CarltonFoster.com

carl took a day off last week and we went to the mall so i could get a battery for the watch that died almost a year ago. we got there a little early and the only store opened was the sporting goods store, so we headed over there.  waved hello to the security guard on our way into the store and wandered through camping gear. the watch place was open so we dropped off my watch and then went to old navy to kill the 10 minutes it was going to take to replace the battery.   carl needed to go to the bathroom, so after i was done looking at what i wanted to check out at old navy, i went to sit in the food court to wait for him. the security guard walks by and sort of does a double take at me before asking ” no class today?”  she thought i was a high school kid!! mind you this is the same security guard we saw when we walked into the sporting goods store and she is the same one i have seen several mornings while mall walking.    the only thing i could think to say was um, i’m 33.  i haven’t been in high school for  16 years!

the fun doesn’t end there. we go to borders and  i leave carl in the magazine section and decide to look at the kid’s books to see if there is anything the girl might like. the sales guy there asks if i am looking for anything so i tell him no, i’m just waiting on my husband. he then proceeds to tell me the wonders of some book about the 40 year friendship of 11 girls blah blah blah, and oh its 30% off, would you like it???  um sorry dude, i read sci fi stuff.

so one person thinks i’m a teenager, and another thinks that just because  i’m a woman, i want to read sappy books.  silly peoples.

carl goes to lunch with a regular group of guys from work. there is the pirate, the big kid and morse code. yes there are reasons why i gave them these nick names, but those are stories for another time.

one of the places they go for lunch is a pizza and sub place that brings out shakers of red pepper flakes. at one of their recent lunches, the red pepper shaker was full. they happen to use the big shakers that most places use for sugar. the big kid puts some pepper flakes on his food, then decides to be a smart alack  and unscrews the top.  the next person who decides to add red pepper flakes happens to be morse code. and with an unscrewed lid, he ends up with more red pepper flakes than he bargained for.  a whole shake full.  he shares these red pepper flakes with the big kid by dumping some of them on top of his food, but he is still left with quite a lot. carl says there was a bit of sweating while eating lunch that day. unfortunately it wasn’t one of the days i ate lunch with them so carl may have more details he can share later. he has some pictures of the pepper flake covered food that are quite pretty.

so that is a bit of back story for the part that i had a hand in. today was the big kid’s birthday, and at a lunch before the pepper flake incident, it was decided that i would make a cake for the occasion. i have a computer shaped cake pan so it seemed fitting that is what i would make for the cake. well after carl told me about the pepper flakes, i thought well we could get him back by putting pepper flakes in his cake.  brilliant idea!  but we wouldn’t want everyone to eat a red pepper flake laced cake.  hmmmm what about cupcakes?  even better idea. so for a couple of days i thought about the best way to spike the cupcakes. i knew i was going to have left over cake mix and would end up with a decent amount of cupcakes., but i needed to make sure i didn’t confuse the regular cupcakes with the hot cupcakes. different cupcake liners solved that.  so how to put the heat in the cupcakes. i had two ideas and decided to try both of them. one was to mix cayenne pepper into the batter of one before it was baked. the other was to cut the top of the other off, pour in some hot sauce, then replace the top and ice it. carl and the girl helped come up with that idea.  the hot sauce i used wasn’t your regular tabasco sauce. the girl likes spicy food so i let her pick out a hot sauce at the store last month that is made with habenaro peppers. that is the hot sauce that soaked into the cupcake.  i iced them with plain white icing then dipped them in black sprinkles to make the tops look like part of a parking lot. i keep telling the big kid that he can be run over in the parking lot, so on one cupcake i put a little lego man running away and on the second one i put a match box car like looks a little like my car so it looks like i’m chasing him down in the car.

i delivered the cake  and special cupcakes to carl’s workplace this afternoon but unfortunately i did not get to stay to witness the eating of the cupcake. however i am told that the big kid ate one of them in one bite.  ouch.  i burnt my taste buds just taking a little sample of the cayenne pepper batter.  one of the other guys took pictures that i will hopefully see soon.

