All this talk of Bill Bennett is going to force me to set up a bourre game. The day we married, Lyman and I joined a group of friends for an evening of cards. I won $42 that day, though I don't think any person in the group lost more than $10.
I might even have to ask Miss Alec from across the street. She is 79, and doesn't get around so well anymore, but she has a reputation as a wicked card player.
Because his bathroom was in flames, Theisen ducked behind a large oak tree in his back yard to relieve himself. Before he could finish, though, one of the police officers at the scene declared he was under arrest for lewd conduct."I tried to tell him, 'Sir, my bathroom is burning. It's on fire.' But he didn't seem to care. As soon as I zipped up, he put handcuffs on me," Theisen said.
(Link via Obscure Store)
Tim Blair dishes up some vitriol from readers of the Sydney Morning Herald. Here's a small sample:
"Bush is currently the greatest treat to world peace, he is a second IDI Amin, he over estimates his own self worth, I put him up with all the othe dictators of the world. The IQ of America can move from 1 to 2 if he is put in exile. I continue to deplore anything American, as they are one of the most backward countries in the world."
I think my feelings are hurt.
We heard the wailing of a bunch of sirens earlier this afternoon. "No," I thought. "Not another of those accidents down the levee road." The levee road is a snaky thing and drivers are apt to cut corners. In February, two 17-year-old girls driving north were killed when they had a collision with a pick-up driving south. The cars hit each other head-on in the middle of the two-lane road.
The sirens came closer and I thought, "No, please, not a fire."
None of that at all. The Vidalia High School Lady Vikings softball team was returning to town after winning its first ever state championship. The team bus was met at the edge of town by a full police escort (I mean every police and sheriff's car in town -- all seven or eight of 'em), and paraded throughout the neighborhoods, sirens blaring and horns blasting. You go, girls.
The boys are in the playoffs, too. I wonder if they can keep up?
I woke this morning to two Post-It tags on my monitor. One says that Cossie called and asked if I would like to do lunch with her today. Another says "MONEY FOR LUNCH" with an arrow pointing to a stack of twenties on the counter. $140. Maybe we should do lunch in New Orleans?
LATER: That was a temptation until I remembered that sugarmama was off to the New Orleans Jazzfest this weekend. Nix.
So we wound up at the bar of the new Comfort Suites hotel down by the riverside. We sat near windows where we could watch the barge traffic going up and down the Mississippi. At 85 degrees, it was too warm to sit on the patio outside, even closer to the riverbank. Excellent Bloody Mary, too. Not too alcoholic with plenty of spice.
Lunch for one = $12 for a drink and a turkey club, including tip.Hey, if Possum is Larry Anderson's blogdaddy, and Possum is my blogdaddy, then we're blog siblings! I knew I liked that guy. Of course, being a sibling doesn't necessarily mean liking. But that's a long post I'll keep to myself.
By the way, I think I've finally figured out how Daddy comes out so wonderfully off-the-wall. Two words: sleep deprivation.
Billy Joe Bob of Compleat Redneck and I have had an e-mail correspondence going on for some time about fried pies. He says he remembers his grandmother drying fruit on feed sack bedsheets. I have no such memory. He wonders if he is dating himself by bringing it up. I suspect it's regional. My grands canned. I don't know that he has ever said where his grands came from, but mine lived most of their lives about 60 miles north of Dallas, TX, up around Gunter, Sherman and Van Alstyne.
I know that my mother's mother was born in 1900. That's a date that sticks with you. My daddy's mother died at 86 when I was in New York, which would be 1979-1983. I couldn't afford to go home for the funeral, and my parents couldn't afford to fly me. Miss Ida Gibson, her name was. Well, at the time of her death, her name was Mrs. Lee R. Davenport.
So, unless I am totally wrong about Billy Joe Bob, he's not entirely out of my generation -- though we could be at the long ends of one. My big brother is about 64. "Talking about my generation ..."
Chastised? Chastised? Oh, Dr. Taylor, you don't know chastised until I catch you setting your sweating tea glass on my antique desk. That was the quietest little nudge.
Go over to James Joyner's distinguished site and find the movies made in your birth year. For me, we have "Hud", "Peyton Place", and "The Three Faces of Eve". The influences ...
Steven Taylor is added to my blogroll because he is the proverbial gentleman and scholar, and he seems to like that kind of thing.
