Author Archives: mohawkvalleygirl

One Cheese, Two Cheese, RATS!

Posted on March 22, 2013 by mohawkvalleygirl

When I closed yesterday I thought I might take today to come up with a rating system for my cheesy movie reviews. A Facebook friend suggested servings of cheese. I had thought maybe kinds of cheese — this one’s cheddar, that one’s Velveeta. That strikes me as rather qualitative and subjective. Then again, who cares about that? They’re my reviews, and any review is perforce subjective. Then again, not everybody likes the same kind of cheese.

For example, when I think “cheddar” I think dry, aged, classy, substantial, delicious. Others might think, can’t have it without crackers, gets lumpy when it melts, I’d rather have American. For another example, I find Cheez Whiz a delicious treat, whereas cheese snobs find it unbearably tacky and I daresay many refuse to try it. Hmmm. That one’s kind of a metaphor for the sort of movies I like.

But now I’m thinking, if I have to explain what I mean when I rate a movie “cheddar,” I may as well leave off the cheddar and just explain. Which is pretty much what I do now. I say, “Worth a watch,” or, “Good if you want a stupid movie to make fun of.” I don’t know that I’ve ever used it in the blog, but my ultimate pan of a movie is “It needs robot heads.”

This, of course, is a reference to Mystery Science Theatre 3000, in which a guy and two robots make fun of cheesy movies. Delicious show. I think if a movie needs robot heads, it’s not just cheesy, it’s dull. I did find one movie so dull even robot heads couldn’t get me through it. The next time I find myself without a feature on a Saturday afternoon, I may attempt it again and write about it.

Where does that leave us? One cheese, two cheeses, Rats! I never should have watched this movie! But am I rating how cheesy a movie is, how good it is, or how enjoyable? I think I’m better off sticking to my descriptions.

So now I’ve wasted a whole blog post deciding to just keep doing what I’m doing. Maybe I should have saved this one for Lame Post Friday.

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Add a Robotized Dead Brother

Posted on March 21, 2013 by mohawkvalleygirl

Spoiler Alert! Actually, I’m not sure how much I’ll actually spoil, but I’m used to putting these in now.

I DVR’d The Awful Dr. Orloff with high hopes. Full disclosure: as I currently write this (in my new spiral notebook while on a break at work), I don’t quite remember the doctor’s name or if he was Awful or Horrible or some other adjective. The description said something about using his robotized dead brother to kill women in order to keep his wife beautiful. Kidnapping and/or killing women in order to make or keep another woman beautiful is, of course, a staple of the cheesy horror genre. Add a robotized dead brother and what’s not to like?

I had a bad moment at the beginning of the movie when I realized it was in French with subtitles. For one thing, foreign films have that cachet — ooh, it’s European, it must be classy! More importantly, I was not at all sure I could knit and read subtitles at the same time. I might drop a stitch and I never know what to do when that happens (I’m not that good at knitting). So I had to make more of an effort at this movie, especially when the subtitles and the background blended together. I persevered though, because lately it seems cheesy movies are hard to come by.

This one starts right out looking like a cheesy horror movie should, on an eerie, darkened street, with a beautiful but not very classy woman fleeing in terror from… it could only be the robotized dead brother. That cadaverous gait! Those wide, unseeing eyes! I’d run, too! He catches her, kills her and carries her away, in view of witnesses.

The time is probably the late 1800s: flickering street lamps, horse-drawn carriages. Of course, movies are known to play fast and loose with period. If anyone says, “Here we are in the year blahblah,” I missed it. At least the atmosphere is good, and I think a mad scientist plays better in a period piece.

Soon we meet the hero and heroine, a detective and an opera singer who have fallen in love. When he is assigned the case of the mysterious killer, the newspapers have a field day printing headlines about how he’s dallying with his girlfriend instead of solving the case. So, no intrepid girl reporter, much to my disappointment. No reporters at all, actually, just headlines. Sorry, journalism.

