Dirty.

In my haste to be a big smartypants about Jussie Smollett, I forgot to tell you about the Dirty Show. It’s an art show that runs over two weekends and is, surprise surprise, dirty. Erotic, I guess you’d call it, although dirty probably fits better.

About 15 percent of the art was decent, most was campy/mediocre/whatever and the rest was porn, but artistic. I guess this would fall in the first category:

But you don’t go to the Dirty Show to look at the art on the walls, scratch your chin and say hmm, interesting. You go to see the other stuff, and to people-watch. It rarely disappoints in that area; half the burlesque dancers in the Midwest show up, and the crowd tries to keep up. When I was getting dressed for the evening, I thought, what the hell, let’s do something fun, so I picked a crimson bra out of the drawer and, first, thought to wear it alone under a blazer, ’70s-supermodel style. But it was cold, and I chickened out, and added a rather sheer top. I felt scandalous leaving the house, but within five minutes of scanning the crowd, realized I was wearing the Dirty Show equivalent of a navy polo shirt and mom jeans. As I often say after Theatre Bizarre: “I had no idea so many women in Detroit own corsets.” Corsets galore, as well as pasties, bare-ass thongs with fishnets, all that stuff. A guy led a woman in a wheelchair around with a leash. A woman led a man around on a leash. I waited in line for the restroom behind a woman in bondage gear and a nun’s wimple.

It was quite the crowd. No John Waters this year, but a good time just the same.

So.

Not long after I wrote Monday’s entry about spotting bullshit, it occurred to me where I’ve read quite a few unbelievable stories in recent years: Accounts of human trafficking. I read a piece about a sex trafficking victim, who described her ordeal: Kidnapped at 15, thrown into an attic with two other women, chained by the ankle, and forced to stay there, sleeping on a pallet and using a bucket for elimination, for a year. A year. No baths, no breaks, “15 to 40 men a day,” just brought in one after another to rape the girls on their pallets. It’s possible. But it doesn’t pass the smell test, and I’ve heard verified stories about chained women. A year? It’s hard to believe that not one guy wouldn’t feel a pang of post-coital remorse and drop a dime to the police, that word wouldn’t spread.

And how often these stories are detail-free, so none can be verified with family or law enforcement, everyone mysteriously dead or gone somehow. And how often these stories are published by Christian presses, and feature redemption/conversion narratives late in the story. And how often these stories are only about sex trafficking, when we know that labor trafficking is just as big a problem, but somehow it’s all white girls forced into prostitution, never brown girls forced into agricultural labor, or domestic servitude.

I’ll repeat what I’ve said often: Human trafficking is real, and a serious problem. But it can’t be addressed without good data about the extent of the problem. And we’re nowhere close to understanding it.

OK, all. More snow expected overnight, followed by ice, followed by rain. Just another day in paradise. Stay warm.

Posted at 9:17 pm in Detroit life, Popculch |
 

102 responses to “Dirty.”

  1. alex said on February 19, 2019 at 11:07 pm

    Just saw a PBS documentary on Sammy Davis, Jr. He blazed a lot of trails for minorities in showbiz. He pissed off a lot of people shilling for Nixon. If you wanna talk about human trafficking, well here’s an example of the complexities that accompany such a discussion, Or should.

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  2. Sherri said on February 20, 2019 at 1:35 am

    Tim Eyman is a pain in the ass anti-tax activist who has been making a living off of anti-tax ballot initiatives for years. One of his major sugar daddies died a few years ago, though, and the state AG has been on him about all sorts of violations, so the gig hasn’t been as lucrative of late.

    Just how less lucrative? He “accidentally” stole an office chair: https://komonews.com/news/local/eyman-taking-of-chair-was-accidental

    Watch the store surveillance video. Yeah, I accidentally do things like that all the time…

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  3. Jolene said on February 20, 2019 at 4:27 am

    The Covington kid obviously feels that he was deeply wronged by the incident at the Lincoln Memorial, but not by the Native American man, who likely doesn’t have deep pockets. No, he feels he was wronged by the Washington Post, and he is suing them for $250M. Obviously, he just wants to put this incident behind him and get on with his life–his life in the legal spotlight.

    https://theslot.jezebel.com/covington-high-school-teen-sues-the-washington-post-for-1832742408/amp

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  4. David C. said on February 20, 2019 at 6:01 am

    The chair followed me home. Can I keep it?

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  5. ROGirl said on February 20, 2019 at 7:34 am

    RE: the Covington kid and the Native American confrontation on the Mall — Feh! Enough! I feel dirty just wasting brain cells and time on it.

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  6. Sherri said on February 20, 2019 at 9:51 am

    In the eyes of the entitled white world of the MAGA teen, being called a racist is so much worse than being a racist. Mostly, because it’s not possible for them to be racist, because they are good people/have black friends/treat everyone the same/don’t have a racist bone in their body.

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  7. beb said on February 20, 2019 at 12:12 pm

    I read a lot of fiction from the early 1900s. White slavery seemed a common theme. I think it’s a off-shoot of the whole “yellow peril” thing which is, itself, a fear that other people in the world don’t believe that white people are the crowns of creation.

    I’m not sure how the Covington kid can prove that the Washington Post defamed him. He was there; he was acting like a jerk and the Post just reported what happened. It’s not their fault that his bad behavior put him in a bad light.

