Days of Milk and Daffodils

There will come a day when my sons' first thought upon viewing flowers growing outside will not be how much I might love a ragged bouquet of them in an old canning jar on the kitchen table.

That day, however, has not yet come. And thank goodness for that.

Spring Cleaning

I was outside with Jack and Charlie yesterday afternoon, surveying the impressive collection of bones left from the dogs' fall and winter of carcass chewing on the lawn. It was pretty grisly. It was also right next to the path that most people use to come into our house. I figured maybe I should clean those up; you know, pretend we're not as woodchuck as we really are.

Charlie was all too willing to help. I can't get him to willingly clear his plate from the table after dinner, but pick up bone shards and pieces of skull from the lawn? So pleased to be of assistance, Mother!

Of course, clearing his dinner plate doesn't result in a coyote skull to play with, so there is that.

Luckily, Jack was mostly otherwise engaged during this chore (by which I mean he was crawling after the cat). This is good, because the contents of that bucket were all too fascinating to him.

Hmmm, which should I pull out to chew on?

Maybe I should have let him take the teeth. Get it? Teeth to chew on? (Just kidding. I didn't even let him touch any of it. Even I have my limits.)

We ended up with approximately two gallons of bone remains. Yum. 

Immediately after finishing this necessary but unpleasant cleaning chore, I realized the dogs had gotten into the bucket containing the remains of the most recently butchered rooster, leaving feathers scattered over a large swath of the driveway. I can dump the bones and re-fill the bucket with feathers, I guess. You think Charlie will help with that, too?

What Remains

The other day I was making a recipe for cornbread that calls for an 8-inch cast iron pan. But I wanted to double the recipe, so obviously the original pan size would be too small. The MiL is usually the one who uses this recipe, and I knew she usually doubles it, so I asked her what size pan she uses when she doubles it. She uses the 10-inch pan. Righty-o.

I made some offhand remark about how it was kind of odd that twice the amount of batter should fit inside a pan that's only two inches wider.

Later that night, the MiL presented me with a list she had made of all our sizes of cast iron pans and their respective areas in square inches.

I looked at it for a second, and then said, "How do you figure out the square inches in a round pan?"

At which point, the MiL asked me very pityingly, "Didn't you take any geometry in high school? Pi times "r" squared?"

Yeah. Right. I took geometry in high school, all right. Almost failed it, too. The chances of me remembering anything from it other than the feeling of dread before a test are pretty much nil. On the other hand, I do remember how to sing "Rubber Duckie" in Spanish, which has made me pretty popular with Cubby, who is learning Spanish in school now.

We all have our own areas of expertise, I suppose. Geometry is not mine. But song lyrics I learned twenty years ago will never leave me.