The rose and the Mud Hens

Facebook is quite nice. It helps us keep up with people, and reminds us of good times gone by. This morning it showed me a picture I had posted six years ago today.

After Detroit Tiger Stadium had been torn down but before the City took over the field, people could wander on the remains of the baseball diamond. I did just that several times, and even played pitch and catch with my family on the old field. Cool beans.

One summer day as I took my morning walk I ended up there, and roamed around the field for a few minutes. I noticed something on the pitcher's mound: it was an old Toledo Mud Hens cap, left with a red rose across the bill. I snapped a picture on my phone and apparently shared it to Facebook.

Such things are what stories are made of, and I wonder what the story is behind it. Was it a tribute to Tiger Stadium? A memory a person? A salutation?

I wonder. The picture is on my Facebook page again today. If I can figure out how to add it here, I will. But for now, well, I am happy that Facebook reminded me about it.

It all happened on May 30

As I sometimes do when I'm otherwise drawing a blank, I will use this space to talk about today in history. It's a cheap writer's trick, but that's okay. I'm a cheap writer.

St. Joan of Arc was burned at the stake on May 30, 1431.

May 30, 1498 saw Columbus leave on his third journey to the New World. That's us by the way.

Explorer Hernando De Soto discovered Florida on this day in 1539. That's good news for retirees and real estate developers.

May 30, 1842 saw an assassination attempt on Queen Victoria. She was not amused.

Decoration Day, now Memorial Day, was started on May 30, 1868.

During a baseball doubleheader, Frank Chance (of Tinker to Evers to Chance fame) gets hit by a pitch five times, May 30, 1904. Ouch.

The first Indianapolis 500 was run on this day in 1911, with Ray Harroun winning at a speed of 74 MPH. We go faster than that during rush hour these days.

Babe Ruth goes hitless in his final game on May 30, 1935.

With that, I stopped culling through internet articles. It seems that far too much has happened on My 30 since then, and I think I've posted enough.

Until tomorrow, which will not be on May 31 in history. I don't think.

Me Pops the Poet

There are strange things done in the midnight sun By the men who moil for gold.

Bill Cosgriff was many good things, but a poet he was not. That's why I have always been impressed by his taste in poetry. First, that he'd have any taste for it at all. Second, and I suppose this is rather unsurprising, his favorite poem was tongue in cheek.

The Cremation of Sam McGee was the one poem which tickled him so much that he'd actually committed it to memory. If you have not guessed or googled it by now, you know that I borrowed the opening line of this here blog from the first line of the first stanza of that epic. It is indeed an intriguing lead-in, exactly the sort of thing which would entice a body to read on. Taken with the poem as a whole, I can see why Dad liked it.

The short, short story is that a guy cremated his friend Sam McGee. Look it up and read it: The Cremation of Sam McGee, if you would like to hear more. I'll content myself now with hearing in me mind me own Pops voice read it as I type,

"The Northern lights have seen queer sights, but the queerest they ever did see,

Was that night on the marge of Lake Lebarge, I cremated Sam McGee."

Snow tires in the summer

There was once this good ol' boy, I'll call him Cloyce just to give him a name, who considered himself the neighborhood innovator. Some of his ideas, to be fair, were kind of clever. But most of the time all he did was jury rig. That's okay too so far as I'm concerned, if it's a decent enough adaptation.

Cloyce had an old Chevy Bel Air, I believe it was a '65, and what it needed was a wheel alignment. It drifted sharply to the left (this is not leading to a political joke I assure you) and really needed front end work. But ol' Cloyce didn't want to put that kind of money into the car. So he looked around in his garage for what was handy and found an old snow tire for the Chevy. He put it on the car on the left front.

That stopped the drift. His theory was that the snow tire, having deeper tread, made up for the amount of space which had been created by vehicular wear which led to the drift. Based on the results, I'm inclined to say he was right, as he drove with that winter tire for about six months before he got rid of the car.

It was a jury rig. But hey, it worked for him, and who am I to argue?

Memorial Day

Memorial Day: the last Monday in May. The day set aside for remembering our fallen heroes. It is fitting and proper that we do this.

