A Sorrowful Mystery

When I was trying to act Catholic a few decades ago I learned all about the Rosary: The Joyful Mysteries and the Glorious Mysteries and the Sorrowful Mysteries.

And then I promptly forgot what they all were except for one. I know for certain sure what one of the Sorrowful Mysteries is, was, and always will be:

The Death of a Good Red Shoe.
Even Mackie looks sad and somewhat at a loss.
I don't know how I shall find the strength to go on. To be without Red Shoes is to be without a soul in Russia. It is to be without Light and Rainbows and Comfortable yet Stunning Feet.

Goodbye, my Beloved LizFlex shoes.

Time to Die.

How To Spend Your Morning Making Maple Fudge

This is a great way to use up extra ingredients and kill half a morning! Make Maple Fudge!

Start by printing out a recipe: Any old maple fudge recipe will do because the end product will be exactly the same no matter what. It helps if you have a trusty assistant who will be vigilant in making sure the printer doesn't attack anything or make any sudden moves.Line an 8x8 square pan with expensive aluminum foil and then spray the heck out of it so it cannot be used for anything else in the unlikely event of a fudge failure. Mix up all the ingredients the way you are supposed to according to your chosen recipe. Be sure and use up the last of the Mapeline so that you can't make a second batch if this one doesn't turn out.

A candy thermometer is an absolute must. You want to follow the instructions perfectly and they are going to say something like "cook to 348 degrees" and you want to steam your face really well when hanging over the pot trying to count those teensy little lines on the thermometer.

But just to make sure, use the 'softball' method, too. That entails a saucer of cold water and lots of runny globs of the mixture respirating in limp depression, semi-floating in the water, their lifespan prematurely ended because they never rose to the task of forming a soft ball in all that cold water.

Fast forward to the part where you scorch the entire batch and have to throw it down the drain and open up all the doors and windows to get the chemical smell of burned sugar out of the air.

Spend the rest of your time scraping the burned stuff from the pan.

That's a Morning Well Spent! Happy Cooking!

Gravitate to the Beer and Soothe your Shrapnel

I had to run to the Dollar Tree this morning and squander my money on cheap plastic items that only cost .9 cents to manufacture and disintegrate upon contact once you get them home. When I was paying for my purchases (a powder compact for my purse which I just discovered will not stay shut because the clasp is missing; a round styling brush that I just discovered tears my hair out by the roots because the little prongs are jagged and probably dipped in poison; one of those puffy fluffy powder brushes that I just discovered feels like dragging straw across my face and is so uneven that it smears the powder in little clumps; a small sized mixing bowl so I can whisk my eggs in the morning that I just discovered once I removed the store label and saw what was underneath, has enough lead in it to kill entire colonies of marmots living on the edges of the old Killhope Lead Mines in North England and thus renders it useless for beating eggs) I was struck with one of those killer, jabbing, sudden frontal lobe headaches.

I said OUCH and the check-out clerk said in sympathy, "Oh, is it one of those sinus headaches?"

Without thinking I responded, "Shrapnel. From 'Nam. Pressing on my brain tumor."

She fell out laughing and said I made her day and that those shrapnel wounds were just fine except for the side effects and we both went on with our day in better moods than before.

People all around me are starting to be as funny as I am. It's a real joy!

On Sunday there was a gentleman walking down the alley on his way to the church next door as I was getting into my car. We exchanged the usual friendly greetings about what a nice day it was since the air was blowing that awful toxic smoke away from all the wildfires at last. I said, "It's so nice to have a little oxygen in the air again!" and he replied "Yes, and we don't have to chew it!"

Then Miss Biddy got her vocabulary a little jumbled while we were having tea and a chat, saying, "My brother is so nice he never lacked in girlfriends. He's just so friendly that is why everyone gyrates to him."

I've gyrated to a man or two in my life so I knew just what she meant!