Lucy and I are on the outs today. It all started over at redneckin where Chuck has been cheering GF along with redecorating her kitchen. After making oh, so many useful suggestions, I looked at mine and said, "Yikes, this needs a good cleaning!"
Out comes the bucket, and the Mr. Clean and the scrubber sponge. This is a problem. Lucy is far nosier than a cat and likes to be in the middle of things. She is not allowed near cleaning solutions because they are not good for her respiratory system. I spent all afternoon yesterday scrubbing (and how, exactly, did THAT get over HERE) and Lucy spent it hollering because she was left out.
She has been cross with me all day. She tossed her boiled egg off the cage onto the floor and bit me when I put it back. Then threw it off again. Snot.
I never read Hillary Clinton's book "It Takes A Village". But it is an excellent title -- parents, grandparents, relatives, teachers, neighbors and friends all have essential roles in raising a child. It is a true statement.
So what idiot came up with the title "Living History" for her memoirs? That title evokes to me the last living Confederate widow, the last World War I veteran, the last living painter of the Cubist school of art. Isn't she supposed to be a working politician? Or is she ready to retire?
Miss Meryl is complaining about bugs in the south. Can you imagine?
I'll pass on this bit of wisdom from Miss Glenda, my beloved friend and graduate of Louisiana Tech's home economics program:
I leave the cobwebs up. They help catch the mosquitos and flies.
I will post more southern housekeeping tips from Miss Glenda as occasions arise. Go Class of '66!
Meryl Yourish has a long letter from Captain Steve. I like this part:
Daewoos are tiny Korean trucks we use here. They are too small to pass US safety standards so you won't see them at home, but they are cheap and relatively durable so the DoD uses them overseas. (That's right. They're too dangerous to sell to farmers and small business owners who need cheap transport, but we buy them for 19 year-olds to tear around in overseas.) They are so small that when I was in Korea it was a popular diversion for 3 or 4 men to walk around base picking up parked Daewoos and carrying them to hiding places. After a while so many man-hours were wasted by people searching for their cars that the Wing Commander had to forbid the sport.
Small pleasures. Kathleen's older girl, Kate, graduates from high school this year. I enclosed a check with a pretty Neiman-Marcus card (from I don't know how far in the past) and crossed the street to deliver it last night. These girls used to feed my cat when I went out of town. Both have grown into young women with striking Irish good looks. Kate plans to go to LSU and study forensic science. What a fascinating field to get into.
There is nothing like sitting with a bunch of good-natured southern girls in a lovely courtyard drinking champagne. Wasn't blue at all. More your pop-jazz songs of the past century.
LATER: By the way, Shirley, the lyrics you missed are:
I guess I'll never see the light
I get the blues most every night ...
I am going to dress this morning and join some ladies for brunch at The Guest House in Natchez. An old favorite of mine, Sylvia Johns, will be playing piano. One of our frequent guests at home, Shirley McClerkin, will be singing blues. It's all part of the Natchez Bluff Blues Fest.
It's early in a beautiful day to be listening to blues, but a mimosa or two might smooth out the mood.
Ballpark figure for new swimming pool liner: $2200.00
Sorry, kids, it's time to play in the sprinkler.
The luxury I crave these days is cut flowers for the house. That patch of ground would be perfect for a garden.
Exercise? I can do yoga. Year round. (And work in the garden.)
Cooling down in the summer? Do you have any idea how warm the water is by mid-July down here?
LATER: And, I don't like the enviromental implications of running a 30,000 gallon swimming pool when it's used as seldom as we and others in the neighborhood use it. That wraps it up.
Not quite. It's not a pretty pool, either. Absolutely zero aesthetic value to the neighborhood.
EVEN LATER: $2200, you say, isn't so much money. It's a whole lot of money when you consider that we spent $3500 on this monstrosity 3 years ago. When it sprang a leak last year WE COULDN'T GET ANYONE TO COME FIX IT. That's why it needs a new liner. What about the boys, you ask? Won't they inherit this property? Don't they have a say? I say, if the boys want to go swimming it would be cheaper to fly them to Cancun. (Better yet, they can go jump in a lake.)
I am going to post this wonderfully clever little cartoon here just in case you are not a regular reader of Tim Blair. Too cool.
Silly dreams. Lucy shrieked me awake from a dream in which I woke one morning to find Ken Layne asleep in the guest bedroom. Apparently, he had come through town for some sort of media event -- a panel, a book-signing, it wasn't clear -- and slept over at our house. Which was all fine with me. Others of his crowd showed up and I counted heads and cooked for everyone.
