A Jewelry Store? A Bookstore? An Art Gallery? Yes to all!

It's no secret that I love to read! I've mentioned many times in previous posts that I like to go to a special Goodwill Store that we have close by that has books, books and more books! The best thing is that most of them are 80 cents! You can't go wrong with that! Even buying online books at 99 cents can't beat my bookstore. I've also mentioned many times that someday I was going to take pictures of this store and write a post about it. Today is that day!

A little background...the reason for my title to this post is this bookstore has many faces. It's a bookstore, true, but it's also a nick-knack store, a jewelry store, an art gallery and much, much more! 

Here you see books! What I love is that the employees that work here have this store super organized. They have signs posted above each section that says whether it's Fiction, Non-Fiction, Education, Health, Parenting, Religious, Cooking, etc, etc...you get the idea, right? The books are all alphabetized by author in each section!

And in little nooks and crannies, like on the shelf at the bottom of this photo, they tuck little treasures, like dolls, candle sticks, looks like there is even a Santa Claus cookie jar down there! Darn, wish I had seen that!

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Here's the front entrance and they have a bookcase there facing the outside with some of their newer inventory of books. I usually grab about three or four books the second I come in!

And I forgot to put in my title that this is also a Hallmark Store!! Well not really, but see that nice, neat little section of different greeting cards? Nothing goes to waste once donated to Goodwill!

Also look carefully and you will see lots of other goodies, see some purses hanging on the wall behind the cashier? They also have some vintage jewelry back there too!

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Another shot of books and they also sell boxes. I've bought some of these boxes many times to move and sometimes just to store some of the books I've bought and read and need to return to Goodwill so someone else can benefit from them!

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I could spend hours in this place, which is why it's nice that they have created such a nice little reading area. All of this is donated stuff and almost all of it is for sale, but these tables and the little couch and a few chairs on the other side are not for sale but for customers to just sit and relax and look at books. 

The store has regular customers that come in and sit on weekends and just pass the time, just like a Barnes and Noble Bookstore...except without a Starbucks. 

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Another shot of books! As you can see there is a never-ending supply of books coming into this store constantly! Can you also see those posters and pictures set alongside? There are treasures to be seen everywhere!

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Another shot of books! When you read as much as I do it's really a nice option to be able to have such a huge selection for such a great price...plus, when I finish I donate them back so the Goodwill continues to profit from the books and someone else gets the pleasure of reading these books over and over again! Win-Win!

I thought this was an interesting little corner to share because this is all their vintage books. I've been looking for a first edition copy of the book, The Five Little Peppers and How They Grew by Margaret Sidney. It was a book I read over and over as a child until it fell apart. I always check out this section and hope that one day I will come upon it. That will be a happy-happy, joy-joy day!

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And say you come with someone that is not into books...well they won't be bored, just tell them to stroll over to the Art Gallery! I love this section!!!

Here's a shot from the entrance, this room is located at the back of the store and there's lots of natural light which is perfect to show off all this cool artwork you can buy. It's all for sale! Someone that really loved ballet must have recently donated!

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More artwork! Isn't this fabulous? And all hung and displayed so nicely. And the store is so clean!!! 

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Can you see why I love this place and constantly rave about it and devoted a whole post to it? And I'm still not done!!! Yes...there is more to see!

I probably should have started with this photo as this is the front of the store. 

Where to start! Ok, so on the shelves to the left you see magazines. Yes, they even salvage magazines, lots of Oprah's and Southern Living and others. More artwork of course, probably their newest arrivals! And lots of little nick-knacks on the shelves and even on the floor! You can see in the background what appears to be jewelry, it is!

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This is a very cute section too. They don't sell the little bookshelf itself, trust me I've asked because I love it, but it is always filled with lots of cute little treasures!

And because I was so busy taking photos I wasn't really paying much attention to what was on the shelf and now I see that little angel blowing a kiss!! Love it! Shoulda bought it!

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And now...my favorite section in the whole store...oh c'mon....who am I kidding, the whole store is my favorite. But you know how you save the best for last? Well I always save looking at the jewelry for last because it is my favorite part.

I have found tons of cute bracelets and necklaces here for great prices! And the great thing is the pieces I find here are unique one of a kind items that no one else has!

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And I didn't leave empty handed. Along with all these great pictures, look what's in my shopping cart?

