4:20 p.m. today
Prescott Valley, Arizona - 89 degrees F.
Phoenix, Arizona - 104 degrees F.
So I said to my lovely wife this morning "I just ate my last piece of the Blueberry Kuchen."
Then to wipe that sorrowful look off her face I added "I saved the crunchy corner piece for you."
That made her happy.
A little later I was picking up her scraped clean plate and she asked "how many blueberries did you have left over?"
I guessed about a cup and a half and showed them to her and she immediately said "A clafoutis!"
Yikes, I thought, back to the kitchen again?
But I dug up my recipe for a clafoutis with any kind of fruit and soon had it into the oven.
Here's what made SWMBO happy when it came out.
The tomato plants await fresh water.
The Monja and the Blue Cat keep watchful eyes on the scene.
Heat, serenity, an Arizona summer.
Very early (6:30 a.m.) this morning I began quietly assembling the ingredients and tools to make a blueberry kuchen (coffeecake).
You may ask why in tarnation I was at it so early.
And I would explain.
Yesterday evening I told my beloved wife that I was going to make the kuchen the next day.
"Oh", she said, "will it be for breakfast?"
"No", said I, "it would be for after breakfast.
So then I spent half the night worrying about the sad look that came over SWMBO's face.
And so I was hard at it at 6:30 this morning, even before she had wakened.
First, of course, I had to feed Sweetie-Pie (the cat) who begins demanding her breakfast at 5 a.m.
Now you'd think a pet cat, having filled her belly, would go lie down somewhere and take a nap.
But no, she is SWMBO's cat and once she is fed she thinks her lady should be awake and so she goes in and sits on her bed and stares intently at her, willing her to rise from the Arms of Morpheus.
Now the mistress is awake and aware of the pesky cat but is pretending to be asleep until said cat reaches out with one tiny paw and taps gently twice on SWMBO's mouth.
And that's all it takes.
So the two of them come into the kitchen where I'm trying to be quiet and SWMBO says "My, aren't you being ambitious!"
And so I turn on ALL of the lights and get on with my baking project making as much noise as I want.
Now I wasn't satisfied with the look of the blueberry kuchen but the taste of it was "ta die for"!
And where the sugar had hardened around the edges it became a crispy treat that both of us enjoyed.
So, here it is, the Early Sunday Morning Blueberry Kuchen, Catalyst Version.
'Twas the day before Saturday and all through . . .
Oh, drat, I never wanted to be Dickens.
I'd rather make you laugh like the dickens anyway.
Huh, I just Googled that (like the dickens) to see where it came from and learned that it is a euphemism that may mean "like the devil".
I tell ya, the things you learn on the Internet.
And I didn't even need A.I.!
But enough philosophy.
Let's instead repair to laughology.
It's Friday after all.
So that's all for this week, my friends.
I hope you've enjoyed yourselves.
Now try to continue that enjoyment throughout the next couple of days.
In other words, have an enjoyable weekend.
And always remember to keep laughing!
Here, kitty-kitty . . .
Summer has landed!
The forecast high temperature here today is 84.
80 miles to the south of us, in Phoenix, it is supposed to be 104 today.
But remember, folks, we live in Arizona and it's a dry heat!
So this is the longest day of the year and tomorrow we shall begin our descent to winter.
But let's enjoy this season any way that you can.
They said it couldn't be done.
Or maybe that was me that said that.
My big ol' computer apparently had contracted a terminal illness last week.
In spite of many turnings off the power and back on and trying to reload, it kept telling me it had lost a kernel (whatever that means) and it was just not going any further.
I told all of you Oddball followers . . . no, no, I'm not calling YOU oddballs, I'm just abbreviating followers of Oddball Observations.
Any way, I told you the blog was going to have to go on hiatus until I figured out what to do.
But 24 hours later I was back.
Sorta.
I had dug out an old laptop and managed to get it working.
But, as I said then and have said many times before and perhaps I should stop saying it, I hate laptops!
The little screen, the little keyboard, the damnably maddening touchpad.
But it rescued me.
Sorta.
But then like a message from above, or somewhere, came word from old friends that they had a couple of newish computers because they had upgraded at their business and I could obtain one at a bargain basement price.
Not only that but My Favorite Computer Geek would try to get my pictures and docs from my old beast and transfer them into the new computer.
Well, he succeeded, dear friends, and once again I am back with my big (16 inch or somesuch) screen and a computer that could have fit in My Old Beast's body 5 or 6 times, I think.
And it's faster.
Much, much faster.
And late today I found all of my old pictures and documents!
I am one happy camper.
So without further ado, I will show you a photo taken yesterday by Crosstown Lori, who just happens to be the wife of My Favorite Computer Geek, who will now be known as Ruthless Rick.
Just to let you know that I am not suffering too much in my Days of Computer Dismay, let me show you what the real kitchen master produced yesterday.
Call it hilarity.
Or jocularity.
Or mild amusement.
It's what I need after a week like this one, what with computer problems and weed chopping-digging-poisoning.
If your week has been anything like mine, you're ready for some laughs too.
So let's see what we can find.
I'm talking about my hiatus of blog posting.
I have a damaged, somehow, desktop PC sitting next to me, useless for now.
But I revived a laptop from a closet and got it running.
It's fairly old; I think the battery is dead; so I can only run it plugged in.
Did I ever tell you how much I hate laptops?
But I have managed to plug my keyboard into it and after some finagling around I got my wireless mouse to work with it so it's just about like having a PC again.
The only problem is all that stuff I had on the PC is just sitting there, inaccessible for the time being and maybe forever.
So we struggle along, trying to pretend nothing is wrong.
But there is one, or actually three, other problems with this day.
I have serious computer problems which force me to put Oddball Observations on hiatus until I get them fixed, one way or another.
With apologies, see ya later.
Hear ye! Hear ye! Hear ye!
Court is now in session!
Wait a minute.
That was a dream.
It's what comes from dozing off into a nap in the middle of the day.
That number in the title of this post does not mean I scored a 10 with my latest kitchen adventure.
It's more like a Beginner's Course Number.
So, brace yourselves.
Today, June 6th, is a day marking many events.
To many, it is D-Day, the day in 1944 when British, Canadian and American troops stormed the beaches of Normandy, France in World War Two.
But there are other events that happened on this day.
In 1523, Gustav Vasa was elected King of Sweden and the day today is celebrated as the National Day of Sweden, though historians quibble about the actual date.
In 1859, Queensland separated from New South Wales in Australia, becoming a separate colony.
The day is still celebrated as Queensland Day down under.
Much more recently, on this day in 1987 my wife Judy and I crossed the border from Nogales, Arizona to Nogales, Sonora, Mexico and a happy life as expatriates that lasted over 4 years.
You might say it was D Day for us with the D standing for departure.
And then, as I've written here before, June 6th in 1904 was the day my mother, Hattie Loretta Hylland, was born.
She would be 119 today.
Here's an early picture of she and my dad during their courting days.
Though she left us way too soon, I always think of her on this day.