Storms

I remember the first time I heard the song Rhiannon. It was on a day in 1976, while I was motoring in the UP of Michigan. I had my four kids in the car at the time, and they were all in fine voice that day as they were going through their back-seat arguing and infighting routines. Somehow the song’s melody made its way through the cacophony inside the automobile, grabbed my organs of hearing, and implanted itself in my brain.

On FM airplay the song had a haunting sort of melody, the kind that held up just fine under repeated listening, and caused me to actually spend a few bucks buying the album. It became my song of the month for at least three months.

But then I saw Fleetwood Mac do it on the Midnight Special, and I was never the same. No, I mean really, I wasn’t. This performance was perfect rock n’roll, and we knew it. It blew right past our eyes and ears and into our amygdalas, that strange small place in our brains where emotion and feeling mill around (and often cause us great mischief).

To watch this video is to remember. See for yourself.

Whew. I think I’ll get me a nice cold shower.

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From The New Yorker

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We’ve had some little rains this past week. Nothing of an order to make us wonder where we’d parked the Ark, but still, any rain in a dry country is cause for celebration. And the are some cool things that come along with it.

• the aromas of the plants and the earth are heightened to the point that even our limited human sense of smell can’t miss them
• the cats coming in through the pet entrance highly put out at their fur being wet, and somehow it seems to be our fault
• the thrilling sound of thunder and how tiny it can make us feel
• the gamble of standing out in the rain and watching the spectacle that is lightning (even more fun when somebody is yelling at you to “get in here right this minute, are you crazy?”)

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Cro-Magnon dialog to be read while above video is running

Hey kids, get those wet bearskins off you then go sit by the fire to warm up

Where’s Fluffy?

She’s not in the cave?

Dad, she will get all wet!

If she’s not in here, she is already wet. Go over by the fire and try not to set yourselves ablaze again, like last night.

I’m hungry.

Supper’s just about ready.

What are we having?

Squirrels and gruel

Can I eat over at Yarmik’s?

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I mentioned my friend Rich Kaplan in a previous post. Rich and I traveled to the Boundary Waters together perhaps thirty times over the years. Most of these trips were not the sort of epic journeys that make good story-telling, but they were satisfying in their own low-key way.

The last couple of times we went into the “BW,” we had made a deal with each other. Both of us were getting older, and the probability of injury or other health problems while in the wilderness was slowly but steadily increasing. So we decided that if either of us were stricken in some way, and could not be safely loaded into the canoe for a return trip, the other would leave him and go for help. Anything else, we thought, was Plan B.

Even as we made those terms with ourselves, they sounded rational, but harsh. No one wants to be left behind if they are hurting, no one wants to feel like they are abandoning a friend. But if there is something to be done for the afflicted person, it will more likely be found in a town, and not out in the bush, leaning against a stump.

Of course, once we had made that brave decision, the opportunity to see if we would carry out the plan never came up. One of those rules of life – if you bring your rain gear, it doesn’t rain. The opposite is also true.

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Had friends over for dinner last night, good people we haven’t spent nearly enough time with this past year. I had decided to grill some salmon on a cedar plank, something I’d done before, but it had been quite a while. And lo and behold, it turned out exactly the way I hoped that it would.

When it works, it’s pretty cool and you don’t have to worry about the fish sticking to the bars of the grill and being torn to pieces in the cooking process. After the cooking’s done you haul in a fragrant, charred board with your supper on it and make this beautiful presentation to your guests. It is kind of a cave man moment.

Morg bring meat to friends on burning board because frying pan not invented yet. Eat.

In preparing to cook the fish this way, I had boned up on the process, and in none of the videos I watched did the plank burst into flames. Nor was this potential catastrophe ever mentioned. Of course, you soak the board in water for at least an hour before you put it on the grill to prevent this. But I thought: Surely someone somewhere sometime put one into the cavernous maw of a Weber gas grill, closed the lid, and before you knew it the neighbors had called out the fire department, and the police were writing you a citation for disturbing their peace and creating a public nuisance.

But … apparently … doesn’t happen?

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From The New Yorker

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It’s 2:15 on Wednesday morning, and I stepped out onto the backyard deck where I was assaulted by a full moon so bright it gave me something of the feeling that a criminal must have when those helicopter spotlights pick them up and won’t let go. Amazing.

Terrifying. Our television weather people nationwide do a great job, I think. They have a tendency to overblow a little, their business being to cry “Wolf”whenever there is a chance of real nastiness. Many of those dire predictions don’t develop into anything serious and we begin to say: “Yeah, Yeah, I hear ya” and just keep going about our business.

But this thing called Hurricane Idalia which is roaring up onto Florida’s coast right now … winds of 125 mph and still gaining strength … this looks like the real deal and I hope that the people there have had enough time to get as far away from it as they can. What awesome power.

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