More or Less

Last month, while visiting Ramstein & breathing in some Air Force fumes, we had dinner with some friends of ours (Hi, Melodi). My friend was begging both of her girls to just eat something & MiniMe was very puzzled by this. She even asked, "Why are you making them eat?" It was a completely foreign concept to her because we are are more focused on when to stop eating and not when to start.

It's not MiniMe's fault. She does live at the Haus, afterall.

Man and I have a motto: Anything worth doing is worth overdoing. Oh, come on. You've seen us in action both individually and as a team & you know we just about have the market cornered when it comes to being anal overachieving.

Ours is not totally a beat a dead horse kind of philosophy. It’s more like a more is more way of seeing the world. I can't speak for Man, but personally, I've never understood the Less is More mantra. What's that all about, anyway?

Shall I introduce HausFrau Rule #4?

More is better.

OK - here's how this rule works around the Haus:

When changing a diaper, if it looks like it might need another wipie, then grab at least 3 more.

When terminating the creepy crawlies, if the cockroach looks like it needs another whack, then go ahead and beat the hell living daylights out of it with a flip-flop.

When fixing things around the house, if it looks like it needs more duct tape, use the whole darn roll on the bed support beams.

When finishing up in the loo, if it's smelling like it needs more air freshener, go ahead and hold down the nozzle for another 5 seconds 15 seconds.

This rule is especially applicable for culinary ingredients, more specifically butter, olive oil, cheese, garlic & alcohol.

As examples:

When preparing Texas Beer Chili: Most published recipes call for a 12 ounce can of beer. My recipe starts with a ½-liter bottle of Pils and I taste to season “season to taste” after that.

When making cherry pie filling: most recipes list ½ teaspoon of amaretto as an optional ingredient that may be substituted with almond extract. Personally, I start with a ¼ cup & leave the option open to adjust up from there.

Likewise:

When making a wine sauce: if the sauce is tasting a little anemic in the wine department, by all means, add another swig splash or two. It’s called Riesling Cream Sauce for a reason. If Riesling wasn’t meant to be the predominant ingredient, it shouldn’t be listed first.

When making Sangria: if it looks like the pitcher needs more kirschwasser, then please, add a weeny bit more. This definitely livens up the party and makes for very memorable evenings. (Hi, Naomi. How’s the baby?) For those of you unfamiliar with kirschwasser, it's basically cherry flavored Everclear.

Although More is Better applies to most situations at the Haus, there are a few exceptions to this rule. Less butt fat is certainly better, less debt is better, less clutter is the best ever and less boxes of HausFrau-defined junk is definitely better. I bring this up because,

A few days back I lost my mind again & plowed full force into our basement boxes. I probably would have kept my head in the sand and let sleeping dogs lie except for the fact that I have to look at piles and piles of boxes every time I venture to my pantry for a bag of Doritos can of spaghetti sauce.

Without any alcohol whatsoever (do I ever cease to amaze you?), I dove head first into not only boxes of my "teaching materials" but also many, many boxes of "Man's Crap". He obviously wasn't going to do it, and I can't participate in another PCS with thirteen intact boxes of junk important papers from the 70's, 80's & 90's. For music, that's a great period of time, for outdated paperwork, it's a HausFrau nightmare - PCS panic attack just waiting to happen.

I have sorted through a mountain of dead trees and loaded up at least three four big huge boxes of paper that needs to be shredded. Members of my Paper Death Row include: hundreds of Hawaii travel brochures from the mid-90's, warranties for electronics that were pawned off as donations to unsuspecting Thrift Shops we do not own anymore, gas ration card from Würzburg (circa 2001), financing paperwork for a 1980-something Daytona that was purchased in 1980-something, years of bank statements from an account that was closed years ago & just to spice things up a bit, a few pictures of crazy witches ex-women that have slipped through the cracks.

Yeah, I know. It would have behooved me to have sipped a little Chianti ahead of time.

In my all out attempt to lighten the load, I've even agreed to throw out some of my teaching files. What's fair is fair. Ok, so it's not that big of a sacrifice. Somes of the files haven't been touched in 10 years, others weren't that great in the first place. Plus, if I get in a bind at some point in the future, I figure the Internet can bail me out. Seriously, how hard can it be to locate a middle school fetal pig dissection lab online?

Obviously, if I NEVER teach again I won't be crying any tears. I'm chunking everything except for bare bones biology curriculum. And, anatomy, that might be handy someday. You just never know . . . yes, I watch all the top-rated crime shows . . .

Besides, I'm 95% certain that I am going to make a career change and this is just one more step in that direction. Once I feel the perfect order of all household files pulsing through my veins, I can more efficiently work on an online Nutrition 101 class. Or, something really exciting like Sociology 101 or better yet, Texas Government. I think this is also the driving force behind my sudden interest in snazzing up all our paper files. That and we could PCS at any given time.

It's either that or I'm stuggling yet again with control issues. Even though there are numerous events and situations that I have absolutely no control over whatsoever, I sure as heck can pare down the paperwork and perfectly organize, file and label every last scrap of paper in this house. Except for toilet paper - I know where to draw the line - it's not like I have a diagnosed disorder or anything.

So, while I'm digging through extremely outdated and irrelevant files I happened upon some interesting artifacts of times by-gone. Thankfully, my sense of humor is intact, más o menos.

Among the basement treasures, I found a deck of bare naked ladies playing cards. Obviously, distibuted somewhere along the way for troop morale & welfare. Right? Again, more would have been better - specifically, more clothes on them would have been better for me. Remember, I've been working without the benefit of ethanol.

Sometime a while back, Man and I were watching Dr. Phil together - like that ever happens - and he recognized the über-dysfunctional couple as "friends" from Germany, Round II. Some couple the exxie decided to befriend - he even remembered being at their house for some New Year's celebration. Yeah, I know.

But, I found the birth announcement for their first born - picture included. What a gem of a find. I mean, cute baby and all, but it was almost like reaching out and touching Jerry Springer from the privacy of my basement. Even I can't say that I actually know anyone who has admitted stupidity &/or moral turpitude on nationally syndicated TV, so Man wins on that count. Ok, so I might be related to know more people who engage in stupidity and moral turpentine, they just don't flaunt it on TV (or in movie musicals).

I also found some baby pictures of Man that I've never seen before. Yes, they were stashed away in a file folder labeled "P" for pictures - I assume. He swears I can out freak him in the neat department. But seriously, while all my photos are chronologically & asthetically displayed in albums or neatly in stacked in photo boxes, that's nothing compared to having them filed under "P", n'est-ce pas?

Anyway, I now know why MiniMe has always been such an Amazon baby. I found this picture of Man, at a tender 3 1/2 months of age - yes, months. Isn't he just adorable? And, definitely out achieving his peers on the standardized growth chart.



And, this one at age 8 months. He's a whopping 26 pounds!



Again, an absolute cutie-pie, and totally buying into the More is Better philosophy.

My project is ongoing & I'm still sorting through boxes and slowly adding more stuff to the trash boxes and retaining less stuff for our next PCS. And, I'm definely feeling better. More or less.