BEST OF: Fry attack

Most of us at least make a stab or two at trying to eat correctly, doing our low-cal, low-fat, high-exercise penance for past indiscretions. But sometimes, after an angelic breakfast of orange juice and cereal with fat-free milk or yogurt, I’ll get a major munchie attack about half-past lunch.

That’s especially true if I’m driving past JJ’s or the grill, and catch a whiff of crisp, hot French fries, right out of the fryer. Yes, I know they’re empty calories, coronary arrest lurking in a greasy little white paper bag. But that aroma can be so seductive that some days, it’s almost impossible to drive past the parking area.

When I’m really hungry and know I’ll be heading past those seductive scents, I’ve even tried distracting myself with peppermint lotion under my nostrils. Trust me: peppermint-laced fried potatoes will never challenge deep-fried Twinkies, which also sound like a culinary nightmare.

Recently, I gave in to the siren of the fryer, deluding myself with the thought that I’d avoided a French-fry binge for weeks. And, according to Julia Child (not to mention various dietary behavior-modification gurus), if you really, really want to eat something, you’re supposed to go ahead and eat it, in moderation.

“Don’t try to eat on the cheap,” they say, or you’ll wind up eating everything in sight to compensate for what you really want. It’s like a “Cathy” cartoon from hell, come to life.

You know what I mean. When you’re really craving a Linn’s éclair, Sugar-Free Jell-O just won’t do. Fat-free yogurt’s good, but it’s not a French Corner Bakery tart or one of Caren’s Corner’s sundaes. Celery’s a joke unless it’s filled with cream cheese or peanut butter, or sautéed in butter with onions for a rich turkey stuffing. And rice cakes make good building blocks for a tiny granddaughter. But lunch?

So there I was, decadence personified, searing my hands by snatching the first few blazing-hot fries out of the bag.

I dug around in the bag for the catsup packets, each the size of two plump, side-by-side stamps and holding a tablespoon or so of the spicy condiment. Aha! Found ‘em.

The trick is getting the catsup out of a packet.

“Tear here,” said the tiny printing near the ridged top edge of the packet.

Sure.

I squeezed my grease-slicked right thumb and forefinger together at the “tear here” mark on the catsup packet. But the minute I tried to pull the other edge with my left hand, my right hand would lose its grip.

It was like trying to hold onto a raw egg white with your fingers spread apart, pry the pit out of an extra-ripe avocado, or grab a wary, soapy 2-year old out of the bathtub.

There in the middle of the sidewalk, my options were few. Those packets are made from well-disguised chain mail. I had no scissors in my pocket, no Swiss Army knife in the glove compartment.

Bite it open? Don't think so. I already pay my dentist far too much money to try that maneuver.

I had this vivid vision of having a catsup temper tantrum, putting the packet on the pavement and stomping up and down on it. But just think of the mess I’d have made and, what’s worse, there wouldn’t have been any catsup left.

By now, I was back at the office, and my fries were cold. Yuk. Cold fries rank right up there with chilled Cream of Wheat, or a warm Dove bar. So I threw the whole mess away, and stalked off in a hungry huff.

Later, I figured it out. The Zone Diet and Weight Watchers conspired to invent the catsup packet. It’s cut-proof, tear-proof and meal-proof … on purpose. It’s behavior modification, whether you want it or not.

I’d say thank you to them for their diet assistance, but I really, really wanted those fries.

Next time? I’ve got it all figured out. I’ll just take along my own little bottle of catsup. Have Heinz, will travel.

This column ran May 1, 2003, in The Cambrian.

Bra-bbling about underwear

I say "grrrrrr" to anonymous writers, people who don't put their names on comments, letters or articles they post on the Internet.

If you've got something to say, by golly, then sign it. Take responsibility. Be proud of what you've written, so we know who to applaud or boo, depending on your stance and ours.

It's all there on the Net--somewhere -- politics, recipes, philosophy and, by the way, here's how my neighbor looks when he's half-dressed, half-smashed and half-witted.

And there are opinions on everything.

For instance, many aggrieved women have griped in print or online about that female-torture device known as a bra.

