No one wants to be in on “turkey confidential”

“Oh, what’s that smell?” questioned my son as he came in the door after spending the weekend up north at his grandmother’s home, which doubles as family deer camp each November. “It’s making me even hungrier and I’m starving already!” He probably was, after spending over four hours traveling home.

Before I could stop him, he was at the oven, opening the door and peering inside. The sight of not one, but two large roasters inside excited him. “It smells so good, what is it?” he wanted to know.

“Well, if you insist . . .  but be warned, you’re gonna get an eyeful,” I said slowly, heightening the tension, before seductively removing the top off one of the pans, simultaneously humming the chorus of “The Stripper.”

“Bread cubes?!” his face fell. “What a rip-off! I thought it was going to be something good because it smelled so good.”

He wouldn’t be the first or the last person to be taken in by a too-good-smelling illusion, only to later have his hopes dashed. Welcome to Kristy’s kitchen, holiday edition: where the unexpected is served up as standard-fare, whether or not fair.

Naturally, the bread cubes weren’t just any bread cubes: they were purchased from the animal feed-bound supply at the day-old bread store: a collection of colors, flavors and textures of bread that didn’t sell during their prime. I oven-dry them just slightly, maintaining their youth as the carbohydrate equivalent of al dente vegetables so they won’t crumble too much and turn into mush when I add the liquid ingredients.

Stovetop, I melt butter, saute onions, celery and garlic, add chicken broth, Worcestershire sauce, sage, milk and eggs, then drizzle the mix over the bread cubes and lightly stir it them, lest they turn into a huge, sage-flavored bowl of batter. Never over-stir! That’s one of the first things I tell prospective kitchen helpers with stuffing, muffins and quick breads. It beats the body right out of them.

A third of the stuffing will get shoved in the non-sunshine region of one of the turkeys, while the other two-thirds will be baked to golden perfection in a medium-sized roaster. It’s how I appease both the wet- and dry-stuffing preferences of my dinner guests. And there are preferences, believe me. That’s why both butter and margarine are available for rolls, potatoes and squash. Thanksgiving is like running a mini, one-day restaurant without health department rules.

Before I continue, I need to swear you to confidentiality. Turkey confidential.

Now about the gravy: I make two kinds – giblet-laden and giblet-free. But what on earth is a giblet? It’s that little bag full of internal turkey parts found deep inside of the frozen turkey; the bag many inexperienced cooks (and turkey thawing procrastinators) don’t know to look for before cooking their turkey and discover only afterward.

In case you were absent during dissection lab in high school biology class, the giblets typically consist of the heart, kidneys and liver. Sometimes other, unidentifiable body parts (i.e. turkey spleen, appendix, bladder or pancreas) are thrown in. My advice is that if you can’t identify it, you should discard it.

If the turkey seller is feeling generous, you may also find a section of neck crammed down the opening of the turkey where it was formerly attached. I usually chuck the neck because not only does it feel disgusting, but I don’t think it cooks up as flavorfully as the other parts. Others swear by it. Whatever.

“However unpromising the giblets may look, they make a wonderful stock for the turkey gravy and the meat from them will provide a wonderful lunch for a deserving cat or dog,” says one online source. Lunch for a faithful pet, my butt! I boil the giblets and then food process them into a paste to combine with roaster drippings and chicken soup base. It creates a creamy-looking gravy that no one who reads this will likely touch, again, until this graphic description of the ingredients and the making of it fades (if ever) from memory.

Best then, like my son, to focus on holiday meal smells and not learn too intimately the food preparation details hereby classified as “turkey confidential.” Shhhhhhh!

Quantifying serial killing and mass murders

Have you been following the national media story about the South Carolina man, Todd Kohlhepp, who had killed and buried two people on his property? Interestingly, when law enforcement paid a visit to Kohlhepp’s property looking for a 30-year-old woman, whom they found chained in a shipping container, they also found buried at that location her boyfriend, who’d been missing, too.

The newspaper articles I read about Kohlhepp discussed whether or not he was a serial killer, which, per FBI criteria, involves murdering at least two people in separate incidents. What?! While murdering even one person seems pretty wrong, defining the murder of two people as “serial” killing seems, well, overkill (pardon the expression).