I am a great fan of Ken Layne's work and he is welcome to stay here anytime. But he needs to be warned that there's not a bed in this house that would be comfortable for a 6'4" man, or woman, for that matter.
Later today I bought 36 white begonias and 12 white impatiens. Along with the 50 White Queen caladiums, I think the front yard is taken care of.
Now time to think about the back.
Dr. Frank needs to prance on over and perform at the Under-the-Hill Saloon in Natchez. It's a historic venue, quite near the place where Jim Bowie had a legendary knife fight. I'll pay double.
Did you watch television yesterday? Did you catch Laci Peterson's mother carrying on? Down south we call that "unseemly". We do not advertise our grief down here. Taking on as she did is restricted to the end of a long night when we are deep in our cups. Fie on MSNBC for televising such a spectacle.
Time to look in on Iranian Girl:
A different day, a good girl...
Today, I was totally another person...although it was Friday & was holiday I woke up soon in the morning & started studying all my lessons for hours, after dinner sleeper for an hours & after that again studied...I connected to Internet just for some minutes & tried to help my mother like a good girl, didn't watch TV or satellite & got prepared for the Sunday physic exam. And now I'm just gonna go to bed soon to be able to wake up early in the morning.....wow, I think I'm going too far & if things go on like this I should get worried about myself...I had never been such a good girl!!!
Oh, gaack! We're now proud owners of a Maruyama string trimmer. I like this line:
Maruyama true commercial grass trimmers are designed and built in the tradition of our industry recognized heavy-duty landscape line.
Believe me, it's pretty serious around here.
And they call this Good Friday.
Miss Lee Ann Morawski at Spinsters has a new job! Congratulations, Miss, and thank you for the incentive to get on with some much needed work.
That was a cheap shot at Lyman and I'm going to take it back, because he hasn't lost a pair of undies under the bed but once in nearly ten years. It's probably not his fault that I didn't find them for two years, either. He is creating a little wall here, though.
Bless his heart, he was planting cucumber and squash plants in the garden yesterday when he tripped over a tomato stake and fell into a pile of them (stakes). He looks and feels like he ran into a gang of toughs in a dark parking lot.
He had the presence of mind to throw the row rake away when he fell, and so prevented any serious injury. But he does require a lot of sympathy.
Today I am going to feel energized. I am going to think good thoughts. I am going to apply myself vigorously and uncomplainingly to housecleaning. I am not going to question the identity of bits that I am going to clean from the walls around Lucy's cage. I am not going to fume when I find men's undies stacked at the foot of the bed. I am not going to wonder how two adults who are not greasemonkeys or field workers or miners can possibly create such a soiled environment. And thus will prove that cleanliness is not necessarily next to godliness, but that it is damned close to saintliness.
I forgot cheerfully. Yeah, that's it. Cheerfully.
Mr. Nieporent and I have had a little tiff over at Charles Austin's site about "terrorism". Mr. Nieporent thinks that the justice system in America is fine without refining crimes down to "hate crimes" or "terrorism".
In many ways, I agree with him. It's an overcomplication to designate "hate crimes". It goes too many ways."Terrorism" might be a tad different. You'll have to take my word on this, but when we went into Afghanistan I saw a short film on MSNBC, "Inside Afghanistan", in which a prisoner-of-war in one of the northern camps was asked about Osama Bin Laden. He was interpreted as saying, "Osama is a terrorist. He does terrorism. Like a doctor does medicine, Osama does terrorism." Yes, Mr. Nieporent, there are different classes of crime.
That's not right. How was your mama gonna holler "William Joseph" out the screen door when she called you to supper?
Here's a great little story by Jesse Walker about a walk with his fiancee:
TRUE TALES OF BALTIMORE: So last night R. and I are walking the series of blocks that separate our car from a party. We pass three elderly women, and R. decides to mess with them by suddenly saying, "I don't know if I feel right about having an affair."There's a pause. Then one of the old ladies yells, "GO FOR IT!"
There are stories of the National Museum of Iraq being looted, like this one. Before everyone starts wringing their hands, experts need to examine what morsels are left and see if they are authentic. Note in this story:
The museum had been closed during much of the 1990's, and like many Iraqi institutions, its operations were cloaked in secrecy under Mr. Hussein.
Given the venality of the regime, and the tremendous value of antiquities on the black market, the museum might have contained nothing but exquisite fakes. Worth looking at.