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I think that book in the front is one my mom or sister threw into my cart because I just looked around here at home and I don't have that book and I know it's not a book I would have been interested in. But the low-carb cookbook and the Atkins book behind it I will love going through.

So this is why I don't own a Kindle. Owning a kindle would keep me from the pleasure of visiting this great place filled with books and treasures and jewels and artwork and would probably put Goodwill out of business considering that I visit this place almost every weekend...but wouldn't you if you had it in your home town?


 

The Ugliness of Reality TV - From Left to Write

Have you ever watched the Jerry Springer Show? If you are a fan, you may want to quit reading now, fair warning!

For those that have never watched the show let me wrap it up by saying it’s a show promoting all the ugliness that is America on reality TV shows.

Jerry and his staff have a knack for finding those people that would sell their momma’s souls for their 15 minutes of fame and a little bit of cash!

The majority of their episodes deal with “Are you my daddy” and “Who is my daddy” and couples that have affairs with other people. I don’t believe I’ve ever seen anything else on Jerry's show.

I tried to find a video I could post for anyone that hasn't seen the show but after watching a few of them it just got so depressing. Human beings at their worse! The shows that deal with paternity are so sad and pathetic and I feel so sorry for the children involved…but the ones dealing with infidelity are the ones that anger me the most! It just seems to me that on the show and in real life, that whenever one spouse cheats on the other spouse, the spouses always forgive each other but are angry at the person that the spouse had the affair with.

I think I've posted before how crazy I think that is. To my way of thinking, if you are married to someone, they promised to love you and be true to you and they broke that promise to you. The other person that they had the affair with, be it a man or woman, that other person never made a promise to either spouse....so why would you want to beat them up, like they do on the Jerry Springer Show and yet they choose to forgive the cheating spouse?

This just does not make sense to me! I don't want to spoil the book that I read this month for my book club, From Left to Write, so I won't say anymore, but the book inspired me to write this post.

This post was inspired by the novel Those We Love Most by Lee Woodruff. Every family has its secrets and deceptions, but they come to surface when a tragic accident changes the family dynamic forever.. Join From Left to Write on June 6 as we discuss Those We Love Most. You can also enter to win a live video chat with Lee Woodruff! As a member, I received a copy of the book for review purposes.

The Oz Principle and Don't be Afraid of the Word NO!

     
At work, we are reading this book called The Oz Principle, it’s a voluntary book club and we will have discussions throughout the reading of it, but I read the beginning of Chapter 1 and I see something that I believe in and voice a lot but never thought to find it in a book called the Wizard of Oz. It really opened my eyes. 

     “Who are you?” asked the Scarecrow when he had stretched himself and yawned, “and where are you going?” 
     “My name is Dorothy,” said the girl, “and I am going to the Emerald City, to ask the great Oz to send me back to Kansas.”
     “Where is the Emerald City?” he inquired; “and who is Oz?”    “Why, don’t you know? She returned, in surprise. “No, indeed, I don’t know anything. You see, I am stuffed, so I have no brains at all,” he answered sadly. “Oh,” said Dorothy; “I’m awfully sorry for you.” “Do you think,” he asked, “if I go to the Emerald City with you that Oz would give me some brains?” “I cannot tell,” she returned; “but you may come with me, if you like. If Oz will not give you any brains you will be no worse off than you are now.” “That is true,” said the Scarecrow. --The Wizard of Oz, L. Frank Baum 

      There have been many times in my life that I have given up on something I wanted or needed because I would talk myself out of it. Thinking to myself that someone would tell me no or some other obstacle would stop me or prevent me from achieving my goal. 

     But with age comes wisdom! Several years ago when I was trying to get pre-approved to buy my first home, the bank gave me a number that they would approve for me. It was about $10,000 less than the asking price of the home. I was doomed. I called my sister and we cried on each other’s shoulder, sad that this was not to be, my pretty little house was just a dream…a far-away, unreachable dream. 

     As we drove to the house to let the seller know that I was not approved for their asking price it dawned on me that I was approved for a certain amount. What if instead of saying, “Sorry, I can’t give you your asking price,” and walking away with my tail tucked between my leg I said to them, “I can’t give you your asking price, but I can offer this.” What did I have to lose? I already didn't have the house and had lived my whole life without it. I was already resigned to the fact that the bank would not pre-approve me for what I wanted and I wasn't going to get the house anyway. I would be no worse off than I was now, but I at least needed to give it a shot, right? 

