Getting Married? Better call Bernice.

Once again, it's time for a trip down memory lane. Time to stumble over the cracked sidewalk of my brain to pay a visit to one of the primary influences in my life. We've already had a colorful conversation with Grampa Pete. And eaten a green tomato pie with Grandma Peg. Now it's Saturday afternoon and Grandma Bernice is waiting. And that's pronounced Bernice, as in rhyming with furnace. Not burr-neice.

I mentioned before that I grew up in a small town two blocks away from both sets of grandparents. I suggest, if possible, everyone should do this.

Grandma Bernice lived across the street from my high school. So her house was often a required stop on my way home. Remember how Grandma Peg could bake pies? Well, Grandma Bernice baked wedding cakes. If you went to a wedding in our church, you probably ate Grandma's cake three times out of four.

When my sister and I were younger, we would have fun looking through Grandma Bernice's old wedding cake books from the 60's and 70's. A lot of yellow and orange frosting was used back then. Sometimes Grandma would let my sister and I practice our frosting technique on a piece of wax paper. I could never make a recognizable rose out of frosting, but I sure enjoyed disposing of the attempts.

Grandma Bernice died in 2001. But Lady Di and I will always remember our favorite wedding cake from her. It was a three tiered white cake with a lemon poppy seed cake topper. And, yes, we did freeze it and eat it a year later. Well, actually it was a year and a couple of months because we forgot about it. It aged very well in that year. Now Lady Di has all of Grandma Bernice's old cake decorating tools and she has put them to good use on the kids' birthday cakes.

The first cake is N1S's volcano (or planet Mustafar if you are a Star Wars geek). The next cake was SP's Barbie cake for her last birthday.
Since Grandma couldn't make me a wedding cake every day, she usually popped popcorn for me when I would stop in on my walk home from school. We would sit in her living room, eat popcorn and play Kings in the Corner or watch television. I would have to watch grandma-type shows, but I honestly didn't mind it much. Now I can watch bowling, Lawrence Welk and Match Game reruns and actually enjoy them.

Grandma Bernice was very active. She was on a bowling team and had the trophies to prove it. She also went dancing with Grampa two to three times per week. When I was in college they would often surprise me with a care package of some sort on their way to their dance. I can honestly say that I was the only guy in the frat house that ever got visits from their grandparents. And I didn't get teased about it once. I think my roommates liked my care packages too.

Grandma Bernice was a hard worker. She grew up on a farm, farmed with Grandpa until 'retiring' and moved into town. She was a typical Lutheran church basement lady. She was superintendent of the Sunday School for multiple years. She held just about every church office there was, and when others her age started to 'slow down', she took the job of cleaning the church every week just for something to keep active.

I have a lot to thank Grandma Bernice for. I appreciated her while she was alive and miss her now that she is gone. She was mostly business but also had a funny side.

She would always tell the same joke while reading an auction notice from the newspaper. The ad would list the items up for auction and then state that 'lunch would be served on the grounds'. And she would ask us every time, "Why would they serve food on the ground?"

If it was one of her wedding cakes, I would have no problem brushing off a little dirt.

Post of the Seven Veils

I have been graciously tagged by The Good, the Bad and the Ugly to list seven weird things about myself. It was over a month ago so that I doubt she even remembers tagging me. But, like an elephant, I didn't forget. Last January I was similarly tagged to come up with seven interesting things about myself and then tag seven more to do the same.

Once again, I am severely tempted to go the easier route and make up 7 untruths about myself for reasons of interest. But since I have never lied or embellished anything on this blog before, I find telling falsehoods uncomfortable. I hope you bought that.

So anyway, here they come.

My first four items of personality involve food.

1. I do not like to eat eggs. Well, most eggs. I will eat an omelet on occasion since it is mostly cheese, ham and hash browns. I can also eat scrambled eggs only if they are hot and loaded with cheese, ham and hash browns.

2. I love to eat cake. I even have a whole set of rules about eating cake. My first ever post on this blog was about cake. You can read it if you are curious about cake, but you probably are not.

