Suburban Blurbs

Farewell Pecan Chicken Sandwich, Part Deux

2009-04-04T22:52:00.002-05:00

I’m not quite as sad as I was before.

Last week I told you how sad I was that Arby’s had discontinued the sale of their Pecan Chicken Sandwich. Frankly, that tasty sandwich on Wheatberry Bread was the only reason I went to Arby’s.

But I’m over it. For one, I have found a couple of recipes online that I believe fairly approximate the great taste of the Pecan Chicken Sandwich. I’m eager to try them as soon as I finish the thrashing crew-sized batch of pasta I made a few nights ago.

But the REAL reason I’m over it is this: in researching the sandwich I discovered that it had about double the calories I had suspected. 769 to be exact.

To put this into perspective: I pop a Lean Cuisine into the microwave, and it’s generally about 300 calories. A little meat, a little vegetables, a little sauce (very little, if you ask me). Three to five minutes later, it’s a meal. More than that and it’s an overcooked, indistinguishable brick. Cooked properly, it’s a tiny meal, to be sure, but a meal with some variety in flavor.

Given the fact that the Arby’s Pecan Chicken Salad Sandwich didn’t occupy a whole lot more physical space than a Lean Cuisine (to my untrained eye), I figured it was 300-400 calories max. It's nearly twice that. Like popping TWO Lean Cuisines into the microwave, instead of one.

Which is why reality bites. 769 calories? Did Arby’s use lard instead of mayonnaise to create the Pecan Chicken Sandwich? Why doesn’t anyone use light mayonnaise, anyway? Why don’t we Americans just throw out all regular mayonnaise? I'd like to hear Jared from Subway "weigh in" on this subject!

To think that those times I stopped at Arby’s and had a Pecan Chicken Sandwich and assumed I was being smart and healthy when I was really being hornswoggled into thinking I was doing something good, calorie-wise.

Maybe no one hornswoggled me. Maybe I just didn’t get the facts. I don’t want to blame Arby’s because I know how to be an informed consumer. Still, it seemed like such an innocuous sandwich that I bought it without questioning its caloric content.

So here’s what you can learn from my experience: Fast food is convenient. It is rarely low or moderate in calories.

That’s it. Only one lesson today. Goodnight.

Farewell, Pecan Chicken Sandwich from Arby’s

2009-03-31T21:52:00.003-05:00

Sometime during the last few months you left, and I didn’t get to say goodbye. Imagine my surprise when I looked for you at the Arby's drive-thru. You weren’t in your usual spot, so I scanned the menu a second time. Then I asked the person on the other side of the intercom where you were….

Arby’s employee: (Click, feedback noise) Hi, welcome to Arby’s! May I take your order? (spoken like every sentence ends in an exclamation point.)

Me: Yeah, uh, I’d like that Chicken Pecan sandwich, not the wrap, but the sandwich, you know, on that really great wheatberry bread –

Arby’s employee: We’ve taken that off the menu! (Like she was HAPPY about it.) Would you like to try our roast turkey ranch and bacon combo with curly fries and a soft drink?

Me: (About to cry and considering pulling out of the drive-thru altogether, then wondering, good grief, how many calories are in a roast turkey ranch and bacon sandwich???) Well, um, sure, but skip the fries, just give me a small Diet Pepsi. Or hemlock if you have it. (Just kidding about the hemlock! I’m not going to get suicidal over a sandwich!)

Arby’s employee: Your total is $5.31 – please drive up to the window!

Me: (sniffling trying to see through tears) Okay….

I may be exaggerating about the tears, but I sure was disappointed. That pecan chicken salad was the best thing about Arby’s, in my opinion. And it got laid off. They didn’t really give it a chance. I suppose in these economic times you’d better prove yourself worthy very quickly if you’re a new menu item. Maybe the stimulus package can bring it back….

But even if the chicken pecan salad sandwich is gone for good, it’s not as upsetting as when Lancome discontinues a favorite shade of lipstick. I’ve already searched the internet and my cookbook library (200 and counting) and have found two recipes that claim to be likenesses of my beloved chicken pecan salad. I’ll experiment with both and I’m sure I’ll concoct something delicious.

You see, a discontinued lipstick is a disappointment of a higher level, since most of us don’t have access to the manufacturers’ formulas or a lipstick laboratory. As a disclaimer here, I have to say I have never personally experienced this level of anxiety with lipstick, but once upon a time I had a friend who did.

What happened is that on one of our usual Saturday afternoon shopping expeditions we stopped at the Lancome counter at Dillard’s. My friend was excited about replacing a tube of her favorite lipstick, a deep burgundy that looked fabulous on her darker complexion, but made me look like I’d been eating too many cherry pixy stix. The helpful makeup sales clerk informed her that the shade had been discontinued.

Had it been me, I would have said, okay, do you have something even remotely approaching that color? Do any of these other makeup salespeople have a color that’s the same?

Not my friend. She wasn’t leaving until she could track down one more tube of the precious burgundy lipstick, which was now worth more to her than an equivalent amount of gold. My friend had a look in her eye that suggested she might leap over the counter and seize the sales clerk by the lapel of her white lab coat if she couldn't find the lipstick. Pronto.

The clerk, a savvy woman who is probably president of Lancome now or at least one of their higher-paid executives, figured out that if she could snag one more tube of the magic burgundy, she’d have a very satisfied customer who would be eager to shell out hundreds of dollars in additional makeup and perfume purchases. She contacted the distributor, called my friend a week later, and once again, there was burgundy lipstick.

At least that’s the way I remember it. The lesson here is that we have to deal with the loss of treasured things in different ways – finding a suitable substitute (concocting your own chicken salad or buying a slightly different shade of lipstick), finding an exact replacement (why ebay was invented), or going without. Which works for awhile, but is usually best cured by a little retail therapy – or in these times, window shopping.

Techno Trauma

2009-03-30T20:53:00.002-05:00

“The easier technology makes our lives the more complicated they become.”

Doesn’t that sound profound? I made it up.

Here in the nerve center also known as my home office I have access to a galaxy of information and ways to use it. I’m more connected to knowledge, people, and tools than ever before. Twenty-five years ago if I wanted to interview someone and broadcast the video for others to see, I needed an expensive camera, recorder, and editing system. Today all I need is a Flip camera and simple editing software.

I sat down at my keyboard much the way world class organist Diane Bish sits down at her keyboards prior to a concert – confident! Expert! Delighted! Luckily for Ms. Bish (who graduated from East High here in Wichita) she has much more experience and far fewer frustrations.

Frustration #1: the audio was low. Even after cranking up every setting I could find. I thought about the afternoon I conducted the interview and my subject. Was the sound too low? (Not sure). Is he just a soft-spoken person? (Not really). Is low audio a defective quality of the Flip? (Not likely).

Frustration #2: I transferred the video from the Flip to the computer and stored it using the software that came with the Flip. But their editing software was too rudimentary and I decided to edit in Windows Media Player instead.

What I found was this: a video in Flip became a .jpg in Windows Media Player. I couldn’t figure out how to make it work and lost patience searching the web for an answer. So I wrote to some of my colleagues and asked them for the answer. I hope they can help.

Years ago we had a great excuse for not making videos on our computers. We couldn’t! If we went to Yellowstone Park and videotaped the family waiting for Old Faithful, well, our audience had to sit through several minutes of nothing before finally seeing the geyser erupt. This was a great time to restock our sodas and popcorn, or, if the movies were really dull, make another Margarita and grab another handful of chips.

Similarly, if we left the house and went to a movie, people who wanted to reach us on the phone HAD TO WAIT until we got home, or, if we were ahead of the techno-curve, leave a message on our answering machines.

My point is this: we have technology (convenient) but we pay a price when it doesn’t work (lots of teeth-gritting).

Which is why you should have a close personal friend or significant other in the technology business, so the two of you can be frustrated together. It’s during those moments of tension when the best solution is to go low-tech: turn off the television, computer, DVD player and cell phone, pour a glass of your favorite adult beverage, perhaps a crisp Chardonnay with pear notes, prepare an accompanying platter of light snacks, and engage in the uncomplicated but potentially highly rewarding lost art of conversing with one another. Because one-to-one is still a connection technology really can’t improve upon.

Hunkering Down

2009-03-26T20:45:00.004-05:00

A blizzard tomorrow? Sounds like an April Fool's joke. C'mon, it's late March! The redbuds are blooming, the daffodils are waving in the wind....spring officially arrived last week!

But the weather guys are serious. My favorite meteorologist, Mike Smith, was quoted today in the Wichita Eagle saying, "This could rival the biggest snow we've ever had in Wichita."

You know I'll do almost anything to get out of mowing the lawn, but I did NOT pray for a blizzard. I would have been happy with drenching spring rains.

Here in Wichita, we could get a foot of snow. Cities and towns west of us have already declared tomorrow a snow day. A person posting on Twitter said his in-laws couldn't get past Colby on their way to Keystone, Colorado. Late this afternoon people stopped by the Dillons Marketplace at Central and Rock to stock up. I was one of them.

I didn't need much. I already feel prepared to weather the storm, with nine jars of salsa, Progresso soup (only 1 Weight Watchers point per serving!), an assortment of crackers, Lean Cuisine, and spaghetti sauce. I figured all I needed was some salad fixins and some veggie burgers for tomorrow (it's Lent). The wine cellar is ready to be pressed into service if necessary, with an assortment of velvety Cabernets. Should I tire of those, an assortment of lightly fruited Chardonnays awaits.

But that's just the beginning. I also have four bags of split peas, some wagon wheel pasta, lentils, tomato paste, a five-pound bag of rice, a jar of bay leaves, and three large cans of diced tomatoes. These are left over from an ill-fated attempt at Christmas to create "friendship soup" jars to give as gifts to family and friends. Putting together cute little jars of layered soup ingredients topped with a festive piece of holiday cloth proved to be too daunting a task during an already overscheduled time of year. Thus I returned the raw materials to my pantry where they currently occupy a great deal of real estate, crowding out the salsa.

Being prepared to withstand the elements does not end with a well-stocked pantry. In the event of a power outage I have a flashlight and a package of extra batteries. If only I could find them. I may have covered them up with the split peas.

Most important, should the heat go out, I have warmth in the form of two thick down comforters. Just thinking about wrapping up in them and reading a book while sitting next to a crackling fire makes me almost want to dare Mother Nature to do her worst.

But I don't believe in tempting fate. I'll expect the best, prepare for the worst, and see what happens.

Just know this: should you become stranded in east Wichita, I have a large basement, dozens of DVDs, and a well-stocked wine cellar. And I can whip up a batch of split-pea/lentil/tomato/pasta soup seasoned with bay leaves faster than you can say 'Frosty the Snowman.'

Back on the Blog

2009-03-25T19:31:00.006-05:00

It's been awhile.

I'm sorry.

Sometimes things happen. Things like people you care about who are hell-bent on self-destruction despite your best efforts to talk them out of it. Things like stupidity, cupidity, and duplicity, for starters.

But I'm ready to put those things in a drawer, close it, and get back to having some fun.

I took the momentous step of creating a Facebook account today. I have been unwilling up to now to expose myself that way, but a reality check revealed that I'm already google-able, through my job and this blog. So I might as well get with the 21st century and join my many friends, colleagues, alums, and even family members who are already 'facebooking.'

I have to admit, I was a bit unsure how to get started. For one thing, I couldn't remember if it was 'Spacebook' or 'My Face' I was supposed to sign up for. Once I leaped over that hurdle, I had to ask myself how much time I am willing to spend on this activity. Every minute I spend online is a minute I take myself away from such exciting suburban activities as vacuuming, cleaning toilets, thinking about mowing the lawn (but not actually doing it, not yet, come on, it's March!), clothing management (going through the closets and coming to grips with reality about certain sentimental, but hardly practical, articles of clothing), and sorting through paper.

Paper, the bane of my existence. Bills paid, bills due, newspapers read, newspapers yet to read, recipes I will cook someday as long as I live to be 150, magazines about health and fitness and new ways to firm up my abs in six weeks, travel alerts about exotic destinations with sunny climates where truckers won't blow off the road the way they did here in Kansas a couple of days ago (seriously), and news briefings about the economy, politics, famous people, and other topics that give me indigestion.