We don’t play just two games of baseball and call it the World Series, do we? No. Two similar things happening may still be considered a coincidence. It’s after a third thing happens that we can more confidently connect the dots toward forming a conclusion about evidenced of a pattern. Geez, FBI, an elementary school kid could have told you that. Elementary, Dear Watson!

Thank goodness for the more logical wisdom coming from the reader-generated annals of Wikipedia, which advises, “A serial killer is a person who murders three or more people, usually in service of abnormal psychological gratification, with the murders taking place over more than a month and including a significant break (“cooling off period”) between them.

Wikipedia states most serial killings involve sexual contact with the victim. What would motivate someone to serial-kill? Here, I must defer to the FBI explanation: anger, thrill-seeking, financial gain and/or attention-getting. Such murders may be completed in similar fashion and the victims frequently have some characteristic in common.

Sometimes serial killing is used interchangeably with the term “mass murder.” Presumably by those who confused greater-than and less-than mathematical symbols back in elementary school, for you can’t get much more opposite. Mass murder, as defined by the FBI, involves the killing of at least four victims in a single incident.

Wikipedia is quick to point out serial killing also should not be confused with spree killing, which superficially sounds like something that could be achieved through poisoned Halloween candy. No, spree killing is what Kalamazoo killer Jason Dalton (who bore a remarkable resemblance to my ex-husband who resides in that area!) engaged in on February of 2016, when he committed murders in two or more locations in a short period of time.

If Dalton had not been apprehended, he might have gone on to engage in a hybrid type of activity some killing experts refer to as “serial-spree killing,” characterized by two or more episodes of spree killing with cooling off/return to normalcy periods in-between. It’s as disgusting as it is confusing.

That said, it appears registered sex offender Kohlhepp, who’d served 15 years’ time for a kidnapping crime committed at the age of 16 (tying up and raping a 14-year-old neighbor at gunpoint) is horribly guilty of some horrible things.

While showing police his most recent body burials, Kohlhepp, 45, admitted to murdering four other people 13 years ago at the Superbike Motorsports shop. Wow! An even bigger wow is directed at his mother, who continues to downplay sonny boy’s behavior. Hard to believe, but perhaps there are some unintentional, parental limit-setting lessons also buried in this gruesome situation.

The mother of this 45-year-old killer, whose body count is now at seven, views her son as the victim, NOT the perpetrator, i.e. he killed the boyfriend of the chained-up woman, “because he got nasty and was smart-mouthed.” Let’s hope the parents of teens don’t start taking similar license.

During his 1987 kidnapping/rape case, Kohlhepp’s mother purportedly said, “Todd knows he did wrong, and he’s sorry, but they won’t even give him a chance to make a good life out of this . . . . ”

Granted, this is an extreme example of excusing unacceptable behavior, but it begs the question: at what point does a person move from the category of a being good person who does bad things to being defined as a bonafide bad person? Perhaps when we no longer know the difference.

Best to play away from the edge to avoid all negative definition.

Electing to take responsibility between elections

I am so glad election season is over. I was getting really sick of hearing people talking about it as if they were in the know. If there’s one thing I hate, it’s people who think they are in the know. About anything. About everything!

It’s the barber who stops cutting hair to pontificate about Trump. It’s the mother on her cell-phone in hushed tones about the latest, greatest conspiracy theory. It’s the grandma holding up BUNCO relaying the latest Hillary gossip. It’s the guy at work who stations himself next to the watercooler or vending machine and monopolizes break times with his self-assured and -proclaimed “vast knowledge” of political pockets.

I am glad the election is over because I am badly in need of a haircut and want to use the bathroom by the breakroom at work. Election years bring knowing types out of the woodwork. I need to be able to strike up a conversation without it turning to political topics, resulting in my wanting to strike a match and set myself on fire and perish prior to having another uninformed political conversation with fictional facts preached as gospel.

You may see the political Cliff Clavins coming (cringe!) but cannot duck them entirely any more than you can dodge 100% of the political phone calls. Even the most studiously avoidant among us eventually makes the mistake of picking up the phone out of habit, without first glancing at the caller ID.

And then we are treated to an earful of mud: recitation of all the latest election dirt, as if the tale-teller personally knows the candidates. This pseudo-confidential information is always related the same, intimate way it would be if they were telling you their son-in-law had a sudden attack of diarrhea while dragging from the woods an eight-point buck he’d baited and shot or that a neighbor found a skunk under the front porch. It all stinks and nobody cares. Because none of it really affects us. Thank goodness!

