REMEMBER PIZZA PARTIES?

 Matty came rushing in the moment I opened the garage door this morning but I'll spare you another photo of him napping on the couch.

Instead I'll tempt your taste buds with a photo I found on my phone yesterday that I'd forgotten about

As you may recall, I prepare pizza most Friday evenings but not the way true pizza cooks do it.

Mine starts with a frozen pizza from the grocery store and is then "doctored" with more pepperoni, a mixture of diced mini-peppers, some mozzarella, sometimes some cherry tomatoes or red onion, and some basil and Parmesan cheese tossed on at the pre-slicing moment.

As I was beginning this post I was thrown back to the 1950's when pizza finally had made it's way to the cultural backwash where I grew up.

We college-age kids used to have what were called "pizza parties" where the pies would be created, baked and devoured while we listened to Duke Ellington and Dave Brubeck records.

We felt soooooo sophisticated!

I realize now that that was typical of many college sophomores of the era, full of "great wisdom" imparted by our reading Jack Kerouac, J.D. Salinger and dipping into some Kafka.

I remember reading "Metamorphosis" aloud to a friend as he drove us somewhere on a North Dakota highway.

That was long ago now in an increasingly fuzzier memory.

But I still love my Friday Night Pizza.

Have a slice!

RELAXATION

 Matty came by again today.

He had a snack and a drink and then headed for his favorite spot on our couch for a nap.

Do you think he's comfortable around us?

PASSAGES

 I read this morning that the French actor Jean-Paul Belmondo had died at the age of 88 in Paris.

Belmondo had a long and illustrious career in the European cinema and though he was famed worldwide he never made films in Hollywood, preferring to make his name in his homeland.

The movie that launched him as "the face of the New Wave" and won him comparisons to Marlon Brando and James Dean was the debut film of Jean-Luc Godard which was called "Breathless" by the English-speaking world.

Much of the movie was shot with a hand-held camera and was mostly ad-libbed by Belmondo and his co-star, the American Jean Seberg.

I don't think I'd ever seen the film so I found it on a streaming service and Judy and I watched it today.

Like most French films, it is very "talky" and seems at times like it's going nowhere but the beautiful faces of the actors command one's attention.

It has since been acclaimed as one of the best films of all time.

Seberg lived half of her life in France and died at the age of 40 in what police ruled as a probable suicide.

THE FRIDAY FUNNIES

 Well here we are again nearing the end of a momentous week.

Lots of developments, both national and local.

But my job is not to discuss those but to amuse you.

So "let me entertain you".

So I hope you're chuckling, snickering, laughing, guffawing and/or hee-hawing now.

If so I wish you a pleasant and charming and LONG holiday weekend.

Happy Labor Day and please labor to always keep laughing!

Here, kitty-kitty . . .

(whoo . . .)

MATTY

 I haven't written about him for awhile so in case you've been wondering, our (neighbors') Rent-A-Cat still comes by for a snack and some catnip occasionally.

And less frequently of late Matty does curl up for a nap.

And I do mean "curl up".

A RAINY NIGHT

 The clouds were building in the early evening.

As I was standing, gazing into the backyard a bit ago, I noticed that there were several wet spots and I said to Judy that it looked as if it had rained.

She said it had and for quite awhile around 9 or 10 o'clock.

I slept through it.

THE WEAK-END

 I don't usually write about the news on this blog o'mine but this Monday morning I just feel a few events need my touch.

Afghanistan and our departure from a 20-year war there is about over.

Contrary to the views of a lot of politicians and pundits, I think the U.S. has handled our leave-taking about as well as was possible.

The Afghan government and military which we supposedly had built up and trained collapsed like a house of cards and the Taliban swept in and took over practically without a fight.

While they were in charge of security outside the airport in Kabul they let a mad bomber through and 13 Americans and hundreds of Afghans were killed.

Since then the U.S. forces have taken out several ISIS K whackos and stopped a handful of mortars while continuing to get Americans and Afghans out of the country; over 120 thousand now in about a week.

So I think President Biden needs to be cut a little slack.

Meantime, on the Gulf Coast of the home front, Hurricane Ida made a mess of much of Louisiana over the weekend.

All of New Orleans is without power but the levee system apparently held.

It's now a Tropical Storm and moving on up to the north.

A FOX news reporter decided to step out of a parking garage and demonstrate the force of the wind.

He was nearly blown off his feet and had to have help getting back into the protection of the garage.

And Sean Payton, the coach of the New Orleans Saints, announced that the team would continue practicing this coming week in Dallas, Texas, and stay away from home for awhile.

For some people, that's serious!

For others of us, the sad news was that Ed Asner died on Sunday.

The exemplary actor lived to 91, entertaining us with both comedy and drama roles and winning award after award.

My pal, Easy Ed, wrote this morning that he and his wife had just been watching Asner in a one-man show called "A Man and His Prostate".

He said it is hilarious.

I think I'd have to see that to believe that, though all the reviews describe it the same way.

And finally, on the home front, we had a marvelous dinner yesterday of Chicken Marsala and a Quinoa-and-Brown-Rice mix seasoned with garlic.

Both items came already cooked in packages from Costco.

It took about 10 minutes to prepare (heat) and it was absolutely delicious.

So the news from this corner isn't all bad on this Monday.

I hope yours is just as good.

THE FRIDAY FUNNIES

 We had an increasingly more and more irritated bulldog in our yard for many hours yesterday.

It was one of several canines belonging to a neighbor and she apparently had jumped to the top of a concrete block wall and then jumped or fallen nearly six feet to our yard.

And she couldn't get out.

And she didn't know us.

And she growled menacingly whenever we tried to approach her.

