Much Ado About Knucklehead

And he didn't even show up.

Apparently Miami told him to stay away and so he did.

Everyone is a little afraid of Miami.

With that potential drama no longer a worry a mostly good time was had by all at the 100th birthday celebration of MDH's granny, Nanny.

On Nanny's big day it rained like hell and MDH and I had to drive all over Somerville and Cambridge on various errands as commanded by Miami, picking up cakes, cannolis, etc.. At one point MDH listened to a voice mail from Miami and said, "Miami now wants us to go down to the bar and pick up M & M's", and because of the typical naming structure of most of Miami's friends I said, "who the fuck is that?" Turns out he actually meant the candy. Miami had special ordered custom birthday M&M's for Nanny's party and had them delivered to the bar. What a relief.

My main concern was of course, my hair and make-up. Because of the rain and gusty winds I was on the verge of a potential beauty disaster and demanded to be dropped off at the door at every stop like a goddamned diva. I'm usually not this demanding or for that matter demanding at all, but we're talking about an all day event and having my picture taken every 5 seconds.

Once we arrived at the party it was pretty smooth sailing. Miami barked and grunted orders at everyone and we all did as he said. Nanny drank 3 glasses of Merlot, ate 4 stuffed quahogs and a giant piece of cake.

For some reason Miami thought it would be a hoot to give Nanny a g-string as a birthday present, and it kind of was.

MDH and I got her an electric kettle because she continues to boil water on the stove to make her tea although she has nearly burned the building down on numerous occasions, melting 4 tea pots in the process in as many years. She seemed to like it, but the look on her face when she opened the g-string was priceless.

I would like to state for the record: I probably won't need to eat Italian food again for the rest of the year or possibly longer.

Italian Food Items Consumed:

1. Napoli-style pizza with fried eggplant on it (dee-lish!!)


2. Spaghetti with a meatball the size of Detroit


3. Cannoli


4. Eggplant Parm


5. Anchovies drenched in oil on toast points


6. Carbonara


7. Mussels Bianco (sounds like another one of Miami's friends)

Due to a collective brain fart MDH and I spent an extra day in Boston.

We arrived at Boston-Logan Airport yesterday morning all puffed up and proud that we had made such good time. A major feat considering we had stopped by Ma's for coffee on our way and between maneuvering our way out of Cambridge, finding an open gas station and missing our freeway exit, we somehow got to the airport early.

Our pride soon turned to shame as we stood at the airline check-in kiosk with the screen displaying a message that took a few minutes to sink in, "You may not check in more than 24 hours before your scheduled departure time."

What the fuck?

Yes, our flight home was booked for the next day. We had each looked at the itinerary several times and neither one of us picked up on this. We had only booked a hotel thru Sunday.

We decided to make the most of it and not tell anyone in his family that we were still in town and got on the laptop and Hotwire booked a room at the Boston Intercontinental which now stands officially as the swankiest hotel I have ever stayed in.

You can take a water taxi directly from Logan to the Intercontinental for $10 per person and I highly recommend that you do so someday. You'll have the most spectacular view of the city. Even if you've been to Boston a million times like I have it will still take your breath away. We even saw some Harbor Seals hanging around.

We spent our bonus Boston day walking all around the city, from the financial district to the North End. Along the way we noticed lots of trailers and lighting equipment and followed the trail to a film crew staging and filming a scene for Pink Panther 2. Then we kept walking until we found ourselves at the Union Oyster House where we stopped in for some chowder and grilled oysters and had two very large Sam Adam's Octoberfests. Yum.

Later we (MDH) watched the Patriots beat the Colts from the humongous TV in our very glamorous hotel room. Features of our glamorous hotel room:

• Big giant flat screen TV (unfortunately NOT high-def)
  


• Intimacy Kit in the mini-bar (only $12 - our best guess was condom and tube-a-lube)
  


• A doorbell
  


• Electronic "Do Not Disturb"
  


• Reading lights that were all bendy and posable (we kept pretending they were microphones and sang songs in them to each other)
  

Enormous soaking tub with jets

• Enormous shower with real shelf space for products - also must note that steam kept itself in the shower so as not to fog up bathroom mirror
  


• Glam Fainting Couch AKA Chaise lounge
  


• 1 million thread count sheets (but they were Euro style flat sheets that come all undone and end up around your neck the second you start to have any fun at all)
  


• Brookstone alarm clock (not sure why this impressed me so much)

I thought I'd try something new and opened a Flickr account. You can see pictures from our trip here.

