I whipped up four* different** fresh*** cranberry**** sauces Sunday for Monday's office Thanksgiving luncheon. There are tables and table and tables of food. The wonderful thing about working and living in such an ethnically diverse center as Miami is the sheer variety of food.

We have flan, and cheesecake, coconut cake, pecan pies and sweet potato pies. There are potato salads and three varieties of sweet potaoes. I saw succotash, an assortment of green bean casseroles. I passed by a platter of yuca cooked with garlic, and watched as one of my fellow workers carved a turkey that had been roasted under a blanket of bacon. (Small swoon.)
I mean, really, as a Southern girl, is there such a thing as enough bacon? Southerners are all about the pig, and so are Cubans.

I present to you all the TurBacon: (not to be confused with Turducken)



Today, I'm going round two with the cranberry sauces, and making a pear pie. Then the RLA, the noble dog Nails, the "special" dog Jojo and I will pack into the Cruiser and cruise north to the land of my relatives where we will celebrate the holiday with the traditional overeating, raucous behavior and unconditional love.

Recipes are available on request.

* Mom's 1950s relish: fresh cranberries, a whole orange (peel and all), sugar, and a little cinnamon. Toss all in the cuisinart and pulse until finely ground.

** Cranberries in port wine (a perennial favorite, and even though it was the first time the office saw it, by the time I got to it — 3/4s of the way back in the line — there was only a tablespoon or two left.

*** Cranberry salsa: tequilla, honey, cilantro, jalepeña pepper, orange, cumin. Another office winner.

**** The one and only Susan Stamberg's famous cranberries with sour cream, horseradish, onion and sugar. I think this one scared the folks at the office.

Oh, I am so mad this morning I don't know what to throw first.

Ever since Hurricane Wilma, the Metromover has been operating in fits and starts. The service has been supplemented by buses, taking riders along the route, and dropping them off at or near the stations. I say at or near, because depending on your driver, they may cop an attitude and refuse to let you off, or not stop, or whatever. In any event, it takes a 7 minute train jaunt and turns it into a half-hour ordeal.

Except for this morning.
See, there are two stops where I can get off the Metrorail and pick up the Metromover: Brickell, which is my usual stop, and, although it takes longer, is more pleasant in that it's out in the sunshine and fresh air and I can stand up there on the platform and watch the sun dance off the turquoise* waters of Biscayne Bay.

Or I can get off at Government Center, and hop an inner loop shuttle past the courthouse and the college and end up at my same end point over on Biscayne Boulevard. I prefer not to, however, because it's a very busy stop, and there's lawyers and government workers and the connection is semi-contained.

Today, I hopped off at Brickell and I was Very Early for work. When I got downstairs, the Mover was barricaded off and we were told to take the shuttle bus. Well, crap. If there had been an announcement on the train (they are always announcing broken elevators) then I would have ridden on to Government Center, which is the next stop anyway.

Down to street level. I waited. And I waited. And I waited some more. I waited while no less (and no more) than THREE shuttles came for Brickell Key (the maids' shuttle, OK?). Finally, after more than half an hour's wait, a downtown shuttle came. Oh, yesh, the driver assured all of us steaming in line, this would take us to Biscayne. So I got on. And we drove and drove and drove and then I realised that the bus, it did NOT turn on my usual street. It kept going straight. And then it turned back and went to Government Center. It was now forty five minutes after I got off the train one stop south of Government Center. I could now take another shuttle bus or any of the downtown regular buses, or I could go upstairs and get on a MetroMover going on another loop, or I could walk to work.

Which is what I did. It took 15 minutes in 3" heels (on a platform wedge, by the way) over crumbling sidewalks, and I still got to the office more rapidly than the shuttle bus that was coming up behind me as I entered the building.

THE OTHER THING I'M PISSED ABOUT

The other thing I'm pissed about this morning is last night's ANTM (America's Next Top Model and what rock have you been living under not to know that?) elimination of Lisa which left that yellow-toothed, Dumbo-eared, skank Jayla around. Lisa could pose circles around that nasty ho even when drunk or hung over, and as for the rabbit-toothed, walking teen snotrag, Nicole: well, she can be sent home any second now, and I wouldn't be crying.

*If, by turquoise, you are thinking of the really dark, muddy greenish brownish stone with heavy dark spider webbing.

The RLA was playing some Dylan this morning as we were getting ready for work, and I have to say, no matter what The Bob did, if he'd written "Sara" for ME? I totally would have taken him back.

Also? The very best sandwich in the world, and especially yummy for breakfast, is a BLT on white toast with a fried egg in it. I had one at my desk, just this morning.

It's long overdue, and it replaces the half-assed version that used to be on this site, but it is with great pride that I present to you the RLA's portfolio. It includes work by his students, his markers, his Illustrator stuff, his realism and his surrealism and even the work we do together in photoshop... Shoes of course, available as giclee prints for a modest price.

The link over there on the left now goes to the dotmac page, too.

This is what a three-million dollar ad campaign looks like:



And you just know that the bright lights at the agency were just pissing themselves over their own cleverness: it's a sign that says it's a sign.
Oh. My. Gawd. We are so funny. A sign. That says it's a sign. Get it?

The other ones in the series say things like "You're in one of the few places we're not." Huh? You mean you don't have a clinic on the train? Well, but the train stops right at the hospital, so sometimes you are where the hospital is.

Or in the immortal words of Firesign Theater, how can you be in two places at once when you're not anywhere at all?

Another one says "Get a better health plan by the next stop." and then has the web address. So I guess that works if you are a commuter with a wireless bluetooth connection on your cell phone. Or something like that.

It's a sign. It's a sign that's a sign.

OK, I mean, I get that this is supposed to represent the family that owns the car. There is a pencil-necked dad, and a vacuous mom, and a teen-age girl with a spiral on her t-shirt (representing that she's spiralling out of control, maybe? That she has an IUD? That she suffers from vertigo?), there's the roller-skating tween of indeterminate gender and rubber-armed boy who loves baseball.

My question is "WHY?"

Really. Why the fuck would you want to advertize that you have underage children available for abduction in the car, and even give strangers a chance to know what sort of bait to use? Who's business is it, anyway, how many people are in your family? Why should I give a rat's ass about the fact that you overbred?

And these things are everywhere... although I've never seen them for sale anywhere.

You can specify your recreational choices. You can add your pets: I've seen dogs, cats, fish and birds. There are toddler stickers and baby stickers. I've yet to see a pregnant woman sticker, or a car with two women and a child. Lots of single parents out there, advertising that they can be met at any Little League park, ballet school or hockey rink.

The RLA and I want to produce add-ons, so that we can vandalize these things, which almost always sseem to be associated with Jesus fish or W bumper stickers. Maybe that's the secret: they are handed out at tent revivals and Republican party meetings.

Yeah... stick-on piles of dog poop, S&M paraphenalia, dreadlocks, jail house bars, beer bottles and bongs. You could accessorize strangers' car windows to your heart's content.