want to try that involves grinding about four different kinds of nut and shaping the dough into a little finger sized roll. I’ve been wondering why four different kinds of nut, actually, and trying to figure out if the individual flavors will stick out, or whether the combination will create a completely different nut. Should be interesting.

And thus it goes. My plan is to make about six different cookies and to package those up for gifts. If I have this worked out like I think I do, then I shouldn’t have too many of them left around here to contribute to our dreaded belly fat. On the other hand, if I don’t have enough for a few weeks’ worth of afternoon tea, I’m going to be irked. You don’t do a baking marathon and not get to enjoy the fruits of one’s labors, y’know.

When Harry was here yesterday, he volunteered his huge kitchen and convection oven to my enterprise. Harry ain’t kidding anyone. Harry likes cookies! Of course, what he’s really and truly wondering is what kind of chocolate creation will find its way into the rotation this year. If a doctor told Harry there’d be no more chocolate in his future, I think he’d plan his funeral. (Heaven knows, I’d be in the same boat. Life without chocolate? Ugh!)

We have a lovely day with the sun shining. After the dismal rainy week, it’s quite nice - On the other hand, our water supply has been helped by the constant soaking we got earlier in the week, so that’s to the good. Our trees and shrubs all needed a good stiff drink. It’s a good day to bake!

A week later and our Christmas tree is finally finished. This was the year I needed to just start fresh with new lights - It took way too long and I was ready to forget having a tree, but then I finally got the last string pulled off and replaced and started hanging the ornaments.

In years past, I’ve had some stellar help in doing the tree, but when they started hanging the ornaments, I got crabby. It isn’t that the team wasn’t any good at hanging ornaments. I just needed to unwrap and hang each one in order to remember the wonderful people who had given us the piece. There are also the ones that the kids made for me. I hang them together, and now I have a few more from the itty bitties that are so precious.

And so it goes -  the little sailboat I bought in Duluth, the ones that came from Andersonville in Chicago, the bluegrass angels, the Bill Clinton sax, the moose from Boulder, the ones Lori had made for me at Neiman’s, the cat ornaments, the hearts, the ones I made, the ones my sister made, the ones that were made by friends, the little wooden German toys, the Steinbach la Befana, the Kirsch peddler, and the silver sleigh bells with their beautiful chimes.

Boxes of ornaments that represent the people, places and events of a very interesting life - they come out once a year and are enjoyed and treasured for a month. Many thanks to all who have put their mark on the tree. You will never be forgotten and your contribution will always be remembered with a huge smile.

Last year I had to bid farewell to my twenty year old gas stove. It had been a good one, but it just plain petered out. I turned to the usual sources for consumer information, studied the models available and ultimately decided to buy a stove from a local independent appliance dealer because they have a great service department and buying local is always a good idea.

The oven was never on the money, and after fighting with it for way longer than I should have, I called and asked for help. It turns out the fact that the clock would mysteriously change time was an indicator that something was wrong. I adore my Maytag guy, Rah. I adore his father-in-law, who gave my old washer last rites, just as much! But I have to tell you, I’ve been seeing too much of Rah and people are going to start talking!

We’re on the fourth clock/thermostat assembly. I baked perfect pumpkin pecan tea bread at 330 degrees on the read-out and 348 degrees on the oven thermometers I have inside the oven. The recipe said to bake them at 350. Twenty degrees difference in baking is dicey business. Twenty degrees difference in making a roast means it might be done too quickly. No matter which way you slice it, something ain’t right.

The store has earned my undying gratitude for their kindness and willingness to get it right, but I think it is now Maytag’s problem. I gave it the old consumer-is-disatisfied try, but they blew me off. The store didn’t much like hearing that news, so they are going to move into a different gear. This has now become a mystery to be solved and all of us wonder why four different clock assemblies have changed times or the oven has been off by anywhere from 15 to 20 degrees.

Meanwhile, we have some time until I roast a little turkey, so we’ll just sit back with a cup of tea and see what happens.

This morning we in the Star City awakened to find that Mother Nature had sprinkled powdered sugar all over the place. It sure was a pretty sight at 6:30! It served as a reminder that we are in that season of late autumn when it is darker earlier. When Barney sits at the window and looks out, the greyness of the landscape blends with his tabby colors.

