During my sophomore year, I started dating, the first was a fellow teacher’s brat that I knew better than most because we vacationed at his family's cottages near Hayward, WI. That started my real social life of parties,and getting to know other people in band, choir and drama. I sung in concert choir and was considered good enough to get some voice lessons, but never got solos or leads. Some friends were on stage crew, so I joined them. It was a blast, so many things go into a show: building sets, sound, lights, props, curtains, moving sets. I got to try nearly all of it. We also had great parties, often pot luck dinners. My lasagna was in demand. I did it all the hard way then, cooking the noodles, making my own sauce. I still like to make my own sauce, but the recipe at the end of this chapter saves a few dishes at least.
While not letting on to most of my friends, I continued getting As in most classes, even calculus. Didn't like it, don’t remember a bit of it, but I could do it. Computer programming was more fun, we were lucky to have the chance to take that, but the classes were quite small. In the first year we were using Fortran and punch cards, by my second year we had moved on to Basic and cassette tapes. The assignment I remember most vividly was moving a knight around a chess board in such a way that it covered every square, but never twice. It took me a while but I got it. While I didn't choose this direction, unfortunately it seems, it is still fairly easy for me to think in terms of flow charts.
I liked my language and literature classes , and most aspects of social studies, too, but was most fascinated by sciences. Our chemistry classes with Mr. Hake were like going to stand up comedy performances! To this day I remember him saying “Fluorine is the brazen hussy of the elements, she’ll combine with anything” One December day, we had a lab to do involving boiling a sugar solution and “protein pellets” I think I was the first to figure out we were making peanut brittle! So between liking science and having a strong interest in food and nutrition, and thinking cousin Laurie’s job sounded really cool, I chose to major in Dietetics.
The grading system changed while I was at Hinsdale Central, at some point they awarded an extra point for getting an A in advanced placement classes. This left them unable to figure out who was really valedictorian, so they named a 14-way tie, which included me, but a better speaker got to give the commencement address. Diane distinguished herself in a different way, she had mostly As too, but also got it all done in 3 years so we graduated together. Uncle Clay and Grandpa Nelson had passed on by this time, but Auntie was there to share the day with us.
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| L to R, me, Auntie, Diane |
Minimal Mess Lasagna
adapted from a church cookbook
Serving Size: 12
-= Ingredients =-
1 pound Ground beef
1/2 Onion ; minced
1 quart Pasta sauce
12 ounce Lasagna noodles
1 cup Cottage cheese ; 2% fat
16 ounce Moreland cheese ; shredded
1/2 cup Parmesan ; grated
1 1/2 cups Hot water
-= Instructions =-
Brown ground beef with onion, drain excess fat.
Place enough sauce in bottom of 9 x 13 pan to just coat it. Add a layer of uncooked noodles. Cover with about half of the ground beef. Sprinkle with 1/2 of cottage cheese, the 1/3 of mozzarella, and then 1/3 of remaining sauce. Repeat. Cover with a layer of noodles and press down gently. Pour 1/2 of hot water over all, cover with remaining sauce and then remaining mozzarella, then parmesan. Pour in rest of hot water around edges.
Cover with foil and bake at 350, 45 min- 1 hr. Remove foil and bake 20-30 min more until bubbly.
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