The Blog I'm Not Writing

Department Of Shameless Self-Promotion- NOT

Not as in, moiself  be promoting the work of someone else.   [1]

 

 

Life coach and business consultant Suzanne Mathis McQueen, author of Four Seasons in Four Weeks, has a new series of children’s books out: The Seasons in Me; The Sun in Me, and The Moon in Me .  Delightfully illustrated by Pumudi Gardiyawasam, the books are a fun and heartwarming introduction for kids as to the concepts the rhythms (“seasons”) of nature, and those of their own bodies…while also sneaking in a bit of age-appropriate  [2] science about the seasons,   [3]  the solstices, and circadian rhythms.

Check ’em out, for the children (or parents of children) in your life and on your holiday shopping list.

 

 

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One of my yoga teachers, Jill Baker, wore this shirt to class two years ago…back when I was attending class in the studio  (I am now streaming classes from the studio).  Moiself  had to have it.  Wearing it puts me in the yule mood.  So does hearing one of my favorite pieces of holiday music – while I was making sandbakkels for my annual lefse-making party dessert, I had to play it   (“…over and over and over…” as MH noted).

 

 

For the non-Norskis, sandbakkels (“sand tarts”) are a traditional Norwegian holiday cookie.  Its dough, a somewhat crumbly  texture due to the proportions of sugars and almond flour, resembles “sand,” (if, like a good Norwegian, you use your imagination, or plenty of Aquavit); thus, the name.  Moiself  does a plant-based version, as I do when making lefse.

 

 

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Department Of Variation On A Theme

Dateline: Wednesday, this one (December 8). After the pandemic cancellation of last year, my annual Ladies Lefse Party returned this year…in a somewhat limited and altered format.  The “ladies” – always a questionable modifier, considering the attendees   [4] – were mostly not in attendance.  I kept the number of invitees limited to the two friends nearby who were part of our COVID safe circle, then one had to cancel, so I opened up the party to The Menfolk.  After the last-minute cancellation of our son K, it was just MH and moiself, friend L, and a newbie to the festivities, L’s friend, G.  Somehow, we managed to have enough fun that we sat down at 7p, then all of a sudden it was 10p.

A nuclear fallout of flour still is circulating in the kitchen.  That means we did it right.

 

 

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Department Of Will Someone Please Explain This To Me Before I Die?     [5]

First time lefse party attendee G was an affable addition to the dinner.  As a fellow American with a Norwegian background, it was inevitable that, at some point during the dinner,    [6]   we shared some of the aspects about our family heritage which, as children, we found nonsensical.  In particular, it was hard for us young-uns to understand the fierce rivalry we’d heard about – particularly in Minnesota, Wisconsin, and other hotspots    [7] of Norwegian-to-USA migration – between Americans of Norwegian and Swedish heritage.  For example, a marriage between a first generation Norwegian and a first gen Swede was considered a “mixed marriage.”

 

 

Also inevitable was our descent into recollections of the astronomically lame, “Ole and Sven and Lena” jokes, and then G said, “Remember this one?” He repeated a saying that I hadn’t heard in years, but which caused me to stamp size 9 feet with excitement:

“One hundred Swedes
ran through the weeds
chased by one Norwegian.”

 

 

Yes yes yes  – and WHY?   My mother told me that her (full blooded Norski) father would occasionally recite that lame “verse,” then chuckle softly to himself.  Okay; Mom, but why did he do that – where did it come from, and why did he think it was funny?  She said he never explained it, and she didn’t want to ask, because that would reveal to her father that she didn’t get it, and she wanted him to think that she did.  [8]  Sure, that’s understandable, Mom, but do you now, today, as an adult, get what you didn’t get at the time?  I never got an answer from her.

Is it just the rhyming of Swedes with weeds ? Why not then,

One hundred Swedes
dressed in their tweeds
tailored by one Norwegian.

To this day, I have never received an explanation (make that, a satisfactory explanation) as to why this Swedes-weeds thang was supposed to be funny. Any takers?

