EAT !!!

MARCHPHOTOADAY

I've joined the Marchphotoaday Challenge along with Mama Tink and some other bloggers. Basically, every participant posts a picture of a specific subject for each day of the month.

Today's subject is "a sign":

Now, could you really expect to ignore this place for long?

For months, we passed this place several times a week and laughed at the sign without stopping in. Eventually, curiosity got the best of us. Inside, we discovered the best Cajun/Mexican joint around. We now stop there several times a month. In fact, I chose it for my birthday dinner last year! (Incidentally, that's not the name of the place. It's just there to get your attention. It's actually an old vintage neon sign they found somewhere. It's mounted about 40 feet up in the air!)

Here's the list if you'd like to play along with the March Photo Challenge, too.

Finally - A creatively productive day!!!

I spent the day painting both orders and some new holiday items for the shop. I have a bunch of stuff to photograph and list by next weekend when I believe (or at least fervently hope) folks will hit the computers with their credit cards handy and start buying - a lot!!

I did get some holiday potholders listed yesterday and I've already sold a few of those. I was also able to list a product that I've been selling off line for a while but had trouble working out a practical means of shipping until now. I haven't sold that one yet but it did get quite a few views yesterday when I first added it to the shop.

In between painting, I also did some major cooking and even caught a little interesting news along the way.

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Did you know, you could actually be arrested for refusing to tip a waitress?

It happened in Bethlehem, PA recently! A group of eight friends reportedly spent a little time at a pub and racked up a $73.00 bill. Service was awful. It took over an hour to get their order and one of the women needed to get up and get their own napkins and silverware. The place was busy but this was a bit unreasonable. They even had to go up to the bar themselves for a soda refill as the waitress "never came back."

When the bill arrived, there was an 18% ($16.00) gratuity tacked onto the bill since it was a large group (not an unusual practice). This was just too much to bear for one of the couples. They went to the bartender in charge and complained about the gratuity when service was pretty much non-existent. Supposedly, the bartender offered to comp the food but demanded the gratuity be paid. They refused to pay the tip but paid the bill for the food in full. The bartender called the police and the couple was actually arrested and charged with theft since the gratuity was officially a part of the bill.

They have a Court date scheduled for next month!

I know they felt it was a matter of principle, but wouldn't it have made more sense for the establishment to simply forgive the tip in the interest of customer service, OR, in the alternative, wouldn't the customers have made out better to pay the tip under protest but accept the comp on the food? To quote my b-i-l, "Let's pretend one of us wasn't stupid here..."

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On a sad note, the U.S.P.O. has discontinued Operation Santa. There's hope it will be resurrected. The Alaskan town that serves as North Pole Central is frantically working to resolve the issue. I'll tell you about this one in tomorrow's post.

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Okay, now for something a little lighter...

Let's look at some of my new stuff!!!!

Here's one of my handpainted tables that I've finally been able to list in my online shop.

I love painting these and they sell fairly well offline but I had been unable to find a practical means of shipping them. I could not locate boxes for packing them and could not afford to swallow the costs of having one of those shipping stores box it for me. (Boxing and packing is where those guys make their profits!)

Recently I read a thread in one of the Etsy forum posts about shipping framed artwork and it was suggested they use boxes available from the U-Haul Stores referred to as "mirror boxes." I checked this out and they do have an appropriate box at a reasonable cost. The actual shipping, once it was boxed, was not outrageous. Look for more of these tables in the shop in the future.

I was also able to get some holiday potholders listed yesterday and today.

Want more details, simply click on the pic for a link to the listing at Splashin (my online shop).

Santa and Frosty are all smiles. Wouldn't these be great Secret Santa items?

I'm sure Granny and Great Aunt Mable would love them in their kitchens, too!

Then there is Mr. and Mrs. Ginger, "the cookie couple." I listed these this morning just before lunch, ran out to the grocery store and came home to find they'd already sold! So, I listed a second batch of them.

These have proven to be the most popular in my offline sales, as well.

This is Ray the Reindeer, he's the lesser known cousin of Rudolph. He wasn't blessed with a glowing nose so he's been relegated to helping Mrs. Clause in the kitchen!