Fashion says there's no choice: We either strap ourselves into bindings to elevate our glands, sharpen their profiles and keep them steady, or we flip, flop and try not to catch our droop-boobs in the zippers of our jeans.

Bras are especially difficult after a certain age: As someone named Val wrote on a blog, "I used to wear a 34D...now I wear a 36 long."

Some of the "bra-articles" surfaced first in newspapers or magazines, then migrated to the Internet, often because someone read the writing, liked it and wanted to share it with someone else.

For instance, Belinda Luscombe wrote an open letter, "Warren Buffet, Adjust My Bra," which ran in Time magazine Nov. 12 (www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1680142,00.html). Buffet owns underwear firms Fruit of the Loom and Vanity Fair (among many others), and Luscombe begged him to bring brassiere design into the 21st century.

I especially loved her tale of Herminie Cadolle, whom Luscombe said invented the bra strap about 120 years ago because "it made more sense for women's breasts to be suspended from above than cantilevered from beneath. So, instead of walking around wearing the lingerie equivalent of the London Bridge, women could slide themselves into a Golden Gate. This was a huge relief -- as anyone who has worn a strapless bra can tell you -- because the London Bridge pretty much always falls down."

Earlier that month, 52-year-old Lee Jackson of Auckland, New Zealand, responded online to the San Francisco Chronicle's "great bra debate" in the editorial pages.

Jackson said she wants to shoot the inventor who developed "an underwire to shove your boobs together for 'cleavage.'" If that inventor was a man, she said, he should have "paper clips wrapped around his testicles" and the clips "fastened to the waist of his BVDs with rubber bands."

Jackson wrote that she's tired of:
* "bras that fit wonderfully until I actually sit down, bend over, twist around or reach up for something";
* "so-called sports bras that make me wonder just what 'sport' they were designed for"; and
* "walking into a lingerie shop and having prepubescent, anorexic twigs advise me I might have better luck finding something that 'fits me' in the geriatric section of a department store."

Well done, Lee.

But we can't thank the woman who wrote of preparing for her high-school reunion with a quick diet and some fashion tricks ... none of which worked.

She battled with a slinky dress, body prep and makeup ("all-day, face-lifting, gravity-fighting moisturizer with wrinkle-filler spackle").

Then came a "black lace, tummy-tucking, cellulite-pushing, ham-hock-rounding" girdle and the matching "'lifting-those-bosoms-like-they're-filled-with-helium' bra."

The contortionist writer "pulled, stretched, tugged, hiked, folded, tucked, twisted, shimmied, hopped, pushed, wiggled, snapped, shook, caterpillar-crawled and kicked" her way into the girdle, then tackled the bra.

The saleslady had told her, "Put the bra on the way it should be worn -- straps over the shoulders. Then bend over and gently place both breasts inside the cups."

The writer groused that "the boobs weren't cooperating." After testing various techniques, she tried rocking back and forth to get her bosoms swinging. "Finally, on the fourth swing, pause and lift, I captured the gliding glands" and fastened the bra.

"Yes, Houston, we have lift up!"

She wrote, "My breasts were high, firm, and there was cleavage! I was happy ...until I tried to look down. I had a chin rest. And I couldn't see my feet."

She never did get to the reunion.

How I'd love to send her a fan letter, if I only knew who she was.

BEST OF: Popping-hot thoughts

Sometimes, my mind is like a popcorn kernel in a hot frying pan, jumping from place to place, but never really getting anywhere. That’s especially true when insomnia strikes. All I really want is an “off” button for my brain, so I can get some sleep.

In the middle of one recent night, I started mulling over some things I’ve learned in my life and how I’d define them.

For instance, I’ve learned that:

• If a jacket or dress in a shop window or ad makes the size 2 model wearing it look like a prime candidate for Weight Watchers, no amount of dreaming, wishing or squinting up my eyes will make the fashions look good on my generously proportioned body.

The phrase “high-style human Hummer” comes to mind.


• Running a vacuum cleaner over the same spot at least six times before I bend down to pick up whatever it is the vacuum isn’t catching is a waste of my time and electricity, and I feel profoundly foolish if somebody else sees me doing it.

Work order: “If you can’t suck it up, pick it up.”


