Happy Mother's Day

The carnation does not drop its petals, but hugs them to its heart as it dies, and so, too, mothers hug their children to their hearts, their mother love never dying.

-- Anna Jarvis

When you have your health, you have everything

Jesus Ben Sirach, 1860 woodcut by Julius Schnorr

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

There is no riches above a sound body, and no joy above the joy of the heart.

-- Ecclesiasticus 30:16

Delight each May morning

 The shepherd swains shall dance and sing,

For they delight each May morning.

If these delights thy mind may move,

Then live with me, and be my love.

-- William Shakespeare

Your traditional chicken broth is probably contributing to all your aches and pains

Simultaneous Determination of Purines and Uric Acid in Chinese Chicken Broth Using TFA/FA Hydrolysis Coupled with HPLC-VWD :

Chinese chicken stock was prepared ... Briefly, yellow-feather chicken carcasses with the head, claws, and internal organs removed were cut evenly in half along the back, rinsed and drained in cold water, and cooked in a 5.6 L stainless steel stockpot ... with purified water ... at the meat to water ratio of 1:2 (w/w). The chicken carcass was placed in the stainless steel pot when the purified water was at 95–99 °C, and cooking was timed when the broth temperature again reached 95–99 °C. After 4 h of stewing, the top layer of fat was removed and the chicken stock was stored at −20 °C for further analysis. ...

Gout is the second most common metabolic disease affecting human health after diabetes. Gout is closely related to the content of exogenous purines and uric acid consumed in the diet. Chinese chicken broth is a delicious traditional meat soup, rich in protein, fat, minerals, and other nutrients, and is popular among consumers. Chicken broth is often considered a high purine food, posing a health risk to patients with gout and hyperuricemia. This work copes with the optimization of purines and uric acid content simultaneous determination in Chinese chicken stock when hydrolysis and extraction procedures, as well as HPLC, were studied. ... It has been demonstrated that Chinese chicken broth contains a significant amount of purines, with the highest content being hypoxanthine. It is also worth noting that some uric acid is also present in chicken soup, which can directly affect the body’s blood uric acid levels when ingested.

Happiness is being able to walk

Happiness is whole kernel rye breads by Mestemacher in Germany, available in the United States

 I found these at my local health food store in Michigan, and they are delicious.

 

Broccoli, brussels sprouts, kale, cabbage contain sulforaphane, now shown to inhibit replication of the virus which causes COVID-19

From the story here:

... low micromolar (µM) concentrations of sulforaphane (2.4–31 µM) lowered virus replication by 50 percent among six distinct strains of SARS-CoV-2 — including the Delta and Omicron variants. Researchers discovered similar results among cells previously infected with the viruses. In these cases, the protective effects of sulforaphane were apparent even in reference to already established virus infections.

Happiness is cranberries for heart health

 

From the story here:

The participants assigned to the cranberry powder group displayed notable improvements in their flow-mediated dilations (FMD). Study authors say FMD signals both heart and blood vessel function improvements.

Scientists consider FMD an important and sensitive biomarker of one’s cardiovascular disease risk, measuring the widening of blood vessels when blood flow increases.

It’s also important to note that the FMD improvements among participants were apparent within just two hours of consuming cranberry powder, with the beneficial effects remaining after one month of daily consumption. This suggests eating cranberries is great for the heart in both the immediate short term and over the long haul.

McGinty says "Happy St. Patrick's Day!"

 Oh, McCarthy was dead . . . and McGinty didn't know it,

And McGinty was dead . . . and McCarthy didn't know it,

They both were dead in the very same bed,

And neither one knew that the other was dead.

