I just love a good pot luck.  I know some folks who hate them because they don’t trust other peoples’ cooking.  The hubster is one of those.  I like trying other peoples’ cooking to find new recipes.  In the past I have found cheesy potatoes, corn bread salad, several wonderful cookie recipes and an excellent recipe for Swedish meatballs.

As luck would have it, I was invited to a recent holiday pot luck.  I took taco cheese dip because I really wanted it but hate to make it because I eat all of it.

I tried a Chinese ramen salad that was very tasty.  There were yummy corn casserole and a notable cranberry cookie dessert.  As I was passing by the table one of the most obnoxious odors accosted me.  I leaned down to discover which dish held the aroma.  As I pretty much always take one spoonful of each dish, just in case it is wonderful, I took one small spoonful of this casserole.

Back in my dining chair, I ventured a taste of the horrible smelling concoction and almost heaved.  I chewed a bit of what I assumed was meat.  I strategically spit the taste into my napkin and got up, threw it in the trash and got myself another napkin.

I have no idea if the casserole was rice, potato, overcooked Noodles or what. and can only venture to guess what this casserole was.  I came up with the most horrid thing imaginable.  It was snake shit casserole.  There, I’ve said it!

Years ago, I had gone to another pot luck with my friend, Nancy, and we had the worst soup I had ever eaten.  We decided that it was butt hair soup.

The next time I saw Nancy I had to tell her about the snake shit casserole.  We had a good laugh.

Although I consider myself an adventurous food consumer, I believe I will be cautious the next pot luck that I attend.

PS  I did a Google search for snake shit casserole and there were images that came up.  I am so very frightened.

Peace be with you.

I’ve had this little stone haunting me in my kitchen for the past while.  It says, “remember” on it, and for the life of me I cannot remember where I got this little stone.  And I can’t imagine what I am supposed to remember.

I have found lately that I forget words that I want to use.  I will be in mid-sentence and forget the word that I need to express what I am trying to get across.  It’s not that I don’t have a large vocabulary, I do.  I just lose words sometimes.  I also have that age-old problem of going to retrieve something and forget what I am looking for.

I guess Alzheimer’s disease is one of my worst fears.  I try my best to do all the things they suggest you do to protect your brain and your memory.  I do puzzles of all kinds – jigsaw, crossword and all kinds of little memory exercises.  (I just forgot the word “exercises”.)

I’m reading a fascinating book called, The Keeper of Lost Things by Ruth Hogan.  It is a great story about a guy who finds things and makes up stories as to what happened to them and to the person who lost the item.  I am thinking I should start to write about the things I find.

I used to walk around the lake (six miles) every Earth Day and pick up garbage.  I’d go one way one day and do the opposite way the next day.  I have found used condoms, unused condoms, tampons, a ton of Marlboro light cigarette packages (some day I am going to find that asshole).  I once found a paper bag with a bunch of herbs.  There was oregano, marjoram, thyme, and parsley as I recall.  I bet that person was pissed when she started making her spaghetti sauce.

I once found a size large navy sweatshirt that said “London” on it.  I brought it home and washed it and it is one of my favorite sweatshirts.  I also found a pair of pink panties once and threw them back on the ground.  That would be some story to tell.

A ten-dollar bill was probably the best thing I have ever found.  I find change all the time.  I even pick up pennies.

Last summer I kept finding those little booze bottles.  They were empty except for the Rumchata that I found.  I gave it to Garnet as it is one of her favorite things.  By the way, I was the inventor of Rumchata.  We were in Arizona for Jess’ graduation from college and she turned me onto Orchata.  I remarked that it would be great with rum and we purchased some and I drank it for her graduation party.

At that party the funniest thing happened.  There was this guy at the party who was obviously one of Jess’ friends and he was like six-foot six and about 250 pounds.  He claimed that he could stop anyone from attacking him and I took his challenge.  He grabbed me from behind and smothered me.  I bit him.  He screamed like a little girl, “she bit me.”  I didn’t do it hard but I certainly broke his grasp. I won!!!

I do remember the strangest things, but I can’t remember what I ate yesterday, half the time.  I remember lyrics to songs from the sixties.  I remember my phone number from childhood.  When I worked for Liberal Markets in Dayton, Ohio I could remember half the phone numbers from the thirty some stores that I worked with.

In this book that I am reading the protagonist drinks Diet Coke.  If you know me this is one of my worst hates.  I hate anything with aspartame.  I especially hate Diet Coke.  I think it is bad for your brain and I try to tell everyone who drinks it, not to.  I heard on NPR the other day that our beloved President drinks a ton of Diet Coke.  We wonder why he lies so much.  He can’t remember stuff because he is poisoning his brain with Diet Coke.  (Perhaps the Democrats have hope yet.)