     So I did it, I offered them the amount that I was pre-approved for and lo and behold…they accepted my offer and I got the house. So I learned a valuable lesson, DON’T BE AFRAID OF THE WORD NO! Reach for what you want, in the end you will be no worse off than how you started. If you go into a situation with a mindset that you have already been defeated, then the only thing that defeated you was YOU. 

The Best Laid Plans

This post was inspired by the novel Afterwards by Rosamund Lupton. After witnessing her children's school set ablaze, Grace attempts to find the arsonist as her teenage daughter lies in a coma in Lupton's suspense thriller. Join From Left to Write on April 11 as we discuss Afterwards. As a member, I received a copy of the book for review purposes

I have to tell you that I really enjoyed this book. Many of the others in our group mentioned how difficult it was to read because they put themselves into the place of the main character Grace and her child who was in a coma, but for me it was different because of what I and my family are going through right now with my dad.

My dad who is will be 82 years of age in a little less than a month took a spill recently and fractured his pelvis. He has been residing in an assisted living facility and is slowly healing. It's been a long two weeks and I've been spending all the time I can with him. This was unexpected...of course it was, it was an accident and they wouldn't be called accidents if they were expected right?

I have always tried to make sure that if anything happens to me my kids would be protected financially. They wouldn't be rich or anything, but there would be enough for them to bury me and have funds left over for them to go to school or put a down payment on a home or something. But I've never thought about what would happen if I became hurt, in a coma or unable to take care of my physical needs and I had to be in a skilled nursing center or an assisted living facility? 

You can bet that I will begin to prepare for that now. I am learning with my dad's fall that trying to navigate the rough waters of Medicare, parts A and B and Medical and in-home health care while trying to be supportive to my dad and wanting only to spend time with him helping him to heal and not having to deal with all the other crap is tougher than you might think and I don't want my loved ones to suffer through this as well.

In the book they didn't really go into finances and insurance and how they were going to pay for hospital stays and medications, but in real life the reality of those things can devastate a family at a time when they need to be supportive to each other.

Plan people...plan. You know the old saying, the best laid plans of mice and men? Tragedy will strike all of us one day, rich or poor, good planner or bad, so wouldn't it be better to be prepared?




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Is the Grass Always Greener on the Other Side?

This post was inspired by Saturday Night Widows by Becky Aikman. After being kicked out of her widow support group for being too young, Becky creates her own support group with an unusual twist. Join From Left to Write on February 14 as we discuss Saturday Night Widows. As a member, I received a copy of the book for review purposes.



     I have to admit here and now that I got just a few pages into this book when inspiration hit me and I wrote a great post. I even wrote in the first paragraph of the post that I hoped when the time came I would have the guts to post it. 

     Unfortunately, I am a gutless wonder and I cannot post the first post I did! Well maybe I'm not gutless, but it is too personal and the personal stuff in the post is not about me. I have no problem being honest about the things that have happened to me in my life, but the story I told in that post was not my story. Well part of it was, but part of it wasn't. Have I totally confused you yet?

     So here I am. The most powerful thing that I was inspired by this book to write I can't share here.

     I guess what I will do is post a twist on the original story. I'll tell you how I think that we as women are never satisfied. Why do I think that? Let me explain.

     In the preface, the main character, Becky Aikman (also the author as this is her personal memoir) writes about how she was kicked out of her Widows Support Group on her first night in attendance. She details why she is attending and describes the setting and the room and the other woman who are there (they are all much older than she is), as well as Jonathan, the social worker who is leading the group. She writes about her feelings as Jonathan drones on for an hour telling them the 5 stages of grief and letting them know that their feelings of sadness, regret, grief, insomnia and depression are all normal.

     The last half hour of the meeting is a meet and greet, each person in the circle is invited to introduce themselves and explain how their husbands had died. The first lady spoke about the horror of her husbands illness, the pain and bed pans and how now no one understood her and they all expected her to be fine. From there it seemed to Becky that each lady was one-upping the other one and each horror story was worse than the one previous.

