Breaking Cat News by Georgia Dunn for February 26, 2021

My dad grew up in a little house in the middle of nowhere. I’ve seen the photos. I really want to read that book!

Am I first? Wow…

Woman, you are missing a perfectly good chance to sleep all morning, read all afternoon, and then go back to sleep.

Churning butter is good exercise for keeping warm. And the butter won’t spoil in the cold.

Little House in The Middle of Nowhere. Hehe love Georgia’s pop culture references. Kinda fun to see how many readers get them.

Slow your roll of that hoop, Woman!

When there’s no electricity, just the simple things take forever. Washing dishes involving boiling water which takes forever. A wash up. The same but not boiling. Getting the room warmer involves more wood, etc., etc. By the time it’s dark you are exhausted, and the dark is boring so you might as well go to bed. I did discover that the batteries on my little iPod lasted long enough to listen to several hours of an audio book, though. I’d plug it into my car audio system to recharge for the next evening.

Hoops won’t roll well in snow. Time for snowsuits and have people and cats make snow angels outside then come back in for hot chocolate. Pictures or it didn’t happen.

It was called a simpler time because it was simply awful. And it looks as though we are doomed to go back to it.

Cornhusks, for making corn dollies.

Gotta admire the Woman’s enthusiasm!

Curb your enthusiasm, Woman!

She’s got the nostalgia crazies, taking inspiration from a time that only really existed on the page…

When I hear “simpler times”, all I can think is I don’t want to be in a simple time when there were no flushing toilets. I know, I know, TMI…. (sorry!)

No electricity means woe is we.

Does the Woman know about the Foxfire books? Frankly knowing what I know about the real Ingalls family and the fact I really did live in a little house in the middle of nowhere, I’m glad I never got into the Little House books. If I want somewhat romanticized country life I’ll watch Nell, which is close to the way my great-aunt actually lived.

“Little House in the Middle of Nowhere”? LOL. My wife is a huge Little House on the Prairie fan. It is on one of the channels in our cable system, UPtv, and I think Amazon has it as well. She remembers it from when she was a kid. I never really watched it too much growing up (saw much more of the Brady Bunch, Buck Rogers, Star Trek, Kolchak, Hardy Boys/Nancy Drew, etc) but have seen a few episodes with the wife in syndication. It did touch on a lot of social issues, many of which are still relevant today, such as Mr Edward’s alcoholism (saw that recently), child abuse, racism etc… Overall a good show with some sort of moral message usually incorporated into it. Nonetheless I could not fathom living w/o electricity as the Ingles did, especially in Minnesota where the days had to be so short in winter!

I loved all the Little House books. But the tv show changed a lot of facts.

OMC!! I can’t believe no one has commented on the adorable Lupin loaf in panel one!! :D

Before it changes below….a quick video on Georgia’s Instagram

https://www.instagram.com/p/CLvxtOzJcEW/?igshid=dqusu5mh2n6s

I think Elvis wants to make dolls from bacon.

Me thinks the Woman is remembering the good parts of Little House – “The Long Winter” but forgetting the hour upon hour they spent using the coffee grinder to grind wheat to make brown sourdough bread.

Why am I not surprised that the Woman likes apple dolls?

On the other hand we could go chop more fire wood

When the power went out at my old house in Quebec, it was time to make soup on top of our little wood stove!

Hey Ma, the twins have cholera again…

Its okay Pa, we put them in with Billy Bob, his smallpox are almost over.

Uh oh, Ma, the corn got knocked down by hail and the barn was hit by lightening,

Its okay Pa, there’s nothing in there. The horse and cow died a week ago from Anthrax.

Hey Ma, come see this. Isn’t that the biggest darn tornado you ever seen, heading this way?

No problem Pa, we were going to have to move anyway, Canada has done declared war on us again.

Excerpts form the less popular children’s series: Little House and the Four Horsemen.

Don’t trip on your petticoats in your rush outdoors, ma’am!

What is an apple doll? Is that a 19th-century precursor of Mr./Mrs./Ms./Mx. Potato Head?

Meanwhile, Back on the Nile

Beatrixia: I just came back from the Great Pyramid. Look at all these ancient scrolls I found.

Elvis-Anum: They appear to be written in ancient Feline Egyptian, just like you’d expect from ancient cats.

Beatrixia: I’ll bet Tabith-Isis can decipher them. She’s very learned in ancient languages.

Sometime Later

Beatrixia: So how did you become so well-versed in languages, Tabs?

Tabith-Isis: It’s something you pick up when studying Red Dot History. Iron Glove has really helped with my Chipmunk.

Elvis-Anum: Just tell us what it says!

Tabith-Isis: Alright, don’t get your tunic in a knot. It looks to be an ancient manuscript by the legendary Lauring-Wild. We weren’t sure if she actually lived.

Beatrixia: So what does it say?

Tabith-Isis: Nothing. You have to read it.

Elvis-Anum: And???

Tabith-Isis: It appears to be an account of her child. It’s entitled LIttle House Out in the Desert.

per NyahNyahNyah’s request, lol!