I'd like to make a giant sweep through my house and clear it of the receipts for tax purposes, medical forms, terms of agreement, meeting handouts, the latest version of my will, email attachments, quirky news articles, and notes to self scribbled on whatever blank square of paper I could find at the moment (here's one: Crunchless Abs video, 1-800-678-5905), how-to-use guide for Microsoft wireless mouse that doesn't work (thanks, Microsoft!). If I transferred most of this stuff to a Dumpster I am certain my house would rise at least an inch from its foundation purely from shedding the weight.

Ah, but it's not that easy. Each piece of paper represents information, sometimes worth its weight in gold. The receipt for a pair of $20 reading glasses purchased in desperation on a trip out of town means cash at the end of the year when I have a few dollars left in my flex fund. The recipe for spicy lemon shrimp has the potential to make me look like Martha Stewart the next time I want to entertain. The Metro Map of Washington DC - well, I plan to go back soon and I'll take the map with me. For less than $10 a day you can go almost anywhere, if you're willing to walk some and negotiate a few turnstiles.

It's a weighty decision, paper or cyberspace. In either case, though, it's about more stuff in the in box and figuring out good ways to streamline it. Regardless, I'm looking forward to it. Because it's just stuff. And stuff is mostly nothing, which is what this blog is truly all about.

Consumer Tip Alert

2008-09-03T21:10:00.004-05:00

This is just a reminder that if something seems too good to be true….unless it’s a huge end-of-season markdown at Dillard’s and you’ve just found a Tahari suit in your size for $30, someone may be trying to scam you.

Over the weekend I received a letter in the mail whose envelope bore a postage stamp from Canada. It looked like a mass mailing, as opposed to a missive from Alec Baldwin, whom I assumed had made good on his threat to relocate following the 2000 general election.

I opened it anyway, discovering a very real-looking check from Orion Enterprises, Inc. in Kansas City, Kansa (that’s right, Kansa), for nearly $4,000 and an accompanying letter announcing that I had won a mega lottery.

Who couldn’t use an extra four grand in their checking account? But my keen instincts, the very same ones that led me to purchase a $1,200 Kirby vacuum cleaner in 1991 that now sits in my basement on Unused Appliance Death Row, told me that something wasn’t right.

For starters, I had never entered the so-called ‘Mega Lottery.’

I don’t know what the Mega Lottery is or how one enters. I do know this: if I ever win the Powerball drawing, first off, I have to buy a ticket. Second, if my ticket matches the winning numbers, I’m not going to get a letter and a phony check in the mail. It is up to me to hang onto that ticket for dear life, notify the Lottery authorities, and then have my teeth whitened so they flash during the television interviews.

Third, even though I haven’t won very many contests in my lifetime, I’m pretty sure there’s something terribly wrong with one that promises total winnings of US$98,000.00, and that the check I have in my hands is for payment of Non Resident Government Service tax (GST) Payable in Canada. Further, I have to contact an assigned claims agent to activate my check and receive further instructions on how to claim my winnings.

Last, there were just enough grammatical errors to make me suspect that the good people at Global Financial Inc. didn’t have time to proofread their letter, as they were too busy contriving schemes to convince people that you really can get something for nothing. They referred to me as the ‘second prized winner’ and said that my ticket (the one I didn’t buy) ‘drew the lucky winnings number.’

My consumer tip is this: if you or anyone you know ever receives one of these letters and real-looking but completely phony checks in the mail, enjoy a good laugh, run them through the shredder, and then indulge in a little retail therapy. It’s a reward for being way too smart to be hornswoggled by unscrupulous people who just want access to your bank account on the pretext of depositing money in it.

The moral of the story is this: there’s no such thing as a free lunch, but a good clearance sale is pretty darned close.

Life Stress Test

2008-08-24T21:38:00.002-05:00

I haven’t posted for a few weeks because, well, life’s been a bit stressful. Family reunions out of town, vacation, visitors, and more visitors…..events that have had me thinking about which life events have the potential to put people over the edge. That’s when I discovered the Life Stress Test.

It’s a great little tool available on the Internet that measures how much stress you’re under, based on life events. It assigns a score to these events and calculates a total score based on the stressful experiences in your life during the past one to two years. A score of 0 - 149 means you’re doing pretty well; 150 – 299 means medium susceptibility to stress and a need to practice relaxation, and a score of 300 and above means the potential for ‘a serious eruption or illness.’

You’ve probably heard of this test and would agree that events such as the death of a spouse (score: 100), getting fired (47), divorce (73), son/daughter leaving home (29), and even Christmas (12) can result in stress-related illnesses or even disease. The test suggests that if you are experiencing high stress you should learn effective coping skills or get outside help, which, and I’m going out on a limb here, the test’s authors can probably provide. For a modest fee.

I reviewed the list of stressful life events and my only criticism is this: the list isn’t complete enough. Living in the suburbs has its own special set of stressful life events. I have listed some of them below along with their corresponding scores.

Cat food with anti-hairball formula actually has reverse effect – 55

Favorite suit no longer fits – 50
Subsequent diet results in weight gain, not loss – 65

Son or daughter returns home – 55
With their toddler – 65
Who cries a lot – 75

Discovery of crow’s feet near eyes – 25
Discovery that anti-crow’s feet creams will cost $100 per month for the rest of your natural life – 50

Week of August temperatures in the 100s – 60
Seeing what it costs to cool the house during a week of August temperatures in the 100s – 90

High traffic en route to the city – 40
High traffic en route to the city and satellite radio is down – 70

Crab grass takes over lawn – 45
While carefully nurtured plants wither in summer heat - 75

Calculate the total score of the above events and you’ll get an idea of the kind of stress I’ve been dealing with. I’d sit down and try to relax while sipping on a perky Pinot Grigio but my favorite wine store doesn’t carry it anymore. In fact, I’m not sure the winemaker still makes it. Just add another 35 points to the total.

BlogHer Bits: Women's Wisdom

2008-07-18T22:59:00.005-05:00

During today’s BlogHer sessions I attended one facilitated by two entrepreneurs: Susan Mernit and Patricia Handscheigel. They’re both savvy and a touch sassy - and I mean that in a good way. Susan has been developing a software product that will be beta-tested soon. Patricia founded stylediary.net and sold it late last year to stylehive.com. They were well-suited to lead a discussion about the lives and thoughts of women entrepreneurs.

Whether you're a full-time entrepreneur, serial entrepreneur, or simply watching from the sidelines, you can benefit from the nuggets of wisdom these women have gleaned from both triumphs and setbacks. I wrote their observations down as quickly as my pen would write. Hearing what they’ve learned in their life stories was like discovering the keys to the queendom. Except everyone gets the keys, and everyone gets to be the queen. If not of her world, at least of her own life.

Inner challenges are the hardest to overcome. You shouldn’t ask, “Who am I to do this?” but rather, “Who am I not to do this?”

A great entrepreneur is someone who can live in chaos and uncertainty. Entrepreneurs say, “I think there’s a better way.”

Follow your passion.

Sometimes what holds us back is not the glass ceiling but the sticky floor.

Don’t let anyone discredit your value.

Success is about persistence. Keep fighting your way through.

Figure out how to keep going no matter what.

Your recovery strategy is what’s important; avoiding mistakes is not.

Know that you need help. Ask for mentors.

Combine believing in what you’re doing with riding through the absolute fear.

You must have three things: 1. Passion about your interests. 2. Truth – be real, be honest about what’s going on. 3. Belief in yourself. The ones who fail stop believing in themselves. (Note: these words of wisdom came from a male participant in the group whose name, I believe, was Mikhail.)

I keep moving.

Play to your strengths. I’m not good at everything and I don’t have time to learn everything. Find someone at a price you can afford who can help free you to focus on what you have a track record of being successful at.

Stand tall within yourself. Define what success means and stay true to your entrepreneurial vision.

Entrepreneurship is like a soccer game – sometimes you’re running, sometimes you’re kicking, sometimes you’re sitting on the bench.

Failure is in the eye of the beholder. You’re in charge of how you’re going to view what’s happened.

Balance is great but balance doesn’t make you great.

You Know You Have a Bad Cold When....

2008-07-18T07:35:00.004-05:00

....you make a phone call and the person who answers says, "Just a minute, sir, I'll be right with you," and you're NOT a sir.

....it's 85 to 90 degrees outside, the sun is shining, and you're shivering like a Chihuahua.

....your ears are so stopped up you can't even hear yourself think.

....but you can hear yourself breathe.

....you'd like to wake up and smell the coffee but you can't. Smell the coffee, that is. Not even Starbucks bold flavor of the day.

....you wonder if anyone would mind if you just wore your pajamas to work.

Disco Fever

2008-07-06T21:21:00.016-05:00

Over the holiday weekend I was rifling through a stack of magazines when I came across an advertisement that caught my eye primarily because it was the only one not promoting yet another new medication that I should talk to my doctor about.

The ad was for car insurance. The target audience was presumably anyone who can remember the 70s from actually having been there, not from watching tv reruns on Nick at Nite. The headline read ‘Disco Fever.’ Answering yes to three or more of the disco-related questions implied that you are still stuck in the 70s. It was a lighthearted attempt to connect with baby boomers by reminding us of the artifacts of our youth such as platform shoes, 8-track tapes, and John Travolta’s dance moves.

I chuckled at the memories and then noticed another part of the ad. It was a list of hit disco songs, including “Let’s Get It On,” by Marvin Gaye; “Love to Love You Baby” by Donna Summer; and “Stayin’ Alive” by the Bee Gees. As I scanned the list I realized that I have loaded every single one of those songs onto my iPod and listen to them semi-regularly.

It was a sobering moment of truth, like understanding that the reason people have been smiling at you for the last hour is not because of your dazzling brilliance, but because you have a large piece of spinach dangling from your front teeth. The advertising people were laughing at, not with, me.

I can’t deny it: I have Disco Fever. I loved disco music during its heyday and still do. Certainly my musical horizons have broadened over the years. But science fiction writers couldn’t invent a better machine to take me back in time than songs from the era when I was carefree and cool (or thought I was). Just a few measures of that booming electronic drum kit mixed with a syncopated bass beat and in an instant I'm 18 years old, dancing in my own Dance Dance Revolution. And I know I'm not alone in feeling this way.

Yet many of my disco-loving contemporaries hesitate to admit that their feet twitch just a little when they hear “I Will Survive” by Gloria Gaynor or “I'm Your Boogie Man” by KC and the Sunshine Band. Perhaps they fear being ridiculed if their peers find out, the way many Republicans are feeling these days.

Of course I can’t blame people for being cautious about admitting to a penchant for a musical genre that spawned some curious products, such as Qiana knit shirts and exotic mixed drinks made with beer. Let me explain.

Here in the Midwest during the late 70s many of us enjoyed a hotspot called Pogo's. Pogo's was the hip, happening place for young college students who weren't old enough to go to real nightclubs. A personable, poodle-haired deejay named Greg Gann spun tunes from a booth that looked out over a dance floor made of colored lights timed to light up with the beat of the music.

Even more memorable, however, were the special drinks and the commemorative Pogo's glass they were served in. Beer, orange juice, and grenadine topped with a cherry was the most popular combo. These imaginative concoctions were due to Kansas liquor laws at that time. Nightclubs for the 18 – 20 year-old set could serve lower alcohol content beer (called “three-two” beer) but not wine or spirits. You couldn't drink an actual Tequila Sunrise but you could sip on the beer imitation and pretend it was the real thing.

In the end, whether you have Disco Fever or not, if you survived the era, that alone is a victory. But if you want to know where I sort the true disco lovers from those who can merely recall songs of the late 70s, it’s with a single by Dan Hartman called “Instant Replay.” If you get happy feet when you hear that song, you’ve got the Fever. I've talked to my doctor about it and the only known cure is to dance until it goes away.

When It's NOT The Thought That Counts

2008-06-30T23:01:00.006-05:00

Many times in my life, more than I would like to admit, I have found myself at an important place of decision making. This place is an intersection, where cluelessness meets good intentions. At this intersection should be a sign that reads "It's NOT The Thought That Counts."

I venture to guess you have found yourself there as well. The way we all arrive at this place is by wanting to do something good for someone else, but not having the slightest idea what that good thing might be or how to do it. That’s when good intentions go awry, like the person who tried to perform a random act of kindness by baking a cake and leaving it on her neighbor’s porch as a surprise. The family dog discovered the cake instead and ate it, becoming terribly ill. Not only that, but the dog required an emergency trip to the vet, stomach pumping, intravenous fluids, and an overnight stay. The total bill for this random act of baking kindness was about $500.00.