And then the ever-scrambled Miss Kitty told me this long, meandering pointless story all about Pearl and Earl, a mother and son who go up to the Spill-Booze Lounge every single day.

"Earl lives with Pearl because she is old and needs the help plus he doesn't have a job anyway. Pearl has a beard. Nobody says anything. Everyday they go up to the Spill-Booze and she sits there with her beard. Nobody bothers her or says anything. They leave her alone with her beard."

I was appalled! "Oh, NO Miss Kitty! She shouldn't have a beard! Her son needs to look into having that taken care of! They have hormones now and all kinds of epilation options. Just typical of a man not to take care of something like that which can be so easily fixed!"

Miss Kitty said, "Well, it's okay! Her son doesn't care! It's just one beard! Nobody says anything to her about it!"

And then of course, the old shrapnel must have shifted and comprehension dawned:

"Miss Kitty, do you mean she has a BEER?"

And that about sums up my week in humor!

More things I am loving right now.

Good Things come from Dumpsters

I love dumpster diving! Or at least, dumpster perimeter scouting! I don't actually dive into dumpsters, that would be unsanitary. But fully 3/4 of my furniture comes from junk I've gleaned from alleys and side-streets and had that lovely word "FREE" taped to its body!

For instance this really ratty old cabinet. It was perched outside my own apartment building in the alley near where I park. I saw it and thought it looked like a filing cabinet but that perhaps it had potential. I liked the brass handles so I determined if it was still there when I came home from running errands I'd take a look at it.

It was there and I decided upon inspection that it was worth salvaging, and so I hoisted it up my stairs and onto the plastic for a make-over. Not wanting to invest a bunch of money I don't have in paint or stain, I just used the Cherry Chocolate I had left over from my pie safe re-do.

This is what the finished thing looked like in this morning's light. As always, you can click on the picture to get a higher resolution, better-lit look at it. I can't decide whether I really like it or will have to get rid of it at the first opportunity but for now it is the perfect home for all my table cloths and linens.

And another good thing?

DAIRY PRODUCTS. Why do they get such a bad rap?

BIG Ken

Yesterday was my regular shopping day with Miss Kitty. As usual she had a list for all the things she needs and on a separate piece of paper, an item that had been recommended to her by her sister in law as something she might like to try.

Why she doesn't put that sort of thing on the existing list I do not know.

It happened to be some Ken's Light Balsamic Soy Ginger Dressing, which I knew was going to be trouble.

Miss Kitty doesn't like change. She doesn't like to try new things, she doesn't like odd brands.

Her favorite phrase is "I know him/her/that/those." I call it Land Park Snobbism. They are so proud of their little elite neighborhood and how friendly they are. Friendly like a nest of snakes. If you are ALSO a Landparker, then you are treated with such sweet kindness. If you are not 'known' then you are condescendingly smiled at. No overtures of true friendliness are made.

Miss Kitty's poor downtrodden pharmacist is retiring, and there is a lot of hoopla about where she will pick up her medicines now. I've told her that the Safeway Pharmacy is quite competent and it would make it so easy to be able to pick up her meds there when we are doing her regular shopping. She could even put them on their own list.

But, no, she has to go to some out of the way little pharmacy because, "I know him."

"How do you know him, Miss Kitty?" I ask.

"Well, I don't, but his Dad knew my Mother."

Of course, that makes him a very, very competent pharmacist so end of discussion. In Land Park you only need to be known by someone and your career is assured.

I only bring this up because my nose is out of joint. Miss Kitty's next door neighbor, the one who was so astonished to learn I was clever, always waves like mad at my car until she sees that I am not carrying Miss Kitty as my passenger and then she turns her back on me. I'm just the hired help, and nobody knows me.

So, there we were, facing a daunting wall of salad dressings, marinades and vinaigrette's, looking for Ken's Light Balsamic Soy Dressing. I could feel the agitation and tribal-fear growing in Miss Kitty as she was about to leave her compound of familiarity and step out amongst the hoi polloi to shop for something new and uncharted.

