Category: Food and Drink

The Era of Milk and Laundry

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I’ve been noticing lately, a change in our quantity and inventory.  A profound difference in quantities.  Normal items like milk, ground beef, laundry detergent, dryer sheets.

I remember a time when we went to the grocery store, to the dairy section, and put 2 GALLONS of milk into the cart.  No question.  We often wondered if we should just get 3 gallons so we didn’t have to come back midweek.  In our family’s heyday (not HayDay the tremendous phone game that I love to play – find that game in your app store) we would drink the crud out of milk.  2%.  Not whole, not skim.  Our kids would rush in from whatever middle or high school activity they just finished, grab the milk, and just glug.  Milk with dinner, milk before dinner, milk with cookies after dinner.  Angie and I would stand and marvel at their capacity.

Now that all three kids aren’t kids anymore, and are out of the house on their own, we find ourselves visiting the dairy section only now and then.  As a matter of fact, Ang drinks fat free 1/2 and 1/2 (fat-free half and half?  I’m not sure how to type that), and I mostly use whole milk for a cappuccino once or twice a week at home.  I USED to buy whole milk in (and here is my point about quantity) ONE QUART bottles until I had to pour over half down the drain because it spoiled in the three weeks it took me to drink it.  Now I buy ONE PINT.  And I hope that I use it before it goes bad.  Angie buys ONE PINT of “fat-free half and half” that lasts a week of morning coffee.

I know.  It’s not earth-shattering climate change data.  It’s not nearly the drastically different political change we’ve recently been experiencing.

Still.  Quantities.

Examine the change in quantities of a thing, and you can often demarcate a new era.  A new epoch.  A different time.  A season.  Of course, “for everything there is a season; there is nothing new under the sun”.

And, always, “Sunrise, Sunset”.

I trust there are still families buying milk in two-gallon trips to last them just a few days.  I’m sure the dairy industry has a steady supply of kids for whom “milk does a body good”.  I merely note that our family is now no longer leading the milk quantity consumption chart.

The other thing I am always amazed at is how little LAUNDRY we have to do.  We each do our own.  That way, we have clean what we want and when we want it.  “What do we want?? Clean Laundry!  When do we want it?? Uh, NOW, I guess!”

It used to be that, if we wanted to run a load or several of laundry, we’d have to get in line.  There was always an assembly line in front of the washer, the toilet next to it, the sink next to that, and sometimes (when we all had stuff to wash) out the door of the combo bathroom/laundry room.  5 people with either sports clothes or workout clothes plus work or school clothes – holy cow.  Go pee somewhere else cuz the door won’t shut until some more laundry is done.  Now, listen, when the kids were tiny, Ang usually ran the laundry.  But as we all grew, we each tried to do our own and take some responsibility.  It never fell to “only Mom” to get all that washing done.  We (mostly Angie) tried to get the kids to do their own, take charge, etc.  So when I say piles of laundry marching out into the hall, no one takes the blame.  It is simply a reality of QUANTITY.

Which brings me back to my point.  I can do a load of laundry literally whenever I feel like doing it.  I have two shirts I just bought that I want to wash before I wear them (and doesn’t EVERYone have to wash new clothes before you wear them??) and I may just throw them in here in a minute.  No waiting.  Plenty of laundry detergent.  Plenty of dryer sheets, too, for that matter.

It’s this kind of thing that marks the changing of the family season, even more than writing a new address for the kids in the address book (or typing a new address in their “contact”, as it were).

I love when the kids are home and I need to buy THREE pounds of ground beef for TMR (taco meat and rice).  TMR is just boring with one pound.  Oh, sure, a guy still makes it – it is just more fun when there a whole pile of people at the table (or in front of the TV watching “Big Business” or “Dumb and Dumber” for the millionth time) to eat it.

May I simply wish, then, that you enjoy the quantities that your season calls for.  Soon enough, those will change, and leave you wishing for more.

Oysters, Potatoes, and Candles

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I find myself remembering, with great fondness, Mom and Dad’s tradition of potato soup and oyster stew on Christmas Eve.  We did this as early as I can remember; always after we got back from church.

The Christmas Eve service is the one where you can play with fire, even if you are a little kid.  Because you ‘Pass the Peace of Christ’, you see.  Each person gets a candle upon entering the sanctuary, which, at the end of the service, you tip towards the lighted candle to light your own wick.  It is very important NOT to tip the LIGHTED candle.  The person with the lighted candle holds the flame straight up, and the ‘new candle’ tips toward the flame.  I loved this candle business because this was before the days of Boy Scouts where we were SUPPOSED to (reSPONSibly) play with fire.  The wax that managed to drip onto my fingers, through the paper candle holder, was merely a bonus to peel off and inspect for fingerprints.

With the heady responsibility of fire stewardship successfully carried out for another year, we returned to our warm home with the promise of two different kinds of soup.   Oyster crackers, all we could eat, made an appearance with Christmas Eve soup, too.  Take a moment and remember dropping those round crackers into soup; then slowly dunking them for a swim.  Although a simple meal, I now realize that potato soup takes quite a bit of work.  Fresh potatoes, peeled and cut into pieces, are not instantly ready.

Oyster stew, even with canned oysters, also takes a lot of preparation.  I dearly hope that I said ‘thank you’ to my mom for always having this traditional meal ready soon after our return from church.  I have only eaten oyster stew on Christmas Eve at my parent’s house in the middle of Nebraska.  I truly love the memory of this meal.  I imagine it is made other places in the world, but I have not tried it.

Imagine for a moment, having the luxury of choice.  Which pot will you fill your bowl with first?

