Say It Ain’t So
Our eldest grandson Alastair was born 14 years ago tomorrow. He’s a very special young man. Being the only boy surrounded by three sisters, he takes pride on his ability to get under each sister’s skin in unique ways. He can spend incredible amounts of time drawing and designing, destined to be an architect or an engineer. When I receive my thank you note from the kids for a birthday or other holiday gift, his note is often my favorite. The best one was the year his Papa and I sent him a chemistry set for his birthday. We called early the morning of his birthday, and was told that he was in the emergency room already with a cut hand from a beaker that had broken. His thank you note went like this: Dear Nana and Papa, Thank you for the chemistry set and science book. I have done a few experiments. My hand is feeling a lot better. Love, Alastair. Hope your day is happy! You won’t cut your hand on this year’s gift. Here are three McLain men….

Guardian Angels
When Bill and I traveled in Europe for three months in 2008, we were convinced then — and are still convinced — that we had a travel angel. There were just too many times that we were saved by God’s hand from a serious boo-boo. Likewise, when Bill recently installed hardwood flooring in our Denver home, we were wondering just how we would move the piano. The day he wanted to start, two men came to collect our freezer. Bill asked them if they would like to earn a few bucks, and they agreed, and moved the piano down the two stairs to the entryway. When it was time to move it back, a plumber accepted the same offer. Yesterday afternoon, Bill and our friend and neighbor Dale were working their pants off trying to remove the stump that remained from our tree being cut down. A three-man work crew from a place I will not mention on this blog (for fear of getting them fired) went past the house, and then turned around and came back. Need any help? they asked. Bill gave them a few bucks and the three men spent an hour-and-a-half removing the stump. Most people are good.

Check Under Your Scrambled Eggs
Bec, Jen, and I went out for breakfast the other morning. I had heard about a place called Joe’s Farm Grill, and we decided to give it a try. The food was delicious, with many of the ingredients coming straight from the farm on which the restaurant sat. We chose to eat outside because it was a beautiful morning. However, we decided NOT to climb this tempting tree for obvious reasons…..

Since our bones are old and brittle, we aren’t sure which would be worse — the falling or the scorpion stings.

One Looks Different From the Other
I was cleaning out the cupboard I use to store our liquor, and realized we had two bottles of Irish cream: one was purchased by Jen and one was purchased by Bill. See if you can guess who purchased which bottle…..

Ciao!

When I was in elementary school, our nationalities became a big thing among my friends. Because we lived in the Midwest, the truth of the matter is that most of us were sort of a mixture of all nationalities. In our town, many folks were of Czech or Polish ethnicity. Since our school mascot was the Shamrocks, those with Irish ancestry were particularly proud to say they were Irish.

It didn’t bother me to not be Irish. I was always safe from being pinched on St. Patrick’s Day because our school uniforms were green. Besides, my only living grandparents had come to the United States in the early 1920s from Switzerland. They both spoke Swiss around the house, and to most of their friends who were also of Swiss nationality. I was very happy to be Swiss.

I reckon most of my friends who were a mixture of nationalities chose the one they thought was the coolest, and proclaimed to be German, or Polish, or Irish. As for me, I always proudly professed to be half Swiss and half Polish. It was a logical proclamation because as I said, my paternal grandparents immigrated from Switzerland. My maternal grandparents were of Polish ancestry, but the original immigrants went further back than my grandparents.

Last August, my granddaughter Kaiya decided she wanted to know her nationality. Towards this goal, she asked to have her DNA analyzed by ancestry.com for her birthday. It was then that I learned that unlike I had always believed, the percentages of ethnicity might not be the same for all siblings. In other words, Kaiya might be a larger percentage of Asian than her sister Mylee or her brother Cole.

So that got me thinking: I might not be half Swiss and half Polish as I had always proclaimed; rather, I might have a larger perentage of Polish, while my sister Bec might have a larger percentage of Swiss.

This realization made me very curious about my DNA. So curious, in fact, that I spent hard-earned cash-money to get my very own spit analyzed. The results came back to me last week.