Ken's is not a major name brand like Kraft or Hidden Valley, but it has been around for a while and does seem to have about 15 varieties on hand. I'm not afraid of Ken. But Miss Kitty was muttering under her breath, "I don't know Ken. Is he Big? How BIG is Ken? I don't know him."

I soothed her as much as possible by showing her that she could actually get the Kraft Brand of Light Balsamic Soy Dressing instead. This put her into further agitation because it meant she wouldn't be getting the same, known kind that her sister-in-law had recommended in the first place.

It was all too much for her, I guess, because she decided that she didn't eat tomatoes anyway so why buy dressing to put on them?

As I was putting the bottles back on the shelf I heard her Loud Bray of Derision echoeing down the halls of Safeway Market...

"WHO the HELL is KEN?"

Poor Ken. If he had just been from Land Park, he could have been a contender!

Things I'm Loving Right Now

The air is really bad right now in Sacramento, due to all the wildfires. So bad that it always looks like sundown on a foggy day. Looking at it through the windshield of my car as I drive to work, I am always reminded of the dust in the air at the fairgrounds, when the whole world smells like diesel from the carnie rides and livestock odors and John Deere Tractors all shiny and new in their green paint.

The fibromyalgia is in full force right now and it leaves me wondering: How much tiredness can a person sustain? How much muscle pain and how much brain fog? Before it all just melts into a puddle of goo and I'm nothing more than a gob of rot on the floor with a forlorn pair of reading glasses on a chain sticking out of the top of it?

So I have to find things I love. I have to find things I like to look at and think about. Things that brighten all and everything for as long as they need to look brighter to take me to the next moment and the next, unglobbed..

Things like this bow tie quilt in the loveliest teals and sky blues.

Things like snow white linen napkins (of which, like champagne, I've never had enough!)

Things like "A New Earth" by Eckhart Tolle.

Things like a Robin's Egg blue Sadler teapot and matching creamer right next to a Bauer pot in the same shade of heaven.

And my homemade crepes.

What are you loving right now?

Handy Hotpad: Official Tutorial for the Crochetically Savvy

Start with a wash cloth that you like. I like white and that's all I have so that's what I used.

So now you are going to do a tricky kind of fold. And good luck with that because giving you a step by step photographic journey for the fold was beyond my skills and capabilities.

Actually I just got bored with that part because I wanted to crochet. So here is part of the fold.

Bwa-LA! Here is the completed fold. See how easy that was? For those of you who are not rocket scientists and may be spatially challenged like me, you can find info on the net for Origami and just look up how to make a Crane Base. That is all this is, a crane base cloth.Okay, then you are going to carefully cast on to the edges of the cloth with a slip stitch. When you do this at home, it won't be blurry. Unless you are drunk. But do not drink and crochet, please. Many, many crochet fatalities go unrecorded each year and why end up as a statistic? How sad for your family to have to shake their heads and whisper through their tear soaked hankies, " She died in a terrible crochet accident. It was horrible. Bloody. Senseless. We told her not to drink and crochet. We should have taken away her hook."Quite sozzled by now, you can still make out the detail on which direction you will put your slip stitch. It will look like this at some point in the procedure. When you get to the end of the cloth with your slip-stitching, you will turn around, chain up a couple stitches and go back the way you came, doing a shell stitch all the way. Okay, this tutorial is NOT for beginners. A shell stitch is easy but I'd have to actually THINK about how many double crochet to put in each hole and how many single crochet in between and then try to write that all out for you when probably it will all be for nothing because you are going to say, "What the heck do I want with a hot pad made out of washrags anyway?" So I'm just saving myself some stress because math makes me tired.

Here is one side finished, and completely in focus for a change.

Because I am a left handed crocheter, you may be completely confused by now. If you want to make these hot pads BACKWARDS you just go right ahead.

