Project 52 - Wk 7

We took a little field trip this week and ended up in a mini time machine. We'd heard there were still small meat markets nearby, in Wilber, Nebraska. Wilber is a charming little town that happily proclaims itself to be the Czech capital of the U.S.A. They host an annual festival that clogs the highways and swells the population of the area by thousands. Every one leaves with full tummies and lighter hearts full of music and ancestral pride.

Off "season" it's a modest little town with pretty facades and the most fabulously smoke scented air imaginable. Why? Well, Frank's Smokehouse is one reason. Close your eyes and imagine the best ever combination of wood smoke, cooking meat and spices and there you are. My apologies to vegetarians, this is carnivore country!

Although it's all about the meat here, there are some very cool pieces of kitchen equipment and that didn't come from some faux vintage kitchen kitch shop either. Check out that vintage coke machine. I'm guessing it's been in the shop for about 4o years. The old display cases remind me of the tiny general store in my grandma's little town when I was a kid. There's sausages of every description here, jerky, hocks... anything smoked you can imagine, I'll bet you'd find it.

We didn't get jerky this time, but we'll be back... this doesn't look anything like what's hanging near the check-out stand in WalMart. I don't think you'd see these guys in WalMart or Kroger either.

They also had some really good looking homemade bread and kolache. The smell of fresh bread and smoke in the air is almost criminal. I was wishing I hadn't just had breakfast when I spotted the kolaches. Kolaches? You never heard of kolaches? Fresh and still steaming up their bags. Almost made me wish I had a couple of kids at home to help eat up all the baked goods I wanted to buy. Not really, but almost! We did buy some smoked hocks (the Viking thinks it's time for some potato klub. We'll talk about that one later), some polish sausage, breakfast sausage, burgers and some Czech style potato dumpling that looks like a sausage thing to try. The butcher was cutting for fresh, gorgeous rib eye steaks for another customer, and we'll be back for some of those too!

One last thing that makes Frank's a totally unique little meat shop, is this little stash of hardware behind the register. At Franks, not only can you get meat and major sensory overload, you can also restock your ammo and buy a last minute anniversary gift for your man.

Splurging on Cats

We share our lives with four cats. Our oldest is either 16 or 18, we can't quite remember exactly when we got him. His name is Secret and there's a story that goes along with that. You'll meet Secret on another day. Then there's Franny, Shadow and Luna. Luna's the baby at only 4 years old. Since we've slipped from middle class (according to recent gov't figures middle class is a lower end income of $60,000 which we haven't seen since 2003) to lord knows what we are today, aisde from furry neon mice and catnip, the poor dears don't get too many extravagant treats. That changed today when the Viking got turned loose in a Super Target, on his own, for the first time!

Isn't this a fun kitty gym? It came in a small box and goes together like tinker toys. Shadow was sitting on the sidelines watching, silently snickering as only a cat can when watching clumsy humans trying to put something like this together.

Mere seconds after we put it in place, Shadow strolled over and hopped right it. She's usually the last one to get any treats and the first one to get clobbered, so I was happy she got to scent mark it first! She's very small and easily intimidated. The large red column hovers about half an inch off the ground, but she didn't care and settled right in. Secret made is way over and she stayed her ground, making him leave.
Next up was the most timid, Luna. She started at the far edge and sniffed her way around, investigating thoroughly. She discovered Shadow still inside ( see her gray back side in the cubby?) and she also backed off. Score again for Shadow!

Shadow eventually decided to give it up for a couple minutes and Luna thought she might try out the cubby. She tested it's stability with one paw tentatively touching the floor of the cubby. It swayed slight and she took off like a shot! We further embarrased her by laughing quite loudly.

Only Franny hasn't checked it out, she's too busy holding the bed in place. She's the Queen of the family, so who knows what will happen when she decides to use one of the perches as a throne. Today, they're all living like royalty, and thanks to Target, the Viking doesn't have to work 6 more hours to pay for it!

Spring Geese Migration

Spring is on the way! I saw two huge flocks of geese today, both heading north. I drive by a large rural pond on my way to work each day. This morning, the geese were in progress of just taking off as I went by. It was like being in a scene from The Birds. Amazing. Loud.