Forget for the moment that it like so many other holidays has been been given something of a second class citizen status. It once was held every May 30th every year. In our rush to celebrate special days more on our terms than as an honest retrospective of deserving people and ideals it has been moved to the last Monday of the month. That is so we may have three day weekends to party more so than a single, specially set aside day to actually contemplate what the day is supposed to be about. Nevertheless, it is still a great day on our calendar.

Great hardly seems the right word. It is sad that we have to have a day such as this, sadder still that willing souls have given us their all in order to make such times a need. But that is the price we pay, they paid, for living in a world where evil exists. We must be thankful for those souls who have made it possible for us to be here and reflect on their actions.

So we will stand by the word great. It takes great people for us to have a chance to solemnly remember their deeds. It takes great people for us to realize that freedom is not free and liberty not a given. It takes great people to give us the chance to grill and hoist a brew and spend time with our families and friends.

It takes great people to lay down their lives for their friends, as the Greatest Friend of ours did. Remember them, today and every day. They've earned the honor. The very least we can do is acknowledge them.

Warm cold warm

This getting old business can be both interesting and, yes I mean this, even fun. But it can also be very frustrating. Downright aggravating even.

Yesterday I told the tale of being too warm on my morning walk. I had overdressed, mostly in anticipation of cold weather which was not there. I broke a sweat for the first time this year. As a result, I happily and also for the first time in 2019 donned shorts and a t-shirt. It felt great.

And one hour later I was cold. I had to get a sweatshirt.

Really, how many times in a day should a guy have to change his clothes, folks?

Odd walks

I had the most unusual experience of 2019 this morning.

As I left the house for my morning walk today, I grabbed my jacket. Why? Habit I suppose. It's been pretty chilly this spring around Detroit.

That's when the odd thing happened. Within about four blocks, I was actually carrying my jacket. I was warm. Too warm.

What is this strange thing, warmth? And that other strange thing: sunlight. It's been that cold and that cloudy and that rainy in Michigan so far this year. So much so that I just presumed I would need my jacket. Now as I hammer out this blog I have on a short sleeve t-shirt and - gasp - short cargo pants!

Of course, there's a 70% of thunderstorms at two o'clock this afternoon. But we take what we can get.

Joe in Oklahoma

Me Grandpa Joe, he traveled a bit. He was all over the country, he was, seein' this and that in his youth and in his beyond his youth. He was even in Oklahoma, if you can believe that.

He hopped his share of freights and thumbed his share o' rides in his day. Once, he were even makin' his way across the great state of Oklahoma a few years ahead o' the dust bowl. And he was thumbin.

He was picked up by a small group of native Americans, he was, one day. They was ridin' around in an old Model A Ford, they was. They was drinkin' and laughin' and a talkin' and had a bottle whisky they was freely sharin' among themselves. And he was feared for his life and limb, he was. So much so, he did somethin' he never ever did. He lied.

That car was a hoppin' and a joltin' its was across Oklahoma to the point where it concerned even old Joe Cosgriff. It jumped up and hammered itself into the ground on quite a many occasion, it did. And he at one point told his mates what he was travelin' with, that right there, that wide spot in the road, is where I'm headin' to.

It was not anywhere near where he was headin' to. No way in the world. But it suited his purpose. I got him outta that car.

He pretended to get outta that car and he pretended to approach the old house at the end of that old road he was at the end of. It suited his purpose.

And at that point, ol' Joe Cosgriff thanked and saved his soul. He truly did.

Donations with extreme prejudice

Yesterday at Mass I helped with the offertory collection. In one pew sat a family with a small child. She was maybe three, and her mother had given her the money to put in the collection basket. She was encouraging her daughter to put the money in the basket, not unlike we did with our kids when they were very young. It's a common thing to see.

So as I arrived at their pew, the little girl looked up at me, took two or three steps towards the basket as I held it towards her and - wham - absolutely slammed dunked the money into it. Then she smiled at herself. Oh yeah, I did it, I helped. I'm the girl.

