third world county

April 15 approaches

For years, excepting only last year—in a private show of support for proper use of tax monies in legitimate Constitutional efforts to promote national security—I have grown a beard and shaved it on April 15, as a mark of my own self-proclaimed “National Day of Mourning.” The reason is obvious: there is so much wrong about the intent, structure, function and purpose[s] of Federal income taxes and the IRS, that April 15 has become a symbol, in my mind at least, of most of what is wrong about our once-federal (but now almost imperial) system of government.

And so I mourn for a Constitution—and system of government—that was designed by our Founders to protect liberty but which is now mostly honored in name only.

Of course—and here I wander into what the current state of revisionist history and polular memes would consider historical heresy—April 15 also ironically marks the death of the first American president to frog-march a federal income tax through Congress. Abraham Lincoln so severely trampled the letter and spirit of the Constitution during his reign that he really ought to be “honored” as the first American emperor…

*sigh*

Kill the Constitution to save the republic… A “republic” become less, as a result of his actions, in the model the Founders and framers envisioned than like it. What a concept.

*profound sigh*

And yet, that’s not the worst of it. The arcane tax laws and extra-legal regulations administered by the IRS are so convoluted and confusing (even to so-called tax professionals) that they make criminals of us all, regardless of our desire to be law-abiding and completely up-front with the IRS. I know I wrack my brains every year to make sure I answer each and every “interview” question in my tax software as accurately and completely as possible, and yet, I always have a nagging doubt that I got it right.

And that’s exactly the dividing line between the citizens of the Republic that once was and the empire America is becoming: No longer can we as soi dissant citizens understand or comply with the plethora of laws (not just tax laws, mind you) spewing from that cesspool in D.C.

Does that sound a bit harsh? How about this sentence from The Declaration of Independence referring to one of George’s abuses:

“He has erected a multitude of New Offices, and sent hither swarms of Officers to harass our people, and eat out their substance.”

Sounds like our congresscritters and their minions in the civil service have been going to school on boy George’s methods of governamce, doesn’t it? (And maybe even done George one or two “better” with such as the Thousands Standing Around bunch of morons.)

Just take a moment and read the Declaration, would you? Don’t linger too long over the stirring and poetic intro, read and re-read the “long train of abuses” and see just how many are eerily similar to the behavior of the feds today.

OK. I’ve finished doing my taxes again this year. I hope (almost against hope) that I dotted all the “i”s and crossed all the “t”s and that I understood the different payments and deductions correctly and noted them in the correct places on the forms.

But the point is, even if I were audited, and even if I were to have a tax “professional” along with me, how could I know I had done right? I can’t. And protestations of tax professionals and auditors notwithstanding, they don’t know, either, because the tax code is too huge, too arcane and too absolutely and inexcusably obscurantist for anyone to know.

Read this. last August, Neal Boortz summed up a tax plan then being floated by Dennis Hastert (among others) that would, in my estimation, solve most of the woes, inequities and downright illegitimacies of the current federal tax code: a national sales tax instead of a national income tax.

Read the article. If it makes sense to you, contact Hastert, your own congresscritters (representative and senators) and the White House. If it makes sense to you, blog it. “Email log” it, too. Write letters. Phone congresscritters, White House, old media.

Someone, somewhere, sometime needs to put a stake in the heart of the Irredeemably Raunchy Scum and hang the corpse at the crossroads of America to warn off other such monsters.

I’d like to sleep well at night KNOWING I’d paid my fair share of taxes for proper federal (and state and local) governance, but the current system leaves me with that neverending, nagging question: Did i get it all right?

(Oh, and Intuit certainly messed with my mind this year, something I’ll hold them accountable for… )

Another “not-quite-a-recipe” for the lazy cook’s repertoire.

Apple Pockets

I like a nice “turnover” but I’m fonder of those made with bread dough than with pie crust dough. Here’s my version of a bread dough apple turnover that’s… not turned over.

Egg Bread crust:

Dry ingredients:
4 cups of white or mixed wheat and white flour
half teaspoon salt
tablespoon sugar
2 teaspoons active dry yeast

Wet ingredients:
2 eggs
1 cup warm water (115 degrees F ought to do)
couple of tablespoons oil

Mix dry ingredients in a non-metallic bowl. Add water/oil and mix. Add eggs. Mix well with hands. Knead lightly until it holds together well, cover and set aside in a warm place for about 30-40 minutes. Knead again until elastic & set aside, covered, in warm place while you mix the filling. See lazy cook’s note at bottom.