Well life in old times is kinda laid back

Ain’t much an old-fashioned gal like me can’t hack

It’s early to rise, early in the sack

I thank Cat I’m an old-timey girl

Well a simple kinda life never did me no harm

A raisin’ me a family and needin’ no alarm

My days are all filled with an easy-peasy charm

Thank Cat I’m a past-lovin’ gal

Well I got me a fine hubs and cats that make me giggle

When the sun’s comin’ up I got cakes on the griddle

Life ain’t nothin’ but a funny funny riddle

Thank Cat I’m an old-timey girl

(John Martin Sommers – Thank God I’m a Country Boy)

I saw a comic where a woman is in the office on the phone: “Yes, the computers are down, and we have to do everything by hand.” Laid out in front of her on the desk is a Klondike Solitaire hand. Always keep a deck handy for emergencies!

Am I the only one/librarian/avid reader/cat mom who is sad and mad about the drive to cancel Laura Ingalls Wilder???

Thank you for remembering Laura Ingalls Wilder in a good way:)

There’s question over who wrote Little House series. Laura started to write a memoir. Rose, her daughter, pointed out it was dull and adult. Rose is probably the one who turned the memoir into a children’s book and then the series. So yeah, even the original books would be a romanticized view of Laura’s life as a child.

I remember my grandmother reading me those books when I visited.Thanks for the memories.

“Little House in the Middle of Nowhere”…nah, title still sounds like it needs some more workshopping… :P

She is way too happy about this

OT: Worrisome news

Atleast the woman can think of things to do and is excited about them – even if they aren’t exactly do-able right then and there. the pandemic made me realize how many people rely on “shopping for non-essential stuff” and “eating out” as major forms of time filling entertainment. I have many more long term mope-ing friends and relatives than I would have imagined. :(

I would not want to live with out a water heater. I can wash dishes by hand. I don’t want to have to do laundry by hand – so maybe one of those pre-modern washers (with an occassional load of “hot water” clothes rotated in) would work ok. I can hang dry clothes/bedding. I like hot shower/bath water. I’m not fond of not having a freezer/refrigerator or a radio either. I have hobbies I could live without TV/visual media entertainment.

About 3 years ago and friend and I (the Book Club of 2) decided to read The Little House on the Prairie books. I had never read them. They were way better than I thought they would be – reading them as an adult. When I sheepishly mentioned I was reading them at work – a co-worker went down memory lane and brought her childhood “The Little House on the Prairie CookBook” to work to show me. She had pages marked of recipes she and her sisters (and grandma and mom) had made. I love the kitschy “old time tours” of houses and farms and what not that you find when you visit not big attraction vacation spots and I have a whole file of “old time recipes” from these tourist/historical places. And yes, I’ve made some of those recipes. My co worker and I had a blast nerding/geeking out going thru my “file of recipes” and the book. Most of the things in the Little House cook book didn’t seem to work for “today” or were beyond what I wanted to attempt – but there was a recipe for Vinegar Pie. And yes, I made a Vinegar Pie (it’s kind of a mock apple pie). I liked it (I like shrubs in cocktails and pickle brine and such…) I didn’t think the Pie was very “vinegar-y” but most who tried it couldn’t quite put their finger on the hint of vinegar they were getting. I bought a bottle of designer Cherry Vinegar and even made a mock cherry pie.

Thank you Virginia (and the BCN team and People) for pulling up some good memories for me!

I made a vinegar pie once as well. I think it might have been because of another book about a pioneer girl.

Pioneer Girl by Bich Minh Nguyen is a novel about what the Little House books meant to a Vietnamese girl! Interesting how it inspired her. It’s also a novel involving a mystery. She thinks Rose Wilder met her grandparents while she was in VietNam. I don’t know if that’s biography or fiction but it’s a good interesting story.

OT: Snowing Again

Where’s Tillie and Freddie, they could help the Woman with her ideas! Also, I’ve never read the Little House books, just watched the t.v. show, but after reading all of the comments, I’ll be starting them tonight.

OT: me…

“Where’s my pedal powered sewing machine? I need to make a dress and bonnet!”

Did she go buy corn husks at the supermarket too?

I haven’t read the Little House books hope to soon. I did get a complete set of the books and sent them to sister in law to read to nieces. However, sister in law decided not to because she thought that whatever references there were to wearing animal fur, killing animals for food, etc would be too traumatic for them. 8X

Now there is a set of classic books that hasn’t been mentioned that takes place from about the late 1890s or so to 1917/1918 in Minnesota so it’s long past the pioneer era. Those would be the Betsy-Tacy-Tib books by Maud Hart Lovelace. The books were set in fictional Deep Valley, Minnesota, based upon the town of Makato, Minnesota, where Maud was born and grew up. She was quite the diarist even from the time of being a little girl, so the books are based upon those diaries of her younger years. Very good books and I’d recommend them.

Don’t drink water. It’s undoubtedly polluted. Avoid cholera, typhoid, and dysentery with distilled spirits.

Only had to do this once in all my time living by myself. I had a battery operated lantern and a lot of good books.

Sounds good to me, Woman!

I’ve made apple dolls.

O.T.

One of my favorite books as a child was Farley Mowat’s Lost in the Barrens or Two Against the North. It taught me that survival is always possible provided one has three things: determination, guts, and brains. Whether that possibility becomes reality is determined by the fourth factor—luck—which is greatly improved by the preceding three.

What is the white spot on Puck’s face the past few days?

One thing I learned about from the Little House books was Ginger Water. It’s mentioned early on in The Long Winter. It involves vinegar, sugar, some ground ginger, and very cold water. (Really, it’s something like lemonade spiced with ginger.) Laura said the ginger warms your stomach so you can drink the cold water without getting nauseated.

I used it for taming morning sickness. Even now, if I’m feeling queasy, I’ll add a little ground ginger to whatever I’m drinking.