Humor

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Albums I Loved But Shouldn’t Admit

This is a story about albums that I have loved, but am now embarrassed by the fact.  Everyone has them.  Those stacks of albums, cassettes, CDs or whatever medium you use that you can’t believe you bought.  It’s one thing if you bought them and didn’t like them.  It’s another thing to buy them and like them and then, years later, realize how embarrassing it was for people to have heard you listening to it or, even worse, singing to songs on that particular album.

Kids of today have it much easier.  They can download a particular track.  They don’t have to buy the whole album or CD to get one favorite tune.  They can listen on their iPhones or iPads to particular genres on apps like Pandora.  They don’t have to go to a record store like I did and ask the clerk for advice on a new music type.  I walked into Record Shack in Iowa one day as a teenager and remember asking the 40ish year-old woman if she had ever heard of a music genre called rap.  And if she did, could she make suggestions on a rap CD I could buy?  She could not.  In our day, it was more trial and error.  You bought as many duds as you did great collections in order to stay hip and current.

I’ve recently had the chance to think through my music collection.  I have decided that because I have always liked to sing is one reason for so many embarrassing albums.  My second reason for the embarrassment comes from the fact that I have always liked a good ballad.  With ballads come bad choices….trust me.  So here are five albums that I dearly loved, but am ashamed to admit it today.  What was I thinking?  I am sorry to all the people who had to hear me sing along to the songs on these collections, that had to hear me discuss their musical merits or that had to stand in line with me when I bought them.  Here goes:

In 1975, the Captain and Tennille came out with ‘Song of Joy’.  The actual tune, ‘Song of Joy’ was to become the last song they sang each week on their ill-fated prime time variety television hour.  I knew all the words.  Each week, my parents would be forced to sit in their recliners and watch the Captain and Tennille entertain and, at the end of each show, watch me join in as they played and sang through their signature goodbye song, ‘Song of Joy’.  Towards the end of the first and only season of their variety hour, I was able to sing harmony to Tennille’s melody.  I’m sorry Mom and Dad.  As a side note, this album also spawned the song ‘Muskrat Love’ which I played so often that the needle from my stereo actually destroyed the grooves on the album.

In 1978, my main man Barry Manilow released ‘Even Now’.  I had several Manilow albums in my stash already, but this album is the one that always sticks out in my mind.  While it contained three of my favorite Manilow hits, ‘Even Now’, ‘Can’t Smile Without You’ and ‘Copacabana’, there was always a sadness in my heart when I listened to it.  I knew that Barry’s world dominance was coming to an end.  This album was one of the first where I realized that I was going to have to work it if I was ever going to be in entertainment (which I am not).  I would sit on my bed and belt ‘Even Now’ out in a manly, yet sensitive seating arrangement.  I even introduced a light dance number to the interlude on ‘Can’t Smile Without You’ just to spark things up a little when I sang it in my bedroom.  I also asked our local barber in Iowa if he could cut my hair just like Barry Manilow’s.  I think that I may have been asking for a mullet, but I thought it was perfect for me.  Barry’s hair was always ‘business in the front, party in the back’.

In 1982, Diana Ross released ‘Silk Electric’.  The big hit on this album was ‘Muscles’ written for her by her friend Michael Jackson.  At the time, I was into some sports like wrestling and track (although not great at either) and therefore thought I had an incredible body.  Let me re-phrase….I did have an incredible body at that time, but didn’t think so.  Now that I am a troll, I realize what a waste of time that was thinking I needed to be in better shape.  I should have worked it more!  Let me tell you right now that there is not a man on Earth that should ever, ever sing ‘Muscles’ where anyone can hear them or could possibly hear them.  There is no good that can come of it.  Yet, I was proud to sing along to the radio in front of my friends.  I’d sing over the buzz of a loud party when it came on so that everyone knew that I knew all the words.  I was proud of that.  Sometimes I would flex my arms to really get into it.  Again, not good.  Don’t try this at home.

My roommates in college during 1985 were listening to new music that their parents would never allow them to listen to at home.  I am remembering Rush and AC/DC.  I was listening to Sheena Easton’s ‘Best Kept Secret’.  ‘Almost Over You’ was my favorite.  Again, any ballad is a good ballad to me.  I listened in my college dorm room to this song when I was happy and I listened to this song when I was sad.  For Christmas that year, my college dorm roommate gave me headphones that worked with my stereo.  He said he had heard enough of Sheena Easton and that song.  I was stunned.  As a side note, I gave every girl I knew the fashion tip to wear her pearl necklaces at an angle like Sheena did on the cover.  I didn’t date once that year.

