Baked French Toast for 12

Or one. Me.

I've tried a recipe in my New Inglenook Cookbook (Brethren Press, 2013) and declare it tasty. It's baked French toast, but the mix is eggs and orange juice with the soaked bread baked in a glaze of butter and cinnamon. It was a camp recipe to serve 12 so I reduced it and left out the sugar, which was rather high.

10 eggs, beaten (I used one)
2 cups orange juice (I used 1/4 cup)
1 cup butter, melted (I used a Tablespoon)
1 1/2 cups of sugar (didn't use it)
1 1/4 teaspoon ground cinnamon (sprinkle)
24 slices thick-sliced crusty bread (I used 2 heels and one dried out bakery something)

• Preheat oven to 325.
• Combine eggs and orange juice.
• Combine butter, sugar, and cinnamon and divide between two 13 x 9 baking dishes (I used one 8 x 8).
• Spread the butter mixture around to thoroughly coat the bottom of the dishes.
• Dip the bread into the egg mixture, turning to coat thoroughly.
• Lay the bread in the dishes.
• Bake for 25 minutes.
• When ready to serve, flip the bread pieces over so the glaze is on top.

Fancy Nancy’s spin on the coming job loss due to Obamacare

Nancy Pelosi is worth $100 million; so it’s easy for her to tell others to quit their jobs.

Thursday Thirteen plus one

Stop setting goals was the best advice book I’ve  ever read—which I didn’t find until I retired.  “Setting goals” is a creativity and thought killer for about half of us and yet we’re always told to do it or have it or accomplish it.  I was a librarian and we tend to be problem solvers, not goal setters.  The author, Bobb Biehl suggests “targets.”  However, here’s a blog with a similar thought—and I see it’s based the same author, Bobb Biehl, “5 big picture questions and 9 accelerators.” I recognize the 9th accelerator from the "Stop setting goals" book. I made three New Year’s resolutions—measureable, easily accomplished and short time frame (January 31) and met them all.  New ones will be built on that for February. Setting a goal for all of 2014 would have been impossible—at least for me.

1. What three changes will most please God?
2. What can I do to make the most significant impact for God in my lifetime? [I would change this to a specific time—like “in 2014” or the next 5 years]
3  What is the single best measurable indicator that I am making progress toward my dream?
4. What three measureable priorities will I accomplish before I die? [Again, I’d use a specific time frame.  Several years ago I had lunch with a friend whom I hadn’t seen in ages.  We had such a great time we decided to do it again in 2 weeks.  Three days later she died.]
5. What three measurable priorities will I accomplish in the next 10 years? [I would shorten that to one year, or 5 years at the most. No one can know what 10 years will bring. Facebook is 10 years old. Five years ago would you have believed the NSA was collecting your phone information?]

If you’re launching a new project (many TT participants are writers or artists)

1  Name your single greatest strength.

2. Identify three decisions causing the greatest stress.
3. What is overwhelming me?
4. What is my impassable road block?
5. What should I resign from?
6. What can I postpone?
7. What things on my list can others do 80% as well?
8. What elephants are in my schedule?
9. Identify three things in the next 90 days I could do that would make a 50% difference.

I think the important words of this list are the numbers three, changes, indicator, priorities, decisions, schedule, and things. Specific and measureable. The word “impact” is a bit squishy for me, but if it works for you, go for it!

Happy Now?

How to spin a 2.3 million job loss

What a fluke.

It's counter intuitive, but more birth control = more sex = younger age = more contraception failure = more pregnancies = more abortions = higher breast cancer risk + higher suicide risk = the real war on women.  Sandra Fluke is building on her minute of fame to run for Congress as another know nothing, do nothing female using sex.

Actually, this whopper may not be that big

 

The trick word here is "expanded." For instance, under Bush SNAP eligibility was expanded, but Obama increased recruitment to the program. EITC, HEAP, TANF, Medicaid, SCHIP, disability, even Obama phones (phone assistance began under Reagan) etc. were all programs of other presidents. Lack of good jobs and reductions because of Obamacare has pushed more onto government benefits.  What's new is people fleeing the workforce to apply for and get SS disability because he couldn't turn around the job situation.

