I find the Easter calendar fascinating. Sometime ago I learned that it falls on the first Sunday after the first full moon after the vernal equinox. I would spout this fascinating fact to anyone who cared and many who didn’t.

Come to find out I’m wrong. It’s actually after the first Paschal Full Moon. Nearly the same thing, but not exactly.

What I really find fascinating is that it will be another 152 years before it falls on March 23 again (and even longer before it falls on the earliest possible date, March 22–more than 400 years since the last time).

My birthday is on April 16. I was 37 before I ever had an Easter birthday. But it happened again 11 years later. And it will happen again 11 years after that. And 11 years later, God willing, I will turn 70 on Easter. That is probably my last chance, because some some odd calendar glitch occurs, and the next time Easter falls on April 16 is in 2090, the 132nd anniversary of my birth.

Go figure.

I got this recipe a very long time ago. 7th grade home ec class, to be exact. Remember back when all the girls took home ec and the boys took shop? Now few schools offer either, when I think that all students should be required to take a bit of both. But I digress.

As I was measuring ingredients, I noticed something rather odd. The recipe calls for 3 teaspoons of baking soda. That’s not an amount you often see in a recipe.

Then it struck me. The tablespoon probably hadn’t been invented yet when I got the recipe in 1970.

Recipe below if you’re interested. (I tried to do it as “More” in an expanded post, but couldn’t get it to work–darned Wordpress!)

King Size Ginger Snaps from Skaneateles Middle School Home Ec
4 c. sifted flour
1 tsp. salt
2 tsp. ground cloves
1 ½ tsp. ginger
2 tsp. cinnamon
3 tsp. baking soda
2 tsp. baking powder
1 c. shortening
2 c. sugar
2 eggs
½ c. molasses

Sift flour, salt, spices, soda and baking powder together. Set aside. Cream shortening until light and fluffy. Gradually add sugar; blend in eggs and molasses. Blend in flour mixture. Shape into ½” balls (maybe ¾”), roll in granulated sugar. Bake 3” apart on ungreased cookie sheet. Bake 8-10 minutes at 350 degrees.

Right after my freshman year, I worked as a costume assistant for the summer theater at my college.  The costume designer was from New York and had worked for Saturday Night Live.  Including the design for one of my all-time favorite skits. 

I decided I needed to see it again and found it online.

I was glad to find it just as funny 30 years later.

I’m happy that I have a great excuse to eat one of my favorite treats–a Blizzard.  Dairy Queen is giving the proceeds from sales of all Blizzards to day to local children’s hospitals.  Check it out here. 

Then pick your favorite flavor and go have a Blizzard.  Me, I’m torn between Butterfingers and Cappucino Heath.

By the way, I’m pretty sure that any food eaten for charity must be calorie-free.

Thanks to Busy Mom for the idea and to Atom Smasher for the means.

For those of you in the Secret Agent field, here is the latest must-have invention, utilizing the newest confectionary technology. And believe it or not, it can be found at your local Cracker Barrel Country Store, where BD picked up this little gem today.

It is sold as a “Bubble Gum Message Machine.” It works like one of the DYMO label makers, but the beauty of it is that you enter the message on bubble gum tape. Send it off to your fellow spy, who reads the message then destroys the evidence by simply chewing the gum. No suspicious smoke from a self-destructing tape to give the agent away. I’m sure it will appear it the next James Bond film, but you can say you saw it here first.

But I digress. As caught up as I was in the story, I found myself having the same reaction I did when I first saw it in the theater last year. Perhaps it’s because my 40-something year old brain occasionally confuses similar pieces of classic literature.

But whenever I see Sam and Frodo climbing up Mt. Doom to destroy the One Ring, the same lines keep running through my mind:

“Three thousand feet up! Up the side of Mt. Crumpit,
He rode with his load to the tiptop to dump it!”

Do you suppose Gollum is actually the Grinch in disguise?

In order to cut the paper in a straight line, I generally pick some repeating part of the pattern to cut along. Some are pretty innocuous: cut next to the red ornament on the tallest Christmas tree. Some others are mighty bizarre:

Cut every second dove in the middle of the eye.

Cut off halo of angel in blue.

Cut Santa off at the knees.