The Egg the Rocks the Table Rules the Roost

I don't mean to brag, but I make a mean deviled egg. Seriously. My deviled eggs ROCK! One time, before I wised up and saw my colleagues bringing loaves of day-old bread, and bags of frozen corn, I even made them for our Thanksgiving potluck at school. They were all the rage. One of my lunch tablemates still speaks wistfully of them every November. They are a staple at our family holiday gatherings.

Yesterday, I boiled two dozen eggs so they would be ready to make fresh this morning. It's not like instant oatmeal or Stove Top Stuffing. They take some time. The egg white is merely the artist's canvas. A tippy canoe to be filled with mustardy nectar, and topped with two olive-slice life preservers.

The eggs were store-bought. Grade A Large. We get bigger ones from our chickens, and more colorful, too. But fresh eggs are very hard to peel after boiling. I'm sure there's a secret ingredient to add to the water, but I haven't been actively seeking the remedy. I used my big stainless steel copper-bottom pot. After boiling, the eggs were treated to a cold soak for about half an hour. Then they were placed in the sink drainer to air dry. Their final destination was back into their foam carton to rest on the bottom shelf of the refrigerator overnight.

This morning I put my other projects in motion and settled down a the kitchen table to peel the eggs. It's a tedious job, but eggs don't peel themselves. I tapped. I rapped. I rolled. I massaged the tip against the table. I did everything but give each egg a happy ending. I was sure those eggs were ready to disrobe in one continuous motion. Some eggs, however, had other ideas.

You would have thought they hailed from the Victorian Era. Those eggs put up quite a fight to keep their outerwear intact. Their skin would not come off. Jame Gumb would have been sorely disappointed. The only headway I made was in ripping away small chunks of shell and attached flesh. Those egg whites stuck to the shell like asphalt-parking-lot gum to the sole of a mid-July Croc. There was no separating them.

By the time I had finished, about one hour after starting, some eggs were not fit for the family table. Their fate lay in the testing arena. After all, some eggs must be sacrificed to taste the filling. The test subjects were not things of beauty. Had they been babies, I think we all can imagine our handsome pediatrician calling them "breathtaking." The were as pockmarked as Edward James Olmos in Stand and Deliver. A few looked as though Injun Joe had whittled them in McDougal's cave with a Bowie knife, after he had eaten the candles.

This photo does not do those bad eggs justice. But I think you can see the whittled one up front.

It was delicious.

You Can Relax, Mom. It's Not a Local Crime Spree.

My mom called me this afternoon, all excited.

"I was reading those one-line things that go across my computer? And I saw one that said, 'St. Louis Women's Mystery Writing Group, A Sisterhood in Crime!' I don't know if you can find it, but it's about half the page down on my Yahoo! page that I read my one-line things on."

Mom knows that I know of some women in St. Louis who know how to write. And they have a writing group. I was sure that was what she was getting at. Why else would she call me all breathless with the news? "Well, I don't know if any of my gals write mystery. At least enough to be in a mystery-writer's group."

"Oh, I just thought you might want to hear about this."

"Did you read the article?"

"Read it? No."

"Then why would you call all excited about it? Just because you thought I might know somebody in it?"

"Well, it said, 'A SISTERHOOD IN CRIME!'"

"Wait. Did you think they were going out and committing crimes and then writing about it?"

"Uh...yes. That's the first thing I thought of."

"Mom. It just means they all write about crime. That's their connection."

"Oh. I'll let you go. I just thought you might want to read it."

I kind of forgot about the whole thing until that darn article popped up on Google News. I didn't even have to search through those one-line things on Yahoo! Of course I clicked on it to see what the hubbub was all about. I called Mom back this evening to update her.

"I don't know any of the writers mentioned in that article. But you'll be relieved to know that they don't go out and commit crimes. They get ideas from places they visit and things they read and guest speakers that come to talk to their group. You don't have to worry about them committing crimes."

"All right. Maybe I'll try to find that again and read it."

"Yeah. You always did like Jessica Fletcher."