Smart money was on the probability that I would have more Polish than Swiss. The basis for that opinion was the fact that I look very much like my mother…..

So it was to no one’s surprise that my DNA results show that I am a full 71 percent Polish, and only a mere 13 percent Swiss. Sorry Dad. The unaccounted percentages are 9 percent Baltic States and 7 percent Swedish.

I was really kind of hoping that there would be some sort of scandalous nationality showing up in my background. Maybe some link to Queen Elizabeth or a smidge of Native American. Of course, had that been the case, some of that should have turned up in Kaiya’s DNA.

Having had my DNA analyzed leaves me with a couple of thoughts: 1) My blood line is way cleaner than I would have imagined. I don’t know (or care, really) where the Baltic States and the Swedish percentages come from. Perhaps from my Neanderthal ancestors or from a Viking battle. 2) I would love to see the results of my siblings’ DNA analysis, but none have taken the leap.

I would be willing to place money, however, on Jen’s percentages being absolutely the opposite of mine, as she is our Grammie reborn…..

I haven’t been brave enough to do a very thorough analysis of bloodline matches. Maybe I should. Maybe I am fourth cousin thrice removed to Albert Einstein or Frederic Chopin.

I’ll let you know if I learn some sort of deep dark secret.

There’s thems that have it and thems that don’t. I’m talking about fearless cooking skills. I’m afraid that I’m in the don’t category. I will try a new recipe, but I have to be pretty sure about the ingredients and the process before I will dive into something totally new. That’s why making tamales and pierogis from scratch all by myself remains on my bucket list, and will probably still be there when I leave this earth.

But our AZ neighbors are fearless cooks, indeed. They are, after all, the ones who gave me the courage to make homemade summer sausage last winter. It was arguably a success…..

Our neighbors Dale and Jan are snowbirds like us, except that they come all the way from Alberta, Canada. We have eaten at each other’s houses on several occasions. Jan’s family is of German origin, and she fondly recalls her mother’s homemade noodles. In tribute to her mother, they have served us delicious homemade noodles on a couple of occasions.

The other day, I received this text from her: Supper at our house? No heavy German food — trying for Asian this time.

Here’s the thing: When I am trying for Asian, I throw some chopped up chicken into a wok along with some veggies and some Kikkoman teriyaki sauce. My stir fry (for that’s what I call it, which would make most Asians cringe) is an easy and quick meal that both Bill and I like. But I would never call it Asian food.

I have a daughter-in-law who is Asian — Cambodian, in fact. She is my favorite partner with whom to share Asian food. She has introduced me to Vietnamese pho, Korean BBQ, Hawaiian poke, Japanese sushi, and Chinese hot pot. I like them all.

BUT I WOULD NEVER TRY TO PREPARE A SINGLE ONE.

But as I indicated early in this post, our neighbors are fearless in the kitchen. Bill, Jen, and I were the lucky beneficiaries of their having entertained a Japanese friend the week before.

When we walked into their house, I immediately asked what they were serving. (By the way, my mother did attempt to teach me good manners, but I apparently wasn’t paying attention to the lesson dealing with eating at friends’ houses.)

But was I ever delighted when I the answer was KOREAN BARBEQUE! They learned the tricks the week before from the Japanese friend who visited them. They, in fact, took a trip across town to the Korean grocery store specifically to buy the appropriately-cut beef short ribs and the necessary ingredients for a delicious bulgogi sauce.

The ribs were still marinating when we arrived…..

…..and Dale was in the midst of preparing a rice dish…..

…..that was one of the prettiest bowls of food I have ever seen.

In addition to the rice and Korean short ribs, we enjoyed a chicken stir fry that was delicious…..

See what I mean? Fearless.

The good news is that they shared their recipe with me, and I will share the recipe with you. But not until I’ve tried it first.

Annyeong!

Recently, as I was impatiently awaiting a package I had ordered from Amazon three hours before and wondering what was TAKING them so long to deliver it, I had a flashback to the Spiegel Catalog.

