"What Do You Call Your Little Guitar?"

 

Today after Mass we went to Fitz's in Okee, because they were advertising a "tiki buffet" for Father's Day. We sat outside, overlooking Lake Wisconsin and listening to live music, and Travalon ordered the buffet while I ordered a seafood boil, so that we could both try both things. I got a free salad bar with mine, and Fitz's has the best salad bar, so I was set for a while. Travalon went up and got his barbecued meat and mashed potatoes and coconut macadamia shrimp, and I took a few of the shrimp. At first I wasn't too concerned that the seafood boil wasn't showing up, but when people who had arrived after us got theirs, I became a bit annoyed. The waitress told us there was some snafu with the kitchen taking it off of the order, and she kept assuring us my order would appear soon, but we waited and waited with no sign of it. Finally they took it off our bill, which was fine with me because I was fairly full... and then someone came out with it. It was so delicious that I said they should put it back on our bill, because it was definitely worth paying for, but they said they couldn't. Travalon also got a coconut mule, which tasted very tropical, and he got a sundae bar as part of the buffet. It had everything - he even had Cap'n Crunch on his sundae! He was also supposed to get either soup or a salad bar, but he never bothered to get either. I feel bad that we got the expensive seafood for free, but they were definitely doing brisk business, and after all Travalon saved them money with not getting the salad bar.

After that we went for a walk nearby and saw these crane sculptures.

There were beautiful hills across the lake.

We took the ferry across the river, and as we waited for it, we watched old Cap'n Crunch ads. (He was created by the same person who did Rocky & Bullwinkle.) The ads were rather silly, especially the ones with the Crunch Berry Creature, but there was one for a smaller, snack-sized box of cereal that caught my attention because it was called a "munch box." As a kid I probably would have just thought that was a funny pun on "lunchbox," but adult me found it really dirty. I pictured myself saying to him, "Cap'n, eat my munch box!" Maybe things were simpler back in the 80's, but I can't imagine them calling something for kids a "munch box" now. Would Cap'n do the dishes afterwards? Okay, I'll stop talking about cunning linguists now.

Our next stop was the dam at Sauk, where there were plenty of pelicans.

We could see black birds hanging out with the pelicans, which usually wouldn't be so strange since cormorants are always hanging out around pelicans, but these didn't look like cormorants. Travalon took a photo of them, and they were turkey vultures!

I have never seen turkey vultures hang out on the ground around water before. They are usually either circling around in the sky or sitting in trees. Here's a pelican and a turkey vulture together.

Are they hunting cooperatively now? This is very new to me.

We hurried home so I could grab my mandolin and go to the Marquette Lakeside Festival at Yahara Park, to play with my Slow Irish Session peeps. I got there just in time, and there were only about six of us until a really good local fiddler joined us. People seemed to enjoy our traditional Irish tunes, and afterwards I asked about swag from the music club, if it was for sale, but the owner said, "No, take it," so I was sort of paid with a tote bag. Travalon and I explored the festival, which was similar to other festivals in town, but smaller, and much closer to water - Lake Monona was right there. Each end of the park had a stage with a very loud rock band on it (the music club had acts playing between sets, as one band tore down and the next one set up), and neither of us liked the music, so we left and went to a sub shop near where band practice would be. (Our new fiddler hosted it.) You couldn't sit in the sub shop, and they didn't have a bathroom, so Travalon bought my sub while I went across the street to the Regent Street Co-op. They had a decent bathroom, but oddly they didn't have regular water (the sub shop had been out of it too), so I settled for some strange infused water that Travalon liked better than I did, so I gave it to him. We also picked up some necessities for the week there, like coffee and pita bread and bananas.

We practiced in the new fiddler's living room, sandwiched between a baby grand piano and an upright piano. The fiddler has a little boy who had just turned three yesterday and received a toy trumpet, so he tooted along with us a little. He told his mom to ask me this question: "What do you call your little guitar?" I told him it was called a mandolin, and that I could play chords like a guitar but also melody like the violins. Best of both worlds! Tomorrow I plan to go to a Moldy Jam jam, and we'll see if I play melody or chords... or both. Moldy Jam did play at the music club tent at the festival, but when they put out the call, they said only people who had played with them for a long time. Whereas I was personally asked to come to the Slow Irish Session performance, which makes sense, because I'm one of the regulars. Maybe if the music club has a tent at the festival next year, I'll be asked to play with Moldy Jam too.

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Condo Association Meetings

I have to laugh at some of the ads on my blog, like yesterday there was one to vote for Walker for president. Not only does that make no sense, considering what I have stated about my thoughts on his policies, but by then he had long since dropped out of the race. The ads supposedly make money for me (at a very slow rate), but I mostly consider them a form of amusement. It’s fun to compare what ads I see with what my regular readers see, because they seem to be tailored to our interests. Except for that Walker for President one, of course. I have no idea who I will vote for, but it was never going to be Walker, even before he dropped out.

