Digging My Way Out Of Kolaches

 

I’M GETTING INTO A RUT. SOME PEOPLE MIGHT SAY, “KRAFTY, YOU ARE GETTING TO BE AS DULL AS DIRT.”

They’re probably right.

It was just yesterday (if you actually read yesterday’s blog) that I highlighted (highlit?) my day with safari into deepest, darkest Dollar General in search of the Wild Parmesan Cheese. How could anything be less exciting than that?

Quite easily if you are me.

This morning, after dream-filled night fraught with images of me walking in circles and the more I walked the farther away I got from everything, At a couple of minutes after 6 AM I popped into semi-consciousness. With only one lobe plugged in and operating I dressed myself, staggered down the stairs and made a pot of tea…all without any injury or embarrassing fashion faux pas. That gave me hope that things might be on the upswing.

I should have known better.

As I sat there slumped over my mug of tea like an early-morning barstool cowboy my wandering (read: unfocusing) eyes lit upon a shopping list note propped up within my field of vision.

Small Bottle of Bleach

Pepto Bismol

I don’t care what fad diet you may be following in your pursuit of skinny jeans, there is no way in Rochester, Minnesota that mixing Bleach and Pepto Bismol can be a good thing. Just seeing that list at that hour made my tummy-tum-tum do a triple back flip. I tried to ignore it as I submerged myself into my tea. It didn’t work

It Is Not As Easy As It Looks

 

SEND OUT THE SEARCH DOGS I THINK I’M LOST. My surroundings look familiar, but different. Nothing is where I know it should be. I have never been as disoriented as I am on this trip into an unfamiliar supermarket. Help me!

I am so comfortable in my own personal Kroger store. I could find my way through that store blindfolded, but when we are down south in Texas I am sent figuratively naked and afraid into the Terra Incognita of the local H.E.B grocery store.

(For those of you residing outside of Texas – “H.E.B.” are the initials of the founder of the chain of stores strewn across the state. They don’t stand for anything like “Hellaciously Evil Brotherhood.”)

Trying to find my favorite bagels or canned soup in the H.E.B. is beyond my ability. The odds are somewhere on the side favoring me finding the Ark of the Covenant first. It can’t be done. They don’t carry the brand of bagels that I like anyway and in the soup aisle nothing looks like anything I want in my favorite Hopalong Cassidy bowl at lunchtime.

I’d Like Another Cup

HOLY COFFEE GROUNDS, BATMAN! Krafty has leapt willy-nilly into the 21^st century. He has moved out of the cave and into the castle. No more plastic cup and a five year old jar of Sanka!

This past weekend we purchased one of those Keurig coffee makers. We now have a Mr. Coffee that makes nothing but tea for Dawn and the new Keurig Mini-whatever gizmo to make coffee for me. (We have a mixed marriage). My wife, the lovely and moderately caffeinated, Dawn, does not drink coffee (And yet she lives and thrives). I will drink tea, but I prefer coffee as my drug of choice. So…the only viable solution (other than getting me my very own Starbucks franchise) was to buy me the Keurig Gizmo.

It’s Uphill Both Ways

I SHOULDN’T HAVE DONE IT. I’m paying for it now and it may take some time for me to catch up. Why did I do that?

Yesterday, for some reason, I ended up really tired. I certainly didn’t overwork myself at anything. I’ll just blame it on the curvature of the Earth that made me spend the whole day going uphill. The end result was that this morning I slept in an extra 90 minutes. That means that the whole world has a 90 minute headstart on me this morning.

When my toes hit the ground I was immediately playing catch-up. I’m not good at that.

This Has Not Been A Good Week

I HAB A CODE IN MY NODE.

About three days ago I sneezed and I said to myself, “Uh, oh. That was no ordinary sneeze. That felt like a head cold type of sneeze. I was right. The next morning I woke up with my first real nasty head cold in a couple of years.

It has been at least two years, maybe more, since I’ve had to deal with the aches and pains, sneezes, and all of the other fun symptoms of your garden variety head cold. I guess my lucky streak was over.

I knew it wasn’t the Flu or Ebola or anything serious. There isn’t any major coughing, or tummy trouble or bleeding from all body orifices – just the usual yucky stuff.

I’m telling you now – buy stock in the folks who make Kleenex because I am going through it as a vicious clip. I am burning through those tissues faster than Rosie O’Donnell at the Caesar’s Palace Buffet line.

Monday, Monday – Can’t Stop That Day

MONDAY MORNINGS JUST AREN’T THE SAME AS THEY USED TO BE. When I was a kid Monday morning used to start on Sunday when there was a scramble to make sure that all my homework was finished. I’d had all weekend to do it, but it would be Sunday evening before I’d even look at it.

When I finished my education and got into the real world where people actually paid you to be somewhere on Monday morning things got rougher. How rough depended on how stupid I was over the weekend.

The Early Bird Gets The Coffee

I LIKE THIS TIME OF DAY. The sun is not up yet. The only sounds I hear as I step outside are a few birds that are bothered by my presence as I bustle about opening and closing doors and starting the car. I try to be quiet. We do have neighbors after all. 

It’s Only Fair.

IT IS AUGUST IN THE MIDWEST. That can mean only one thing: State Fairs and Deep Fried Food. OK, I guess that’s two things, but who’s counting?

When the gates to the fairgrounds open some people will head to the livestock exhibits, some will rush to get their seats for the entertainment shows, but thousands will head right to the food midway so they can see what’s new on this year’s menu – and there is always something new.

If there is a way to deep fry it – into the fryer it will go.

A Tasty Dream

SHE HAD A GREAT IDEA LAST NIGHT.

We were having dinner, polishing off some leftover roast as “Pork Manhattan.”

For the first fifteen minutes there was complete silence as we stuffed our faces – then my wife, the lovely and entrepreneurially minded, Dawn, unleashed a thunderbolt of an idea.

No Matter Where You go, There You Are

NO MATTER WHERE YOU GO – THERE YOU ARE.

And things are different wherever you go. Not “better” or “worse,” just different. That is true wherever you are. Everything “at home” is what you are used to, and whether you go to spend the day with your next door neighbor, or cross the ocean to…let’s say, Ireland, for example.

Different.

Can I Have A Do-Over?

SOME DAYS START OUT BADLY. Little warning signs are dropped in your path that tell you, “Go back to bed. Stay there until tomorrow. Save yourself.” Yesterday morning was one of those days.

Let me explain.