Bill and I were sitting in that special kind of traffic jam that comes just before the holidays and is the result of a small town growing like an overdose victim of Jack’s magic beans, leaving mundane things like convenience and city planning behind.
The roads were packed like the straw in a peach milkshake. Fruit gets stuck in the end, all movement stops, and nobody gets any relief. With a milkshake you can pull out the straw and suck out the peach pulp. With overburdened roads, the obvious answer is to block off one lane with orange cones and commit to a ten-year construction project.
We'd dropped our kids off at a mega-bookstore at what seemed like a short time earlier, doling out the last bite-sized candy bars from Halloween left in the bottom of my pocketbook to hold them until we got back and could hit a nearby buffet extravaganza. Sometimes eating out, even with two teenaged mouths to feed, is a better idea than a sound investment plan.
In the meantime, the Highway Patrol issued an all-points-bulletin to every mall-bound traveler in the area, describing our location, destination, and current state of irritability. That’s the only reasonable explanation for the fact that our car began to attract morons like a pan of biscuits attracts men named Bubba.
Traffic stalled and Christmas shoppers begin to share the joy of the season with their fellow travelers one finger at a time. I attempted to retain my normal good nature even though Bill was getting testy. He always gets that way when he misses snack time.
Bill: Do you have any more candy in your pocketbook?
Me: Why? Are you hungry?
Bill: No, I thought I would toss some out the window to lure people out of our lane.
Me: You’re being sarcastic because you’re too hungry. (Pointing across six lanes of stationary traffic.) There’s a Wendy’s. And a Chinese buffet. And a pizza place. I'll bet that gas station has candy bars.
Bill: Are you hungry?
Me: (Fumbling through my pocketbook.) No. Why do you keep bringing it up? Look--there’s that place with the wonderful barbecue ribs. I could walk there and back before you got to the red light.
(I find a cellophane-wrapped object which I pull surreptitiously from my bag. I wince as a tiny crinkling sound gives me away.)
Bill: What’s that?
Me: Nothing.
Bill: What is it?
Me: Nothing. Leave me alone, willya?
Bill: You have food.
Me: No I don’t. It’s a cough drop. (Here I wave the cough drop with a flourish. It’s of a nondescript color somewhere in between magenta and pink eye.)
Bill: I want half.
Me: It’s mine. I found it. (I fondle the cough drop like it was the One Ring.)
Bill: We can take turns licking it.
Me: (Pensively) I don’t think I’ve bought any cough drops this season. . .not since I had the flu that year we had the big snow.
Bill: You can have it.
Me: No you. I can wait.
Bill: I can wait, too.
We laughed together, the warm laughter of two people coming together over misfortune.
Under cover of laughter, I shucked the paper off the cough drop like it was a peel and eat shrimp and popped it in my mouth.
Just then, in a holiday miracle moment, traffic parted like the men’s restroom line for a father-daughter combination. Nothing clears the tracks like a man doing daddy-duty with a lace-clad toddler in tow. We picked up the boys, and wheeled into a nearby restaurant.
Bill: See, it all turned out okay because we made sacrifices and worked together. That’s what Thanksgiving is all about.
We all smiled at each other like the Brady Bunch on the 29th minute of a 30 minute show. Secretly, I gave thanks for a cough drop appetizer that kept me from acting like a turkey.
Laugh
Showing posts with label turkey. Show all posts
Showing posts with label turkey. Show all posts
Thursday, November 24, 2011
Wednesday, November 23, 2011
Thanksgiving Spread
Basking under the lights, skin as brown and buttery as a ginger snap, the star of the layout sprawled across the centerfold like she had stock in staples.
“Beautiful.”
“Perfect.”
“That’s the one I’ve always dreamed of.”
“Don’t drool on the recipe.”
It’s girls night out and we’re gathered around the table checking to see what the beautiful people are having for Thanksgiving dinner. Glossy pages are open to a shimmering feast. There’s not a fried onion ring or can of mushroom soup in sight. The turkey is as flirtatious as a '40’s pinup girl, wearing nothing but a brown sugar and paprika rub. It’s enough to make me want to be a Spice Girl.
Every diet that has ever been tested and tossed aside is represented by our group. Elizabeth is low carb. Kaitlyn is high protein. I represent the “high sugar raises your metabolism so you can eat Ho Ho’s for breakfast” school of thought. If the road to hell is paved with whole wheat good intentions, the highway to heaven is coated with brown sugar.
“I’m tempted to give this one a go,” I said, scanning the ingredients for potentially recognizable items. “I have a guy bringing me a fresh turkey and I want a fancy new recipe.”
