Cicada Summer

Forty or more years after the fact, if I happen to catch the blaring of a guitar tract unmistakably Foghat (Slow Ride) or a lick from Peter Frampton, I am reminded of Homan Hall - usually 12:40 AM when one of my dorm mates down the hall cranks up his large stereo system to shake the cinder block walls.  What is now merely a reminiscence of undergraduate youth, was back then an annoying disturbance before the next morning's chemistry class.  Studying for physics, calculus and chemistry back in the 1970's, I had to ask - Why pump up the stereo in the small hours of the morning in a dorm full of students?  

Tibecen sp. perched on flowering Brown Eyed Susan
in Suneson's backyard, August, 2019.

Now, long gone from the haunts of campus, I find myself 1,335 miles away, living in suburban North Texas.  There are some things that I immediately took a shine too in Texas, of course barbecue and its culture, Tex-Mex cuisine, fire flies and impressive springtime thunderstorms.  Some other things I have come slowly to appreciate, and some that I just plain have had to get used to over the years.  A hot and humid Texas summer is one of those things that is just a natural fact, and something you have to get used to - no real sense in complaining.  I've recently become aware of the growing fondness I have developed for a suburban Texas summer phenomena, the local "locust" or more entomologically correct, the Cicada.  The cacophony of shrill, metallic trilling and throbbing coming from the tree tops is as much a part of a typical hot summer Texas July day as Foghat's Slow Ride was a part of life in Homan Hall when I was trying to get some sleep.

The cicadas incessant songs are mostly a display to attract a mate, and in answer to my question back in the '70's; Why Foghat turned up to volume 11 at 12:40 AM?  I think the answer is the same - the bigger the stereo systems, the louder the trilling and throbbing in communal space, the greater the display of virility.  Isn't it always a matter of getting sex?  Same for college boys and Texas cicadas.  Males of all species are so simple.

It is official that the State Insect of the Lone Star State is the Monarch butterfly, and who doesn't like the Monarch?  But I think the Lone Star Locust is deserving up runner-up, the silver medal, for the State Insect of Texas.  The cicadas measuring in at 2-inches from proboscis to wing-tip, sits tall in the saddle on an insect scale, they are loud and proud and dominate the auditory landscape across Texas' hot afternoons when that space is left open for mad dogs and Englishmen.  They are pure Texas in my opinion.  I'd give 'em full credit for making a run for top billing as State Insect of Texas.

I've grown to marvel at summer's sexual symphony synonymous with simmering sun.  With parallax heat waves rising from the suburban concrete sidewalks in combination with the chorus of clamoring cicadas, I know I am smack dab in the heart of Texas.  I've grown to appreciate it; Cicadas songs along with those of Aerosmith, Frampton and Foghat.

Specific identification of this species of Texas cicada is unknown by me,
but I root for this gal being a Dog Day Cicada (Tibicen spp.) because that is a cool name to have 

On this mid-August afternoon, the cicadas are mostly silent, I listen and hear only the brief, lonely buzz of a forlorn long-lived individual in his depopulated tree.  Their life cycle above ground is but a flash on a summer's day.  By this time of the season they are mostly gone, I miss them.  But I will enjoy their full throated (tymbral) return with the humidity and high heat telling me it is summer in Texas.  Appreciate it, or might I say; Take a slow ride, take it easy.



https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GcCNcgoyG_0

Can't Mail It In

On the cusp of another July/August transition, it is not the ideal time to do yard chores and outdoor projects.  Never-the-less, not to be totally daunted by the high humidity and the searing sun raising the stakes at around 100 degrees; there comes a time when things just gotta get takin' care of.