So it was with a random act of baking kindness I performed many years ago when I was a young bride. We had just bought our first house that summer and not long after the move learned that a neighbor two doors from us had died. She was an older woman who lived with her daughter, and although we had never met either of them, I decided it would be a neighborly gesture to bake a loaf of pumpkin bread to be shared with visitors stopping by to express their condolences.

When I think of pumpkin bread what comes to mind is Thanksgiving and Christmas and large groups of people eating as though they are preparing for three months in hibernation. Pumpkin and fall are as linked together as watermelon and summer. Pumpkin bread is not a food you typically associate with barbecues, picnics, and high temperatures in the 90s.

Nevertheless, armed with my new Betty Crocker cookbook, a can of pumpkin in the pantry, and all the requisite spices, I eagerly set about the task ahead of me. This poor grieving neighbor whose name I did not know would at least know a measure of comfort that only Betty herself could bring.

As I emptied the can of pumpkin into the mixture of eggs, sugar, butter, flour, and assorted spices, something troubled me. A slight metallic scent permeated the air. Had the pumpkin gone bad? Nonsense, I told myself. Canned goods last for at least a year. This particular can of pumpkin had been purchased no more than eight months ago. It was fine.

The odor continued to bother me as I mixed the batter. I decided that if it still didn’t smell right I would throw it out and not even bake the bread. The last thing I wanted was to present a toxic gift to a grieving neighbor.

And so, without turning off the mixer, I leaned down to catch a whiff. In a moment I felt the sensation of a beater pressed against my face and a motor vibrating next to my head. Apparently the mixer had grabbed a lock of my hair and wasn’t letting go.

The sensation of a motor-powered beater yanking my scalp was not unlike what I imagine a facelift might feel like. My skin was being pulled so tightly I could barely move my lips to call for help.

Help arrived, and together we untwisted the lock of hair that had become tangled in the beater. A triangle of smooth white flesh appeared over my ear where the hair used to be. There was no blood and no injuries - just wounded pride over making such a silly, preventable mistake. Of course I tossed the batter. Later I baked a batch of cookies. Without using the mixer.

I learned many lessons from this incident. But the one that has stuck with me the longest is this: when you find yourself at the intersection of good intentions and cluelessness, it really isn't the thought that counts. A good intention that goes awry can create as much havoc as a practical joke. If you want to express sympathy do what we do here in the suburbs and send a thoughtful note, perhaps with a gift card enclosed. It's practical and unlike a random act of baking kindness, there's little possibility of injuring either yourself or someone else.

Pigmentally Challenged

2008-06-24T21:07:00.003-05:00

When I was a scrawny adolescent in a hurry to become the Person I Was Meant To Be, I wanted in the worst way to look like the shapely bikini-clad models in the tanning lotion commercials.

They promised a transformation from washed-out wallflower to bronzed beauty in just a few short hours. After many afternoons of dutifully dragging my beach towel, transistor radio, and a large glass of Diet-Rite outdoors I understood something that the good folks at Coppertone had neglected to mention: some people, no matter how long they lie in the sun, will never get the deep, dark tan portrayed by those fun-loving, beach-cavorting youth.

No, some of us are pigmentally challenged. We can’t, and we shouldn’t, lie out in the sun. Because we now know that a tan is your skin’s reaction to the sun’s damaging rays, and that when you get to be a middle-aged adult like me the cumulative effect of all that sun will be to look like a leather boot.

Today I wouldn’t dream of lying in the sun to get a tan. In addition to the health hazards, there’s far too much perspiration involved. But I do like to wear shorts when it’s hot. That’s where tan-in-a-bottle comes in. Those same good folks at Coppertone have made it easy for the pigmentally challenged to achieve a surfer’s sun-kissed look merely by applying sunless tanning lotion.

The trick is not to over or under apply. This advice has proven to be much more difficult to follow. Which is why my bathroom cabinet has become a warehouse for multiple bottles of various brands of sunless tanning lotion and spray.

Bottle #1: Was purchased prior to the Habitat for Humanity Build I participated in last month on the Mississippi Gulf Coast. I thought if I could just get a little color on my legs and arms I wouldn’t look so much like Boo Radley. Following the directions I showered, shaved, and exfoliated. Three hours later, I applied the lotion to what was left of my skin. The bottle guaranteed that this product was streak-free.

The next morning I woke up and was horrified to see that, far from the outdoorsy “Survivor” contestant image I was hoping to project, my legs resembled that of a café awning, with stripes in varying shades of skin tone. Not only that, but the tanning lotion made every light freckle much darker, so that I appeared to have a skin disease to go along with my stripes.

Bottle #2: Undaunted, I was ready to try again a few weeks later after the first fake tan of summer had faded. This time I purchased a bottle of self-tanning mist that promised a 360 degree continuous spray and ultra-even application. I just knew I was going to wake up with legs like a tennis player’s.

Instead, I resembled a brindled cow. I could see large circular patches of color with gaps of pale skin in between. The color was beautiful, it just wasn’t consistent.

Bottle #2, Attempt #2: Over the weekend I decided to give the self-tanning mist another try. Reasoning that I had learned much from my mistakes I optimistically applied the mist in one steady spray up and down my legs without stopping.

I had never seen anything go so horribly wrong. Apparently gravity forced the steady spray I had applied so carefully to collect in a runny pool on the back of my heels, causing a discoloration that looked like I’d had an accident with a can of Krylon. And despite my attempts to cover every square inch from the knees on down, I had still missed some spots.

Perhaps I should join other pigmentally challenged people who embrace their paleness. After all, it’s the way God made us. Still, I’m not ready to give up. I understand Coppertone has a new product out. It’s called “Endless Summer Gradual Tan.” Better yet, one reviewer says it’s dummy-proof.

Summer Fun

2008-06-20T23:08:00.004-05:00

If my last post seemed critical of moms who want their children to do more than sit in front of the tv all summer long, I did not properly convey my sentiments. I am all for kids being able to think creatively and explore new worlds without having to worry about report cards. You and I know that some parents do go a bit overboard, though, failing to balance activities with down time. The end result is that the whole family can get to be pretty cranky, which leads to some pretty joyless memories.

The fact is, I, too, enjoyed many varying summer activities during my childhood, including classes in Journalism, Public Speaking, Typing, and German at Adams Elementary. To get to school, we carpooled with a neighborhood family. The mother drove a beat-up station wagon and the kids looked as though they had just gotten out of bed, tousled hair and sheet imprints still on their faces. When they pulled up in our driveway, and this is the truth, they were still eating breakfast.

I don’t mean noshing on a few Cheerios from a Tupperware container the way little kids do at church; when I say cereal I mean the full meal deal. By the time they got to our house what was left in the bowl was curdling milk and a few pieces of soggy Lucky Charms that had ceased to be magically delicious. My sister and I rode silently, our teeth clenched and our bodies plastered against the doors to limit the surface area that could potentially be exposed to airborne sour milk if Mrs. S drove too quickly over the railroad tracks. It seemed like so much work to take the bowls out to the car, eat, and then figure out how to dispose of the remaining cereal and milk when all this family needed to do was just wake up ten minutes earlier and eat breakfast at home.

For several years my summer activities included swimming. Based on the number of lessons I took I should be able to do much more than dog paddle from one end of the pool to the other, but sadly, swimming just didn’t take. Even as a kid I was so nearsighted that taking out my contacts in order to swim meant that I could barely distinguish people, let alone those long ropes that demarcate the swim lanes. Once I actually swam under the rope and ended up in a different lane without knowing it. The coach was so baffled as to be utterly speechless when I climbed out of the pool to head for the showers. That’s when I switched to band.

Band meant playing the flute with a bunch of other kids playing instruments and trying to create a sound approximating music. Whoever takes on band director as a career should certainly be nominated for sainthood. If they’re really up for a challenge, they work in teaching kids to march in formation while playing their instruments. I imagine what keeps many band directors going is the hope that some day, one of their students may end up playing in the USC Trojan Marching Band.

That never happened to me. But some of those summer activities did have staying power. Typing class has paid off many, many times over. Journalism and public speaking introduced me to the idea that a person actually could earn a living writing and talking, which is pretty much what I do, with a little bit of thinking thrown in.

In other words, summer activities really can lead to new skills and happy memories. But do your kids a favor: give them time to just have fun. And for heaven’s sake, wake up ten minutes early and eat breakfast at home. You don’t want your car to smell like sour milk.

More Bounce to the Ounce

2008-06-17T23:07:00.007-05:00

Summer is almost here, by the calendar, but for many of us the first day of summer is signaled by a dramatic change in routine or weather. For kids here in the suburbs, the first day of summer is often the Friday before Memorial Day, the first of what they hope will be many lazy days of sleeping in, doing only what they want, and text messaging friends when they could just pick up the phone and talk to them.

In contrast, for overachieving alpha moms, the official start of summer begins with a rigorous schedule of activities like swim lessons, gymnastics, horseback riding, art appreciation classes, and space camp all tightly rolled into one day with a few stops along the way for sustenance. In a household with multiple kids, constantly ferrying them from one enriching experience to the next can be more work than work itself, which is why I have always held a steady job.

However, for those of us who are wine lovers, the first day of summer is the day we begin keeping the refrigerator stocked with our favorite Chardonnays, Pinot Grigios, and Rosés. So enthusiastic are we about the wines of summer that space-wise, we have to decide between allowing room in the fridge for the mayonnaise jar or another bottle of our favorite summer beverage. Bye-bye, Hellman’s! See you in the fall!

Such was the case in my household when chilly overcast days gave way to rainy overcast days. The weather still wasn’t suitable for a good barbecue, but the need for a raincoat instead of an overcoat meant we’d transitioned to another season.

It was on one of those days when I opened a bottle of my favorite Chardonnay in anticipation of some quiet time on the deck with my thoughts and the latest life-changing issue of O, the Oprah Magazine. I am no wine expert but I know what I like and St. Francis Chardonnay is a great way to ease into summer. It’s consistent from season to season and while it’s fashionable among some oenophiles to scorn buttery oaky Chardonnays like they’re the WalMart of wines, I like them.

Not every day, not for every occasion. But for me, starting off the summer wine season with a dependable Chardonnay like St. Francis is like starting a baseball game with the National Anthem. Provided Roseanne Barr isn’t singing.

There I was, taking a quick sniff before my first sip. I detected the scent of wildflowers, meadows, perfume…..unusual for a dependable Chardonnay that hints of pear and vanilla. I sipped. Interesting and not expected at all. Perhaps one of the perfume ads in O had somehow overpowered the wine?

Impossible. I hadn’t even cracked open the magazine. And yet the wine did have a perfume-y taste, like the time I took a cup of coffee into the bathroom while getting ready for work one morning. I had given myself a last-minute spritz of my favorite body scent before heading out and, had I not been driving along a busy highway where such an action could have endangered many lives, I might have swerved off the road. The taste was that vile.

This time the flavor wasn’t dreadful, because, obviously, I wasn’t drinking a shot of perfume, but still, it was a mystery.

A mystery soon solved with a little serendipitous detective work. I poured out the wine, washed the glass, mindlessly dried it with a towel while wondering what domestic discord Dr. Phil would solve in 90 words or less, and discovered the culprit. The towel had been part of a laundry load dried along with a sheet of Bounce fabric softener.

And that, my friends, is how my first wine of the summer ended up with more Bounce to the ounce. Now if you should decide to play a cruel joke on someone who claims to be a wine aficionado, just don’t tell them you learned about it here on Suburban Blurbs.

New Shoes Blues

2008-06-14T07:57:00.010-05:00

The other day I found an especially attractive new suit at Macy’s in downtown Miami. I was there on business and wanted to look my best for a presentation the next day. It was lightweight, fit like a glove, and was discounted 20%. Don’t tell the people at Macy’s this, but I would have bought it even without the discount, it was that attractive.

This purchase posed a slight problem, however. The black espadrilles I had brought with me were far too casual to be worn with such elegant attire. Although they scored high on looks and comfort, they weren’t compatible with the suit. Wanting to hit on all cylinders for my presentation, I headed for the shoe department.

