steaming hot...

 Don't you love playing with a new toy?  As an adult, playing with a new appliance is just as good. 

Yesterday our new microwave was installed.  You may recall, from an earlier blog, that our cleaning lady burnt a hole in the door of our  microwave by accidentally turning it on when there was nothing in it.  The lesson learned there was never, never run your microwave with nothing in it.  It wasn't her fault.  By design, that microwave was made to start with a touch of one of the number buttons.  She turned it on by wiping a cloth over it to clean it.  Never again.

We did try merely replacing the door of that microwave, only to learn, through a series of frustrating exchanges with the manufacturer, that new microwave doors arrive broken three times out of three tries.  

 Enough of that.  With my approval my wonder spouse started searching for a safer, more user friendly microwave. He is the expert on online shopping.  Did you know that Amazon delivers microwaves? They don't install but they do deliver. 

 He found what we wanted in a Kitchen Aid unit that is a microwave/ convection oven/ hot air fryer.  But better than that it has very easy instructions, clearly marked buttons, and clearly marked steps to make it do what you want it to do.  It will not turn on with the accidental touch of one button.  This evening we put it to the test by steaming (did I mention that it has a steamer feature?) corn on the cob, following the directions printed on the front of the microwave. The directions were easy to follow and the result was absolutely delicious, perfectly cooked corn on the cob with no boiling water and no mess.

This is it, our marvelous new appliance.  I'm looking forward to steaming lots of other vegetables - asparagus, broccoli, cauliflower??  My wonder spouse is not as enthusiastic about these veggies as I am.  Perhaps if I pour enough melted cheese over them.  

arts and crafts

 On Monday afternoons I meet with some church friends at a group gathering we call FFF (Faith, Fibers and Friendship).  We each bring a fiber project to work on and talk while we work.  What I particularly like about this group is that everyone is kind.  There is no cattiness or malicious gossip.  

We also don't spend much time on our phones although we do share pictures of grand and great grandchildren, and sometimes even adorable pets.

All of the ladies in this group, except me, either knit or crochet and they create beautiful pieces - shawls, sweaters, socks, blankets, etc in glorious colors and lacy patterns. 

Sadly, I cannot knit or crochet.  I have tried but my fingers just don't want to work that way, or perhaps I don't have the patience.  So I weave, and after I have taken a long strip of fabric off my New Zealand lap loom, I stitch designs on it.  Happily, my FFF friends are very encouraging and like what I do. 

This is my current project.  It is pictorial representations of the trips my wonder spouse and I have gone on since we first got together.  The three finished triangular panels represent trips to Michigan, the Caribbean, and Key West.  Still to come - Canada, South America, Egypt and Japan & Alaska.  When those are finished I will have two spaces left. So obviously we need to go somewhere else.  Although a friend who knows us well suggested that the final panel could show my spouse and me working on a jigsaw puzzle. 

My wonder spouse refers to this as our own personal Bayeux Tapestry.  Happily, though, no battles are involved. Also it is only seven feet long not 70 meters. 

a fine feast...

 Neither my spouse nor I are gardeners.  We do have some landscaping around the house which we try to keep looking nice with professional help, but you will never see us planting, nurturing or harvesting lettuce, carrots, beans or anything else from our own backyard garden.  We are growing a rather nice patch of bird seed sprouts right now, but that's a different story.

Just because we aren't gardeners doesn't mean that we don't eat vegetables and fruit.  I mentioned my wonder spouse's shopping spree in another recent blog.  Our fridge is full of his farmer's market harvest. 

We are though sometimes rather single minded in our meal planning.  We don't feel the need to have vegetables, meat and salad at every meal.  This evening, for example, we indulged in one of our favorite single item suppers - green beans.  

We washed and snapped a huge bunch of green beans, enough for two meals, put them in a pot of water with chopped onions and cooked them until they were nicely tender but not soggy.  No one likes soggy green beans.  Once cooked we each took a heaping helping, added butter and real bacon bits and feasted.  That was our supper - just delicious green beans. 

That was our supper, but we did also have dessert.  Coffee cake from the Amish bakery needs to be eaten while it's fresh.  It is delicious, especially with a little butter.  I'm not sure if butter is considered good for you these days, but it certainly makes things taste good so I shall continue to use it on toast and veggies and, of course, coffee cake.  In case you're concerned about the health risks of coffee cake here's a picture of the label.

If you notice, every ingredient on the lable is natural and recognizable so I think it's good for us (in moderation of course).  If you'll excuse me now, I believe it's time for our bedtime snack.

What's in a name?

 A while back my west coast brother accused me of being a paronomasiac, in other words a person who enjoys puns or word play.  I think he must be right because not long after that I heard someone ask the question "Why are pants called pants?" and I've been pondering that question ever since.  Why not pant?  It is after all a single garment.  And it's not just pants, there are trousers, slacks, shorts, culottes, capris, and even jeans - all ending in 's'.  

Because it has two legs? Generally speaking all of our upper body wear (unless it's a poncho or cape) has two sleeves or at least two arm holes and yet we don't speak of blouses or shirts when we mean only one of such an item. 

Obviously I decided that this needed some research and here's what I discovered.

The History of 'Pants'

The word's origins are rooted in comedy

In US English, the word pants isn't a particularly funny one. It's the most common term for that very common piece of clothing that covers the body from the waist to the ankle (give or take), with a separate part for each leg.

But the word pants is rooted in comedy.

Image of Pantalone. The word 'pants' comes to us from an Anglicization of the character's name, "Pantaloon."