LATER: The scam is, during these ten years you make exquisite fakes for the museum, and store the real things out of country. When war arrives, incite a mob to loot the museum, setting the whole world in a tizzy over lost relics, and forcing the US to start paying sums to recover the lost pieces, which you sell from your cache which has been safely stored away for years. I like it. Lovely way to get the last laugh.
Saddam just borrows the art from the people, and finances his lifestyle and such terrorist activities as he can afford with our dollars.
Body on beach had two left thumbs
Police said Friday that the fact that a body that washed up on a Wilmette beach had two left thumbs could help them identify the man.
Well, I guess so.
Via Brothers Judd comes this tale of horse-thieving during the looting in Baghdad. What a strange thought.
BAGHDAD, Iraq - It was enough to make a Texan president's heart swell: Hassan Atiya, an Iraqi on horseback, riding off into the chaos of wartime Baghdad with a vigorous wave and an exclamation — "I love you, America."
By way of Kathy Kinsley and Mommabear, to Command Post, to Defense Tech, to Noah Schachtman's article at Tech Central Station. Why are people in the field getting false positives on chemical tests?
Last night I was watching Fox News when embedded reporter Greg Kelley described how he and his team had left the presidential palace the night before to sleep in a clearing. Some members of the team put a tarp on the ground, but Kelley said no, he camped out on the hood of the Humvee.
Now, I don't mind sleeping on the floor, but I won't be sleeping outdoors in anything but a deluxe tent. I don't like bugs and I don't like snakes.
So what kinds of bugs are the soldiers living with in Iraq? Here's a story about an entomologist working with US forces in Kuwait. An excerpt:
Obenauer said malaria ---- spread by mosquitoes and parasites ---- and other nasty infections caused by "filth" flies, pose the biggest threats.But there are other dangers, posed by other bugs, including:
Sand flies: Like the no-see-ums in the southern United States and jejenes of Mexico and Central America, sand flies in Iraq like to bite feet, ankles and wrists. The Iraqi twist on the common pest is that they carry deadly viruses called cutaneous and visceral leishemaniasis, which can cause fever, weight loss, an enlarged spleen and liver before death.
Ticks: Unlike the ticks Marines may have seen before, in places like Camp Lejeune, N.C., Iraq's blood-suckers can transmit a bacteria into their host that can cause a form of hemorrhagic fever. They are pretty cunning, too, Obenauer said. "They're long-legged and fast, and they feel the vibrations of animals or humans and move toward it," he said. "They're pretty bad ticks."
Spiders and scorpions: While they do not carry diseases, spiders and scorpions are high on the troops' list of concerns, Obenauer said. And there are many to be concerned about.
Sun spiders, also known as "camel spiders," are not true spiders but spiderlike bugs that grow to be about 8 inches in diameter and are sure to freak out any Marine sharing a foxhole with one. Obenauer said that while they are big and ugly and pack a mean bite, they are nonvenomous and nearly harmless. Janis: Here's another reference for these guys, which includes this charming quote: "The popular terms 'haarskeerders' and 'baardskeerders' (Afrikaans words for hair and beard cutters) originate from the strange behaviour of some of these animals where they cut hair from sleeping people or animals (dogs) at night. It appears that female solifugids find hair to be an ideal nest liner."
There are 19 species of scorpions in Iraq, five of which are "very dangerous," Obenauer said. Among the latter is the black scorpion, one of the deadliest in the world.
It's worth reading the rest of the story to find out how dreadful conditions have been in Iraq. It also explains those 50 gallon drums of pesticides.
LATER: Here's a military site with pictures of snakes and scorpions, dangers and treatments.
So, Iraqis grow tomatoes, too. I am too lazy to cite, but, of course, you have heard the reports of Iraqis living on little but tomatoes. Must say, if I were restricted to a food or two, tomatoes would be high on the list.
My question is, "Do middle-aged men in Iraq compete in growing tomatoes?"
Is there a state-mandated way of growing tomatoes, or do men sit around arguing about the best way? Do they argue about fertilizing? Spacing? Depth of planting? Watering? Picking suckers?
Do they brag? "My tomatoes are marble-sized." "Well, my tomatoes are golf-ball sized." "When did you put yours out?" "Oh, my garden was ready in February." "My tomatoes are beginning to turn." "Birds are getting all mine."
Or is it all different?
