Odds and Ends.....

The house seems awfully empty today. My son left for Florida yesterday to spend spring break. When he's home he is always running in and out, busy with his friends, so I am used to him being gone, but this feels different somehow. I did some chores around the house and actually spent a couple of hours sitting on the deck reading a book....yes, a book. It was very relaxing. Tomorrow I shovel the crud out of his room!!

The teenager down the street is into motorcross, and from what I understand he is pretty good at it. Riding in quite a few events. But for some reason, he feels the need to work on his bike in the front yard, which is no problem, except he revs up the engine over and over and over again while he is doing whatever he is doing to it. And he likes to ride them up and down the street over and over and over again. It doesn't make it very pleasant to sit on the front porch and listen to that and smell the fumes. Remember those old World War II movies when the Allies would string a really thin wire across the road and when the Nazis would ride through on their motorcycles......pppffffttttt.

I HATE yard work. I like my yard to look nice, but I don't want to do it. My son has helped in the past, but I wanted it done a certain way, so I would end up doing it all myself. Last year I hired someone to cut it for me. It was like Christmas when I would come home and it was all done! But, he really could have cut it shorter. I like it to be cut as short as possible, where you can almost see dirt.  This year I have decided it will be my son's job to do the grass, and I am going let go of being in control of how every little aspect of it is done. He is more than capable of handling it.  Maybe I can just have it all concreted over!!!

I have been reading "The Girl Who Played With Fire" by Stieg Larsson. It is about murder, mayhem, intrigue, set in Sweden. It is by the same author who wrote "The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo", which is now a movie. I've read that one also.  I am a voracious reader. I have always got a book, sometimes, two that I am in the middle of reading along with assorted magazines. I have always loved reading, even as a child. As a teenager I read almost all of the Agatha Christie mysteries. I love mysteries and biographies the best. NO romance novels here.  I tried to instill a love of reading in my son, I use to read to him everynight at bedtime, bought him books for Christmas and he saw me read quite often. But that whole theory didn't work out. He couldn't care less about reading. When he says he is bored I tell him to read a book. He answers that reading is for nerds. And when I tell him that I like to read, he says that's because I am a nerd.


RECIPE OF THE DAY                        EATON MESS (unknown)


4 cups of mixed berries
1/2cup sugar
1 Tbl lemon juice
1 1/2cup heavy cream
2 tsps vanilla
2cups crushed store-bought meringue cookes

Rinse berries and leave them whole if they are blackberries, raspberries and/or blueberries. If you add strawberries, rinse, hull and slice them.

Bring 2 cups of berries along with sugar and lemon juice to simmer in a saucepan. Turn into medium bowl and stir in remaining fresh berries. Refrigerate until chilled. When ready to serve, whip cream and vanilla to soft peaks. Assemble in the following order..Spoon a portion of half the cream, crushed cookies and berries into 4 large glasses, then repeat with remaining ingredients.  Really good.


Kathy