Tom will be happy. Sally will be happy.
If my brain is functioning today, they'll each receive some fresh-made jelly.
Tom gives me corn stalks for the horses.
A while back, I started giving him jars of jelly in return.
Nowadays, Tom tells me he expects "keep-fill" service on that jelly.
As for Sally, she used a little sweet flattery to convince me to bring another jar of that jelly.
One day when I walked into her salon, the first words out of her mouth, "We all want some more of that jelly."
So, with the next trim, I handed her a small jar of raspberry jelly, telling her my supply was low.
Well, yesterday the supply increased by a few jars.
This time Tom and Sally (today is hair-zap day) will receive some experimental jelly.
I went to the freezer yesterday and pulled out raspberries, blueberries and even a bag or two of huckleberries.
With a little prayer and one near kitchen disaster, the combination turned out great.
A little zip and very tasty.
The near disaster occurred when I made the mistake of trying to pour hot fruit from the kettle into the jelly bag.
The metal standards holding the jelly bag collapsed. Hot fruit landed on the kitchen island while its accompanying juice chose several different directions to escape.
As the pinkish, purple lake quickly spread from the jelly bag all directions from the middle of the kitchen island, the main stream came directly toward me.
Within seconds, that stream reached the edge of the island and began cascading to the floor, forming another fast-growing lake just inches from my feet.
What to do! What to do?
Rather than losing my cool, I remained calm and came up with a plan.
Remove other stuff from the island and salvage what fruit you can seemed to be the logical approach.
Fortunately, the jelly bag had collapsed soon enough into the process that most of the fruit still remained inside the kettle.
So, I carefully reassembled the now messy jelly bag holder, found a scoop and, while holding the jelly bag and its stilts upright, spooned fruit into the bag.
This was all near a small mountain of blueberries, huckleberries and raspberries which had, by now, released most of their juice.
I really should have taken a picture, but my cell phone did not need a sticky purple coating.
Fortunately, there ended up being enough juice to make several jars of jelly.
It took me a good 15 minutes to clean up the sticky mess on the island and the floor.
But I've got jelly AND bread.
Earlier I had mixed up some bread dough and left it to rise during the jelly project.
All in all, about three hours was invested in four loaves of bread and 12 jars of yum, yum jelly.
I'm thinking that was a good investment of time cuz we and others will be enjoying the "fruits" of yesterday's labor for at least a few days.
Though my legs were weary from all that standing, the feeling of satisfaction overruled exhaustion.
Yesterday's project kinda fits in with an article I read this morning about a course at Yale, teaching people how to be happy.
After reading the highlights of the piece, I decided that we really don't need to go to college to learn how to be happy.
For many of us, these simple, sensible guidelines come naturally.
We just have to actively practice them on a daily basis, simply by applying four generalrules noted in the article.
Each and every time we engage in any of the suggestions, it's bound to make us happy.
For some reason, the author did not mention one very vital aspect of working toward happiness.
Could be that he, like Jimmy Kimmel, thinks that Gonzaga is a mythical place, hardly worthy of much "mindfulness" during the daily grind.
Poor guy!
But we ZAG fans know: the road to the Final Four can make you happy, especially when your team keeps on dancing.
And, we also know---some of us for almost 100 years---that Gonzaga is SO real and that on their road to the Final Four, they are keeping their thousands of fans on the road to Happiness.
Good times, for sure.
Keep on Dancing, ZAGS! We love you.
Happy Friday.
GO, ZAGS. Keep it up, Jimmy. You make us happy!
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