Author Archives: cat9984

2

First Foot Forward

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New Year’s Eve always reminds me of my grandmother. When I was little, I used to spend the night with her.  My parents always went to a party that night. I don’t remember my brother being at Grandma’s. So I don’t know if the two events were related or not. Of course, maybe I just wrote him out of that memory. Can you do that?

My father would come first thing in the morning. He had to “first foot” the house. Where my grandmother grew up (Scotland), the first person in the house in the new year had to be a dark-haired man. (I think it was also OK to be formerly dark-haired, currently bald, because Grandpa did it before he died.) The man had to enter on his right foot and carry something to eat, something to drink, and something to keep you warm. Dad brought meat pies, Scotch, and either coal or wood. Scotch seems to be an odd choice as a survival drink, but who am I to say?

I honestly believe Grandma would have refused entry to anyone other than the “first footer”. I know my mother (her daughter-in-law) was afraid to find out.

The night before, Grandma would burn down all the candles in the house. (This was before the days of 70-hour candles.) She wanted to burn away all the bad luck of the previous year. Similarly, no calendar could survive the end of the year. She had to sweep all the bad luck out the door as well. Grandma was pretty happy with her life, so all this stuff might have helped. If nothing else, the house looked and smelled good on January 1st. We always sang Auld Lang Syne, but I think that was more tradition than lucky.

I was looking at some other traditions earlier today. The first footing and sweeping seem to be pretty common. It also seems that while you want to sweep on New Year’s Eve, you do not want to sweep on New Year’s Day because you will sweep away the luck that comes with the new year. Apparently every year starts out good; somehow the bad luck seeps in as time goes by. Or leaps out at you when you least expect it. You also do not want to wash dishes, laundry, or your hair in order to not wash any of the good luck down the drain.

Laundry seems to be especially bad. Some traditions equate it with washing a person away, meaning someone will die in the coming year. You really do not need that special shirt for your team to win the big game New Year’s Day. If it was that important, you should have washed it immediately after the previous loss.

So far, we’ve done a lot of work on New Year’s Eve and pretty much nothing on New Year’s Day. Sounds pretty typical. But don’t forget to eat: grapes – 12 of them, one for every month of the year (some sources say you need to stuff one in your mouth at each chime of the midnight clock – no word on what comes after that); pork – because pigs root forward when they eat while chickens scratch backward (and you may remember I told you that bacon was this year’s “in” gift); black eyed peas and lentils – they resemble coins; and greens such as collard greens, chard, cabbage and kale – the folds of the greens resemble money. Actually, if you put all of that together, call me. It sounds delicious.

The key seems to be that whatever you do on New Year’s Day will be an indication of what you will be doing the rest of the year. It is especially important that you bring in before you give out. Don’t spend money you don’t have. Don’t start the year owing anyone (that must have started in the years before mortgages and car payments). Spend time with friends and loved ones. Take care of yourself. I’m not sure what it means if you ate bad crab dip the night before and are in the bathroom all day.

Finally, some words of wisdom if you happen to be traveling next year. (I don’t know how you’ll find it next year when you need it.) :

  • In Spain, wearing red underwear on New Year’s Eve means that you will have prosperity and good luck in the upcoming year. (Note to traditional men: no one will see it if you don’t let them.)
  • In order to chase out the bad luck of the New Year, the Irish bang white bread against the walls. (I’m not sure how old the bread needs to be before it will actually bang.)
  • In Ecuador, it’s customary for each family to burn a scarecrow at midnight. The scarecrow represents the negativity of the previous year, so burning it ensures positive energy and good luck as the new year begins. (Please remember to do this outside or you will not be invited back.)
  • Brazilians jump seven waves for good luck — one jump for each day of the week. (You may want to find a beach first. Or hope that your friends are really drunk.)
  • In Greece, smashing a pomegranate outside one’s door at midnight is said to bring good fortune. The red color and seeds of the pomegranate represent fertility, love, and happiness. (In college, a friend and I got pomegranate juice on my white curtains. Nothing would take out the stains. Just a warning.)
  • If you’re in Germany, touching ashes is the key to good luck in the new year. (Apparently Mary Poppins was on to something.)

I wish you all the best in the new year. Now I have to go see how the candles are doing.

5

Dollar Disappointment

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My family has always exchanged stockings on Christmas morning. When I was little, the goodies always included a red apple, a yellow apple, an orange and a tangerine. I remember being disappointed that Santa was so health conscious. All I’d ever seen him eat were cookies. Years later, my son commented on always receiving shampoo and body wash in his stocking. You never see Santa bathing or changing his clothes either. I’m guessing Mrs. Claus has some influence on what gets included.

