For years, I thought I wasn’t a casserole man, myself. I thought they were all gloppy and tasted alike. Then, as I began to get into food and cooking, I came to realize it was cream of mushroom soup I wasn’t crazy about. If I sometimes seem to confuse my own thoughts with the words that come out of Arlo’s mouth, or Janis’, I hope you won’t read too much into it. After all, everything they say and do does come from me, but I am not them. Really. Well, not literally anyway.
On another subject, I’ve talked a lot here about space exploration, because as a boy I was mesmerized by the Mercury program, and I’ve never quite lost the fascination it held for me. We’ve talked about the feats of the Mars rover Curiosity and the incredible journeys of Voyager I and Voyager II, among other things. Over the years, these marvels have been, by definition, American ventures. I didn’t want anyone to think I’m being a sorehead, because I haven’t mentioned the European comet expedition. Others have talked about it here, but I haven’t given “Philae” its due. I mean, like, WOW! What else can I say? I just hope it comes out from the shadow of that cliff and comes back to life in coming months. What a tough break: send a spacecraft on a 10-year mission, land it on a comet, and it winds up in the shadow of a cliff, leaving its life-giving solar panels next to useless. We’ll be rooting for you, Philae!
Cartoonist’s note: I admit it. I went to today’s A&J on the GoComics Web site, and I didn’t get it. Then, I remembered, “Oh, yeah! Big pot, as in big tummy!” I remembered further that I had intended to go back and put the words “big pot” in parentheses, to draw attention, but I got in a hurry and failed to do so. One thing cartoonists learn (some faster than others) is, You can’t be too obvious. Obviously.
75 responses to “On a Casserole”
When in the Army, sent fatigues out for laundering and heavy starching. Had to break starch on a very regular basis in the olden days.
Jackie, one of the funniest things I ever saw a cat do happened when my ex and I tried to put a dog sweater on a cat. (It was short-haired and liked to go on the screened porch in cold weather, so we thought it would be warmer with the sweater). Anyway, we got it on and sat the cat on the floor, and it just rolled over. She didn’t even try to walk. Each time we put her up on her feet, she would just flop over again.
On the other hand we got our short-haired dog a couple of small-sized women’s sleeveless vests at Wally World and she loved them. We just turned them so the zipper side was up, slipped the front legs through the armholes and zipped it up. Since she was a female, there were no plumbing mods necessary.
Back to the pots—– I count three DIFFERENT pots and a odd lid.
That isn’t unusual if you like to cook except mine get stored up high over stove and I can’t reach them, being short and can’t climb step stools, missing knee cartilage! The additional ones out in laundry/store room are even higher.
The extra door is simply the closet door where he keeps additional appliances, pots, stuff too big to fit in a normal cabinet. Doesn’t everyone have one of those? I used to say it was the appliance farm for younger daughter who like Ghost owned one of everything ever made.
Once at Restoration Hardware we were trying to find something to buy for her and the only thing she could find she wanted and didn’t own was a stainless steel gherkin fork and a special spoon to scoop out the capers from a jar. That is someone who owns too many cooking tools!
Ghost, do you own a gherkin fork and caper spoon?
Love, Jackie
Here’s a slideshow of some of our pets my ex put together for me:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lQff4ruJ–E
George Lucas missed his chance with those names. Jerkin Fork and Caper Spoon vs Hans Solo. To prove that I am safe I offer that no one that I have ever dated is deceased, as far as I know.
10# Rottweiler loves to get dressed. He is wearing a ratty and tattered skeleton head sweater right now, either was a Halloween dog sweater or a biker themed one, could be either? I need to dig out his winter wardrobe.
Mom’s hairless Australian shepherd actually should wear a sweater, I bought her some and she will not wear them. She is hairless because she has terrible skin allergies and mom wouldn’t take her to vet. I take her now but it is too late, she only grew back part of hair on body.
Speaking of which I need to go turn on heater for my two that live in enclosed breezeway, as the heating system doesn’t do well making it out there without a booster rocket!
Love, Jackie
Jerry I promise dating me didn’t guarantee death! But I decided most of the people I knew who killed others were either love triangles, or money related, like insurance. Or inheritance. Or both or all three!
