Kraft Dinner

There now: how many of the eyes and ears of my Canadian friends perked up at the mention of Kraft Dinner? Here in the States it's thought of simply as mac and cheese. Either way, it's sort of a staple, isn't it? My family ate a lot of it over the years.

I was on the road a long time yesterday, covering just over 700 miles between 2 AM and 5:30 PM. One of the nice things about being out and about often is that you can get whatever you want for your meals. Yet that has a down side. When you can routinely have whatever you want, the choices actually begin to lack. Arby's, Wendy's, or KFC (which we all still call Kentucky Fried Chicken despite it's attempted healthier sounding rebranding to KFC, as though we wouldn't still think of it as fried chicken) have all been had, and frequently. McDonald's, although I still eat too much of it, stopped being a real treat ages ago. To wax a tad philosophic, when you actually can get whatever you want the choices kind of dull, don't they? When you can get whatever anytime, freedom to choose loses luster.

So I was yesterday faced with that loss of luster. After having a couple frankfurters off the roller grill at a Love's truck stop at about four in the morning - hot dogs aren't just for breakfast anymore -  I went the rest of the day, starting around mid morning, wanting more to eat. But nothing appealed to me despite the plethora of options.

When I walked back in my front door in the late afternoon I was still hungry. I had not eaten anything after those red hots and had nearly abandoned hope of pleasing my picky stomach. Yet looking through the pantry I spied a couple boxes of Kraft Dinner. I honestly think it's been years since I enjoyed good old, plain old mac and cheese. I grabbed a box and fixed it up.

Tried and true Kraft Dinner hit the spot for me. You can't beat the classics.

Columbo: Master Plumber

You remember how Peter Falk as the TV detective Columbo would always set up the guilty party? He'd pester them with visits and queries all through the show. He'd eventually go back to them towards the end of an episode and ask a few more questions before appearing satisfied. Typically he would turn to leave, only to reverse course and say to the perp, "But one more thing..." You knew he was going to ask the crowing question, the one that would seal the deal and show the guy did in fact commit the murder. It became Columbo's catchphrase. I always looked forward to it.

I no longer do. We have our own version of Columbo who comes into the Shop, a plumber who never seems quite finished with us. We dread his arrival, me brother Phil and I, because he'll always start with a couple things for us to do. Then he thinks another, and afterwards typically a third or fourth. Finally he will always actually leave the old barn, to reappear at the door a minute or two later to say, "But one more thing..."

Yeesh. Especially when both my brother and I are there, if he would tell us everything at once we could both attack his repairs (or fill his orders as the case may be) and expedite things. We've even told him that. He will comply on the next trip, maybe, and then go right back to being Columbo the Master Plumber.

The other day was no different. He didn't pull out of the driveway for 90 minutes. After the first 60 he left only to come back in about that one more thing. Then he sat in his van for 15 minutes longer before finally leaving. It was an eternity for me and Phil; we kept expecting one more one more thing.

I would have confessed to murdering the Queen Mother by that point.

Fancy meeting you

I know that I've spoken about the wildlife in Woodbridge, the part of Detroit where I live. Hawks, rabbits, pheasants, opossums and others I'm sure all inhabit the area. Yesterday I had one particular animal introduce himself to me.

While standing by a work bench doing whatever, work I suppose, I caught a glimpse of something waddling under the gate which blocks our front door. The gate is there to keep someone from sneaking up on us and has to be opened from the inside. It only goes down to about ten inches of the floor. Anyway, I caught sight of the animal and turned to look, expecting it to be a cat as there are quite a few strays around here.

It was a beaver. I'd seen them before here in Woodbridge but I had never had one stop by to say hello. It shuffled in a few feet before noticing me. It stopped and looked me in the eye and, I swear, appeared to nod its head at me. "Hullo guv'nor," it seemed to say. Yes, with a Cockney accent too.

All right, maybe it wasn't quite like that. But it did look up at me, decide that perhaps he had stumbled where he should not have, and skittered back out under the gate. "Huh, a beaver," I thought, and went back to work.

More of a rant than I meant

Just wear the mask. I am sick of hearing it.

