Calamities Prevail

Just call me Calamity Jane. That's what I feel like lately. December has arrived suddenly. What happened to November?

I never Spring clean. When the weather turns warm and things start popping out of the ground, I am ready to totally abandon my house. I want to spend every waking moment in my gardens. As the weather turns cooler and the leaves abandon the trees, that is when I go nuts cleaning. I bought a broom the other day. It has two heads and an extension handle. The shape of the heads will go into corners and crevices. I love this broom! One head is for sweeping the floor and the other is for the ceiling! I swept my ceiling! And my walls.

And then I sort of went a little crazy and took my sewing room apart. I moved every single thing and then put it all back. I found fabric I had totally forgotten about. I am now inspired to either sew or reorganize every room in the house.

I decide that I should finish sewing all the things I have cut out. Spaghetti is sounding good for supper, as the temp is dropping. So I go to the freezer and pull out the ground beef and tomato sauce in the Ziploc freezer bag. Tomato sauce made from my bountiful garden of the summer. After I have my coffee, I head to my sewing room.

I take pictures of all my organization and the doxie socks. All to share here with my bloggy buddies. While the ground beef is browning in the pan I attempt to download the pictures. I have a brand new computer, an early anniversary gift from He Who loves me (or was really tired of me using his computer). I cannot seem to figure this out. Doesn't work like the old computer. I simply give up and decide to wait to ask someone. The ground beef is nicely browned and crumbled into very fine pieces. I add all the appropriate seasonings and onions. I let it sit, since the tomato sauce is still frozen.


I trip on the dog's bed as I am tending the wood stove and bash my hand on a table while blocking an almost fall. My shoulder is better, but still not 100%. My hand hurts, but I am thankful I didn't twist the shoulder again. Off to the sewing machine and a Scott Turow novel on audio. All is right in my world. I finish a vest and skirt and cut out a shirt for my Granddaughter, Zara.

I take a break and realize that the day is getting away from me and I need to get the sauce done. Into the kitchen I go, with all good intentions. I whip up some beer batter bread and have it all ready to pop into the oven. I grab the Ziploc bag and dump the contents into the pot with the crumbled, seasoned, oniony ground beef.

When I put those tomatoes in the freezer, I did not season them, just peeled and cooked them. I stand there stirring and decide that something is not right. The consistency is right, but it smells ..... not right. Not bad, like spoiled, but not like tomatoes. It looks, I don't know how to describe it. Not red, but, not all tomatoes are red. Not really an orange, but sort of.

Nothing to do but taste it, right? I sniff it again and decides it smells sweet. Tomatoes are somewhat sweet, right? I grab a spoon and do the deed. PEACHES! I remember now. I wanted to make jam, but wanted to wait until it was cold out, so I precooked them and froze them. I did not, however, LABEL the bag. I was in a hurry. There were weeds and grass calling out to me.

So, there I stood. How to salvage this? I am not opposed to actually eating this concoction. Peaches taste good grilled with pork chops, right? Individually the components are all good. Maybe if I had not already seasoned the meat I could have pulled it off. If it had been a small amount of peaches I could have made it into a barbecue sauce. But, as it was, it was just gross. I toyed with thoughts of asking He Who will eat anything covered in cheese to taste it.

I confessed my mistake to He Who loves me lots and, bless his heart, offered to go get some take-out. I took out more ground beef and some tomato sauce (clearly labeled) in a jar. I cooked it too fast and burned part of it. I salvaged what I could and added some left over turkey. Not the best meal I ever made, but I covered it with Parmesan cheese and ate it anyway. The bread was good and I couldn't mess up the salad.

Ventured back into the sewing room. Tripped over a cord and hit the cutting table. Broke the needle on the machine. Still can't get the pictures from my camera onto my computer. Perhaps I should just go to bed .......