A tenant had a friend that stayed for the night who wasn’t probably used to other people in her near acquaintance.  The door to my brother’s former room opened and the guest began petting my dog, Max and uttering traditional dog baby talk.  She suddenly stopped, and mildly stunned faced panned through the door gap to look up and see me sitting at my desk mercing bitchs.  The door closed quickly.  Moments later, the door opened and she walked to the rest room wearing a grey t-shirt held to her knees with a force of determination that’d make most bull riders jealous.  Normally I have to open my mouth to make people feel awkward.

For the first time, my father, our two tenants and I were watching Jeopardy when some jerk from Harvard was telling a dumb story about how he improperly addressed Ségolène Royal in French.  One, I don’t need to be told who the head of French Socialist Party is.  Two, I don’t care about your stupid grammar snafu, you’re going to Harvard, you can do better.  Later:

Dad: I don’t like him.
Dave: wow, that guy from Harvard’s a douche.
John: He’s a douche nozzle.
Me: I also believe him to be a douche.

Dave called him a manslut when he failed to bet enough during a Double Jeopardy answer and for the first time in a while, I felt like I was part of a family again.

Me: Where’s Dave been?
Dad: He’s been sick in bed for almost a week.
Me: Really?  Where?  I haven’t seen him.
Dad: He’s been here the whole time.  His reserve of soup and protein shake’s slowly been dropping.

Yet more evidence that our tenants aren’t normal power workers but shinobi in the employ of PSEG…

A byproduct of having people hunt on your property is the unavoidable gift basket of dear parts that appear sporadically in the freezer. I’d whittled away at the chuck roast, the ground various and the burger through the cooking axiom of “that which should not be identified can not be identified in chili” but this paper-wrapped timebomb would not go so quietly. So, I salted it, rubbed it with Mrs. Dash and roasted it over low heat until the core hit 160°F. It tasted… of meat. Dave said it reminded him of lamb, although I think he used the term “reminded” like one sees a piece of toast that “reminds” the observer of the Virgin Mary.

Next time I’m going to go with the newest entrant to my culinary toolbox: Add 1 cup chicken broth, 1 can mushroom soup, and 1 packet of any Lipton Cup-a-Soup. Later I discovered that “venison roast” is butcher code for “deer neck”. I wonder what type of soup best goes with neck.