The Dackel Princess

Chop, chop, chop!

I spent the morning pondering whether nor not I had enough cucumbers to make my Moon Glow pickles or not. I stared into the vegetable bin and counted and tried to guage their size.

I decided that I did and so I began to peel, scoop and chop the cucumbers up, with the assistance of the lovely Emily!

We spent about an hour doing this before we found that we had exactly the correct amount of cucumbers needed for the batch! The cucumbers, onions, peppers, etc. are now soaking in a salt water solution until the morning.

I wasn’t in the mood for much more domestic work, but I’d promised Em that we would make a pizza for lunch, so we did do that. Nothing like a home made pizza.

After lunch I was totally lazy and lay down with the puppies and fell asleep in my chair for an hour or so.

Dinner was a trip to Canoe for salads and some sweet and sour calamari with friends.

Did you ever have one of those days? You know, the kind where by the end of the day you think perhaps wearing a necklace of garlic might have been appropriate? Well, Monday was that sort of day. Let me tell you about it.

The day dawned hot and humid. I dressed in my “going to the doctor in the summer” outfit, and Hubby, our friend from Germany and I headed to Boston for my eye appointment. Actually, while I had my eye appointment, Hubby would show her a little of the beautiful city of Boston.

We arrived early and off they went. I’d decided to grab a nice cup of coffee, walk around a little and then grab a sandwich and go to my appointment.

I walked over to one of my favorite coffee shops. A month ago a friend had given me a gift card for this store and until now, I hadn’t had a chance to use it. I went in and talked with the nice guy working there, and then selected my coffee and ordered a cup to go.

I stood at the next counter fixing my brew, and a young man came up next to me with his cup of coffee and started to fix his. What happened next shocked me! You see, in this high priced coffee shop, I was mugged!!!

The man looked at me and then poured his coffee down my shirt!!! I reacted quickly and pushed myself backward, but the hot coffee got the front of my blouse! I stood there for a moment, and the staff yelled at the man and charged toward him, but he turned and fled.

It was then that I realized I’d been mugged!

Not in the usual sense, of course, but mugged nonetheless. I was frazzled by the attack. I was wearing a pretty cream colored blouse and suddenly it was drenched in coffee. We got a container of Tide and I went to work in the ladies room sink. I washed and scrubbed and soon the coffee was gone, but the shirt was soaked. I tried to put it back on, but found I was looking very much like the obscene loser of a wet T-shirt contest!

The staff felt terrible and they gifted me with extra coffee beans and even a sandwich, but I was soaked. So I went to a gift shop nearby and bought a navy blue t-shirt with the word “BOSTON” printed on it. I suppose to commemorate the days events.

I then hoofed it over to my eye appointment and got some really great news! My vision, without glasses is now 20/20 in both eyes!!! The only glasses I need are for reading. Best of all, my eyes have both healed well and Dr. W. is thrilled with the outcome.

I then called Hubby as I left the office so we could meet up at The Parker House. I had started to walk when all of a sudden, the sky opened and it began to pour. With no umbrella, Hubby and I soon were soaked (our friend had a rain poncho).

We headed back toward the car and I realized I needed to get my parking stub validated for the parking garage. So while Hubby went to the car, I raced back to Dr. W.’s office. I walked in and the office staff looked at me! I looked like a drowned rat! Her secretary smiled (she knew the entire coffee story) and giggled a little and said, “Do I want to ask?”. I just laughed and said that today even Mother Nature wasn’t giving me a break!

Despite the strangeness of the day, I am happy with how it all ended.

Hubby has been taking a lot of pictures this past week and unfortunately I am in them. I say this because even though I have tried very hard to lose some weight, I am not doing at all well. And at way over 40 years old, the changes to my body are not good. Not good at all!

It’s summer. The one time of the year when you feel like eating hot-dogs and hamburgers, barbecued ribs, and all sorts of summer foods that are not conducive to reducing the waistline.

I try to eat a little less, perhaps choose a salad over eating all of the fries, but it is hard. I also have found that during the summer I love to cook and then, of course, I cook what I eat.

It would be far better that I not enjoy eating and just the cooking part of all of this.

But, I digress.

Hubby, taking pictures and me in them. Bah! I thought perhaps there might be one or two that were fairly good, but today when I downloaded the pictures I saw something I hadn’t realized.

My stomach now looks like I am pregnant. My backside, well we just won’t go into what “IT” looks like! Talk about depressing! Now Hubby assures me that this is not the case and it was just a bad angle, but I am feeling self conscious, and when I feel self conscience I tend to eat.

Not a good remedy to the current problem.

So I guess I will have to do something drastic, like go on a starvation diet. (Only kidding!) I just don’t want to let this get out of hand so that little children begin to think that Santa Claus and I are related!

One positive thing about my current appearance, my hair is getting long. Maybe it will grow really long and I can hide under it!