Inspired by my wife's intensity to drastically trim back the "Green Monster" (not the left field wall in Fenway Park), a Lady Banks Rose bush that I mistakenly planted along the driveway with the expectation that it would fill-in nice greenery between the pickets in our iron fence.  It quickly took over a third of the driveway's width and extended its long green tentacle canes for 8 or 10 feet upward; leaving just a thicket of deadwood along the fence and bustling at the top with Little Shop of Horrors our-of-control greenery.  Over several days Sue clipped nearly every last one of those green canes and all of the deadwood on evenings, mornings and on her days off.  We hauled a brush pile estimated to be over 500 pounds to the curb for the city to take away.  With the taming of the rose, she suggests it's my turn to do some of the needed yard work.

First up - those rusted off welds on some of the iron pickets means that the pickets are no longer firmly attached to horizontal cross pieces, which in turn means that our clatter of tortoises or any guest dogs [see A Wedding Wrapped in a Circus with a Silver Lining, 11/10/2018] are capable of finding a weakness in the perimeter and disappearing into the Texas sunset.  When discovered, these loose pickets had been secured by electrical tape and baling wire.  A more permanent solution is required, and that involves drilling a 1/8" hole through the iron picket and crossbar and securing them with a #10, 2" bolt and a nut.  I broke all 5 of my 1/8" drill bits on this project.  A hop over to Home Depot to replenish my wood drill bits allowed me to encounter a specifically designed 1/8" metal drill bit.  It worked like a charm.  Pouring sweat in the noonday sun, I threaded the last bolt through my slickly drilled holes and the job is finished.

One more top item on the summer honey-dos, refurbish the mailbox.  It has stood in front of our house through sizzling heat and cobblestone ice, through dusty drought and furious flood and it was more than beginning to show the effects.  A new wire brush to work off some of the rust and a can of shiny black Rustoleum spray paint and I think I can upgrade the curb appeal to ol' 2725 in no time.  Only problem, Home Despot has had a run on the supply of adhesive numeral 2.  Dang, I'll need four of those number 2's.  I go next door to Lowe's, and they have enough adhesive numerals to sponsor Sesame Street for a fortnight.

Reading the spray paint instructions on the label, I am advised "not to use in humidity above 55% or in temperature conditions between 40 and 90 degrees (F). Ha!! Might as well say, "Do Not Use In Texas In Months That Do Not Contain the Letter "R"!  I'm a rebel and I have a to-do list in this damnable heat and humidity; neither rain, nor snow, gloom of night nor heat and humidity will stop stay me from my appointed rounds.  The US Mailbox will be refurbished!

BEFORE

This is a project that one can not just mail it in.  You have to be committed.

AFTER

 [Now, if I pass out from heat stroke, the ambulance will be able to find the address of our house]

Planes, Trains & Automobiles (with a Little Sole at the End)

Now - for something a little different...

I, like most Americans, rely heavily on my private automobile to get me almost everywhere of importance.  Now, I love the independence of putting the keys in the ignition and pulling on to the open road, I can get about anywhere that I want to be.  Getting behind the wheel is a great feeling (only better if not everybody else was doing the same thing and putting their traffic on my roads).

I know there are other ways to get to Point B; slower, more expensive and less convenient, never-the-less, there are ways.  I have discover yet another way myself, my discovery was purposeful and planned, it was slower, less convenient (but one always pays for convenience you gotta know), and cheaper.  I had family business to attend to in NW Washington in early June.  I was dropped off at DFW Airport where I boarded a non-stop Alaskan Airlines flight to Seattle.  It took 4 hours to fly Dallas to Seattle. It took the better part of an hour to get off the plane, navigate out of the satellite terminal and ride the shuttle bus to the car rental agency.  I picked up my reserved rental car and headed south 41 miles to Tumwater (the drive took 2 hours) where my sister had supper and my parents waiting for me.  Family matters managed in Tumwater and also points north on our Pilchuck Creek homestead and a layover with family in Anacortes and La Connor. 

The wife would be otherwise engaged when I returned, so I was told to find a way home without her.