Filling:

Note: you can mix up a buncha this stuff, cos if you have too much, you can just refirgerate it and use it for other things–top hot cerals, on/in pancakes, etc.

Apples-some moderately sharp ones (well, I certainly don’t know how many you’ll want to use, just grab four or five medium apples, ok?) Core and slice them. Leave the peels if you want; I do. Avoid “delicious” varieties like the plague. Winesaps, Johnathons, even some Fujis would do.
Raisins
Nuts-(NOT peanuts, real nuts) I like walnuts, pecans or cashews.
Cinnamon. Do NOT use pre-ground cinnamon powder. Get some cinnamon sticks and make your own in your coffee grinder you’ve reserved for spices. (Don’t have one? Don’t whine to me. Get one.) To taste, of course. (You’ll be surprised how much richer freshly-ground cinnamon is. You’ll use less than you otherwise might. And it’s cheaper than old pre-ground stuff in the long run.)
Nutmeg–same as for cinnamon: get some nutmegs and grind your own fresh powder. About 1/8 as much nutmeg as cinnamon.
Ginger-I use crystalized ginger as perhaps the best compromise. A couple of small “rocks” for every four or five apples.
Cloves-four or five cloves per four or five apples. More to taste. 🙂 Whole cloves, ground freshly, of course.
Sugar-one-half to three-quarters cup for every four or five apples.
Butter or oil-maybe a quarter cup or less.

Prep? Easy. Pre-heat the oven to about 350 F now. Core and slice the apples as mentioned above; prepare the other ingredients as mentioned; put it all in a bowl and mix it up til all the apple slices are well-covered in the goodies. Pop it, covered loosely, in the microwave on high for about four minutes, then re-mix the “apple goody” stuff.

Knead the dough again for a bit, then roll out onto a floured surface. Now, divide the dough into four parts, if you want VERY LARGE pockets, more if you want smaller. [Forgot this next step earlier: don’t you forget it!] Spread butter or margarine on the rolled-out dough pieces. Put filling on rolled out dough, fold over and pinch shut. Place on well-oiled baking sheet. You can give the tops of the dough an egg wash at this time, if you want.

Pop ’em in the oven and give ’em about 25 minutes (oven temps vary, size of pockets makes a difference. Check back often after about 20 minutes).

Lazy cook’s note: When you’re feeling really, really, realy lazy, you can cut your prep involvement as I… um, have been known to do:

1.) Mix the bread dough in a bread maker on the “pizza dough” setting.
2.) Make one HUGE pocket and cut slices off that to serve. This does take a lil longer to bake, but who cares? Oven time isn’t work.

Oh, and do feel free to substitute. I can recall as though it were only yesterday (Oh! It WAS yesterday!) running out of sugar and substituting… cinnamon sugar I’d made up for use on some quick cinnamon toast. So there was a lil extra cinnamon in the mix. So? (Yum. Mom used to make cinnamon toast by buttering bread slices, sprinkling with cinnamon and sugar and placing the slices under the broiler. The untoasted side of her cinnamon bread was always an interesting contrast in texture. I just do something similar in our toaster oven.) No rasins? Try dates or… prunes! No nuts? Go buy some. Low on flour? I do NOT recommend substituting garbanzo bean flour. Don’t go there.

NOTE: I did say you could divide the dough and make more, smaller ones didn’t I? Some email indicates that wasn’t real clear. If you want to make “normal” sized apple pockets (like you may be used to seeing turnovers), you can make a good dozen out of these ingredients. But why? 🙂

BTW, as I ought to have noted when I originally posted this, you can use the egg bread dough very effectively with leftover Whatever Stew as filling, for a hearty main dish. Indeed, Apple Pockets originally grew out of finding an alternate use for some leftover dough after making some meat “pasties” out of… some very beefy leftover Whatever Stew.

Aarrrrgggghhhhhhh!!! I gotta get my taxes done… but I wanna read more of this stuff!! (OK, one ‘lover’ is abusive… )

OK, now he’s done it. Just what I need: a way to waste some time that yields more laughs. Dan’s blogroll at Riehl World View has some of the most off-the-wall possibilities I’ve seen since Dave Barry (said) he hung up his hat on column-writing. For example, at Topic Drift, this gem:

kheuh urhgi 4rgibflkur ???