It’s almost Christmas and I have everything ready.  Of course, I don’t do a whole lot.  I sent my packages to my girls and the Webbs already.  My cards went out the second week of December.  I don’t buy many gifts but got the hubster a little something.  Yesterday and today I delivered cookies to all the folks I love and appreciate.

We are going to the in-laws for Christmas Eve.  I’m making big-ass salad.  I hope I don’t forget it this time as I did on Thanksgiving.  But since it is the main meal I am sure I will remember it.

Peace be with you.

I started out my day eating a baked potato with cottage cheese and Pace hot salsa.  Breakfast of champions!  I then continued to Facebook where I watched daughter, Addi, baking Cookiepalooza.  She is so very entertaining.  I think she is unique and I am so proud that I had something to do with her creation.

Another friend, Alicia, recommended me to watch Zooey Deschanel explaining that white bread is garbage and we should be baking our own bread.  I reminisced about the time my good friend, Dave Staddon’s mom taught me and his wife, Mari, how to make Butterhorns.  She was so patient with us.  We also make homemade Whole Wheat Bread.

Two years in a row, I made Buttterhorns for my family for Thanksgiving and Christmas.  My mother made those store-bought dinner rolls and everyone ignored my homemade bread.  I quit making homemade bread for my extended family but made them for my own little family.

Now-a-days, at the Faerber residence we don’t eat much bread.  The hubster decided years ago that white food was bad for him and refused to eat it.  I occasionally buy a loaf of whole grain oat bread and have a piece of toast for breakfast.  I keep the bread in the fridge.  (Don’t you think the smell of fresh made cinnamon toast is one of the best smells ever?)

I wish you could buy just four slices of bread at a time.  Then it wouldn’t waste away in the fridge. Or perhaps I should start baking my own bread and making little loaves and freezing the rest. I do love a warm piece of bread with real butter melting on the top.

I like shopping at Sullivan’s grocery where you can purchase just one roll or a dozen if so desired.  I do so love having a bigass burger on a fresh onion roll.  Or a meatball sub on a fresh hoagie bun.

Years ago, I wrote a story about baking bread with Dave’s mom and I want to share it today.

LEARNING TO BAKE BREAD

            We have this friend of the family, Dave, who is a Native American and he ate with us frequently when we were young.  He talked about the fresh bread his mother would make and suggested that I should learn to make bread someday.

            Dave spent two years in Japan studying Martial Arts and came home to America with his Japanese wife.  Dave’s mother, Agnes, called me one day before Thanksgiving.  She invited me over for a Saturday and asked me to bring a large mixing bowl, a stick of real butter, a bag of flour and some baking sheets.

            Agnes, Dave’s wife and I spent the Saturday before Thanksgiving, and she taught us how to make Butterhorns and whole wheat bread.  She stressed the importance of the temperature of the yeast, the strength of kneading the bread and the love we were putting into the creation for our families to enjoy.

            My baby, Addi, spent the day also and banged on Agnes’ pots and pans with wooden spoons and got flour all over the kitchen.  We girls shared cooking stores and Agnes told us stories of when Dave was little and how much he enjoyed it when she baked bread.  Agnes shared stories of when she was little and lived on the Ojibway Indian Reservation in Canada.  We had such fun and learned so much about her and baking bread.

            Almost twenty years later I still take the time to prepare Butterhorns for my family for Thanksgiving dinner.  My memory of that day and all that Agnes taught me has remained with me.  I feel she shares Thanksgiving with us each year.

Peace be with you.

Thanksgiving has forever been a very special holiday for me.  I remember as a child, my grandparents always came to our house for the feast.  I remember sitting on the back of the couch and watching out the window for them to arrive.  Grandpa drove the ugliest ass car.  I think it was a 57 Chevy in titty pink and white.  I would yell, “they’re here”, and rush out to the car to meet them.  Grandma’s purse always smelled of Clove chewing gum and I always got a piece right off the bat.

My grandfather was a shy man but tall, strong and blonde.  He gave the best hugs.  He was the first person I ever heard of having Alzheimer’s disease.

Waking up on Thanksgiving morning was the best.  The aroma of turkey and dressing permeated the air. My mother was up early in the morning to cook the innards for the giblet stuffing.  She had a fresh pone of cornbread baked to go in too.  I’ve always said that heaven would smell like Thanksgiving morning.