It just so happened we had a second collection. The same thing happened: I approached, she toddled over, and slammed that cash right into the basket. She made absolutely certain, left no doubts at all, that SHE made the donation. She was very happy and proud to have done her part.

You gotta love that moxie.

Joking with customers

I like joking with customers. All right, I like joking with anybody. It makes the day go better, and, well, yeah, it's more fun.

An older gentleman came into the Shop yesterday wanting parts for his Electric Eel. He had the original receipt, showing that he had bought it off me Pops in 1992. He said he needed this, that, and the other thing to make repairs on the unit. He asked, clearing going for the funny, "So what is the warranty on these Eels?"

Sensing he was a bit of a joker, I replied, "Ohh, sorry, sir. The warranty expires after 25 years."

"I knew I should have come in two years ago!" he exclaimed. We both had a good laugh.

I like things like that.

Give me a Hell Yeah

During the course of Mother's Day festivities this past Sunday, someone asked how my daughter in Arizona was doing. I explained that she was doing well, and in fact I was going to drive out there to visit her in July. "You're going to drive?" someone, I'll call him Cloyce just to give him a name rather than explicitly identify my incredulous brother-in-law, asked.

"Hell yeah, I'm going to drive," I responded in my best Grandpa Joe voice. "It's hardly 2,000 miles." I've driven 900 in a day, with stops, on my job. I can do 2,000 over two days with minimal breaks. Easy peasy.

You see, I come from a long line of Cosgriffs who Love. To. Drive. Me Grandpa Joe drove a lot, all over the country and into Canada and Mexico, as did me Pops. The folks at Electric Eel called Pops the Road Warrior for the amount of driving he did. Hell yeah, I'm going to drive.

What's not to like? It isn't difficult, you have the freedom to move about as you want; there's no pat-downs or full body scans, no insolent questioning by surly TSA agents. You just drive. You just go where you want to go.

I know the advantages of flying. I will even concede that I, after this first visit (where I can see countryside I've never seen before simply by driving), might fly out my second trip. That is, if I take the time to make sure my driver's license is ID compliant for flights within the US. That idea bugs me, especially as my license is already driving compliant through these United States.

Can I get a Hell Yeah for that?

Getting the kids to wash your car

As I pulled into a gas station yesterday to gas up the old Chevy Venture, I thought: "I better get the squeegee and wash the windshield." Believe me, when it's at the point where I think the windshield needs washing, it needs washing. So I squeegeed the windows as I pumped gas. And I remembered, the kids used to wash the car's windows when I got gas.

I think it started out as one of them wanting to be a help, as young kids truthfully often do, especially in a different or unusual sort of way. Pretty soon they all wanted to help wash the windows, to the point of grabbing squeegees from adjacent washer fluid reservoirs at adjacent gas pumps, so that they, all three, could wash the windows.

Eventually they wouldn't stop there. They began washing the whole car, squeegeeing windows and doors and trunks and tailgates and even tires. It must have become a game to them, brushing washer fluid across the vehicle and scraping it off with the rubber wiper opposite the foam which held the fluid at the end of the squeegee. They were a regular pit crew working over a car as I waited for the gas tank to fill.

A couple of times I actually had to slow down the rate of fill so that they could get the entire van done. I mean, the only thing worse than a completely dirty car is a car with a one squeegee wide path of dirt along one side.

A very Marty joke

Facebook can be pretty cool sometimes. Why, this morning it reminded me of a status update I posted eight years ago today. A rather clever one too, I might add. It's a political joke, but a short one. And I know you simply have to hear it now.

What do socialists vote for?

Wait for it...

Left rights!

Thank you, thank you. I am proud of that one.

Mom's sense of humor

Me Pops was well known for his sense of and good humor. That would not stop me Mom from sometimes playing a trick or two on him.

One time as they made their way home from a fast food restaurant, Pops stopped at a party store for whatever. While he was inside, Mom took a bite out of a hamburger and re-wrapped it. She stuck it in the bag but made sure he got it at home. He sputtered and stammered and was ready to run back to demand an explanation, refund, and whatever else he might force the restaurant manager's hand to do before Mom fessed up and took the burger she'd bitten for herself. Pops thought it was funny...several days later.

