Hot Dog Soup

It's been a quiet week so far, midwinter break. That means that I spent my day bouncing around in the house knowing that Nick sequestered himself in his room with only an occasional appearance. It's funny how the feeling of a house can tilt in an entirely different direction when someone is in it, even if they're quiet behind a closed door. It means that my day was more relaxed and I farted around more than usual. It means that I watched TV.

It means I made hot dog soup again. I invented hot dog soup the other day when Nick was hungry and I wanted him to eat something decent. I opened up the lunchmeat and cheese drawer and the only thing in there was crumbled feta, a hunk of old cheese, and a package of hot dogs. The vegetable drawer looked a little better, an onion, kale, cucumber, some half-dried mushrooms, and cherry tomatoes. I love when I come up with a new thing by looking at what's in the fridge and the cabinets.

Mike raised one eyebrow the other day when I told him I'd made hot dog soup. Today, he gave me the thumbs up.

The other day, he asked, "What's hot dog soup?" while at the same time wrinkling his nose.

"I started with beef broth. Then I added chopped onions, kale, garlic, and beef bouillon. I threw in leftover rice and shredded turkey, and a hot dog to give it the name."

I didn't say that I put in an old mushroom for the flavor but took it out and ate them before I served it to Nick. Nick hates mushrooms. Mike isn't a big fan of mushrooms either. I like the umami flavor. Umami is the taste of glutamate, inosinate and guanylate and aids in the digestion of protein by allowing the stomach to secrete saliva and digestive juices. I sound so smart, don't I? I read it on the Internet.

"It had vegetables in it? And he ate it?" Mike asked.

"I called it hot dog soup so he'd ignore the vegetables."

"Sounds like it worked."

"It did. He didn't say a thing about kale."

Today, I was out of fresh kale, but I had some purple Brussels sprouts I'd seen at the store. They were pretty, green and purple, so I bought them. Plus, they were local. Dr. Oz says that purple foods contain anthocyanins and promote eye and heart health. I love that you can categorize fresh foods by their color.

Hey, I said fresh foods. IT DOES NOT WORK WITH M&Ms! You do not get anthocyanins in purple M&Ms but I would eat them anyway. Mmm. M&Ms. Now you want chocolate, don't you? Me too.

Sorry about that.

I was talking about the value of purple foods. Right. I'll have to look for purple cauliflower and potatoes for Mike's heart. He can't eat Brussels sprouts. We don't mess with Mike's IBS intolerances. Know what I mean? One misplaced onion can ruin Mike's day. Mine too if we had anything planned.

So, today I'm the champion of hot dog soup with secret vegetables thrown in.

Thank you for listening, jb

My Funny Valentine

I sat at the dining table, scribbling my morning to-do list and other incoherent blather before my mind dulled into the daily grind and I forgot something that was essential for me to do. The last you heard about Blitz, he seemed to be stuck in an eternal land of fearfulness. Remember that I worried about him?

I called him dirty and afraid. He was.

As usual, Blitz walked past the legs of my chair and I dropped my left hand to let my fingers run across his back and tail as he passed. It was as soft as trailing my fingers through water.

Then, there was a thump. I stopped writing and looked down to see what was the matter. He had dropped and rolled over, paws reaching for my hand. I leaned down. He drew my hand to his head where I rubbed it and he folded his face into my palm. I could feel his canine tooth. That used to make me wonder if he was going to bite me next, the way a cat tired of rubbing sometimes does. Not Blitz. Not ever. Then, I rubbed his fuzzy dotted belly as he rolled back and forth and patted my hands with his paws.

Earlier this morning, as I trudged to the top of the stairs, Blitz lolled about on his back as Mike rubbed him all over. I had the urge to tell Mike to be more gentle but I could see that Blitz didn't need that. These days, he runs to Mike in the morning. It was another cat lesson. If that was what Seth did, run toward Mike when he got up in the morning, then Blitz followed suit.

Later in the kitchen, I noticed that when Mike used the can opener, Blitz ran in to be with him again. Mike had to stop what he was doing, bend over, rub the fuzzy belly, and explain that it was only corn today not tuna.

And when Nick got up late for school because he was still a little sick and I moved along behind him picking up dirty dishes and trying to help him get ready faster, he stopped, backpack on his shoulder, to take a moment to pet Blitz while he stood on the cat tree waiting for the farewell and have a nice day at school.

It was lovely to see, but the hasty-mom in me, the one that works to get Nick moving, gigged him because he was late and still dawdling.

"You need to get going."

Nick turned and glared at me.

"Hurry up. Everything is hurry up and I'm still a sick."

To him, petting the cats was an essential part of the morning.

Fuck. What a mom. I was just lucky he was well enough to go to school at all. His immune system had picked up so that he only missed two and a half days instead of his usual week from school.

Scientific studies have shown that pets bolster the immune system, that their dirtiness is actually a benefit. So maybe it was okay that my little cat still rolled in the litter box sometimes. Maybe it was okay that he was still a little bit dirty.

And maybe these days, he wasn't quite so afraid.

Thank you for listening, jb

A Review of 'Destiny's Gambit' by RJ Wood

When I was a kid, I did anything that gave me the sensation of flying, riding out of control downhill on a bike, pushing the wide arc in a circle behind a turning boat on skis, leaping out of a tree hoping to cling to the fat scratchy rope to get the biggest swing ever before landing on my on my feet and feeling that jangly-nervy feeling that meant I was doing it wrong, even grabbing the cables of a cargo parachute on a windy day and ending up bouncing ten feet into the air before being dragged across corn stubble left after the harvest. I did anything to feel space and time rush past me.