Even without hearing the content, you can always tell someone who thinks he/she is in the know about a particular subject or person. It’s obvious. Many will start a sentence with the phrase, “Well you know … ” and then dump the dirt about whatever. The dirt-dumping is frequently accompanied by a squinted eye and emphatic finger-pointing, if the dumper is male. Or by eye-rolling and excessive hand-talking, if the dumper is female. If you don’t believe me, start watching.

What I heard most, whether the one being discussed was anyone from dog catcher candidate to Democratic Party Oval Office nominee, was “He”, “She”, and “They”. The election and the state of things to follow was being completely externalized. That’s what really stinks about election years. At no other time do people react as such major victims of politics, yet personally take no responsibility.

Just like real faith is lived out between church services, real political change occurs in real situations outside of the polling places, and in off-years. I’m not kidding. So don’t wait for someone playing politician to change things, Actively work toward affecting change, yourself. Do your part. Be the change you want to see. Don’t just vote at elections. Vote through your daily actions.

As Union City High School alumnus Debbie (Craig) Egnatuk, now of Marshall, posted on Facebook three days before the November 8, 2016 national election:

“On this next election day, and days to come, whether it be Hillary or Donald, we are human beings living in a country with freedom and choices to make.

“We will be kind to each other, help those in need, love unconditionally, love the unlovable, befriend someone less fortunate, treat each other with respect, forgive, believe, never lose hope, work to eliminate un-justice, hug the babies, care for the elderly, and on and on and on!

“Whether it is Hillary or Donald, we can continue to create a world that is united in our care for all life and stewardship of Creation. I have seen this in our families, communities and the world. We may mourn the outcome, but should not lose focus on what is right in front of us on a daily basis.”

Amen, Sister Debbie!

Rental house triggers starting out memories

Early one recent weekday morning, I found myself at the local laundry-mat: washing the heavy comforter that graces the foot of my bed during colder months. I’d just changed to flannel sheets, added a blanket and laundered the quilt that goes atop the bedding. I wanted the whole shebang ready for cold weather.

I periodically turn up at the laundry-mat, like a bad penny. While I wouldn’t give a plugged nickel to go back to hanging out there a few hours each week, the clang of the quarters in my pocket triggered a wave of nostalgia. No rich memories to be mined, just dime-a-dozen fool’s gold from my early adult years. Back when I was certain I knew more about life.

Those were quite the days. I’d spend the week accruing seven dollars in quarters (the change machine was perpetually out of order!) to do laundry. Of course, that included not just my work and home wardrobes, but also towels and 5-6 sets of stinky gym clothes.

I can remember trudging into the laundry-mat, dirty duds spilling out of my laundry baskets, powder detergent box balancing precariously atop one of them. Then I’d spend the better part of two hours vying with other adults and their wild-butt children for possession of the few working machines to do my washing and drying.

The thought of having kids without a washer and dryer of my own is incomprehensible: all of the food spills and bodily fluid accidents that would’ve had to wait the better part of a week for eradication turns me bleach pale at the thought. How tough to have clothing out of commission for that long, not to mention not being able to dryer fluff the crap out of everything!

While I hope never to be washer-less or having to start over, again, in life, I recognize you must start somewhere, especially if you were not born with a silver Tide pod in your mouth. I was reminded of that recently when a friend of mine was accepting applications for a house he had for rent. It featured a washer and dryer. YES!!!

Similar to my laundry-mat era Friday nights, which often involved going to the bar with friends, for every legitimate person who showed interest there was a someone your mother would have warned you about, had you asked. That describes the highly-varied pool of rental applicants.

The spontaneously volunteered stories of need and want of the house ranged from humbly honest, to harmless white lies, to partial-fabrications, to trophy-catch fishing stories – such whales of tales that only the teller could believe them.

As a former probation officer, I know you can’t afford the folly of fiction, but must traffic in truth’s cold reality. Otherwise, you forfeit the happily-ever-after fantasy for an expensive and sad ending. Falling into the believe-what-you-hear (over what you see) potential trap is a bottomless pit. You cannot afford to be seduced by someone’s potential. To quote the William O. Coats Agency’s successful auctioneering business motto, “Performance continues to outsell promises.”

