Much Ado about Nothing...

and I'm glad.




I really didn't want to be snowed in again.   It would be okay if it shut down the store, but that doesn't happen and since that doesn't happen, it means I either have to try to get there or I have to call & say I can't come, while other people ARE there.   I don't like either choice.   If I'm scheduled to work, I want to be there doing my job.    I guess I'm overly "dependable".


But the Winter Storm Warning was cancelled.   Not before many of the schools in North Alabama had already issued a delay in opening so as not to endanger the lives of the kiddies.  At least that will get me through the school zones this morning without having to slow down to 25.   (I go through three different ones after I turn onto Bailey Cove when I go into work in the mornings.)   I really like it that the co-manager started scheduling me to come in at 8:30 instead of 8 on Wednesdays.   That means I don't get to the school zones until after school has started.   




On Sunday I had Ginger, Shane, Haley, and Alycyn over for lunch after church.  And Josh, Tesia and Cash.   It was my Sunday to have them.   Our schedules were so convoluted in December and January with various things coming up either at church, because of snow, or because the Johnsons were out of town, and then inventory for me, that this was the first Sunday I'd had them over in awhile.  


I was somewhat unprepared for the event.   After having so many grandkids on Friday night and Saturday.  Then on Saturday before I went to work, I wanted to deliver the "Christmas presents" that Uncle Fred had sent us via Jef.  Uncle Fred was not with us on Christmas because of the snow that came in overnight.   Jef's job is routinely taking him to south Alabama now, because Inline Electric has a store in Pelham that he services and also has just opened another one in Montgomery that they are setting up with computer systems and whatnot.   He evidently is their main computer tech for all their stores.   Anyway, his job takes him through Gardendale so he picked up the presents earlier this month, but various schedule interferences-- both his and mine-- have kept me from getting and distributing the gifts.  


So I dashed around Saturday morning after Jef and Jeni left with their kids and got ready for work, loaded up Cathleen and Caleb and set out to make my deliveries to Josh and Tesia, Davis,  Cathi,  and Tim.  


Then I worked from 1 until after 9 o'clock.   I texted Ginger on my lunch to be sure she was still planning to eat at my house on Sunday.   The answer was yes.  I had planned to go by the store after work and pick up whatever I needed to do Sunday dinner, but when it ended up being so late-- and my tiredness caught up with me too-- I just came on home. 


I decided I'd just "think about it in the morning".  I'd get up early and go to Food-4-Less and buy what I needed.   Of course, on Sundays, they don't open until 8 AM so I was going to be pushing it.   And I still had quite a bit of mess to clear out of the way that I hadn't taken care of because of tending to grandkids.  


Oh, well.    I went to bed anyway.  I did lay out some ground chuck I had  previously purchased to thaw while I slept.


I debated just having hamburgers but that would still mean a trip to the store.  I just didn't want to GO anywhere.   So, I decided to make soup from whatever I could find in my freezer and my cabinets.


Truthfully, it was VERY GOOD soup.   I really enjoyed it and my company all seemed to, too.  I made some cornbread to go with it.   (My brother had given me-- all of us-- gift cards to Target and I had taken time on Friday afternoon to go by there and buy myself a Christmas present.  I got a large jelly roll pan, a muffin pan large enough to cook 24 muffins, and a nonstick skillet griddle.  I actually went to get a nonstick skillet and ended up getting  three pans.  I had to pay some extra above the card, but it was less that ten dollars.)   I cooked the cornbread in the "jelly roll" pan.  I wanted to have plenty and I didn't care anything about it being thick.


The cornbread turned out okay.   It wasn't as good as the soup.  I had two packs of cornbread mix that I used but when I poured them into the pan they didn't fill it so I mixed up some more batter with cornmeal mix, egg, oil and water and added it to the mixture and stirred it all together.   I usually put some sugar in my cornbread, but I didn't this time because I knew there was plenty already in the soup.


The sugar in the soup was not something I added.


My soup was a pull together with what I had:
From the freezer--
The ground chuck
Frozen corn.
From the cabinet--
Two cans of Campbell's tomato soup
1 quart of boxed chicken broth
1 can of sliced carrots, chopped up
From the Fridge--
Onion
Ketchup, probably a cup full.  ( I used the ketchup because I had NO tomato sauce in my cabinets and I needed more tomato base.   The ketchup is what supplied the sugar.)
From elsewhere--
Four potatoes-- which I peeled, chopped up, and cooked before adding to the soup.
Salt and pepper.


I put it all in my crockpot and cooked it while we were at church.   When I came home and stirred it, it seemed not thick enough to me so I added  some ground beef I had already browned and refrigerated earlier.  By the time the cornbread was mixed up and baked and Josh and Tesia had arrived with the Milo's tea and Shane and Ginger with the Edwards pecan pie and some chocolate ice cream, the added ground beef had had time to "cook in".


We all ate until filled and I had soup left to eat for after church Sunday night, for lunch before going to work on Monday, and one LAST bowl-- which I was sorry about-- to eat last night for supper.   I really liked that soup. 


****


Last night it dawned on me why so many people put off all this stuff they plan to do "until retirement".   I've always been puzzled by that.   People have so much they'd like to do and don't do it but dangle it out in front of themselves like a carrot that they'll reach when they retire.   But when they retire either their health or their finances keep them from doing all that stuff.   So, I've always wondered why they do that.  


Until last night. 


I was thinking of some stuff I'd like to do and the thought came to me, "It will just have to wait until I retire," and -- FLASH!!-- the light went off.  Now I know why they do it.  


After you've worked all day and you know you have to get up and go back tomorrow, you really don't want to get involved in doing a whole lot of stuff.  You just kinda want to relax and call it a day.  Rest a while so you won't feel drug out all day the next WORK day.   So, all that stuff that you'd like to do is still "dangling" out there waiting for you to have more time.   But when you get the time, there's no guarantee you'll have the energy or the money. 


I guess the best way to handle all that is to figure out ways to take care of those things in SMALL DOSES.


Well, I've gotta go to work soon so I have other things that need done before I leave.

One of these days, I'm going to sit down at this computer and ONLY DO the thing I sat down here to do....  

or am I just kidding myself?


I do not think computer life is an aid to my (already-easily-distractible) self.