Unmitigated

Playground of Asphalt

One of the games we played on the 'playground' as kids, we called Boston Bay. The girls playing formed a circle that was open in one spot. The person at one end was the leader, and the rest of the girls were the chorus. It went like this:

Leader: How many miles to Boston Bay?

Chorus: Threeeeeeee thousand!

Leader: Can I go through your Golden Gate?

Chorus: No! Where's your man and where's your boat?

Leader: Here's my man (points to self) and here's my boat (slugs the next girl in the gut[!]), so open the gate and let me in!

Then the last two girls at the other end would raise their joined hands, and the leader would take the rest of the line through the arch they formed. Once the loop is complete, the leader goes to the end and the girl who got slugged in the gut got to be the leader.

This must have origins somewhere. I'm thinking of immigrants entering at San Francisco, but I can't find any references on-line anywhere. A Google search for "How many miles to Boston Bay?" brings up another Detroit memory, so maybe it was something local? It's entirely possible this had to do with Asian immigrants on the west coast, because we used to play with "Chinese jump ropes" with the chant:

Ching Chang Chinaman
Sittin' on a fence
Trying to make a dollar
Out of fifty-nine cents
He missed, he missed
He missed like this!

Need I remind anyone that this was about 40 years ago? Can you imagine hearing that on a playground in this day and age? Yow.

 

 

Brightening My Days

Still unemployed by choice. Still working on projects. I have been doing some more cooking, with recipes from all the Marias out there. I have branched out into baking, of a sort. I found an easy, no-knead bread recipe on Mother Earth News (someone linked there...Jan/Maria?), and a fruit galette that I made with blueberries and raspberries from Three Many Cooks.

The bread was awesome, and calmed my bread-making fears. Its easy to screw up bread. Then I remembered...I have a bread machine! Remember when everyone had a bread machine? Back in the 80s or early 90s. So far, I have made a french honey bread, that I used blueberry honey in, and a traditional Italian bread. Next, I am thinking of some Hawaiian sweet bread, or some beer bread. 

Before I talk about the next two-and-a-half projects, I wanted to point out that my wonderful husband, who goes by the name JimStyro, has posted again on his blog, Speaking in CAPS! It's been a very long time. Pop over if you get a chance, you will see an awesome picture from Ms. Partly Cloudy's wedding. Also posting recently after a long absence is Captain Dumbass. You won't believe how much Mickey Finn has grown. Protect your iPods.

OKay...next project: We use Microsoft Money to keep track of finances, which means that we have receipts to enter in a piece of software. We generate, on average 2-3 receipts per day. No big deal, right? What if the primary enterer hasn't had the time or the inclination to enter data in awhile....like, since May of 2011? View my Purgatory:

That there is over 200 receipts that need to be entered.The first step in getting our finances organized, and my project for the rest of today, and probably part of tomorrow. Yesterday, I alphabetized them, as I prefer to enter all the receipts from a single vendor at once. The biggest pile? Quiznos, where JimStyro eats lunch nearly every day. 

Once that is accomplished, I move on to the junk drawer. Drawers. Just in the living room and kitchen, there are EIGHT junk drawers. Eight. In the basement, there are three storage areas that are disastrous, and I'm not even going to talk about the garage, which will need to wait until it is warmer outside before I can attack. I want a dedicated space for my yoga practice, and a space where I can work on stained glass projects. The living room over carpet is NOT a good place to cut glass.

If I don't emerge from Microsoft Money by Saturday....send the Marines.