The dismal state of the economy has people trying very hard to get into a holiday spirit - it’s going to be tough this year, especially since the power company is getting a rate increase, and natural gas has gone up again. The heating oil companies made sure to fill a lot of tanks with the higher-priced inventory, which was sticker shock for those on automatic filling plans! They weren’t going to miss a chance to make a buck.

Yet, I still notice that people are feeling hopeful that Prezelect can spark a turn-around. Many of us have placed our trust in his ability to collect reliable information and make sound decisions on our behalf. Something tells me that when we gather around our Thanksgiving tables, there will be plenty of prayers uttered for his safety and our collective future!

Meanwhile, for a few hours, my garden is covered and my weeds aren’t thumbing their noses at me. Mother Nature, thanks for that. I was really tired of their taunting.

Yesterday morning we awakened to frost on the windshields and grass. It was nippy when I stepped out for the paper. Today, however, the Star City has been given the gift of rain. We could have used it earlier in the year, but we still needed it. It’s just inconvenient to have the streets and sidewalks slick with wet leaves.

At the same time, I have been whittling down my stash of the last tomatoes that I coerced BGF into planting. I came home with greenies, neglected to make fried green tomatoes, and had a wonderfully red batch of small, firm maters. I have already made okra and maters for the last time this season. Ahhhh, yum. But for this evening, it’s one last fresh one for the salad, and just for old time’s sake, I popped in little balls of fresh mozzarella.

All summer we gorged on salad Caprese - slices of fresh tomatoes, covered with slabs of fresh mozzarella, liberally covered with chopped Genovese basil, drizzled with some nice olive oil and seasoned with a little salt and pepper. I gave BGF some basil plants, but I don’t think he got around to getting fresh mozz, so he wasn’t motivated to keep those going. He did a stellar job with the tomatoes, though - I am really going to miss them.

When I was a youngster, we’d get a call from Grandma Kate. “I got hungry for ______ (fill in the blank with an Italian specialty). Come pick me.” We’d pile in the car and return with Grandma and a vat of whatever she’d had an urge to eat - gnocchi, stuffed artichokes, cabbage rolls - you name it. What was not a special thing were ravioli, although she was the undisputed Queen of Ravioli in our hometown.

Actually, what she made were tortellini, as my sister and I discovered when we found them in cookbooks. Little bellybutton shaped morsels of heaven, they were. Grandma churned those out as a little cottage industry, so we had a fairly regular supply. But warm weather meant dandelion salad and later, tomatoes.

It’s hard to say goodbye to them, but it’s also important to acknowledge that some foods are better in season where we live, rather than trucked in from a gazillion miles away. Tomatoes fall in that category. So, until next summer, farewell, red orbs of  culinary joy. Farewell, fat leaves of basil. Arriverderci!

Yesterday I had Stephanie and Shannon here teaching me the finer points of life on Facebook. I learned all about the little Flairs and garden patches and all that sort of thing. This is why I love having young people around. They keep on me and drag me kicking and screaming into technology and other assorted discomforts.

Stephanie was here, tutoring me when Shannon arrived, and she announced she had me on a 504 plan. Later, I had the pleasure of teaching Shannon about the infamous 504 plan itself, and she was pretty amazed at what it could do for children. More on that later…

I am now sporting some really cool stuff on my profile page. I have flairs that are near and dear to me, such as, sighhhhhhhhhh, da Cubs, my alma mater, Frank Lloyd Wright and even a cat wandering through a catnip patch. My garden of little plants is growing and I’ve been sending out a bunch, although the people I’ve sent them to probably don’t know how to retrieve them because they’re in the same boat as I was before my individualized 504 session!

Number One Niece says Facebook is a huge time waster, and she is absolutely correct. I really should be doing other things. Maybe I need a 504 plan to help me get my awfiss back under control.

For those who aren’t sure what I’m talking about, a 504 is a required educational plan for children who are not achieving as well as they should, and who have a diagnosis of something like ADD or ADHD, among other things, that impair their ability to achieve their potential in school. When I say required, I am not kidding. In these days of high-stakes testing, teachers are under the gun to document everything there is to document about the kids who aren’t making the grades.

Shannon had the idea it was for someone of low IQ, but the fact is, a 504 is essential for dealing with kids who can’t keep it together, and if they have one, the teacher then has the flexibility of building in accommodations that will put the child on the right track. In the division where I taught, it was required for any child whose grades weren’t up to snuff, or who had a medical diagnosis that had the potential to cause academic issues.

