And what did YOU have for dinner last night?

Octopus with soy sauce and tomato...Sounds great, doesn't it?

Heh.

Unfortunately, it appears this is really a dish. According to our corespondant (yes, our. The other half of my split personality is making its rounds, so you have to put up with both of us. :P ), a few nights ago(alright, late in January), some teenage boys were having an adventure.

With octopus.

Did I mention it was live?

Evidently one of them had found some sort of recipe for these little cephalopods, and they were on a war path to try it. There are no reports on what happened to those involved in the carnage, although I think one of them is missing a nose at the moment, and no one was interested in eating the leftovers the next morning....

Interestingly enough, the boy's wild adventure with creatures from the depths (or not so depthy) sea applies to more than just their tummies.

The Law defines octopi as unclean creatures. They do not have fins or scales, which is the requirement for any water-dwelling creature to be considered "clean."

Or does it?

Our Lord redefines "clean" and "unclean" when He stated that;

"What goes into a man's mouth does not make him 'unclean,' but what comes out of his mouth, that is what makes him 'unclean.'"

Although none of our dear little squishy friends are here to hear that, it should make them happy.

I, for one, am not interested in such culinary excursions, so I will bow out from further courses.

Have I ever shared our family's Possum Recipe with you?

I Will....

I will, I will, I will, I will.

And Elle MUST keep me from doing it.

I will NOT, I will NOT, I will NOT, I will NOT, I will NOT.

So far she has vacuumed me up (she always finds that crack in the floor I hide in!), stuck me in a bottle (which I broke.), locked me into the back drawer of her desk (which I also promptly broke.)

I will NOT, I will NOT, I will NOT.

But her major mode of keeping me from doing it is hand slapping.

slap slap slap slap slap

Suddenly, I'm reduced to eating cellary.

But we have fun with it. Even when I'm not hungry, I'll pretend I'm sneaking to get a cookie, and we'll have a rousing chase all round the room, that will end up getting Ara wet, poking MD and Briggs, and spilling the cookies.

Dieting with cookies in the house is hard. But I am prevailing over the cookie!

Avoiding the Holiday Pounds--and Rush

To enjoy this commentary to the fullest, I would suggest reading We Wish You a Merry Christmas Without Us, including the comments. Since this is rather lengthy and only attached to the FCN subject in only vague strands, I decided to place it here, instead of using up FCN space.

Merry Christmas, FCN.

~~

That was funny-depressing. I'm trying to loose weight right now, guys. After I finish the cookies I made last night, I'm cutting sweets until I reach my prefered weight. For those of you that ever catch me eating, remind me of this fact if I happen to backslide. I will not be making any cookies in the foreseeable future. I will not ingest any hot chocolate until...really late in December. I will not consume any candy until January...AFTER PLNU. Bread and cheese are going off-limits, too.

All of my Christmas shopping, besides stocking stuffers, is done, and was done online the day after Christmas. I will not be purchasing See's Candy for anyone.

I WILL continue to post on my blog.

I will write Christmas Cards. Lots of Christmas cards. I do not plan to ship any gifts to my relatives. If it can't fit in a card, it's not going.

Instead of spending my days shopping, I will spend them not eating. I plan to curl up by the fireplace with a cup of hot water, and read. Or write. Or research.

Okay, so I guess you could boil everything I'm going to do down to one goal:

For every pound FCN gains, I want to lose a pound.

Isn't life so wonderfully simple sometimes? :)

NOT my Drug of Choice

Hmmm...I almost titled this post "Getting High," but that didn't quite sound right, plus I don't think that this will fulfill the normal definitions of drugging ones self into happy oblivion. Plus I didn't want to get in trouble with the IRS...I mean, well, whatever. I guess the IRS is more widely feared.

It all began last night while a friend and I were discussing weird beeping noises that emit from air freshener dispensers when they happen to be out of, well, air freshener. This got us on the discussion of things that irritate little noses when we landed back on our dear friend, air freshener. My friend walked into a room in her church that had just been exuberantly sprayed with air freshener and had to immediately sit down.

