Packers are having a scrimage with the Buffalo Bills tonight. The first football activity of the season and from what Dick says, it is going to be a LONG season. I was at Rhine helping tend bar and not able to follow it while I was there. Sunday, Bobbie and I will work the County Shoot at Rhine. Harold Diedrich says he will want me to be a runner. We are providing steak sandwiches for the crowds so I will bring some home for supper that night.

While at Bible Study on Monday, we were commenting on the fact that Tom Keyes is such a brave soul to be the only man, usually, in this mainly women't study. Someone commented that they would not want to be the only woman in a men's group. It made me realize and comment that I was and have been the only woman in several groups - the Parish Council and Rhine Plymouth Field and Stream are two that come to mind. Usually, Bobbie or Sara Behr are at Rhine. Someone at Bible Study commented that it is easy to be the only woman in a group of men and feel secure if you are carrying a gun. However, I was the only woman on Council for two years. We decided that it is the mutual interest that makes for comfort and I also believe the integrity and caliber of the people one is associating with.

I am working on a list poem for Writer's Club on Monday. Jane Kocmud and myself took a class at UW Sheboygan and this was a form that was presented to us. A lot of it is form and the way it appears on the page. I have been "worrying" the terms Comfort Food and Comfort People and this is the only thing that has come of it so far, though more is muddy in my mind and eventually will appear with something OK, I hope. However, here is my "list poem". Let me know what you think.

Comfort Food

Fresh bread baking in the oven.
Grilled cheese dripping in butter.
Prepared – smashed and cooked
On a griddle that is black with burned grease and cheese.
Rhubarb, fresh from the backyard
Eaten raw, dipped in a cup of sugar.
Fresh apple pie (hot OR cold) big juicy slabs.
Meatloaf!!!
Prepared with LOTS of onion,
(Because that's how Dad liked it.)
Chocolate Éclairs with homemade custard filling
A dozen.
One for everyone - one extra to fight over.
Corn on the cob, slathered with butter and salted.
Contest! Who can eat the most.
Creamed Egg on Toast for supper during Lent
Poured liberally over Mom's homemade white bread toasted and slathered with Oleo.
Talk about creamed.
How about creamed kohlrabi, creamed cabbage, creamed green beans?
How come we didn't die from all the fat?
Friday Chili in an age of meatless Fridays
Horror of horrors, Mom softened the onions with bacon grease.
Meat on Friday?
Will we all go to hell?

Love


Mary

Dick's blood test was perfect, as usual. He is one of Sue's prize patients. In the two or more years that he has been testing, he has only been out of the range three times. Today, though, after Dr. Schwalbach and Dr. Phelan both got a regular heartbeat, Sue detected an irregularity. She said it is not unusual for the hearbeat to become normal sometimes. Anyway, all is well.

We went grocery shopping after that and then stayed home the rest of the day. It was really beautiful, though warm, in the late afternoon, so I turned on the fountain and read on the deck for a while. I may go back out after I finish this.

I suppose you have all heard about the seagull infestation that Sheboygan has been experiencing on the Southside, not too far from the condo complex that we lived in for all those years. For those of you familiar with the area, it is on the edge of the property that was an oil refinery storage area and now has a strip mall with a Piggly Wiggly, a Walgreens and other various shops. Anyway literally HUNDREDS of gulls had nested on a vacant section of land, raised their young and were dive bombing and pooping all over the land, the parking lot and the car dealership across the street. Unfortunately, (not for the gulls of course) it is against the law to kill them. Those affected had to wait until the babies left the nest. Just the past day or so the entire lot was bulldozed and the empty nests destroyed. A web like plastic gizmo has been strung over the entire lot. Someone was standing to drive any gulls that came back away with lazer lights but apparantly the gulls were unhappy with the plowed field and the web and circled but did not land. I can't begin to imagine how happy the car dealer is. Jim has an interesting question. Where will the gulls go now?

We had haddock, hash browns, green beans and cole slaw for supper and brownies for dessert. This noon Dick and I ate a meatloaf sandwich. Boy do we live high on the hog around here. Like George Hiner used to say. "Wonder what the rich people are eating tonight?"


Have a nice evening
Happy Birthday - Dick (my stepson, for those of who who might not know.)

Love

Mary

Dick and Jim went gambling today. Jim gave a donation again but Dick ended up $40 ahead. He said it was so hot in the place that he finally stopped and went out to a cooler area or he probably would have lost that before they left. Well, $40 is $40.

I had a busy day cooking and delivering. I stopped at Mother's house and she was gone. Then I remembered that she was getting a perm today so when I stopped at Evans to pick up some yarn, I walked down the street to the beauty shop. Sure enough - there she was and I saw my friend Lorraine too. I visited for a few minutes then came on home.