When we lived in Dayton, Ohio we started a tradition of having all of our friends over the weekend before Thanksgiving for a pre-turkey party.  My house would be full of card tables and tv trays for our almost thirty friends to eat.  Everyone would bring a dish to pass and the hubster and I made the turkey and stuffing.  I really miss those parties.

When we moved to Illinois, we would take turns having Thanksgiving at relatives’ homes.  The first one we had in our new home was very special as my parents and my favorite aunt and uncle came from Ohio to join in with the hubster’s parents, grandparents and his brother’s family.  We had a real house full that year.

Later, when the girls went to college we started having Thanksgiving with Addi bringing friends from Beloit College that couldn’t go home for the holiday.  (Sometimes I think they just wanted to come to our house.)  We had such fun times.  We made the usual turkey and stuffing dinner but the hubster always made a roast beast.  (i.e.  bloody beef roast.)  Everyone was in the kitchen cooking, or opening the wine and passing out spirits.

Now that the girls are at the far ends of the United States, it is just the hubster and me for dinner.  Last year I got to make a small chicken with stuffing and the fixins.  (Stuffing, mashed potatoes, green bean casserole and rolls.)  The hubster confessed that he really doesn’t like turkey and stuffing and I admitted that I could exist on it.

This year we have settled for making Tonkatsu.  This is a Japanese dish of deep fried pork cutlet on a bed of raw cabbage, rice and deep-fried hunks of onion and green pepper with Tonkatsu sauce.  The sauce is similar to A-1 sauce or Heinz 57 sauce but a lot better.  We usually make this dish when we have company.  It takes at least two people to make it.  One frying and one handing off prepared items to go in to fry.  We decided that it was special enough that we would have it for Thanksgiving.

If you are interested and would like to have it, come one over.  Yeah right!  J M K Nippon serves it, but you have to request to eat on the dining room side and not on the teppan side.

Happy Thanksgiving.  And may peace be with you.

As I get older I find that I listen to NPR a lot more.  I guess I am getting tired of hearing the same old songs on the radio.  I am a rock and roll girl and I love most everything from the late sixties to the nineties.  Pop music sucks butt, rap music sucks something else and some of the new hard rock is a little too hard for me.

And so I digress on the subject of this blog.  My subject is “thank you.”  Or possibly “you’re welcome.”  On the talk shows on NPR the host always thanks the guests for being on the show and rather than them saying “you’re welcome” they thank back.  What ever happened to “you’re welcome?” What I am saying is why not say, “You’re welcome and thank you for having me on your program.”

I believe the problem is that people don’t want to feel indebted to anyone else.  I thank you, you thank me – we’re even.  I thank you, you “you’re welcome” me – does that mean that I won?  I just think it is common courtesy.  Let’s not let “you’re welcome” die.

The sign language for “you’re welcome” is a “W” to the side of your face, and cross over.  We should all learn sign language in case we can’t hear when we get really old. (Back to digression.)  The universal sign for “thank you” is your hand at your lips and drop it to your chin, fingers pointing outward.

Most every day when I walk the dog I thank the universe for “this day”. I am so very lucky to be able to live in the country, breathe fresh air, walk this little dog who lived in a shelter for five years, and be able to speak and write my mind freely.  I have the most wonderful daughters and sons-in-law and a brand-new grandson.  My friends are the best.  I have good health and I think my breath is usually fresh.  And so, I thank the universe every day for “this day”.  (BTW, it has never “you’re welcomed” me.)

I have been getting a massage (or fifteen minutes of absolute torture) every Monday morning, trying to break up these knots in my shoulders and neck.  When she finishes, I always say “thank you”.  She usually just murmurs something.  I appreciate her so very much.  I took her one of my jams.

Today my big project is to write six “thank you” notes.  I oversee the maintenance of the garden at the front gate where I live at Lake Summerset, Illinois.  I have a crew of six women who on and off help me.  We usually work for an hour but sometimes we must work for two.  The more hands the faster the work.  And I am so very appreciative of these ladies.  Two years ago, when I took over the task of being team leader, I worked by myself on many Monday mornings. That year when I got a couple of workers, I took them to breakfast for our last Monday.

“Thank yous” are given right and left to each other, to our waitress, to our teacher, to just anyone who comes into our world and helps out.  The “thank you” that is not given enough is to ourselves.  In this day and age, we do not have enough pats on our back to ensure that we are doing a good job.  There is too much depression in way too many lovely people.  There is way too little kindness drifting around the atmosphere.

Just for today, thank yourself.  Say “thank you” to the mirror after you brush your teeth.  Say “thank you” to yourself after making your bed.  Thank yourself after making and eating your breakfast.  Thank yourself for every little task you perform.

