Open your home...and your heart.

P.S. My birthday yesterday was fun-filled and fabulous--except for when May Bee sprayed the veterinarian like a skunk with her anal glands (!)...and then two hours later, when I was at the doctor myself, wishing humans had the same option.

P.P.S. The vet laughed out loud when he brought May Bee back to the little exam room after her shots and I gasped, "What is that horrible smell? Is it...umm...FEAR?" He explained that sometimes dogs who are afraid will express their anal glands. (I had no idea. None. When Karen called last night to wish me a happy birthday, I asked if she ever heard of dogs doing that, and she proposed that only dogs whose hearts are black and evil could pull off such a diabolical stunt.)

Oh, wait...don't let those two revolting postscripts keep you from adopting a pet.

May Bee makes my day, every  single day! (What's a little fanny spray among friends, anyway?) People with pets live longer, happier lives...so share your home with a companion asap! Make a holiday wish come true for a homeless dog or cat...ADOPT!

First ornament on the tree...

The last person on Earth to know.

Bethany and Falisha failed to tell me about Har Mar, Superstar. (I rely on my girls to keep me informed about important trends and items of popular interest.) You really dropped the ball on this one, my dears!

Favorite line: "How long is this song? Girl, this can not be healthy!"

Sunday morning...

...while her mama typed up this week's puzzle segment (Weekend Edition Sunday always features a puzzler with Will Shortz), May Bee snoozed away in the sunshine. It was a three-cups-of-coffee, linger-in-your-flannel-pajamas sort of morning--complete with beautiful music, courtesy of Sunday Baroque. 

Oh, and that's one more reason to visit my church, HOPE Church of Christ...we meet at FIVE IN THE AFTERNOON. Just sayin'.

A week ago today...

...Philip took me to the Compton Family Thanksgiving. We had so much fun! (Thanks to everyone for making me feel so welcome.)

And two days before that, on Thanksgiving Day, Philip and I actually cooked together! Two of our favorite recipes of the day below.

"Everything Stuffing" 
(adapted from Taste of Home's recipe at

http://www.tasteofhome.com/Recipes/-Everything--Stuffing/Print )

You might want to use Bette Votral's original recipe at the link above. I used the low-sodium broth, omitted the shitake mushrooms, and left out the added sage since I used sage sausage. (I also added a little hot sausage to spice the recipe up a little!)

The great thing about this recipe, besides being yummy, is that you make it in the crock pot...which leaves your oven free to bake other things. Pretty handy, huh?

1 lb. sage sausage
1/2 lb. hot sausage
4 cups seasoned stuffing cubes
1 1/2 cups crushed corn bread stuffing
3/4 cup chopped toasted pecans (some chopped, some quartered for aesthetic appeal)
1/2 cup minced fresh parsley
pinch of salt
1/2 tsp. pepper


2 C. sliced baby portobello mushrooms
1 large onion, chopped
1 medium apple, peeled and chopped
2 celery ribs, chopped
3 tablespoons butter
1 can (14-1/2 ounces) low-sodium chicken broth

Directions

In a large skillet, cook sausage over medium heat until no longer
pink; drain. Place in a large bowl. Stir in the stuffing cubes, corn
bread stuffing, pecans, parsley, salt and pepper.

In the same skillet, saute the mushrooms, onion, apple and celery in
butter until tender. Stir into stuffing mixture. Add enough broth to
reach desired moistness. Transfer to a 5-qt. slow cooker. Cover and
cook on low for 3 hours, stirring once. Yield: 9 servings.

Nantucket Cranberry Pie 

See the Pioneer Woman demonstrate every step at:

http://thepioneerwoman.com/cooking/2010/11/nantucket-cranberry-pie/ 

Hope your Thanksgiving was wonderful.

Ours sure was!

Fun and games CANCELLED.

Well, the fun and games I predicted on Monday did NOT happen. Not only did my cold get worse and worse during the day (HONK! sniffle, sniffle! COUGH! sniffle! HONK!), but the morning started with an unpleasant jolt.

"Oh, no! Someone dropped their Blistex as they left the library!"

"GAH! Wait!! That's NOT Blistex! Ugh...I have to go boil myself now!!!"

Fun and games

Today, as Kirsten plays "Tante Kirsten" to her new-born niece and nephew in Arizona, we'll be decorating the library for Christmas! (Three classes of speech students are on the schedule, but the rest of the day will be fun and games!)

Yeah.

I climbed that. (It was NOT my idea.)

We sat on top of the grain bin and ate wheat right out of the trap door on the top.

And then my favorite Blood Donor and I watched the sun set.

(Oh, and there may have been a smooch or two...)

Conan TOMORROW!