When I was a girl, my town of Columbus had a Monkey Wards, a J.C. Penneys, and a Schweser’s Department Store if you were in the market for clothes. Twice a year we drove the full 70 MILES to Omaha to buy school clothes and to Christmas shop.

But nothing beat the arrival of the Spiegel catalog.

The catalog arrived late summer, early fall, in time for Christmas shopping. As a small girl, I remember that it was thick and heavy, with pages so slick and light that they almost turned by themselves……

Maybe I was just a big nerd, but MAN, I loved perusing that catalog. I would nestle into the corner of the couch, and slowly turn the pages of a magical world. It seemed to me that Spiegel sold EVERYTHING IN THE WORLD. That wasn’t actually true, however. In fact, unlike the J.C. Penneys and Montgomery Ward catalogs, I’m pretty sure that Spiegel emphasized clothing and toys. If you were in the market for tools or yard equipment or sheds, you looked at the Wards or Sears catalogs.

But clothing and toys were what interested this young girl, and I couldn’t wait to get my hands on it. Spiegel would tell me what was going to be in style over the year ahead. It gave me ideas of what to ask for from Santa. It was pretty easy to see what we wanted for Christmas because those were the pages with the corners folder over.

If you actually placed an order (well, if your MOTHER actually placed an order), it took a very long time before your package was delivered. You mailed in your order, and then awaited the ding-dong of the doorbell that brought a package that included your new pajamas, a skirt and blouse (size 6X), and a white cardigan with ruffles to wear over your blouse. The anticipation made the whole process even sweeter, though I didn’t think so at the time.

And now I’m impatient if I have to wait two days for my Amazon delivery. I’m serious, because here in AZ, there is an Amazon warehouse, and it isn’t uncommon to have a package delivered the same day you order the item, or the next day at the latest. No waiting for the Wells Fargo Wagon to deliver your package.

I was at my physical therapy appointment the other day, and I overheard a conversation from one of the younger physical therapists. She was telling someone that she had gone out for a margarita the previous Friday.

“I don’t drink very much, and the margarita was really strong,” she said. “I ended up drunk-ordering from Amazon. The next day, a package containing some golf clothes showed up on my doorstep, and I have no recollection of ordering them.”

I was kind of chuckling about this to myself when my PT rounded the corner. He knew what was amusing me.

“Don’t laugh,” he said. “The same thing happened to me. I apparently drunk-ordered a scope for my rifle from Amazon one night when I had too much to drink.”

Drunk ordering. Is this a new phenomenon? I’m happy to say, while I have had second thoughts on occasion about something I sober-ordered from Amazon, I was at least fully conscious at the time of order.

At least when ordering from the Spiegel catalog, you had to be sober. After all, you had to write down the number of the items you’re ordering and find the postage stamps.

If I knew how to post a poll, I would ask my readers to tell me if they’ve drunk-ordered from Amazon. Have you?

Bec, Jen, Maggie, Josey, and I met for lunch and a book discussion of Where the Crawdads Sing on Thursday. Maggie was the chauffeur for Jen and me. As we were leaving after lunch, someone nearly backed over Jen, Maggie, and me, but stopped in the nick of time. That initiated a discussion about the dangers of backing up. Jen said she is especially fearful when she is parked next to a truck.

“Mom, you have a backup camera,” Maggie said.

“Yes I do,” Jen agreed. “But sometimes the car is off to the side, out of sight of my camera.”

It was clear Maggie was almost up to HERE with the antics of her aunts and her mother, and senior citizens in general.

“Well then Mom, you turn your head around to look,” she said. “You’ve got a backup camera AND a neck!”

Good to know, Maggie. We all love you and hope you’ll stick with us and our necks when we are in The Home…..

Have a great weekend.