LATER: According to this story about tomato farmers in Al Zubayr, probably not.Sorry, folks. I just experienced the best life has to offer. I was setting out the last two tomato plants in our rich Mississippi River soil when a tug on the river sounded its horn and cheers erupted from the ball park across the street.
Of course, there are already mosquitos. And Lucy is ticked because she couldn't participate. West Nile, you know.
Bosh, Josh. John Kerry has a tin ear. That's from a registered independent.
LATER: I'm watching Joshua Marshall on Fox right now. He has a good television presence. Nice voice.
It seems things just don't change:
Last November, exactly one year after the fall of the Taleban, I stayed in the Kabul house once occupied by Osama bin Laden. Though hardly on the scale of Saddam’s palaces, by Afghan standards it was a stately home, the residence of the Saudi-born terrorist’s third wife. It was at once a surprise and a confirmation to discover that the ascetic, anti-Western terrorist had chosen French bidets for the green-tiled en-suite bathrooms. His luxury mansion outside Kandahar, with its door handles studded with semi-precious stones, would not have been out of place in Footballers’ Wives.Caves? Riiiight...
From Smiley Anders in The Baton Rouge Advocate:
According to a recent survey, men say the first thing they notice about women is their eyes. And women say the first thing they notice about men is they're a bunch of liars.
Attacker held off with curling iron
That's as good a headline as I've seen lately. Here's the story from The Baton Rouge Advocate.
Tata Possum posted another excerpt from his turn-of-the-century writing guide today. It includes this excerpt:
Men of Action, Writers of Power.—Any atrophy of action in the writer is loss of power in the writing. The masculine literature of the world is the marrow of men great—in action as in writing: Moses, David, Paul, Cæsar, Æschylus, Michel Angelo, Cervantes, etc. Of more avail, also in literature, it the action any writing means than its literary finish. Homer, less literary than Virgil, is yet the greater influence. Milton, in form more measured than Shakespeare, is yet behind him in magnitude and power. Burns, who made no profession of literature, arouses more enthusiasm than Wordsworth, whose one business was poetry. Emerson is more literary, but less virile, than Carlyle, whose bias was all in favor of action.
Several years ago, to help my son Jason, I read a book or two of Milton for the second or third time. I have no time for Milton anymore. However you go about it, the man is a bore. On the other hand, Shakespeare is a charm.
Here is a story about the expulsion of CNN correspondent Nic Robertson from Iraq which makes a curious counterpoint to the Peter Arnett fiasco.
Way to go, Iraqis.
Not a particularly effective way to cure "humiliation". We could say you fight like girls, but that would insult Cpl. Blondie.
From Sparkey at Sgt. Stryker.
I would advise moderate Muslims to speak out now. I am angry. I have the vote. I will get your asses deported back to the middle ages. This story will work.
Me? I can walk. It would do me good.
I am putting this story up, not because I am a fan of Robert Fisk, or want to malign the Coalition effort, but this is a report of the the view from Baghdad. Regardless of who was responsible for the attack on the marketplace, it's what war looks like, too.
From Obscure Store comes this story from a suburb of Houston:
A Harris County resident Thursday was ordered to pay $100 a day until she cleans up her front yard of "natural" vegetation that has angered her homeowners association.
This is my destiny if I don't crawl "out there" by April Fool's Day. Does clover count as "natural vegetation"?
By gosh, I'm beginning to like that Donna Brazile. (Via The Corner.)
LATER: I have been filtering stories like this through the information in the story above. Donna Brazile ain't no "skeeza" neither.
I could've sworn I had Fritz Schrank on my bloglist when I started on this enterprise, but I see him no more. Let's try again. Sneaking Suspicions.
Many months ago, when I first started this weblog, a story came from Sydney, Australia, through that inimitable source Tim Blair of a parrot stolen from a pet store. Hector, the 31-year-old galah, or rose-breasted cockatoo, had been taken from his cage by a couple of silver-haired ladies. I have been checking on this story from time to time on Google and finally found the resolution to the story the other day. Here it is, from Persons Missing News, a source for missing persons in Australia. As the source does not provide a link, I will reprint the feature on Hector here:
7 August | The Daily Telegraph 7/8 p13 by Stavro Sofios
Hector thieves make contact - Breakthrough in the parrot-napping mystery
HECTOR the abducted galah is alive, "safe and happy" with the animal liberationists who stole him - and his owner doesn't necessarily want him back. The kidnappers made contact with The Daily Telegraph yesterday, claiming the 32-year-old parrot was freed from his "prison-like existence" to live with other birds in a large enclosure. The liberationists received qualified support from Hector's owner Doug Eyre, who offered to give up the community icon if they could prove the galah was now in a better environment.