Okay! Isn't it looking kind of cool, now? Like it has turned a new leaf, and is ready to join the ranks of the Big Guys who handle hot pots and casserole dishes fresh from the oven.

I like how jaunty and pretty it looks while sitting up. But it just needs one more thing. A little handle. You just chain onto the top point of the hot pad and make a small chain about 20 stitches and then single crochet around them until it looks sturdy enough to hang on a nail. You figure it out.

Pretty as a Daisy Bloom and no bigger than a tessy wren, my wee little moppet with a handle!

And here we have the finished thing, waiting in the wings for it's chance in the Pot-light. No photography is allowed during the actual performance, as the insurance underwriters feel it would be much too dangerous considering the mess that was made of the pre-production stills.

July, July, July do ya Love Me?

Just thought I should post something for you to look at besides my hives!

Happy Fourth of July!

Wheals of Fire

Wheals on my skin keep on burnin'

I don't know if I'll see tomorrow

Wheals on my skin keep on turning

I think some salve I must borrow...

There I was, just cruising along in life, work going smoothly, managing my fibromyalgia, no drama, no pain, dancing on lily pads, cavorting with the nature spirits, when SUDDENLY!!!I'm a mass of itching burning scary welts and wheals that look like GIANT mosquito bites that travel from place to place on my body and cause me to itch so badly I want to dig out my own eyeballs and slice my skin off like a cleaned carrot..I like this picture.

Don't I look PISSED OFF?

I think I look PISSED OFF!!!!

Are these pictures too graphic for you?

Be thankful I am sparing you the ones of my ASS!!!!

Darn It!

Does anybody darn anymore? I think we as a society as a hole (ha ha-hole, get it?) throw things away when they get a bit of a tear. But I was raised back in the era of the abacus and I learned to darn at an early age.

My Dad wore white wool socks, and there was a basket of darning wool, a darning needle and one of those red aluminum drinking glasses used as a darning egg always on the floor by his closet door, ready to be grabbed up and used for repairs.

I remember when my Mom taught me to darn. She taught me to sew, iron, darn and wash dishes, but not to cook. Looking back I realize it wasn't because she thought those were useful skills to teach me, but rather they were the tasks she hated doing and so sluffed off onto me!

And I think those skills have come in mighty handy, regardless of the motive behind teaching them to me. But who in the world bothers to darn nowadays? OLD LADIES do! Or rather, they get their home helpers to do it for them.

So today my task was to bring home a very holey old purple wool sweater and darn at least 6 good sized holes as well as sew on a button. Why, that thing is now as good as new! She ought to get at least another decades worth of wear out of it!

As always, I had my assistant eager and ready to lend a helping hand.

First, I needed my needle, thread, sharp thread nippers and my wonderful wooden antique darning egg. Mackie, understanding the value of the egg, kept a close paw on it so it didn't roll away.

Always desirous of taking advantage of a good angle, Mackie poses for his close-up, Mr. DeMille.

I can't even begin to tell you how happy I am he is up and about, because I came very close to losing him last week. He got into some bad food and after throwing up violently five times in a row, crept under my bed and didn't come out for 5 days. I had to get him to lick water from my fingers and I cried every day thinking I would lose this dear friend of mine.

But he rallied at last with the help of some antibiotics and steroids to stimulate his appetite, and he seems to be none the worse for wear for having used up yet another of his nine lives. I figure he's used at least 4 of them by now, but a friend said it would be more like 7 since cats don't always let you know what kind of trouble they've gotten into when you weren't around.

Once the darning was underway, Mackie saw no more need to remain conscious, so he took a little cat nap...keeping his paw on the thread so it wouldn't get away, of course.

When he woke up he shoved the thread at me in a barely civil manner! It must have been annoying him in some way!

Last but not least he decided it was time to dispatch the scissors, too. I had to take these away from him, though, because I really don't want to push it in case he is really up to 8 lives, now!

