farmer songs

Posted on February 28, 2012 by is there any more pie?

No bargain-shopping, no groceries, no trip to the dump for Banjo Man last Saturday.  No cleaning, baking or laundry for me.

Instead we went to a local farmer’s market to hear some music.

Yep, music.  If you look closely at this photo I took with my phone (first ever phone pic!) you will see, standing just to the right of the pole, our very own Jeff playing guitar with his band, “Saddle Up The Chickens”.

We supported the local economy.  Banjo Man bought crusty, gorgeous loaves of rye bread and a goat milk hand scrub.  I bought a raspberry filled cookie and coconut moisturizer.  I wanted to buy Banjo Man a t-shirt with a tractor on it, but they didn’t have his size.

We visited with Angela, smiled at happy babies and watched small children eat fancy cupcakes.  Jeff’s band sounded terrific.

Soooooooooo much more fun than the dump.

Posted in food, friends, rhode island | 1 Comment

westminster winner

Posted on February 27, 2012 by is there any more pie?

Did you hear a Pekingese won “Best of Show” at Westminster last week?  Everyone on the news had something funny to say about the hairy, waddling little dog, but Banjo Man and I got a little choked up.

We have a soft spot for Pekingese.

Miss Lillie

For several years I volunteered with a regional Pekingese rescue organization, so I worked to pull Pekes from pounds, remove them from homes, find them new ones, do home checks, transport them from one home to another and foster.

My first transport was for a West Virginia Pekingese who, as an unwanted puppymill breeding machine, had been tossed in a snow bank, rescued by a couple walking nearby, nursed in an animal shelter and sent to RI to live with me while she had surgery for inguinal hernias and found a home.  She was elderly, one-eyed, dirty, frightened, smelly and obviously in pain when I met her driver in Connecticut on the last leg of her trip.  But she was sweet and docile, and so exhausted she fell asleep in the tub while I was giving her a bath.

I called her Miss Lillie, after Lillie Langtry (who came from humble beginnings and ended up in luxury as mistress to the Prince of  Wales).  The vet thought she was at least 12 years old and wouldn’t live six more months, but after her surgery and ear drops and eye drops and stomach medication and teeth cleanings and extractions, she felt pretty darn perky.  As long as she was in the same room with me, that was.

Banjo Man and I went toe-to-toe about adopting her ourselves.  I’m pretty sure we both yelled and sulked.  But I wasn’t going to put that old blind dog through the stress of adjusting to a new home and Banjo Man–realizing the old girl wasn’t going to live much longer–kindly agreed to treat her to a pampered senior lifestyle for the last months of her life.  Aside from her snoring, she was a perfect companion.

She lived for six more years.  Blind, deaf and senile at the end, she was always sweet and good-natured and grateful for her RI home.  We–and especially Banjo Man–miss her terribly.

Best of Show??  You bet.

Posted in family, rhode island, Uncategorized | Leave a comment

bargain hunters

Posted on February 25, 2012 by is there any more pie?

I introduced my friend Ruth to some of my favorite consignment stores last weekend.

We had a long lunch in a sunny corner of a cafe on the Pawcatuck River and then we hit a place called “Too Good To Be Threw”, where Ruth scored a puppet theatre (complete with puppets) and a scarf.

And I bought more baking pans.  Just because they were there.  And maybe I’ll have an overwhelming urge to make large heart-shaped cakes next Valentine’s Day.  (See the round and rectangular Wilton baking pans?  Also consignment store bargains.)

2 heart pans $5.00

We had a darn good time at “Exceptions” and “Again and Again Consignment”, too.

Shabby Chic curtain $6.00

Hand-quilted lap quilt $15.00

Winne the Pooh cake pan $3.00

Pampered Chef pastry maker tools $3.00

Other bargains we found?  A new-with-tags Evan Picone suit and a gorgeous skirt (Ruth), a new handbag (Ruth) and a set of mini-funnels (me).

But alas, no cowboy boots.

Posted in rhode island, secondhand stuff | 1 Comment

flax off

Posted on February 24, 2012 by is there any more pie?

Excuse my language.

I’m tired of flax.  Seeds, oil, meal…any kind of flax.

I’m tired of reading about it, hearing about it, sprinkling it and baking with it.

It’s horrid stuff and I don’t care if I live an extra month or two because I dribbled flax oil on my yogurt (a very bad idea) or into my salad (another very bad idea) when I was 60.

Did you know how quickly it turns rancid?  I do.

Have you ever made a 10″ x 15″ pan of blueberry-almond gluten-free, sugar-free, fat-free protein bars unknowingly using rancid flax meal?  I have.

Do you know what flax (rancid or not) does to your digestive system?  I do.

I may never recover.

So flax off, all of you tv doctors and nutritionists and authors of bestselling weight-loss books.  Spread your flax advice elsewhere.

And may all of you who continue to eat flax live a long life.  I’m sure those nursing home bathroom facilities are lovely.

Posted in a more pie opinion, food, personal female whining, rhode island | Leave a comment

abs and cabins

Posted on February 23, 2012 by is there any more pie?

The plumber came this morning to fix a toilet and some decades-old mysterious leaks from a shower and a tub.

All three bathrooms were going to be off-limits so I escaped to the library to once again rent the Pilates Yoga dvd.  One of these days I will actually open the case and put it into the dvd player, I just know it.

Children were arriving for a special President’s Day event (it’s vacation week here in RI): make an edible log cabin.

Wow.  An edible log cabin?  (I’ve been on a diet for two years–I’m hungry enough to eat a log cabin, barn, schoolhouse and a church).  I tiptoed into the activity room to see tables all set up with thick pretzel sticks and bowls of shredded wheat.  Each child was to bring his/her own can of frosting.

