Duh.

I have no idea why anyone would think that this is a good idea. I mean plastic and metal don’t work well together. The plastic will always either break or wear out.  Anyway, they ordered the $99.00 part and are waiting for it to come.

Meanwhile, I took home her load of beach towels that were hanging out on the fence to dry when it started raining and were in danger of souring.

(Have I ever mentioned the humidity down here? If things don’t get dried fairly soon, they sour and then mildew.)

Anyway, the stuff had been being rained on since yesterday so it all needed washing anyway, as mud had splashed up on it.

I got home, took a load of my own towels out of the washer and tossed them in the dryer and turned it on.

Nothing.

It started to go, the lights dimmed for a second and then nothing.

Wait a minute… the lights dimmed? This can’t be good. I tried again and it happened again. Over and over.

Finally, I held the knob in the on position and the stupid dryer started. It ran for the allotted amount of time and did not dry a thing. Not even a little bit.

It did not get remotely warm.

Shit.

Meanwhile I attempted to wash Lisa’s towels. My washer is making a bizarre noise that can only mean bad things.

Did I mention that the central A/C is blowing and not shutting off, yet not cooling at all? At all?

AT ALL?

Will someone just wake me up before we all go to the poor house.

Just go here and do as I say and nobody will get hurt! Seriously, this is some really good crap,  booty!

Sooo, I’m like just minding my own business this afternoon and in the span of a few minutes, my laid-back, vegging out, bon bon popping self was plunged deep, DEEP into hell.

I walked into Henrietta’s room to check on her, thinking all the way from her doorway to her bedside that it smelled quite… bad. Like urine, but she has a catheter, so… what?

She has been steadily sliding downhill lately and warrants trips in to check on her even when she hasn’t rung the bell. She mouthed some garbledy-gook to me. She makes absolutely no sense anymore. Only a few recognizable words scattered here and there amongst crazy sounds. And nothing that you could string together in a sentence. Plus the fact that she can barely make any noise at all. Her voice is a mere whisper of it’s former self. Literally.

Anyway, I check her out and chat with her for a few minutes. Pull her up more in bed and ask if she needs to sit on the potty. She shakes her head no and I tell her that I really do need to change the dressing on her bottom anyway. She nods OK and I get her ready to roll over on her side. I get gloves and prepare to get down to business.

Sloooowly and carefully I roll her over after I have undone her diaper.  I peel back the old bandages and examine the remains of a few small bedsores. Yes, they are coming along nicely.

I turn around to retrieve some sterile gauze and the medicine tube from the bedside table. I then turn back and there is a poop fountain sprung anew right in front of me.

Oh, so fast. How did she do that? A big stream of it. I shove the new diaper under the… stream and begin catching all the rest that’s coming out. I clean it all up off of her, remove the soiled hospital chux and there is now poop stoppage.

This is a good thing.

I run out of t.p. and am about to go and get some more, since she is resting comfortably on her side and the more time she can spend off of her butt the better for getting her sores well.

The phone rings. So I trot down the hall and answer it. It’s my brudder, Cam. He is calling to confer about the malware problem I’m having on my blog site. I tell him I’ll call him back in no more than 5 minutes.

When I turn to leave the DINING ROOM where I had left the phone, I notice shiny footprints on the floor. Not good. The floor was clean moments ago.

Weird. They seem to lead right up to where I am standing.

Odd. They are the same shape, size and pattern as the soles of my flip-flops.

Slowdumbandstupid. That’s me.

Well…WTH???

I backtrack and find footprints through the foyer, aaaall the way down the hall and across her room. As a matter of fact they are all over her room. Between the bed and dresser and closet and all around the nightstand.

It’s pee, people. It’s everywhere. And I had been cavorting in it the whole time.  If you can call cleaning up pee footprints and bandaging butt sores cavorting.

Her catheter was leaking. There was a puddle of pee on the floor at her bedside the size of a turkey platter. How I didn’t see it when I walked in the first time is beyond my understanding. I blame these wood floors. You can’t see anything on them.

So I spent… God knows how long, on my hands and knees with a roll of paper towels and a spray bottle of disinfectant, crawling all over the freakin house spray, wipe, put in plastic bag. Spray, wipe, put in plastic bag. Spray, wi….. you get the idea.

It took forever!

I know this turned out to be just one long bitch session about my ridiculous administrations to her and all and she really is doing much worse and don’t see her lasting too much longer.

I joke around about her, all the shenanigans she used to get up to and the problems with taking care of her.

I wonder how it will feel when she’s gone?

