Tag: silliness

Rutabaga for days

rutabaga (n.)“Swedish turnip,” 1799, from Swedish dialectal (West Götland) rotabagge, from rot “root” (from PIE root *wrād- “branch, root”) + bagge “bag” (see bag (n.)). (from Etymology Online)

There was a time in my life when I had never, to my knowledge, eaten rutabaga. That day has long since passed. At some point, maybe 20 years ago or so, rutabaga became a key component of the roasted root vegetables that I make as part of our fall and winter holiday feasts. But it turns out that I can’t always find rutabaga at the grocery store. So it was that when I was in Vermont on Saturday, I brought home not only my firstborn child, but also a rather substantial rutabaga. We had stopped in to the local co-op/grocery store for snacks for the road, and I poked my head into the rather small produce section. Having not scored a rutabaga at my local store, I was happy to see rutabagas in stock. There were only a few, and all of them looked pretty big. I picked out the smallest one. Which, it turns out, was still quite large. I didn’t think too much of it until checking out, at which point the cashier said, “wow, that’s a big rutabaga.” It turned out to be over 3 pounds, and to cost over $10. I considered putting it back (because this seemed a rather hefty commitment for one root vegetable), but in the end, decided to pay the hefty sum and heft the hefty root home.

But I also decided that I would get my money’s worth out of it. Not only in the roast pan, but also here. Having once declared November 21 to be the International Day of the Odd Vegetable (or alternately the Day of Peculiar Produce), I decided that I would share my bounty pictorially. Joining the annals of noteworthy produce, such as the extraordinary eggplant of 2011, the dashing squash of 2012, and the sorrowful potato of 2015, I bring to you the humble but hulking rutabaga of 2022.

Below are some of the photos that I took of this venerable vegetable. I wasn’t sure what the appropriate light would be for its portrait session, so I tried several options and backdrops.

Brodie was uncertain of the threat-level of this rutabaga.

One thing that struck me about this rutabaga was its resemblance to an old-fashioned ice bag or cold compress. (And one thing that strikes me in writing this is that the hefty rutabaga is one thing that I would not want to be struck with. Especially about the head. Because I would certainly need an ice pack to recover.)

I was also amused to note that the etymology of rutabaga contains roots meaning “root” and “bag.” So aptly named. I think my rutabaga should be the poster child for rutabaga etymology.

Watching the world cup

I admit to never before having watched the World Cup. But since Theo has been playing soccer this year with much enthusiasm, I thought it would be fun to watch some together with him. Plus, having watched and enjoyed Ted Lasso, I have found a greater understanding of the appeal of the game. We looked up the schedule and how to watch the games, and John signed us up for a Peacock streaming account. (Funnily enough, it turned out to only have commentary and most commercials in Spanish. Which was actually good for Theo, who has been taking Spanish since kindergarten, and not terrible for me. I don’t speak a lot of Spanish, but caught some of it. Terms like “la pelota” and “el offside.” It also added to the novelty of the experience for me.)

To mark the occasion, I got out a world cup from the cabinet¹. (For the record: I did indeed watch some of the actual first game, which was between Ecuador and Qatar. We were rooting for Ecuador, having both visited there, albeit on separate trips².)

Off to bed early now, as I am picking up my mom at the airport in the morning. She arrives around 6:00 a.m. The kids want to join me on the trip to the airport, and Theo is hoping to be home in time to watch the next game (at 8:00 a.m in our time zone).

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¹ It seemed fitting given my past praise of a super bowl, as well as my enthusiasm for the red socks.

² Plus Qatar has the whole poor track record of human rights violations thing.

pumpkins present, past, and presently passed

These dramatic weather shifts (warm, frosty, and warmish again) take their toll on a pumpkin. Especially one that has been carved and left to sit on a porch.

We carved our pumpkins quite late, only a couple of days before Halloween. Even though we haven’t been getting trick-or-treaters in the last couple of years (no more small children on our street), I still put them out with their lights on Halloween.

And then, as it is wont to do, time passed. Mostly I would forget the pumpkins. I would walk out past them in the morning when walking the dog, and mostly they looked okay. And then I returned from my trip to DC, and they definitely had passed over into a next stage.

A couple more days passed, and again, the pumpkins mostly passed right out of my mind. Until I was putting out a crate full of postcard packets on my porch for people to pick up. (I’m not even trying to be alliterative!) And then I noticed how very smooshed the pumpkins were looking. Yesterday morning, I attempted to carry one of the pumpkins from the porch to toss it into the woods as I headed out with the dog. It did not go well.

The pumpkin started to fall apart in my hands, and I just dropped it on the lawn. (And went back inside to wash my hands before walking the dog.) And then I went about the rest of my day.

Today I finally resorted once more to using the snow shovel to help the pumpkins pass on to their next phase. (Also glad that no one was watching me. In my attempts to get a photo of the pumpkin in the shovel, I managed to drop the contents of the shovel onto the grass once more. It was not pretty.)

On another note, observe that my traditional pumpkin was reborn once more into a new pumpkin body.