Take, for example, a child with a severe case of asthma. We’re looking at an affable kid who misses a lot of school because of a medical condition. We’re also looking at a family who doesn’t manage the disease for the child. A 504 plan can be written to allow flexibility on attendance, but it can also build in accountability for parents. We did that for a little boy. What happened was that his mama didn’t want to have to jump through the hoops of coming by school every single time she kept him home, so she got on the stick in terms of making sure the house was as free of the triggers as possible, and she also didn’t keep him home everytime he pulled a little manipulative game about his health. We had our own set of things we had to do to make sure the things that could set off an asthma attack were under control, and the upshot was that when he didn’t miss so much school, he started to like it better and began to do really well. I saw him wandering around the campus of the community college the other day when I had to go re-enroll for classes!

The thing is, it’s legally required for kids with the diagnosis of things like ADD and ADHD, but parents don’t necessarily know about it. It’s not out there like special education services. They don’t know there are entire classes devoted to teaching kids with those problems and that not all teachers take advantage of the research that is out there. At one of my elementary schools, we had 504s all over the place, and the kids were very closely monitored. The accountability factor is huge, but it’s worth it when a smart kid who can’t stay in his seat is able to have the accommodations that will enable him (or her) to excel.

In any case, my 504 plan worked yesterday and I am feeling a little more like a spry young thing with my cool cause listed and my flairs and my garden escapades. I can now poke people and play with the best of them. I wonder if I can be released from the plan yet, or whether my teachers are going to insist on monitoring my progress for a while longer.

I did it. I signed on to Facebook. It wasn’t anything I would have thought of on my own, but then here came Kay, my ladyfriend who is ‘of an age,’ with an invitation to be one of her friends on Facebook.

Admittedly, she is probably the most computer savvy person I know, but this was not something I would have expected given all her other activities, not to mention her website, etc. etc. I capitulated because she always sets such a good example for me, and also because the nieces were on Facebook and both had sent me the invite. What’s an aunt to do?

My first problem was that I needed a picture. I used a really cute one of Barney that I took the other day. He was ensconced on the living room loveseat, his power spot, and a pink mousie was on the floor. I tucked the mousie into the crook of his paw and he just sniffed Mousie and kept watching me watch him. Barney is partial to pink. I got the camera.

Next I had to fill out all that other stuff. I was amazed by all the people they thought I’d want to be “friends” with. Granted, I knew a few of them since they are in-law in-laws, but we aren’t all that well acquainted.

Suffice to say, I did what I needed to do, posted a couple of pix and even chatted with Stephanie a little. (Wait until she finds out that her boss is happy about her new suit selection!)

So what’s more fun? Herban Sprawl or Facebook? Aw, the Sprawl! By a landslide! It’ll be even better when I get the picture uploading gremlin figured out!

Barack’s gram is very ill. I hope that all of us good Democrats are saying prayers of love and support for Toot.

Two weeks to go, Toot! You’ll have raised yourself the next President of the United States! Thanks for all your hard work and sacrifices - it has definitely paid off!

It’s a beautiful, crisp autumn day here in the Star City of the South. I’d really like to be working in the yard, but I got this bizarre case of tendinitis in my arm which has cramped my style in very strange ways. I had no idea that holding my bowl of oatmeal with my thumb in a certain position would cause a shot of electricity to go zapping up to my elbow! Eegad.

Nevertheless, I was tired of the pile of junk mail that needed to be shredded but too cheap to go out to buy a new shredder, having melted down the switch on the last one! Instead, I decided to defy every city ordinance against open flames and fired up the Weber! Mind you, my Weber is not a large kettle, but an almost 30 year old Smokey Joe version. I smell like fall from my youngsterhood, when the people in my aunt’s neighborhood would rake their leaves to the curb and set fire to them. It was a totally satisfying experience, and I am seriously thinking about getting one of those cool fire pits instead of another shredder! The ash from the credit card and insurance offers can be used as mulch.

