Headliner

Just now I’m cruising toward the intersection of Heavy Sigh and Bless His Heart.

The daily newspaper for the metropolitan area where I live with hundred of other people ran a headline recently that shouted, “Shotgun Blast Kills Woman.”

While I shook my head at the level of violent crime in our world today, my teenaged son peered over my shoulder.

“Why did that make the news?”

What did I raise? A wild animal in the Jungle of Man? A zombie with no heart, not even somebody else’s?

I never miss the opportunity to dish up a life lesson like it was biscuit gravy. “A woman was killed. Thankfully that doesn’t happen much around here, so it made the front page.

“That’s not what is says. They’re all worked up over the blast. Are they surprised that a shotgun actually shot somebody?”

“That’s just the way they wrote the headline.”

“They should be careful what they say. It would be news if the shotgun pulled a knife, or if it popped somebody over the head for a bad joke. But a shotgun blasting somebody is like saying a woman went shopping at the mall.”

“It’s not exactly the same thing.”

“Yeah, I’ve seen you cause more damage at the mall.”

I needed to continue this discussion, but just then I spotted a coupon for a favorite department store.

“Well you should feel sorry for her family.” I reached for my scissors.

“I feel sorry for the writer who doesn’t know about the shotgun thing. He’s gonna feel mighty stupid when he finds out we knew about that cause and effect theory all along.”

I begin to clip. Twenty per cent off, even for sale items.

“Well what sort of headline would you come up with?”

“Well I would sure point out that there was somebody who pulled the trigger.” He watched me as I started to tuck the coupon into my wallet.

“See, Mom, it’s just like you and the mall. Coupons don’t save money.”

I raised an eyebrow.

“People do.”

I checked the fine print on the small slip of paper. Not good on clothing, glassware, food items, or school supplies. The thing was no more effective than an empty gun.

Somewhere the head of the NRA is weeping over the spokesman they’ll never have.

Confederate Cooking

I don’t mean to speak ill of the deep fried, but sometimes in the South we get carried away. I’ll admit that there’s nothing like a pot full of oil crackling on the front burner to bring a tear to my eye, but it’s a fact that anything that will lay still long enough for us to roll in flour is likely to end up fried in enough fat to clone a cow.

Also, it’s important to know that there are just some things that were never intended to produce gravy. I had a friend who swore he could whip up a fine gravy from flounder drippings, but I just can’t imagine ladling fish juice over a hot biscuit on a cold winter’s night. Of course, I was doubtful about shrimp and grits, too, until I tried them, and now I’m an absolute addict, but it just doesn’t seem plausible to believe you can get a thick, rich gravy from a creature that lies as flat as a shingle on the ocean floor and has to have both eyes on one side to see.

On the other side of the cornbread, there are some items that turn up at the table with gravy that couldn’t have been come by naturally. Despite the boastings of “homestyle” gravy on every menu item from pot roast to potatoes, only some of these are the chosen few; those selections ordained to produce broth which is the fount from which scrumptious brown gravy flows.

As a dear friend from an undiscosed geographical location says as she lifts five pounds of ground chuck in the natural form of a free-range meatloaf (an 11 x 13 rectangle) from her oven, “grease isn’t broth.”