Then tonight, a second even larger flock was just passing over my home as I was approaching. There must have been thousands of them, hundreds of V formations in the sky. It's a wonderous thing to behold. This isn't my photo, but it could have been. I plan to have my camera out and ready to go on the seat beside me and maybe, if I'm lucky, I'll get my own shot to share. I love a sky full of flying Vs.

Valentine's Day

Happy Valentine's Day! This lovely card is a 1907 Valentine postcard. The early 1900's were the height of holiday postcards with creative designs and original sentiment. I love the delicacy of this one. Although the celebration of a day set aside for love goes all the way back to medieval church celebrations (as it seems, all holidays do) the Valentine greeting card made it's first appearance in England during the 1840's.

By 1847, Valentines as we know them had jumped the pond and were becoming a successful business for Esther Howland of Worcester, Massachusetts. She is credited for being the first commercial producer of embossed paper lace. According to a Wikipedia article on Valentines, Her father operated a large book and stationery store, but Howland took her inspiration from an English valentine she had received.

Victorian era lover's embraced Valentine cards with the same over enthusiasm they did any other form of art and design, if a little decoration is good, lots more is lots better! They produced some truly magnificent, frothy designs with romantic imagery of doves, cupids, roses, the works. They had breathtaking pop-up cards that are often replicated today.

When I was in grade school, in the 1960's, it was a tradition to have Valentine's parties at school. The American idea of fairness demanded that every child get a Valentine, to avoid crushing little 7 year old spirits. I really disliked giving Valentines to pesky boys, but at least it gave me something to do with the Valentine cards I really didn't care for!

We had fun parties thanks to lucky stay at home Moms who volunteered to be Room Mothers. My own Mom was always a Room Mother, and she did make sure we had fun parties at school with pretty treats. One of the best parts in my memory of Valentine's Day was getting to turn an ordinary shoe box into a magnificent, gaudy, flashy Valentine mail box. Some kids, without shoe boxes, used milk cartons. It didn't matter, they were all things of beauty. I wonder if kids still do that, or has modern life run right over that little joy and kids now have pink plastic mailboxes? Or worse yet, no Valentine's day parties at all for some politically correct reason?

The Better Angels of Our Nature

Today marks the 200th anniversary of Abraham Lincoln's birth. In years past, it's been relatively easy to overlook this date, especially since Lincoln's birthday and George Washington's birthdays got jumbled together into one observation, President's day, for the convenience of workers everywhere.

When did we become too busy, too modern, too thoughtless to allow for the recognition of these transcendent men on days of their own? When did the significant, but truly individual guidance of these men cease to have value on their own?

On this historical anniversary, take a moment to consider the life of Abraham Lincoln. He endures, not just for the way he met challenges in his career that had never before been faced. He endures, I believe, because we feel he remained like us; flawed but doing our best to forge ahead into the unknown, because to stop is unthinkable.

Look at this man, how a short four years of agonizing choices is plainly written on his face. The top photo was taken in 1861, thought to be the first photo of Lincoln as president. The second, taken in 1865, is the last known portrait before his death.

Today, spend a little time at the Smithsonian's online exhibit, Abraham Lincoln, An Extraordinary Life. Read some of the articles and commentary at CNN's From Lincoln to Obama pages.

Perhaps one day we'll recognize Obama as one of those better angels, that remains to be seen. It is enough today, to know that better angels of our nature have existed and will continue to exist, for humanity could not survive without them.

A Sign of the Apocalypse

I know the end of the world is actually nearing. I have an undeniable sign. See, I love chocolate desserts. Pies, cookies, cakes, mocha, brownies, if it's chocolate it's my number one pick. It's been since Christmas that I really indulged my sweet tooth in a big way, so when I saw a recipe entitled Baked Fudge on Pioneer Woman, I was revved up and ready to bake. Tonights dinner was going to end in warm, gooey chocolately goodness.
I followed the directions to the letter. I am an experienced baker and frequently go off the recipe, but I could tell this was one that I needed to stick to closely. I made the thick fudgy batter and loved the deep chocolate aroma. I had the ramekins in the waterbath, just as I should. The idea of breaking through a thin shell of a crust, to delve into warm chocolate heaven was almost unbearable.

The kitchen filled with that heady unmistakeable smell of baking chocolate. I whipped real cream into soft clouds, imagining how the cool creaminess would meld with the warm chocolate. I made some decaf, and knew the weekend would end on a high note.