Have I mentioned how I loathe Vista?  I do.  We are getting an Apple sometime in the near future and all I have to do is find a way to finance it….  Hum.  I have children I could sell.  They are 18 and 19 now, but really, if I list them as “slightly used”, won’t that cover my butt?

Anyway, as I was saying before I got all sidetracked, H had a birthday with a beautiful cake I made and Kes iced for me and presents and whatnot.  She had a grand time.  Only her daughter never showed up or called.  So about half way through the day, I’m figuring she may have forgotten and I started trying to call her.  I left messages and never heard back from her.  John did the same from work.

The next day, Thursday, she showed up with the most gawd-awful looking pot of almost completely finished blooming tulips.  Some of them were lying over the side of the pot.    She said she hadn’t called the day before because she was out of minutes on her cell phone and she never gave any idea about why she didn’t come.

She doesn’t own a car, but drives a 14 year old piece of junk Accord that belongs to her boyfriend.  And I DO mean junk.  Rust showing through, no A/C, dings and dents everywhere.  Ugly as sin.  She always parks right in the middle at the end of the sidewalk.  We always make a point not to park there because it is directly across the street from my neighbors driveway.  It’s the elderly couple with the red door that I have posted about before.  They are very sweet and terrific neighbors.  It just makes good sense to not park right where someone has to back out.  You know, the courteous thing to do.

We should have told her not to do it too.  The man that lives there was backing out and hit that piece of junk and dented the front quarter panel.  So he rang the bell and asked me if he could talk to me and I went out and he showed me the dent and said that they were going some place right then and just tell SIL they’d be back in a little while.

So SIL called her boyfriend and told him.

Here’s where I get politically incorrect.

He’s a wet back an illegal alien.

Of course he wanted the insurance info.  **Sigh.**

She stayed here longer than usual visiting with her mother that day so that she could go and talk to my neighbor.  That’s the only good that came out of this.  He gave her his phone number and asked her to call him when she got an estimate.

That was all on Thursday and Friday SIL was calling saying that she’d talked to him and he’s supposed to be bringing a check over.

For $244.00.

To fix body damage on a car.

Yeah,  right.

John was appalled at the whole thing of course and we are both embarrassed.  So when the neighbor came over with the check, he talked to him and apologized.  When the guy left John told me that he’s going to tell his sister that he brought the check but needs a copy of the estimate for his records. He didn’t believe for one minute that $244.00 was going to fix that car either.  And, he and I both know the car will never get fixed.  It will just be an embarrassing reminder every time she comes over here of what happened and how she extorted money from our retired, on a fixed income, neighbors.

She came back on Saturday earlier than she has been here in many, many months, (1:15), and while I was surprised to see her that early, I wasn’t.  My first thought was “OK, at least she’s in time to change her mother’s diaper this time.”.

She stayed 10 to 15 minutes and left.

H promptly rang the bell to be put on the bedpan.

This is my life.

The copy of the estimate she brought looks legit enough.  It’s barely legible, but has the name of the garage stamped on it.   So… whatever!

This is totally unfair to ME.

And that’s what it’s all about, right?  OK, shut up.

Around here holidays are something to fear and loath.  Something that takes away the husband/father and spits him back out, after the date has passed, a used up, hull of a man.  A man who only wants to sleep and get some decent rest.  When he passes out nods off in his comfy chair in the living room and we mess with him because he is totally defenseless and cannot wake up and protect himself say something to him, his response is something to the effect of, “Go clean up the back room and then start reorganizing isle 9.”  This without ever opening his eyes, of course.

And if you ask him questions?  You can even get him to argue with you.  This is one of our girls favorite pastimes.

Daughter: “What do I use to mop up the soda with?”

John, never moving a mussel or cracking an eyelid except to speak: “A MOP!”

Daughters and wife: massive giggles.

Daughter: “Can I go home early, Mr. Lopez?”

John: “No!  Get back on that check stand!  Now there’s a line!”

This can go on and on.

It gets them to snickering and laughing everytime.  And the only thing I feel badly about is the fact that when we are having close, fun, family moments like this… he won’t remember them.  Completely absent.  But at least he is HERE!

At one point she looked at me and said, “Krissa… What would happen to us if we just went ahead and left?”

Don’t think I wasn’t already thinking about doing it.

Right about that time they finally got her all fixed up with wheels to the car and we made a break for it exited the premises.

