What do you make of this?

We think we have an idea. (How's that for certainty?)

But we're not sure.

A Degree in Den Management

Mr. Big Food and I used to call our room the "Master Suite" because that's what it was-- a master bedroom sufficiently large enough to accommodate typical bedroom furniture plus my desk that looks out on the shooting range, and a couple of other odds and ends pieces of furniture including the couch and chair my mom & dad bought some time around the time I was born. The couch is in dreadful shape, but I cleaned it up as best I could. 

UPDATED. So it has something to so with my phone

and the latest security updates to my computer.

It's after 8-- well after our bedtime-- and I've been trying to figure out why I couldn't log on to blogger-- i.e., access my blog-- for hours. And it finally occurred to me that I should try to log on using the mi-fi, instead of my phone. 

Here I am. 

My uneducated guess is that the security update I downloaded doesn't like something. 

Lord. 

In the future, I will write something, mimeograph it, and mail it to y'all. Which assumes there will be a mail service.

CRITICAL THINKING!

UPDATE: It was my phone. And for quite a while I had the geniuses thinking it was Apple's fault that the update didn't like my phone. But in the end, and after quoting Sherlock Holmes to the genius (who knew the quote), it was what I thought was improbable, not what he thought was improbable. I hate to be wrong but I'd rather be connected than right.

For "newbies"

Bob Owens at PJMedia is starting a series, "So you want to own a gun: Advise for the first-timer." The first installment begins

For those of us who grow up in “gun cultures” where firearms are merely another tool and fact of life, getting your first gun may consist of getting a pint-sized .22-caliber single shot rifle almost as long as you are tall when you are a child. It is a simple and expected rite of passage that is a mark of growing expectations, trust, and new-found maturity.

Bob goes on to give advise to those who didn't come to know guns this way.

"There are no French peasants."

As you may have guessed from the photo-post without captions post, after a productive day of farm work, we sat down to a French provincial supper. French bread. Olive oil infused with freshly picked rosemary. 

It's not French but you work with what you have.

Wine. French Peasant Soup. Fruit and cheese. Cognac.

I thought the tablecloth was a nice touch.

We listened to some music and chatted with a friend (who reminded us that there are no French peasants). 

The soup is the second entry in The Spring/Summer Soup Contest. After it's assembled, it bakes! There will be a separate post.

A photo-post without captions

Good night.

Yesterday's mail

brought the sweet potato slips!

I've talked about this before but I'll recap here. The folks at one of my favorite seed companies, New Hope Seed Company just north of Memphis, work with a local sweet potato farmer to make slips available to New Hope customers. The slips are shipped, via USPS, to you when it's time to plant them in your area. Twelve slips cost $16.95. Plants are also available in quantities of 25, 50, 100, 500, and 1000 (for $174.50). 

Sweet potatoes are indestructible. These plants are sitting on the kitchen windowsill. I will get them in the ground this weekend, but if for some reason I weren't able, they would last for weeks just sitting here in an inch of water. Sure, some might not make it, but do you have any idea how many sweet potatoes 12 sweet potato slips will yield? 

It's been a while

since I posted photos of the dogs.

Here you are--

Rocky has grown board* with the raft.

The raft has a long history on the pond. Rocky drug it up to shore and had fun with it for a while, but now it's old news.

Missy found something.

My guess is a meadowlark nest.

I have video, but the photo substitutes well.


* Ha ha.

I hope she doesn't mind,

but the subject of this post is my response to my friend's comment on this post. My friend says,

Two thumbs up. I don't care who does what, but I certainly do not like being disparaged for what I have chosen to do. You tell 'em, M!!

And so I will talk a lot about my friend. She blogs about homemaking things. She takes lots of how-to pictures of what she bakes and cooks. She refers to a kid-- and, gasp!-- a husband, so be prepared.

~~

The Creeds, &c.

If it were not such a busy day, I'd drag out a bunch of crappy old stuff in response to the stay-at-home Mom dust up, but it's a busy day for this here homemaker. And so I've gone to the archives. (Excuse the differences in formatting. I'm just copy/pasting straight from old posts.)

The Meal Planner's Creed from The Modern Family Cookbook by Meta Given 

(J. G. Ferguson Publishing Company, Chicago. 1958. p2)

The Meal Planner's Creed

The health of my family is in my care, therefore--
I will spare no effort in planning the right kinds of food in the right amounts.

Spending the food dollar for maximum value is my job, therefore--
I will choose from variously priced foods to save money without sacrificing health.

My family's enjoyment of food is my responsibility, therefore--
I will increase their pleasure by planning for variety, for flavorful dishes, for attractive color, for appetizing combinations.

My family's health, security, and pleasure depend on my skill in planning meals, therefore--
I will treat my job with the respect that is due it.

~~ 

Quick thoughts-- and links to longer thoughts-- on food shopping, mending, washday and more crappy old stuff below the fold.

Doggie Adolescence

The standard way to understand how old your dog is in people years is 1=7. Thus, a seventeen and one-half year old dog is 17.5 X 7 = 122.5 years old in people years. (Yes, Suzy is still alive as I write.) This ignores a lot of developmental biology (and breed variation). A better-- although not perfect-- way is to use a formula that equates a dog's first year with a human's first 15. Thereafter, each dog year equals six human years. (On this model, Suzy is 15 + (16.5 x 6) = only 114.) 

In my humble opinion, given my limited understanding of mammalian growth patterns, the first year of 1=15 needs to be parsed out a bit more, but... .

Missy is now about seven & one half months old. Again, I am opposed to doing this, but on the 1=15  model, Missy is, roughly speaking, a little over nine years old. 

Behaviorally, I'd put her at an Advanced 13, maybe 14. 

