Friday, May 02, 2008

Buttered Up

The kitchen has been fairly silent lately due to the whole working full time thing, not to mention that its been really nice outside so the kids and I usually end up in the yard after work rather than at the stove. But this week, in an effort to use up some various produce items that were on the brink, I threw 3 parsnips, a sweet potato, and some carrots in a skillet with an undisclosed amount of butter (read: a few tablespoons!). Sprinkle on a generous amount of nutmeg, salt, and a little cayenne, saute to desired tenderness, and you end up with a pretty tasty dish. 3/4 of our family loved it, although after Conrad tired of feeding bits of it to himself we had to throw the rest into the food processor and feed him by spoon. Kids these days...so lazy! The 4th member choked down a few carrots and, with a pinched face, said "It's good but I don't want anymore." Sigh! Pat and I also ate an entire bag of spinach at that meal. Will I ever get over the fact that spinach just wilts down to NOTHING when cooked? Probably not!

While sleeping Conrad and I waited for the 50% of our clan to get off the carousel, an older gentleman, after guessing Conrad's age precisely, remarked that about our son's "healthy" size. After agreeing, he added that his own granddaughter, who had just turned a year old, was going to be very short. I remarked that our own daughter had been a pretty petite baby, to which he replied, "Yes, my granddaughter just started wearing 3-6 month clothing." With a bit of shock I said, "Oh, she is VERY tiny." His response was, "Yeah, she's a real dwarf." Not understanding his implication, I continued remarking about what a little girl she must be, when he interrupted and, with more emphasis, said "NO...she's a REAL DWARF." Oooh!

We here in Indiana are in a unique position. Our primary votes actually COUNT! For a democrat no less! Its so very strange to receive fliers in the mail each day, see presidential ads on the TV, and to even receive personal phone calls from volunteers working for their candidate of choice. Here in the county we live in, the democratic party is basically non-existent. In our last local parade, a pick-up truck pulling a flat-bed trailer with a few old ladies sitting in lawn chairs rolled down the street amidst the various trampy dance troops and Little League teams. These ladies --the Democratic Party of Hendricks County. Pat almost jumped aboard their float as it passed to show that there was at least one male, under 50 who valued their views. It's really hard to say how the vote will go in this backwards state. My grandpa, a life long Democrat, is a racist, misogynistic farmer. (In the most lovable sort of way!) I have not asked him who he'll vote for, but I'm guessing it would be something like, "Well, he's black but its not like we can put a woman in charge." And for this mama....OBAMA!

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