Carpet, Coffee, and Kale: Fly on the Wall

  

Welcome to our monthly Fly on the Wall, a blog post written in snippets. Marcia, Diane, and I invite you to catch a glimpse of what you’d see if you were a fly on the wall in our homes, at our writing desks, and in our worlds. Come on in, buzz around, see what we've been up to. Bet you laugh! 

Hubs is a bit of a dinosaur. Among many other things, he's always worn a watch, and he still does. Not necessary since his cell phone . . . you know . . . will tell him the time, but whatever.

I've also mentioned that he tends to think very differently than I do, so a lot of what he says, opposite of how I'd think through whatever the circumstance may be, doesn't surprise me. Until yesterday:

Hubs: I need to buy a new watch for my battery.

Me: That's an interesting way of remedying the situation. Not exactly frugal, but if it makes you happy . . .

Two things I've mentioned before: first is that I often share here the (mostly) funny things I text due to either my cell phone's text correction (I need to figure out how to turn that off), or, well, operator error. My history dictates I should check texts before I send them, but I'm usually in a rush.

Second is that PurDude and I text every day, we have since he moved to Boulder. He checks in, I tell him a few things that are going on around here, he usually gives me a one-word answer, then ends with "love you ma." I either say "love and miss you," or "love you, honey."

Yesterday, the conversation ended a little differently.

PurDude: Love you, ma.

Me: Love you, horny.

Ah, yeah, I'm not too embarrassed.

One of the few things I dislike about my house is the carpet. The wood floors I love, but the carpet is not what I’d choose. Most of it is white, which doesn’t work well with young kids, as we’d had when we moved in. But the carpet in the den is the worst.

I had really thought I’d end up replacing it, but something else always seemed to come up. Like completely furnishing the place, since I sold my last house furnished at the request of the buyer, and you know, kids . . . college . . . life . . . 

I bought a beautiful, large, Persian hand-made rug, so some of the carpet is covered, but the rest is a constant frustration. It’s textured. And speckled. I’ll be walking to another room and think I see a bug, or a bit of food, or part of a leaf from outdoors. I stop, bend down to look and no, a dark carpet speckle.

I was pointing it out to a new neighbor, and it turns out she’d sold carpet in the past. she told me it was a fairly expensive carpet, and when she’d sold something like this, she’d always mention that people love it because the speckles of dark color are like camouflage, it hides dirt.

And I have to say, I could never sell carpet. Because I couldn’t explain as a selling point to some poor customer that you can’t tell when it’s dirty, because it always looks dirty. 

Not with a straight face, anyway.

FB is often suggesting people I should friend or groups I should join. They're often pretty arbitrary, leaving me wondering where they come up with these recommendations.

This morning, they took me by surprise. Their recommendation was for a group I should join called Wacky Widows.

And although I bet it's a fun and supportive group, I wonder whose job it will be to tell my husband . . .

We were watching a Celtics game when, at half time, they cut to the studio. One host was wishing another a happy birthday. The desk was covered with Kale, a birthday present.

Me: Don't ever get me Kale for my birthday.

Hubs: OK.

Me: Will you remember?

Hubs: Yes, since I don't know what it is.

Me: But you could bake me a loaf of Clementine Blueberry Bread.

Hubs: You've got a better chance of getting a bunch of Kale.

Clementine Blueberry Bread

Hubs had some errands to do and decided to take my car as I needed gas and he could stop on the way home. About an hour later, I hear screeching sounds coming from the garage. I go out the door and see my car sitting in the garage, alarm going off, all the lights flashing, and Hubs sitting in the driver's seat looking like a deer caught in the headlights.

Me (yelling over the noise): What are you doing?

Hubs: Trying to shut this off.

Me: How did you turn it on?
Hubs: I don't know.

He reaches for the Audi owner's manual, I head in to check out YouTube. After a few minutes, I hear it shut off.

Me: How did you do that?

Hubs: I don't know, it just stopped.

Hubs needs a new car, and I'm thinking maybe we should trade his in for a tricycle. 

 

Tuesday evening I noticed that the laundry chute was getting pretty full, so I guess laundry was on the agenda for the next morning. I decided to collect and do all of the towels too.

Me: I'm doing laundry tomorrow, I'll do a load of towels as well.

Hubs: Should I send my towels down in the morning after I shower?
Me: It doesn't matter, I can get them when I go up to shower.

Hubs: That will work. There's like a 50/50 chance I'll remember anyway.

Me (rolling my eyes): More like a 20% chance.

Hubs: Are you insulting me?
Me: No, but it doesn't matter.

