Artful Scheme of Happiness: 02/01/2003

Friday, February 28, 2003

Catholic Homemakers' Corner

For my Catholic brethren, who know about these things, I have unearthed this little treasure. If "Lenten meals create problems in your home," Ann Pillsbury has worked up a real treat. (Macaroni and cheese must be too good for this bitch and her persnickety brood.)

Giant Tuna Stack (I can hear the lesbians getting excited, but no.)

Ingredients
1 cup Pillsbury Extra Light Pancake Mix
2 tbsp. chopped onion
2 tbsp. chopped green pepper
2 tbsp. butter
1 can flaked tuna
1 can cream of mushroom soup
1/2 cup shredded cheese

Idea
Mrs. Pillsbury wants you to make eight pancakes and set them aside. Then mix everything else together. Then stack the pancakes on a cookie sheet and spread hot tuna filling between each layer. Top it all with cheese, broil, and cut into wedges.

Et VOILA, that'll teach your family to feel bad that Jesus died.

I never thought I'd be saying this, but...

I wish I were sick. And not just sick with the flu or tetter or some plain old cold. No, I need some old-fashioned disease, like polio or smallpox, something I can take a good long time to recover from. The thing is, I was browsing through Betty Crocker's Picture Cook Book (circa 1950 ... less appetizing pictures I have never seen) and I found the following recipe, which is described as an "appetite tempter for the convalescent:"

Grape Juice with Egg
Pour into a tall glass...
3 tbsp. orange juice
1/2 cup grape juice
Add...
2 tsp.sugar
dash of salt (SALT!)
To...
1 egg white, beaten stiff

Add egg white to fruit juice and stir just enough to mix well. Yield: 1 tall glass.

Predicted result: RELAPSE, accompanied by vomiting and extreme anger.

Thursday, February 27, 2003

Ripped from the Headlines

27 February, 2003 ... Oshkosh, WI. The Oshkosh Northwestern reported this morning that a SEXUAL OFFENDER has been RELEASED. I thought it might have been Laurie Woodruff Ebert Mosher, and I was terrified. Well, you can breathe a sigh of relief, because they've released a different sexual predator. That crazy Christian crackpot whore is still safely behind bars.

Wednesday, February 26, 2003

Do you know where you're going to?

So, I know that the Oshkosh Northwestern probably doesn't write its own obituaries, but I have to assume (ass ... u ... me) that they at least edit them. (Ha ha ... edit ... the Northwestern.) So why can't they at least get the names right? I mean, come on.

Also, there should probably be some sort of refresher course in math offered to the Northwestern obituary staff. I mention it out of charity. 2003 - 1913 does NOT equal 87. Couldn't a Mrs. Beyer or Mr. Hudson take these people in hand?

I love, incidentally, that my parents are named not once but TWICE in the aforementioned obituary. But the thing is, they're described as being the "special friends" of the deceased. And "special friends" sort of smacks of "longtime companion" or "devoted lesbian lover."

Anyhoo, in the interests of posterity, I would like to add the following facts to the public record:

Mrs. GUHL was a generous and beautiful woman who never drank or exposed herself to the sun. She was always perfectly turned out, often with an incredible updo or some sort of darling little headband. Her wardrobe was full of Von Furstenburg scarves, Givenchy jumpsuits, and tons of other fabulous clothing. Her house was loaded with exquisite furniture that her husband, a master woodworker if there ever was one, lovingly made for her. She offered a wide variety of premium candies at Halloween, (we're talking WHOLE Snickers bars), and could be relied upon to produce Reese's peanut butter cups whenever you visited her. I will miss her.

Tuesday, February 25, 2003

In nomine Patris, et Filii, et Spiritus Sancti

Someone I know died last night. She was relatively old, not in the best of health, and suffered either from Alzheimer's or dementia. So I'm sitting here, feeling really sad, and wondering if it really is for the best that she's gone or if that's just something we say to make ourselves feel better. Well, I'm saying my Hail Marys for her.

