Posted in Five Friday Happy Bringers

Five Friday Happy Bringers 8/18/23

My weekly gratitude journal, of sorts.

1. So Robert and I LOVE our local Bull Street Library. We are there FAR more often than normal people. Recently we discovered the library has a little program called The Spice Club. (I’m so glad it isn’t The Fight Club.) They feature a different spice every month or so. And they give you a little history of the spice, two or three recipes, and the spice itself!

Our first spice upon “joining” was Galangal. Okay, I know, I had never heard of it either. It’s a kissing cousin of Ginger. The recipe we chose to make was a delicious salmon dish.

The second spice … Black Peppercorn. We made two of the recipes. First, South African Chocolate Pepper Cookies. Differently Yum!

Here you go …

The second recipe, Citrus Melon Caprese with Black Pepper.

It was a hit! We will make it again and again.

We just got the latest spice … Dill. Here’s the little package you get each time there’s a new spice.

I think I’ll run for President of the Spice Club! Will you vote for me?

2. Our sense of Smell. Spices have such incredible aromas! Make a dash into your kitchen and take a whiff of two or three.

3. Dahlias.

4. The beauty of wood.

5. This fifth Happy Bringer may be a tad demented.

As you may remember from my “Hello Anxiety” posts, I drive about an hour north of Savannah every other week to see my therapist … “Rubi.” (What?! You don’t remember that?)

His office is in a beautiful old house on one of Statesboro’s main streets. And there’s something about the physicality and energy of the place that often grabs my attention when Robert drops me off. (On second thought, maybe I’m just trying to get my labored breathing to calm down a bit before “the talk” and more Neal-revelations.)

Well, yesterday I walked up the steps onto the screened porch and saw this:

Lo and behold. The vine (Virginia Creeper? Surely not a poison something or other!) had somehow trickishly/roguishly made his (her? Virginia’s?) way up through the porch floorboards and onto the innocent ivory rocking chair. WHERE CLIENTS/PATIENTS ARE SILENTLY INVITED TO SIT BEFORE VENTURING INSIDE.

Well, I had left my Hazmat suit back in the closet in Savannah, so I said No to the Sit and hightailed it through the door of the Amityville house to the reception area, locking the door securely behind me.

But there is something eerily wondrous, even edgy beautiful, about the determined little vine, don’t you think?

May you have a weekend Peppered with Joy and Peace.

Posted in My Saturday Evening Post

My Saturday Evening Post: 8/5/23 “$1.5 Billion Pickles“

So today, after buying the winning ticket for Monday Night’s $1.5 billion Mega Millions Lottery …

… a distressing thought occurred to me, interrupting my more-pleasant day dream about the hippest colors for matching Land Rovers for Robert and me. The Distressing Thought:

“What if, because of some Freak Accident by The Universe, I DON’T WIN?!”

After hyperventilating and falling into the depths of despair far too long for a man of my age, I finally came to my senses, realizing that there’s more than one way to get 1.5 billion dollars. Duh.

Then, Creative that I am, it didn’t take me long to come up with a viable Plan B.

A PICKLE BUSINESS!

Right?! Yes?! You with me?

I got to work, feeling so lucky that HR and I had just purchased some beautiful fancy cucumbers.

TIB (Truth in Blogging): Robert prepped the cucumbers, using his Fancy Stainless Steel Kitchen Mandoline Slicer thingy, which he won’t let me ANYWHERE near. He says I would kill myself because of my wandering attention span.

See? You’re believing in me now, I bet.

The name of my new $1.5 Billion Pickle Company?

“NEAL’S DILLS,” of course.

Posted in My Saturday Evening Post

My Saturday Evening Post: 7/29/23 “Group Hug”

So for lunch on Thursday, HR (“Husband Robert” for the uninitiated) suggested we drive across the Savannah River to Bluffton SC and eat at Cahill’s.

We’ve eaten there several times before, and their Meat and Three is just scrumptious.

Oh goodness, Cahill’s Fried Chicken is Southern Culinary Joy.

For my Three, I chose sweet potato soufflé, collards and creamed corn. Robert got mashed potatoes with gravy, pickled beets and stewed cabbage. (We kept reaching our forks across the table to each other’s plates.). Washing it down with sweet tea, the “champagne of the south,” as Dolly Parton says.

HR’s plate

The grounds of the working farm are simply beautiful.

Robert, who grew up in Inner City Baltimore, kept trying to pet and then milk this fake cow (bull?).

When I told him it was a statue of a cow, he got all huffy and stormed off toward the (real) chicken coops and the giant oaks proudly displaying their recently rained-on Resurrection Fern. (Do you know about Resurrection Fern? It looks brown and dead until rain. Then it is gloriously alive.)

HR storming off.

“See”? HR asks, as if he caused the Resurrection Fern to resurrect.

When we got home, with our odds and ends we purchased at Cahill’s Market, Robert placed the few items on the cutting board for a photo op. The peppers and the tomato quickly scooted close to each other in a Group Hug.

If we could all be like vegetables!

Okay, sorry, if we could all be like fruits and vegetables.

Posted in Humor

“Pine-Apple-ing”

So I walked into our bathroom, an hour or so ago, in order to, well you know.

I started to sit down and saw this …

“Wait, what’s going on?” I thought, as I leisurely, then worriedly gazed at the curtained window. “Is this my bathroom?! Where AM I?”

“Is that an alien just outside my bathroom window? Look at his/her TALL hair!”

Terrified, I was ready to squeal, to yell for HR (Husband Robert- you know that!) to come help me, when I decided that, “No, let’s pull back the curtain. Kind of like with the Wizard of Oz.”

And then I realized.

HR had just put the pineapple in the bathroom window to catch some sun and ripen a bit more.

But seriously, IN THE BATHROOM?!

Posted in Robert and …

“Robert and … #38”

A blog category of pics I’ve taken of HR (Hubby Robert) and … well, just about anything.

Robert and … his foot with three cats.

See them?

Well, you may have to squint a bit for the third.

Benny: “Neal, you do realize there’s really only one cat, right?”