Mischief managed, I  drove back to Sea-Tac Airport and turned in my rental car. Thus a 41 mile first leg of my return journey using an automobile. I arrived in plenty of time to wait comfortably to fly on the airplane.  Once airborne, I had a window seat and could watch 10,000 feet below for landmarks to let me know where in the USA I was.  Mt. Rainer was easy to spot, Mt. St. Helens was another easy ID, and with Mt. Hood in the distance I could see we were flying toward the Columbia River.  We crossed the Columbia in Eastern Washington and I could see the basaltic landscape of Southern Idaho.  It was a thrill to fly directly over the distinctively upturned Mesozoic beds cut by the Green River in the eastern reaches of Dinosaur National Monument.  I could have put a pinpoint right in the spot where we camped as newlyweds back in 1986 where those tilted rock formations were breached by the river.  I could spot the Great Salt Lake to the south and then we cut across the northern Rockies and headed down the eastern slope where I could set the volcanic crater of Capulin Volcano National Monument in northern New Mexico.  The plane banked and we flew over Amarillo and began our approach to Dallas.  All of these landmarks I knew well from the vantage threw my windshield over my years of roadtrip travels.

One on the ground in Dallas, I climbed the stairs in Terminal E to catch the Skyway Tram on the upper level and ride it to Terminal A.  Disembarking from the Skyway Tram, which was a new experience for me, I went hiking in search of the DART (Dallas Area Rapid Transit) Train station.  I bought a $5 fare and waited a few minutes when the arriving Orange Line opened its doors and I took a seat, one of five to board DART at that hour.  Tens of thousands of people a day come to DFW, but I'd guess only a score or two come on the DART Train. The Orange Line pulled out of the station and wound its way to downtown Dallas, where I transferred to the Blue Line which was bound for downtown Garland.  The DART train ride from airport to hometown was 1:55.  By car it would have been around 45 minutes.

So far today's journey has been in a (rental) automobile, a plane, an electric tram, and a commuter train.  Once I got off the DART train at the Garland stop, it was another 2.6 miles to home.  Some of the day's mode's of transportation were either new or arguably exotic, but for the final leg, it was sole power, something I've been doing most of my life.  With my minimal luggage strapped to my back, I walked off into the sultry Texas night, covering the final leg of my route in 51 minutes.

Planes, Trains, Trams and Automobiles and some old fashion hoofing it.

As always, Enjoy The Journey - which ever way you choose to take it. 

The Clatter - Hat and Tortoises

 If you have a group of cattle, you've got a herd.  If you are visited by a bunch of black crows, you have experienced a murder of crows; likewise, a group of whales is a pod.  So what do you have when you have a group of tortoises?  We aptly refer to our group of tortoises collectively as the clatter.

This bright morning in May, I come into the sunlit dining room and look out across my spread, casting a proud and watchful eye on my clatter as I properly drizzle the Cholula hot sauce on my two eggs over easy. There is a saying in these parts, "All hat, no cattle".  It is not a good thing to be labeled as such. One does not want to be found to look the part, only to be revealed to be a pretender.  A shallow facade. A fake.

Here at the Suneson spread, we are the real deal.  Sure as shootin' we harbor no hollow boast under our hat.  I have the Hat AND I have the Clatter.

A proud Tortman - Runnin' four head of tortoise on his spread.
No Idle boast, Hat and Torts guarnan-damn-teed. 

I finish my eggs and Texas toast, wash up the dishes and step out the back door to check on the clatter.  Though you say they are only ponderous reptiles, I say, as a decades long tortman, that these fellows have their own inquisitive personalities and are surprisingly spry.  And just like cows gather around the rancher's truck when he drives into the pasture, my clatter comes a moseyin' toward me when I step into their yard.  I do not like to disappoint my boys, so I usually have saved up melon rinds, lettuce or bok choy for them to graze upon when we meet and greet one another.  It makes a tortman proud to have his clatter gather 'round him.

(L to R) Morph, Li'l Tex and Chomper munch their greens.

This particularly fine May morn, I fetched half a head of romaine out of the crisper and sauntered out to feed the clatter some treats.  They were all out and each expressed joy in seeing me come their direction.  I parceled out lettuce leaves to Isaac, Chomper, Morpheus and Li'l Tex. 

