A Two Week Hodgepodge

I Double Dog Cat Dare You!

First we had either Penny or Reggie jumping up and sitting on the top of the doors.  Now we have both at the same time.  They tolerate each other for a few minutes and then begin fighting.

So far no one has fallen off.  But check Reggie's feet hanging over the edge!  LOL!  Penny is determined to be Queen of the Door.

It's good to have friends in high places.

In my last post I was telling the story about Deiter being distressed by biting a stink bug that landed on his back.  Angie from the Shozzy's Place blog asked me 'what is a stink bug'.

If those of you in the UK don't have these pesky creatures, count yourselves lucky!  They have been the Pest of the Year for about the past three years.  They don't really do anything harmful like biting people or
contaminating food or anything.  They just invade the house and if they are threatened, give off a noxious odor.  The younger cats love to play with them.  They roam around the house and try to sniff them out.  They they smack them with their paws to make them secrete the odor.

Hopefully they will soon have had their 15 minutes of fame and go back to being an occasional visitor.

On Valentine's Day we went out to lunch to one of my favorite restaurants, Los Palmeros in Chambersburg.  They are a Mexican and Salvadorian restaurant that serves Latin food but many of their specialties are not particularly spicy which is good for Zip.  He's not a big fan of spicy but he's becoming more accepting over the years.

We both got the beef tongue chimi with rice, refried beans and a trio of condiments.  Then shared a flan for dessert.

I did some cleaning in the kitchen lately.  Most of my counter tops are now cleared of clutter so I have been feeling more like cooking.  The other day I made this really yummy spinach and bacon alfredo pizza.  One of the best pizzas I've made in a long time.  I used hot roll mix to make the crust which cut down considerably on the prep time.

I got to thinking about the foods I loved when I was a kid.

Mom used to make the Chef Boy-R-Dee pizza from a box kit with the dough mix, can of sauce and little container of parm cheese.  Since we were a family of five, she spread the crust as thin as a cracker so that everyone could have several pieces.  Oh, gosh!  We thought that was the greatest treat.

And fish sticks.  Did your family eat them?  A while back I bought a box just to see if I would still like them. Guess what!  There sure isn't much 'fish' in them any more.  Was there ever?

Back in the days before I even knew there was such a thing as a Chinese restaurant, we had Chung King chicken chow mein in a can.  Do you remember that?  With the container of crispy noodles.  And no real oriental flavor.

When Zip and I were kids another thing we both liked was Swanson turkey pies.  They don't live up to the memory either!  And enough sodium to send us old people into shock.

My Mom was a very conventional 1950's cook.  Every night it was some kind of meat, potatoes done in a variety of ways and a canned vegetable.  Waaaah!  I'm so glad for the proliferation of ethnic food available today.  Though maybe if there weren't so many yummy things available, I would not be overweight!  Something to think about.....

And to prove the point, here I am modeling my sweater vest.

Since the weather has been mild, I've been wearing it a lot.  I just love this pattern and want to make another in sage or heather gray.  It's really nice for driving instead of wearing a bulky coat.

We have had two little snows lately that didn't even stick on the road, but looked pretty on the grass and trees.  I thought this picture of the house across the street looked so inviting with the lamp in the window.

Enough blathering for one day!

Hope you all have a great weekend!

Note:  It seems that the Word Verification has been changed to two words and one of them is hard to read. I've turned mine off for now, but if I get a lot of spam I will have to change it back.  Why do they keep messing with Blogger and making it less user friendly.  Pictures would only load one at a time today, too!  YUUUUUCK!!!