It was being run that afternoon solely by one person, a woman named Merle, who operated with authority and efficiency, the shoe store version of an air traffic controller. Merle directed customers from her command post behind the counter, where they brought her samples of the shoes they wanted to try on. She rang up satisfied customers and then quickly disappeared in the bowels of Macy’s where she retrieved shoe boxes for three people at a time.

Merle clearly knows her inventory. All she had to do was look at the style you wanted to purchase and right away she could find it if Macy’s had it. She could also tell you immediately if they didn’t. Even more amazing was the fact that a dozen or so women were in various stages of trying on shoes, modeling them, paying for them, or waiting patiently and NO ONE got upset. But here's what makes Merle a champion: she knows the sizes of all the display shoes without looking. She's that good.

After three attempts I found a pair that fit my feet as well as my shopping criteria, a pair of black patent pointy-toed pumps. The points are so severe that if I’m ever trapped in a vehicle or building I may be able to hack my way out simply by using my shoes. The heels apparently double as a hammer.

Purchases in hand, I floated out of Macy’s with that satisfied feeling you get when you know things are working out in life, like when the pizza delivery guy shows up less than a half hour from the time you called and the pizza is still mouth-searingly hot. It was a good omen for the start of a busy week away from home.

Appearance-wise, the combination of the suit and shoes was magical. But I wasn’t quite experiencing that same floaty feeling from the day before because the shoes were starting to pinch in a few places, like my heels, toes, and tops of my feet. “They just need some time to be broken in,” I rationalized. Later in the week I wore the same outfit to a different meeting, one that required more walking. By the end of the morning I was limping and wincing like someone who had sustained a groin injury.

A few bandages later the circulation in my feet was once again restored and I felt like a new person. I made it through the rest of the day with a smile on my face and continuing goodwill for humanity.

As for the shoes, they will be temporarily retired. I'll probably wear them again once the calluses on my feet build up to the point where I no longer feel the pain. Because here in the suburbs we all know it’s better to look good than to feel good.

If I Could Save Time in a Bottle...

2008-06-10T20:37:00.005-05:00

If you've taken a commercial flight anytime during the past two years you know that the days of hauling around the jumbo Costco-sized bottle of shampoo you keep in your shower are over. That is, if you want to carry your suitcase onto your flight, as opposed to checking it in.

In fact, any container holding a liquid or gel of more than three ounces is subject to removal from your bag. This is because one day SOMEONE on a flight had a HARMFUL liquid or gel that almost caused DEATH AND DESTRUCTION and now ALL OF US have the potential to do the same thing, so WE MUST PAY.

Not that I’m upset. However, this regulation effectively eliminates the qualification for carry-on nearly every HBA (health and beauty aid) purchase I have made, because 1) I buy the Costco size and 2) I am at that stage in life where I require a great deal of HBA just to leave the house every day. This attention to detail is a good thing, particularly for loved ones and colleagues.

Normally on a business trip I just pack all of the required HBA and then check in my suitcase, leaving the business of hauling all those potentially lethal hair gels and toothpaste around to the airlines’ baggage handlers.

But due to some timing issues in getting from one place to another, I was forced on this six-day trip to pack as efficiently as a Sherpa in order to avoid checking in my luggage. Never before had I compressed six days worth of clothing, shoes, and HBA into my smallest Samsonite suitcase AND been able to zip it shut.

This was a challenge, another on my life list of things to accomplish before going to that great security check in the sky. By the way, I will definitely know if I’ve gone to the place of fire and flames if I encounter any of the humorless TSA agents I have met in this life.

The key to making this work is to purchase a set of very tiny HBA and/or some miniature plastic bottles, the kind Gulliver would have discovered in Lilliput. Then spend a couple of hours pouring and condensing your daily beauty routine into these small bottles. Be sure to label the bottles appropriately so that you don’t make a big mistake that could be difficult to fix, such as using self-tanning lotion as eye makeup remover.

THEN fit all of the tiny bottles into a quart-sized zip-loc bag. You will need to show this bag to the TSA agent while you are also removing your shoes, belt, metal jewelry, jacket, placing your keys in a small bowl, putting your laptop in a bin of its own, all without misplacing your boarding pass. It’s a juggling act worthy of the Barnum and Bailey Circus.

This is where good decision-making skills come in handy. Because I decided that blush is neither a liquid nor a gel, I placed it in my combination makeup/pharmacy bag along with the eye shadow and eye pencil. Liquid foundation, however, had to go into the zip-loc. After several hours of practicing artful arranging, I successfully fit my products into the bag.

Just for fun I computed how much time I will save once I arrive in Boston tomorrow and can exit the plane with my suitcase in hand instead of waiting for it at the baggage carousel: about 30 minutes. So for six hours of work (shopping, condensing, arranging, condensing, arranging some more) I will save a half hour.

But it’s worth it. I think I’ll carry on from here on out. Because as maddening as the whole process of miniaturizing HBA is, just try going without it at all. That’s what can happen if you get on the wrong side of a humorless TSA agent and your bags end up in Guam. And me without HBA is a lethal weapon we do not want to unleash on anyone, not even sworn enemies.

Swirling Suds and Memories

2008-06-06T22:36:00.004-05:00

When I bought my charming country cottage in the city several years ago I knew it needed modernizing. I soon replaced a pair of cumbersome, counterweighted garage doors with a sleek single door and an electric opener. I gutted the flamingo pink bathroom. And I considered installing a dishwasher.

For years I put off making that improvement.

When friends asked, “Are you ever going to get a dishwasher?” I responded with an exasperated homeowner’s frown, hoping to obtain their sympathy. I complained that my kitchen was too tiny; I simply couldn’t give up the cabinet space. The truth was, I didn’t mind doing dishes by hand. In fact, it was the one household chore I didn’t mind doing every day.

What could be satisfying about a sink full of dirty dishes and steaming suds? Maybe it’s in the doing – the mindless work of swishing the dishcloth over plates, bowls and silverware, knowing they are spotless. Tomorrow I will have meetings to attend, budget crises to resolve, and children who need reminding to change the cat litter.

But here in this little corner of the world, everything’s in order. Cups, saucers and pans are clean and put away. The countertops sparkle and the stovetop shines, thanks to lemon dishwashing liquid, hot water and my own muscle. All is well as I turn off the light and go to bed, pleased with a job well done.

Or maybe washing dishes by hand connects me to another time and place where dishwashers didn’t exist – my grandparents’ home in a small Nebraska farm town. Holidays meant a happy swirl of their twelve children, their spouses and an ever-increasing number of grandchildren. At my grandparents’ home, the kitchen was the heart and Grandma was its soul. It was where you usually found her, expertly turning out Thanksgiving dinners that included mountains of real mashed potatoes, giblet gravy and ended with homemade sour cream raisin pie.

Afterward the men gathered in the living room to watch football while my mother and her sisters, all seven of them, formed an assembly line that would have taught Henry Ford a thing or two about efficiency. They lined up to wash, rinse, dry and put away enough dishes to fill two dishwashers, finishing in half the time it would have taken just to complete the rinse cycle.

The sisters-in-law joined the group, too, and over the years we granddaughters were invited to help. Washing dishes marked a transition from childhood to womanhood. And there was no better place to celebrate the change than among my kin in Grandma’s kitchen.

I suspect there was a reason why my grandmother never insisted on installing a dishwasher in her kitchen, a reason that had nothing to do with tough times or conserving electricity. At the end of a big meal everyone was full and content. Babies began their naps, children went off to play, and the men either went back to work on the farm or to watch the current bowl game. For an hour or so, the women could just be girls. While drying and stacking plates together they giggled, sharing the funny things their children said and husbands did.

The first time I ever saw my grandmother laugh so hard she cried was while washing dishes. I’ve long forgotten the story that sent tears rolling down her crinkled cheeks, but I’ll always remember her joy at sharing the secret delight of women laughing together while doing “their” work, turning a task into a treasure of time.

A few months ago I finally broke down and installed a dishwasher. I had convinced myself that it would add to the resale value of my home, enhancing its overall appearance. I admit it has its benefits. For one, my son is much more willing to empty the dishwasher now than he was to wash, rinse, dry and put away the dishes after dinner.

But lately I’ve found myself filling the sink with hot sudsy water to wash cake pans, mixing bowls, skillets and other cookware too large to fit in the dishwasher…and then washing the rest of the dishes one by one. “Might as well wash my good knives by hand since the sink’s full,” I rationalize. “I really need to give this coffee mug a good scrubbing,” I say aloud to no one. I wash, I rinse, I dry alone, and for a brief time I am 16 again, stacking Corelle dinnerware with my adored grandmother in her kitchen.

What If The Big One Comes?

2008-06-05T21:36:00.013-05:00

It didn't tonight. And thousands of us in south central Kansas are glad.

My favorite meteorologist, Mike Smith of WeatherData, warned yesterday that today's weather conditions replicated a pattern from June 8, 1974, when three dozen tornadoes touched down in the southern plains. Being a lifelong resident of Kansas I take tornado warnings very seriously. Those who have seen me tote around my portable weather radio all day long might say a bit too seriously.

I just want to have a fighting chance if the Big One comes. Today's advance notice was the most serious threat this year, so I immediately went into tornado preparedness mode. My goal: minimal damage to family, home, and of course, my lipstick collection.

Regarding family, until today I was the only one who owned her own Oregon Scientific Portable Weather Radio. To share the joy I bought one for my daughter and one for my parents so that they, too, could be awakened in the middle of the night by the radio's jarring high-pitched alarm.

Then I worked assembling my disaster preparedness kit. The Red Cross advises having:

1) a first aid kit and essential medications
2) foods that don't require cooking or refrigeration and a manual can opener
3) bottled water
4) flashlights
5) a battery-powered radio with extra batteries and other emergency items for the whole family.

Diane, my trusted hair artist, suggested these items:

6) a pickaxe in case you have to hack your way out of a pile of debris
7) long pants and a long-sleeved shirt to protect your skin

To be honest, I forgot about the first aid kit or medications, so focused was I on finding a pickaxe. In an effort to be efficient and get home as quickly as possible, I visited WalMart, the standard for one-stop shopping, where you can have your tires rotated, eat lunch, pick up some plants for the garden, and buy canned goods for your disaster preparedness kit all under one roof.

Unfortunately, you cannot find a pickaxe on the tool aisle. At least I couldn't. Colorful fishing lures of every size and shape imaginable, yes, pickaxes (or any kind of ax), no.

Once home, I quickly assembled a food box of non-perishables by grabbing the first few items I could find in the pantry. Were I to become trapped in my own basement, my next few meals would consist of four different types of canned beans, a jar of minced garlic, and a bottle of pickapeppa sauce, the theory being that I could then blast myself out from under the debris on my own power. If you know what I mean.

Knowing that the wine cellar is in the basement, and that if it really is the Big One I would rather be sipping a really velvety Cabernet with notes of blackberry and oak than bottled water, I included a corkscrew and plastic wineglass in my kit.

I also included amenities, such as a big fluffy pillow, a thick comforter, and some essentials, such as the remote to the plasma tv. When the siren went off, I moved downstairs with confidence. I was ready to spend the entire evening and even the night holed up inside my tornado shelter.

But the tornadoes were never a serious threat, at least not in my little suburb. I hope they didn't menace anyone else, either. It rained only a little, and I never lost power.So the Big One didn't come today. Far from being disappointed, I'm relieved. But once the siren sounded and I was safely downstairs I realized one thing: I had forgotten to retrieve the lipsticks.

Perhaps I don't need to take the entire collection to the basement. I'll just put a couple of spares in the disaster preparedness kit. Because it's a disaster of a different kind if a cute rescuer shows up and a gal doesn't have on her lipstick.

The Drumbeat Red Goes On

2008-06-02T21:29:00.004-05:00

Perhaps you are wondering why I have so many lipsticks arranged in ascending order beginning with 103 – Revlon’s "Caramel Glacé" and ending with 892, L’Oréal’s “Raisin Rapture.” I have wondered that myself, and believe I have found the reason.

It is this: I am a sucker for almost any advertisement that claims, however subtly, to make me look as gorgeous as the model in the photo.

Which explains Drumbeat Red.

The cutout of the model on L’Oréal’s lipstick display was nearly full-size. She had pale skin and blue eyes like me. And the red lipstick she wore was just right. Not overly garish, yet not invisibly subtle. She was provocative but in an innocent way, like, “Aw, shucks, I didn’t think I’d look THIS great with just a little ol' tube of red lipstick!”

