Well, another Halloween has come and gone, and I made it through the entire season without eating one piece of candy corn or one Brach's mellowcreme pumpkin. Bob was in Wisconsin and had planned to return Wednesday evening. He did not drag his sorry carcass home until almost one o'clock this morning (Sunday). He does have three weeks of vacation that he says he's going to take before the end of the year. We'll see if that really pans out. The weather on Trick or Treat night was wonderful, and we had more visitors than we've had in recent years. They were pretty taken with my book of treats. When you open it a witch's voice says "Have some candy!" or "Yummy!" or "Choose carefully!" Some of them were also amazed by my barking dog.

"Your dog just keeps barking," remarked one fairy princess.

"Don't I know it, Princess. Don't I know it."


Reflections on the Orphans and other Illinois team mascots: Well, another high school football season has also come and gone, and the Centralia Orphans were, again, winless, going 0 for 9. I think this makes them 0 and 39 or 0 and 40 - something like that. Maybe they might want to think about changing their name? It is quite a co-inky-dink that my sister and I were just having a discussion about where and how the Centralia team came by such a lame-o/loser name, and this week she ran across an article in a recent issue of Illinois Country Living magazine that pertained to this very topic.
It seems that the name, Orphans, came from a coach the team had in the early 1940's named Arthur Trout. Either: A. The team was playing in the state championship and their uniforms and equipment came up missing and they had to beg and borrow assorted uniforms from other teams and looked like a bunch of orphans out on the floor. Or B. Coach Trout was very frugal and made the team wear a variety of mismatched, leftover uniforms from the past and they looked like a bunch of orphans out on the floor. or C. Coach Trout was a big fan of D.W. Griffith's epic film about the French Revolution, Orphans of the Storm. He used the silent picture to motivate his team, and they looked like a bunch of brave and fearless orphans in a storm out on the floor. Nobody seems to know for sure.

The article mentions some other noteworthy high school mascots like our own beloved Effingham Flaming Hearts, and our neighbors, the Teutopolis Wooden Shoes, and it gives a shout out to the Hoopeston Cornjerkers and the Cobden Appleknockers. My niece, Megan, used to teach at a school whose mascot is the Pretzels. She commented that she didn't get what was intimidating about a pretzel, but then, President Bush almost choked to death on one, and she decided that, perhaps, pretzels were more formidable than she had realized. Well, Megan, you weren't the only pretzels at the snackbar. Apparently New Berlin High School also adopted that name. It seems that back in the 1930's, at a district basketball game, the score was so lopsided that the New Berlin players on the bench started throwing pretzels at each other and a newspaper reporter dubbed them the Pretzel Throwers. This was later shortened to just plain old Pretzels, but still, they were worthy opponents. Flying pretzels? You could put an eye out with one of those things.












Get out the vote Peeps!










From the Archives: 1957 - A single strand of pearls looks good with anything, anywhere, - even standing on the kitchen counter in only a pair of sturdy cotton panties.









Recipe of the Week: I catered a breakfast on Friday, and served the standard, glazed fruit, Hashbrowns-Helen, cake-mix cinnamon rolls, and Wake-up breakfast casserole. It occurred to me that I had shared all of these recipes on the blog except for the casserole recipe. Lindsey took this to work a few weeks ago, and people are still asking her for the recipe, so here it is for all of you. It comes from the Thorpe House Bed and Breakfast in Metamora, Indiana



Wake-Up Casserole

2 cups seasoned croutons
1 cup shredded Cheddar cheese
1 4-ounce can mushroom pieces, drained
1 - 1/2 pounds bulk country fresh sausage, crumbled
1/2 cup shopped onion
6 eggs
2 cups milk
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon pepper
1/2 teaspoon dry mustard

Topping
1 - 10 3/4 ounce can cream of mushroom soup
1/2 cup milk

Place croutons in greased 9 X 13 pan. Top with cheese and mushrooms. Brown sausage and onion. Drain and spread over cheese. Beat eggs with 2 cups of milk and seasoning; pour over sausage. Cover and refrigerate overnight. In the morning, mix soup with 1/2 cup milk and spread on top. Bake at 325 degrees for one hour. Serves 8 to 10.

"Children need encouragement. So, if a kid gets an answer right, tell him it was a lucky guess. That way, he develops a good lucky feeling." Jack Handey