You want me to wear a mask, fine. Convince me that's it's the right thing to do. Do not order me to do it. We have representatives who represent us who are supposed to decide what people should and should not do. We are not supposed to be commanded from on high by any one person *cough* Governor Whitmer, *cough* Governor Cuomo *cough* several other governors who think they're God's gift. That's not how a Republic works.

And stop the shaming too, please. Because I want everyone at risk dead. I want everyone over 80 dead. I want every teacher dead and everyone on the front lines dead. There now: have you got the venom out of your system? Because if you really believe I want all that, we have a problem with one another which runs far deeper than whether either one of us ought to mask up.

My trouble with the whole mask thing is the same trouble I have with almost anything else COVID related anymore. It's been more than five months and it's patently obvious the virus isn't the terrible threat our Fearless Leaders want us to believe. It's time to ratchet down that rhetoric. One big way in which we can do that is to let the legislators do what they, not governors or courts, are supposed to do: legislate.

If you don't want that to happen because - gasp - they might not do what you think is best for the body politic, then I say with all due respect you're part of the problem. I will say, again with all due respect, you're petty little dictators yourselves. I hope you are not, because such an attitude is risking all of us getting a dictator. Pray tell, what will you then say when that dictator commands you to do something you don't like? Will he even let you speak?

At one time we may have had to tolerate it. But it's time to stop leading by executive order. The threat, such as it is, does not require it.

It just figures

A few days ago while on the road I decided I wanted to buy a certain type of carbonated water. I wanted blood orange flavor. I didn't even know there were such things as blood oranges, oranges with reddish pulp and a raspberry-ish taste, until I stumbled upon this water. It is available through Dollar General on their house brand.

Dollar General stores are everywhere, right? Every wide spot in the road has a DG. Hell, there's even some places where they are the wide spot in the road: no town, no houses, no other buildings, just a Dollar General sitting alone almost as though randomly set down. Anyone own that piece of land? No? Then buy it and put up a DG; what are you waiting for?

My taste for blood orange grew with every turn of the highway, every glimpse of rural town, every mileage marker for the next city of any import. And no Dollar General anywhere. What the heck?

Maybe they hide are readily as they appear, eh?

The blogging game

I got nothing this morning. Yet my conscience says I gotta try to give you something. So, here goes.

One bit of advice I was given when I decided to blog was that you have to put up something every day. It's to build up an expectation among readers that you are serious and will regale them with daily fare. That anticipation will make them loyal readers.

If that's true, if that's in fact good strategy which will cause people to look forward to what a guy writes ever day, well, I'll you what.

You just got played.

Pure bull

"Sure Marty, we can bull you."

I must admit I was at first taken aback by that response to an email I sent earlier this morning. It was to one of my suppliers in response to a small parts order sent via the ol' Internet.

No one wants bull of course. But in the next part of the reply they had copied and pasted the relevant part of my own missive: 'Please ship and bull Cosgriff Sales...'

I like jokes, and I like joking with people who can joke. Touche, my friend. Touche.

They did add that, kidding aside, they would ship the order within the next three days. 

In the toilet

When we moved into our house, the upstairs bathroom had a nice mahogany toilet seat. But as with all things human made, it eventually broke. I went to the hardware and bought a decent replacement. We simply threw the old one in the common dumpster which we shared at that time with about six neighbors.

Several days later I happened to be in my neighbor Dan's house. Excusing myself to use his washroom, I saw a nicely refinished mahogany toilet seat. "When did you get this, Dan?" I asked.

"Out of the dumpster. Isn't it cool? Someone was throwing it out; can you believe that?" He had taken the thing, reglued and refinshed it, and put it on his commode.

I answered, "Yes I can, because it was mine. I can't believe you took something like from a dumpster!"

"It's perfectly good," he protested. But that didn't keep him from chastising me several days later when the seat had rebroken and left a blood blister on the back of his thigh. "You toilet seat did that to me," he whined.

"Serves you right dumpster diving stuff like that," was all I said.

David McCullough

Of the many books I've read in recent years The Great Bridge, the story of the building of the Brooklyn Bridge, is perhaps the one I most expected not to like yet made myself read anyway. It was penned by David McCullough as a follow up to his book about the devastating Johnstown flood. He wanted a happier subject as he didn't want to be filed away as the disaster writer. I get that.

