Wayne Johnson's blog

The new year seems to have launched without any perceivable improvement over the last year. The economy is or isn’t reviving, we are or aren’t on the cusp of health care reform, and gays are or aren’t entitled to all the rights other citizens enjoy. 

 

Old recipes often deliver somewhat less than we think they promise. It’s not always clear why.

Sometimes I think modern appetites demand more flavor than our forebears expected. I know my spice rack is at least twice as big as my mother’s was.

Sometimes the recipe calls for ingredients that were practical and available at the time, but a global economy and modern canning and freezing techniques make fresher food available to us.

I’ve been asked to bring a dish to pass. An appetizer. As the holidays approach I’d guess a majority of you have asked or been asked for a dish to pass. So what’s the big deal?

Just this. It’s been nearly five years since my business closed. It’s been nearly 5 years since the monthly pot-lucks guaranteed a) a great lunch b) some interesting lunch conversations and c) a chance to bring a dish that would be popular, tasty and health conscious.

And now I’ve been asked to bring a dish to pass. An appetizer. For a group of people I barely know.

Sarah Palin has shed the limitations of governorship to present herself as a full blown, knowledgeable adult to the world. Last year she muffed tricky questions asked by self-serving journalists like, “What newspapers do you read?” but now it seems Sarah may have the guts to look interviewers right in the eye and announce “None of them. I’m a Fox News kinda gal.”

I understand the most famous plumber that isn’t a plumber will be gracing our fair county soon. Sam Wurzelbacher (aka Joe T. Plumber) is coming to Livingston for the second time in just a few months. His first visit was with the traveling herd known as the Tea Bag Express, which partied down at the Brighton Mill Pond.

Soupy Sales died.

In the scheme of things, the death of an 83-year-old comedian doesn’t much change the cosmos.

But he was so much more than a comedian to so many of my generation. He couldn’t have been 83 years old. He was one of us. We sat in front of grainy black and white TVs and ate our tomato soup or PBJ sandwiches and watched a grown man behave like we wanted to.

 

Starting off the day Friday with Rush Limbaugh hollering about the secret coded message five guys in Norway sent to President Obama was kind of a surprise.

I never tune in to Rush Limbaugh since I'm more of an exclamation point head.

But, whew, it was just a sound bite from his show on my regular station, Radio Free Livingston.

 This article was first published April 9, 2006.

Michigan summers generally discourage lengthy cooking or baking indoors. Kitchens can be unbearably hot after roasting something at 425° for an hour if the thermometer has been stuck at 94° all afternoon. And unless the air conditioner’s thermostat is actually in the kitchen, everyone in the house will be comfortable but the cook.