"Doris Night" > wrote in message
...
> On Sat, 5 Mar 2016 18:28:49 -0800, "Julie Bove"
> > wrote:
>
>>
>>"Janet" > wrote in message
. net...
>>> In article >, says...
>>>>
>>>> "Janet" > wrote in message
>>>> t...
>>>> > In article >,
>>>> > says...
>>>> >>
>>>> >> "Ed Pawlowski" > wrote in message
>>>> >> ...
>>>> >> > On 3/3/2016 11:52 AM, jmcquown wrote:
>>>> >> >
>>>> >> >> Well, Leona was quoting from an article. I watch 'House Hunters'
>>>> >> >> on
>>>> >> >> HGTV. Seems like lots of people want the latest greatest
>>>> >> >> kitchens
>>>> >> >> but
>>>> >> >> they don't actually use them. (I've got some neighbors like
>>>> >> >> that.)
>>>> >> >>
>>>> >> >> True, not everyone is a great cook nor do they want to cook. I
>>>> >> >> would
>>>> >> >> suggest a different restaurant if I felt it was over budget.
>>>> >> >>
>>>> >> >> Jill
>>>> >> >
>>>> >> > Or pick up a bucket of KFC or a bag of burgers. While we enjoy
>>>> >> > going
>>>> >> > to
>>>> >> > dinner with friends, we enjoy just spending time with them even
>>>> >> > more.
>>>> >> > They
>>>> >> > just have to speak up and with real friends you can do that.
>>>> >>
>>>> >> I love to cook but I hate doing the dishes. And if you have people
>>>> >> staying
>>>> >> over, you'll eventually have to do that while they are there. You
>>>> >> can
>>>> >> only
>>>> >> put this off for so long. That cuts into visiting time.
>>>> >
>>>> > Whatever kind of friends or family don't offer to help in the
>>>> > kitchen
>>>> > when they're staying over?
>>>> >
>>>> > while they're helping cook or wash up you can still socialise.
>>>>
>>>> Ha! Not in *my* kitchen. Only one person will fit comfortably. Get
>>>> two
>>>> in
>>>> there and it can be a battle. You have to carefully orchestrate things
>>>> or
>>>> one person gets trapped at the stove end, unable to move.
>>>>
>>>> And maybe it is common to help in the kitchen where you are at.
>>>
>>> Absolutely. Tonight one of my neighbours is making dinner for ten of
>>> us; she's 82. She will do all the cooking and set a pretty table. The
>>> rest of us will all help her serve and clear away, and before we go home
>>> we'll wash and dry the dishes (men and women).
>>>
>>> I don't
>>>> know. My mom hated other people to be in her kitchen so mostly they
>>>> just
>>>> weren't. She did have a nurse friend who always came over at dinner
>>>> time
>>>> and kept insisting on cooking for us. And my mom did let her do this a
>>>> few
>>>> times. But the woman was a horrible cook and everything she made was
>>>> inedible. So my mom put her foot down there too.
>>>
>>> I love it when anybody else wants to cook in my kitchen :-) especially
>>> when their food is something new to me. I've had guests teach me to make
>>> sushi, pasta, Thai cooking, and all sorts of new recipes. If they can't
>>> cook they can pour drinks.
>>>
>>> Ever since they could stand on a chair, our kids and now theirs help in
>>> the kitchen and it doesn't matter how long it takes or how much mess.
>>> Even tots can scrub potatoes, pod peas, roll pastry, set the table.
>>>
>>>> I know that some people here have cook alongs and such. Something like
>>>> that
>>>> to me would be potential for nightmare. Not something I'd want to do.
>>>> It's
>>>> all a moot point for me anyway. We have a small house and we don't
>>>> have
>>>> people stay over, except for Angela's friends and they all sleep in her
>>>> room. We have no extra room or extra beds.
>>>
>>> Gawd, you'd hate my family, where a single bed isn't considered full
>>> until there are two adults sardined into it; a double can hold at least
>>> four kids, some at the top and some at the bottom; all the sofas are
>>> long enough to sleep on. The overflow sleep on the floor; or bring a
>>> tent.
>>>> And I don't know of anyone who
>>>> might come from a ways off to spend the night.
>>>
>>> That's really sad.
>>
>>Sad? Hardly. I hate overnight guests. I am a night owl. They'd likely
>>only be a bother to me. You might like it. We all like different things.
>
> When we have overnight guests it's generally people we haven't seen
> in a while, like my sister and her DH and their dogs. We really enjoy
> having them, and we sit up until all hours yakking and drinking wine.
>
> We have a couple of spare bedrooms, so there's no problems about where
> everyone is going to sleep.
I am just not accustomed to having people over. For example, apparently the
high school kids all have sleep overs these days. That's not such a big
deal for me because they *do* stay up all night and they are not depending
on me for food, save for what I might have bought ahead of time if it is a
planned in advance thing. They pretty much stay on the other side of the
house. I just find it weird because when I was a kid, the sleepovers were
mostly done when I was in elementary school. I do remember a very few in
Jr. high. None whatever by high school. We were all too busy working and
stuff.
