Speaking of contradictions . . .

"Raise a reader", the front page tells us, on a paper full of stuff you don't want your kid to read, from the fairly mild line "Raw food seduction" to the article about the prostitution laws being struck down, complete with picture of a rejoicing woman the caption ID's as a "dominatrix".

He's talking about environmentalism, but it fits just as well with predicting the end of the world.

We really should be humble. And cautious.
But how can a humble and cautious man say we are "past the 59th minute"?

-- Dan Gardner

25 Words or Less

It wasn't the flu, Mrs. Shady Nook. It wasn't a strike, Mrs. Mud Creek. It wasn't even a vacation. It was just a breathing spell. We can't say funny things all the time. We are not the four Marx brothers. We are just another well that ran dry.

-- Evelyn Ryan, aka the Prize Winner of Defiance, Ohio


Another memoir which, like My Life in France, shows that Fifties housewives had more options than we tend to think, especially if they were a little talented.

And resourceful. Mrs. Ryan couldn't afford to buy enough Dr. Pepper to get all the bottle caps she needed for clues to the contest answer, so she sent her kids out to pick up the caps around all the vending machines in town.

The part left to the expert -- Mom -- was coming up with the last line to an ad jingle.

Today, Dr. Pepper's still running contests, but they're nowhere near so artistic. You merely have to decode the yellow-on-yellow raised numbers on the cap, go online and key them into the box, figure out what you did wrong when it says that's not a valid number . . . It's still demanding, just not in a good way.

Grande Dame

I once dreamt that I knew why Julia Child had talked the way she did, but when I woke up, I couldn't remember. While I read My Life in France, I half hoped she'd explain, but no luck. And in the end it didn't matter. She was what she was.

Viewers thought she was drunk -- she was really just big and awkward. (Too big to join the service during WWII. If only I'd been able to pull that off 40 years later.) And she was fond of adding a dash of something to her cooking. I remember one show where she said, "You can add a little cognac if you like . . . and if you don't like . . . well . . ." It was one of the apparently many occasions when she couldn't think of anything nice to say, so she didn't say anything, just swept on to the next bit of fun.

It was all fun for her, as she often says. She seems to have been able to find enjoyment in all sorts of ordinary things. Here's how she describes one good time:

One December Sunday, the three of us drove out to the Fontainebleau forest. The cloudy gray sky broke open and turned blue, the air was vigorously cool, and the sun shone brightly.

She makes you wish you'd been there -- and yet, it was just a hike on a winter day that started out cloudy and turned sunny. It's the sort of thing I've done myself a few times, but somehow I didn't see it with that same -- okay, cliché alert -- joie de vivre.

And now that I've used French, I'll confess to one of the guilty pleasures of this book -- Julia Child uses lots of  French and hardly translates any of it. Gave me a nice, smug, in-the-know feeling . . . connaissance?

"Usually one's cooking is better than one thinks it is."

Words of wisdom from Julia Child's My Life in France.

I don't believe in twisting yourself into knots of excuses and explanations over the food you make. When one's hostess starts in with self-deprecations such as "Oh, I don't know how to cook . . ." . . . it is so dreadful to have to reassure her that everything is delicious and fine, whether it is or not.

From the good old days

When children smiled cheerfully all the time . . .

. . . and boys and girls looked so different from each other.

(from the past via Dover)

Note to spammers who write "i wana know mroe about you"

1. I use correct spelling and capitalization.
2. I don't open spam.

What a blogger gets for deciding not to post

So I announce I'm not going to update my ESL news blog tomorrow, since there's not going to be any time either this evening or tomorrow morning when I could fit it in. And what happens? Into my inbox comes a load of FBI stories that would've been great to blog about: Impersonating an FBI agent!  Fake anthrax, the joke that never gets old! The Where's Waldo Bandit menaces the town of Tualatin! Lasering aircraft!

And they'll be a little past it by Monday. Oh well.

Irregularly scheduled blogging

Yes, I'm still here. I've just been fighting a nasty infection and taking on too many extra responsibilities, that's all. Gotta do something about that can-do attitude . . .

The Stuff Store: Profile of a Home Based Business

"They're dressed to kill and looking fantastic . . . "

Tracy's gone for rubber and plastic
Nicola's is a bit of elastic
It's under a heck of a strain.

-- Victoria Wood

Images from Dover

Someone thought this was photoshopped

Claimed they would've heard if asteroids had hit Jupiter. Actually, NASA says, it goes on all the time just fine without us.

Amen-Alleluia

Restauratrice Melissa Fox-Revett (emphasis mine):

Facing a dwindling and aging populace, this church had made a business decision to reach out to families -- to endure a toddler's occasional outburst in order to ensure the church's very survival. Restaurants are no different in this regard.

Nor are shopping malls, supermarkets, public transit . . . maybe even seniors' centres.

I have so many memories of my children's public outbursts that it may not really be fair for me to call them "occasional", but that's another story -- one I hope to get paid for.

Thoughts on Toy Story 3, in no particular order

• Some upscale daycare -- freestanding building, reception desk, janitorial service, vending machine in the staff room. However . . .
  
• They seem to have blown all their money on facilities, rather than hire staff who knew enough not to let toddlers play with things that fit up their noses.
• Washing off the residue of -- well, no spoilers -- would take a lot more than a hosedown with cold water.
• I thought at first that The Return of Lotso would be a good Toy Story 4-- but now I think his reappearance, if any, would be better as a short. That is, if anyone actually wants to see any more of him.

Toy Story 3

Poster
Buy at AllPosters.com

A new year is coming, though not for us

Even so, I came up with a loaf of challah yesterday and wrote it up for Holidays Helper.

If this brings a lot of outraged comments from people who are actually Jewish, I'll be glad of the attention.

You'd think they could track him down through the cab

I posted an ESL news story today, just to get the hang of it again.

When I read the subject line on the FBI press release -- Man Robs Bank, Then Takes Taxicab -- I thought it was going to be a "stupid criminal" story where the guy got caught right away. But they're still looking for him, offering $5000 for info.

The trouble with thrift

Also what I get for staying to clean up after the BBQ:

Cold baked potatoes.

I have so many cold baked potatoes I'm afraid to count them. I used up a few as hash browns yesterday, then got down to business this afternoon, putting 10 of them in a casserole with cream cheese and sour cream that I had to go out and buy, then freezing that and making a whole other potato dish for dinner.

CBP's do not mash nicely like freshly cooked potatoes. You have to grate them -- or purée them, in which case you should get them well started before you throw in anything you want to blend with them.

They need lots of cheese, sour cream, fat for frying, and probably other stuff I haven't yet thought of.

Too bad it's not cool enough for potato soup. By this time next week, that may not stop me.

"If I could put that much stuff away in this much space, my own house would look a lot different"

As I said last night in the school kitchen, after the BBQ wound down.

Create your own video slideshow at animoto.com.

The Upside of Hoarding

Take enough random photos of boring everyday objects, keep them long enough, and eventually a story will come along that goes perfectly with one of them. Or at least part of one of them.

It happened again today.