Add to that the rainy day effect. When it’s raining and you can’t carry an umbrella, purse, briefcase AND cup of coffee all at the same time, you sacrifice the umbrella. You get a good soaking, at least on the head, and maybe even the legs, if a thoughtless driver splashes you.

It must have been raining that day. I’m almost certain of it. And I was traveling, far from home. The model's hand was extended, the lipstick like a torch. The store display flashed a subliminal message.

‘Come, you tired, you poor,
You drenched masses yearning to be free
of the wretched refuse of your soaked clothing.
Come to me, I lift my red lipstick up
Inside the Target door….’

Or something like that.

I thought, if all that is standing between me looking fantastic, the way this model does, and the drowned rat I am now, is a tube of Drumbeat Red….count me in!

And before you could say “Cat in the Hat” I was the proud owner of a new tube of Drumbeat Red, L’Oréal Number 310.

I returned to my hotel room and immediately applied the treasure. There were no dinners, no appointments that evening, just quiet time to work and read. But I was excited. Any minute I knew the Drumbeat Red would work its magic, transforming me from wethead to vamp.

After working on my computer for an hour or so I saw myself in the mirror. The Drumbeat Red had spread. Small dots of it appeared around my mouth and on my cheeks, even on the backs of my hands and my sweater. My only explanation for this was that perhaps I had pursed my lips and chewed on my pen while concentrating, spreading Drumbeat Red like a virus.

I realized that if I weren’t careful, I’d have red muck all over the hotel room like the Pepto-pink in “The Cat in the Hat Comes Back.” I thought, “I need Voom, and I need it NOW!”

Lucky for me, a few tissues wiped up the spread of red, erasing forever the fantasy that a tube of lipstick was all I needed to be glamorous. I felt more like the character Bette Davis played in “Whatever Happened to Baby Jane”, an aging actress who, among other cardinal sins, was unable to keep lipstick within her lip lines.

Yet I keep the tube of Drumbeat Red. If not a tube of hope, it’s certainly a tube of amusement on a rainy day.

Two, Two, Two Tubes in One

2008-06-01T22:06:00.003-05:00

My colleague Paula is a very smart cookie. But frequent travel has a way of making even smart cookies crumble, or at least lose a chocolate chip once in awhile.

[Note: Paula said I could share this story, for which I am grateful.]

Paula worked at the Habitat for Humanity Pascagoula site in Mississippi along with several of us from Knight Foundation. Toward the end of the week she broke out into painfully itchy hives on her face. This had never happened to her before, and she was eager to find a solution.

The hives bothered her so much that she went to the First Aid tent on site for a remedy. She was given a dose of Benadryl along with the advice not to operate any power tools. In fact, the First Aid team recommended that she go back to her hotel.

Meanwhile, another colleague asked me if I had a remedy. Perhaps she knew that, due to the size of the suitcase I typically carry, I always have a small pharmacy on hand. True to form, I had a tube of anti-itch cream. In fact, I had two.

I gave Paula the tube with more cream and hoped it would help.

It did, in more ways than one. Because shortly after our trip, Paula traveled again, this time to Washington DC. Being exhausted, she didn't look carefully at the tube of anti-itch cream and began brushing her teeth with it.

In her words, "My tongue didn't itch all day. Crazy. I travel with few cosmetics so without looking am used to grabbing the only tube which always is toothpaste. I really need the weekend off!!!"

I'm certainly glad her teeth didn't itch. I'm also glad she didn't ask for a tube of Superglue. We need her at the office, not in the hospital having her lips unsealed!

But she shouldn't be too hard on herself. I purchased the tubes of toothpaste and anti-itch cream featured in the above photo earlier today. You can see how much they resemble each other in size, shape, and color scheme. It wouldn't be too much of a stretch to grab the hydrocortisone cream, squeeze it onto your toothbrush, and not realize until you were swishing around a mouthful of it that you'd made a mistake.

I'm seeing a business opportunity here for an earnest entrepreneur with a potential payoff that could surpass that of the Ginsu Knife: a combination toothpaste/anti-itch compound that perhaps also has the added benefit of improving crow's feet around the eyes. This could really be a boon to all of us business travelers who very nearly fill TSA's requisite quart-sized Ziploc bag with all of our HBA (Health and Beauty Aids).

No, Paula, far from making a mistake, you just might be onto something big. Just don't ask me for any Superglue, because I don't carry that in my pharmacy.

Record-Setting Rain

2008-05-31T22:45:00.005-05:00

Today was the last day of the month. It rained early this morning with some golf ball-sized hail thrown into the mix.

These days I don't worry too much about hail as long as the Blazer is safe. I certainly don't worry the way I did when the boat took up the entire garage and the Blazer had to stay outside. There were a few crazy times when I parked it in a nearby parking garage and walked home during a thunderstorm, lightning flashing all around me. (Note that I didn't worry about hail thumping my head, only my vehicle). That's how much I fear hail damage.

Now I have room in the garage for the Blazer, but a new worry has replaced the old one. What if the hail crashes through the two skylights? As the hail pounded early this morning, I lay there immobilized, wondering how I would solve such a problem.

Luckily I didn't have to. Instead I went about my day wondering when the rain cloud that has been residing over Wichita might migrate to Death Valley or Phoenix. I tuned into the Weather Channel to see if their meteorologists had any insights regarding when things will start drying out. They shared this: there is a high probability we will get MORE rain tomorrow.

They also shared that our rainfall for this month is 290% times the average for May, with a record 12.8 inches.

It shows - my herb garden is thriving. For the first time this year I harvested some sweet basil to make bruschetta, which was delicious. But I feel as though I live in Panama. It's muggy, sticky, and hot. Not only that, but this evening I discovered more dampness in the basement. The carpet in one corner is soaked.

Sigh. Wet basements, too, are part of the excitement of living on the edge of the city. The very, very wet city.

I Can See Clearly Now

2008-05-30T22:54:00.006-05:00

For most of my life now I have worn corrective lenses. I discovered a need for them when I was about six years old, visiting my grandmother for Christmas in her rambling old Victorian home on the outskirts of Clearwater, Nebraska. My dad had several brothers, most of them tall men with long wool overcoats they hung inside the front door.

Being a child, and short, and as I would later learn, as nearsighted as Mr. Magoo, I bumped into the rack of coats. Promptly and politely I apologized to it. When I realized I had just spoken to an inanimate object and not one of my uncles, I quickly looked around to see if anyone had noticed. Not that I would have seen them – they would have appeared as a fuzzy blur somewhere in my peripheral vision.

Welcome to the world of myopia, a genetic gift handed down through my mother’s side of the family. Apparently the gene for nearsightedness is so dominant that when scientists observe it on the DNA helix, it can be seen brandishing a small sword that it uses to wipe out its competitors, which are the genes for the eyesight of a hawk. You can see just how dominant the myopia gene is at a family reunion of my mother, her siblings, and my cousins.

Especially if there’s a gathering that takes place late in the evening, when the eyeglasses start coming out. Not readers (I now have those, too), but the thick-lensed spectacles we wear around the house after taking out our contact lenses for the day. After a few glasses of wine, to really get the party going, we’ll start discussing diopters and astigmatism in order to determine which one of us truly has the poorest eyesight. Unfortunately, the winner is also the loser, the poor chap whose eyeglasses have the thickest lenses.

Not that I’m complaining. I am thrilled to live in an era when myopia doesn’t have to be such an obvious flaw as, for example, the decision to wear Mom jeans or black nail polish. Thanks to contact lenses many of us with defective vision can proudly stand side-by-side with our eagle-eyed peers and no one has to know. Unless a hair or speck of dirt touches our eye. Then we’re blinking madly like Andy Kaufman’s “Foreign Man” character.

But even the near-perfect solution of contact lenses has its hazards. The most notable one occurs when you mistakenly put in the wrong lens. I am careful to put the right lens in its proper half of the case, the one where the lid has a giant R stamped on it, but every so often I get distracted.

What results is this: the next morning, filled with optimism and coffee, I put in the mixed-up contacts. Sometimes I don’t notice immediately what I have done. But it’s obvious once I start tooling down the road and can’t see anything clearly. My first thought is, I wonder if this is what it’s like to have a stroke. My second thought is, even with corrective lenses I’m stumbling and bumbling around like Mr. Magoo. Oh Annie, you’ve done it again!

Mow, Or Not Mow

2008-05-29T21:54:00.009-05:00

Now that the rain has stopped, it is time to make a critically important decision. Mow, or not mow.

The threat that the lawnmower will disappear into the temporary marsh in my back yard lessens with each successive dry day, meaning that Saturday morning will probably be the perfect time to fire up the mower and get it done.

But I know myself, and what I know is that I will go through an hour of mental gymnastics whereby I delay the inevitable by getting immersed in some completely useless chore like organizing my lipsticks in ascending order based on the number printed on the bottom label (beginning with 103, Revlon’s "Caramel Glacé" and ending with 892, L’Oréal’s “Raisin Rapture.”) My friend Polly says this behavior is a sure sign of OCD; I say it’s just being more organized.

Yet I cannot lose myself entirely even in a task that requires all my powers of concentration; the grass dancing in the wind outdoors taunts me. This leads to another delay tactic, questioning and rationalization. “Do I really need to mow today? Could I wait until tomorrow, thus being gentler on the environment and my own lungs?”

Then one of two things happens: I eventually fire up the mower, but I’m grumpy because now I’ve just wasted 45 minutes doing something I now realize was utterly ridiculous, or I feel smug because I have accomplished something TRULY IMPORTANT that will make my life flow more smoothly and save time in the long run. But I will still have to mow.

Despite the seeming inconsistency of such behavior, I am insistent about this: I will not TRY to mow. I will not TRY to vacuum the living room rug, TRY to walk three miles on the treadmill, or TRY not to watch so many episodes of 'House Hunters'. I will not TRY to do anything. I will not use the word TRY unless it is followed by ‘ing’, as in, all this talk about TRY is TRYING my patience.

Think about it. If you tell someone you’ll TRY to do something you’ve given yourself a free pass not to do what you said you’d do.

“Please pick up a gallon of milk on the way home.”

“Okay, I’ll try to do that.”

But then you don’t, either because you never really cared to in the first place, or because you know you can say, well, I didn’t do it - at least I tried.

However, the end result is the same as though you had said, “NO! I WON’T buy any milk! Not at all! Forget it! Don’t ask me!”

Either way, you can't be counted on. Although the second scenario seems like defiant behavior, at least you were being honest about your intentions.

Luckily, in my household, where I am both queen of the castle and her hired help, this dialogue doesn’t take place very often. If I want milk, I can’t TRY to buy it. If I want a tidy lawn, I can’t TRY to mow. If I want to change my tv viewing habits, I can't give it the old college TRY. Because there is no try.

Which is what wise old Yoda said long ago. “Do, or do not. There is no try.” If he could, the Jedi Master might tell me, “Mow, or not mow. But don’t ever waste time arranging your lipsticks in ascending order. Because that’s not mastering the Force; it’s being mastered by it.”

No Time to Wallow in the Mire

2008-05-27T22:19:00.006-05:00

The average monthly rainfall in Wichita during May is 4.16 inches and in June it’s 4.25 inches. That means nearly two months of rain have fallen in just five days. THAT means my back yard has recently turned into a morass of muck and mud.

If I’d been a little kid I would have squealed and squished – squealed with joy at the opportunity to squish my toes in such pristine mud. But I'm not a little kid - I'm an adult who worried about the two window wells in the basement that kept filling up with water, almost to the glass. Another inch of water and the pressure would have pushed them in, allowing oozy mud to seep indoors.

Last night when I discovered this I started bailing water out of the wells, but the rain fell so hard and fast I had to come inside. I bailed again in the morning and then at intervals used a fountain pump to remove the water. Did any of this hard work make a difference? I’m not sure.

What it did was confirm that once upon a time in the life of my home and property, someone working on the landscape architecture either reversed the drawings or had a malfunctioning level that tilted the wrong way. My back yard slopes. Toward the house. Following is a dialogue that I imagine took place during the construction of my home, an era long ago, prior to GPS, cell phones, Facebook, and good restaurants in Las Vegas.

Landscape Guy #1: “Hey, shouldn’t the dump truck be closer to the house? Do we really want the dirt that far out?”

