Oatmeal volcano on the prairie

My oatmeal boiled over
in the microwave this morning, creating
a cement like substance which fused with the
paper towel beneath the bowl.
There's a name for that...decoupage.
In addition, there is now a permanent coating on the outside of the bowl
with a slightly bumpy
and gritty texture.
This is good...
The bowl will no longer slip from my hands,
and the rough feel triggers from deep within
a collective unconscious memory of cowboy breakfasts
on the wind swept prairie.
Ah, those days...
The smell of burnt coffee, the dented tin cup,
the whistling of a lonely cowboy refrain.

Plea bargaining with my career

I forget sometimes how fortunate I am to "own" my own business.

It's amazing. I am the president and sole employee of Steven B. Blum, Ph.D., Inc. One of the annual obligations I have is to have a corporate board meeting and submit "minutes" of that meeting. (I remember this duty around this time of year, because I need to see my accountant to do my taxes, and my accountant holds me "accountable;" he always asks me if I've done the minutes from the annual meeting.) The Board of Directors of the corporation are... me (President and Treasurer), and my wife (Vice-President and Secretary). Hmmm, somehow, my wife turned over the responsibility of keeping minutes to me... WAIT A MINUTE... I thought I was President! Oh, well, don't sweat the small stuff! Since I write the minutes, it is not surprising that once again, I have been named employee of the year. But, what is surprising is that I decided this past year to cut my hours... So instead of being "open for business" at 8:00AM, I have been going to work at 9:00AM. I still work three nights a week till 7:00PM, and two nights till 5:00PM. But I get a whole extra hour every morning to sleep, walk, sleepwalk, read the paper, pray, etc.

Here's the thing...I get just as much work done, and see just as many clients each week as I did before I cut my hours. So, I'm wondering... maybe I've stumbled onto something. Perhaps every year, I should trim a few more hours off my schedule. Maybe once or twice a week for the rest of 2011, I shouldn't be "open for business" until 10AM...

That's being proactive...at that rate...by the time I'm 65, I'll only be working 3 1/2 days a week... and I'll have 3 1/2 days a week off. Who needs to retire? At seventy...two days of work a week. Eventually, I'll just show up at my office, have a cup of coffee, and go home. Priceless!

I think I will submit this proposal at the upcoming annual Board Meeting for consideration. I wonder what the Vice-President will say...

How to store homemade bagels

Yes...this can be a problem. You must protect them from bagel-vandels. You just never know. You may feel safe in your home, but one must not minimize the dangerous possibility that unbeknownst to you, you are sharing your house with a carb junkie sneaking around in the middle of the night. Besides, you may decide to take a homemade bagel to work... Talk about an invitation to bagel-burglary!

So, if you are going to go to all the trouble of making your own bagels, I highly recommend the following... for a mere $19.99 (plus shipping and handling) you can protect your investment!

Mishu, again

I always was a dog person. My last dog, an American Eskimo named Nanook, kept me company for 15 years... throughout grad school, internship and my early career. Nanook was special and very intelligent. She had a way of crinkling her nose into a smile when she was happy. It made her sneeze. Somehow, after Nanook, I couldn't think about owning another dog. Then, my eyes were opened to the joys of cats after a rather unusually interesting calico cat named Simcha (pronounced...Sim-ka) shared our home from 2002-2010. Sadly, Simcha had to be put down after getting a blood clot at age 8. She had, at age 6, spent a week in intensive care at Kansas State Vet School clinic after contracting a rare opportunistic fungus that generally only happened to dogs. She was only the third cat on record to be so afflicted... She nearly died, but valiantly pulled through, and the experience made her wiser for the next two years. It seemed that Simcha just kept getting smarter, to the point that she seemed to take on an almost human-like persona, with her own possessions, habits, spaces, games, sense of humor, eccentricities and sensitivities. Simcha pretty much had an equal say in what went down in the house. At times, it seemed she was in charge. She had her own plastic drinking cups, and wouldn't stoop to drinking out of a common cat bowl. She got ready for bed with numerous rituals, and had her nighttime companion...a green rubber ball that she would get out only at bedtime to sleep with. She had certain postures to indicate what game she wished to play, and one way or the other, the human involved was going to stop what they were doing to play the game. Sometimes, she was dangerous...if the game was her hunting game, she showed no mercy. In that game, we often had to freeze in our tracks, or risk a lunging, leaping attack from a crazed lunatic cat. Simcha was neat, clean, precise, strategic, loyal and thoughtful. She was gentle and nurturing during my cancer treatment and recovery and would sleep on top of me to keep me company.

