bitteroldhag

OUsooner is probably right. You can make white gravy yourself by using about a TBS of bacon grease (American bacon), sausage grease or Crisco, and 1-2 TBS of flour, salt and pepper, and about a cup or more of milk, depending on the consistency you want. Heat up the grease and stir the flour into it until it looks kind of like melted caramel. Pour in the milk and salt and pepper the gravy. Let the gravy boil, stirring all the time until it gets thick. Gravy making is an art that takes awhile to learn. Here in Oklahoma we use bacon grease for the oil part, but I sometimes use Crisco or sausage grease. Don't use olive oil or any runny oil. It won't work. I have also found that an egg whisk will get rid of lumps in gravy. But I suspect if you buy an envelope of white gravy, that will be what you want. Hope this helps.

Boy, Vines, you are one tough woman. I'm glad you have learned to fire doctors and that you have found what is really causing your problems. I don't think Cushing's disease is a death warrant, so I hope to see you back on this board, working with us as we try to lose weight. We can use your wisdom and kindness. Thanks.

Thanks for this. My mother and aunt worked at the Douglas Aircraft factory in Tulsa, Oklahoma, during the war. Mother was already married but my dad was in New Guinea. My aunt married my dad's brother when he returned from the Navy. These two valiant ladies are still alive and don't seem to think they did anything extraordinary. Mother likes to laugh and say she put in the relief tubes in bombers. Relief tubes were the bathrooms on bombers. They didn't have real bathrooms, just tubes. I bet going to the bathroom was a real thrill at 30,000 feet with no heaters or oxygen. Those guys flying those bombers made very long trips just about every day and it was very, very dangerous. I think my aunt worked on fighters in another part of the factory which is really big, about 1/2 mile long. I think they are called the Greatest Generation because they went through the depression and WWII without complaining too much. They just got it done. I am sad that they are passing away now. But we can learn a lot from them. I too thank them -- the soldiers who faced horrible situations and the ones who stayed home to make it possible to win the war. By the way, I study 20th century American war literature and teach a class on it. I highly recommend Paul Fussell's books on WWII. He doesn't pull any punches. One of the biggest problems was that our tanks just couldn't face the German tanks one on one. Our tanks were crummy compared to the Tiger and later tanks with their 88mm guns and superior armor. One guy says he saw one of our tanks fire on a German tank, hit it, and the shell bounced off. He was a tanker and wasn't happy about that. Fussell also gripes about the fact that the Germans had smokeless powder and we didn't. I would certainly want smokeless powder if I were in a battle. The Russians should also be thanked for winning WWII. I think they are the ones who really won it. Their tactics of simply throwing millions of people in the line of fire wasn't very good since they had lots of casualties, but the fact is that they ground down the German army in Europe, so they couldn't mount much of an offensive after the Bulge which was a desperation measure. Their airforce had been destroyed by that time by Russian and Allied planes. There are some pretty interesting memoirs from the Germans, particularly on the Eastern Front which was simply horrible. But the all time best war book is All Quiet on the Western Front, written by a German. Not surprisingly, the Germans understand war.

Well, I'm glad I'm exempt from the old people draft. I'm not a good shot. In fact, I don't know how to get the safety on and off. GWB doesn't seem to know how to work the safety either. Maybe he'll just take the shotgun approach and invade all countries on earth. That should settle their hash.

Tommyo -- You're right and have not lost your marbles. Other countries are moving along at a very quick pace. I read this morning about people going to India and Thailand for surgery. It's luxurious and cheap. I went to Mexico and have never been in such a nice hospital. In fact, I have stayed at a lot of big name hotels and they've never been that nice except possibly for the Mark Hopkins in I-forget-the-name-of-the-town Florida. I think that the "third" world is rapidly becoming first world and the U.S. must keep up or become second rate. If we keep being conservative, we will lose out. We may lose out anyway, but we definitely will if we don't change. But change is hard. It's so easy to stay in one's comfortable rut. Maybe after all the baby boomers die, things will be better.

This appears to be yet another front in the Puritan war to make everyone feel inadequate about something except for the chosen few. Physicians seem to be feeling the move of folks away from treating doctors as gods. So they have to scare us into spending all that money and stroking those egos. What poop. I do agree with the label for those sluttish clothes that the girls wear. I have noticed (and since I teach at a university I have plenty of chances to notice) that girls seem to think dressing like a prostitute is sexy. Actually, it's sort of disgusting from my point of view. I spend much of my lecture time looking at cleavages that just don't seem possible to me. How can a girl weigh about 120 pounds and have breasts that are double Ds? I guess it's silicone. We certainly didn't have breasts like that when we were young. Well, some poor folks did. They had breast reduction surgery. The worst is the low slung jeans they wear. Aren't they aware that they flatten out their butts because they're so tight? Their butts look mighty peculiar is all I can say. Another thing they do which doesn't make much sense, aside from multiple tattoos and piercings, is wearing stiletto shoes to class. While this may be sexy, it's asking for many trips to the foot doctor in a few years. I gave up walking in high heels for any distance at all many years ago. But I guess I'm just an old fogey. Having taught for so long, I remember when students wore nice clothes to school instead of jeans and a tee shirt. I understand that boys in bigger universities just wear their pajamas to class. And one wonders why I want to retire. It's hard explaining the intricacies of T.S. Eliot's poetry to a guy in pajamas. I guess I should be glad they show up at all though. But back to the original question, this doctor should take a leap.

