A M M M M M M M Mole for Your Troubles

Wednesday, October 22, 2008 - Remember your chemistry? Do you remember the number of atoms in a mole? How, infact, did someone count the number of atoms in a mole? Was this a large mole or a small mole? Is there a difference between the number of atoms in a mole versus a gerbil? According to Amadeo Avagadro, the number of atoms (or molecules) in a mole is
6.022 X 10²³. So from 6:02 am to 6:02 pm on 10/23 (October 23rd), science teachers are celebrating National Avagadro's Number Day. If Peter Piper picked a peck of pickled peppers, and a peck was a mole, and pickled peppers where say pickled carbon atoms, then we know just how many pickled peppers Peter Piper picked.

If you stutter, Peter Piper is a pecker. And that Sally who sells the sea shells at the shore... well she's a real &*#!. And today is neither Peter's nor Sally's day. Today is also International Stuttering Awareness Day. There are so many challenges in the world as it is. Imagine if you also faced the world with a stutter... it's a troubling, and challenging speech impediment to overcome. Now imagine if you are in Chemistry class and have to explain the phenylalanines or combustible compounds... I'm guessing that this isn't your day either.

Some days are just better left unsaid.

Count your Pumpkins Before they Hatch...

Tuesday, October 21, 2008 - Pumpkins. They are everywhere at this time of year. They are in every store, outside the stores, on steps and porches... and soon they will be in bits on the street, in your back yard, on the car...

But the best thing about pumpkins is pie. You just can't get enough pumpkin pie. As the pumpkin is a vegetable, the pumpkin pie is not really a desert. It's a vegetable course. So someone got wise and decided that if you take a vegetable, load it up with spices and cream, put it in a pie shell, you can pass off your vegetables as desert. After all, what else do you do with pumpkin? As a vegetable, it isn't the greatest. Now if you really want to turn pumpkin in to something special, the pumpkin cheesecake is better than pie. Better than chocolate, take that same pumpkin pie, load it up with cream cheese, and turn it in to a dairy serving as well. It's like dining multi-tasking. So for Pumpkin Cheesecake Day, go ahead and multi-task. I wonder if you can turn eggplant or zucchini into a dish that would earn it a day of its own?

Does this sound remarkably like babble? I haven't begun to tell you about my collection of buttons. I have this very heavy brass jar that was my Grandmothers. I've had it for years, and for the first time since she passed away, I knocked it over and lo and behold, there are buttons in that jar. I'm guessing the red ones are from my wee red coat when I was 5. There are buttons there from dresses and jackets and shirts that surely my Grandmother thought she would one day get to sewing back in place. Now I have a whack of buttons and none of the clothes to which they belong. But like anything people collect - they don't need a purpose. My good friend collects crystals. She has crystal elephants and panda bears and so many others. Do they have a use? Not so much. Are they adorable? Certainly. If they weren't adorable would they still serve a role? Sure. She loves them and that's what matters most. I have a brass jar full of old buttons. Round buttons, plastic buttons, wooden buttons... buttons. For someone who didn't know I was collecting buttons, I could really go on and on about them. Babbling is ok - it is Babbling Day. Babbling about buttons works too... It's Count Your Buttons Day. I haven't counted them - but if I get serious about collecting buttons, I'll be sure to count them out.

I could sort them by shape, size, fabrication, number of holes....

Time for an Oil Change?

Monday, October 20, 2008 - Maintaining the car isn't always high on my list. I put gas in it, it goes from point "A" to point "B" pretty much without much else in the way of intervention. Heck, half the time I don't remember even doing the driving. It's as though after you get in the car and point it to the destination, it gets there. I'm sure there is more to it than that, but hey... I'm still alive. Of course I've been called Crash for many many years.

But alas the car needs more than gas. It needs air for the tires, coolant for the coolant thingy, washer fluid for the windows, air filters for the air conditioning, and oil for the engine. If not for the little sticker on the inside of my window, I'd never remember to do the oil changes. Hell, I don't remember to send birthday to my mother and that's only once a year, never mind once every quarter. In keeping with my complete inability to remember when to get my oil changed, today was Oil Change Day, and lo and behold... I have the same oil in the car I had last month. We'll see if I can get that sorted soon. If not, I'll drown my sorrows in a vat of brandied fruit.

Brandied fruit is a funny thing. Take a nice piece of fruit, soak it perfectly good brandy and add them to a door stop of a cake called the Christmas Fruit Cake. The only thing about the entire process that is the brandy. But today is as good a day as any to dip a few pieces of apple into a snifter. It's Brandied Fruit Day and we are all supposed to eat 5 - 10 servings of fruit and veggies a day.

Hot flashes? Shave.

Saturday, October 18, 2008 - Stubble. Five o'Clock shadow. Going Don Johnson. Facial fur. Winter face. Grizzly Adams. Playoff beard. Call it what you want... there is no time like the present to rid yourself off the hair that grows on your face. It's No Beard Day and that means today is the day to pull out the razor. Go for it. If you dare go bare, go bare from facial hair.

