Any way you slice it

The teeth on the old knives are worn down like the teeth of an old dog.

Cleopatra looks so cute in her new glasses. All studious and school-girly. The frames are titanium and can withstand a nuclear blast. Which can’t compete with the way mom abuses frames but at least they may last a bit longer than the last pair!

Now a natural segue to the subject of knives.

Tired of the icky feeling that our old steak knives had on my hands — dry, peeling and splintery wood that stuck into your flesh — I bought a new set. At Target. They’re Henckels! We know what Cleopatra did to my last giant chef knife by Henckel – she broke the big tip of it off! Now it’s a $60.00 paint scraper.

The big point (ha!) here is that it is difficult for me to throw our old knives away. Why is that, I ask myself. Well, they are not just ‘old knives’. Technically they could have my father’s DNA on them. They could have every family member’s DNA on them who have been to the house in the last 40 years: my brother Gary who doesn’t speak to us anymore; Tootsie; Aunt Celia; Aunt Rose and Uncle Ham; Bob and Jeanne Baird from across the alley; all of my ex-beaus (that’s a damn lotta DNA!); my ex-husband.

They are a concrete link to the past. These old, wood handled knives hold the souls of everyone who used them. They sacrificed themselves for our carnivorous pleasures. They have reflected our aging faces in their blades. And if I put them out to pasture, I think, that is too close of a metaphor that portends that all of us (including myself, who has not accomplished enough yet) knife users are headed to pasture too!

But one can’t, like, mount the knives into a shadow box frame and hang them on the wall for nostalgic reasons. That’s plain wrong. We are here when we’re useful and functional and we are gone when we give everyone splinters as they cut their rib eye.

Bye-bye, knives of my life. Thank you for all you have done, seen, put up with, endured. May you cut for eternity in knife heaven — or, just sit back and relax, you know whatever you prefer.

Packaging Northwest: “We’ll box your ears for you!”

I saw this box at the foot of our alley and thought it looked like art. While shooting the photo the owner came out with his family and told his kids that I have the little dog Charley that bit him one time. I feel so embarrassed! I think I went into denial over that because when I heard him say it I was horrified. They call him 'leash aggressive' which...I should look up on the Internet so that I might learn how to remedy it. A clicker? I remember Charley in obedience class taught by Robin Granell of Canine Behavior Center, the same instructor Bix had for beginner and intermediate (which he passed with flying colors!). Charley was the BRATTIEST dog in the entire class!

Drove Cleopatra and I out to my sister’s house for corned beef and cabbage. I brought cheesecake and reduced blackberries for a topping. Mom eats more when she is away from the house. I try not to take it personally but it’s true, the food we eat at my sisters or at a restaurant is usually better than my fare of late. At least I always try to work in the food pyramid: Cheez Its on the bottom, peanuts in the middle and cookies at the top.

This morning eating muesli, bananas, soy milk and coffee on the window seat mom starts in on the apple tree:
Molly, do you think that tree is dead?
It isn’t dead (I say super loud so that she can hear) it’s just that when I trim the top off I trim off all the leaves and new growth.
Oh. Guess we should take it out.
It isn’t hurting anything; let’s just leave it.
I’ll miss a tree there…

After awhile she was at the back door looking out the window:
Molly, could you come here for a minute?
Yeah.
Do you think this shrub — I don’t know what, is it a shrub?
It could be called a tree (it’s a snowball tree).
…do you think it’s dead?
No (I say loudly), it’s just that I have to trim it down so far that it never has a chance to grow. (Now I’m convinced I’ve gone into the world of metaphor.)
Oh.
(I don’t think she understands what I mean. Our shrubs and trees are all extremes: big trunks immediately turn into tiny twigs with nothing in-between. They’re all stunted but not in any methodical, Bonsai way. They’re just sad and gnarly, not necessarily in that order.