Ektorp Dreams

A couple years ago when my health fell to pieces, I had to sell everything that wasn't nailed down including the sofas. I was sofa-less in Sacramento for quite a while and then I bought a used one from Salvation Army. It cost more to have it delivered than I paid for it, and upon having it in my little living room for 13 or 14 seconds I realized that it stunk so bad I was going to reverberate until I got rid of it. Er maybe I mean regurgitate? Even Mackie wouldn't get near the thing.

So I had to give it away to a nice lady who had no sense of smell and oodles of children who were going to pour grape Koolaid on it, anyway. It found a good home.

And now, more than a year later, I am fed up with only having this old arm chair to sit in.

Anytime I have guests they have to pile onto the floor or stand around awkwardly like at a soiree. Not that comfy when you are trying to watch a movie together.

I decided that I was going to swing by the Salvation Army downtown and see if there was something I could pick up for 50 bucks. As long as it wasn't butt ugly or had a stank upon it, I figured I could work with it.

I saw what I wanted, or at least what would work for me, at once. It had a price tag of $90 on it. I could tell it had been in some nice old ladies formal living room for the last 30 years. It was the right size, shape, didn't smell and I figured I could live with the really despondent beige-on-beige floral print. Even the creepy fiberglass feel of the fabric would be all right. But $90? Out of my price range entirely.

When suddenly! The manager approached me and said, "I can tell you want that sofa. I'll give it to you today for 75 bucks out the door!"

"Oh, wow! My budget is 50, though."

"Okay, I'll meet you halfway at $60!"

Sold! And upon getting it home and getting it all arranged, I realized it felt horrible and was the ugliest color imaginable. But it's comfortable, well-made and has good lines so I figured I'd just have to live with it for a while.

Until I could get the sofa of my dreams. The Ikea Ektorp Sofa. That's the one I want.

Sometime in the night I started to think that perhaps I could 'Ektorp up' this sofa a little bit. Why not? I measured carefully and yes, it might work! The cover I wanted for it is only 49 bucks. That's half the price of a Sure-Fit and those things suck. Might as well throw a blanket over it as use those Sure-Fit covers; that's my thinking.

I looked at a slipcover for the chair, too, but at $39 I knew it wasn't going to happen.

So I was off to Ikea and as I was wandering through the labyrinth I spotted the Discount Stuff area. Just popping through there quickly I noticed a bin full of textiles. And yes, there seemed to be a pile of Ektorp Slipcovers! And each piece was marked anywhere from one dollar to 3 dollars! I had to really dig and really think, because I knew I was going to need extra fabric to make it work, since my actual armchair is nothing like the dimensions of the Ektorp Armchair. But after a good 20 minutes of measuring and digging, all the while elbowing this ridiculous Hispanic Woman out of the way, who was determined to get in there and grab something just because I was there, I picked out the 3 essential pieces needed to slipcover my armchair.

Meet my new and improved slip-covered armchair! I paid 5 dollars for this! The body cover was 2 bucks, the seat cushion was 2 and the back pillow was one dollar.

SCORE!!!!

And all that was left to do was pry apart this sofa to make the Ektorp Slipcover fit it completely. I had to slit the back cushions off of the frame, as they had been sewn to it for some weird reason. But I didn't spend 40 years as a seamstress for nothing! Give me a razor blade, point me in the right direction, and I'm not afraid to close my eyes and Slice Away!

VIOLA!!!

Millenium Years Old

I finally drummed up enough money to get the oil changed in my car over at the Jiffy Lube yesterday. As I pulled into the lot I was waived toward the proper bank by a perky lad in latex surgical gloves. What is up with that? Since when did burly mechanics care if they had grease under their fingernails?

"Are you here for our Signature Service today, Ma'am?"

Apparently my alien/human universal translator was on the fritz. I simply could not figure out what he meant. Wasn't he going to give me a choice as to what kind of service I was getting? How did I know if it was the Signature Service I wanted? What if it was a trick? What if I was supposed to say, "Perhaps I just want the Unsigned Service." What if by saying I wanted the Signature Service I was dooming myself to the full deal and my bill would come to 300 dollars?

