Sunday Rerun: Look down when you're walking around!

 I was at the diner one day for breakfast when I found a really wonderful omelet, and then Ziv Nitzan outdid me while on a nature walk with her folks.

Ziv lives in central Israel. She's three, and that means she does what three-year-olds do on walks - she picked up just about everything the ground had to share with her delighted eyes.  She found a little stone, rounded, just about the size of her little palm. She dusted it off and asked her mom what those little markings were on the rock.

I'm glad (and so are many others!) that the family didn't just toss the stone down, because it turned out to be, not an omelet, but an amulet, 3,800 years old. It dates back to the Middle Bronze Age (2100 to 1600 B.C.E., according to the Israel Antiquities Authority.)

These little stone objects were designed in the shape of dung beetles, or scarabs. Scarabs were considered sacred in Ancient Egypt because they symbolized new life.

That was in the old days in Egypt, but these are the new days, and Ziv's folks knew what to do with the stone. They let Google Lens take a look at it, and then they were off to the Antiquities Authority the next day to share their child's find.

Ziv was awarded a certificate of appreciation for good citizenship, and the amulet is on display now through Passover.

My omelet is long gone, but it deserved a special certificate, too! 

The Saturday Picture Show, October 31, 2026

 

By way of reminding you to set the clocks back an hour tonight, remember how hard it is in Stonehenge to reset their stones? This is a picture from 1877, before restoration work was done.

You can't convince me that there is any prettier landscape than a fall scene. This is in Illinois.

The real duck is wondering who the imposters are...

 Bobby Wright passed on this week. He had an interesting career, growing up the  son of Kitty Wells and Johnny Wright from the Grand Ole Opry. But he wanted to try acting, and wound up as one of the crew on McHale's Navy. Then he lost interest in acting and moved back to Nashville to sing. His biggest hit was 1971's "Here I Go Again."

And I might add...it's CATSUP.

Well, then, what in tarnation is it?

They were the kids on the "Mr Belvedere" show...Rob Stone as Kevin, Tracy Wells as Heather, and Wesley, played by Brice Beckham. They still mourn Bob Uecker and attended the World Series together to send winning vibes of Bob in heaven.

Maryland is in the pink for this winter's El Niño, so we should have warmer temperatures and higher than average precipitation. Get your slush shovels ready!

There is no such thing as too much Halloween!

It is thoroughly respectful to dress as a First Lady for TRICK or treating.

Take Charge

 Peggy's car battery died a lonesome death the other morning. My fault. She rarely drives it, but I should wedge myself into that Corolla now and then and give it a good pizza run. I should also resume my piano lessons, but we have a better chance of me paying attention to that wee car, trust me.

In 1976, as part of my Bicentennial frenzy, I invested in good tools, one of which was a good set of heavy-gauge jumper cables. Cars were always conking out in those days; I blame that on disco music and post-Nixon melancholia, and I gave and got my share of jump starts. But now, those same cables have been with me in my various cars and trucks over these fifty years, and they still work fine.

My advice is to spend a few extra bucks and get a good set of jumper cables...not those cheesy ones that come packed in a $12.99 Roadside Emergency Kit along with bandaids, luminescent sticks, and a compass. Get the good ones and keep them in one of those canvas tote-sacks you got with your New Yorker subscription. 

You'll thank me one cold night.

What time is it, anyway?

 Here in Baltimore, there are two discussions you can expect toward the end of October every year. #1, what is it with Lamar Jackson? You can hear from every amateur physical therapist and bone surgeon and family counselor on this topic. Lamar says he's hurt, who am I to dispute him, especially without direct knowledge of anything!  (Not that that ever stopped anyone from opining.)

"Be back Sunday."

The other thing is, as the end of Daylight Saving Time mercifully approaches, here come the Howling Hildas and Grumbling Gusses. Yes, it will be dark around 5 PM this coming Sunday, and unless and until Congress does something foolish such as making DST year-round, that's how it's gonna be. Take a flashlight.

