Fat Friday

     Happy Fat Friday! Or Vendredi Gras as the French would call the day if the French celebrated Thanksgiving. A friend told me on Thanksgiving that he was looking forward the day after: his favorite Friday of the year. A day of no obligations. Meals ready to eat. Just add heat.
     I agreed with him, but as the day progresses, I find I'm doing things here, there and everywhere. I did sleep in an hour. That was a good start. I went to the guest house to stoke the fire. I don't believe in astrology, but I was born under a fire sign so tending a fire is a pleasure. I noticed the bin of burnable trash and decided to reduce that to ash The cardboard boxes burn well, but the junk mail requires poking. Fuel, heat and air, those are the three elements of fire. A judicious poker being the honorary fourth.
    I had bought a new shop vac a few weeks ago, but hated to open the box. These things usually require assembly. But what the heck. If it looked too complicated, I'd just shove it back in the box for another day. But the only requirement was to remove a twist tie from the cord. I plugged it in just to assess the noise level and suction. Not bad, and succulent. I carried it over to the garage, where we would use it mostly for vacuuming out our cars which were sitting right there. Again, I "what the hecked" and vacuumed out the front and back seats. Teresa's car is never dirty. Mine leads a harder life.
     As I was burning trash earlier, I had noticed a postcard from Stephan, a guy I met in Ireland. He seems to travel constantly and sends me postcards. I rescued the card, a nice picture of Edinburgh, and resolved to send Stephan a card even though I haven't been anywhere postcardable. I also owed a note to our hosts for Thanksgiving dinner.
    While I had been vacuuming the cars earlier, I remembered I wanted to fire up the snowblower before I needed it. It always starts easily even with the pull cord, except for the first time after it's been sitting all summer. Sure enough, it wouldn't start. There are four different steps. I did them all four times. I pulled the plug. It had spark. The fuel tank looked low. I got the extension cord to use the electric start. Bang! she started. When it it's ten below with a foot of snow on the driveway. Future Joe will thank me for taking care of this.
     Thank goodness for days like this with no obligations. I get so much done.

I cleaned the beach, assembled the chair, and distilled this gin.

Holiday Tour

This is not funny!

   Thanksgiving gets little respect. I've heard many otherwise sensible people say that Thanksgiving should be moved to mid-October like in  Canada. But that's not going to happen. We are never going to copy the Candians in anything, though we should copy them in many things.
   People complain that the Christmas hubbub starts right after Halloween. Thanksgiving is only tolerated for its long weekend; our only dedicated four day weekend of the year. Those four days tempt people to travel further than they should. For what? A turkey dinner? A fine turkey dinner can be had much closer to home. Everyone should stay off the roads. There's a lot of crazy people out there.
   Halloween is the appropriate start of the Season of Light. By early October we've finally accepted that summer is gone and won't be back for a long, long time. This is scary. Unseen forces are shortening the days. Darkness extends its realm. We don masks for a day in a pathetic attempt to frighten away the monsters that may be coming, forgetting for a night the monsters that are already here. We eat a bunch of candy which makes us feel worse. That's Halloween.
    A bit further back we had Labor Day, the very first made-to-order three day weekend. It was a supposed end mark of the summer season. A sop to the working man who must return to his job after spending the summer at his rented beach cottage. No one complained that the stay at the beach only lasted a week. No one complains that it took a depression and a world war to bring about changes that gave the working man enough money for a week in a cottage. And now his wife must work too to affard the week at the beach, and the kids are left on their own. Mother and dad go their separate ways. Beach house is turned into condos. That's Labor Day.
     earlier in the year, summer got rolling on The Fourth of July, even though the days are getting shorter by then. We set off fireworks to remind us of the wars that set us free. It's a follow-up to Memorial Day, which honors the troops that fought in those wars. Memorial Day is not that important a holiday because it shifts around to the nearest weekend. I'm all in favor of that. It's like Presidents Day. Couldn't Washington and Linclon have been born on the same Monday? Their birthdays are so close. They were so indispensable to the country's survival. Maybe they'd pull the turf tighter over their heads if they could see us know.
     And don't let us forget St. Patrick's Day. A sign of spring, of shamrocks and flowing streams of Guinness. By some incredible quirk of Irish luck, the Saint's day falls on the day the British occupiers sailed out of Boston Harbor in 1776. They had been under siege all winter until Washington mounted cannons captured at Fort Ticonderoga upon Dorchester Heights overlooking the city. The British agreed to leave without burning the city if Washington agreed not to sink their ships. The British might have left on the 16th, but by the aforementioned Irish luck, they sailed on the 17th. That day became a civic holiday in Boston. It still is. No school! Yahoo! We always went to the big parade in South Boston, which has since sadly moved to the weekend.
     Valentine's Day? A special day for lovers. I guess that's all of us, or should be. Which brings us back to New Year's Eve. The lights of Christmas are going out. Let's have one more blowout before confronting the darkness that stretches endlessly ahead.