• Cutting your nails over a shag rug will come back to haunt you.

Mantra: “Stepping on a rug of nails is no more comfortable than sleeping on a bed of them.”


• Buying a self-help book or listening to a do-it-yourself program doesn’t get the job done. If I want the results, I have to do the exercise, clean the refrigerator’s compressor, dig up the tulip bulbs or study Italian.

The title “’something for dummies’ means the dummy has to do the work herself.


• Once cupboards, closets and shelves are full, such pleasant occupations as window shopping, retail Web surfing, catalog-page flipping and going to garage sales can cause conflicts.

Having one mixing bowl is good. Two bowls can get me through a party. Having five identical bowls means I’ll never be able to get any of them into or out of the cupboard without a fight, and may not be able to close the cupboard door.

The dual phrases “Visa bill” and “But where are we going to put it, honey?” come to mind.


• Hunches are good things. Years ago, when county workers installed an all-way stop sign at Burton and Ardath drives, the concept made me nervous. It seemed to me then that having 99 percent of drivers stop at the busy intersection would make the remaining 1 percent is even more dangerous, because nobody would expect those drivers wouldn’t stop.

In a close call, I was nearly the statistic that proved my hunch.

I had stopped at the stop sign, ready to turn right on Ardath on my way home. As I began to turn the wheel and step on the gas, two commercial trucks came over the Ardath rise to the south.

A little voice in the back of my head said, “Those blankety-blanks aren’t going to stop.”

The big, heavy delivery truck, loaded with sheet rock and pulling a trailer loaded with an industrial forklift, sped through the intersection without a hint of stopping or even pausing. A second, smaller delivery truck followed behind.

If I’d made the turn, just because it was my turn and my right to do so, I’d be dead.

That first truck would have hit me right at the driver’s seat, and the second truck would have ploughed into the back of the first truck.

I recall a statement at the end of a public service message: “You may be in the right. Dead right.”


Now, if my mind would just quit popping so I could get some sleep, maybe I wouldn’t have such bizarre thoughts.

This column first ran in The Cambrian on April 3, 2003.

Follow the money

“You think there’s no good left in this world,” Mary Woeste of Cambria said. “You listen to the news and ask yourself, ‘Can it get any worse?’ And then something like this happens.”

Mary, a warmly caring woman eternally on the go, is a caregiver for seniors. She has more to do than time to do it.

I’ve known Mary for about a quarter century. Her brother and uncle, Keith Woeste and Pat Wade, were best pals with our sons Brian and Sean.

About a month ago, after a long shift, Mary was rushing to the post office to buy a money order, carrying cash in an envelope, five $100 bills saved up from Christmas and birthday gifts.

“I must have picked up the envelope upside down,” she surmised. As the money fluttered away, full-speed-ahead Mary was probably already a half-block away. She didn’t notice until, at the post office, she reached inside the now-empty envelope.

She went looking for the cash, but didn’t find it.

“I said to myself, ‘OK, it’s gone. I just hope the person who picked it up needed it worse than I do.’”

However, Henry Rodriguez, on his lunch break from Antiques on Main, had spotted two $100 bills. He thought, “It can’t be real. It must be play money. But then I saw someone else picking up paper in front of the drug store.”

Steve Johnson of Bend, Ore., had found the other $300 and was walking toward Henry. Once they figured out that the money didn’t belong to either of them, Henry gave his two bills to Steve and went to lunch.

Steve was puzzled. How to find the owner? He did what any smart guy would do — he consulted his parents, Loren and Jeanette Johnson of Cambria, telling them, “It was raining $100 bills downtown! I’ve just found $500, and I don’t know how to find out who it belongs to.”

He decided to check at the drug store.

Bingo! This is a small town. Chances are good that if you’re looking for somebody, somebody else you know will know that somebody.

Cambria Village Pharmacy clerk Mandy Ervin, recalls, “A man came in and asked Kris Morris and me if someone had lost some money. We said ‘yes, five $100 bills.’ He pulled them out of his wallet.”

Then he left, but the man who’d had a fistful of dollars wouldn’t be a man with no name for long.