Another time he picked up pizza. Unbeknownst to him, one of the boxes (he had bought I believe three pizzas that day) was left empty. It was sheer inadvertence, and the pizzeria (Audia's, which I've spoken about recently) called before he had gotten back home to apologize and explain that they were sending a pizza by their delivery driver. Mom took the call yet didn't tell Dad.

At home at the kitchen table, he opened the empty pizza box. His jaw dropped in shock and surprise. But then the doorbell rang and one of us kids fetched the pizza before Mom could have much fun out of the situation.

That one me Pops did find immediately funny, perhaps because he hadn't time to get upset. Plus he knew the Audia family and knew they were good people and that it was a simple if silly mistake.

Asparagus blues

As I drove through farm country one day last week, I saw a sign which heralded, 'You-pick asparagus'. And I thought, people do that?

I know there's you pick apples, peaches, strawberries and such. But asparagus? Really?

It's simply unimaginable to me that a mom might say to the family one fine Saturday morning, "Let's hop in the minivan and go pick some asparagus!" It's even less imaginable that dad or the kids would agree. I mean, people actually do that?

Even further from my mind is the idea that a farmer would think that idea in any way touristy. Imagine a fella sitting in a small booth alongside his asparagus patch, broad smile on his face, eyes wide open in anticipation of the coming onslaught of asparagus you-pickers. It leaves me to wonder: is there a Linus wannabe who stays out the whole night in the asparagus patch awaiting the Great Asparagus stalk?

I mean, people do that? Self pick asparagus? Oh-kay, but nobody better ever bug me again about watching golf on TV.

An Electric Eel Monday

Tomorrow morning I make the trek to Electric Eel in Springfield, Ohio. There's nothing unusual about that; I do it virtually weekly. But this time it will be different. I'm going in the wee hours of a Monday morning.

In forty some years, and very much more frequently of late, I honestly can't remember if I've ever made the trip at the start of a week. Typically, I go midweek, Tuesday, Wednesday, or Thursday. I distinctly recall going on the occasional Friday as well. Yet Monday...I don't believe I've ever made a Monday trip.

That it's a relatively unimportant thing I will not argue. Still, it is going to feel odd walking out the door at 1 or 2 o'clock tomorrow morning to go to the plant. In a weird way, I'm looking forward to this trip more than any in along time. I'm sure it's a good way to begin the week.

The Newark Keurig

When I was young I was very sentimental. Then I went through a time where I didn't believe I was sentimental at all. Now I wonder if I've come a little more than full circle. I'm starting to think I'm too sentimental.

This all started with the Keurig I bought in a flea market in Newark, Ohio, where some of my kids live. I have it up at The Shop, where I use it nearly every day. And I've begun, in my own mind anyway, to refer to it as my Newark Keurig.

Perhaps that doesn't sound all that bad. Yet it's reached a point where I almost get misty eyed while watching it brew a cup of coffee. "Yep, that's my Newark Keurig, the one I bought while in Ohio visiting my family," I think as I await my morning starter.

It's a silly thing, almost an affectation. Would it be a little less silly if I mentioned that I often drink coffee from it out of the Newark Catholic mug I bought at the same time? Yes, I call it my Newark Catholic mug. But it says as much right on the side, so that's not all me.

Saved by the cable

Regular patrons of this here blog know well that me Grandpa Joe rented arc welding machines, and that he trained as a welder. I've too lamented how he hated tangled welding cable, hated it with a passion. So it was quite a surprise one day when he told me that if he ever took a ride on an airplane, he'd take a length of welding cable wrapped around him.

Completely perplexed, I stammered, "Why would you do that?"

"Cause if I fell out of that plane it would save me. Welding cable always catches on something."

Who says the old coot didn't have a sense of humor?

The cutting edge

One year, I don't remember exactly when, I bought me Grandpa Joe a carpet knife for Father's day or his birthday or something. He called it a hawkbill knife, because it looked like the beak of a hawk. He loved it, but my aunt living with him and me Grandma Cosgriff, hated it. "He opens everything with that knife," she lamented.