Chomper tucks in to his Romaine vittles 

Mr. Morpheus

I bid them all a fond farewell and remind them that I'll be back before sundown to check on them and make sure these guys (especially Chomper) have not set to rasslin one another and have gotten somebody flipped over onto his back.  It happens sometimes on the range.





















A group of tortoises is known as a clatter.   
[So designated by Susan Suneson]

A Fine Day for a Cardoon

So... What is a cardoon?

What's a cardoon?

I'd never heard of a cardoon.  My bet is most folks have never heard of a cardoon either.  But we've had one at our house a few years, just lurking next to our driveway - surprise! We are the only cardoon house on the block.  The wife has a soft spot in her heart for those misfit botanical specimens, those plants with unrecognized uses and of dubious origins that come with questionable utility.  When one of the local plant nurseries offered a special on some such small, wilting, unsold potted plant; she of course asked what is this?  The knowledgeable sales woman said "I don't really know, it may be a French artichoke."  Sounded like enough of a misfit that the wife paid good money for it and she came home and put it the earth.

Last year, she harvested the tiny, tight thistle heads and steamed them and painfully (they are definitely in the sharp & pokey thistle family) and laboriously treated them as one would best think a French artichoke should be treated.  We ate the tiny little steamed thistle heads (once we removed the thorny covering) and I said, "Umm - that was 'interesting' dear. Thanks".  This winter, while reading in her Culinary of Spain book, she encountered the description of the exotic cardoon tucked away on some obscure page and it sounded suspiciously like what was sitting behind our house.  Did we really have a French artichoke in our garden?  Or, maybe it was something else.  Ah Ha! It's cover has been blown, it has been revealed to be from Espana not France.  She called her brother, a professor of Botany at Midwestern University in Wichita Falls and had him do his research on cardoons and when he came for a visit in April, he confirmed our suspicions, "You're definitely growing a cardoon".


What do you do with a cardoon, now that you have a healthy cardoon growing next to the Globe artichoke?  I have a plan for this very nice first Saturday in the merry month of May.

I will go and enjoy touring the Cottonwood Art Festival and get artistically inspired by the booths of painters, potters, jewelers, fabricators and assorted artisans, then I will come home and make a nice grilled dinner to complement the cardoons.  That evening, after the harvest, we dined on fresh steamed cardoon stalks (eating only that part below the spiky thistle heads) drenched in garlic butter and pared with an effervescent French white wine from the Loire Valley.



So, what is a cardoon?  It is a delectable misbegotten vegetable that tastes like an artichoke that makes for a fine finish to a perfect day of wandering art displays and grilling steaks with fire and smoke and sharing a good bottle with the girl who loves to plant unknown, unloved, spiny little plants and put them on my dinner table.

I'm wondering - did Paul Simon on his Graceland album, record the lyrics to a song on that album that goes; "I don't want to end up a cardoon in a cardoon graveyard"?  Maybe Paul knows about cardoons.  If you play the Graceland album backwards you can hear a secret message; "Paul is dead wrong about French artichokes".  

Snow White Texas Spring

Arriving home on a late Spring day, I turn into the driveway from the back alley and in the light breeze my vision is filled with a flurry of flittering, floculating flakes. The air is filled with white as if I am caught in a late Spring snow shower  - or so it seems.

If I let my imagination run away to the northern latitudes (where I am sure they would not welcome a late March frozen flurry); I can imagine these pure white blossoms being plucked by the breeze from my backyard Moonlight Pear tree as March snow.  My back lawn, alley and the driveway are covered by the small white petals, looking like the driven snow.  Neither pear blossoms, nor a Spring snow in Texas, lasts long.  The winds disperse the petals and they soon wither and shrivel and are not noticed soon after they fall from the branches.  But for a brief and shining white moment, the small world around the pear tree is a surprising sight, a winterish wonderland strewn with snow white petals.

Makes me wonder where have all the flower children and pollinators gone?