Also, we got to open ONE present on Christmas Eve.  Only one – so the torment of choice dominated my very being, WHICH ONE FOR NOW??? What if I missed the best one?  Or more dire, what if I OPENED the best one on Christmas Eve – what would I do in the morning with no ‘good’ presents left??  Of course, it never came to that.  And we never got “bad” presents.  My over-active imagination at work, I guess.  I still have a ‘delayed gratification’ mentality about many things, gift-opening specifically.  If there was a way to NEVER open a gift, but still enjoy the feeling of having it to open, I would bottle that and sell it.

Gifts, of course, are for giving and opening, not for hoarding.

I do hope, this Eve, that you have a gift.  I hope you have a warm home to share.  I hope you have food to share.  I hope that your traditions are still alive, and that you have loved ones to whom you can pass these traditions.  Now that I am older, I realize how vital the message of Christmas Eve is; Jesus, on His way to save us from ourselves.

I wish blessings on you, your family, your tribe, and your efforts to bring light, peace, life, and love to this world.

And Not a Drop to Drink

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Poor little birds have no water to drink.  I’ve set out a heated base with a water dish on it.  Hopefully, this will allow our wild friends a sip of water now and then, so they can continue their rowdy lives in west Wichita.

From the comfort of my writing desk, in the swivel chair, I notice that the ‘water feature’ in our back yard has completely frozen.  The pump has stopped its faithful pumping, which has stopped the gentle trickle from pool one to pool two to the main pond.

I am always pleased to see the winter birds return to the back yard haven we’ve built; dark-eyes juncos, black-capped chickadees, cardinals, blue jays, and the cedar wax wings.  I haven’t put food out for years.  After all, I don’t want a bunch of moochers on my hands.  Plus bird seed tends to draw the ‘junk birds’, too.  Grackles and starlings show up in flocks; they have little regard for conscientious potty procedures.  Poop somewhere else, I say.

Not a world changer.  Not my job today.

Today, my job is to set out water for the thirsty.

Drink The Rain and Thank The Clouds?

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Water Deep recorded a song, “I Will Not Forget You”.  It starts out with “Many men will drink the rain and turn to face the clouds; many men will hear you speak, but they will never turn around.”

How sad the truth.  How accurate the phrase.

What can we do to help our friends realize that it is God’s voice that caused them to turn around?  Even though God formed the earth to make rain and weather (which makes doubters use science as an explanation), His mercy still falls like a drink of water to a parched throat. 

On a summer’s day, after the sun, wind, and dust of the Great Plains, my throat craves!  I lust after a huge glass of dark, freshly brewed iced tea.  I want to drink it until my front teeth ache, my stomach pooches, and there is still another gut-busting draught left in the glass.

THAT is where God wants me.  Thank God for – not the tea, it’s just the metaphor – the satisfaction to my itch, my unrest, YOUR sense of dissatisaction, unease, that “what am I doing with my life?” feeling.

God sends the rain on the just and the unjust; true.  The difference is this:  His faithful send prayers of thanks to him for mercy.  The unjust merely look for a way to gain from God’s blessing.

Welcome To Subway

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But you could tell she was required to say it when a customer entered the store.

I’ve gotta say, maybe this idea, to say “Welcome To Subway” sounded great in the Dunder-Mifflin Corporate Office.  I just think they should have taken the idea on the road and asked a few employees to ‘try it out’ in the real world before they made it corporate policy.

I so wished I could have hopped the counter (and the attached sneeze guard) and helped our ‘sandwich artist’ finish our stuff (Seriously, PUT SOME JALAPENOS ON THERE!!!).  But, at the very least, it would have been cool to get her to have a happier day. 

Maybe she was just focused.

Saturday morning

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Three things, all for filing under the Life is both hilarious and tragic, almost at the same time.  Many times we have had to stop doing the ‘life-changing stuff’ (My dad has concer, for instance) to take care of the mundane (I need lunch money, for instance).  The cool part of this is that we CAN shift gears back and forth – that is what makes life so fascinating!

The first thing – hilarious.  The Wichita Eagle (11/15/08, page 6A) had a blurb from Hormel about how popular Spam is now that economic times are tougher.  Apparently Spam is a great buy, when money is tight.  Spam is vacuum-sealed in a can and does not require refrigeration, and can last for many years.  Because of those qualities, Here is what Hormel said, “it’s like meat with a pause button.” 

I never knew you could PAUSE MEAT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Second – tragic.  Also from the Eagle (11/15/08 news in brief) 3 high school students drowned in Illinois when they snuck out at night to take paddle boats out on the lake.  The camp management had already removed the floor plugs to winterize the boats.  They were on the last day of an 8 day leadership camping retreat.

I think about how quickly the normal can turn tragic for all of us, but especially us parents.  All the stuff our kids go and do and come home safely from, but that the potential for disaster is always there.  Talk about releasing our worries to God!

Lastly,  Krispy Kreme with my daughter this morning.  What a great day!  She ordered a plain, a chocolate glazed, and a ‘fall’ sprinkles.  Since I was there ANYWAY, I got a bold coffee (she made a fresh pot, after I whined that it wasn’t hot enough) and, uh, well, uh, ok TWO really tiny donuts – sour cream and pumpkin spice.  If it helps any, I didn’t really enjoy the sour cream one.

Coffee

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I realized, while walking my daughter to the bus stop, that I should talk as little as possible in the morning until after I’ve finished my first mug of coffee.  Seriously, I don’t make very intelligble sentences.  It is a feeling like, ‘wow, I used to be able to speak this language, but I’ve forgotten it all overnight’.  That first mug, while brewing is still happening – black gold.  That’s all there is to it.  Can I get an ‘amen’?