Monday, February 24, 2003

Kitty Mews-A-Lot Is A SLUT

I just saw that damned cat sunning himself on another neighbor's porch. How could he do this to me? Leading me on all this time. I mean, I haven't befriended any other cats. I've maintained the sanctity of our relationship. Who does he think I am? A common two-bit gutter whore whose affections can be ignored after twenty minutes of heavy petting? Well, let me just say this: IT'S OVER BETWEEN US.

Saturday, February 22, 2003

Recipe for Perfect Happiness

I went for a four-mile walk yesterday around Greenlake.

When I stepped out of the house, there was a fine mist in the air. But I figured that I am a hearty individual who won't melt when he gets a little wet, so I thought I'd go out anyway. By the time I got to the end of my block, it was drizzling. But I was wearing a water-resistant jacket and besides, I like the rain, so I persevered. By the time I got to the lake, it was pouring and I couldn't stop laughing. I think I giggled the entire way around the lake. The joggers probably thought I was insane, but I have to say, it was one of the nicest walks I've ever taken. There were primroses and crocuses and daffodils, not to mention all sorts of flowering trees, all in full bloom. And it was a warm rain, so I had no real cause for complaint.

Jenny W. (now B. -- she got married and never told anyone, including her own mother, until after the fact) and I once walked home from school in the pouring rain and we had the time of our lives then too. So maybe there's something inherently cheering about the rain. If you're looking for a good time, I recommend taking a walk in the rain (preferably with no lightning).

Wednesday, February 19, 2003

Two Things Of My Own

1. What about William Shakespeare?
2. The Normans spoke French, and were as French as the Franks or the Gauls by the time Guillaume le Conquerant crushed the English. Non?

Monday, February 17, 2003

Who Comes UP with this Crap?

I just got an urgent e-mail from a lovely woman named Regina who is clearly interested in my sexual well-being. This Regina character is dying for me to take a look at pictures of Jennifer Lopez naked. Now, the only way I'd want to see Jennifer Lopez' naked body is if she were lying dead in a morgue and I was somehow picked to identify the body. (Maybe she'd been murdered by Gwyneth Paltrow, who would have knocked Jenny's block off for stealing the toupee-sporting, action-hero-wanna-be love of G(rand)Pa's life).

And then it occurred to me. WHO WRITES these things? I mean, there must be someone (someone lonely and very pale) who sits out there and composes what she assumes to be titillating messages. Because if *I* were this person, and I'm not saying that I'm not, then I would want to use slightly more effective target marketing.

Sunday, February 16, 2003

La Belle France

Since when did the French lose the War of the Spanish Succession? A Bourbon king, directly descended from Louis XIV, sits on the Spanish throne to this day.

And lest we forget, the English language would not be half as beautiful or expressive as it is today if France hadn't completely overrun England in 1066, thereby changing the course of English history entirely. That fact is mysteriously left out of your "complete" military history.

How odd.

Friday, February 14, 2003

2 Good 2 Pass Up

Apparently, and I'm kicking myself for not knowing about this sooner, a girl I went to law school with (we called her Boob Job) was a NOT on Am I Hot last night. OH WHY didn't I watch that show?

My Love Is Your Love

Remember back in grade school, how we got to spend the weeks before Valentine's Day begging our parents to buy us a box or two of cards (of the "Choo-choo-choose you" variety) for our classmates? And how we got to make the strangely political (for fourth-graders) decision of whether or not to give a card to everyone in the class? Ahh, good times.

I would like to drop a Bee Mine card in each and every one of your little construction paper (lace trim optional) mailboxes. Happy Valentine's Day!

Wednesday, February 12, 2003

Squirrels and Alcoholics, BACK AWAY FROM MY HEAD!

Oh, ALSO. Why did the inventors at Tigi think people would want their heads to smell like a big Pina Colada? Because I DON'T want that. Not now, not ever.

You've Ruined Everything, Ruiner!

Due to the fact that he's an ass, I had to break up with my last hair stylist. So I've embarked upon the traumatic search for a replacement and let me tell you, the first step was not auspicious.

