Overbooked and Underpaid: Notes from a Yes-aholic

Today's Inspiration: The Most Obnoxious Man In The World

 

 

Today's headline may seem like an oxymoron. And it probably is.

 

In keeping with my recent theme of recommending things to rent - either from Netflix or your media outlet of choice - my suggestion for the  week is:

 

Fawlty Towers.

This short lived BBC series (only 12 episodes) never fails to make me laugh. Which should tell you something horrible about me because Basil Fawlty as written and portrayed by the legendary John Cleese is one of the most obnoxious characters to ever grace the small screen.

This pompous, bullying hotel manager/owner makes Steve Carell's character on the office look like a choirboy.

So why am I recommending it under inspirations? 

Because there is something enormously satisfying in watching someone this obnoxious get his deserved comeuppance; as Basil eventually does in every episode. More perfectly - he always does all the damage to himself. And, as violent as these 12 shows are (Fawlty rarely misses a chance to take a swipe at his waiter Manuel), they truly do seem to fall into that category of cartoon violence ala Tweety and Sylvester.

As they say in the disclaimers, "If you have delicate sensibilities or are easily offended" you will want to skip Fawlty Towers. But if you're one of the legion of Python fans that can quote every line from the Holy Grail, you should rent these today.

Overbooked Cook: Bruschetta

 

(First posted Summer 2011)

Tis the season to harvest Tomatoes and Basil. Which means 'tis the season to make Bruschetta.

This is the recipe I've come up with over the years after some tinkering.

 

Knock Out Bruschetta

Ingredients:

2 good sized garden tomatoes like beefsteak or 4 smallish "on the vine" grocery store tomatoes or one pint grape or cherry tomatoes or 6 roma tomatoes, chopped into small pieces.

2-3 tbsp balsamic vinegar (the older, the better)

2 tbsp olive oil

1 tbsp honey

6-10 good sized leaves of fresh basil, chopped

coarse salt

freshly ground pepper

2-3 cloves garlic, pressed

1 small ball fresh mozzarella, diced into fairly small pieces

or

2 oz fresh parmigiano or asiago cheese julienned

 

Put everything except the tomatoes and cheese into a medium sized bowl and mix together thoroughly making sure the honey dissolves completely.

Cut the tomatoes into small pieces on a cutting board (not in a food processor) and try to drain off as much of the extra juice as you can before adding to the oil and vinegar mixture.

Add the cheese and mix all together.

Let sit for about 15 minutes before serving so that the cheese and tomatoes get sort of marinated. 

Overbooked version: serve with Breton Crackers

Full gourmet version: Using the best baguette you can find, cut it into diagonal slices. Then rub each slice with a clove of garlic (one clove should do several slices), brush lightly with olive oil and broil until lightly browned. 

Note: Eating Bruschetta can be a very messy business so I try to keep the bread pieces small enough for 2 bites. The same for serving on crackers - the less fragile the cracker and the fewer bites it takes to finish, the better.

Extra note: As the quantity and type of tomato vary, so will the exact measurements of the oil and vinegar mixture. There should be enough of it to coat every bit of cheese and tomato, and enough vinegar and garlic that you can taste the bite.

The Incredible Transforming Sandwich

It was summer.

And, as usual, it was an overbooked summer.

Which meant a softball schedule, a baseball schedule, a drama schedule, and our usual overbooked work schedules.

I thought we were handling everything pretty well. We got everyone where they needed to be when they needed to be there, between the two of us a parent was at every game, and I didn't forget to show up for any gigs.

Yep, the summer was going well.

Then the smell started.

It was subtle at first. We weren't even sure where it was coming from. It might have been the baseball cleats. Or the compost pile in the backyard.

But, by day three we settled on the minivan. It was definitely coming from the minivan.

There was a chance it was coming from the air ducts. Which was a problem because it would mean that something had died somewhere inside the engine or other nasty hidden car places. Which would mean paying someone expensive to find it and fix it.

We resisted taking the van to the dealership. We drove with the windows open. We bought air fresheners. And we looked and looked and looked to track this odor down.

As the noxiousness grew ever stronger rather than weaker, our suspicions that something had died intensified.

We were right. Something had died. But it wasn't an animal.