I carefully eased my spoon through the crispy layer of crust, carefully loading my spoon with rich, gooey chocolate. I made sure I had a little whipped cream, to tease the tip of my tongue. It was going to be wonderful.

It wasn't. It was, well, way too much chocolate. I thought I must be wrong, took a sip of coffee and tried again. Ugh. I really didn't like the texture of the fudgy part. And it was still too sweet. This can't be. So I decided maybe I could salvage the night by just eating the super thin layer of crispy crust. Two more bites. It wasn't working.

How could this be? I've made several of PW's recipes and been happy with them all. Sinfully pleased with her chocolate sheet cake. Happily surprised with her weirdo Bacon Wrap Appetisers. Totally in love with Pastor Ryan's Spicy Orange FGarlic Shrimp . But this, this was just not fair. PW... I counted on you.

I finished off the whipped cream, drank the coffee and called it quits. It was unbelievable. The one and only chocolate dessert that I have rejected in 50 years.

I guess it's really not her fault, but that only leaves one other option. The world is coming to an end.

Project 52 #5 Yipes Stripes

Zebras in Nebraska? In Beatrice,Nebraska? Yes indeed! I'm not a local, so I don't know why they're here, but they are here. Along with several bison, llama, elk and donkeys. Which just goes to show, never say anything is impossible.

Little Joys

This is one of the little joys in my life. Notthing spectacular but, it makes me happy. I like rocks. They're all over my house. One of the best presents I received for Christmas this year was a bag of rocks. Pretty fancy rocks, but rocks all the same. Well, actually, crystals to be more exact. This is a large quartz formation from Arkansas. It's about 4 inches across, with lots of personality. There's some points with rainbow inclusions, some so incredibly small they barely qualify as points and then there are chunky fingers that reach out to grab you. The cluster is sitting on one of my honestly antique books that I love. Enough of worldly doom and gloom. Go find something in your home that brings you a little joy; then come back and tell me about it.

Weird Word Wednesday Rutabaga

Today's word is not so much a weird word, as it is maybe an unusual word. I didn't think this was the case until yesterday when I overheard a conversation about making soup.

One cook insisted that no vegetable soup could be complete without rutabaga and the other had no clue what a rutabaga was. Certianly the use of rutabagas as food has fallen off as we are no longer reliant on only hardy root vegetables through out the winter, but to not know what this is at all?

So, if that could have been you, keep reading.

Rutabaga , (rōō'tə-bā'gə, rŏŏt'ə-, rōō'tə-bā'gə, rŏŏt'ə-) n.

In both senses also called swede, Swedish turnip.

1. A European plant (Brassica napus var. napobrassica) having a thick bulbous root used as food and as livestock feed.

2. The edible root of this plant.

So now you know what it is, you should also know that a rutabaga is one of the hardest substances known to cooks. Trying to cut this monster requires your heaviest chef's knife. And don't even think of trying to get away without peeling. It may be true that most of the nutritional goodies are in the peel, but it's not something anyone would want to ingest. Just trust me.

What do you do with it? Well, I do give in and add it in very small cubes to soup on occasion. Rarely. I hear you can mash it or serve it in a variety of tasty ways, in place of turnips. Since turnips aren't really in my daily recipe file, I'll take someone else's word for it.

I'm not advocating for rutabagas, but I do think people should at least know what they are.

Groundhog Day

Today is Groundhog Day and in the little town of Punxsutawney, PA, an oddball rodent has garnered our attention just long enough to predict another 6 weeks of winter. Of course depending on where you live, it might have been Gen. Beauregard Lee, Woodstock Willie or Staten Island Chuck doing the prediction. And you know what, according to records kept since 1887, the predictions are about 40% accurate. How’s your local meteorologist compare to that?

So, how on earth did civilized people in two countries come to decided that a groundhog would be the ideal predictor of weather? Did you even know that Canada also has Groundhog Day? Well, they do.

It seems that Groundhog Day stems from a Western European, probably German, tradition that timed the emergence of hibernating bears or badgers to the end of winter. If the day was sunny, there would be six more weeks of winter. As immigrants always do, they had to make do with what they found in their new homeland. With a shortage of bears, they settled on big rodents.

