Pie

Even when you're kind of blue, and a little bit down, there's always pie. Pie can be better than a stiff drink.

I turned on the TV the other night, and John McCain was yelling at me. "GROW THE PIE", he demanded. Well, I may not be a McCain supporter, but I definitely consider myself pro-pie. So tonight MizBubs peeled up the last of the Honey Crisp apples from southern Michigan, and we grew ourselves a pie.


Compound apple crumb pie



Ingredients:

1 pie crust of your choosing (Both my mom and MizBubs have made absolutely brilliant, flaky, melt-in-your-mouth pie crusts in the past, but tonight I used one of those rolled Pillsbury crusts.)

5 apples, peeled and cut into eight slices each
1/2 cup sugar mixed with 1 tsp cinnamon
1/3 cup butter, cut into pieces
1/2 cup brown sugar
2/3 cup flour
1 tsp cinnamon
1/2 chopped pecans (Unbelievably, I forgot to add pecans to the pie you see pictured above. It was a delicious, and yet sadly incomplete, pie.)

• Preheat oven to 450
• Place crust in pie pan
• Slice apples and arrange in pie crust
• Pour the 1/2 cup sugar/cinnamon mix evenly over the apples in the crust
• Mix 1/2 cup brown sugar, 2/3 cup flour, 1 tsp cinnamon in a mixing bowl. Use a pastry blender to mix in the butter until the mixture is crumbly. This will be your topping.
  
• Mix the chopped pecans into the topping. Spread the topping over the apples.
• Bake at 450 for 10 minutes, then reduce heat to 350 and bake for about 40-45 minutes until it's dark and bubbly.
• Enjoy your pie.

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While I'm at it, this is as good a time as any to remind everyone about the Big Wicked Online Pageant over at A Cup of Coffey (Coffey goes great with pie!)

On Monday evening, post a picture of yourself as a kid in your adorable/scary/unfortunate/dorky Halloween costume on your blog, and email Beth with your link. If you can't find a picture of yourself as a kid, pick something suitably mortifying from your more recent past and post that. The pageant is being co-hosted by yours truly and Florida expert Dale.

All the cool kids are doing it. My favorite procrastinating noir writer Cormac chipped in with an early contribution just to help everyone get in the spirit.

It's going to be very scary!

Germany or Florida: And the winner is...CANADA!

Congratulations to long-time friend of the compound Dale! He successfully went for the bold "all Florida" gambit and won this week's contest. He even did it in a typically polite and unobtrusive way:

"Is it wrong to guess Florida for all of them?"

Well done, sir!

Clearly Dale has shown unique insight into the Florida mindset. Does he winter there? Until now I had never pictured Dale as one of those millions of snowbirds who flock to Florida every year; however, a careful re-reading of his Honeypot stories made me realize she is very likely some native Florida white trash that he brought back north for his (and our) amusement.

I'd also like to take this opportunity to welcome some new visitors to the compound. Eternally Curious and Jewels both stopped by and jumped right into the contest. Thanks for visiting, and I hope you'll be back soon!

Answers and commentary are in blue.

1) A man and his girlfriend returned home after arguing in a tavern. The man wanted to have sex, and the woman didn't. The man threatened her with a rifle, but only succeeded in shooting himself.

No Bang? Bang! Bang! Xanax was also involved, in addition to the alcohol and firearms.

2) An argument between two men resulted in one of them grabbing a hammer and threatening the other. The other grabbed a letter opener and stabbed the hammer man. It was not hammer time.

Man with hammer loses to man with letter opener, police say.

3) A man wanted to teach his son "how to party right" and showed the teenager how to crush and snort prescription drugs. The son died.

Boy dies during dad's 'how to party' lesson, police say.

If I'd told you the drug was Oxycontin, it would totally have given away the source.

4) A homeless woman hit a homeless man over the head with a Heineken bottle during an argument.



Well played, Skylersdad and Kirby, for recognizing that the Heineken reference was a red herring! If I had given the reason for the argument, it would totally have nailed this as a Florida story:

"...Diane Parrish hit him over the head with a Heineken beer bottle after he told Parrish her daughter could not get her into heaven, only Jesus can, according to the report."

Remember this for future reference: Jesus + interpersonal violence=Florida.

5) A pet rat starts a fire in the owner's home.

Flaming pet rat starts fire, damages Titusville home. If I'd mentioned that the kid's parents were away doing mission work, that might have given it away (again with the Jesus=Florida). Maybe this line, delivered with typical Floridian understatement, would have done the trick:

"I had a few beers before it happened, but nothing out of the ordinary," Stanifer told Eyewitness News.

6) A driver pulled over on suspicion of drunk driving promptly urinated on himself as he asked the officer if he was in any trouble.

Driver gets pulled over, urinates on himself.

This one was tough just based on the information given. Now, if the driver had actually called the police there himself, or if he'd been stopped while fleeing from a poorly-planned robbery, that would have made it an easier Florida pick.

7) The owners of a traveling educational zoo are sued by a hotel worker who claims that her exposure to bird and monkey feces and dander caused a chronic medical condition when they stayed at her hotel.

Inn housekeeper sues Paso's traveling zoo.

Another tough call: monkeys=Germany, squalor can go either way and generally litigation=Florida. If you read the story, though, you'll see that an alligator was involved.

Music For Funerals

The good folks at Social Zymurgy recently asked a number of us to come up with 12 songs we'd like played at our own funeral. Now, I'm assuming they were including the wake or post-funeral luncheon, and were not just referring to the music you'd have played at the funeral service itself. Johnny Yen followed instructions and came up with 12 songs, including lyrics from his favorite one.

Dale, perhaps trying to be polite and not take up too much of anyone's time, posted a list of 10 songs.

I love this idea. I have a thing for funerals, and my own is something that I've given no small amount of thought to. I've been a cop for a few years, I'm in the department honor guard, and I've served on rifle squads for police funerals. My ethnicity is Irish, and my family are transplanted hillbillies (I'm two generations away from coal mines and railroads). So, I'm into funerals. I want my own to be a great blast--I want people to eat and drink, I want some crying, plenty of laughter (hopefully, some of it wildly inappropriate) and lots of loud conversation and music.

Since Dale was such a good sport, using only 10 songs, I'll list a few extra tracks since he didn't use them. Now, mind you, these are just a handful of tracks that came to mind. I could easily come up with another 10 or 15. But, here they are, in no particular order, to be played as part of the service or at the rollicking party afterward:

• Amazing Grace—Any good traditional hillbilly version, or with bagpipes
• Tango Till They're Sore—Tom Waits
• Going Down Slow—Howlin' Wolf
• Come On Up to the House—Tom Waits
• Sick Bed of Cuchulain—The Pogues
• Once in a Lifetime—Talking Heads
• I Saw the Light—Hank Williams
• Rank Stranger—Stanley Brothers
• I'll Fly Away—There are too many versions of this I love: The Louvin Brothers, Johnny Cash, The Stanley Brothers, Alison Krause..
• Isn't it Grand Boys—The Clancy Brothers
• Young At Heart—Frank Sinatra
• Rockin' Bones—The Cramps
• Didn't He Ramble--Louis Armstrong
  
• After Hours—The Velvet Underground