He was waiting patiently and I was looking confused. As in all such situations I turned to humor as my shield. "Oh, I was actually looking for a burger and some fries. Isn't this the drive up window for MacDonalds?"

"Pop your hood for me, Ma'am, and then come right this way."

I lumbered after him still fretting over just what I was committing to and was told, "Just have a seat Ma'am and we'll send your fries right in to you."

Well, why not? It's probably the same kind of oil used in either place.

Eventually another man, also wearing latex gloves, came to the cash register and called my name. Assuming I had entered the Special Needs Germaphobe Jiffy Lube I was careful to use my own pen and not touch any unnecessary surfaces as I signed on the dotted line and paid my $39.95 for the Signature Service. (Whew!)

"Your vehicle is ready and we will see you in 3000!"

I was again confused by yet another unfathomable remark but I quickly recovered enough to reply, "Well, I don't think I'll still be alive by then!"

Glove Unit #2 turned fully around in the hallway and stopped in his tracks, staring at me. "I mean 3000 miles, Ma'am."

Oh.

A Versatile Little Plant

It's been a while since I've blogged, Dear Readers, but it's just been work, work, work and nothing of note to report.

At last, however, I have a mildy amusing incident to share!

I was standing in the checkout lane at Target when a young man chomping wildly from a large bag of potato chips approached me. He hung out behind me for quite some time, yet he wasn't really in line himself. He just seemed to be on his snack break and drifted in from somewhere.

Abruptly addressing the back of my head he asked me, "Do you know where there is a Staples or an Office Max?"

I told him where the nearest ones were and he quickly asked, "Will they have money orders?"

I told him I really didn't think so; they didn't seem like the money order kind of stores to me.

He then asked, "What about the natural food co-op?"

"What about it?" I asked.

"Do they have money orders, do you think?"

Still in recovery from the rapid shift from office supplies to natural herbs and veggies, I was slow to give him a full answer..."I've never seen..."

"Well, they are probably made out of Hemp if they do have them." he said.

True Confessions--The Spring Edition

The guilt is killing me so I may as well fess up.

I recently got one of those Trac-Phones by Motorola. The phone is only $8.98 cents and you pre-pay the minutes in one hour increments for 20 dollars. It came with 20 minutes free and that's all I can afford so I don't get to really use it. I can't really give out my phone number.

But it will be nice to have if I'm ever in the car and have a flat tire I can call AAA. Or if I get locked out of the gate at work I can call and get buzzed in by somebody.

But the thing is, I'm so smitten with the idea of finally having joined the 22nd Century that I walk around pretending to be talking on my cell phone. I drive with it glued to my ear, giving every indication that I'm asking for directions to the Pentagon or asking someone how far apart her contractions are so that I can be there in time to deliver her baby.

I go out back to the laundry room or the garbage dumpster loudly exclaiming as if the person on the other end of the line is in a major crisis or just a very vehement story teller who expects vehemence in return.

Sometimes I just pretend that I have a best friend who wants a blow-by-blow tale of my every move. "Yes, yes," I say! "They are totally OUT of my kind of ink cartridge at the Office Max. I know, I know, I'm just going to have to try some place else."

You know, important stuff.

So, yes, I admit it.

I'm a Cell Phony.

Time Passages

Ah, Daylight Wastings Time! How I look forward to this twice a year! A weeks worth of lost sleep, starving when it's nowhere near mealtime, and being late for everything because I forgot to set my car clock for the change.

(Note to self: Have not yet changed car clock.)

This Sunday Last I managed to miss the time change, again! It was a full-on 10:20 in the morning by the time I realized I was on the wrong time schedule and had changed all my clocks.

So I changed the living room clock. I changed the kitchen clock. I changed the bedroom alarm clock. I changed the bathroom clock. I changed the clock in the spare bedroom. I changed the microwave clock and then I took a break, rested, caught my breath and girded my loins to change my watches, my VCR and the oven clock.