Here’s what the sample looked like (sort of):

That was the Martha Stewart version.  The library’s log cabin was much cuter and used graham crackers for the walls and roof.  Then the pretzel logs were stuck on with frosting “caulk”.  The roof was made of shredded wheat squares, the chimney of mini-marshmallows.

Now this might be old hat to you preschool and kindergarten teachers reading this, but I was fascinated.  So fascinated that the woman in charge invited me to stay and make my own (if I hurried down the street to buy my own can of frosting at the mini-mart first).

I regretfully declined.  I wish I hadn’t.  But time was running out—I had a busy morning planned and an afternoon filled with work.  I had to keep moving.

Here’s where the “abs” come in.

This was at one of the consignment stores I hit Saturday.  (FYI:  in case you think I do nothing but shop for old stuff, it had been six weeks since I’d prowled the stores–just sayin’).  I researched it via google, found out it was a good product and was strongly urged by Banjo Man to go back to the store and get it (we are both working on our “abs”, which we haven’t seen since 1983).

I also went to the health food store and picked up some of the stuff Dr. Oz has been recommending on his latest shows.  Turns out there are all sorts of strange supplements one can take to miraculously get rid of belly fat (and therefore reveal your abs).

Liposuction might be cheaper.  The Abworks machine certainly was.

Posted in food, secondhand stuff | 2 Comments

next best thing?

Posted on February 22, 2012 by is there any more pie?

Because the Peach Man Season is five months away, this box caught my eye at TJMaxx.

Bet you can’t guess what’s inside.

You can?  Really????

Two bars of peach-scented soap.  Two bars.

Almost as good as standing in the shade of the Peach Man’s burlap tent, but not quite.

I miss you, Peach Man.  Please take good care of yourself.

Posted in lake, rhode island | Tagged , , | Leave a comment

mardi gras mystery

Posted on February 21, 2012 by is there any more pie?

In honor of Mardi Gras, a story:

About 12 years ago a box arrived in the mail.  There was no return address.  It was supposed to contain fabric donated by someone online who wanted to support my fundraising efforts for the local animal shelter.

(I sewed Christmas stockings from vintage fabrics, laces, buttons and flowers which were given to those people who donated $200 to the shelter in December).

Inside was a beautiful velvet crystal-studded, sequin-trimmed Mardi Gras costume.

My friend Ginny modelled it for us last Thanksgiving.  Parts of it are old, parts (with the sequins) redone.  The train is over 14 feet long.

The dress is a bit risque.  A show-girl costume, perhaps?  With materials taken from a vintage Krewe costume?

Why would someone anonymously donate this to a stranger to be cut up and destroyed?

(and doesn’t Ginny look fabulous!)

Posted in friends, secondhand stuff | 4 Comments

beach scenes

Posted on February 20, 2012 by is there any more pie?

Posted in rhode island | 2 Comments

garbage soup

Posted on February 18, 2012 by is there any more pie?

How to make Banjo Man’s Saturday Garbage Soup:

1. Clean out the refrigerator.

2. Dump everything you find into a pan, including past-their-prime vegetables and a lump of baked garlic.

3. Saute, add water and simmer while you take the rest of the garbage (the “inedibles”) to the dump in More Pie’s truck.

4. Light candles, as the smell of old cabbage will make More Pie complain.

5. Serve to yourself.  Eat by yourself.  Enjoy by yourself.  Never share with others, who wouldn’t touch it with a ten-foot spoon anyway.

Posted in family, food, rhode island | Leave a comment

why i am boycotting the news

Posted on February 17, 2012 by is there any more pie?

I am going to rant.

I do not want to hear any more details about Mimi Somebody and her sex life with JFK.  Call me crazy, but I don’t understand why a woman–especially a woman old enough to know better now– would brag about acting as Prostitute to the President.

What on earth does her family think?  Does she have children and grandchildren?  Are they mortified and hiding under their beds and praying she’ll shut up?

If it were me, I’d go to my grave hoping no one ever found out I’d been that stupid.  I read she wanted to rid herself of the secrets she’d kept.  Sigh.  Why????  Couldn’t she have gone to a therapist instead?

Granny should get a hobby, learn how to crochet, volunteer at a food bank….honestly, this woman needs to find something else to do besides go on television to relive the old days in the White House pool.

Kris Kristofferson once eye-flirted with me, when I was 19 and he was playing in an almost-empty auditorium and my girlfriend and I were front row-center.  He wasn’t really famous then; I only knew of him because I’d seen his name on the sheet music of “Me and Bobby McGhee”.  He didn’t even have a band, just a guitar and a stool and a mike. He was pretty darn cute and I was pretty darn married and I didn’t eye-flirt back or even get his autograph.  Though I’m sure I blushed.

I met Willie Nelson in an elevator.

And Tony Bennett in San Francisco.

And George McGovern in Nebraska.

I waved to John F. Kennedy when I nine years old.  That’s what Granny should have done, waved and kept her panties on.

President Kennedy at Quonset Point, RI

So much for fame.

Which brings me to Whitney Houston.  I do not want to watch full network coverage of her hearse, coffin, private plane, etc.  She was a sad, sad drug addict who threw away the gifts that had been given to her–that miraculous voice, beauty, talent—for an abusive man and a druggie lifestyle.  She endangered her daughter, also a cocaine addict, and wasted most of her adult life.

May she have a beautiful private funeral and rest in peace.  Hopefully the publicity ends and the young, talented people in the music business will learn to make better decisions.

Hey, I warned you I was going to rant.  Maybe I shouldn’t have had that second cup of “half-caff” coffee this morning.

[Survivor has started another season.  American Idol is getting good.  And Amazing Race starts Sunday.  Whoopeeeee!!!!]

Posted in a more pie opinion | 3 Comments