The word comes from the name of a stock figure in the commedia dell’arte, a form of Italian comic theater popular throughout Europe from about the 16th to the mid-18th century. Pantalone, as he was called, was a greedy, lecherous, scheming old man who often ended up being duped and humiliated. His costume consisted of a soft brimless hat; a pleated black cassock (typically worn open); slippers; and a vest, breeches, and stockings that were conspicuously red and tight-fitting. In later representations of the character, the breeches and stockings were replaced by long trousers.

When trousers of a similar style became popular during the Restoration in England, they became known as pantaloons, Pantaloon being an Anglicization of Pantalone. Fashions changed over the years, but pantaloons continued to be the word used to refer to various types of trousers. Americans clipped the term to pants in the early 19th century, and that shorter word became a standard term for the garment, serving also as the basis for new formations denoting new garments, such as underpants and panties.

Harmless enough to our ears, the shortened form pants alone was considered vulgar by some language commentators for quite some time, including Ambrose Bierce, who wrote the following in his 1909 book Write It Right about pants for trousers: "Abbreviated from pantaloons, which are no longer worn. Vulgar exceedingly."

We don't know that the "vulgar exceedingly" characterization had anything to do with another use of pants or not, but in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, pants appeared in an insulting assertion about a person's name: to say that someone's name was pants meant to say that you didn't like or trust that person, much like in the still-used expression "your name is mud."

And in the 20th century, the word began to appear in the phrase "with one's pants down," meaning "in an embarrassing position (as of being unprepared to act)."

Pants by itself has of course continued in US English to refer to trousers, but in British English, pants is used most often to refer to what Americans call underpants—which, makes the word a good bit funnier across the pond, at least for 8-year-olds and anyone who shares their sense of humor.

And the British have taken the humor to another level: since the 1990s, British English speakers have also used pants informally to mean "nonsense," as in "It's ridiculous; the whole thing is pants" or "The whole thing is a pile of pants."

Clearly there's too much history about the word pants for anyone to declare it itself pants.

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This is all very interesting but it still doesn't answer the question why pants plural?  Why pantaloons for that matter? The Italian word has no 's' at the end.  But that's enough pondering for now.  I guess I'll just skirt the issue.

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shopping spree..

 As a general rule, when you send a husband grocery shopping you never know what might jump into his cart or follow him home. Or so I've been told by various friends and relatives. 

Interestingly though, my wonder spouse does most of the grocery shopping in our household.  He has it down to a science, with a shopping list he creates on his phone.  No casually roaming the aisles with a paper list (my style) his phone list includes brand names and aisle and section numbers.  No wasted steps, no backtracking, his engineering spirit is obvious.  

But sometimes he gets to go a little wild.  Today was one of those days.  I had commitments this morning (a manicure and a visit with an elderly cousin) so he went by himself to our favorite farmers' market, Schmuckers, where things are not nearly as well organized as at Krogers but so much more fun to discover.

A few hours later (it's a long drive, especially with road construction detours) he came home laden with fresh scrumptiousness.  Michigan cherries, Indiana tomatoes, cheese curds, colby jack cheese, corn on the cob, green beans and one large onion will keep us eating well for days to come. 

Oh yes, he did swing by the nearby Taste of Tradition Bakery to pick up apple bread and coffee cake.  

If I look like I've gained a few pounds the next time you see me, I'm sure you'll understand.  

By the way, if you look back at the blog I wrote a few days ago about the new food pyramid, you will see that this week we are eating all the right stuff.  Well, except for the coffee cake, but nobody's perfect.

Hooray for books...

 Again with thanks to my west coast brother.  Today is "National Paperback Book Day," definitely a day worth celebrating.  Over the years I have dscovered many of my favorite authors via paperback books. John D. McDonald, Laura Ingalls Wilder, Lilian Jackson Braun and Nevile Shute come to mind.  

During the year that I taught in upstate New York I didn't have a television, but there was a paperback book store only a few blocks from my apartment. It was conveniently located next door to the laundromat.  Pretty clever, I think.

What I like most about paperback books is their portability.  I can easily fit one or two in my small carry-on bag when I travel.  

I know what you're thinking.  "For goodness sake Luci come into the 21st century.  You can listen to books on your I Pod or any similar gadget.  You can even check out audio books from the library to listen to on the go. If you want to hold something in your hand you can read from your tablet.  You don't need old fashioned books with paper pages."

I know all that is true.  There are many, many options out there.  And yet, I can't help remembering the time that my spouse and I were on a cruise and the book I had brought along to read in my spare time (there is a little spare time) which I had carefully downloaded on my tablet from my local library, refused to be read in proper order.  It would start in the middle when I opened it or worse at the end, never at the page where I had stopped.  Eventually I did finish that book but not until I was back in Fort Wayne and could borrow a paper copy from tne library.

So I will continue to carry paperback books with me when I travel. No travel plans right now but I have no doubt that something will be coming up.

Here kitty, kitty...

 My west coast brother has informed me that today is "International Tiger Day."  I'm not really familiar with tigers, having seen them at a distance in zoos, but I do think they are beautiful big cats. 

But, closer to home, we have a tiger striped cat who prowls our cul-de-sac most days.  She has a collar and looks well fed so I presume she has a happy home nearby.  

I think, though, that she has delusions of tigerness.  She would like to be padding softly through the jungle or across the veldt sneaking up on an unsuspecting gazelle (or some kind of animal), pouncing and making the kill.

While this may be her dream, her reality is lurking under or near our bird feeders, waiting for some unwary bird to fly near her.  They never do.  

 The antics remind me of a book I used to read to my children about the little blue bird who comes walking along, walking along.  When the following cat gets too close (just when my children would get worried) the blue bird would fly away.  And so it goes in the real life of our back yard.