Something Old, Something New

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Not long after April Fools Day, I decided to delve into the bag of fortune cookies -- something I haven't done for a while.  Actually, I grabbed a couple of cookies on two different days, and I just haven't written about the fortunes until now.

I have had the fortunes with me for over a week now.  Make that over two weeks, now that I think about it.  Today was the first time I haven't let myself get distracted from writing.

Once I dug the fortunes out of the dark corner into which they had retreated, I compared them to some of my previous entries.  I thought had seen one of them once before.  As it turns out, I had seen it before -- not once, but twice:

"You have a deep interest in all that is artistic."

For the record, this is my second triplicate fortune.  And as was the case with the previous encounters with this fortune, the "lucky numbers" and Chinese phrase were identical.

The other fortune was one that I had not seen before.  At least, I hadn't seen it on a fortune cookie before.  I have seen the same idea expressed elsewhere, although possibly in slightly different wording:

"Success is a journey, not a destination."

In an earlier entry, I wondered how many duplicates I would encounter while going through this bag.  Now, I'm finding myself wondering how may triplicates (or more) are still lurking in the bag.

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Love, Dove®

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I had acquired some Dove Promises a few months ago. I'm not completely certain where, though. this was not a case of buying a bag of Promises; this was more like being given a bunch.

In any case, when I unwrapped them, I noticed that M&M/Mars was still printing messages on the inside of the foil wrappers of each chocolate. I also noticed that in the lower right corner of the message was the signature, "Love, Dove." (The Dove should be followed by the registered trademark symbol -- the R in a circle -- but my laptop doesn't have a numeric keypad that would let me type in the code for that symbol.)

I've been carrying around three of the wrappers for a couple of weeks, because I have been planning to share them here. And as the saying goes, there's no time like the present, so here they are:

"Be a little naughty with your nice."
"Find your passion."
"You're gorgeous."

Okay, maybe that last one really doesn't apply to me that well.

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Happy Birthday, Dr. Asimov

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Today is Isaac Asimov's birthday. Were he still with us, he would be 92 -- and I find it hard to believe that it has been almost 20 years since he died. I thought I would mark the occasion by listing a couple of favorite quotes of his:

"Violence is the last refuge of the incompetent."

"Writing, to me, is simply thinking through my fingers."

I just wish I could think through my fingers as quickly as he did.

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A Fortune-ate Beginning To The Year

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Happy New Year, everyone!

Early this morning, I decided to start 2012 by diving into the bag of fortune cookies for a little bit of inspiration. And what I got was my first duplicate of the year:

"You have a friendly heart and are well admired."

I took this as a sign that I should try again. The second time I pulled out a cookie, the fortune was something I had not yet encountered:

"A thrilling time is in your immediate future."

Hmmm . . . that sounds like an auspicious start for the year. Here's hoping that I'm right.

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MoreThan A Pattern

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I decided to pull another couple of cookies out of the bag from GFS today. I've been on the road over the weekend visiting my family, and for whatever reason, I decided that I was in the mood for a fortune cookie.

This time, I finally pulled my first triplicate fortune from the bag. I had a feeling it would happen eventually; I was just curious as to when. On the other hand, the other cookie was a fortune I had not seen before now.

The duplicate -- excuse me, triplicate -- fortune was:

"All your hard work will soon pay off."

And the numbers and mini-Chinese lesson was the same on this one as it was on the other two bearing the fortune.

The fortune I was seeing for the first time read as follows:

"You have a friendly heart and are well admired."

This is where I want to start borrowing a line from Bugs Bunny: "He don't know me very well, do he?"

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Cookie-Less Fortunes

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While I was reaching in the bag of fortune cookies a couple of days ago, I happened to notice something. I saw a couple of fortunes that weren't inside cookies.

