Ripe Recipe

9/17/2015

I had a wild hair today.   It was so annoying.   Don’t worry, it’s gone.

This is a #3 guard, on the clippers. Too long?

Artistic, no?

Pretty short, huh? Cool!!!

My Mama almost had a fit when she saw me. She thinks it’s a catastrophe.  I knew she would.  And it’s not that I don’t care, or want to upset her.

It’s just that I’m trying to survive the  oven Florida climate!  Remember this?  Icy Exterior.  103 degrees in the shade, ain’t no joke!  Add to that, I’m still fat fluffy, and NO AIR in my car!!  And there you have a recipe for heat stroke!

Kompliment Kudos

9/11/15

I just got the sweetest compliment from Sarah Eliza.

“Miss Congeniality Prize:  

Dishes, Dishes, Dreaded Ding Dong Dishes, via purpleslobinrecovery

This entrant was at a disadvantage in terms of clicks, due to joining the party towards the end of the window, but in addition to linking up several very funny posts, she was also by far our most enthusiastic participant.  She left comments pretty much everywhere!  Not only are you funny in your own right, but you’re also a natural-born encourager, Ms. Purple-Slob-In-Recovery, and that deserves a shout-out!  “

 

And then about T(r)ank Trouble:

Submitted on 2015/09/18 at 4:16 pm

“Drum roll please……

You’re featured at Free and Fun Friday today! 😀

Hurray!”

Thanks, Sarah Eliza!!  Go check her out, you’ll be glad you did!

PS:  Look- she loves alliteration too!!

Party Planning

Stella from Purfylle suggested a “How to Host a Farewell to Youth” party post, since the one I gave Brother was so successful.

And no, I’m not just bragging! Many people told me that! Besides my family, I mean!

1.  Grab ahold of an “OLD” person, well preferably one who is just on the cusp of becoming old.

2.  Determine by whatever sneaky means you have to, their actual birthday.

3.  Gather your party committee, preferably at least one who has money!  (I left out the second part of this step, when planning with my Sis.  This step is VITAL!!)

4.  Plan a planning plan.

5.  Dream up all kinds of diabolical old jokes, and ways to say, “Nanny, nanny, boo boo, you’re OLD!”

6.  Gather old pictures of victim honoree.

7.  Order huge poster with picture, proclaiming that the “Party is NOW OVER”, or “You’re Over the HILL”, or other cliche of choice.

zazzle.com

8.  Invite friends, and enemies – because they like to rub it in their face that the person is old!!

7.  Buy lots of black food coloring.

8.  Order the bread dyed black, at the bakery, ( I got ours at Publix.)   I didn’t know they did this until I wanted pink for PP’s shower!  So cool!!

9.  Make photo collage of baby pictures, and thru the years pix.  Make sure you only use the most embarrassing ones.  A “swimming in the tub” naked one front and center is the preferred placement.

10.  Buy lots of coffins, black roses, tombstones, crows, and black crepe paper as decorations.  If your party is in Nov. or later, and you can score them at Michael’s for 90% off, you win!

11.  Paint “Your Youth is Dead”, RIP ____”s Youth”, etc on the coffins.  (Please do NOT procure any life size ones!  A heart attack of the victim honoree is NOT what you’re after!  (Unless YOU are one of the aforementioned enemies…)

12.  Make all black food.  Suggestions: black deviled eggs,

Dutifully eating the “rotten” eggs.

black sandwiches, blackies (really brownies), tootsie rolls, licorice, cola drinks, black olives, devil’s food cake, etc.  Let your imagination run wild!  Just make sure it’s still edible, just looks nasty!!  (Again, unless you’re one of the aforementioned ….)

13.  Have glow sticks at the ready.  Black lights would be even better!  Make sure you’ve just whitened your teeth, if you choose blacklights.

14. Oh, I forgot to mention- keep it secret from the birthday person!  Of course, since they’re approaching old age, they might forget, even if you told them.  Use your own discretion.

15.  Wait for the birthday person to arrive, and yell surprise!  Oh, they didn’t show up??  You have to have someone bring them!  Geez, I didn’t think I had to tell you EVERY little thing!

16.  Make sure you have an AED unit, and someone who knows how to use it.  Old people’s hearts don’t stand up well to surprises, ya know.