In Response To Your Google Search Query #1

Just in case you thought I was done blogging for the day:

Dear Person Who Found My Blog Via The Search Query "how to make big fluffy croissants",

Quel Damage! But mercy buckets for visiting! I presume to take the meaning of your query in a non-sexual way and hope you weren't too disappointed to find this blog has nothing to do with baked goods or pastries and everything to do with my life's boring and often disgusting minutiae. I do have some good news for you, however!

No, I didn't just save a bundle on car insurance, but I actually DO know the secrets of how to make big fluffy croissants.

Here you go:
Don't over knead the dough and make sure that both the butter AND the dough are about the same temperature before you begin rolling. 65°F (23°C) is ideal. Now, if that doesn't work for you, you can try a little trick I learned several years ago in Paris that I like to call "go to the bakery and let a professional worry about such things darling because life is short".

Bon appétit et Bonne Chance!

Toodles!
The Lady

Shameless Cat Exploitation

I'll check back in Monday with a full report of Nanny's 100th birthday party. To keep you entertained until then - here is a video of our cat Turtle eating his kibble. Yes. He is in perfect health and no limbs are broken or damaged, yet he always eats this way.

Watch it over and over - it'll totally freak out MDH when he sees that the number of views has dramatically increased. Seriously. Watch it as many times as you can stand it.

Creamed Corn + Pie = Love

I mentioned in an earlier post that I screen all calls from my mom. Well, that was only partially true. I screen all calls - period. MDH is much friendlier and nicer than me and eagerly makes every effort to pick up on the first ring without ever looking at the caller id. I don't know how he can do that. I haven't got the strength.

As much as I enjoy caller id I certainly don't need it. Before there was caller id I had just an answering machine and I let the machine pick up every call. Before I had an answering machine I would simply let the phone ring and ring and ring because frankly I didn't give a shit who was calling. Back in the day, when I had room mates my bad attitude about answering the phone caused quite a lot of ugly rows as I'm sure you can imagine.

When I lived alone I often kept the phone unplugged for glorious days at a stretch. Now that I am married compromises must be made so if MDH wants the phone answered he must answer it. If MDH answers the phone and it is for me and don't feel like talking to that person then he must tolerate a seething, tight-lipped glare from me as I take the unwanted call. Compromise.

The truth is, even if I like you, with very few exceptions I probably don't want to talk to you on the phone. My close friends know this about me and don't seem offended, but that's probably because they are the few people that I actually ever want to talk to. They know who they are. (As if that's hard to figure out. If you call me and I answer the phone you're in.)

If I am related to you then I don't want to talk to you on the phone ever for any reason. This is especially true if I am related to you and you are over the age of 70. It's not because I don't love you. I love you guys, I really do, but I can't talk to you on the phone because you are all hard of hearing and bugass crazy.

One morning last week when the phone rang to my surprise I saw my Uncle Dan's name on the caller id with a Michigan area code. He is my dads brother and in his early 80's. His call was surprising for two reasons. #1 Because the last I'd heard he'd been living in Pompano Beach, wedged between my crazy aunts in a Villages wannabe condo complex. (My 2 crazy aunts live one house away from each other and Dan was silly enough to buy the house in between them) And #2 because not only had I not seen my Uncle Dan and his wife Aunt P for a couple of years but he had never once in my entire life called me. It was just plain weird so I let the machine pick up for fear that someone had died.

When I finally listened to the message it was sweet and lovely, albeit slightly tedious and certainly making me feel all guilty for not picking up the phone. Damn you sweet old people. His message said that he and Aunt P had moved back to Michigan last spring but he didn't call until now because he had fallen down the basement steps of their new condo and broken a couple of ribs and hurt his knee, then he developed pneumonia (from the broken rib) and had his pancreas removed (yeah, more spooky, I found this out after I wrote a post called Potato Chip Pancreas, I'm haunted that way) and was calling me now because he is finally feeling better and wanted to say hello and see when we can come visit them.

I called him back right away and MDH and I made plans to visit them today. And so we did. We got up at 7:30 on a Saturday morning and drove 2 hours to Southern Michigan on a gorgeous fall day.

I had forgotten how good it can feel to be fussed over. My own parents don't really make a fuss over me. Even when I haven't seen them for over a year my mom is still very likely to point to the fridge and tell me to make myself a sandwich when I get hungry. This is probably why I don't particularly like being fussed over. I'm just not used to it and it makes me feel weird.

Aunt P fixed a huge supper for us. We ate at 3:30pm because she and Uncle Dan go to bed at like 5.

Aunt P made under-seasoned salisbury steak with runny brown gravy from a little paper packet, instant mashed potatoes the consistency of kindergarten paste and canned creamed corn.