Can't wait! Can't WAIT! While I'm *not* looking forward to the 11 p.m. drive home from Philip's house afterward (since I can't make myself break down and pay for cable), the thought that we're gonna' be watching Conan TOMORROW makes me so happy!


Okay, so while I was in Fentress with Bethany last weekend, Philip sent a camera phone pic he snapped of the Conan blimp...right over ABILENE, of all places. Last night, though, we found out that Philip's son, Brandon, got to see the blimp touch down at the Eastland airport and refuel (who knew Eastland had an airport?)  just a few hours before Philip snapped it! Check out the photos he managed to get...

Thanks for the new desktop wallpaper, Brandon!

And in related Conan news...

Click HERE for today's NPR story about Conan's return to late night.

Or HERE for Yarn Blimp!



P.S. Feel free to call me at 9 p.m. tomorrow. Or even 11. (10 p.m. is NOT an option.)

Happy Monday, Mom!

I'm not sure my mom has ever entirely forgiven my grandfather ("Bobo," a half-Swedish/half-Texan Borden milkman and elder in the Church of Christ) for denying her the chance to see The King when he came to Corpus Christi. And while my generation probably doesn't appreciate Elvis as much as we should, I really liked this one..and the reaction of the two ladies at 2:25 gives me a little peek into the adoration!

P.S. Thanks to Karen's Porch blog for this one!!

Whew! What a weekend!!!

Got SO much done...so much. And the weather? AMAZING!

After mowing and edging and poisoning three beds of fire ants, I stuck my gloves onto holly bush branches to air out while I did dishes and laundry and some other indoor chores. HOURS later (after I forgot they were out there), I opened the door to head outside and stopped dead in my tracks. It looked like a disembodied set of hands was coming around the corner of the house at me! SPOOKY!

One of the MANY things accomplished this weekend was sending out the NPR puzzle from Weekend Edition Sunday with Will Shortz. Want it? See below...but I am NOT responsible for formatting errors. Typing it in email and posting it online makes it go wonky. 

***

Synopsis of
NPR Weekend Edition puzzle
Rebecca Roberts (for Liane Hansen) & Will Shortz
2010-10-03



CURRENT CHALLENGE (given 20100926):
From Elizabeth Gorski: Take the phrase "patron saint," remove a letter,
then rearrange the letters to create a new, familiar two-word phrase
that names something important in life.
Hint: The first word has three letters, the second word has seven.


The answer was NPR STATION, an answer which Will noted could not be
solved by computers who didn't recognize NPR as a word. Will also
accepted RAP STATION.


Rebecca reported 597 entries, "which is low for us."


The randomly-selected, on-air player today was James Steffen of
Germantown, Tennessee. James works at a digital printing company where
he manages new product design and automation, and his fiancée is the one
who hooked him on NPR puzzles about a year and a half ago. He also
participates in what Rebecca described as "insanely competitive extreme
sports"; James confirmed that "I do a lot of running and triathlons,"
and he completed an Ironman Competition in August. He is a member and
listener of WKNO.


Today's on-air puzzle: Will gave Rebecca and James sentences, each with
two blanks. The word that went in the first blank ended in the letter D
as in DOG. When they dropped the D, they had (phonetically) the answer
that went in the second blank. Examples given were FIELD to FEEL and
BEARD to BEER.


CLUES (HINTS directly below clues; ANSWERS at the end of synopsis):


1. In Napa Valley, this road will BLANK fifteen miles through BLANK
Country.


2. Even though I have a phobia about yellow foods, I added BLANK to my
hot dog with all the strength I could BLANK.


3. That lazy bum is such a BLANK, he'll never practice batting skills
enough to become a BLANK.


4. In Colonial New Hampshire, before the European immigrants could
settle in BLANK, they first had to BLANK the Indians.


5. During Seniors Week on the TV game show, one old BLANK just couldn't
push his BLANK fast enough to get any answers.


6. To improve city hygiene, BLANK, Alaska has installed a new BLANK
system.


7. In return for her long-time service to the Food Network chef, Sarah
personally received an BLANK broach from BLANK himself.


8. With the increase of money into the English royal treasury, King
BLANK was considerably BLANK.


HINTS:

7. From Will: "Think of the U.S. Secretary of State who helped the U.S.
purchase Alaska."

8. From Rebecca: "Kick it up a notch there, James!" (At first, James
thought he was being reprimanded for taking so long to solve this one,
but then Rebecca exclaimed, "That was a hint!")



Author Ammon Shea, (described by Rebecca as a "Word Nerd") and author of
_The Phone Book: The Curious History of the Book That Everyone Uses But
No One Reads_ , read James the list of prizes he'd won for being
selected to play the puzzle on the air.