Cleopatra always asks about the weather. What’s it doing out there? she’ll say. I mean, she could step on to the porch and find out for herself! She acts like the outdoors is as far away as Iceland. Plus she still runs around the house in a summer, short nightie with NO SWEATER! She keeps removing her sweater (that I put on her) and turning up the thermostat (until I have a hot flash). Then I go upstairs, get another sweater and ask her to put it on so that I may turn the furnace down some.
Oh, I’m not cold, she says.
I know…it’s just that you turn the furnace up so high and if you wear a sweater I can turn it down a but…
But she doesn’t get it. Every day. Many times a day. I can’t reason with her. When I do it sounds like I’m the unreasonable one!

Then, thank goodness, one of us will say something to crack the other one up. Humor is a reset button for the soul.

Canine Behavior Center

Eye/Teeth

Charley cross-country sking last weekend. Cleopatra didn't ask how the trip went because she didn't remember that we'd been gone.

 

Today at her cleaning mom’s dentist said that her front teeth are wobbly for no apparent reason — “We’ll just watch it closely,” he said. It could be time to text the Tooth Fairy! 

Since she was dressed, out and about I decided to hit the eyeglass store on the way home. She hasn’t had glasses for a while because her lenses fell out and have never been found. The lady who helped us, Amber, said that mom was within two months of the two-year mark since her last eye exam. 

“You can use this prescription but it is likely that it’s changed since she last took it,” said Amber looking at the paper work and looking concerned; “I recommend she be re-examined.”
“I would prefer not to test her again,” I said in my inimitable Bartleby fashion; “it’s probably okay, and if we test her again it is going to take forever and I can’t handle it.”
This made Amber very uneasy. She shot me a look like I was a monster. Then of course Cleopatra had to chime in.
“Well, I took care of you for quite a while!” said mom cracking a joke. Amber tapped her clipboard, pausing for what she thought would be long enough for my guilt to sway toward Yes. But it didn’t.
“Okay,” Amber said slowly, setting down the clipboard and heading to a wall filled with frames; “flexible frames that bend might be good…also, titanium frames are very strong.” I had told her that mom was rough on eyewear. 
“How rough?” asked Amber.
“She puts them in her back pocket and sits on them,” I said.

We got out of there and walked next door to the bakery. Mom picked out a chocolate chip cookie and I bought a pecan roll along with a loaf of whole wheat bread, not sliced. When we got home Charley Chan, as usual, went crazy and we didn’t do the ten minute attention wait that you should do with dogs who have separation anxiety — before leaving, be cool and don’t pay attention to them for ten minutes; after returning home make no big deal of it and ignore them for ten minutes. 

So much for consistency in training as I selfishly squatted down to enjoy his kisses and licks.

Love is earthquake proof

"Bix! Time for your drink!"

Happenings in Haiti make me want to do a good job here in my own tiny life since I cannot control the world. I have to remember to hug Cleopatra and tell her that I love her and not run past to whisk about my activities. In a split second we could all be under rubble. Now I know what my friend Bill Butler meant when said that love is all that matters (not that he was so great at it).

Oh, and it wouldn’t hurt to buy some jugs of water to put in the garage!

The other night I came home to find a bowl of wine on the floor. How ancient Greece! What, are Spartans going to run past me and down the hallway as well? I guess that you have a better chance of not being an alcoholic if you don’t drink alone (that was my favorite method, being able to feel the warm wave of escapism wash over me without distraction — sigh). So it looks like Cleopatra was trying to get the dogs to join her! It didn’t look like they had touched the cheap red wine (they are purebreds, after all) but it sure looked all ruby pretty in the bowl. Into another dog bowl on the floor she had thrown whole, shelled peanuts. Which I think go best with beer?

Once, twice, three times an antic

Today on the telephone which I rarely talk on my pal Lisa brought up the topic of yoga which took me back to a time about 6 years ago when I felt compelled to get Cleopatra some excercise. I went as far as signing her up during a special deal at my gym. I can’t even recall if she actually went! In my mind I could see her get confused on the treadmill and fly off the back of it through the air, over the weight training wall and into the lap of some pumped up dude. One of those shake it off day-mares.