What has expanded is the wait for veteran’s benefits.  For welfare recipients, there is a 30 day wait to qualify for food stamps, or expedited, 7 days. Over 675,000 claims pending for veterans, 58% for over 125 days. Why are veterans required to wait? Haven't they already paid? Are the low income, unemployed a bigger voting block than disabled veterans?

You can look up your childhood home

http://www.vpike.com/

Use this website, type in the address, and then stroll down the street.  It’s approximate, but you can probably find it.  Caution.  Everything will look a whole lot smaller than when you lived there.

We’re expecting bad weather tonight

But maybe they’ll be wrong—it often happens.

How Republicans shoot themselves in the foot

               

I was a Democrat much longer than I’ve been a Republican, and I suppose it’s that “conservative” mind set of the Republicans, but really, they just don’t know how to get in there and fight like a Democrat.  They also don’t know how to plan or execute. Democrats are setting up country wide plans to accomplish what we all know—all elections are local.  I get their newsletters and e-mails—I read the plans.  Republicans, meanwhile, push away their only hope—conservatives.

Republicans will chase the Hispanic vote by caving on citizenship, border security and amnesty. But they'll flee from confirmed conservatives, Tea Party supporters and Libertarians who actually gave them the House in 2010 and many governorships. Who's a better bet for supporting Republicans in the long run? Certainly not illegal immigrants who always vote Democratic. The 1986 IRCA is a good example of bipartisanship, and look what it got us. Porous borders, more anchor babies, more low wage workers taking American jobs, and more Democrats.

In Ohio SB 193 has been called the “John Kasich Re-election Protection Act.” I found an early January article.  Like many Republicans in Washington, Kasich was elected with the help of Tea Party and Libertarians to get rid of Gov. Strickland, and is now running the other way--away from his right wing supporters and trying to keep anyone who could run against him off the ballot.

Brandon Clark and Gin House singing about his roots

http://youtu.be/jqRNzE_fG8w

 

Every day in America, 50 babies . . .

The Alan Guttmacher Institute, which is the best source
for abortion statistics in the United States, reports, “Sixtyfour
percent of [abortion] providers offer at least some
second-trimester abortion services (13 weeks or later), and
23 percent offer abortion after 20 weeks. …11 percent
of all abortion providers offer abortions at 24 weeks.”
The institute also indicates that of the approximately 1.2
million abortions in the United States each year, some
18,150 are performed at 21 weeks or more. Of the 40 states
that reported in 2005 to the Centers for Disease Control,
32 states reported abortions of babies 21 weeks or older.

This means that every day in America, 50 babies the size
of a large banana are dismembered and decapitated – and
these include healthy babies of healthy mothers…and it’s
happening legally.

Priests for Life Newsletter Jan-Feb 2014

We’re expecting a lot of snow by Wednesday

Nice coverage for the mature woman

I’m not going to buy it, but if I were going to get a swim suit, it would be one like this.  I think I gave away my last two and had never worn them.

This is in the L.L. Bean Spring 2014 catalog, or online.

Monday Memories—Inglenook Cookbook

                     

I received  "The New Inglenook Cookbook" (Brethren Press, 2013) for my birthday (arrived Friday for my September birthday). I have my mother's "Granddaughter's Inglenook cookbook" (Brethren Publishing House, 1942), and someone in the family may have the first one that was my grandmother's (1901). I don't do a lot of cooking that needs recipes anymore, but I love to read them. Also, I love looking at the names of the women who contributed the recipes. Still so many old Brethren names. I see "Sweet sour meatloaf" very similar to mine, which I hand out to new brides. Things have changed: Gluten free scones contributed by Elsie Holderread of McPherson, KS (2013) compared to Wieners in Creole Sauce by Mrs. Irva Kendrick Haney, Muscatine, IA (1942).

                   

Also listed for a 1942 school lunch was cottage cheese and chopped pepper sandwiches with raw turnip strips. I don't know about other people my age, but cottage cheese was in everything at our house.

