Warning. Guest at Five O'Clock

I am one of those travelers who does not sleep well away from home. I love to travel. I love to see new things. I love to explore places of history and color. Most of all, I love to eat food that I wouldn’t normally fix as one of my everyday meals. But something in me does not allow me to relax at night.

I am currently in Slidell, Louisiana visiting friend, Deb, and her husband, Bill. My purpose for this visit is to alter her ball gown for a Mardi Gras banquet. She is on the Mystic Krewe of Nyx, a group of professional women – everything from doctors, retail owners, fire fighters. You name it, the ladies of Nyx represent a wide range of what women do in our world.

I think I slept 1.5 hours the first night - not because I was uncomfortable. On the contrary, Deb offers five star accommodations. I have baskets of fancy little toiletries; stacks of good books and magazines to read; my own little Christmas tree; a fabulously large, comfy bed and my own bathroom with yet even more amenities. I simply do not sleep.

I usually read until about two a.m. I bring mind-numbing, I mean soothing, music to help cover the quiet. I watch the clock every twenty minutes, and I try to be silent when I rise at five in the morning. While trying to do my utmost to be quiet in my bathroom, which is across the house from their suite, I seem to manage to drop everything that I don’t normally drop at home. I try to run the blow dryer on low, but invariably throw the switch to the high position instead of off, creating a  high pitched whine that wakes all the cats. I try to close doors with care to prevent bolts from clicking and clacking into place. I sit and read or work on the computer on the bed. I watch the sun rise over the water just off their dock. I watch ducks come in for a treat. I listen to the geese traveling. It is an idyllic setting in the morning that I thoroughly enjoy – all the while trying to be quiet as everyone else sleeps past the sun’s rising. I certainly don’t want to be one of those guests whose hosts mutter, “Dang it. She’s up at dawn again.”

My second night netted about three hours of sleep. I finished a good book, started this article, and made headway on the evening gown. Five o’clock a.m. rolled around and I decided to wait to shower and let the others enjoy some quiet. Six o’clock came and I couldn’t stand being trapped in my room.  You know that old story about the difference between a dog and a cat?

The dog’s life goes: Dog food! My favorite! A ride in the car! My favorite! I stay home by myself and sleep! What fun! Master’s home! I’m ecstatic!!!

The cat’s life goes: Cat food. Don’t they know what gourmet cooking is? Oh gosh, a ride in the car. I’m going to the vet to be put to sleep. Home by myself. Well, at least they won’t be foisting their stupid human tricks on me. Master’s home. Geeze. I am still being held hostage in this place.

I am the cat.

But I am not a bad guest. Part of my problem being away from home is that I am a list maker and a planner. I spend a lot of my time organizing my daily life, especially since I am still in the move-in and settling mode. Part of my day includes meal planning, shopping for household supplies, and busying myself with a lot of work.

As a guest, I have the assigned duties of nothing. And I really don’t handle that well. I would rather be waiting hand and foot on a guest in my home, bustling about my kitchen, and cleaning constantly. I am at a loss when I have nothing to do, even though I have a very big challenge of tailoring a ball gown this trip. I am still not busy enough for CHERYL.

However, this time I brought food. I am going to prepare our New Year’s Eve dinner. I started last week offering Deb and Bill menu choices. We settled on a bone-in pork loin roast with an onion mushroom cream gravy, garlic-tumeric fingerling potatoes with a homemade tzatziki sauce, and a first course of lemon grass wild rice soup. There will be radish roses and carrot flowers to decorate the plate and the tzatziki sauce will be in yellow squash boats with herb fronds decorating the handle. All the decorative veggies can be eaten with the sauce.

After the menu was settled, I made the grocery list. There were lists of items to buy, lists of what was already in the pantry to pack, and lists of cookware I needed to bring. Then there is the cook time chart. I have the meal planned out like a battle from the timing of searing the meat, the amount of time between the preparation and cooking of each course that will allow me to create garnishes, to serve times. For once, I am in my element. Detailed organization. I know. It sounds crazy to get joy out of all this work. But I am a worker-bee. I am a doer.

Deb fussed at me the whole time. She constantly asked if I needed help. My answer was NO. I didn't need help. Actually, truth be told, I didn't want to give up anything that would let my hands go idle for even five minutes. I stopped short of saying, "No, this is my stuff to do. Go away and don't touch anything. Mine, mine, mine. All mine."  (insert evil laugh following my diatribe.) 

It is now 7:30 a.m. of New Year's Day. I wonder when the hell they are going to get up. I need coffee.

Shot and Left for Dead

When I heard her story, I had to tell myself I couldn’t do anything to help. I already had two dogs and was caring for my mother with Alzheimer’s. I had a high-stress, high-demand job. I had added the volunteer position of choir director to my church. I simply could not add to my list of things to care for. But, if you don’t know me by now, as in the song by Harold Melvin and the Blue Notes, “You will never, never, never know me.”

This story is about the black Labrador Retriever I adopted back in 2010. It started on one of the days I had taken mother to the lady who did her nails. Since mother had very little communication skills at that time, the nail tech and I conversed during the process to keep mother distracted. (Mother would get distressed when her nails were cut. She had always kept long, well manicured nails. With personal hygiene skills being one of the first things mother “lost” I got tired of cleaning her nails – so off they went.)

On this particular day, the tech was telling me about a dog they rescued but couldn’t keep. Their Yorkshire Terrier had a Napoleon complex and was biting at the new dog in the house. The family was in chaos over the whole thing, and they were discussing taking the new dog to the pound, even though they had spent untold amounts of money on the dog. I knew the local shelter was NOT a no-kill shelter. My mind said an immediate “no, I can't let her go there” then another u-turn to tell myself “no you don’t - you have too much on your plate.” I did not need to open my mouth and say I would rescue her - Until I heard her story. And I have not regretted it since the day I brought her home.

Part of the dog’s story had to be pieced together. My vet is the one who figured some of the history surrounding the dog and the most likely answer as to how she ended up dumped in the country.

In the summer of 2010, the nail tech and her husband were out in the country helping her brother mend fences. They heard rifle shots ringing from the driveway of the farm across the street. A large, black dog was racing across a field toward the street. Another shot was fired and the dog went down. She didn’t move. Everyone was sure she was dead. The neighboring farmer continued on his drive into his driveway. The group mending fences had a “so sad, too bad” conversation. Then the dog stumbled to her feet, staggered a few steps and sat down.

They raced across the road. The black Lab had a bullet lodged above her right eye. They raced her to their vet, surgery was performed, and she was diagnosed as going to be perfectly fine. They named her Ruby. They took this sweet dog home only to have issues rise from the first steps in the door. The Yorkie acted out on everyone. It was almost too much consternation to deal with on a daily basis. Discussions of what to do with the big, black dog ensued, but no friends stepped up to the plate.

My heart melted. I blurted out, “Bring her to me. I have a Rottweiler who is the best dog on the planet. I have fostered a number of dogs over the years for the Baytown Humane Society. I think we can work this out.”

So, Ruby came to live with me, Bella, and Maggie in the fall of 2010. She turned out to be a sweet and loving dog who only wanted someone to love her. I took her to my local vet for an exam. This is where I learned the rest of her story – or the most plausible explanation we could come up with. The vet said it was obvious Ruby had been used as a breeding lab. Since she ended up with heart worms, the vet assumed that it was probably a puppy mill situation where the dogs do not get good veterinary medical care. When she hit the age of being no longer valuable as a breeder, she was not worth the expense of heart worm treatment. Can you imagine the confusion of being left alone, the heartbreak of being away from any life she may have known, then the absolute terror this dog suffered after being shot and hit - all in the matter of a couple of days? Can you have any doubts to my reaction to open my mouth and volunteer to take her?

