MY LUNCHTIME EXPERIMENT

I usually make my lunch for work in the mornings while my bread is toasting.

It isn’t hard to fling something together but I still don’t like the rushing around.

I saw something recently that really caught my eye. A make ahead salad that you just grab and go.

How simple is this and yet it is also clever.

You start with a large canning jar and put your dressing in the bottom.

Next layer something that doesn’t absorb the dressing like tomatoes.

Add some more layers. Next time I will be adding some cooked quinoa grains but the choices are unlimited. I have Feta cheese in this one along with the tomatoes, cucumbers, carrots, red peppers and spring greens

Just remember to leave the green leafy vegetables for the top row to keep them away from the dressing so as not to wilt them.

When you are ready to eat it you just tip it over and pour it out on a plate and the dressing follows.

At least mine will because it is just oil and vinegar.

If you use a thicker dressing I would tip it over about 15 minutes before you are going to eat it to give the dressing time to mingle.

Now this is supposed to last for 5 days in the fridge so I should be good until Friday. I will let you know if this is an epic fail but I am hopeful that the vegies will stay just as fresh in my jars as they would any where else in the fridge.

I AM SUCH A CRY BABY

Owwwwie I have a sliver. How can something so tiny hurt so much.

Just a tiny little speck of black under the skin on the palm of my hand.

I will get out the needle and the alcohol…to clean the needle I will use to lift the skin. I hope I won’t need any alcohol to prep myself for the major surgery to ease that little piece of wood fibre out of my hand.

I can remember as a child the hollering and whining when my mom would get out the sewing needle and tweezers to remove a sliver. No, no, no, no… I would cry. I was just a little on the dramatic side back then.

Now I will be a big girl and remove the splinter myself and I won’t even cry. Just don’t get me started on paper cuts.

WHO SAYS I DON’T GET ENOUGH EXERCISE?

AMAZING ARCHIVAL PHOTOS

Oh how I wish I had more photos to share with you but alas the New York City Archives web site is down to the overwhelming traffic that has come to the site since they announced the release of around 780,000 archival photos of the New York area from the mid 1800s to the early 1900s. So here I am telling all of you about it and that of course will just increase their traffic. I didn’t think this out very well did I?

This photo is of the Lower East Side 1908. What language is the bottom half of that sign written in?

I learned of this release from the genealogy newsletter put out by Dick Eastman.

His newsletters have given me more advice and information than any other genealogy resource I have found anywhere.

WE ALL NEED A LITTLE CHANGE

So I have made a few changes around here today. Let me know what you think.

HAVE YOU EVER?

GOING BACK IN TIME

How many of these do you remember doing?

Spool knitting? Making that long cord of wool. What did you do with the cord you made? Coiled it into a mat of some sort? Hard to find wooden spools today in order to make one.

Did you ever make these? I can still remember what the liquid plastic smelled like. You would make your wire petals and then dip them into the plastic to make the thin flower petals.

I had some Fuzzy Wuzzy soap once. You would wash your hands with it and then leave it to sit and it would grow “hair”. Seriously what was that stuff growing on the soap? What sort of chemical additive did that? No, no don’t tell me.

The back pages of the comic books and magazines were always interesting. You could hypnotize people, you could see through clothes with X-Ray Specs.

 You could create your own miniature world filled with little Sea Monkeys.

Bet those smelled really bad since they were really Brine Shrimp. Ugh.

Last but not least how about the Tri Chem Liquid Embroidery products. How much fun was that. Of course it cost a fortune to get enough colours to do anything other than a candy cane or a lemon. I’ll bet some of you still have some napkins or pillow cases decorated with Liquid Embroidery.

I have a lot more memories for you but it is 3:00 am here (don’t ask) and I am going to try to get back to sleep since I get up for work in 2 1/2 hours. I hope I have brought some fun memories back for you.

UPDATE

Modest gift card but a written note of apology from the manager and a personal apology from the clerk when she saw me at the deli counter this morning.

First of all she scurried to the back of the department but I guess she finally figured she had to come back to the counter for other customers so she came over and offered her most sincere apologies.

So that is the end of that. I will continue to shop there as that is where I prefer to shop. I do appreciate the positive comments from all of you though. Thanks.

APOLOGY ACCEPTED

I was waiting until I had a chance to get back to the store before I posted the outcome but time has gotten away from me and I haven’t been able to  go in.

I finally spoke with the manager of the store. Don’t know what I am talking about??? Click here to read the story….we will wait for you.

He was very apologetic to say the least. He expressed his dismay that the staff member never came to him to advise him of her ignorant words knowing full well there could be repercussions.

He said they are appreciative of the many years I have been shopping with them.

He asked me when I could come in again as he has a gift card for me. I was going to wait until I had picked it up before posting this but I just haven’t been back to the store recently to get it.

The amount really doesn’t matter (okay 10.00 would be kind of insulting too)but the fact that this staff person would be dealt with is the outcome that I wanted. Fired? No I don’t want that at all. But I do hope she was very embarrassed by her actions and that she will never, ever say something so stupid again, to a customer or anyone else.

LISTEN TO THIS!!!

