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The following article appeared in HuffPost: 8 Common Kitchen Habits That A Food Safety Inspector Might Fail You For
This reminded me of an incidence in my first bout of matrimonial swamp fever. Needing a job, any job, I started working for the Arkansas Department of Health as a County Sanitarian (Health Inspector). I said job, any job, because this position entailed some very serious responsibility for the public safety, not only in Continue reading “Home Kitchen and Food Safety Inspection”
I started golfing in my early 30s. I will leave it to the you, esteemed reader, to calculate how long ago that was. In retrospect one of the primary reasons I began this maldito sport was to have a mutual activity to do with my father. Never a dear or cherished relationship it was improving ever so slightly in this period.
If you know anything about golf you know two very important things. First, it can be and frequently is very addicting. Secondly, it is Continue reading “Cow Pasture Golf”
“But the truth is, that when a Library expels a book of mine and leaves an unexpurgated Bible lying around where unprotected youth and age can get hold of it, the deep unconscious irony of it delights me and doesn’t anger me.” ~~ Mark Twain in a letter to Mrs. F. G. Whitmore, 7 February 1907
I recently finished watching a truly excellent and very timely course from Wondrium, Banned Books, Burned Books: Forbidden Literary Works taught by Maureen Corrigan, Ph.D. Ms. Corrigan is a professor at Georgetown University, a book critic for NPR, a contributor to several of the most prominent newspapers of the country, has served as a juror for the Pulitzer Prize in Literature, an author in her own right, and on and on. She is unquestionably Continue reading “Banned Books, Burned Books”
A few years back the Missouri State Bird, the eastern bluebird (Sialia sialis), started showing up in our yard regularly. It was not very long after that when Senora began talking about desiring a pair of bluebird houses. After listening to her dream for a spell I did an internet search for Continue reading “Señora’s Bluebird House”
If you know Señora or if you are one of the 3.141592 dedicated readers of my blog, you know that Señora has been through two major back surgeries and still struggles with back problems.
I injured my back when I worked in a warehouse in my early 20s. I have had to deal with back problems, previously more off than on, as the result of a prolapsed disc stemming from that injury. As I have ceased to be young, this back problem has become more on than off. It has gotten to the point that I had to give up walking the golf course. Even with a push or pull cart my back will not let get through a round of golf, walking. Even with a riding cart, it is hard for me to play two days in a row. Gawd forbid, there comes a day when I have to give up golf completely.
Princess Lily, aka Tater Tot, aka Fuzzy Butt, aka The Wee Dog, is a quarter dachshund. This breed is famous for their back issues. The Wee Dog, who is 10, is no exception, and she is on medicine, again off and on, to control her pain from this.
We are a household of back problems.
I bring this up because the other night when I had to get up in the middle of the night (if you are old enough you will understand), I did what I always have to do when first getting out of bed. I stood there a minute to let my back do what feels like to me, stabilize. All this prompted Señora to say, as I then hobbled my way to the johnny, “we are a household of the Wounded Old.”
And so it is going.
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My mother had a unique and characteristic method of passing on values, morals, correct behavior – I am not quite sure how to categorize what she was attempting to do. She had a library of canned routines that were triggered by the conduct of, first of us boys, and then later by grandchildren. I theorize that she was utilizing the marketing method of repeated hearings to drive home a point. She was not above turning these chastisements into little ditties. I do not have fond memories of her educative method, quite the contrary. I did not see then Continue reading “CFOP – Consideration for Other People”
I stopped in Quick Trip, a convenience store, the other day. Going up to the counter with my purchases, the cashier rang them up and told me the price. As I was swiping my debit card he repeated the the price in Spanish.
“¿Hablas español?,” I replied as his accent was not very Latino although he appeared to be so. The reality is that many 2nd or 3rd generation Latinos only speak English.
To which he responded, “Para nada.” Basically saying, “not really.”
He then went on to tell me that his father was Mexican and his mother was Greek. Adding that there was a very good chance that much alcohol was involved in their meeting! Then he mentioned something about being raised by foster parents, and wanting to learn his paternal language.
I encouraged him in his endeavor, adding that it was a beautiful language.
There is a short story in there somewhere.
And so it goes.
What triggered this latest round of silliness was that I was watching a Wondrium (formerly Great Courses) course, America’s Founding Fathers. On the class about one of my early idols, Thomas Jefferson, it mentioned that his mother was Jane Randolph. The brother just younger than me is named Paul Randolph. The Paul is after our Uncle Paul of USS Carr fame. I am not recalling the provenance of his middle name right now, but my father’s side of the family will occasionally use the family name of one branch or another for a middle name. For instance, my father’s middle name was Marrs. All this started me wondering about a connection to Jane Randolph and sent me to FamilySearch.org, the genealogy site ran by The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints aka the Mormons. Stayed tuned.
A few thoughts before I delve deeper.
First, this blog posting will most likely be of more interest to the handful of my relatives that read my blog.
Secondly the Mormon genealogy site is very well administered. I am sure that the Mormon portion is meticulous in its research. The portion open Continue reading “More Genealogy Silliness – Presidents”
“True knowledge exists in knowing that you know nothing.” ~~ Socrates
For some reason Sargent Schultz of Hogan’s Heroes comes to mind…
People with overwhelming certainty about any number of things, scare the bejeebers our of me. I have very few things that I see as black or white. Most things, for me, fall in the gray zone. I tend to see too many ‘ifs’, ‘ands’ and ‘buts’.
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