Husband and I were contemplating the possibility that we would have a bumper crop of eggplants, and sat down together in the living room to search the New York Times Food app and other on-line sites for eggplant recipes in the event our fears came true. Husband commented that it was such a nice thing to be able to sit down with one’s partner of many years and do something as simple and as satisfying as hunt for recipes, and that this was a wonderful example of senior romance. He then told me that he ran across a You Tube video of a song by Holly Williams, and that it reminded him of my parents. He played the video for me. It was quite sweet. She wrote it about her grandparents.
This brought to mind the Nanci Griffith number that I have always loved:
Both my sets of grandparents were married for more than 50 years, and were pretty devoted, but also pretty crabby with each other at times. I remember taking care of my paternal grandfather while my grandmother was having gall bladder surgery, I was about 17, and he needed care as he had a stroke and was paralyzed on his left side and had his left leg amputated due to diabetes. He was always pretty stoic, but told me out of the blue while I was helping him get his prosthesis on that “She’s a pretty good grandma, you know”, which was his way of telling me that he was worried about her and he wanted her to come home.
Who are the most devoted older couples you know?Other examples of sweet senior romance in songs or stories?
I’m ashamed to have to admit it but I’m really not a very adventuresome eater. When I find a restaurant or a particular dish that I like, I’m loyal. I stick to it like glue. There are often pangs of guilt involved in this. Whenever I’m about to order my favorite, it occurs to me that I could try something else. Maybe I would love it just as much. But I rarely take the chance.
So when my friend Tony said we should have lunch on my side of town, I decided it had to be at a new place. I spent a lot of time googling restaurants, looking at the menus, checking the ratings/reviews. Finally found a place called the Tipsy Steer over on Hiawatha. I will admit that the name was the hook but the menu had a good variety that I was sure would give Tony and me options.
We sat outside on the patio (overcast but cool so perfect weather for it) and then I found another selling point. All of their different burger combinations can be made with a meatless burger option! I love that although it does make it a much longer process for me to pick something. I settled on a Pimento Cheese & Olive Tapenade with Roasted Red Pepper Burger. They serve the burgers on metal platters with a nice helping of fries – nice presentation.
The burger was fabulous. I’ve never had pimento cheese OR olive tapenade on a burger before and I have to say it was an excellent combination. It was messy, but we had plenty of napkins. Tony had a straight up cheeseburger which he reported was great. The fries were no slouches either. We had grabbed to-do containers before the food even arrived – good thing – the burgers were huge – we needed to put half of them in the containers right away!
I was so happy to have chosen a new restaurant and tried something different. Now the only problem is getting myself to try a different burger when I take YA there sometime soon!
How do you like your burgers? Ever had a burger that you would consider “adventuresome”?
I was glad to see how tall Ben’s corn is last week. The summer has been good for me – after last summer’s blisteringly dry heat, I’m enjoying the slightly milder temps and the rain. I haven’t even had to get the sprinklers out of the garage yet.
And Iowa must be doing OK as well. My next-door neighbors were gone for about 10 days – visiting the grandparents south of the border. When they travel in the summer, I always water their outdoor plants; it’s easy as they just pull all the pots over to the fence and I can just apply the hose to them whenever I am watering my bales.
I’m happy to do it and I don’t think of it as an onerous chore (especially when it rains so much) so I was surprised when they came home with a bag full of corn for me as a thank you. Straight off the farmstand corn and the pretty kind I like best – yellow and white.
The only problem with 12 ears of fresh corn is when you are the only one home for over a week. YA was away on a work program. There was no way I was going to waste all that gorgeous corn so I rolled up my sleeves and dived in.
I saved two for just eating and de-kernelled (is that a word?) the rest. Froze one bag then made a double batch of corn salsa (froze some), a lovely fresh kernel cornbread and then a fun garden veggie pizza with ricotta as sauce. All done in three hours!
So now I’ve processed cherries and corn this summer. Wonder what else will come my way?
What kind of foodstuff would you like to have too much of?
My little friend next door, Minnie, loves to sing and dance. For the past two summers she had done a summer camp at the Lundstrum Performing Arts Center; this year they presented Annie Jr (just a shorter version of Annie). Considering that it is all untrained kids and that they get the whole thing together in two weeks, they did a great job.
This was all that Minnie talked about for two weeks. In addition to previewing the song/dance that she was in, she regaled me with stories of how things were progressing and who was playing what part. There were several kids who had been in Little Mermaid with her last year and although I did see the show last year, I couldn’t have told you any of the players except Minnie.
Of course there was also the post-production discussion the day after the last performance. I commented that the young man who played Rooster Hannigan did a nice job. He also had a great dance solo dressed as a street Santa in the N.Y.C. song. Minnie quickly pointed out that he had played Prince Eric in Little Mermaid. When I said I hadn’t remembered that, she commented that he hadn’t had to do very much to be the prince. Then she added, almost as an afterthought, that princes don’t usually have much to do.
