Month: November 2011

Is It Just Me Or …

For $299.00 you can own this framed archival matted black and white photo of President and Mrs. John Kennedy along side of an original, unsent invitation to JFK’s January 20, 1961 inauguration. Comes with a certificate of authenticity. Quantities are limited.

Kennedy Invitation

Ahhh, c’mon.

Sure, it’s nicely presented and it’s a nice enough photo of the couple. But seriously, what are you supposed to do with it? Put it up on the hallway picture wall to suggest mysterious family connections to unsuspecting guests? Add it to your collection of unsent invitations to other parties? Haul it to the Antique Roadshow in 30 years or so?

Well, just so you know, I’d rather have the waving queen. It’s a 6 1/2 inch solar-powered facsimile of her Royal Highness who flaps her hand for hours if you don’t stop her. She only costs $18.95. (Acornonline.com )

Work in Process

I spent a good part of the day scraping lime deposits from the bathroom tile in back of the toilet. All the while I worked at really staying mindful to make an unpleasant task less so.

Didn’t work much.

However,  I do have a new-found grudging respect for Lime-Away. I usually steer away from anything that suggests using gloves when applying but Sig’s mother was a big believer in the stuff and I got a nearly new bottle when we cleaned out her apartment.

Too bad she didn’t leave an almost full bottle of Maker’s Mark or something, it would have been a lot easier to stay-in-the-moment.

Gobblers

What is Black Friday, anyway?

Why, son, it’s the kind of day people have when they wake up after Thanksgiving and realize they somehow have already eaten all the left-overs.

Happy T-day

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Just before that first Thanksgiving dinner, a wise Native American woman was overheard to say,

Don’t feed them. If you feed them, they’ll never leave.

                       Dylan Brody

                                                                         Image from Awkward Family Photos

Dinner with O

I got an invitation today. For a measly $3.00, I can put my name in to have dinner with President Obama. I thought, hmmmm, interesting. I’d like to have dinner with the guy but what is with the $3.00? I followed the trail and found that it was a campaign thingy, with all of the proper disclaimers and claimers and breezy kinda talk-talk in small print.

Actually — way on the bottom, it says, I really don’t have to send in $3.00 if I don’t want to, I can just put in my name and click away. But, if I did that, I then would send my click to a different site from the $3.00 people. And no — of course not, there wouldn’t be any advantage given to those who coughed up the $3.00.

But I thought to myself. I don’t think so.

Somehow, I think the lucky clicker who gets the grand Poopah prize will go to one of the faithful who sent in $3.00. And I felt sure that the $3.00 people would also be on the receiving end of a great rush of incoming e-mail in the months to come.

Nah, sorry, President Obama — as much as I’d love having dinner with you, frankly I don’t have a thing to wear.

Playing with Fire

Crack Pie 2There is a restaurant in New York, the Momofuku Milk Bar, that has a pie so addictive they trademarked its name, Crack Pie. And guess what?

You can order this $44.00 dessert and have it sent by overnight delivery for Thanksgiving as long as you make their November 22nd deadline.

Momofuku’s Christina Tosi dreamed up the recipe; it’s a toasted oatmeal cookie-like crust with a gooey butter filling that has a rich salty-sweet taste. There is also a recipe on Epicurious (image by Christopher Griffith) with a litany of helpful reviews that share cooks’ tips.

Preparation time is 15 hours from start to finish so it’s not a light commitment.  The long wind-up probably contributes to the craving sensations that begin to crop up around the 11th hour. I’d make two just in case.

Really?

I got my driver’s license in the mail today. And frankly, I have a bone to pick with the entire government of the Motor Vehicle Division of the state of Kansas.

I can forgive them for the 2 1/2 hour wait in the renewal queue; I can overlook the institutional  carpet and the yellowed-beige walls in the concrete waiting pen; I can rationalize their lack of clear signage and, since it’s not their fault – the obnoxious nerd of a guy sitting in front of me whose loud conversation consists mostly of f-ing this and f-ing that.

But, it is Absolutely Inexcusable that the picture on my driver’s license, a document that I will have to safeguard and display repeatedly for the next 5 years, looks like I volunteered for a police line up in a serial burglary spree.

Never mind that the today’s simplest technology enables a third grader to take a National Geographic grade photo, never mind that automatic photo booths are a new art form, never mind that even a dimwit with an iPhone can win a photo contest.

Oh, hi – Clerk-person. I’m afraid I lost my license. Where is the line for duplicates? 

Over-look

An orderly at the hospital catches my eye as he pushes a patient past the waiting room to freedom. He is wearing hospital-regulation-issue boxy pants and tunic in a royal blue. And he has thick-soled imported athletic shoes whose construction purposefully pitches him slightly forward as he walks.

The dark hair on his forearms is in stark contrast to his pale skin; several tattooed bracelets circle each of his wrists.  He has a single rhinestone stud in his right ear. His face is a narrow oval shape with just a shadow of a beard. Yeah, a fairly regular guy.

His hair, however, is quite fashion-forward. He has doused it with gel of some sort to rake it all upward so that it looks vaguely like a mini great wall of china balanced on the crown of his head. As he passes by, his scalp reflects tiny points of light from the overhead glare.

Move over comb-over, there’s a new dude in town.