The mad scientist, it turns out, doesn’t know how to transfer the beauty from his murder victims to his deformed daughter — not wife as I was sure it said in the description (I couldn’t get back to the description on digital cable and check). He just keeps trying different experiments. There’s one boob shot when he slices a woman open. Oh, these French films!

The robotized dead guy, by the way, is not not a common or garden dead brother. He was executed for murders including parricide. I thought they guillotined convicts in France. At least, they did on some Frankenstein movies I saw (and wrote blog posts about). I guess I shouldn’t take those as historic fact. No matter, he was a bad man before he was dead and robotized and he’s a bad robotized dead guy now.

That doesn’t stop the mad scientist’s assistant from feeling sorry for him. At least, I don’t know if she’s an assistant. She’s a beautiful woman the mad scientist broke out of prison by making it look like she was dead. I guess she liked him well enough before, but now she thinks he’s mad as well as evil.

The detective’s girlfriend gets to be intrepid, going undercover to try to catch the killer. She’s not completely stupid about it, either. It’s not her fault her detective boyfriend fails to read the note she sends him because he thinks it’s from some random crazy woman. Oh well, it makes for more suspense.

It’s actually a pretty good movie. You just need a large capacity crane to suspend your disbelief. As cheesy entertainment, I say it is worth a watch. Once again, I think I need a rating system, like thumbs up or three stars. Maybe I could discuss a few possibilities on Non-Sequitur Thursday.

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More Green Cooking

Posted on March 20, 2013 by mohawkvalleygirl

I realize that headline implies my recipe (if I may call it that) will be good for the environment. I don’t think it is necessarily bad for the environment, but “green” in this context is meant only to denote St. Patrick’s Day.

Yesterday I wrote about how I added a green pepper to sausage balls in honor of the day (perhaps you read my post). While the sausage was cooking (I did mention it tends to take a long time), I made guacamole with a couple of avocados I had purchased the week before, when they were on sale. How clever of me to save my GREEN avocados for St. Patrick’s Day! Luckily, they last a long time, especially if you intend to mush them, as in guacamole.

I didn’t bother looking up a recipe; I just threw stuff in. A little of the garlic I had crushed for the sausage balls, some minced onions from the spice rack (I had had enough of chopping onions), a splash of lemon juice, a smaller splash of Worcestershire sauce, some cumin, some lemon pepper (actually, I think they call it Lemon & Pepper now). I mushed it with the potato masher, then stirred it thoroughly with a fork.

I taste tested it, as did Steven. I added more spices and let the flavors blend. It turned out pretty good.

I had meant to include this recipe (such as it is) with yesterday’s post, coming as it did in the middle of that cooking adventure. However, as I typed that post in, I feared it would be too lengthy. I always say, waste not, want not. Now I have plenty of time to worry about tomorrow’s post.

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St. Patrick Sausage Balls

Posted on March 19, 2013 by mohawkvalleygirl

Since yesterday was St. Patrick’s Day, I thought it would be a good idea to cook something green. I just happened to have a large green pepper I had purchased at Hannaford. I had also purchased some Hannaford All-Purpose Baking Mix (they didn’t have my usual Jiffy). This was going to be good.

Regular readers (if any) will recall that Saturday I had wanted to make sausage balls but lacked the proper ingredients. I still had the sausage (from Dino’s in Utica, NY). Now I had the baking mix. The green pepper would be a new addition to the recipe, which in any case I couldn’t find. I found a similar recipe in a book. I felt confident in my ability to wing it.

I started by peeling and crushing some cloves of garlic. I set the timer for 15 minutes, so the garlic could reach its full antioxidant benefits (or is that cancer fighting qualities? Whatever). I chopped up a yellow onion and put it in a cast iron frying pan with some olive oil. Then I cut up my green pepper into small pieces and added that to the onions. I put the sausage in the pan all in a lump. I figured it would be easier to break apart as it cooked. I added the garlic shortly after the sausage, as soon as the timer went off.

