Random Thought Tuesday

Yesterday I made a big pot of 13-bean soup.  Just the recipe printed on the side of the bag.  But I soaked them overnight in the crockpot set on low and then changed the water.  Must be the trick because it's not making me unbearably... gassy.  There's just no polite way to say it - beans make you fart.  Probably why they have their own song.  Come on, sing it with me!

Beans, beans the musical fruit

The more you eat, the more you toot

The more you toot, the better you feel

So... let's have beans for every meal!!

While I'm sitting here eating lunch, I'm making a set of Recovery Disks for the computer.  It's one of those tasks you should do when you get the computer.  I think it's even in the setup instructions when you very first turn it on.  But, yeah, I skipped that step.  If I had followed the instructions and made them with the laptop, I might have been able to recover it when the hard-drive crashed a couple of months back.  Hmmm... the desktop is the same brand and has the same version of Windows.  Wonder if I could use these disks on the lappy?

Because the Recovery Disks are taking so long, my mind is wandering.  And I keep singing the bean song to myself.  It reminds me of my Aunt Helen.  She is the source of my learning about the bean song.  I remember her dancing around their kitchen singing it after a dinner of chili and crackers and chocolate cake.  Still a perfect meal if you ask me!  Of all my parents' brothers and sisters and their spouses, she was the one who just didn't hold back.  Today we might be more politically correct and say she didn't have a good self-filter.  G-rated in the presence of children or not, if she thought it, Aunt Helen said it!  I'm sure more than once I came home from her house with those uncomfortable "What does this mean?" kind of questions for my mom and dad.

Another thing I remember about being in Aunt Helen's home is the kitschy little decorator plates on the dining room wall.  Some of them were plain white plates with a silhouette of a person's face painted in black for each member of their family.  Mixed with them were little plates with funny pictures or sayings printed on them.  Most of those were the early post-WW II dime store knicknacks from Japan.  My grandmother had some, too.  And I have 3 of hers.  I sorted through the box where they've been stored for years a few days ago and found them.  I hung them in my kitchen in a little grouping in the odd space between the countertop backsplash and the bottom of the cupboards.

They make me smile!

Yes, I do know (very much so) the wall STILL needs to be painted.  When I do that I'll fix the little strings that are attached to the plates so they hang nicer, although the odd strings and angles kind of go with their sarcastic messages.  I think there might be more of them packed away.  I hope so!  Since the photo is a bit on the small side....

The largest one says:
THANK GOD FOR DIRTY DISHES
THEY HAVE A TALE TO TELL
WHILE OTHER FOLKS GO HUNGRY
WE'RE EATING VERY WELL

The little square one with the old-fashioned stove:
IN THIS KITCHEN THERE IS ONE FINGER IN THE POT... MINE!

And the one with the toddlers checking out what's in their pants:
THERE IS A DIFFERENCE...

And you wonder why I'm the way I am?