     When it's Becky's turn she tries to be a little more upbeat. She explains that her husband had died a year ago from a rare cancer and that he had managed to live for four and a half years with chemo and surgeries but that the last few years the cancer had spread to his brain, which made it all that much harder. But then she says, "What I want now, what I want to say is...well, I want to cheer up! Something awful happened to him, and to me, but I don't want to live in some kind of purgatory for the rest of my days because of it. I want to be happy again, don't you?"

     She looks around, hoping for support but doesn't see it in any of the faces staring blankly back at her. One of the widows begins to speak in a dignified tone and says, "I'm seventy-five years old. My husband and I had fifty wonderful years together. Now I feel like my life is over. But that young woman over there", here she points at Becky and continues saying, "she has it all! Her whole life is ahead of her! And I...I have nothing", then she breaks down into tears.

     The group begins ministering to the older woman and murmuring comforting words and shooting daggers with their eyes at poor Becky for upsetting this poor old woman and for still having her youth and her whole life ahead of her.

     Becky is thinking to herself, " Whoa, hold on babe! Fifty wonderful years might have been nice!"

    And at that point in the book, I new what I wanted to write about. But I can't share it, so I am going to put a twist on it and tell you about why women are never satisfied. So this story is about my sister and I versus my mother and my sister-in-law (SIL).

    See...my mom and my SIL are stay at home mom's and wives. They never had to work outside of the home. My sister and I have always worked, staying home just as long as our employers and disability would allow.

     Quite a few times in my life, during the growing up years of my children who are now 27 and 32; I would hear from both my mom and my SIL about how lucky my sister and I were to work outside the home. Say what??? How do you figure that? My mom and SIL would say that we were lucky because we got to get up in the morning and fix our hair and wear makeup and put on pretty office clothing and heels and nice jewelry and go to the office and actually socialize with people and go to lunch with the girls and general just be a part of society. 

     And my sister and I would look at each other and say, "We're the lucky ones?" You two get to stay home and play with your kids and clean your house and have a nice dinner waiting when your family gets home. You get to go to your kids school and help out in the classroom and bake cupcakes and do your laundry at your leisure. You get to stay home and not have to worry about doing your hair and putting on stinking makeup everyday and you can wear your pajama pants and flip flops and not worry about panty hose and callouses and corns on your poor little feet!"

     It was kind of a running battle between the four of us. A friendly battle but still...

     So that is why I think that women are never satisfied, those at home want to be at work, those at work want to be at home. We can never find the happy medium. Now at my advanced age of 54 I realize that I couldn't stay home now, I would be so bored! But I would have loved to stay home when my kids were little, to have walked them to school and helped out at their schools and be home when they came home instead of having them go to the sitter.


 

Super Mom - The Expats

This post was inspired by mystery thriller novel The Expats by Chris Pavone. Kate Moore happily sheds her old life to become a stay at home mom when her husband takes a job in Europe. As she attempts to reinvent herself, she ends up chasing her evasive husband's secrets. Join From Left to Write on January 22 as we discuss The Expats. As a member, I received a copy of the book for review purposes.

I had a difficult time trying to think of what to write for my book club, From Left to Write. We don't review the actual book itself but write about something inspired by the book.

I finished the book a while ago and wondered what to write about as I didn't really enjoy the book. Don't get me wrong, the book was good, but when you read in bits and pieces like I do, it gets difficult to follow a book with so many twists and turns.

I racked my brain trying to think of something to write about and as I pondered various ideas I got to thinking about how the main character in the book, Kate Moore, is a mom. A mom with a secret identity that she keeps from her kids as well as her husband. She plans and plots and connives and her kids are none the wiser, she's always there to pick them up after school and play games with them and feed them.

It made me stop to realize just how many identities moms have, identities that their kids and many times their spouses know nothing about.

My mom for example. I used to go off to school and I never wondered what my mom did all day. I knew she did housework because our house was always clean and there was always food on the table, but what else did she do? To this day I still don't really know.

Just like my kids probably will never know exactly what I did. I wonder if my kids knew that while they were at school their mom was working as a bill collector. Calling debtors, fighting with them to get them to pay their financial obligations. I was threatened and had things thrown at me. Once a man threw a stapler that was on the counter at me (we learned not to leave anything on the counter that could be used as a weapon.) Luckily I was quick and ducked in time to avoid getting hit.