My brother lives not far from me as does his son and family. I don't really
know any of my other relatives very well and some I am not in contact with
much if at all. There is some post going around on Facebook about how
cousins are our first friends. That just wasn't the case for me. Some of
my aunts and uncles moved away when I was very little. I didn't even meet
their kids until I was a teen at a family reunion in OK and that was only
for a few days. I was close to a cousin who is a year older for a brief
period of time when we lived in Wichita. We would both stay at my grandma's
house on occasion. And her dad moved the family out here for business for
a few months not long after we moved out here.
My mom has a cousin who is a year older than me but she made it pretty
obvious that she thought she was better than me and she never had anything
to do with me save for those times when her parents likely forced her to
stay home and put up with me. When she was living in Seattle for college, I
did try a few times to meet her for lunch or some such thing. Never got a
response.
I do currently have a cousin who I have only met twice who lives in another
part of this state and did invite us to come visit. And I had another who
lived in another part of the state. He's a personable sort with a very good
sense of humor. I did enjoy those visits even if brief. But he and his
wife are now running a BBQ stand at his wife's family's farm in CA.
So I guess in the course of my lifetime, we only had overnight guests like
that a few times. My grandma when both of my parents were laid up at the
same time. She was needed to help out, particularly with care for my mom.
I was not quite old enough then. She came another couple of times to visit
and my other set of grandparents came once.
My mom had a cousin who just sort of appeared with no notice. She didn't
even know who he was. Might have been a distant cousin. She had to call
around to other relatives to find out if he really was related to us. He
was a pain because he smoked in the house and that was forbidden. Didn't
matter what my parents said the house rules were, he violated them. Then
the first night, he complained bitterly about the food. It wouldn't have
mattered what had been served. He made the claim that his taste buds no
longer worked so unless he had almost a whole bottle of Tabasco sauce on his
food, he didn't want to eat it. We didn't keep it in the house so he wound
up using up all of the black pepper that we did have. We didn't keep a lot
of that either as my mom only ever used it for specific things like fried
eggs. I can remember both of my parents asking him many times about his
dietary stuff so they could buy whatever it was that he needed. But then
with each new meal, some new complaint would crop up because we didn't have
____. Worse still, we thought he would never leave! He said he was just
stopping by for a couple of days but he stayed for two weeks.
We did have aunts and uncles and occasionally some of their kids come to
visit but by then the kids were mostly grown. One incident that I fondly
remember was my mom's mom and aunt coming to visit. That was the aunt whose
house we stayed at for a few days and I ate little more than a candy bar per
day while there. I had to sneak out to get the candy. At least there was a
mini mart nearby but I didn't have much money. My brother thought he was
faring better as she had plum trees in the back yard and we were told to
help ourselves. He loved plums but he ate so many he got sick. The problem
with the food there was that she insisted that my mom's uncle could only
have soft, bland food and that is what she served. Breakfast was always
Cream of Wheat and a poached egg. I can't remember the other meals but they
were bad enough that we could not eat them. I am not kidding when I say
that she had no seasonings in the house. None! Not even salt and pepper
and no sugar either.
Anyway... For the first night, my mom served a big ham that she had
intended to use the leftover of for more meals, and baked beans with bacon
in them. The aunt got all indignant and ripped my mom a new one for serving
elderly people such horribly salty fare. Was she trying to kill them? I
also remember her getting my grandma to agree with her. I'm pretty sure
that my grandma didn't really care but just agreed to stop suffering her
wrath! The reason I liked this incident so much was that I have always
hated ham and dreaded the nights when it was served. So I was very happy to
get out of having to eat it again, at least for a while.
The next night went no better. My mom put the ham and beans in the freezer
for another time and made pot roast. She always made it the same way. In
the oven with a packet of onion soup mix (that was certainly loaded with
sodium), carrots and potatoes. We never had gravy unless it was a holiday.
She just served the natural juices that came from the meat and veg. But oh
no! The aunt went on and on about how her husband would never eat it that
way. It had to be thickened. I can still remember my mom muttering in the
kitchen about how it didn't matter how her uncle ate his meat broth because
he was no longer with us. I also remember the aunt stomping into the
kitchen to do the thickening because my mom hadn't a clue how to do it. And
I think we didn't have enough flour or cornstarch or whatever to do the job
because it didn't come out right.
But by far the biggest reason that I hated overnight guest like that was
because my mom made me give up my room to the guests. Reason being, I had a
double bed. That had not been my choice but when I insisted on the white,
French Provincial furniture from Sears, they insisted that I take their old
mattress and box springs and those were full sized. So that meant that I
had to sleep on the pullout bed in the couch and it had one of those evil
bars across the back of it. There was no way I could get even close to
comfortable on that thing so I had to do without sleep. I begged for them
to let me just sleep on the couch as is or even on the floor. But they
refused and said that I had to sleep on the pullout bed.
Finally one day long after I had moved out of there, I insisted that they
try the pullout bed. They had pulled it out to clean inside the couch or
some such thing. I just told them to try to lie down on it. I got a really
big apology after that! They had refused to listen to me when I told them
how horrible it was. And it was.
So anyway... I basically have a lot of cousins spread out all over the
country that I know little to nothing about. I used to send Christmas cards
to those that I had an address for but I finally paired my list down and
only send cards now to those who send to me. My grandparents are long gone.
And my aunts and uncles are for the most part either dead or senile. Not
likely that anyone would visit except perhaps for my young adult niece but
if she did it would not be likely that she would stay here. We are just too
far away from Seattle for her to want to stay here. But she would happily
move to the area if she could get a job here.