Make a big-ass sign that says “THANK ME” to remind yourself to give yourself some thanks.  You deserve it.  You need it.

You’re welcome.

Peace be with you.

I’m reading a book for my Master Gardeners’ Book Club in November and there was the most wonderful chapter about water and it got me thinking about how water has played such a role in my life.  I’ve never been without water but when we lived in Dayton, Ohio I wasn’t thrilled with the taste of the water and I often carried water from my aunt’s home in Germantown, Ohio.

My first love of water was as a child.  My dad was a fisherman and we would pack up on a weekend and go to Twin Creek which was also in Germantown. Us kids would play in the water and have a rip-roaring time and my dad would take off away from us to fish.  We would skate rocks over the creek and catch crawdads. I learned to swim at Twin Creek and enjoyed many fun days swimming there and at the local swimming pool in Chautauqua.

Our house had a well which provided us with drinking water.  I remember waking up in the middle of hot summer nights and drinking from my hand the ice-cold water from the bathroom tap.  My mother would get up to check on me and I would be close to drowning in the refreshingly cold tap water.

On occasion my parents would allow me to hook up the sprinkle and run through it.  Why is it that you know how cold that rush is going to be but you persist in running in and out of it? Years later as an adult I ran through a sprinkler in a stranger’s yard while on tour with the marching band in Minnesota.  It was so darn hot, and I really didn’t care that I was soaking wet.  This was my only wet t-shirt episode.

After the hubster and I married he was my brother’s fishing partner.  They fished Twin Creek.  We had small mouth or rock bass for breakfast almost every weekend morning.

In my third year at college the hubster and I decided that I would take scuba diving lessons as one of my classes.  I made it through the physics thanks to him but when my check-out dive came time, I discovered that I was pregnant. I waited a whole year before I finally did my check-out dive.  We dove mud ponds in Ohio but I just loved being under the water.  We have dived many times since in Jamaica while on vacations.

We set up an aquarium at our little house in Kettering, Ohio.  The hubster brought home a large mouth bass whom we named Bucket Mouth and a rock bass named Sideburn.  Bucket Mouth had tried to eat Sideburn and took half his dorsal fin, hence the name Sideburn.  We turned the fish loose in a little creek near our home one Sunday morning and to this day if we drive that way I think of our little fishies.

We set up another aquarium at our house we purchased in Dayton and raised gold fish which had come from my dad’s outdoor pond.  His neighbors complained about the fish pond and so he gave the fish to us and filled the pond and make a flowerbed.  The pond was only a foot deep and really was not a threat but my dad didn’t like confrontation and got rid of the pond.

When the girls were little we set up a swimming pool in the back yard.  The hubster dug a big hole in the ground and we sank a little plastic pool about five feet big.  It was about eighteen inches in depth.  The girls would take off from the back door and run and dive into the pool.  It made those horrid summer days bearable.  And when the girls went to sleep the hubster and I would go out back and lounge in the cool water.

The girls didn’t want to go out to play if it rained so I made them up as Wonder Woman.  They put on their bathing suits and rubber boots.  I tied towels around their necks for capes and taped their wrists and foreheads with masking tape. They ran around and tromped in the rain puddles and had a blast playing Wonder Woman.

Jess now lives in Arizona and misses the rain.  She says she misses the smell of rain.  I claim she misses the smell of the earthworms that cover the driveway when it rains.

Years later we would go boating at Caesar’s Creek Lake with our friends, The Miller family.  We would take a lunch and the kids would jump off the boat and into the water with their life preservers.  We tried skiing but found knee boarding much more to our liking. The kids had a big innertube and we would pull them around on that.

When we moved to Illinois, we decided that we really had to live on a lake.  We drove out into the country looking for a lake near Roscoe but ended up at Lake Summerset and fell in love.  We spend every day possible in the lake or at the pool.  Every evening when the hubster got home from work we ended up at Beach Two when we claimed we had reserved seats on the beach.  We would swim and lounge until the sun went down and then made it home to fix our dinner.  Addi claims that even now when it is hot she isn’t hungry until she has swum.

Addi brought home a beta fish and set up a little aquarium for him. She even took him to college with her.  I called him Fluffy because he was so beautiful.  She called him Tolstoy (talk about stupid names for a fish!).

One of my good friends, Kim Clark, passed away when she was 39.  She had gotten a goldfish for entertainment and asked me to take it when she became unable to take care of him.  The hubster set up another aquarium and he began raising fancy goldfish.  Kim’s fish was named Marley.  We got a black moor fish and called him Bob.  We then got Rita, Ziggy and the Whalers.  Ziggy tried to eat one of the Whalers and the hubster had to extract the Whaler from Ziggy mouth.

