memorial day

Memorial Day BBQ – BBQ Chicken

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We made this a couple of times in the past few months. I sauteed them, but I think they’d be great on the grill.


Recipe:

Mix the following ingredients together in a bowl:

About 1 cup of BBQ sauce (I used Sweet Baby Ray’s)

1 TB Apple Cider Vinegar

2 TB Worcestershire Sauce

1/4 cup Brown sugar

2 tsp Orange Peel


Melt a tablespoon of butter in a frying pan. Mix in some of the BBQ mixture, the amount is to your liking.

Saute the chicken tenders until fully cooked. I personally like them a little burned.

They came out wonderfully, moist on the inside, a little crispy on the edges.

Enjoy your summer!

National Hamburger Day

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I’ve heard this as a national day, national week, and national month depending on which burger place is promoting their burgers. In fact, with this being Memorial Day weekend, The Fresh Market has their (typically on Thursday) Little Big Meal Deal for burgers available now through Monday. We’ve had this before and it’s well worth the $20 sale price. We picked it up today to have for tomorrow’s dinner.

For that $20, this meal, which serves four easily (we’re a family of 5 and we split the burgers and it’s still plenty of food) includes: four gourmet burgers, 4 brioche buns, choice of potator or macaroni salad, 4 cobs of corn, package of cheese, and a box of 10 pillow cookies (choice of lemon, almond or raspberry). Please note that you must to buy all of the items in order to get the discount. We also grabbed a Red, White, and Blue pie (apple, blueberry, cherry) for only $5.99.

Excluding fast food places, here is a list and respective lnks to satisfy your burger cravings no matter when they strike.

Burger 21

Burger Fi

Chili’s

Elevation Burger

Five Guys Burgers & Fries

Fuddrucker’s

In n Out

Juicy Burger & More

Red Robin

Smashburger

Sonic

Wahlburger’s

Memorial Day

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The holiday that we celebrate with barbeques and fireworks began much differently than that. I also know that it is a popular day to remember our veterans, and that is admirable, but that is not what today is about. Today is about memorializing and remembering those men and women in our armed forces who died in service to their country.

Memorial Day began as Decoration Day in 1861 during the Civil War and continued with the commemoration and dedication of the Battle of Gettysburg Battlefield Cemetery. There were annual decoration day activities with potluck picnics at individual cemeteries. Until 1868, many of these days were separated into Union and Confederate observations.

The name Memorial Day was changed from Decoration Day in 1882 but didn’t become popular until after World War II. It was celebrated on May 30th or the first time in 1868 (beginning in the North) and continued on that date until 1971 when the Uniform Monday Holiday Act, passed in 1968 became federal law. It wasn’t adopted by all of the states until 1974.

As a personal aside, my mother’s birthday was May 30th, so she was disappointed by this change in holiday dates, although on some years instead of having her only birthday off, she got a whole weekend, which she definitely enjoyed!

The Confederate Memorial Day observance began in 1866 and eventually became a commemoration of the Lost Cause as it shared the spotlight with the American nationalism.

With the nationalized and reinternment of soldiers at both Gettysburg and Arlington National Cemeteries, Memorial Day in May soon became the norm and the annual event, the date chosen both because it was not the anniversary of a particular battle and because flowers would be in bloom and could be placed on the graves of the fallen servicemen.

Memorial Day is observed on the last Monday of May.

The Start of Summer

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Memorial Day* is the unofficial first day of the summer season. For some of us, school has already finished; for the rest it is a long weekend respite before the big sprint to the finish line of end of school and the Fourth of July. It is red, white, and blue and barbeque, no homework, shorts, and sunscreen. Unless you’re in retail, it is one of the only holidays that everyone is off from work.

We pretend to clean the house, catching up on family TV time (Heroes is our current family series) instead. Hot dogs for dinner, whether or not we grill them doesn’t matter as long as they come with beans and possibly corn on the cob.

Currently, I’m spending the next couple of hours in a comic/gaming store while my son plays hero clix and I catch up on my writing and next month’s editorial calendar for my site.

I’m sitting at a table, kindle and keyboard at my fingers, Diet Coke at my side, enjoying the air conditioning, and trying to figure out how to ask for the wifi password, but in the meantime I’m contemplating summer.

Summer is my least favorite season. I dread it every year. Not that I’m such a big fan of winter either, but at least in winter you can warm up. Whether you’re using a cozy blanket, extra sweater, or cuddling with a favorite friend or family member, or even a dog, you can eventually warm up.

No so with summer. There are only so many clothes you can remove to get comfortable, and let’s be honest, it can get so hot that you could be stark naked and still sweating bullets. Putting on deodorant to sleep really expresses the oppressive heat that just won’t be relieved. And I live in the Northeast, not known for the heat except for the occasional heat wave. I have friends in Arizona, and their weather truly astonishes me. It seems to me that it can’t be that hot on the sun, but they survive.

The only thing I want to do in summer is lay back, put my feet up, adjust the air conditioning, and make sure that my Kindle and Netflix remote control are at my side.

I do realize that my anti-summer attitude is caused partially by my adverse reaction to the sun because of one of my medications. I barely need to be in the sun for the itching to start. I don’t get a rash, but I’m constantly scratching, and it won’t stop until I’m either asleep and wake up the next morning or take a shower. It’s awful, but it is in fact, not as bad as most people’s allergic reactions or even sunburns.

I hate it, though because it makes me look lazy. Not that I don’t have lazy tendencies or a zillion procrastinator bones in my body, but I hate saying that I don’t want to go outside. I love my backyard; from the kitchen window at least. We have a beautiful lilac tree that I love the look and the smell of, but I can almost never enjoy it. By the time I steel myself to head out of doors, the yard has no more shade left.

Still, I have three kids who love the outdoors and need to get outside every day. They have their Nerf guns and bow, soccer balls, bicycles, and a tiny bit of newfound independence.

Summer can be long, but like me, those who are not fans of summer, we can still have a good time during those months with our kids off from school, and making plans for fall, my favorite season of the year.

If I can get through summer, I can relish the fall.

So…
What is your favorite season?
What is your favorite thing to do in that season?
What is your favorite thing to do in summer?

*A post about the commemoration of Memorial Day will follow this afternoon.