Last night Travalon and I had our annual condo association meeting at Mariner’s Inn, so we went there for dinner beforehand and sat outside, overlooking the water. We have to take advantage of being able to eat outside while we still can! To quote Game of Thrones (so I hear– I’ve never seen it), “Brace yourselves – winter is coming!” This meeting was quite calm and lasted almost exactly an hour, since everyone who came agreed with the proposed budget. In my experience, problem people generally don’t come to condo association meetings anyway, although I wouldn’t say we have any “problem people” in our current association. At my old condo complex, there were always people who violated the dogs on leashes rule, and we would complain about them at the meeting, but they were never there to hear us. The worst offender had some sort of pit bull-type creature named Annabel, which we nicknamed “Annabeast” because she was never on a leash so she would run up to us, growling and threatening to tear us to shreds. Then her owner would grab her by the collar and laugh, “Oh, Annabel, they’re friendly!” She would add, for our benefit I guess, “She’s a rescue. She isn’t sure who’s friendly yet.” Okay, great, I can understand an abused animal being unsure about people, but for crying out loud, KEEP YOUR BEAST ON A LEASH!!! It’s not our problem if she doesn’t like people! We would complain about Annabeast at every condo association meeting, and the president of the board would assure us that Annabeast’s owner had been warned about her behavior, yet the behavior continued. Eventually the owner spawned (I shudder to think of Annabeast around a child), and then she moved away with the baby daddy, so that was the end of our issues with Annabeast. Fortunately there is no equivalent in our current neighborhood. Everyone has very small dogs that they keep on leashes, and some are amazingly yippy, but I have no fear of any of them tearing my jugular open.

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Women's Evening of Avent Joy

These internet ads are starting to get too personal. It was weird enough when they were all about wedding stuff, but today I saw one for Green Bay Packers manicures. How do they know I’m a Packer Backer? At least they don’t know everything about me, because they think I get manicures.

Friday night Luxuli wanted to go to the Women’s Evening of Advent Joy, so she was trying to round up women to go with her by telling us that there would be crafts and refreshments. I’m not a very crafty person, but who doesn’t like refreshments? Then I thought, hey, maybe the craft is making Christmas tree ornaments, and that might be kind of fun. Anyway, another woman and I said we would go with Luxuli. We got there and the promised refreshments were not a disappointment; they even had vegan and gluten free stuff at one end of the long buffet table full of treats. The crafts, however, were nowhere to be seen, except for a couple of women making rosaries from cords at our table. We had to do one of those ice breakers where you find something in your purse that represents you and use it to introduce yourself to the rest of the table, and one woman had Packer tickets. Then we had to vote for who had the coolest thing, and you know what I would choose, but I was outvoted by the people who liked cute grandbaby pictures. Then someone got up and told mildly amusing anecdotes about her progeny, and then another woman gave an overly long talk about Advent joy. So that was the Diocesan Women’s Evening of Advent Joy. Afterwards I was standing somewhat in proximity to the refreshment table, and a woman begged me to take a plate of leftovers, so I took them right to Rich’s house. Why should he miss out on goodies just because he’s not a woman?

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3 Debroom Appartment

The good news: my office mate Light Bright put an offer on a house and it was accepted! The bad news: her landlord will not let her out of her lease, so she has to find a subletter. Here is what she has to say about her apartment:

Our offer was accepted for the house on 123 Easy Street today! :) But... that means we have to sublet our appartment... tell everyone you know who may be looking for an apartment! :) It happens to be fabulous :) here is a brief description if you do know someone looking: 2000 sqft, 3 debroom, 2 full bathroom apartment heat and 2 stall underground parking included in rent 1050/month.

So there you go. If you know anyone looking for a 3 debroom appartment, have them talk to me and I will get them in touch with Light Bright.

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Girl Supplies for Boys

My office mate Light Bright told me a really funny story today: last night she asked her hubby to get her some girl supplies. You know what I mean, ladies. We need them for one week a month and they often come with an applicator. He came back from the store with what she said was the coolest box of girl supplies ever: it was black with neon stripes all over it, and nothing indicating that it was girl supplies. Her usual brand comes in a blue box with a big picture of the supply right on the front. She said this other brand must be targeted at men who have to buy them for wives and girlfriends, so they don’t have to look like they are carrying a box of girl supplies around. I thought that was rather ingenious of the girl supply makers, to think of something like that: girl supplies marketed for boys.

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Truth in Advertising

Banjo Player sent me the following article.  She says, "You can't make this stuff up!"

A Carmel-based candy company is recalling its Toxic Waste Nuclear Sludge chew bars after California public health authorities say they found the treats contained double the minimum levels of lead.


You can find the entire article here.

On the theme of advertising, she also saw the Paratrooper Twinkies ad on the SyFy (or however they are spelling it these days) channel, but it is actually for Little Debbie Snack Cakes.  You can see it here.  Banjo Player notes: "The weird thing is that it STILL looks totally digitally enhanced, so I still can't figure out why they filmed it on the streets of LA (and about 10 other places judging from the commercial...) Would have been kinder to bus passengers such as myself to have done it entirely virtually."

Thanks, Banjo Player, for keeping us updated on the paratrooper snack cake commercial!

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