Cooking up Thanksgiving

I decided to cook a full Thanksgiving meal this year, all by myself. This is the first time I’ve done that.

In the past I have cooked the turkey and acted like I was doing a big deal, although, let’s face it, a turkey isn’t hard to cook.

First, there was menu preparation. Since only two people were going to be at my holiday meal I decided on a turkey breast instead of a whole turkey. This was a good decision.  I also decided on dressing, mashed potatoes, gravy, rolls, green bean casserole and some type of pie for dessert.

I hate crowds, so I went to the grocery store at 6:30 a.m. The store had conveniently grouped the ingredients for green bean casserole in one place, which was nice, as this was the only thing I was going to cook from a recipe. I picked up a turkey breast, agonized over what type of stuffing to get, and settled on some pre-made stuff that just had to be heated up.

I got brown-and-serve rolls, instant potatoes, canned chicken gravy, and a pecan pie from the store bakery, and I was set. So yeah, saying I actually cooked a meal might be a stretch.

The big day arrived and I determined I needed 1.5 hours to fix the meal, based on the cooking time for the turkey breast.

I prepared the turkey breast per the package instructions and stuck it in the oven, setting the timer for 20 minutes, at which time I’d set the green bean casserole in the oven.

I enjoyed mixing up the casserole ingredients. At first I was afraid it wasn’t going to work, but after a minute or two it mixed up real nice and at the appointed time I stuck it in the oven.

Next was the stuffing, which I emptied into a large sauce pan and heated up over low heat.

All was going according to plan. I stuck the rolls in the oven with a few minutes to go until everything else was done and started heating up the canned gravy in the microwave and boiling the water for the instant potatoes.

As with most meals I cook, I timed it so that everything was ready at the same time. I’m generally pretty good at that. My son and I sat down to eat.

Which is when we discovered the turkey wasn’t cooked all the way. Grrrr.

I grabbed the baking dish to put it back in the oven. No permanent scarring on my hands, but I have to say that hurt a little. My son didn’t actually laugh, but it was close.

My son grabbed oven mitts and stuck the turkey back in the oven, at precisely the moment the power went out. Good grief.

A few minutes later the power came back on and the turkey finished cooking while we watched part of “The Long Kiss Goodnight.”

I tried to keep everything else warm while the turkey cooked, and was semi-successful.

The food was excellent, if I say so myself, except for the pre-made stuffing, which was just OK.

Five hours later we ate most of the rest of the food for supper, and at 10 p.m. I finished off the turkey.

The only leftovers the day after were some gravy, some pie and a little bit of casserole.

It was a great day, and I got to spend a lot of time with my son, which was really nice.

I have much for which to be grateful.

A friend is going to give me a recipe for stuffing that supposedly can’t fail. I’m excited. My Christmas meal will really rock!

 

 

 

 

The will of the voter

I have a theory about the election, and why Republicans did so well. It goes back to the final days of George W. Bush’s administration, when the American people were clamoring for the United States to get the heck out of Iraq. The Republican administration was intractable on the subject and used the lack of a Democratic super majority to block legislation to end the war. Voters realized the only way to end the war was to vote in a super majority of Democrats. That’s what happened. Now we’re pretty much out of Iraq. Now the country is in a painfully slow recovery from a recession. People want jobs. Mission accomplished on Iraq, however, Democrats don’t seem to be able to provide jobs. So, boot them out and let the GOPtake a shot at it. Here’s the thing, if the Republicans spend the next two years in an obstructionist frenzy instead of working with Democrats to create jobs, the voters will return a super majority of Democrats to both houses of Congress and the Republican party will be mortally wounded. So far the Republican leadership has said it plans to spend its energies repealing health care reform rather than addressing the need for new jobs. Bad call, for both the Republican Party and the people of the United States.

 

The end of a good run

In 1992 a serious young woman named Blanche Lambert walked into my office at the Marianna Courier-Index.
She explained to me that she was running against Bill Alexander for the Democratic nomination for his congressional seat. We visited for a while. She was very pleasant to talk to.
The big issue of the day was gun registration. She was for it. So was I. But, I feared it would be the kiss of death for her campaign in Eastern Arkansas, which is a hunting bastion in a hunting-friendly state.
So, Lambert did something that impressed the heck out of me. She scheduled a meeting with the local gun lobby. And she explained to them, face to face, why she was for gun registration and why they should be, too. Lending credibility to her argument was that she was an experienced hunter herself, and knew guns as well as any of them.
She won the Democratic nomination, helped along by Alexander’s involvement in a banking scandal in which congressmen were writing hot checks by the truckload.
She served two terms in the House, got married, changed her last named to Lincoln and had twins. She stepped out of politics for two years, but  in 1998 was elected to the U.S. Senate, where she has been ever since.
During that time, Lincoln was always open, accessible and helpful whenever I called. Occasionally I’d run into her in our respective roles as journalist and politician, and she always made time to talk about our mutual friends in the delta, sometimes to the intense frustration of her handlers.
I remember one telephone conversation during which I interviewed her about some national issue that had a local impact. I no longer remember what that was. But after that on-the-record conversation we visited a bit and she gave me some insight into George W. Bush, after I asked a specific question about him. And I won’t be recounting that conversation because it was off the record. But I did appreciate her candor.
I’m going to miss having her as my senator. She’s had a good run. Unlike some senators, when she leaves office, it won’t be in disgrace. She can be proud of her term of service to our nation.