I have no idea how how these fortunes became separated from their cookies. I'm guessing that the most likely explanation is that some of the cookies have been broken from the bag being handled at various times, and the jostling separated the fortunes from the cookie fragments. I'm not particularly in the mood to think of alternative suggestions, in any case.

I plucked the orphaned fortunes out of the bag, and thought I might as well use them in an entry of their own. And it turned out that this pair is split -- I've pulled out one fortune before, but for the other, it was the first time I've encountered it. (At least so far.)

"If you wish to, you will have an opportunity."
(This was the second time I've seen this fortune.)

"The reward of a thing done well is to have done it."

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Double Double

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It has been a while since I pulled a fortune cookie out of the big bag I bought early this year. Last night, I pulled a cookie out of the bag. It was yet another duplicate fortune. So, I decided to try again, and pulled a second cookie out of the bag. You guessed it; it, too, was a duplicate.

I don't have the original fortunes readily at hand, so I can't compare the lottery numbers to see if they are true duplicates. But based on previous experience with this bag, it's a pretty safe bet to guess that they are. Here are the duplicate fortunes:

"Soon you will be sitting on the top of the world."
"Your future brings cheerful company and merry times."

Well, the latter does seem to be appropriate, seeing as how Christmas is just around the corner.

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Looking For Some Hot Sauce . . .

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As I mentioned a couple of entries ago, sometime last year, Taco Bell introduced two new sauces at their restaurants. I wrote about the Border Salsa Verde previously. The other new sauce is the Fire Roasted Border Salsa.

As was the case with the Salsa Verde, the packets of the Fire Roasted Salsa had new fortune cookie-like messages printed on them. The Salsa Verde messages seemed to have more of a humorous bent to them, with several of them relying on "green" puns. The messages on the Fire Roasted Salsa, used puns relating to fire and heat. They also seemed to be slightly . . . edgier, for lack of a better term, in their humor. At least that's the way I perceive it. Here's the list; I'll let you judge for yourself:

"Dibs on the taco."
"Give me some knuckles."
"Have your people call my people."
"I see how you look at other sauces."
"I'm a people packet."
"I'm gonna be Fire for Halloween."
"I'm not just another pretty face."
"I'm with the band."
"Is it me, or is it hot in here?"
"I've been through fire for you!"
"Let's go get matching tattoos."
"Taco me."

Okay, maybe "edgier" isn't the right word, but I'm not certain what is.

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In Brightest Day, In Greenest Sauce

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This particular entry has been waiting to be written for some time -- probably close to a year, if I'm not mistaken.

It was about a year ago that Taco Bell introduced two new sauces at their restaurants. One of those is their Border Salsa Verde, and that is the subject of this entry.

As I said, I'm not completely certain when I first saw packets of the Border Salsa Verde at Taco Bell, but I'm pretty certain it was about this time last year. And when I picked up a couple of packets, I noticed that they had some of the fortune cookie-style messages printed on them -- just as Taco Bell has had on their sauce for a couple of years now. But as I noticed that the packets had new messages -- and that the Salsa Verde packets had messages specifically designed for the sauce.

I've been picking up packets for a few months, and by now, I'm certain that I have collected all of them -- for the moment, that is. I've found 12 different messages, and here they are in alphabetical order:

"Add a little verde to your life."
"Did the paparazzi see us together?"
"I'm green with envy."
(Yes, they are going to be big on the green puns with this set.)
"I'm not just a sauce; I'm a way of life."
"Imagine a world without sauce . . . sorry, I need a moment."
"Is green a good color on me?"
"It would be an honor to sauce your food."
"Kiss me, I'm Irish."
(And when did the Irish put colonies in Mexico?)
"Sauce has taken on a whole new greening."
"Take me to your leader."
"'Verde' is fancy for 'green.'"
"Verde (vur-day)."

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Sticker A-Peel

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A few weeks ago, I bought a bunch of bananas while I was grocery shopping. I picked up a larger bunch than I normally do, because I noticed that it had several of the "fortune-ish" stickers on the bananas. (Okay, I actually peeled off a couple of stickers from other bunches and stuck them on the bunch I bought.)