Snow white pear blossoms
before they fall into the spring breeze and
cover the world around the tree's roots in white

In a few months we will have some small, hard Moonlight pears
not too good for eating, but they can be cooked into a very sweet,
honey-like compote that goes well with cheese cake

Tulips Gone Down to Texas

Mid-March is Texas Tulip Time.  

Seems like I just packed away the Christmas bulbs and just when I turn around, out comes the Spring tulip bulbs!  With a bright Spring late afternoon sun, the sun's rays were vividly illuminating the unfurled petals of recently planted tulip bulbs transplanted from Mom's Montana garden.

Glory in the afternoon sun
Texas tulips brighten the front porch in the middle of March

It was a frenzied October when 7 of the greater Suneson family gathered to pack up the contents of the parent's lake house in Polson, Montana.  Mom and Dad had decided it was best for them to move to their chosen retirement living center in Tumwater, Washington.  

Of course packing action ensued. Plenty of furnishings, decorator and household items, tools and various sundries were loaded into two Uhaul trucks, one to carry the basic things to furnish the pared-down parent's single bedroom living space, and another truck to carry the 'inheritance treasures' so selected by each member of the two generations descended from Mom and Dad.  I was to deliver each of the desire inheritance items to either of my two sisters or to the 6 grandkids.  One of the last, little noticed items amidst the stuff strewn thickly across the Polson garage floor was a basket of Mom's tulip bulbs.  Sue tells me, "Those (pointing at the basket of dug up bulbs) just have to come with us, your Mom will love to see pictures of them once they've bloomed in our yard in Texas".  As it so happens, there is always enough room on the Treasure Truck to Texas to carry some tulips.

In November, Sue placed the bulbs into the warm, clumping clay that passes for soil here, and then we wait to see what nature brings us in both color and germination.  

So...  this is what we got from Mom's basket of bulbs taken from Montana, through Washington, Oregon, California, Arizona, New Mexico and then to Dallas, Texas in the back of the Treasure Truck.

My wife was right. Mom's enjoyed the photos of her tulips in their new home on the range.  And, sister Sheri planted some of the bulbs in a pot on Mom's new back porch for her to enjoy them there as well.  Tulips make everyone happy.

Tortoise Spring

Isaac declares "Hibernation Over!"
Feed me some dandelions.

It is a remarkable phenomena, the animalistic clock.  Those who are owned by dogs know that their Canine-Americans will always pester for their food at the very same time every day - it is the 'dog clock'.  

Yet, I find it all the more remarkable that in the middle of October, 2018, our two backyard Desert Tortoises came to the patio door, wanting to come inside. Of course we let them in per their request, and they proceeded to march down the hallway into the master bath and plunked themselves next to the commode and quickly settled in for a long winter's sleep, i.e. hibernation.  This hibernation for our pair will last until sometime in the middle of March, about 5 months.

In the interlude while our original locals, Chomper and Isaac, were in deep slumbers, two additional Desert Tortoises were acquired from my sister in Fresno, California.  We're now runnin' four head of tortoise on our Texas parcel. [We believe a group of tortoises should be referred to as a 'clatter of tortoises']

Back in October I had removed Isaac from his drop-zone next to the commode into his custom-built hibernation box in the corner of the kitchen dining nook (spice maple wood construction that matches the kitchen cabinets). However, I left Chomper fast asleep next to the commode, with his head tucked into the scrub-brush receptacle behind the toilet.  I thought it was kind of charming to have a Desert Tortoise as part of the WC decor. 

Chomper backs out of his WC
Hibernation Location

Slow Forward...