As I approached the baseball diamond one evening my husband asked me, "What night was it that we bought Alex that sub sandwich?"

"Oh man, that was like, two weeks ago. Maybe even three. Why do you ask?"

In answer, he led me over to a nearby garbage can. The smell hit me from easily 20 feet away.

And there, in a plastic bag, was the worst smelling glob of liquid I think I've ever encountered.

Which, apparently, is what a half eaten Italian sub sandwich turns into after two or three weeks in the door pocket of a hot van in the summertime.

It was like a Magic Schoolbus episode.

No one went near the garbage can for the rest of the night. 

I pity the poor garbage men that eventually had to deal with the results of our overbooked, "we'll just grab something quick to eat as we go to drama practice and then not have enough time to finish it so we can stuff it out of sight someplace later and ruin an expensive minivan" lifestyle.

It took two months for the smell to fully leave the van.

And I swear on hot days I can still smell the ghost of that sandwich.

The ghost of overbooked summers past.

Goodwill and St. Vincent de Paul - Underpaid Mecca

 

     

 
 
I started shopping at thrift stores when my first two kids were about 1 and 4.

 

I don't know about your children. Maybe you have demure little tykes that sit quietly. They don't crawl around on their hands and knees, don't jump in puddles, don't spill grape juice down their fronts or throw spaghetti at each other or have mud fights. Goodie for you.

My first two children were a couple of very active boys and it became crystal clear that they had no invested interest in keeping their garments free of stains or holes. And, being underpaid as I am, my clothing budget has always been about, well, the word shoestring comes to mind.

(I'm always stunned at those magazine articles - you know the ones - about "how one family spends their money" and they list their monthly clothing budget at $600.00. What are they wearing? Platinum? I'm lucky if I can spend $1000.00 a year. And that's for 5 of us.)

Anyway, I figured if my kids were going to view their clothing as disposable, then I needed to view it that way too. And there was no way on earth I could do that for $20-$40 a pop for jeans and tee shirts.

Enter thrift stores.

Read the rest of this story....

Pic of the Week - The Next Generation Of Farming

Sorry today's post is so late! This is from our trip to Marceline Mo. The driver is 4th generation farmer Willie Ewigman and the little guy destined to be generation 5 is his son.

The Next Generation of Farming 

click on image to enlarge

Today's Inspiration - Inflatable Rafts

Thanks to TV channels that specialize in old shows from the 60's and 70's and also the release of most of these old shows onto DVD's, I can now recommend to you some golden comedy for inspiration. 

This week I'd like to focus on the inflatable raft and it's role in some of the funniest TV ever made. If you need a good laugh, rent the following.

M*A*S*H episode: "Dear Peggy" in which Klinger tries to escape in an inflatable raft.

WKRP episode: "Who is Gordon Sims?" in which Mr. Carlson has his own problems with an inflatable in his office.

Dick Van Dyke Show episode: "The Curious Thing About Women" in which Laura's insatiable curiosity leads to disaster involving, of course, an inflatable raft.

I guarantee you'll be in a better mood after you watch any one of these!

The Overbooked Cook: Rafaele's Meatballs

I have spoken before of my dear friend and cousin Rafaele who lost her fight with breast cancer two years ago. And I have mentioned how important I think it is to make time to cook together and share recipes. Perhaps sharing recipes is one of the ways we achieve immortality. A little slice of our lives gets passed along to others and enjoyed - possibly in perpetuity.

And so I offer to you a little bit of Rafaele that I get to carry with me - it won't matter where I live or what my circumstances are - I'll always have the memory of the time we lived together in college and she taught me how to make her German meatballs. I actually give her a little nod in my mind every time I make them or eat them.

Enjoy!

 

German Meatballs

 

 1 lb Ground Beef

1 egg

1 potato, peeled

3/4 cup rolled oats

1 medium onion, diced

2 tbsp paprika

1 tbsp oregano

1 & 1/2 tsp salt

1/2 tsp pepper

2 cloves garlic, crushed (or 1 tsp garlic powder)

 

Before I begin, I need to put up a disclaimer. When I make these meatballs, I never actually measure the spices. I just eyeball them. Through long years of experience, I have learned how much salt, pepper, garlic and paprika my family likes in their meatballs. So I have given you my best guess at amounts and, if something seems to be too much for you - like, say, the paprika - then cut the amount down the first time and then experiment as you go. To be fair, Rafaele never measured anything either and so experimenting is, apparently, part of the recipe! 