Happiness is beautiful people, behaving well, speaking well

 

Happiness is the 5 magical superfoods an immunologist says boost the immune system the most

Here:

Mushrooms

Ginger

Broccoli sprouts

Garlic

Turmeric

Happiness is Johnny Mathis singing The Twelfth of Never

 

Happiness is Jackie Wilson on The Ed Sullivan Show, May 27, 1962

 

Happiness is Bob Hope in "The Ghost Breakers" from 1940

 

Happiness is whole wheat toast for breakfast, spread with Nutella and topped with dried blueberries

 

Happiness is maybe saving your own life during the pandemic for thirty cents a week

 

Israeli study offers strongest proof yet of vitamin D’s power to fight COVID

Happiness is one of the greatest birthday songs ever recorded, Close to You, The Carpenters (1970)

 

Happiness is Keemo Kimo (1854)

 

Happiness is a rasher of bacon, thin or thick

 

If we grow all to be pork eaters, we shall not shortly have a rasher on the coals for money.

-- William Shakespeare, Merchant of Venice

Happiness is the brotherhood of The Mystic Knights of the Sea

 

Andy, Kingfish, and Amos

Happiness is Ma Cohen's herring in wine sauce, made in Detroit

 

Happiness is polite dinner conversation

Thou say'st his meat was sauc'd with thy upbraidings;

Unquiet meals make ill digestions.

-- William Shakespeare

Happiness is what is seasonal

 At Christmas I no more desire a rose,

Than wish a snow in May's newfangled shows;

But like of each thing, that in season grows.

 

-- William Shakespeare

Happiness is December the 25th, the dearest day in all the year

 

Happiness is an authentic German stollen on Christmas morning

 

Happiness was when American Colonial forests ruled the sea for England

 Lords of the world's great waste, the ocean, we

Whole forests send to reign upon the sea.

 

-- Edmund Waller

Happiness is . . . Santa Claus is coming to town

 

Happiness is the vaporless morning

 The morning is the best, because the imagination is not clouded by the vapours of meat.

-- John Dryden

It's Christmas time again, and you know what that means

 

Happiness is a Double Shot of My Baby's Love (1966)

 

Happiness can has good grammar

 

Happiness is Michael Martin Murphey singing his 1990 "Cowboy Logic"

 

Happiness is Texas logic, aka cowboy logic

 

Happiness is Texas math

 

Happiness is foods for brain health

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Out:

added sugars such as high fructose corn syrup, baked goods, sodas; 

fried foods;

potatoes, white bread, white rice;

alcohol;

nitrates.

In:

dark chocolate 70% or higher, 45 grams a week;

strawberries, blueberries, blackberries, one half to one cup a day;

turmeric, black pepper, curry;

dark leafy greens;

fermented foods with live active cultures such as yogurt, kefir, kombucha, miso, sauerkraut, kimchi.

Happiness is a Texas rain gauge

 

Happiness is Kerrygold pure Irish butter

It really does taste amazing, and it most likely has much more vitamin K2, necessary for bone absorption of calcium, than conventional butter:

The measurements we are talking about when measuring levels of MK4 is the μg(microgram). In Anú Dairy butter there is 54μg per 100g of butter; other high quality Irish butters are around half that at 25μg but it can go as low as 7μg or 11μg for conventional indoor feed cattle. Kevin explains that in Europe having a claim of “uniquely rich food”means it needs to be at 30% or above. ...

Butter is a huge industry in Ireland, there are 9 butter plants in Ireland each producing 10,000kg/hr and 140,000 tonnes/year in exports. In terms of scale Anú Dairy is very small and not really in that space, they are a small artisan producer. ...

There are so many different brands of butter, Président butter is white, so there is no grass there, but Kerrygold butter is much better. Even Irelands conventional butter is very good quality compared to international butters and the reputation is very strong overseas. Kevin also mentions there are good small farmers in America such as Maple Hill Creamery, for example.

More. 

 

Happiness is a recipe which helps you cut back on toilet paper!

 For a butt-hole which is clean as a whistle, eat one of these oat flour and wheat bran muffins every morning instead of toast! You'll find yourself using far less toilet paper as a result!

Foil the kitty!