3. I love school cafeteria food. I know I am in the minority, but I just love to eat there. It's probably because most school cafeteria food can be classified as either, fried or sweet. And when they serve french toast sticks, it's both. Now that Sweet Pea and Number One Son are both in school, I have many opportunities to join them for lunch when I am not working. I can also lean over to one of them and ask, "I'll trade you my stewed tomatoes for your tri-tater-tot."

4. The last food related quirk about me is that I like to mix corn with my mashed potatoes. That may sound weird to some of you, but I know there are a lot of you out there that do the same thing. Don't be embarrassed. Go ahead and give the waitress something to talk about back in the kitchen of your favorite restaurant.

5. Over half way to the end. Hang in there. One thing I definitely do not like is foot massages. My feet are too ticklish for any touching. I also don't care for back rubs or any kind of massages much. If I'm tense, I'll lay down on the couch and watch "The Office".

6. Let's get back to something I like to do. There is a sport that I enjoy to watch on television every four years. It is played during the winter Olympics, and it is called curling. For those who know what curling is, I'm sure you're eyes are rolling back into your skull from boredom just thinking about it. For some reason heavy stones sliding across the ice and knocking into each other entertains me. It's also fun to cheer on the sweepers and maybe hope that one will slip. But, sadly, they never do. In the last winter Olympics, the USA team got the bronze medal. That team was from Bemidji, MN and we visited the team captain's pizza restaurant. It was odd seeing an Olympic athlete tossing pizza dough behind the window. I so wanted to see him wearing his Olympic medal while spreading pepperoni, but it must have been at the medal polisher shop that week.

7. For those who made it this far, your reward is soon approaching.
When I was around six or seven years old, my Mom would take me to the mall to shop. I would be bored out of my mind while she looked at bolts of fabric and sewing patterns. During these times my mind would wander and I would people watch. Everyone I watched seemed more interesting than me, so I thought up something to make myself more exciting. My idea was to walk around the mall with an odd limp. In my mind, I thought everyone who saw me would wonder, "How did he get that limp?", "I wonder what happened to that kid.", "That poor kid. I should buy him some ice cream."

As I think about it now, they were probably feeling sorry for my mother for having such a nerdy kid.

Well, if you made it to the end, congratulations, you don't have to read any more. Give yourself a pat on the back.

I'm not going to tag anyone because I always end up tagging the same people over and over. If you would like to share seven of your innermost secrets, then I tag you. Just let me know when you do, so I can limp over to your blog to read them.

Happy Birthday to Us.

Sweet Pea finally had her real birthday. She turned six this weekend. I know we already had a couple parties for her when the grandparents visited, but that didn't mean we could skip the actual day. Lady Di and I stopped by Sweet Pea's school to volunteer on her birthday. She was pretty excited. Later on we took her out for supper to Space Aliens and then back home for cake and a bonfire. The cake was pretty much the climax to the day.

Lady Di, once again, outdid herself decorating SP's cake. This was SP's first ever Barbie cake. We blindfolded her before presenting her cake so I could get a picture of her reaction. My timing was off, of course, and I managed to take of picture of a blindfolded Sweet Pea. Once she saw the cake she squealed, "Hey! That's my Barbie!"

Needless to say, she loved her cake and noticed many of the little details Lady Di included. Barbie had a frosting crown with matching frosting earrings. She then opened gifts which were all, "Exactly what I've always wanted.", according to her. Then we all watched the bonfire turn different colors from burning her wrapping paper.

I decided to borrow SP's birthday and celebrate a little myself while she was in school. I treated myself to a day of accomplishing nothing except fun. I happened to have the day off so I slept in after the kids went off to school. I then treated myself to a new bicycle. I've had my old bike for ten plus years and it was starting to show its age. I haven't been in the market for a bike for a while so I was obviously shocked at what a real bike costs. Instead of Walmart, I went to an actual bike shop. They had some pretty amazing bikes. I had to steer clear of the four digit price tags and settled on a nice mid priced mountain bike. I then had to accessorize and found a great pair of spandex neon colored biker shorts with a matching helmet. Lady Di saved me from embarrassment by talking me out of them.