I suppose there are pros and cons to facial hair. Pro... you save valuable shaving time in the morning. Con... you probably use up all the time you saved in the morning plucking stray lunch bits from your Chin Pet throughout the day. Pro... you look masculine. Con... Grizzly Adams was masculine, but he lived in a hut in the bush with a bear. Pro... Your face is warmer in the cold weather. Con... Warm face cold nose. Pro...You come out looking more mature. Con... most of your gray hair finds its way to the face first screaming "I'm old". Pro... you've made the playoffs. Con... You won't need it come March anyway, the Canucks are already on the golf course.

So what about the summer months? Is there sweat under that beard? When it is hot and humid out, does it get a little damp in all that hair? Imagine if the bearded guys had to experience menopause? Hot flashes and fur? Doesn't seem like a good mix.

Ok, so I'm probably not the best person to talk about menopause. I experience cold flashes. Moments of chills that my grandmother used to tell me meant someone was walking across my grave. At the rate I have these chills, I'm guessing I'm going to be buried somewhere pretty central. Maybe I can get put under the sidewalk of a Starbucks... in a paper cup. I wonder if menopause will be less chilly? The hot flashes sound pretty good right now. I wonder if menopause will be less chilly? Hot flashes sound pretty good right now. What? I said that already?

Today is World Menopause Day. If you know anyone who is experiencing this 'life changing' event... give them a little slack. They won't necessarily remember your name, or where they met you. They might start stripping in the middle of a cold snap. They may borrow another personality for a while, but with any luck, it won't take long. I'm not sure exactly how to celebrate this one. Maybe part of the party means shaving the beard to ease the hot flashes. Worth a try.

Hairy Boobs and Shaking Balls

Friday, October 17, 2008 - Golf... the sport of kings (and queens, and men and women, and kids, pros, novices, honesty and cheating). There is no club in my bag better than my pencil. There isn't anything quite as effective as the 'Foot Wedge' or the 'Hand Wedge', and when all is done, a 'Sandwedge' and a beer. Though it's hard to convince your foursome of these more creative clubs, there is one golf tradition that is easy to run with... the Mulligan.

Ah the Mulligan - the ever present 'free' ball that needs not be counted, written down, scored, played with... In my foursome, there are two Mulligans. Each 'nine' gets you another Mulligan. These are the balls one likes to keep in one's bag. You know there is going to be two balls each round that you just don't want to remember. The Mulligan is an important part of the game. If you can get out on to the course today - take more than two balls off your card. On Mulligan Day you should really get all the play out of these free balls as possible.

From balls to boobs - today is also Mammography Day. Always "celebrated" on the third Friday in October - today is the day to get out there and check the girls. Is it surprising that Mammography Day was first declared as such by President Clinton? If you are one of the millions of women who won't be celebrating today with an actual Mammogram... how about lying out in the garage with your girls behind a tire of the family car. Get the husband, boyfriend, girlfriend, pal, to drive back and forth over each boob. Maybe with any luck that stray hair that has popped up will get caught in the tire treads.

Today is also the anniversary of the premier of "Hair" on Broadway in 1967, and the day that the great San Fransisco Earthquake hit in 1989. This is a shake'n, rock'n hairy day all around. As long as you aren't' completely bald (sorry Uncle), this is a great day. Even better if you are a male golfer with a bad slice. Nothing but free balls and a lower score card for you today.

Bosses and Hungry Bookworms

Thursday, October 16, 2008 - Seriously... I would write more, but I now have four bosses, and each one has a project. For some bosses I wear steel toed boots, for others I wear heels. But for all of them, I wear a hard hat. The dictionary has many ways to describe 'boss'. According to Dictionary.com Unabridged (v 1.1) 'boss' is

/bɔs, bɒs/ Pronunciation Key - Show Spelled Pronunciation[baws, bos] Pronunciation Key - –noun

1. a person who employs or superintends workers; manager.

2.	a politician who controls the party organization, as in a particular district.

3.	a person who makes decisions, exercises authority, dominates, etc.: My grandfather was the boss in his family.

–verb (used with object)

4.	to be master of or over; manage; direct; control.

5.	to order about, esp. in an arrogant manner.

–verb (used without object)

6.	to be boss.

7.	to be too domineering and authoritative.

–adjective

8.	chief; master.

Ah, the boss - the director, foreman, head, manager, overseer, superintendent, supervisor, taskmaster, chieftain, slave driver... Whatever you call yours, today is National Boss Day. Check in your thesaurus for other words, but don't linger too long. Today is Dictionary Day. The thesaurus will just have to wait.

Today is also World Food Day. Millions of children, men and women are starving throughout the world.
Televisions broadcast hours and hours of images of starving children on other continents. It is an epidemic that ultimately affects all of us. Take a good look around that corner you invariably look away from. There is poverty and hunger right out our back doors. Given the recent economic downturn, it will be out your front door as well. If there was ever a time the food banks needed more help, it is indeed now. When you stop in at the grocer, stop by the food bank bins and donate.


It is also National Feral Cat Day. I'm not sure what the feral cat did to get an entire day. Is it a coincidence that it's today? Sweet and Sour Chicken Balls anyone?