The room got quieter than the fifth grade gym during ballroom dance week.
“You’re going to cook a fresh turkey?”
“Sure. How hard can it be?”
“Ever tried to put pantyhose on a squid?”
I pondered my history for possible matches. “I dressed a toddler as a noodle one Halloween.”
“Close enough.”
The day before Thanksgiving I stood in front of the sink. The turkey, whom I’ve named J.R. Ewing because it has the largest spread I’ve ever seen, is sprawled in the kitchen sink like a centerfold model. One drumstick is propped coyly on the hot water faucet, and the toe of the other is stuck in the spray nozzle. There are so many pin feathers left, it looks like it needs a shave.
A fresh turkey is different from a supermarket sale bird that has had its legs trussed together and frozen into shape. Left to its own devices, the bird in my sink could probably out cancan any Rockette at Radio City.
I was trying to wrestle the thing into position to tie the legs together when the Captain and his faithful companion, Bo a sleek, by which I mean obese, black dog, half Labrador and half Dalmatian sauntered into the kitchen.
“What’s up Master Chief? Can’t you get the bad guy under control?”
“I don’t know if I’m cooking this bird or doing the cha-cha with it. It could take the prize on Dancing With the Stars, drumsticks down.”
“Need a hand?”
“Sure. I’ll hogtie it and you smear on the rub.”
After a few minutes we paused for breath.
“You were supposed to smear it on the turkey.” I flicked brown sugar from an eyebrow.
“This thing fights back. Are you sure it’s a turkey and not a kangaroo with a grudge?”
We dove back into the fray, and emerged, basted in sweat, a half hour later.
If generations follow the Thanksgiving tradition we set that day, there will be Rockwellesque paintings hanging on future walls with a man, woman, and big black dog covered in brown sugar, eating snack cakes dripping with artificial flavoring.
Everybody is thankful for something. I’m grateful for a husband who doesn’t mind Ho Ho’s for holiday lunch.
“Beautiful.”
“Perfect.”
“That’s the one I’ve always dreamed of.”
“Don’t drool on the recipe.”
It’s girls night out and we’re gathered around the table checking to see what the beautiful people are having for Thanksgiving dinner. Glossy pages are open to a shimmering feast. There’s not a fried onion ring or can of mushroom soup in sight. The turkey is as flirtatious as a '40’s pinup girl, wearing nothing but a brown sugar and paprika rub. It’s enough to make me want to be a Spice Girl.
Every diet that has ever been tested and tossed aside is represented by our group. Elizabeth is low carb. Kaitlyn is high protein. I represent the “high sugar raises your metabolism so you can eat Ho Ho’s for breakfast” school of thought. If the road to hell is paved with whole wheat good intentions, the highway to heaven is coated with brown sugar.
“I’m tempted to give this one a go,” I said, scanning the ingredients for potentially recognizable items. “I have a guy bringing me a fresh turkey and I want a fancy new recipe.”
The room got quieter than the fifth grade gym during ballroom dance week.
“You’re going to cook a fresh turkey?”
“Sure. How hard can it be?”
“Ever tried to put pantyhose on a squid?”
I pondered my history for possible matches. “I dressed a toddler as a noodle one Halloween.”
“Close enough.”
The day before Thanksgiving I stood in front of the sink. The turkey, whom I’ve named J.R. Ewing because it has the largest spread I’ve ever seen, is sprawled in the kitchen sink like a centerfold model. One drumstick is propped coyly on the hot water faucet, and the toe of the other is stuck in the spray nozzle. There are so many pin feathers left, it looks like it needs a shave.
A fresh turkey is different from a supermarket sale bird that has had its legs trussed together and frozen into shape. Left to its own devices, the bird in my sink could probably out cancan any Rockette at Radio City.
I was trying to wrestle the thing into position to tie the legs together when the Captain and his faithful companion, Bo a sleek, by which I mean obese, black dog, half Labrador and half Dalmatian sauntered into the kitchen.
“What’s up Master Chief? Can’t you get the bad guy under control?”
“I don’t know if I’m cooking this bird or doing the cha-cha with it. It could take the prize on Dancing With the Stars, drumsticks down.”
“Need a hand?”
“Sure. I’ll hogtie it and you smear on the rub.”
After a few minutes we paused for breath.
“You were supposed to smear it on the turkey.” I flicked brown sugar from an eyebrow.
“This thing fights back. Are you sure it’s a turkey and not a kangaroo with a grudge?”
We dove back into the fray, and emerged, basted in sweat, a half hour later.