The magic number is 30

There are things I don’t understand.
I bought a printer the other day. I needed one for my home office. It’s hard to make a claim to be an aspiring novelist without one.
I got a real nice one. It prints, copies and scans. In color. Neat!
And I got it all for $30.
How do they do that? A friend suggested that I check out the price of replacement cartridges. They were $30. So, it was sort of like I bought a cartridge pack, and got the printer for free. It makes my head hurt. When I need more toner, do I buy a cartridge or a new printer. I could use the cartridges packed with the printer and sell the printer for whatever I could get on eBay.
I filled up my pickup last night. It was $30.  So, a tank of gas and a printer have the same relative worth. How odd.
A pair of tickets to a movie, popcorn and two soft drinks is about $30.
The used TV I bought was $30.
My monthly Internet service is $30.
My DVD player cost $30.
My last VCR cost $30.
You can buy a new microwave oven for $30.
New hardback books run about $30.
I’m thinking $30 is the new $20.
The old typographical symbol for end of story is —30—.

Bikerless biker

A few years ago I was watching that show where that family builds custom motorcycles together.
The episode I watched featured a contest for viewers to win a chopper. The viewers sent in videos of their appeals to be picked.
The winner was a guy who said he was really into the biker lifestyle. He had biker clothes and tattoos and went to rallies and other biker events. He was a biker, he said, without a bike. That comment drew a laugh from me. Daddy biker dude commented, “That guy is cool.” They gave him a custom chopper.
I’m starting to identify with that guy.
I’ve got helmets, gloves, tailor-made riding suit, boots, specialized tools and other assorted biker paraphernalia. I get motorcycle magazines and catalogs monthly in the mail. I belong to a couple of motorcycle owners groups on the Internet.
What I don’t have is a bike.
I sold my bike a few months ago to fund a personal project.
While the money I got for it was well spent, I am really, really missing having a bike. I had motorcycles when I was younger, then went a few years and got back into riding when I was about 42. For more than a decade I’ve had a motorcycle tucked into my carport. Sometimes two.
For a while I published a motorcycle magazine. My newspaper columns have frequently been about motorcycling.  I taught motorcycle riding classes for about six years.
I no longer have the option of taking the bike to work when the weather is nice, or if the truck is in the garage for repairs. Or taking weekend camping trips with my biker buddies.
It’s a lonely feeling.
At some point I’ll get another. I’ve got other things making demands on my time and money right now.
In the meantime, I have to make do with combing the classified ads and manufacturers’ websites, checking out what’s available, and occasionally thinking, “That bike is for me.”
I wonder when the biker-dude family is having another contest?

1.5 seconds to act

When I learned to drive, the instructor told me the proper amount of space to leave between me and the car in front of me was one car length for each 10 mph.
I used this technique for years and years.
A few years ago, I trained with the Motorcycle Safety Foundation to teach people how to maximize their safety on a motorcycle.
The MSF take on following distance is a little easier to follow: Make sure you are at least two seconds behind the vehicle in front of you. And that’s if weather and road conditions are optimal.
This is easier than trying to mentally picture a line of cars between you and the car you are following. You picked a fix object and start counting after the car in front passes it and quit counting when it reaches the front of your car, or motorcycle, or whatever.
I do this on my commutes to and from work, which is all Interstate travel.
Usually when I check, I’m right on the money. Good for me. However, a frightening thing is how many people don’t allow a two-second following distance. Or even one second.
This morning I was amazed as I watched cars stack up in the left lane, going in excess of 70 mph, with about a half-second of following time.
If the driver in front had braked suddenly for any reason or had a blowout, the drivers behind would not have been able to stop in time to avoid a collision. A high-speed collision.
I increased my following distance to three seconds.
Here’s the funny part. If they increased their following distance to two seconds, they would have only delayed their arrival by 1.5 seconds. I don’t know that I’ve ever been in such a hurry that I couldn’t spare 1.5 seconds.