Sue Patchen and Kay Ash were unloading their van in front of the antique mall. Henry came back to work. “I found $200, but we don’t know who it belongs to,” he told coworkers, including Debborah Patchen.

She told her mom and Kay, and they said they’d seen a distraught Mary going from store to store in East Village, asking if anyone had seen her $500.

Debborah called Anne Winburn, owner of St. Mary Mead, a shop across the street. By the time they called Mary, she already knew her money had been found. You see, the drug store clerks also knew Mary, and the pharmacist knew how to reach her.

Mary remembers, “The girl at the pharmacy called me and said, ‘I’m in tears. You won’t believe what just happened.’”

An amazed, grateful Mary “went right down, got the money and went straight to the post office.” But she was dismayed to not know who her Good Samaritan was.

That didn’t last long. Soon, Mary tracked down Good Guy Henry, just a couple doors down the block.

Mary didn’t need CSI Cambria to figure out the rest, because —surprise, surprise — it turns out Henry had known Steve when the Bend resident owned a store in San Simeon.

Mary called Steve’s mom, Jeanette Johnson. Jeanette asked, “How did you find out so fast?”

This is Cambria, Jeanette.

Mary wanted to send a “thank-you” gift. Jeanette checked with her son, then told Mary he wouldn’t take anything, “but you can send him a card.”

Mary said that, on the card, she told Steve that the next time he comes to town, “at least I hope he’ll let me treat him and his family to dinner … What a guy. I’m forever in his debt … and so is my American Express card.”

BEST OF: Not-so-Iron-Chefs' ice-cream duel

When neighbors get together in Cambria, it’s often to share a meal.

We and two sets of our Marine Terrace neighbors added a twist to that equation, sharing a holiday weekend night as we made up quarts and quarts of homemade vanilla ice cream in a duel to determine who has the best ice-cream making machine.

The official competitors and their choice of weaponry were:

• Richard Greek, (then the county’s personnel director and former ag commissioner), with a wood-bucket, hand-crank, uses-salt-and-ice model ice-cream maker;

• Superior Court Judge Martin Tangeman, with an electrified version of the Greeks’ machine; and

• Richard Tanner, retired baker-caterer and former pit boss for Harrah’s Club, Reno, with a self-contained, no-salt/no-ice, commercial-style electric ice-cream freezer.

The Greeks paid close to retail for their model. We got our machine on super sale/closeout/slight scratches/discontinued model and they couldn’t even find the original box. And the Tangemans got their ice-cream maker at a rummage sale for $5.

Serious competition? Of course not. Hilarious? You bet. Competitive? Oh, definitely. We’re talking some major A-type personalities here, and each was devoutly convinced that his machine was the best on the block, literally.

We all live within a few houses of each other, even one of our official judges Joan Wedbush, who doesn’t have an ice-cream machine, but is a former caterer.

That Sunday proved to be ideal in every way but one: the weather, which was cold, foggy and London-like. Not exactly ideal ice-cream weather, but I guess ice cream is a hit in any environment.

While the idea was strictly for fun, we did have to do things correctly, we agreed. To make sure nobody hyped their own mix to make it special, we made up a giant batch of rich vanilla ice cream, and ladled it into the side-by-side containers right before the machines started their magic.

There were the three contestants, three judges and eight ice-cream groupies in the bunch, ranging in age from 3 to 76. The “duel” was a hoot. Good fun and dessert were the only real goals. We all laughed so hard, our sides and cheeks hurt.

Marty made a big play of stretching his arms behind his head and saying over and over, “See how hard I’m working, checking the ice cream,” while Richard, Christine and son Kris Greek took turns churning the crank on their low-tech device.

Marty made sure he or his wife, Carol Tangeman, stood guard at all times over their machine, to protect against insidious industrial espionage, I suppose.

The Greeks kept needling Marty, noting the noise factor from the Tangemans’ machine. “It’s so loud. You’re drowning out the ocean,” Richard Greek said. “And what if the power goes out?”

“You should have solar panels just for this,” Marty countered to my husband.

In turn, my Richard raised his hands above his head, looked up into the dense, drippy fog and said, “And just what good what that do you? Or us … remember, our machine is electric, too.”