Fast forward to yesterday. I bought myself a little snack at a truck stop, and dagnabbit, I could not get that thing open. It was some sort of vacuum sealed plastic and it would not tear open despite having a notch of sorts which was intended to allow easy opening. I surely looked like an idiot, sitting in my van and pulling and yanking on that package, biting it trying to get it open, and trying to pierce it with an old key. And I recalled Joe and that hawkbill and thought, I want to get me one of those and keep it on me at all times.

You see, Joe had tired of trying to open things with brute force. So he used his knife to get around that. And by gosh, that's my plan for the future. Get a knife and cut things open.

I think my aunt hated it because of the debris trail Joe's package-opening typically left, and I get that. But after yesterday, I'd rather have more to clean up than fight with something. I may have burned all the calories I consumed simply in getting to my snack.

Pops and the deer

As I drove down US Route 68 in Ohio in the wee hours this morning, I couldn't help but notice all the deer crossing signs. I thought that in travelling that road frequently the last several years, it's impressive that I haven't seen much less hit a deer.

Then I thought, me Pops drove this road many more years and thus many more times than I have. He never once hit a deer on route 68 either. That's pretty good, never hitting a deer on route 68.

Yep, me Pops never hit a deer on US 68.

He did hit a deer once on Interstate 69 south of Fort Wayne, Indiana, where there were no deer crossing signs. It just goes to show, things happen when you least expect them.

Sorry. That's all I got this morning.

How to scare your daughter without even trying very hard

Yesterday I called my daughter in Arizona, but I didn't mean to.

I pulled out my phone and brought up my contact list, intending to call a customer about something. Yet instead of scrolling down the list, I must have put my finger down too hard on the phone's surface. My daughter's number, being the first listed as her name is Abby, came up on the screen. It was clear I was calling her, this at about 11 o'clock yesterday morning.

This would scare her, I knew, because Dads don't call, especially on weekday mornings. So if Dad is calling, something awful has happened; that would be her immediate reasoning.

Hang up, hang up, hang up, my brain frantically implored. But hanging up would be worse because it would show that something really is wrong, and she would only, rightly, call back the moment she saw I had tried to 'call' her. I let it ring.

"Hello?" she answered. I could hear the panic, sense the fear and obvious concern in that one small word. I felt bad.

"Hello sweetheart! You can just disregard this call, I made it accidentally. I didn't mean to scare you. I'm so sorry."

"That's okay Daddy. But you did scare me. A little," she replied. We said love you to each other and hung up, for me to make the call I actually meant to make.

For the record, my daughter and I get along well. We text regularly, and share things to each other's facebook pages like normal friends and family. We just rarely talk on the phone at my instigation because, well, Dads don't call. Unless something's wrong.

The expensive shovel

Smitty's Rental was on the northwest side of Detroit for many years. I'm not sure how many, but I remember Smitty when I was still in high school and he only retired recently, so it was quite a few. One day he related a tale to me Pops which, when I think of it til yet, I shake my head in wonder.

A guy came in one day to rent a shovel. Just a regular spade shovel, like many of us have in our basements or garages. Smitty told him they rented for a buck a week or five dollars a month. He said he wanted it for a month, so Smitty took his credit card information, ran it, got his Lincoln deposited in the bank, and the guy left with the tool.

When he didn't return it at the end of the month, Smitty called him. He wanted it for another month. Having kept the card info as a hedge against thievery or breakage, a standard business practice in the rental trade, Smitty ran another month's rent.

That month passed and Smitty called again. The guy said run his card for a third month.

The next month came. Smitty called once more. After not getting a call back in several days, he ran the guy's card for a fourth month, and it went through. The same thing happened in the fifth and six months. In fact it continued for three years, five dollars a month, the card never rejected, until Smitty had collected $180 on that one spade shovel.

He quit running it at that point. "Bill," he told Pops, "I grossed $180 on one rent on a shovel that cost me ten. This after renting it to a few other people first. But it was my shovel, the fella quit calling back, and nobody ever complained." Smitty paused. "But a guy's gotta have a conscience, right, Bill?"