You have never met anyone as bitchy as she has become since she got home.  Well, actually, that’s not entirely true.  It started before she got home.  While she was still in there she commenced to tell me how I should be changing her diaper differently and I need to do it like the nurses do it there and every time she asked me to raise her up in bed she tried to die when I actually moved her.  Keep in mind that I laid the bed out completely flat and grabbed the hospital chux and slid her upward as slowly as I could.  She is no longer the light weight she used to be and I can’t just suspend animation anymore.  She seems to think everything should be in slow mo and I can’t just stop midway between the wheelchair and bed while holding her.  Or move any slower than I already am.  I certainly am gentle and I don’t just toss her around.

Before she came home I received a call from a lady in charge of her case at the hospital and she said, “Ms. Lopez, it says here on her chart that you are interested in a hospital bed for her at home.”

Noooo… I’m not interested in one…

“Oh, well they must have just stuck this note in the wrong file.”

My wheels were turning at this point and I was remembering the two times she asked me if we needed one while she was in there.  I just shrugged and said, no, I didn’t see why, but she insisted it would  be easier for ME if we had one. Translation: She is pitiful and wants all the hospital equipment she can get around her.

We have been through this before.  Years ago when she was on hospice.  It was an enormous monstrosity that left very little room to move in her bedroom.  Well, comparatively.

Here is her room with a twin bed.  That bizarre looking thing with all the thousands of photos stuck on with ten pounds of scotch tape is her rolling cart of tricks.  It’s on wheels so I can move it out of the way to change her and get her in and out and what not.  It has shelves inside with all her accoutrements.

It’s an ancient, cheap, laminate, microwave cart.  And if something ever happened to it… well, we would all perish, I am sure.

The hospital bed we had ate up the walls when “sliding” the head of the bed up and down.  And since she sleeps in a fairly upright position the only thing we would need it to do is sit up some.  I can accomplish this with pillows.  AND a comfortable mattress, not a hospital one.

Bottom line, we’re getting another damn hospital bed delivered here this afternoon.

But that is not what I was talking about sucking.  No.  There is a thief amongst us.  It could be your neighbor, friend or YOU.  Well, OK, so maybe none of that is even remotely close to likely.  STILL!

Yesterday when I was in here, in the boudoir, hacking out carefully constructing the poop post for yesterday, Kes came in and told me that the next day, (today), she was going to go up to U of H and purchase a text book that she has to have for school.  Those dirty bastards are requiring her to buy a $250.00 book with some sort of electronic gizmo that has to go with it, that you can only get at UH. Her dad and I had discussed it and we were going to help her with that book so I gave her a little stash of cash that had been lying on the desk for a few days waiting to go to the bank.  It was $190.00 even.  A hundred bill on the outside, four $20.00′s and a $10.00 on the inside.  She said no, she would pay for it, she knew we were having a hard enough time with bills and why not spend the money she has been saving for her education now while we are strapped, blah, blah, blah.  She was being very sweet and understanding and trying to pick up some responsibility.  But I insisted and pushed it on her and she took it eventually and went her way.

Today she came and found me and asked me if I had taken money out of my purse.  I said,…. no?  And she raced away looking for her sister.  She came back in a bit of a panic and said that she doesn’t know what happened to the $100.00 dollar bill in my purse.  I must have looked a bit blank and told her I don’t have a $100 in my purse.  She explained that yesterday when she left my room she just walked straight in and put the $190.00 in my purse in my little coin purse thing where I keep my cash and cards and zipped it up and dropped back in the middle section where I always keep it.

Today she was looking for change for a $100 dollar bill of hers and remembered the money in my purse she had put there last night.  Nobody knew about it but her at this point. So she looked in there to see if she could scare up another $10.00 to make an even 100 out of the smaller bills and the $100. bill was missing from the outside of the folded cash.  She called her dad at work and asked him if he had gotten it out of my purse this morning and he said, no, he knew nothing about it.

Oh crap.

There was a complete scouring of the area and searching on hands and knees and looking so far deep down into my purse I found traces of Jimmy Hoffa.  Every single item came out and was examined closely to see if it had ever even tried to look like a $100.

Next she went and looked for her sister and was frantically asking about the missing money.

Keelan was clueless as well and responded with something like, “Money?  In Mom’s purse? No, I didn’t even know Mom had money in her purse…”  Neither one one of them have ever even thought of taking money from us without asking and so that wasn’t really a valid way to go, but Kes was trying to exhaust all avenues because the money had to be somewhere.

About this time we started backtracking who all had been here between last night and this afternoon.  I mean it’s the only place left to “look” cause, people we have seen things in this house now that make YOUR dustbunnies look like pansy assed wimps.

