The Frugal Gourmet (if you count tuna straight from the can)

I'm actually enjoying this a bit too much. Figuring out ways to save money, that is. It's what I do. The universe has just handed me an excuse to do it, that's all.



I need to do a cost-benefit analysis; do I keep the husband, with the only source of income at present, or do I permanently alienate him, causing him to run off with a 25 year old millionaire with VERY poor eyesight? (ha! Just kidding, honey! You're awfully darn handsome!)



The above picture is me wearing my grandmother's real pearls and a real fur wrap that she received for her 50th wedding anniversary in 1964. Just didn't want this post to be all about frugality.



I had to play with it to disguise my lack of makeup. It was a spur of the moment snap on Halloween. I'm wearing no makeup and standing in full bright light with a strong flash. Those of you in your Golden Years, as I am, know that this is a recipe for disaster. I have these weird brown splotches on my face. I'm not talking Elephant Woman here, but a coat of latex paint does help a great deal to enhance my natural beauty.



"Willful waste makes woeful want," my mother would intone, while folding the wrapping paper after Christmas or carefully smoothing out used aluminum foil while turning the thermostat down in the winter to "freeze" and up in the summer to "the boiling cauldrons of hell." Climate control? I GOT YER CLIMATE CONTROL RIGHT HERE BUDDY. Yes, I'm one of the few people alive who still can remember the days before air conditioning. After we traveled to South Carolina in our covered wagon and bought our Little House In The Hellish Swampland Known As Columbia we had one window unit. On summer nights, we'd sleep with our windows open and a fan blowing air on our sweaty torsos.


My darling husband enjoys a house that has a temperature sufficient to sustain life. I enjoy a low power bill. Our old thermostat used to beep. We'd take turns tippy-toeing down the hall changing it. I'd push it lower in the winter and higher in the summer. And then Roger would hear the beep and wait till I pass out and tippy toe out and change it. Now our new one is silent and I can often get away with it. So can he, unfortunately. More money will be flowing into the household by summertime (POSITIVE THINKING!) so I won't have to maim him when I catch him turning on the air conditioning before it reaches 100 degrees outside.


My darling husband loves him some fast food. Luckily, I have an unindicted co-conspirator here. Madeleine just happens (seriously, just luck) to be reading Chew On This which is the kid's version of Fast Food Nation and informed her father last night that "strawberry yogurt contains BUGS in the red dye!" So we have resolved as a "family" (air quotes) to break SOMEBODY's fast food addiction. (I must add that Roger can still FIT IN HIS BASKETBALL UNIFORM FROM HIGH SCHOOL..he isn't getting fat on the stuff, but our wallets are lean at this time).


Wait a minute what do I hear? Why it's the sound of my little dear...Lecturing her father about trans fat. When I started this paragraph, I didn't know that. (While I popped over to Amazon for links, I heard her latest sermon begin).


Now she's doing her London Tipton impression of "Yay Me!" Madeleine has always despised "fizzy" drinks and has never had a Coke/soda/whateveryoucallitwhereyoulive in her life. Oh, this is just priceless.


Signing off to enjoy the show in the den.

Cue Yer Tiny Violins

Cue the violins and pull up a chair,

So I can tell you how life isn't fair.

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No, I cannot explain why I've taken to verse,

I'm no Emily Dickinson. I'm much much much worse.

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The earthquake in Haiti has shown the spotlight

On people who live in a miserable plight

And if you can explain my question of why,

I wish that you would. I can't even try.

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How can I sit on my first world posterior

And complain all the time how my life is inferior.

But what do you say when you have a young child,

Who made Honors Orchestra!!!! and makes us so proud.

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The first rehearsal my eyes were a' brimming,

Until they said something about Orlando and swimming.

And what to my wondering eyes should appear,

But a schedule and costs that made me faint, near.

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FIVE HUNDRED DOLLARS? Why it might be as well

Be a million. Oh Law, my heart fell.

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Yes, yes, my dear readers, I think you heard right.

In May a greyhound will cruise through the night

And SIXTH GRADERS to Orlando will go.

Can they stay with relatives? Oh no no no no.

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I'd put up a Paypal but for one small thing.

I'd rather pawn my diamond ring.

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But oh my dear readers, if you'd be so kind

And click a few times? Could you, would you mind?

Leave your blog address and I'll click you back,

And thank you so much from this talentless hack.

Poodles Roasting On An Open Fire

Well, I hear there was a devastating earthquake in Haiti. Did you hear about it?

I wrote my last blog post and felt like the biggest whiny twit in the world after I heard about the heartbreaking destruction in one of the poorest groups on earth. I have been avoiding the news, as I'm depressed enough already.

There's a Facebook page now devoted to "Bring Home Haiti's Orphans." I want to address that briefly. This does not mean kids who have just lost their parents. This is for people who have already begun the paperwork to adopt a child already placed in an orphanage in Haiti and are afraid that their paperwork will languish as the government, such as it is, works to bring order of our chaos. So please look for it on FB and join if you can.

I chose this picture because it makes me happy and CORNBALL CORNBALL CORNBALL OBVIOUS OBVIOUS OBVIOUS FLASH FLASH FLASH yes, what a time to pour my heart out to you about this rough time in my life.

That is Callie up there on Christmas Eve waiting for Santa Claus to bring her doggie treats.

I don't have a thing interesting or thought provoking to say about this devastating earthquake or Conan O'Brian being thrown out after 7 months of hilarious shows. Somewhere, I believe Johnny Carson is doing revolutions in his resting place.

I can't even think of an interesting way to tie all this together except that tomorrow Conan and I will be able to eat healthy food and drink potables and so we're both lucky.