    It must be hard to dress for “The Dirty Show” when it’s freezing outside. Though it does allow one to test just how cold a witch’s tit is.

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  8. brian stouder said on February 20, 2019 at 12:41 pm

    Looks like a violation of the penal code…

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  9. Jakash said on February 20, 2019 at 12:55 pm

    What kind of idiot doesn’t realize that there are going to be cameras at a store like that? Clever of him to dress in such a nondescript way — incognito, he’s not! Plus, both his “already paid” and “distracted by phone” alibis seem to be effectively shot down by that video. D’oh! My default assumption these days is that, once I walk out our door, I’m being filmed by some camera, somewhere, the whole time. Obviously, that’s a large exaggeration, but it’s coming closer to being true than I’d have ever imagined, especially in big cities.

    Anyway, thanks for posting that, Sherri.

    Has everybody seen this harrowing crash pile-up video, by this point?

    https://twitter.com/Dantej21/status/1096550488714170368

    Finally, I’m surprised there’s been no mention of the towel thing here. Essentially, a guy on Twitter suggested that a couple should have at least 30 towels and 20 wash cloths, “preferably more.” Uh, no. What I learned is that those huge beach-towel-sized towels are actually called “bath sheets.” Commenters seem to love them. Am I the only one who actively dislikes them? I’m over 6 feet tall, but feel overwhelmed by those things and have never had a problem with the effectiveness of a regular-sized one. Harrumph!

    https://www.thrillist.com/news/nation/bath-sheet-bath-towel-twitter-debate

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  10. Jeff Borden said on February 20, 2019 at 1:21 pm

    Jolene,

    I believe that smirky teenager from Covington Catholic will soon find a lucrative career as a conservative personality peddling anti-P.C. outrage. There’s good money to be made if you can silence your conscience.

    Meanwhile, how interesting that Clarence Thomas, whose wife is a rightwing conspiracy theorist and major tea bagging star, has suggested it is time to revisit New York Times vs. Sullivan, the bedrock of libel law in the U.S. Of course he would. . .and especially now with the Orange King in office.

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  11. Jolene said on February 20, 2019 at 1:40 pm

    I saw the initial question re the appropriate number of towels, but didn’t follow the discussion so am happy to see the summary. Questions such as this can give rise to some pretty entertaining responses and also to insight about differences in what people know (or think they know). I mean, who doesn’t know what a bath sheet is? Obviously, lots of people.

    Can’t think right now of other discussion-launching tweets that I have seen, but I enjoy the genre.

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  12. Deborah said on February 20, 2019 at 4:15 pm

    What started that whole towel discussion anyway? It was all over the Internet a couple of days ago, why? Who cares about how many towels you have and what kind?

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  13. Sherri said on February 20, 2019 at 4:27 pm

    Why is our infrastructure so shitty and pricey to build?

    https://hmmdaily.com/2019/02/15/americas-signature-mode-of-transportation-is-high-cost-rail/

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  14. Mark P said on February 20, 2019 at 4:56 pm

    Sherri@13 — Indeed. You see the same public/private corruption every day at the local level, when the city council decides to buy a fleet of cars from a local dealer rather than from someone outside the city at a better price. Greed is the true reason every government prefers to use private businesses to do public works. It’s not a political philosophy, it’s just good-old-fashioned theft, the kind this great country was built on, starting from the very beginning, when we stole the land from the Indians.

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  15. Sherri said on February 20, 2019 at 5:29 pm

    I’m always being told I should read a variety of sources, expose myself to more points of view, etc. The problem is, finding a conservative source that isn’t full of pompous self-righteous pricks like Victor Davis Hanson: https://www.newyorker.com/news/q-and-a/the-classicist-who-sees-donald-trump-as-a-tragic-hero

    With respect to his last statement in that interview, and since he declares he looks at the world empirically, here’s his Wikipedia page which contains of photo of VDH, so we can all judge whether he’s homely or not.

    https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Victor_Davis_Hanson

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  16. Jolene said on February 20, 2019 at 5:51 pm

    Deborah: If you look at the link Jakash posted, you’ll see that the towel discussion began with some guy saying, “My girlfriend and I disagree about how many towels of each size people need. Here’s what I think. What do you think?”

    Just people goofing around about one of the many mundane topics that come up when people live together, but kinda fun.

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  17. Jolene said on February 20, 2019 at 5:55 pm

    Good God! I’m pretty sure Victor Davis Hanson has never said or done anything important enough to warrant a Wikipedia entry of that length. I’d rather talk about towels than read it.

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  18. Jakash said on February 20, 2019 at 6:02 pm

    Thanks, Jolene. Sorry that didn’t suit your fancy, Deborah. As Jolene noted, a guy (who has 116,000 followers on Twitter) simply asked folks about towels because he and his girlfriend were curious about it. The guy who replied about how a couple needs to have at least 30 writes for Huffington Post and has 342,000 followers. From there, it was off to the races, evidently. “Who cares about x, y or z?” could be asked about plenty of the stuff people bat around on there…

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  19. Sherri said on February 20, 2019 at 6:31 pm

    My aim is to have enough towels, underwear, gym clothes, etc so I can go two weeks without doing laundry if I’m busy, now that I don’t have a kid to do laundry for.