She got a "happy high" from air freshener.

~~

It all began with a tournament where there was no partner nearby to stop him. It was then that he decided to experiment. Three days and 48 cans of Coke later, he finally had to quit--cold turkey.

He got a "happy high" from Coke.

~~

It all began with my partner telling me that we really should do well at this tournament. Actually, it didn't begin with that. It all began when he told me it would be best for me to be awake before we went to our first round. As I was tired, I got a coffee. One venti with an extra shot or two has been a necessity.

I got a "happy high" from coffee.

~~

It all began when Halo III came out. He played until he could conquer. He lost a night's worth of sleep. He has re-conquered the game yet again.

He got a "happy high" from Halo III.

~~

It all began when she decided to bring "Apples to Apples." She made us all play, and play and...well, play. We got together with friends, and she brought the game. We went home, and she brought the game. We played that night. We would have played in the car, but I can't read in the car without getting sick.

She got a "happy high" from that game.

~~

It all began when he first set eyes on the little Emergen-C box. That, my friends, was the beginning of the tale. The little packages are supposed to give you an energy boost and have waaaay over your daily requirements for vitamin B. He used about a dozen packets in one day.

He got a "happy high" from the dietary supplement.

~~

It all began when she asked to bake cookies. Actually, it began long before that, but I first witnessed it when we baked the cookies. She decided we should make snickerdoodles. And put peanut butter in them. She used a lot of peanut butter in the cookies. She also ate a lot. Every physical malady can be solved by using peanut butter, in her estimation.

She got a "happy high" from peanut butter.

~~

It all began while he was searching for a snack. But a munch here, and a munch there, and suddenly, the whole box was gone.

He didn't get a "happy high" from Taquitos.

Support yer low-cal sheriff

Support yer low-cal sheriff! He's always got some weight-reducing food on hand, and is always ready to jump you through the hoops of your exercise regimen. What would the sheriff say? Go, go, go, go!

And then the temptation of Krispy-Kreme? Well, the last one in the valley just closed, and the good ol' sheriff will be more than happy to point at your gas gauge and remind you that gas is about $2.75 a gallon right now. Why not get out and take a brisk walk to the nearest jamba-juice? And make sure you get the protein boost! No, don't turn in at the starbucks. You need to be able to sleep tonight. Jamba's just up ahead...there we go.

Augh!!! NO!!! Do NOT even THINK about getting that bready item! It has sugar in it! You are simply to get a 16-oz Jamba with a protein boost. And not that dream-sickle one. Get the green tea one. That'll boost your imune system. There we go...see, its almost ready for you. Now all you need to do is walk back home and scrub the kitchen.

VIGOROUSLY! We want to clean up you! The Sheriff in Support Your Local Sheriff cleaned up the town. I'm here to clean up you! We need everything to be nice and in order so that your little house will run just as well as that little town ran under the Sheriff. And that's what I'm for! Clean! Scrub! Exercise! No coffee, no caffine, no soda, no junk! Slim down and clean out!

Don't hear it? Well, it's time to rouse your little Sheriff...Where did mine go?

Okay, let's quit being silly.

Support Your Local Sheriff is an older western movie (not too old, as it is in color) that is...pretty good, actually. The movie has a good mix of shootin' and rough-housin', along with some idiotic scenes that should make you laugh.

Story line is simple enough: Gold rush in a town, the whole world comes over to speculate, the bad guy's family takes 20% of all the gold, since the gold has to be shipped through their territory, town needs a sheriff, and James McColough just "happens to be passing through on my way to Australia." Which, he claims, is the last real frontier country. He ends up becoming the sheriff, and after lots of bang! bang!-s he defeats the bad guys, explodes Madame Orr's house (completely by accident. He didn't know the cannon was loaded!) gets married, and never makes it to Australia.

Wonderful movie. I feel a top 10 list coming on...Ought to think about that one....