Hubs: It doesn't matter if you insult me?
Me: No, after all, there's like a 20% chance you'll remember it tomorrow . . .

I still have a coffeemaker, don't use those single cup makers because that's just not how I drink my coffee. I set up the coffee maker the night before and put out mugs for Hubs and I.

I don't drink an entire mug of coffee at a time, I pour myself a cup and sit down on the couch to play my word games. As the coffee starts to cool down, or as I drink it most of the way down, I just go fill it the rest of the way up.

Hubs goes into the office, usually twice a week. On those days I put out a travel mug for him. But he will sometimes forget to fill and take it. So, I decided to remind him.

That morning, I reminded him and that night he came in, handed me the mail and his mug, and turned to go change his clothes. The mug, though, didn't feel empty. I go to the sink and pour out an entire mug of coffee. Hubs sees me at the sink with a perplexed look on my face.

Hubs: It's your fault.

Me: What is?

Hubs: The full mug of coffee.

Me: How is that my fault.

Hubs: You reminded me to take it in the car with me.

Me: Yeah, and . . .

Hubs: You didn't remind me to take it out of the car and into work with me.

And this, my friends, is proof positive that the brain does not function properly before coffee.

Who are you, really?

It's difficult having the name Karen lately, I'm guessing you can figure out why.

When people use the name as an insult, I mostly ignore it. But when a social media post is specifically from someone touting how kind and compassionate and pro this and that they are, that just ticks too many of my boxes. 

This recently happened on threads, a post about how humanitarian, caring, empathetic and the opposite of Karen's (yes, they used an apostrophe for a plural, so clearly a brain surgeon) this person claims to be. I responded that using a name that many good people share as an insult is not caring and empathetic, it's bullying.

And wow, did I get bashed. People responded telling me to stfu, that I should go cry somewhere else, that I'm the reason the name Karen is used that way . . .

So, if this is humanitarian, caring, empathetic, and compassionate, I wonder what cruel and hateful looks like to these people (all of whom I blocked, of course).

Maybe I should share this with them:

And who I am. Really.

Hubs had some work he needed to get done, and as well as a few things I'd put on his list that needed done around the house.

I had a load of laundry to do, dishwasher to run, dinner to prep, and grocery list to finish. 

We both got our lists completed and were finally settling down to watch TV, this night there was another Celtics game on and we were looking forward to watching.

But 2 minutes in, and there was a problem.

Me: I'm not going to be able to watch this game.

Hubs: What? We've been looking forward to this all day.

Me: I know.

Hubs: So what do you mean you can't watch.

Me: Did you see White?
Hubs: Yeah, I saw him, he's a starter.

Me: But did you see the back of his shirt?
Hubs: The back of his shirt? 

Me: Yes, his tag is sticking up out of the back of his shirt. And that's just going to drive me nuts.

Hubs (rolling his eyes): You're kidding, right?

Oh, how I wish I were.

 

Now click on the links below and see what my friends have to share:

Menopausal Mother 

On the Border

Clementine Blueberry Bread

                                                                       ©www.BakingInATornado.com

Printable Recipe

Ingredients:

1 TBSP sugar

1/2 tsp cinnamon

2 1/2 cups plus 1 TBSP flour, divided

1 cup sugar

1 tsp salt

1 TBSP baking powder

1 1/4 cups milk

1/2 cup oil

1/2 tsp vanilla

1/4 cup sour cream

2 eggs

1 cup blueberries

2 clementines

OPT: 5 TBSP powdered sugarn and 2 tsp orange juice

Directions:

*Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Grease a loaf pan, mix 1 TBSP of the sugar with the cinnamon and dust a loaf pan with this mixture.

*Place 2 1/2 cups of the flour, the remaining sugar, salt, and baking pwder in a large bowl and whisk togethter. Add the milk, oil, vanilla, sour cream, and eggs. Mix until incorporated.

*Peel the clementines and separate into sections. Set aside 5 sections for the top, and chop the rest.

*Set aside 5 or 6 blueberries. Toss the remaining blueberries with the remaining 1 TBSP flour. Fold into the dough along with the chopped clementines.

*Spread the dough evenly into the loaf pan. Top with the reserved blueberries and clementine segments. Bake for 60 - 65 minutes, until the top springs back to the touch.

*Cool in the pan for 10 minutes. Run a knife around the edges, remove, and cool completely.

*OPT: whisk together the powdered sugar and orange juice. Drizzle over the cooled loaf.

None by None: Word Counters

 

Counting my words again.

