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Amy
When Donald Trump announced he was running for President, people scoffed. His earliest supporters were shushed, intellectuals informing America that he was a pompous ass and not to debase themselves by publicly approving someone who was so clearly a joke. As it became clearer he was no joke, and in the very least not one to be counted out, collective America was still stamped down. Don’t waste your vote to someone who doesn’t have a chance, we were told. But when the polls opened for early voting and they were packed from daylight till dark, and the plastic coat hanger signs popped up in yards, and the campaign tour wore on, it became obvious he did have a chance. And blue collar America had a voice. And they were screaming. America turned out day after day to stand in line to cast their ballot for their best chance. Their only chance. And maybe their last chance. And by God, he won. He actually won. And we couldn’t believe our luck. So we rejoiced. And again, we were silenced. We were told it was over, to stop celebrating, whatever. In four years, they’d show us. We think it’s gonna be so great, but it’s gonna be a train wreck. And on Inauguration Day, Trump made yet another rousing speech, and it wasn’t a sugar coated backpedaling of all his promises…
I don’t make any plans beyond what to eat and what to read when there’s snow on the ground. Usually it’s soup or chili. Something hearty, you know. Yesterday was no different. While eating breakfast, I was plotting supper. I decided on chili. And I like Mexican Cornbread with my chili when I have time. So much more savory than crackers. But it is a bit of a pain. It involves lots of dirty dishes. But first things first: snow cream. It surprised me a few years ago when we got about 7″ of snow dumped on us and so many of my Facebook friends were asking for the recipe. Recipe? I’m pretty sure that was the first thing I learned to “cook” because it didn’t involve an oven and the secret is you just add more sugar till it tastes good. Step 1: Gather snow. It’s best to get it somewhere your dogs haven’t been, for obvious reasons. But you might want to think about birds, too. Typically the hoods of cars provide unblemished snow. Get more than you think you’ll need. And if this is the wet, heavy stuff, you really gotta hustle. Step 2: Reserve about a quarter of the snow to another bowl unless you don’t mind going back out or can send a minion/ husband/ child. Add milk, LOTS of granular sugar, and a…
I’ve been craving fajitas since Christmas Eve. I wanted to make tacos for Christmas dinner and Johnny said it was sacrilegious. I think we had chicken pot pie instead. Like, I’m totally sure Jesus would prefer tacos on his birthday, but whatever. Anyway, since he’s camping with his buddies this Saturday, I get whatever I want on Friday. Usually I make him take me to Maryville for Chili’s or Cheddars, and maybe peruse Hobby Lobby and the bookstore while we’re at it. I rarely push my luck for a movie, but it does come under consideration on occasions when I’m particularly vexed. So it was decided early in the week that we would finally satisfy my fajita famine this Friday, unless an oyster craving took over my life between now and then. No, I’m not pregnant. I just like food. So after two full days worth of snow advisory warnings and twelve hours of on again/off again snow showers, we bundled up and set off, he in his camo, and me in my Lularoe. We take note of the specials and settle into our booth, making conversation with our favorite waitress (her kids are already hoping they won’t have to go to school Monday, nevermind the snow has yet to stick). We enjoy our drippy cheese dip. We make fun of the Yankees in the booth behind us. Our tiny…
I….I….I…. Ahhh-CHOO!!!! I swanny. All I want on my days off are to be able to relax. I love staying home. The rainier and colder it is, the better. I’ll loll about, reading two or three books, leisurely fix breakfast, maybe do some light housekeeping. I’ll bake cookies, troll Facebook, maybe pin some recipes or crafts that I have no aspirations of creating. I’ve been craving fajitas for four days, but when going-out time rolls around, either Johnny or I don’t feel like venturing out. I made the typical New Years Feast yesterday (for the non-southerners out there, that consists of collards, kraut-n-weenies, fried taters, cornbread, and black eyed peas disguised as soup beans…because they actually were soup beans because black eyed peas are dis.gust.ing.). We technically should have eaten those leftovers today, but you know me, always thinking ahead…so I decided to go ahead and make supper tonight that way we could have the soup bean conglomeration tomorrow night, so that I wouldn’t have to cook after working all day. Once that was decided, I sought out a roast from the freezer. And boy did I find one! It was enormous and I plopped it in the sink to thaw. An hour and a half later, I skipped into the kitchen to transfer it to the crock pot. This is where I encountered…
Here we find ourselves at the tail end of 2016. I’m ending it much the same as I have every other Saturday night of this year: in my pajamas with a book and a glass of wine nearby. Although I have recently debated the merits of hot chocolate over fermented grapes… I am fully dreading taking down the tree tomorrow. Not because it’s enormous and laden with decorations, unlike the trees of years past. I’m dreading it because I’m lazy. That’s really all there is to it. I don’t WANT to. I got around to packing everything else up today: all the candles and knick-knacks…I broke my Pottery Barn reindeer but I have high hopes for the miracle that is superglue…once I eventually find it. That can wait till next November, at least. Until then, I have plenty of things to keep me busy, such as this blog post I’m rushing to finish before midnight (or, more realistically, until I fall asleep, which would have been by ten o’clock if I hadn’t been going back and forth with the good techies at Bluehost). I almost lost my mind there for a minute. You see. Turns out I’ve been logging into the wrong WordPress account. Who knew? When I log into Facebook, I log into Facebook, whether I want to post something on my page…
