Susie's Snippets

               Today my brother is 82 years old (or years young, in our family).  He’s been my older brother for a long, long time.  Sometimes it feels like we were growing up together just a year or so ago, and sometimes it feels much, much longer.

               We didn’t actually grow up “together.”  Yay-yay (my nickname for him when I was a tot), is about 10 years older than I.  This means he was more parent than brother to me.  My best memories of my childhood – other than the food – is things we did together.

               He taught me how to play whiffle ball.  And basketball.  And Canasta.  He never “let me win,” which may account for why I’m so competitive at games.

               He took me to movies.  Thanks to Yay-yay, I saw “To Hell and Back” with Audie Murphy at my first drive-in movie.  It was fantastic!  He also tried to take me to see “The Sword in the Stone” on New Year’s Eve.  But being it was a holiday, they changed the movie to “Move Over Darling” without  notice. So we stayed, and it began my life-long love of all Doris Day movies. 

               The rule with my brother for dating was – if you didn’t want little sister to come along, then you stayed home and little sister went.  So I went to movies, to mini-golf, to games, to amusement parks,  and to parks for picnics.  It was a wonderful childhood.

               At least, that’s what I try to remember.  My parents were not the best parents in the world.  In all fairness, they did their best, and we did have some great times.  But their best was often loud, scary, and violent.  What I remember the first eleven years of my life is that my brother was my protector (as well as my mom’s and our other brother’s) from all the chaos.  He stood in the path of anger so that I might be a kid.

               When I was 11, my brother got drafted.  He went to fight a war in Vietnam, because that’s what his country told him he needed to do.  He got back (thank God) in one physical piece, but it was not the same for us.  He served his country, but I’m not convinced our country served him (and the thousands of other Vietnam vets).

               When, as a young adult, I was going through a rough patch, he took me in. No questions, just laughter, prayers, and support. 

               He taught me a lot of games.  He taught me a lot about movies and movie stars.  He also taught me about love, loyalty, service, and perseverance.

He was my hero. Still is.  And even though he turned 82 today, in my head he’s still a 16-year-old kid driving his little sister around like she was a princess. 

Happy birthday, Johnny. I hope you have many more!

               Lately, I’ve seen a lot of advertisements for losing weight that talk about being in a “calorie deficit.” Basically, these folks (whoever they may be) want you to track your calorie intake and stay around 1000 calories per day.

               Well, duh. I guess you’ll lose weight.  You’ll also lose muscle and damage your organs.  That’s not a healthy calorie intake for any adult (unless you happen to be 4’ 5” and weight 80 pounds).  At any rate, I don’t need to be in a calorie deficit to lose weight.

               What I DO need to do is pay more attention to “portion size” on the backs of packages of food.  I have a feeling that when (and if) I do that, I will lose weight.  Because recently, I have paid attention to that information and I’m eating way more portions than are recommended.

               Let me give you some examples.  Last night, in an effort to eat food from our freezer, I baked up 5 fish sticks.  They were crunchy, flaky and delicious and I paired them with homemade tartar sauce of sorts.  I ate four of them – they were about three inches long each and about an inch wide.  I also had a serving of low-cal jello mixed with pineapple.  I was full and satisfied.

               Then I read the package.  Apparently, one (ONE) of those fish sticks is considered a portion.  One of those fish sticks wouldn’t have satisfied my cat.  It was absurd.  But I spent the evening with the sad knowledge that I had – again, apparently – overeaten.

               Last week, my husband and I splurged on a bag of potato chips.  It was a normal size, not the “party” size, and I made dip and we enjoyed this treat while we watched a game show.  The bag was about half gone when we folded it up and put the remaining dip in the fridge.

               As I folded the bag, I noticed that the data on the back said “Bag contains approximately 13 servings.” If that was true, two things were clear right away.  First, a “serving” of these potato chips is about 4 or 5 chips.  Secondly, half the bag was empty, so we had each consumed about 3 ½ servings of chips for our treat.

               This is bad news.  I went through my pantry to see what other items I have been routinely eating way too many portions of.  Three mozzarella cheese sticks comprise a serving.  I’ve never seen anyone stop at 3, but hey, there you go. Three mini-sized Butterfinger bars are a serving, as well.  That’s about 1/3 the size of a normal-sized Butterfinger candy bar.  Come on, you barely get a taste  – that’s literally 3 bites of candy!

               The good stuff that has low calories (but sometimes high sodium) counts, as well.  Little pimento stuffed olives?  Five olives, my friends.  That’s a serving.  And that well may work if you count them in martinis, but I can eat four or five times that amount at one sitting.

               Nuts are good for you, but basically you can have 25 pistachios, 14 cashews, and 7 macadamia nuts.  Very easy to go overboard on those, I know.