What caused me to read this particular book is multi-faceted. I loved McCullough's biographies of Harry Truman and John Adams as well as his fictionalized account of the first year of American independence, appropriately titled 1776. Too, having walked the Brooklyn Bridge itself, I was impressed with its grandeur and, I suppose, awed that such a thing could have been made in the ancient 1870s; no doubt a little modern arrogance at work there. But more than anything, I was piqued at an attempt to make a tale of bridge building interesting. How is that possible?

It's possible if you have a talent like McCullough's. The thing that makes it work is his ability to talk about the people, and the people of course made the bridge. I had a bit of a duh moment when that occurred to me. McCullough wrote about the people. As such, I have great respect for the father/son duo of John and Washington Roebling, the engineers behind the project. The past comes alive, it comes into the present, when we learn about the people from back then who were intimately involved in such projects.

To be sure, McCullough as ought to be expected spends some considerable time on the engineering aspects. He does well with his explanations: I *think* I understand how the caissons are used and the dangers involved, so well does he describe the craft. Plus there's other historical aspects behind the Bridge which are well examined. But the bottom line is, make it about the people and you can make a good book. That of course will make a good read.

Gas tanking

We all know enough about cars to know that they break down. The starter gets fried, the transmission goes out, and we have to from time to time deal with nuisances such as flat tires. But sometimes truly unusual things happen to our vehicles.

Back in the Seventies we had a tan Chevy Suburban. With Mom and Dad and seven of us kids, you had to have a car large enough to transport everyone around, and Suburbans fit the bill. One day, I was 13 or 14, Mom and I were going to or coming back from somewhere and were just tooling along the street. Suddenly there was a loud and emphatic 'ker-thump!" and a terrible dragging sound. Mom eased the car to the curb. "Get out and see what's wrong," she instructed me.

I wasn't sure why she thought a barely teen kid would know to look for, but fortunately the trouble was obvious. When I got to the back of the Suburban, I saw the gas tank plain as day lying on the asphalt. It was held on by only the gas line.

I went back and said to Mom, "The gas tank fell off."

"Oh, come on," she responded. The tone in her voice and the look on her face told me she didn't believe that could possibly be the case.

"Ma, it's laying on the ground," I replied, incredulous myself really.

She got out, walked around the car, the looked at me and laughed. "You're right, the gas tank's fell off," she concurred. Thanks for the vote of confidence Mother.

Back then there weren't cell phones but pay phones were still all over. We found one only a block away and we weren't far from home either. So me Pops and me Uncle John came, disconnected the tank, and towed us home. The straps holding the tank in place had rusted through, and it turned out an easy fix. And though perhaps similar stories are out there, I've yet to hear a car trouble tale quite so bizarre as dropping the gas tank.

The descent into crime

This is the last time I blog as a free man for I don't know how long. The descent into criminality is sometimes long and slow. You don't always realize that it's happened to you, it's so gradual. I never thought it would happen to me. Yet so it has. The evidence is spread out before me, obvious and damning.

I never expected it, never saw it coming. Now, how much jail time awaits? How will I handle it? I'll have to learn to play the harmonica I suppose.

But there's no hiding and no denying the crime. I have no choice but to admit it and face fate. The case against me is laid out drying on the kitchen table, all nine dollars. A five and four singles if you must know. I can't laugh it away. I'll have to turn myself in and pray that judge and jury are lenient.

While washing clothes yesterday it seems I stupidly left my wallet in a pair of pants. Now my offense against society stares at me. It mocks me derisively.

Money laundering. How many of my twilight years is this gonna cost me?

Midnight rant

Well, there he goes again. Marty's going to talk all serious and stuff. He's gonna rant.

You know what the trouble is in this old world? When something goes bad or something bad happens, we don't really know what to do, who to believe, or what the actual truth is about what's going on.

So what do we do about BIG SPECTACULAR PROBLEM? We watch news and news shows for information. But here's the rub: I'm not going to believe shrill Chris Cuomo and you're not going to believe shrill Tucker Carlson. That said, I'm not sure any of us should believe shrill anybody. Maybe we should all take a pill and calm down when talking about serious matters. Shrill doesn't help. I'm inclined to say it usually hurts, as it seeds rancor and not harmony. Rancor stymies truth and understanding.