"If you can show me he is happier in this new place, then keep him. Let him live out his last days happy," the West Ryde Pet Shop owner said yesterday. "My family needs closure, the people around here need closure and I won't push for charges if we can talk about it face-to-face. "If you really think this was the right way to go and if you're part of a fair dinkum liberation cause, why not prove it to us? Show me Hector in a good aviary and I might not take him away."
Expert analysis of the letter sent to The Daily Telegraph reveals it was written by the person who stole Hector and is also consistent with witness reports of the kidnappers -- two greyhaired women in their 50s with a "social conscience". The women took Hector, in his distinctive cage, from the footpath outside the West Ryde pet shop on July 20. The theft caused community uproar, with a reward of $7000 quickly offered for the return of the popular bird. "It says something about our society when $7000 is rewarded to put a galah back into a miserable existence in a cage no larger than a couple of milk crates rather than $7000 being offered to release a bird to his or her natural environment," read the letter, printed on a laser printer and sent in a yellow envelope. "Hector is safe and happy. Hector has not been released in the wild but now has the freedom to move around in a very large enclosure enjoying the company of other birds."
The owner gave his consent. Don't expect mine.
Despite my post below, don't think I'm looking at this war with a casual eye. I sat through the last Gulf War with a different man who had a son in the reserves. He waited every day dreading the news that his son was called up. I cannot imagine the anxiety of parents who know their children are on the front lines, and I cannot imagine the grief of parents losing their children in this conflict, or wives, or husbands, or children of men and women in service.
God have mercy.
Operation "Profound Dismay and Disgust" was a success. Unfortunately, many targets appeared to have been vanquished prior to attack. DNA experts will be required to identify certain specimens. While we can currently report that the area has been sanitized, we cannot guarantee that the area will not require further attention.
The fantasy baseball league will be meeting here tomorrow night, except for the two boys out of state. Let's see, that should be eight. We'll need some snacks. I have kangaroo sticks left from February. What else? Polish sausage? Spanish olives? Dutch cheese? Italian bread?
Friends of ours have experienced a strange repetition of events this weekend. Twenty years ago, their son was outdoors and heard strange bird sounds. He searched about, and found that the source of the noise was a cockatiel in the branch of a tree. He tempted the bird down and took it inside. They tried to find the owners and failed. The bird became a family pet for ten years.
This weekend, the father was outdoors, heard a strange sound in the trees, and looked up to find a cockatiel. The bird lit on a ladder and jumped onto John's finger when he offered it. Now they are searching for the owners. If they don't find any, they'll keep the bird.
UPDATE: The owner responded to the ad placed in the local newspaper and claimed the little guy. Good news all around.
Most of us are familiar with Meryl Yourish's Eat An Animal For PETA Day campaign. She received an e-mail from a critic that she dissected in this post. The writer writes:
I would listen to what you had to say, if you really tried to tell me why I should eat animals for a day. Why don't you tell me and others why we should eat animals for a day?I have a little story apropos of this question. I'll try to keep it short.From 1978 to 1983 I lived in New York City. I fell in with some New Age thinkers. Katherine, in particular, was a vegetarian of the ilk who believed that it was a spiritual necessity to refrain from eating meat. I never had philosophical qualms about eating meat, but to tell the truth, it was inconvenient in the neighborhood I lived in to find meat to cook. It was far easier to pop around the block to the green grocer's and pick up veggies and grains for meals. I also ate dairy and eggs, and spent some effort making sure that I had a complete diet, considering.
When I returned to Dallas in 1983 I continued with the vegetarian diet. One night I was leaving downtown with my pal Sam to go eat Indian food. I stepped badly off the curb and fractured my foot -- just a stress fracture, nothing too serious. I went to the doc-in-the-box the next day. He applied a fiberglass cast, and told me to report back to him in four weeks.
When I returned to the doctor he took x-rays of my foot. After four weeks, NO knitting had taken place. The bone was as clearly fractured as it had been in the first place.
From that day, for the next three weeks, I ate a rare roast beef sandwich and a large glass of milk for lunch every day. After the three weeks, I returned to the doctor and the foot was healed enough to remove the cast.
That's why I eat an animal a day.