That’s one theory anyway. More likely in my mind is the correlation of Groundhog Day to the ancient pagan traditions of Imbolic and Christian celebration of Candlemas on Feb 2. The ancient church adapted many pagan celebrations into their calendar, simply because they couldn’t totally get the newly converted pagans to give up their parties! Feb 2 is the day dedicated to the Irish pagan goddess Brigid and also the day ancient Christians recognized as the purification of Mary, 40 days following the birth of Jesus. The symbols of both celebrations involve purification ; candles, spring cleaning, turning over the fields to prepare for spring, fire, hearth, cleansing of the body and spirit. Conveniently, this day also comes midway between winter solstice and the spring equinox.

So, in a round- about way, Groundhog Day is the perfect day for a funny, goofy celebration in the middle of cold, dark season that almost always lasts another 6 weeks, but reliably dissolves into spring.

Project 52 - The road home

I have a gypsy spirit. I don't know how I came by it, but it's as much a part of me as breathing. I always wonder what's over the hill, even when there is no hill. It's led me to have more than 13 addresses as an adult and I'm reasonably sure there's a couple more to come.

This shot was just before sunset, on my way home from work. I didn't think the camera would even focus, since I was driving and holding it with one shaky hand. I do love the traffic here.

Memories of Another Time

My poor, frozen sister is home in Arizona again. She made good use of her time here.She came with the intention of visiting with our uncle and hopefully being able to scan the small number of family photos and documents he had collected through the years. Almost 1500 individual scans later, she breathed a huge sigh of relief and was done. With only one night's sleep and then off to the airport,she sure has earned her rest. I wish she could have stayed longer.

It will be a while before she manages to rename and organize her files, make an index and then bless everyone in the immediate family with this massively impressive archive of our Tollman/Anderson ancestors. For anyone who's interested, here's a tiny peek at the wonders to come.

Meet my maternal great grandfather, James Mundy Tollman,at age 17 in 1893. He's an ambitious young man, soon to become a western Nebraska homesteader in 1899. One day, he'll be father to four children. I wonder what he was thinking this day. He's certianly handsome, isn't he?

Project 52- Week 3

Winter in Nebraska takes many forms; snow has it's own personality. This morning we awoke to a light, gently falling peaceful snow, just the kind of snowy memory my Arizona sister needed to take home with her. No harsh wind and a balmy 14°.This isolated scene is outside the town I live in and captures rural midwestern winter in my mind's eye perfectly.

We had plans to have brunch with relatives in a nearby town. On the way home we did a little detour to the small town where our Dad grew up. My sister hasn't had too much excitement on her visit; for most of the week either the Viking or I have been seriously flattened by a virus. Fortunately she's escaped and I recovered enough by Saturday that we did a little antique shop memory hunting and wandering around ancestoral stomping grounds.

Doorknobs

It's funny how the littlest of things can elicit memories. Who would have guessed that both my sister and I would have such a fondness for old door knobs?

She's visiting this week and we were able to spend time in our grandparent's old home. It was built in the early 1900's as the Friendship Church of God, and became their home in 1951. Much of the house remains the same, all these years later, the things we remembered most as kids.

My sister and I were both elated that the elegant orignal glass door knobs we both remembered were still there. I honsetly expected to discovered that other relatives had taken them off. The home is still in the family and used as an office.

We grew up in a typical 60's era tract house. For me, at least, visiting the grandparent's on their farm became almost as much a trip to soak in more of the house as it did to see family.
This this most unusual house full of glass door knobs,
arched doorways and wooden trim was so different than my own, it was like venturing into another world. Today was a day for time travel.

Pink Glasses

Aren't these the most fun glasses ever? Well, they are if you're a crazy cat lady! I think they may be the wildest glasses I've ever worn, and I've had some colorful one's since "readers" became a mandantory part of my wardrobe. These little beauties were tucked into my Christmas stocking by an equally crazy cat lady.

The way I see it, if you're going to be over 50 and have to wear readers over your contacts to use the computer or read anything, you might as well have a sense of humor about it all. Besides, the "meow,meow" and "here kitty, kitty" all over them distract everyone from noticing that the crinkles around my eyes aren't quite fulfilling the promises of renewal made by Oil of Olay, just yet anyway.

Project 52

There's a lot of buzz these days about Project 365, Project 52 and others I can't even remember. They basically all boil down to the same thing, creating a photo record of your life. The photo a day Project 365 just sounds like too much to me so I'm going to go with the 52, one photo a week idea. Ideally, I'll get them digitally scrapped too.

