November 4th has come and gone. Everyone in America got to make their voice heard about who our next elected officials are going to be. Some are happy, some aren't, some are just indifferent.
Regardless of how you feel, why do you still have campaign signs in your yard and stickers on your vehicle? Why are there still signs along every road and on every corner?
Is it because you are voicing a protest against who was elected? are you still celebrating? or did you just forget?
A small business nearby still has 15 or 20 signs sitting next to their driveway. Another business has still got a couple campaign signs in their windows.
I'm all for supporting your candidate but, can we please, at the very least, go get all the signs down that are littering the area? All the ones still next to the road are the for the people who lost the election. All the winners' signs have mysteriously vanished.
I'm tempted to make a list of all the candidates with signs still arrayed all over the place. Then when the next election comes around, I can pick candidates based on whether or not they and their supporters picked up signs after the last election. That might be better than what some people choose their candidates based on.
Saturday, November 15, 2008
Wednesday, November 12, 2008
Birthday lunches
When you work in a big office, there is always the monthly "birthday cake."
Someone picks up a cake from a grocery store and brings it in so that everyone in the office who has a birthday that month can feel special.
Not so, here in the rural South.
I was just informed this morning that it would be my responsibility to bring a dish for the birthday lunch to be held on Friday for the November office birthdays. Apparently, each person is supposed to bring something, be it food or plates, napkins or drinks, for a big birthday lunch.
My first impulse was to bring bruschetta - I've been dying for some good bruschetta. It'd be easy to make Thursday night after work and I could toast the bread here in our little kitchen's toaster. Toss on the cheese and it'd be easy and beautiful. It's one of my favorite dishes to take to friends' houses for dinner or whip up when I have unexpected guests. What's not to love about it? Simple, elegant and, really, healthy and decadent in all the right ways.
I asked everyone else what they were going to bring. For the birthday cake, there will be a homemade-that-morning-chocolate chip pound cake. Someone else is bringing a bag of chips. Another is going to grill hamburgers out back so someone is bringing buns. Potato salad, macaroni salad, baked beans, a vegetable tray and a watermelon.
It's November... I thought that was all summer food or for picnics. Not so!
One of my co-workers, also a "foreigner" (read, not local), is going to bring spinach dip and rye bread. That elicited some "oohs" and "ahhs".
I wonder how the bruschetta will go over. Maybe it'll be a hit. Maybe it won't. Maybe I'd be better off bringing ice cream.
The next Friday, we're having Thanksgiving... and we're all supposed to bring something. The company will provide a turkey. Fridays are looking more and more intimidating.
Someone picks up a cake from a grocery store and brings it in so that everyone in the office who has a birthday that month can feel special.
Not so, here in the rural South.
I was just informed this morning that it would be my responsibility to bring a dish for the birthday lunch to be held on Friday for the November office birthdays. Apparently, each person is supposed to bring something, be it food or plates, napkins or drinks, for a big birthday lunch.
My first impulse was to bring bruschetta - I've been dying for some good bruschetta. It'd be easy to make Thursday night after work and I could toast the bread here in our little kitchen's toaster. Toss on the cheese and it'd be easy and beautiful. It's one of my favorite dishes to take to friends' houses for dinner or whip up when I have unexpected guests. What's not to love about it? Simple, elegant and, really, healthy and decadent in all the right ways.
I asked everyone else what they were going to bring. For the birthday cake, there will be a homemade-that-morning-chocolate chip pound cake. Someone else is bringing a bag of chips. Another is going to grill hamburgers out back so someone is bringing buns. Potato salad, macaroni salad, baked beans, a vegetable tray and a watermelon.
It's November... I thought that was all summer food or for picnics. Not so!
One of my co-workers, also a "foreigner" (read, not local), is going to bring spinach dip and rye bread. That elicited some "oohs" and "ahhs".
I wonder how the bruschetta will go over. Maybe it'll be a hit. Maybe it won't. Maybe I'd be better off bringing ice cream.
The next Friday, we're having Thanksgiving... and we're all supposed to bring something. The company will provide a turkey. Fridays are looking more and more intimidating.
Tuesday, November 11, 2008
Southern food is not for the faint of heart
Have you ever gone to a new place and decided to try some local cuisine?
