A pause in memory of Peg Bracken

If author Peg Bracken had been born 30 years later, she might have been a blogger. I remember the laughs my mom, a rural stay-at-home mother of five, got from her books. I think Peg was a bit of a sly feminist before her time.

 

From the LA Times obit:

Her instructions for stroganoff, for instance, said to cook the noodles in water flavored with a bouillon cube; brown the garlic, onion and crumbled beef; add flour, salt, paprika and mushrooms; then "let it cook five minutes while you light a cigarette and stare sullenly at the sink." She called this recipe "Skid Road Stroganoff."

 

Her books included “The I Hate to Cook Book,” "The I Hate to Housekeep Book" (1962), "Appendix to the I Hate to Cook Book" (1966), "The I Hate to Cook Almanack" (1980) and "The Compleat I Hate to Cook Book" (1988).

 

Peg, wherever you are, I hope you have your feet up and your “big dishwater hands around a dry martini instead of a wet flounder."

 

Chain smoking

Sunrise on the way to work this morning

It's hard not to use words like "apocalyptic" when you are dwelling in a pit of smoke, fire and ash.

The air is so harsh that I feel like a two-pack-a-day smoker. Headache, eyes hurt, raspy coughing.

People in China deal with air quality like this ALL THE TIME. How do they survive?

Other than that, I got nothin'. I'm busy just trying to breathe, and I certainly don't want to discuss the Red Sox. Apocalyptic, indeed.


Did I mention the wind was blowing like hell, too?

Oh but wait...one cheerful thing -

Can you FEEL the happiness?

Smoke from a not-so distant fire

That's not fog, that's smoke

As is usual in this type of weather, half of Southern California seems to be going up in flames.

The "Santa Ana Winds" blow in hot and dry from the valleys. The temperature rises into the 90s, humidity drops to below 10%, and even irrepressibly wavy-haired folk like me suffer from flat tresses.

Because it has not rained much for over a year, our state is a wildfire waiting to happen. The smallest spark and WHOOM, it goes right up.

We are having about 3 fires in our county, but the biggie is right over the county line in Malibu and it is all over the news because OMG! Movie! Stars! Homes!

A wall of smoke blew in about 2 p.m. and turned everything an eerie burnt orange color. Ash began to fall from the sky to blow about in little drifts. The bag boys at the grocery store were wearing dust masks as they went out to collect carts from the parking lots.


That tiny bright dot up there is the sun

The other side effect of this is that everyone loses their damn minds. As I shopped last night, I was noticing the wonderful lighthearted brio of my fellow citizens. Today, all that was gone. I had people cut me off in traffic, try to run me down in parking lots, and, in 5 stores on errands, not one clerk said "Thank you." I guess everyone is just busy trying to breathe, because the smoke makes it feel like an elephant is sitting on your chest.

Pray for rain for us, okay?

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Not for important client meetings

I got this pen at my gynie's office the other day. I am a pen snob and don't normally take free pens but I couldn't resist this one because oh my gah! Can you IMAGINE ever using it?

I gave it to my attorney, who was dee-lighted. He said he would hand it to people to sign contracts with. Ah, University of Michigan Law, you know how to train 'em. Go Blue!

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And there are good posts from my blogroll over at Linkateria's Smashboard Sunday. Go check it out.

Lame

I know it is lame to apologize about the lack of posting, because that presumes that I am so important in your minds that you might have noticed. It is just that some of my blog friends are such excellent post-a-dayers and usually I am too.

But I'm tired. Long week of classes and meetings and volunteer things after work. Today I did a freelance job that took most of the day.

The carpet is filthy, the car is dirty, and the shower looks like the Creature from the Black Lagoon bathed there and left part of the black lagoon behind himself.

Here's the problem with housework: when I get home at night (on the nights I get home early enough not to just fall into bed), I want to relax and entertain myself, not clean. In the morning, I am too rushed just trying to feed and clothe myself somewhat appropriately for work. On weekends, I do freelance girl reporter jobs or, you know, try to have the fun that I work so hard all week to deserve.

Which leaves when? Never!!

Do any of you have this problem too?

Proud to be an American?

Dear God: Please do not fool me with this Attorney General candidate. Please let him follow the things he said today about the Constitution. My hopes are up. Please do not crush them. Amen.

The thing I hate about the Bush administration most is not that they have involved us in an endless war. It is not the lies, the crimes, the tax breaks for the very rich, the fact that they are on the wrong side of almost every issue. No.

The thing I hate MOST is that I am no longer proud to be an American. That kills me. It honestly brings tears to my eyes.

I have always been a dissenter, a protester, a screamer. But I was a PROUD dissenter. When I marched in a parade protesting the first Iraq war, my sign said "Protest - it is the American way." I was proud of my right to protest.

As an Amnesty International supporter, I knew that there were so many countries in the world where people didn't have basic human rights. The right to speak freely. The right to cast a meaningful vote. To be free from torture and detention without charge or trial.

I wrote hundreds of letters to dictators and other bad folks urging them to release people who were being tortured or held for expressing basic human rights. I was SO proud that the US didn't do these things.

Well, pride comes before a downfall, as they say.

Now we torture.
Now we hold people without charge.
Now we hold people without trial.
We have mercenaries (we call them "contractors") who are apparently above the law, and who can kill innocent people without being subject to any laws whatsoever.

I feel hopeless and helpless and sad. Not at all proud. I have an empty flagpole on my front porch. I haven't flown a flag since the "Patriot Act" was passed, and at this point I can't imagine flying one again.

Please, someone, step forward. Do the right thing. Make me, and America, proud. I miss that feeling.