I addressed the issue of heart worms and brought all her shots up to date. Ruby came home to be welcomed into a family – not a breeding mill cage. She blossomed. She bonded. She and Maggie fast became running buddies. I quickly came to respect how smart this breed is. Then, one night, I fully understood why the Labrador breed is tapped for use as assist dogs in all walks of life for the handicapped. Their natural intellect is amazing.

In case you haven’t read about my dog Bella, she is my Rottweiler. She is a BIG gal. She also has no clue she is a Rottweiler. She has been known to be my 119 pound lap poodle. Bella is terrified of storms. Hence, on the night a big storm rolled in while I was doing laundry, Bella stayed as close to me as possible. I made the mistake of not turning on a light on the way to the laundry room. I stepped out with a big basket load of clothes in my arms, completely blocking my vision from the floor of the dark room. Bella had placed herself in my path like a huge, black speed bump in the dark hallway of the laundry area. I went crashing across the room. Clothes flew everywhere. I hit the floor with my right leg crumpled in the wrong direction underneath me. My left elbow was bent in another direction and my face hit the floor full force. I couldn’t straighten my leg. Mother was useless in the television room unaware of anything going on around her.

I was actually trying not to sob as I dragged my body toward a dining chair to pull up. Ruby came to my side and nudged me. “Ruby! Go away! I am not playing!” I shouted. Ruby bumped her nose against my side harder. I screamed at her to go away. I managed to clear the floor by about an inch as I grasped a chair leg. I was in agony. Ruby, again, slammed her nose against me. She slid her head under my stomach. Within a second, Ruby shoved her whole body underneath mine and stood up. She stayed there until I had control of myself against the chair. Then she stepped away and silently watched me to ensure I was going to be okay. Bella was still on the floor imitating the speed bump.

I would not have believed it if it had not happened to me. Ruby has continued to amaze me over the last two years. She has an astounding inner clock. She knows the exact time for the evening meal. Every time Daylight Savings Time rolls in, and we roll the clocks back one hour, it is impossible re-set that inner clock. When “Fall Back” happened the first time, she barked at me one hour earlier than dinner time. I was the dumb one who didn’t catch on. All three girls get a dog cookie after they come in from a noon trip to the yard. Two of them will dally a bit, but Ruby heads straight for her spot in the kitchen. If I am the one dallying, Ruby will bark at me to remind me to get my act in gear.

While she was under heart worm treatment, she had to remain quiet. I took her to work with me. She stayed by my desk. She got into the habit of sitting by my office partner to say hello each day, then returned to her spot by me. My office partner worked part time Monday – Thursday and was off on Friday. Ruby did her visit each day until Friday rolled around. Friday was a different story. We walked in, sat down and started the day. Ruby finally got curious about the vacant chair across the room. She strolled over to my partner’s chair, sat down facing the empty seat, turned and looked at me as if to say, “Where is she? She’s not here.” Ruby sat there long enough for me to dig my phone out of my purse and take her picture. It was the saddest little face staring at me. I could hardly get any work done that day.

As I was packing for this latest move and sleeping on the floor exhausted every night, Ruby would lie beside me. I swear she sighed every time I sighed. This beautiful, intelligent creature could have graced someone’s household for the first ten years of her life. I can only hope the two-plus years with us have helped erase some of the past. She is slowing down, her muzzle is graying, but her heart has lost nothing with age. I pray she has no memory of the days she spent dumped like trash and was shot and left for dead.

November Crop Report

We are in our fourth week harvesting pecans. The small Giles and Major trees in the back yard have just about finished dropping fruit. The big Stewart tree in the front is losing leaves, but there are plenty of pods visible to the naked eye. Info from Pecans 101: In the big orchards they use a machine that walks up to the tree, locks onto the trunk, and the tree is shaken to encourage it to drop fruit.

                                      

We have cold, rainy weather on its way Tuesday. I told Ramon we needed to figure a way to get the pecans down before weather moved in. He said to me, “It won’t hurt them to get cold and wet on the tree.” NO DUH. My reply? (Insert sarcastic tone here.) “I know the pecans grow on trees, trees grow outside, and it rains outside. I’m the one who doesn’t want to be out in the cold rain picking up pecans!”

His bright idea was to get a choker and a shackle, tie it to the tree and connect the system to the trailer hitch on the truck, pull forward and back a few times to emulate shaking the tree. Mind you, the equipment he referred to is used to lift large items with large cranes on construction sites. Slight overkill. We got connected, the truck was put in gear, the straps pulled tight. The truck groaned. The tree leaned – a little. I was under the front porch holding a bucket. I yelled, “You’re not shaking it enough.” He backed up and started again. He was a bit more successful pulling the tree a little further, but we noticed that when he backed up, the strap slackened and the tree snapped back into place.  

Eureka! So here is what played out next. He says, “Maybe I could just bump it with the truck.” I said go for it. He said, “You need to flag me in so I don’t hit it too hard and dent the bumper.”

Okay, so how many of you have figured out what transpired next? If you didn’t, go back home and ask your parents to explain the birds and the bees to you again. You were obviously left behind somewhere.

I LEFT the safety of the porch. I stood at the rear quarter panel of the truck. His window was down as I relayed the closing distance to the tree, “Six feet, four feet, two feet, one foot, six inches. . . easy. . .” bump

The giant Stewart pecans were raining down on my pea picking little brain, striking me on the cheekbones and forehead. . . CUZ I WUZ LOOKIN UP LIKE A DANG FOOL!!! I was ducking and trying to run. What did Ramon do? He backed up and whacked it twice more. He paid no attention as I danced in the storm of golf ball sized hail. I didn’t want to risk breaking my glasses, so I just crouched down for protection and took the beating.

We picked up pecans for over forty minutes. I had to call it quits when the mosquitoes sent the message to the rest of their colony that the pale, white lady was being served for dinner. We will be back out there tomorrow and the next day, weather permitting. And there are still pods on the tree.

I am certain the whole world traveling on Massey Tompkins watched the little byplay. I am sure someone was on a cell phone and their conversation went something like, “On my way home. Milk, eggs, check. Hey, I just saw two old people in their front yard. The old man was backing into a tree and the lady was dancing around all crazy in the yard.” On top of that, it hadn’t dawned on me that the commuters have had plenty of opportunity to view my rear end in the course of this harvest season and probably know what brand of bra I wear. Sigh. Why do I not think of these things sooner? Next year I will have a better plan to avoid a Janet Jackson wardrobe malfunction. 

Bumper Crop

I moved to Baytown in 2000. The house sits on one of the busiest thoroughfares in the area. The noise from the traffic can be obnoxious at times – fire engines are a constant, and the motorcyclists seem to think it is their personal raceway. On top of that, we are only a couple of miles from Houston’s Raceway Park – monster trucks and race cars can be heard in the living room of the house.

However, there is a flip side to the cons on the pro and con list. I have one full acre of land divided in half. My house sits on the western half of the lot, one of Ramon’s sons has a trailer parked on the other half. The house has a privacy fenced back lot that is shaded with some wonderful trees. The trees are the topic of today’s entry.

