Birthdays Old and New

August is a special month in B-Days for me.My grandmother's was August 10th,A sister in law is August 2nd,A good friend the 26th and one old girlfriend I got serious with is the 7th and my high school sweetie who I'm still in touch with turns 50 on the 15th.When we started dating she was a sweet 15 year old sophomore and I was a worldly 19 year old Senior.Plus my blog friend Susan turns out to be an August girl also.On saturday Sweet Pea went to a B-Day party a few houses down for a buddy who was turning 5.She's a sweet girl who's parents are both NYTimes reporters and not quite as friendly as her.She had a puppy party where they bring in a group of puppies for happy little girls to play with.I was thinking back that when I was a lad we really didn't have birthday parties where one went to a friends house and then the cycle began where if you were invited to this persons party you had to invite him to yours.I lived in simpler times.I recall going to only one B-Day party in the third grade where Joe Meizensahl invited a group of his Saint Margaret Mary guy classmates over.I think we all wore coat and ties and there were about 7 of us.Since his dad ran the Prince Spaghetti plant in Rochester I was looking forward to pasta and meatballs.Instead his mother served us homemade fried chicken with mashed taters,homemade gravy and green beans that I still recall to this day as some of the best fried chicken I've ever had.After, his dad showed Little Rascals shorts on a projector and then Joe's collection of old piggy banks that all did something with the coin.Myself I watched with half interest hoping that his mom would bring out the leftover fried chicken which she did.After that I always looked for his mom in church on Sunday.She was one of those ladies who back then had those little fox stoles with the fox's head still on.I used to hope we would sit behind one at church so I could study the face of the Fox wishing I could close my eyes also and sleep.That is until I became an altar boy and got to see the whole church thing from the altar where we felt like princes looking down on the rabble before us.That and sneaking some altar wine after mass.So happy birthday to all the Leos and other August bday folks out there.

Babes Alumni

On Tues I talked to my old boss Claudia for well over 40 minutes and caught up on the past eight years.I found out her mother is still alive and living at her house in Germany.The guy leasing Babes from her is an arrogant ass and has done all kinds of things to our beloved restaurant he is not authorized to do in the lease and got info on some of the old gang.One was a youngster named Crit Bliss who was my backup one year while still in high school and then my last summer of 81 took over the Toastman spot in the kitchen when my buddy Tom went off to the real world.81 though was my last summer and it turned into a fairly short one when after three weeks I was in the Surf Club one Wed night with an old girlfriends dad(We were surf fishing as far as Mr. Worth's wife knew)when we ran out of money so I wandered over to the Bradford where my roomies were listening to Magic and the Reggae Stars but stepped off the curb at the Surf Club with untied wallabies and did a nasty ankle sprain.That led to a trip to the hospital all the way in Hyannis after I limped to the Bradford.There I was given crutches,a rather large supply of Percocet with refills and told to stay off it for three weeks.After three weeks of lying about in the sun and free drinks at the Surf Club in exchange for samples of said pain killers I went back to Babes but by the end of the first day back it was obvious my ankle was in need of more off time.I spent the rest of the summer playing country squire and Crit bless his soul retired my apron to the kitchen rafters of Babes with my name just like an ex Celtic.So I found out from Claudia and I just had it confirmed that Crit and his wife Diane own Luscious Louies Pastry and Cafe in Chatam,Mass.So if anyone gets to Chatam,a picture post card kind of Cape Place give him the buisness.

Kini

This afternoon Sweet Pea and older brother Knuckle Sandwich were outside with their mom and knuckles little gal pal from across the street.Sweet Pea, 5 in Nov. was wearing her new bikini and after much running around instead of going to the park with the huge fountains they went across the street to the house of Knuckles gal pal to run around in a sprinkler.I found out though that sweet pea doesn't have a bikini.I heard it as a zoo kini and she seems quite firm about that.So after her Mom talked about it with another neighbor and Scout our friendly dog was scanning the trees for squirrels I went inside and as I walked across the back of the bldg to my stairs and past all our herbs and vegetable plants it dawned on my dim bulb of a mind sweet pea was saying she was wearing a zu kini(It's not a Bikini).That brings to mind a friend back east whose now 13 year old daughter came home after her first day of first grade and was telling her parents the names of teachers in her classes.Mr. Brown for Math,Miss Lebowski for reading etc and then gets to gym and says her teachers name is someone called Phys Ed.I still can get her going by bringing that up.