Just as you can't take a foot off the end of your blanket and sew it to the top and expect to have a longer blanket, there are only 24 hours in a day, and the sun is tired from baking us all summer long, so he starts working shorter hours.

Just go with it, as the kids used to say, until everyone started actually going.

My Book Report

 I love reading biographies and autobiographies, so I borrowed Hayden Panettiere's memoir from the library, and it left me very sad, not just because she died from drugs earlier this year, but because she was sad before she ended her life.

I have to say, I wasn’t in the audience for her tv shows and movies. I saw more of her in the Neutrogena commercials she did for years, but that company quietly fired her for seeking therapy because she suffered from postpartum depression following the birth of her daughter. Neutrogena consumers, be advised, that company is concerned about skin care, but not emotional care. 

The book tells us she had one of those stage mothers who pushed to get her in front of cameras as soon as she was out of diapers. Soon she was being bullied and her mom took her out of school, which, naturally, stunts social development. She got on the series "Heroes" and was happy for the first year, after which, she said, the writers quit writing and the show became dreck. 

Along the way she played roles in a few good movies, but her career lost its spark when she developed jaundice from too much alcohol intoxication.

She fell in love with a boxer from the Ukraine and she thought it was true love at last, but she was saddened to learn that his fights came first, so even on the few occasions he had time to visit her in the US, his face was in his phone all the time. Next she found a guy who seemed perfect at first, but then he started beating her and leading her down the road of drug abuse added to the physical.

When she died this spring, it was in that guy's apartment in Greenville, SC. The autopsy determined the cause of death to be fatal intoxication by use of fentanyl, 4-ANPP, alprazolam, methocarbamol, and quetiapine.

The people who prey on young, unsophisticated, improperly guarded children should really plan on answering for a lot when they get to the gates. I'm very sorry that I read this book. It makes me sad that people gifted with so much can't find happiness.

Next up: "A Writer's Life" by Gay Talese. That should be easier on my heart.

Go on, take a puff

During World War II, the story went around that Lucky Strike Cigarettes had changed their package color from green to white because the copper-based green pigmentation they used to make that famous green pack was urgently needed for painting tanks and ships to help the USA win the war.

That story was started by the American Tobacco Company bending over backwards to color itself in red-white-and-blue patriotic glory. And everyone said, How wonderful that these selfless cigarette sellers are voluntarily changing the colors of their smokes so that our nation can launch more ships and tanks.

Great story, except for it not being true at all.

Women started puffing on tailor-mades - packaged cigarettes - in the 20s, but they shied away from buying Luckies because the green and red pack clashed with their clothing. American Tobacco even tried changing the fashions to make their cancer sticks acceptable, putting on a “Green Ball” at New York’s Waldorf Astoria Hotel, where the influencers of the day (!) paraded around in green dresses.

That didn't work. Green was not cool, although the cigarette vendors longed to make piles of the long green of dollar bills.

World War II came along as American fretted. They saw a great opportunity to wrap themselves in glory and any old color except that pea-soup green, changed to white packs, and told the world "Lucky Strike has gone to war!"

Imagine, a tobacco company lying to the public. 

 

A hundred billion schmillion

 

Because I do a lot of the cooking here at the Lazy 'C' Bunkhouse, I click on a lot of recipe sites.  Some ideas I get are very good and have become regulars on the chow rotation around here. Some didn't quite get as far as the plate.

The dishes above are Marry Me Pasta, Million Dollar Potatoes, and Marry Me Chicken Dip. I'm not much for overselling things. For instance, don't try to see me a pair of shoes and tell me they are the finest brogans ever cobbled. Don't tell me the canned soup you're selling is the favorite of the Crowned Heads of Europe. And don't keep telling me Coca-Cola will clean my bathroom porcelain so that it sparkles like a diamond, please.

I don't know anyone who would marry someone over a plate of noodles, or pay anything close to a million clams for some baked potatoes. You can't beat a well-baked potato, but you can't get me to pay a million for it.

Let's keep it real with the foods. And stop telling me you're serving buffalo wings. Buffalos are large land mammals and they don't fly.