At one point, I spent a lot of money on stocking stuffers. (The amount I spend has never had any direct correlation with the amount I have, by the way.) I would wander the malls looking for things that would fit in a stocking. There are more than you might imagine. One day, a friend finally explained to me that the concept behind a stocking was that it was filled with little inexpensive things like candy canes and chocolate Santas. Oh. Like the idea that you break up with someone before you give him the expensive gift. I never was good with money.

Enter the dollar store. My first experience with dollar stores was not positive. It was located in a strip mall where I worked. The neighborhood had seen better days (I hope). It was poorly lit, crowded with merchandise, and not very clean. From what I looked at, the reason it was crowded with merchandise was that no one would take that stuff at any price. I could not understand why everyone was raving about dollar stores. Were my friends really that cheap?

A few years went by. I got another job, and drove past a dollar store every day on the way to work. One day I stopped to look around. It was incredible. There were office supplies, craft supplies, school supplies, candy, wrapping paper, all sorts of things. They even had the metallic pipe cleaners my son used to make rabbits (they look better than they sound). I’m not really a shopper, but I looked at everything. I was totally hooked. At Christmas, I fully stuffed all the stockings for under $50.

My dollar store was not part of a chain, so you can guess what happened next. I drove by one day and the owner had sold the shop. The new owner must have been related to the first shop owner I encountered. I was traumatized. I was not going back to spending $7.95 for a Mylar balloon. I had to find a replacement.

My next stop was what I’ll call a pseudo-dollar store. It’s a national chain. A lot of the stuff was one dollar, but the rest was brand-name at discounted prices. This store was the source of most of the health and beauty supplies I bought for a few years. They even had fashion-name make-up for a dollar. It had to be labeled ‘discontinued color’, but in Michigan who knows the difference? The odds of running into Beyonce wearing last year’s eyeliner are pretty low. Alas, I had just made the full commitment when it disappeared.

They opened a dollar store a few miles away from our house. Coincidentally, it’s the same chain that has a store on my way to work. My daughter wanted to stop by one night. It was great! The candy, the pens, the wrapping paper. All was well in the dollar world again. Last Christmas I even bought some nice wrapping paper at the one close to work.

Things were a little crazy this year getting ready for Christmas. Both my daughter and my mother have been ill, so shopping took a back seat to that. I didn’t get to stocking stuffers until two days before Christmas. No big deal – I’d just stop by the dollar store on the way home and I’d be set. We’d have a few more pens and pads of paper than usual, but it’d be OK.

Imagine the look on my face when I opened the door to find that the only wrapping paper left was covered with Justin Bieber. (I didn’t need paper, but it was still traumatizing.) I moved on to the candy. It was appalling – I could only get chocolate-flavored or chocolatey. There was no actual chocolate! Luckily I did have a back-up plan for that – I had bought some of the family’s favorites at work because I knew I would never find it in the dollar store.

I went to toiletries. No nail clippers. No floss. Icky toothbrushes. No body wash for men. No make-up. Large bottles of lotion from some company I’d never heard of, in a scent I didn’t know. This was totally unacceptable. What was I supposed to do?

I went to office supplies. Very few pens. A few memo pads. I tried to think of where else I might go as I wandered the aisles. I finally found some snacks – trail mix, peanuts, etc. Stain remover pens. Socks (not even from China). Packaged, non-Christmas candy. At the counter I found some lip balm.

When I filled the stockings, all was well (although there was LOTS of candy). I’m already planning to stake out the dollars stores next fall to find the best place to go.

In the meantime, I’m going to size up the fruit.

3

I Don’t Have Time for This

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I will admit up front that I am a Christmas procrastinator. However, I do have a couple of not-bad excuses for it. (Of course I have time to make up excuses – I’m not doing much of anything else.)

I have always preferred to do my wrapping all at once. I’m one of those people who has twenty-five different rolls of paper because I love to have all the different colors under the tree. I probably got the idea from TV in the days before I realized those people don’t actually wrap their own stuff. I should look into getting “people” to do it for me. I make a huge mess. Besides, I have to make sure all my daughter’s presents aren’t wrapped in the same paper, don’t I?

I’m also one of those people who likes to see lots of presents under the tree. So I have been known to wrap a stack of books in several different packages. And I like ribbons and bows. And ribbons really do look better if you get the skinny kind and make some of your bows by hand. But that’s a lot of work, so I can’t do it at the same time as I wrap because I would be too tired to care what things look like at the end and get crabby. And my husband says I get crabby enough as it is.