At the back of the lot we have two pecan trees. Directly in front of the house we have a couple of oaks and a pecan tree. For almost twelve years I did not see pecans falling from any of our trees

I have often heard that a pecan tree will never produce fruit in the lifetime of the person who planted it. They are finicky plants that prefer a certain type of soil, weather and water. We knew the previous owners planted some of the trees. No fruit was seen by the original planters, nor by us. That all changed this year.

We have been picking up pecans for over two weeks. We gave away about 20 pounds straight off the ground in the shells. Then Ramon and I thought we would cash in on something that costs an absolute fortune at the grocery store – shelled pecans. I have never worked so damned hard for so little results. Hours upon hours of cracking and shelling. We put a price on a pound of shelled pecans that was competitive with the grocery stores – no one stopped to buy our product. On top of that, I caught Ramon eating our profit margin. He said he was checking them for quality of taste. I said, “Don’t give me that. You were never with Quality Control in the construction business. You ran the crane department!”

It wasn’t long before my kitchen became a pecan factory. Ramon cracked and shelled while I cleaned. I bought a scale to accurately weight them and started bagging. I decided that, if no one wanted to pay for them, I would give them away to friends. Best friend, Sue, said pecans were going for the price of diamonds in Arizona. I am bagging up several pounds of shelled and several pounds in the shell. If I had purchased them at the store – geeze – my gift value just went through the roof!

So I put myself through Pecan School 101. I learned that we have three different types: the small, slender pecans are known as Giles, the medium round pecans are Majors, and the big mama-jamas are known as Stewarts. And they all taste fantastic. The Stewarts are the biggest I have ever seen. They come from the tree in the front of the house.

Needless to say, my manicure is shot. Picking up pecans in our black, sandy dirt is tough on the nails. Some pecans have the outer shuck still clinging to them – try prying those off. It’s work. I have washed sink after sink full of pecans. I have stood for hours cleaning them. But the end result was worth it. I have fabulous gifts for my friends, and I took three pounds to my daughter. I spent a day baking with her last week. I haven't had that much time puttering around in a kitchen with my daughter in many years, and I have had more fun working on this project than anything else in a long time.

Please refer to my glazed pecan recipe in a blog below this. I know the store-bought pecans you find on the shelves can often taste like cardboard. I know Tina’s purchased pecans didn’t taste like anything compared to the fruit falling like manna from heaven in my yard.

Storing Pecans:
In the Shell (uncracked) at room temperature in a cool, dry place - 12-16 months
In the Shell (uncracked) in the refrigerator - 18-19 months
Shelled or Cracked in the refrigerator - 9 months
Shelled or Cracked in the freezer - 2-2 1/2 years (in airtight freezer bags or containers)
They can be thawed and re-frozen repeatedly during the freezing time period.
Shelled pecans are good for almost 2 months after removal from cold storage.
Pecans are known to lower LDL (bad) cholesterol.

Glazed Pecans

More than thirty years ago, I was noodling around with a candied pecan recipe. The original was too 'hard candy' shelled for my taste. I wanted something a little less hard on the teeth. Since this was long before the internet, I called someone in my church and asked about candy cooking and how temperature affected the outcome. After enough practice sessions, which my family didn't mind at all, I had what I thought was a great recipe. Everyone who tried my glazed pecans agreed that they should almost require a prescription because they were so addictive.

Years later, my daughter asked for the recipe. I couldn't find it. Plus, I am at this point in life where everything is packed. I knew I put everything that needed to be climate controlled [which includes all papers]  into the house, not the storage building. I was certain the box was in this house - somewhere. However, I took great care in this packing and moving process and sorted, cleaned, matched up items that had mates and labeled every single box with a list of the contents and placed a label on the top and one end of every box. I made sure the boxes were placed such that I could read the label. Mind you, towers of boxes have to be moved in every search process. And why, oh why, did I load the boxes of music and books in the room last? Oh, that might be the answer to the twelve pounds of weight I have lost. I might be a size three if I keep searching for stuff. I made one last valiant effort today to locate the box labeled My Handwritten Recipes.

FOUND IT. Yes, I was shouting.

So, for everyone's holiday pleasure, here is the recipe.

Glazed Pecans

3 cups shelled pecans [halves are preferred]
1/2 cup water
1 tsp. ground cinnamon
1/2 tsp. ground cloves
1/2 tsp. ground nutmeg
1/2 tsp. salt
1 cup sugar
1/2 tsp. vanilla

Pre-grease a cookie sheet with butter.
Mix all ingredients except pecans and 1/2 tsp. vanilla. Boil to a soft ball stage - or 235° F using a candy thermometer. The "soft-ball” stage means that the "syrup" will form into a soft ball when you drop a bit of it into cold water to cool it down. You can get an accurate "feel" by rolling it around in the bottom of a cup of cold water - cold from the tap, not iced water. It will actually go from being kind of a string to sticking together in a soft little ball. Once you hit this stage, add the vanilla. The mixture will kind of foam up - that's my best description of the chemical reaction.
Stir in the pecans and stir to coat as evenly as possible and spread out as flat as possible on the buttered cookie sheet.
Allow to cool, then break them apart.
Put the separated pecans in a fairly large plastic container with a lid on it and shake the container for a few minutes to "dust" them so they are not sticky on your hands.

From my kitchen to yours.

Chuck Wagon Cooking

Well, I have added another skill to my belt. Not because I set out to accomplish this goal, but because of necessity.

 As most of you have read, I am currently sharing a house with ex-husband number three. All my possessions are in boxes. I don’t know where anything is. Undergarments and nightwear are in a plastic storage bin in the living room, and I am sleeping on the couch. There isn’t even room to open the sleeper sofa. This also means real cookware is packed away gosh knows where.

So what did I decide to do Saturday? Bake my No Brainer Cookies for my granddaughter’s birthday barbeque. I bought supplies at the grocery store, but I didn’t want to invest in real cookie sheets when I have expensive ones – somewhere. Instead, I opted for aluminum cooking pans that you can throw away. Here is where my lack of thinking this through took me south – once again. Oh, and let’s veer to the other issue I battled. Both of my cooking timers are hiding with the cooking utensils, so I bought a cheap timer at a local dollar store.

First order of the day was to locate a pan of some sort to use as a mixing bowl. Then I had to wash everything that I hadn’t already washed before. (I am nowhere near finished cleaning this kitchen.) Once I had everything lined up, I was ready to cook. I mixed the dough, lined the aluminum pans with parchment paper, dropped dough in the appropriate size blobs, popped the tray in the oven and with a swollen head full of “I got this” set the timer.

I am pretty sure the oven at this house works perfectly, because I used to make wedding and birthday cakes in it. I know the temp control is correct. However, I didn’t account for the thinness of the aluminum pans. My first clue was the smell of burning parchment paper. Uh Oh. My cooking instructions on the recipe, which I created, are “bake at 350 degrees for 13-14 minutes.” I was at nine minutes and charring chocolate was not a pleasant smell. I lowered the heat by 25 degrees and tried again. Wait, what was that? The timer went off four minutes early. I handed it to Ramon and told him to run it back to the dollar store and swap it for another one. Now I was left to paying attention to my watch, which meant I couldn’t get caught up loading pans. I paced the floor. I kept opening the door to check cooking status. Second pan fared better than the first, but the cookies were still cooked past that perfect fudge line in the center. Drat. I decided to try to trim the time just as Ramon walked in with a new timer. I turned the knob to 10 minutes and turned my back to load more pans before my dough could dry. Wait, what was that smell? AGAIN? Surely not. YUP. The second timer was a total failure.

