This really is a snake and it really was in our friend's dishwasher after their house flooded last week.
It made me consider just how dangerous housekeeping can be if done properly.
Just today I went to do some laundry and BAM.....................
No laundry today........................
I must consider my safety ........I mean, who would pick everyone up from school if I was dead on the bathroom floor from a bite from this guy?
Then I thought about doing a little dusting since you could pretty much write a novel with your finger on any surface in our house............but BAM.............
EEEK!.....................safety first.
I "WANTED" to cook something fabulous for dinner
but......................................
..........looks like it's another Chick-a Vay kind of night.
And with all this spare time I had left........
since I couldn't do my normal "Wednesday housekeeping" schedule,
I EVEN considered going upstairs for the monthly viewing of "What In God's Name Have The Kids Been Doing Up Here".........
but, alas........................................
Blocked. No upstairs for me today.
Finally, I considered bathing Ruthie since she smells like rotting wet gym socks,
but even THAT plan was ruined.
So I guess I have no choice but to sit on the couch and clean a few Oprahs off the ol' DVR.
I think my friend's snake-in-the-dishwasher episode was God's way of saying, "Take it easy on the housekeeping.........things could get dangerous."
Some of the "BIG TIME" bloggers out there often feature a guest blogger.
I guess that's what happens when you are so HUGE and IMPORTANT, you have to have someone guest post just so you can have a day or two to answer your gabillion emails.
I do not have that problem................however, I'm going to post a story that Trey's friend/client/golf buddy/tennis buddy/racquetball buddy sent me this morning.
It is hugely entertaining in a creepy kind of way! Enjoy!
Ladies and Gentlemen..........I give you my very first guest blog entry.....by Ken L.
By: Ken L.
Saturday afternoon, about 1pm.
The golf tournament is on and its time for me to have lunch, kick back on the couch and dine while watching Tiger stomp the field.
As usual, I asked Kim to make me a sandwich for lunch. She brought me the sandwich, but then I needed a nice, cool beverage to wash it down with.
"Kim", I hollered from my reclined dining position on the coach, eyes still affixed to the TV, "will you bring me a drink please, too".
She opened the dishwasher to grab a clean glass and I then heard.....
...Ok, the gears start turning and burning in my head. What would possibly cause her to shriek like that.....
Did she cut herself? No, not a bloody scream.
Did the dishwasher fall out of the holder? No, the scream had too much emphasis.This was important!
Did the dogs eat something gross? No, not enough disgust in the scream.
"Oh", I thought, "The dogs ate my chips off the counter" A usual issue here at our house.
But then I heard it....
"Kenny....THERE'S A SNAKE IN THE DISHWASHER!!!!!"
I jumped from the couch, heaved the dishwasher open, and TADAAAH....
There was a snake in the dishwasher!
Ok...stay calm. Hmmm...Do I kill it, do I catch it....Oh, I got it.......lets get the camera and take pictures!!!!!!
So I got a few good pics. But then he started to slither away....now what.
If he gets away, where does he go? Will he be back? Are there more? Is that thing poisonous? Hmmm....
...and all the while I ponder he is disappearing from sight....THINK FAST!!!!!
I grabbed some tongs from the kitchen, but they were really short. Too short for me, in fact. I wasn't getting bit, that’s for sure.
Here is what the experts say about a pit viper bite, which is what a moccasin is (Cottonmouth)...
The cardinal signs and symptoms of pit viper envenomation include: burning pain (the commonest, earliest sign), puncture wound (50% of the time accompanied by a bloody ooze), swelling, skin discoloration, nausea and vomiting, minty, metallic, rubbery taste in the mouth, sweating, chills, numbness and tingling of the mouth, face, scalp, and wound site, ecchymosis and production of blebs and blisters, erythema and edema progressing from the wound site, weakness, vertigo, haematemesis epistaxis, muscle fasiculations, paralysis, shock, convulsions, loss of sphincter control, melena haematuria, and renal shutdown. Envenomation may include some or all of these symptoms, depending on the severity of envenomation.
yeah, not for me.....