Their mom also spent many years meeting with families who had just lost a loved one in order to organize funeral arrangements. She also arranged flowers and photos in the viewing rooms and many times helped the embalmer to casket a body and helped the funeral director to load caskets into the hearse. She even drove the limo once for the family of prize fighter Jerry Quarry who once fought Muhammad Ali. 

There are also lots of other things that I did that I'm sure I never want my kids to find out about and some things that I really wish they knew about me. But what is amazing is that there are so many moms out there doing interesting and amazing things but to their kids, they are simply mom.

One thing that I always loved about working in funeral service was hearing kids give their memories and thoughts about their mother when putting together an obituary. Many times I would hear one of them say, "Really? I never knew that about mom."

Do you know what your mom did while you were in school? Was she a surgeon, an astronaut, a baker, a business woman? Did she write a book or invent a product we all know about?

Mom's are the unsung hero's of the world, except on Mother's Day of course!

Books Read in 2012

I've been keeping track of the books that I've read each year on my blog. In 2009 and 2010 I read 24 books each year. In 2011 I read 29 books. For 2012 I set a goal of 30 books but unfortunately didn't reach my goal as I only read 26! I was so close! The cool thing is that I've started keeping track by using Goodreads.

By using Goodreads I can keep track of what books I've read, what books I want to read and I can review the books I've read and read reviews of the books I want to read that other readers have already read. Wow...that sounds like a tongue twister!

And another thing I love about Goodreads is that I don't have to go search for all the book covers...they save them for me! Gotta love that. Here's the first 20 I read. Of these twenty the book Gone Girl by Gillian Flynn is my favorite, but the book and the movie The Help are a close second.

Here's the rest of the books...

So my goal for 2013 is to try to reach the goal that I didn't reach in 2012...30 books. Can I do it? I think I can. Maybe if I turn the TV off a little more often and reach for a book I'll make it!

What's your goal for 2013?

A Great Way to End the Year!

I've had many good trips and fun times in 2012.

Some of them I blogged about, some of them I never got around to blogging about.

About two weeks before Christmas my sister and I took a drive to Santa Clarita to get some Christmas shopping done. Santa Clarita is about two hours south of Bakersfield. When we got there we happened to notice on the way out of town that there was a huge Goodwill Store right there on Lyons Avenue and we both said, "Look, Goodwill! We need to bring mom!"

My mom loves thrift stores and I've learned to love them as well through her. My sister Lisa...not so much. So today, we had nothing to do other than the normal grocery shopping, vacuuming, mopping, dusting, laundry, you know...all the normal stuff that we do on the weekends to get ready for the next week...so we took mom to Santa Clarita instead.

That in itself is not such a big deal, the big deal was driving the Grapevine. The Grapevine is notorious for having bad weather during the winter months and earlier in the week the California Highway Patrol had to escort traffic through the mountainous area.

When we left it was a bit overcast here in Bakersfield, but we convinced my mom that the weather wouldn't be bad and that once we got over the mountain the sun would be shining. I guess maybe we should have checked The Weather Channel before we left.

We hit snow! Not bad snow, but snow none the less! I was driving and I have never driven in snow. Well I've driven in snow after it's on the ground, but not during a snow storm. Well this wasn't really a snow storm, mostly a lightly falling snow. But you can see the snow from earlier on the side of the road.

You know a weird thing that I never knew about snow? That when it falls it doesn't stick to and wet your car's windshield like rain does. I didn't even need my wipers. Now it may be that when it falls heavier that it does, but this one didn't.



Picture taken by my sister from the rear window of the car.

Needless to say...my mom was not a happy camper! She doesn't like to go outside during the winter and doesn't even like to look outside. So to be in the backseat of a car at 5000 elevation with snow falling around her was sheer torture! We tried to tell her it wasn't that bad and this is a great adventure and something we will remember forever, but she wasn't buying it!

A couple of times I contemplated turning around and going back home because many times people get to the other side of the Grapevine and then it snows so much that the CHP closes the pass and you can't get back. You can go around but that adds hours to your trip. But I'm nothing if not stubborn. I figured the driving wasn't so bad. Everyone was going at a decent speed and I wasn't scared, so why not continue on and if we had to get a hotel room and spend the night in Santa Clarita, well then we would. This was an adventure after all!