don’t unscrew the lid of red pepper flakes, you might end up eating something worse.

http://www.cnn.com/video/#/video/tech/2009/03/28/dcl.data.doc.computer.worm.cnn

yesterday was a short day for the girl. the elementary schools here get out early on wednesdays to give the teachers planning time or something. they get out of school 2 hours and 40 minutes early. on top of that, there was a 2 hour delay because of fog. so school started at 11 and got out at 1:10. they were pretty much there for lunch.  well you don’t get much homework when you only have 2 hours of school, so the girl finished up pretty quickly. after i got dinner started (yum meatloaf)  she wanted to play a game. we started with scrabble. neither of us are the best scrabble players, but we played better than we usually do. then we moved on to go fish. i won a couple of games, she won a couple of games. and by then it was time for dinner. after dinner we played war. the girl kicked my butt. then carl got in on the games and we played spoons. do not play spoons with carl. he cheats.  though he finally lost a game of spoons. yes on march 19th 2009, carl lost a game of spoons to me and the girl.  we had a good time hanging out together.

i realize that in the grand scheme of things this is a minor issue, but it is still annoying.  i am on an email list that is supposed to be used only for spreading information about official happenings. tonight i get two solicitations from the same person about classes they want to offer with an attachment for the program flier. (no i did not open an attachment from a stranger) then someone else decides hey i want in on the action and sends out a reply all to find out how she can “get hooked up to offer classes” through this organization. then goes on to say that their group misses this first person and it just isn’t the same with out them, blah blah blah.

thanks for the spam. that’s not why i gave those in charge my email. if you want to advertise these kind of things that the groups are going to have to pay for, come to a meeting.  do something active in the organization. plan a saturday event and invite the whole organization or certain age groups of the organization.  don’t use the email list as your personal advertising bank.

again i know this isn’t the end of the world, it’s just annoying.

monday, i went with the girl on a field trip with a club is in at school. the club is one whose members are selected on their good citizenship and good behavior at school. one of the projects they have done this year was to raise money to help with the care of a horse at a therapy ranch.  the ranch has several horses that work with children and adults with various disabilities.  the girls took a tour of the facility, saw the horses, tack room, feed room, the sensory trail, and the indoor and outdoor horse rings. the sensory trail was a project taken on by a local boy scout for his eagle project. it has different stations to help with sensory development.

the girl and a friend of hers got to ride the horse the club adopted because the two of them raised to most money in their fundrasier.  the horse they adopted is merlin. he is a tennesse walking horse.  instead of bouncing you up and down when you ride, a tennesse walking horse’s gait is pretty smooth.  one of the owners of another horse told us that they don’t trot. they have a regular walk, a fast walk and a cantor, all of which provide a smooth ride.

they also have a grey horse there that they let the girls paint with hand prints. they all got their hand smeared with paint and then they got to press it on the horse.

they all had a great time.

there is white stuff faling from the sky. it seems to have started sometime last night. stopped for a while, and now it is snowing again.  the kids have a snow day today.  they’ll either loose one of the random days off or they’ll go an extra day at the end of school. later i’ll post  pic or 2 of the snow, but carl will have to show me how to do that.

I know the weather here is usually very wacky anyway, but just a couple of days ago is was 70 degrees out side.  I opened the windows and turned off the heat and everything. Now we have cold rain, wind, and a current temp of 38 degrees. There is a 100% chance of snow/sleet tonight with a 60% chance of snow tomorrow.  Freaky weather, man.