When I got home, I peeled off the stickers and placed them on an index card. That way, it would be easier to have the stickers at hand when I wrote this entry. Naturally, the card disappeared as soon as I stuck it in my backpack, and has been disappearing and reappearing on a random basis over the past few weeks.

I found the card again within the past hour, so I decided that I should write this entry now before the card decides to vanish once again. The bunch of bananas I bought had three stickers with messages on them. Here they are, for your amusement:

"100% Perfection."
(Well, at least until they start turning a little too brown.)

"Brain Fuel."
"PSSST! I'm Full of Vitamins."

And as I have done previously, the messages are capitalized just as they are on the stickers.

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Birthday Fortune From The Orange Owl

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The last time I went to Hooters (which, I should point out, was the first time I had ever eaten there), I discovered that the pre-moistened napkins they have at the tables are printed with what I call fortune-ish phrases on one side. I told myself that the next time I dined at Hooters, I would need to keep an eye out for napkins that had different phrases.

Today, I went by my local Hooters again. I had signed up for their email club, and a few days ago, I received a birthday present -- a plate of 10 free wings. I had to use the coupon within a week of my birthday, so I decided to use it today.

Once I found a table, and had settled down, I took a look at the napkins in the rack. There were a couple of packets with the same phrases that I saw last time, but I also found three new fortune-ish packets in the assortment. Here's what they said:

"58.3% of statistics are made up."
"Bartender: Pharmacist with limited inventory."
"Insomnia is nothing to lose sleep over."

Interesting birthday present, to say the least.

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The Wisdom Of An Owl

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At the moment, I'm sitting in Hooters. Normally, I would not have thought that this particular place would be a source of research material for this particular blog. But as I was waiting for another plate of wings (I ordered the all-you-can-eat wings), I noticed the pre-moistened napkins at my table. (They're in the same rack that holds the menus and the roll of paper towels.)

On one side of the package is the Hooters logo. On the other side was a short phrase of the type that I usually tag as "fortune-ish." I found two different ones at my table this time:

"Does the name Pavlov ring a bell?"
"Indecision is the key to flexibility."

I'll have to keep my eyes open the next time I go to Hooters.

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A Baci For Destressing

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In my last entry, I mentioned that I was in the process of cleaning my condo. I still haven't completed it, but at least the main reason for doing so is out of the way.

I had spent most of the last couple of weeks trying to clean the place. I won't go into details, but I was doing this because someone was paying a visit that lasted, at most, 15 minutes. I also spent a good portion of the last couple of weeks stressing out over the visit, for two reasons. First, there was the reason for the visit, which, as I said, I would rather not mention the sordid details. Second, I'm not really not that good a housekeeper. In fact, my housecleaning skills do not come up to the high exacting standards of Oscar Madison.

Yesterday was the visit, and I was cleaning up until about 10 minutes before my visitor arrived. At that point, I realized that I had completed as much as was going to be completed. And it was time to face the visit itself.

As you perhaps may have already guessed, I don't entertain. In fact, I tend to stress out when someone else is in my condo, which probably explains my somewhat . . . relaxed attitude toward housecleaning. If I remember correctly, the last person in my condo (other than me, of course) was a plumber sometime last year.

By the time my visitor left, I was in need of something to destress me. I recently read that two good ways of dealing with stress were sex and chocolate. Well, one of those is not a viable alternative, and it would probably take more chocolate than I could comfortably consume to ameliorate my stress levels at the time. Fortunately, simply getting out of the condo for a few hours handled things quite nicely.

While I was doing the cleaning, I discovered a box of Baci that had gotten buried under some other stuff. The box (and they) were slightly smashed, but were otherwise all right.