I'm happy to say that we made it over the Grapevine. And it was sunny, a bit cold but sunny. We had a yummy lunch at Coco's and then took my mom to Goodwill. The Goodwill in Santa Clarita was a tad more expensive than our local Goodwills, but my mom still had a good time. I found an awesome cookbook, 1,000 Classic Recipes from Around the World! The sticker price on the front said $17.89 but I got it for $5.00. This book is like four inches thick and filled with pictures and super heavy! I can't wait to look at it and try some of the recipes!

I've also been collecting Jodi Picoult books, trying to get them all and I found another one today that I didn't have in my collection. Haven't read this one yet, have no idea what it's about, but I love Jodi Picoult books and can't wait to read it! And the sticker on the front says $8.43 but I got it for $1.99!

And my favorite thing I found was a silverware caddy. I had been looking for one for quite a few months now and hadn't found anything I really liked. My cousin Stella has a perfect one that I believe she got a Ikea or Pier 1 Imports, but I haven't been able to find one exactly like hers. This one is great because it has touches of green, my favorite color and the color of my kitchen curtains and it has butterflies, which I love and have several of all over my house.

I already got it all washed up and placed the silverware in it. Not sure this is going to work for me because the utensils tend to slip out of the bottom. I put some cupcake pan liners in there for now but I'm hoping to find some acrylic containers that might fit in there. See the butterflies and the ivy leaves? So cute!

So my sister, mom and I had a great day! I wish I had thought to take a photo, but let me share one of the three of us making Biscochos for Christmas this year.

From L to R...my sister Lisa, my mom Tomasa and me!

Yep...a great way to end the year!

The Year of the Classics and a Giveaway!

I think 2013 is going to be the “Year of the Classics”.

No…I’m not talking about classic cars, or music classics such as the Beatles or The Rolling Stones, or classics as pertains to vintage clothing.

I’m talking about books.

I think 2013 is going to be the year that I “read the Classics”!

You can get them for free online and yet I go out and buy books when I could read these? What am I thinking?

There must be a reason these books have been read by countless generations, right?

Books like…

Pride and Prejudice
Moby Dick
The Scarlett Letter
Wuthering Heights
A Tale of Two Cities
Oliver Twist
Frankenstein
David Copperfield
Jane Eyre
Dracula
Jane Austen
The Great Gatsby
Vanity Fair
Treasure Island
The War of the Worlds
Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea
Adventures of Don Quixote
The Last of the Mohicans
Emma
Lorna Doone
Little Lord Fauntleroy
The Red Badge of Courage
Robinson Crusoe
A Christmas Carol
David Copperfield
The Brothers Karamazov
The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes
The Count of Monte Cristo
The Hunchback of Notre Dame
Les Miserables
The Phantom of the Opera
Ivanhoe
Anna Karenina
War and Peace
Journey to the Center of the Earth

How many of those listed above have you read? Which would you recommend?

I have read these…
Great Expectations
The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn
The Secret Garden
The Wonderful Wizard of Oz
The Adventures of Tom Sawyer
Black Beauty
Little Women
Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland

So I guess it’s going to be a busy year for me in 2013 because I do of course, have a stack of books by my reading chair that I have already bought that I have to get through also. Not to mention the ones I read for my online book club From Left to Write!

And speaking about the From Left to Write book club, we are hosting an awesome giveaway just in time for Christmas gift giving. Crown Publishing has put together an amazing book bundle. There's enough to keep some for yourself and gift to others.

Go to BOOK BUNDLE GIVEAWAY to see the list of books you can win and enter!

What about you? What's on your reading list for 2013?

 

FOOD...What is it good for? Absolutely Everything!

If feeding me and my brothers and sister as we were growing up had been left strictly to my mother then we would have eaten nothing but beans and tortillas morning, noon and night!! Ok, well maybe that’s a bit exaggerated, but seriously…if not for the fact that my dad was a meat and potatoes kind of man we would have starved!

See mom is a very picky eater, always has been, even as a child. Plus she doesn’t like to cook. She CAN cook…she can make some awesome dishes! She is a wonderful cook! Her chile colorado is to die for, as are her chili beans. But she dislikes cooking with a passion, probably because she dislikes eating. . .

