Author: thorens

I’m not a greenskeeper or a gardener, but I don’t think I’m alone in wanting a green lawn. This summer has been exceptional with regard to temperature and moisture so the lawn really hasn’t needed too much attention. That being said, we always seem to have a recurring fungal problem in one half of our front yard.

Granted, this area of our lawn is almost under the constant shade of some very large Elm trees, but it only seems to affect the one section. Virtually overnight we can get a small Smurf colony. In fact, while we were away on vacation, our neighbors were charting its growth. I think one of them was a mycologist or something and was hoping to see if this crop of ‘shrooms was edible.

Knowing full well how mushrooms spread their fungal goodness, it’s always a challenge to keep the boys from obliterating them (i.e. punting, kicking, smashing, golfing). Instead we prescribe the use of the patented hand-in-a-plastic-grocery-bag method of harvesting. I’m sure to casual on-lookers it appears our boys are cleaning up after a month’s worth of dog business. Ironically enough we don’t own a dog but it’s a good way to put a stop to their begging for one.

I’m certainly no chef, but I can follow a recipe. I don’t spend a lot of time in the kitchen, but I’ve had to pinch hit now and again. Every once in a while I like to venture beyond the safer fare (toast) and try something more challenging (homemade soft pretzels). I credit the number of flops I’ve had to my lack of experience but I have also found that preparing dishes isn’t just combining ingredients. Order, technique and timing have their place as well. It is chemistry after all. Thanks to Food Network’s know-it-all Alton Brown I can feel comfortable being one of the culinary illiterates out there and benefit by his superior knowledge and entertaining form of teaching. I may have learned a few new tricks but I doubt I’ll be given free-reign in the kitchen anytime soon.

I had the opportunity to revisit the relaxing recreational activity known as fishing this past weekend. Though I managed to lure three fish from Beaver Bay, I still don’t consider myself an angler. The fact that I, a junior fisherman, had the most bites in our fishing party is why I have a difficult time believing that there is any great amount of skill involved in fishing. The rod wasn’t mine. The lures weren’t mine. The bait wasn’t even mine. I simply happened to be casting and reeling the line that these small fish decided to take the bait from. Simple luck. Ironically enough, luck was the very thing that turned me off to fishing so many years ago.

As a kid, fishing with either of my grandpas was an almost religious occasion. When you went fishing, it was for the entire day. If you were on the water, you stayed on the water (even if you had to ‘go’). I tried many times to catch fish, but failed. Watching everyone else pull in their limit of fish while I picked off the weeds and re-baited my hook was enough to discourage me from liking it. It was fruitless labor. My younger brother and dad certainly looked forward to fishing more than I ever did and before long I had removed myself entirely from this great American father-son pastime because I simply had no luck with it.

My oldest son enjoys fishing and has already landed more fish than I have in my entire life, so for his sake I feel obliged to try it again. Thanks to my brother-in-law Doug and friend Kelly, I got the chance to bone up on a few things. I relearned how to tie a fisherman’s knot, how to free a line hung up in weeds and how important it is to thread your line through the eyelets of your rod (sorry Doug). Yes, for the first time in almost thirty years I actually enjoyed fishing. Thanks, guys!

Every August, at the insistence of the queen, all bees must leave the colony and aggressively attack humans. Or so it would seem. Our youngest received his annual bee sting yesterday from some yellowjacket that thought it would be cool to inoculate a seven-year-old in the palm of his hand. I couldn’t help but ask him if he was carrying the bee around. His reply between sobs was a firm, resounding ‘NO!’ I also learned (through subsequent whimpers) that he wasn’t collecting, swatting at or otherwise aggravating said bee but was attacked unprovoked.

We’ve always told our boys that when a bee circles you, not to swat at it. The affirmative phrase, ‘if you leave them alone, they’ll have no reason to sting you’ was running through my mind as I tried in some way to explain to him why he was unjustly stung. I couldn’t think of anything. I just comforted him as he nursed his hand with a bag of ice, tears still rolling down his cheeks. I don’t know that I’ll correct him if he vengefully swats and kills the next bee that goes near him.

While in Seattle we were intrigued by two eager street magicians. I’ve seen street magic on television before and was always skeptical of how ‘real’ it was. I thought that there must have been some behind-the-scenes trickery going on, though the spectators always seemed genuinely entertained. Naturally I kept a watchful eye as this young twenty-something lured in my oldest son for a card trick.

It started out with your typical ‘pick a card and don’t show me’ but then he pulled a new one. To really make it obvious that he couldn’t ‘cheat’ on this seemingly standard card trick, he had my son write his name on the card he picked with a sharpie marker. He did all those impressive, vaudevillian magic moves – the slow deal, the inverted shuffle, the switch – to reveal my son’s chosen card every time without fail.

Probably the most unbelievable was when, while expecting another clever reveal from the deck on the table, he told my son that his card was on his shoulder. And it was! I realize there had to be some slight of hand, but even my eagle eye couldn’t detect how he pulled this off. I started analyzing the logistics of this young wizard’s ‘power’ trick. I thought about the distances, proximity and fact that my son was standing right in front of me with this shoulder in plain sight the whole time. Admittedly I was entertained.

With all of us standing dumbfounded with mouths agape (several passersby included) the magician attempted to pull off his most difficult trick: getting the spectators to purchase the $20 DVD that purportedly revealed how to do the tricks he had shown us. We politely declined, thanked him for the show and slowly walked away.

Later that same day we encountered another young charlatan performing card tricks. We obliged him by again volunteering to take part as audience assistants. When the routine started to look familiar I thought to myself, ‘this time, I’ll figure it out.’ After ten minutes I was still dumbfounded (and amazed) when the pitch for the $20 DVD purchase came up. Again, we declined and sheepishly walked away. Though both magicians were legit (I saw their vendor permits), the second was a lot more persistent with his DVD offer, almost begging and belittling us when we declined. I couldn’t help but think that we had just experienced the most sophisticated form of panhandling. Ta-Da!