Stuffed cabbage, guessing games and another stock market hoo-hah.

Investors are probably excited as hell to know the Dow vaulted back up above 12,000 yesterday. I don’t really understand why this happened except apparently it has something to do with central banks all over the world “freeing up credit.” I’d suggest a giant Howdygram cheer but the market could crap out again 24 hours from now and make us all look like a bunch of grinning idiots ... so never mind.

Great news for clogged arteries. Lipitor, the hugely popular cholesterol-lowering drug, lost its patent Wednesday, paving the way for cheaper generic versions. I think we should celebrate with a large cheese pizza.

Before I forget ... I know you’re all waiting for this in-depth recap of yesterday’s junket to Costco! In addition to everything on our list we also bought a container of KOSHER SWEET & SOUR HUNGARIAN STUFFED CABBAGE, gigantic stuffed shrimpy/cheesy portobello mushrooms, a tub of Sam’s favorite Italian pasta salad, a 25-pound sack (I might be kidding) of Hoody’s peanuts in the shell, “chicken firecrackers” (chicken/poblano pepper appetizer thingies), the world’s largest box of frozen mozzarella sticks, sliced rotisserie chicken for sandwiches, two loaves of bread, two huge bottles of barbecue sauce and fresh chipotle chicken burritos.

Hungarian stuffed cabbage, which posed for the photo you see here, is my #1 favorite entree in the whole world, and — brace yourself — IT’S EVEN BETTER THAN MONGOLIAN CHICKEN. (Regular Howdygram readers will grasp the gravity of that statement.) Those “chicken firecrackers” are pretty damn good, too.

Holy crap, all of a sudden I’m STARVING. There’s no more stuffed cabbage in the fridge so I’ll move on to Plan B ... sugar-free chocolate-covered marshmallows. 

In case you’ve got some free time on your hands please study the photo below and try to guess who this laughing 13-year-old boy is. You can either send me an email or post a comment below. There might be a prize for the winner. (I’ll post the results tomorrow so be sure to come back.)

Yesterday was my mom’s 89th birthday. Happy birthday, mom! To commemorate this milestone event I thought I’d post a photo of the house where I spent the first five years of my life ... 6628 Newgard on the north side of Chicago. The building is actually a “two-flat.” We lived on the second floor; my grandparents owned the property and lived downstairs. I used to ride my tricycle back and forth on that sidewalk.

Incidentally, if the picture looks a little grim I should probably mention this was a screen capture from Google maps. (The fact that the house is more than 100 years old might have something to do with it, too.)

I need marshmallows now. Thanks for stopping by.