I think the reason women my mother's age (b. 1912) used so much cottage cheese is that their mothers made it from the skim milk left after separating the cream. My grandmother (b. 1876) used several pounds of real butter a week--I have her butter churn--and that's a lot of skim milk left over which needed to be made into something. I watched her working with (I thought it was a smelly mess) it, but by then she must have used purchased milk since they no longer had a cow. If all the liquid is pressed out (whey, which is then fed to the pigs), it is called farmer's cheese. This is from someone who knows nothing about it, so corrections are welcome.

The 2013 edition has a symbol for gluten-free.  This one looks impossibly easy.

“The best peanut butter cookie” contributed by Sharon A. Walker (Brumbaugh) Clayton, Ohio, p. 290

• 1 c. creamy peanut butter
• 1 c. sugar
• 1 large egg
• 1 t. baking soda
• Preheat oven to 350 and grease 2 baking sheets with nonstick cooking spray and set aside.
• Beat together the peanut butter and sugar until combine.  Beat in the egg. Sprinkle baking soda over the mixture and beat until combined.
• Roll heaping teaspoon-size pieces of dough into small balls. Arrange on the prepared baking sheets and with the tines of a fork, flatten the balls.
• Bake the cookies in batches in the middle of the oven until puffed and pale golden, about 10 minutes
• Cook the cookies on the baking sheets for 2 minutes before transferring to cooling racks.  This is important because they are very fragile when hot from the oven.

After checking the internet, I see Ms. Brumbaugh Walker also contributed to a genealogy book (found it on WorldCat) and I'm sure if I dug a little deeper, we'd find some Brethren relatives in common from Montgomery County who came there from Pennsylvania.

http://www.cheesemaking.com/CottageCheese.html

Minimum wage increases

My New Year’s Resolutions

But I'll tell you anyway. I've achieved my New Year's Resolutions. The trick is to set targets, not goals; make them achievable and measurable and for short time periods.

1) Learn the names of the books of the Old Testament; 2) clean my office book shelves; 3) use my Power Spin 210 U at least 5 minutes a day. By January 31, 2014.

I'm trying to think of something for February.

Update: For February, 4 hugs a day (suggested by my husband), 10 minutes a day on the Power Spin 210 U, and read the books of the Old Testament that begin with H. Achievable and measurable.

Fresh take on an old Chinese proverb

State of the Union feel good throw aways

The president’s SOTU list—pre-K education; “equal pay”, raising the minimum wage or extending unemployment benefits--is not going to address the real drivers of upwardly mobility--marriage before parenthood and a high school education. Head Start after 50 years shows no discernible advantage in learning, behavior, parenting practices, or health outcomes (at $8,000 per child it does supply a lot of jobs) so why add compulsory pre-k education?  Marriage of her parents is a child's best hope to stay out of poverty, but welfare programs discourage mothers from marrying. Raising the minimum wage won't help people who haven't finished high school--it just decreases their employment opportunities. 92% of black teenagers in Chicago can’t find employment; how will raising the minimum wage help them? And the $10.10 minimum for government workers was a throw away since it is a tiny minority with few at that level.

http://townhall.com/columnists/walterewilliams/2013/04/10/black-unemployment-n1561096/page/full

And that new retirement vehicle? That’s puzzled everyone.  Don't look at MYRA if you have a 401-K or IRA. It's government backed securities. The rate of return this past year would have been about 1.4%. If you need more to open an IRA, just save it in your piggy bank and then invest. On your worst day, you'll get more than 1.4%.  The stock market has been going like gang busters since 2010. If there had been a MYRA, the return would have been dismal. http://www.forbes.com/sites/johnwasik/2014/01/30/myra-not-needed-you-can-set-up-your-own-retirement-plans/

They were wrong about the horse

At one time the horse was a machine essential to truckers and transportation, farmers and taxis. 100 years ago it was predicted that the auto would replace the horse, and it did as a draft animal, but there are over 9 million horses in the U.S. now, up from the approximately 3 million in 1960, but down from the 25 million 100 years ago. At the turn of the last century it was predicted that the auto in 100 years would be cheaper than a horse--now that didn't happen.

http://www.americanequestrian.com/pdf/US-Equine-Demographics.pdf

http://www.theequestrianchannel.com/id3.html