When challenged over his demand for a handicap because he’d been “forced” to use the Greeks’ salt and ice, Judge Tangeman said he’d review the legal precedents … until one of us asked if there’d be any ice cream left by the time he’d get around to handing down his ruling.

This went on all night long.

We’d set up a wine-style blind tasting, complete with official judging forms and palate-cleansing glasses of water. And were those judges meticulous! “All contestants clear the area,” said Wedbush. “Let’s not have any undue pressure.”

The judges studiously nibbled and sipped, rolled the ice creams around on their tongues and slowly filled in their judging forms — much to the consternation of the youngsters waiting to dig into the leftovers.

Then we all sampled the three ice creams, eventually adding fresh strawberries or blueberries, caramel sauce or my Richard’s truffle topper, nuts, M&Ms or sprinkles. In some of the kids’ dishes, it was hard to find the ice cream among the add-ons. Memories of ice-cream-parlor “suicide sundaes” come to mind.

There were distinct differences between the three ice creams. One was soft and smooth, another slightly grainy and homemade style, another firm, icy-cold and silky.

Who won?

The Tanner’s commercial machine took the honors, I think partially because the self-refrigeration unit got the mixture so cold, so fast.

Finally, the sated contestants and judges staggered home, grateful to the end that neighbors could enjoy such a fierce competition, and each other, so much.

Summer’s coming. Anyone for a rematch?

This column ran first in The Cambrian on September 19, 2002.

Dye-hard egg hunt

Before I became a grandmother, I never knew it would be so much fun — or so complicated.

For instance, we hosted a houseful for Easter: granddaughters Caitlyn (12), Alyssa (9), Isabelle (8) and Georgia (5), plus our son Sean and his fiancée, Kim. What resulted was this family’s longest-ever Easter egg hunt.

The girls are each so different! And there were some special circumstances to consider: one girl is severely allergic to most nuts; another is fairly fussy about which candies she likes (such as peanut-butter cups); and a third was on crutches, with her leg in a cast after a sledding accident.

The fourth is 5.

So this hunt required some MBA-level pre-planning.

The holiday event began as soon as the girls awoke, with a nervous Easter Bunny (EB) fervently hoping the preparations would produce frolic and fun, but without any youthful hurt feelings, tears or temper tantrums.

At the dining table, each place was set with an egg-shaped place mat, a bunny mug, an Easter candy and a couple of little gifts to keep the girls occupied during breakfast. Meanwhile, EB snuck out, put four filled baskets on the front porch and hid 28 boiled hens’ eggs the girls had colored the day before.

Once the adults were up (if not yet Easter outfitted or even totally awake), the chant began. “Egg hunt! Egg hunt!”

When the girls opened the front door, the squeals began. Baskets! Candy! Trinkets! Chocolate bunnies (three of them filled with peanut cream and delightfully named “Reester Bunnies,” and one nut-free Cadbury)! The giggling gaggle of girls deposited their loot on the dining table, then dashed out the door in search of eggs.

“Halt! Wait!” EB said with nose twitching. “Rule time. There are seven eggs out there for each of you. Caitlyn and Isabelle — once you’ve found seven each, then go help Georgia and Alyssa,” who was limping around on crutches.

Caity and Izzy were done in a flash, of course, but they amiably played “you’re getting warmer … colder” with the other two girls as a couple of adults trailed along to make sure Georgia didn’t wind up stranded in a tree and Lyssie didn’t fall over trying to dig an egg out of a flower pot.

Meanwhile, EB and her two cohorts were inside the house, hiding candy-filled plastic eggs and other goodies.

Once the girls had found all the real eggs outside, the hunt was on in the living room, dining room and halls. It was like having four caffeine-amped monkeys playing “I spy” throughout the house, peering into vases, under couch cushions and behind pillows.

(I so hope they got it all. I remember my grandmother finding an overlooked chocolate egg in August one year — behind the radiator on a white rug that wasn’t white any more.)

Once our girls had ferreted out the goodies, the “Easter Banker” took over.