If Simcha was in advanced placement classes, Mishu is in special education. He knows how to jump, and enjoys jumping, but doesn't particularly care what he jumps into... be it a clothes dryer, a toilet, a dishwasher, a refrigerator, a cabinet, etc. He jumps with little finesse...he misses his target frequently, and crash lands back onto the ground. He does like to be around people, and hates it when we leave...he sits in front of the door in the morning and tries his best to keep us from leaving the house, batting at us with his paw in a brave, but futile attempt at keeping us captive.

Mishu, (pronounced mee-shu) a Ragdoll kitten, is clumsy, sweet, wreckless, confused, impulsive and hasn't quite figured out his place in the family. He's not quite a year old, and maybe I have forgotten that Simcha was once not so bright as well.

I am slowly learning to appreciate Mishu for who he is, rather than comparing him to Simcha. I think Mishu is slowly learning to appreciate us as well. It's taken awhile for us each to adapt...

Baking Blum's bodacious, bo-licious bagels

I did it!!!! Mix, knead, rise, rest, shape, rest, rise, boil, glaze, sprinkle toppings, bake and BAGELS!

For all those years I waited for Lincoln to open a bagel shop, I could have been baking my own! Who knew? I thought you HAD to buy them at a bagel shop.

Here is some photographic proof:

Picture one

The bagels shaped, not yet ready to boil...not yet done rising. If you look carefully, you can see a baggie of lox thawing lovingly right behind these babies.

Now, for further evidence, take a gander at:

Picture two

Some of the finished product, just minutes out of the oven... Yes, these bad boys are not just plain bagels, but some have sesame seeds, some onion flakes, along with some plain bagels. The first one I ate, still warm, with cream cheese and lox was quite a taste treat! I tried to take a cell phone picture of myself eating my bagel, but it was too scary to post; trying to photograph oneself at arms length, without being able to see the frame of the picture you are about to snap is a fool's mission! Take my word for it...the bagel was good!

If I could bake bagels, maybe I could...I could... I could do just about anything!

bagels and lox

Thanks to alert reader, Diane, I am now aware that today is National Bagels and Lox day. So, why is this worthy of a post? I'll tell you. First,I grew up eating bagels and lox from the crib. When I was between the ages of 9-12, I spent my summers in the Catskill mountains at a Jewish summer camp; Camp Kewanee. Every Sunday morning, we were served fresh bagels and cream cheese and lox. I think because everyone made such a big deal out of what was such an everyday breakfast item, bagels became special to me at that point. When I was 21, I left New York for the plains of Nebraska and graduate school at the University of NE in Lincoln. To my horror, one could not buy fresh bagels (other than pitiful grocery store excuses for bagels) in Lincoln. How could this be??? For many years, my annual visits to New York meant filling half my suitcase with bagels to bring back to Lincoln. After about a decade in Lincoln, oh, blessed relief, a Brueggers bagel shop opened up here. Life has been more tolerable in the midwest since.

The other thing you need to know, to make this story more poignant, is that twice a year I buy one pound of lox and carefully divy it up into 26 individual portions, each placed lovingly into a baggy and placed in the freezer. I eat one bagel a week... on Sunday morning. (hmmm...I wonder why?) Every Saturday night, I take one baggy of lox and one bagel out of the freezer to thaw (the lox goes into the frig, the bagel, in its own baggy, onto the counter). Voila! My Sunday morning treat is ready to greet me upon awakening.