My brother in law is the producer of this. There will be an album coming out. Have a listen and share, share share.
What do you do when the nightly news is gtting you down? If you're the Michael Wood Band you write a song about it. The first single from the new album "End of the World" is available for free download from bandcamp. We hope you enjoy it, and perhaps share it with your friends.

I MAY START GOING TO GARAGE SALES

I may have to start going to garage sales more.

They are not something I usually bother with knowing that I don’t want your junk any more than you want mine.

Typically I see things like odd ball plates, old romance novels, half of a scrabble set and if I am really lucky a hot water bottle complete with the plug.

I never come across anything like someone here in Vancouver recently did.

They paid a high price for some artwork. About a hundred bucks. That is a lot for garage sale crap.

Except for this crap turns out to be very valuable paintings. One done by artist Frederick Varley who is one of the famous Group of Seven painters. The other by artist Tom Thompson who, although not  a member of the group was one of the inspirations for the group.

Tom Thompson 

Frederick Varley

Imagine finding out you sold off valuable works of art at your own garage sale for cheap. The buyer has put these up for auction and the top one could go for $250,000.00 or higher.

I will have to start going to more garage sales but in the mean time I have to get this special piece authenticated and appraised. What do you think I can get for it at my own garage sale?

STORE UPDATE

Not much to tell regarding the debacle at the grocery store on Saturday.

The form I filled out with my contact info when I first emailed them required a daytime phone number. The company has tried to call me twice but they don’t leave a message so I don’t know who to call back. I work in a secure office and can not answer my phone during the day.

My break times are not set in stone either so I can’t even suggest to them what time to call.

I emailed them again last night to advise them that I can’t take a call during the day and that they should contact me via email.

So far I give them credit for trying to call me. Now let’s see what the outcome will be.

For those of you who have no idea what I am talking about click here to read that post.

WHAT AN INSULT

I have shopped at the same grocery chain for 30 years. The same store even.

Today I went in to do my shopping. Made my way through the produce section picking out all my fruits and vegetables.

The next stop was the deli counter to get a few things. I hadn’t had breakfast and as I often do I asked for a box of the MoJo fries. You know what I mean? The potato wedges. No different than having hash browns…don’t you judge lol.

Anyway, to make it easier for the cashier to scan my little box of eaten fries when I go through the checkout I asked the deli person to put the price sticker on the side because I am going to eat them while I shopped. This way I don’t have to tear the sticker to open the box.

This woman actually said to me “Be careful because they have cameras and they watch”.

WTF? I said “excuse me” to which she replied “oh I didn’t mean you would do it but we are finding the empty boxes all over the store”.

I was so embarrassed. There were other people standing around there who heard this. I shoved them back on the counter and told her to keep them. I wanted more from the deli but I walked away. She is lucky I didn’t throw them at her.

I would have left the store had I not been so far into my shopping trip as I didn’t have the time to start over down the street at their rival store.

People may well eat the potato wedges and leave the box on the shelves unpaid for. They can also drink a carton of chocolate milk and leave that. Open the bag of mixed nuts from the bulk section and munch on those while they shop. Banana? Apple? Sure could.

What an ignorant thing to say.

When the cashier asked me if I had found everything okay I was ready let fly with a nasty comment. Luckily someone I knew came up behind me in the checkout and we started talking. I saved my anger until I got home and sent off a scathing email to the head office.

Glad I could vent here and if I don’t get an appropriate response from their head office I will then be naming names using all my social media connections.

COMMENT SPAM

Within half an hour of changing my comments to a pop up window again, to aid those who said they have trouble commenting, I have received spam. I rarely ever get spam comments but every time I switch it to anything but embedded comments it starts up again.

I am not going to moderate beforehand and I am not going to captcha or stop anonymous comments. I am going back to embedded comments and I am really sorry if you can no longer comment on my blog. I suggest trying a different web browser to see if that makes a difference.

RANDOM MONDAY THOUGHTS

Just some random stuff this morning.

Why was Kiss at the Country Music Awards? I don’t like country but my BB Guy does so he was watching it. I didn’t pay attention at all but then looked up and saw Kiss. And really how do we know that it really was Kiss under all that makeup? They could be fill ins.

Octomom has now applied for welfare. Gee so surprised. What took so long. Shame on her and everyone who helped her breed a herd of children that she had no hope of supporting.

(I was going to post a picture of a litter of puppies here but thought that isn’t fair to the children)

So as many as 40% of big lottery winners wish they had never won the money. Seriously? I promise you I would never be in that group. Money may not buy happiness but are people so unhappy that the release from financial pressures wouldn’t be a huge benefit to their lives?

An estimated one in 88 children in the US has some form of autism spectrum disorder. This is a 78% increase since 2002. Now I understand the increase comes partly from more diagnosis being made and not necessarily all from an increase of the disorder. This should be a high priority for research into the causes.

Technology experts are working on cars that “talk” to each other warning of lane changes and other important things. This is basically driverless driving. I wonder if the other car will swear at the car that is pushing its way over into the occupied lane, maybe sending up a big car middle finger to show that the lane is occupied.

And that is it for me. Thanks for stopping by.