I also at this desperate time signed both of us up for a yoga class just a few blocks away in Magnolia Village. Now, Magnolia Village is full of a lot of stay at home mom’s who are hot and drive around in Land Rovers, Mercedes and Prisus’. (Jesus, tonight I was walking out of Albertsons after going to the gym  feeling righteous as usual because I had remembered my cloth bags; I was loading them in the back of my car when a lady with her little girl came out, as usual I held the sacks up sort of high so that as many people as possible could see how I am single-handedly saving the earth, etc. Alas! The lady and the girl got into their Prius that was right next to my gas guzzler –talk about putting a damper on things!)

So I take mom to this class that is full of skinny, pretty rich ladies and maybe a few wussie men masquerading as being ’spiritual’. They’re all very serious about their namaste et al, even though this was a beginner class! (Carrying around yoga mats is a status symbol that says, ‘hey I have time to do yoga while everyone else is at work’.) So the woman who runs the yoga place is up in front with her pretty, streaked blonde hair giving us instructions on how to perform different positions — downward dog, upwardly mobile, etc. While everyone else is following her perfectly there is Cleopatra completely confused and doing the strangest contrary moves because she can’t hear! The teacher who should be loving and detached and everything had this frustrated air beneath her yoga outfit, like ‘Why the hell can’t this lady follow instructions, she is making the class asymmetrical!’

It really was all like a television sitcom and in the movie version of my life I will definitely play up all the emotions and antics of this class. In all seriousness, I do wish I could make myself do yoga. I know how good it is for everything! But I’m so western, I am such a cowgirl that I need the type of excercise where I can SEE that things are happening — lots of jumping, moving and struggle. The kind of excercise where you get injured and stuff.

Yippie yi yea with a little namaste!

image courtesy of http://www.bettersexthroughyoga.com/

Post script: OMG! Can you believe this? The spell check program on WordPress suggests I use ‘woman’ instead of ‘lady’ — tell that to the Commodores. And the most horrific part: it KNOWS how to spell nameste! I knew that yoga people were going to take over the world.

This little piggy had my love

Bonita sort of looks like this only...she's CUTER! Image courtesy of http://theprimamomma.com/

I need to take Cleopatra out so that I have something to write about. Winter is a low-lying time when mom likes to stay indoors with the bulldog while Charley, the Brussels Griffon and I head out into the world.

Charley and I walked in the rain this evening him in his little coat that I had to adjust with Velcro because of his weight gain. We walked north along 35th to see if by chance Bonita the neighborhood pig was out. She was! Howard, Bonita’s owner, had just returned from jet skiing in the ocean. He handed me his card that has a photo of him on his ski dolled up in a wet suit that has an orca fin fitted to the back of it! I think Bonita has one, too. Oh, Howard, please leave Bonita with me when you and your wife and the dogs move to Oahu! (Bonita’s house has a for sale sign in front of it now.)

Howard says that Bonita’s body temperature is 104 degrees so she is a bristly black hot water bottle at night. Plus, since she is prey she likes to snuggle to hide. I’m sure Howard’s wife loves that, Bonita in the bed with them. I met Howard’s wife one day when D., Cleopatra and I compulsively jumped in the car to see if by chance Bonita was home. Which she wasn’t. She was out in the truck with Howard, where she always practically is.

Standing in Bonita’s front yard Howard’s two small dogs hung out with Charley Chan while I got to feed Bonita some pumpkin seeds. She ’sat’ – more of a squat since she didn’t want to get her butt wet on the driveway — and took them so deftly from my palm. That little snorkeler!

Wouldn’t Cleopatra just love to have a little pig around the house!

I’ll take some double-vanilla with half the fat

Cleopatra is the Ice Cream Queen!

Walked into the kitchen and Cleopatra was wearing a striped crown from around the lid of a vanilla ice cream package. Watch out because she always puts the ice cream back in the refrigerator! It melts and I turn the boxes over in the sink.

She’s been more active in the kitchen of late. She likes to wipe everything off with a damp paper towel even though there are dish cloths and sponges galore. She uses only water even though there is a canister of Ajax sitting on the counter. She also ‘washes’ the few dishes in the sink  instead of throwing them in the dishwasher. Or, as I’ve written before, she puts the dirty dishes away and I have to go through and cull them out to return them to the dishwasher.

I like that she’s puttering a bit more of late. I let her do things any old way she desires.

