Words of Wisdom

                                        
                                                                             Lomabardi statue via: http://www.flickr.com/photos/katieharbath/
SAY WHAT?:  We're already planning for this weekend's Seahawks' party (because that's, like, a full time job right now - just kidding - kind of). We want to make something to represent the team the 'Hawks are playing against. For instance, last week we had jambalaya when they played the New Orleans Saints. This week, I am NOT making Rice-a-Roni when they play San Francisco (although that is, of course, the first thing that came to mind).

Gharadelli chocolate is from San Franscico, but I can't 'make' Gharadelli chocolate, that's what THEY do. The other night Kennedy informed me that fortune cookies originated in San Fran. Well how 'bout that?!

Though most all Americans' fortune cookie experience comes when getting a handful along with an order of Chinese food, I had heard that fortune cookies were not of Chinese origin. Apparently, the cookie's roots reach back to Japan, but Makoto Hagiwara of Golden Gate Park's Japanese Tea Garden in San Francisco is reportedly the first person in the USA to serve a modern version of the cookie, at his tea garden in the 1890s or early 1900s. Hagiwara's cookies were made by a San Francisco bakery, Benkyodo.

I have made fortune cookies a few times before, and have the scars to prove it. (Seriously, pardon the double negative,but there's just NO way NOT to get hurt making fortune cookies by hand.)

I thought it would be fun to make football fortune cookies, with inspirations sayings from coaches, etc., for the game. So first, we need the quotes. I asked the kids to hop online and find me some quotes. That turned out to be such educational endeavor - history, philosophy ... turns out there's lots to be learned by making fortune cookies. ;)

We talked about the late, great Vince Lombardi, of course. Lombardi was the granddaddy of great football quotes!

Other quotes about football came from everyone from John Madden to Dwight D. Eisenhower to Hunter S. Thompson, so we did some learnin' up on all sorts of individuals.  Amazing where a quest for 'inspirational football quotes' can take you!

Of course, it was also a fun exercise in understanding what, exactly, these quotes meant. For instance, I posed Notre Dame coach Lou Holtz's quote to them: "Don't tell me how rocky the sea is, just bring the ship in," and asked what they thought it meant.

Annabelle didn't hesitate in saying it means, "Don't tell me about how hard it is, just get the touchdown!"

BINGO!  Or, as our favorite Archie McPhee saying goes ...
                  
Another one of my favorite quotes today: “Once you learn to quit, it becomes a habit.”

Amen to that, Coach Lombardi.

When I worked for the state of Washington as a job counselor for the unemployed, I used to keep on of Lombardi's quotes prominently displayed in my cubicle for job seekers to see: "The harder we work, the luckier we get."

I believed that then, and I believe it now.

RIDDLE ME THIS: Questions. All day long, I field questions. I feel like my life is one big press conference. But my inquisitors aren't the press, they're CJ and Annabelle. And frankly, mostly CJ. He is a question posing machine. It starts before 7 a.m., and it doesn't stop until he's forced to go to bed, about 15 hours later.

One of these days I'm going to write down EVERY question he asks me, I think, just for 'fun.' Today my favorite was, "What is the proper action to take if your doctor diagnoses you with the bubonic plague?"

The funny thing is, he'll often be in the middle of doing something completely unrelated when he'll ask the question (for instance, today he was playing a cartoony, kid friendly video game when the bubonic plague came to mind).

It's entertaining. And exhausting, because I try to answer each and every question. ...

CLIMB ON BOARD: Come one, come all! Let's go to the asteroid Bennu together!

NASA and The Planetary Society are inviting people to submit their name for a round-trip ride to Bennu, a 1,760-foot wide asteroid.. If you're up to the mission, you're going to launch in 2016, hitch a ride to the asteroid, hang out there for 500 days, and return to Earth in 2023. Sounds like fun, right?

It's all part of the OSIRIS-REx mission.

Image Credit: 

NASA/Goddard/Chris Meaney

To get in on the fun, just go here: http://www.planetary.org/get-involved/messages/bennu/