Pumpkins Don’t Have Ankles

The best part is, I didn’t even make that title up. It’s a part of traditional Irish folklore, as my friend Christin shared with me earlier this week. (She’s also the one who first showed me the Irish Dirt website.) Here’s part of our instant message conversation:
CHRISTIN:
I just came across another great piece of folklore—the [...]

Today my friend introduced me to the website officialirishdirt.com.  Yes, take a minute to go back and separate those URL words out. It’s Official Irish Dirt dot com.
What do they sell, you ask?

Why, Irish dirt, of course!
That’s right! For a mere 10 dollars (plus shipping and handling), you can be the proud owner of 1 [...]

On the last night of our family vacation in Hilton Head, we ate at the Grumpy Grouper Grille. We wanted to go just because it was called the Grumpy Grouper Grille. The food was good, too, though in my opinion the mascot wasn’t nearly grumpy enough.
This has gotten me to thinking about other cleverly named [...]

The neon sign is supposed to say “Hot Doughnuts,” but some of the lights have gone out.
So now it just says “Hot Doug,” which sounds like something you might exclaim when you are surprised, as in: “Well, I’ll be. You mean t’say we jist done won a lifetime supply of Squeezy Cheese? Hot Doug!”
I confess, [...]

Back around Christmas my mom found a Scottish cookbook from 1974 in which the author talks about some of the country dishes of her childhood. In honor of the Greater Greenville Scottish Games and Highland Festival, I thought I would share some of what I found with you.
A disclaimer: I’m not particularly trying to pick [...]

So my sister and our roommate decided to watch the film Twilight (you know, the one about love and vampires. Yes, love and vampires). I threatened to mock it mercilessly as it played, then at their request promised them I wouldn’t. Well, it’s over now, so let the mockery commence!!
For those of you who have [...]

Some people have wondered why this blog is titled “Pumpkins Don’t Have Ankles.” The reason is … because I am a firm believer that they don’t. And to prove this statement is true, Christy and I went to the infamous Pumpkintown Pumpkin Festival.
No, for real. There is a place called Pumpkintown and they have a [...]

Yep, time for another grand adventure! I went with Christy and guide dog Reba to the Greenville Scottish Games, an annual outdoor festival held at Furman University, which has a tradition of being 1) always a great experience and 2) always in the middle of an extreme heat wave.

I came prepared for the festival. Not [...]

It’s happened before and it will probably happen again. A sibling (Heidi) got older. To mark the passing of this event, we (my two other siblings and I) decided to take said sibling for a grand day out.
We went to the outlet stores in Gaffney, South Carolina. That was fun in itself, but even more [...]