Ch-ch-ch-subversive

Cleopatra has always believed that no one person is better than another. I mean in general, she comes from a blue-collar family who could I guess be called ‘low class’ — my grandfather worked at the Texaco, my grandma ran an elevator in a downtown hi-rise. Wilber and Olive, my grandparents,  never had a car until my parents bought them one in the 1970’s. Even then, only grandpa Jones knew how to drive. Their entertainment was going to the local bar and seeing their friends.

I love that about them, their qualities of compassion with never any race-or-class-ism.

When President Obama was a candidate he and his family were on the television. I would try to explain to mom what was going on in the news, telling her there was an upcoming election and so forth. One time when we were watching the news there was video of the Obama family and I turned to mom to tell her that he was the democratic candidate. She looked at them and said, “They sure are tan.”

Image courtesy chia.com. There is a 'happy' and a 'determined' version. I read that the determined version is in limited supply. On the side of the 'pet' it says, "Yes we can!" From Googling this item I see there is a trail of controversy. I love America!

The Chia Obama head that is now on sale is, I believe, wonderfully subversive. I guess Chia thinks it is honoring the president by having fashioned a Chia head of him. But in a way it is racist — or, at least to work it has to rely on nappy quality hair usually found on an African-American person. I mean when we grow the foliage atop our Chia Obama it must resemble an afro to work. And Chia foliage is nappy. I mean, you couldn’t have a Chia George Washington and make that plant work on him! He had that thin, straight hair held back in a pony tail. It’s crazy!

If I had a Chia Obama I would let the foliage grow into a big, green Black Power ‘fro and stick a cake cutter/rake in it.

Freedom Now!  (Oh, and don’t forget to water.)

From Wikipedia: Salvia hispanica, commonly known as Chia, is a species of flowering plant in the mint family, Lamiaceae, that is native to central and southern Mexico and Guatemala. It was cultivated by the Aztec in pre-Columbian times, and was so valued that it was given as an annual tribute by the people to the rulers. It is still widely used in Mexico and South America, with the seeds ground for nutritious drinks and as a food source. It is also used for chia pet planters.

Turning wine into water

Ways I once forged for alcohol as an underage drinker in life’s jungle — i.e. hanging out with or sleeping with older people I didn’t like, bootlegging in front of Albertsons, stealing from friends’ liqueur cabinets and/or of course my own — now help as I search for clever ways to keep Cleopatra hydrated.  Sneaking and quests of yore come back to roost and produce results: 2 parts Livingston Burgundy, 2 parts Welch’s grape juice, 1 part water and…voila!  You’ve got yourselves some non-diuretic liquids, baby.

You may think, ’she must need Alanon, watering down the wine like that‘. But that’s the other fork in aging’s river — this one is pure practicality, a method as steely and medical as a disinfected scalpel. In fact there is an episode of Doc Martin — isn’t he interesting looking? Those jug ears, irregular teeth, boyish looks and undertaker’s suit — where Martin’s aunt’s friend who is usually very sharp and smart ass becomes suddenly demented and the problem was that she wasn’t drinking enough fluids!  They were about to remove her from the home they placed her in since she was back to normal, but it turns out she wanted to stay — there were cute guys her age to play croquet with!

All this goes to say that should you come over to our house and are poured a glass of wine let’s just say that your glass will be near innocuous enough to serve a plate of cookies with. Unless you’re a recovered alcoholic, of course — in which case you’ll get a pour of plain old grape juice — from concentrate!

Juicing down Cleopatra's wine reminds me of my father putting oil in the car.

Chicken Sandwich Query

(image from the site nexnature.net)

To whom it may concern
to whomever sees this post
perhaps you can help me?
I am curious as to why I get so many hits on my one blog post that has ‘chicken sandwich’ in its title.
What are you, chicken sandwich surfer, looking for exactly?
Should I decide to write a blog called Chicken Sandwich, perhaps you can tell me what you would wish to find there.
Recipes?
Something different and NEW for a sandwich?
Sandwich photos?
Perhaps people could send in chix sand info and I could collect it?
The feathered history of the chicken sandwich?
Thank you for your help and…don’t forget the salt and pepper!
Molly