 

Preheat your oven to 350 and line a baking sheet with foil.

In a large bowl, put the meat and the egg, the onion and the oats and smoosh it all together with your hands - doing your best to distribute the oats evenly. Next add all the spices at once and, again, smoosh together and distribute them evenly. Now take out a course grater and grate the potato into the mixture. Again work the potato around until it seems well distributed.

Form the mixture into meatballs of desired size - I like to make them about 2 inches in diameter - and place them onto the baking sheet.

Bake for about 16-20 minutes or until done in the center. Baking time will vary with the diameter of the meatball so keep an eye on them the first time you make them. They should be thoroughly cooked but not crunchy.

 

Serve alone with mashed potatoes and gravy or in spaghetti sauce with pasta. One thing about these meatballs - they are good served cold and are even better the second day so they make great lunch food.

Overbooked tip: make a triple batch and freeze the rest for the next time you need a 16 minute dinner. Some cooked pasta and sauce from a jar and dinner will still taste homemade if you use these meatballs.

Overbooked Cook: Banana Bread With - You Guessed It - Peaches!

 

 

 

So, in looking for recipes for things to do with peaches - many of which are now rotting because I just could not deal with them all - I came up with one of my own. The good news is that it is delicious. The bad news is that you can't put an entire bushel of peaches in each loaf. Here goes:

 

 

Banana Bread with Peaches.

Ingredients:

2 cups flour

1 tsp baking powder

1/2 tsp baking soda

1/2 tsp salt

2/3 cup white sugar

1/3 cup shortening or butter

2 eggs

3 tbsp buttermilk or yogurt

1 mashed banana

2/3 cup diced peaches

 

Preheat oven to 350.

Prepare a loaf or bundt pan by rubbing it with shortening or butter and then dusting it with sugar (not flour!)

Set aside. 

In a medium sized mixing bowl blend together the sugar and shortening. Once thoroughly combined, add the eggs and the yogurt. Then, again after thoroughly combined, add the fruit.

In a separate bowl sift together the flour, salt, soda, and baking powder.

Gradually add this to the banana mixture.

Mix until combined - do not overmix. The batter should be thick and sticky.

Spoon into prepared pan (it will be too thick to pour) and bake for 45 minutes to an hour, depending on the type of pan and your oven. I always check it at about 40 minutes.

Loaf is done when the top is golden brown and springs back in the center.

Extra touch: I like to sprinkle raw sugar over the top before baking - it gives a nice crunch. (Raw sugar, if you're not familiar with it,  has much larger crystals than refined sugar and is light brown in color.)

How To Throw Your Back Out

We interrupt today's scheduled organizing tips to bring you this public service announcement:

 

How to throw your back out; in 8 easy steps:

Step 1) put on dress with zipper in the back

Step 2) forget that dress also has hook and eye at the top of it

Step 3) put on fishnetty type pullover and catch it on said hook

Step 4) wriggle around your upstairs trying to get the hook out of the pullover desperately wishing there was someone else in the house to help you.

Step 5) swear and twist around trying to get the whole mess off so you can deal with it later.

Step 6) swear some more as you feel your back go out.

Step 7) while writhing in pain, throw on a different, easier to get on, outfit.

Step 8) blog about it, thus making yourself late to teach your class.

A Dog's Life

 

Do you have a companion animal?

Maybe a dog, maybe a cat, maybe a mongoose?

Well, OK, probably not a mongoose.

But chances are pretty good that you own a dog (39% of American households own at least one dog) or a cat (33%).

And, if you own a dog or a cat, chances are that you consider that animal a member of the family.

This can be more challenging with some animals than others. I've already mentioned our crazy Border Collie/Lab. She of the destroyed vinyl floor, the decimated cove base, the chewed arm of my favorite oak chair, the 52 stolen chocolate truffles. (Supposedly chocolate is toxic to dogs - this apparently does not apply to the walking garbage repository that is the Labrador stomach.)

The Border Collie/Lab is living proof that cute and fluffy counts in this world. I can guarantee that a dog with less "hug appeal" would have gotten promptly transferred to another unit for even five of the infractions she's perpetrated. But she's incredible with the kids and a phenomenal tent camper and she's pretty entrenched in our hearts.