I understand Smitty's point. I just don't understand what the renter wanted with a $180 shovel.

You can't miss it

As you know, I have words and sayings which I use regularly. So did me Pops, such as, "That'd stink a dog off a gut wagon". So did me Grandpa Joe with, "I ain't hell on pretty." Well, me Uncle John had a phrase which he actually disliked: "You can't miss it."

When giving directions, he believed, you never told someone they can't miss it. They will. If he was being given directions, he knew that, once enlightened with the fateful phrase, he would miss it. To him, the words never failed to give the opposite outcome.

He didn't believe in the fates or jinxes of course. It was more that anything can go wrong, anything can be 'missed'. The right thing to do was simply give the directions and don't mix opinion into it. Answer the question about how to go where and find what, and leave it at that.

I hope you get his point. Because, of course, you can't miss it.

Derby day

I know next to nothing about horses. About race horses I know even less, mostly just names. War Admiral. Whirlaway. Count Fleet. Secretariat. When you think about it, there are some really cool horse names out there.

Maybe that's why I'm fascinated by the Kentucky Derby. Most of the year I pay zero attention to racing. But on Derby day, the first Saturday of May, I usually end up with the TV on, waiting to see what interesting new name will win.

It actually if inadvertently led to a nice family memory. While in Ohio visiting the aptly named Ohio Cosgriffs, we ended up in a pub and grub for a Saturday dinner. Not realizing it was Derby day, we were surprised to see how crowded it was. Folks were anticipating the race.

Pretty soon my son, daughter-in-law and I were picking who we thought would win. Yes, us, who know squat about thoroughbred racing. We chose on the basis of the names. I picked a horse with an Irish name because, well, it was Irish.

Surprisingly, I don't think any of us 'won'. But it was fun, and I'll be thinking of that day as I tune in to watch the Derby late today. My pick is War of Will. It's a cool name.

The nonpayment payment

We have had a lot of interesting individuals come through our Shop door over the years. Some, you had trouble getting money out of them. Not all of those guys were out to con you, though.

One fella in particular, I'll call him Cloyce just to give him a name, has been on open account for better than forty years now. He's slow to pay but he always, eventually, pays. He's a genuinely good guy too. I think he's just undisciplined, kinda the way a kid is undisciplined. The kid means well yet doesn't quite understand how things should work.

A habit of Cloyce's has been to bring a check to pay his bill but then post date it. "Can you hold this for a week, Bill?" he would ask me Pops on presentation of the scrap of at that point worthless paper. And Dad would hold it, knowing that it would be good sometime within the next three weeks.

He's done that to me too. I deal with it because I know Cloyce means well, and also because I genuinely like him. As I say, it's not unfair to say he's almost confusedly childlike in his approach to life. There's a part of me which finds that quaint, or even endearing.

Still, getting paid is why we work. Back in September Cloyce came in and gave me a post dated check, asking me to hold it for a few days. I said yes but added, "You know, Cloyce, paying me today with a check I can't cash today really isn't paying me today." Cloyce nodded, and I could I could almost see that light bulb brightening above his head.

Cloyce stopped by the old barn this past Tuesday to pay his current bill. He wrote out a check. "Look, Marty, I dated it today," he showed me.

"Great, Cloyce, Thanks," I replied.

He then asked, "Can you hold it til Friday?"

Yes, I can hold it til Friday. I actually wonder whether that's his way of making himself pay me, to know in his own mind that a check is out there that he has to, some day, honor. Whatever the reason, I'll surely have my money later this afternoon.

Catholic or Protestant drain snakes

I had an issue with a customer the other day which reminded me of something me Pops would do from time to time as circumstances would merit.

This guy had a unit which was, um, ah, beyond its prime. It had joined the choir invisible of sewer machines. Yet the man didn't want to accept that. There had to be something we could do, he insisted.

Dad, under such circumstances, would ask the customer, "Are you Protestant or Catholic?"

"What difference does that make?"

Dad would take his hat, hold it over his heart, and say somberly, "All we can do is make proper arrangements."