Good-bye little pumpkin. Until we meet again next year.

Holding on to my pants

Happy International Pants Day! Okay, well, I guess that holiday is not so widely celebrated, outside of this blog. Today is the 16th anniversary of the start of my blog. It’s a complicated anniversary for me, tied up as it is with a sad anniversary as well. But both of these anniversaries remind me to hold on to my pants. For you see, it was my dear friend who introduced me to the power of pants. Or at least, the power of the word pants. All these years later, the word pants still holds a special place in my heart.

As you may have figured out, I love to play with words. And I love word games of all sorts. So it shouldn’t surprise you that I enjoy playing Wordle. But it turns out I’m not great at it. And the main reason for that is that I am stubbornly holding onto my pants.

When I started playing Wordle, I would vary my starting word, usually with some combination of frequent letters. (“STARE” or “TEARS.”) But at some point in the Spring (likely in April, when I also think about my pants-loving friend), I decided to try “PANTS” as my opening word. I decided that I would keep playing PANTS every day, and sooner or later I’d hit the Wordle in one try. Many months passed, and I’d faithfully start my day with PANTS. At some point in the Summer, it came up in a group chat that I always start with PANTS. And then some time after that, one of my friends shared with me the heartbreaking discovery that the Wordle would never be a plural ending in -s. For whatever reason, the Wordle powers that be decided not to include this one particular word structure. Incredibly aggravating and arbitrary, given that they include other morphologically complex words (repay, coyly, beady, finer, lying, parer, unfit, to name a few). But whatever.

I’ve ended up continuing to start my Wordle with PANTS, even knowing that I’ll never score the coveted single guess success. And I’m (mostly) okay with that. PANTS makes for a decent starting word, Wordle-wise. At this point, it would feel like a betrayal to switch. (Or maybe I’ll just drop my PANTS one of these days.)

On an aside, in deciding to write about this topic, I felt like I should have a photo. And I remembered (or half remembered) just the photo I wanted to share. (The one now at the top of this post.) Except that I couldn’t quite remember when I’d taken it. So I spent quite a bit of time filtering through my rather dauntingly large photo library. And struggling to remember when it was that I’d take it. Memories came back to me that it was from the Boston MFA (Museum of Fine Arts). But I couldn’t remember the year. So I kept poking through. And then I remembered that it was from an exhibit on Gender-bending fashion. And so Google came to my aid with at least a date range (March-August 2019, in case you wondered.). It was quite the trip down memory lane, flipping through my photos, and racking by brain trying to remember when I’d gone to the exhibit. In the end, I found my pants. But what started out as a quick post turned into a rather bigger time sink than planned. (Such is the story of my life.) But since I tracked down the pants, and their source, I figured I’d share a couple more photos from that exhibit. (Or at least photos of signs from that exhibit.)

2020: the year of cancelled plans

I’m trying to get caught up with some work projects, but I’m also still committed to some community volunteer projects. For one of them, a program to encourage the adoption of clean energy in local homes and businesses, I’ve gotten involved with doing some of the social media. And in coming up with a post on the theme of home heating/cooling, I went on a bit of a flight of fancy, and I made a thing. It makes me laugh.

Here’s my caption: “Spending a lot of time at home this year? If your summer cooling wasn’t what you hoped, and/or your winter heating could use an upgrade, we can help with clean heating and cooling solutions that will save you money. Learn more at https://www.solarizemendonupton.com“

I had a couple of cancelled trips this year. Not quite the beach scene depicted in the image1 above, but trips I was looking forward to nevertheless. Sigh.

On the bright side, I have had a lot of quality time at home, where I can enjoy drinking tea from my new favorite mug. (Featured in the above photo.)

The “Things Could Be Worse” mug from Calamityware. There is no better motif for 2020.

1Beach/drink image by PublicDomainPictures from Pixabay. Picture of my laptop by me.

Counting some more.

It’s two days after voting wrapped in the U.S. election, and the vote counting is continuing. This is a good thing, as every vote counts. The group organizing the Protect the Results event near me was meeting again this afternoon, so I headed back. But first I decided to add the Count to my sign.

With all the talk of counting, I’ve found myself getting some counting things stuck in my head. Like this song by Feist:

A Sesame Street version of Feist’s 1,2,3,4. All about counting.

And this song by Throwing Muses:

Counting Backwards, by Throwing Muses.

I was considering doing a full-blown ThThTh list (Themed Things Thursdays, that is), given that it’s Thursday, and my mind is making a list of things on a theme. But those things take a lot more time to put together than I have available for putting them together. So instead, I’ll list a few more things on the theme of counting that came to mind:

  1. Counting Crows: a band
  2. Everything Counts: a song by Depeche Mode.
  3. Counting one’s blessings: an expression about taking stock of the good things one has in one’s life
  4. “How do I love thee? Let me count the ways.” A line from a poem by Elizabeth Barret Browning. (Sonnets from the Portuguese 43.)
  5. Counting your chickens before they hatch: an idiom meaning to plan on events coming to pass before being sure that they’ll happen. Very unwise to count chickens based on the number of eggs you have. Especially if you bought your eggs from the grocery store.
  6. Counting sheep: said to help put one to sleep when one is having trouble falling asleep. (This is supposed to be counting images of sheep in your head, versus having a bunch of sheep in your bedroom. Because probably sheep in your bedroom would keep you awake. And likely would also smell.)
  7. I also feel compelled to mention that the Count from Sesame Street has been getting some good meme love these last couple of days.