The Italians Have Twice As Many

Eat Your Oatmeal

     On September 9, 1973, I was standing next to my new wife, Teresa, at her parents farm near Roseau, MN. We had been married the evening before and were opening our gifts under the oak trees in front of the house on this beautiful Sunday morning. We had just opened our fifth toaster, four of which we would later exchange at the local hardware store. Actually we should have kept them all since a toaster only lasts ten years. We would be on our last one now.
     Then we opened a package containing a Betty Crocker's Cookbook. Someone said, "It even has a recipe for oatmeal!" Two of Teresa's aunts snickered to themselves. "Oatmeal! Uff da, who vould need a recipe for oatmeal?" Well I would, for one. But I kept quiet. These aunts were formidable farmwives, used to cooking large joints of beef and unmentionable parts of pigs. They probably had twelve-quart kettles of oatmeal simmering on the back burner right now.
     I felt bad for my cookbook and slid it under a couple of toasters. I could make a sandwich or a salad. Bacon and eggs was intuitive, but anything more complicated would need a guidebook. Over the years I learned a lot from Betty Crocker, but every time I opened the book, I was reminded of that slapdown in '73.
     Just last night I was making biscuits. I only make biscuits every few months so I needed the recipe. I do make oatmeal fairly often. I use a half cup of water and a half cup of oatmeal. Add the oatmeal to boiling water and simmer until the water's absorbed. I like a chewy oatmeal. With brown sugar and cream it's the perfect bedtime snack, but that's just me. I know different people have other preferences. I decided to see what Betty recommended.
      I was shocked to find there was no recipe for just plain oatmeal. Oatmeal cookies, yes, and muffins, etc., etc. All these years I'd been living a lie. Or at least a fib. As I cast my mind back to that Sunday norming so long ago I saw her standing there. There was Betty herself in the back row of onlookers, smiling sardonically. "Read the box, Joe," she said. "Just read the box."

Recipe for mushy oatmeal.

Environmentally Sound

     My mother used to ask me to put the kettle on for her. When it began to whistle, she'd come to the kitchen to make her cuppa tea. My mother had a choice collection of sayings and I'd often hear her call out, "You made an enough for an army!"
    I've carried this practice into adulthood. When I put the kettle on for a cup of tea, it feels too light. Once it boils, it feels too heavy. Does heat have weight? I decided to get scientific. I've started weighing the kettle and water before I put it on the burner. I will train the muscles of my left arm, my kettle arm, so those muscles will know, without interference from the brain, just how much water my oolong will take.

Tea for Two

Common Clay

     This past April I attended a game at Fenway Park, something I hadn't done in a long time. My brother-in-law Pete bought the tickets, my sister Mary-Jo bought the beer, the Sox won by a lop-sided score: it was great.
    But as we left the park, I saw something that disturbed me. A crowd was waiting by an overhead door in the back wall of the park hoping for a glimpse of the players as they whizzed by in their limos.
    When I was a kid, we were likely to see the players on the same trolley as us, headed for home. During the off-season, the players worked as short-order cooks or carpenters. What has happened? We've become a nation of silly adulators. Most disturbing.

Former Sox utility player.

A Photo Journey Up The Roseau River

   
       It's been dry this August and the little river by our place which usually has a few inches in it, has dried up into a series of shallow pools. This is the South Fork of the Roseau River which begins a few miles southeast of us and runs mostly north through Roseau then mostly west (and north) into Manitoba, finally ending up in Hudson Bay.
     I called my travelling companion Steve and asked if he'd like to walk upstream on the dry parts of the river. I suggested he wear his Mucks boots and bring along his waders in case we ran into some deeper areas.

         That's not Steve over my shoulder, but my waders. Steve had bought his waders a couple of years ago and has never worn them. This might be his waders' lucky day. I decided to start our trek upstream and away from Hudson Bay. 

     After Steve picked me up we drove over to my neighbor Frank's place. We parked at the end of an overgrown road. This road leads to an abandoned farmstead, "The Old Palm Place," where Steve's great-grandfather lived. The road was thick with ferns and we had to climb over several blowdowns.

         All that remains of the bridge to the farmstead are some pilings and the stones that were rolled down the bank to prevent erosion. We headed upstream crossing the shallow pools that alternated with sandbars. The most amazing sight was the hundreds of little frogs pouring off the sandbars and into the pools as we approached. Had they turned and attacked us in a mass, we would have been in trouble.

     One pool contained dozens of black insects, swimming rapidly round and round. If you didn't know any better, I thought, it wouldn't be so bad to be a bug swimming in a pool on a hot August day.

    Closer to the old farm there was a pile of rocks that had been cleared from the fields and rolled down the bank by the industrious Palms. There were also several pieces of broken machinery.

     There was one long stretch that was completely dry, like a sandy path through the woods. This is a nice place to canoe when there's a few inches of water.

     By now we had had enough.  Man those waders were heavy! We climbed up into a wheat field and made our way back to Steve's vehicle. He had brought along a couple of cans of Cwikla beer, God love 'im, which we consumed on the spot. Cwikla beer is named in honor of neighbor Frank. Back in the days when Frank was farming, he would sometimes stop by my place. After a bit of chat he'd ask if I'd like a beer. Sometimes the cans had been rolling around so long in the back of his truck, you couldn't tell what brand it was. Nothing wrong with Brand Anonymous, I always say.