It seems like a terrible time to write my next installment entitled "Entitled Middle Class Girl Gets Devastating Autoimmune Disorder, loses job, and has access to excellent medical care and a roof over her head."

I....really can't think of anything else to say except that this is a tough planet to live (or die) on.

The Law Of Attraction

Ms. Positive Thinking

I'm having some problems with this Law of Attraction stuff.

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It's the same stuff that was discussed in "The Secret."

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Everybody keeps telling me Think Positive!!! Whoa! Good things will happen!! Money will start flowing in!!!!

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Well, we were approved for reduced school lunches, does that count? (cringes in humiliation)

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I applied for a job in Florida. I estimate the chances of getting an interview being about 1 percent, and the chances of getting hired 00001. percent. Would it make a difference if I thought positive about it?

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I applied for a job this fall that would have been perfect for me. I thought positive thoughts for months. I nearly drove myself CRAZY with positive thoughts.

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It made it so much worse when I didn't get it.

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I even wrote a note and put it by my bed saying "Thanks God for this perfect new job!!!"

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(cringes again in humiliation)

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I'd take it down and burn it, but some primal, atavistic fear keeps me from doing so.

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(cringes again...oh you know the drill by now!)

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I have a few things I want to say about this LAW OF ATTRACTION STUFF.

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The day my father died was one of the best days of my life (well, until...yeah). We were on vacation. I distinctly remember one of those Moments. The ones you keep in your memory scrapbook. It was Monday night and we were at the beach. We were sitting on our rented cabin's front porch listening to the mosquitos whine and the roar of the surf.

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I was celebrating the fact that I was wearing a bikini at...oh...um...38? SHADDUP. I didn't say I looked like Christie Brinkley in it, but I didn't see anybody screaming and hiding their eyes and making the Sign Of The Cross either.

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I was drinking a beer. Why do I remember that it was a Bud Light? (I'll drink most any beer. I don't have one special preference).

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It was one of the happiest moments of my life.

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Daddy died 4 days later.

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Sure, I guess it's good to be happy and think positive thoughts but do you really think that the Universe is going to send rainbows and puppies and flowers your way just because you THINK them?

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My Dad used to shoot down any talk about that by saying two words. It was the name of one of his closest friends in grad school.

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This friend, I'll call him Michael, since that's his real name..... Well, Michael's family were German Jews. They had been in Germany when the Mayflower landed. (Mixing metaphors here). But you get the idea. They were German through and through. So they went to a synagogue instead of a church to worship? Who cared?

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Michael's dad did. He went around at family gatherings saying you know, this Hitler guy kind of scares me a little bit. Did you know that Dachau opened in March, 1933? Yes, the famous death camp in Germany opened for "politcal prisoners" eight years before the US became involved in the war?

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His family all shouted him down. "Don't be so gloomy!" they said. "Such an alarmist, ptfht! Our family is one of the oldest and most prestigious in Germany. "

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Yeah.

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Michael's father obtained passports and exit visas for his wife, son and daughter, bribed the proper officials, packed the family silver and jewels and left. Left his homeland. Started over again. His first job in the US was as a laboratory assistant, cleaning test tubes. He had been a research scientist in Germany.

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Yeah.

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I don't need to tell you what happened to all the positive thinking relatives, do I? Well, if you want to ask them, I suggest a seance.

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Uncertain how to make the positive energy flow,

yrs truly,

REALLY clueless in carolina

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Breaking News Update! The phone just rang. Not kidding. I raced to the phone, sure it was one of my prospective new employers.

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The phone readout said "SPECIAL OLYMPIC."

Wallowing In Misery Makes One Miserable-Bulletin At Eleven

Hi everybody.

I... don't know what to say that isn't depressing. I'm out of work, I hate not getting dressed up and going somewhere with an office and typing something that they pay you for but I have a roof over my head (albeit a 15 year old one that is in GREAT SHAPE!. POSITIVE THINKING!!! ) and food on the table. So I feel silly whining about life.

But I'm bored and miserable. I was not cut out to be a housewife.

On the other hand, miracle jobs in my field are appearing almost every day from friends....and I feel ridiculously lucky to even have these opportunities--and I can always hang out a full time law shingle on my own I guess, but I don't really want to do that.

I want to sink into a pit of misery and depression for awhile, but all the positive thinkers tell me to BUCK UP!!!! I sometime want to tell them...oh well, this is a FAMILY BLOG.

otoh, I don't REALLY want to spend a couple of months of my precious life in a pit of misery and depression. I already regret all the time I spent crying over fools (men! LOL) in my salad days. (WHY am I always tempted to write that, then I backspace and erase it, thinking it sounds hopelessly stupid and cliched?) This time I'm just going to write it!!

I mean, if I end up at age 80 thinking about those days back in 2010 when I was still young (ISH, SHUT UP) and hawtish (SHUT UP!) LOL I don't want to remember that I spent Jan 6, 2010 sad and depressed.

So everybody send me POSITIVE VIBES! YEAH!!! GO LORRIE!!! THE FUTURE IS YOURS!!! SEIZE THE DAY!!!!!!!

YEHAW!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Okay. I feel better now. Thanks.

Back to you in a few days with a better attitude about Life Its Ownself, the title of one of my favorite books by that great American, Dan Jenkins.

"Ya gotta play hurt." - Dan Jenkins

"What coulda happened, did." - Dan Jenkins

"All day long I've been telling myself it's only a merry-go-round. Some people fall off faster than others. No big mystery." - Dan Jenkins

"Laughter is the only thing that cuts trouble down to a size where you can talk to it." - Dan Jenkins.