By this time I was muttering to myself about the situation I had myself in. Camping in my own house, and I HATE camping of any kind – in a cabin, in a tent in the woods, on the beach – nothing. My idea of camping is in a hotel that does not have a restaurant. It dawned on me that I was literally cooking with pots most people use outdoors. You know - the ones that aren’t in good enough condition to even give to the charity stores? People hang on to them for camp-outs with the guys. Dented. No Handles – there’s that one that has to be moved around with barbeque tongs. Two ragged oven mitts. Knives with split wooden handles. Two big stirring spoons that gladiators probably used in fighting matches. And lots of plastic spoons and forks that came with take-out dinners. All I wasn’t doing was starting a fire in the back yard.

Yet, I have been turning out fabulous meals in spite of the quality of cooking equipment at my disposal. Just goes to show you how hardships can be overcome. I think I will enter myself in a chuck wagon cook off contest. Anyone turning out roasts that melt in your mouth, fabulous pastas, bacon wrapped asparagus and garlic stuffed Cornish game hens using whacked out pans and utensils ought to win some sort of contest.

And my cookies were a roaring success with all the attendees of the birthday bash.

But there is still a bathroom in this house I haven’t ventured into. I have ordered a NOMEX jumpsuit and steel toed boots for that project.

Bachelor Squalor

Are all men blind to rotten food and filth? That is my question, and here are the facts that bring the question to light.

I have been, temporarily, sharing a house with my ex. Yes, you read correctly. Ex-husband #3. I was awarded the house in Baytown in the divorce several years ago, but I have been residing in my mother’s home in Richmond while I cared for her during her losing battle with Alzheimer's. She recently went into a care facility, and I now have the Richmond house up for sale. (Ramon has been occupying the Baytown house since the tenants moved out. It was a reasonable answer to keep the house open while I was taking care of mom for the past five years.) I found myself in need of a cheap place to stay until my move to New Orleans. Staying with Ramon in the Baytown house sounded like a good idea. At the time. Until I got my first glimpse of the condition of the house, that is.

The house was pristine when I moved him into the property about a year and a-half ago. That was because I spent a week cleaning it after the tenants moved out. I set him up with dishes that matched, new stainless flatware, cookware and some utensils – not because I thought he would actually cook something other than heating a tortilla or nuking things in the microwave, but because of some OCD need of mine for everything and everyone to be just right. The fridge should have stayed clean because Miller Lite was about the only thing I knew he would be putting in there. I did not expect to discover that he was applying for the Good Housekeeping Kamikaze Award.

My first night was October 16th. It was almost my last. I lifted the lid of the toilet in the hall bath to discover a mold ring that Farmer’s Insurance remediation experts would not touch. He never used that toilet so he thought it was clean enough to bless that restroom for COMPANY and the likes of myself. I think I heard it growl at me. I went to the hardware store and asked for the strongest acid that would clean battery terminals on an M-1 Abrams tank. After dealing with the toilet that would have frightened children, I then vanquished spiders in one corner of that restroom. Please note that I did apologize to the Daddy Longlegs spider I squashed. I know they don’t bite people, but anything in the Arachnid family had to go if I was going to pee without squealing constantly. I didn’t slide back the shower curtain at that point in time – I had not yet had sufficient Canadian Hunter whiskey in me to be that brave. The sink was daunting enough. I actually asked when that hand towel had been washed and dried my hands on my work shirt still grimy from sweating in it all day from the moving process.

I am thankful I didn’t drink the coffee brewed the next morning. I brought my own little unit and had it prepared the night before. God’s hand was guiding me, because three hours after rising the next morning I decided to start cleaning. I cleaned for two hours and only succeeded in cleaning the kitchen sink, the dish drain, the dishwasher used to hide (not to clean) dirty dishes, the knives and their holder (more on this later) and the two counter sides of the sink. Not kidding you. You know how some people make coffee every day and think swishing water in the pot cleans it good enough. Yeah - not here. Clean water and swishing never happened. There was a coating of old coffee so hard I used OVEN CLEANER in the glass coffee pot and still had to scrub. Then I rinsed the water chamber. I think the same mold from the toilet had a family in there. I dumped the contents onto paper towels and called him into the kitchen. “Ramon! This could have killed you.” His answer? “No, Miller Lite kills bacteria.” Wrong answer. I sent him to Dollar General to buy a new unit. He argued. I took a knife and severed the cord from the unit. “Go to Dollar General NOW.” He went. Mind you, it is only four blocks from the house.

The knives appeared to have been used, rinsed A LITTLE and slid back into their housings. Rust, dried whatever and who knows what crusted them. I soaked them in hot water, scrubbed with steel wool pads and poured boiling water in the holder and left it to drain. Next we played the game show HOW THE HELL LONG HAS THIS BEEN IN THE FRIDGE? I was actually going to fix us a brunch because I knew I had brought over eggs, cheese and butter, and we had leftovers of a delicious pork chop and steak fries from the night before. I reached into the fridge and spotted something trying to converse with me in an inter-stellar language. It shimmied, glowed and moved like a chia pet come to life.
“Ramon, what the heck is this?”
“I dunno.”
“Throw it away.”
“Wait, it might still be good.”
“Throw it away or I will pour out the Miller Lite.”
I won.

My language and descriptions of the items became more colorful as the cleaning went on. I believe the F bomb was dropped a few times and pleonastic descriptions flowed from my tongue. Did you know that dried burritos have the consistency of those musical blocks played in the drum section? Did you know that old rice goes from green to pink? Pink is the final color in the nuclear stages of mold development, and it actually becomes valuable at that point. And who opens a pack of wieners, eats one and thinks rolling the bag a little will keep them fresh until the next time you have too much Miller Lite to desire another wiener straight from the fridge? And who eats wieners without buns, chili, cheese, mustard and onions? Oh yeah, those people consuming six or seven tall Miller Lites. . . .

I quickly removed the few good items I sent over days ago to store in his fridge. They went to live in my own fridge moved days later and now found standing (clean I might add) in the other corner of the kitchen. I did not want to trust anything from a refrigerator that had a language of its own. That’s how you get children who are a little odd…..like some royalty with really bad teeth and hair.

Alas, my day was at a point where I needed a shower. What’s that sound from the movie Psycho? Yeah. I put a bath towel down in the shower before I put my feet in there. Another job for oven cleaner. Mental note to put this on the growing list of cleaning supplies that do not seem to have ever existed in this house.

Sigh. I think my dogs are the only happy creatures in my life. Living with Ramon for a few weeks has been a bonus vacation for them. Whatever bad food he has dropped on the floor has been manna from heaven. If they grow a second head I will know they were drinking from that toilet.

Traveling Back In Time With A Hamburger

Long before the fast food era and McDonald's, the small town where I grew up had one option for a hamburger/soda stand. It was called The Dippo. It's siding consisted of red and white vertical wooden panels. It had a slanted front plate glass window with a sliding door in the center. You walked up, placed your order, and the attendant wrote it down on a pad on a worn plastic laminate counter. Then they snapped the window shut in your face and called your name when it was ready. It was the only place in town from the time I can remember until the sixties when Burger Town opened near the junior high school.

When I was three, my mother treated me to an ice cream cone because I had been good at the doctor's office. She gave me the ice cream and struck up a conversation with a friend standing beside the car. When she entered the car, she told me how proud she was of me - I didn't make a complete mess of myself or my dress. I was a good girl.

After a few more errands, we went home. It was a hot summer day. There was no air conditioning in the car, nor was our house air conditioned - something I have moaned about before in previous blogs.