Landscape Guy #2: “Nah, fuhgettaboutit, we’ll just rake it in a nice little slope away from the house, sorta like this – hey, isn’t it time for lunch?”

There are places near the house that are like a miniature reservoir, with standing water six inches deep. Tufts of unmowed grass dot the yard like small islands. It’s possible to avoid most of the mud by leaping from one tuft of grass to the next. In contrast, the back of the lot looks normal. It’s almost a desert by comparison.

This is the most rain that has fallen in one month since I moved here. What I found today on http://www.wunderground.com/ (Weather Underground) confirms it:

“When it rains... OH can it pour. This is especially true in May 2008 as yesterday's record-shattering calendar day total of 3.23 inches at Wichita's Mid-Continent Airport for May 26th brought the monthly total to 11.45 inches. This easily breaks the monthly May record of 11.22 inches set 73 years ago which... oddly enough... was during the dustbowl era of the mid 1930s. Of this 11.45 inch rainfall total 6.31 inches... or 55 percent of the monthly total... drenched Wichita Mid-Continent in a 3-day period spanning the 24th through the 26th.”

There you have it. It rained the entire Memorial Day Weekend and it would be great to have the weekend again only with better weather. Squishing my toes in all that mud reminded me of something else kid-like: Can we have do-overs?

Rain, Rain, Go AWAY!

2008-05-26T21:24:00.006-05:00

Wherever you are in the world, if you watched The Weather Channel at all this weekend you may have noted that the entire state of Kansas has been marked in red, indicating a high probability of severe weather.

It has rained every day for the past four days, with several weather adventures happening every day. None of them tornadoes, thankfully, at least not in my little suburb. My heart goes out, though, to all the folks whose weather adventures were of the tornado type. Some people lost their cars, some their homes, and a few, their lives.

About six inches of rain have fallen here in the last four days. I knew it was getting bad when I went downstairs and found the cat adrift in the basement, clinging to a couch pillow with the remote in her paw.

Yes, Mother Nature is on a tear this spring. While I am thankful that a tornado has not leveled my home, I am finding all this water frustrating. My back yard has become a marsh. I fear I will need an airboat to get around it if the rain continues. While I always appreciate an excuse for not having to mow the lawn, today was different. I would much rather have mowed the back yard today than continue to hear the sound of rain pummeling my skylight. I did manage to mow the front before the latest deluge, a small victory on a very wet weekend.

During the brief break from rain I also planted some tomato plants in the mushy raised bed. If all goes well, in about 90 days I will have enough tomatoes to start a small salsa canning business. Of particular note is a hybrid called “Mr. Stripey” that features orange and red stripes. I don’t know how Mr. Stripey will taste on mayonnaise-slathered honey wheatberry bread, accompanied by his friends Mr. Bacon and Ms. Lettuce, but I was intrigued enough by his looks to purchase a couple of his plants to find out. I also planted a Roma, four Big Boys, and a couple of Beefsteak. There’s still room in the garden for more, but before I surrender the space to just any hybrid, I want to conduct additional research and locate some rare heirlooms to see if they will grow in my corner of the world.

But if this rain continues, Mr. Stripey and the Big Boys will float off before they have a chance to thrive. I just hope they don’t take the cat with them. She still has the remote.

Church

2008-05-25T22:39:00.004-05:00

Last night’s weather adventures meant that I was awake for 3 – 4 hours listening to the storm coverage along with the shrill early warning system I had purchased prior to tornado season. I woke up a bit later than usual, at 8:40, and realized that, due to my tightly scheduled day, the only opportunity I would have to go to church would be at 9:30. Fifty minutes.

I wasted four more minutes pondering this, to see if I could come up with a “God is everywhere” or “I serve my fellow man every day” loophole somewhere, but no. I either had to make the commitment to be there at 9:30 or forget it. I was meeting a friend for lunch, shopping for food, cleaning, cooking, and having my family over at 6 for a big dinner – pulled pork, corn on the cob, salad, potato salad, baked beans, and root beer floats.

There were no other possibilities. Also entering the decision equation was the fact that I had a half hour to get ready, which meant no coffee. NO COFFEE on Sunday morning!!!

When you’re a grown-up and no one’s watching, it can be very tempting to skip church and just pad around in your pjs on Sunday morning, drinking coffee, reading the paper, scarfing down last night’s leftovers for breakfast…. Lots of people do. I have. But the thing is, even when no one else is watching, I know. What I also know is this: I have been so blessed in my lifetime that I want to know this incredibly generous Creator even better.

At any rate I got myself together and went. The funny thing was this: the thoughts I had about going/not going, being an adult, who’s watching….all of these topics were covered in the homily by the priest. It was as though he took what had been in my head and turned it into a message for everyone.

I suspect that in the divine scheme of things it really was the other way around. The thoughts entered my head because they were already out there, ready for me to hear if I just made the commitment to go. The truth we seek is out there, but we have to take the time to listen.

Stormy Weather

2008-05-24T22:41:00.003-05:00

A couple of months ago, in anticipation of the severe weather season, I purchased a small hand-held weather radio. Like all things electronic, it requires reading a small manual written by a professional engineer prior to using it.

While this manual is much easier to read than the coffee-table sized book that came with my TiVo, I still couldn’t figure out how to program the radio so that the only weather alerts I would receive would be for the actual county where I reside, not the entire south central Kansas region.

I blame this on the fact that it was late and the print was tiny, not on the engineer who wrote the manual.

After fiddling around with the different settings, I finally figured out that “FR” on the screen meant Friday, not French. I went to sleep, secure in the knowledge that I would be appropriately alerted in my native language should a weather emergency arise.

And one did. I was awakened several times by the shrill buzz of the early warning alert system as a thunderstorm moved through several different counties adjacent to mine. While I have an odd fascination with severe weather, which is mostly a fascination with how not to be harmed by it, around midnight I also have a fascination with sleep. Which was being disturbed by my deceivingly small, yet loud, radio.

All the weather alert system has to do to get my attention is say either ‘golf ball-sized hail’ or ‘tornado warning’ and I go into ultra-readiness mode. My adrenalin kicks in as though I’ve just consumed a couple of Red Bull energy drinks. A few years ago, prior to moving to the suburbs, ultra-readiness mode meant driving to the nearest parking garage to protect my Blazer from hail damage. (The boat took up all the space in the garage. Now I have a bigger garage where both the boat and the Blazer safely reside).

I’ve seen how hail can reduce an awning into tattered strips of cloth, or make a car look like it’s been used for target practice. In 1991 I was in Andover about ¼ mile west of the tornado that struck. I was never in harm’s way, but I will always remember the black wall of destruction that reduced homes to piles of broken lumber and mud, sometimes leaving only a bathtub intact.

But last night there was no tornado in my area, just a powerful thunderstorm that moved into my neighborhood around 1:45 am. It wasn’t destructive, just windy and wet. As much water as it dumped I thought I might even be off the hook for mowing today.

I could have, I should have. But instead of mowing I found other things to do. Meanwhile, the weather radio is buzzing again. Severe thunderstorms in Sumner County. Sigh. I really need to get that thing figured out.

A Most Righteous Recipe

2008-05-23T21:10:00.008-05:00

On this, the eve of a much anticipated three-day weekend, we at Suburban Blurbs would like to recognize the fact that while many people will be traveling, many more from the suburbs, like me, will be enjoying a “staycation”.

A “staycation” is where you don’t go anywhere but the movies, mall, or market, staying at home to enjoy the harmless decadence of having time to drink coffee on the deck, read that stack of unread Bon Appetit and Cooking Light magazines (we like to explore both ends of the caloric spectrum), test new recipes, finally get around to view DVDs received as gifts at Christmas, put away the last of the Easter decorations, etc.

Some may have agreed to host a Memorial Day gathering for family and friends during their staycation. In an effort to help you make this a most pleasant event, I am sharing the following recipe that should wow your guests, if they like salmon. I found it in a recent issue of Southern Living on a full-page ad for McCormick Seasonings. Three times now I have prepared it, and it’s always tasty. The key is to use smoked, not regular, paprika. Yes, I know gasoline is expensive, but go to the store anyway. The smoked paprika is worth it. And whatever you do, DO NOT buy salmon with bones in it. You don't want to spend your holiday picking tiny white bones out of your dinner. Or your throat.

Smoked Paprika Roasted Salmon with Roasted Spinach

(Makes 8 servings. Yeah, right. More like 4 – 5).

Ingredients:
¼ cup orange juice
2 tablespoons plus 1 teaspoon olive oil, divided
2 teaspoons McCormick Gourmet Collection Thyme Leaves, divided
2 pounds salmon filets
1 tablespoon brown sugar
1 tablespoon McCormick Gourmet Collection Smoked Paprika
1 teaspoon McCormick Gourmet Collection Saigon Cinnamon
1 teaspoon grated orange peel
½ teaspoon McCormick Gourmet Collection Sicilian Sea Salt
1 bag (10 ounces) spinach leaves

Directions:
MIX orange juice, 2 tablespoons of the oil and 1 teaspoon of the thyme in small bowl. Place salmon in large baking dish, skin side up. Add marinade. Cover. Refrigerate 30 minutes or longer for extra flavor.

MIX sugar, smoked paprika, cinnamon, orange peel, remaining 1 teaspoon thyme and sea salt in small bowl. Remove salmon from marinade. Place skin side down in greased foil-lined baking pan. Discard any remaining marinade. Rub top of salmon evenly with smoked paprika mixture.

ROAST salmon in preheated 400 degree Fahrenheit oven 15 – 20 minutes or until fish flakes easily with a fork. Meanwhile, heat remaining 1 teaspoon oil in large skillet on medium heat. Add spinach, cook and stir 2 minutes or until wilted. Serve salmon over spinach.

The Roasted Bean Routine

2008-05-23T17:27:00.005-05:00

Our work site in Pascagoula was about a 40-minute shuttle bus ride from the Beau Rivage hotel. Right away I learned that one way to cope with waking up early for a day of manual labor was to stop by the Roasted Bean coffee shop at the Beau, purchase a large coffee, and enjoy the ride.

This one little thing dramatically altered the trajectory of my day. I know, because on the first day of the work week, Monday, I did not purchase coffee. Thinking vats of it would be available when we arrived at the large gathering tent for breakfast, I walked right past the Roasted Bean.

That first morning I missed out on one of life's little pleasantries: sipping coffee, heavily laced with skim milk and artificial sugar (I know, I'm weaning myself of it) early in the morning before reaching my destination. But I learned. Every morning after that I stopped in at the Roasted Bean.

While I can't say I was 20% smarter for the rest of the day, I am certain that I was 20% more enjoyable to be around. As I looked around and saw other Habitat workers cradling their cups of coffee they seemed to be experiencing the same gentle effect.

Therein lies one of the keys to a more civilized society: a warm breakfast beverage to get your blood circulating and help you wake up, a long ride with someone else at the wheel, and perhaps a friend or two to talk with. (Or a cocoon of tunes.) I believe if more of us began our days that way we could be well on our way to achieving what treaties and peace talks haven't: a world of friendly people who help each other get important things done.

If you don't believe me, look at what we achieved last week: we were part of an effort to build 250 homes along the Gulf Coast. The coffee and conversation were part of the success. Because you sure can't create something wonderful if you're not alert and grumpy.

A Cocoon of Tunes

2008-05-22T21:34:00.011-05:00

No doubt it's out of politeness that people have yet to ask what music is on the 'cocoon of tunes' I enjoyed while waiting at the Gulfport-Biloxi Airport for 10 hours last Saturday (disclaimer: due to my error, not anyone else's).

I take music with me whenever I travel, as well as a large set of noise cancelling headphones. They come in very handy not just on the plane but during long layovers. I used to try to find "CNN-Free" zones at airports, locations where either the tv was turned off (good luck) or there was no tv to be found.

Then I decided to fight back and purchase an iPod. I don't have to tell you what that is. If you are savvy enough to read a blog you know how the iPod has revolutionized the music industry and the ability to discreetly ignore people all around you. A little electronic box the size of a deck of cards, or smaller, means that you never, ever have to listen to a used car commercial again if you don't want to.

iPods were banned on the Habitat construction sites for good reason - you have to be able to hear your team leader and co-workers. But at the airport they're a great way to shut out the loud cell phone talker next to you, the unhappy child, and of course, CNN. (I don't know how that deal slid through - being able to install tvs at every airport tuned permanently to CNN - but someone needs to go to jail.)

