The Darkness Did Not Understand The Light

There is a certain comfort I take in watching a burning candle. It amazes me being in a black room, how far the light of one single flame can reach.

It is a good reminder, that although the darkness seems suffocating, one has to but light a match to end the ebony chokehold.

I suppose growing up in a very loving, stable home makes seeing children in less than livable conditions, ...extremely upsetting...to say the least. This last weekend I was witness to yet another "family" being split apart because of the evil, slothfulness of its mother. She's been given time and leniency by the court to simply provide a "livable" environment for three innocent children..(and that is a very liberal definition held by most courts)...and yet she refuses to comply. The "house" has been condemned simply because of the garbage and feces that has piled up and now three children have to be separated and emotionally traumatized because of it. Strange to deal with a 9-year-old that is deathly afraid of blue toilet water....and no, I'm not joking about this, if only I could. She doesn't know what good food is unless it comes "super-sized" with a toy. Obesity is already beginning to effect her health. The depressing list goes on...

There has been so much damage to a once beautiful and vibrant child, it is hard for me to know where to start. How does one retrieve innocence lost? How does one undo such evils done to one who did not possess the maturity and emotional stability to cope? How to light this candle and help it show light....

tis a puzzle.

The Magicians Owl

The "Turkey" is Going To Make Dinner

Many times in my life I've been called a "turkey", usually by my mother. I think it was meant as a derogatory adjective and I always tried to defend the poor birds reputation. Even Benjamin Franklin, one of our beloved forefathers, wanted the turkey to be our National Bird of America instead of the Bald Eagle. (This opinion can be found in a letter to his daughter January 26, 1784.)

It has been rumored that turkeys are...well.... less than bright...even to say that one will look up in a rainstorm and drown itself. I live in a place where a flock made up of 40 or more individuals visit my gardens every other month, and after some observations, well, I can tell you that next time someone calls you a "turkey"... trust me... it's NOT a compliment! Ha ha

So it is with great apprehension that Thanksgiving dinner has once again fallen to me to make for the relatives. Argh.

Not to say that I'm a bad cook...not at all. When relaxed and calm, feeling creative and energetic I can fix some wonderful things. I just don't do well under "pressure". For example...my first Thanksgiving in my first house.

I've learned some things since then, and there is always time to make new mistakes..and this is why I reminisce about the "old days."

1. No one told me that a 23 lb. bird has to thaw several days in advance of cooking. If you wait only 12 hours before cooking a bird like that you will NOT be able to get the bag of giblets out of the hard frozen carcass...no matter how much hot water you pour down the throat. You will end up with a half boiled turkey, three broken nails, many tears and scalded hands.

2. Be careful when finding creative ways to get lumps out of the gravy. One rule of cooking...always add water to powder...never the opposite or you get dumplings. In a nervous panic I had a GREAT idea! Why not take a sieve, pour the gravy through, eliminate the lumps easily and go back to cooking a bazillion other things. What I forgot when I was hurriedly pouring the gravy out is that although the sieve worked fine, no bowl underneath the sieve allows your concoction to continue down through to the sink's drain. Thus keeping the lumps and removing your gravy. Lumpy gravy = problem solved.

3. When creatively doubling parts of a recipe, remember which parts those were..highlighters work wonders! If ya'll want a GREAT recipe for a wonderful tasting pumpkin pie, take the Libby recipe on the back of the pumpkin can and double all the spices except the ginger. (Ginger is really strong so add to taste but easy....less is more.) If you are super nervous and distracted about Aunt Jackie or Grandma Marge liking your new house and your cooking, double everything and then wonder, why, in filling two pie crusts...you have enough filling to make 8. ??? Let it take you a few minutes to sink in that in doubling the spice..you doubled everything...eggs..mixture...milk...etc. and in doing so overfilled the pie crusts you had..and thus undercooked the pies into a strange, pumpkin flavored mush. Yummy.

4. Butter is NOT a substitute for cream cheese. Even though you may have purchased that fancy butter from the organic farmers market, and set it out to get soft, and then it had a similar look and consistency to cream cheese....make sure which recipe is which when making 5 at once. Fancy cheese ball dip with a beautiful cracker arrangement will taste strangely bland and guests will take on that strange characteristic of a horse eating peanut butter. (Fancy cheese balls are always better when using the right product!)

5. There is a reason they are called "Baking Powder Biscuits". When you forget to put the baking powder in the "baking powder biscuits", be ready for a bizarre, flat, pancake-like effect in the bread with an odd aftertaste.

All in all, I know my family loves me anyway..but that first Thanksgiving on my own was a disaster. Hopefully this one will be better or I'm hanging up the apron once and for all!

Happy Turky Day to Everyone!!!

The Magicians Owl

Thank Your Lucky Stars I'm Not A Surgeon!!

It happened about a year or two ago, I started to notice a strange pattern.
One day of every month, in a total freaky, inescapable, bizarre, incomprehensible way... I change.

Not into something awesome such as a seductive vampire, a lone werewolf, a beautiful hawk, or an enchanting sorceress. Nope. I turn into..... a COMPLETE klutz!!!

And it's getting worse every time.

SO...yesterday was going great! And then of course I woke up to start the day.The first thing I accomplished was the loss of my wallet. Normally, I know where I place everything. I needed to take my little nephew to school as a favor..and already I couldn't find the necessary paperwork for operating a vehicle. Perfect...I guess I'll be going the speed limit then.

