Monday, June 18, 2007

Monday miscellany

Today is the first day in several without a retirement, anniversary, birthday, wedding or Father's Day to celebrate, so I'm just going to celebrate Quiet Monday.

It seems like it's been a whirlwind since last
  • Thursday---teacher retirement party at my sister's house
  • Friday---conservancy meeting at Hope, then, anniversary dinner back at Hope (two trips to Hope in one days leads to an optimistic view and a pretty one)
  • Saturday: phenomenal country wedding at the Brackenbusch farm in Samuels
  • Sunday: Father's Day geocaching adventure to Dawson Ridge and Moyie Bridge overlook followed by grocery run at the Boundary Trader, which included Father's Day dinner purchase of fried chicken and potato salad from the deli.
So, today seems relatively quiet, but there's company comin', and it will keep coming through the Fourth of July, so my quiet is going to be short-lived and the roar of those lawnmowers will break the silence as soon as that grass bogged down from all that rain dries a bit.

I'm doing Monday miscellany today cuz I've got a lot of little tidbits on my mind this morning.

First, there's another Myra story. I heard from Myra on Friday---that would be Myra Converse. She made it clear who she was this time when she called to tell me she had another granddaughter, born last week. So, I must issue a congratulations to Brett and his lovely wife who are now parents of two girls. I'm sure it was a special Father's Day at the Converse house.

Then, there's another Myra story. This time it's Myra Lewis. I walked up to her at Ty and Keely's wedding Saturday night, just in time to hear her telling Rochelle Ruen about Marianne's "Myra" mixup in a recent blog posting. I'm glad that I've made such a mistake cuz it's getting a lot of mileage with both Myra's who are very careful to tell me precisely who they are these days.

Then, there's the Edgar Martinez story. That's the one Willie gets to write this week when the famed, now retired Seattle Mariner is honored as a new member of Boise's Humanitarian Hall of Fame. Willie got to talk to Edgar last week, and he gets to meet him this week, so it's another one of those great perks that come along with journalism. Willie also had an opportunity to golf at the new Tamarack Resort new McCall. He missed seeing Andre Agassiz and Stephie Graff by one day but did get to visit with the owner of the resort for about an hour. He said it was a pretty darned good gig, and the golfing was fun too.

I have to tell the goat story. Here we were on our outing yesterday looking for wildlife. Our sightings were limited to a couple of deer, but we did see some pretty tamelife walking down South Center Valley Road with people and dogs. That would be Rudy and Lily, the Watson's goats. Apparently, every so often Rudy and Lily, who live on the corner of Center Valley Road and South Center Valley Road, get a chance to leave their enclosure and go nibble leaves along the roadside. I must say that was a first. I know goats are friendly creatures, but seeing them ambling down the road with their family and without a care in the world was indeed a treat.

I also have to tell the food story. That one popped into mind as I was reading this morning's paper in the entertainment section about one more detective show which begins its new season tonight. Seems the female detective has an addiction to sweets, and she tries to hide her addiction by sneaking her sweets on the side when nobody knows.

This resurrected a memory of my days as a college senior when I went through a phase of sneaking my cans Franco American spaghetti and meatballs, always at times when my roommate Wanda was gone. Now, I've always been a food thief, even these days, and a sneaky one at that. It's just something that goes along with our childhood habit of robbing my mother's cupboard, her refrigerator, fruit room and freezer. Once you get into those habits, they're hard to break; besides, food tastes so much better when it's pilfered.

This Franco American spaghetti thing was pretty weird compared to the days of carefully fingering the chocolate frosting off the cakes or breaking off those cookie edges that keep a cookie from looking perfectly round. During my senior year, Franco American spaghetti binges took place on Friday afternoons, when Wanda was in class and just before I'd head home for the weekend. I always had to walk past Modern Way Food Store on my way to the apartment, so I'd pick up a can of spaghetti along the way, usually the mid-size can.

Once in the apartment, I'd get the can opener, crank off the top, grab a spoon, sit on the couch and down bite after bite of that spaghetti and meatballs, savoring every glob as it slid down my throat. This was not heated up, mind you. I liked it that way. Once the last bite was gone and every remaining drop of sauce was scooped from inside, the can got buried deep in the trash so Wanda wouldn't know. Soon, my ride to Sandpoint would come, and I'd head home satisfied with spaghetti and certainly a pound or two heavier for the weekend.

That was weird, for sure, but not quite as weird as what I learned later. I learned later that Wanda loved it when I went home for the weekend. She loved my absence cuz that meant she could stop by Modern Way, pick up a box of Hostess Ding Dongs, walk up the hill to an empty apartment, sit on the couch in peace, quiet and no guilt---and eat the whole box of Ding Dongs. Then, she'd stuff the wrappers and box in the trash, and Marianne would never know.

For some reason one day, the truth came out. We laughed ourselves silly, and since those days, I'm sure neither of us can look at a can of Franco American spaghetti or Hostess ding dongs (do they still make those) without thinking of our nutty roommate and laughing at our nutty selves.

Well, that's it for Monday Miscellany. Hope everyone has a great week. Go sneak some spaghetti and have a laugh on me.

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