               There’s good news, though.  One can of tuna makes up one serving.  And carrots are almost unlimited.  They don’t even put serving sizes on bags of carrots.  Enjoy!  If my diet is tuna and carrots, I’m very likely to lose weight.  Also, you can visit me in the hospital.   

Why am I constantly misplacing things?  If you worry about something like this, you can do what I do to research.  No, not discuss with trusted friends.  Certainly, do not go to a doctor!  No, the best thing to do is to look it up on your internet, so that A.I. can tell you what in the world is wrong with you. 

               I did that and A.I. told me that I was either “trying to do too many things at once,” or perhaps “under stress,” or that I wasn’t registering where I put things down.  Well, duh.  That didn’t really help me stop misplacing things, now did it?  Because I have always – ALWAYS – done too many things at once, I don’t embrace stress, and I never register where I put things down.

What kinds of things am I losing?  Well, unfortunately, these are important things.  For example, a few years ago I called my husband from the car in a parking space downtown.  I was frantic.  My purse was updumped all over the front seat and I was nearly in tears.  “I can’t find my phone,” I wailed.  It took a second or two, before he calmly said, “Look in your hand.”

I looked down at my empty hand and said, “There’s nothing there.”  Oh, he meant the other hand.  The one holding…the phone.

Then a couple of weeks ago, I was going to the bank and couldn’t find the check we had to deposit.  It wasn’t in my purse, or in the desk drawer, or anywhere on the counter.  I scoured the house for it, and finally in despair didn’t go to the bank. Later that day, when I was using my husband’s truck, I remembered where it was – in the viser of my car.  A poor choice of places for an important check, but I’m sure I was convinced that I would remember it was there when I needed to.

That’s fairly typical of me when I misplace things.  I vividly remember thinking, “I need to put this here so I will remember where it is when I need it.” But remembering where “here” becomes problematic.

Yesterday, it wasn’t even my fault!  I was making casseroles for a church breakfast and my hubby was helping. As I cracked eggs and threw the shells into the open garbage can, he walked behind me.  I saw something sail into the corner of the full garbage bag.  I asked him what he had tossed in there, and he looked surprised.  “Nothing,” he said.

Oh, no.  I felt my ears.  Yep, one earring on my ear and the other…gone.  I took the garbage outside and sorted through the 24 eggs shells, empty packages of cheese and ham, paper towels, coffee pods, and other assorted disgusting items.  Twice.  The second time, I found the little earring! 

I looked up what to do about this problem.  Again, excellent advice from the computer.  One suggestion was to state out loud where you are putting things as you put them down or away.  It appears I’ll be talking to myself all day long.

               Throughout my life, I have become aware that sometimes things I worry about or dread turn out to be much easier than I thought they would be.  Of course, the reason I still worry and/or dread some events is that there have been occasions when things I believed were easy, just weren’t what they seemed.  This has happened to other folks I know, as well.  These occasional events, that turn out somewhat badly or strangely, continue to reinforce my tendency to worry about things.
               For example, I am very timid about needles.  Not sewing needles, needles that doctors and medical staff plunge into your body.  So, blood draws and blood donations are a dreaded event for me.  Last year, I went for my annual blood work and, as usual, I was not anticipating it with joy.  The results of the test didn’t worry me, but that needle did.

               I sat down and per my routine, began actively looking at the art on the wall and out the window.  The phlebotomist was very kind and told me it would be over quickly.  She poked around with her hand a bit, applied the tourniquet, and then, wham!  it was done!  I breathed a big sigh of relief, and said, “Wow, that was easy.”  She smiled and said, “That was the alcohol wipe.  I haven’t put the needle in yet.”

               Yikes.  It wasn’t easy, and I still dread every needle stick.

Years ago, when drive-through restaurants were very new, we had some friends who were older and had never been to a drive-through. They were nervous about trying the experience, but decided they would do it. They pulled into the lane with about 2 cars in front of them, and soon there were 2 cars behind.  Eventually, they arrived at the window to pick up their food and paid the bill.  As they drove away, the man said to his wife, “Gee, that was easy!”  She smiled, and then, as they continued down the road, she looked at the sack of food and asked, puzzled, “How did they know what we wanted?”

They had not stopped to order at the little grid machine. (Note:  Nowadays, the little machine is embedded in the huge, digital menu, so much harder to miss – even for first-timers!)

Once, on a return trip from a vacation, my husband and I took a toll road home.  We thought the only downside would be slowing down to pay the occasional toll.  On the last toll, we notice the outside lane had no line! The sign above it said “EZ” and we went through it without a hitch.  We slowed just a little, but there was no one there to collect money.

My husband commented to me, “Wow, that was easy!”  And it certainly was!  Of course, about two weeks later, we received a notice in the mail (along with a picture of our license plate) that informed us using the “EZ” lane without an “EZ” pass was a traffic violation.  Twenty-five dollars later (plus postage), we realized, it hadn’t been so easy.

Have you had experiences that you thought would be “easy,” but weren’t?  Do tell!