Karma and Even Steven Need to Redouble Their Efforts

The world is full of scofflaws. I see anarchy on the horizon of Backroads.

Just this morning, my dear sweet mother, she who exalts me alternately as her eight-dollar daughter or her five-cent daughter, was nearly bowled over by a person of Walmart. A person of Walmart exiting through the enter door. Before you go defending the offender because you assume that a person of Walmart can't read the door, so is not at fault, but is a victim of the public education system...let me elaborate on the scenario.

Mom had ridden along to pay the house bill with The Pony and me. Being more of a five-cent daughter today, I asked Mom to meet us along the route so that I would not have to go out of my way to her house and back. Mom was agreeable, because she had plans to stop by the store later anyway. We had a fine time chewing the fat while I piloted the Tahoe to the next town.

Among things I learned on our trip is that Mom has decided she will say what she thinks. "I figure that at my age, I'm done with giving in to people. I went to pay my Christmas club, and the credit union lady asked me if I wanted to be on the board. I told her, 'No. I do NOT want to be on the board. I was on the board one time, and they only meet twice a year. Then I have to see them at the annual dinner, and they all act like they're my best friends.' And there's that one guy (name redacted) I don't like. I wonder if he's still on the board. Surely he's retired by now. Oh! I never could stand him! Those people didn't like me anyway, and then to pretend they were my friends once a year was too much."

Next, Mom said that she was afraid she'd made her friend in Florida mad. "She sent me an email saying that she's been having dizzy spells, so she quit taking her heart medicine. I sent one back saying that I'm pretty sure you're not supposed to just stop taking heart medicine. She has her whole family depending on her. She said that since the dizzy spells, she only drives a block to the grocery store and back. I know how she's trying to be cautious. I'm always really careful that I don't drive through the wall or anything. Did I say that? I mean, I'm careful not to back into a pole or something. But just because she doesn't want to go to the doctor before her May appointment, she can't be deciding on her own to stop the heart medicine. I emailed her that she should call the doctor's office and ask what they think. After I sent it, I thought, 'Well, I'm not going to hear from her for a while now.'"

Among the things my mom learned on our trip is that The Pony is perhaps more visually-challenged than we think. Because when we came up the driveway yesterday, and saw Juno running around to the garage door, we had differing opinions on her limp. I said she was still holding that foot up like she does about fifty percent of the time. The Pony disagreed. "No. This time she has a reason. Look. There's something stuck on her foot." I said it was just the fur between her toes. "Nooo. Look. Something is stuck to it. Like a dead mouse." Really? REALLY? It was just toe fur. I don't know why The Pony thinks a dog would run around with a dead mouse stuck to her foot.

One thought that occurred to me was that I might need to keep closer tabs on Mom and The Pony when he spends the day and night with her. What with them crashing through store walls and hallucinating dead mice on dog feet and all.

Anyway, getting back to the scofflaw who nearly took down my own personal septuagenarian...he KNEW he was coming OUT the IN door. Mom had to jump back behind me, since we couldn't walk in side-by-side with the crowd of scofflaws rushing out. The first guy, with his woman walking right beside him, said, "Oh. Sorry. I think we're going out the wrong door." But he did not stop and step five feet to the left to exit through the OUT door. Nope. He made Mom be nimble and quick to avoid being flattened faster than Sam Bradford of the St. Louis Rams. Let's just say Mom's candlestick-jumping days are over. She tucked in behind me like a NASCAR driver drafting at Daytona. Just in the nick of time to avoid a seven-person pile-up.

This guy probably cut his teeth going up the down staircase. It's a gateway behavior. Now he's graduated to exiting through the entrance door because he knows nobody is going to call him on it.

Look out for him coming at you on a divided highway.

Under the Influence Age

Yesterday I stopped by my convenience store, with a name akin to Voice of the Village, to pick up a quick 44 oz. Diet Coke. I proceeded without incident to the back wall where the eight-foot-long soda fountain holds court. After refilling my refill cup, I headed up front toward the counter. That's where the incident foisted itself upon me.