Now, with nice weather and a new bike, I am all out of excuses for avoiding exercise. Maybe, the kids and I can go for a ride and give Lady Di a little peace for Mother's Day. Happy Birthday SP. Happy Mother's Day Lady Di and to all mothers today.

Don't Forget the Lyrics

What ever happened to the Happy Birthday song? Growing up, the Happy Birthday song pretty much stayed the same through the years. Every birthday day party would culminate with a cake, candles, and the song. Nobody would want to start the song, so a few people kind of half started until everyone could join in. Inevitably, the person who started the song would always start it either too high or too low. Then, uncomfortable screeches or gurgled rumblings would occur on the second to last stanza, causing giggles and groans until everyone finally got together at the end to shout the phrase 'too you!'. Sometimes some joker would add, 'And many more.' to the end. Or a child would start the 'How old are you" verse until Mom would give him 'The Look' that would cause his voice to sheepishly fade out.

I do like the verse about looking and smelling like a monkey though.

Then about 5 years ago I started hearing a slightly new version of the song. After our oldest started preschool, he came home with little extras added to the song.

It seems that quite a few 'cha, cha, cha's had been added after each stanza. As in, "Happy Birthday to you. Cha, Cha, Cha. Happy Birthday to you. Cha, Cha, Cha. Happy Birthday dear Whatsizname. Cha, Cha, Cha. Happy Birthday to yooooooooou. Cha, Cha, Cha.

This was pretty cute when our youngun sang this the first time, complete with the booty shake that goes with the Cha, Cha, Cha's. After a few years a 'Hi-yah' was added to the last Cha,Cha,Cha. And it wasn't just our child. I heard the Cha Cha's at multiple parties from N1S's friends. Where did this come from? How can the Birthday Song change? Are we breaking a law, singing it that way?

Now I know that time moves forward. Sometimes things change. It's fun for the kids. It's still a cute song. But now the kids have gone too far with the song. Our kids have added rhyming verses at the end of the song to prolong the torture.

The song now ends with a chant like this.

Happy Birthday, to you.

Cha, Cha, Cha!

Hi-yah!

Cut the cake!

Belly ache!

Scooby Doo!

Pikachu!

Pizza too!

I love you! (this one they reserve for family members only)

Followed by peals of squealing giggles, then and only then, are the cake and ice cream ready to eat. By the time they are done with the song the ice cream is already melting and the cake surface is covered with a thin coat of candle wax. Those of you who know me, know that I don't wait for cake well.

I know N1S created the added chant and sinisterly brainwashed his sister and her friends to shout it after every birthday song. I'm wondering if anyone else sings alternate versions of the Birthday Song. Does anyone else say Cha, Cha, Cha, or is it a local preschool teacher scheme. Can I cut the cake without getting a belly ache?

Cake

Lady Di must have read my mind tonight and made brownies. The chocolate, gooey ones with chocolate frosting. She makes them so they stick together and you can just press your fork flat into them to eat them. You don't even have to wait overnight to let them set. So after having my piece, (plus a narrow row when she wasn't looking) , I followed it all with a big glass of milk. So why do dairy products always go so well with cake products. It doesn't matter what kind of cake a person eats. Chocolate, marble, carrot, wedding, milk always is a good match. The only thing better than milk with cake, is ice cream with cake. For some reason, after that bite of cake and frosting, milk or ice cream just washes the mouth sweetly clean for the next bite.

No other beverage comes close to milk for cake. Just try orange juice or apple juice. They just won't work. Beer sometimes works at the end of the evening, but it probably doesn't matter much what you are eating by then.
My favorite cake or bar to eat is pumpkin bars with cream cheese frosting. The cream cheese frosting offers another dairy connection to cake. Lady Di makes awesome pumpkin bars too. I wonder how clean I will have to get the garage to get some pumpkin bars.

I know this is my second post about cake. I don't think that's too obsessive. Not for cake, anyway.