When Marley got really large his wen grew so big it covered his eyes.  The hubster did surgery on him and removed the top of his wen.  I’ll have to blog that story some time.

On occasion when I am canning I don’t have a full canner and so I can water.  I have several jars of canned water in the pantry downstairs.  If there is ever an emergency, I will be prepared.

I drink a lot of water and for some stupid reason I have always thought the water in the bathroom was sweeter than the kitchen tap water.  Perhaps it is that childhood memory of our ice-cold well water in the summertime.

I have so many memories of water and adventures in and with water.  I love living on a lake and seeing so many people enjoying it. I’ve never had a time in my life that I wasn’t without water.  I think the reason I don’t like the desert very much is because there is so little water.  I’ve also never been in a flood.  Our basement gets a little water from a crack in the foundation, but I am pretty sure that our septic pump has never been run.

I’ve got to get off this computer and go get a drink of water.

Peace be with you.

Today is my younger daughter, Jessica's, 36th birthday.  I made her a quilt for her college graduation and I wrote this that day in 2003 when I was finishing her quilt. She has just presented me with my first grandchild and I am so very thrilled. Happy birthday my love.

As I sat sewing the last stitches of Jess’ graduation quilt I was overcome with memories of her and Addi, me and my problems, and our lives intertwined.  When I was pregnant with Jess, I was scared that I wouldn’t love her.  I had such an overwhelming love for Addi and didn’t know if I had it in me to love two people in the world like that.  Believe me, love for your children is a lot different than romantic love.

Not liking most people is one of my problems.  I know I can pretend but not well.  I guess that is the reason I never wanted to have children.  I was afraid to have this little person thrust upon me and then – what if I didn’t like them?

Addi was so easy because she was so pleasant.  When she did cry, she cried so hard that she passed out.  Talk about scared!  And Addi was so adventurous.  Everything was exciting -- bathing, nursing, swimming, the dogs.  She was such a pleasure to take care of.  I thought when I was pregnant with Jess that I was having a boy.  I had sort of wanted a boy with Addi but she turned out so perfect that it didn’t matter.  I thought having a boy would be a new adventure for me.  I was so afraid that I didn't have any more love possible within me though and I was more afraid of the bond between my new baby and me than I was of having a baby.

Jess’ breach birth scared Rick to death.  He was so afraid he would have to tell me that my (our) baby was dead.  He was so relieved when she finally cried.  I had been anesthetized to give way for the baby’s birth because we were well beyond doing a Cesarean.  Jess’ feet were out while I was first examined and I could have had her in the exam room while waiting for the doctor to arrive.

I know how pioneer women and native women must have felt when they found themselves alone and birthing.  I needed to push and there was no one near.  I was in too much pain to cry out.  All I could do was pant and try not to push.

Luckily, I had a wonderful pediatrician and Jess was born amid a melee but was healthy.  I suppose the strain of this horrendous birthing experience scared Jess for life.  She was caught in the calamity of the moment and still allows this hurricane out of her on occasion.

When I awoke from the anesthesiology Rick was right next to me waiting.  I asked him, ”where’s my boy?”  He told me that he thought to himself, “I’m so glad I don’t have to tell her that he is dead.”  He replied and told me the one thing that he knew would make me relived.  He said, “Wilma, our baby is a girl.  And she has the longest eye lashes.”

I took a moment to incorporate the shock of another little girl and in my mind’s eye I saw her looking similar to me with my long eyelashes but even longer.  Addi had looked like neither Rick nor me and the thought of a little human being similar to me touched my heart and soul.

When the nurse finally arrived and I asked to see my baby, she wheel chaired me to the nursery.  She placed this blanket wrapped package into my arms and I looked down on her little olive puckered face.  She did have beautiful eyelashes.  I began to cry gently.  I was sad that the son I would have had was not to be and I was relieved that this child who had scared the living daylights out of an entire maternity ward was all right.  And I cried because my question was still not answered.  Did I have enough love in me for one more?

One of my tears must have run down my face and dropped onto Jess’ eye.  I looked down at her and in that instant I saw the tear fall into her closed eye.  At that moment she opened her eyes and looked at me.  I looked back and we continued to gaze at each other for what seemed like a very long time.

“It’s going to be all right,” I whispered to her.  “I’m going to be your momma.  It’ll be all right.”

And most of the time it was all right.  We had our ups and downs but they weren’t significant.  Only the good times were important and there were so many of them.

As for enough love within me for two daughters – they call me “Smother” because I guess I have too much love.

Jess and her "Pa" traded glasses.

Peace be with you.