Carrying my precarious tall cup by the tiny bottom that fits into the car beverage holder, I was nearly bowled over by a screaming heat-seeking missile. Well. Not so much a screaming heat-seeking missile as a slightly-plump blond-haired high-school-age girl darting from behind the Sun Chip endcap. I lifted my cup, though definitely not in a toast, and shrugged a shoulder, allowing her to pass by with my innate bull-fighter reflexes. About three steps past, she turned slowly and said, "Woooaahh." But without the leather jacket and coolitude of Fonzi.

Dud Missile had been lurking near the front door when I entered. I paid her no nevermind. When one works with individuals that age all the live-long day, one is not inclined to greet and befriend strangers of the same ilk. Besides, Dud Missile was talking to a younger boy about some issue for which I could not have mustered less interest. I walked right through the sentence, "Would you still like me if..." and out from under their drama.

After dropping my eighty cents into the hand of the eldest of the clerks, I turned and headed for the door. As my karma would have it, Dud Missile was back on that side of the store. Taking up space. Fiddling with her cell phone in her left hand. I put my 44 oz. Diet Coke in my left hand to protect it with the buffer zone of my body. Much like an all-conference point guard protecting the basketball from the terrier-like advances of an aggressive defender. Or like a medieval gentleman on the street protecting his lady from garbage, chamber pots, and other effluence tossed from windows above.

Dud Missile wheeled around at the instant I inched around her. She jabbed that cell phone deep into the fluffy folds of flesh near my equator. I think her hand momentarily disappeared up to the elbow. I pivoted a bit to facilitate the withdrawal of her appendage from my person. "Excuse me," I said. Not in the Steve Martin manner of, "Well, excuuuuuuuuse meeeeee!" No. Just a simple excuse me. Like that used by teachers who do not suffer bad manners gladly, but who must maintain a modicum of self-control.

Dud Missile looked after me as if in slow motion. "Oh." The encounter itself would have been fairly unremarkable except for one glaring anomaly. SHE REEKED OF BOOZE! Yeah. There's no way that gal was twenty-one. And I don't mean she smelled like her alcoholic mother driving to the store on a booze run had accidentally spilled Pink Panties on her. No. She smelled like when a person ingests alcohol, and the byproducts ferment their way out the mouth with each exhalation. This was at 4:00 in the afternoon. Maybe Dud Missile had been drinking Germ-X all day. Or she had inserted some kind of alcohol-soaked implement into an orifice for a quick buzz. But the fact remains that this little gal reeked of spirits.

I went out the door and about my business. I don't know how she got there or who was responsible for her, or how she managed to careen around that establishment without knocking over merchandise. It may take a village to raise a child, but my voice remained silent on this one.

Sometimes You Feel Like a Wergle Flomp. Sometimes You Don't.

I don't know about you, but I'm feeling a mite Wergle-Flompish.

I realize that time is running out. But I plan to throw caution to the wind and throw together a bad poem for entry in the Wergle Flomp Humor Poetry Contest. Don't cost nothin'. I can copy a poem as good as the next person, by cracky! And you may not believe this, but on rare occasions in the past, a few people have told me that I am humorous! Of course, they could have just been referring to my haircut or driver's license photo or wardrobe. I don't always pick up on social cues like that.

My topic has not yet grabbed me by the throat. I can't decide if I need an ode to my 44 oz. Diet Cokes and the people who enable my habit, or an endorsement for my delectable gas station chicken, or a rant about the occasional circumstances that sometimes rub me the wrong way. I might just make it a very special shout-out to my love for cliches.

So what if the deadline is April 1st? I have all weekend!

Eating Crow Can Lead to Gastrointestinal Distress

I have been eclipsed. Surpassed. Shoved to the back of the pack before I even left the starting gate.

My sons have both made more money with their writing than I have. Yes. It's true. Today the truth was especially flauntable, because the local newspaper showed up to photograph winners in last fall's VFW Voice of Democracy Speech Contest.