At one point, I was organized enough to get my shopping done by the end of November. Then I got married, got a real job, had kids, and got medicine for being bipolar. (I spend a lot less money, but around the holidays really miss those days when I could get twice as many things done at once.) All of that took up a lot of time. But the final straw came when Rascal moved in.

Rascal was a sweet, lovable cat with one really annoying habit. She never met a ribbon or bow she didn’t want to eat. She also liked opening presents. For years, every bow we had came with teeth marks. Not only that, cats don’t digest ribbon well. So we’d spend a fair amount of time cleaning up cat vomit.

This house has a sun room we can use to store presents. But the first one was really small. It was either wait to wrap the presents or continually repair things with tape. Eventually nothing could be opened without a knife on Christmas morning. Luckily I come from one of those families where the men don’t feel fully dressed unless they have a pocket knife.

I also like to power-bake over a couple of days. Once again, I make a huge mess and would like to limit the clean-up to one major sand-blasting each year. Besides, we want fresh cookies, right? My mother used to make a lot of pressed cookies (the ones that come out of the thing that looks like a lube/grout gun) and Mexican Wedding/Russian Tea Cake cookies. Those cookies start out so dry, no one can tell how old they are (at least hers did). Mine tend more to the chocolate chip/peanut butter variety which don’t hold up so well.

Bottom line? This was my week-end to prepare for Christmas. On Friday, we had a lot of boxes to unload at work. No big deal; I have a brace to wear at night and can barely tell by the next morning. I’d been having a little trouble with my shoulder, but that wasn’t interfering with anything, so I didn’t even consider that. My plan: I’d get up Saturday morning, get to work, and be ready for Christmas Sunday night.

Wrong. Apparently whatever I strained in my shoulder is connected to whatever I hurt in my hand. (Guess the song’s right about the shoulder bone being connected to the elbow, etc.) By 1a Saturday morning, I couldn’t sleep because of the pain. I finally got up about 7a. I could barely move my hand. I wasn’t sure which was worse, the pain or the constant feeling that my arm was ‘waking up’. I tried all those pain relievers (not all at once) that are supposed to allow you ‘to get on with your life’.  I had always made the assumption that they meant with minimal pain. I guess it just means they won’t kill you.

My husband told me I should go to the doctor. It was probably good advice, but unless the doctor was going to do the baking I didn’t really see it as a short-term solution. So I did the logical thing – took a couple of muscle relaxers (from the last time I hurt my shoulder) and slept most of the day. I didn’t get anything done, but I didn’t care.

So, now it is Sunday morning. My arm feels a lot better, but I have a hang-over from the muscle relaxers. I wonder how the family would feel about having all the presents in a giant box. They could guess which present was meant for which person.

3

What Would Grandma Say?

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[Welcome to my new look. I was getting a little tired of the old one. Besides, I couldn’t resist something called “Choco” – it sounds very close to my favorite food.]

My mom’s mother lived in a retirement community that had a potluck once a month for quite a while. While Grandma really enjoyed the potlucks, she had two complaints. The first was people who brought only enough of their dish for three or four people. On the one hand, she had a valid point; unless you rushed to the table, there were certain dishes you never had a opportunity to try. On the other hand, our family gatherings always had enough food to feed Oliver Twist’s orphanage.

The other complaint was that people brought store-bought food and said they made it. Grandma didn’t have a problem with someone picking up a frozen pie and heating it up or using a cake mix, but she did not consider that home-made. She said that it wasn’t home-made unless you made it from scratch. She baked until she was in her mid-eighties, so she was entitled to her opinion.

As often happens through the generations, my mother used many more convenience foods than her mother, and then the pendulum swung back with me. I am a cooking snob. You cannot tell me that taking frozen hash browns and melting cheese on them makes it a home-made dish. Similarly, cutting up cooking dough from a tube and heating it is not baking home-made cookies. Some of my attitude comes from Grandma, some comes from all the preservatives and additives in prepared foods, and some comes from the cost of ready-made dishes. My attitudes have changed over time; when we were first married, I was a much bigger fan of frozen stuff.

The holidays always highlight the various ways we can decrease our time in the kitchen. A woman caught me off-guard the other day. She asked me where she could find the Rice Krispie treats that were formed into a flat sheet and could be cut out into shapes. I love Rice Krispie treats. They’re so sweet, I can’t resist. I even like the pre-made ones you can take in your lunch.