It took a long time to cook, as sausage often does. I kept chopping the sausage into smaller and smaller pieces with the spatula, which helped. At last it was ready. I emptied it into a bowl and added two cups of baking mix.

And it didn’t seem to do much but kind of sort of coat the sausage a little. I added some more. Then a little more. Then I poured some milk over it. Finally I got a consistency I liked.

I turned the oven on to 350 degrees and sprayed no-stick stuff on two baking sheets. I dropped the sausage mixture onto the sheets by the spoonful. I filled both sheets and a pizza tin. I put them in to bake for 20 minutes. I took the oven temperature and baking time from the recipe I had found, which may have been silly of me, since I didn’t really follow anything else in it.

The sausage balls turned out perfectly tasty. Perhaps I could have taken them out of the oven a trifle sooner, but really not too bad. Some people like them extra brown. Steven and I enjoyed them. And there are plenty left over. I ate a couple before typing in this post. Still perfectly enjoyable. I hope all my readers enjoyed Menu Monday.

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Unable to Entertain with a Cooking Post

Posted on March 17, 2013 by mohawkvalleygirl

Yesterday (Saturday) I thought to cook something good, so I could do a cooking post today instead of having Wrist to Forehead Sunday. I had some lovely sausage from Dino’s in Utica, NY that was thawed out and ready to go. What to do with it?

Of course, sausage is always good in spaghetti sauce, and I do love me some spaghetti. However, I did not have any green peppers. I have many times made perfectly tasty sauce without green peppers, but for some reason yesterday, I just did not feel that I could. And I was definitely not inclined to go to the store. Oh dear.

I thought, really, wouldn’t it be a good idea to go out to eat? After all, dinner at Crazy Otto’s Empire Diner would support a Main Street business, which I believe I mentioned in yesterday’s post is something I intend to do. I had mentioned dinner at Crazy Otto’s to Steven that morning, and he seemed a little unenthusiastic. Oh, he loves Crazy Otto’s. It’s just that after a long day of work, he would rather stay home, put on his sweats and relax.

Steven was working till 6:30. As the afternoon wore on, I started to think how happy Steven would feel to come home and see me in sweats. I do like to make my husband happy. I was ready for the sweats on, bra off portion of the day anyways. Surely I could cook SOMETHING.

Then I thought of Sausage Balls. We love to have appetizer-y things for dinner! I started to search for the recipe, first pouring myself a glass of wine, because I like to cook with wine.

And then the whole thing came to a grinding halt. We didn’t have enough Jiffy Baking Mix. I was already in my sweats. It was after 6:15.

I suppose as Saturday night disasters go, this was pretty minor. We still had plenty of options regarding food. I talked Steven into one of my favorites: we called Carney’s Corners and got delivery. A Chicken Bacon Ranch Sub and Potato Wedges. We also ate some cottage cheese, which I think goes delightfully with potato wedges (unless you are having ketchup; I don’t care for ketchup on my cottage cheese).

So here I am on Wrist to Forehead Sunday, unable to entertain you with a cooking post. I went to Hannaford this morning, though, so things may be looking up for tomorrow. Stay tuned.

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Herkimer in the Sun

Posted on March 17, 2013 by mohawkvalleygirl

So there I was, with Saturday wearing on and no blog post in sight. I was not about to go running. For one thing, I had a bad headache earlier and the medicine I take, OTC though it may be, kind of drains me. For another thing, it was COLD out and I didn’t need the cold air bringing my headache back. “There’s some things I don’t mess with,” I told myself. “Like going out in the cold air when I have a headache!”

Then I realized I had a dog who had not been for a walk in a few days. She gets her exercise on those days by running around the back yard, which I’m sure she also enjoys. But dogs like to go for walks. Someone told me they benefit from the sensory stimulation of different smells, sights and sounds. How could I deny my beloved schnoodle, Tabby, any benefit that a little effort on my part could bring her?