If generations follow the Thanksgiving tradition we set that day, there will be Rockwellesque paintings hanging on future walls with a man, woman, and big black dog covered in brown sugar, eating snack cakes dripping with artificial flavoring.
Everybody is thankful for something. I’m grateful for a husband who doesn’t mind Ho Ho’s for holiday lunch.
Saturday, October 8, 2011
Talking Turkey
Two years ago, facing a diagnosis of “your internal organs are going to explode,” the Captain lost enough weight that he could send some to underdeveloped countries, such as Japan, where no one is ever overweight except Sumo wrestlers, the people who wear the least clothes.
Come to think of it, it’s that way at the beach, too. And, of course, Wal-Mart. Why is it that people with the most to show wear the least to cover it up? I’m certainly not the poster child for the “Feed the Runway Models” campaign, but I sure don’t want to have the seat behind the Sumo guy when he does his warm-up stretches.
Anyway, Cap also practically emptied his blood stream of triglycerides, a medical term that means “the fuse to the bomb that will make your internal organs explode.”
He did this all by himself. While he was very busy with the sort of advanced mathematics that deals with less than, greater than, and the sort of cholesterol level that voids whole sets of fat grams, I busied myself roasting turkeys, steaming vegetables, and skimming fat from by-products.
Eventually the Captain’s math resulted in the need for a belt to hold his pants up, and life returned to normal on the poop deck.
Until yesterday. One simple stretch and the button popped off his pants with enough force to put another hole in the ozone layer. Either his pancreas exploded or his body is rejecting artificial fasteners.
That little button also blew a hole in my holiday planning calendar for the next few months. I’m back to skimming, steaming, and roasting.
Luckily, my house is full of turkeys.
Come to think of it, it’s that way at the beach, too. And, of course, Wal-Mart. Why is it that people with the most to show wear the least to cover it up? I’m certainly not the poster child for the “Feed the Runway Models” campaign, but I sure don’t want to have the seat behind the Sumo guy when he does his warm-up stretches.
Anyway, Cap also practically emptied his blood stream of triglycerides, a medical term that means “the fuse to the bomb that will make your internal organs explode.”
He did this all by himself. While he was very busy with the sort of advanced mathematics that deals with less than, greater than, and the sort of cholesterol level that voids whole sets of fat grams, I busied myself roasting turkeys, steaming vegetables, and skimming fat from by-products.
Eventually the Captain’s math resulted in the need for a belt to hold his pants up, and life returned to normal on the poop deck.
Until yesterday. One simple stretch and the button popped off his pants with enough force to put another hole in the ozone layer. Either his pancreas exploded or his body is rejecting artificial fasteners.
That little button also blew a hole in my holiday planning calendar for the next few months. I’m back to skimming, steaming, and roasting.
Luckily, my house is full of turkeys.
Thursday, November 25, 2010
Wednesday, November 25, 2009
Not Talking Turkey - My Top Ten List
I have a friend who writes a witty letter to send to the far reaches of her family at Christmas time every year. Since I never purposely steal anyone’s idea unless I can do it better or score first blood, I decided to compose an annual Thanksgiving letter instead, so that mine will be done before she gets out her shiny balls and Ho Ho’s. But on further reflection, I don’t want to risk competing with a lady who has enough culture to inquire, “What wine goes with roadkill?”
Therefore, in an act of stubborn cowardice, I have decided instead to present the top ten list of things I’ve learned this year. There’s been a lot of study material.
I learned that Life Lessons are either immensely painful or expensive. And also that one does not exclude the other.
I learned that driving a kidney patient to the hospital requires you to slow down, at least over the railroad tracks.
I learned that kidneys must be emptied more often than pockets at a police station and that the announcement that a patient’s kidneys are about to explode like the planet Alderan under attack from a fully functional Death Star shortens the wait at the Emergency Room immensely.
Transporting the patient home across the same railroad tracks, I learned that men with catheters DO NOT have a sense of humor.
I learned that the insurance company will pay for a bandaid quite cheerfully, but morphine requires an offering of type O positive and Taylor Swift tickets with backstage passes for the daughter of the insurance company’s CEO—and 350 of her closest friends.
I learned that if the kidney patient schedules a physical to see if anything else is wrong; something will be.
I learned that triglycerides are neither a good name for a rock band, nor a circus acrobatic act that revolves around a three-wheeled vehicle.
I learned to appreciate whole grain bread, lean meats, garden vegetables, and fresh fruit.
I learned that “refrigerate after opening” doesn’t necessarily apply to fresh fruit.
I learned that poached, grilled, boiled, and baked fish are still basically fish. Unless corn meal and hot grease are involved, all recipes are the same. Disclaimer: This is just an observation. I like fish. Please do not send me your recipe. I rejected Martha Stewart and I’ll reject you.