Alas, The Dippo closed some time around the eighties. It was still there in 1974 because my boyfriend and I ate there. But those old land marks have all disappeared. I thought they were a total thing of the past when voila! Driving down the heart of Richmond, Texas I spotted a familiar building. . . worn red and white vertical wooden panels, the slanted window, the sliding screen door.  Could my eyes be deceiving me? I took the chance and walked up to the window. I ordered a burger and fries. The elderly proprietor, Betty, slid the screen open, pulled out a ticket pad and took my order on a well worn plastic laminate counter that had seen better days about fifty years ago. I struck up a conversation with her by stating that I had driven by on Monday and was disappointed that they were closed. She informed me that she decided some 35 years ago she wanted a day off and chose Mondays. I don't know how long she has been in businss, but she ran that place in record time. My order was called, not by a number on a ticket, but by the phrase, "Honey, your order is ready. You enjoy that burger now and come back."

I sank my teeth into the sandwich. Years peeled away. I was transported to my younger days when we either walked or rode our bicycles to The Dippo. I will certainly patronize her several times before I move away. I was charmed and delighted to discover an old world way of life was still thriving in today's society.

Oh, and that ice cream cone my mother treated me to back in 1958? I did not eat the whole thing primly and neatly. After that long, hot day of errands, my mother discovered that I had placed it in her purse for safe-keeping. . . . it was one hot mess.

On Being a Neighbor

Once upon a time, everyone knew their neighbors. Not just the folks next door on either side of your house - you knew everyone on the block and down the street a way. I grew up in a small town - have written about it in previous pieces. It was the type of place you didn't bother to lock your front door when you left for vacation. We had no air conditioning, so all the windows were open. Same for everyone else around us, except one family who had window units. You could hear Edith sneeze from across the street. You heard children playing outside. You could hear everyone's mother calling them to come in for dinner, etc.

Well, knowing your neighbors is a rare thing now. I have lived in several places where a cursory glance between neighbors didn't even happen. I thought being neighborly was a thing of the past. Until, that is, I moved to Woven Wood Lane in Richmond.

There is a guy next door, I think he's somewhere around my age, who knows everyone on the street, talks to everyone, waves at everyone as he drives his vintage muscle car with its distinctive mufflers roaring through Pecan Gove. Instead of being the creepy, oddball bachelor sharing a house with a buddy, he is truly a neighbor.

When life with mother got much more demanding, I would come home to discover my yard mowed. It still happens. In bad weather, my garbage cans find their way from the street to the garage with the lids on them to prevent them from filling with water. I happened to notice that my mail box post was coming apart and made a mental note to call my brother to help me fixt it some day. I glanced sideways while I was backing out of the driveway last week - it was fixed. I know who did it. There was no doubt in my mind.

He has referred me to reliable mechanics for Lil' Buddy. He has helped me load items too big or too bulky for my puny frame to handle, and he constantly asks about mother and her well-being. We talk about family, pets and God's grace. I have come to call Brent a friend, not just the guy next door.

On a hot, summer day you will see Brent running up his water bill hosing down the kids on the block as they run through the water squealing with delight. They fight with water cannons and shoot fireworks together. He watches out as they play in the cul-de-sac and makes them get up in the grass when a car enters our short street. He talks cars to the car guy on the corner across from me. He listens to the fishing tales and marvels at the haul from a fishing trip the guys several houses down bring home. You will find out that every kid on the block knows him personally - and they mind him when he tells them to get out of the street or look both ways before crossing.

There was something so familiar about Brent. It took me a long time to nail it. I don't know why because it was so obvious. Brent is a carbon copy of Frank Jonas - my dad's best friend. Frank was the oldest kid on our street. He was like a second father to many us. His yard was the place to be. We gravitated to him like little magnets. So did every stray animal. There was safety there, and there was always fun.

When they are grown and have moved on, I hope the children of Woven Wood Lane will look back and realize what kind of neighbor Brent was for them. I don't think they make many of these people at all. They are a rare find. I thought the mold was broken after Frank Jonas was created. I was wrong, and I am very happy to say that!

Fashion History

 My grocery store card. 


















From the Evidence Files:

I have two nieces in the National Guard. Tricia is stateside, but Krystal is serving overseas in Africa. [Krys has already served a tour in Baghdad and Tricia's husband has served several overseas tours in the current conflicts. Couldn't resist an opportunity to be the proud aunt of people defending freedom.]

We usually communicate via email and Facebook, but I am sending Krys an old-fashioned card. I spotted it in the grocery store. I have no clue why it caught my eye because it was half covered by a card in front of it. Out of curiosity, I pulled it out of the slot. I nearly died laughing. It is a shot straight from the seventies. The granny dress days . . . Yes, I had them. Several of them. I have a photo of me in the black and white checkered dress that looks suspiciously like the girl on the right in a gingham print. That's me sitting on my cousin's lap in a Christmas photo my senior year. Dig the collar on the dress from my sophomore year!!! I think the girl in the middle on the card had the same pattern I had. See the pants on the guitar-playing dude looking all cool with his hair and sporting a cheesy attempt at a  Sonny Bono mustache? I had those too! The pants, not the mustache. [Although, that last item may be next on my life-list now that my jowels have appeared.]

What on earth were we thinking?

Looking back at fashion, we have several decades to be proud of. The thirties and forties have been recreated time and again. Nothing can compare to the timeless elegance of the A-line dresses and the 'Jackie O' and Marilyn Monroe looks of the late fifties and early sixties. The eighties? Ouch. The big hair, the painted clothes, the padded shoulder jumpsuits, oh my goodness. Fashion travesties I must say. We weren't even all stoned to make an excuse for it.

And speaking of timeless fashion, take a look at this photo of my mom. Classic. Sexy. And those legs. No wonder my dad took a picture of her every time she moved. I just have one thing to ask: "Mom, why didn't I get your genes instead of the short, squatty, round, freckle-faced grandmother from dad's side of the family?" Just thinking . . . life isn't always fair. And for that, I am pissed.

The Greatest Racket in Town

I would like to boycott the Town and Country Shopping Village of Houston, Texas. Last Friday evening I fell victim to the best legal racket I have ever heard of. Let me state that the money collected in this situation may not go into the pockets of Town and Country Shopping Village management, but the sheer inconvenience and expense to me and my friend, along with dozens of other people, caused by Town and Country Shopping Village is the foundation for my boycott. If I can get the message out to enough people to spare someone else from experiencing this, maybe Town and Country Village managment will rethink their parking policies. If you want to attract business, this is not the way to do it. Causing money to be taken out of my pocket will not leave it in my pocket to spend in their establishments.

I was invited to dinner that night by my preacher’s wife and two ladies from my church. They wanted to meet at Brio's, an upscale Italian restaurant. The location given to me was City Centre somewhere in the Town and Country district. Being unfamiliar with the area, I was unaware that there was a difference in City Centre and Town and Country, nor did I know that you did not have the liberty to park anywhere and shop both districts. When you drive into the area, every single street is named after Town and Country something: lane, street, avenue, way, boulevard. Other than some fancy flags, there is no distinction between the two shopping districts. It is a hip and happening venue - live music on weekend evenings with upscale stores and restaurants in abundance. People from across the Houston Metro area drive in to spend endless hours shopping, dining, and strolling. Parking is a beast to deal with. The parking garages are usually full, as are most of the parking lots. The parallel parking on the main streets is prime property on the weekends. You are either struck with dumb luck finding a place, or God has blessed you with the parking angels guiding your way. In the parking process, one must dart between moving traffic and dodge pedestrians and strollers.