As we walked, I realized I like the sensory stimulation, too. Maybe not the smells, which my sinuses prevent me from noticing much anyways, but definitely the sights. For one thing, it was a bright and sunny. I think it’s wonderful how sunshine can make almost anything look better. Old dirty snow, clods of earth where snowplows were a little too enthusiastic, muddy sidewalks. Nothing looks as bad in bright sunlight.

I suppose some people will argue with that. For one thing, some people will argue with anything. But I know there is also a big thing about older women (probably men, too, for that matter) looking better in candlelight. I guess I don’t know about that. I just know I enjoyed the sight of Herkimer in the sun today.

We walked down Bellinger Street and through Meyers Park. I was a little surprised Tabby did not turn down Church Street toward her favorite Historic Four Corners, but so it was. She led me across Prospect and onto Main Street. When she turned up toward German, I saw that the street was blocked off where some recent bad events had taken place.

“We can’t go this way,” I told Tabby. She did not seem to be paying me any attention, but after she stopped and sniffed a pole, she turned back toward State Street. Perhaps she noticed the yellow tape herself. She’s a smart pooch.

We walked to Albany Street and by Crazy Otto’s, Hummel’s Office Plus and Belly Up Pub. The lady in Hummel’s waved at us as we walked by. I waved back, but Tabby was busy sniffing other poles. I thought I should do something to support Main Street businesses in light of recent events. Perhaps a meal at Crazy Otto’s or a card at Hummel’s. A drink at Belly Up Pub or Pete’s Tavern? There is also a barber shop and cell phone place, but I don’t have any need for either of those. Do I need anything available at Collis Hardware? I’ll have to think about it. I’ve neglected to mention a few places, but those were the ones I actually noticed today. I’m only one blogger, after all.

During the course of our walk I found two pennies, not both at once. An encouraging sign from the angels? I’d like to think so. I was really glad we went for our walk. My legs felt better for the exercise, and the cold air did not exacerbate my headache. Tabby seemed happy about it, too. What’s not to like?

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Friday Comments About Monday

Posted on March 16, 2013 by mohawkvalleygirl

Well, here it is Lame Post Friday and once again, I got nothing. And not plenty o’ nuthin’, like in that song in Porgy and Bess. But I do have a comment about another song that I was thinking about earlier in the week.

I don’t know who sings it or what the real name of the song is, but it starts, “Monday, Monday,” and goes on to some words I can’t understand very well so don’t remember. The gist of it is Monday is no good to the guy singing because, “Monday morning couldn’t guarantee/ That Monday evening you would still/ Be here with me.” My apologies if I misquote. I haven’t actually heard the song in a while, but it was playing in my head all day one day.

And it was really annoying me! Come on, guy, better to have loved and lost! Who spends a relationship saying, “Oh, I hope we don’t break up before nightfall!” I suppose some do, but then the singer goes on to say, “Every other day (every other day, every other day) of the week is fine, yeah!” What? Tuesday et al. can guarantee that the girl will still be there in the evening? What kind of chick is this that only breaks up on a Monday?

I suppose somebody will argue that Monday is the most stressful day of the week, at least for Monday through Friday workers. If you’re going to have a messy break up, it might as well be on a Monday (oh, I know, nowhere in the song does he say it will be messy; I’m just extrapolating). Maybe there is something special on Monday, or even this particular Monday, that I don’t know because I never listened to all the words in the song (which is unusual for me). Just get through Monday! Then we’ll be together forever! After all, who am I to judge other people’s relationships?

I think it is more likely that someone will argue, “Lighten up, Cindy, it’s JUST a SONG!”

And Friday is just a day. And now that I’ve made my Lame Post, I’m going to go enjoy what’s left of it.

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So That’s a Cyclops?