When people say “Physician, heal thyself,” I always start weeping uncontrollably, because what if the physician is walking around, minding his own business, when both of his arms fall off? He won’t be able to pick up his arms, much less heal himself. Someone is going to have to pick up his arms for him – and this helper won’t be able to hand the physician his arms, because the physician will have no arms to hold his arms in his arms. That’s what I’m talking about.

Check out Topic Drift (courtesy of Dan’s blogroll @ Riehl World View Yeh, just do it. You have time to burn. Rub my nose in it. Go ahead. *sigh*

Woody beats up on the Mass Media Podpeople’s Army

In “Think On This (And hate Our Biased News Culture)”, over at Woody’s News & Views, is a good example of a measured, thoughtful response to the Mass Media Podpeople’s Army’s response to the lies, damned lies and stupid damned lying inconsistent tales from the mouth of a commie terrorist c sympathizer (and co-conspirator?), Giuliana Sgrena and its effect upon troop morale and safety.

Did I say, “measured” and “thoughtful”? Add “righteous.”

“… I can honestly tell you that I hate (yes, hate) the prevailing media culture in this country. CNN, CBS News, NBC News, ABC News, and especially morning shows like Today and Good Morning America that are trying to get the soccer moms weeping on a daily basis can all go to hell. Wake up people! This hand wringing and second guessing is making us a weaker nation. We can’t afford this during wartime, especially just for the sake of TV ratings.”

Count me in, Woody.

Read the whole thing (and the article he references).

Pamibe’s Carnival of the Recipes #30

Check out all the good stuff. I’ve already saved several recipes for future reference… and not all that far in the future at that! Indian Tacos, for example–how did I ever forget those! Well, folks don’t know how to make ’em here in America’s Third World Countyâ„¢ so I’ve missed the Indian Taco Dinners of old for the past ten years or so. Gotta have some, soon.

so to speak (off to the salt mines, more like 🙂

Here’s a parting shot. Think for a sec what changes you can make along the lines of “How can I live my day with LESS impact?”

Less spending.

Less hassle, etc.

“Can I buy/do Xxxx for less $$/effort?”

“Can I get a better quality (stuff/experience, whatever) for less $$/effort?”

etc.

It’s the essense of true tightwaddery: can I do better with/for less?

Heck, even simple things like washing the dishes. Do I need a dishwasher for two people? Can I clean the dishes for a two person meal faster and better by hand? Can it be a better experience than that muted rumble in the background from the dishwasher, that almost sub-sonic hum? I found the answer to that to be “Yes”—IF I make it so.

There are probably a myriad of things in our lives that we think are convenient and frugal but are not. Just try today looking at what you do and asking

“Can I do/have this better for less $$/effort? Can I have a better quality life for… less?”

Might be a surprise or two waiting.

Update: *sheesh!* Some folks are entirely too preoccupied with sex. After some offline queries, “Xxxx” above does NOT refer to

1.) Porn
2.) Getting some X-chromosome-laden “stuff,” as in “Four xes? Must mean two
women… ” *shee-e-esh* (slaps forehead… not my own, dope-slap on backswing)
2a.) No, the size of the xes has nothing to do with anything either.
3.) Anything but some unspecified “unknown”

OK? Golly, folks, get some algebra, would you?

Faster than a speeding bullet?

Quick snack pizza. Thin crust. No, really thin.

C’mon, tell me you haven’t been in this situation. No time to make a meal. Have a hankering for pizza. Ain’t gonna use some frozen sewer cover pizza. Uh-uh. Not gonna do it.

Whadda ya gonna do?

Well, if you were in my house, no problemo. Always have cheeses and some sort of leftover Italian-seasoned tomato sauce. Flour, oil, etc. (or just some leftover flour tortillas–store bought are really usually OK). Some sort of toppings (veggies, meats–usually leftovers or some bacon pieces or crumbs in the fridge, whatever).

(Addendum: here’s a decent flour tortilla recipe. It’s easy, and it just works.)

Easy: just slap some tomato sauce–appropriately seasoned–on a flour tortilla, add cheese and toppings, more cheese. Set oven at about 350-375 (oven temps vary). Use a convection oven if you have one to get the cheeses nice & melted quickly, etc. Depending on your toppings, about 20 minutes oughta do it.

Yeh, the tortilla crust makes a nicely crisp THIN crust. And while I prefer a thick yeast crust, this’ll do in a pinch.

