I didn’t make it. Can you tell? I’m sorry but Suzie is going to have to wait until next Friday when Suzie’s House will make it’s regularly scheduled appearance.
In other news, I got my samples in and am feeling much better. Still no appointment for the cysts, but I’m not too worried. One of the pains is completely gone and the other not bothering me much.
I’m going to go work on Suzie now. Anyone got anything in particular they’d like to see the characters do?
Alice
I love Pyrex! I have their pots and pans, their pie plates, bread pans, and a remarkable collection of their storage containers. I love the way they clean up when you burn something onto them, the way they handle freezer to microwave or oven, the way they don’t get pitted in the microwave even if you leave them in for WAY too long. I adore the rubber lids. I love the way you can see what’s in them at a glance.
But there is room for improvement *grin*.
Leave Martha Stewart behind! She goes for those lovely “sage” colored lids. They are so attractive. Until you put them over spaghetti sauce. Seriously, give me brownish-red lids! All right, the navy blue are fine because they hide the stains, but I’m not a big fan of navy. I want a decorative shade of brown.
Martha must have a separate room in which to store her kitchen stuff, because she does a lousy job of making things stackable. Simply being able to place one on top of another and have it stay there doesn’t count. When I say stackable, I mean I want each container to sit down inside the other so that a set of four will take up less space than if you placed two of them back to back. To do so, they can’t have straight sides.
Pyrex does this with some of their direct lines, but never with the Martha Stewart stuff. When it comes to buying Pyrex, go direct.
They recently came out with a storage container I LOVE. I mean, more than usual. It’s 7x5x1.5 inches. I didn’t think I’d get all that much use out of it when I first bought it. Silly me. It’s perfect for pork chops and left over lasagna, and baking those shrink-wrapped chunks of frozen fish I’m seeing in the supermarkets all over town.
Sure Pyrex has some problems with chips and scratches, but so does my no-stick cookware. At least Pyrex I can clean with bleach and not pit. I do a lot of freezing, and nothing’s better for telling at a glance what’s inside or putting in the microwave then eating straight out of.
Yep. I love Pyrex.
Alice
Seems like this time of year a lot of people turn their kitchens into bakeries. Patricia McLinn not only bakes cookies to give to friends, family, and neighbors. She used to send cookies overseas to our troops. She can’t now because all the people she knew over there have come home.
BTW, you can send all kinds of other things to people in our troops, even if you don’t know them, through www.AnySoldier.com . Just not home-made food. Twinkie anyone?
In some neighborhoods you HAVE to bake something to exchange. Not in my neighborhood, but I know there are some out there. In my mother’s neighborhood, for instance.
I tried it in mine, and got a lot of pained smiles for my efforts. It didn’t take long to realize my helpful, friendly, outgoing neighbors – mostly men – didn’t want the guilt or obligation of a cookie exchange.
So here I am all set to bake with no where for the cookies to go. The kid’s won’t let me skip making gingerbread men. It wouldn’t be Christmas without them. They’ll eat most, but that still leaves a dozen or so unwanted cookies laying around the house.
I guess I’ll have to eat them.
Darn. *Grin*
Alice
On the task list for today – Toast the bread and make cornbread for the dressing. Mix dressing’s dry ingredients in a big bowl with a lid then set aside. Make the cranberry dressing. Take the giblets out of the turkey and cook them up.
What?! It’s still frozen?!! Argh. Fine, get giblets out with a chisel, but get them out and cook them up now cause I am NOT getting up a 3am to make the dressing. Not this year. So now I’ve got the plastic covering off the stupid bird and the dressing made, but I can’t put anything into the bird until tomorrow anyway and what am I supposed to do with the bird? Oh yeah, have dh turn it into a Saran Wrap mummy. Yeah, that works.
Put the ingredients into the bread maker but don’t start it until tomorrow. What do you mean bread makers are cheating? Go away, Mom.
Find the good china. Unpack the good china. Forget the good china, wash the everyday and call it good.
Make the pie. Get more eggs. Make the spinach dressing. Get more eggs. Make omelets for lunch. Opps, better make that something from the deli because we’re out of eggs again.
What do you mean I’m running around like a turkey with it’s head cut off? I’m a little busy. That’s all.
.
Alice
You know how Foxworthy likes to do those “You might be a redneck if…” jokes? I’ve got “You might procrastinate too much if…” jokes.
You might procrastinate too much if …
…the tools you need to get ready for a party include a pumber’s wrench, a screw driver, a hammer, or a paintbrush.
… your child’s teacher phones – yes PHONES – to find out where the reports for the last four chapters went, and you only got your hands on the book yesterday.
