You ARE in the chair.

Broken hurricane siren: the sound of doom

Growing up, I had a constant sense of doom. Maybe it was from being a Cold War kid and having nothing explained to me. In this doomy era of Trump, many of those feelings are back.

I swear to God, it must have been 20 years ago, I was sitting at home minding my own business when I heard the end-of-the-world sound of an air-raid siren. I couldn't even take it in. Nobody could explain it to me - in fact, nobody else had even heard it. It was the story of my life.

Later I asked a friend about it, and he said, "Maybe they were just testing it out."

For what? I never found out.

Chew your little troubles away

TIPS to Housewives!

Latest Flavor-Hit in Soup

Made with Peanut Butter - nourishing, economical, easy to do

1/2 c peanut butter
2 c. milk
1 c. boiling water
1/2 tsp. onion juice
1 tsp. salt, dash pepper, paprika

Heat peanut butter in top of double boiler and gradually stir in boiling water, mixing thoroughly. Add milk and seasoning. Cook over water for 15 min. . . . For thicker soup add 1 to 2 tbs. flour first made into smooth paste with 2 tbs. cold water and stir into soup; stir and cook 10 min. more. Serves 4. Top with whipped cream, peanuts or chopped bacon, or serve it plain.

Blogger's note. At first I had the horrible thought that this peanut butter soup had Wrigley's Spearmint Gum in it. It's bad enough as it is. Peanut butter IS sometimes used as an ingredient in cooking, but here it's just - wrong. I mean, two cups of milk and one cup of boiling water? That's THREE cups of liquid added to a mere half-cup of peanut butter. It's just not going to work. Fifteen minutes of cooking isn't going to make this into soup, and even adding flour paste (the kind we used to stick paper together) won't make it thick enough to resemble soup. The whipped cream garnish strikes me as pretty bizarre, and the bacon - it's just a waste of bacon.

Is this a wartime/rationing recipe, do you think? There used to be a kind of "soup" in England during the war called Brown Windsor, made of gravy powder and water. Let us give thanks that, at least in this small details, things have gotten better.

Another Blogger's Note. I did find a number of recipes using peanut butter. I won't give the full recipe for this one (African Peanut Chicken Stew) because the page has asked me not to, but I could certainly go for it:

        
2-3 pounds chicken legs, thighs and/or wings
3 Tbsp vegetable oil
1 large yellow or white onion, sliced
A 3-inch piece of ginger, peeled and minced
6-8 garlic cloves, chopped roughly
2-3 pounds sweet potatoes, peeled and cut into chunks
1 15-ounce can of crushed tomatoes
1 quart chicken stock
1 cup peanut butter
1 cup roasted peanuts
1 Tbsp ground coriander
1 teaspoon cayenne, or to taste
Salt and black pepper
1/4 to 1/2 cup of chopped cilantro


No flour paste here.

Bentley the space alien

Bentley is in such a state of bliss in this video, cuddled up in the cat bed I knitted for him. There really is a resemblance to a space alien here. A very cute, sweet one. With fur.

They just didn't love you enough

A harrowing scene from one of my favorite movies. Bette Davis is scary in this thing - at the height of her genius. Has anyone ever captured alcoholic self-pity better than this?