Raise A Glass

You're probably aware that the musician Chuck Berry passed away on March 18 at the age of 90.

Berry was proud to be from St. Louis.  Even after he became a big star he lived in the metropolitan area.  He mentioned his home town in "Back in the USA" (New York, Los Angeles, oh, how I yearned for you/Detroit, Chicago, Chattanooga, Baton Rouge/Let alone just to be at my home back in ol' St. Lou) and "Sweet Little Sixteen" (They're really rockin' Boston/In Pittsburgh, P. A./Deep in the heart of Texas/And 'round the Frisco Bay/All over St. Louis/And down in New Orleans/All the cats want to dance with/Sweet little sixteen.

Up until 2014 Chuck Berry still performed once a month at the Duck Room at Blueberry Hill, an intimate 350-seat venue. I saw him there in 2008.

There will be a public viewing service for Chuck Berry today, followed by a private celebration of life. In addition to those, last night at 10 p.m. everyone in the area was encouraged to raise a glass and toast him.  Hubby Tony and I both had busy days that started early, and by 10 p.m.we were already home. However, that didn't stop us from toasting with glasses of lemonade.

Chuck Berry wrote a lot of great songs.  Here's one of the most well-known:

A Single Letter Can Make All The Difference

As you may remember, one of my volunteer tasks is to make slides for events that run on monitors around the church campus.  Over the past three years I've gotten pretty good at it and can put together slides without too much thought.  As I found out tonight, that's not always a good thing.

Two weeks ago I made a slide for an organization's "Bunch for Bunco" fundraising event.  (In case you're unfamiliar with it, Bunco is a mindless dice game) I emailed the finished product to one of the organizers; she replied that it was perfect.  That weekend, and the next one, it was part of a slide show on two of the three screens.  Today I made new slide shows and after dinner went to set them up.  Once the first slide show started running I stood and took a look at it.  AND discovered a problem!

The top of the slide was supposed to say "Bunch for BUNCO Fundraiser. What it actually said was:

That one incorrect letter at the end of the first word made quite a difference.  In two weeks of running, no one had discovered the error.  I came home, fixed everything, and will take the corrected slide shows back up tomorrow.  What do you think are the chances that I can get by one more night without anyone noticing?

Five years ago today: The Cruise Diaries--Fun And Fitness

Cyberspace Blunders and Gaffes

The Internet works great.  Except when it doesn't. I've been on the receiving end of my share of cyberspace blunders and gaffes.  Two recent examples:

Later this month Hubby Tony and I will be visiting Son Tony, who relocated to Dallas last fall.  The downtown apartment he chose doesn't have a spare bedroom, so right after we bought plane tickets we booked a nearby condo through Unnamed Internet-Based Vacation Rental Site. 

Then Tony called us with exciting news--he and his friend Ie were buying a condo!  The condo is several miles away from where they are living now, far enough that the place we booked no longer made sense.  We decided to cancel it.

However, that was easier said than done. Even after much searching, I couldn't find a way to do it on the company's website.  I tried calling the Customer Service number, but gave up after being on hold for more than 20 minutes. Next I emailed the company and explained the problem. When I read that it could take 2-3 business days for them to respond I crossed my fingers and hoped for the best.

The next day I had a message telling me that the request had to go through the condo's owner.  If they had only stated that plainly on the website I would have started there!  It took several back-and-forths with the condo owner to complete the cancellation.  Finally, four days after I started the process it was completed.

 

Three weeks ago I realized I was getting low on the specialty shampoo and conditioner I use to keep my hair and scalp in good shape.  I normally purchase it at a local beauty supply store, but since someone had given me an Amazon gift card I decided to buy it online.  The products cost the same there as they would at the local store, so I added the items to my cart and chose the free (4-5 day) standard shipping. 

After I closed the browser tab I forgot all about the order until several days later when I ran out of shampoo.  According to the Amazon website the items were ready to ship, but it wasn't until two days later that I got the email that said they were on their way.  I received the box nine days (seven business days) after I clicked the "BUY" button.  Somehow my hair and scalp survived, but they weren't happy.

Five years ago today: The Cruise Diaries--Eating My Way Through The Caribbean

Just The Way I Like It

 Son Donald was home last week for his school's Spring Break.  It was wonderful to see him and spend some time with him.  However, he had a busy week planned, including catching up with friends, doing homework, and working on professional projects.  As the week wore on, in his busyness, he reverted to 'college boy' cleanliness.  It didn't help that I had a very busy weekend with not much time for housework.