Serves one. Make your own. This one is mine (Three cheeses, thin-sliced dried pepper-beef, bacon, onion and jalapeno peppers—yum!)

No, really: shoot!

Over at Riehl World View, Dan has broken the *worldwide exclusive!!!* story clearing the military in the shooting of the commie Italian “journalist” who had spent a few days shacking up with her buds in Iraq. Read “Military Cleared in Sgrena Shooting.”

Reading is believing.

(BTW: Her buddies now say they turned down the Italian government’s offer to “chip in on the rent” for her visit with them. “Nah, we’d already paid the rent and utilities for the month. One more ??????? ????? ???? ????? ???? ???? ???? ????? ???? ???? (filthy whore) in the crib didn’t cost us anything extra. She didn’t eat much, and, being Italian, didn’t even bathe.”)

Nah, hate’s too mild a word…

I hate doing my taxes. I also hate paying someone else to do them (a function of my Tightwad Philosphy of Lifeâ„¢). My compromise, for the last 12 years, has been to use relatively inexpensive computer software to make a compromise between these two in-tension feelings.

When Parsons sold out to Intuit, it wasn’t too bad. I could still import my Parsons material from th previous year into Turbotax.

Even when Intuit decided one year to install some really malicious spyware (crippled, totally crippled my CD burner on the machine I had Turbotax on. had to scrub the machine and re-install Windows to get my full-functionality back on the burner), I managed to grit my teeth and bear it, because at least doing my taxes was pretty darned easy.

but this year… Familiar with Kim du Toit’s “RCOB” (red curtain of blood) expression? THIS year, Turbotax found and imported by previous year’s Turbotax file all right.

And recognized absolutely NO usable data!

Scrub that. Try a backup file (of which I had four, on different hard drives and CDs).

Same thing.

RCOB.

Oh. You have NO IDEA how enraged I am with Intuit. No. Earthy. Idea. Were I still in my 2003 clinically obese body, I probably would have stroked out… seriously. You have no idea how much I now HATE Intuit. With. A. Passion. One that I dare not give vent to, because

I HAVE TO DO MY STINKING TAXES!!!!!!

ARRRRGGGGHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh………….

I don’t know… but it’s an intriguing thought

OK, this post is as wild a departure as can be from anything that can be considered normal for this blog (whatever normal for this blog is?I still don’t really have that pegged down).

I thought I had an explanation for my transformation a year ago from clinically obese to well within normal range. Then I started reading some USDA-referenced info about drops in food nutrition—vitamin and mineral content—and began to wonder about something. I have noticed a change in my appetite. I feel “fuller” faster and have fewer cravings for just… stuff. Could my altered appetite be due in part to a substantive change in my nutrition?

Yeh, maybe. When my wife switched brands of vitamin supplementation (something we’d researched as a part of her cardio/PPS health regimen), I began taking a subset of the same brand of super-duper “patented formulation” (well, they are) vitamins, as well. Yeh, I also ate the “fat conversion activity bar” that was developed for use in the Arctic, and I’m sure it had some impact. But my exercise levels have, um, leveled off and even declined over the winter months and no gain in weight, inches, whatever.

And no increase in appetite or junk food cravings as in past years when my idiosyncratic form of cabin fever set in.

Could it be that the cravings for more stuff to stuff in me were in part because the food I was stuffing myself with was deficient in nutrients my body needed?

Maybe. I just don’t know. I do know that after years of failed diet and exercise programs, now in my *cough cough something* 50s I have been able to not only lose a good 50+ pounds of excess weight (and BUNCHES of inches in chest, waist, etc.), but I have been able to keep it off for the past year.

Could one (surely of many) factor in the obesity problem here in the U.S. be that folks’ bodies are craving vitamins and minerals not available in the “healthy” (note: I abhor that construction/use when used in place of the term “healthful”—but that’s a different rant entirely) fresh fruits and vegetables we’ve been encouraged to consume, let alone in all the crap we stuff ourselves with?

Maybe. I just don’t know.

But it is an intriguing idea.

Back to regularly scheduled ranting.

Check that. I notice I can’t lay my figurative hands (via mouse/keyboard) on the pdf I downloaded from the USDA with the data that has been brewing in the back of my mind concerning this thought. Well, the same data seems to have been used in this article. Maybe that’s enough for now.

Back to the salt mines.