I never even minded sitting in the back of the boat waiting for my turn to ski either. I'd just lean out over the water and look at the water rushing under my fingertips just feeling the speed until Grandpa yelled for me to get all the way back into the boat.

The books I chose then reflected that same need, Peter Pan, Bednobs and Broomsticks, and later, Roald Dahl's book, Going Solo. I still pick adventure books this way, sometimes reading books that were intended for middle grades.

Can I read and picture myself sailing the skies?

Destiny's Gambit by RJ Wood, though I'm old and slower than I've ever been, is a book that lets me imagine I'm a kid again, feeling the rush of flying, of spinning, of rushing through a crush of flying asteroids or picturing the battle against enemy ships. It reads like a classic for middle grade readers.

The story begins with Jake, a kid who feels the frustration of being different somehow and his meandering in an attempt to understand himself. Jake finds a boat in the middle of a field of grass. It fuels his imagination and the next thing you know he's off on a nautical adventure. The cool thing is that he finds some intense friends along the way. How can you have an adventure without friends? The other cool thing is that this adventure is in space so things are different. Sound in a vacuum, remember that? And 'an object in motion tends to stay in motion' especially without gravity or friction or anything. And what about oxygen? Yeah, well that's all worked into Jake's universe. But the coolest thing is that when you're in space you have to ask yourself what up actually means. Jake gets used to all this stuff, plus some pretty radical 'people.'

If you know anyone who loves the rush of space and time, then Destiny's Gambit is a good read for them, even if they have grown up and slowed down everywhere except in their dreams.

The coolest thing is that Wood's next book Beyond the Moon is coming out soon! Check it out.

Thank you for listening, jb

'Dog Medicine' by Julie Barton

I read a lot of nonfiction about animals and their people, especially memoir.

A while back, I read the book Wesley the Owl about how a biologist gave over her life to adopt an owl. I loved it except that in so many ways, I knew I'd never be as patient or forgiving and that I should never bring a intractable raptor into my house no matter how much Nick begged to have his own Hedwig.

I read Dewey the Library Cat except that I wondered, seriously, how anyone in town with allergies managed to go into the library to borrow books before anaphylaxis set upon their throats. The nice thing was that Dewey seemed like an ordinary cat and I still loved him.

Marley and Me was the best story about the world's worst dog except that I hated how he died in the end of the story. It's killer how dog and cat books so often end with their deaths and then the author spends the next year or two writing about how much they were loved to hold onto them longer. I get that. I do. I write about the pets that I've lost too, just to remember this story or that, and hold onto them longer. But it's hard when you read about the life of a great friend and they always die in the end of the book.

I read Ravens in Winter and wondered at the dedication of a scientist who would spend Christmas night in bitter cold in a blind in the forest to get good results on the kindness of ravens. I wanted to hear his wife's story of his dedication. Did she pack him hot soup? I hope so.

In Homer's Odyssey, I loved how a kitten fighting against such odds turns fierce in his love and loyalty. Plus, we all want to read the good stories about the bombing of the Twin Towers because it was such a critical time in history. Where were you when the Twin Towers fell? I knew I could never live in New York City, not even if I had a cat to keep me company.

Not long ago, I picked up a copy of A Street Cat Named Bob from the Choice Reads shelf at the library. I loved it, but it had recently spent significant time with a homeless person because whenever I opened it up, that smell of homeless drug addict wafted up to my nose. I never was a fan of smellovision. This was similarly unpleasant but it faded to a reasonable foulness by the time the book aired out on my nightstand and I finished reading it. I liked the book, but I have a hard place in my heart for people who keep pets despite their inability to properly feed them. I know that Bob thrived in the end, but did he suffer in that beginning?

I keep telling my librarians about Finding Gobi and how that little dog ran 250km with the ultramarathoner for three days in the desert. I'm telling you, they're probably still getting money in the GoFundMe account intended to bring him home. Ah, I see they've closed it, but I guarantee that you'll want to make some kind of donation anyway after looking at the photos of that little dog running with his guy. The Humane Society still needs donations if you're interested. Last fall when I read about Gobi, it wasn't yet available except as an ebook and since my ereader had expired software, I read the whole thing on my computer in two days when I was supposed to be getting my work done.

There are the classics: All Creatures Great and Small and Travels with Charley. 

But I sat down to tell you about Dog Medicine by Julie Barton. I have trouble walking past that Choice Reads table at my library and Dog Medicine just leaped into my hands. I'm in the middle of Fire and Fury but I get aggravated at the corruption and ineptitude in the White House and need to take breaks while reading sections of it aloud to Mike in a strident tone.

The beginning of Dog Medicine is so incredibly hard to read, but I think it's important because we need to drop the stigma of mental illness from our culture. We're on our way, but we're not there yet. I wonder if Barton has read Furiously Happy by Jenny Lawson. I hope so because Lawson is so incredibly funny and really helps to break that old judgmental mold. I wonder if Lawson has read Dog Medicine. Oh, I hope so.

So, I've spent the last two days reading Dog Medicine when I was supposed to be editing. I'm totally hooked and I want to sit down now and read until the end. And I don't want it to end. It's that kind of book, the ones that cast a spell on you, like J.K. Rowling wrote in Harry Potter, so that you walk around reading that book forever, walking into to light poles, reading while you burn the gravy, and furiously reading at stop lights that seem suddenly too short.

Go get a copy of Dog Medicine. I hope you'll love it as much as I do.

Thank you for listening, jb