I get him to school, walk him to the door, chat with the teacher, go back to the car......but where are the keys?
(They would be locked...safely.. .inside the car.)
FINE.... I'll call AAA roadside...and my cell phone would be.....
(That would also be locked...safely... inside the car.)

Coat hangar anyone? An agonizing half hour later....door pops open.

Perhaps I just need caffeine, right? I stopped, grabbed a Coca-Cola, a croissant with ham and continue back home....crap didn't see the pedestrian who just sauntered across the road in front of me...crap..forgot to cap the soda.....slam the brake...

FINE....one pair of now coke-stained jeans going back into the washer when I arrive at my domicile. GGGrrrrrr.....

I need music for calm AND! I have cool tunes on the car's massive stereo system which can only be operated by the tiny remote control that came with the car. Humming along I put the remote on my lap, turn a sharp corner. But I hate the next song on the USB....but that's okay!! I have a tiny remote that.....wait a minute..

Where'd it go? AAAaahhhh...under the seat of a car that eats things more efficiently than a goat! So I dug under the seat and promptly cut my hand on something sharp.

memo to me..memo to me.... "run car into large, solid object at first chance."

Continuing home...frustrated, coke-stained, sticky, and bleeding.

Get home...hour search for missing wallet..which was under magazine on the counter...duh. Jeans in washer, hand wrapped in gauze, memo taped to forehead, keys and cell phone in drawer. Check. Okay..before sculpting perhaps I'll clean a bit and get mentally settled.

So of course while I'm doing the dishes I had to drop one, do a unique ballet pirouette-like move to try to catch it in mid-air, probably looked about as graceful as an antelope in a skirt doing the Can-can..... all to no avail. ... CRASH....
FINE....I only need one dish to eat off of anyway.

It is these kinds of days where nothing I do goes right. I haven't learned yet that to save myself, my dishes, my friends and family, and any meandering pedestrians...I should just learn to stay in bed or admit myself to a psychiatric ward with rubber walls, thereby minimizing the damage.

LOL...thank goodness its only one day!
The Magicians Owl

FINE...Dangle the Carrot

Here I am, grounded again in California, for at least two weeks. Business is slow, so I guess this will have to do. Ya, ya, ya, I know... I'm going to go crazy here, I may climb the walls, hang off the ceiling with my nails... or better yet... :)

It seems interesting to me that when I walk away from certain parts of my life, those parts begin to dangle "carrots" entreating me to come back. This is soooo unfair. Recent example: I walked away from sculpture, much to the disappointment of....well,

everyone I know, apparently.

Sculptures take a LOT of time. I love detail, and to my sculptures (which are almost surrogate children, as I have none) I give all my time, love, talent, effort, and dreams. However, at some point realism sets in, and although I would love to starve to death for love of sculpture, ha ha.. there are easier ways to make money. There are only so many hours in a day, so many days in a week...and I'm only one person.

The choice: Dream?/ Survival?

So, I put the sculpture ideas and dreams on a shelf. Argus, the winged Pegasus pictured above, is or was in the process of being completed. Only about 300 more hours and then off to the bronze foundry. But again, I've had no time, so there he sits in my studio, gathering dust. My aunt sent his pictures to one of the top sculptress' in the nation...only to tell me that she was very excited over what she saw and that I have the talent to be great, and that I should be an artist. Extremely flattering..but....there's that carrot....on a stick....leading me on...

So life brought me back home for two weeks, brought me back to Argus, brought me back to dreaming, back to my studio filled with wax penguins, pegasus leaping off cliffs, elephants fighting, and mermaids wrapping their sinuous bodies around flying sharks...

What to do....what to do.....

The Magicians Owl

To Flag or Not to Flag ??

Colorado.... So here I am traveling down the roads of Colorado. Not bad scenery, very steep mountains, and..some very bizarre road working techniques.

Okay..no I don't work construction or rebuild roads, so what would I know, right? But someone has to answer to some basic logic regarding this little incident.

I pull up to a line of various cars, SUV's, trucks, and campers who have suddenly slowed from 65 mph to a crawling 25 mph. The reason: a very bored little man equipped with hard hat, waving his "SLOW" sign, standing in front of a bright orange "Begin Road Work" placard. I rolled my eyes, sighed loudly, thought to myself... 'yeah..how long is this going to be'. As the parade of motorists continued I noticed something odd. There was not one road worker out there,... no shovels, no jackhammers, ...no lane closures, no cones, no k-walls, no accidents being cleaned up by highway patrol,... no asphalt layers, no backhoes.. just open road as far as the eye could see. There wasn't even one piece of equipment laying about for potential work later on.

Okay...and the flagger would be for ?????

Upon approach of the second mile, a second flagger (with same "SLOW" sign and another bright orange placard, "End Road Work") yawned slowly, as traffic picked up speed. I started to laugh. Somewhat confused I wondered why I just slowed for construction I didn't even see.

Are the highway workers now working in "stealth" and because of new Eastern techniques I just didn't see them? Was the reconstructed road actually finished, and someone forgot to tell the flaggers? Were these two just doing their jobs early so they could go home sooner?

Things that make ya go "Hmmm".

I continued to New Mexico and upon crossing their border I saw road workers hard at work. Jackhammers broke asphalt, workers dug furiously with shovels, asphalt layers and backhoes whined, and cones were set to block motorists from the damaged lane. And what was missing in this picture?

Flaggers!

LOL
The Magicians Owl