Slender people are different than the rest of us.

For years I carried a load of guilt caused by that perpetual cycle of ‘lose-4 pounds, gain-5-pounds’, but then I found a list of 25 reasons that explained in detail, the ‘why’ of why thin people are thin. It’s tucked into their genes before they were even born, and here’s what they have, and we don’t.  Read and wonder no longer.

1. They think the dish on their desk is for paper clips, and not for candy.
2. They won’t eat popcorn in movies because it makes their hands greasy.
3. They think banana splits, sundaes and Ice Cream are, like all Gerber products, for children, and, for heaven’s sake. not adults.
4. They throw out small portions of left-overs instead of putting them in the refrig to nibble on later in the day.

5. They take it for granted that one normal pizza is for four people.
6. They think cookies are for people under 13 years of age.
7. They eat nuts one-at-a-time.
8, They think do-nuts are indigestible.

9, They get so absorbed in some special project that they forget to eat.
10, They hold their book or magazine with both hands.
11. They allow no food in the family room, living room, bedroom or any room where there is a TV.

12. They take a nap when they feel an energy drop instead of eating.
13. They trade-in or pass along, all gifts of any kind of cooking pans , and get clocks, radios, or books.
14. They (and this difference proved it all to me) they lose their appetites when they are depressed or have nothing to do.

15. When the party is over, and the guests go home, they throw out any left-over potato chips, corn chips, along with any leftover Dips.
16. They don’t celebrate getting a salary raise, or any  big event, by dining out at some great cafe, but head straight for a Health Food Bar and order a huge Green Salad, Tofu croutons and a V8 drink.
17. They think it’s utterly silly and not worth the time, to go to a special store to get a special kind of chocolate, or fancy bakery to buy a  special cake.

18. They use Carob in cooking instead of Chocolate.
19. They find Ice Tea more refreshing than an Ice Cream Soda.
20. They have such interesting conversations with people at cocktail parties that they never get around to visiting the Buffet Tables.
21.They do not feel compelled to ‘even up’ the candy dish by eating the ‘extra’ pieces to achieve a perfect balance.

22, They never once think they ‘may as well’ eat that leftover piece of pie, cake, or whatever, rather than tossing it out.
23. They prefer reading any book or magazine rather that the latest copy of “The Joy of Cooking”.
24, They don’t tuck a handy sack of nuts/mints/ or cookies in a pocket, when they go walking.
25. They give away or toss out all gifts of candy, cake, or cookies.

See? It’s just as I said, it’s right in their genes. For nobody could train themselves to such odd habits.  Born way, way, way , way, way different. But just think what they’re missing. I mean besides the extra pounds you and I gather ’round us and they, dang it, don’t.   Oh, me.

ethelbrad@comcast.net

Cornish game hens with wild rice?

Men, I’ve heard told, are marvelous creatures and those of us who don’t have one, often cuss our single status, and yet . . . there are times.

Yes, there are times when every woman is in accord with the gal who, after long years of marriage, was asked if she had ever considered divorce.

“Divorce?” she replied in consternation, “Oh heaven’s no!” But then, with a lift of an eyebrow and a humorous grin, added, “But murder? Now, if you ask if I’ve ever felt like murder, why, that’s a different story.”

I imagine that’s how my friend Janet felt last week about her males. She called me and all it took was one quick sentence for me to know the whole story. A story every wife knows.

See, Jan is a happy, capable gal who keeps a nice home and like most of us she knows her way around the kitchen and all in all puts good food to the dinner table for her family, which happens to be her husband and three sons.

But the other day she felt a certain dullness about her meals, (TV cooking programs can do that to us) and decided to serve her fellows something different. To give them a real treat.

And so, not content with any half-measures Jan planned “A Dinner”. None of that “I’ll fix your plates and you can finish watching the game” stuff. No, she’d treat them to the whole bit. Silver, candles, china. Real TV style. The whole bit.

For the meat Jan bought small Cornish hens and then thumbed her cook book for the proper know-how. Stuff with wild rice, the book said, and so she bought Wild Rice and stuffed the birds with it. Then following each step precisely, she basted constantly with minced garlic, butter and sage as they gently baked. Mmmmmmm, I can taste them now.