NEXT WEEK'S CHALLENGE:

The listener challenge for next week, copied from the NPR puzzle page:
"Name a famous person whose first name has six letters and last name has
eight. In this person's first name, the first two letters are the same
as the last two letters. And, these two letters also start the last
name. The first two letters of the last name are pronounced differently
from how they're pronounced in the first name. Who is this person?"


The listener challenge for next week, as Will gave it on the air: "Name
a famous person--6 letters in the first name, 8 letters in the last. In
this person's first name, the first 2 letters are the same as the last 2
letters, and these 2 letters also start the last name. And even more
oddly, the first 2 letters of the last name are pronounced differently
from how they're pronounced in the first name. Who is this person? So
again...a famous person--6/8. In this person's first name, the first 2
letters are the same as the last 2 letters, and these 2 letters also
start the last name--and the first 2 letters of the last name are
pronounced differently from how they're pronounced in the first name.
Who is this famous person?"


Answers must be received by 3:00 p.m. Eastern Time on THURSDAY.  One
entry per person. NPR will no longer receive entries by email.  Be sure
to include a telephone number where you can be reached if you are
selected as the winner.
Entries may be made at the web page:
http://www.npr.org/templates/contact/index.php?columnId=4473090
You can also get to this page by simply visiting:
npr.org/puzzle


* ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ *

Editor's notes:
Puzzles, and contents of the _Weekend Edition Sunday_ puzzle segment are
copyrighted 2010, by Will Shortz and NPR. Reprinted here with
permission.


Today's serendipitous links:

How appropriate that today's on-air player lives in Germantown,
Tennessee! Today, Germany celebrates the Day of German Unity (auf
Deutsch: "Tag der Deutschen Einheit") to mark the 20th anniversary of
East and West German reunification. The party is ON in Berlin, btw; the
live web cam at Brandenburg Gate can be seen (at least until dark) at
http://bit.ly/alMH4h .


The much-publicized Commonwealth Games open today!
http://bit.ly/bbSW45



Here's our regular monthly puzzle transcription schedule:
1st       Kristy
2nd      Richard
3rd       Joe
4th       Jerry
5th       Richard

Email us at:
Kristy Fowler gmail.com>
Richard Renner igc.org>
Jerry Miller muohio.edu>
Joe Wander gmail.com>

So email for next week's synopsis goes to Richard:
igc.org>


* ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ *

Our group of volunteer co-editors distributes these free weekly synopses
of the NPR puzzle segment.  You can read more about this free
distribution at:
http://groups.google.com/group/nprpuzzle/topics
You can subscribe from this page, too.

To unsubscribe from this group, send email to:
nprpuzzle-unsubscribe@googlegroups.com

For more options, visit this group at:
http://groups.google.com/group/nprpuzzle?hl=en

If you want to remove your address from the former Topica list, send a
blank email from your account to:
nprpuzzle-unsubscribe@igc.topica.com

To change the email address of your subscription, remove the old one
(from the old email account), and add the new Google subscription (from
the new email account).  For more information about this list, and an
archive of those distributed by Topica.com, visit:
http://igc.topica.com/lists/nprpuzzle@igc.topica.com/read
or, for more information about the Topica mailing service, visit:
http://lists.topica.com/NPR which posts the weekly challenge (and the
previous answer) on its World Wide Web page.

You can also pick up an audio recording of Weekend Edition Sunday
program after 12:00 p.m. Eastern time each Sunday.  In the alternative,
for the text of the weekly listener challenge, you can go directly to:
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=4473090Podcasts are
available at:
http://www.npr.org/templates/rss/podlayer.php?id=4473090 or
http://www.npr.org/podcasts/


From:
r.org/rss/podcast.php?id=4473090&uid=3ba205bf25adca5af473ab1102e03b75
How do I subscribe to this podcast?
Copy the URL [above this paragraph] into your preferred podcasting tool
software (e.g. Odeo, iTunes, iPodder). You will automatically receive
this podcast each time it's published.Follow Liane on Twitter:
http://twitter.com/nprLiane

Links of interest:
American Crossword Puzzle Tournament:
http://www.crosswordtournament.com/

Merl Reagle's article on constructing crossword puzzles, available at:
http://www.crosswordtournament.com/articles/inq031697.htm

World Puzzle Federation:
http://www.worldpuzzle.org

For U.S. Puzzle Championship info:
http://wpc.puzzles.com/uspc11/

More of Ed Pegg Jr.'s puzzles are available at:
http://www.mathpuzzle.com

Next year's National Puzzlers' League convention will meet in
Providence, Rhode Island. For information, visit:
http://www.puzzlers.org

Joe Wander suggests linguaphiles check out:
http://www.wordsmith.org/awad

You can join Kathie Schneider's email list for accessible word and logic
puzzles. To subscribe, send a blank email to:
blind-puzzlers-subscribe@googlegroups.com