Our holiday was mild, which is the way I like it. I especially liked the part about being off for four consecutive days. Friday I was run-run-Rudolph, indeed. I had a hair appointment at 8 (what? You think I’m competent enough to keep myself this perfect red? I can barely apply blush). A pleasant surprise was a Krispy Kreme doughnut as I processed. Then a quick elf run to my cousin’s house to drop her off a thank-you-for-helping-with-my-blog/ Christmas gift. Then, as is common for me, I had to come back by the house to pick up Robin’s gift because I’d had plans to meet her for lunch for a solid week. I hurriedly washed dishes while I was here so they would stop mocking me. They’d only been there for fourteen hours…which sounds like a long time when I think about it, considering they typically don’t last more than thirty minutes. I digress. I also collected a helping of éclair cake because the heathens at the Co-op hadn’t thought to save her a morsel of theirs. I had my own personal one delivered to the shop by both the Newmans! I skirted by the dump, then by the Co-op to drop the dessert so it wouldn’t acquire E.coli while I ran my other errands before lunch…
They tell me I need to post pretty regular on here. So here’s the current situation. Last week, I walked over to my uncle’s house to pick up the latest installment from Amazon. Since our two enormous dogs tend to poo wherever the mood strikes them, one has to be cautious of land mines scattered throughout the yard. It was past six, therefore, past dark. I dug out my custom flashlight and, out of habit, checked to make sure the light was working. No dice. Johnny oh-so-helpfully offered the use of his, which is a chancy privilege indeed. He’s picky about his flashlights. And he has like, two dozen of them. Must be a guy thing. So grudgingly, I took it. It was one of his better ones, I knew. It sure was heavy, for no bigger than it was. You could screw the end around to get your desired brightness and beam diameter, or you could hold the button down on the end for immediate use. I elected to hold the button, since I wasn’t going far. Once I got on the other side of the fence, I tucked it into the kangaroo pocket on my sweatshirt with my dead one. I collected my packages after a few minutes of small talk and headed back home. Now, here’s where things get hazy. I placed my (non working) flashlight in my sweetgrass basket on the end table, where…
Purina Mills has been around for over a century. In that time they put on the most informative sales meetings (for companies & feed customers alike) I have ever attended. A few stick out in my mind. One was where they showed a tag for a 12% horse feed. It sounded pretty good from a nutritional percentage standpoint. When you got down to the ingredients they were actually motor oil, cardboard, and a whole host of deadly components that carry protein, fat, and fiber ratios. Purina sets itself apart from competitors by constantly researching. Their private farm is home to over 3000 animals situated on 1200 acres. Once upon a time, I was attending a training meeting hosted by Purina. This presentation began by telling a story that *I benignly thought* had nothing to do with feeding horses. Seems that there was this woman that was cooking her Christmas ham. Her husband was in the kitchen, underfoot and watching. He noticed she cut a good two inches off each end of the ham. “Why’d you do that for?” he wanted to know. “Do what?” “Cut the perfectly good ends off.” The wife reportedly scrunched her brow. “Well, to tell you the truth, I don’t know. My momma always did it when she fixed the ham.” The ham was pushed into the oven to bake in pork peace. Later, as it was transferred to the table, the woman…
I don’t read emails. I mean, I used to. When they were new and novel. But the past fifteen years, I have been inundated with all manner of “chain” emails, sales, and stupid jokes…so along the way I just stopped reading them. Ask Mike Rucks, he will tell you. He was my Farnam rep while I was at Co-op and it took him a year or two to catch on. But see, here’s the thing. If it was really important, he would come by. So technically, I’m a product of my environment. Well, anyway. Now that I’m a DOMAIN owner, emails evidently have a new level of importance. You’re probably wondering why I’m writing this on here instead of my sparkling new blog, as promised. Well, I’m getting to that. It has to do with reading emails. Or not, if you wanna get technical about it. So I go to login tonight and I can’t. I thought I had inadvertently reset my password so I hit the little “forgot password” located oh-so-conveniently at the top, just there. “Email not found” it spat back. Well, that’s just garbage. WordPress has been nothing but a headache from the get-go. So I moved to step 2. “Check that spelling is correct.” Of course it’s correct. I…
I’m having trouble understanding the people who are going to sightsee the ruined areas of Gatlinburg. They ogle, they take pictures, they take souvenirs of ash and more. They are trespassing on all that remains of many people’s homes. I know people are curious, but melted aluminum isn’t “cool”, what’s left of the Castle isn’t “awesome” and the dregs of the apartments on Ski Mountain aren’t to be gawked at. I’m just sickened by what thrills certain people. I can’t bear to look…I still have trouble digesting how many people lost their jobs, their businesses, and their transportation. That Monday night I sat in my living room, surrounded by my life’s work. I can’t fathom what I would try to make it out with. I have no doubt that Shug would get the dogs and hopefully a chainsaw. I’ve lived in this very house almost my entire life. It was built by my great-great uncle for my Grandmother when my momma was still a wee tot. I reside on what remains of the original farm. I know every inch. My town has grown up around me. All these people have moved in and brought with them their restaurants and their way of doing things (namely driving entirely too fast and not waving when they see you working…