In 1990, I had moved to San Francisco and was enjoying the whole new R&B and hip/hop scene.  Bobby Brown’s ‘Don’t Be Cruel’ was the album to own if you liked this kind of music.  There is nothing wrong with this album and the music on it.  ‘My Prerogative’ is still one of my favorite tunes and I listen to it on my iPod even today.  It is probably (and unfortunately) Bobby Brown’s singular contribution to the music scene before he turned into the crazy Bobby Brown he is today.  The problem was the clothes.  I filled my closet up with double-breasted suits that had huge, stuffed shoulder pads in them.  Tab collar shirts buttoned all the way up to the neck were all I wore.  As the album got hotter and hotter, my shoulder pads got bigger and bigger.  My hair got shorter and shorter on the sides and higher and higher on the top.  I saw Bobby in a sequined blazer at one point and exhausted several department store sales people in a massive hunt to find a match.  This is the truth….see the jacket in the picture on the left.

I was cool while this style was popular.  However, after it wasn’t popular anymore, no one told me.  When a woman in a club looked at me circa 1992/93 and called me a ‘Sad Bobby Brown’, I knew I needed a makeover.  It was my prerogative to change, so I packed up my suits and tab-collar shirts and put them away for another time when they would be back in style.

They say that the truth will set you free.  Telling you about my embarrassment and shame around these albums is helping to release me.  Again, there is nothing wrong with the music on any of these albums…they are not duds.  It’s just that hindsight is 20/20.  Looking back 20 and 30 years later, what was I thinking?  Thanks for reading.  I’m off now to download a couple of these songs onto my iPod.  At least I can listen to my iPod in secret with my ear buds and no one will even know what I’m lip synching to in my bed room.  What albums do you still love but are embarrassed to admit…be honest?

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A Picture Is Worth A Thousand Words – Winter Anyone?

This is a Winter picture from February.  Remember when we all said we couldn’t wait until the Winter was over and Summer would get here?  After yesterday’s 103 degree scorcher, I’m sure I wouldn’t mind sitting out in the cold for an hour or two.  Weather seems to be the number one thing that you can always complain about…it’s always either too hot or too cold.  Yesterday, absolutely too hot…way too hot.  What has the weather been like in your neck of the woods?

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Friday Dance Party – Last Friday Night (T.G.I.F.) With Katy Perry

This is another edition of Friday Dance Party on Acorns On Glen.  It’s the time where we give thanks for another week of living.  We give thanks for making it through and for being able to celebrate this fact.  How do we celebrate another week of living?  We dance.  So take a moment and be proud of the fact that you’re here and you’ve made it to another Friday.  Not only you, but your family and friends as well.  So, to that end, are you alive this Friday?  Have you given thanks for this?

Good, now let’s dance.

Every Summer has its own song.  You know, that one song that speaks for that one particular Summer season.  When you hear it, you immediately identify it with what you did that certain Summer, where you went on vacation that certain Summer, who you were dating, what you were drinking, etc.  I was reading Billboard.com and actually found a list of the top songs of Summer by year.  Reading through the list brought back memories and also made me realize that I’m not getting any younger.  The songs were ranked on each track’s performance on the Billboard Hot 100 chart during the Summer.  So here’s the list for the last ten years, just to refresh your memory:

  • 2000 – Bent by Matchbook Twenty – I must have been in a coma because I don’t even remember this song.  Where the hell was I?
  • 2001 – Let Me Blow Ya Mind by Eve featuring Gwen Stefani – Nothing bad ever comes from Gwen.
  • 2002 – Hot in Here by Nelly
  • 2003 – Crazy In Love by Beyoncé featuring Jay-Z – Danced to this one and thought I was hot and that I had all the moves until I saw a video of myself and realized I was an old man who had too much to drink and wasn’t very good at all.  Love her!
  • 2004 –  Confessions Part II by Usher
  • 2005 – We Belong Together by Mariah Carey – Listened to this one so much that when I hear it now I sort of cringe.
  • 2006 – Promiscuous – Nelly Furtado featuring Timbaland – Still love this one and listen to it all the time.
  • 2007 – Umbrella by Rihanna featuring Jay-Z – Still to this day I will belt ‘Brella, brella, brella’ for no known reason.
  • 2008 – I Kissed A Girl – Katy Perry
  • 2009 – I Gotta Feeling by the Black Eyed Peas – Will.I.Am is what Martko1964 Wants.2.B
  • 2010 – California Girls by Katy Perry featuring Snoop Dogg

So what will be the song of Summer 2011?  I am putting my vote in now for ‘Last Friday Night’ by Katy Perry.  Yes, this would give her three Summer titles, but this song is what Summer is all about.  Letting go and having some fun.  She also has quite the cast of characters in this video, including Kenny G.  What can be bad about that?  So enjoy the rest of your Summer and let loose to this little T.G.I.F. goodie.  You made it through another week and deserve to celebrate.  Does anyone even wear retainers like this anymore?  What do you think the song of Summer 2011 will be?