In her world, all her princesses and princes are represented by Disney. As I thought about it the next few days, I realized that Disney has, for the most part, not spent too much energy on princes. Snow White’s prince doesn’t have a name, Sleeping Beauty’s prince does have a name (and a bit of backstory) but doesn’t have much personality. Cinderella’s prince is also pretty non-descript. Ariel’s prince is a little bland and definitely clueless. Belle’s prince spends most of the movie as a beast and Tiana’s prince spends most of the movie as a frog. Merida has three princes, all of whom are a bit… lacking. A few princes fare a bit better in their Disney representation but clearly it’s all about the princesses.
I’m not too worried about this unfair portrayal – I doubt that young girls and boys are too damaged by this uneven treatment. But I also don’t believe that Barbie dolls are inherently evil either.
If you were to be a Disney princess or prince (or villain if you prefer) for a week, who would you choose?
I’ve got the brush mower on and I’ve started mowing weeds. We have a good crop of thistles. They’re taller than the tractor!
I went around the mullen’s.
As always though, majority rules.
Mowing waterways is a good opportunity to go down the middle of the field and see the crops. The corn is taller than me and the tractor in places.
Soybeans are not quite up to my knees yet, but they’ve got blossoms on them. The oats are up to my waist, but the quackgrass is quickly taking over. My neighbor who combines the oats, will be out of town this weekend and next. The oats aren’t quite ready to swath, yet it’s starting to go down (from the rust fungus weakening the stalk) plus the grass taking over, so I hate to wait too much longer. I’m thinking by the end of next week I’ll want to be cutting it. It will need to lay and dry for a few days before it will be ready for combining.
I had an email this week from the oat growers who market it for food grade vs animal food. The price at the food grade plant is $4.30 / bushel. At the local elevator, it’s $3 / bushel. That’s pretty hard to pass up the higher price. Yet I need to get it hauled down to the plant in Iowa, and the grain needs to be heavy enough for them to accept it. All things that are harder for a small operator like me to coordinate. Not impossible, but harder. And, of course, it costs money to haul it to Iowa, too. So there’s always a trade off. I’m still working out details.
The ducks are doing well. We bought them a kiddie pool last week and they’re big enough to get in, but not big enough to get out, so there’s a big rock in the pool. They’ve figured out how to go into their pen on their own at night. They’re fun, when I go out there and call to them, they all call back to me. It isn’t quite a ‘quack’ yet, still more of a ‘peep’. I call out “Hello ducks! Hey Kids!” and they’re all “peep, peep, peep”. They know I’m bringing food. They don’t want to be picked up or anything, but they come over closer too me. This sure is an interesting looking bunch. I can’t wait to see what they look like when grown up. Notice the black spots on the feet of some of them.
I spent most of the week working on the Rep Theater stage again. I’ve had good help from my buddy Paul, and Chris, Michael, Doug, Max, and Noah. Max and Noah are the teenage boys helping me this summer. Max hasn’t done anything like this construction before. He’s learned and used a lot of new tools (and found the chalk line really fascinating- although he doesn’t come out and say that). He’s a good kid, a hard worker, smart, and good to have around.
The majority of the work is done, the main stage is done and has one layer on it. Next up will be the second layer of 3/4″ plywood and a top layer of 1/8″ plywood. We call it ‘lauan’, but the lumber yards don’t know it by that name. And it used to be $10 / sheet. Double that now. Jeepers. And 3/4″ plywood is $40. And that’s not even the fancy sanded stuff.
I did get a little bit done in the shed at home and replaced the windshield washer pump and one nozzle on my truck. Cut some grass one night.
A couple years ago, four of the bolts holding a gear box on the brush mower got loose. My brother and I tightened them up. They came loose again. This summer we replaced the bolts and put ‘lock-tite’ on them. After mowing for a day, they’re loose AGAIN. I need another helper to tighten them up again, but I’m afraid this might turn into a bigger repair job requiring a piece of steel welded underneath or something. I dread adding it to my list again.
It’s finally drying up around the barn and yard a bit, so that’s good.
Ever had a pedicure? What color would you paint your toenails tonight?
One nice thing about living out here is that no matter how hot it gets during the day, it almost always cools down at night because of the low humidity. That means we can turn off the air conditioning and open up the windows after midnight. Our town is also really quiet at night, with the only the occasional train whistle breaking the silence.
On Tuesday night I woke up at 3:30, turned off the air conditioning, and opened the windows. I had just settled back in bed when it started. Somewhere in our neighborhood, very close to our house, a bunch of crows began making a hullabaloo. First one crow would give voice, then four others would chime in. They were loud and raucous, and it went on and on for an hour and a half. They sounded really upset. I didn’t have the energy to get up and close the windows and turn the air conditioning back on, so I just put a pillow over my head, I finally fell back to sleep after they quit.