I learned that even though Life Lessons are expensive and painful and fraught with adventures that make you late for supper, having a healthy husband makes it all worthwhile. Tomorrow, between the green beans and Splenda-sweetened tea, I'll be putting in a word of thanks for that.
(Of course, that’s 11 things on the list. But when it comes to lessons, I was always an overachiever anyway. Happy Thanksgiving, Honey!)
Therefore, in an act of stubborn cowardice, I have decided instead to present the top ten list of things I’ve learned this year. There’s been a lot of study material.
I learned that Life Lessons are either immensely painful or expensive. And also that one does not exclude the other.
I learned that driving a kidney patient to the hospital requires you to slow down, at least over the railroad tracks.
I learned that kidneys must be emptied more often than pockets at a police station and that the announcement that a patient’s kidneys are about to explode like the planet Alderan under attack from a fully functional Death Star shortens the wait at the Emergency Room immensely.
Transporting the patient home across the same railroad tracks, I learned that men with catheters DO NOT have a sense of humor.
I learned that the insurance company will pay for a bandaid quite cheerfully, but morphine requires an offering of type O positive and Taylor Swift tickets with backstage passes for the daughter of the insurance company’s CEO—and 350 of her closest friends.
I learned that if the kidney patient schedules a physical to see if anything else is wrong; something will be.
I learned that triglycerides are neither a good name for a rock band, nor a circus acrobatic act that revolves around a three-wheeled vehicle.
I learned to appreciate whole grain bread, lean meats, garden vegetables, and fresh fruit.
I learned that “refrigerate after opening” doesn’t necessarily apply to fresh fruit.
I learned that poached, grilled, boiled, and baked fish are still basically fish. Unless corn meal and hot grease are involved, all recipes are the same. Disclaimer: This is just an observation. I like fish. Please do not send me your recipe. I rejected Martha Stewart and I’ll reject you.
I learned that even though Life Lessons are expensive and painful and fraught with adventures that make you late for supper, having a healthy husband makes it all worthwhile. Tomorrow, between the green beans and Splenda-sweetened tea, I'll be putting in a word of thanks for that.
(Of course, that’s 11 things on the list. But when it comes to lessons, I was always an overachiever anyway. Happy Thanksgiving, Honey!)
Sunday, June 7, 2009
A Close Shave
Back in my day when men carried wallets instead of purses, it was commonly thought that if a man had enough spare time to shave his back, he was either a ward of the state or he was living off Mama’s welfare earnings while she made pot roast and homemade yeast rolls with cream puffs for dessert.
Any man caught moisturizing body parts that Nice People couldn’t see would be subject to ridicule and excommunication from his bowling team. In extreme cases, license to own and drive muscle cars would be suspended. I know of one man who shaved his body to satisfy the whim of a roller skate waitress at the new drive-in. She was later caught pulling on the pony tail of a Harley biker at the drive through.
I come from a section of the country where any male over the age of 21 who doesn’t have a scar that precludes hair from growing on some part of his body is considered a Mama’s Boy and is subject to exclusion from all-you-can-eat wing night with the guys. Show me a man who shaves his face, waxes his chest, tweezes his eyebrows, and has his legs lasered, and I’ll show you the next winner on Project Runway.
Really, I’m just being self serving about the whole thing. In these days when it’s the fashion for men to keep their body slicker than an icicle, there’s nothing to keep the surface temperature at a desirable level once frost dusts the peaks and points. I like a man with some heat conductors left intact. When winter comes and my behind is colder than a Butterball turkey the week before Thanksgiving, I want to know that I’m snuggling up to somebody who doesn’t think of defrost exclusively as a microwave activity.
But for now it’s warm and winter is way beyond the horizon, so I'll just while away my time watching all the Hollywood hunks in the summer movies. I’ll start with Wolverine.
A little hair of the dog never hurt anyone.
Any man caught moisturizing body parts that Nice People couldn’t see would be subject to ridicule and excommunication from his bowling team. In extreme cases, license to own and drive muscle cars would be suspended. I know of one man who shaved his body to satisfy the whim of a roller skate waitress at the new drive-in. She was later caught pulling on the pony tail of a Harley biker at the drive through.
I come from a section of the country where any male over the age of 21 who doesn’t have a scar that precludes hair from growing on some part of his body is considered a Mama’s Boy and is subject to exclusion from all-you-can-eat wing night with the guys. Show me a man who shaves his face, waxes his chest, tweezes his eyebrows, and has his legs lasered, and I’ll show you the next winner on Project Runway.