There were clues that I should have paid attention to, I will admit. I didn't think it was good that my new stylist had his own hair cut like Billy Idol's. Or that he seemed to be an alcoholic biker with a severe addiction to hair bleach. Or that he was a straight man, which just could NOT be MORE WRONG. But I'm an easy-going, kind-hearted guy, the salt of the earth really, and I thought I'd give him a chance anyway. Oh when will I realize that my incredible generosity isn't always a good thing?

I look like I was placed face down on the ground and then hacked at with a weed whacker. Like a Hell's Angel, suffering from a raging hangover and nursing a grudge against well-rested homosexual men, took a straight razor and shaved SOME but not ALL of the hair off of my neck. (Oh wait, that did happen.) Like Stevie Wonder CLAPPED the hair off the top of my head.

My roommate actually laughed at me when I got home. If my next go at a hair stylist doesn't turn out, I'm changing my name to Grizzly Adams and moving up to the mountains, I SWEAR.

I Love To Love

There's an exciting flurry of possibilities in my life right now, all due to Valentine's Day. I've been asked out to dinner by a girl that I know, and I've been asked to go bowling by another girl.

Do you see a pattern emerging here? Do you see how it's slightly off-kilter? Such is my life. A la Casanova, I am accepting both proposals.

Monday, February 10, 2003

But Officer...

I was driving around in Ballard (the Westhaven of Seattle) today, running some errands. And what did I see? Three cops on three horses. Now, I don't know about you, but when I'm on a city street, I don't know who has the right of way: a horse walking slowly down the side of the street with a burly, ticket-issuing cop on his back, or a super-fast, souped-up, V-9-engined automobile such as the one I drive. No one else seemed to know either, which produced a big traffic jam. Picture a traffic jam in Westhaven. It's sort of hard to imagine. Mm hmm. The horses decided, after producing this spectacular traffic snarl, to walk down the sidewalk. Which must have bewildered the aged pedestrians of Ballard.

If a horse isn't going the speed limit, can you pass him on the left? If a horse is walking down the sidewalk, is he breaking the law (because isn't the horse essentially a vehicle)?

I WISH that I had a tame ostrich (named Beeky or Mrs. Henderson) so I could ride around town on it, testing legal theories. You know, my birthday is coming up.

Saturday, February 08, 2003

Just one request

Are you there, God? It's me, Margaret's brother. I promise this isn't about my bust.

God, I would like it if, when I have a cold or any other terrible illness, my beard could stop growing. Just temporarily, that would be fine. Because let's face it, Lord: there is no way I am going to shave while I'm sick. But I don't really like the kleenex-shredding properties of the damn whiskers that patchily cover my face. So on the next go-round, could you do something about this? Thanks Lord, you're a real sport.

Thursday, February 06, 2003

Rip van Winkle

I looked out my window just a few minutes ago, and noticed that our camellia tree is in full bloom; beautiful red flowers on a deep green tree. There are also dandelions raising their buttery heads to the sun, which is shining brightly in a deep blue sky.

Gel-gel? I would be too, if I didn't know that I was stuck in the house with a miserable cold.

Wednesday, February 05, 2003

The rigors of being practically mortis

My symptoms develop apace. I can feel your concern, and I thank you for that.

Just so you never make this same mistake, I should warn you that taking Alka-Seltzer Plus cold medicine AND two Advil will lead to terrible sleeplessness and more drool than you ever thought possible. We're talking Turner and Hooch. Floods of biblical proportions.

This just isn't good. Care packages of chicken soup (are you listening, Mrs. Grass?) should be sent stat.

Monday, February 03, 2003

We interrupt this regularly scheduled post ...

I was going to tell you about my weekend on the Olympic Peninsula, where I saw deer and seals and rainbows, and scaled mountains and built chairs out of pine boughs (all on my own ... I'm a camping PRO). But now I find that I'm getting a cold. So instead I'll just wallow in my own misery, and let you imagine all the hilarious things that might have gone on.

Artful Scheme of Happiness