Then Kim says, "If he disappears and you can't show me a dead snake, I am outta here!!!!!"
Well, gotta do what you gotta do.
I grabbed the tools from the garage and started to dismantle the dishwasher in record time, all the while thinking the vibrations from the drill was pissing that thing off and it was gonna jump out any minute.
I couldn't properly dismantle the dishwasher, so I did what any male would do in this situation...
use brute force, a hammer, and a crowbar!!!!!
I got the dishwasher lid off, which is where the snake had gone. I could see him in there, just chillin'.
I took the lid of the dishwasher outside and threw it off into the street.
There it was...a juvenile water moccasin!!!!
He was PISSED!!!!! He was striking every time I got near him. He was small, but I have heard that regardless of the size, they pack a pretty good wallop of poison.
So, as any typical man would do, I chopped his head off with a shovel.....
We then had to head to Best Buy for a new dishwasher. The old one was just that, old. It still worked well, but I can guarantee you it wasn't going to be put back together and still function properly.
So, by the time all this is said and done, that'll be almost $900, with installation.
That works out to about $85/inch of moccasin.
The million dollar question.....
Are there more?
This was a pretty small snake...a juvenile. Where are his brothers and sisters?
HAPPY EARLY MOTHER'S DAY TO ME! HAPPY EARLY MOTHER'S DAY TO ME! HAPPY EARLY MOTHER'S DAY TO ANDREA............. HAPPY EARLY MOTHER'S DAY TO ME! (Thank you dear family for the $uper awe$ome ticket.......college fund shmollage fund, right?) Last night, I had the privilege of going to see My Stevie and some other people on stage with her Fleetwood Mac and it was truly magical..................not as magical as when Stevie tours by herself, but magical nonetheless:-)
I had a 12th row floor seat on Stevie's side of the stage and right off the bat made a new "Stevie Friend"! Her name is Sheila and she was sitting by herself just like me!
I think my fairy godmother fixed it so we could sit together and meet!
Meeting new "Stevie Friends" is sooo much fun.....last year I met a gentleman named Ryan at the Woodlands concert and we still email occasionally! Stevie friends have a special bond:-) ha!
Sheila is also a crazed fan well-informed fan just like me! It's so awesome to sit next to someone who KNOWS their stuff, and let me tell you, Sheila knows:-)
She said her son had introduced her to Fleetwood Mac years ago and she had been hooked ever since. I hope to see Sheila at the next concert because I KNOW she will be there!
When I was standing in line earlier in the evening, I was chatting with this gal named Megan. Megan was what I like to call, "First Semester Stevie."
She was saying things like, "Stevie and Lindsey used to be a couple" and "I don't think Stevie has ever had any children." DDDDUUUUUHHHHHHH!
I liked Megan, and while I admired her interest in all things Stevie, she had such a long way to go, I kinda felt sorry for her.
Here are some of my high points/thoughts:
Gold Dust Woman: This song is a drug. It should be illegal in most states. Stevie turns into this high priestess and at the end of the song, she turns her back to the audience and spreads out the witchy gold shawl (reserved ONLY for this song in every concert). Watching this song alone is worth the ticket price.
The Gropey-Dopey LOVERS in front of me: I have no idea why these two paid for floor seats because all they saw were each other's eyeballs while swapping spit THE ENTIRE NIGHT. I felt it was almost disrespectful to FM to not give them their full attention, but that's just me. Why couples need to convince those around them that they are in love baffles me. I think I saw more of their tongues than I did of Stevie's........and Stevie had her mouth open all night SINGING.
Sara: GORGEOUS.....she changed it up just like on her Soundstage CD that recently came out. I love how at the end she included the lyrics that you couldn't really hear on the original track AND included a new lyric. All I ever wanted/was to know/that you were dreaming/Sara and then the new lyric of And the wind became/crazy.