Why all news all the time? Why not the Food Channel? Bad news makes people grumpy. Food makes people happy. Simply changing the channel at all the airports in the US could really help the airlines these days.

For example: your flight has been delayed and now you are going to miss your connecting flight home. With CNN broadcasting the latest flood, fire, mass murder, earthquake, corrupt person, or hardened criminal in a continuous loop you start walking around like a lab rat helplessly trapped in a maze, seeking a way out.

But if the Food Network were on (or for some people, NASCAR) you'd be a much happier lab rat. "Well, okay, I guess I'll be delayed 10 hours, but wow, they're having a Paula Deen marathon all afternoon so I'd better get some Moon Pies, a Coke, and settle in."

At any rate, having a cocoon of tunes is such a civilized way to spend time, as long as you keep the volume down so that the people next to you can't hum along with you.

And what's on mine? So far, 2,500 of my favorite songs, but I still have several hundred CDs to download. Last Saturday I listened to:

*Marvin Gaye - Midnight Love

*Barry White - Greatest Hits

*Herb Alpert - Herb Alpert's Ninth

*Acoustic Alchemy - Red Dust and Spanish Lace

*The Rippingtons - Kilimanjaro

*Big Maybelle - Candy

*Walter Wanderley - On My Mind

What I did NOT listen to: Just about anything, other than Jazz, produced in this century.

I am decidedly unhip. But that's the great thing about creating your own playlist. You can groove to your favorite tunes and no one has to know that Tom Jones is singing "It's Not Unusual." Which, by the way, I'm thinking of downloading. For 99 cents it's a steal.

A Tale of Two Blackberries....

2008-05-21T19:52:00.002-05:00

....and the wonderful people behind them.

Blackberry #1: Belongs to me. Faithfully I brought it each day to the work site, reading emails on the 40-minute bus ride to and from Pascagoula. Like the responsible adult that I am, I took along my charger and plugged it in every other day.

Sometime on Friday morning I noticed it wasn't in my tool apron, where I'd kept it all week. I had an unsettling thought that I'd dropped it somewhere, but hoped I had left it in the hotel room.

Not so. I officially proclaimed it lost when the Knight Foundation staff and friends met for dinner on Friday evening following our final work day at our Habitat sites. My colleague Paul notified T Mobile immediately and I assumed that Mr. Blackberry was gone for good.

Blackberry #2: Saturday morning I was exhausted and rattled about losing my friend. At least that's my explanation for leaving my bag behind on the shuttle bus from the Beau Rivage to the airport. Not only did I not have my wallet and ID at that point, but I realized I was without a communications device in case anyone called to tell me they had found my bag.

I mourned appropriately, and then fantasized about how neat it would be to own a RED version of the Blackberry Curve. Sweet! No more looking for a black PDA in the bowels of a black purse! No, the beautiful cherry red of my new Blackberry would stand out, and make me look hip as well!

Polly Talen, my colleague from St. Paul, MN, graciously offered the use of her Blackberry. For her, this was a TREMENDOUS sacrifice. I think she uses her Blackberry more than her laptop to communicate with people. Yet she could tell what a spot I was in and she responded with kindness. Since it was a Saturday, it meant she wouldn't get it back until Tuesday at the earliest.

As it turned out, I only needed to make a couple of calls. But Polly had left on the same flight I was supposed to take. Her Blackberry was mine until sometime Monday.

Blackberry #1: With all the rain that fell on Friday there was no way my Blackberry could have survived the deluge. I was certain it had drowned in a puddle somewhere near our job site. Or been crushed by the trample of feet, wheelbarrows, golf carts, trash trucks, semis hauling sod, etc. And I was certain I could request a beautiful, swell new RED Blackberry as a replacement. All I had to do was figure out how to position my request, which, let's face it, came from a position of weakness ("I screwed up and lost my Blackberry.") as opposed to a position of strength ("I was rescuing people who were lost at sea and my Blackberry fell out of my pocket as I plucked the last one who was clinging to life on a small rubber dinghy.")

You can imagine how my fantasy was interrupted by the jarring reality of receiving an email on Monday of this week from a man named Bracky Cooper, who said he saw my blog, the name was familiar, and he had my Blackberry (thanks, Bracky, for reading my blog! :) He offered to return it.

Blackberry #2: On Monday I overnighted it to my colleague Polly, making a mental note regarding the typeface she had selected, the layout, and the action photo of her daughter that she used as wallpaper. I had Blackberry layout envy and vowed to unlock the mysteries of how she had set up her screen so I could do the same. Polly received her Blackberry on Tuesday, a little more than 72 hours after she had lent it to me. I'm sure they were among the longest 72 hours of her life.

Blackberry #1: Arrived today. I didn't have high hopes about the state it would be in. I was certain it would be a shorted-out, waterlogged piece of junk. Figuring it was ruined, my colleague Philip Francis wanted me to send it to him so he could take it apart.

IT WORKS PERFECTLY. Not a scratch on it. There's the whole SIM card and registration issue to deal with, but somehow my Blackberry was preserved from being drowned and run over. It's charged up, the phone works, and I've gotten over my Blackberry envy because I've reconfigured it to look like Polly's. What a journey it's been on! If only it could talk!

I'll talk for it instead. Thank you, thank you, good and honest people for a) lending me a Blackberry to use for a couple of days and b) for returning it ASAP and, a bonus thank you for c) reading my blog! :)

Photos of Rosalynn and Jimmy at Work

2008-05-20T22:22:00.003-05:00

I snapped a few photos of Rosalynn and Jimmy Carter while they were working next door. I believe it was at the closing ceremonies when Rosalynn said in that lovely honey and molasses accent of hers that she has become a 'pretty fair carpenter' over the years. I was pretty young when she was the first lady and I didn't pay much attention to politics, but my recollection is that she was just as kind and gracious then as she is now.

The Kindness of Strangers

2008-05-19T22:38:00.002-05:00

After a week of hammering, insulating, and painting, I was weary. As much as I enjoyed meeting the good people of the Mississippi Gulf Coast, I had reached a place where I was ready to resume my routine of sleeping in on Saturdays, planting herbs in my new flower bed, creating container gardens, reading cookbooks as though they were romance novels, etc.

My flight was scheduled to leave on Saturday at 6:30 am, necessitating a wakeup call at 4:15. This could partially explain the coma-like and forgetful state I was apparently in. But the upside of taking Northwest's first flight of the day was that I would be back in Wichita just before 11 am. I'd still have most of a day to wash the sand and dirt from my clothes and re-enter the atmosphere that is my life.

Which I did, only about ten hours later than scheduled.

I cannot blame this one on weather, airline overbooking, mechanical delays, or any of the other standard reasons for arriving home late.

No, this one was on me.

I left my "Habitat for Humanity" messenger bag on the shuttle bus. It had my wallet and camera in it. When the ticket agent asked to see my ID I looked in the place where I usually keep my wallet when I travel - my backpack.

I wanted to crumple to the floor when I realized what had happened. By then the bus driver was gone, returning no doubt to the Beau to pick up the next batch of weary Habitat volunteers and deliver them to the airport.

It's a horrible moment of realization when you're at the ticket counter and you know you've left your ID at home or somewhere other than your wallet. It's even worse when you know it's riding around somewhere, and you're not sure how to get to it. I considered renting a car but you can't do that without ID and a credit card.

Luckily, the kind man who dropped off the folks on the 6 am shuttle helped me out. Tyrone Reed with Calco Travel made a few phone calls and assured me that my bag would be in my hands by 7:30. He was right.

Equally kind was the Northwest ticket agent, who didn't penalize me at all for my error. I missed my flight, of course, but after getting my bag back I decided to wipe away the tears and make the best of the day. I talked with other Habitat volunteers at the airport, shut out the world in a "cocoon of tunes" with my iPod, chatted with my colleague Vivian Celeste and her husband Vernon, and read, something I hadn't done much of all week.

By the time I got home I was very nearly babbling, exhausted as I was. I don't remember much except for feeling overwhelmed with gratitude - both for the kindness of caring people who were willing to take time to help me out, and for my very large, and soft, pillows.

The Beau's Secret Fleet

2008-05-19T22:10:00.003-05:00

In an earlier post I marveled at the number of Beau Rivage guests who use scooters to get around in the casino [the Beau is where many of the Habitat volunteers stayed]. A little mobility challenge is NOT going to keep them from enjoying their favorite pastime.

In fact, there are times, primarily any time of day associated with a meal, when you need to be extra careful or you might get mowed down by a fleet of grannies on Rascals.

I don't fault anyone for wanting to be as mobile as possible despite a setback, but I do think that perhaps a driving or safety course should be a prerequisite for going out on the open road, or in this case, the open casino.
Even more astonishing than the number of folks on scooters was the fact that all the scooters seemed to look alike, as though the Rascal vendor had a monopoly. But an accidental discovery revealed the answer to the puzzle: deep within the bowels of the Beau is a secret fleet of scooters, oxygen tanks, and wheelchairs.

This represents a standard of customer service that Congress and the airlines would do well to emulate. THIS level of planning is how you make sure your customers are pampered. If having a scooter is the only obstacle to your enjoying an evening of tossing change into a slot machine, then you can bet the casinos will be sure to have a fleet of them at the ready. You can even call ahead and request one.

Not me, though. Because the perfect evening after a day of hard work in Pascagoula wasn't gambling or sightseeing or even dining out. It was soaking in a hot tub. You can take those scooters almost anywhere, but not the bath.

Tools of the Trade

2008-05-18T22:29:00.003-05:00

You don't have to bring your own tools to a Habitat build, but some of the veteran volunteers do. And in our case, it was a good thing. Without the cat's paw, we might still be at the site, pulling out nails with our hammers, our bare hands, or even our teeth.

The cat's paw (or bear claw, I heard it referred to both ways) is a small crowbar for pulling out nails. Habitat must have been very optimistic in thinking that we volunteers on House #9 would all be able to drive the nails securely into the wood, and thus not require the use of a cat's paw. They supplied us with a dozen or so hammers, but no tools for prying out errant nails that bent or broke.

Luckily, a couple of members of our crew had brought their own cat's paws with them. At times these little tools were more prized than cold bottled water. Because when you whack a nail and your aim is slightly off, it bends like a rubber band. Sometimes you can pull it out with the claw end of the hammer, other times you need the hammer for leverage and the cat's paw for pulling.

And you want to remove bent nails as quickly as possible. Because when you're standing at the site with a bunch of bent nails sticking out of the wall like an angry artist's sculpture it's embarrassing. You want to get rid of the evidence. Fast.

That's why I recommend if you've never been on a Habitat build you bring along one or two cat's paws. Keep one for yourself, and save the other to use for barter. As in, "Sure, I'll let you use this, but that means you get to do roofing and I'll stay on the ground."

This way, your tools of the trade can become tricks of the trade.

Hammer Time

2008-05-15T22:17:00.004-05:00

My sister wants to know what my work boots look like. A colleague in Wichita can't imagine me swinging a hammer. Here are actual, un-Photoshopped photos taken this week.

What you don't see is the time I hit my thumbnail with the hammer. But it didn't bruise - it was only a flesh wound.

I learned a great new Southern expression today. "All that and a bag of chips." Let's hope I don't get a big head over this experience. I don't want anyone saying, "Anne thinks she's all that and a bag of chips."

A Bit About The Beau

2008-05-15T21:33:00.005-05:00

The Beau Rivage is the hotel where many of this week's Habitat volunteers are staying. Despite the fact that the rooms don't have their own coffee makers like the Holiday Inn Express, necessitating that you have to be fully dressed before you can enjoy your morning java jolt, it is a fine place, with several restaurants, upscale shops, a coffee house with the friendliest staff on the planet, large, posh rooms.....and a casino.

I have never understood the allure of gambling. Giving away my hard-earned money to bet on a the fickle finger of fate doesn't seem like fun.

Maybe that's because I'm gun-shy. In the 80s I bought some stocks that ended up being unintentional penny stocks, which was gambling without the buffet. Or the cocktails. I didn't even get a shrimp platter or glass of wine for my troubles, only a stack of worthless paper.

However, the Beau, beautiful as it is, has not caught up with the non-smoking laws that are standard operating procedure in most other parts of the country. Smoking is allowed in most of the hotel, to the delight of many guests who find themselves alternately breathing from their oxygen tanks and taking a drag.