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A Toad’s House Or Did We Buy Some Bad Real Estate?

This is a toad house.  Have you ever heard of such a thing?  Neither had we until someone commented on Acorns On Glen that I should buy this guy a house.  Remember our little half-inch toad friend?

So we are told that these little guys like a house built for them that they can live under and not worry about predators likes snakes to eat them up during the night.  We guess we understand…who wouldn’t like a house built for them when they are born or when they get married?  Even more, would you like to get eaten during the night by a snake?  The little ceramic houses also protect them from the elements….sun, rain, etc.

So if all thing go according to plan, we should have a toad or two living in the two apartments that we constructed in a very short amount of time….one in the back yard and one in the front yard.  This is what we hope our happy toad family looks like in their new home.  Think ‘Extreme Makeover, Home Edition’ for toads.

Let us know….good idea or a huge rip-off?  Each house cost $13…not a huge investment and if it is successful, how great would it be to see where our toads live and be able to point it out to all of our city friends.  If it doesn’t work, can’t you buy plastic toads at the garden supply store and try to trick all your friends into believing they are real?  We’ll keep you posted on how they are received by the toad community.  I’m off to buy an ab cruncher and a few knives off the television.  Aren’t they guaranteed for success as well….just like the toad houses?  What do you think….will toads move in or will we have a vacancy all the rest of the Summer?

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A Picture Is Worth A Thousand Words – Dragonfly Dreams

This is a little dragonfly warming up in the early morning sun.  They always look so magical and mystical.  Friends with the faeries and gnomes that live out in the woods or so my little five-year old neighbors like to tell me.  Makes me want to curl up and lay in the sun all Saturday as well.  What are your plans for the weekend?

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Friday Dance Party – Shaggy’s Sugar Cane

This is another edition of Friday Dance Party on Acorns On Glen.  It’s the time where we give thanks for making it through another week and for being alive and present here on Earth.  How do we celebrate another week of living?  We dance.  So, are you alive this Friday?  Are you and your family safe and sound?  Take a few seconds now to be in the moment and realize what a great life you truly have.  Did you give thanks for that?

Good, now let’s dance.

Wow, it’s been a hectic week here at work.  There was a new system upgrade (which really didn’t work that well) and so it meant a lot of late hours for my team and lots of stress.  This week I was pondering on where we should go for summer vacation and although no final decisions have been made yet, after this week, I need a break.  Whenever you have an extremely hard week at work, do you every so often think about just throwing in the towel and starting over from scratch?  This was one of those weeks for me, but every time I think about what I’d do if I could pick a different job, I can’t figure out the answer.  I just can’t think what I want to do when I grow up.  That’s what made me think of this song for this week’s dancing.  Why not give up all of this and move to a sugar cane ranch somewhere on a far away island?  I could do that.  Could I do that?  Can you see me as a sugar cane farmer?  Anyway, this is a great song by Shaggy.  So get your reggae beat going and sway to the sounds.  It’s been a rough week, but we’ve made it through.  We deserve to dance and dance hard.  Oh Whoa…Oh Whoa…Oh.  Do you ever think of giving it all up and moving far away and starting over?

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Comfort Food With A Twist – Meatloaf

This is some real comfort food if there ever was some.  It’s good old fashioned meatloaf with some creamy mashed potatoes.  But it’s not your ordinary diner-style meatloaf.  It’s not dense and dry and covered in brown gravy.  No, this meatloaf recipe is a twist on that old recipe and produces a light and juicy meatloaf topped with a sweet and sour glaze made from ketchup and brown sugar.  It also is pretty quick to prepare because all of your vegetables just need to be chopped in large chunks and then ground in the food processor.  You don’t need to stand for hours dicing celery, carrots and onions.  It also incorporates three kinds of ground meat to make the meatloaf light and full of flavor.  I also use Pepperidge Farms as my white bread of choice when I make this recipe.  Why only Pepperidge Farms?  When I was younger and used to go to the grocery store with my parents or my Grandma, I used to beg to buy a loaf of Pepperidge Farms bread.  I figured since it was so much more expensive than the other loaves than it had to be like a slice of heaven when you ate it.  I would explain to them the facts of how it was made with care by jolly looking bakers who kneaded the dough with their own hands with tender loving care.  I would tell them about the ovens where the bread was baked and how it was wrapped in paper and then placed in the plastic bag for extra freshness.  Not only that, but they wrapped it while it was still warm from the oven.  This is why too much television is bad for a small child to take part in every day!  My parents or my Grandma would stare at me in disbelief that here was this small child reciting facts he had learned from a bread commercial.  It must have been this scary little feeling inside of them that always made them tell me no.  My parents and Grandmother were tough because I remember begging (and many times probably crying and screaming) to buy a loaf of this special bread.  Why don’t they see what I see in this delicious loaf that is so much better than the other white breads out here on this rack?  Now that I have my own money, I always buy Pepperidge Farms white bread to use at home.  I’ve come to realize that it doesn’t necessarily taste any better, but it’s just the whole principle of the matter, if you get my drift.  Bread aside, if you are looking for a comfort food classic with a twist, give our meatloaf a try.  Your family will love it.