When she called her guys to the table it was so beautiful that the only thing missing was Julia Child standing at the doorway welcoming them in.

Now, every woman knows exactly how Jan felt as they sat down to eat. Would her guys stand up and cheer? Would tears of appreciation well up in their eyes? Or would they eat in silence, feeling mere words a desecration to such divine nectar of the gods? So Jan waited, as every woman waits, for the verdict of her males.

With knife and fork they cautiously prodded their hens and one of them ventured, “Looks like someone forgot to feed this here bird and stunted its growth.”

Another wondered aloud if their mother had cooked them long enough, and so the meal went. But the fellows (all recognizing an occasion when face to face with one) ate on and only fleetingly glanced toward the light switch in preference to the flickering candles on the table.

And, as they left the meal, oh the cruelty of the male specie . . the main comment was, “Well, it was okay but why go to all this trouble when plain roast chicken, with bread stuffing is better?”

Well, it was no doubt lucky for those fellows that Jan didn’t happen to have any weapon handy, for that was one of those times she must have felt the same as that other gal who first said, “Divorce? Heavens, no. But murder????? Now that’s a different story.”

I sent a letter to a dozen or so friends. expressing my anger, disappointment, and frustration with the two candidates Clinton and Trump, one of whom will  evidently be our choice to have as our President for the coming four or more years.  Neither, to me, is Presidential material and the United States will lose much of its world wide respect.
 
My letter expressed my feelings, and asked for theirs, and here are some of the responses I’ve received,   I promised all identities will remain hidden.

Exhibit A:

Yer right! The prospect of either is frightening.

Trump first, I’ve never liked the guy, his business priveledge has repelled me. But, his ridiculing of the way congress has acted over the last twenty years, his frustration with stupid idiotic spending and pandering to those with their hands out, his reaction to the general weakness of our status in the World opinion, and comments on welfare recipients has resonated with the silent majority of people who are tired of Washington’s nonsense and emphasis on reelection.

Clinton, on the other hand is just a common criminal who has no regard for the rule of law, is an outlaw, a hypocrite of the first water. It was she that demanded during the Watergate investigations declared, “I want to know who knew what and when.” But now when she is in the hotseat equivocates, evades and dissembles. No one in government has had so many people fall victim of death and disgrace as around her. Her blatant disregard for the people of the US and the Constitutional guidelines and controls is alarming. She sounds a lot like Hitler in describing the panacea for the ills of the country. Her position on the 2nd Amendment is criminal and quixotic. I think she feels volume is the answer for questions she doesn’t want to answer.

Entitlements by the Feds are valid only for SS recipients and Veterans. All other funds transfers are Welfare, and ObamaCare is a recipe for the kind of lying of those not wanted as in the case of Jews, Catholic Priests, mentally ill, and unpatriotic as in Germany in 1939.  Her ideology is to parley as many illegals as possible into voters.

Well, you asked! Well, for whom shall vote?

Terse and to the point this caller from the great northwest . . .

I keep wondering if a third party is going to appear.  it wouldn’t surprise me at all.  i might wonder how many people will write in Mickey Mouse.  If the country got together and wrote in the same candidate there might me a humble person as president–but who?  I’m waiting for a third party to come through.

Email #4:

I’d like to know how much money has been received, and what future promises have been made by Hillary’s organization. She learned all the ropes, and got first hand knowledge of such methods when Bill Clinton, her husband, made his successful run for the same office. She watched how he got around illegal corners, and is using those methods now. The average person, running for some small town office, and doing the same things she has done, would be legally investigated and put out of the race by now.

This rant came to us via hand written paper, wrapped around a rock, tossed near our door:

Maybe I am getting older, seeing a bit more clearly, or just becoming jaded.  But I see almost no one I admire or respect or get excited about.  Bunch of loser puppets with long coat tails hooked onto money and power.

I know he is a self proclaimed marxist, and doesn’t stand much of a chance againast Killary, but Bernie is my guy.  He is honest, hard working, and is for the little guy.  Call him a populist, but he rejects (seemingly) the big money and God and g0d knows we need some balance right now Away from big money running things.  They say politics is the entertainment arm of the military-industrial-complex.  If so Bernie is playing some fringe and indie roles.