Really, I’m just being self serving about the whole thing. In these days when it’s the fashion for men to keep their body slicker than an icicle, there’s nothing to keep the surface temperature at a desirable level once frost dusts the peaks and points. I like a man with some heat conductors left intact. When winter comes and my behind is colder than a Butterball turkey the week before Thanksgiving, I want to know that I’m snuggling up to somebody who doesn’t think of defrost exclusively as a microwave activity.
But for now it’s warm and winter is way beyond the horizon, so I'll just while away my time watching all the Hollywood hunks in the summer movies. I’ll start with Wolverine.
A little hair of the dog never hurt anyone.
Thursday, November 27, 2008
The Seventh Level of Thanksgiving
For sheer heat index, Hell’s Kitchen is nothing compared to my kitchen. Of course, a straight comparison is really not fair because I have a secret weapon.
The Inferno.
The Inferno, a malicious representative of an extra level of the Bad Place that was too frightening for Dante to include in his detailed description of the place where murderers and people who leave the copier jammed go to spend eternity, looks relatively innocent poised there beside the refrigerator waiting for me to thrust the next victim into its cavernous maw. Soot from past victims cover the oven door like oatmeal around a baby’s mouth.
The trouble comes from a malfunctioning thermostat deep inside the Inferno. It’s either broken or has learned human characteristics like the freaky computers that take over the world in stories that I used to think were fiction.
Me: I’d like to preheat to 350.
Oven: I’m afraid I can’t let you do that, Amy.
I only use one rack at the very top. Anything lower would just be cruel. When I first got the thing, I foolishly and against orders turned the knob to Preheat and sacrificed a pan of brown and serve rolls. The dogs wouldn’t eat them, even the Lab that once tried to consume three hubcaps and a tire tool in the garage. Finally I threw them in the yard and claimed a meteor hit the elm tree.
As you can imagine, cooking a nice Thanksgiving dinner is out of the question. Oh, ever the optimist, I tried it once. The Inferno gutted that bird like a freshly caught catfish and raced across my innocent roasting pan like the great Chicago fire. There are fossils embedded in the enamel that will amaze archaeologists in centuries to come.
As I whipped open the oven door in a suicidal attempt to rescue the dinner, the heat sent my hair flying toward the ceiling like space dust and singed my eyebrows. Armed with Kevlar potholders, I whipped the pan out of the oven and hurled it toward the table. The remains of the charred cooking bag stuck to the turkey’s skin like a huge black bandaid and the legs looked like Tiki torches. The bones at the end of the drumsticks crumbled to ash upon contact with fresh air.
Bill Dear, ever the man with the right thing to say when kitchen disasters strike, strolled into the room coughing and clutching a cup of coffee like it was the last life boat on the Titanic. “I didn’t even know you could make blackened turkey.”
I peered at him through the smoke. “It was only in there for half an hour.”
“At least you had the foresight to put it in a body bag before you cooked it.”
I gazed forlornly at the little ashen piles of soot under the drumsticks and thought about the Thanksgiving dinner we would eat at McDonald’s.
“Don’t worry, Baby,” Bill drew a gentle hand across my face where my eyebrows used to be. “Anybody can cook a turkey breast, but it takes somebody special to mulch the feet.”
The Inferno.
The Inferno, a malicious representative of an extra level of the Bad Place that was too frightening for Dante to include in his detailed description of the place where murderers and people who leave the copier jammed go to spend eternity, looks relatively innocent poised there beside the refrigerator waiting for me to thrust the next victim into its cavernous maw. Soot from past victims cover the oven door like oatmeal around a baby’s mouth.
The trouble comes from a malfunctioning thermostat deep inside the Inferno. It’s either broken or has learned human characteristics like the freaky computers that take over the world in stories that I used to think were fiction.
Me: I’d like to preheat to 350.
Oven: I’m afraid I can’t let you do that, Amy.
I only use one rack at the very top. Anything lower would just be cruel. When I first got the thing, I foolishly and against orders turned the knob to Preheat and sacrificed a pan of brown and serve rolls. The dogs wouldn’t eat them, even the Lab that once tried to consume three hubcaps and a tire tool in the garage. Finally I threw them in the yard and claimed a meteor hit the elm tree.
As you can imagine, cooking a nice Thanksgiving dinner is out of the question. Oh, ever the optimist, I tried it once. The Inferno gutted that bird like a freshly caught catfish and raced across my innocent roasting pan like the great Chicago fire. There are fossils embedded in the enamel that will amaze archaeologists in centuries to come.