Today my fellow Word Counters and I are sharing our monthly group post. Each month, one group member picks a number between 12 and 50. All participating bloggers are then challenged to write something (or a few somethings, as the case may be) using that exact number of words. Today we share what we all came up with.

 This month's number is 27. 
It was chosen by Me.

As I've been doing in these Word Counters posts, I've chosen a theme and am using my word count multiple times in keeping with the theme. This month I've chosen the theme None by None.

~ Do you remember ant farms? Ever have one? Not me. Ever want one? Still not me. Especially not now, anyway, and definitely not on my upstairs landing.

~ It started with siding. When we had some replaced on the west side of the house, the worker accidentally broke our window. And replaced it, of course.

~ We had no problems. Actually, I was pretty happy, the original window didn't open, was just glass, but the new one opens for a nice cross breeze.

~ Fast forward about three years, when we noticed one day, a big blank ant was crawling down the wall under that window. Then later, another. Oh, no.

~ The ants were marching. One by one. And two by two. And lots by lots. According to google, looking for something sweet. That could be a problem.

Strawberry Banana Bread

~ Recon mission: identify ingress point. We knew it had to be around that window, but never saw exactly where. Choosing between kill and deter, we chose deter.

~ They don't like cinnamon (those insect heathens). So I although I rubbed the window ledge with it, I certainly wasn't sprinkling it on my wall and carpeting.

~ Don't know if that deterred some, but certainly not all. Plan B time. Hubs found a gentle, indoor safe insecticide. And they stopped. For a few hours . . .

~ Sorry, I'm not sharing my baked goods, wall, stairway, and even (how far do ants go?) my bed {{shudder}}. No more Mrs. Nice Girl, this is war.

~ Plan C: divide and conquer. Vinegar's another deterrent. I sprayed the window, wall, carpet. Hubs sprayed a stronger insecticide outside, in the rocks and up the house.

~ The ants aren't marching. Or they've changed course (hopefully not to my neighbor's house). All's quiet on the western front, but us? We stand at the ready. 

Here are links to the other Word Counters posts:

On the Border 

Messymimi’s Meanderings 

 Strawberry Banana Bread         

                                                       ©www.BakingInATornado.com

Printable Recipe

Ingredients:
1 overripe banana

1 ripe banana

1/4 cup oil

3/4 cup brown sugar

1 egg

2/3 cup strawberry yogurt

1 1/4 cups flour

3/4 tsp cinnamon, divided

1/4 tsp salt

3/4 tsp baking soda

1 tsp sugar

3 TBSP strawberry preserves

Directions:
*Preheat oven to 325 degrees. Grease a loaf pan.

*Set aside 4 slices from the center of the ripe banana and set aside. Hull and slice one of the strawberries and set aside.

*Mash the remaining ripe banana, along with the overripe banana in a bowl with a fork. Whisk in the oil, brown sugar, egg, and yogurt.

*Mix in the flour, 1/2 tsp of the cinnamon, salt, and baking soda. Hull and chop the remaining strawberries. Fold into the dough. 

*Pour the dough into the prepared loaf pan. Even out, then arrange the reserved sliced banana and strawberry onto the top.

*Mix together the remaining cinnamon and the tsp of sugar, sprinkle over the top.

*Bake for 55 - 60 minutes, until the center of the top springs back to the touch. 

*Cool in the pan for 10 minutes before running a knife around the edges and removing from the pan. Whisk the strawberry preserves to loosen. Paint onto the top of the bread using a pastry brush. Cool completely before slicing.

Appraisal: Monthly Poetry Group

 

Last Friday of the month is for
Monthly Poetry Group to rhyme.

Diane, Mimi, and I take turns,

All That Glitters, the theme this time.

 

As usual, today I'll try,

a poem to write . . . or fudge.

Whether I'm successful or not,

you get to be the judge.  

 

Appraisal

All that glitters is not gold,

that's the story we've been told.

Just because something is pretty,

doesn't mean that's its nitty gritty.

Don't look only at the outside,

open up your mind, (really, really wide).

Look beneath the surface, there's no doubt,

if you don't, you'll be missing out.

Sometimes things aren't as we'd planned,

not being pretty doesn't make food bland.

Take time to check out what's within,

that open mind is the best way to win.

Chive Quick Rolls (no yeast)

An important lesson, I'll concede,

one of value, we all should heed.

And don't judge a book by its cover too,

what doesn't glitter could be gold to you.

So listen, if I may be so bold,

sometimes what glitters is, in fact, gold.

Appraise opportunities as they come by,

Don't be left holding the bag and wondering why.