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  20. Deborah said on February 20, 2019 at 7:14 pm

    OK, didn’t mean to offend anyone. If you’re interested we currently have 4 towels. They’re all 100% cotton waffle weave not thick and fluffy. I first was introduced to these thin absorbent type towels on a trip to Italy years ago. They take up less space which is important to us because of the small spaces we live in, they dry faster, and are somewhere in between the size of regular towel and a bath sheet. We each have one hanging in the bathroom and when they go in the laundry hamper we use the other 2. Isn’t that fascinating?

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  21. Jolene said on February 20, 2019 at 7:22 pm

    It is kind of fascinating, Deborah. And your detailed description of the number and kind of towels you have and the rationale for those choices proves the point that people have opinions about and make choices about towels, just as they do with clothing, furniture, cars, cans of beans, and everything else we buy and use.

    And, when there’s more than one person involved, there’s room for conflict and, hence, discussion.

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  22. 4dbirds said on February 20, 2019 at 7:43 pm

    I have lots of towels and I don’t apologize for any of them. I buy plush all white towels that I can throw in the washer and dryer together And I relish that I’m at a point in my life where I can enjoy every single towel I have.

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  23. Jakash said on February 20, 2019 at 7:51 pm

    I wouldn’t say that I was *offended*; I just thought it was curious that, out of all the stuff that gets talked about around here, that inane topic was somehow beyond the pale. (The original tweet has over 10,000 “likes” for whatever that’s worth.)

    And I gotta say, when I posted it in the first place, Deborah, I actually thought about you. A lot of the comments kinda hinted at needing a linen closet the size of a destroyer to hold the numbers of towels people were mentioning, and I knew from the things you’ve said, that you wouldn’t be on board for that! : )

    Like Jolene, I think it *is* rather interesting how different people are about random stuff. We have what almost seem like polar opposites immediately represented: the HuffPo guy thinks 30 is maybe not enough, while you opt for 4. I really don’t know how many we have, but it’s closer to 4 than 30, that I can tell you!

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  24. Deborah said on February 20, 2019 at 8:04 pm

    Yeah, I realize we get involved here in some inane topics that I’ll admit to instigating from time to time. So I guess towels are no different. I may have even mentioned my towels here previously for all I know. It just seems odd to me that the subject of towels took the internet by storm recently.

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  25. Julie Robinson said on February 20, 2019 at 8:16 pm

    4dbirds, I’m now picturing you rolling around on your towels as they’re spread out all over the floor, like Scrooge McDuck with his gold! But compared to Deborah, I’m also a towel hoarder. It’s leftover from the years when our daughter would bring half a dozen or so friends over for a weekend or longer.

    My favorite towels are from IKEA, not all plush but more like what Deborah has I think. But I don’t like to go more than four days without washing them because they get too stinky. But I’m lucky enough to have a washer and dryer, and on the main floor too.

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  26. alex said on February 20, 2019 at 8:25 pm

    Actually, towels are quite a serendipitous subject underneath this post about the Dirty Show. We had to miss it because tickets for Saturday night had sold out, but on Friday Nancy and Alan picked up a promotional handout that got passed around for shits and giggles — it advertised a rather costly plush towel expressly for use as a cum rag. I guess the nearest T-shirt isn’t good enough for some people.

    We debated whether to pick up additional towels at IKEA on Sunday but decided what we have at present is adequate. I couldn’t tell you the number we have but there’s certainly no shortage. On the other hand, I always grab a multi-pack of scissors every time I visit that store because no matter how many scissors you own, you can never find them when you most urgently need them.

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  27. Suzanne said on February 20, 2019 at 8:44 pm

    I have fewer towels than I used to since I cleaned out the linen closet a few weeks ago. I had towels that I am pretty sure were 30 years old or so. Gone.

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  28. Sherri said on February 20, 2019 at 9:02 pm

    I remember that when I went off to college, I didn’t buy any towels, I just raided my grandmother’s closet. Not her linen closet, with the towels she used. The other closet, with all the towels she’d been given as gifts over the years that were “too pretty to use.”

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  29. susan said on February 20, 2019 at 9:17 pm

    Apropos of this conversation, I remember a discussion here about how often one washes bath towels. Just as scintillating.

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  30. susan said on February 20, 2019 at 9:56 pm

    Jakash @9 – Not only does Office Despot have cameras aimed at places all around the store, they SELL security cameras. Eyman is a tax-troll, and a stupid person.

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  31. LAMary said on February 20, 2019 at 10:27 pm

    I replaced most of my towels about a year ago and gave the old ones to the animal shelter. I now have two bath sheets and a lot of bath towels. I also have two waffle weave microfiber hair drying towels. I bought a bundle of washcloths for some ridiculously low price on Amazon so I have lots of those. My towels are either grey or grey striped, btw. Let me know if you want to know what sort of sheets I have.

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  32. Dexter Friend said on February 21, 2019 at 1:35 am

    Looks like some artists used men suffering from Peyronie’s Disease for models. If you want to know what the hell I am writing about, watch TV once in a while; the fucking ads are on full-time now…some guy has a cure . https://www.health.harvard.edu/media/content/images/cr/204869.jpg

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  33. Jeff (the mild-mannered one) said on February 21, 2019 at 7:01 am

    Dexter, many of those artistic devices look somewhat impractical. Assuming I understand their intended purpose, which I may well misconstrue.