Very funny. I suppose the old men would include Bush himself as well as Cheney, who certainly ducked service in the old days. Would this include old women as well?

I agree with TOM as usual. I am a Unitarian, so I'm not really a Christian. In fact, I'm a transcendentalist, but it seems to me that if the Oversoul gave us the brains to figure this stuff out, we should use them. Most fetuses from which stem cells may arise are due to be thrown out anyway. Better to end up helping a living person than end up down a drain. I have a problem with all the people who worry about the unborn, but seem to think that the diseases of the born are just too bad. But if they can create stem cells from fat, I have a lot to donate. I also think people who are anti-abortion should simply adopt all children born because abortion isn't available. That would solve a bunch of problems. As is, these folks, who seem to be mostly led by men who can't have children anyway, are all for poor women having children who will lead horrible lives. So my idea is that all children born due to anti-abortion laws be adopted by families' who are anti-abortion. If a man is rabildy anti-abortion, he should raise at least 5 kids from women who were denied an abortion. Anti-abortion families could raise 10 kids. That should take care of the worst of the problem. I'm serious about this. People all too often force their own ideas on others without thought about the consequences to the other people involved. If they faced the consequences, maybe that would mitigate their ideas. So if abortion is declared illegal, I recommend a grassroots movement to promote my idea. Sometimes, I'm so brilliant I amaze myself.:biggrin1:

Mouse -- Thanks for your viewpoint. Early Americans realized that democracy is the way to have all viewpoints represented and, while I may not agree with you, I will die to allow you to voice your opinion. I have found that Americans disagree on a lot of small points, but usually agree on the big points and the country at large usually finally gets it right. In Saddam's Iraq, opinions were not enthusiastically received. I think Saddam got what he deserved, but I hate the way it was done, especially with the catcalls and all. Also that fact that it was done on a Muslim holiday is awful. It would be like hanging G.W. Bush on Christmas. One would think the powers that be would take these things into consideration.

While I think your post is very good in general, I must point out that fascists were the people who brought order to Germany and Italy in the 20th century. Saddam may have had order, but it was at the point of a gun. Democracy is not orderly and if Iraq ever succeeds in getting democracy, it will be the general mess it is everywhere else. However, I don't think they will manage that. They want order and some strongman will offer it to them and they will take it regardless of the loss of freedom it will entail. I would do that too if I were there. Most people just want to live their lives with a minimum of inconvenience and I think the Iraqis have a maximum of inconvenience at the moment. So I think another dictator is in the offing. For the U.S., the key is to make sure the dictator is on our side. That is our history with dictators. Washington has a long history of propping up dictators who side with Americans. It's sad really. I'm so glad Canada is there to offer some sanity in this world.

Hmmm. If international law were followed, George Bush would on trial for crimes against humanity.

I have two New Year's resolutions which is breaking the resolution I made many years ago not to have New Year's resolutions. However, I intend: 1. To walk at least 15 minutes at least 3 days a week. I hate exercise, but will grimly try this because I haven't lost a pound in 4 months. 2. Eat more French food. Why are those French people so thin? Because their food is so satisfying that you don't have eat much of it. Of course, when I made that delicious French pork tenderloin in orange and sherry sauce, I threw up 8 times before it got it out of my esophagus. So my resolution also includes eating French food VERY slowly. One thing about it though, it tasted just as good coming up as it did going down. I plan to make French scalloped potatoes a whole lot more. It features a whole lot of garlic. Garlic is good for you, right? 3. I will not make anymore New Year's resolutions.:paranoid

I will buy four of these immediately. I have always worried about my dogs collars. The cats don't wear collars unless they have fleas and those don't usually last long. I found Ozzie's collar in the yard this week. I think he and Sarge were tustling and it came off. I always have my dogs collars pretty loose,but they can still get caught. I will buy these collars now. Thanks a million.

We'll have to see. So far, nothing too unusual has happened. I think old Saddam was pretty much shelved when he was captured. But a whole bunch of people died in Iraq this weekend. So sad.