And now I should get to bed. Because if there’s one thing I can count on, it’s that morning will come, and I’ll need to get moving again.

Counting sheep: Said to help you fall asleep. Probably an occupational hazard for shepherds.

Having any counting things to add? Feel free to list them in the comments. :)

wfh: Peep chaos edition

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I’ve been wanting to make a Peep diorama for years. I remember making a diorama (of the Peepless variety) for a 6th grade school project, and I really enjoyed the process. (Wish I photos of that–it was of a scene from a Nancy Drew book.) Anyhow, I may possibly not have made another diorama since then.

A few weeks ago, I decided this was the year. And I had the idea I wanted to go with. I may have told a few people that my biggest fear* was that someone would beat me to the punch with the idea. (*Not actually my biggest fear.) And I’ve been working on it here and there for about the 3 full weeks. (I ordered the Peeps on Amazon, since I wasn’t sure we’d be able to go out to get them.)

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It was really quite therapeutic to work on the little details. I made these bunny slippers one morning while everyone else was still sleeping.

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I made the portraits on the wall by photographing the “family” in front of a landscape painting.

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An early stage of the diorama. This box appeared to be an excellent size for a Peep desk.

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The coffee cup was one of the final details. I just made it this afternoon. You can sort of make out the cookies (made from felt) and the colored pencils (made from toothpicks.)

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The curtains are made from some old torn pajama pants. Rather fitting, I guess.

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I was also quite pleased with the armchair, which I made from cardboard, foam, and fabric from some long-departed corduroy pants.

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I couldn’t  quite capture the whole scene from one angle.

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Yes, I did walk around the house taking photos of peeps in different locations for the zoom meeting.

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I was rather inordinately pleased with my grocery bag, amazon box and laundry basket.

One of the things that also pleases me about this project is that is was almost entirely made from materials we had around the house. The only new items were the Peeps. There are a few items that were small toys, but most of the things I made from materials from our recycling and scrap fabric.

Ceci n’est pas une peep.

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Ceci n’est pas une peep.

Or, perhaps, the Treachery of Marshmallows. (After Magritte’s Treachery of Images, in case you don’t recognize it.) ceci-nest-pas-une-peep

A few years ago I had a sudden inspiration to create this image, by posing a Peep on a piece of card stock, and writing with a brown Sharpie.  A few weeks ago (though it also feels like years), in a fit of stress-induced work avoidance, I decided to revive and revamp the design. I cleaned it up a bit to make it into an image I could put on a t-shirt in time for Peep season.

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In case you need more surrealist t-shirts in your life, too, you can find it on TeePublic. (I ordered one for myself, and it came at least a week ago. But I haven’t washed it yet, and almost forgot about it. What with life taking on its own surreal quality.)

Puttin’ on the Pants

i-put-on-pants3-01Pants have been in the news again lately, but I’m sad to report that it’s more a lack of pants that is trending. With large percentages of the population staying home, pants have been down. Or at least the wearing and sales of pants.

I, for one, will not be party to this ongoing pantslessness. For a start, I still walk my dog every morning. So I get up and put on my pants. And, yes, I think I should get a ribbon for that.

Whether or not you yourself are currently wearing pants, we all deserve at least somewhat of a virtual pants party. Or in this case, a pants-themed musical extravaganza from the crooners of yore.

Put on your on your Blue Velvet Pants, and dial back your radios a few decades to enjoy these stylish pants standards by the Rat Pack and other mid-century songsters.

    • Puttin’ on the pants
You won’t see the well to do
Up and down Park Avenue
They’re staying home
Hardly getting out of bed
  • I left my pants in San Francisco
  • Under the Britches of Paris
  • La vie en pantalons
    • Strangers in the Pants
Strangers in the pants,
Exchanging glances
looking for romance,
What were the chances
    • Moonpants

Well, it’s a marvelous night for some moonpants
With the lycra surrounding your thighs
A fantabulous night to make no plans
‘Neath the cover of quarantine skies

  • I’ve got you under my pants
  • I Almost Lost My Pants
  • Ain’t That A Kick In The Pants
  • Smoke gets in your pants

This has been a Pants Radio production, and the product of a slightly unravelling psyche. For more pants music classics, check out: Saving all my pants for you, 80s pants party, and the magic of Santa’s pants.

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This post is dedicated to the memory of my dear friend, who should have been celebrating a birthday today. Among the many ways she enriched my life, she taught me to appreciate the humor in the word pants. She’s been gone over 10 years, but I still miss her. Rest in pants, sweet friend.