   Games:

17.  Have wheelchair or walker races.  These are hilarious! 

spenceronline.com

18.  Photo booth.  Have props, such as granny glasses, canes, white wigs, IV poles, etc.

19.  Relay races, wearing huge slippers.

20.  Stuff cotton is everyone’s ears and play telephone.

21.  Let party person open presents.  Make sure you have lots of old people products.  Geritol, (do they even MAKE that anymore??), fake false teeth, hearing aids, tums, cane, reading glasses (unless they really DO wear glasses, then this is NOT funny, ask me how I know), memory pills- candy in a prescription bottle, labeled with person’s name, Take one every day for memory.

spenceronline.com

22.  Light cake, have fire extinguisher at the ready.  Brandishing it right in front of the cake, is best.

23.  Make sure you have a photographer who is skilled in catching people looking their absolute worst.  Then you can use these either as blackmail,  or at their 50th birthday party!

24.  Have fun!

Comment Chaos

Lately EVERYONE has been talking about how to manage your emails, and blogs.

Sharon from HowtoGetOrganizedatHome.

Janice from MostlyBlogging.

Ralph from BlueFishWay.  (Here is the guest post he wrote for Janice, explaining how he deals with the pressure.)

Hugh from HughsNewsandViews.

I was getting an email everytime someone commented on a post. Necessary, ok.  (But, was it really??? Everytime I log on to WP, if the bell has a circle on it, I have comments.

 So, hmmm  maybe I can cancel those emails too???  Double notifications are a time waster… So, yeah!  I’m gonna cut out those emails too!  Yay!  More digital de-cluttering! 

I was getting double emails from several sites when a new post went up. ARGH!  Too much!

I was getting an email everytime someone I was following posted.  Too much!  Not necessary, ditched those.  They are in my reader, and can be accessed that way.

AND, I was getting an email everytime someone LIKED my post, or a COMMENT on a post!!! AAAAAHHHHH!

(Talk about  overload! )

My eyes were burning from all the reading of emails!  My finger was cramping from all the clicking to delete.

Enough already!!

Something had to change!!

Well, duh!  Turn off the LIKE email notifications!!  Tonight, this morning, whatever,  I finally played around in the dashboard long enough to figure out how to turn off the “Like” emails.  Thank goodness!  Hopefully, some of my sanity will be restored. What little there is left of it!

(and maybe only 50 emails a day, instead of 1,000???  Please!!!!)

Look!  I got thru my whole inbox, and only 3 left!

 (2 are books I need to read, so they don’t really count, and I already deleted the OneDrive one.)  What an accomplishment!

AND, I just winnowed down my following list to only 57.  I don’t have to feel guilty about not following someone, just because they follow me, right, Hugh??  I just took a very big, relieved breath.  Maybe the insanity (of my inbox, anyway) has been banished.  My real sanity will always be in question!

Wawa

Today’s choice of beverage:

See my pretty Tervis? Oh yeah, and the orange water in it.

Vintage: 3 pm, Today

I went to Outback, and ordered water.  [What an accomplishment!]  YAY me!!  I deserve a Water Conservation Award!    Oh, no, wait… that would be if I DIDN’T drink water.  Okay, so I deserve a Healthy Beverage Choice Award!   And I asked for orange slices,

My own photo, Kjetil Lenes.

instead of lemon, which the waitress was more than happy to do.  Ummmm, so refreshing!  Why don’t I remember to do this at home?

It’s stupid simple to make.  Hello oranges, {before} meet knife.

Author=Donovan Govan.

 Deadly carnage ensues.  {After} Results:  Tasty hydrating beverage that also tingles your tastebuds!  What else could you want?  Besides a yummy drink that makes you small enough to go down a rabbit hole, I mean?

Graphically Gross

WARNING:  The following picture is graphically gross!  If you’re squeamish, cover your eyes, and chant rhythmically to yourself: “Lalalalala, I can’t SEE you!!”

Roach squooshed in my hand.

This is the “after”.  I did the deadly deed in the bathroom.  With my hand.  By PurpleSlob.  (Anybody catch the “Clue”??)

Okay, you can look now. All clear.

I know you think, (at least I THINK you think) it’s gross that I squoosh roaches with my hands.  In my defense:

1.  My hands are washable.  Sterilizable, even.
2.  Inexplicably, the roaches never respond to my shouted demands requests to sit still while I run and go get a shoe with which to annihilate them.
3.  A dead roach in the hand is worth much more to me than a hundred running around behind my back, especially running around in front of my back!
4.  I don’t carry a can of bug spray on my person at all times.  It interferes with my swatting arm.
5.  I honestly don’t mind bug guts on me.  It gives me such a sense of personal satisfaction to cream them, by my own “hand”iwork, that I kinda revel in the bloody evidence of a battle well won!