If we end up with a snow day tomorrow, the kids are going to have to either lose a day off somewhere or they are going to have to add another day onto the end of school. They used the built in snow day on inauguration day. There was a forecast of snow, but no actual snow falling here, but at 6:30 am they cancelled school anyway.   If we actually get some snow tonight/tomorrow, I’ll post a picture.

i have been reading several websites lately about girl scout cookies and the fact that they have had to reduce the amount of cookies in some of the boxes. not all of the varieties of cookies have been reduced, and the ones that were reduced were only reduced by 2 cookies. compared to items you buy in the grocery store that have slowly shrunk in size over the last 9 years, 2 cookies is not a lot and they were upfront about it. none of the icecream manufacturers gave press releases to cnn. nor did the cereal makers.

i’ve also heard about people complaining about the price per box. in our area it is $3.50 a box. it ranges from $3.00 to $4.50. that price is set regionally by the councils. if you live in an area with a lower cost of living, you will probably pay less than some one in LA or Connecticut.  there are only 2 bakeries that make the cookies. it is up to the councils to choose which bakery to use. they also can decide which of the alternate cookies to choose from. the core cookies like thin mints and trefoils are required, but there is some leeway for other cookies. this year we have lemon chalet cremes and a caramel cookie called dulche de leche. because of the 2 bakeries, the same cookies may be called something different by each one.   if you don’t like the cookies you have bought, call your council. they may have changed bakeries and need the feedback about unsatisfactory cookies.

the big thing i have been reading has been major misinformation about where that $3.50 goes. NONE, i repeat NONE of the money goes to the corporate office in NYC. less than a dollar goes towards paying the bakery for the cookies and towards the sales papers. less than a dime goes towards administrative supplies, $1.72 goes to the local council for the girls’ programs, training, upkeep of buildings and camps.  the troop gets 60 cents to 70 cents of every box sold. then there is a 3 cent troop bonus and a 3 cent service unit bonus. 12 cents goes towards the girls recognitions, but troops can opt out of that and that 12 cents goes towards the girls’ profits.  some of the $1.72 that goes to the council goes towards financial assistance programs.

i’ve seen lots of complaints that the poster’s daughter never got to go to camp just because she sold cookies as others have claimed that their daughter got to go to camp because of the money she earned selling cookies. it is up to the troop to decide how to spend the money earned. if you want to know where the money is going, ask the leaders. if you don’t get a satisfactory answer, please go to your service unit or council.  not all troops decide to use the money to go to camp, especially summer camp. some use the money for supplies, day trips, weekend camping trips, sleep overs, etc.  badges that the girls have earned maybe purchased with cookie profits. you also need to consider the amount of cookies sold. if your troop only sells 20 boxes per girl, the troop isn’t going to have as much money to do things as a troop that has sold 200 boxes a girl.  get involved in the troop so you know what is going on. i’m not saying everyone needs to be a leader, but at least talk to your leaders.

are the cookies the healthiest things to eat?  no. they are COOKIES.  eat one or two and then put the box away. no one says you have to eat them all at once. most of ours will be going into the freezer to be eaten throughout the year, not to be eaten within the week.

the other off the wall complaint has been that GSA donates money to planned parenthood, and that poster refuses to support an organization that supports planned parenthood. GSA does not donate money to planned parenthood.  on the cooperate level, planned parenthood might donate to GSA, but i am not positive about that. it’s nothing i have heard about other than the misinformation about GSA giving them money.  on the local level, planned parent hood has no involvement in local troops or service units or councils.  so don’t let that untrue association deter you from buying cookies.

please support your local girl scout troops and buy a box of cookies. if you go to www.girlscoutcookies.org you can find your local council selling cookies.

thank you!

i’ve been thinking about what to plant in the garden this year. last weekend we went to a couple of garden centers, but didn’t buy anything. today while we were out and about we stoped at home depot and bought seeds and a seed starting kit.  so i have seeds planted for peas, green beens, carrots, tomatoes, peppers, sunflowers, and cucumbers. they are happily sitting on top of the dog’s crate in front of the window.  they should be ready to transplant outside in april. now i just have to figure out what i am going to transplant them into. the dirt in the yard is hard and when you get down a couple of inches, it’s hard clay.  so it’s either building a raised bed and filling it with bagged garden soil, or using containers. we also have rabbits to deal with, so that’s something else to have to deal with.