Ingredients:

  • 4 slices Pepperidge Farms white bread, crusts removed and torn into large pieces (I just know it is the best!!)
  • 3 garlic cloves, chopped
  • 1 medium onion, chopped into eighths
  • 1 celery stalk, chopped into quarters
  • 1 medium carrot, chopped into quarters
  • 1/2 cup flat-leaf parsley
  • 12 ounces ground beef chuck
  • 12 ounces ground pork
  • 12 ounces ground veal
  • 1 large egg
  • 3/4 cup ketchup
  • 1 tablespoon Dijon mustard
  • 1 tablespoon Worcestershire sauce
  • Coarse salt and freshly ground pepper
  • 2 tablespoons light-brown sugar

Directions:

Preheat oven to 375 degrees.  Pulse bread in a food processor until finely ground (you should have about 2 1/2 cups breadcrumbs).  Transfer to a medium bowl.

Pulse the large chunks of garlic, onion, celery, carrot, and parsley in food processor until finely chopped.  Remember to let the food processor do all the hard chopping work.  This is a huge time saver.

Add to breadcrumbs.  Add meats, egg, 1/4 cup ketchup, the mustard, Worcestershire sauce, 1 tablespoon salt and 1/2 teaspoon pepper; mix together using your hands.

Transfer mixture to a 5-by-9-inch loaf pan.

Stir together remaining  1/2 cup ketchup and the brown sugar until smooth; brush onto meat.  I also poke six deep holes into the top of the meat with my finger before I brush on the ketchup mixture.  This enables the ketchup to penetrate farther down into the meatloaf and increase the flavor.

Set pan on a rimmed baking sheet and bake until an instant-read thermometer inserted into the center reaches 160 degrees, about 1 hour 20 minutes.  Let cool slightly before serving.

Always a family pleaser, this little meatloaf with a twist is great as your dinner’s main course and then equally as good the next day in a sandwich or two.  It is also easy to pair up with almost any side dish.  A potato dish, a vegetable dish…..it all works with meatloaf.  Hope you like this new twist on an old fashion main dish staple.  What old classics do you cook up with some modern twists to them?

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A Picture Is Worth A Thousand Words – Vacation Needed

This is where we might be spending our Summer vacation unless we decide on something to do as quickly as possible.  All of our friends are off to Europe, on cruises, at the shore.  Us….absolutely no plans.  While the hammock would be nice to lay in for a week, it’s not very exciting.  We need to make a plan and make it now.  What are your plans for Summer vacation this year?

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Summer Update….Warts And All

This is a Summer update to some of the stories we have posted earlier this year on Acorns On Glen.  Can you believe it is the middle of July?  It doesn’t seem possible until you go outside and the hot sun beats down on you while you are gardening or messing around on the patio.  Time goes so fast.  I am remembering a saying that seems to hold some truth for us this year–the older you get, the faster time flies.  That sums up 2011 so far for us even though I am not admitting to getting any older.  On Sunday, we posted a virtual garden tour on what was blooming in our garden.  While we were walking around the garden, there were so many times we stopped and remembered that we had done a post on a certain flower or a certain plant earlier in the year.  So we came up with the idea of doing a post to show what has happened since we first posted the original garden or everyday life story all those months, weeks or days ago.  Some of the stories show progress and some show a different picture.  In the spirit of open and honest communication, we are going to share the good with the bad.  It’s what’s going on at Glen Road….warts and all!