Early Saturday morning, March 9, Chomper begins to stir from his catatonic state beside our porcelain stool and backs half-way out onto the WC floor.  We welcome him into Spring 2019; but he is too groggy to pay us much mind.  Then, later in the morning, while making breakfast, Isaac emerges out of his box and into the middle of the kitchen.  Isaac seems more awake than his brother in the bathroom, so Isaac gets moved out onto the lawn to enjoy the 75 degree sunshine and green grass.  Soon after Isaac begins to soak up some rays, one of our new arrival, Vortexia, comes charging out of her cardboard box in the kitchen checking out her new environment.  She too is placed outside to enjoy the spring weather and snack on some tasty dandelions after a 45 minute post-hibernation rehydration water soak and sip in the master bath tub.  This makes 3 of 4 tortoises all coming out of hibernation within a few hours of each other after being oblivious to the world for nearly 5 months.  How do they know? -- Morpheus remains in his hiber-box at the back of the kitchen; doesn't there always seem to be the that 'special somebody' that just didn't get the memo?

Vortexia looks dehydrated after emerging from
hibernation, so she gets a re-hydration soak in the bath tub
before going out to play on the green grass

Mercurial March weather cooled off after Saturday, and everybody went back to bed.  But warmer and sunnier days are a commin' my wonderful hard-backed friends.  And I have some nice lettuce stashed in the fridge planned for y'all, it'll be the  best Tortoise Spring Party.






ps: The perennial scourge of Pharaoh ants came boiling onto our kitchen counter tops that Saturday also.  How do they know?  And boy do I have a surprise (it is not a pleasant one) for these uninvited spring visitors.

Big Announcement that has a Nice Ring to it

While we were all waiting on Saturday February 2nd, Ground Hog's Day, to hear if the ground hog saw his shadow or not - there comes a ring upon Sue's phone with the news.

Grant and Kaileen announce their engagement

Overshadowing any Ground Hog shadow news, was news from our son Grant and Kaileen announcing their engagement to be married.  They had just finished up a wonderful day out in New York City celebrating the grand news with their friends.  Grant had coordinated and schemed for months among their mutual friends to pull off a proposal and a party.  From all accounts, despite his natural anxiety, he managed (with a little help from his friends) to (almost) completely surprise Kaileen and put together a sweet and wonderful event around the momentous moment.  Grant had worked with a distant relative of Kaileen's father, a jeweler, to select and design a suitable ring for his future wife.  He had shown us a photo of the ring at Christmas time while he was in town.  He had craftily hidden the ring in their small Queens, NY apartment and was now waiting for all the needed coordinated pieces to fall into place in order to select the right time to propose.  Many of Kaileen's closest friends were consulted on how to properly do this once-in-a-lifetime kind of event, so secret spreadsheets and secret communications were then woven together over the weeks to make sure everyone could and would be included.  It worked like a charm says Grant's beaming fiancee, Kaileen.

Kaileen professed to be not all that suspicious when Grant suggested that they take a walk by the water-side, and when Kaileen threw on some clothes suitable for strolling along the water in 30 degree weather, Grant tactfully suggested she might want to change into another set of clothes, since they were "going to meet up with a friend later in the day, and he might be taking some photos that he might post on social media sometime later - so maybe you just might want to look a little more arranged just in case you end up in a photo that is shared."  Grant is not usually so sly, but he was primed and ready to do what it takes to make this event a success.

It worked!  She said "Yes", and the score of friends and conspirators that had secretly gathered in the upstairs loft of the Alewife Pub cheered and celebrated and toasted the happy couple.  The event which Grant hosted, was documented by a professional photographer friend from Mizzou.  Kaileen was surprised and said it was the 'best day of my life - just perfect!', while Grant professed relief that it had worked so well, along with all of the other emotions that go without saying.  We got the call with the announcement after all of the Alewife festivities had subsided.

From our end of the ring tone, we are well pleased with the Ground Hog's Day news as we love Kaileen and believe they are a well suited to one another and make a fine couple.  We welcome Kaileen into our family!  This is great news!

******

The next we hear from the couple is that Kaileen has scored some cheap plane tickets from NY to Houston for March 2 - Texas Independence Day; and we were invited to join Kaileen and Grant at her parents home in The Woodlands, about 45 miles north of downtown Houston for a Celebration of the Engagement.  Done.