You are from Florida which used to have a lot of dramatic crimes back when I was younger, the Jimmy Buffet “Cuban crimes of passion”. But I remember a lot that fit into the paragraph one description too. I used to read the Miami Herald daily when I was young in the 1950’s.
Back to cats, pets, Mark those are cuties. I hope you got to keep them or visitation rights? You referred to ex.
Love, Jackie
sand, I wouldn’t argue either of those two rankings. General Yeager is a personal hero of mine.
Ha! In tech school, extra heavy starch from the laundry was just the beginning. Then we went to work on them with Spray Sizing and an iron. When you got them right, you could literally stand the trousers up in a corner. When we were on A Shift, we got inspected when we got back to the squadron area after noon chow, which meant we sat through classes and two meals without ever bending our legs so we wouldn’t break our creases. There were rumors that our Student Leaders (“Ropes”) used masking tape to hold piano wire inside their trouser legs to preserve their creases. Oh yeah, and since a spit-shined boot would lose some of it shine when exposed to sunlight, and we knew that the First Sergeant knew that, and we knew from the angle of the sun at our location at that time of day which boot would be in the sunlight and which in the shade, we spent a lot more time shining our right boots than we did our left ones.
Who says the US doesn’t have the smartest military in the world? 🙂
No gherkin fork, Jackie, but I do have caper spoons *and* a jar of capers in the pantry.
Re kitchen organization, soup pot, chili pot, pans, skillets, sauté pans, wire racks, cookie sheets and such go into under-counter storage space. Stock pots (yes, plural) woks (yes, plural), slow cookers (yes, plural), pressure cooker, Crock Pot-brand indoor BBQ PIT, electric steamer and such go in the pantry on a metal wire shelf unit with the small appliances (toaster, Belgium waffle maker, rice steamer, electric deep fryer, etc.). Large cast iron items are kept in the oven when not in use, and smaller ones live in the bin below the oven with my metal and silicon bake ware.
If I can cut it into small enough pieces, I can fry it, sauté it, stir fry it, steam it, bake it, barbeque it, pressure cook it, boil it, or slow-cook it. 🙂 BTW, the electric BBQ PIT cooker does a really nice job on ribs, brisket, etc. when it’s too wintery outside.
Jackie, they are in TN and I am in AL. That’s why she made the video. So I could see them even though they are too far away to visit, barring my employer requiring me to come in for something.
Wow, Ghost, you have WAY more stuff than I do … and I used to cook for nine people every day — Chris and myself, and our seven children. I will add more in the morning; it’s late.
I am impressed, Ghost! You sound as well equipped as the youngest daughter and as organized. She bought me some appliances with cords when she semi-moved in when her dad became ill. I have always had this “thing” about electrical appliances, no doubt caused by growing up in home where my “Granny” didn’t own a cookbook, a measuring cup or spoon!
I found a “ricer” that appeared to date from Civil War era and no one used, from then on I would put any leftovers I needed to disguise through it and add the puree to soups! That was closest thing I ever found to anything we’d recognize now. Let’s just say I grew up cooking under “primitive” conditions and learned from self taught slicing and dicing with chef’s knives and restaurant pots! After I got married, that is!
Really, I shouldn’t make it sound as though I were deprived, Mike went into restaurant industry not long after we married, so he’d come home from conventions bringing things like microwaves and Cuisinart’s and stuff like that before anyone even knew what they were. That’s how I acquired all the restaurant quality pots and pans and knives, stuff not readily sold in department stores back in the 1970’s.
I’ve been reading about Grant’s and Union Army burning down and raiding my Louisiana parish causing everyone to fall into a state of poverty they never recovered from. Truly sad, mostly from prospective of civilians.
Love, Jackie
Yeah, well, I did go a little overboard a few years ago when I decided to purchase just about every appliance and gadget I didn’t already have. On the bright side, I bought good quality, so it will undoubtedly outlast either me or my need for it.
Gosh, Charlotte, I knew you’d raised a larger-than-average-sized family, but somehow I’d missed you had seven children. You’re an even more remarkable lady than I thought.
Jackie, Croxton got the University of Alabama, but it came back. Someone in the state had the bright idea of turning it into a military academy during the Civil War. For the losing side.