You end up in a small restaurant with a friendly wait staff, small tables and usually, fairly cramped quarters. Sometimes the food is spectacular, just weird or outright disgusting.
When I first set foot into a Southern diner, I was appalled. I'd gone to lunch with some co-workers and they wanted to hit up a local cafe. Or so I thought.
15 minutes after we left the office, we arrived at a gas station. Yes, I said gas station. Adjoining it and with it's own entrance, was our lunch spot. And the place was PACKED!!
Inside, I encountered a hot plate cafeteria like you'd find at a hospital or a school. And everyone in the office had wanted to eat there. Curbing my skepticism - a few of my co-workers actually enjoy food that is not Southern cuisine - I decided I'd get the "meat and three." Three vegetables and a meat, bread, dessert and a drink - sweet tea or water. Who eats that much for lunch?
On the food line, there were several choices for meats - fried fish, fried chicken, country steak, some sort of meat chunks swimming in a whitish gravy, baked chicken and grilled pork chops. I'd normally opt for baked chicken but it was swimming in a greasy looking pool of sauce, but I decided I'd go for the fried chicken and try "real" southern food. Two huge pieces of chicken were dropped onto the plate and passed to the next lady in line.
There were about 20 vegetable choices, which surprised me. One of the choices was tomatoes - just raw, sliced tomatoes. What the heck? Mysterious greens that all looked the same but were, assured my co-workers, all completely different, three kinds of peas, more beans than I could count, a huge pot of mashed potatoes, macaroni and cheese, two kinds of corn and fried vegetables too numerous to mention. And on the very end - three tiny bowls of salad made from iceberg lettuce, an onion slice, a cucumber slice and five tiny croutons. Clearly, salad was not a popular vegetable at this restaurant.
When I decided on the mashed potatoes, the lady behind the counter asks me "White or brown? We got red-eye too." Seeing the confusion on my face - I thought she meant the kind of potatoes - she says "White gravy, brown gravy or red-eye gravy?" Ah HA! Brown gravy, isn't that the right one for potatoes? The look I got when I asked for that clearly said no. I'm not sure what that red-eye gravy is but it sounds pretty scary. Food named after body parts, especially exhausted body parts, does not equate to an enjoyable eating experience in my book.
The "connoisseur" of my co-workers gets fried okra. That must be okay... I think I'd had it once or twice when I was young at one of those church potlucks I'd been forced to go to. It was definately less scary than the mysterious greens. I grabbed one of the lonely salads and was confronted with the dessert line.
These people are serious when they give you choices for desserts. Banana pudding, chocolate pudding, pound cake, three kinds of cobbler, four kinds of pie, ice cream, cookies or the mysterious "special." Staring at the enormous plate sitting on the counter in front of me, I realized I wouldn't have any room for dessert. The banana pudding was in little styrofoam cups and there were lids at the end of the line so I grabbed one of those, figuring I could eat it later on at work for a snack.
You remember that "bread" that the meal came with? It wasn't just "bread." It was a bread basket. A slice of white bread, fried cornbread (what the heck!?), a honey butter biscuit and a plain biscuit. There really was not enough room on my tray for any more but, it's included so, I might as well. I figured that what I didn't eat, I could take home and feed to a small country to avert world hunger.
Paid for my lunch and dutifully followed the crowd over to a big table. A waitress came over and plunked down a huge glass of sweet tea in front of each of us. Embarrassed, because I hate to be complicated, I politely asked for a glass of water. I swear to you, that glass was half a gallon of water. And it was smaller than the tea glass.
The food was... and I hate to admit this because I was so disturbed at the beginning... absolutely and utterly delicious. I ate until I was almost sick. And everyone else in the restaurant was "tucking in" like they hadn't eaten in weeks. It really was that good... or there is some mysterious famine that I don't know about and everyone else is eating before the food is gone.
When I got back to the office, that pudding sat on the corner of my desk for about 30 minutes, staring at me. Knowing that I'd regret it tomorrow, I went ahead and ate it. I don't want to know what scale is going to say tomorrow. And I think that I'll have a salad for dinner tonight.
