Yup I’m off seeing family and friends and soaking up some vitamin D.
The thing is, I need a blog break too.
Due to my illness I got insanely behind. So I’m taking my first blog vacation in four years.
Regular Monday Book Review, Writerly Wednesday, and I’ve been Thinking Thursday posts will return January 7th. Until then, read The Body in the Pool if you’re missing me.
Died in the Wool is the second Knit and Nibble series by Peggy Ehrhart I have read. I liked the first one enough to grab the second.
Basic Summary (Courtesy of Amazon):
Pamela is ready to kick back and relax after a busy day selling stuffed aardvarks to benefit Arborville High School’s sports program at the annual town festival. But just as she’s packing up, she makes a terrible discovery—someone’s stashed a body under the Knit and Nibble’s table. The victim is Randall Jefferson, a decidedly unpopular history teacher after his recent op-ed criticizing the school’s sports program. But the primary suspect has an alibi, and the only clue is a stuffed aardvark found on the victim’s chest. Now the Knit and Nibblers must unravel the case quickly—before a crafty killer repeats a deadly pattern.
My thoughts:
Despite this being a knit book there was very little yarn talk but I can tell you what the main character ate for EVERY meal for the duration of the book in nauseating detail. It felt like filler. And it made the book feel super slow moving.
On the plus side:
-all the clues to solve the mystery are laid out for you.
-The clues are put together by the main character in an inventive way.
-The little town this takes place in sounds adorbs and I think I’d like to live there but I won’t join their knitting club. The author is way too fond of the new person in town being both the killer and the victim.
I’ll read the next one to see if this laborious heavy food will continue because I do like the characters and I like the plots.
This is a not PG rated post, in case you want to stop reading now.
I was watching an old episode of CSI. I’ve been enjoying them this stress filled summer. Excellent unwind capacity. But on this particular episode a woman is dead. Everyone who met the woman when she was alive kept going on about how beautiful she was and what an amazing body she had. Then you see her laid out in the morgue in a bra and panties.
Her hip bones stick out of her abdomen a good 2 inches. So does her pubic bone. Her ribs stick out further than her breasts in a push up bra.
This got me thinking. Yes, she’s beautiful but when you’re in bed with her, don’t all those bones hurt? Or is it like an acupressure thing?
So men, if you’ve had sex, vigorous or not, with a woman with bones sticking out everywhere, what’s that like?
No, don’t describe it. laughing. This is a mostly family friendly blog.
I want to understand the physics here. Do you have to be careful? Or it not even a thing?
I got tagged a tag round up so to speak. Jay over at This is My Truth Now was catching up on all the tags he hadn’t done and rolling them into one big shebang. I ended up on his nominees list. Alrighty, I’m game.
Burn – The Greatest Zombie Movie Ever by Jeff Strand. Gag Me.
Rewrite – Unsolved Mysteries in American History by Paul Aron
Reread – Pride and Prejudice and Zombies (Quite amusing if you don’t mind someone messing with canon)
Random fact about me: When I was in my early twenties I was offered a job directing porn but I turned it down because I couldn’t imagine telling people what I did for a living with a straight face.
Ariel, Under the Sea, A Book With a Water/Ocean Setting
Jaws
Drama: a book that has a lot of over-dramatic hype
50 shades of whatever
Car Type: I am driving a 67 mustang convertible. I am alone. It a windy back road through the mountains. There’s no music just the wind in my hair.
“His majesty is wide open to ridicule and scorn”- Something (anything) That Astounds You With Its Popularity
The Girl on the Train. What was that all about?
Nominees: Bill, BQB, EDC, At Milliways with a Pen, Sheri J Kennedy, The Phantom Child (are you still out there?)
The other day I was chatting with a mom from co-op. I don’t really know her very well but she was telling about the health thing she was doing and so I mentioned I just started a couch to 5K program. Not because I think it will make me healthier but because it will help me get through the 3 miles my dog needs each day faster. LOL. So I can do other things. Like eat breakfast.
She says “oh where do you live, I’d love to run with you.”
“I live in the middle of no where.”
To which my friend says, “I just had to pick something up at K’s house. Now she lives way out there. It can’t be that bad.”
Through laughter so great I almost fell down, I choked out “She’s my next door neighbor.”
Life is so flippin amusing sometimes, I can’t make this stuff up.
On Tyranny: Twenty Lessons from the Twentieth Century, Timothy D. Snyder
I grabbed this book because I am teaching 20th Century world history this upcoming year and I love new perspectives. Yeah, this was a total bait and switch book. It’s not actually about 20th century world history. It’s about drawing as many parallels between Trump and Hitler. The author adds all sorts of inappropriate commentary. This was not a historical work. This was not a political work. This was not even an academic work. It was a 100 page op ed piece. I don’t like bait and switch. Hence, a one page review.
The Swans of Fifth Avenue, Melanie Benjamin
I really tried with this book. The opening was pretentious and irritating beyond belief but I pushed on because 2 pages was not a fair opportunity. I made it to 67 when I found I would rather listen to Princess Label Maker on audio book (for the 116th time) with my son that read this. It just wasn’t compelling to me.
The Chemist, Stephanie Meyer
Um. Yeah. So someone told me the Twilight madame’s adult stuff was way better. So I downloaded this one from the library late one night when I couldn’t sleep. Worked like a charm. I was out in about five pages. But since I had it on my kindle I endeavored to read it for several weeks until the library took it back. It’s about a chemist on the run. I don’t know why. I don’t know who the chemist is. In fact however many pages I got in to the book, I did not care. It was so in the present moment, all exposition because she’s on the run and never speaks to anyone, but there was NO tension. I totally did not care.