But I could not imagine buying a sheet of it and using cookie cutters to make shapes. What do you do with the scraps between the shapes? They must be your reward for working so hard. How many sheets would you need to make enough cookies to put on a plate? Sometimes it hard to tell what shape a sugar cookie is (who designs some of those reindeer cutters?). I would imagine that a Rice Krispie star would look an awful lot like a Rice Krispie Christmas tree.

These questions must have even occurred to the Rice Krispie people; the product is no longer available. The woman truly looked crest-fallen. I couldn’t bring myself to tell her that she could make her own treats in any thickness she liked and cut them out. I knew that she would tell me that mixing the cereal and the marshmallows together was too messy and too much work.

There are several Christmas displays right across the aisle from where I work. One of them has gingerbread house kits. I can appreciate the idea behind these. I tried to make one from scratch once and discovered that I am not coordinated enough to hold the sides together while they set. Or detail-oriented enough to get all the pieces the same size to actually fit together. I never would have been able to lure Hansel and Gretel. But it did taste good.

A year or two later, I was still fascinated by the idea so I bought a kit. Like most pre-made food, it was considered edible for six months after its holiday. I still had trouble getting it to stay together. Obviously, I am not the one who fixes things around the house. Finally, I got frustrated and walked away. I decided to eat one of the candy decorations. Apparently the emphasis should be on decoration. I almost broke a tooth. I tried the gingerbread; it tasted awful. Not only would I have trouble luring Hansel and Gretel, they probably would have poisoned themselves on the house. And who wants to eat poisoned children?

I noticed that one of this year’s models was larger than the previous ones. It appeared to have a yard as well as the house. It also came with LED lights so you could back-light your house. I was impressed. The company has accepted that the product is inedible and is now trying to sell it based on your being able to have the only gingerbread house in the neighborhood with Christmas lights. Looking into the future, I can see tiny inflatable snowmen and reindeer on the roof. Scout troops can start having competitions as a fund-raiser.

Another lady came up to me and said that she couldn’t find the gingerbread cookies in a tube. I helped her find them. She told me they were so good that she always stocked up at Christmas and stored them in her freezer. That way should could have them year-round. I refrained from telling her that hoarders like her were the reason other people had to do without gingerbread cookies at Christmas.

I think those cookie rolls used to only come in one size. (Even my mother drew the line at cookies in a plastic tube.) It seems like the diameter was somewhere in the 1″-1 1/2″ range. Now you can get that size, but there is also a tube that appears to be about twice that size. I wonder if tubed cookies work the same way as the ones I make. It doesn’t matter what size I make, people generally take two or three.

There are also lots of flavors: chocolate chip, sugar, gingerbread, peppermint, cut-outs in the middle of the round. I’m guessing some are more popular than others. The other morning I came in and was checking my aisle for miscellany left during the night. I found an open tube of cooking dough with a bite out of it. Apparently the person tried it and didn’t like it. I suppose there was no reason to steal it if they weren’t going to enjoy it.

It’s true that my stuff doesn’t look as symmetric as what comes out of a tube. But I can buy the ingredients any time of year. So I don’t have to fill my freezer with tubes of cookie dough that have the potential to fall out, breaking one of my toes.

2

Everybody Talks Too Much

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I once worked for the Wicked Witch of the Great Lakes. She had hired me to work at one of those nationally-known human resources consulting firms. After I was hired, I realized that my job really was to sell people very expensive consulting they didn’t really need and leave before the results actually became apparent. And to suck my soul out of me. Luckily I escaped before I became too bitter. 🙂

Back to my point. One day, we both came to the conclusion that I did not belong there. At the exit interview, Ms. Witch kept asking me if there was anything I wanted to say. There really was no way to explain what was wrong without becoming equally vile, so I kept quiet. For some reason, my silence totally enraged her. I didn’t realize that following the adage “If you can’t say something nice about someone, don’t say anything at all,” could have that type of positive karmic repercussions.

Unfortunately, fewer and fewer people seem to follow the practice. Perhaps “Better to be silent and seem a fool than to speak and remove all doubt” is more appropriate for the present times. I have been trying to think of the last time I heard someone say something nice about someone else at work. I know I’ve complimented people to their face and to the managers (because I’m perfect, remember?), but from the shocked looks I get, I’m guessing it’s not just my perception that it’s a rare thing.

I unload the pallets first thing in the morning with people from another department. Our stuff is all mixed together. so it makes sense to work together. Most of the time, I enjoy working with them. One day last week, things got a little ugly. There are three of us who regularly work together. We were working when a manager came by and asked where a fourth person (Employee X) was. Apparently the load comes in at his “lunch time,” so I had never seen him there. The manager paged him and told him he needed to get to Receiving.

