Letter #52!!!

Dear readers: Please find herein contained version #52 of "The Friday Letter." It took us a year and two weeks to produce 52 Letters. It has been exhausting, tedious and rewarding.

Little did we know when we started out that we would be entering the blogosphere. I didn't even know what a blog was, a year ago.

Sometimes I wish I still didn't know what a blog is – it's a stupid word, and an awful lot of stupidity is reproduced under that description. (I know, I know, there's good stuff too.)

What we really wanted to do was establish a website, not a blog site.

What we found out was that in order to operate a website, one must ordinarily engage the services of a person who owns the software to do that. One ambitious fellow offered to set us up for something like $4,000.

We decided the appropriate software was too expensive to produce just one website. And, we screw up enough on our own without adding a third personality into the formula.

But, we still have pictures and we still have new material on a regular basis, so perhaps blogging isn't so bad after all. I simply dislike the sheep-like mentality of stuff like blogs.

White sauce recipe

To my surprise, I discovered several years ago that my dear mother-in-law had somehow missed out on a fragment of knowledge – she didn't know how to make pancake syrup from sugar and Mapleine.

With Mom (Doris) this was a shocker. There was hardly anything she didn't know, including the ins and outs of construction contracting, and the Bible, forwards and backwards.

So I cast my bait out again, like the daredevil son-in-law I was to her. "How about white sauce, Mom?"

Nope. She didn't know from white sauce. So here's the lesson:

Into one-half cup of flour, pour vegetable oil. I've never used a measurement for the oil but simply stir the flour with a whisk while adding the oil. When the mixture reaches a satisfactory thickness (in culinary school this is called a "roux") and smoothness, quit adding oil and switch to milk.

Add two cups of whole milk, whisking again until all this is fully mixed to a uniform liquid.

Here is the critical point: Do not begin heating the liquid until the flour, oil and milk are fully mixed. If you try to hurry things, you will end up with lumpy sauce. Lumpy sauce is not good.

Because white sauce can boil over with a pernicious nastiness, you must continue to whisk while heating on a burner set at medium. Inattention can be costly.

If the white sauce begins to boil angrily, turn off the heat and remove the saucepan from the burner. It will boil over, I promise, if you don't pay attention and use this precaution.

When the sauce has come to a slow, bubbling boil and continues to boil while being stirred, it is done, ready, edible.

However, you will eventually add two cups or more of water. Add water until the thickness – or thin-ness, suits you.

This can be made into beef gravy by the addition of beef bouillon, or chicken bouillon, or, go ahead and be inventive.

White sauce is the basis for cream soups. So if you have boiled potatoes on hand, you have instant potato soup. Or carrot and potato soup. Frozen veggies work too – green peas come to mind.

Make white sauce into cheese sauce by grating a generous quantity of cheese into it – stirring all the while.

Yes, you too can make white sauce. If I can do it, you can do it. I don't think Mom ever ventured, though.

Good intentions

Our friend Sheila was downtown running errands one day when she thought of our mutual friend, a widow.

"I'll drop by and see her," Sheila thought. When she got to the woman's home, a great panic was underway. The keys to the manse were lost. Nowhere to be found.

The spare house key had been produced from under the doormat, but the original set was still missing. So off go Sheila and our friend.

They re-visited every place the woman had been that day. Grocery store, clothing store, thrift store, doctor's office, you name it.

They searched all the vegetable bins at the grocery, all the clothing displays at Penney's, every nook and cranny at the Salvation Army, the benches at the bus stops.

Still no keys.

Having made the rounds, there was nothing to do but take our friend home. There, of course, the keys resided on the mantle.

Will Sheila go back for to visit our lonely friend again? Of course she will. But what did Sheila really think about all this?

"She sucked 3½ hours out of my life."

Lowe's Update

There were several comments about our story featuring Lowe's hardware and the frustrations of Lowe's installation program.

One reader said he had taken a day off from work to "be there" for the Lowe's contractor. The worker never showed up. No call, no apology. Just a no-show.

Another reported that the malady is apparently widespread. He advises, don't plan on going across the street to Home Depot. Their installations program has the same problems, and worse.

It's what happens when we live in a litigious society.

The Price of Gasoline

The price of gasoline is on everyone's tongue. Even the radio personalities on EWTN have spent many hours on the topic. (EWTN is a Catholic radio and TV network. They usually talk about salvation.)

Here's the trick: There's nothing anyone can "do" about high gas prices. It's not George Bush's fault, and the "government" doesn't have the power to control prices except under an act of war.

If you are more than 10 years old, you remember that gas prices go up every year just before Memorial Day. Long about Father's Day, prices level out for a year. Sound familiar?

Prices are set by the companies that produce the oil. The companies charge what the traffic will bear – just like producers of potatoes, cotton, steel, leather.

When you engage in windy discussions about gas prices, like the EWTN team, you fall into a conformist stride. Talk about it, and you do what "the man" wants you to do.

You have been distracted from the real issues of morality, honesty, devotion, dedication, salvation. They've got you looking at gas prices when you should be looking at corruption and malfeasance.

By the way, the economy is no longer based in precious metals. We left the gold standard long, long ago. Now it's unspoken, but it's the oil standard.

In reality, gas prices didn't go up: The value of your dollar went down. Gas isn't worth more. Your dollar is worth less.

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Word of the week: Ambush. Guess what. The French didn't need the help of the Romans on this one: they invented the word! It comes from embusche, an arrangement of soldiers hiding to make an attack. In English, nowadays, it means to attack from hiding.

Next week's words: Dubious and doubtful.

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Gripes? Complaints? Whines? or Comments? Adoration? Puppy love? Reciprocal rant? Feel free to express yourself in the comments!