Breakfast Fit For A Day-Off Pony

Looks like The Pony had some steak left over. He was off Sunday, and made himself a sandwich. He didn't specifically say it was for breakfast, but I'm thinking it was. Not saying what TIME he had breakfast, of course. The Pony is reluctant to get out of bed when the weather is cold.

Monday morning he was texting me while waiting for his car to warm up to go to work. I had sent him a worried text about the icy weather. More on that another day...

"Yesterday I did a steak and egg sandwich."

"That looks good."

"It was! Though next time I'd slice thinner or dice it instead of strips."

A Hearty Meal For The Beast Of Burden

The Pony basically eats one meal a day. Sure, he grabs something for a brief breakfast before heading to work. But it's not like he prepares a hearty country breakfast of sausage, eggs, biscuits, hash browns, gravy, and juice. I'm sure he'd like that, but he's said before he prefers to work on a not-full stomach. 

He generally snacks through the work day. Perhaps buying a treat or nuts or mini donuts when he takes his bathroom break at Casey's. Or he might take along some Chex Mix or fruit gummies with his jugs of water.

As you might imagine, The Pony is famished when he gets off work. He can't take time to drive over to Bill-Paying Town for Steak N Shake every night. And I assume he grows tired of ordering out for Chinese or pizza. So he will cook himself a feast. 

Here's the discount steak that he bought on Friday evening:

"That looks delicious for me. Maybe a little overdone for you!"

"Yeah. They're just a bit thin."

"Still good, I bet."

"Very!"

Oh, that wasn't ALL the food. Here's a view of the dinner table:

No need to put the mashed potatoes on the fancy plates Farmer H got for The Pony, when he can eat them right out of the pan! And look! The Pony is also grazing on greens these days!

He might want to clean off the table next time, to fit more FOOD on it! Not shaming. It's hectic to work a 40-hour week and shop for groceries and prepare your own meals and wash your own dishes and do your own laundry. The Pony will get the hang of adulting soon enough...

The Pony Grows Disillusioned

The Pony has taken to shopping less at the Devil's Playground, and more at Country Mart. There is a Country Mart literally across the street from the post office. So easy for The Pony to dash in there after work, then drive the couple blocks to his house, rather than going past his house for five minutes to the Devil's Playground. Still not a hardship, but after a hard day at work, convenience is the key.

The Pony still gets his non-food supplies at the Devil's Playground, and picks up things for me that I can't get at Country Mart. He used to go a couple times a month, but lately it has been about every six weeks, when he runs out of staples like the frozen foods he likes to keep on hand.

Anyhoo... Friday evening, The Pony sent me a text. His texts usually come at one of two times: when I'm trying to sleep after just going to bed mid-morning, or when I'm trying to prepare supper for Farmer H. I don't complain. It's not like I'm bound by a schedule. I would never hurt The Pony's feelings by making him think he's inconveniencing me.

"Bought discounted steak at Country Mart."

"Excellent sticker placement."

"I think it's because of the sticker. Pressure does that. Like if I stack something on top of my hamburger package. Should be fine if it smells okay."

"I mean, I don't usually sniff meat. AFAIK it smells fine."

"I sniff it when it's on the date. After I have it home, and get ready to cook it. Not in the store!"

"But yeah, it had two dollars cut off the price and is supposedly good for two days from now."

"I haven't had trouble with their meat."

Tomorrow I'll show you The Pony's meal table...

Farmer H Is Cooks' Pet

There's a reason Farmer H is obsessed with his weekday lunches at the senior center, and it's not gourmet cooking, nor the low, low price of $3.00.

Farmer H is COOKS' PET!

He doesn't just sit at a table with his cronies and shoot the bull over a cheap meal. He has a seat of honor at the COOKS' TABLE! I don't remember when he let this information slip, but I'm pretty sure he regretted the moment it crossed his lips.

Of course there are benefits, like the times they've given him leftovers to bring home. They have offered him work fixing up the place, but Farmer H is reluctant to get involved in such a way. I'm pretty sure he is leery of letting a good thing go bad if they are not satisfied. He DID reach out to several union tradesmen last week, about getting a crew to do the work for less than union scale. Several were receptive.

But here's the biggest benefit reaped by Farmer H. He didn't like the dessert last week, which was pineapple something. He took a bite, and was immediately disappointed.

"Is this cottage cheese?" 

"Yes. Cottage cheese with pineapple."