Unwrapping these Baci proved to be a slight challenge. After all, I didn't want to damage the love notes underneath the foil. And I was rewarded for my efforts with these notes:

"Doubt thou the stars are fire . . . But never doubt my love." -- William Shakespeare
"The woman does not exist of whose beauty all men shall agree upon." -- G. Leopardi

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Linda Collection 8

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Well, I have finally reached the last of the fortune cookies that my friend Linda gave me. So unless Linda shows up at a club meeting with another big bag of fortune cookies, this will probably be the last Linda Collection.

Looking back, I see that I made the cookies last over two years. More importantly, these last cookies didn't taste stale, so it seems I didn't have to worry all much on that account. And I have decided on a replacement for the Linda Collection entries (more on that in a future entry). So for now, I present the fortunes (with comments by me in parentheses):

"You are a bundle of energy, always on the go."
(Well, most of the time, anyway.)

"You have a potential urge and the ability for accomplishment."
(Sounds promising.)

"Your dearest dream is coming true."
(You mean the identical triplet majorettes?)

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Eh, Happy New Year, Doc!

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If the title doesn't make any particular sense, imagine Bugs Bunny saying it.

Today is the Chinese New Year. Specifically, it is the Year Of The Rabbit, which is why I chose a title referencing that Oscar-winning rabbit.

Last year, I discovered that ordering takeout from a Chinese restaurant might not be the best idea. Oh well, at least it didn't fall on Super Bowl Sunday. That would probably be chaos squared, at the very least.

I went by Jefferson Mall today. After visiting the food court, I concluded that mall food court Chinese restaurants probably don't deal with the same sort of insanity on the Chinese New Year. The traffic at Max Orient -- indeed, the entire food court -- seemed to be fairly normal. Of course, when I made my stop, it was just after the usual lunch hour, and it was way too early for the dinner crowd.

I didn't have any fortunes on me, and I thought I should post some sort of entry today. So, as you may have guessed, I made a swing by Max Orient just to pick up some fortune cookies. I picked up my usual half dozen for $1, and I nibbled on the cookies after catching TARC.

Here are the fortunes, with some editorial comment by me (in parentheses):

"At 20 years of age the will reigns; at 30 the wit; at 40 the judgment."
(Okay, what happens after that?)

"Depart not from the path which fate has you assigned."
(How do you know that fate has assigned you a particular path until and unless you try to depart from it?)

"The best prophet of the future is the past."
(Those who do not learn from history, etc., etc.)

"When winter comes heaven will rain success on you."
(So far this winter, all heaven has rained on Louisville has been rain -- and snow.)

"Your happiness is intertwined with your outlook on life."
"Your happiness is intertwined with your outlook on life."
(Yeah, I got two cookies with the same fortune. I'm not sure if this means I should pay more attention to this one or not. I'll probably be writing another entry on this fortune later.)

And even though the Year Of The Pig was four years ago, I think it appropriate to end with the words of Bugs's friend Porky Pig:

"Th-Th-Th-That's All, Folks!"

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Linda Collection 7

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You might have noticed that I have been somewhat conspicuous in my absence this month. There's a simple explanation, really. I haven't been in the mood for Chinese food recently. And if I don't get Chinese anywhere, that also means that I don't have any fortune cookies.

Well, I still have a few fortune cookies in that bag my friend Linda gave me. So, it's as good a reason as any to post another Linda Collection entry. (Unfortunately, I think I have only one more entry to go before I use up all of the fortune cookies.)

This time, I grabbed two cookies from the bag. Here's what the fortunes said:

"Your life becomes more and more of an adventure!"
"Your whole family are well."

All right, the second fortune sounds more than a little vague. And I'm wondering just what sort of adventure my life is going to become.

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Linda Collection 6

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I noticed a few days ago that it had been some time since I posted an entry concerning that big bag of fortune cookies that my friend Linda gave me many months ago. I also realized that sooner or later, those cookies are probably going to go stale, so it might be a good idea to go ahead and finish the cookies before that happens.