 

 

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Department Of I’m Not Naïve But…

I mean, I get around the block, depending on your definition of block. So why was I caught offguard…when I was?

Dateline: last week.  Several days in a row.  After dinner we turn on our Roku feature to see what is on TV, and the clever device lists several ongoing shows it thinks moiself  might like.  I followed its suggestion to an episode of The Waltons, not realizing, until the commercial break, something that came as no surprise to MH – The Waltons reruns were being played on The Hallmark Channel, where it is apparently their “Countdown to Christmas.”

Believe it or not…

 

 

…I had never previously visited that channel.  But for three evenings in a row, I tuned in to see parts of one The Waltons episode, and was tortured by treated to previews of upcoming Hallmark Channel produced “movies.”

I’d been vaguely aware of THC’s schmaltzy reputation; even so, moiself  lacks the family-friendly vocabulary to describe how eye-gouging dreadful the previews were.  And although the commercials were promoting (supposedly) different features with different titles, it seemed to me that THC was going to be airing eight versions of the same movie, repackaged.

 

 

Meet The Plucky Protagonist,®  an attractive white woman estranged from/bored with her family and/or disillusioned with/burnt out by her High Stress Job In The Big City ®, who returns to flyover country her home town where she meets the simple-minded mild-mannered incredibly handsome dude who shows her the holiday sausage fest she’s been missing all her life the real meaning of Christmas.

THC’s moldy cheese Christmas romcoms are likely the same basic plot, recycled with variations in ages of the participants and locales.  I don’t know why THC’s programming executives even bother to give them different names.  Why not just run night after night of,

Hallmark presents:
“A (Heterosexual) Hunk for Christmas.”

In the spirit of it-might-be-so-bad-it-could-be-a-teeny-bit-good, or at least morbidly entertaining, moiself  be considered parking it on the couch with an emergency bottle of insulin and/or a jug of Pepto-Bismol handy, and trying to watch one of those movies. I’m still considering it.

 

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Department of Thanks For The Imagery…ooooommmmm….

Dateline: Thursday, circa 6:15 am. I hear the best ever – as in, most evocative – focal point (aka mantra) offered by one of the three meditation apps I regularly use.

I am a thunderbolt of good vibes.

 

 

 

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Department Of I Promise Not To Do This At Your House.
Sub Department Of Am I The Only One Who Ever Gets This Feeling?

Sometimes, when I pick up or am holding a large, heavy, porcelain or china or glass or ceramic plate or bowl, I have the urge to fling it across the room like a frisbee. For just a (so far) resistible instant, it seems to moiself  that to see and hear the plate shatter against the wall would be very satisfying.  It’s not a catharsis issue – I don’t get this feeling when I am angry at or irritated by something. Rather, just when I’m feeling… musical?

 

 

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Punz For The Day
Norski Heritage Edition

I want to visit Norway soon, but I can’t a fjord it.

How was the Mr. Ed Show theme song adapted for Norwegian television?
♫  A Norse is a Norse of course, of course….♫

I always appreciate a good pun, but never geographical ones.
There’s Norway I’d sink Oslo as that.

Did you hear about the bike race that goes all the way across Norway and Sweden?
It ends at the Finnish line.

 

 

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May you never recite deeds of chasing Swedes through the weeds in their tweeds;
May you be a thunderbolt of good vibes;
May you one day just let loose and fling that #@!&%!% plate against the wall;
…and may the hijinks ensue.

Thanks for stopping by.  Au Vendredi!

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[1] Disclosure: I do know this person, and like her. So I may be biased…y’all can handle that.

[2]  ages 3-8.  Accessible info for older bipeds as well.  No boring quantum mechanics or string theory.

[3] Remember: axial tilt is the reason for the season – for *all* seasons.

[4] Yeah, I’m talking *you*, JR and JWW.

[5] But I don’t want you to explain it to me, and then I die.

[6] After the first glass of champagne, which followed the gin and tonics.

[7] or should it be cold spots? What is the proper term here, re a country where half of its land lies north of the Arctic Circle?

[8] Which would be blamed on her mother’s contribution – 100% Irish – to her genes.