Kaileen, Grant's fiancee

Sue and I left Friday afternoon to meet up with the Gauls and have dinner together that night.  We picked up Kaileen and Grant Saturday afternoon, to later go out to a marvelous dinner there in The Woodlands, and toast the 'kids' and enjoy the possibilities of their future together and the uniting of the Gaul and Suneson families.  It was a wonderful time, but brief as we had to return to Dallas later on Saturday night.

We took some photos, talked of preliminary ideas for the coming wedding and ate and drank and truly enjoyed the good news and good fortune before us all.

Kaileen flashes her engagement ring
while home with her parents in The Woodlands
for an Engagement Celebration among the Gaul and Suneson Families

Grant and Kaileen enjoying the 70 degree shirt-sleeve Texas Independence Day
weather after flying in from snow-covered New York City

Grant with his smirking fiancee, Kaileen
in front of the Gaul's home

The couple is forced to pose for photos by the future in-laws
along Lake Woodlands before going in to dine and celebrate 

Kaileen's father, Greg, photo-bombs
while Grant and Kaileen are seated on the "selfie bench" art project

Kaileen and Grant
Hand-in-hand, lakeside

Glenda shows Sue a good photo she has captured of  the kids

Newly Engaged

Newly staged

The celebration begins!
Greg and Glenda hosts us all for a fine meal and pleasant talk of the joyous future

A toast!

Just like the Celebration Cake says, "Congratulations"

The details are just starting to be explored and not much has been established for sure; but what we are told is that the wedding will be in the Houston area, aiming for March or April of 2020.  Barbecue will likely be featured for dinner somewhere in this happening.

Cheers! And our love to Grant and Kaileen!

BOOM! Squash!??

Susan walks into the kitchen, reaches for the handle on the oven door, and...
just before she touches it -- BOOM!

She jumps back. "What in the h - e - double toothpicks was that?!
The oven door had just been blown partly open and then snapped back shut right before her eyes.

She again cautiously approaches the oven and gingerly pulls back the door to peek inside.

OMG! It's an IEV.  

In Iraq, American forces faced the threat of IED's (Improvised Explosive Devices) hidden beside common roads.  And here on the home front, we too were taken by surprise in our very own kitchen by an IEV - an Improvised Exploding Vegetable.

The damage was done by a 2.8 pound spaghetti squash.  Sue professes to enjoy eating these stringy, tasteless vegetables as a substitute for gluten pasta.  I had warned her about the dangers of the spaghetti squash, but my culinary warnings went unheeded.

Look! I clamored, it is proof of vegan terrorism, an assault on my plate and palate.  Those innocuous vegetables can not be trusted.  

She just laughed at the carnage. Oh! the humanity!  All from roasting a squash.  This is how kitchen unrest on the domestic front begins, I solemnly warned.  My wife just chuckled, "I should be much more upset at this mess, but this is just too funny".  

"Look, that sucker got blown clean in half. Wow! Amazing."

She went about cleaning and scraping and scrubbing all of the smithereens of tiny, stringy strands of squished squash from the baking racks and the oven's interior with a gleam of wonderment in her eye.  She salvaged much of the well-roasted interior goo, (that was now obviously on the exterior) and cleaned up the rest the best she could.

I told her the battle of the clean oven was lost at this point. I think we will have to use the nuclear option.  Yes, no one has ever felt called to press the red button before, but this time we have no choice but to give the "Self Clean" command and clear out.

She agreed, and I dialed in the code and the 4 hour count-down to total obliterating clean destruction began and we went to bed.

The self-cleaning work was expected to end at 02:35 hours. I awoke at 02:55 and wondered what was going on in my kitchen at this point, so I pushed open the closed kitchen doors and inside the kitchen it must have been 100 degrees and the acrid smell of victory permeated the whole house.   

With the morning light and the cooled kitchen environment visual inspection of the interior was possible to view where the IEV had been planted.  There was nothing but a fine power residue of gray ash inside.  Later in the evening, Sue returned home from work and quickly wiped down the ash-covered interior and proudly showed me our spotless oven's insides.