Headline

Seen tonight online"Woman Riding a Donkey fights off Lion with Machete" Now that is one of the best headlines I've ever seen.About the only thing that would have made it better is if she had a pet chicken on her head who attacked the lion also by pecking at it.I was looking at the Truro Treasures weekend for this fall and I notice there is no longer a Dump Dance but something called a Grape Stomp and Jazz fest though with only one band at Truro Vineyards.Finally are you all as fascinated by this whole Clark Rockefeller story as I am.Everyday some strange new twist comes to light.I can't wait to find out who this dude is though I keep looking at his current pic and see some Danny Bonaduci and a little Corbin Beronson(sp).Last night when I was reading his age was 58 instead of his being 48 and the German passport thing I was thinking some kind of Nazi Spawn but at 48 he's to young.Where did the money come from though and this is my fave bit.It seems when he and his ex-wife were spending off season on Nantucket for several off seasons he actually raised the rent he was paying himself.The owner of the place mentioned it in a Boston Globe story.

The Sunday New York Times

This afternoon I took my paper outside to the patio and spent about three hours reading and picking amongst my plants.If there is abetter thing to do on a Sunday than hang out with the NYTimes I don't know it(except in Fall when you read it while watching the NFL games)I was looking at the top of our wall that sits about 5 and a half feet high where I have a narrow strip of dirt backed by the neighbors wooden post fence which sits above our wall.A few weeks back I scattered Bachelor" Button seeds across the whole top because they grow easily and then towards the front of the wall hoping they'll cascade over I placed every six inches or so Mounding Nasturtiums"Cherries Jubilee" from Renee's Grdens(seed company).They are both coming up quite nicely about two thirds of the way but stop suddenly behind a large potted Ficus on the patio.It's very strange as I have always had no problem with the far end of the wall sprouting seeds before.It's also a very straight line in the dirt where they stop.Not even a few seedlings popping up here or there in the dead zone.So I'll get some more seeds and sow hoping I don't have to go buy some small plants to put there and then everything will look strange.The other thing is in some places the seedlings are coming in thick and the packet always says to thin but I just can never bring myself to decide who lives and who dies so I just let them compete.The other thing is I'm sprinkling Cayenne Pepper along the whole area after I came out the other day and found a squirrel about to start digging amongst my seedlings looking for a buried nut.The funny thing is when I did the pots on the patio about a month ago the guy at the garden store tried to sell me a peanut plant.I gave him a look like"what are you a wise guy?" or maybe he was one of the squirrel infiltrators who take on human form to help bring about our downfall but not before we plant plenty of nuts.They were even in that movie"Best in Show"You don't think that whole rant by the guy with the good old boy accent about different kinds of nuts was just a coincidence.

Manny It was Time to Go

The previous pic of Manny is from last year when he hit the monstrous three run homer against the Angels in round 1 of the AL playoffs to give the Red Sox a 2-0 series lead.It was one of those Manny Homers that you knew was way gone the moment it left his bat and sent Fenway Park rocking.That was the Manny we all loved.Manny was our goofy relative we all put up with cause that's the way he was and New England has always loved individuals and lord Manny was an individual but in the past few weeks the whole Manny saga unraveled so quick I'm still not thinking it happened.Much as I hate to say it the Red Sox did the right thing in sending Manny away.Manny had gone way beyond eccentric with his actions of late and it became apparent Manny was a cancer in the Red Sox clubhouse and that his selfishness was growing day by day and when it really looked like to me he had quit on his teamates at least twice in the past ten days it was time.It's a sad end to a chapter but Manny has no one to blame but himself and his way inflated ego.We knew this day was coming but not so soon.I applud the Red Sox for standing up to Manny and his boorish agent.The new guy Jason Bay not only played for Chatam in the Cape Cod League but also for the Vermont Expos and he's a Canadian to boot!His dad was a diehard Red Sox fan from British Columbia no less.Plus he got out of Pittsburgh!Now back to regular posts.

Farewell Manny