My Wrinkles

In October I wrote about my dog, Stella.
Stella had performed some tricks and I caught it on video and posted it on YouTube.
I titled the blog item “Stella for posterity.”
That ended up being kind of an ironic name as a couple of months later she disappeared. The videos are about all I’ve got to remember her by.
The animal rescue community responded robustly at the time, with people physically searching, sending notices out over the Internet. One lady even checked with the animal shelter on a daily basis to see if she showed up.
She never did.
I really miss Stella. She was a beautiful animal. She was a chocolate Lab mix with a white blaze on her chest. She was smart and I had trained her to do some basic commands, including sit, beg, stay and come. She had about halfway learned “lay down” and we were working on her leash manners when she vanished.
I hope she’s OK and living with someone who will love her.
I’ve since gotten another dog. In my search for Stella, I saw a picture of a dog that superficially looked like her. When I went to check it out, it turned out the dog was NOT Stella, and in fact, did not look at all like her and was little more than a puppy. All I can say is it wasn’t a very good picture.
She’s part Shar-Pei, part something else. I call her Wrinkles. The Shar-Pei part is all on her head and she can get some pretty amazing expressions on her doggy face because of all the wrinkles. Her head is silky soft. Her body is not. The hair, while beautiful and sleek-looking, is kind of coarse.
I haven’t spent much time training her. She’s not as smart as Stella and doesn’t respond to the promise of treats the same way Stella did. She tends to bury dog cookies. Weird.
However, she is as sweet an animal as I’ve ever encountered. I’m absolutely crazy about her.
I guess I better take some videos of her.
For posterity.

Working without a ‘Net

So. Here I sit.
My computer is working flawlessly. It is a marvel of modern engineering. It can process data an unimaginable speeds.
But, it can’t check up on Lindsay Lohan when the Internet connection is down.
I’ve been sitting here for two hours with no update on LiLo.
No offers for male-enhancement drugs.
No photo slideshows of which starlet wears an identical outfit better.
No come-ons from Classmates.com to see who has signed my guest book.
No Facebook updates.
No tweets from the Old Spice guy.
No teaser headlines about how to lose 100 pounds by following One Simple Rule!
If this keeps up much longer I may have to resort to conversing with my co-workers.
I better find out their names!

Bargain bonanza

I have furnished my house for under $200.
For the record, I wasn’t trying to do that. It just worked out that way.
I recently moved and the only furniture I had was a recliner, a bed, a kitchen table, an end table and a dresser. My daughter had a desk and a bookshelf.
Since my budget was a little tight, I joined Freecycle.org, scanned Craigslist every day and let friends know I was looking for furniture on the cheap.
So, here’s how it went. I bought a washer for $50 from a friend of a friend, and the next day a dryer for $50 off of Craigslist.
The next week I bought an end table for $2 at a yard sale.
That took me up $102.
The next week I got another recliner (looks brand new), a microwave oven, and a bunch of kitchen stuff (serving spoons and such), all for free off of Freecycle.
The next week a friend found a desk next to a trash bin. Another free item.
The next week we found a free, almost-new sleeper sofa off of Craigslist.
The next week a co-worker gave me a bedroom set for my daughter’s room.
Still at $102.
The next week I bought a set of three matching solid-wood living room tables at an estate sale for $50. Up to $152.
Over the weekend I bought four wooden kitchen chairs with upholstered seats for $25 at a  yard sale. Then I bought a 20-inch TV for $7 at another yard sale.
I’m up to $184 and have about run out of room for any more furniture.
The interesting thing is, this isn’t cast-off, junky-looking stuff. Most of it is nearly new and in perfect condition. It’s all of higher quality than the stuff I already had.
I’ve got too much kitchen stuff now. Guess I need to box some of it up and offer it up on Freecycle or tote it down to Goodwill.
I finally got so much furniture, that I actually had to rearrange it. In my short life, I’ve never done that before. It was kind of fun, but not something I’d like to make a steady habit of.
I’m almost sorry that the house is furnished now. It was a lot of fun. I’ll miss surfing Craigslist and my e-mails from Freecycle. Maybe I need to get a bigger house.

The bald truth

If you took a magic marker and drew a line from the back of my head to the front, bisecting my scalp, it would denote the areas of my scalp where hair grows, and where it doesn’t.
For years, hair has grown on the right side of my scalp, but not the left.
Several years ago I decided I didn’t like that particular look and I shaved the area until I had a fairly symmetrical doughnut cut.
Since then I have owned by baldness proudly.
Never was I so proud of my fleshy pate than on Monday when I went out to eat with a friend at Western Sizzlin in Jacksonville.
On the marquee in front of the restaurant were the words “Bald Head Day.”
Well, cool.
We walked in and wandered to the order area, where we settled on the buffet. I paid. A sign behind the cashier said the bald-head discount ranged from 25 to 50 percent.
My friend asked the teller how much of a discount I got. “The full 50 percent,”  she said, noting that I was pretty bald.
My friend snorted.
The people behind us in line, who I did not know, offered up their assessment: While I was undeniably bald, I did have some hair. They had seen balder.
First time I’ve been accused of not being bald enough. Not sure of how to respond to a stranger’s assessment of my baldness, I paid and went on to enjoy my meal.
Now if they’ll come up with a fat-guy day and a corrective-lenses-required-to-drive day, I’ll be all set.
I’ve still got a year to go before I officially become eligible for senior-citizen discounts.
I wonder if I could combine that with the bald-head discount.
I could eat for free!