So this morning was all about getting things back to normal.  Before I left to run the day's errands I swept and damp mopped the kitchen floor, and promised it a thorough cleaning down the line.  I put all the dishes in the dishwasher, then cleaned the countertops with soapy water.  Donald had already started his bedding in the washer on his way out the door.  I transferred it to the dryer, then started another load which included the rug by the door to the garage.  The last thing I did was sweep the debris out of the garage so it wouldn't get tracked back in on the clean rug.

Now everything is just the way I like it.

Five years ago today: The Cruise Diaries--Ya Mon

The Laughing Gnome

When I was out running errands today this came on the radio:



After the song was over the DJ came on and announced that the song was by David Bowie. That originally surprised me, but when I came home and re-listened to it, the voice was obvious. Wikipedia said the song, which was released as a novelty single in 1967, was "a pastiche of songs by one of Bowie's early influences, Anthony Newley. At that time the song flopped, but became a hit when it was re-released in 1973.

Too Tall Grass

For the past two weeks, nine days have had at least some rain. The others have been party or mostly cloudy.  The damp and gloom haven't been great for my attitude, or the cutting of the grass.

Hubby Tony bought a new lawn mower, and when he did the first cut of the year the grass was already long  He had to raise the wheels as high as they would go.  I had the same problem when I followed up with a second mowing a little over a week ago, and kept the wheels where they were.   Since then the grass been growing luxuriantly, and short rain-free breaks haven't been long enough for things to dry out.  

When I walked through the grass yesterday morning, the blades covered my shoes.  It needed to be cut!

Last night as I was cooking dinner I heard a neighbor using a mower and decided that if he could do it we could too.  However, Tony had an appointment to go to, so if the grass was going to get done it would fall on me.  After I ate I left Tony to clean up the kitchen while I got on my grass cutting shoes and headed out the door.

The new mower starts up like a champ, and turned out to be the easiest part of the job.  I only had to push it a couple of feet to find out that the mower would have a hard time with the long grass. 

Tall grass is difficult to cut, and tall, wet grass is even worse. The mower has a nice self-propelled function, but that was unusable with the thick, unruly grass.   If I went too fast the motor would get overwhelmed and stall. I eventually figured out the best procedure...walk two steps forward and one back, lift the front of the mower a couple of inches to allow any accumulated clippings to shoot out, then repeat.

However, after a couple of successful passes across the yard I'd get cocky, go too fast, and the mower would stall again.  Every time it stalled a large clump of wet clippings were left behind. (After I was done I tried to go back with a rake and get them all up, and Tony made a second pass when he got home.  I don't think we were completely successful.)

When I was done the grass looked much better, although there were weird tufts standing up here and there that managed to avoid being cut.  There were also grass clippings and wheel tracks up and down the driveway.  I pulled the spark plug on the mower, turned it over, and removed massive, damp, thick grass mats from underneath.  I also tried to remove the green stains from the driveway, then came in and did the same with my hands and clothes.

Our plan was to lower to blade a notch or two and cut the grass in a couple of days and break the too-tall cycle, but last night I was laying in bed and heard the rumble of thunder...then the sound of rain.  The forecast has precipitation in the forecast for most of the days in the next week.

I'm not optimistic that our plan will work. 

Five years ago today: The Cruise Diaries--It's Grand!

Around The World In Six Blocks

Yesterday I was leafing through this week's Review (our area's Catholic newspaper) and came across an editorial about supporting immigrants and refugees in the area. There was also a sidebar list of specific ways to get involved. The very last one was to support an immigrant-owned business or restaurant, suggesting a good place to start would be one of the ethnic restaurants along South Grand, which is considered the International District of St. Louis. I mentioned the idea to Hubby Tony, and had barely finished my sentence when he said "Let's do it." An adventure was born.

South Grand is only six blocks long, but it's filled with a wide variety of restaurants and shops. Before we left the house we did some research to find out if there was a church in the area, and were pleased to find out that St. Pius V parish was at the southernmost edge. Their 4:30 Mass fit perfectly into our plans.

We decided to get there early enough to do some shopping before Mass, attend church, then go to dinner.  As we left the house mid-afternoon a light drizzle started falling.  We briefly thought about changing the plan, but decided to be adventurous. The rain stopped, but as we pulled into the church parking lot it started again.  Tony grabbed an umbrella from his car and we started walking north. (The drizzle stopped five minutes later.  Glad we stuck to the original plan.)