The last one I reset was the oven clock. 10:20. Finally!

Exactly Ten Hours and Twenty Minutes later my oven started beeping at me.

I had set the Oven Timer not the clock!!!!

Another Miss Kittyism

While heading to the grocery store I mentioned to Miss Kitty that I thought it was very hot in the car.

She nodded wisely and said conspiratorially: It's That Time, isn't it?

Um, What time, Miss Kitty?

You know, that time. Time for the change.

Yes, perhaps, I replied.

Well, we won't talk about it, said she. My mother never talked about it.

Okay, I said, Mum's the word.

In her repetitive fashion, Miss Kitty continued:

No, Mother never talked about the change.

She never talked about it when she died, either.

For which I am eternally grateful! Because even at Eastertime when such things have been known to happen, I do not want a dead woman rising from the grave and talking to me about menopause.

Pagan Rituals

I was recently informed by a Jehovah's Witless acquaintance of mine that Easter is a Pagan Holiday to be avoided at all costs lest I anger Jehovah and be punished.

It instantly made me run to my holiday goodies box and dig out all my little pagan statuettes of the Evil Easter Bunny, which I placed around the Pagan Tree of Eggs of Fertility and Twinkly Lights of Imitation Starlight.

And then I danced a caper and swayed and sang the Incantation Song:

Oh! here comes Peter Cottontail,

Hoppin' down the bunny trail,

Hippity hoppity,

Happy Easter day.

Here comes Peter Cottontail,

Hoppin' down the bunny trail,

Look at him stop,

And listen to him say:

"Try to do the things you should."

Maybe if you're extra good,

He'll roll lots of Easter eggs your way.

And soon, as if by Evil Pagan Magic, I will have evoked the appearance of many dozens of dyed boiled eggs and Easter Egg Shaped cookies dripping in buttercream icing.

And if I am good, very, very good, perhaps this will be the year that I catch a glimpse of the Great Bunny Himself so that I will know that all my 51 years of pagan worship have not been in vain!

You'll wake up on Easter morning

And you'll know that he was there

When you find those choc'late bunnies

That he's hiding ev'rywhere.

Oh! here comes Peter Cottontail,

Hoppin' down the bunny trail,

Hippity hoppity,

Hippity hoppity,

Happy Easter day!!!

What If?

I just heard today that of the people who see those drug commercials on tv and run to their doctor and ask for them, 82% recieve that prescription.

82%!!!!

Does that mean the same 82% are running around with side effects?

I Believe in Evolution

Long ago, long long ago, back in the ShabbyChicocene Era, we saw the first emergence of the pie safe in it's most basic and rudimentary form:

It's purpose then was to give the appearance of casual Granny Chic. And it lived up to its functionality in the Grand Design. Then, of course, came the Ice Age:

When absolutely everything had to be painted a snowy white. What was originally pristine and timeless, over time became antiseptic looking and rather sterile. Change was inevitable, as very little breeding took place in this frozen wasteland.

And thus was born the New Age of Pie Safes! The Amisholithic Epoch was ushered in with the help of Dutch Boy Cherry Chocolate Paint and several panels of old black pillow ticking. We here in the Pro-Evolution camp feel that this most current incarnation of cabinetry will be with us for a long, long time to come.

Brought to you by Sylvia Browne

I was at my new 97 year old clients house yesterday dusting away when she toddled into the living room and plopped down in her recliner. She lifted her legs in front of her, looked at them musingly and said,

"I think I just had a Sylvia Browne Moment."

Well, that got my attention! I raced right over to the easy chair and sat down for a listen.

"I have been having trouble with my legs, you see", she continued. "I was wondering what to do about them hurting so much when a deep, gravelly voice said, "WALK!" I thought that was so frightening!"

"I don't think that is so scary," I told her, "After all it could have told you to set yourself on fire."