One of the trio of friends told me she would meet me on a specific corner, jump in my car, and show me where to park. Luck was with me, and I found her pretty quickly. She jumped in the front seat as shoppers behind me fumed at my twelve second delay of their evening plans. We traveled a block or two down the way, spotted a fairly empty parking lot in a strip center, and waited for that split second when I could gun the engine to race into the lot between oncoming cars. With oncoming traffic as heavy as it was, there was no way I could have stopped at the entrance of the lot to read the 10x20 inch signs posted. If I had, oncoming traffic would have slammed into me, cars would have been honking, and everyone else trying to enter the lot would have been furious with me for holding them up. We went to the very BACK of the lot where very few cars were parked and walked to our restaurant a half block away. MIND YOU, THERE WERE NO SIGNS IN THE LOT ITSELF, AT THE BACK OF THE LOT, OR POSTED ANYWHERE ELSE IN THE LOT EXCEPT THE ENTRANCE AND EXIT. As we left the lot, a police officer in a fancy golf cart casually drove past us. He didn’t stop to say a word to us. He merely smiled. [I think he was listening to the cash register dinging in his head.]

I enjoyed a delightful meal with my friends, one of whom picked up the tab. We celebrated my service to the church as music director, solved the problems of the world and had a few good laughs. At the end of the evening, my 'parking' friend and I walked together to get our cars - WHICH WEREN'T THERE!!!!! We were joined in our confused circling of the lot by a woman and her daughter and a young couple with a small boy. Frantic phone calls were made to ascertain the whereabouts of our vehicles while we witnessed another car being prepared to be towed. As we walked toward the front of the lot to wait for one of our friends to rescue us, we saw the sign: Parking for Town and Country Patrons Only. WE WERE ON FREAKING TOWN AND COUNTRY BOULEVARD!!! WHO KNEW THE DIFFERENCE?

The vehicles were towed a mere three miles away. It was pitch dark, the area was not well lit and it was downright spooky for three women to be alone in that section of town. We get in line with the young couple who shared our fate. Meanwhile, they are bringing in cars one after the other – a Mercedes, a BMW, and several Hondas. It was a good night for them. Near the check-in window was a very large sign stating that they would accept cash and electronic payments only – credit card, debit, electronic check, etc. I was lucky that I had a copy of my current insurance card in my wallet. I stepped up to the window, presented my I.D., insurance card, and credit card. She looked at me and said, “Debit only, no credit.” I pointed at the sign. She reiterated that they would only take a debit card. Thank goodness I had a little money in the bank. The fee was $218.30!! In the span of time it took us to get our automobiles out of jail, I figured someone made over $1,500.00. Between the Town and Country Village Association and the towing company, this was a sweet deal indeed. My friend had to leave, go get a copy of her insurance card, visit an ATM for cash and find her divorce decree to prove why her name was different on her I.D. and her insurance card. Guess what? They don’t give change. She handed them $220.00 cash and they kept the change. If that happened fifty times a night, they pocket an extra $85.00.

Here is my beef . . . if they had posted signs that were obvious within the lot that did not put you in jeopardy when you stopped to read them at the entrance, I still wouldn’t have known that there was a difference in Town and Country and City Centre. It was a mere one-third block span between the two. How would tourists know this fact? And how would the Association know if someone choosing to dine in City Centre did not come back and shop in Town and Country? To top it all off, the young couple’s car was towed with their child’s car seat in it. They had no safe transport for their child, required by law to be in a car seat, while riding in a taxi on Houston freeways. They even told us that they had walked across the street and looked in some of Town and Country’s stores before they walked down into the other section, not having a clue they would have to pay a towing fee that they couldn’t afford – just because they didn’t spend money on that side of the block.

There were a number of businesses that were closed for the evening in that sector. I can see no harm in taking up parking in a place that is not showing signs of needing their spaces for their patrons. That Association knows full well how busy that area is. I am sure they also know that the whole world is not beating a path to every single one of their stores.

Why can’t we all just share and get along?

Hats off to you, Town and Country Village Association.

Ka-ching!!!

You have a great deal going for yourself. I will never patronize an establishment in your shopping district. My friends, and everyone sharing my experience at the impound lot, said the same thing. My blog has about 185 readers a month. That may not sound like a lot, but word spreads.

3 - 2 - 1 Mini Cake Mix

I saw this at work one day. This is a great idea for individual gift cakes.

1 box Angel Food cake mix

1 box any flavor cake mix

Mix the two dry cake mixes together and store in a gallon zip lock baggie.

When ready for a mini-cake, place 3 Tbsp. mix in a small microwave safe bowl. Mix in 2 Tbsp. water. Microwave on high for 1 minute.

You Gotta Love Those Little Old People

I can’t wait until I am old enough to say just about anything and get away with it. Case in point was one of the office angels [volunteers in the church office] working the desk at my former place of employment. She got a little miffed when the new minister’s wife took over the prayer chain calls. It had been her service to her church for ages until the new preacher arrived. She was one of those silver haired Southern women who was prim and proper. . . until this happened. While answering the phones for me one day, she made the remark, “Well, I’m not too keen on the new preacher, and his wife is a pasty faced horned toad.” Whew! I wasn’t expecting that. Then there was the office angel who dropped something, and a clearly uttered, Southern-drawled “Oh Shit” rolled off her tongue.  It had that two syllable pronunciation we are so well known for - shee-it - the voice is higher on the first syllable and drops a tone on the second.

These memories came back to me the other day while visiting my mother in the nursing facility. There was a new lady walking in to the dining room for lunch. She chose a chair and started to sit down. A table-mate very loudly said, “That’s Jim’s chair. You can’t sit there. He calls Bingo from that chair. It’s Jim’s chair!” She shuffled off to another table, asked if a seat was assigned to someone and was invited to sit down. The three women sat at the table quietly for a moment, then one long-time resident leaned over to the newcomer and said, “Did you poop?” She responded with a no. “You pooped. You smell like you pooped!” The newcomer vehemently denied the accusation, but got up from her chair and left the room in a hurry. I don’t know if she was embarrassed or if business did, indeed, need to be addressed. No sooner had she cleared the room, her accuser announced, “She went to her room because she pooped!” She had this distinct emphasis she put on the word poop. It actually sounded like she took delight in the announcement.  It was downright comical.

I told my daughter my fears of getting old. You know how some people grow old gracefully and some don’t. I am afraid I will be the one the grandchildren will be arguing over “It’s your turn to take grandma shopping. I did it last time.” or I’ll be the one saying over and over, “What time is it? I want a jelly donut.” [from an old Saturday Night Live sketch] I told my daughter I wanted to go out early before I could be a burden. I said I was going to take up eating red meat three times a day, drinking, smoking, and cussing. She admonished me, “Now mom, you already drink and cuss.” I retorted back, “Well I’m going to do everything else!”

Closing the Door

I spent last weekend with my daughter and son-in-law. Tina and I did the usual - tried some great food at a restaurant they had scoped out previously, sat at the breakfast table and talked, did some shopping, and caught up on a few chick flicks.

Almost always our table conversations are quiet, low, sad and centered on a time in our lives that neither of us has closure over - my second marriage. My first marriage was to Tina's father. We were great friends and musician buddies. We did everything together, and we never fought. I guess we kind of out-grew each other. There is more to the picture than that, but when the end of it came, I was so tired of being the workhorse that I slept like a baby the first night he left. I should have been torn, hurt - anything - but I wasn't.

