The Dangers Of Comfy Pants

Comfy Pants should come with a warning label.

It should be known far and wide that comfy pants are so comfy, you will want to wear them all day when you are lounging around the house on a lazy Saturday. Next you will come home from work, kick off your heels and peel off your tights and slid into your comfy pants, since you are just hanging out at home.

The next step on this slippery down hill slope is wearing them out. You will wear them to drive through the bank. Run to the library. The grocery store. Dinner out.

The next thing you know, you are sad when your one pair of comfy pants are in the dirty clothes and you start dreaming of having two pairs so you will never be without.

This my friends, is a dangerous place to be.

But it's so comfy!!!

My Mother's Biscuits

My Mother's biscuits are the bomb.

They are the best biscuits I've ever had. Hands down. No exceptions.

Going to eat at her house, if she says she's making biscuits, it's like, oh man oh man oh man, it's my lucky day!

I've tried to make them myself. They are simple baking powder biscuits. I can follow a recipe. I can do this.

But I can't! No matter how I try it, following the recipe exactly or playing fast and loose with the measurements, my biscuits are just a sad imitation of my Mom's. After all these years, 17 married one's in fact, I am finally close to accepting defeat.

No one can touch my Mom's biscuits.

And that is why I'm sitting here eating my fourth (!!!!!) cold biscuit. She sent some home with the kids last night and I knew, I KNEW, I would be eating them for breakfast.

Oh man oh man oh man!

I Hate This Old House

And I used to be it's number one fan!

When that magazine came to our door, I couldn't wait to flip through it's glossy pages, see it's lovely redo's, dream of changes big and small in my own old house....

It's been years of living in this old house that I love, years of getting This Old House periodical, and years of just the basic remodels being done.

The final straw came yesterday when I read the cover of the latest issue.

"Install A Wall Niche."

Install a wall niche? Really? This magazine is not preaching to my level of grade school choir! I'm still holding out for a real hand rail leading up the stairs and actual tiles to cover the hardibacker that lines my kitchen walls.....There is no way I'm going to make a hole in my wall when I've been working so hard on covering the ones the house came with!

I can finally admit it. This Old House is full of dreams I had for My Old House when we first got it. I still dream of those things, and I know one day, some day, I will have this old house put to rights, but until then, I am sick of This Old House.

I want a magazine based more closely to my reality.

I've Tried It And I Hate It

Sushi. It's hip and happening.

I'm totally hip and happening.

I like rice. I don't like raw fish.

Apparently, a California roll has crab instead of fish. I like crab. I do not like imitation crab.

I like cucumbers. I do not like avocado.

It was going to be a 50/50 crap shoot whether it was good or bad.

I probably would still be a sushi virgin except we had lunch brought to our office, and there was some sushi, and some comments were made about me not trying it (as in, I'm a chicken!) and I am not a chicken.

I am adventurous, as previously posted.

I tried one.

It tasted like a beach smells.

I can now say I've tried it, and I hate it. The only problem is, this was sushi in a clear plastic box, from the local grocery store. I was quickly informed that "real" sushi is so much better.

Crap! Another challenge! I guess I've got to try it one more time before I can say it's not really for me!

Of course, this challenge of chicken-ness could all be in my head......

Cluck, Cluck!

Goodbye Old Fort

When my son was 8 or 9, we bought him a wooden play structure, a fort if you will. It wasn't fancy, we never got the slide or the rock wall we dreamed of, but it had a rope ladder and a steering wheel and it was good. My son is a kind enough big brother that more often than not, his sister was climbing on it too. They would have elaborate play times in it, adventuring all over in their imagination.

Even the dogs loved it! It had a rope swing that the dogs would make made dashes at, tugging and swinging back and forth.

It hasn't been used in a while, by kids or dogs.

It was sitting on the back corner of our property looking sad and lonely, literally rotting away with neglect.

My son said I could give it to my nephews. I asked my sisters and I got a taker. But it's actually a daunting task to move a play structure without taking it apart, and no one wanted to take it apart! So there the fort sat, waiting.

Then today my sister said she was ready for it. A spot was cleared at her house, my husband would be home with the truck, we would move it. So we did.

I was in the middle of cooking dinner and didn't want it to burn so I did not see it get loaded up. I did not drive down the alley's of the next two blocks to come to a stop at my sisters house. I did not see R and T's joy at having a fort in their back yard.

And my husband said the boys were beyond joyful!

I keep telling myself the fort has gone to a better place. It is going to be loved and used and keep going on its adventures with two very clever little boys....

Apparently my husband was right when he told my sister I was going to cry later.

I so am.

Goodbye Old Fort, you served us well. Give R and T some awesome memories, but please, keep your splinters to yourself!

Who Knew I Wasn't Going To Like It?

I should have, that's who.

I know myself well enough after 36 years of living in my own skin to know that as lovely as the picture might be, as perfectly as the extra veggies going to seed on my shelves will find a way to be eaten, as tasty as the name implies it will be, if it calls for sweet potatoes AND cauliflower AND onions AND garbanzo beans AND tomatoes, I probably won't like it.

I like most of those things on their own. With butter. Or cheese. Or cooked down until I don't recognize it (that's why I love ketchup!). But all together, with a liberal dash of hot curry powder, to replicate a dish from India, well, I shouldn't be surprised that I didn't like it.

But, here's the thing about me, I am actually adventurous. I do try new things and I like to taste new foods. I guess I will remain surprised every time a recipe I try doesn't quite live up to how I imagined it would taste.

I think that's why God made McDonalds, right? So when one of my adventurous meals is a complete and total fail, and I'm not feeling the love to start over on a new meal, the kids can still eat happy.

This might be why, on new meal nights, they are very eager to hear how the first bite is.

Is it good?

Yes? Oh. Okay.

No? Awesome! Cheeseburgers for us tonight!

October, You Are Not Summer

October, you are not Summer. Why are you acting all sunny and warm? Why are you making it so hard to really transition into fall?

Oh, don't get me wrong. You are lovely! Beyond lovely, actually. You are a ray of sunshine perfection!

But, you are not summer. You are supposed to be colder and wetter and darker.

I am going to work without tights! And no jacket! Short sleeves, bare legs, in October!

No way is this the way I imagined October. I mean, in your sister month of September, I forced myself to not get out the tights. I said to myself, wait until October 1. I will be wearing tights and sweaters from now until April, wait just a bit.

So I waited, toughed it out, and now you, October, have the audacity to be full of sun and warmth!

Thank you.