But more than that. We all have our sources we trust and those we don't trust. But can we know who or what to trust?

The recent corona troubles I think highlight this problem. I say reporting is wrong, you say it's not, but where can we find data which reasonably demonstrates who's right? Masks bad, masks good, the virus lives on stainless steel forever but then not so much, social distance good unless you're protesting, blah blah. It all seems to change rather suddenly. And I can't help anyway noticing a certain obvious hypocrisy involved.

Tests are reliable except when they're not. Cases are added and subtracted all the time, and why? On what grounds? Florida testing appears tragi-comically skewed (it was done either through attempting to influence action a certain way or is a result of spectacular ineptitude, and I personally lean towards an attempt to influence policy yet in a particularly stupid manner; how's that for combining points?) and there are issues within Texas about how accurate their counts are. And those are only two states offering, ah, uh, I'll say conflicting information just to be kind. What's a fella to think?

We're told it's a national crisis, yet nearly half of all fatalities have been in New York, New Jersey, and Connecticut. Shouldn't that raise a flag? Please notice I have not yet gotten to questions of political action or incompetence yet. It may be simply that the population there is so dense that transmission is too readily accommodated. Yet political actions must play a part, musn't they? And that after months and months of being told (shrilly) that it's all going to end badly for us IF WE DON'T ACT IMMEDIATELY IF NOT SOONER. That won't entice the political wizards into doing something, just anything, will it? Particularly as they tend to be some of the ones feeding whatever the crisis of the day is.

I believe in a certain thing called common sense (yes, it exists). It is very, very rare that anything requires the immediate and unquestioning extreme actions which corona has caused. Common sense dictates that things almost never are or ever will be as bad as leaders (governmental or societal) insist they will be IF WE DON'T ACT NOW. Please. That exact attitude destroys any real chance common sense might have. Sudden, knee jerk reactions tend not to end well for anybody involved. And I think that's a clue to the real problem here: we want all bad things ended right now kapow. Life don't work that way. It never has and it never will.

Demanding that action, any action, be taken immediately generally only makes the problem worse. We almost never have to make decisions post haste. When we do make such hasty choices, things tend to go south pretty quickly.

The answer? Try as best we can to get good information to act on and then act on it. If we can. I personally would leave a lot more problems to individuals acting cooperatively to figure out as best they can on their own without government getting in the way, because government (and the media) tend only to make things worse. The corona scare I will argue illustrates this point ideally. Shrill sells papers and wins elections. That's all.

This means if you have a health problem go to health care professionals in the private sector because they're the ones truly interested in your health. Their livelihoods depend, directly and immediately, on making you healthy. Personal relationships develop where they care, person to person, about you. There is no personal relationship between you and Dr. Fauci. Government bureaucrats ultimately only care about what influence they can have and how they can keep their cushy job. A job almost certainly without censor if they make a mistake. Even though your life can be ruined when they're wrong.

That's it, I quit. See what you get when Marty wakes up suddenly at 1 AM?

The wonders of technology

Technology, huh? Sometimes I giggle about it, I'm so impressed.

See, there are these things called "apps" which you can "download" to your phone, however that is (I think it's magic), and apparently there's one for just about everything. My son even found one which acts like a remote control. Now I can sit in my bedroom and turn the channel and adjust the volume of my TV right from my cell. I'm so impressed with that that I giggle while I'm using it.

Can you imagine future phone conversations? "Sorry I hung up on you, I was changing over to Fox Sports Detroit." Or maybe you might go to turn down the TV and instead turn down the volume on your call. "Hello? Hello? You still there?"

Telephones. They're not just for conversation anymore.

Go Tigers!

Well, in this summer infested with almost everything which is wrong with the world, I at least finally get to watch the Detroit Tigers play baseball tonight. And they are playing...the Detroit Tigers.

With 2020 being as weird as it has so far been, why not? It actually is an intrasquad exhibition game, not unlike what major league teams play during normal spring training (and even occasionally during the regular season). Because of the corona virus, teams are gearing up for an abbreviated baseball season by training in their home parks and playing games against themselves. In today's case, the local Fox Sports channel with air tonight's match live.