This time, I pulled out five fortune cookies from the bag. No particular rhyme or reason to my selection, although I did select one cookie that was crushed. In any case, here's what the fortunes said:

"A cheerful letter or message is on its way to you."*
"Accept the next proposition you hear."
"Happiness always accompanies with you."
"If you have a job without aggravations, you don't have a job."**
"You are kind-hearted and hospitable, cheerful and well-liked."

*This time of year, that will probably be a Christmas card.
**There are aggravations, and then there are aggravations. When people seem hellbent on causing as many as possible, I can do without them, job or not.

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Fortune Crushing

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Recently, I stopped by Jefferson Mall. It had been some time since I had picked up some fortune cookies at Max Orient, so I decided to make a swing by the food court and get a half dozen cookies.

I put the bag of cookies in my backpack, and then quickly forgot about them. I was planning to crack them open and write about the fortunes either that day or the following day, but they were shoved . . . well, not quite to the bottom of the pack, but close enough.

I remembered that the cookies were still in my backpack today. Unearthing the bag didn't require quite the skills of Indiana Jones, but it came close.

After spending about two weeks in my backpack, I didn't have to crack open the cookies. They were more than cracked open at this point. In point of fact, they wee well on their way to being crushed. Fortunately, they hadn't been pulverized to dust just yet.

The crushed state of the cookies did make things easier when it came to extracting the fortune. All I had to do was open the wrapper -- very carefully, I might add -- and pull the fortune out from the crumbs. I then dumped the crumbs into my hand, and from there they went into my mouth.

Once I had disposed of the cookies, I had these fortunes:

"A man can fail many times, but he isn't a failure until he gives up."*
"All things come to him who goes after them."
"Love is as necessary to human beings as food and shelter."**
"Soothing your body are the name of the game today."
"The path is getting easier from here on out. Luck is helping."
"Time heals all wounds."***


*I keep seeing running into a variant of this whenever I run out of time on Jewel Quest 3.
**If that's the case, I'm practically anorexic.
***I know I've seen this quote before, but who said it?

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Delay Not?

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I had lunch at #1 Asian Buffet yesterday. I was at Mid-City Mall at the time, and I was just in the mood for something substantial.

Now, the last time I ate there, I mentioned that I felt uncomfortably overstuffed when I left. I didn't know why, because I didn't think I had eaten more than I usually do. This time was different. I was feeling a little stuffed when I was finished, but I didn't have the feeling that I had last time. The feeling that I described as having a large lump of spent uranium just lying there in my stomach.

I ended up with two fortune cookies this time. I didn't open them until this afternoon, which gives the first fortune just a little bit of irony:

"Only put off until tomorrow what you are willing to die having left undone."

Okay, that sounds like a not-so-subtle reminder to write the entry as soon after getting the fortune cookie as possible. And then, there was the other fortune:

"What's hidden in an empty box?"

Now, that sounds like something that The Riddler would send Batman in advance of his next crime.

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That's Potassium With A "K"

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I bought a bunch of bananas earlier today. And as I looked over the bunches, I was also taking a good look at the stickers.

I was thinking of getting some bananas a few days ago. But when I started looking at what was available, the only stickers besides those bearing the Chiquita logo simply said, "Wii." I am guessing that Chiquita is doing some sort of promotion in conjunction with the Wii game system, but I didn't see anything to confirm my guess.

Today, however, was a different story. Oh, I saw plenty of the "Wii" stickers, but I also saw a variety of the fortune-ish stickers that I saw about a month ago. I saw one bunch that had a couple of different stickers, so of course that was the bunch I selected. Here's what the stickers said:

"The Food that Fights for You!"
"Yum, Yum, Potassi-yum!"

These are capitalized exactly as they were on the stickers. I'm not sure why some words were capitalized the way they were. And I like the second sticker's way of emphasizing bananas as a good source of potassium.

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