I think it's interesting that all around me EVERYONE, whether I know them in person or just cruise their blog is getting turned on to doing more with their cameras this year. On almost the same day, my sister posted about her "my year of the camera", I enrolled in a photography class, a coworker started talking about buying a new camera, daughter and son-in-law started Flicker pools for their photo experiments. It's like a massive wave of photo-lust has swept the planet.

I pretty much take a photo every week (at least) anyway, so maybe it's cheating just a bit to do my normal thing and call it a project. Either way, its good. So, here are my catching up photos. Week one at the top of the page was on New Years Day. This is straight out of the camera, at the west end of the small city of Beatrice,NE.

Week 2, is this little organza blue angel. She's just the palest shade of blue imaginable. My sister has one almost exactly like her, only in pink. They came from my Grandma Opal. As we were told, they were package decorations on Christmas presents. Since my third sister doesn't have an angel, we had to have gotten them from 1957-1959. Mine is missing a little golden instrument of some sort, maybe a harp?

She doesn't like having her photo taken. I have taken 30 some shots of this ornament this season, ALL except this one have been awful, blurry despite even resorting to a tripod. Almost makes me wonder if someone wasn't sending me holiday wishes each and every time I focused on her, until this very last shot.

Back to School

I'm back in school... in a fashion. When the community college booklet of continuing education classes came a couple of weeks back, I decided it was time to do something different this winter. An intro to digital photography seemed like just the thing. Once I decided to go, the Viking thought it might be an ok thing too.

So tonight after a quick dinner out we went to class. I expected this first class to not be very enlightening since I'm pretty savvy in digital terminology, file saving, pixels and resolution and tonight was starting from ground zero. I was right. I'm sure next week will be more interesting for me.

The class is a short one, only 6 hours, but I'm hoping to pick up some new ideas and hints.The instructor has been a professional photographer for 30 years. He's an interesting speaker and has an excellent way of explaining things like image compression in .jpg format and what lenses area actually doing. One new thing I did learn tonight, is that I prefer my photography education without religious commentary. 'nuf said.




So, wanna see my camera? It's not exactly point and shoot because it has full manual control, but it's also a great point and shoot. What I am hoping to get out of this class is an understading of it's capabilities and how to begin to use them. And some tips on better flash shots. Right now, I almost always turn the flash off because when I do use it the pictures are awful. Once I get this little guy mastered, I'll join the big leagues.

Anyway, this camera has

• 7.1 megapixels
  6x optical zoom with optical image stabilizer
• ISO 800
• 1 centimeter (.4-inch) Macro mode

It can handle additional lenses, and it's a rugged camera, great for me. I dropped it, lens down last summer on the pavement, and the only problem was the cute little lens bezel got dented and wouldn't stay on. I love this camera.

Weird Word Wednesday

This one comes from a novel I'm reading, Lisey's Story by Stephen King. The word as he uses it, incuncabilla, isn't one I could find exactly, but it is how the main character hears the word.



I think the actual word is incunable or incunabulum, either of which is completely new to me, maybe you won't know it either.



in·cu·nab·u·lum , (nky-nby-lm, ng-) n. pl. in·cu·nab·u·la (-l)
1. Bands holding the baby in a cradle

2. A book printed before 1501; an incunable.
3. A work of art or industry of an early period.



Either way, it's certianly an unusual work, seeming to date to the 1860's in first use. Somehow, I don't quite see how it's going to come up in my daily writing, but what a killer word to know for a Scrabble game!

Computer Help

When most people talk about getting computer help, they mean calling in a geek. A smarty pants kid next door, their relucant spouse, and in worst case scenarios, tech support from their computer vendors. Heaven save us from that. Over the course of the summer, my new computer and moving from XP to Vista with software and hardware issues to spare, meant literally days on the tech support "help" lines, at least 6 total reinstalls, with some problems still existing. If I pretend not to notice, they'll eventually fix themselves, right?

In my case, tech support better come equipped with a big bag of catnip.

Fruitcake

Time to come clean... I like fruitcake. I especially like Grandma's Famous Fruitcake with Amaretto. I've tried baking my own fruitcake. It's expensive and more prone to being a 20 pound doorstop than a dessert. Take my advice, don't. Just buy Grandma's. I figure, if they've been doing it since 1917, their Grandma must have been a better baker.

There's a bakery outlet in my town, where it's made. It's half price right now. Guess where I'm stopping my my way home from work. Happy New Year.