How to Sing in an Irish Pub

   Four years ago at about two in the afternoon, I chanced to enter Dick Mack's Pub in the town of Dingle on Ireland's beautiful west coast. Dingle is smaller than my home town of Roseau, Minnesota (pop. 2050) but it has lots more pubs (40) and way more tourists (hundreds of thousands).
     Dick Mack's is one of my favorite pubs. It's in all the guide books so it gets lots of tourists, but it's somehow managed to retain it's authenticity. However you won't want to go in there on a weekend night.  It's a mob scene. But an early afternoon is the perfect time to stop in for a pint and a chat with the other tourists who've made their way there from all over the world or maybe even from your old neighborhood back home.
     Now on this particular day at Dick Mack's, a portly old fellow was inviting people to "give us a song." He even looked at me as I walked in, but when I didn't take the bait, he moved on. He got a  young woman to sing an Irish ballad, and I thought, "She's brave to expose herself like that."
     The host looked at me again. This was my big chance. I had always fantasized about singing in an Irish pub, but I chickened out and recited a short Irish poem. The man waved me away in disgust and found another woman, who started singing "Edelweiss." The crowd joined in. Edelweiss! Apparently you could sing anything you wanted in any key. I slunk away, my pint of Guinness unordered, unearned.
     Over the next four years I polished my repertoire, picturing myself back at Dick Mack's, singing my song. receiving a polite smattering of applause, and ordering a well deserved pint. And wouldn't you know, just this past July, I found myself back in Dingle along with 50 or so of my nearest and dearest.
     Early one afternoon, my sister Mary-Jo and I stopped in at Dick Mack's. Some of our group were already there  chatting with a guy from Boston. An elderly couple started playing fiddles behind us. They weren't particularly good and we continued our chat. "Shush!" said the woman. "It's traditional to be quiet when someone's playing." "Yes, if you're bloody Yo-Yo Ma," I wanted to say.
     We took our pints and entered the snug which is a little room at the end of the bar where the women sat back in the days when it was considered improper for a lady to be seen drinking in a pub. We snickered into our stout as the old couple sawed away. This was the first time I'd ever been shushed in a pub. Unbelievable!
     So the week passed away and on my last night in Ireland, I was sitting in McCarthy's, our favorite non-touristy pub. McCarthy's is far enough up the hill above town that few tourist make it there, but it's the first pub down the hill into town from our residential compound. Ennaways, I was sitting there with my brothers Steve and Mark, and it was a bit after eleven when Mark nodded toward the corner. Two women were taking out their instruments, a fiddle and a concertina.
     They were quite good and we stopped talking as they played a series of jigs and reels. The pubs close at twelve. At 11:45, Daniel, the proprietor, closes one of the two half doors as a signal that the end is near. At twelve he closes the other half, but it's ok to linger awhile and finish your drink.
      We chatted with the women when they took a break. They were from Dublin. They had both been musicians earlier in life, but had let it slide. They had recently started taking classes to polish up their playing which is how they met. It's traditional in Ireland for musicians to just set up in a corner and eventually someone will buy them a drink. If they're any good that is. They had never been in McCarthy's before.
     The doors to the pub were closed when one of the women asked if we'd give them a song. Of course we would. When my brother Steve was a kid, he had bought an album of Old West songs. One we liked and had memorized was about Cole Younger and his raid with Jesse James on the Northfield Bank. I started off and Mark joined me. Steve decided to shush. There was one other couple at the bar and they slid closer to observe the outcome.  Mark's a good singer and there was applause at the end. After some more chat, we were asked for an encore. I was ready with "The Buffalo Skinners," another favorite from the Old West. This time Mark shushed too.
     Now it was time to go. The two women may have stayed for another round. I don't know. The other couple from the bar were heading up the hill, when suddenly the woman was running past us back to the pub. Daniel was waiting outside with her phone.
     Meanwhile my brother Steve had made an Irish exit, zipping up the hill without taking leave. We joined the young couple. They were Irish and had just gotten married in New York. They were on a mini-moon here in Dingle. Kevin, the groom, thanked us for our songs and said he wished he had the courage to sing in public. His wife, who had one of those traditional Irish names I have trouble remembering, said that was true, that he had always wanted to sing in a pub. Mark and I asked him to give us a song.
    We followed behind the couple on the narrow sidewalk as Kevin sang a lovely song about people leaving home in Ireland and arriving at Ellis Island. His voice was a bit quavery because he was nervous, but he did a fine job. It was a lengthy song and as we reached our turning, Mark nudged me and we followed along till Kevin finished his song. We applauded, and I only wished I had a pint to hand him, we enjoyed it that much.
     So I managed to sing in a pub after all; one more thing added to my lifetime list of accomplishments. What's next? Perhaps I'll take up the uilliann pipes. Shush!

In front of McCarthy's