In June, we posted an article entitled “Another Post About Legal Pot“.  We thought the title was funny as the post was about potting plants that we had purchased from White Flower Farm and not about the happy weed that most people would think about when they read the title.  Can you believe that it is one of our most visited posts?  We get it, it’s not the gripping story that unfolded, but the provocative title.  In our story, we show two collections of annuals that we received and planted in pots around our pool.  At the time we wrote the post, the pots looked pretty empty with the little plants placed in them.  Here are the pictures that showed the planting of the ‘Sunny Summer Annual Collection’ and the ‘King Tut Annual Collection’.  Pretty meager to say the least.

Well, we hoped in our post that our two collections would take root and grow and grow they did.  We have been lucky to have some long spells of sun interrupted by a few days of rain and this has been the perfect trick to grow our two collections into some impressive potted displays.  Here are the same two pots still sitting around the pool, but look at how well the plants have filled in.

Sometimes your best intentions in the garden turn out to be disappointments.  Take our story in April on Grace Kelly coming to see us on Glen Road in the post entitled ‘Grace Kelly Moves To Glen Road‘.  If Grace Kelly visited or moved in that would be news to us because we missed it.  Our post was about a tree rose where a Grace Kelly rose bush was fused to a tree trunk and the small tree would bloom with Grace Kelly roses all Summer.  Here are a few shots of the tree rose that we planted and placed on our patio.  So full of potential at the time!

So to be honest, things looked great at the beginning of Grace’s growth.  She pushed out a few leaves on the top branches and hopes were high.  Then she just stopped, dried up and died…or so we thought.  At about the time we were ready to give Grace and her soil a final resting place in our compost pile, we noticed that she decided to change her mind and grow from the bottom of the container and not from the top of the branch like she was supposed to do.  So we have left Grace in her same spot to see what she produces from the rose branch that is growing from the base of the pot.  Do you think we will get a pretty pink rose by the time Fall comes to visit?  Look hard at the base of the pot and you can see the spindly little rose branch growing.

Remember when we were ‘Hot For Horseradish‘ and ‘Raising Rhubarb‘ in April?  We planted some horseradish and rhubarb at about the same time and we were so excited for them to grow and then come back in 2012 for some harvesting.  Well, we will have some rhubarb, but the horseradish had other plans.  Here are our horseradish and rhubarb plants from back in April.

Needless to say our horseradish patch is now a nice little track of dirt and mud.  Did the plants just pack up and leave?  Maybe they didn’t want to live by the sweet and sour goodness of the rhubarb?  Whatever the reason, our horseradish struck out while our rhubarb hit a home run this season.

There are even updates from our post on Sunday ‘What’s Blooming – Another Virtual Garden Tour‘.  In that post, we talked about our best garden buy ever, which were the long-blooming day lilies from QVC.  Well since that post where we showed two blooming varieties, a third one has opened its buds to display a brownish bloom that will last for a couple of months.  Maybe it’s the child of the original yellow variety and the coral variety that we showed you on Sunday.  Remember them?

We are not sure we remember this variety from previous years.  Can that be possible that it just came out of no where?  Doubtful, but stranger things have happened in our garden.  Again, notice the almost brown color of the petals.  As well, the dark purple middle is a killer.  So gorgeous and, best yet, long lasting.

Remember this little stunner from our trip to Christie’s auction house in June in our post ‘Lots Of Bling – Christie’s Important Jewels‘?

This little diamond ring set with an oval-cut diamond, weighing approximately 46.51 carats, flanked on either side by a pear-shaped diamond, weighing approximately 1.01 carats, mounted in platinum was estimated to go for anywhere from $2,500,000 to $3,500,000 in auction.  Guess what the final bid price was when the dust settled at the auction?  $4,226,500!!  A steal (or to steal it is the only way we would ever be able to own such a gorgeous diamond!).

Lastly, we had made a smart little comment about our Asiatic lilliums being some of the first flowers we planted at Glen Road and, while we were excited that they came back year after year, they were not the most vivid colors we had ever seen.  We tried to get out of putting them down by saying we weren’t the most vivid color either after six years on Glen Road, but it didn’t work.  Here is what we snapped on Sunday in ‘What’s Blooming – Another Virtual Garden Tour‘.

Well this morning on a little garden stroll, another Asiatic lillium had shown its face.  Guess what?  The blooms match our embarrassed faces.  How dare we make fun of our lillium tribe.  Our new bloomer is a dark red.  We may be less than vivid in our six years here on Glen Road, but don’t bring the lilliums down.  They are a diverse nation if we have ever seen one.

So we hope you enjoyed our little update of what’s been going on here at Glen Road.  The garden and everyday life are amazing and fun things.  With every great story, there is another one where things just didn’t go exactly as planned.  That’s life!  Well, for all our less than stellar performances, we guess there is always next year…or the year after….or the year after.  You get our drift.  What good or crazy things have been going on for you this Summer?