I agree with this war much in the tone of Thomas Nephew and Gary Farber. But no one should go forward without reading this post by Salam in Baghdad.
Here's a cheerful departure from the common scum e-mail. 25,000 recipes from Italy and around the world, and I can speak only a few words of Italian. Chow, hon.
Regardless of how low I might feel, a quick trip to Molli Ann's to see how handsome little Sean is growing always cheers me up. She doesn't even know she has a fan.
UPDATE: I might have to delete this post. Sunday night I dreamed that I was mother to not one, but two chubby baby boys. Eeeks, NOT NOW!
All right, I should call the cops. It's pitch dark outside and two girls no more than 22 showed up at my door touting their faith. Keep off my doorstep, proselyters, and keep your pretty girls home after dark. Damn it, can't you understand that girls are taken and killed regardless of faith! I didn't have my glasses on and couldn't read their tags, but this is absolutely unacceptable, not because I have no need of their particular message, but because these young women are in danger. Idiots. We just had another body of a young woman from Baton Rouge found at a Whiskey River boat launch. WTF are you thinking?
To honor Meryl Yourish's Eat An Animal For PETA Day campaign, we will be treating ourselves to Chicken Piccata tonight. Lucy will get a bite, too, little cannibal. No veal, though. I have my limits, and besides, my mother won't let me eat it.
Patricia and Erin left for Dallas yesterday morning and arrived safely home at mid-afternoon. On previous visits, they usually left on Saturday, but some gentlemen friends beckoned them home early. Ah, well. We were all beginning to turn a little inward after four days together, and the long-distance bills were piling up. It was a good visit -- good company, good food, loud laughter, and the girls had some much needed rest. Patricia told me it's always good to come here to rest because she doesn't knock herself out looking for something to do -- because there isn't anything to do.
That's not exactly fair. We could've jumped in the car and ridden up to Vicksburg in an hour or down to New Orleans in 2-1/2 hours. We could've toured the Indian mounds or taken a drive up the Natchez Trace. But after the 6-1/2 hours over here, all the girls really wanted to do was hang out and be fed.
Feed them we did: Lyman's catfish Monday night, spaghetti and meatballs Tuesday night, crawfish and trimmings Wednesday night, and fajitas Thursday night. Patricia e-mailed her boss that she'd be back at work on Monday if she could fit back into the car.
Come to find out, I am a little behind the times (surprise, surprise!). Erin is eighteen years old and in her last year of high school. She has a job and spends her own money as she sees fit, which means that she has had her navel and tongue pierced. Piercings are so common that they're hardly worth comment. We found with our son Jason, the less said the better. If it doesn't arouse the elders, it just ain't hardly worth doing. Cossie, one of the women at the crawfish boil, and I urged her not to do anything to her face, though. Erin is a strikingly pretty girl and it would be a desecration. I also urged her to change her make-up to a more nude look. Why do young girls think they have to wear so much? And such garish colors? That's not what the hot models are doing. Probably did more harm than good with that advice. Thank goodness she's not mine to raise. By comparison, we teens of the seventies were a calm lot. (My ears are burning. My mother is saying, yeah, right.)
The crawfish boil was a success. Six women were present, and Lyman was the cook. He drove down river Wednesday afternoon to buy a 33-pound bag of live crawfish from a family farming crawfish in drained catfish ponds. The crawfish were satisfyingly large for this time of year, so we didn't have to starve to death peeling enough for our dinners. Patricia had never had crawfish before. She picked up peeling them in a snap, found she liked them, and kept pace with best of us. Erin wouldn't touch them. She ate hot dogs instead.
One of our guests was a woman widowed just six weeks ago. The very day her husband suffered a fatal heart attack I sent out the invitations for our party in February. She was, of course, not able to come to that party, but as she's a great fan of crawfish, she was invited to this small gathering. At the end of the evening, once we'd finished eating, she told us that we didn't know what we'd done for her that day. It would have been her 38th (excuse me, that would be 48th) anniversary, she said, and she would have been at home grieving had she not had a safe place to go. Just heart-breaking. We received a pretty thank-you card from her yesterday. Sometimes we do good.
Lucy had a week of it. Patricia was so disappointed early on because Lucy kept her distance and eyed her suspiciously. Patricia kept talking to her, and by Thursday Patricia was stroking her breast. In a few more days they would have been chatting merrily together. As it is, Lucy made a new friend just in time to lose her. We need to expose her to other people more often.