And then there's the Terrier. For the last five or six years his official name has been "Lucky you smell."

This would be due to his head full of rotten teeth. Teeth that we didn't dare fix because there was a good chance we wouldn't survive the general anesthetic needed for doggie dentistry.

Lucky came to us 15 years ago when our second child was barely walking. We had been dogless for about a year after a traumatic episode with our previous dog, a Sharpei that developed a serious aggression and biting problem. (I loved that dog but, if I had known then what I learned later, I would never have gotten a Sharpei as a family pet. They are closely related to Chows and tend to have the same issues with children.)

When we finally felt we were ready for another dog, we went looking for a Rat Terrier. John had grown up with one that he had adored and so we found one in the classifieds and went to check him out. After our experience with the Sharpei, the primary thing we were looking for was agreeability and bonding with the kids. Which he passed with flying colors.

We were to be his third owners and were never exactly sure how old he was when he came to us. The vet's best guess was 1 to 1  & 1/2.

The story was that the people selling him had discovered their children were allergic to him. Within a month, we were pretty sure that had been a front and that the real truth was that they couldn't handle his marking his territory all over the house, running away every chance he got, and his incessant barking.

By the time we discovered these endearing traits, it was too late. He was officially one of us.

After about a year of dealing with the peeing and the fleeing, we scraped together the money to get him fixed. This took care of the first two problems pretty well - although, every once in a while he would slip into old habits - but we could never cure him of the barking. John used to say Lucky barked at the passing time.

I once read part of a book by the neurologist Oliver Sachs called "The Man Who Mistook His Wife For A Hat". With a title like that, you might think it was a funny book, but it turned out to be a serious look at various medical conditions including one called "visual agnosia". Which turns out to be an affliction where the affected person cannot recognize faces.

As soon as I read about it, I turned to John and asked, "I wonder if a dog could have that? Maybe that would explain Lucky."

Because, I kid you not, not only did this dog bark at my students - some of whom came to me weekly for over ten years - every single time he saw them, he would often bark at them again if they simply moved from one room to the next. He would bark at us when we arrived home. It was as though, until he sniffed us or heard our voices,  he had no clue who we were. And it's not that he couldn't see - he could sight and run down a squirrel from 200 yards.

So let's recap. He was stinky, he had an overdeveloped bark instinct, and he occasionally peed in my house (which is why I never spend more than $100 on a rug).

But he was the sweetest dog I have every owned. No biting issues. Loved to be with us and slept with the kids. Perfect at sitting and staying. He was particularly good at walking on a leash - something which I failed to appreciate until I spent 5 years trying to get the Border Collie not to drag me down the street.

And he was a member of the family.

Which is why, when he began failing in June of 09 we dealt with the extra smelliness and the extra barking and the fact that he now had trouble walking and had to be carried practically everywhere. And we bought him special arthritis dog food at $28 a 5 pound bag. And we gave him pain pills wrapped in cheese. And the food and the pills helped for a while. Until they didn't.

And because he could not be described as a clever dog, it was difficult to tell if his whining or howling was because he was in pain or had forgotten we were in the room.

I have owned 4 dogs and 2 cats since I became an adult and have had to have 2 dogs and a cat put to sleep. And it never gets any easier. You ask yourself over and over "Is it time? Is he suffering? Might he magically get better?" And you can never come up with the right answer. And you torment yourself with the knowledge that, once you make that move, there's no going back. Euthanasia is the definition of final.

I am getting choked up even writing about it. Because he was such a sweet little dog and we so hated to do it.

But it was time. The pain pills were less and less effective, he ate and drank less and less, his muscles atrophied from lack of use and he weighed a fraction of what he was at his healthiest. And, contrary to the way it usually goes, it was actually the kids urging us on. They could see his suffering and could hardly bear it.

And, most of all, I didn't want to come home from work to find that he had died here in the house alone, confused and afraid. Or worse, in my arms drowning in his own fluids with pneumonia at the animal ER the way my Boston Terrier had.

So I know we did the right thing.

But we can't take it back. And I miss him.

And I probably always will.

 

Goodbye Lucky. You were a great dog.