The funniest thing about it all - and this comes back to me as I sit here, wondering when we'll all go there for lunch again - when I asked one of the local historians where the best food was, his response was "in gas stations." I thought he was joking. He wasn't.
And to quote Paula Deen from the October issue of Ladies Home Journal, "I don't eat my own cooking every day! My lord, I'd be wider than the table if I ate chicken and biscuits and gravy every day." She's not joking either.
You end up in a small restaurant with a friendly wait staff, small tables and usually, fairly cramped quarters. Sometimes the food is spectacular, just weird or outright disgusting.
When I first set foot into a Southern diner, I was appalled. I'd gone to lunch with some co-workers and they wanted to hit up a local cafe. Or so I thought.
15 minutes after we left the office, we arrived at a gas station. Yes, I said gas station. Adjoining it and with it's own entrance, was our lunch spot. And the place was PACKED!!
Inside, I encountered a hot plate cafeteria like you'd find at a hospital or a school. And everyone in the office had wanted to eat there. Curbing my skepticism - a few of my co-workers actually enjoy food that is not Southern cuisine - I decided I'd get the "meat and three." Three vegetables and a meat, bread, dessert and a drink - sweet tea or water. Who eats that much for lunch?
On the food line, there were several choices for meats - fried fish, fried chicken, country steak, some sort of meat chunks swimming in a whitish gravy, baked chicken and grilled pork chops. I'd normally opt for baked chicken but it was swimming in a greasy looking pool of sauce, but I decided I'd go for the fried chicken and try "real" southern food. Two huge pieces of chicken were dropped onto the plate and passed to the next lady in line.
There were about 20 vegetable choices, which surprised me. One of the choices was tomatoes - just raw, sliced tomatoes. What the heck? Mysterious greens that all looked the same but were, assured my co-workers, all completely different, three kinds of peas, more beans than I could count, a huge pot of mashed potatoes, macaroni and cheese, two kinds of corn and fried vegetables too numerous to mention. And on the very end - three tiny bowls of salad made from iceberg lettuce, an onion slice, a cucumber slice and five tiny croutons. Clearly, salad was not a popular vegetable at this restaurant.
When I decided on the mashed potatoes, the lady behind the counter asks me "White or brown? We got red-eye too." Seeing the confusion on my face - I thought she meant the kind of potatoes - she says "White gravy, brown gravy or red-eye gravy?" Ah HA! Brown gravy, isn't that the right one for potatoes? The look I got when I asked for that clearly said no. I'm not sure what that red-eye gravy is but it sounds pretty scary. Food named after body parts, especially exhausted body parts, does not equate to an enjoyable eating experience in my book.
The "connoisseur" of my co-workers gets fried okra. That must be okay... I think I'd had it once or twice when I was young at one of those church potlucks I'd been forced to go to. It was definately less scary than the mysterious greens. I grabbed one of the lonely salads and was confronted with the dessert line.
These people are serious when they give you choices for desserts. Banana pudding, chocolate pudding, pound cake, three kinds of cobbler, four kinds of pie, ice cream, cookies or the mysterious "special." Staring at the enormous plate sitting on the counter in front of me, I realized I wouldn't have any room for dessert. The banana pudding was in little styrofoam cups and there were lids at the end of the line so I grabbed one of those, figuring I could eat it later on at work for a snack.
You remember that "bread" that the meal came with? It wasn't just "bread." It was a bread basket. A slice of white bread, fried cornbread (what the heck!?), a honey butter biscuit and a plain biscuit. There really was not enough room on my tray for any more but, it's included so, I might as well. I figured that what I didn't eat, I could take home and feed to a small country to avert world hunger.
Paid for my lunch and dutifully followed the crowd over to a big table. A waitress came over and plunked down a huge glass of sweet tea in front of each of us. Embarrassed, because I hate to be complicated, I politely asked for a glass of water. I swear to you, that glass was half a gallon of water. And it was smaller than the tea glass.
The food was... and I hate to admit this because I was so disturbed at the beginning... absolutely and utterly delicious. I ate until I was almost sick. And everyone else in the restaurant was "tucking in" like they hadn't eaten in weeks. It really was that good... or there is some mysterious famine that I don't know about and everyone else is eating before the food is gone.
