Two weeks of sinus infection has done me in. I just have to go to bed. On November 30th I am trying a sinus specialist who moved here from the Cleveland Institute. Opera singers from New York and stuff come to him. Doesn't this sound promising? Really, something has got to change here or I might curl into a little ball in my bed under the covers and simply, in due time, expire. I am not exaggerating.

I do have things to blog about, but they will have to wait. They're all listed, ha, messily on messy scraps of papers all over the messy desk and on the pages of sundry Sports Illustrated magazines, because Mike keeps those in the bathroom upstairs, which is exactly where little gold nuggets pop into my head that must be scratched down on paper or lost forever. I need to arrange a funeral service for all of my ideas all ready lost forever. It's just awful.

In New System is going Mexican Fruitcake. Hands down the easiest and best cake recipe you could ever hope to have in your repertoire. The kind of cake that you eat the whole pan right then and there. I got the recipe from Ollie Dahl. That should tell you something. Ollie was a friend in the DAR chapter in NC. She was teased as being Ollie Doll. She was a little microscopic doll of a lady, to be sure. I loved to go sit in her big old house and visit on fall afternoons. She and her house were so gracious. Back in the day, I was the "baby" of the chapter, at least the one and only junior member for the longest time. This made me a celebrity of sorts, based on age alone. I enjoyed it. All those ladies were like grandmothers to me. Somehow, I get along best with three and four year olds and post-80 year olds. I do not fit in with my peers, isn't that strange? Never have. What I mean is, ON THE WHOLE I don't fit in with my peers, but have always had a few priceless friends in my age bracket. Teens, however, I cannot relate to at all. I couldn't even relate to myself when I was a teenager. So, I just steer clear. When you are out of your teens, please give me a call.

Okay, one day I will tell you some more about the lovely and charming DAR ladies from Battle of Alamance Chapter, Burlington, NC. They sprinkled refinement into my life, and I aspired to be such a lady as they. I have not attained, yet I aspire still . . . when I think about it . . . which I am afraid is not often enough.

Why do I have so many cake recipes in my new system? Because Aunt Bee served cake. Also, I read where a layer cake standing on the kitchen counter adds an instant homey quality to your house.

Today I helped my friend pick out a wedding gift for a splinter group (splintered in 1925) of the Mennonites. She is lucky enough to live a few blocks from this group which lives in an old inn on the bay. I'm telling you, it's the ultimate. When I walk on the property I somehow feel instantly removed from the anxiety of modern living. A peace envelops me like a mist, it cradles me. Anyhow, the million dollar question is what do you get the happy young couple when Mennonites don't believe in extraneous worldly possessions? You skip all else in the store and get them a winter white quilted bedspread and shams, that's what.

Tonight at Mike's singing class he showed the Number 5 short cartoon of all time, followed by the Number 1. They both completely revolved around singing and were perfectly hilarious. One Froggy Night is about the cocky singing frog, who was discovered in a cornerstone of a demolished building and would perform only for his greedy new owner but turn into a limp rag frog on stage, essentially, the second he was placed in front of any other human being at all. His specialty for Mr. Greed was Hello, Ma Baby! He dances like a Rockette doing that. His name is Michigan J. Frog, why am I not surprised? This cartoon was based on a "true" story about a frog from Texas who survived in a cornerstone for 31 years.

But the Number 1 cartoon was What's Opera, Doc? and stars Elmew Fudd (Mike cowwected me aftew I owiginally wote Elmew Thedd) and Bugs Bunny. SERIOUSLY FUNNY. The whole thing is a pawody on Wagnew opewas. Elmew wants to kiww the wabbit so Bugs Bunny disguises himself as a pwincess. They go a wooing, singing awias and what have you back and fowth to each othew. It wowks until duwing a lavish embwace in Elmew's awms, Bugs' hat dwops off and the wabbit eaws give him away. I won't spoil the ending, you have to see it fow yowself. Othew than to say Elmew uses his magic helmet to bwing evewything down on the wabbit, like huwwicanes and townadoes and eawthquakes, even SMOG. Mike's singing classes think he did nothing his whole youth except watch TV. But this is how Mike had eawly exposuwe to all these wondewful songs, thwough the cawtoons. He fell in wove wif them.

Spellcheck did not appweciate the above pawagwaph. I hope you do.

Cawamelized Pineapple,
KEM