In which we rehearse food in preparation for the Upcoming Feast

Here's the thing about cooking at Haiku Farm:

I make pretty good soups. The horses and dogs are also impressed with my mashes, especially the mashes that have lots of apples in them.

Jim is the King of Outdoor Cooking, and is also our chief Breakfast Maker and Bread Baker.

Willy is the the family member who makes the most amazing Korean food.

Although we won't be cooking the Thanksgiving turkey out-of-doors, Jim has claimed the project as his own anyhow. He has also brewed a special batch of beer for the occasion, and is concocting some amazing ingredients (apples from the orchard) for a turkey brine. Go crazy, sez I.

I'll be, uhm, mashing the potatoes. I also have a butternut squash-and-apple dish specialty.

Willy will be making SanJack. That's the best 'Murken translation of the name of the Korean harvest dish he made for our dinner tonight, as a rehearsal for Thanksgiving. Since he'd never made it by himself before, he wanted to practice it before making a bunch for the crowd next week.

Willy's directions are written in gold. I took the pictures.

San-Jack
need: beef, 2eggs, green onion, garlic, carrots, mushroom, oil, sort, sugar, black paper, and any kind of skewer

1. first making souse sugar(i don't use for Aarene),sort, garlic, green onion and olive oil little and mix

(I can't have sugar, so he skipped that ingredient for my benefit). He mixed up the sauce in a ziplock bag.

2. next mix souse and beef

3. than cut the Carrots,Mushrooms, and green onion like width 1cm length 6cm Thick 0.5cm4. after 2 and 3 low warm

He sauteed the carrots and mushrooms. The whole house smelled divine at this point!

5. then use the Skewer Piercings all to getther

6. next add the flour cover to 5

7. then use the egg and cover to 6(but only use to yellow part)

8. after use the pen and cook

We may be the only family in the Swamplands this year to serve this dish...but next year, who knows? I think it might catch on.

Life is good!

In which we inquire about readers' gravitational preferences

Please answer the following question in the COMMENTS section below.

Haiku Farm and scientific inquiry worldwide appreciates your contribution to this survey.

As regards an involuntary dismount (also called a "dirt check" or a "gravity verification") I prefer to fall off my horse in the:

a. summer

b. winter

c. arena

d. mud

e. nude

f. presence of qualified medical personnel

g. other (please specify): __________________

because the:

a. ground is more hospitable

b. seasonally-appropriate clothes I'm wearing offer more protection

c. accompanying sound effects are so gratifying

d. story is sure to get me free beers for at least a week

e. audience makes everything so worthwhile

f. news crew will be sure to play the whole thing over again in slo-mo so everyone can appreciate my airborn acrobatic skills

g. other (please specify): ____________________

In which I emulate the grasshopper, which is maybe a good choice

I'm having one of those weeks that seems to be full of the word "should.


I should be writing more words on my NaNoWriMo novel (25,068 so far, but not a single word for the past two days!)

I should rake the leaves before they blow all over the yard again.

I should tidy the kitchen before I leave for work.

And yet...

In the same way that other people listen to "inner messages" via their recurring dreams, my inner messenger often communicates through stories that get stuck in my head. For example:

When I was job hunting years ago, I couldn't stop telling the story of Cinderella, especially the part about how the stepsisters were urged to mutilate their own feet in order to make the shoe fit. When I accepted a really great job (which I still hold), I abruptly stopped needing to tell Cinderella's story.

Another time when my neighbors were making me crazy, I kept finding myself telling the story of the Old Woman who lived in a Vinager Bottle--she who kept wishing for a bigger and fancier house, but was never happy with what she had. When I took a box of apples to the neighbors, thereby appeasing their weirdness, I stopped being so unhappy at home and I moved on to a different story.

Hmmm. My storytelling subconscious isn't very subtle.

The story in my head today begins like the Aesop fable about the Ant who works hard all the year to plant and prepare and store away supplies for the winter, and the Grasshopper who sings and dances and tells stories all year.

You would think that a farmer like me would empathize with the Ant. But that's not how this version of the story goes:

The Ant and the Grasshopper : a story you thought you already knew:



If the embedded player above doesn't work for you, try listening on the source page, located here.

Enjoy!

In which I tell a story that I didn't anticipate telling

I went to the radio station this morning, although it isn't technically "my turn" in the tall chair.

Mary Marguerite and I take turns hosting the program, with Jim filling in for us as-needed. We aren't normally as elegant in the studio as we are in our publicity photo, by the way. I often wear my jammies when I'm on the air. Hey, it's radio. Who can know what we look like?

So anyhow, it wasn't my turn this week. But I went in anyhow, because I had a story to tell and I wanted to tell it and I didn't want to wait a whole week. This is typical for me.

Mary had the guest mike and headphones all set up for me, and we were almost ready to go...when the phone rang.

When the phone rings at a commercial radio station, a paid employee picks up the line and speaks in a professional manner with the caller. At a public radio station, especially a teeny-tiny public radio station like KSER, the phone is answered by a volunteer. On the weekends at KSER, the phone is often answered by the same person who is running the FCC checklist, making the coffee, swabbing the bathroom, and spinning the program...in other words, there is only one person in the building, and the voice you hear on the phone is also the voice on the radio.

Except this morning, remember? Because today wasn't my turn. So Mary turned off my mike and told a story on the air, and I talked to the person on the phone.

The person on the phone, bless her heart, was calling in a membership pledge, even though the pledge drive was finished last month. Hey, at a little station like ours, we'll take new members at any time of the day or night! So, I talked to her for a while and took her pledge information. It was nice. She's a nice lady, and she called our station on a Sunday morning to do membership stuff without us even having to do the "pledge thing" on the air. It was really nice.

So, I told a story just for the lady. And now I'm gonna tell it for you.

And hey, if hearing the story makes you smile, just think how much the person on the other end of the phone will smile if you call KSER and pledge some money as a member. Honest. We smile for hours after a call like that. Just think about it, okay? And see if you smile at the end of the story before you make a decision. The pledge info is at the bottom of this page.

The Storyteller's Blessing

If the player embedded above doesn't work for you, you can visit the storage site to play the story, instead.

Here's info about the radio station, just in case you smiled when you heard the story:

LISTEN LIVE LOCALLY at 90.7fm Streaming on the web: http://www.kser.org/

Between 7am and midnight (sometimes earlier and sometimes later, too) there are live, local people running the shows, so if you'd like to call and make somebody smile, the phone number is (425) 303 - 9076 Tell 'em the Sunday Storytellers sent ya.

If you want to pledge online, the smile is slightly more remote but just as genuine. Totally secure pledging at the website http://www.kser.org/ click the "Donate Now" button.

End of public service announcement and now we return to your regular Haiku Farm Day:

Life is good!