As I whipped open the oven door in a suicidal attempt to rescue the dinner, the heat sent my hair flying toward the ceiling like space dust and singed my eyebrows. Armed with Kevlar potholders, I whipped the pan out of the oven and hurled it toward the table. The remains of the charred cooking bag stuck to the turkey’s skin like a huge black bandaid and the legs looked like Tiki torches. The bones at the end of the drumsticks crumbled to ash upon contact with fresh air.
Bill Dear, ever the man with the right thing to say when kitchen disasters strike, strolled into the room coughing and clutching a cup of coffee like it was the last life boat on the Titanic. “I didn’t even know you could make blackened turkey.”
I peered at him through the smoke. “It was only in there for half an hour.”
“At least you had the foresight to put it in a body bag before you cooked it.”
I gazed forlornly at the little ashen piles of soot under the drumsticks and thought about the Thanksgiving dinner we would eat at McDonald’s.
“Don’t worry, Baby,” Bill drew a gentle hand across my face where my eyebrows used to be. “Anybody can cook a turkey breast, but it takes somebody special to mulch the feet.”
Monday, March 10, 2008
Apple of my Eyetooth
Today, the sun finally peeked through the storm clouds long enough to make the daffodils bloom before the next cold snap mows them down like a serial killer on Sunset Strip. Definitely a sign from heaven telling us spring cleaning is in order.
Spring cleaning is probably a good thing to do at least once a millineum. So I scrubbed the bathroom fixtures, reorganized the bookcases, and scraped the ooky stuff from around the burners on the stove.
Hubby took the dog to the dump. No, he didn’t leave him there. The weekly dump adventure is their version of a father and son backpacking trip with the Cub Scouts. Plenty of male bonding with the added bonus of disgusting smells.
Bo is a Labrador-Dalmatian cross. He is born to be outside and happy to be riding along at top speed in the name of emergency resolution, even if the crisis involves getting the turkey parts to the dumping grounds before fumes overwhelm us.
Don’t get me wrong. I appreciate the importance of the chore. But why does it take two hours to ride six miles? I know for a fact as they pull out of the driveway I won’t see them again until I’m scooping macaroni shreds and broccoli bits out of the drain.
It’s not that I’m jealous. But it just doesn’t seem fair that the dog gets to ride in the front seat.
Sure enough, just as I’m wiping the slimy stuff off the top shelf in the refrigerator, they reappear grinning like a pair of superheroes who have saved the world from coffee grounds.
“Thought I’d take Bo for a romp so we wouldn’t have to worry about walking him later,” Bill says, stopping in the kitchen to empty leftover dog treats from his pockets. He drops enough kibble on our kitchen table to feed a team of Iditarod Huskies.
If that’s the leftovers, I can’t image how much he used for the main course. When we go out to eat, he gets me the children’s meals. I’ve got a nice collection of toy surprises and some neat Disney collector cups.
“I see Bo won’t need any breakfast.”
“No, we stopped at the drive-through. He worked up quite an appetite.”
“I understand driving past huge containers full of rotting refuse will do that.”
"We took the recyclables, too.”
Scrubbing around the knobs of the oven with a toothbrush, I had a little difficulty focusing on the bigger picture. At the moment, “going green” was just another reason to throw out the cheese.
Just about that time, Bill stopped and took a good look at the kitchen. The sink was spotless, the stove sparkled, and the KoolAid stains had been bleached from the countertops.
“Uh oh. What did I do? It’s the two hour dump trip isn’t it?”
This dog’s been hunting long enough to smell a trap long before he’s hanging upside down by his hind leg.
“What makes you say that?” I ask sweetly, scouring the finish off the microwave.
“You haven’t cleaned this much since I forgot to tell you that I volunteered to take six loaves of apple bread to the Thanksgiving dinner at work.”
“And what happened then?”
“I learned to make apple bread.”
“So, you took off for two hours with the dog, who rides in the front seat with his tongue cleaning the pine sap off the windows, and you don’t get home until all the cleaning is done. What do you think is wrong?”
“You want me to make apple bread?”
I ponder this logic for a moment. I want him to help me empty the refrigerator drippings from the grease pit under the ice box. On the other hand, his apple bread makes the angels sing. You don’t get this kind of food in a Happy Meal.
“That’s right, honey,” I said smiling.
“Well, Bo and I worked hard this morning and I’m worn out. Let me take a little nap and I’ll make you a double recipe.”
What can I say? Sometimes it’s best to let lying dogs sleep.
Spring cleaning is probably a good thing to do at least once a millineum. So I scrubbed the bathroom fixtures, reorganized the bookcases, and scraped the ooky stuff from around the burners on the stove.
