Did you notice that I'm posting again? That's what happens when you treat the drought-stricken rural folk with four inches of rain. It's taken three weeks of scattered showers, but we no longer feel so sere.

Oh, Diane, what is the name of the writer who writes the coffee-shop mysteries? The one with the lovely chocolate-covered cherry recipe?

A few chocolate-covered cherries with a side of ice cream and a cup of coffee would make a good dessert at Christmas, no?

UPDATE: Cleo Coyle

Colonial Cranberries with ice cream?

Shouldn't somebody step up and do noir cozy mysteries about the Hummingbird hash house in New Orleans? They'd read like Tom Waits lyrics, but they'd have some characters.

Oh, look. Here's a Baldwin County phone book from 2006.

And a Cook's Illustrated mag from 2007.

A friend sent me an email with the results of the Bulwer-Lytton bad prose contest. A comment from the the writer of the article and the entry follow:

To take the prize for best purple prose, Mike Pedersen of North Berwick, Maine, relied on a thesaurus'-worth of synonyms:

"As his small boat scudded before a brisk breeze under a sapphire sky dappled with cerulean clouds with indigo bases, through cobalt seas that deepened to navy nearer the boat and faded to azure at the horizon, Ian was at a loss as to why he felt blue."

Those are not synonyms, darlin', those are different shades of blue.

Umm.

My SIL Karen has a point. Though she doesn't do it, and keeps a spotless house, she advocates moving every five years so we go through all our "collectibles" and discard those without use or meaning.

Now, we renovated our house in around 2000. In the lefthand cabinet under the counter in the office, I found a stack of Southern Living magazines from 1999 today.

What can I say?

No more experimenting. That way, we get to eat the rest of the grits ourselves.

So I'm looking at the luncheon this way:

Traditional shrimp cocktail
Ms. Spicer's garlic soup -- just a few sips
Caesar salad -- light and subject to change
Ms. Spicers Shrimp etc.
And a cool, fruity dessert -- perhaps a fruit compote over ice cream

So, the deal went down in the parking lot as expected.

Figuring out how to cook and cut this product is something else.

Ain't that cool?

I need some stone-ground grits to do Susan Spicer's recipe properly. I found a listing for the Louisiana Pride Grist Mill in Pride, LA, up the road from Fred. (Gotta love that -- I live in Fred, or Alice, or Nancy, or Thomas.)

The upshot is that I am going to meet the miller at the local McDonald's for delivery of freshly milled stone-ground grits around 7 am on Saturday. He and his wife will be on their way to a camp at Larto Lake near Jonesville.

While we're at it, let's add Lisa Fain's Homesick Texan to the blogroll. She offers lots of tempting recipes.

Let's put this here.

Now we may be getting somewhere with proper Tex-Mex enchiladas outside of Texas.

Adding this cookbook to my wish list.

Mmm. Mmm. Mmm.

Today I lost a nearly brand new pair of shoes. I'd worn them once (and they are comfortable), and thought I'd tucked them under the bed (since son 2 is living in the big guest room where my closet is).

I remembered taking them off and changing into cloppers, then nothing. I looked high and low, under chairs and sofas and counters and tables, in cabinets and drawers, on shelves and mantels. Nothing. They were gone.

Lyman said, "Don't tell me they were walking shoes."

I was sitting on the edge of the bed wondering who would do me such a dirty trick when it occurred to me that I had put them in the shoe sleeve hanging on the inside of the foyer closet door. Voila!

It's gonna be a long middle age.

Now is the time to reach into our can of tricks and start seriously considering the annual Christmas luncheon. These recipes need testing, and tend to be costly.

I'm for Susan Spicer's Shrimp and Tasso in Cream Sauce with Chili-Cheese Grit Cakes.