Oat Flour & Wheat Bran Muffins

1 cup oat flour (just grind up one cup whole oats in the coffee grinder)

2 cups wheat bran (I pay $1.29/lb at the health food store for a refrigerated bag of organic; super cheap!)

1.5 t baking powder

0.5 t baking soda

0.5 t ground cinnamon

 

1.25 cups milk

0.33 cup brown sugar

1 egg beaten

0.5 cup apple sauce

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

1/ preheat oven to 400 F

2/ combine dry ingredients in one bowl, wet in another

3/ add the dry to the wet, whisking together

4/ line two 8-bay muffin tins with parchment baking cups

5/ spoon in the completed mixture, about 1/4 cup each

6/ bake 15-20 minutes

7/ let cool thoroughly before storing in the frig or freezer

8/ parchment peels right off once cooled

9/ rewarm in microwave and serve with butter and jam

10/ one a day will do ya

 

 

Happiness is really roughing it

The roots of thistles have my hunger fed,

Two roods of cultur'd barley give me bread,

A rock my pillow, and green moss for my bed. 

-- Walter Harte

Happiness is the rye, and the straw thereof

In champion countrie a pleasure they take

To mow up their haume, for to brew and to bake:

The haume is the straw of the wheat or the rie

Which once being reaped, they mow by and by. 

-- Thomas Tusser

Happiness is the vivid imagination of Shakespeare

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 I told John of Gaunt he beat his own name; for you might have truss'd him and all his apparel into an eel-skin: the case of a treble hautboy was a mansion for him, a court.

-- William Shakespeare, Henry IV Part 2, III.2

Happiness is the sweet oblivion of country life

Oh, could I see my country-seat!

There leaning near a gentle brook,

Sleep, or peruse some ancient book;

And there in sweet oblivion drown

Those cares that haunt the court and town.

 

-- Jonathan Swift

Happiness is Reformation Day, October 31st every year since 1517

 Perhaps you've heard of it?

 

Happiness is Don Ho singing his 1966 hit "Tiny Bubbles"

 

Happiness is savory with sweet

On smoaking lard they dine;

A sav'ry bit that serv'd to relish wine. 

-- John Dryden

Happiness is The Five Reasons Why Men Drink

 

 

If on my theme I rightly think,

There are five reasons why men drink:—

Good wine; a friend; because I'm dry;

Or lest I should be by and by;

Or — any other reason why.

 

-- Henry Aldrich (1647-1710)

Happiness is the one thousand year old oak tree

The King Oak of Denmark may date as early as the first century AD

 

 

 

The monarch oak, the patriarch of the trees,

Shoots rising up, and spreads by slow degrees;

Three centuries he grows, and three he stays

Supreme in state; and in three more decays.

 

-- John Dryden

Happiness is the champion of Genovese pesto, Roberto Panizza

 

Happiness is Tim Hawkins doing inappropriate songs for when she's walkin' down the aisle

 

Happiness is grill smoke

If from adown the hopeful chops

The fat upon a cinder drops,

To stinking smoke it turns the flame.

 

-- Jonathan Swift

Happiness is nutbrown ale

Young and old come forth to play,

Till the live-long daylight fail,

Then to the spicy nutbrown ale.

-- John Milton

Happiness is learning your water heater isn't leaking and putting all that water on the basement floor

 

Happiness is my Norwegian Forest Cat all vaxxed up and raring to go

 

Happiness is 1937's "Let's Call the Whole Thing Off"

 

Happiness is a pleasant, productive Saturday

✓ The humidity dropped into the 40s and the temperature into the 50s.

✓ The windows were opened and the oven cleaned.

✓ The wheel bearing job on the old car was finished.

 

✓ Weeds on the sidewalk were torched.

 

✓ Groceries were sorted and frozen.

 

✓ Pizzas were made from scratch, as usual.

 

✓ Jeeves and Wooster provided the entertainment with a cottage set ablaze.

 

✓ The internet and the phone came back.