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  34. Heather said on February 21, 2019 at 8:32 am

    I have just two bath towels, and some other old towels in case those are in the wash when I need them or for the rare occasion when guests are over. They’re pretty ragged though, so I should probably donate them to an animal shelter and buy some new ones. These kinds of things make me feel like I’m still not very good at adulting, but I don’t have tons of room for extra linens. I did just buy a new bath mat though!

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  35. Suzanne said on February 21, 2019 at 8:57 am

    So now, Jussie Smollett has turned himself in to the police and will likely face charges of disorderly conduct and filing a false police report. And Mike Huckabee on Twitter is wondering why the authorities didn’t storm his house with guns drawn like they did for Roger Stone.

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  36. Bitter Scribe said on February 21, 2019 at 10:25 am

    What is it with the New Yorker profiling worthless right-wing hack “journalists”? They’ve already done Mike Cernovich, Rod Dreher, Glenn Greenwald and Tucker Carlson, none of whom is worth the rope to hang them with. Now it’s Victor Davis Hanson, talking about how Trump is a classic tragic classical hero Achilles Antigone blah blah puke.

    I can only surmise that the NYer is afflicted with a case of both-sidesism, the same disease that led CNN to hire a former Trump staffer (with no journalism experience) as “political editor.” I hope they get over it.

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  37. susan said on February 21, 2019 at 10:33 am

    bitterscribe, the NYorker probably thinks it’s cute.

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  38. 4dbirds said on February 21, 2019 at 10:50 am

    All of my towels and bed linens are white. That way it makes laundry easier. I can put them all in the same load and I use small pillows for pops of color on the bed. I also own two, also white Ikea plush bath robes and I find I use them more than the conventional towels. Also to get into more inane detail, I wash with Tide and Clorox bleach. I stick to these because that’s what my mother used and I love the smell. 🙂

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  39. Bitter Scribe said on February 21, 2019 at 11:04 am

    The only thing I have to contribute to the towel discussion is, whoever thought up the herringbone pattern concept should be immediately shot. Herringbone towels dry you off about as well as sheets of newspaper.

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  40. Scout said on February 21, 2019 at 11:30 am

    Probably because we live in a super dry climate, we wash our towels once a week. I mean, you use them to dry yourself off when you are about as clean as it is possible to be. I do remember only being able to go two or three days back east where it was so humid. Given that, we have more towels than we probably need, although we just gave a whole large black garbage bag full of them plus old blankets to a no-kill shelter.

    I read this morning that Jussie S was charged with a felony. Good. The whole thing pisses me off to no end on behalf of people who have been true victims of hate crimes. And I’m still pissed at how that wing nut operative tagged on to the MeToo movement to slime Al Franken.

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  41. Dorothy said on February 21, 2019 at 11:54 am

    Boy I forgot to read this page for a few days and come to find out everyone is up in arms about towels! I think I participated in that discussion on Twitter. Not about how many I own but I yelled at someone who said they wash their towels daily. That’s a huge waste of water in my opinion. I put fresh towels on the towel racks in our bathroom twice a week: Saturday and Wednesday. The ‘dirty’ or used towels come out, clean ones go in. That means one set gets used for 3 days and the other for 4. We hang them up after we use them (and they’re not folded, except to drape over the rack) so that they can dry out completely between showers. I did recently go through my linen closet and took two garbage bags of assorted sizes to shelter where we adopted Nestle. We had a bunch of towels from my father-in-law who died 10 years ago. I don’t think we ever used any of them but my husband thought we could. Rich liked bath sheets but I thought those are a waste of $$. And space in the closet.

    I think I have 10 sets of towels, so that means 20 total. One hand towel and one wash cloth is all we need because we share them. I hope that’s not gross to anyone but it never made sense to me to have separate wash cloths or hand towels. Any home we’ve owned has only had a ring to hold one hand towel. But I like to have a nice variety of towels – it makes me feel luxurious in a weird way. Maybe because I came from such a big family and our towels were thin and only white. Plus we get overnight company from time to time (my sisters or brothers, or my daughter and her partner, or my son and his wife) so you have to have more than 4 towels for that situation, right?!

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  42. susan said on February 21, 2019 at 12:24 pm

    Aggghhhhhhhhhhh!“Please stop talking about that ca-a-a-a-akkke!”

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  43. Jakash said on February 21, 2019 at 12:29 pm

    4dbirds @ 38,

    “I love the smell.” That reminds me of when I was in high school and spent a fair amount of time at a friend’s house. His mom used Tide, which I often smelled in that house, and which I liked a lot. Due either to frugality or some other factor, we never bought it at our house. Once I was making my own purchases, Tide often was the choice, which I considered a “luxury.” Alas, these days we use “free and clear” of dyes and perfumes, or whatever, of whichever brand is on sale. You want inane? I’ve got inane! ; )

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  44. Deborah said on February 21, 2019 at 12:48 pm

    Regarding laundry, we usually use our towels for a week And launder them with the rest of the laundry, Since they are 100% cotton thin waffle weave they dry fast, much faster than regular regular fluffy towels so they don’t get stinky, and as Scout says we use them when we step out of the shower fresh and clean. Also in Chicago we are gone a good 3 days of the week because we usually go to Uncle J’s place. Although this week we aren’t there because he’s in Florida with his caregivers. Our towels are white as are our wash clothes which we have maybe 10, and change out more often than towels. Maybe during the summer in Chicago we change out our towels more often because of the humidity, but now we spend a big chunk of our summers in NM so that’s not really an issue. Our laundry hamper is small like everything else in our place, there’s a laundry room in the building, we usually use 2 machines at a time sometimes 3, once a week. I don’t dry a lot of our clothing in the dryer because I don’t want them to shrink, and I think dryers are hard on fabrics. We have a laundry rack that I set up in the bathtub that we dry jeans and shirts on etc. Weird I know, but most of our clothing is black or dark navy so it’s easy to do one load of whites and one load of darks each week. My husband gets his collared shirts done at the cleaners in the building across the street (where we used to live). So there you have it.