It was a thing of beauty. 

I got a clean oven, and Sue got a kick out of making a lunch that was the bomb.

It's Christmas! Another Day Another Feast

Christmas Day Dinner is served!

It was to be a casual and easy-going Christmas Day with a feast planned for mid-afternoon.  It would be just the three of us, Balthasar, Melchior and Gaspar - wise guys all, and one who actually came from the East.  Christmas Day promised another menu featuring more of my favorites (since I had a hand in planning the menu - nice how it works out that way as an adult); there would be a rib roast (rare), asparagus, sweet potatoes and a crusty baguette to sop up the oil and vinegar on small plates poured over freshly grated garlic cloves served with a Pinot Noir from Oregon (in honor of our Oregonian daughter who was unable to join the feast here in Texas).

For dessert, we of course could have more than our fair share of Christmas stocking-stuffer candies, but the 'Big To-Do' was to break out the fondue pot and top off the feast with strawberries, pineapple and morsels of angel food cake dipped in the pot of melted dark chocolate and liqueur.

Once the tablecloth is removed - I wouldn't trust myself with messy chocolate either
We dip our tongs of fruit and cake into the molten chocolate
Could be the start of a new tradition

Merry Christmas and to all a good respite!

  

  

Christmas Morning - barely

Grant, home for the holiday, but tagged to put in some hours through Christmas Eve as he worked remotely on his laptop computer and electronically filed his work at Wall Street 24/7 in order to keep the news presses rolling.  Once work was complete, it was Christmas time and time for bed after the Christmas Eve feast.

Following his typical schedule since we was just a small fellow, Grant would be in no rush to trundle downstairs on Christmas Morning to paw through the piles of Santa's largess doled out to every good boy and girl.  The gift of sleeping-in is a now a precious gift and one easily given around here.

Christmas morning would start once all had assembled according to their own schedule, so Christmas Morning was well nigh unto Christmas Afternoon.

It was cool outside on Christmas Day, but not what most Texans would even consider cold, but a request was made for a 'Christmas fire' to blaze away in the living room hearth, and so it was.  Now, the mood is set, let the festivities and the joy begin!

His mother sewed his name over a
Christmas Stocking belonging to his Father.
Traveling light from NYC, Grant did not have a
repository for Santa's gifts on Christmas Morning

Sue gets a couple of bottles of oil and vinegar to
be poured onto a rugose plate of grated garlic cloves.
These will come in handy for the
Christmas Day feast in a few hours.

A good surprise by the guess on Sue's face

Grant gets a single large gift as he is
'carry-on limited'
for his return to New York on the 27th

A dress over coat
Good for his walk from NYC subway to Lexington Ave.

  

Hook 'Em Horns!
Lookin' good for Bevo
Texas will upset and defeat #5 Georgia in Sugar Bowl in a few days.
Must be the new lucky hat

Our Christmas Tree
The boughs are bright and merry
The gifts beneath the boughs have been unwrapped.
It was a good Christmas

As has been my tradition for the past 3 years, I have given some small gifts at Christmas time to my two young Turkish friends, Tahir and Fatih who live next door.  And these gifts have been reciprocated by their mother, Kubra, who bakes us a treat from her kitchen to be delivered by her boys.

This year, Fatih rang our door bell and when I answered, Fatih asked me, "Mark, are you open?"  I told him with a big smile, "Yes, we are open today!"  He stood there on the stoop and looked inside for a while and I tried to make small talk and he looked for a way to gracefully exit and report back to his mother that we were open.  He then decided the time was right, and announced, "I will come to your house with something", and the bolted across the lawn and fallen leaves to his house.  In a few moments, Tahir appeared with a hand made pizza for us and we all thanked him and his brother Fatih who was now hiding behind our front hedge.  We exchanged a wishes for a Merry Christmas and the small Muslim contingent bounded back home.

We will get to that pizza after we have our Christmas Day feast.

Kubra's Christmas Pizza sits on our counter top
as Sue makes homemade eggnog.