Posted on March 15, 2013 by mohawkvalleygirl

I DVR’d Cyclops (1957) from TCM with high hopes and it did not disappoint. Oh, it was not a good movie by any stretch. But I had a good time making fun of it.

Oh yeah, Spoiler Alert! I’m probably going to spoil practically everything.

In the first scene, a girl is meeting with a Spanish-accented official who is denying her permission to fly… somewhere, looking for her fiance whose plane crashed there some three years ago.

So let’s start with that. Three years ago? If your fiance disappears in a plane crash, how do you wait three years before going to look for him? Or am I asking too much of a movie female? I suppose the expedition was a little complicated to arrange. For one thing, the girl couldn’t finance it all on her own (I can go on calling her “the girl,” because she’s the only one in the picture). She has joined forces with a guy who has invented something that detects uranium. Gee, do you suppose he is in this only to make a buck and is likely to cause trouble later?

The official plans to send someone with them to make sure they fly straight home and nowhere else. It’s not really spoiling anything to tell you that they circumvent the official and head for the restricted place, is it? I was hoping they would do something at least marginally clever and fool the guy, but no, Lon Chaney, Jr. sucker punches him and they take off. Nobody follows them.

In retrospect it occurs to me that they could have used that fact as foreshadowing: the place is so dangerous the officials will leave them to their fate. I think the script writers got lazy (if they ever invent a time machine, I may try to get myself a job as a movie writer in the ’50s). Well, that’s OK, we want to see the mysterious, dangerous place with the Cyclops; we don’t want to spend the whole picture getting there.

Regarding Lon Chaney I kind of got my hopes up when I saw his name in the credits. Well, I guess actors have bills to pay, too. Actually, Chaney does a good job as the uranium-seeking trouble-maker. It’s just that I had kind of wanted to see him get turned into a Cyclops.

And may I just insert a word about movie slugs? In movies and on television, one sock to the jaw is all it takes. The slugee is down for the count. Men especially like to do this to women “for their own good.” So the man can go off and have all the adventure while the girl stays “safe” (I use the terms “man” and “girl” intentionally). No women get slugged in this picture, so it’s got that going for it.

Lon Chaney is apparently a very good slugger. His next is administered to the pilot of the plane. Even in the close confines of the cockpit, he knocks the guy out so he can grab the controls. Chaney wants to land while his whatevermeter is clicking high. He almost gets his wish in a big way as the plane plummets toward the earth. You see, the other guy has grabbed him from behind and pulled him away from the controls.

Excuse me, what? The pilot is out cold. Why are you pulling the one left awake away from the controls? Luckily the girl shakes the pilot awake in time to avert disaster. I’ll pass over my wonderment that you can shake somebody awake in that situation. Likewise I’ll pass over their extreme luck in finding, inches before impact, a strip of ground sufficient to land on in a huge mountain range. I know, I have to suspend some disbelief. I didn’t even blink when the girl’s map shows they are very close to where the fiance’s plane went down.

So she and the other guy go off hiking into the jungle (yes, a jungle in the mountains, get over it), leaving Lon Chaney to try to talk the pilot into flying him home so he can “stake his claim” to the supposedly uranium-rich area. OK, so they weren’t even allowed to fly there legally, but this guy can just claim it for his very own, like in the Old West? The knock-out slugs and safe landing were easier to swallow than that one!

Never mind, it’s a movie. Let’s get to the monsters. Through the miracle of perspective, we get giant lizards, a giant mouse and a giant hawk. The first time a character sees a giant lizard, he stands there watching it and smoking his pipe in a contemplative fashion. When the lizard retreats behind a rock before anyone else can see it, the guy says it must have been his imagination.

You see where this is going, right? Fiance isn’t dead, he’s a giant. And his face has been hideously deformed by reasons which are never made clear (after all, the animals are all intact) so that he only has one eye and can only talk in grunts. We don’t know if he can understand anything, but the girls tries to talk to him.