All in all, it was energizing. Now on to the yard.
Peg Britton of Kansas has posted a story of grassroots effectiveness here.
Inspires me to get to work out there in Lucifer's Little Acre. For some, it's the thaw, for some, it's the first robin -- for Louisianans, it's the first crawfish boil that signals spring.
OK. You must go right now to Quana Jones' site for the picture a reader sent. (Friday, March 7, 2003 in the archives. The permalink link doesn't show the picture, for me anyway.)
Lyman has said "Call Kathleen." Kathleen lives across the street. She is married to an old marine and has two boys in the Army reserves. I called Kathleen. She has four children now, the two boys already mentioned and two girls, 16 and 18. I asked her two questions. "Where are the boys?" and "Would one of your girls befriend my niece?" The boys are at Fort Eustace (sp?) in Virginia, undergoing 15 weeks training before they can be deployed. "What do you think of the war?" "It's coming. All we can do is support our troops." "Tell me. I'll buy sunglasses, bake cookies, write notes, send e-mails. Just tell me what they need." "Thank you, Janis."
Many years ago, long before I came to this neighborhood, Kathleen lost a baby girl, Megan, to SIDS. This war is hard on her.
And yes, she thinks it's always good to make a new friend.
So don't expect to hear much from me this week, as my sister and her daughter are coming. I haven't spoken much of Patricia, but she is a pretty, crazily funny and kind woman. I can't wait to have her for a whole week. Her daughter, Erin, has put in an order for Lyman's catfish. (How does Billy Joe Bob do it for only $4.99?)
I might unleash Erin on you. She's seventeen, and I'll predict that she'll be bored without a friend with her.
I want to thank MommaBear and Kathy Kinsley at Site-Essential for introducing me to Iranian Girl. She is a gift:
...It's an ordinary Friday & is our holiday; the weather is great & all signs of nature are reminding me that spring is coming...So I don’t feel like studding at all, you know It's less than two weeks to the end of year & the new year holidays & the high school is not serious at all, no one feels like studding & every ones waiting for free coming days... we have about two weeks & sometimes, a couple of days more holidays for the new year, many ones say that there must be less, I also do believe that generally Iran's holidays are too many , but actually like everyone else I have get used of it & can't stand less than it ;)... Anyway, first days of new year, is the days of dido bazdide eid; that means that all of relatives & friends go to each others houses , just as a matter of seeing each other in the new year, at first the young ones should go & see the olds of the family & then others...I think somehow It's a nice custom, for example there are lots of persons of our relatives that we don't see them in the year at all & It can be a reason for seeing each other, & also the ones who have had argument & are not in touch, must stop these kinds of behaviors & start the new year with kindness. So first days of the New Year is spent on such a think, personally I don't like this custom & have no sense of seeing the ones who I hardly know, but it should be done...there are lots of little things like this that make the great culture of Norooz, & all of them are based on happiness, kindness & nice connection between humans, ... Oh, I feel that nowadays so far we are from these things & we are getting farther & farther, That's why these customs seems strange for this new generation that have been growth in sadness, lie, tricks & have seen many ones who don't care about humans' peace & happiness.
Anyway...forget about these talks, beauty of spring & the magic of nature is another thing & that will destroy all the bad things itself. I'm just waiting for the bride of seasons to come & gives everyone hope of surviving...
Iranian Girl is considering some spring cleaning:
My room is a real mess, I wanna make it tidy & clean it; actually killing two birds with one stone, first for the coming year & the Norooz that we should make house nice & clean & also for the little party that I'm gonna have with my friends on the weekend...although here is like hell & I just don't know where exactly I should start from but I'm happy because both of the reasons are good & I have great motivations...Honey, I feel the same way, except maybe for the "great motivations". When will the weather clear?
Oh, yuck. I haven't seen such overcast since I left Portland, Oregon in 1976. Where went the Sunny South? Where is my book?
Oh, great. Now we have a tornado warning.
I keep trying to do something silly and life overtakes me. Some Christmases ago, I instituted stockings for Lyman's boys. Neither are married, though this past year they were 35 and 27 years old. I shop for nail clippers and emery boards, nail brushes and toothbrushes, pens, post-its, notepads, packs of playing cards and, for a joke this year, duct tape. Every American boy needs a roll of duct tape, right?
Yikes, we're next!
This report from Paul Robichaux targets Louisiana for the next front in the war against WMD. From Sgt. Stryker.