 I met my second husband in the Beaumont Community Band, a civic group of adults playing concert music for the public, nursing homes, church and community functions. We had a faction of friends who worked hard to put us together as a couple. It worked. I fell madly in love. I thought he was my soul mate. I lived and breathed him. He was good with my daughter, and his son soon became an integral part of my life. We struggled financially, but we were okay. The world thought we were the greatest family, the perfect couple. What the world didn't see was what I struggled to shield from everyone.

 We all have demons that drive us to do things we shouldn't. I guess his demons had more sway and influence over him than I did. I know now that my love wasn't enough for him to fight them away. He spiraled further and further out of control. After seven years of marriage I felt like I was in a storm. He never put the family first. He never made me feel like anything more than barely adequate. When the end came, I confronted him and told him that I could no longer handle the things he was doing that hurt me and endangered the children. I named them all; drugs, pornography, the sneaking off to get stoned on prescription drugs with us searching for him for hours, bailing him out of jail when he got arrested for shoplifting under the influence. You name it, it happened. His response to my anguished tirade was not "I'm sorry I did those things." "I'm sorry I hurt you." "I'm sorry I put the family in danger." It was, "I'm sorry you feel that way." The knife went into my heart all the way to the hilt and twisted. And this was the nicest, funniest guy you would ever meet. The world could not believe it when we separated in the midst of our eleventh year.

I waited by the phone. Willed it to ring. I prayed to hear the words, "Can we talk?" It didn't happen. My daughter became so distressed over me crying myself to sleep she crawled in bed with me and begged me to stop. My college-age daughter slept with me every night for the next several years. I was in utter despair.

As the years passed, I had a couple of relationships that were never serious. I married for convenience and loneliness - thinking I could make it work just because I was tired of being alone and struggling. Well, we all know that doesn't work, and it didn't.

So last weekend came around, and Tina and I do the same talk. It was as raw for us that Friday morning as it was sixteen years ago. We left the house, did some shopping, had a fun lunch and returned to the house to catch up on some movies.

If you have never seen "The Bridges of Madison County" I would like to give you some advice. Some movies are tissue movies. This is a bath-towel movie. It is a heart wrenching story about a young woman who came over from Italy as an army wife. She was bright and witty. All she knew was that she was going to America, the great land of America where everyone had everything and did everything. She was not prepared for landing in the mid-west cornfields with daily grinding chores and no prospects in life other than to raise two children. No prospects that was, until a chance meeting with a photo-journalist that happened while her family was away for four days. He needed directions to the bridges the magazine sent him to photograph. She showed him the way and accompanied him for the shoots. It was love at first sight for her. You knew they were soul mates. He begged her to leave and go with him. She packed her bags, but they both knew she was not going to go. She faced the agonizing decision to stay for her family because it was the good and proper thing to do. As he was leaving town, his truck was stopped at in intersection in front of their vehicle. Through the rain you could see him reach into the glove box for something which he suspended on the rear view mirror. It was the religious medallion she had given to him, engraved with her initial. Her hand gripped the door handle as tightly as it could. As she sobbed, her hand let go of the handle. You could almost hear her heart shatter.

Years rocked along. She stayed at her husband's side as he died of an illness in their older years. The kids married and moved on. When she was finally alone and free she tried to locate the photo-journalist, but it was to no avail. She gave up on her soul mate. Months later, a box was delivered to her from a lawyer who handled the photo-journalist's final affairs. As she pulled out the items, the viewer's heart tightens with each one as they surfaced from the box; his camera, her medallion, a book he published titled Four Days featuring the bridges he photographed and the images he recorded of her, the container with his ashes and his request that they be scattered at a specific bridge. He was gone, but she knew he had loved her all those years. Upon her death her children discovered the treasures in the cedar chest, including her diaries chronicling the four days and the years that followed. She left instructions to be cremated with her ashes scattered at the same bridge her beloved requested for himself. At first her children were against it, upset about the affair that unfolded in the diaries - until they came to a greater understanding of love and relationships as they continued to read. The futility of love lost was the real tragedy of the story.

I realized that, after sixteen years of a broken heart, it was time to close the door on a chapter of my life that is mostly a hollow room reverberating with the echoes of something that could have been wonderful. We all have things in our lives, both terrible and beautiful, that mold us, but we should be able to love each other - both because of them and in spite of them. Alas, I guess it doesn't work for everyone.

The movie had such an impact on me I could not sleep. I found myself sitting at my daughter's kitchen table at three in the morning. On the back of a magazine I penned these words:

What once burned with passion is reduced to ashes imprisoned in a chamber of my heart. I'll pour them out into the winds and let them float upon a distant breeze. Perhaps it will take them far, far away to a bridge in Madison County. And I will know that I have found peace at last.

The End of a Long Week

A while back it seemed life was bent on tripping me up. Nothing was going right. My dogs were misbehaving. I thought I was losing my mind or falling prey to Alzheimer’s. I was even afraid I was losing my sense of humor. I used to be considered one of the funniest people you could know. In fact, my eulogy at my funeral is going to be five words long. “Damn, that woman was funny.” I will be honest and say that my humor wasn't quite dead.  Every now and then, something pops into my head. With that in mind, let’s talk about my idiot dog, Bella.

Bella is a Rottweiler I have had for about eight or nine years. She has no clue she is a Rottweiler. My ex and I were away from the house one day and returned home to discover that the lawn tractor and all our yard tools had been stolen. Bella had free reign of the back yard and the garage. We scratched our heads in wonder. It didn’t appear she was frantic about anything and she barks her fool head off at the sound of just about everything. Surely she wouldn’t let total strangers in the yard? About four hours later, Ramon’s youngest son, John, called. He said, “Hey, I borrowed your mower and stuff.” We asked how he got past the dog. “Easy,” he said, “we talked to her over the fence. Told her she was a pretty girl and asked if she was friendly. She wiggled her butt, and we put one of the kids over the fence to pet her.” [I was horrified that they put a child over a fence with a strange dog.] Once distracted with someone to lick, Bella was happy. And she probably showed them where the key to the tractor was.

The week prior to this blog story was an ‘if it can go wrong it will’ week. Bella’s tummy rejected dinner Wednesday night. Then it rejected breakfast Thursday morning, this time there was blood showing in the offering she placed at my feet. I called the vet. The vet actually asked me if I could [I’ll put this delicately] transport some of the rejected stomach content. So I scooped up the dog towel I mopped with and threw it in a garbage bag. Knowing this vet trip would make me late for work, I called in the situation to the office, got the leashes out and hooked her up. Yes, I said leashes plural. I run one around my waist to link to her and have one I control with my hand. This madness is based on the fact that I am a pianist. Bella could snap an arm or a wrist if she got carried away. My thought with the waist leash is that my whole body weight would help hold her back. If nothing else, once my body hits the ground, there is the possibility that I might be able to wrap myself around a tree to stop her. At any rate, we are a sight going anywhere. Plus, picture in your mind how short I am and how big this dog is. Everyone stares.

Speaking of big is where this story is going. After the Thursday trip to the vet, where Bella got a couple of shots, I had weekend plans she seemed intent on destroying. She had either an allergic reaction to one of the shots, or she was stung by a wasp when I put her out at noon on Friday. While I was on the road, she managed to chew and lick her hip until there was no hair on a 3.5 inch area and tore her flesh until it was raw like hamburger. Back to the vet.  After treating it with medicine, Dr. Amy said I had to keep Bella from licking it. Since the clinic didn’t have a cone of shame large enough for Bella’s neck, I spent the first two nights connected to this dog with a leash so I could tug her head away from her hip. Neither one of us slept well.