I guess I could try wearing a chatelaine,

Chatelaine, 1765-1775 Victoria and Albert Museum no. -C.492:1 to 7-1914

and just add a heavy-duty fly flap, some of those suckers get huge!!  It would just have to have some sorta quick release mechanism.

Nah, it’d weigh me down too much.  Back to hand-to-roach combat for me.  Hoo-Rah!

All Aglow

Okay, since the winning pic got it’s own post, and LBeth got her requested post, when is the runner-up gonna get it’s own post? Huh?  Ya predjuiced against glow sticks, er summin??

Alright, Alright, quit nagging!  Sheesh!

Here is the behind the scenes story of Me-All Aglow.

It was Brother’s Big Black Birthday Bash:  Farewell to his Youth.  His youth is DEAD>  Did I mention he is officially OLD now?

Sister and I planned big ole black funeral party, for his 50th.

Decorations, even the food had to be black.  Remember the black eggs???

Dutifully eating the “rotten” eggs.

(I know I’ve written about them before, I just can’t remember where.  Sieve brain.  Don’t make fun, you’ll get old one day.

I finally remembered!  Yay me!  Go here.)

WE even went so far as to order request that everyone wear black.

Sis had glow sticks for everyone.  And of course, since I can NEVER be like everyone else, I wore mine as a necklace, AND earrings!

me all aglow

I wanted to make rings, a bracelet, AND a headband too, but Sis whined something about, “Melinda, you can’t take them all.  There’s other people here too!”

Whatever.…

Did I mention the temp tats?  See the star on my cheek?  We wanted to really blow it out for his 50th.

(Poor guy, as the middle child, he never had any parties.  Yeah, right, like he was the only one who had to eat beans everyday, while we ate steak.  snicker, snicker)

Anyway, they had to be temp tats, cuz the real ones HURT!!!

Strawberry tat, that was NOT kissed on by a kitten.

 And the tat parlor refused to tattoo him, while he was still tied up.    What?  Like you’ve never tied up your little brother and tried to tattoo him???

Skunk head- just for LBeth!

Here is your special order, ma’am, hot off the press!

skunk-me

I was helping my aunts paint my grandmama’s house, the same one I was sitting on the porch, after Grandma had passed.  Unfortunately, no one in the family could buy it, so it was going on the market.  😦

So, here we were, painting the ceiling of the dining room, do ya feel where this is going???

We are all laughing, then crying, talking about Grandma, and memories we had in the house.  So, after a too long crying jag, I painted someone’s shirt back, just to get a laugh.  Then, it was all out paint war!

Before long, we all had paint smeared hither to yon.  I already had flecks in my hair, so I painted the stripe down the top, and said, “Hey, y’all!  Remember when Sherry skunked me??”

They all stared at me horrified!!  “Melinda!!  That is oil paint!  You’re gonna have to use paint thinner to get that out!!”

“Yeah, but do ya remember when Sherry put that streak of white down my hair, by using all the bleach on me, cuz I was too impatient to wait for her to do it right??  Blast from the past, baby!“

And, just like 35-ish years previously, it had to grow out.  But!  This time Mama couldn’t yell at me for ruining my hair!  HA!

I love my adventure filled life!

So So Sorry

Recently I’ve had to make some changes in my WP subscriptions, and email preferences.   I was receiving over 75 emails a day!!  It was chaos! ( Not to mention, digital clutter.)

 I couldn’t deal with it!!!  ARGH!!  So, I had to make some hard choices.  If you’re one of the blogs that I quit receiving emails for, therefore I don’t read you every day, and comment, please forgive me.  It wasn’t anything against you.  Nothing personal at all!!  Trust me, it was me, not you.  Sorry I had to break up with you, but I have to get some sleep some time!

 Let’s still be friends, okay?

Icy Exterior

Not really icy, per say….

But, at 9:30 pm, it’s a cool wave, for us!

Here in FL, the daytime temps can range up to 105, {I would put that little degree sign, but I can’t find it on the keyboard.} IN THE SHADE!!!!

IN THE SHADE!!

Did I mention this thermometer is in the SHADE????

Those are the days I don’t get anything done, except sitting right in front of my A/C!!  With a fan blowing on me as well!  Dressed in shorts, and a tank top, with a bottle of ice water in my hands.  With my feet stuck in a bucket of cold water.  (Hey! I should really do that!!  Instead of just making it up for effect!)  The first 4 parts are really true.  Only the bucket of ice water was make-believe.  But, I can assure you, no ice cubes were harmed in the making of this movie.