When I got back to the office, that pudding sat on the corner of my desk for about 30 minutes, staring at me. Knowing that I'd regret it tomorrow, I went ahead and ate it. I don't want to know what scale is going to say tomorrow. And I think that I'll have a salad for dinner tonight.
The funniest thing about it all - and this comes back to me as I sit here, wondering when we'll all go there for lunch again - when I asked one of the local historians where the best food was, his response was "in gas stations." I thought he was joking. He wasn't.
And to quote Paula Deen from the October issue of Ladies Home Journal, "I don't eat my own cooking every day! My lord, I'd be wider than the table if I ate chicken and biscuits and gravy every day." She's not joking either.
Monday, November 10, 2008
Southern charm isn't all it's made out to be.
Southern charm has a really great feature - you can insult people and get away with it!
There's a lady who comes into my work every few weeks, I'll call her Miss June. She's as nice as can be and she always brings food. Always. She epitomizes that Southern charm thing I'd always heard about. When she talks, I feel like Paula Deen is standing on her shoulder giving diction lessons. She's in everyone's business, knows everyone and is a veritable fount of gossip. When she gets going, it sounds like someone left the tv on at a nature show of frogs gurgling at each other... non-stop.
There's only one problem with her. That net between her brain and mouth that we all have - or should have - is not there. She can say anything that she wants about anyone, even to their face, and you can't get offended because she always follows it up with one of three things:
"Oh, bless his little heart."
"But we all know her parents aren't like that, are they?"
"He means well, the poor darling."
It's an instant reaction that she's somehow learned to say right after she says anything that someone could be upset by.
Here's an example of Miss June:
"You know that Bobby Brown beat up his wife last night, don't you? She called the police and they took him to jail. Now she claims he didn't hit her and she tripped and fell, bless her little heart. We all know Bobby's parents taught him better."
What she's really saying is:
"Bobby beats his wife and she probably deserves it. He never should have married her but she made him do it. Bobby is much better than his wife and he ought to divorce her but she'll just take all his money and ruin his life."
When I finally figured out what she really meant as she shared all the gossip with everyone in the office, I decided I'd try out her tactic.
"Why does Miss June come in here every day? It's always so inconvenient for us since it's in the middle of the day. Is she really just a lonely old lady who has nothing better to do? That's so sad, bless her little heart."
I got a "Bless her heart" in agreement from everyone in hearing distance. How backhanded is that?
Everyone here says something like that at least once a day. It's not just Miss June.
There's a lady who comes into my work every few weeks, I'll call her Miss June. She's as nice as can be and she always brings food. Always. She epitomizes that Southern charm thing I'd always heard about. When she talks, I feel like Paula Deen is standing on her shoulder giving diction lessons. She's in everyone's business, knows everyone and is a veritable fount of gossip. When she gets going, it sounds like someone left the tv on at a nature show of frogs gurgling at each other... non-stop.
There's only one problem with her. That net between her brain and mouth that we all have - or should have - is not there. She can say anything that she wants about anyone, even to their face, and you can't get offended because she always follows it up with one of three things:
"Oh, bless his little heart."
"But we all know her parents aren't like that, are they?"
"He means well, the poor darling."
It's an instant reaction that she's somehow learned to say right after she says anything that someone could be upset by.
Here's an example of Miss June:
"You know that Bobby Brown beat up his wife last night, don't you? She called the police and they took him to jail. Now she claims he didn't hit her and she tripped and fell, bless her little heart. We all know Bobby's parents taught him better."
What she's really saying is:
"Bobby beats his wife and she probably deserves it. He never should have married her but she made him do it. Bobby is much better than his wife and he ought to divorce her but she'll just take all his money and ruin his life."
When I finally figured out what she really meant as she shared all the gossip with everyone in the office, I decided I'd try out her tactic.
"Why does Miss June come in here every day? It's always so inconvenient for us since it's in the middle of the day. Is she really just a lonely old lady who has nothing better to do? That's so sad, bless her little heart."
I got a "Bless her heart" in agreement from everyone in hearing distance. How backhanded is that?
Everyone here says something like that at least once a day. It's not just Miss June.
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