Finally, late in the afternoon the neighbor lady came home, found my note on her front door and called one of her sons to come across town and take care of the situation.

He did, the dog was very glad to see him and apparently a barricade was built on the other side of the wall to prevent this from happening again.

And do you know what yesterday was?

The Day of the Dog.

I kid you not.

But today is Friday and I intend to kid you now.

Okay, Gentle Readers, that's about all I've got for this week.

Now try your darndest to have a delightful weekend and always remember to keep laughing.

Here, kitty-kitty . . .

BREAD UPDATE

 For those of you who expressed curiousity about the bread in the comment section on yesterday's blog, here's how it came out.

The Queen of the Kitchen sliced one loaf this morning and was surprised to see that it looked about the same as when it's made with the right size measuring cup.

Perhaps a bit more "holey" but not enough to worry about.

To clarify, going light on the flour would create a less dense texture to the bread, with holes appearing.

(So sayeth My Mentor, and who am I to argue.)

We hasn't tasted it yet because there were scones to devour this morning but it shouldn't be any different from normal.

The proportions are the same: 3 of enriched flour, 2 of whole wheat flour.

If my ineptness had not been on display, that would be 3 cups to 2 cups.

This bread was made with 2-and-1/4 cups to 1-and-1/2 cups.

Even if the bread is not noticeably altered, in the future, I pledge to check my measuring cups more carefully.

And that makes a better baker, doesn't it?

A DAY IN THE LIFE

 I have a friend (who shall remain nameless) who used to say when he was hungry: "I need food! F-U-D, food!"

Unfortunately for my long suffering wife, I picked that expression up and have used it often in the decades when she has provided for my appetite.

I have written here before that in recent years she has grown "sick and tired" of the kitchen and has fairly often relinquished it to me to provide for myself.

I can turn out a pretty good Friday night pizza, even though it comes from the store frozen and all I do is doctor it a little.

But yesterday Her Nibs decided to make Sunday dinner and it was a huge success.

And all done on one sheet pan!

Regrettably my appetite overcame my common sense and I did not get a photograph of the finished meal.

What I did get was a photograph of the meal about to go into the oven, right after Her Majesty said, "That looks darned near good enough to eat right now!"

There was a pork tenderloin, mini-peppers, some undefined green peppers from our garden plants, a passel of halved mini-potatoes, some halved yellow squash (also from our back yard), and some quartered onions.

I wish I could show you a photo of the meal on my plate but the closest I could come would be to show you my mid-section and since this is a family blog I choose to forego that.

Suffice it to say it was delicious.

So today I announced to the Royal Companion that I would be spending my day baking.

To begin, she needed a couple of fresh loaves of English Muffin Bread, which I have grown to be good at.

As usual, it came out brown and beautiful.

I'm a little curious, though, what it will be like once she slices it tomorrow.

(I leave the slicing to her ever since I found out that I am incapable of slicing bread in a straight line.)

But I'm curious because I found out later that I had measured the five cups of flour that goes into this concoction with a 3/4 cup measure instead of the one-cup measure the recipe calls for.

By my calculation that means they were one-and-a-quarter cups of flour . . . light!

Now the loaves look and feel exactly the same but we are both anxious to see what the inside looks like.

But leaving idiocy and carelessness aside, I plunged on into my next project - Sour Cream Blueberry Scones.

I made scones once before and recall the memory as a messy and unforgiving attempt at what I would call Foolish Cookery.

This was no exception.

There was flour everywhere, especially on me.

I might add that I own a very nice black with white pin-stripes chef's apron but, like today, I forget that it hangs just feet from me in a closet.

But all that being said the finished scones, though somewhat messy in appearance, were delicious.

And finally I turned to one of those rip-off recipes one finds all over the Interwebs, this one titled Copycat Olive Garden Breadsticks.

Everyone loves those breadsticks, right?

I remember going to dinner once with the wife of a friend (no, it was completely on the up-and-up!) who shocked me by asking our waiter when he brought the notoriously buttery breadsticks to the table . . . for some extra butter!

Could be she and her husband, my late friend, ate that way all the time.

He died many years ago of a sudden fatal heart attack in the kitchen of his home.

My breadsticks today were . . okay.

They're not perfectly symmetrical like the breadsticks from Olive Garden but they tasted about the same.

I got one of those eye-rolling "Oh, really" looks from my Lord and Keeper when I said I thought the restaurant must have some kind of machine rolling device to make theirs so perfect.

So anyway my day in the Taylor Family Bakery is over and done with and tonight's vodka tastes particularly good.

And my take on the life of a baker?

It's DRUDGERY!

FREAKIN' DRUDGERY!

Not fit work for an 81 year old slacker.

FOUR

 

I wrote on this blog recently that I was not a superstitious person.

And yet.

I have always believed that 4 is my lucky number.

That idea originated when I became old enough to take note of the day I was born.

April 24, 1940.

Or, 4-24-40.

Lots of fours in there.

Today, when I looked at my daily calendar, I found that this is the fourth anniversary of the "installation" of my fourth Pacemaker.

Hmmmm.

Should I buy a lottery ticket?

'Course then I noticed today's date.

August 21, 2021.

Or, 8-21-21.

Now I'm really confused.

THE FRIDAY FUNNIES

Welcome to Ye Olde House of Humor!

In yet another trying week of news, the Olde Catalyst has arrived just in time to lighten the Olde Mood and offer some respite.

And some jokes.

So let us not delay one moment longer.

Cue the cartoons!

So that's all for now, my friends.

Now I ask you to abandon all abhorrences, abasements, aberrations and any additional addled and asinine activities and affectations.

To abbreviate: TGIF!

Have a wonderful weekend and always keep laughing!

Here, kitty-kitty . . .