Good food (Christmas Day) AND SOME SILLINESS!

CHRISTMAS DAY
 
After eating nothing but toast for seven consecutive meals  (I'd been under the weather and had lost my appetite), I was ready for a good Christmas Feast.
 
My good friends Fred and Diana Emrich invited me to join them for a buffet in the Country Club Ballroom at the Longboat Key Club.  I was careful not to over-eat, but "darn it all", the food was good.
 
I began with oysters on a half-shell, poached salmon, some shrimp, and a token salad.
 
This was followed by small portions of delicious braised chicken,  slices of baked ham and roasted turkey, and a small slice of the best prime rib you could hope to meet.  I was good - so I also had a generous helping of green beans - cooked to perfection.
 
I resisted the rich variety of desserts in favour of some good cheeses and sliced cantaloupe.
 
Fred and Diana had three other guests. Two of them had been stewardesses (as they were then called), and had worked with Diana for Pan Am, and then Delta. It all made for delightful and congenial company.
 
Fred, jmp, Diana


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HUMA
 
I received a lovely Christmas Card from my friends Kate and Kevin Wallace up in New Hampshire.  Kate (she now tells me) had written the cards in haste, late in the evening.
 
 
My card was addressed to   Michae Povey.
 
 
I e-mailed Kate and said  "I get it":   NOEL
 
 
(with love to Noel Bailey)
 
 
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DEPARTMENT OF LAZY JOURNALISM.
 
One of the news websites I visit regularly had this mind-bending headline today.
 
 
"Pope Prays For Peace"
 
 
What a shocker!  Is he the first Pope to have so done?
 
 
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CHRISTMAS CAROLS
 
 
My esteemed Cambridge MA colleague the Revd. J. Mary Luti today posted a thoughtful piece about Christmas carols.
 
 
She mentioned the naughty versions of carols which she and her classmates sang in Catholic Schools many years ago, much to the ire of the Nuns:  viz
 
"While Shepherds washed  their socks by night
All seated round the tub
The Angel of the Lord came down
And gave them all a scrub"  (OR and they began to scrub).
 
AND
 
"We Three Kings of Orient are
Trying to light a rubber cigar.
It was loaded, it exploded
BANG
 
and then "We Two Kings of Orient are" etc,  finally "I one King of Orient" etc.
 
Naughty children in the U.K. also sang this nonsense with glee.
 
I told  Mary of another silly parody which children of my parents' vintage (born in the 1910's) sang.
 
"Hark the herald angels sing,
Beecham's Pills are just the thing.
One for women, two for men,
Half for children under ten"
 
Beecham's Pills were originally marketed as a "cure-all".   They were no such thing, but they did prove to be an effective laxative.
 
The Beecham Company still exists as part of Smith-Kline Beecham. 
 
The pills were at one time marketed in the U.S.A.
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 


 

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