Needless to say, when X returned he was not happy. He told the other two guys that they were not to touch the stock for the week’s sale. They were only allowed to touch the non-sale boxes. The guys were not happy and commenced to complain about X and his need to control everything. Later X complained about the guys’ inability to do their work in an organized manner. I’m never quite sure what to do in these situations. I let them vent, but no one seemed any happier for the opportunity. So the day began.

Then the chickens arrived. I think I’ve talked about the chickens before. Large quantities of them appear (seemingly) at random and take up space in my cooler. I had room for them (more or less) so they stayed. Later, the team leader was complaining to one of the deli stockers (Stocker A) that no on ever told her when there was deli stock in the cheese cooler. It started as a complaint that she had found three ham dinners from Thanksgiving still in the deli cooler. That is the cooler physically in the deli where they keep their meat.

From there, the team leader complained about how the other stocker (Stocker B) wasn’t doing his job. She might have to hire a third stocker. (Or get B to do his job?) The general consensus is that B is lazy. However, one of the deli people (Employee Y) doesn’t like A because he got to come back after quitting with no notice, when one of her friends didn’t. It seems that the friend had also broken down and tried to hurt someone. Y’s friend also doesn’t like A because she thought he was lazy when he was employed previously.

B was not scheduled this day. Earlier in the week he had posted on Facebook that he was scheduled for Friday which would make a long week for him, Friday through Wednesday. He was really unhappy about it and would have to look for another job. When he had found out about working Friday, he refused to talk to anyone. He has been complaining about how hard he has to work and how it isn’t fair.  I think it’s his first job.

Near the end of the day, someone told me that the late shift at the deli has finally been busted for not working. As long as I have worked there, the day shift and the night shift have argued about who is doing less. Recently it has become apparent that we had a winner. Leadership was receiving complaints during the evening shift about not finding anyone in the deli or waiting in line while one person worked and the others talked or used cell phones.

It seems somewhat appropriate that the end came for them when someone took pictures on a cell phone to show what was going on. Of course, there was much talking and wringing of hands. There wasn’t a lot that could actually be done. No manager was there to document the situation. The team leader decided she should work more evenings, which traumatized the entire second shift. She told one employee, and within five minutes everyone knew.

So what does any of this have to do with me? Absolutely nothing. I may have wasted more time that day than I have the entire time I’ve been at the store. The funny customer stories are good for dinner conversation. Who wants to listen to me recount the employees crabbing about each other?

I have looked everywhere on Amazon for a negative energy neutralizer or maybe a black box that would suck it out of the air. So far, no luck. I wonder if spraying the air with ginger or peppermint or lavender or something would work in a space that big?

2

North Pole Irate Over U.S. Spying

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Grimm Report's avatarThe Grimm Report

A Special Report By Grimm Report Chief Polar Affairs Correspondent,
Cathy Behnke
https://cat9984.wordpress.com

Things are not very merry up here at the moment. In a meeting with Suzy Snowflake-Frost, Santa’s Chief of Staff, I learned that the NSA spying scandal has created another incident. Ms. Snowflake-Frost told me that she had received a call from Human Rights Watch asking whether it was true that Santa was violating international protocol by delivering non-essential aid to countries sanctioned for human rights violations.

Ms. Snowflake-Frost asked how they knew anything about where Santa delivered presents. Apparently after all of the big stories were covered from the NSA spying leaks, someone decided to actually read the whole document.

View original post 265 more words

3

You Got Me That? Why?

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Now that you’ve finished shopping and wrapping, the tree is up, the cards are out, and the baking is under control, there’s one more topic we need to discuss. Why I would never be friends with someone so perfect. Just kidding. I’ve never met anyone who is at that point two weeks before Christmas, so you may be a wonderful human being. Or an alien. Or manic. (I’m bipolar. The one year I got everything done this early was before I started getting proper treatment.)

No, I’m talking about gift etiquette. Kids are not the only ones who open gifts and suffer from “You obviously spent a lot of money. Why on earth would you spend it on this?”

One year when I was in college, my boyfriend got me a large mirror. It was a cat amidst a bunch of houseplants with the title “In the jungle darkness lurks the tiger.” It was really cute, and definitely fit my personality. I had no place whatsoever to put it, but thought it was a great gift. My mother took one look at it and said, “Why did he get you THAT?” Can you tell she didn’t like him?

Of course, she is the one who got a pair of faux Louis XIV lamps from her mother-in-law to go with her Danish modern furniture. And a purple negligee from the same woman (she is neither the purple type nor the negligee type). They didn’t get along. I think she may have been living vicariously through me. She spent years bashing the gifts I got from various boyfriends. Fortunately she got more tactful by the time my husband started giving me gifts (or she liked him better).