The Art of Character, David Corbett
Another craft book I picked up because someone recommended it to me. Could not get engaged. It’s written like a long philosophy lecture. If you like philosophy lectures, you might find this book super useful. It wasn’t even a good cure for insomnia – every time I tried to read it, I got so frustrated, I was angry in minutes.
Addressed to Kill, Jean Flowers
Sigh. This is the third in the series, so I hoped the author would have reached her stride. I guess she has but it’s more of a zombie lurch with body parts falling off than a lope. LOL. The writing is stilted and awkward. The dialogue totes ridic. LOL.
If you’re looking for something good to read, pop over to Amazon and grab a copy of our horror anthology, The Box Under The Bed, number 1 in new releases.
I have to give credit to the basis of this meal to my friend G. She serves something very close to this every time we go to her place and I LOVE it so much, I started making my own.
Thinly slice a red onion and a red bell pepper. Begin to saute over LOW in the fat of your choice, I like butter for this one. Stir occasionally as they cook for 20 minutes or more, til soft and golden brown.
Slap a some steak on a grill. I use about a pound and an indoor grill but really scale this up or down anyway you like. I grill at 350, five minutes each side, rotating on both sides for that lovely cross hatch effect. Medium rare, when it’s done.
While the steak is cooking, start defrosting a pound of large shrimp, fresh is awesome if you got it but frozen works just fine in this recipe.
In the mean time, steak is still cooking, shrimp defrosting, make some fresh guac.
When the steak is done, pull it off the grill and tent it with metal foil until you are ready to serve.
Throw the shrimp on the grill. Two minutes per side should give them a nice opaque color and a bit of grill mark.
While that’s cooking, open a bag of slaw mix, bowl it, and squeeze 1-2 limes over the top. Toss.
When the shrimp are done, bowl them, then squeeze a lime over the whole mess and give a healthy shake of Chile Lime seasoning salt.
Slice the steak.
Add any topping you might like as well. Sour cream, cheese, tortilla chips on the side if you dairy and grain.
Assemble: slaw salad, sauteed veggies, meat, guac, etc.
This recipe scales easily. More steak, less steak, sub chicken, no shrimp, anything goes. Just remember to add onions and peppers as needed, the one and one is for the base meat amounts I mention, so be sure up them if you change the meat.
I find whenever I talk to someone I haven’t seen in a while or a friend I’ve known forever, they always ask if I am happy. What I want to say is yes, I am happy and sad and annoyed, angry, joyful, excited, tired, irritated, frustrated, cheerful…these are emotions, which come and go and I feel them all at various times.
I think what they really want to know is am I content? And I am. I have an amazing life which is nothing like what I ever imagined for myself. And I think that’s why people ask if I am happy. It’s not what they expect to see for me. It’s not the world they expected me to live in.
But I feel like a wild animal who once caught and put in captivity, adjusted and has now realized, it’s not so bad here. No one is hunting me. I am well fed. I have things to play with and people who play with me. People routinely line up to admire me.
I am this polar bear. 
His world maybe be concrete and limited, but the water is cold, it is snowing, and all is well for him in this moment.
Side Note: I actually had this awesome video of him swimming laps I took at the Berlin zoo but WordPress wants me to give them more money to be able to show videos. So you get a still shot. LOL
So after Amsterdam we went to Berlin. I liked it a lot. Then again no one was smoking marajuana on every street. Things always look rosier when you aren’t going to vomit any second. That said, Berlin is a total foody town. Gluten free was everywhere, which makes it so easy to feed the kiddo and myself. Their public transit system was awesome as well. Even at peak travel times you could still find standing room on every train we needed.
Highlights:
Berlin Zoo, totally fab! I like zoos. Visit them everywhere I go. This is top 5 easily, maybe top 3. They put some serious time and effort into designing the enclosures for the animals both from the perspective of what the animal needs and viewing for people. Example: The Mountain Goat enclosure had a 50 foot high mountain in it for them to climb. I have never seen anything like that for goats. Plus their kids’ playground was way cool. Tons of things that never happen in the US for safety reasons. Snort.
Allied Museum: Museum dedicated to the Berlin Airlift. They have a plane from the airlift on the grounds which you can go into, if you’re there at the right time of year. We weren’t but it was still way cool. No barriers. So I got to walk under that huge beautiful plane. sigh. Lovely.
DDR Museum: hands on, interactive museum about life in East Berlin when the wall was up. You can ever “drive” the one car that was available in East Berlin in a 3D virtual street reconstruction.
Kaiser Wilhelm Memorial Church.
Yes, I went to a church. The thing is, this one got bombed in the war and rather than demolish and rebuild it, they restored it just enough to keep it from falling down as a memorial to those who died in the war. It looks amazing as it is.
Jute Backeri: Gluten free bakery. So good. Seriously. It might have been better than Kyra’s. Maybe. LOL.
Things that made me sad:
“The Wall.” There is a mile long stretch of the wall called the East Side Gallery. Artists have been invited to paint murals regarding their experiences in the DDR. Half the strip is protected by a fence. The other half is tagged to hell with graffiti. It made me very sad that they have to protect “The Wall” with a wall.
Checkpoint Charlie: Oh dear god. It’s all reproduction. And it’s like Time’s Square meets bad Hollywood repro. Picture the scene, KFC on the left, McDonalds on the right. CC in the middle, complete with Germans pretending to be American soldiers in uniform, manning the checkpoint. Shoot me now. The real stuff is in the Allied Museum.
The kiddo had a brief desire to move to Berlin. I think he liked all the gluten free food availability. The fact that we never got stuck in traffic. And the amazing museums. He was particularly taken with the Pergamon and it’s amazing set up of the Ishtar Gate. He and his dad are currently building one in MineCraft. LOL
T.A. Henry 