The small group of friends Keelan had come over with her just popped their heads in to say hello over from the foyer.  They never even came through the living room and went to the other side of the wet bar, where I stash my purse so it’s easy to grab on the way out the back door.

HOWEVER, this is Friday and the Caregiver Provider Aide was here from 11:00am to 2:00pm.  About noon I went in and ran a nice hot bath for myself like I always do when she comes and John is not able to be off work.  So she knew I was in the bath and my purse is there sitting on the wet bar right by the door where she goes to put the dirty linens in with the laundry.  H is turned in her chair with her back to that general area and there is no one else in the house.

My first thought was why would she wait and do this when I am home with them instead of when I am gone with John when he is off?  And then I heard that little intelligent voice I rarely hear from say,  “Because my purse is gone with me then.”  And the dumb ass in me replied, “Oh.”

So now, we are starving to death and don’t have the money required to pay attention, we are trying to figure out what to do next.  I consult with my dear Mither and Pop and then, of course, Lisa is called into the loop.  Kessa’s  boyfriend suggested we get a camera and set her up and record it.  I feel it would cost much more than the lost $100. to buy the equipment for that and she is here for three hours, so it would have to be a motion sensor kind that would come on when she walks in front of it.  I guess?

Well, I was telling Lisa about this and she said that they have a camera that does that.

You could have knocked me over with a feather.  I asked, Why? And she said that they put them up on deer trails and what not in Colorado on their vacation property and see all kinds of wildlife.

Whatever.  How cool is this?  I swear if I catch her, (and I will cause I am stealthy like that), I will show you guys the video footage.

After I get finished beating her to death with H’s bedpan.

She showed up in a few minutes and went on in to wake up and see H.  I went about my business and saw no reason to go in as there was no need for me to stand and scream what the nurse was saying at H because the nurse is too lazy to raise her voice and do it herself interpretation.  Sometimes Henrietta is having a particular complaint that she wants to address and so I go in and relay the answers back to her, but not today.  Not that I knew of.

She stayed back there talking to her, taking her vitals and getting information about the frequency, size, shape, color, smell and over all IQ of her stools.  I know this because the neighbors at the end of the street could hear her screaming the questions.  When every last bit of info about the poo, (classified and otherwise), was gathered.  She emerged victorious and held out two plastic bags to me proudly saying, “Here, I brought you supplies.”

Does it make me a bad person that my gut instinct, first response was, “You got booze in there?”

I took the bags and judged by weight and size of the bulges that there were several catheters, a box of latex gloves, and about 3 sterile catheter kits.

The latex gloves were a bit of a surprise and I am guessing the nice lady in the office, Paula had included them for me as that’s not part of the deal.  We are expected to buy our own gloves and I go through a shitload of them.  Hahaha!  Did you see what I did there?  I use the gloves to change shitty diapers and empty bedpans and I said I go through a shitload of them!  Hahahaha!  OK, maybe the shit jokes are a bit dense around here, but so is the shit.  (I bet that nurse didn’t even ask about density….)

Then the nurse leaves and almost immediately Henrietta rings the bell.  I go to see what’s up and am a bit surprised she rang and I hadn’t had time to get her breakfast in to her yet.

“Krissa, I hate to tell you this, but I have a dirty diaper.  That stuff just came out all of the sudden!”

It’s always called “that stuff”.  She has never referred to the poo as anything other than “stuff” once it has happened.

I must admit it helps to think of it this way…

So I assure her that it’s all OK and we set about the business of cleaning it up.  I see fairly soon that the reason she was so unaware of the situation is that it’s very loose.  (Am I getting too graphic, yet?  Cause I don’t mean to be, but really… YOU weren’t here cleaning this old lady’s butt up and changing gloves and swiping her with the required lotion.  SO DON’T JUDGE.)

We got done with that and I brought her the first course.  Oatmeal with a few cut up prunes and a dose of Miralax.

Now I know what you’re thinking.  Why would Krissa give H the Miralax if she just had a U. P. that was loose?

Well, my pretties, it’s like this.  It doesn’t matter what I do.  I’m screwed.

I have tried cutting off the fiber and shit-making producers as soon as there is any kind of disturbance in the digestive-go-about before.  It is all for not.  There would be an Abrupt Poop Stoppage and massive discomfort.

So we don’t do that anymore.  I mean the APS wouldn’t happen until the next day, but it WOULD happen.