While I would never advise my mother’s route of putting hideous lamps in your living room for ten years to show appreciation for the thought, I don’t recommend opening something and telling the giver “but this isn’t the one I wanted!” either. (Another relic of my pre-medicated days. My family is really, really grateful I found a decent doctor.)

I think it’s important to understand the giver. Obviously, anything you get from your child should be accepted with the same heart-felt joy they had in buying it/making it. No matter what it is, they genuinely thought you would like it and have spent a lot of time on it. Needless to say, this advice needs to go by the wayside somewhere over the age of ten.

While some teenagers still care about the recipient, I think some are more casual about the whole thing. “Oh, that’s right, you belong to the NRA. Sorry about the vegan food club membership.” Or, “I ran out of money after I bought gifts for [significant other]. But I’m sure you’ll like this soap from the dollar store. You always told me it’s the thought that counts.” A large percentage won’t care (or notice) if you return it.

Not so much with parents. Assuming they still like you and your spouse, they have put some thought into your gift(s). And they would like to think they know you well enough to know what you would like to have. So, if you receive another gift for your office (zen garden, aquarium, scorpion paperweight), be enthusiastic. They will never know that you returned it for the office basketball hoop with automatic return you really wanted.

It’s a little trickier with a spouse. He will probably notice if you return the sexy negligee for a flannel gown. By the time you are married, it is too late to tell him that it makes you feel like a slut (unless it’s a combination wedding/Christmas gift). We all know the gift is really for him, but there is usually something of a compliment in it. He won’t buy it unless he wants to see you in it. You can wear it one time for him. On the way from the bathroom to the bed. If you look as bad as you think you do, he won’t ask again. If you look as good as he thinks you do, you’ve got a new outfit.

Conversely, she’ll probably know if the boxers with “Gift from Santa” on the front disappear. (If you’re married to the girl above, you’re probably already happy with the gifts and don’t need my advice.) However, in your case, you need to find out whether it’s a joke or her idea of sexy. If they are accompanied by another pair covered in cartoon reindeer, it is probably a joke. If there’s a how-to manual for something you’ve never heard of, there are things you may not know about your wife.

Writing this has reminded me that the only thing that is done around here is the tree. And that is handled by my husband and daughter. You’re on your own with your bosses, friends and neighbors. Keep in mind: the tactfulness should increase based on the amount of damage they can do to your life/career.

2

Meet My Most Obnoxious Ex – Mr. Technology

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At one point, we were very close. I even considered changing my life for him. I had begun my career as an employee benefits analyst/consultant. Then I met him on a new project. We were going to create a benefits administration system.  Before I knew it, I could write business requirements and do data diagrams. I designed phone trees. We became serious when I joined a software company as a business analyst.

Then something happened. We seemed to plateau, and we both knew we weren’t meant for each other. So we went our separate ways. I still run into Mr. Technology, but he has developed some very irritating habits.

My doctor works out of a clinic with one general phone number. When I call to schedule an appointment, the nice voice on the phone tree tells me to listen carefully to the menu because the options have changed. I’m not sure when they changed; they’ve been the same for the past year I’ve been calling. I press the number to make an appointment. Another nice voice tells me that I am caller fifteen with an expected wait time of twenty minutes. My call is important to them and they appreciate my patience. While I wait, I listen to on ongoing advertisement for the affiliated hospital and medical centers. The nice voice deserts me.

I ordered Christmas presents on-line last year; there were two things from one vendor. I got a very nice message back thanking me for my order and giving me an expected delivery date. Sure enough, my order was delivered on time. Unfortunately one thing was not what I ordered. Instead of cute flannel lounge pants for my daughter (size small), I got an XXL fishing t-shirt. I emailed the company, and they gave me directions for returning the item in exchange for what I wanted. They asked if I was sure I didn’t want the shirt.

A week later, I called to follow-up. A pleasant young man answered. They couldn’t send the pants until they received the shirt, but the pants were definitely coming. Another week passed. I called back and spoke with another pleasant young man. They had received the shirt, but it hadn’t been entered into the system yet. He would try to expedite it.

Five days before Christmas, I called to ask (less pleasantly) where the pants were. The less pleasant young man told me that they were sold out and I would have to wait for a refund to process through the system. I bought a new present locally; I got my refund mid-January. I did not receive a pleasant apology. They did not receive an order this year.