As we strolled up and down the street we looked in all the store and restaurant windows and tried to narrow down our dinner choice.  A large portion of the world's cuisine is represented on South Grand. In addition to USA "eats", you can also find food from Brazil, Ethiopia, France, Italy, Japan, Lebanon, Mexico, Morocco, Persia, the Philippines, Thailand, Turkey, and Viet Nam. For good measure, there are two Vegan restaurants and a couple of dessert-only places.  After we'd browsed through an ethnic grocery store, a used book store, a Fair Trade shop, and popped into a half-dozen restaurants to look at the menus we had a short list to ponder.

After church it was time to make a decision.  We decided that Moroccan sounded good.  It was.  My Cucumber Salad had diced cucumbers tossed in a balsamic vinaigrette. Tony tried the Harira, a traditional Moroccan soup that contained beef, lentils, chick peas, and vermicelli.  It was hard to narrow down my entree from among all the choices, but in the end I ordered the Artichoke M’Kally, which had several fried artichoke hearts on top of a vegetable medley that had been cooked in a fantastic tomato sauce and topped with olives and slivers of feta cheese. Tony got the Vegetable Couscous, which had large pieces of vegetables and chick peas on top of a bed of couscous.

When we came out of the restaurant it was drizzling again.  By the time we'd walked three blocks the drizzle had turned into a steady rain, and we ran the last block to the car in a downpour.  By the time we got in the car we were soaked.  The adventure and good food made the inconvenience worthwhile, though

Five years ago today: Polished Piggies Redux

Good Day, Sunshine

We're two weeks past the spring Daylight Savings Time change.  As always happens, the yearly shift to extra light in the evening made it dark again in the morning.  However, as the days continue to get incrementally longer the beginning of the day light has started to return.

This morning when I woke up at my normal time there was enough brightness that I didn't have to turn on the bedroom light to pick out my clothes.  That realization of longer days to come makes me happy.

Fancy That

Yesterday I was reading an article in a foodie magazine about a new trend; evidently chefs are using all types of unusual ingredients to make fancy waffles.  I'm usually not on the cutting edge of fads, but I'm already doing that.  For the past few months I've been putting a version of falafel batter in my trusty old waffle iron. The results are quite yummy.

Traditional falafels are Middle Eastern balls or patties made from chickpeas.  They are usually fried, and look like this:

Popo le Chien, Wikipedia

These are mine:

Falafel Waffles, ready to eat

My inspiration was this Waffled Falafel recipe, but I've made several changes.  My version has scratch-cooked beans, half the oil (I substitute bean liquid), chickpea flour instead of all-purpose (which makes them healthier and gluten free), less salt, and whole eggs instead of egg whites (because I hate wasting anything, even if it's just an egg yolk).

Falafel made in a waffle iron are far from traditional, but the waffled version contains all the necessary flavors.  The batter is easy to put together.  After it's ready I heat up the waffle iron and spray the interior surfaces with a good coating of cooking spray.  The first time I made the recipe, it took me a couple of rounds before I figured out that a half-cup of batter was just the right amount.  As each waffle finishes cooking I place it in the oven to stay warm.  Eventually the leftovers go into the freezer. 

A traditional falafel sandwich is stuffed in a pita and topped with tomatoes, lettuce, cucumber, tahini sauce, and hot sauce.  That's too much work for me to put together, so I've been adding a crumbled falafel to a spinach salad mixed with a spoonful of yogurt and several dashes of hot sauce.  Even my meal is untraditional!

Falafel Waffles

4 cloves garlic
1/4 cup chopped fresh cilantro
1/4 cup chopped fresh parsley
3 cups chickpeas
1/3 cup bean liquid
1/3 cup vegetable oil
2 eggs
1/4 cup chickpea or all-purpose flour
2 teaspoon baking powder
2 teaspoon ground cumin
1/2 teaspoon kosher salt
1 teaspoon ground coriander
1/2 teaspoon cayenne pepper

Preheat the oven to 200 degrees F (to keep cooked waffles warm).

Pulse the garlic in a food processor until minced. Add cilantro, parsley, and chickpeas and pulse again. Add remaining ingredients and blend until smooth.

If necessary, lightly coat the top and bottom of the waffle iron with cooking spray. Add 1/2 cup of batter. (Some waffle iron will still be showing.) Close the lid gently and cook 5-10 minutes, or until the falafel is golden brown. Keep the cooked falafels warm in the oven or covered with foil on a plate while you make the remaining falafels.

Five years ago today: The Cruise Diaries--Sunday At Sea

Global Goof Off

Are you feeling unmotivated today? Here's your official invitation to do something about it:

For the rest of the day I'm taking a break from the things I have to do, and substituting want to dos.  Wanna join me?  Let me know how you celebrated.

Five years ago today: The Cruise Diaries--Embarkation