It was very hot again today but we are supposed to get a break starting tomorrow. We may even have some rain tonight. I watered the spots that are showing signs of the grub worms trying to creep in both today and yesterday but God's watering is the best.

We could learn a lot from crayons:
some are sharp, some are pretty,
some are dull, some have weird names,
and all are different colors....but
they all exist very nicely in the same box.

Have a good evening

Til tomorrow.

Mary

Tonight I am going to watch a movie, called The Forgotten at 8:00PM and decided to post this a bit early. It has been a fairly quiet day.

Dick and I grocery-shopped (that can be a new verb) this morning after a pleasant breakfast at Zana's on the way. I like the fact that the resturants we go to for breakfast offer fruit in lieu of potatoes. We made it home before it got too hot. Actually, it did stay below 90 degrees though you could have fooled me the few times that I ventured out.

I got caught up on computer work today. After the Celtic Faire Meeting last night, I had to contact a few people. I had copied the song Lament that I absolutely love to a tape for Jim Wilsing and when I called him today, he says he has figured out how to do it. He thinks that we can even get words written to it and have the choir sing it. I am jazzed.

Jim will be home for somewhat over a week on vacation. Tomorrow, he and his Dad are going to Oneida to gamble. All I have to do is prepare the meatloaf and the Mac and Cheese that I am taking to my friend's house. Sam is very ill and I CAN help by preparing a meal. One feels so helpless.

Here's one of my sonnet attempts - I will share it to hope it will help you think cool in the midst of this heat wave.

WINTER CHILL




If today I see the sun should shine
God is in the warming rays.
And fills the center of my mind
With comfort through the day.
Sun on snow creates a glare
That hurts the eyes at times
But if a choice of cloud or glare
I'll take the sun that shines.
Rambling o'er the winter crust
Wandering through the snow
My breath like fog with little puffs
Accentuates the way I go.
Ice and snow on everything
Deny the future warmer spring.


Love

Mary

We got some banana split ice cream last week. Finally got around to trying it tonight and it is good but I think I like the cookie ice cream we got last a bit better. As Dick says most are usually good anyway but some become favorites. I still like butter pecan but we don't get that too often because, as everybody knows, Jim is allergic to nuts. Nuts!

Had an organizational meeting for Celtic Faire tonight and our leaders didn't appear. So we did the best we could. I reported on the entertainment, vendors and liturgy and then rushed off to Rhine Plymouth for the end of the monthly meeting. Actually, I missed the whole meeting but John Wilde wanted me to help make calls to remind members, not signed up about the County Shoot which we are hosting this weekend. He said I should take Sheboygan and Sheboygan Falls. Actually that is Bobbie, Bob Plappert and me. We are all signed up already, so my job is done. I can't ask for better than that. Our clubhouse is getting so poshed up. The guys finished the indoor gun rack - it is gorgeous and will be hung for the County Shoot. Dennis Schmidt put in landscaping around out sign out front. That has been such a mess and looks really great. He planted it with plants that will continue to come back year after year, barring the deer.

My trap shooting was down a bit tonight again. Don't know why. I have to keep concentrating on getting the bead and keeping ahead of the bird. Eventually it may stick in my head.

Start where you are
Use what you have
Do what you can
It will be enough

Have a great Tuesday and come back again

Mary

Germanfest is over. It was HOT down there, though an occasional breeze from the big pond made it managable if one stayed out of the direct sun.

The Mass was lovely. The presiding minister is a German priest who ministers to the German community in Philidelphia. He was charming. He gave his serman in German and then another priest translated for those of us who are German illiterate. The singing went fine, I only feel that I blew two of the 10 songs we sang and only parts of them. The partipating members from our Blessed Trinity Choir are going to sing a couple of the pieces next Sunday at the 10:30AM mass. They are so pretty and a far cry from the polka masses that I have attended here.

The food is always so good at Germanfest. I had a pork schnitzel sandwich and later, a cherry strudel.

The sun was relentless. I sat for a while at the Harley Stage to listen to a group called Die Lausitzer Musikanten. They were just excellent, but I could only sit for three songs - then I got worried about burning so I moved away into the shade, but I did go back when they were done with their set and got a CD. I really have very little German Music and like to rectify that with groups that I like.

Next big event is Irishfest though we do have a reunion at St. Michaels Church near Parnell and a day bus trip to Chicago this month. We lucked out - the trip to Chicago, called an Ethnic Tour, is on our anniversary. I like that.

It is supposed to be REALLY hot for a couple of days again. I started watering again, beginning with the pots on the deck.

Have a good week and stay cool

Mary