But maybe we don’t stand too much of a chance changing things.  The business of America is business they said during the imperial period, and it still holds true now.  He who has the gold, rules.

Our best chance is to make sure we participate in the local politics.  Here comes rant number two:  We are WAY too far right in Utah because of the fundamentalist mormon overlay on all of local politics.  It’s not that the LDS have a majority, it is that they are organized, mobilized, and generally do what they are told.  So controlling local elections is easy for them (like the caucuses) especially when the more liberal crowd does not get out to vote or participate.  So if you want some change, do it locally, and just get a few new voters out.  The mormons rule all of rural Utah due to TSCC’s grip on the locals.  Not so in Salt Lake COunty.  Ever wonfder why the district map for legislative is so funny looking?

Email #7:

In Utah it is a done deal for the republican for national office so what is the point to get all excited.  Vore for someone you might know locally or just do All GOP like most of the state.

Well,  good thing I wasn’t looking for something positive to brighten the day, but you know how this stuff goes.  Any comments please post them here, I’ll add any that might come in.

Now what was I looking for ?

We’re all seekers. Whether we recognize it or not, we begin in our childhood and that search never ends. Age and circumstances may tie us ultimately to one city, one street, one house, one room and even one bed or chair, but the search goes on.

“Happiness” or “fulfillment” is what nine out of ten will say they seek, and perhaps that’s as good a name for it as any. But call it what one may, it’s a life-long search.

To some it means a place, a location, and those are the travelers of the world. In an earlier age they were the explorers. The restless ones who always looked beyond the horizon, certain that the next country, city or ocean would give the answer, the completion to their inner hunger.

Today, they go to the moon, circle far planets, prowl the isolated corners of the world. They have ‘sand in their shoes’ and are never content in one place. Among their names are Marco Polo, Columbus, Magellan, Lewis and Clark, DeSoto, The Vikings, the Pilgrims, our Pioneers, missionaries who, the world over, traveled, their entire lives, seeking, seeking, seeking.

Then there are the ones who seek their happiness in people. They are the ‘family’ people of the world, the service people, the finders of the needy and givers of what is needed. The nurses, as Florence Nightingale,  who gave help to injured in wars the restless men had created.

Again, in a more simple age, they were the ones who had large families, or went to India, China, Africa, or to the slums of any great city to find the destitute and gave alms. They are the ones who, no matter how wealthy they might be, reached out and gave voluntary aid in hospitals, held benefits, sponsored foundations.

They established food kitchens for the hungry, clinics for the sick, aged and poor, and organized societies for relief of any who needed help. They are the ones, who even though there is work to be done at home, find time to hear and answer the call for help. They too, seek, seek, seek.

Then there are the seekers who, perhaps, travel further than any other, although they may never ever leave home. These are the ones who recognize that happiness, true everlasting happiness, is to be found only within themselves.

Early on they learned that a restless, unfulfilled person will be just as restless and unfulfilled in Timbuktoo as he was in Chicago, Tokyo, New York, or Murray, Utah. He is the one who learns that if there is no peace within, he’ll never find peace any other  place. Or in any other person.

We finally know that If there is no joy within our self, we’ll search long and futilely for joy elsewhere. If there is no love within, we’ll find no love without.

These, to me, are the most adventurous seekers of all. They might  never visit a new country, or dream of setting foot on a planet, and may seem (to those around them)  to be a bit ‘different’.  And could be, for these are the ones who have read   Thoreau’s   “Walden”,   have heard the different drummer he told  about, and then have courage enough to step to  that  beat,  no matter how far off it may at first seem.

These are the ones who seek to know themselves. And, joy, joy, joy,  when they begin to ‘find themselves’,  find that’s also where the happiness, fulfillment and love has been  hidden..

We’re all seekers, and the lucky ones find  that the longest, deepest, most exciting road is the one which reaches, not outward, but strangely enough, turns and goes straight inward. Right to the spot where the joy, happiness and peace of the whole world is centered. Within one’s own heart.