It's better than nothing. While I have been enjoying Korean League baseball on ESPN it's just not the same as watching your favorite team of all time. Even if they are facing each other. Or themselves. Or, or, I'm not really sure how to say it.

So, I guess, go Tigers! And, well, I suppose go Tigers!

Curmudgeon mild

I have nothing against the hipsters or whatever the current batch of up-and-coming young challengers to the daily status quo are, really. And maybe I am just becoming an older guy less interested in innovation, increasingly simply wanting things to stay the same. But I gotta admit I don't typically get whatever happens to be new at any given time.

As my neighborhood gentrificates (is that a word?) new shops are opening. I won't name names because I really don't want to hurt their business intiatives. I don't really mean to pass harsh judgments either. But as I look at what passes for their attraction I don't always get their point.

One such store offers what we would have once called eclectic or eccentric items. Ok, so be it. But it strikes me as nothing more than a second hand store more bizarrely stocked. Odd paintings and statuettes and, for my taste, simply strange furnishings and the like. I wouldn't call it wrong, to be fair. I wouldn't even call its wares pigs with lipstick. But they are, well, weird.

Then there's the pizza parlor (I'm sure the owners would bristle at what that implies) which has all sorts of unusual toppings. I've tried several types, and they're honestly good. But at the end of the day it's overpriced hipster fare. Give me a Little Caesar's Hot and Ready first if I have any say, though I would go along and not rain on the parade if the majority of whom I was with wanted Pricey Hipster Pizza.

I want to stress I'm not calling anything wrong here. But I do wonder if my elders looked on me the same way when the roles were reversed although, quite honestly, I don't recall ever deviating significantly from the standards of the times at any time. So call this rant Marty: curmudgeon mild. It kind of fits.

Dad's Day at Tahquamenon

Tahquamenon Falls are a natural beauty found in Michigan's eastern Upper Peninsula. There are two falls a few miles apart. The walking trail between the two is around four miles long. I've walked it once, in 1994, with me two sons and me Pops.

We were vacationing in da U.P. as usual that summer and decided to see the Falls. Mom and Dad had come up for a few days and so went with us. While there I thought it would be cool to hike the trail. It was immediately after the words expressing that wish came out of my mouth that I felt a pang of regret and concern. You see, Pops was between cancer treatments at the time and about six weeks ahead of scheduled surgery to remove a tumor enveloping his kidney. After I had opened my yap, he decided that walking the trail would be cool too. I surely would not have said anything had I thought he'd like the idea.

It was probably the first time I came close to confronting him seriously on anything. I was really worried about his health. I told myself that maybe I ought to discourage him, with his cancer and all. The tumor was by that point diagnosed as inactive and the MDs were certain that all other cancerous spots (he had them on his liver and lungs when the disease was initially found) had been eradicated. Still, I wasn't sure a 58 year old man dealing with such ought to be hiking a rough trail through the woods. And what would we do if something happened while we were out there? Yet as a son taught to respect his father's wishes, well, I said nothing and figured I'd just watch him closely. He likely wouldn't be denied anyway.

Damn but if that old man didn't hammer that trail. He more than kept up; he led the way more often than not. He always walked fast anyway, but I wonder if he took the hike to prove he could do it and was further determined to show us he could despite his (then) recent health issues. I had feared after his tribulations that his stamina would not allow the full journey. His stamina then proceeded to embarrass mine.

So I'm glad I suggested the hike and I'm glad he walked it with us. It's become a happy and proud memory. One of these days I'll walk the trail again in his honor.

Hobart sentiment

Sentimentality can really take hold of a man.

Knowing that I've needed a new torch set for awhile now, I resolved yesterday to buy one. Once arrived at the store, the Hartland, Michigan Rural King since you're dying to know that I bet, I went around to where they sell such things. Lo and behold, they had a nice set with gauges, hose, a brazing and a cutting tip for the torch, and even goggles and a striker to light it all up with. And, trumpet fanfare please, it was made by Hobart.