No matter how much you might want to provide a home for someone who seems down on his/her luck, the tables can be turned in no time if you install that someone(s) into your rental home and no rent payment follows. Unfortunately, it’s harder for landlords to evict for non-payment than it is for tenants to not pay!

An amazing number of applicants tried to dodge down-payment. Huge red flag to Mr. Landlord! “I’m applying for jobs” is far different than “I’m working.” Evidence of employment is a must, as is a track record of bill-paying.

Those who openly admitted blowing their parents’ Popsicle stand domiciles (due to oppressive rules) were the most interesting. “My girlfriend and I want to be together, but don’t want to get tied down with jobs until we decide where we want to live.” Talk about getting the cart ahead of the donkey!

It all reminded me that life is a lot like laundry: you’ve got to plan ahead, save your quarters and get up early to get the best washers. Preventing stains from setting in keeps both your clothing and your record clean. It’s called taking care of business!

 

 

Car has turned into a mobile disc jockey unit

Over the years, many people have asked me if I’ve carpooled to save gas and wear and tear on my car. Seeing as how I’m always looking for ways to save a buck, they naturally assume carpooling would appeal to my sensibilities. But it doesn’t.

Of course, I always politically correctly reply I’ve considered it, but never found someone with compatible enough work hours or work proximity. That’s kind of true, and most of my jobs have required driving during work hours.

When I attended community college, I shared rides with several people over those two years, including a couple of friends, another friend’s mother, a boyfriend and a boyfriend wannabe (I only figured that out years later, but was oblivious at the time). Nothing much got in the way of ride-sharing back then, for in my late teen years, I still had enough free time that commuter “alone time” wasn’t yet a precious commodity.

That’s the real reason I’ve avoided later life carpooling, not because the hours wouldn’t jive. After I started having greater responsibilities and a family, as well as driving greater distances for work, I recognized my commuting time was the closest thing I’d get to alone time on any given day. That’s a pretty pathetic commentary on my life, I know. But it’s honest and I strive to protect my pockets of patheticism.

I’ve always enjoyed and made constructive use of my car time. I’ve listened to educational and motivational books, practiced speeches and songs, mentally outlined writing ideas, rehearsed difficult conversations, held private phone conversations, given myself pep-talks when I was feeling down and prayed: all things that might push a passenger over the edge and perhaps straight out the door onto the highway while the car was still moving.

Call it crazy, but car time is my sanity-producing therapy. Even when it involves heavy traffic in more urban areas, it remains far more peaceful and calming than the rest of life. Only occasionally do I listen to music – mostly instrumental CDs. Lyrics only clutter my head and ruin the mindless state I am trying to achieve.

Given this perspective, you can guess how I feel on the occasions when my teens, whom I’ll refer to here as “Wolfman Jack, Jr.” and “Katie Kasem”, ride shotgun and think they have license to take over the sound controls of my vehicle. It’s a wonder I’m still of sound mind! The radio station immediately gets changed to something “cool” with sassy lyrics when my offspring board my vehicle.

Sometimes they plug in ipods or other electronic devices and tap into mp3 song playlists, which means a different kind of bad. Worse, they torture me with my own phone, piping Youtube songs through it with the volume cranked. When I tell them I hate a particular singer or suggest they turn down that $#@&! and surrender my phone, they use my deafness to justify the unacceptably high volume levels.

Because I have “such a crappy car stereo system” (per my son), clearly in need of having boosters added so I can more readily pump up the volume, my son has begun bringing along his own wireless speaker. I shouldn’t be surprised because he has a fatal attraction to the thing.

Wolfman took a very long while picking it out and actually parted with some of his hard-earned tomato picking money (from which he cannot easily be separated) to acquire it. He takes it out, gazes fondly at and polishes it. The device actually changes colors as the music pulses, reminding me that (unfortunately) disco isn’t dead. But I would be quite happy if that Bee Gees’ era speaker perished in an inferno, disco or otherwise. Holy ear and eye assault!

Bereft of peace of mind and holding my ears while steering down a dark and rainy stretch of roadway with deer popping out at various intervals, I nevertheless manage to clasp my hands in prayer. “Lord, should our vehicle careen off the road, please allow that wireless speaker to be first among the casualties.”

Rest in peace in the Hereafter, all mobile music devices, next to the youthful deejays who mistakenly thought you were a good idea.