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  45. Jakash said on February 21, 2019 at 1:36 pm

    Well played, susan @ 42! : )

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  46. beb said on February 21, 2019 at 1:50 pm

    The towel discussion has been kind of fun to read. In a way it’s like talking about the weather — small talk. But it’s also revealing about a person in a harmless fashion — how many towels do you need; how many do you want? How do you balance the two. I like Sherri’s answer #19 — enough of vital cloths to go two weeks if necessary. It’s better to have a little too much than be caught flatfooted with only dirty clothes.

    Sherri also wonders if there is a conservative commentator who is calm,, reasonable and not puffed up about themselves or endlessly derogatory about their opponents. I can’t think of any. I think it goes with the territory. And maybe it has to do with how liberal and conservatives respond to disgusting things. There was a recent study (or so I read) that found that conservatives have a much stronger revulsion towards disgusting things than liberals. So maybe when the Right acts like they’re always disgusted by the way things are, they really are.

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  47. Deborah said on February 21, 2019 at 2:48 pm

    Now I feel obligated to describe my cake eating habits.

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  48. LAMary said on February 21, 2019 at 4:34 pm

    I use a clean washcloth every time I wash my face. It’s a habit I started when I was a teenager worried about breakouts. That’s why I buy cheapo washcloths by the bale from Amazon.

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  49. JodiP said on February 21, 2019 at 5:27 pm

    I have actually enjoyed this whole discussion. We have eight of everything–washcloth, handtowel, bath towel. Four sets for each bathroom. When we re-did our basement, we splurged on the bathroom and so got towels that went with the theme. They are Tommy Bahamas, with a little palm tree embroidered on one hem.

    We also have cloth napkins, mostly for environmental reasons, and I iron them. It’s deeply satisfying. Guests feel that they are getting an extra treat, too.

    We don’t have that much storage space, so we keep many things to a minimum.

    Also: if you need/want snow, I will ship you any amount for only $5 per cubic foot, plus S & H. We’ve received over 30″ this month, breaking any previous record for snow in February!

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  50. Dexter Friend said on February 21, 2019 at 5:46 pm

    Chicago’s police chief surely did not try to pose a poker face, now did he…he was sickened by this Jussie character’s ridiculousness. The first reports showed no cameras had recorded anything but the 2 dudes hanging on the street. I smelled a rat then and posted it here…what? 3 weeks ago? Now it’s over and Jussie is facing a trial and possible jail, prison, but probably a giant fine and community service and/or probation. At least now we can lead with The Wall and put Jussie to bed. I got a big laff over Trump’s tweet yesterday about building a wall…it was old footage he posted as new, but was from 3 weeks back.

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  51. Suzanne said on February 21, 2019 at 6:11 pm

    Of course, our fearless orange leader tweets about The Smollett fiasco but not a word about the neoNazi who had weapons stockpiled and a hit list of prominent politicians and media people to take out.

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  52. Julie Robinson said on February 21, 2019 at 6:16 pm

    We’ve always used cloth napkins as well as tablecloths and I also have way too many of those, but I love variety. I sewed some napkins for the Orlando house from some of my sister’s leftover fabric. This last trip, the kids said they were having trouble remembering whose was whose from meal to meal. So our daughter suggested clothespins as napkin rings, and I painted a bunch of them in different colors. Since the napkins are all different kinds of batik prints, it makes for a colorful table. And to me, it makes meals together more pleasant.

    Suzie Homemaker signing off.

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  53. David C. said on February 21, 2019 at 7:59 pm

    As disgraceful as the Jussie Smollet thing is, it isn’t half as disgusting as the Coast Guard Nazi, or that Smolett lead the news. We have a white nationalist extremists with guns problem. We don’t have an actor I’d never heard of two weeks ago making false police reports problem.

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  54. alex said on February 21, 2019 at 8:39 pm

    Some excitement in this neck of the woods…

    There’s a little coffee shop near my office where I go for my caffeine fix and it was unusually busy today with people turning out in support of one of the staff who posted a viral video on Facebook…

    It was quite an emotional day in that place.

    Watch.

    https://www.nbcnews.com/feature/nbc-out/indiana-waitress-viral-video-addresses-customer-who-wrote-gay-slur-n974191

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  55. Colleen said on February 21, 2019 at 9:11 pm

    I made the mistake of reading the comments on the waitress story. Lots of people doubting her story and being pissy about the Go Fund Me that was set up on her behalf. How do people go through life with such a distrustful attitude?

    Regarding towels….I,too use a fresh washcloth every time I wash my face. We have a towel warming rack which helps keep towel stink to a minimum.