With a reserve of each kind of candy in another basket, the Easter Banker could exchange candies for another kind. That way, the fussy eater and the nut-allergic could redeem treats they’d found but couldn’t or wouldn’t eat. The other girls could exchange, too, if they wanted to.

Were we done yet? Not a chance.

After Easter Banker negotiations finished, the girls whooped and headed outside again.

Soon they were back, announcing that the adult Easter Egg Hunt was about to begin. They’d re-hidden the colored eggs, and now the parents and grandparents were to find them.

Devious? I ask you, how was I to know they’d hidden an egg under an upside-down abalone shell?

With a little coaching and a lot of hilarity, hooting and hollering from the youthful gallery, we oldsters finally found all the eggs (which by then were destined for the garbage rather than a deviled-egg tray or egg-salad sandwiches).

Whew! The hunt was over. We’d pulled it off. We’d made memories — and a huge, so-funny mess. A month later, in the most unlikely places, we’re still finding biliously pink and purple strands of Easter grass.

Could the Easter Bunny finally relax? Of course not. She’s already planning the 2009 hunt, playing “Can you top this?”

BEST OF: Tour de chance

Imagine joining a group of strangers traipsing around on a shared vacation, seeing sights, having adventures, being taught new things.

Imagine us running rapidly in the other direction.

It’s called a tour, and for decades, we’ve avoided them like the plague. I'd protest that we’re too self-reliant, too stubbornly autonomous. We like to go our own way, make our own decisions, do our own thing at our own time.

On a tour, most of those choices are premade for you, about your room, your schedule, your activities, your menu and even the people with whom you sit and dine.

“Go, go,” our friends had told us. “Trust us. You’ll have a wonderful time.”

Finally, feisty as I am, I had to admit there was a lure in having somebody else making the decisions once in a while. I was willing to give up my tour-director hat, just for a little while. So, recently, we gave in and dipped our travel toes into the world of shared vacations.

Now as newbies, we weren't brave enough to sign up for a two-week group jaunt to Zimbabwe. We started small, with a close-to-home tour that began on a Sunday night and ended on a Tuesday morning.

Know what? We really did enjoy it. But we did our homework before we went, and that helped a lot.

Here are some things we did pre-tour, and one I shouldn’t have:

· We made sure that we were staying in a hotel we’d have chosen on our own. After you arrive is not the time to discover your hotel is a flea-trap in a red-light district. Fortunately, ours wasn’t.

· Ask dumb-sounding questions, such as “Do you have good water pressure there?” Why ask that, especially at a small hotel? Because on tour, everybody’s on the same schedule, which means most of them will hit the showers at the same time. It’s a bummer to bathe at 6 a.m. with cold water coming out of the showerhead drop by drop.

· Make sure the schedule matches yours. If you sleep till 10 every morning, and the group breakfast is served at 7, you’re going to be miserable.

· The itinerary also should allow you some down time. We had three walking tours in a row, one at 9 a.m., one at 10:30 a.m. and another after lunch. But we had a long sit-down meal, and time to rest before the beach barbecue that night. Even so, our tootsies would have appreciated a longer break.

· Conversely, if you have the chance, switch between types of activities. If you’re sitting on your duff being lectured in the morning, then go for a kayak tour or ping-pong competition in the afternoon. Otherwise, your scheduled evening stroll on the boardwalk may turn into a hobble.

· Make sure the prices you’re paying are, indeed, less than you’d pay if you were setting up the same activities on your own.

· Probably, you’ll be barraged with food. If you’re lucky, as we were, it will be marvelous. But it’s still different than your normal fare. So go easy. Don’t take that third skewer of shrimp or second piece of pie, even if it is included in the cost. Your tummy will thank you.

· And, for heaven’s sake, don’t do as I did and change purses right before the trip. It was plumb mortifying to hold up the line as I rummaged around for my pass in the 17 pockets that purse had suddenly sprouted. I must have looked like an aging bimbo as I smiled (aka grimaced) and apologized over and over.

So, go, go. Enjoy some group travel. If you plan ahead, it can work out to be more fun than you’d have had alone or as a couple. Trust us.

This column ran Sept. 18, 2003 in The Cambrian. And while we've only taken one other shared tour since then, we remain impressed with the concept.