I believe Husband and the dog identified a possible motive for the crows’ behavior. Yesterday morning on their walk they came upon the corpse of a rabbit on the sidewalk near our house. The rabbit’s head was missing, and it looked as though it had been there for a couple of days. There is a small stream and slough several blocks from our house where a mink or weasel would feel quite at home. Minks and weasels decapitate their prey. I think the crows were sounding the alarm that a murder was being committed in our neighborhood. The crows have been quiet since Tuesday night. The next time they start a ruckus in the middle of the night I will have more sympathy for them and wonder who is being murdered this time.
What are night noises in your neighborhood? Any mysteries in your neighborhood? Any other creative theories for the headless rabbit or the crows’ alarm?
Went for my eye exam last week. No changes so I decided this was a good time to invest my annual glasses allowance for a pair of prescription sunglasses.
Since I had such a good experience with Warby Parker last year, I headed over to the store again to ask about new shades. Now last year I was in and out of the store so fast that I barely had time to even look around (except when I was actually looking at the various glasses styles and even that didn’t take me too long). This year the store was hopping; I ended up waiting about 20 minutes after I checked in so I had a chance to take the place in.
First off, there are books above each alcove of frames… real titles but the spines are all monochromatic (all white over one alcove, all blue over another, etc.) so I’m guessing they are probably not the actual books. I could be wrong but I doubt it. Then I noticed their 100 word “all about us” statement printed on the wall. Each word is numbered. The funniest things were books of haiku on shelves under each alcove titled “Baby Pigeons”. Apparently at WPHQ they write haiku. They have them on the walls, in emails and in various correspondence and collected in a book. Here is the haiku that inspired the title of the book:
How come you never
See baby pigeons? I asked
“What?” said the dentist.
I also liked this one:
finish lip balm tube rather than just losing it? honor this moment
I didn’t ask if the books were for sale but I liked that WP apparently doesn’t take themselves too seriously. It did inspire me to write a haiku of my own on the way home:
Every eight weeks we get a call from the Memorial Blood Center. I assume it’s because her name is before mine in the alphabet; YA gets the first call and usually before I even get my call, she has come to me to pick out a good date for us.
We went down to our local center as usual but unlike usual, YA got light-headed afterwards and instead of grabbing a snack, put her head down on the table where we were sitting. This was like an alarm bell going off in the center. Suddenly there were five folks around us, one bringing a cool cloth, one bringing a wheelchair, two helping to get YA into the wheelchair and one poor gal, who was just hovering but didn’t seem to have a specific job. YA actually lost consciousness for a second in the wheelchair.
The phlebotomist (what a great word) who had done my draw was the one who appointed himself as YA’s guardian while she recovered. He was very knowledgeable and answered all our questions. OK, all of my questions. He was very clear about what he was doing and how long before the next “check-in”. It was very comforting for the anxious mother. YA stayed reclined for about 45 minutes before we took off. She wanted Taco Bell on the way home and then she spent the rest of the afternoon in bed, watching tv.
I asked if this has soured her on giving blood. She said she doesn’t think so. Guess we’ll know in another six weeks or so!
The plan was just to go into my local Aldis, get the shredded cheddar and a half gallon of milk. I swear.
You know those big cardboard boxes that usually are full of watermelon at this time of year? Or all those bags of freezee-pops? Well, right inside the door was a big cardboard box of cherries. Bag after bag of gorgeous cherries and at a very good price I might add. I was powerless.
Yesterday I pitted all the cherries from one of the bags – chopped up the amount was exactly what I needed for a batch of cherry freezer jam – 6 and a half jars. Fairly quick but the messiest of all the jams I make. I ended up using my Vidalia chopper – it made just the right-sized bits for the jam and it also didn’t spew cherry juice all over the place.
But here’s the kicker; you all know that I didn’t just buy one bag of cherries. I’ve never actually made cherry jam before so wasn’t sure exactly how many cherries I needed. Well now I know. With YA out of town for work, it’s just me and that whole bag of cherries. I suppose I could make more jam but I’m already pushing the limit of how much jam I can eat in a year.
As I was leaving the gym yesterday morning, there was a large group of geese walking away from the building. I’m not sure why but all I could think of was a group of teenagers having just finished a quick basketball game at the gym, heading off for a burger and a pop. Made me laugh.
For a very short time in high school, I was on the track team. Very short. My trail leg didn’t quite clear a hurdle during practice and while it was a life-threatening injury, it was pretty gruesome and it ended my extremely short track career. That was my only foray into team sports.
Trail Baboon 