The Pony came prancing up the hall just before 7th hour. Usually not one to show emotion, he had a horsey grin on his face that was evident way down past the cafeteria. In his hot little hoof he held a certificate with a bank envelope paperclipped to the top. First Place. The monetary award was $100. Uh huh. Not too shabby. Those veterans are a class act.

Genius the senior, way too cooler for school than freshman Pony, barely mentioned his Second Place finish. It only came up after school because he needed a deposit slip to put his $75 in the bank. This makes the second Second Place for Genius, with First Places the other two years. That is $350 over his high school career.

Let's see how that compares to my literary earnings. Not counting all the money I have spent on various and sundry contests, my adjusted earnings from my writing stand at...let's see now...just about...um...NOTHING! Zero! Zilch! A big goose egg. Not even a real goose egg. I am proud of my boys, but just a little disappointed with myself.

I am the proverbial cow. Giving it away for free.

It's hard to four-stomach their success.

Sometimes a Mediocre Notion

Sometimes, I feel like the old woman who lived in a shoe.

Sure, I'm old. That's not the reason. I'm old all the live-long day. And I don't actually live in a shoe. But if I did, by cracky, I'd be sure to stock up on Febreze. Have you seen those commercials? Febreze would have probably been called Fantastik if the name was not already taken. I suppose we're lucky it isn't called Coyote Ugly. You can strap used sweat socks, a stinky fish head with spine attached, a bucket of incontinent baby skunks, a fifteen-year-old boy's armpit, a brick of Limburger cheese, and the entire Azerbaijan wrestling team under a person's nose, and they will think they're smelling roses and freshly-laundered sheets. Febreze should be able to destinkify an ancient boot with one arm tied behind its back.

Furthermore, I don't have so many kids that I don't know what to do. Oh, I'll admit to the not knowing what to do part, but the number of kids is not the problem. No, what I have too many of are ideas. Ideas for stories that never get told. Sometimes they're on scraps of paper, but more often they're in a little computer file that grows bigger by the day. It's chock full of clever subjects that get bumped for more timely issues. Then I go back to retrieve them during a creative drought, and THEY ARE UNINTELLIGIBLE! Like notes of a dream on the nightstand that read flaming globes of Sigmund. I refuse to give up on them. I saved them for a reason. A story I wanted, and a story I'm going to get.

Here are my most recent Sigmunds:

--Not hold me back likes notoriety did he not brag about I ran over her one time

--Lost my crown flag pole snubbing post declared unofficial queen of the world

--Boys of august I'm not as dumb as you want me to be

--Dog snouts poking like sharks at a bloody piece of meat, tails whipping like a cane for a hooligan

--My nine lives

--Tupperware vs cheap containers for spaghetti, almond sink not stainless, stain, prop up clean items more recalcitrant that a 13-yo-hooker on beyond scared straight, stuffing all over stove like 11 yo peer around toilet

--Bedsheet head

--Mail pony express walk snail tortoise

--Bone rabbit graveyard delivery men wrong house

--Queen city on grid like spider web really can get there from here

--Compliment because I don't dress out of the rag bag

--Osteo aficionado Juno bones graveyard trap UPS lady

--Looking forward to tourney to kick off the season/crowds/sardines sideways

--Passive aggressive custodianship

--Great literary tombs went over my head

--When beleaguered night-school instructor Mutt Jefferson jolts awake to find his dimwitted class of adult GED underachievers (“The Idiots” to his fellow faculty) mysteriously miniaturized, bobbing helplessly in the puddle of drool on his desk, he inadvertently gasps, swallowing his entire roster, which precipitates a panicked call to his reformed-stripper fiancé: “Bunny, I drunk the Ids!”   (58 WORDS)

I imagine that last one was a blog contest of some sort. Whether I did not enter or failed miserably, I don't remember. I'm hoping the next-to-last one was a comment I saw somewhere, because I definitely do not want great literary tombs over my head.

I think it's time to clean out the file.