Sunday afternoon, the vet tech called my cell phone and said they located a cone. I picked it up and we buckled Bella into it. This cone was so large I had to fold it for her to go out the door. She was literally scraping the paint and plaster off my walls as she navigated the house. And I think she banged it on the bars of my brass bed about 80 times a night to let me know how much she hated it. In the picture you can see my other two mutts hanging their heads as if to say, "Uh, we didn't do anything. Please don't make us wear one of those fashion statements."

I leave you with the comments from my friends on facebook:
How many channels can she get with that?
Holy Cow! Did you get a permit from NASA for that satellite?
How’s the reception for Russian radio?
That’s one big cone of shame.
Latest technology in satellite dishes – moves room to room with you.
Can I borrow her? Our network is down.
Geez that thing is huge! But Bella’s huge!
Bella to Mars. . . better be watching for those green people.

LOL I feel sorry for Bella, but, I’ve had my laughs for today for certain.

Bisbee, Arizona

Just a couple of miles north of the Mexican border, perched on the rocky outcrops of the Mule Mountains in Cochise County you will find Bisbee, Arizona. Copper, gold and silver were mined there from 1880 to the 1970’s. When the mine closed in the seventies, the city was virtually abandoned. However, there were some residents who NEVER left. . . .more on that later. A couple of years rocked along and hippies from the sixties and early seventies gravitated to the place. City officials didn’t seem to mind these folks who made Bisbee home and a haven to smoke pot and hang out. The new residents actually helped clean up the place and put a stop to graffiti. Soon artists of all genres were drawn to the town. Once it turned into an artist colony type of place, tourists started picking up on it. Housing went from practically free if they had squatted on the property long enough, or dirt cheap at one hundred dollars for a house, to exorbitant prices for a shack hanging off a hill. Our handsome-cowboy-bus-driving-tour-guide told us the city went from being “the mile high city that cared” to “the city so high it had no cares.”

It’s a quaint and charming town with some streets so narrow and winding you cannot navigate a vehicle down them, or up them as the case may be. Walking or cycling are a few of the options. It was also interesting to note that the access from the street to houses on the second and third level of the mountainside was via stairs – yes, stairs – sometimes as much as 60 – 70 steps straight up! Can you imagine doing that trek with a load of groceries? Every October they host an event called The Bisbee 1000 Stair Climb. It is a five kilometer run through Bisbee that goes up and down 1,034 stairs. Billed as "The most unique physical fitness challenge in the USA!" by the organizers, it includes being serenaded by musicians at various locations across the city of stairs. The event has grown to include the Ice Man Competition, designed to honor the history of men delivering blocks of ice by hand before the advent of refrigeration. In the Ice Man Competition, entrants race up 155 steps carrying a ten-pound block of ice with antique ice tongs. It helps raise money to renovate the stair systems of the city crumbling as they age. People from all over the world come to this event to compete. With a bed and breakfast on every other corner and several vintage hotels, the visitors get to experience how life was back in the day. They also have a chance to meet the locals – and those OTHER residents . . . more on that later.

My trip to Arizona had the usual agenda of cool places to eat, things to see and do with best friend Sue and a trip to Tombstone and Bisbee. Tombstone, by all accounts of the tourist industry, is supposed to be fun, historical and interesting. Let me tell you, Tombstone is a wart on the hind quarters of a hog compared to Bisbee. Bisbee had the first public golf course in the country. Yes, you read correctly. It also had the first professional baseball field. Yup, again, correct. Lil’ old Bisbee’s Warren Field predates Chicago’s Wrigley Field by almost five years, and it boasts that it is the oldest baseball field in continuous use today. And some of those spectators from 1909 are still hanging  around today . . . more on that later.

Our hotel of choice was the Bisbee Grand. It was constructed in 1906 and restored in 1986 in the Old West Victorian style. I have created a photo album on my Facebook account for those interested in checking it out. We had to check in at the bar.  I thought that was very appropriate for the old west and made a mental note that Sue and I needed to plant ourselves at that bar sometime later that evening. We were given keys to the front door and to our rooms. The clerk informed us the front door was locked at a certain hour in the evening, but our keys would allow us to come and go as we pleased. When one enters the front door of the Bisbee Grand Hotel, you walk straight up the grand staircase to the second floor. A lovely landing wraps around the stairwell and hallways break away to the different suites and rooms. Now, let me confess that I didn’t have time to surf the web and read up on everything about Bisbee. Our attendant led us to Sue’s room first. We entered, and his first words were, “This room gets a lot of activity.” ACTIVITY? WHAT KIND OF ACTIVITY?  They have a ghost. Wait, let me correct that. They have two ghosts – one upstairs and one downstairs. The lady upstairs, he said, is harmless – all she does is check on you. My brain made a mental snort and said, “Yeah, right.” (I attended a mini-convention in Jefferson, Texas and stayed in what was supposed to be a very haunted hotel.  Not a one of us in the group saw anything.) Next we made our way down the hall to my room, which was perched over the bar. Sue’s room was very Victorian and cute. My room was called the Hunter’s Room, with a hunting theme décor. It was also pretty neat. We spent the rest of the day with Sue’s friend who gave us a private tour of the area. We did some snooping around in the shops and bar hopped a bit.

At some point we decided to call it a night. I watched some late night TV. The band downstairs rocked out until way past eleven. I turned off the TV the minute the band shut down, even though the occupants of the bar were still quite rowdy. Jimmy Fallon was talking about a comedian coming on after the commercial break as I was pressing the off button. I rolled over and flipped the covers up over my shoulders, telling myself to ignore the noise from downstairs. When the bed depressed at the location of my calf on the mattress my instant thought was that something fell off the ceiling onto the bed or a critter had jumped up on the bed. I immediately started to roll over to turn on the lamp and the bed depressed with a heavier impression at my hip level with two smaller depressions landing on either side of my head. In the instant it took to roll over, someone sat beside me and leaned over me to look me in the face. It was a dark enough image to block the light streaming through the lace curtains of the transom over the door with longish hair hanging down. Noise gurgled in my throat. I was frozen for that split second before a groan of a scream came out of my throat. It was gone as fast as it came. I hit the lights. Turned on the TV and Jimmy Fallon’s comedian was starting his bit. It was that fast. I was not asleep and dreaming. I called Sue. No answer. I bolted down the hall to her room as I called the bar downstairs. I frantically asked them if there was ever any report of ‘activity’ in my room above the noisy bar. The answer: 'Honey, there’s activity in every room. Did she visit you? Come on down to the bar if you need to relax.' I hauled Sue down to the bar and got a gin and tonic. Once for each hand. The bartender told me they don’t close up alone because the male ghost downstairs is a prankster who likes to turn on the beer taps when they’re not looking and lets the beer spill over the clean floor. He also likes to enter the ladies’ restroom and bang on the garbage can.

I spent the rest of the night with the television blaring and every light on. The next morning I was in a shop and the shop owner asked where I was staying. After I mentioned The Grand we discussed the ghost situation. I bought a book about the haunted places in Arizona. I read that all the hotels and bed and breakfasts in Bisbee have house 'residents' who cannot be explained.  It is a town well noted for its non-paying-continuously-staying guests.

I can still feel the sensation of it weeks after it happened.
It was a very cool place to visit.
ONCE.