 

✓ Power was restored after four days without.

 

✓ And the generators finally fell silent.

 

 

Happiness is discovering it's not the COVID, just the English food

 

Happiness is seeing The Four Lads perform their 1953 hit "Istanbul (not Constantinople)" live in 2014

Featuring left to right Frank Busseri, Harry Duvall, John Hasselback, and Don Farrar.

Only Frankie, who died in 2019, was an original member of the group.

 

 

Happiness is an Amadeus (1984) joke

 

Tihs ym tae.

Happiness is I Wanna Be Sedated, Ramones 1978, especially these days

 

Happiness is the master-hand

Musick resembles poetry; in each

Are nameless graces which no methods teach,

And which a master-hand alone can reach.

-- Alexander Pope

Happiness is a cleft tree

The cleft tree

Offers its kind concealment to a few,

Their food its insects, and its moss their nests.

-- James Thomson (1700-1748)

Happiness is the fabulous The Crystals singing the 1963 hit Da Doo Ron Ron

 

When you need to move water, happiness is a 2-in-1 utility pump by Everbilt

This unit functions as a transfer pump for draining a water heater, for example, or as a submersible pump for draining a flooded low spot in the backyard, basement or driveway. Connect to it using a 3/4 inch garden hose.

About $119 at The Home Depot.

Happiness is real lemon, real pepper, Atlantic salmon baked in the oven

 Skip the dry, bottled, lemon-pepper seasoning and do this instead.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Real lemon pepper salmon

 

1 2+lb. Atlantic salmon filet, skinless

canola oil

1-2 fresh lemons, well-washed, sliced thin

ground black pepper

salt

 

Pre-heat the oven to 375 degrees F.

Oil a roasting pan with canola oil

Place the salmon in the pan

Sprinkle, very generously, with ground black pepper

Sprinkle lightly with sea salt or kosher salt, if desired

Arrange the lemon slices all over the top of the salmon

Bake about 25 minutes on the center rack of the oven

Remove and squeeze roasted lemons with a spoon against the pan, if you wish, and spoon over the servings

Serves about four

Happiness is light yellow and cherry, the colors of July

July I would have drawn in a jacket of light yellow, eating cherries, with his face and bosom sunburnt.

-- Henry Peacham

Happiness is lions, and tigers, and bears! Oh my!

 

Happiness is clean gutters and downspouts, thanks to a Werner 24' aluminum extension ladder

Werner 24 ft. Aluminum Extension Ladder with 225 lb. Load Capacity Type II Duty Rating

This fella has just enough of the length I needed to reach the second story gutters in the rear comfortably, but only from the first floor patio deck in back, which is itself already elevated almost 6' off the ground.

It also reaches comfortably over the big shrubs and other plantings in front to get to the first level gutters.

I don't think the 20-footer would have worked as well.

The ladder is less than 35 lbs, but the gutter cleaning was still a two-man job.

 

 

Happiness is a cat who catches vermin

Grimalkin, to domestic vermin sworn

An everlasting foe, with watchful eye

Lies nightly brooding o'er a chinky gap,

Protending her fell claws, to thoughtless mice

Sure ruin.

 

-- John Philips (1676-1709)

Happiness is a silvan scene

Betwixt two rows of rocks, a silvan scene

Appears above, and groves for ever green.

-- John Dryden

Happiness is RMS Queen Mary: My dad came home on her in 1945

After decades of rocky seas in Long Beach, Queen Mary in danger of sinking. Can it be saved?:

'After the start of World War II, it was painted gray and converted into a troopship that ferried Allied soldiers, earning the nickname the “Grey Ghost” for its speed and camouflaged color.'

Arriving in New York Harbor, 20 June 1945, with thousands of US soldiers – there is a prominent degaussing coil running around the outer hull.

 

Happiness is the color of June

 June is drawn in a mantle of dark green.

 

-- Henry Peacham (1578-c.1644)