Hobart Brothers are a welding industry staple. What made that torch set special to me was that, of all the welding machines me Grandpa Joe rented for all those years, the overwhelming majority were made by Hobart. More than 200 in fact, and maybe approaching 300 if you factor in the number which were burned out and replaced over time. In further fact, Joe bought more new Hobarts in 1953 than anyone else in the country but Ford and Chrysler. That's rarefied air if you ask me.

So I'm tickled to have brand new Hobart products, indeed probably the first new Hobart products a Cosgriff has purchased since 1953.

There. I beat you to the joke. But I am incredibly happy about doing my part to keep a family tradition going.

All those fields

I'm currently reading Ballparks: Yesterday and Today. It offers interesting and quick histories (along with a few pictures) of, you guessed it, ballparks, baseball stadiums. It's led me to think that if I had a bucket list but it could be experienced over and through time, I would visit all those old parks.

Needless to say I would go back to Detroit's old Tiger Stadium often. But what modern baseball fan wouldn't want to see Ebbets Field in Brooklyn or Forbes Field in Pittsburgh? Crosley Field in Cincinnati or Braves Field in Boston (there were a lot of fields in the day weren't there)? Many are gone in the mists of time, though a section of Braves Field still exists as, ugh, a football stadium.

To be sure, there are things in the modern world I would like to see despite what I might say. But I lack the burning desire to see them which I have where baseball stadiums are concerned. There is something off about your bucket list being in the past, isn't it?

But the description of Ebbets Field really was enticing.

What's the wurst that could happen?

Have you ever felt like Oliver Douglas on Green Acres? In Hooterville, it was like everyone else was crazy and that he alone were sane. I've had that experience before. You might read about it here:

https://thesublimetotheridiculous.blogspot.com/2018/07/the-open-book.html

I had a similar feeling again over the weekend. While I was up north in Hessel in Michigan's glorious Upper Peninsula there happened to be a farmer's market about the equivalent of a block away from our place. My son, daughter in law and I hiked the short distance to it Sunday just to see what they had.

One woman there, a kitchen baker from nearby Rudyard, had carrot cake with buttercream frosting which was a-mazing. I tried a couple other pastries and was quite pleased with them. My kids came across a farming family which processed their own meats and were very happy with what they had bought. "They have homemade bratwurst too," my daughter-in-law informed me, knowing how much I love brats. So of course I had to check them out.

At their trailer was sign which told what types of bratwurst they had, ten varieties in fact. There were plain brats, brats with green pepper and onion, ones with jalapenos and so forth. One item listed was sweet Italian sausage. I love them too. "Oh, you have Italian sausages?" I asked in conversation.

"No," a young woman answered, to my confusion. The chalkboard plain as day said Italian sausage.

"It says Italian sausage right there," I said, pointing at the sign.

She answered, "Oh, no. We use our finest ground pork and natural casings as on all our bratwurst. We just put Italian sausage seasoning in those."

"Then they're Italian sausages," I mildly protested.

Looking at me as though I were the confused one she replied, "Oh, no, sir. They're brats flavored like Italian sausage." She wasn't condescending or anything like that. But one of us clearly didn't understand what was at issue.

Giving up the debate (because what would it really have served anyway?) I bought a package of plain brats, one with the green pepper and onion, and one with Italian sausage seasonings. They await in the freezer my next trip to Hessel, hopefully soon. But in her mind she sold me three types of bratwurst. In mine, I have two kinds of brats and an Italian sausage. And I will be shaking my head in wonder as I eat them hot off the grill next month.

A video

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VhK7VbozCcE&feature=youtu.be

Just trying something different. Enjoy!

Gettin' vittles

There were two things in particular which I loved to hear me Grandpa Joe say and they were both associated with working for him. They were, "Let's get that coffee," and, "Let's get them vittles," whenever he decided it was time for a break.

It struck me even back then that his words sounded almost as though we had to hunt them, had to track them down, as if the coffee pot didn't just sit there on a table by the office or that the snacks weren't right alongside it. The vittles were the snacks which he always had me or me Pops or me Uncle John buy for the morning coffee break. Joe paid for them; I think he genuinely liked treating us, but I don't doubt at all he looked forward to them too.