****There's a bonus Christmas Cookie recipe included with every potholder purchase.

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Oh yeah! I mentioned cooking today, too. Seems we bought some oversized produce this weekend. What can I say, I can't resist a bargain. Among our purchases were a bag load of bell peppers at 4 for $1 ( I cut these up for the freezer. We use an inordinate amount of peppers around here. They're as much a staple in my kitchen as flour and eggs!) and a giant head of broccoli for 75 cents! We do love broccoli, so we just cut that up and have steamed some every night this week. (I believe I will be ready for a different green veggie in the next few days. I like it, but enough is enough!) Then there was the large economy size head of cabbage, weighing in at close to 6 lbs!! This was the deal at only 50 cents!! I couldn't resist taking their picture ( the soda can is for size perspective) and sending it off to my b-i-l the "bargain king". He's so jealous!!

Today I shredded all that cabbage and I'll be cooking it tomorrow. I have a great recipe for a hot spicy slaw that tastes like a richly seasoned sauerkraut but is much more colorful. it really looks "harvesty." (Is that a word?)

Fun Eats in Ohio

As we are both Certified BBQ Judges with the Kansas City BBQ Society, we hate to miss an opportunity to check out interesting BBQ restaurants. So we were eager to try Jed's BBQ & Brew located directly across the street from our motel in Maumee, Ohio (just outside of Toledo) last week.

The parking lot was practically overflowing so The Big Guy had me jump out to check on how long a wait we'd have. Turns out the joint is much larger inside than it looks so I was seated immediately. While waiting for him to find somewhere to park, I began skimming the menu. Surprisingly, the only "BBQ" on the menu was a pulled pork sandwich hidden among other sandwich selections. (The waitress says they do have ribs on Tuesdays.) Surprised but not disappointed, we were fascinated by some of the interesting offerings. Basically a sports bar, Jed's offers a "pub style" selection but with some quirky twists!

Their signature item is "Fire Balls." The original Fire Ball is a boneless, skinless chicken chunk (larger than a nugget) that's been lightly breaded, flash fried and then dunked in a sauce of your choice. Among the 15 sauces offered are the usual flavors as well as names like "Superfly", "Hot Honey", "Sweet Jalapeno", "Sweet Baby Jane's", "Jed's Secret Sauce" and "Mike's Louisiana Licker". We tried the Mike's. It was sweet with a kick.

The interesting twist to the Balls is the list of "Specialty Balls" with names like "Hangover Balls", "Thunder Balls", "Freak Balls", "Fungus Balls", "Garbage Balls" and "Bette Balls". Basically, these are dishes of Fire Balls with toppings (like a nacho platter). "Hangover Balls" are topped with shredded cheese, tater tots, green pepper, onions, bacon and two fried eggs! "Garbage Balls" offer bacon, sauteed mushrooms, fries, black olives, Bleu cheese crumbles and cheese. So what are "Bette Balls"? A lot of the menu items bear names so I guess this was Bette's personal concoction - chopped hard boiled eggs, bacon and cucumbers, all tossed in Bette dressing and then served on a bed of spinach.

Another specialty is "Spudsters," deep fried mashed potatoes offered with a choice of sauces, sour cream, ranch dressing or butter. These are NOT your Mama's pan-fried potato patties. These are balls of mashed potatoes which have been battered and then deep fat fried. We didn't try these but they did look good as they passed by our table!

They also offered some unique pizza combinations, fries with various toppings, some really creative burgers, salads and fried pickles.

It took us a while just to read the menu and even longer to make up our minds, We only regret we couldn't try more of the unique items. Maybe next trip. (We usually seem to stop at this point, often staying in the same motel.)

Jed's also has locations in Toledo proper, Perryburg, Bowling Green and is soon opening in Sylvania, Ohio, too.

We're actually planning to serve our own version of Fire Balls at a get-together we have coming up. Seems easy enough to execute and is something different from the run-of-the-mill nibbles this time of year.

Why not give it a try yourself? Go ahead, get creative with them.