I have not eaten these things since I was in elementary school and was given 50 cents each day to dine in the school cafeteria. These things tasted terrible but at the same time it was all so marvelous and I felt so loved. She made peanut butter pie from a box mix for dessert. I cried a little on the drive home. I was overwhelmed.

Are they bugass crazy? Yes. Aunt P spent the entire day looking for a pink, flip-flop shaped flyswatter that was never more than 2 feet from her hand. She would swat and kill yellow jackets that kept getting into the house every time she opened the back door to flip a dead yellow jacket out the door on the tip of her flyswatter. I happened to notice this pattern and when I brought to their attention the giant yellow jacket nest next to the screen door my Uncle Dan hauled out a container of poison the size of an RV and proceeded to engulf the entire tri-state area with plumes of Raid.

Are they hard of hearing? Yes. My throat is sore from our visit today. It could also be from inhaling poison, but they do have really bad hearing.

However, I'm not going to let the machine pick up for Uncle Dan & Aunt P anymore. They called me to visit and made me pie. They're in.

At the top of the page is a picture of Uncle Dan, one of the crazy aunts, me and my parents looking all glamorous on the sofa behind us. I think everyone is hammered except for me and Uncle Dan.

1300 Reasons To Love Casinos

And they all say "In God We Trust".

Yep, this weekend MDH and I were treated to an invitation only soiree for the high roller status members of the new gambling establishment about a 2 hour drive from our house. They made an offer a single income family, one Target trip away from financial despair and starvation, couldn't refuse. Two actually. A free junior suite and a free steak dinner. The junior suite was about 700 square feet (bigger than my old apartment) with a jetted tub, separate shower for two, separate WC, two flat screen HD TV's and an iPod docking station. The steak dinner turned out to be a 28-day dry aged filet so tender I could cut it with my fork. We also got 8 free top-shelf drinks so - cheers!

That's all great stuff, but it gets even better. If you've never been to a non Las Vegas casino you may not understand, but when MDH and I go to these types of places we are no longer the fattest, most un-hip people on the planet. In fact the moment MDH and I step into any number of casinos in Michigan, Indiana or even Canada we are the youngest, most fashionable, most attractive people there. Amid the uncombed, the combed over, the sweatsuited, the toothless, the fanny packed, and the holiday sweatered, we are downright dazzling.

I thought that last night would be different since we were at a VIP event in an elegant restaurant with only about 50 other couples. To my delight not so. We arrived for cocktail hour to discover a sparkling, softly lit space filled with formally attired casino staff members in tuxedos and evening gowns ministering to a roomful of the same types of unkempt zombies we always see farting around the casino. It was bizarre, confidence building and so very entertaining.

As we stood sipping our drinks and sampling the various snacks being offered, MDH and I watched fascinated as a cater waiter with a silver tray of oyster shooters, in some kind of fennel infused cream, approached a man wearing a dirty trucker hat (yes, indoors), a sideless shirt that I guessed he had earned by sending in cigarette carton proofs of purchase 15 years ago (when he lifted his beer to his mouth armpit hair was visible), jean shorts with hanging fringe and dirty flip-flop sandals. Sideless Marlboro and his female companion Split End Ponytail, decked out in the tightest white tapered jeans I have ever seen, some kind of sports jersey and grayish Keds, rolled their eyes at each other as they listened to the waiter describe the milky treat. When he was finished they made sour scary faces as if the waiter had asked them if they wanted to sample a sip of Draino.

The oyster turn down is understandable because many people including me find them repulsive. But a simple no thank you works wonders. No need to roll your eyes all up in your head and make faces and gagging noises. Similar reactions were elicited by Sideless and Split End to the other concoctions offered. Blinis with smoked salmon and some kind of creamy fluff, Tempura lump crab puff with asian chili chutney, medalions of brown sugar braised beef. C'mon people! Not even the braised beef? Reverse snobs they were.

We spent dinner and a good part of the rest of the evening wondering all about Sideless and Split End. Were they staying in the same kind of swanky junior suite as us or did they turn their noses up at that too? When they stay in hotels (or motor inns) do they unpack and hang up their clothes? What kind of appetizer would they have preferred? (My guess was Cool Ranch Doritos and Corn Nuts) Did they send back their medium rare filets and ask them to be well done? Were they on special diets? Have they spent all their money at the casino and thereby have enough points to qualify for elite status, but have to wear rags to all of the VIP events?

All in all we had a wonderful time. It's a drag to stay in a hotel all by yourself, especially when you do it all the time. So it was lovely to stay in such a nice hotel suite with MDH.

Oh, and I won $1300 at 25 cent video poker by landing a royal straight flush.

ps - don't ask how we have elite status - we just do