I also caught up with Clarice today. He was in Ohio, another swing state, visiting relatives. All this business on Wall Street and with the banks has him as nervous as a long-tailed cat in a room full of rocking chairs. His bank is fine, but, as he is quick to point out, thirty minutes up until they announced they were bankrupt, that’s what Wachovia said, too. Anyway, he had to catch up on the news here at the Sprawl, and was guffawing over my experience at the Obama rally. Clarice was a skeptic, early on, but as the campaign has worn on, he has decided that the party hasn’t lost  its mind and he can get behind this candidate. He was a Hillary guy, after all, and like me, he mourns the loss of President Bill. Barack is earning his respect.

Clarice and I haven’t hit the road in a long time. That aircraft carrier of his is a bit of a glutton for gas, plus both of us feeling broke and scared of the future has been a lot of the problem. And, I think we’ve just gotten lazy. I was still in my pajamas at nearly 1:00 when we hung up, for pete’s sake. You can’t just up and do something when one of you hasn’t even hit the showers yet!

One of the things I did last week was to volunteer at the campaign headquarters, and part of that is to house an out-of-town operative on election day. It’s only a short time off, so I figured I should do a few things to spiff up around here. Luckily, with my sister having just been in residence, I had half the battle of the clutter demons under control, but then there was the matter of all that paper that needed to be shredded. Now I can cross that off my list and move on to something else.

We put the bay tree and the tea tree on the screened porch last night. Today I tidied them up and brought them into the house. The tea tree is high maintenance, but I am determined to keep it going. Evelyn at the greenhouse didn’t make cuttings last year, so I can’t just wait for a new one. We can have a frost and I won’t worry, although I do need to make sure the aluminum hose wands are brought inside. And that’s the crux of autumn. We clean up and make sure we can batten down the hatches when the hard frost is nigh.

It’s the time of making soup and crusty bread and it’s the time to thumb through the recipes to plan heartier meals. Clarice and I will be thinking about the Christmas decorations before too long, but for now, I’m just going to enjoy the scent of smoke in my sweatshirt and be pleased that I have the guest room ready for the next visitor.

Sunday morning is the time of ritual. I am not speaking of the religious types of rituals, but rather that of the ordinary Sunday morning person. It is the day when I use a bone china demitasse cup (from a Replacements yard sale, of course) for my morning shot of Lavazza. I sprawl out on the living room floor with my coffee and the paper, leaving a big patch of sunshine for a lolling Barney or Charlie.

Simon, ever the ambitious porch monkey, then lobbies me to let them outside to the screened porch. However, fall is when we start explaining the realities of ice fleas. (He doesn’t believe us.) We engage in a ritual of him standing on the article I’m reading, me annoying him so he will leave, him returning to crawl into my lap, my knee giving out and making me annoy him some more (he’s easily annoyed), him swatting me when I get up for a second cup of coffee, getting chomped at when I return to the paper without opening the door, and so on. Simon is nothing if not persistent, and highly vocal about his displeasure.
With an economy in the cellar, the articles about saving money with compact fluorescent bulbs and grocery coupons have been ramped up. I read that there is a woman who rarely pays more than fifty cents for a bottle of Tide. I thought that was pretty awesome, until I realized what all she went through for that. Does no one ever take into account the gasoline and time involved, not to imagine the amount of storage space required for all the stockpiling she does. We’d need to rent another storage unit!
Anyway, I began to go through the coupons that come in the Sunday paper, and I have been doing this for about six months now. I used to do this, but gave up because there were never coupons for things that we use. There still aren’t.

I have come to the conclusion that Americans must have the most horrid smelling homes on the face of the earth, given the sheer numbers of air freshening devices and products. Indeed there is one aisle in Wally World that I avoid like the plague because it makes my throat close up.

My nephew used to have an amorata who brought two delightful cats into his life. Along with the two kitties came plug in air stinkers that gave me a stopped up nose, post nasal drip and a sore throat. When she left, the cats remained, but the air stinkers were removed. His place didn’t smell bad at all. In fact, you could finally smell his fabulous pizza baking in the oven!

But I wanted to save some coin of the realm so I began to peruse the Sunday fliers for coupons that I could use. In six months, I have gleaned maybe ten, causing me to conclude that the only products for which coupons are generated are those for people who don’t cook, who like to try a lot of different shampoos, and who want their houses to smell like dime store perfume.

I’m thinking there has to be a better strategy, but until I come up with one, I think I’m going to skip that part of the Sunday ritual. My time is better spent on the crossword puzzle and trying to do the Jumble in my head.