Hubby took the dog to the dump. No, he didn’t leave him there. The weekly dump adventure is their version of a father and son backpacking trip with the Cub Scouts. Plenty of male bonding with the added bonus of disgusting smells.
Bo is a Labrador-Dalmatian cross. He is born to be outside and happy to be riding along at top speed in the name of emergency resolution, even if the crisis involves getting the turkey parts to the dumping grounds before fumes overwhelm us.
Don’t get me wrong. I appreciate the importance of the chore. But why does it take two hours to ride six miles? I know for a fact as they pull out of the driveway I won’t see them again until I’m scooping macaroni shreds and broccoli bits out of the drain.
It’s not that I’m jealous. But it just doesn’t seem fair that the dog gets to ride in the front seat.
Sure enough, just as I’m wiping the slimy stuff off the top shelf in the refrigerator, they reappear grinning like a pair of superheroes who have saved the world from coffee grounds.
“Thought I’d take Bo for a romp so we wouldn’t have to worry about walking him later,” Bill says, stopping in the kitchen to empty leftover dog treats from his pockets. He drops enough kibble on our kitchen table to feed a team of Iditarod Huskies.
If that’s the leftovers, I can’t image how much he used for the main course. When we go out to eat, he gets me the children’s meals. I’ve got a nice collection of toy surprises and some neat Disney collector cups.
“I see Bo won’t need any breakfast.”
“No, we stopped at the drive-through. He worked up quite an appetite.”
“I understand driving past huge containers full of rotting refuse will do that.”
"We took the recyclables, too.”
Scrubbing around the knobs of the oven with a toothbrush, I had a little difficulty focusing on the bigger picture. At the moment, “going green” was just another reason to throw out the cheese.
Just about that time, Bill stopped and took a good look at the kitchen. The sink was spotless, the stove sparkled, and the KoolAid stains had been bleached from the countertops.
“Uh oh. What did I do? It’s the two hour dump trip isn’t it?”
This dog’s been hunting long enough to smell a trap long before he’s hanging upside down by his hind leg.
“What makes you say that?” I ask sweetly, scouring the finish off the microwave.
“You haven’t cleaned this much since I forgot to tell you that I volunteered to take six loaves of apple bread to the Thanksgiving dinner at work.”
“And what happened then?”
“I learned to make apple bread.”
“So, you took off for two hours with the dog, who rides in the front seat with his tongue cleaning the pine sap off the windows, and you don’t get home until all the cleaning is done. What do you think is wrong?”
“You want me to make apple bread?”
I ponder this logic for a moment. I want him to help me empty the refrigerator drippings from the grease pit under the ice box. On the other hand, his apple bread makes the angels sing. You don’t get this kind of food in a Happy Meal.
“That’s right, honey,” I said smiling.
“Well, Bo and I worked hard this morning and I’m worn out. Let me take a little nap and I’ll make you a double recipe.”
What can I say? Sometimes it’s best to let lying dogs sleep.
Tuesday, November 20, 2007
The Cough Drop--A Thanksgiving Miracle
Bill and I were sitting in that special kind of traffic jam that comes just before the holidays and is the result of a small town growing like an overdose victim of Jack’s magic beans, leaving mundane things like convenience and city planning behind. The roads were packed like the straw in a peach milkshake. Fruit gets stuck in the end, all movement stops, and nobody gets any relief. With a milkshake you can pull out the straw and suck out the peach pulp. With overburdened roads, the obvious answer is to block off one lane with orange cones and commit to a ten-year construction project.
We'd dropped our kids off at a mega-bookstore at what seemed like a short time earlier, doling out the last bite-sized candy bars from Halloween left in the bottom of my pocketbook to hold them until we got back and could hit a nearby buffet extravaganza. Sometimes eating out, even with two teenaged mouths to feed, is a better idea than a sound investment plan.
In the meantime, the Highway Patrol issued an all-points-bulletin to every mall-bound traveler in the area, describing our location, destination, and current state of irritability. That’s the only reasonable explanation for the fact that our car began to attract morons like a pan of biscuits attracts men named Bubba. Traffic stalled and Christmas shoppers begin to share the joy of the season with their fellow travelers one finger at a time. I attempted to retain my normal good nature even though Bill was getting testy. He always gets that way when he misses snack time.
Bill: Do you have any more candy in your pocketbook?
Me: Why? Are you hungry?
Bill: No, I thought I would toss some out the window to lure people out of our lane.
Me: You’re being sarcastic because you’re too hungry. (Pointing across six lanes of stationary traffic.) There’s a Wendy’s. And a Chinese buffet. And a pizza place. I'll bet that gas station has candy bars.