As a result, when you go walking around to check out the shops and restaurants you come back to the room experiencing the scratchy-voiced sensation of having had a couple of cigarettes. I feel like Jerry Seinfeld, who once joked, "I'm a pack-a-day second-hand smoker."

But aside from that I can see why folks love it here. The staff treats you like a million bucks once you arrive. And even the non-Habitat guests have been quite friendly. A couple of times I've stopped for coffee in my Habitat gear (t-shirt, shorts, name tag, hard hat) and complete strangers thank me for the wonderful work Habitat is doing here on the Mississippi Gulf Coast.

So all in all, the Beau is a place I will definitely visit again. But not for the gambling or even the food - which is delicious - but because those gals behind the counter at The Roasted Bean are the essence of Southern hospitality. I wish I could take them home to Wichita. But instead I'll take home the memory of their kindness. And raise a toast to them the next time I brew a pot of coffee at home. If I can remember how to do that.

If You're Claustrophobic, This Job Isn't For You

2008-05-14T20:55:00.002-05:00

Here on the Gulf Coast houses don't have basements. They're just too close to the water. But what they do have is a sizeable crawl space under the house. It's unfinished, but a good temporary place for storage while we're working.

This morning we needed someone who didn't mind venturing into the crawl space to remove the siding that was stored there. I thought given a choice between that and the roof, I'd crawl.

It's not unpleasant, just cramped and somewhat dark. But it's not uncomfortable because of the soft red earth that some wise person spread on the ground while preparing the building site. It's like a cushion for your knees as you're crawling, which is the only way to get around.

I must have done an impressive job of shoving boxes of siding out from the crawl space because later in the day I won the prize for best crawler! My prize was that I got to go back inside for a half hour to store the insulation that we will place inside the ceiling tomorrow.

Thanks to this Habitat project, I'm learning all kinds of new things about home building. Luckily for Tiffany, the young lady who will take possession of the house next month, there are some very capable people on our crew who are making sure all of us volunteers are doing things right. Because without their oversight, I'm not sure I'd want to live in a house I built!

It Really Is All About The Food....

2008-05-13T23:20:00.003-05:00

...So I talked to former president Jimmy Carter this evening. Yes, he and Mrs. Carter (Rosalynn) were the featured guests at a dinner I attended. Jimmy walked around for a bit and shook hands with some of us.

The food at the dinner was delicious. Crab cakes, sweet potato parfait, bananas foster, shrimp, a risotto bar, pecan pie bars....scrumptious! As was the food at a dinner I attended last night, and that my colleague Adele cooked for some of us on Saturday.

Yup, I've enjoyed some mighty fine traditional Southern home cooking since I arrived here in Biloxi a few days ago.

So what did I say to President Jimmy Carter when he shook my hand?

"I sure am enjoying all this great Southern cooking here." !

My chance to say something to the former president and all I could do was think about food!

If I Had A Hammer....

2008-05-13T23:08:00.002-05:00

....There's no 'if' about it. You will have, and use, a hammer at a Habitat build.

I was hoping we might get to use those swell, zippy tools that you see on "Carter Can", but no. We're amateurs, and we might get hurt using nail and staple guns.

Throughout the day there's one thing you can count on hearing, and that's the steady 'thwack thwack' of hammers pounding nails. The sound reverberates throughout the neighborhood and even in your dreams long after the work day has ended.

And there are a dozen different kinds of nails to thwack. Luckily, if you have never used an 8 penny galvanized nail before, the crew will be glad to show you what it looks like. There are roofing nails, cabinet top nails, finish nails...that's just for starters.

Even if you don't regularly swing a hammer, you can at a Habitat build. Just be prepared to take ibuprofen and a hot bath at the end of the day.

What These Houses Mean to Kids

2008-05-13T23:02:00.002-05:00

At lunch today I sat with Melissa and Marie. Melissa will be the proud owner of one of these homes. Marie is her stepmother. They seem like best friends or sisters, and were a whole lot of fun to talk to.

As a soon-to-be homeowner through Habitat, Melissa has been working at the building site like the other homeowners. Unfortunately, her two young sons aren't old enough to help out at the build. But they are very excited about their new home.

So they played a trick on their mom. They told her that they had missed the bus to school and begged her to take them. Coincidentally, the route to school is VERY close to their new home. So they asked their mom if she would mind detouring a bit so they could see where they will be living soon.

Melissa drove them past the house. For two young boys, these are very exciting times. In about a month they will be eating, sleeping, playing, having friends over, and just being boys in their new Habitat Home.

I wish I could be there when they get to walk in the doors for the first time....

Blogapology

2008-05-13T22:50:00.002-05:00

Last night I didn't post because my wireless card was misbehaving. I made many attempts to log onto this blog because I knew so many of you were eagerly awaiting my latest post. I finally gave up because I needed to rest for a big day of:
1) pounding nails
2) cutting insulation
3) helping install the insulation
4) eating

Something about my magnetic field repulses wireless internet and attracts bugs in equal measure. One of my colleagues, Belinda, told me that she loves her wireless card and it works just great. I thought, hmm, does she have an updated model? Why is mine so hit and miss, and mostly miss? Why, when I have a three-hour layover at the Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport, is it so darned hard to read and respond to emails using my wireless card?

Recently while at this same airport, I had to send some documents NOW, so I built a small tower, stacking my laptop on top of my backpack and down-filled coat, just to get the best wireless signal possible at my gate. It was the digital version of putting Reynolds Wrap on your tv antenna.

But while I seem to have a knack for repelling forces that can help me, I have a great talent for attracting bugs that not only bite, but leave huge welts on my arms, legs, neck....this happens no matter what hemisphere I am in. Not one of my colleagues has complained about bug bites. But me, well, if I'm not careful I'll blow up like Martin Short did in the movie "Pure Luck".

Why We're Here

2008-05-11T22:23:00.003-05:00

My Knight Foundation colleagues and I had an action-packed day touring Biloxi, Gulfport, and East Biloxi together. We saw for ourselves the progress these communities have made, and how much more needs to be done to restore homes, office buildings, and businesses. Some folks just cannot afford to rebuild - insurance costs are so much greater than they were before Hurricane Katrina. Some are restoring slowly. Some seem to be just getting by.

One of the bright spots was seeing the homes in East Biloxi, where the rebuilding started before the storm. They look bright and cheerful, the way kids look on the first day of school showing off their new clothes and high hopes. A boy skated by on roller skates, perhaps practicing to get a job at Sonic. Another boy rode a bicycle. People sitting on a porch waved to us. The whole community isn't this bright and shiny - you still see buildings with broken glass and sagging walls - but there's a lot to be happy about.

One of the highlights of the day was when all the Habitat volunteers converged for dinner, music, and motivation. The Mississippi Mass Choir sang a song whose refrain was "I'm Not Tired Yet." And then Garth Brooks and Tricia Yearwood, who are helping build a home this week, introduced Jimmy and Rosalynn Carter.

But most meaningful to me were the testimonies from people who helped build a Habitat home and are now living in it. We saw videotaped presentations about the hurricane damage, the cleanup, and rebuilding. One of the images showed a hand-painted sign that read "If you lose hope, you've lost everything." Having a clean, new home to move into after losing nearly everything made all the difference to these survivors.

And that's why we're here.

No Specific Skills, But Willing to Learn

2008-05-10T23:53:00.000-05:00

A few months back I completed Habitat’s volunteer registration form. It asks what previous building and/or Habitat experience you have, along with your specific skills. Somewhat alarming was the fact that they also requested the name of your doctor and your health insurance policy number.

Having watched hundreds of hours of remodeling/refurbishing shows as well as an entire season of “Design Star” on HGTV, I felt confident that I possessed at least a few highly specialized abilities that could support the cause. For example, I can choose complementary paint colors, buy coordinated pillows, and match throw rugs all purchased at completely different stores. Send me on a shopping run to Kohl’s or Gordman’s and I’ll return with an SUV filled with colorful, affordable decorative doodads.

However, the Habitat folks are not looking for volunteers with this skill set, unique as it may be. I learned this when completing the registration form. After checking ‘no’ to skills in plumbing, landscaping, painting, electrical, general contractor, roofing, trim and finish, flooring, and siding I had to stare reality in the face. Officially I fall into Habitat’s category of ‘unskilled’, which means I have no specific skills, but am willing to learn.

Fortunately for the good people who will be living in these new homes the 1,700 volunteers include many enthusiastic long-time Habitat volunteers who have the proper building skills. Many will be supervising people like me. After landing at the Gulfport-Biloxi Airport I rode to the hotel with several seasoned Habitat veterans. Because I was the only newbie in the group I thought perhaps I had stepped onto the wrong bus. They greeted each other like old friends with multiple Tower of Babel-like conversations happening all at once.

They were certainly a welcoming bunch. Jerry Kwas, from Detroit, who has been a volunteer since 1999. He has missed only two of the annual Carter Builds. His dedication and quiet modesty are impressive. Most Habitat volunteers like Jerry who travel to the Jimmy and Rosalynn Carter build sites pay for their travel, lodging, and registration fees themselves. (Note: My Knight Foundation colleagues and I are being sponsored by our employer, who is also a major sponsor of this build. More about this in another entry.)

Jerry explained that at the builds in Mexico, Philippines, and Korea the homes are like small shelters, only about 300 square feet and built with concrete blocks. Their construction requires masonry skills. Here in Biloxi, the new homes will be framed. The frames will be delivered pre-built on sites where the foundation is laid and the infrastructure is in place. If not, we would need much more than a week here to really accomplish anything.

The experienced volunteers tell me this will be a week like no other. One thing’s for sure: after this week some families are going to have a place to call their own thanks to the efforts of thousands of people who care. And I think that’s the reason we’re all here. I just that my lack of skills doesn’t result in a need to call my family doctor or use my health insurance ID.

Of Steel-Toed Shoes And Pig Boots

2008-05-09T23:29:00.002-05:00

For no reason whatsoever I started worrying about my feet. Then I realized the worry was due to reading the Habitat for Humanity Volunteer Handbook for the first time. Open-toed shoes, flip-flops, and Crocs are strictly forbidden. Running shoes/sneakers are okay, but the Habitat folks strongly recommend steel-toed shoes.

Which is why I started worrying. I don't own any steel-toed shoes. And I figured I'd better get some. Pronto.

Steel-toed shoes convey a sense of know-how about fixing things that in my case is fictitious. When you see people wearing steel-toed shoes you realize they probably have jobs that require a particular skillset that combines athleticism with danger, like shimmying up electrical poles or installing cable tv. They're not for pansies like me with indoor jobs.

In the course of the day I conferred with my friend Peter, who owns a farm in Oklahoma. "You need pig boots," he advised.

Pig boots?

"Yes." He was serious. He's the proud owner of several pair himself. They are plastic boots that reach almost up to your knees. You can tuck your pant legs into them and they'll stay dry. Intuitively I figured out that their name comes from the fact that some folks use them when slopping the hogs.

He assured me that I can find them when I get to Biloxi. Relieved, I made a compromise. I purchased waterproof boots that look like they have steel toes but don't. In the end, I wimped out. That little "electrocution hazard" icon on the box of the steel-toed boots is what did it. I think I'd rather drop a two-by-four on my waterproof boots and risk hurting my toe than getting zapped because of my shoes.

Ready To Build With Jimmy and Rosalynn?

2008-05-08T20:53:00.002-05:00

Several months ago I signed up to help build houses in Biloxi, MS with the Habitat for Humanity team. One reason I agreed was that several people from work would be part of the crew, and I had an image of myself fearlessly swinging a hammer in the heat of mid-day, impressing my colleagues with my substantial homebuilding know-how acquired primarily from watching hundreds of hours of HGTV.

The other reason was that Jimmy and Rosalynn Carter would be there. They've been tireless Habitat for Humanity volunteers for 25 years. I thought working on the annual build they lend their names and energy to might be one of those history-in-the-making experiences I could tell my grandkids about.

Okay, there was one other reason. I thought I might learn a new and useful skill, like putting up drywall or installing plumbing fixtures.

So I'm writing a blog about the experience. I will take photos and talk to volunteers while working side by side with more than 1,700 volunteers and 60 families as we build 30 new homes, refurbish 30 homes, and construct 48 frames to be completed later. I hope to create an experience for you that is almost like being there, except without the perspiration.