Did your mouth just drop open in shock? How can anyone dislike eating? Well trust me she does. She eats because she has too. Food is not a big deal to her and she finds it frustrating to think of what to cook. And when she does cook she’s so sick of the smell of the food while it was cooking that she can barely manage to eat a bite or two. And leftovers?? Forget about it! She’s not touching leftovers!

My dad on the other hand will eat your arm if you don’t move it out of his way quick enough. I can remember him coming home in the mornings and my mom would make him breakfast. She would make him three or four pancakes slathered with butter and then she would fry an egg and put it on top. Dad would then smother it with maple syrup and joyfully break open the yoke and watch all the yellowy center mix with the syrup and he would scarf it down.

Dad loves food so much and eats with such relish and abandon that small children have been known to stop in restaurants to watch him eat. The way he moves his mouth and the joy in his eyes I guess are like magic and little kids can’t help but stare at him while he eats. He’s kind of gotten used to it. We have pictures of almost all the grandchildren sitting on his lap and staring up mesmerized by their Tata as he eats.

So suffice it to say that my brothers, sister and I were not brought up to be open to many kinds of foods. We didn’t have any idea when we were kids and up to young adulthood what tuna was, or onions, or fish, or beets, cauliflower, lobster, crab, shrimp, or even salads. We knew beans, tortillas, potatoes and always some kind of beef, cooked some kind of way.  We knew that dad would buy a small tin of something called sardines but we never knew what they were because he had to go outside to eat them as mom couldn’t stomach their smell!

I remember one of my first dates ever with a boy and they brought me a salad with garbanzo beans. I asked him what those were and he said, “Garbanzo beans” and I said, “No seriously…what are these?” I refused to believe him and he had to call the waitress over and ask her what they were and she said, “Garbanzo beans”, and looked at us both like we were space aliens!

So I’m reading this book for my From Left to Write book club called The Headmasters Wager by Vincent Lam and the author goes into detail about a lot of the food that was served in the home of the headmaster who was of Chinese descent living in Vietnam. I tell you what!!! Mom would sooner have died than to have lived in that home.

The food talked about in this book! Wow! Man oh man! My mom would be overwhelmed and disgusted by most of it. But some of it sounds so intriguing to me. For instance:

Squabs stuffed with cave swallow’s nests, scallops in a cognac reduction, braised and truffled lobsters, sharks fin soup, braised goose, giant abalones with fragrant mushrooms and freshly spiced jasmine flowers, giant chilled crabs, raw fish salad, kuay teow teng soup of egg noodles containing eight meats and sea foods, poached groupers, fresh sweet prawns live and wriggling in bowls to be cooked at the side of the table as each guest preferred, either deep-fried or dunked into boiling water.

I couldn't even find photos on the whole worldwideweb of most of these dishes. Here's a few that I did find.



Shark Fin Soup

Photo courtesy of Wikipedia

Braised Goose - Photo Courtesy of Street Directory.com

Abalone with Mushrooms, I couldn't find the Jasmine Flowers. This photo courtesy of Yelp.com

Raw Fish Salad - Photo courtesy of Food Network

Kuey Teow Teng Soup - Photo Courtesy of Elizabeth Lin

Sweet Prawns - Photo Courtesy of the YapIsland Blog

And that was all for just one party held at Tet or Vietnamese New Year! What a way to start the New Year! I guess it's not that different than the way we always started the New Year as far as strange foods because I'm sure to many of you the idea of eating Menudo would be a bit disconcerting right?

Menudo - Photo Courtesy of Victoria blog

Menudo is a traditional New Years Day breakfast food that is supposed to have medicinal purposes in that it is the cure for hangovers.

I like the description of what Menudo is that I found at the Urban Dictionary: Awesome Mexican soup made with tripe (beef stomach,) hominy, chile peppers, onions, cilantro, oregano, and a splash of lime. Some like menudo served with tortilla and "con pata"--which means with a pig's foot in there too. Menudo is traditionally eaten on Saturday mornings and has been known to cure the common hangover.

What's the strangest food you've ever had? Have you ever tried any of the foods pictured above?

Headmaster Percivial Chen is a proud Chinese born man who runs English language school during the cusp of the Vietnam War. In his refusal to accept his adopted country's turbulent times, his gamble becomes a life changer. Join From Left to Write on November 15 as we discuss the The Headmaster's Wager. As a member, I received a copy of the book for review purposes.