A little bragging from the grandparents here. GC1 entered a Halloween costume contest
Lady Liberty
And won first prize
Edgewater Beach Now
May not be the current picture. But you still get the idea.
Bombers Over Louisville
We live not far from the “old” Louisville airport, so the sight and sound of small aircraft are often seen and heard from our house. Occasionally I will hear a louder, deeper noise signaling one of the twin-engine aircraft taking off and I usually will turn to look at them. They come in all sorts of shapes.
CVH and I were out in the garden today, picking vegetables. I heard an airplane approaching that was clearly not a small single engine craft, so I looked up. In a moment, over the trees, came a B-17 Flying Fortress. It slowly banked by our neighborhood and then flew off to the west. I said to my wife, “Now there’s something you don’t see everyday.”
This is not my picture, but it’s just what it looked like:
B-17
Posted in History, News from Louisville, Outdoors
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What is it with cats?
How can they possibly be comfortable like this?
National Honeybee Day
Local Honey
I’m a big fan of the honeybee, everything that does for American agriculture, and certainly for the honey it can give us. Today was National Honeybee Day 2012, and one of our local farmer’s markets had a special program in observance of the occasion. There were tastings of various honeys made from different blossoms, demonstrations of beehives, and I even got to see the American Honey Princess again (she gets around).
And of course, I bought some local honey. This stuff is so good, it made me feel like a kid again. If you come by the house soon, we’ll share some.
Posted in Food & Eats, News from Louisville
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2012 Kentucky State Fair
Another year, another trip to the Kentucky State Fair.
We went through the “Pride of the Counties”, where almost every county in Kentucky has a tourism booth set up. We discovered that Smuckers Uncrustables are manufactured in Kentucky.
One county had a huge watermelon.
We got to meet Dave Shuffett and his dog Toby, the stars of Kentucky Life, a public TV show that has been invaluable to introducing and orienting us to our adopted state. I was starstruck. Dave seemed a little nonplussed at my enthusiasm, but graciously arranged for this photo.
By now, CVH was getting hungry for a corn dog. We stepped outside to wait for the shuttle to take us around to the Kentucky Proud Producers tent (so named because the Kentucky Corn Producers, the Kentucky Poultry Producers, the Kentucky Pork Producers, and so on, have their cooking trailers there). But the shuttle never arrived, and we ended up walking all the way to the tent.
On the way, we passed the judging for Kentucky’s largest pumpkin.
Best corn dog ever
Then we got behind a group of rabbit raisers (rabbit judging was tomorrow) who apparently had never ordered food before, or didn’t know what a corn dog was, or something. After a lengthy delay, one of the cooks in the trailer called us over to the side and took our order. He couldn’t understand what was so complicated about ordering corn dogs, either. But the corn dog was delicious; you can’t get a better corn dog anywhere than the Kentucky Corn Producers trailer (these are freshly hand-dipped corn dogs, not the frozen Cisco corn dogs that they sell on the midway).
Tobacco
Now refreshed, we returned to the displays of the State Fair. We saw hundreds and hundreds of rabbits. We watched goat judging. Although tobacco is not the crop in Kentucky that it was a generation ago, we saw (and smelled) the crop competing for ribbons.
We saw the pumpkin that ended up winning the contest.
Ribbon winning display
We saw beautiful displays of produce, like this basket of peppers.
I got to meet the 2012 American Honey Princess.
Cow milking apparatus
We saw dairy cows and where they milk them.
We went to the health exhibits. Here we see CVH getting her blood pressure checked before we entered the giant heart model.
Me and the giant colon
Here I am by the giant colon.
We bought fudge and knives, and said hello to people we knew. I even got CVH to go up on the ferris wheel. We had a wonderful time at the fair.
Posted in Food & Eats, News from Louisville
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Asimov foresees future, again
Asimov
My boss was cleaning out her basement, and brought in some old science fiction books for any of us who were interested. I picked up one of Isaac Asimov’s “robot” stories from the early 1960’s. It was basically a sci-fi police procedural, but the most interesting part was where he described a colony of humans who had gone to another planet and decided to concentrate their energies on improving their technologies. They eventually reached the point where they couldn’t stand to talk to each other face to face and always communicated via computer.
How did he know?
Birthday Bash
Last weekend, I was invited to a birthday party for the daughter of a co-worker. It was the child’s third birthday.
Lots and lots of balloons
Now, I’ve been to third-birthday parties before, but I was unprepared for the party that awaited me. There were mass quantities of balloons (a fraction of which are visible in this photo), and the mom had blown them all up – no professional help.
It seemed like half the people in town were there – it was the social event of the evening! – and I met several very nice folks.
Yours truly checking out the appetizers
And the food! Oh my, the food! There were two courses of appetizers, including samosas with mint and curry sauces.
There was cake-cutting, of course, and then more food.
Me mugging with the family
Goat curry, mutton biryani, hot pickled cauliflower, sharp onion yogurt, lots of other delicious things that I don’t know the names of, and gulab jamun – those delectable little dough balls soaked in honey and sugar syrup that I can never get enough of.
Posted in Food & Eats, News from Louisville
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The Judgement of Conrad
A while back, I was walking across the parking lot with some co-workers when I made a reference to the Trojan War. I sensed that some of them were somewhat bemused by my referring to the war as an historical event.
The Judgement of Paris
“Well,” I explained, “we know there was a Troy, and we’ve known where it is since at least the times of the ancient Romans. It’s right where Homer said it was.”
“And in the twentieth century, it was excavated down to time when Homer said the war occurred, and the remains of the city then look like Homer said it looked. And the evidence shows that this city was sacked.”
“Now, was there a wooden horse, and Hector and Achilles? Maybe yes, maybe no. But I think it’s clear that something big happened there; something so big that we’re still talking about it over three thousand years later.”
So don’t you believe the Trojan War actually occurred? I thought everybody did.
The cat’s all right
A while back, I reported my fear that one of our cats had started suffering from migraines.
This is not my cat
This week, I took her to the vet and described the systems to the doctor. I told him that it looked just like the poor thing was suffering from migraine headaches.
I don’t think so, the vet replied, and he went on to describe the usual symptoms of neurological problems in cats and dogs, none of which my cat was exhibiting. “Your cat is just acting like a cat.”
I’m relieved. Sort of.
Posted in News from Louisville
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A new stripe
It appears that hard work, dedication, and a good attitude sometimes pays off. Who knew?
Posted in News from Louisville
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