    However, if you DO have stinky towels, or workout clothes, there is a product that really works,called Defunkify. It is environmentally friendly as well.

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  56. LAMary said on February 21, 2019 at 10:56 pm

    Cloth napkins here too. I buy odd ones at Cost Plus World Market. Sometimes they’re as little as 50 cents.
    Oh, and white vinegar also destinks towels. The mildew smell goes away and the vinegar leaves no trace.
    I feel the need now to confess that in 1971 I won the Betty Crocker Homemaker of Tomorrow award for my High School. Participation in the contest was mandatory and I beat out several girls who really wanted that home economics scholarship. I still have the medal that says Home is Where the Heart is.

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  57. Dexter Friend said on February 22, 2019 at 1:33 am

    She was way too polite, referring to that no good motherfucker as “sir”. Once , leaving a leftie political convention on Union Square West, Flatiron District, New York City, a bunch of thugs began taunting me and a friend with horrible hate slurs, mistaking us for gays, no doubt they hated queers, and since there actually were many dykes and gays exiting the hall, they assumed everyone was, which was inaccurate; maybe 1/3 were. The hate was real, though, but no physical attack was imminent. This was long ago, but I remember it clearly, like a war memory, it was intense.

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  58. Connie said on February 22, 2019 at 6:37 am

    LAMary, I too am a Betty crocker Homemaker of Tomorrow winner. I took the test on a dare, and am a gifted test taker. That was one pissed off home ec teacher. One of her girls didn’t win. I have a winner’s charm on my old charm bracelet.

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  59. Suzanne said on February 22, 2019 at 8:06 am

    The Jussie Smollett story and any story like his, the racial slur that is found to have been painted on the door by the “victim”, the mom that raises money for her cancer stricken kid that doesn’t actually have cancer, are why people distrust stories like the waitress’s tale. Sad, but true.

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  60. Suzanne said on February 22, 2019 at 8:38 am

    And swimmer Ryan Lochte, remember him? Claimed he’d been attacked and robbed by men claiming to be police but it turned out he was just being drunk and disorderly. Another case of why people doubt when something actually does happen. There really should be stronger punishment for people that do this.

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  61. Dorothy said on February 22, 2019 at 9:12 am

    In my senior year of high school I won the Rotary award for Outstanding Business Student of the Year award- it got me a special picture in the year book.

    Alex I’m glad that coffee shop worker is getting good support from the locals. I wish she had spoken a little more strongly to those jerks but if she had it might not have had the same effect on people.

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  62. Sherri said on February 22, 2019 at 10:25 am

    Can we interrupt the outrage cycle over Smollett to spare a bit for Richard Sackler, who is responsible for more deaths than a serial killer?

    https://www.propublica.org/article/richard-sackler-oxycontin-oxycodone-strength-conceal-from-doctors-sealed-testimony

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  63. Sherri said on February 22, 2019 at 11:11 am

    Here’s what I’ll say about Smollett. I don’t believe that increasing penalties for false reporting of hate crimes will significantly impact anything, simply because incidents like Smollett’s are very rare. And even if they *never* happened, lots of people would believe that they did, because to acknowledge otherwise is to admit that there is a power differential that should be addressed. People don’t really want the status quo to change when they think they might lose something in the process.

    So unless they know the victim personally, it’s easier to assume that the victim had a hand in it, or st the least did something to cause it, than to admit the systemic forces that set up the situation. It’s the same reason people don’t want to admit rape culture is a thing; instead, they would rather talk about stranger rape and women who drink too much and dress provocatively.

    I was once on a jury for a child molestation case, and we had a juror who simply couldn’t go there. She could not handle the situation at all, and so her default was to question whether it had happened at all. We would have had a hung jury, except she got kicked off for discussing the case outside of court. (I always assumed intentionally; she told someone who was friends with another ADA, who then called up the ADA in our case and let her know.)

    I do think there’s something to the different reactions to disgust. From my own experience growing up, I’ve long thought that the opposition to homosexuality is rooted in what I always called the “ick factor.”

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  64. susan said on February 22, 2019 at 12:15 pm

    That’s so funny, because some part of gay “opposition” to heterosexuality is the ick factor.

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  65. Julie Robinson said on February 22, 2019 at 12:45 pm

    Dorothy, I watched the coffee shop worker’s video–she didn’t see the comment until after they’d left. But she had a great line at the end, about something else they got wrong–“I’m not a fag, I’m a dyke”. Said with a bit of a smirk.

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  66. Jeff (the mild-mannered one) said on February 22, 2019 at 1:53 pm

    Well, here’s some reinforcement for the Super Bowl & sex workers annual story cycle:

    http://www.espn.com/nfl/story/_/id/26055197/patriots-owner-robert-kraft-charged-solicitation-prostitution

    And at least good news for Patriots haters everywhere.

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  67. Sherri said on February 22, 2019 at 2:37 pm

    KEN STARR was part of Jeffrey Epstein’s legal team, because, the universe really does have a sense of humor.

    https://www.esquire.com/news-politics/politics/a26467966/ken-starr-jeffrey-epstein/

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  68. beb said on February 22, 2019 at 2:42 pm

    I saw a story on Yahoo today. Woman dies after being arrest at a church. Curious, I clicked on the link and the article just repeated the headline. No mention of why the woman was arrested. Why the arrest was made in a church. Or how or why the woman then died in police custody.