Right on Target
Jen was in the market for new towels for her bathroom here, so a trip to Target seemed in order. She couldn’t decide on a color, so she took some photos and we returned home. After lunch, she had made a decision, and we drove back to Target. While she shopped for towels, I picked up a few things, including some chicken thighs. I dropped her off at Maggie’s and returned home, only to find that I had forgotten the bag with the chicken thighs. I called Jen to see if she had accidentally picked up my bag, but alas, she had not. I went back and forth — was it worth yet another drive back to Target to see if by chance they were still hanging around somewhere? But it wasn’t long before Jen called me to tell me she had returned to Target and gotten my chicken thighs and was on her way to drop them off. She gets Lenten brownie points for sure.

Red Mountain March
Yesterday morning, Jen and Maggie and I met up at nearby Red Mountain Park. Maggie, being younger and more ambitious, set off to do her own walk/run exercise. Jen and I walked at a slower pace, but it felt good nonetheless. When Jen dropped off the chicken in the afternoon, she confirmed our suspicion  that she had actually put more steps on her pedometer in Target than she had at Red Mountain Park.

Konechiwa
Our eldest granddaughter Adelaide (who just turned 16), is, as I write this blog post, in Japan with a group from her high school. She takes Spanish as her foreign language choice, and her Spanish teacher was leading a group of TJ students to Japan, and invited her to join them. Originally, Addie was to be accompanied by her father, but he was unable to go because he was tied up with a court case. While I’m sure Addie was disappointed, she is making do…..

In a million years, I wouldn’t have had the courage to go to Japan when I was 16 years old. I’m proud of her, but praying like crazy.

Baby, It’s Cold Outside
We FaceTimed with our family in Vermont last night. Heather told us that she volunteered at a field trip for their eldest son Joseph. It occurred to her that perhaps she miscalculated just how much fun her role was when she realized that the temperature was 14 degrees. They are eagerly awaiting the arrival of spring.

New York State of Mind
Speaking of Joseph and Micah, they recently accompanied their parents to New York City, where Heather and Lauren lived when Joseph was born. the boys explored the city that they love so much. I asked Micah what he thought about New York City. He told me he did so much walking that he thought it should be called Walking City…..

Ciao!

I think that I shall never see
A poem lovely as a tree.

A tree whose hungry mouth is prest
Against the earth’s sweet flowing breast;

A tree that looks at God all day
And lifts her leafy arms to pray;

A tree that may in summer wear
A nest of robins in her hair;

Upon whose bosom snow has lain
Who intimately lives with rain.

Poems are made by fools like me
But only God can make a tree. – Joyce Kilmer, February 2, 1913

I had to memorize that poem at some point in grade school, but I only remember two phrases: 1) I think that I shall never see a poem as lovely as a tree; and 2) Poems are made by fools like me but only God can make a tree.

The poem is equally praised for its lyrical tone and cursed as being too sentimental. What do you expect from a man named Joyce? All I can say is that sometimes when I look at God’s earthly creations, I wonder how anyone can doubt the existence of a Supreme Being.

Take, for example, the palo verde tree which, perhaps to your surprise, is AZ’s state tree rather than the saguaro cactus. Perhaps you’re not surprised at all; most likely you haven’t given it a single thought. But you should, because the most interesting thing about the palo verde tree (palo verde means green stick in Spanish) is that the leaves are teeny-tiny, but the trunk is solid green….

How does this tree photosynthesize given the small leaf size, you might ask? That’s why God made the trunk green.

I learned this, and other interesting facts about AZ plant life because Jen and I made a trek yesterday to the Desert Botanical Garden. We were given a tour by a Garden Docent extraordinaire named Rebecca Borman. My sister Bec has been a volunteer at the Botanical Garden for a number of years now. Her knowledge of botany and nature in general — and Arizona nature specifically — is commendable, particularly since she was an English teacher and not a scientist or a botanist in her earlier life…..

The famed saguaro cactus should, for all intents and purposes, be the state tree because the Sonoran desert — a large part of which is in AZ while the remaining part is in Mexico — is the only place in the world where saguaros grow. Most saguaros look much the same: tall and slender with a couple of arms that add to the plant’s beauty about every 50 to 75 years. Once in a while, God gives us a gift by, well, mutating the saguaro, giving it a king’s crown…..