Finally...one last comment... I bought a pound of lox during my cancer treatment right before I could no longer eat food... that frozen lox sat waiting for a good six months until my ability to eat and my tastebuds were restored to some level of dignity. In some of my darkest hours of radiation/chemo misery, I would fantasize about eating New York Pizza and bagels, cream cheese and lox. Yes, indeed. I really did. I remember lying in bed and thinking on and on about how much I would enjoy those culinary delights again if and when my throat healed and my taste buds would finally awaken again. I will never take either for granted again. My favorite bagel? Poppy seed. My favorite Pizza? Veggie. (or just plain cheese if I'm in NY).

Don't take any of it for granted... what a wonderful blessing tastebuds are! You don't know till you completely lose them for awhile, (along with saliva), just how special they are.

So...forget the glycemic index for a day, and have yourself a doughy, chewy, tasty treat... celebrate with an "everything" bagel with cream cheese and lox! Mmmmmmmmm!

This video makes it look so simple that I might try my hand at making my own this weekend.

Super bowl...and God

Yah, it's that day... and I will watch with delight and root for the Packers since my team didn't make it... (the Jets).

I'll give myself permission to stuff my face (why?) and abandon myself to the enjoyment of the game.

But, lest I forget... we sang this hymn this morning, (a morbid thought, but if this can be sung at my funeral I'll be smiling down from heaven, even if the Pastor forgets my name.)

There's so many poignant phrases in this hymn, but the one I like best is

"...thou my best thought."


To paraphrase Paul, when I think of knowing Christ, everything else is just rubbish... I went to worship this morning with a blank and bland heart and mind. I thought, "today is going to be one of those going through the motions days." And I confessed my feelings of indifference to God, along with the notion that I had more interest in football than in Him today.

And then we sang this Hymn...

I wish I could put into words the way my heart is transformed in a moment, but I can't. I wish I could put into words the way my life was transformed in a moment some 30 years ago, but I can't. You just have to know. As the hymn was sung this morning, everything was put back into perspective, and that unsurpassable joy that I only have in knowing Him filled me again.

So, I'll watch the Super bowl tonight, and, unless it's a blowout, I'll be engrossed in the game. But right now I remember again, that it's in Him that I live and breathe...now and forever. And everything else... just fluff.

Be Thou my vision, O Lord of my heart;
Naught be all else to me, save that Thou art.
Thou my best thought, by day or by night,
Waking or sleeping, Thy presence my light.

perfect possibility

A photo of Mishu our 10 month old ragdoll kitten in front of flowers and a barely visible fireplace

Yes...here is something perfect that only those who live in inhospitable environments know: There is something special about a frigid snowy afternoon and the solitude of a quiet house with cats and plants...especially when there is not a single good reason to go outside, and there is a fireplace and a good book to read. So...there you have it...Nebraska is indeed the good life!

I have a feeling that this poet was not writing about a snowy afternoon in Nebraska, but let's not be so picky!



AFTERNOON IN THE HOUSE
by Jane Kenyon

It's quiet here. The cats
sprawl, each
in a favored place.
The geranium leans this way
to see if I'm writing about her:
head all petals, brown
stalks, and those green fans.
So you see,
I am writing about you.

I turn on the radio. Wrong.
Let's not have any noise
in this room, except
the sound of a voice reading a poem.
The cat's request
The Meadow Mouse, by Theodore Roethke.

The house settles down on its haunches
for a doze.
I know you are with me, plants,
and cats - and even so, I'm frightened,
sitting in the middle of perfect
possibility.

not sunshine

not pleasant
not fun
not warm
not calm
no signs of life.

Snow. Ice. Cold. Wind.

...forty eight days till spring. I'll make it.
I think I can
I think I can
I think I can.