OK, that strange pot with no handles is still in Arlo’s kitchen. It reminds me of one of those Le Creuset steel stock pots with a lid, usually enameled in various colors, but I’ve never seen one without handles.
How does one destroy a railroad line? I’d never really thought about it until the day I saw something in one of the Southern cities I grew up it. If you are Gen. W. T. Sherman, you have your men pull up the rails and ties; pile up the ties with the rails across them; burn the ties to soften the iron rails; and have them walk the ends of the rails around the bases of live oaks…where some of those “Sherman’s neckties” will remain wrapped around the trees more than a hundred years later to amaze a kid who had never really thought of such a thing.
I always think of those bent rails when I hear the song “The Night They Drove Old Dixie Down”.
Another example, I suppose, of what Faulkner meant when he wrote, “The past is never dead. It’s not even past.”
I was thinking same thing just now when a strange “something” took over post I was typing.
Tonight I have been searching archives for anything about murder/robbery that took place about 100 plus years or more ago in our house in Louisiana. Can’t find a word, although my hometown newspaper seems to have been a real paper back then!
But this led me to the family who originally owned all the land and multiple farms/plantations and the most famous murder that took place, as it involved supposed buried treasure, gold and a giant silver bell. And the largest plantation home being built in LA which sits across river from ours. In ruins and pockmarked with holes.
But what I really ended up finding was that my parish, once the richest in the state became the poorest, that the family who began our farm/plantation came from Virginia after Revolutionary War, signed Declaration of Independence and now their last descendent in parish lives in a decrepit shack on welfare.
This is sad. So good night all.
Love, Jackie
Good morning Villagers….
Mark, I watched your video and the background music just wanted to make me…tear up, especially after I had read they were in TN and you’re in AL. So, do you have a cat(s) now?
And thanks for the rum ball link, GR was quick to note that Indy Mindy would eliminate the middle man……too funny.
Yesterday, this man comes into the packing room. Seems his friend’s daughter parked her Dad’s car in the hen house parking lot. Ian and Andrew were leaving (still manual feeding two troughs of feedings), and she asked if she could park there. Ian said not here, over there….pointing closer the edge of the corn field. Upon her return, she found her car had been egged. Her Dad was not a happy camper. Everyone in a ten mile radius probably knows where we keep the key to the door…..been a many teenager work there….oh, when she left her car there, she left in a truck with two boys…..hmmmm…..envious boyfriend got even maybe!!!!
Have to get in my babysitting mode today….I have Kyler tonight and tomorrow night. Think I’ll introduce him to Foghorn Leghorn tonight.
ya’ll have a blessed day
GR 😉
The last of the…..
Important List
The most important thing in life. God
Maybe over the weekend, I’ll ‘recap’ the entire list. As I’ve said, I have it taped to my wall, next to my computer and I see it every day, and at least one if not two ‘pop’ out at me…helps me keep my life in somewhat of a perspective.
…and I did have, at one time, papers that stated I was not crazy 🙂
One grin:
https://i.chzbgr.com/maxW500/8379989248/hFFF3E2C0/
…and one more grin:
https://i.chzbgr.com/maxW500/8379985664/h6C58109B/
🙂 “…lite Brunswick stew salad for two…” ! 🙂
Good morning, I say, good morning Debbe. A balmy 27 this morning with a high today of 65. My great grandfather lived until I was about 10 and today I don’t understand why I never asked him about life in the post-war south. Even my grandfather, who lived until 1986 at age 88. Kids! Tell them about walking barefoot in the snow, uphill, both ways, whether they want to hear it or not. They’ll be glad later.
-2F on the cheap thermometer attached to triple pane window. But they predict possible above freezing this weekend: +34 or so. That’s when it will get messy. About 4″ on the ground now.
Jimmy –
In the strip about brunswick stew salad – why that name? I have made it for decades, but have never heard of salad being appended to the name or found anything like same in it. Is this because I am used to VA and not AL brunswick stew?
My husband actually likes mine even better when I cook it at (1770’s) reenactments over an open fire, though I have to precook the chicken at home as we don’t have enough time to cook it at events, nor the proper sanitary standards to take it off the bones after the chicken cooks.