It looks like something you would see in Disneyland, doesn’t it? Along with its fellow plant, the mountain laurel….

…..in bloom now, and making the area smell like grape soda. The mountain laurel blossoms aren’t out long, but longer than the magnificent flower that appears on this cactus…..

That flower will be lucky to stick around for more than a day or so.

I’ll leave you to bask in the glory of God by perusing these photos…..

Jen and I had a wonderful day, and learned a lot about our second home…..

When I was growing up in the 1950s and 60s, sugary cereals were growing in popularity. I blame Captain Kangaroo. As I recall, he was sponsored by Kellogg’s. Tony the Tiger haunted my childhood. He’s grrrrrreat!

We didn’t eat a ton of cereal as a kid. It wasn’t that Mom particularly worried about sugar intake the same way young parents do nowadays. We weren’t gluten intolerant or lactose intolerant or any of the intolerances prevalent in today’s world. We just were more likely to eat smoky links than Sugar Smacks, because we also weren’t processed-meat intolerant.

The two cereals you would find in our pantry were Rice Krispies and Frosted Flakes. Tony got to us after all. I preferred the Rice Krispies with bananas. When I would eat Rice Krispies, I would put so much sugar on them that there was a layer of sugary goodness at the bottom of my bowl. It was the best part. As far as I’m concerned, the leftover milk is still the best part.

As an aside, my grands are a divided nation when it comes to the leftover cereal milk. Some like it and some throw it down the sink. As for me, I’m Team Slurp-the-Sugary-Milk all the way. Especially if it’s Cinnamon Toast Crunch.

I recently came across a BuzzFeed article that ranked 27 cereals by taste. I won’t link to the article because, well, BUZZFEED. Since my grands read my blog, the language wouldn’t be prudent. But I will tell you that number 27 — therefore the least tasty cereal according to BuzzFeed — was Grapenuts. According to this Nana, I couldn’t agree more. Eating Grapenuts is like eating dog food. Wheaties was next worse. Personally, I’ve never tasted the Breakfast of Champions. Raisin Bran was number 25, and I disagree with that. I actually like Raisin Bran, or did when I was not on a low-fiber diet and could eat bran. However, if my choice was between Raisin Bran and Cinnamon Toast Crunch, it would be hell-to-the-no on the Raisin Bran. I’m not crazy, after all.

You might have picked up by now that Cinnamon Toast Crunch is my favorite cereal. It’s also my favorite cereal milk. Next in line in both categories is Apple Jacks, a cereal that didn’t make the cut at all by BuzzFeed.

Cinnamon Toast Crunch was number 4 in the BuzzFeed author’s opinion. Beating out my favorite cereal were a couple of dark horses: Reese’s Puffs at 3, and a surprising Life as second runner up. And as to BuzzFeed’s favorite sugary cereal, number 1 was Fruity Pebbles. Wow. Fred Flintstone must have bribed them to claim that as their choice for the best cereal on the grocery stores’ shelves.

In this tell-all blog post, since I admitted that Cinnamon Toast Crunch was my favorite cereal treat, I will also tell you that my sister Bec’s secret cereal choice is Frosted Flakes. Like Tony, she thinks they’re grrrrrreat. Another fun fact is that when her grands come over, they are terrified that their only choice will be Frosted Flakes. For them, Froot Loops is the winner by far. In fact, before committing to a sleepover at their nana’s house, they make sure she has been to the grocery store and has an ample supply of Froot Loops to meet their needs.

The other day, my great-niece Lilly told me she and her Grammie (my sister Jen is in town for a visit) were going to the grocery store to buy Lucky Charms. She was quite excited, because sugar cereals are not a part of her typical breakfast. I told her a true story about the time Cole got ahold of the box of Lucky Charms while Mom and Dad were still in bed. His goal: easy access to picking out the marshmallow “charms.”…..

She thoughtfully considered the photo, and then gave her assessment: He shouldn’t have dumped the cereal on the steps; he should have dumped it on the kitchen table. It would be easier to get the marshmallows.

There are cereal rules when it comes to 4- and 5-year-olds.