Aaaaanywaaaay, I got her all cleaned and lotioned up and she has the rest of her breakfast.  An egg, breakfast sausage and an oven roll with a bit of jelly.   Of course, the U.P. has set her off her game and she prefers to stay in bed for the rest of the day.

Whatever.

A few hours later she rings for me to come in there and she has had another poopy diaper.

Well, shit.  I am just elbow deep in it today.

The day progresses and eventually I bring her in her supper.  (She never eats lunch and considering she doesn’t get up until noon, I can pretty much see why.

Remember she is being sickly today and playing it up big time.  No other complaints other than she is poopy.  Literally.  She wonders aloud numerous times what is the matter with the poops and why “all that stuff just keeps coming out…”.  I clearly have no new answers and have told her repeatedly that it’s OK.  Nothing to worry about.  Same ol’ same ol’…

Well, tonight I took her in the loaded toothbrush, fresh water, her two pills and a napkin and spit bowl.  She told me that when she was coughing during her soup she may have messed up her diaper.

So I peel it all back and there it is.  POOP.  From The Endless Font of Poopage.  AGAIN.

So I changed her again.  And ran like hell.

I want the hell out of here people!  I need a makeover!  WITH NO POOP!  Or even mudpacks, cause I don’t even think I like chocolate anymore due to the color and texture…..

I casually, even innocently, strolled to the cabinet that holds the precious black ground up goodness that gets me through the day.  I reached for the container and put it down on the counter, opened it up and…

CUE THE SCARY MUSIC.

This is what I found.  EMPTY. (Note: that word is in italic, bold, caps AND underlined. That is how it sounded in my little caffeine starved head.)

AAAAAAAAHHHHHHH!  I called John immediately and he dropped the phone cause I was still in screaming mode assured me calmly that he would bring home coffee when he was off work.

It was a very trying day.  I cried when I broke my fingernail and in hindsight that seems a tad dramatic, but at the time, there REALLY WAS NOTHING ELSE TO DO.  My whole day was in capitol letters. The strange little dogs hid from me the whole time.  I choose to think that my not having coffee was…depressing them and they just wanted to hide from… the whole world.  Yeah.  That’s it.

There were headache pills and Henrietta was a pill AND a headache.  I had tea with her and it always does help, but I still needed my coffee!

For once, John’s ridiculously long work day was longer for me than him.  YES IT WAS, JOHN!  Finally he came home and “delivered the goods”.  No.  That is not a sexy euphemism.  He brought the coffee and he KNEW that there was no coming home without it.  As a matter of fact he had to show me the bag of perfectly ground beans before he was allowed through the door.  I snatched the bag and ran to see my best friend the coffee maker.  With trembling hands, (and a silent prayer that John would quit trying to kiss me hello- Don’t make that face! He was getting in my way!), I carefully scooped the grounds right out of the bag into the precious magic machine.  Turned on the water right next to the maker of miracles and stretched out the faucet hose to fill it with water.  With a quivering finger I pushed the “ON” button.  Tears of joy escaped down my face as the tortured day came to an end and the black liquid gold ran into the pot.  Soon I was pouring a cup and blowing frantically/burning my tongue because I couldn’t wait.  I didn’t care.  The best reason to burn my tongue ever.

Today?  Got up, made coffee, ran the dishwasher, read the paper…  You know, same ol’, same ol’…

Free toes, everybody!

Hello there.  I am just sitting here waiting for the caregiver provider to get here at 11:00 to stay with H for the next three hours and I am OFF!  Lisa and her Mimi are picking me up and we are running the roads.

Let that be my own personal warning to anyone in the area who might be out and about at the same time we are.

There will be Christmas shopping and lunch eating, laughing and cussing, squealing and hair pulling.  Well, OK, maybe not hair pulling, but ya never know with Lisa and me.

I will give full disclosure when I get back.

It is Thursday now and no, it didn’t take this long for me to recuperate from the wild partying shopping spree we were to go on.  The original one on Tuesday didn’t even really happen.  Lisa’s grandson, a three year old, got kind of dumped on her at the last minute, when his mother, never showed up to pick him up from the father’s house and the father and his girlfriend had to go to work.

So we were attempting to shop with a three year old.  We, basically, didn’t.  The whole day was shot.  There was no stroller and it was a constant effort to keep up with where he was.

So yesterday, Wednesday, we struck out again and accomplished a bit more.  I bought two nightgowns for the girls for Christmas and then took them back.  I did keep the house shoes I got them, though.