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  69. basset said on February 22, 2019 at 4:20 pm

    Sherri@63, I was on a jury a few years ago, drug case, which hung because of one juror who kept repeating “I just can’t vote to convict a black man.” Ten minutes in the jury room and we had all agreed to convict, eleven of us from varied races and genders, and this guy would readily admit that the defendant was just guilty as hell, but, “I just can’t…”

    If I remember correctly the defendant was up on a bunch of other stuff as well and ended up pleading to a combination of charges.

    Connie and LAMary, I too am a home ec award winner… got the award the first year my high school had “boys’ home ec” in about 1971 or 2. May still have the charm around here somewhere.

    And, meanwhile, we’re back. Took Mrs. B down to Florida so she could swim with the manatees, did that, got pics and video, did some other stuff, admitted that we weren’t having a good time and came home early.

    Down on the “Nature Coast,” Gulf side above Tampa, enjoying nature is something you pay for and do in large groups while others hover nearby waiting their turn. Never did see a beach or wet a fishing line, didn’t even string up the rod I brought with me to fish off the bank. Had one really good shrimp dinner and probably the best margarita of my lifetime, though.

    White vinegar, btw, is good for sunburn as well as laundry.

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  70. Dexter Friend said on February 22, 2019 at 5:50 pm

    https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=10156108219321524&set=gm.2245472425719724&type=3&eid=ARCgeWGfRXZGeKv1mv_qs5TRVUmpPmqiRgT58aowmw-BJof2fqhyq-LwmEc3DpcFaiMsry2E3W_k8DqY&ifg=1 Leaving the Dirty Show

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  71. LAMary said on February 22, 2019 at 8:49 pm

    Basset, I knew we were kindred spirits. Connie and I already established a weird Frisian surname connection years ago.

    Trump has appointed another blonde woman who’s had work done on her face. Kelly Knight Craft has those startled eyes going on.

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  72. LAMary said on February 22, 2019 at 8:57 pm

    Connie, the home ec teacher at my school was ticked off too. I was unworthy of the Betty Crocker honor since I didn’t take home ec.

    What are the odds that there would be three unlikely home ec award winners here at the same time. Spooky.

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  73. LAMary said on February 22, 2019 at 9:06 pm

    Google “Elizabeth Herring Betty Crocker Homemaker of Tomorrow.”

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  74. Suzanne said on February 22, 2019 at 9:34 pm

    I got some sort of home ec award, too, in high school after taking one semester of home ec. But the teacher liked me, so it was all good, but I was surprised. Home ec winners apparently turn into blog commenters when they grow up.

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  75. Jeff (the mild-mannered one) said on February 22, 2019 at 10:03 pm

    LAMary, my first thought on seeing pics of our new UN ambassador was “Botox.”

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  76. LAMary said on February 23, 2019 at 12:02 am

    I get ads on Facebook all the time, frequently related to something I’ve bought online earlier. For the past two weeks I’ve been getting ads for nipple covers. Furry ones, feathery ones, little black bows. I have never purchased anything like this, honest. Some of the ads are for Nordstrom Rack. Who knew they carried pink furry nipple covers?

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  77. basset said on February 23, 2019 at 12:26 am

    LAMary, no Frisian surname here, mine is pretty much obviously Anglo, but we just may agree on nipple covers. Are these what used to be called “pasties”?

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  78. LAMary said on February 23, 2019 at 12:44 am

    Connie and I come from Frisian stock. Other Dutch people make fun of Frisians for being cheap. Certainly my grandmother was a good example of that. Anyway, I just checked the nipple cover situation and they sell them at regular expensive Nordstroms, not the discount one. They are called nippies and they have the furry pink ones in stock. Also sparkly stars with tassels. Now that I searched the Nordstrom site for them I’ll get more ads.

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  79. Deborah said on February 23, 2019 at 8:12 am

    Kelly Knight Craft is Trump’s kinda gal. Married three times, her current husband is a billionaire coal baron. Now she can afford all the Botox in the world.

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  80. Joe Kobiela said on February 23, 2019 at 9:39 am

    Basset,
    Aren’t those the meat pies we get in the U.P?
    Pilot Joe

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  81. Deborah said on February 23, 2019 at 10:25 am

    Actually I think it’s kind of creative to figure out how to eat your salad with a comb. I used a fingernail file once to slice cheese, on a road trip.

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  82. Julie Robinson said on February 23, 2019 at 11:09 am

    In case no one else googled LAMary’s #73, it’s Elizabeth Warren. As with most women her age, she started out very conventionally. My mom had to fight to major in ag when she was in college, and she said at that time the vet school only accepted men. Sometimes we forget how much things have changed, even as we continue to fight.

    All these high school awards have me searching my memory banks for something to brag on, and I’m sure I won something, but I just can’t remember. Feeling a little sad. 🙁

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  83. susan said on February 23, 2019 at 12:54 pm

    I won the GAA (Girls Athletic Association) singles badminton cup in my senior year of high school.

    I hated hated HATED home ec. I was sent to the “dean of girls” (yes, they had those in public schools, back in the day) several times because I just did not cooperate in class. I wouldn’t eat the mac & cheese we made, because I never liked that shit. I did NOT want to make a collar. I did not want to bake biscuits. I screwed up putting a zipper into a “dress” I “made.”