Bringing movie female stupidity to new heights, she does not realize that this scary creature is her fiance. She just wonders why looking at him makes her sad. Come on! Even I know who he is, and I never met the guy! Oh well, I suppose three years and radioactive deformities can change a person.

The movie is full of “Why would they…?” moments. For example, why does the Cyclops block the people into a cave with a big old rock which he is then unable to reach them over, as he tries to do? Then he leaves (why?) and they do NOT (a) look for an alternative escape route, (b) see if he’s still there, or (c) try to come up with SOME plan. Instead they opt for (d) go to sleep. I thought it was still morning!

At least this gives Lon Chaney a chance to steal the rifle, which eventually leads to his coming to a not very exciting end at the hand of the monster (who can only get one hand into the cave far enough). Oh, but first he goes back to sleep, and when they all wake up, nobody says, “Hey! Gimme that rifle back!”

The movie can’t seem to make up its mind if the Cyclops is scary or sad. They kind of go back and forth, ending up on scary in one of those “Oh, now the movie is over” endings. I see I’m over 1000 words and I haven’t even started on how that’s not what I thought a Cyclops was. I guess I’ll just end with, if you like a stupid movie you can make fun of, Cyclops is a good choice.

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Bad News Day

Posted on March 14, 2013 by mohawkvalleygirl

I am really sorry to be making two serious posts in less than a week (although I guess I did get a little silly talking about depression), BUT…

Something really bad happened in the Mohawk Valley this morning, and it is still going on.

In a nutshell, it seems a guy set fire to his home in Mohawk, NY then drove to two businesses, one in Mohawk, one in Herkimer, and shot six people, four of whom are dead. At last report he is holed up in an abandoned building on North Main Street, surrounded by law enforcement. They have not been able to make contact with him and are playing a waiting game.

I’m not really writing a post about this event, because this is not a news blog. I don’t have the sorts of resources and skills needed. In short, I probably can’t add anything valuable.

However, with this going on, I feel utterly incapable of writing my usual Mohawk Valley Girl schtick. The building where the guy is allegedly hiding is two blocks from my house. I could not go to Curves for my endorphins, because it is basically across the street (although the address is the next block over; it’s a big building). I felt happy I could get to my house, that the police had not set a WIDE perimeter and evacuated five or six blocks over. And this is after all day at work hearing things in bits and pieces, gleaned from what people texted my co-workers, who were not supposed to be on their cell phones at work anyways but I don’t think management got too exercised over it in this situation (that may be a run-on sentence, but I don’t care).

So, sorry. Not a real post. If you want the whole story of the shooter, I can refer you to www.wktv.com, where I have been watching it on the news.

I hope to be more myself tomorrow.

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Holding Out for a Hero

Posted on March 13, 2013 by mohawkvalleygirl

What drama! The suspense is killing me! And the play hasn’t even started.

Last September I wrote about how Dirty Work at the Crossroads, the play which my husband Steven was directing for Ilion Little Theatre (lengthy subordinate clause), had to be postponed, due to the leading lady dropping out. At that time, the full cast was committed to doing the play in the spring.

Of course, things happen (some people use a more vulgar expression). By February we had lost the heroine, the hero and two supporting characters. Yikes! Last night (Monday) we held auditions to try to fill those parts.

The folks that had already been cast and were keeping their parts (including me) were all on hand to read with newcomers. Once Steve and I had figured out how to turn the stage lights on, we waited in anticipation.

And we got some new people! Some talented, nice, fun people! We added four ladies to the cast. I know my previous list only included three females, but we were also able to undouble a previous double casting. Woo hoo!

Now here’s the bad part: new new men showed up. We need a hero!

People re making phone calls, sending emails and asking around. Some really good-sounding possibilities have already been eliminated. Rats!

So this may be it for Dirty Work at the Crossroads (say it ain’t so!). Steven can’t take the part and we can’t double cast. Like I said, DRAMA! I remain in suspense. So, I fear, must my readers. Expect further posts as events warrant.

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