I don't think Saddam was letting a whole lot terrorists use Iraq for training. Maybe a few, but most were in Afghanistan (the forgotten war). Saddam was a bad man and deserved what he got, but I hope it's made very, very clear that the Iraqis tried and executed him, not us. And I agree, I'd rather have 3000 dead soldiers and the approximately 20,000 wounded soldiers back here safe and sound and Saddam still terrorizing Iraq. As is, we have dead and woulded and WE are terrorizing Iraq. A sad situation.

Carlene -- Have a happy birthday even though it's the day before Christmas. I always felt sorry for Christmas babies. But then, a birthday just makes for more presents. If you want, you can use my birthday, July 26. No holidays are in sight then.

I decided this confession should be a rant because I bought about 8 pieces of baklava at Walmart and ate most of them. I love baklava and have concluded that while Greek and middle eastern people eat far too much mutton, they have created a truly delicious dessert. It's almost worth eating mutton (yuuuuk) just to get to dessert. I think they have decided to undermine the progress of humanity by forcing us to eat baklava which puts us in such a pleased state that we don't want to conquer the world. We just want more baklava. I could say the same thing about rugalach which is Jewish. It's delicious beyond reason. I think we should have a middle eastern standoff between the best baklava bakers versus the best rugalach bakers. Whoever wins gets the middle east. I want to be a judge. What about you?

People who didn't live through that period may pick apart Gerald Ford's legacy, but I was a democrat then and I loved him. He helped restore sanity to this country after two and a half decades of insanity. Unfortunately, every generation has to go through the insanity. George is providing it for these generations. Have fun group! I'd take Gerald Ford in a New York minute over the clowns we have now. I'm embarrassed by my generation. I hope we get someone younger who can get it together or maybe Hillary, though I'm an Obama fan. Sometimes lack of experience can be a good thing. Also George Bush had zero experience in Washington. He was the governor of Texas and in Texas the governor doesn't have much power. Also Texas democrats are republicans in drag so he naturally could get along with them. I say God bless Gerald Ford and Jimmy Carter, who may not have been great presidents, but who were and are decent men. I still maintain that Carter lost because he held to the treaty with Panama and was going to give the canal back to them. He was too decent to know that he was supposed to lie to them. Reagan on the other hand invaded Panama for trumped up reasons and secured the canal for us, possibly forever. The major tactic in that little brushfire was to play loud rock music at Noriega's palace night and day. We also arrested and charged a leader of a foreign country which I don't think is diplomatically very good. Reagan also invaded some tiny island in the Caribbean because some Cubans were there, and we had medical students who couldn't get into stateside schools there. Actually I think these were both just exercises for the military. They were getting stale after Vietnam was over and needed some real blood. But that's just my opinion. I think both "wars" could have been handled by the FBI or CIA, assuming they aren't the bunch of screw-ups that they seem to be. While this was going on, stagflation was eating up everyone's income at home. I really don't think Reagan was a great president. He took credit for the demise of the Soviet Union, but the truth is they ran out of money and destroyed themselves. What he did was spend more than they could on armaments. So they went broke. I wonder if we will ever get a decent president again in my lifetime which isn't all that long.

Yeah, I've heard of dungarees but have always thought they were some sort of off-white pants like fisherman wear. Of course, I think fishermen wear overalls now. We always called jeans jeans or Levis. Lots of people here in cattle country wore Levis before they got popular and became designer wear. My brother could wear out the knees in a pair of Levis in a week. So mother did a lot of Iron on Patches on his Levis. The only Levis we had were the currently very expensive 501s. We got them for about $5 a pair. I also have heard people call tennis shoes sneakers. We call them tennis shoes even if they do cost $200 and are made by some designer shoe company. Lately I've heard people in Oklahoma using the word sneakers!! Heresy! Clearly we played tennis in rubber soled shoes while the rest of the nation was sneaking up on someone. Tonic here means tonic Water for alcoholic drinks. Man, I would have been lost in Boston.:nervous

Only some Americans call Coke soda. I remember when I moved to Illinois from Texas this really good looking guy asked me out for a soda. I had visions of an ice cream soda with two straws -- very romantic. A soda turned out to be a Coke. I thought the guy was cheap, but he was really handsome. To me, any soft drink is a Coke except fruit flavored soft drinks which are pop. I used to love Nehi grape pop when I was a kid. If we ask for a Coke, we get Coke or Pepsi, whatever the store has. We don't seem to care. In the South, if its cold, it's good.