Costume Changes: There is ONLY one good thing about seeing Stevie leave the stage while we are forced to endure get to enjoy a 20 minute one of these:
(A Lindsey Buckingham ego booster guitar solo. I mean, I KNOW he is INSANELY talented and is responsible for producing all the awesome touches that make FM songs so special, but I'm not there to see him, so forgive my attitude)
The solo in "Im So Afraid" went on. and on. and on. for...............ever.
BUT, back to the only good reason to see her leave the stage..........A Costume CHANGE! This red dress was my FAVORITE! (Before the beginning of the concert, Sheila says to me, "I can't wait to see the red dress." At that moment I knew she was officially my new Stevie friend......she even knew the EXACT costume changes.........that's what real Stevie fans know:-)
I know what you are thinking..................
I bet you are saying to yourself EXACTLY what I was saying to myself................
"This dress is so reminiscent of her album cover "The Other Side of The Mirror"from 1989"
Well, guess what?
YOU ARE EXACTLY RIGHT! That's EXACTLY what I thought, too!
My personal Shout Out: This is Stevie hugging Lindsey telling him, "See! Andrea's in the audience! I'm so glad she came!"
Another costume change: You can't really see it, but this dress had sparklies all over the top and a flowy whispy skirt. Notice how she is looking my way? Coincidence? I think not. She knows where I am.
Looking for Stevie Outfits: One of my FAVORITE things to do at a FM/SN concert is to search for my next outfit idea. It's so neat to be walking through the crowd and look at someone dressed in their Stevie-Garb and smile at each other as if to say, "She's your fairy godmother, too?"
This chick had the dress specially made for her with the big flowy sleeves and she also had this fabulous head dress........................................ that had sparkly things in the feathers. WAY COOL.
Note to self: Have dress/headdress made for next concert
Mick Fleetwood's Introductions: I love the way Mick calls her Stephanie. It's cute.
Mick's CRAZY INSANE Drum Solo: He CRACKS me up. He should have been a front-man. He talked to the audience in this crazy "Mick Language." I think crowds RARELY get "into" drum solos, but with Mick............the crowd goes nuts.
I also loved "Second Hand News"----download it right now if you don't have it. It's fun.
Well, I could go on and on and on about every little note of every little song, but you get the picture!
It was an incredible night and I'm such a lucky girl to have received such a great Mother's Day gift from my guys!
Well.........I'm officially RAW from trying on 5,000 different combinations of shawls with different colors under them and I've decided to go with boring BLACK!
I'm fixin' to about to walk out the door! I'm so excited! I'll give a FULL report tomorrow because I KNOW you all are waiting with anticipation to hear how my date with myself went!
I'm going to try and not send daggar eyes toward Lindsey Buckingham when he goes into his 20 minute long guitar solos.........or what I like to call them......"wasted time that could be spent listening to Stevie sing."
As a general rule, birds scare the bejeezies out of me.
But not this one.
I'm so excited.........in less than 24 hours I will be at the Toyota Center right smack dab in front of my fairy godmother. I've been trying out shawls all night trying to decide on my outfit!
WOW---there sure is a lot of "negative space" on my page with this picture.
This is me typing a bunch of words to take up the "dead space" that this picture has left.
Words, words, words, words, words...........Now is the time for all good men to come to the aid of their country. (That's what my mother used to type in the typewriter to wow me with her mad typing skillz)
Here I am typing more words just to make the post look prettier because I didn't really have anything to say, I just loved this picture and wanted a light hearted funny thing to post today.
Here are some more words, I am typing words, if there were someone watching me right now, they would think I was typing a real post and not just filling up space.
I was reading a blog post this morning from Tried and True Cooking With Heidi, and she was talking about how some recipes are yummy, but not particularly "photogenic".
This, my friends, is one of those recipes.
It's one of our FAVORITE things to eat around here, but isn't exactly what you would call "culinary eye candy".