 

Before you go, stop by these blogs for more poetry:

 

On the Border

Messymimi's Meanderings

 

Chive Quick Rolls (no yeast)

                                                                       ©www.BakingInATornado.com

Printable Recipe

Ingredients:
1 1/3 cups plain Greek yogurt

2 3/4 tsp freeze dried chives, divided

1 TBSP butter

1 2/3 cups flour

3 tsp baking powder

1 1/4 tsp salt

Directions:
*Mix 2 1/2 tsp of the dried chives into the yogurt. Set aside.

*Melt the butter, add the remaining chives, set aside.

*Preheat oven to 375 degrees. Cover a baking sheet with parchment paper.

*In a large bowl, mix the flour with the baking powder and salt. Remove 1/3 cup of this mixture and use it to flour a kneading surface.

*To the bowl with the flour, add the yogurt and chive mixture. Stir to incorporate, then turn out and knead for 5 minutes. It will still be a little sticky.

*Divide the dough into 8 equal sized pieces, then roll into balls. Place on the baking sheet, brush the tops with the melted butter and chives, and bake for 25 minutes.

Exercism: Monthly Poetry Group

 

 

 

Last Friday of the month is for

Monthly Poetry Group to rhyme.

Diane, Mimi, and I take turns,

"Exercise" is the theme this time.

 

As usual, today I'll try,

a poem to write . . . or fudge.

Whether I'm successful or not,

you get to be the judge.  

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Exercism

Church was not just spiritual,

but a social place for many.

Parishioners got together in

fun groups, and there were plenty. 

One day, a new group was formed,

exercise, the mutual plan.

Going on a daily walk,

with all of those who can.

 

Though he was much older now,

Father joined in when he could.

But to their shock and awe, he said

that they were up to no good.

 

"No, I cannot do that," 

he exclaimed, "I'm much too old.

And wrong, stay home and bible read,

if I may be so bold."

 

Shocked, dismayed parishioners,

went along their way.

On the phone that night, though, they,

agreed to meet up the next day.

Next day, about to have coffee and

some freshly baked quick bread,

saw a group in the parking lot,

so he headed outside instead. 

 

Blueberry Cinnamon Loaf

 

Yes, the group had gathered,

they were ready for their walk,

when from inside the rectory,

Father came out to talk. 

"Good morning," Father, smiling, said,

"What's up on this fine day?"

Worried, Mabel told him,

"Going walking, we'll be on our way."

 

"That sounds like a fine idea," 

Father asked "can I go with you?"

Everyone looked to Mabel,

her answer? Blunt but true.

 

"Father," Mabel calmly said,

"you were invited all along.

but you told us quite clearly that,

exercise was somehow wrong?"

 

"Exercise? Oh, exercise!

Guess I didn't hear it.

Thought that you'd said exorcise 

as in . . . you know . . . expel a spirit."

 

Before you go, stop by these blogs for more Collections poetry:

 

On the Border

Messymimi's Meanderings

 

 

Blueberry Cinnamon Loaf

                                                                       ©www.BakingInATornado.com

Printable Recipe

Ingredients: 

2 tsp sugar

1 1/4 tsp cinnamon, divided

1/3 cup cinnamon baking chips

2 1/2 cups flour plus 1 TBSP, divided

1 cup brown sugar

1 TBSP baking powder

1 tsp salt

1 1/4 cups milk

1/2 cup oil

1 tsp vanilla

1 egg 

1 1/4 cups blueberries 

 

1/2 cup powdered sugar

2 TBSP blueberry jam

1 TBSP lemon juice

Directions:
*Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Grease a loaf pan.

*Mix together the 2 tsp sugar and 1/4 tsp of cinnamon. Dust the loaf pan with this mixture, moving it around to coat the bottom and sides. Set aside.
*Place the cinnamon baking chips in a clean coffee grinder or a food processor. Grind to a powder.

*In a large bowl, whisk together the cinnamon chips, the remaining cinnamon, 2 1/2 cups of the flour, brown sugar, baking powder, and salt. 

*To the bowl, add the milk, oil, vanilla, and egg. Mix until incorporated.

*Toss the blueberries with the remaining 1 TBSP flour to coat. Set aside about 1/4 cup of blueberries, and fold the rest into the dough.

*Spread the dough evenly into the loaf pan. Top with the reserved blueberries. Bake for 55 - 60 minutes, until the top springs back to the touch.

*Cool in the pan for 15 minutes. Run a knife around the edges and cool completely.

*Whisk together the powdered sugar, blueberry jam, and lemon juice. Drizzle over the cooled loaf.