…. your family is so used to the things stuffed into the closet falling on their heads that they coined the phrase “booby trapping” to describe your cleaning habits.
… you have been spotted chasing the FedEx truck. More than once.
… you never change the VCR clock to Daylight Savings Time because it’s only going to go back to Standard Time in a little while anyway.
… it’s easier to buy a new computer than to clear off all the old files.
… the turkey is still frozen when you put it in the oven. Dressing? What dressing?
On the task list for today – Clean the house. Maybe paint the upstairs hall. Fix the leaky faucet. Remind the kids they are supposed to help cook, not make messes in the living room. Eat all leftovers to make room in the refrigerator. Poke the turkey. Still frozen? Better get out the cooler.
.
Alice
I keep thinking of the time my grandmother dropped the turkey as she was bringing it into the dining room. The minister and his family were present along with the president of the women’s relief society. She said she could cry to have to face them with no main course.
Luckly Grandma was a smark cookie. She said “Let me go get the other one” as she picked everything up. She took it into the kitchen, cleaned it up, put the same turkey on a fresh platter, and served it.
Then it was simply a matter of keeping a straight face while collecting compliments for both her good cooking and the foresight to have cooked two of them.
On the task list for today – make sure I got everything on my grocery list. Find the cranberry mold. Assure my sister I don’t expect her to bring a peacan pie 400 miles in the back of her car. Make sure I have enough pillows and blankets. Poke the turkey. Yep, still frozen. Mostly.
Alice
Did you hear the one about the woman who decided to try a popcorn dressing in her turkey? She decided to skip a step. She filled the bird with un-popped popcorn. Everything looked fine until the oven door burst open and the turkey shot across the kitchen, spewing popcorn like rocket fuel. She and her family had their Thanksgiving dinner at a Chinese restaurant.
.
On the task list for today – poke the turkey and see if it’s still frozen solid. Yep. I thought it would be.
.
Alice
I’m hosting Thanksgiving this year, as I have for the last half-dozen. Usually I recruit my mother and sister to help make the meal, but due to health problems it doesn’t look like it this time. Which means it’s up to me and the kids.
When faced with a daunting task – make a list.
First on the list is a trip to the grocery store. I almost forgot I had to get the turkey with enough time for it to thaw so I could pull out such wonderful things as all the internal organs they put in the little paper bag then stuff up the bird’s back side. Yeah, ‘eww’ is right.
My local Super 1 supermarket has a great sale. If you buy $25 worth of food, and my T-day list requires more than that, you can get the turkey for 24 cents a pound. My turkey cost me $3.50.
I’m seriously thinking of going back tomorrow to get one for the freezer. Now if only I hadn’t unplugged the darn thing.
Alice
You may have noticed that some of my blogs are labeled “Suzy Homemaker”. There is a reason for that.
Back when I was in Jr. High and High school everyone was required to attend either Home Ec classes or Shop. The thing is the women’s movement had gotten far enough along that the schools could no longer tell you which one to take, based on gender, but everyone expected girls to do Home Ec and boys to do Shop.
One of my best friends – I had two – and I were talking about how unfair it was to be expected to take Home Ec. I may have been wearing tie-die, but we could both cook and sew, and keep house with the best of them. Only we didn’t do it because we expected to become good little home makers of the future. We did it because it had to get done.
I’ve been cooking since I was 7, turning out regular meals by myself since I was 9. To me it was not a joy. It was a chore. If I sew, it’s mostly because that’s the cheapest way of acquiring something to wear. I’ve been at it since I was 7, with minimal help by the time I was 10.
When we found out we’d have to do in school the exact same things we were doing at home, neither of us was thrilled. As my friend said, “I don’t care what they say. I am never going to be Suzy Homemaker!”
So we took Shop.
Though I haven’t done any of it in a gazzillion years I know how to bend metal, rivet, solder, follow blue prints, use a scroll saw and a drill press, and can hammer a nail straight. I can also create a cake recipe by modifying an existing recipe until I get what I’m after, make a pattern off of an article of clothing, and not turn my husband’s underwear pink in the laundry. Not that I won’t indulge that past time now and then out of spite.
Now and then I will have someone drop by the house who is amazed that I bake my own bread, or whip out a batch of cookies simply because I feel like it, and frequently hear jealous comments about making my kid’s costumes and clothes. Despite my intentions, I became Suzy Homemaker. It amazes people who know me for supporting garage bands, organizing charity events, or avid camping to learn that I am a Suzy Homemaker. But there it is. And now and then I really like it.
And that friend? She’s an electric engineer.
Alice
Alice's Restaurant 