But I promise you.............it's YUM.
I'm calling it "Salado Stroganoff" because it's what my mom used to make at least once a week and I never saw her use a recipe.
When my sister and I go home to Salado, this us usually what we request mom make for us:-)
Here are the ingredients: ****This is for a double amount, the original recipe is half of everything I've listed***
2 pounds hamburger 10 slices of bacon, cooked and crumbled 1 yellow onion, chopped 1 Large Family sized can Cream of Mushroom 1 small can Cream of Mushroom 3/4 cup milk (ish.....maybe more) 2 TABLESPOONS Paprika 1 package Egg Noodles Salt and Peppah
First, take out your Pampered Chef 12" Family Skillet. If you do not own one of these, get on Ebay at this very moment and get one. It's my favorite piece of cookware in the whole world. I use it every. single. day.
"Fry you up" about 10 pieces of bacon. I'm extremely picky about frying bacon. My secret is "cookin it low and flippin it often".
If you just said to yourself:
"Hey...I'll just use that pre-cooked bacon, or the microwaveable kind instead of messing up my whole kitchen with greasy gunk and smelling up the whole house"
Go immediately to the bathroom and wash your mouth out with soap. You need a spanking.
Be a real woman, get your skillet out, and stop talking nonsense.
Can you just SMELL this? Ahhhhhhh.....hello my friend. As in all dealings with pigs..........you can't RUSH a pig. Whether you are clipping one or frying one.......you must be patient. Now here's the part where it gets kinda icky and you are probably going to say, "YUCK...I'm not making this". You must SAVE about this much bacon grease and leave it in the pan. I would say there is maybe a cup?
I didn't put "1 cup bacon grease" in the recipe above because I didn't want you to throw up or call the American Heart Association and report me. Add your chopped onion to the grease and let them hang out and get to know each other.
Until they look brown and yummy like this. Then add the hamburger meat to all that greasy oniony goodness and cook the bejezies out of it. While you are cooking the Vat O' Heart-Attack hamburger mixture, crumble the bacon. You can try to do it with a knife, but you will just frustrate yourself and end up with bacon all over the counter, so just use your fingers from the get-go. And don't forget to "accidentally drop" some of that bacon on the floor. It's the perfect way to maintain the status of "Most Favorite Awesome Human" with the pups. After you have the artery clogging hamburger mixture cooked, drain all the grease off. (At this point, I put it in a "pot" because it makes it easier to stir later) Add the crumbled bacon............. the Cream of Mushroom soup............ the milk............ a good "handful" of salt.......... a good "handful" of peppah.......... and the 2 TABLESPOONS of Paprika. (or, if you prefer, "Pap-A-Ree-kah") Basically all the "pap-a-ree-kah" is going to do is to change it from a dog-food-looking shade of gray to a beautiful, more edible looking shade of orangeish red. Are you still trusting me? I promise you, just stick with me. Your tummy will thank me later.
Boil the Egg Noodles (or "new-nules" as my sistah used to say) according to package directions.
And then Plate It Up!!!!! Now, in order to do this the way my mom used to do, you MUST serve this with: Green Beans and Deviled Eggs* *(Not pictured because I forgot to buy eggs and was too lazy to go back to the grocery store for the 50th time this week.)
Happy mom, Happy wife, Pet lover, Procrastinator. Lover of all things carbolicious. Fairy Godchild of Stevie Nicks (although she may not know it...our souls are connected) I am at my best mid way through a Diet Coke. Class of 1990 Aggie---but I only get obnoxious about it if I'm around someone who hates Texas A&M. Married my best friend in 1991 and gained not only a husband, but my very own personal CPA for life! Two great teenage boys that are growing up too fast. Dreading the day my house will not be filled with buttloads of sweaty socks, shoes, golf clubs, golf balls, backpacks and "that's what she said" constant jokes. So glad following my "gypsy" led me to be a wife and mother.