I utilized several job-hunting sites intermittently over the years before I found my true calling in cheese. Many of them have their own rules for what can be entered as a user name and password. The sites and I worked closely together for awhile, then I would get bored and move on to something else. Reality would set back in and I’d return to the site.

But the site always pretended it didn’t remember me. I’d type in what I thought was the correct identification and get “wrong user name/password” in red letters. So I’d try something else. (Whose bright idea is it that you’re supposed to have a different password for everything you use and not write them down anywhere? Life is much easier now that I use my Social Security Number for all of them.)

Finally I’d break down and admit to the system that I couldn’t remember my password. So it would ask for my user name. And tell me that it didn’t recognize my user name. So I would tell it I couldn’t remember my user name. It would ask for my email address. And tell me it didn’t recognize my email address. I asked for the security questions. And it would tell me there weren’t any security questions for me. Of course there weren’t, you stupid computer. Why did you ask if I wanted to answer security questions when you didn’t know who I am.

After much frustration, I would decide to re-enter my information into the site. When they asked for email address, I would type in the one I use for employment follow-up. It would then tell me that I already had a record on file. I would ask them to send me the password via email. It would tell me once again it couldn’t find my record. I contacted the help desk and received a pleasant response that they had received my inquiry. It was number a62785zb892, and someone would respond shortly. Please use that number for any inquiries.

A few days later, I would receive another pleasant email apologizing for my inconvenience and telling me that everything was fixed. I would go back to the site with much anticipation. Enter my user ID and password. And get “wrong user name/password” in red letters.

My husband told me Mr. Technology is bad for my stress level. I am forced to admit that we are irreconcilable. I hope he’s happy with the choices he’s made.

2

Holiday Indulgences Don’t Have to End With the Holidays

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Back in the days before kids, I bought my husband a membership in a wine-of-the-month club. It went well, so the next year I tried the spa-item-of-the-month. That was nice too, although I think we may still have a container of powdery stuff that’s supposed to go on like lotion (or something like that).

In case you might be interested in sending this type of gift, I have done you the service of researching a few. You don’t have to thank me, chocolate will be fine. If you’ve been paying attention the past few months, a couple of these should come as no surprise.

“When Pigs Fly: American Bacon Club” is brought to you by the Ann Arbor-based Zingerman’s deli. What could be better – bacon from the home of my alma mater? You can get 3 months for $99, but you might want to go for the 6-month plan at $189. It includes Balinese Long Pepper Bacon. I assume that the long pepper is from Bali, not the pig. But the recipient would never know.

Next we move on to Murray’s Cheese of the Month Club. You can get a four-month membership starting at $275. Each month the recipient will get 1.5 pounds of cheese from various sources (cow, goat or sheep). I would make sure your loved one likes to eat almost anything. One year a friend got us cheese hand-made by monks in some famous abbey. It was a soft cheese and when we melted it, it smelled (and tasted) like dirty socks.

My personal favorite is the 12-month, $480 plan from master chocolatier Jacque Torres. Once a month, they send something something chocolatey to your chosen recipient. The gifts range from brownie mix to truffles and everything in between. (Men: this may sound like the perfect monthly gift to your wife. Just make sure she’s not planning a major diet for after the new year. Unless you don’t think she’ll mind you eating top-notch chocolate in front of her.)

Want something sweet but not chocolatey? I’m not sure what’s wrong with you, but try a quarterly shipment of Capogiro’s gelato. (It’s kind of a creamy sherbet for you provincials.) They send six pints at a time in what they call hyper-seasonal varieties. I’m not cosmopolitan enough for these flavors, but perhaps someone you know is. They include honeysuckle, rhubarb and sweet potato. Only $240 for the year.

Then we have the above-mentioned wine clubs. The most cost-effective (cheapest) option I found was a $29.98/month club offered by wine Library TV. You get a red and a white for that price. It is the same price I paid 15 or so years ago. I’m guessing these are not of that quality. But I could be wrong.

Looking for something stronger? Stirrings offers a 12-month plan of drink mixers for $180. They are advertised as flavorful, original, and all-natural. Once again I would recommend that you only send this assortment to someone who will try almost anything. Flavorful and original mean different things to different people.

Not a drinker? How about the Counter Culture coffee plan? The beans are fresh-roasted and seasonal. Don’t all coffee beans come from more-or-less the same part of the world? The hot part? How seasonal can it be? You can get a 3-month subscription for only $79.95.

These final three clubs are for those of you who really want to impress. We start with the Organic Vegetable Club. (Disclaimer: The ad is addressed to people shopping for a woman. If you are shopping for a man, this is not an appropriate gift.) It’s kind of an open-ended offer. You can choose how much you want to send (5-15 pounds) and the number of deliveries per year. Five pounds for 3 months costs $119.99. It doesn’t say anything about being seasonal (or local), so you might need to keep an open mind.