Remember when everyone was asking me why I named her "Missy?" 

I answered, 

"Miss Manners," "Miss M., who loves manners."

Accuweather Revised

Last evening I posted about the chance of frost tonight.

Here are the predictions as of a few minutes ago, (with yesterday's forecast for tonight in parentheses) :

Wunderground--------- 37 (37)

Accuweather------------ 41 (51 LOL!)

The Weather Channel-- 39 (39)

NOAA-------------------- 37 (40)

I note that there is no hazardous weather alert form NOAA. Despite my issues with NOAA, the NOAA folk in Jackson do a good (albeit sometimes a bit hyperbolic) job of alerting people to weather that affects agriculture and home gardeners. I'm not expecting a frost-- at least not where I have things planted.

Speech for free

Background: FIRE is the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education. From its Mission Statement:

FIRE's core mission is to protect the unprotected and to educate the public and communities of concerned Americans about the threats to these rights on our campuses and about the means to preserve them.

Several weeks ago FIRE released its list of The 12 Worst Colleges for Free Speech. The full article is at the link, but just for fun, watch this two minute video (below the fold) all the way to the end to learn which college is the worst for free speech. 

The Devil at work / 8%

In Mississippi news

Governor Bryant has signed into law SB 2878 "which raises the alcohol by-weight limit in beer from 5 percent to 8 percent."

[Cartoon by Marshall Ramsey, Mississippi's cartoonist and host of The Marshall Ramsey Show on Supertalk Mississippi Radio.]

The bill will allow more craft beer to be sold in Mississippi. That's the good news. The bad news is that it won't matter for residents of 36 (of 82 total) counties in the state. Those 36 are dry. And when I say dry, I mean desert dry-- 

Who do you trust? / Really? You Planted Tomatoes Already?

Word on the street road is that we may have a light frost tomorrow night. 

In order... .

Wunderground.

Accuweather.

The Weather Channel.

And now the Authority... .

NOAA.

To recap: Tomorrow night is forecast to be-- in degrees F-- 37, 51, 39, 40. 

I'm tempted to laugh out loud at Accuweather because it's the outlier. But it's a prediction. We shall see what happens. 

On a related note, I've brought the tomatoes and peppers out. 

Actions Have Consequences

Consequences.

Origin (from Dictionary dot com):

1350–1400; Middle English  (noun) < Latin consequent-  (stem of consequēns,  present participle of consequī  to follow closely). See con-, sequent

Consequent: 

From Dictionary dot com's entrant on "consequent"

[Yes, yes. It is my habit to check old dictionary entries, but it's late. I took a zillion years of Latin and these definitions cohere nicely with my definition of "consequence."]

Actions have consequences.

Right Left: rawhide; Left Right: artsy thing on the mantle.

So when I told Daughter C. that I'd given Rocky a piece of raw hide, and that he'd gently growled at me when I tried to take it away ... . And he did the same thing when she tried to take it away from him as we were eating supper and watching t.v.  ...

There's your rawhide. Up on the mantle.

Fantastik!

Image from http://www.scjohnson.com/en/products/brands/cleaning/fantastik.aspx

DIRECTIONS FOR USE: It is a violation of Federal law to use this product in a manner inconsistent with its labeling.
GENERAL HOUSEHOLD CLEANING: Spray product onto soiled surface and wipe with a dry paper towel of lint-free cloth. No scrubbing or rinsing necessary.

If you spray your kitchen table and counters as one of the final steps in cleaning your kitchen, and you use your wet dish rag to wipe them off, you have violated Federal law.

Likewise, if you hold you can of Scrubbing Bubble [insert some trademark thing here] less than 6" or  more than 8" away from your tub surface, you have violated Federal law.

Likewise, if you sprinkle fire ant bail on ant hills, and do not water it in, you have violated Federal law. 

Likewise, if you do not store your Sevin dust [insert TM thing] in a locked area, you have violated Federal law.

I could go on and on-- the Federal Government certainly has. But that's okay-- it's for your own good, just like laws requiring you to put your bike helmets on and buckle up before you pick up that screwdriver. Because, you know, no one ever survived to reproductive age before Nanny took control.

Security

Paco, who blogs from western North Carolina (I believe) revives an old Southern Favorite:

THE BEST SOUTHERN HOME SECURITY SYSTEM

1. Go to Goodwill and buy a pair of size 14-16 men's work boots.

2. Place them on your front porch, along with a copy of Guns & Ammo Magazine.

3. Put four giant dog dishes next to the boots and magazines.

4. Leave a note on your door that reads ......

Read the short note here.

Recipes: Easter Dinner

We are more stuffed than a Christmas goose, but I think we can manage to share the recipes for Easter Dinner.

From top to bottom: Mashed Potatoes, Baked Asparagus, Baked Ham I, Orange Pound Cake.

1. Mashed Potatoes. Recipe: If you don't know how to make mashed potatoes, you need to learn.

2. Baked Asparagus. 

Recipe:

1 large can green asparagus, drained

4 oz. (1 C) yellow cheese, shredded

1 C bread crumbs

Salt & pepper to taste

1 can mushroom soup (not cream of)

Small can French fried onions

Preheat oven to 300*. Place half asparagus in bottom of baking dish. Layer with half the cheese, and half the bread crumbs. Salt & pepper to taste. Repeat. Top with soup, sprinkle with French fried onions. Bake 30 minutes.

3. Baked Ham I. Recipe:

Happy Easter!

From the folder, "Stormy Bright Sky"

Mr. Big Food has planned a wonderful Easter Dinner for us. Check back later in the day for photos and recipes. Teaser: Easter Dinner will conclude with orange pound cake.