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Heads or Tails category this week: “SHAKE”
Well, there are two things that came to my mind when I read the theme for this week. A memory of my childhood. Well, actually BOTH of the items I thought of came from my youth. When I was a youngster of 5 or 6, each Saturday after my dad got home from work, I, my brother, my sister and my mother were are cleaned up nice for a night out for dinner. It wasn’t anything fancy, no sit down type restaurant; those kind were unaffordable by my parents’ one worker income! But,none the less, we were happy to be able to go out to eat. It was in Lincoln, Nebraska, right down town on the main street. That was “O” street. It still IS considered main street, tho it’s now part of ‘old town’ Lincoln. The place was a drive-up type where you sit in the car and eat, or order and take it home. We were all gussied up to sit in the car! LOL Still, I remember the fun time had by us all. The drive up was called “The Mug”. Outside the building, even from the distance of about a mile or so, driving along and waiting for traffic lights to change green, on the horizon, I could see peeking through the front seat [back in those days the front seat was a 'whole seat' with the backrest flipping down for the ones who rode along in the back seat could get into the car...there was a slim gap between dad's backrest and mom's [the passenger] —anyway, I could peek through there and see this huge, monstrous, colossal, giant chocolate sculpture –a billboard like, and it was a chocolate Milk Shake…in the “Mug”. They were thick, icy cold, sweet, and oh such a Saturday night time treat for us all. Oh we all ordered cheeseburgers with the shakes.
Then, a bit older but still a child of probably pre teen, I remember a commercial of a new product that was sweeping the nation. It was called….Shake N Bake! Not only was the commercial insipid, but so was the product! Of course my mom, who loved to cook by the way, wanted to try it. You know, something new. Something that would make her meal not so mundane for her loved ones. She convinced dad to buy the two kinds….the pork, and the chicken. Now my mother’s fried chicken was out of this world ‘southern fried’. And her fried pork chops were always good too. [I, tho, really liked the potatoes and the gravy from the pan drippings most!] Anyway, we helped or watched her prepare the new stuff. It smelled good while cooking…we all sat down at the table [yes, back then, if you didn't eat with the parents at 'dinner time' you were out of luck! You missed your chance! We ALL sat at the table and dined together!] So, we sat down -dad was always first to get his share and then he’d pass it to us kids…we each got a chop or a piece of chicken…and all the other fixin’s —ready, eat! Ewwwwwwww. Nasty!!! Needless to say, none of us got a chance to say to everyone “No daddy, it’s Shake n Bake, and I he’pt”!! It never came in our house again. Mom’s from scratch cookin’ was soooo much better.
photo above IS Lincoln Nebraska and it’s main street “O” Street. Circa 1940′s.
courtesy of internet photo search.
~…end Heads or Tails
[comment here if you'd like to skip my Google Browser Beta below]
Sunday afternoon, after reading about the new browser for anyone to download and install, I thought I’d give it a try. Well, I did! And I disliked it from the get-go. Let me explain….
- With Firefox you have so many options and so many ad-on features that I did NOT find with Google Chrome. And the ONE THING that I really ‘need’ while browsing is the Ad Block! While working with the new browser I opened some of my bookmarks that were automatically imported to Google’s new browser that was an option as installing. I began clicking on those bookmarks of mine and so many ads and animations began to appear! No way! So, tho it seems pretty well organized, I would prefer my Firefox. That, to me, is the most user friendly browser around. Nope…Google Chrome Browser, while the features are somewhat innovative and less cluttered, there just aren’t my favorite features available while I surf the net. It’ll continue to be Firefox usage for me. I’ll wait a while and then test drive the new browser again to see if there are any features that make more sense in the future. Also, Google’s new browser, as with Google Earth, and many more exe files from Google’s downloads, it seems that privacy is not an issue with those that program their new files for the computer and internet users. And, by the way, it is STILL in Beta, so there WILL be a lot of tweaking before it’s all set up with the best features possible, I suppose.
She was one of three girls in her family of siblings. 12 children in all! She was the 4th oldest of her immediate family. And of course, being from such a large family, you’d no doubt guess that her family was of a farming community. I remember the house she grew up in as I was privileged to be there most weekends until I was five, when we moved to Colorado because of my dad’s job. The house was huge…Three stories. I can still vividly see ‘my room’ where I slept when I stayed there for weekends. How I loved that room. It was almost ‘turret-like’…odd shaped walls…not just your ordinary squared off rooms…the walls were angled and had bay windows both facing south and west. From the south window I could get up from the feather-tick mattress and see the huge barn and the tractor ruts out into the fields of corn! To the west, looking out the window I could see the iron of the sky-high windmill!! And below this the spring and just beyond the windmill, the chicken coop in the distance along with a huge field of hay and grazing cattle. How I loved this place, and how I wish I could turn back time. When my grandparents passed, the 16 section piece of farm was sold, and the huge house was moved to ‘town’. So much for going back in time, huh?
She graduated from high school [back in those days that was an accomplished life!]. She met my dad at a high school baseball game. [Hmmmmmmm, wonder why I love baseball so much?] They both lived a wonderful marriage for over 55 years. Birthing five children of their own [three naturally, and home deliveries -while my youngest older brother and myself were born in hospitals], living and surviving through the Great Depression. I remember one particular story about them owning a car but the headlights went dead in the car [back then, there weren't batteries as we know today] —and in order to get back home, my mom propped herself on the hood of the car, in the dark, in order for my dad to drive the country roads…seeing only by my mother holding a flashlight in front of the car’s hood!!. They loved traveling the USA –camping mostly where here again, it wasn’t much of a ‘vacation for her’ as she did cooking and cleaning and laundry while they took 3 state wide trips to see the country! With absolutely no complaining. To me, today, that’s 
Over the years we’d become quite the confidants in my life; me and my mother! She told me stories of her youth, and her young teen-aged life; stories she never shared with any others. Two of her favorite songs that she’d sing at the top of her lungs was “You Don’t Know Me” along with Ray Charles, and “Secret Love” by Doris Day. She once told me of a ‘secret love’ of hers. One of which my father, to his dying days, was jealous of…so I’m assuming that it wasn’t too ‘secret’ with him. More so with her kids. It was a classmate of hers. And a twist of fate brought my father and us to Colorado because of his skilled reputation in his line of work for the government, that lo and behold we learned my mother’s secret love 
My mom, in her later years, suffered and survived four strokes!! She loved my Bud. Those two were inseparable!! He was a favorite for her of all the ‘in-laws’. The two adored each other and had quite a wonderful, and meaningful ‘son-mother’ relationship. I think secretly she knew he was the best of the lot of her kids’ spouses. LOL When she had her 5th stroke, she recognized no one but Bud! It was a very tearful time, she couldn’t speak, but her eyes glowed at the end…she lit up the room when Bud entered with her acknowledgment of him, and as the two of us…Bud and myself sat at her bedside, she breathed her last.