A little more indulgent? Holy Smoked Salmon has a smoked salmon of the month club. There are more types of smoked salmon than you might imagine. Once again remember the open mind about flavors. It is described as silky, spicy, salty, supremely good salmon. Hopefully it is as good as its copywriter.

Finally, for the well-off Ernest Hemingway types, I recommend the Kobe and Cab Club. It is offered by Signorello Vineyards in Napa Valley. Three times a year someone would receive “a rich, buttery, marbled piece of Kobe beef (note single serving) and a tremendous glass of Cabernet (I assume they send an entire bottle).” At $390 per shipment, it’s probably too expensive to send to get even with the evil vegan who just broke up with you.  But it might impress the father of the new one.

Upside to these gifts: you don’t have to wrap it. Downside: if they don’t like it (or you), they will be reminded every few weeks throughout the year.

2

Bring Me a Figgy Pudding

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Pudding – [UK] a sweet and usually hot dish made with pastry, flour, bread,or rice, and often fruit: a stick toffee/treacle pudding  › [US] a sweet, soft food made from milk, sugar, eggs and flavouring, eaten cold: chocolate/vanilla/butterscotch pudding (Cambridge Dictionaries Online)

When I was little, I heard about plum pudding at Christmas. It sounded like a strange flavor, but grown-ups eat strange things sometimes. Imagine my surprise, while watching A Christmas Carol with my dad, to find Mrs. Cratchitt using a towel not to burn herself while serving the plum pudding. It looked like a brown lump of bread with raisins in it. I was close.

I found a recipe for it. The ingredients include whole wheat flour, fresh bread crumbs, shredded suet, eggs, carrot, apple, dark brown sugar, blanched almonds, preserved stem ginger in syrup, ground almonds, walnuts, candied cherries, raisins, dried currants, golden raisins, candied mixed fruit peel, plums, lemon, mixed spice, baking powder, and ale. Wow! This sounded a lot like my mother’s fruit cake recipe with suet added! Yum! Not only that, you have to steam them for 5 to 10 hours to set them, baste them in brandy or rum regularly, and steam them for 2-3 hours to reheat them.

I don’t care how much rum or brandy to add to it, that pudding is not coming to my table much less to my recipe collection. I wondered how the people who created the language had attached such an attractive name to such an, um, interesting set of ingredients. Of course, my mother’s family (from Cornwall) made tons of fruitcake every year. They liked to brag that they only used enough batter to hold the fruit together. I’m not sure it should be allowed to be called fruit once they petrify it like that.

With this background, I dreaded the thought of what figgy pudding might be. As near as they can tell, “We Wish You a Merry Christmas” originated in England sometime in the sixteenth century. Imagine my surprise when I discovered that figgy pudding really does sound like a dessert. It’s a kind of souffle made with figs and walnuts. They say it tastes a little like spice cake. You will have to either take their word for it or try it yourself. Sticky brown lumps do not made a tasty base for any food as far as I’m concerned. However the serving suggestions include topping it with whipped cream or ice cream, which speaks well for it.

Thinking I was on a roll, I decided that I would look into one more “English dessert”, mincemeat pie. Silly me. I was thinking pumpkin pie when I should have been thinking meat pie. My grandparents from Scotland loved meat pies. Based on smell, I had never asked what was actually in the pie. Since all the jars of mincemeat I have seen in markets here have no meat, I figured it was some sort of substitute for people who couldn’t afford real meat. At least I think that’s the idea.

The Victorian recipe I looked at has the following ingredients: lemons, tart apples, raisins, dried currants, citron, candied orange peel, beef kidney suet, nutmeg, mace, ginger, salt, brandy, beef (optional). You mix it all together and let it set a couple of days for the flavors to mingle. More time with no beef. I am not a huge fan of beef, but in this case I think it would be a positive addition. My first image when I read the recipe was fruitcake mixed with suet (kidney suet at that). I now understand why the American supermarket version emphasizes that it is made with raisins and walnuts. I think the brandy manufacturers had a role in developing these recipes; I’m sure the more brandy you use, the better they taste.

For as long as I can remember, our desserts on Christmas have been hot-fudge sundaes and home-made cookies. A couple of times, I got really motivated and made a buche de noel. I was pondering the idea of making a more traditional dessert to go with the roast and Yorkshire pudding (yikes – I never made the name connection). Upon further thought, those molasses cookies are sounding pretty good.