"Oh. I can't stand cottage cheese."

THEY WENT TO GET HIM SOME COOKIES!

Can you imagine them doing that for all the other lunch-eaters who don't like cottage cheese? Not gonna happen!

Farmer H has his harem well-trained.

Can't Say I Felt An Ounce Of Sympathy

We had delicious beans and corn muffins on Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday. Yes. I made another batch of corn muffins due to Farmer H consuming more than his allotment.

Thursday, Farmer H sent me a text at 11:13.

"Guess what lunch is ham and beans and potatoes and stewed tomato"

"Bet mine were better."

"Yes they were much better"

Anyhoo... when Farmer H got home, I chided him about the beans.

"That's what you get for being a leftover snob. You never want to eat leftovers. And now you had beans for the FOURTH DAY, heh, heh!"

"I don't mind leftovers. Two days is fine with me."

"That's barely a leftover! You eat it one day, and then one more. You always find some way to get out of the third day, like going to your storage unit, or to an auction. So I think it's funny that you had four days of beans."

"They wasn't very good. The ham in them was like sliced squares of wafered lunch meat ham."

Still. No sympathy from me... They were all meals he didn't have to cook or clean up after. Three were free, and one cost him $3.00.

The Mail Must Go On. Within Reason.

We had 8 inches of snow on Tuesday night. A heavy, wet snow that came down at an alarming rate, reducing visibility, and keeping us home from our planned casino trip to Oklahoma. Of course it could not keep The Pony from going to work.

That pure driven snow does no favors for The Pony's garage in the background. It's scheduled for a makeover in the summer. After breaking his rear windshield wiper during the last winter storm, The Pony left his front wipers up this time, so they didn't freeze.

His first order of business was to find the windshield! Good thing I gave him my scraper.

The snow was deeper than The Pony's boots. He said it hurt his knees walking, due to the heaviness of the boots he was not used to wearing yet this winter, and having to step so high.

The good news was that The Pony and his work crew had instructions to skip any areas that didn't look like they could safely walk or navigate with their vehicle. The Pony was in a Metris van, which is rear wheel drive, and not good on snow. So he could not deliver to some apartment complexes that didn't plow the parking lot or area around their mailboxes. He also couldn't stop on streets where there was no room to park off the main roadway. So he was thinking he might get off a little early.

Good thing he has a big triangle tub to soak in after a hard day of semi-work.

Bananadrama

Farmer H came back to the Mansion before I was ready for him to on Tuesday. It was scarcely 12:30! My day was already messed up from having to alter my schedule to cash in my big winning lottery ticket. HM people problems...

Anyhoo... I hadn't been to bed, and I hadn't showered. Just wrote out some bills and left for town around 10:00 a.m. There was a snowstorm forecast anyway, supposedly starting around 4:00. (You KNOW that didn't happen. Television meteorologists have a long history of letting me down.) I was sitting on the short couch watching The Best Thing I Ever Ate on the Cooking Channel. It's old reruns. This show was from 2009. The big-name chefs looked really young, and really thin.

Anyhoo... Farmer H sat down in his recliner to watch. He didn't dare snatch the remote to look for Gunsmoke. The topic of this food show was "Pizza." There was some concoction with bananas. Perhaps it was a dessert pizza. Chef Aaron Sanchez, before all his visible tattoos, was introducing it.

"The Veteran's little girl (Farmer H mentioned her by name) is right. If it has a spot on it, I ain't eatin' that banana. When they get too soft, I throw them away."

"I am NOT going to the store every day to look for green bananas! I already go every fourth day. It's like a drug addict always looking for his next fix! Seems like I'm always going to the store for bananas."

"Well, I don't like them once they start to get spots."

"The store doesn't get a shipment every day! And I've noticed that you started taking your banana from wherever you want! For years I have lined them up in the fruit bowl, with the ripest ones on the end to eat first. And now you've been going to the other side of the bowl, and picking whichever one you want! So you're eating the green ones first, while the others get riper and riper!"

"No I don't."

Yet the evidence clearly shows otherwise. It's always been a matter of 'when it's your turn, it's your turn.' Sometimes you get a bigger banana, sometimes a smaller. Sometimes it has more tiny freckled spots than the next one. That's just luck of the draw. It's not like I secretly arrange them late at night to favor myself with the second one in line. You get what you get. 

Unless you're Farmer H, and pick out the best one from wherever it sits in the bowl.