Bill: Are you hungry?
Me: (Fumbling through my pocketbook.) No. Why do you keep bringing it up? Look--there’s that place with the wonderful barbecue ribs. I could walk there and back before you got to the red light.
(I find a cellophane-wrapped object which I pull surreptitiously from my bag. I wince as a tiny crinkling sound gives me away.)
Bill: What’s that?
Me: Nothing.
Bill: What is it?
Me: Nothing. Leave me alone, willya?
Bill: You have food.
Me: No I don’t. It’s a cough drop. (Here I wave the cough drop with a flourish. It’s of a nondescript color somewhere in between magenta and pink eye.)
Bill: I want half.
Me: It’s mine. I found it. (I fondle the cough drop like it was the One Ring.)
Bill: We can take turns licking it.
Me: (Pensively) I don’t think I’ve bought any cough drops this season. . .not since I had the flu that year we had the big snow.
Bill: You can have it.
Me: No you. I can wait.
Bill: I can wait, too.
We laughed together, the warm laughter of two people coming together over misfortune.
Under cover of laughter, I shucked the paper off the cough drop like it was a peel and eat shrimp and popped it in my mouth.
Just then, in a holiday miracle moment, traffic parted like the men’s restroom line for a father-daughter combination. Nothing clears the tracks like a man doing daddy-duty with a lace-clad toddler in tow. We picked up the boys, and wheeled into a nearby restaurant.
Bill: See, it all turned out okay because we made sacrifices and worked together. That’s what Thanksgiving is all about.
We all smiled at each other like the Brady Bunch on the 29th minute of a 30 minute show. Secretly, I gave thanks for a cough drop appetizer that kept me from acting like a turkey.
We'd dropped our kids off at a mega-bookstore at what seemed like a short time earlier, doling out the last bite-sized candy bars from Halloween left in the bottom of my pocketbook to hold them until we got back and could hit a nearby buffet extravaganza. Sometimes eating out, even with two teenaged mouths to feed, is a better idea than a sound investment plan.
In the meantime, the Highway Patrol issued an all-points-bulletin to every mall-bound traveler in the area, describing our location, destination, and current state of irritability. That’s the only reasonable explanation for the fact that our car began to attract morons like a pan of biscuits attracts men named Bubba. Traffic stalled and Christmas shoppers begin to share the joy of the season with their fellow travelers one finger at a time. I attempted to retain my normal good nature even though Bill was getting testy. He always gets that way when he misses snack time.
Bill: Do you have any more candy in your pocketbook?
Me: Why? Are you hungry?
Bill: No, I thought I would toss some out the window to lure people out of our lane.
Me: You’re being sarcastic because you’re too hungry. (Pointing across six lanes of stationary traffic.) There’s a Wendy’s. And a Chinese buffet. And a pizza place. I'll bet that gas station has candy bars.
Bill: Are you hungry?
Me: (Fumbling through my pocketbook.) No. Why do you keep bringing it up? Look--there’s that place with the wonderful barbecue ribs. I could walk there and back before you got to the red light.
(I find a cellophane-wrapped object which I pull surreptitiously from my bag. I wince as a tiny crinkling sound gives me away.)
Bill: What’s that?
Me: Nothing.
Bill: What is it?
Me: Nothing. Leave me alone, willya?
Bill: You have food.
Me: No I don’t. It’s a cough drop. (Here I wave the cough drop with a flourish. It’s of a nondescript color somewhere in between magenta and pink eye.)
Bill: I want half.
Me: It’s mine. I found it. (I fondle the cough drop like it was the One Ring.)
Bill: We can take turns licking it.
Me: (Pensively) I don’t think I’ve bought any cough drops this season. . .not since I had the flu that year we had the big snow.
Bill: You can have it.
Me: No you. I can wait.
Bill: I can wait, too.
We laughed together, the warm laughter of two people coming together over misfortune.
Under cover of laughter, I shucked the paper off the cough drop like it was a peel and eat shrimp and popped it in my mouth.
Just then, in a holiday miracle moment, traffic parted like the men’s restroom line for a father-daughter combination. Nothing clears the tracks like a man doing daddy-duty with a lace-clad toddler in tow. We picked up the boys, and wheeled into a nearby restaurant.
Bill: See, it all turned out okay because we made sacrifices and worked together. That’s what Thanksgiving is all about.
We all smiled at each other like the Brady Bunch on the 29th minute of a 30 minute show. Secretly, I gave thanks for a cough drop appetizer that kept me from acting like a turkey.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)