For the results of April's 5th Annual World Sudoku Puzzle Championship,
see:
http://wpc.puzzles.com/wsc2010/

Kristy Fowler, guest editing today for Richard Renner:
<mad4cowbell@gmail.com>

* ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ *


CLUES & ANSWERS:

1. In Napa Valley, this road will BLANK fifteen miles through BLANK
Country.
(WIND to WINE)




2. Even though I have a phobia about yellow foods, I added BLANK to my
hot dog with all the strength I could BLANK.
(MUSTARD to MUSTER)




3. That lazy bum is such a BLANK, he'll never practice batting skills
enough to become a BLANK.
(SLUGGARD to SLUGGER)




4. In Colonial New Hampshire, before the European immigrants could
settle in BLANK, they first had to BLANK the Indians.
(CONCORD to CONQUER)




5. During Seniors Week on the TV game show, one old BLANK just couldn't
push his BLANK fast enough to get any answers.
(BUZZARD to BUZZER)




6. To improve city hygiene, BLANK, Alaska has installed a new BLANK
system.
(SEWARD to SEWER)




7. In return for her long-time service to the Food Network chef, Sarah
personally received an BLANK broach from BLANK himself.
(EMERALD to EMERIL)




8. With the increase of money into the English royal treasury, King
BLANK was considerably BLANK.
(RICHARD to RICHER)


End of NPR Puzzle Synopsis.

Love dogs? Love New Hampshire?

If you answered "Yes" to one of those questions, you'll be fine. If you answered "Yes" to BOTH of those questions, then prepare for Operation Throat Lump.

San Angelo Saturday.

San Angelo was GREAT! One of the best District 1 fall meetings EVER, a delicious lunch at Sealy Flats,  a shopping blitz down Concho Street, and finally, Lily Fest 2010 at San Angelo's International Water Lily Gardens.

Oh, and then when we took Sarah & Jane back to their car, there was a WEDDING happening at the gorgeous San Angelo Visitors Center! What a lovely day...and then...

...when Terry pulls up to the curb in front of my house after the long drive home, she says, "Is your dog SUPPOSED to be in the front yard?"

Apparently, May Bee crashed through the gate in the morning and spent the whole day outside, growling at anyone who came near. (Thank God May Bee is a homebody...as Karen said, "This could have been tragic.")

Grateful that Man's Best Friend (and my best friend!) is safe and sound,
May Bee's Happy Mama

Roach? Mouse? (gasp!) RAT?

Ugh. Can you see the two little poops deposited on the toilet paper rolls in my cabinet? I'm pretty sure that toilet tissue did not come pre-pooped when I stuck the rolls in there last Saturday. My fingers are crossed that it's just the cousin of that "water bug" (a.k.a., ROACH!) that landed ON MY BODY during a shower once.

My worst fears would be vermin. I am terrified of mice and rats...and would have to burn this house down. So I guess it's time to call Pest Patrol and have them do a CSI-style investigation of the poop evidence and then treat the premises accordingly.

Oh, and speaking of All Things Scatological...

TO THE MAN WHO POOPED IN HIS PANTS WHEN MY DOG TRIED TO KILL YOU THIS MORNING:

Hey, here's an idea. When a lady is running IN THE DARK, don't step out of the abandoned playground toward her and her dog. (May Bee didn't bark at anyone else this morning because they were all running or walking. Plus, they were all wearing athletic gear and sneakers--not dress shirts, pants, and boots.)

I would offer to buy you new "running slacks," but I was a little too busy trying to keep you from being ripped to shreds to get your name...

I'm with Lisa from "Green Acres."

To all the Farmer Types out there trying to make us all jealous with your canning and bread-baking and kefir-brewing(?) and home-schooling stories...it's City Girl's turn!

This morning, after visiting HEB, the world's best grocery store that is 4 MINUTES from my house, it was time to hit La Popular for the Yum Fuel I would need to mow the lawn with an old-fashioned reel mower. (Oh, and the HEB "Combo Loco" deals were especially LOCO this morning. Anyone buying four Lean Cuisine frozen dinners could score free Nestle or Wonka candy. That's right...if you buy low-calorie, low-fat meals, HEB will reward you with free CANDY.)

Next I'm off to the post office (a full 3-minute drive), the mall (where I get a nice employee discount on the cutest clothes at Christopher & Banks!), and then Sonic for a half-price Happy Hour tea (UNsweet, as God intended). City Life has its PERKS. :-)

"Abilene is where I'd rather stay.
I get allergic smelling hay.
I just adore a sunset view.
Dah-ling I love you, but give me Sayles Avenue!"