Vittles were the height of the workday for a young boy like me. There were always single serve and two for everyone, an assortment of cupcakes, pies, donuts, and cinnamon rolls. I hoped every morning for a Hostess French Apple pie, which was really only their apple pie with raisins added, but it seemed significantly different. Joe and Pops and me and whomever else was there would lay into them vittles like we hadn't ate in days.

Uncle John rarely did, and I don't know why. He would buy a paper and sit nearby reading it as the rest of us fell into sugar induced stupors. At times I wondered if something was wrong with him, but that was surely the kid in me thinking such stuff.

It was 15, maybe 20 minutes of the day. But man, I miss gettin' them vittles.

July 5 in science

Late last night, or very early this morning however you may like it, my son and I made a breakthrough of astronomical proportions. We discovered the Moon.

Well, all right, not exactly discovered it. But we were able to sight it from the front porch of Hessel Homestead in the glorious Upper Peninsula of Michigan, using a telescope. We were trying to get a close up view of the Buck Moon, a form of a lunar eclipse.

We didn't see the eclipse. In fact we had trouble seeing the Moon. It's harder than it looks, lining up a telescope. But we figured it out, and saw the Moon at least a bit more close up than usual.

So, for us, we discovered the Moon. It's been a great day in Cosgriff scientific history. The Man in the Moon was no doubt laughing with us and not at us. We are relatively certain of that.

Abnormal Fourth?

Sitting on the porch in Hessel, Michigan, at 6 A. M. with a cup of coffee, reading Conan the Barbarian. And, go. There's a joke in there somewhere.

Happy Fourth all!

Friday Holiday Law

I've crabbed about the Monday Holiday Law but it hadn't really occurred to me that there was a corollary Friday Holiday Law. Well, maybe it's not a law but custom (I could look up the details as I'm at my computer but I don't feel like it) but apparently the immovable holidays which fall on Saturday are celebrated on Friday. Hence, July 3 is Independence Day this year. Kind of.

Actual Independence Day is in truth July 2. It was on that date in 1776 that the motion on independence was approved by the Second Continental Congress. The wording of the Declaration of Independence was accepted on July 4, so that that day has usurped the Second as the Anniversary of American Independence. Rightly so, I would argue.

The weird things are, you know how after a Monday holiday, Tuesday feels like Monday and so on? How it messes with your perception of time and the days of the week? Well, yesterday felt a lot like a Friday to me, knowing today is technically a holiday. Reverse psychology perhaps?

Further (I said weird things are so I have to come up with at least a second weird thing or my grammar will be incorrect), all this stuff leaves me unsure of how I'm supposed to feel tomorrow on actual Independence Day. Then there's that bit of ambivalence I'm left with over the fact that July 2 is in fact the date we split from England. Throw into that mix that July 3 is the celebrated holiday this year, what's a fella to think?

I think I'll have three holidays in a row whether I like it or not. It's a tough life.

Freeway baseball

In these days you rarely see pickup baseball games. When I was a kid we played pickup baseball all the time. So did me Pops. In fact, he and his friends played a very rare type of pickup ball. They played it on the Lodge Freeway.

Not once it was open for traffic, of course. But when the Lodge was being built in the early 1950s it ran right alongside of the house he grew up in. When the roadway had been graded but not yet paved, he and his friends would go down on Sundays, set up bases, and play baseball on the Lodge.

A nearby bridge, the Warren Avenue bridge in fact, had already been completed. It overlooked their makeshift diamond. Pops said that every time the guys went down to play, a crowd would eventually form on the bridge (and also along the service drives in place) and watch the games, cheering the young men on as they pitched, hit, and took the field.

They were only able to do it for a few weeks one summer, until the freeway construction had progressed to where play was not possible. But boy, I bet that was a sight to see. It was exactly the sort of thing which happened when neighborhoods were neighborly.

Grandmaw's wisdom

As I finished my walk this morning I thought to myself, 'I'm starving. I think I'll go to BK and grab breakfast."

This I did. But as I drove down Trumbull I heard the voice of me Grandmaw Hutchins as I thought again about how I was starving. Apparently one day as a child visiting her I remarked, "I'm starving." She replied, "No, now, you ain't starving. You might be hungry, but you ain't starving."

Grandmaw was right of course. And that little lesson sticks with me until today.