I bought two pairs of sleep pants and two tee shirts to go with them for The Boyfriend, and they are going back today.  The pants, not the tee shirts.  Kes says the pants are way too small.  They are X-large and I know how big his waist is cause he’s worn some of John’s old belts before.  She says that I keep forgetting how big his thighs are.

Oh.

He is very large and muscular. and has gigantic muscles thighs.  So his pants have to be bought huge in order for his legs to fit into them.

Maybe he needs to sleep in shorts.  It’s not that cold.  I mean really.  We’ve been sleeping with the air conditioner on for the past two nights.

OK, now it’s Saturday and John and I spent all day yesterday and the day before frantically running around doing Christmas stuff.  And by “stuff” I mean shopping.  You know… buying shit you can’t afford for people you “have to” give to because they always give you something, whether or not either one of you can afford to do it.  And I mean people you don’t even necessarily like, but you are obligated to share Christmas with and give crap to JUST BECAUSE THEY ARE PART OF YOUR HUSBAND’S FAMILY.  AND DID I MENTION THEY REPRODUCE LIKE RABBITS AND THERE ARE A MILLION OF THEM?

(Stepping down from rickety platform I hastily erected for myself.)

Anyway, we were driving in unbearable traffic and trying to make it all the way to a certain store and John popped in a CD since nothing was really good on the radio at present.

All the sudden I am listening to Willie Nelson and Waylon Jennings.

I know.  John is a strange one and his musical taste is… diverse.  You never know which way he’s gonna go.

So we’re sitting there and Willie and Waylon are belting out “Good Hearted Woman” and it comes to a spot in the song where Willie Nelson is singing close to the end and he’s going on about how she loves him in spite of his *something* ways she don’t understand…

John was singing along with him kind of low and I turned and looked at him and said, “What did you say?”

He repeated himself and said, quite clearly, “She loves him in spite of his Micky Mouse ways, she don’t understand?”

I could not speak I was laughing so hard.  So there was much backing up of the CD and replaying that particular part, and this version really did sound weird.  I couldn’t understand what Willie was saying right in that particular part, but, I assured him that he absolutely WAS NOT saying anything about Mickey Mouse.   He might have been taking a drag off of one of his herbal cigarettes, but he was not speaking of the mouse.

This is not the same version that John had burned for the CD, however it IS Willie and Waylon and a good listen if you like this kind of music.  I guess I like it well enough, just not my usual cup of tea…

Oh, note the lack of mention of Mickey Mouse…  He says, quite clearly, “…his ways, she don’t understand…”

The tree is up and it’s one of those pre-lit ones that looks wonderful when the lights actually WORK on it.  Last year, (only the third year we had it), the entire middle section didn’t light up.  So I just piled on more lights and it looked OK.  For some reason I was expecting it to work this year when I plugged it in.  No.  It hates me.  It’s been talking to those elitist live bushes in the front yard that are (still) pissed off about the snow.

I DID, however, come across this most excellent recipe for a holiday… favorite(?) that I am willing to share with you all.  You may have seen it before… but it’s worth a re-read.

World’s Greatest Fruitcake

1c water

1c sugar

4 large eggs

2 c dried fruit

1 tsp. baking soda

1 tsp. salt

1c brown sugar

Lemon juice

nuts

1 bottle of whiskey

This is very easy to make and awesomely delicious, especially for the tiny amount of trouble.  Assemble all ingredients and be sure you have enough counter space.

Sample the whiskey to check for quality.  Grab a large bowl.  To be sure the whiskey is of highest quality, pour one cup and drink.

Repeat process.

Turn on electric mixer, beat one cup of butter in a large fluffy bowl.  Add one tsp. sugar and 1 cup baking soda and give it a beating.  Check the whiskey and turn off the mix machine thingy.  Add two whole eggs to the bowl and chuck in the dried fruit.  Mix on the turner.  When the fruit gets stuck in the beaters pry ‘em loose with a drewscriver.

Check whiskey once more for tonsisticity.  Shtir in two cups of salt.  Or something white.  Pour another cup of whiskey, use both hands so you don’t spill.  Sift the lemon juice and strain your nuts.  Add one table.  Spoon.  Of sugar or whatever you have handy.

Grease the oven.  Turn the cake tin to 350 degrees.  Don’t forget to time the setter.  Aw, heck save time and put it where it would end up anyway: in the garbage.  Except the whiskey.  Finish the whiskey and crawl to bed.

Now, see.  Wasn’t that a simple recipe?  I believe I’ve made it before, but for some reason the whole episode seems kinda foggy to me…

Merry Christmas, everybody!