    I wanted to take shop, like my brothers did. Girls did not take shop. I wanted to make birdfeeders and dust pans. I still resent that.

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  84. Jakash said on February 23, 2019 at 1:01 pm

    LAMary says: “Anyway, I just checked the nipple cover situation and they sell them at regular expensive Nordstroms, not the discount one.”

    Seems to me that the more logical source for that product would definitely be their “Rack” stores, no? ; )

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  85. Deborah said on February 23, 2019 at 1:03 pm

    I took both shop and home ec in jr high. I don’t know how I was allowed to do that, I loved shop. We made simple bookends out of wood, had to use a saw, a hammer and sandpaper. My favorite part was learning how to do mechanical drawing. Home ec, wasn’t so fun, but I did get to make a big mural for the background of the fashion show where we modeled our outfits that we made. My outfit was a wrap around skirt. I won no prizes.

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  86. basset said on February 23, 2019 at 2:46 pm

    Jakash for the win…

    Joe, they are one and the same. It’s all about the turnips.

    I liked mechanical drawing too and was good at it, remember a basketball player tracing my drawings with a ballpoint pen right in front of the teacher. Not sure if he got the award that year.

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  87. LAMary said on February 23, 2019 at 2:53 pm

    Very true, Jakash.

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  88. David C. said on February 23, 2019 at 2:58 pm

    Mueller whomped the shit out of Manafort this morning. https://www.motherjones.com/politics/2019/02/read-robert-muellers-brutal-sentencing-memo-for-paul-manafort/

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  89. Deborah said on February 23, 2019 at 4:18 pm

    We went to lunch today with a former student of my husband’s, she picked the place which is known for Nashville style hot chicken. I had not heard of that before, is that really a thing in Nashville, Basset? It was pretty good, you could choose one of four levels of hotness, I chose the most mild version but they accidentally served me the hottest version and didn’t realize it until after I’d already taken a bite. The best part of the meal though was the banana pudding I got for dessert.

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  90. Minnie said on February 23, 2019 at 7:29 pm

    Ha. Another Betty Crocker Homemaker of Tomorrow reporting. Never took home ec but was good at taking standardized tests. My high school counselor talked me into taking the test. Won a trip to New York, Washington, and Williamsburg, and that scholarship money went a good distance back then.

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  91. basset said on February 23, 2019 at 7:52 pm

    Sure is, Deborah, started here and is now all over the world. Original plce burned but their branch store is still going, many different varieties out there from original to fast food and hipster-fied.

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  92. LAMary said on February 23, 2019 at 8:40 pm

    Wow, Minnie. You must have won the state level. Impressive.

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  93. Minnie said on February 23, 2019 at 9:49 pm

    LAMary, with your prompting, I realize that it surely was. It occurred in a long time ago in a galaxy far, far away.

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  94. LAMary said on February 23, 2019 at 10:13 pm

    I suspect that all of us got those awards because we had been involved the operation of the households where we lived. I certainly did. I had home ec in 7th and 8th grades but I don’t recall learning anything new.

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  95. Jolene said on February 23, 2019 at 10:34 pm

    No home ec or shop classes in the tiny high school I attended. But my sisters and I were all marched through various 4-H activities, so we learned quite a bit about cooking and, especially, sewing.

    I had never heard about the Betty Crocker contests until a friend that I met at Girls’ State told me that she had won her school’s contest. I found this entertaining because both she and her mother were fairly terrible cooks. In her case, it was being smart, not being skilled, that carried the day, as seems to have been the case for several of you.

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  96. LAMary said on February 23, 2019 at 10:40 pm

    I recall there were questions about how to safely use a stepladder and what to do if you open a jar of home canned tomatoes and there is black slime on the top. Lots of common sense stuff.

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  97. Jakash said on February 24, 2019 at 1:18 pm

    How windy *is* it?

    https://twitter.com/drewtoothpaste/status/1099687711139643392

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  98. Deborah said on February 24, 2019 at 2:55 pm

    Our building is swaying, that’s how we know it’s really windy. The blinds on our floor to ceiling windows on the north side are moving from side to side.

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  99. Diane said on February 24, 2019 at 4:40 pm

    I too am a high school Betty Crocker award winner and one that never took Home Ec. I was in general a fair to good student but, like Connie, I was a stellar standardized test taker. (The whole school was shocked and appalled when I was also a National Merit Scholar.)

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  100. Deborah said on February 24, 2019 at 5:22 pm

    How is it statistically possible that so many nn.c commenters have won that Betty Crocker award? I never even heard of it before LAMary mentioned it.

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  101. LAMary said on February 25, 2019 at 12:16 am

    We BCH of T people are everywhere. We share the message of towel inventory management and strong test taking skills.

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  102. JodiP said on February 26, 2019 at 10:36 am

    I’m just young enough that I got to take both shop and home ec. I began cooking at around 12, helping to feed the family and farm hands. My biggest lesson in home ec was learning how to use a gas range. I burned French toast the first time I made it at school! Shop didn’t thrill me, but I also took welding which I really liked. Machines always scared me because my mom got injured trying to clear a baler when I was around 4 or 5. You hear a lot about injuries growing up on a farm.

    As anyone who is friends with me on FB knows, those early days in the kitchen sparked a passion for cooking. If I haven’t mentioned it yet, we really love the cooking magazine Milk Street. Is anyone else reading it?

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