If you are planning to give a party, the first thing you should do is lie down, take 5 deep breaths and think of the ocean or a mountain stream until the urge subsides. If, after meditating for quite awhile, you still plan to give a party, you should follow these rules: If you make sausage cheese balls, stand over them and eat all of them without letting anyone else have one. Tell them you suspect they are poisoned and you feel that it’s your duty to taste all of them. Make stuff ahead of time. By this I mean, buy stuff ahead of time. You can get great little quiches and spanikopitas (spelling?) and stuff like that at the grocery store. Buy some good tasting lunch meat and rolls and make little sandwiches, and the folks will think they are really uptown. I’m a believer in olives. My friend serves these Greek olives that taste absolutely horrible and have pits, but if you have to be uptown about it, they have some Greek olives with peppers stuffed in them that are edible. I like plain old green and black olives. Avoid olives with pits or you will be finding them all over your house for days. Do not make a salad or a vegetable plate. No one will eat it, and you’ll have to grind it all up in the disposal, or throw it in the yard hoping the birds will eat it though they never do. If you don’t have dogs, borrow some. They are great disposals. Do not give the dogs the margarita punch. You can borrow my dogs who will eat anything—peas, salad greens, cranberry jelly, anything. Have lots and lots of booze. If the guests are well oiled enough, they’ll listen to people talk about their grandchildren and actually act interested. I always make heavily laced Margarita punch which they love. With enough Margarita punch, they will swear yours is the best party they ever attended. Recipe for Margarita Punch: 2 or more bottles of Margarita mix, 1-2 bottles of Tequila per punchbowl depending on the size of the punchbowl. Lots of largish plastic cups or iced tea glasses. Ice. Buy a lot of cream cheese. You can spread a dab of cream cheese on a cracker and stick an olive or canned shrimp on it, and the guests will think they are at the Ritz. Another cream cheese trick for the really lazy is to plop a block of cream cheese on a plate and pour something like blackberry or currant jelly over it and add some parsley on the side. Serve with fancy crackers from the grocery store. It looks great and with enough Margarita punch, guests will eat it. If you don’t have parsley, just put some celery leaves by it. It will taste terrible but if you have followed the Margarita punch instructions, it won’t matter. Have a carry-in. I like to do this. It saves a lot of work and the guests will generally eat the stuff they brought even though no one else will. If you insist on cooking fresh food, make the guests work. They love it because it delivers them from having to make small talk about their gallbladder operation or their trip to Cancun. I am a big fan of chili or Frito pie if I want to cook something. I made chili with Wick Fowler seasoning at one party, and one guest had enough Margarita punch that he swore that was the best chili he had ever had. Make more Margarita punch. Drink a lot of it. If you are attending a party, there are some problems with etiquette I should cover: Since you can never find a seat at a party to eat and drink because someone else has always gotten there first, there is a real problem in holding your plate and drink and eating. I find that if I hold the plate in my left hand and the drink in my right hand, I either spill the food or the drink. If I spill the drink, I usually just stand on the spot on the carpet until I figure that people won’t notice I messed it up. But with diligent research, I discovered the way to hold a plate and a drink at the same time and still eat. This requires a sort of genius that most of us don’t have. But here’s how to do it. You slide the edge of the plate between your little finger and third finger and set the drink on the plate. Then you eat and drink with the other hand. This works with paper or plastic plates which weigh about .000007 of a gram, but I haven’t tried it with real plates. I suppose if the plate is heavy you could put it between your 2nd and 3rd fingers and prop it up with your little finger, but I don’t know because I only attend cheap parties. The plate trick works unless you have a fork. You can try to wedge the fork under some food, but after you eat that food, you’re out of luck. My solution is to lick the fork clean and put it in a pocket or your purse. Ladies can always stick it down their bras. If you are not wearing a bra, I recommend buying a fork garter and you can stick the fork in there. This is particularly useful at weddings where they use real silverware, so you can’t go back and get 3 or 4 forks. Really, the nerve of some people – only one fork per person! I hope this has been helpful for the coming holiday season. If you don’t spill your drink, you can thank me. __________________ bitteroldhag Banded: May 11, 2006 Dr. Arturo Rodriguez Monterrey, Mexico

I thought it was August. I don't know where I read that. I don't trust the History Channel since they air a whole lot of B.S. I just watched a show on the Mayan calendar and how it had to do with "selected" events around the world. How would the Maya have known that the U.S. would materialize? Would they have cared? This whole show is b.s.

The problem with many evangelical Christians around here is that they've never read the Bible. They have read verses chosen by the powers that be in the church, but never the actual Bible. I admit I'm no better. I started reading it several years ago but bogged down in Acts and never got back to it. So, to do what TOM wants, people would actually have to read the Bible, at least the New Testament. That would be grand. Then maybe people would have some idea of What Jesus Would Really Do.

I hate to be a snotty person, but I depend you on also. Your wife is just going to have to share. Hope you have a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year. Just don't go away. Okay?

That's all I have to say. I wonder sometimes why "Christians" don't follow the word of Jesus. Sometimes, it takes us pagans to follow Jesus.