Something Stinketh This Way Come

At the barber shop I smelled something musty, something pungent. The odor wasn’t continual( constant) but sporadic. I checked my arms pits and clothing. Over a period of 2-3 hours the smell kept reoccurring. We work around body odors and dirty, greasy hair frequently. I wondered if it emanated from a customer. I surmised Steph had smelled it too because she borrowed my disinfectant to spray her chair. Several patrons later I sprayed my chair. It smelled more like a dead rat than perspiration.

Even when I went to the rest room and I still caught whiff of the same odor. Back at the shop, I sniffed my smock. I couldn't detect anything on the left, yet on my right side I smelled something.. I wondered if I had leaned against a customer. I had just finished a big guy who fit snug in the chair that afternoon. Why would my smock smell? Yes, it gets splashes and powder on it but I wear it over a blouse so it’s not against my body.

I mused, maybe I should take my smock home to wash it. With this thought in mind, I started to clean out the pockets when I found an old sandwich bag in my right pocket which contained something slimy green. The culprit, the lonely piece of celery had decomposed unnoticed in my deep pocket.

As a man stinketh so is he.

Soggy Socks

It all started with the purchase of a opera ticket. I was committed to attend Mozart's "Magic Flute" Thursday night. The same morning I went prepared to work with coat, umbrella and neck warmer but I forgot to wear irrigation boots.

After work, I should never have turned down Lauri's offer, "I can give you a ride to your car,"once we reached the stadium parking by bus.

"No thank you, I'll walk." I wanted to get my exercise.

The all day spring snow storm had accumulated slush on campus sidewalks.I surmised maintenance waited for the snow to melt or for the storm to finish before cleaning walkways. Public roads and sidewalks were even worse with curbside streams of melting snow.I It looked like a giant cement truck had poured 7-11 Slurpee down 5th North. I tried stepping into previous footsteps and soon learned that I had better take baby steps because I kept slipping and sliding around. The worst snow I'd walked in all winter season. Where were my snow boots when I need them.? Needless to say, my journey across the edge of campus and three blocks to my parked Elantra left my nylon tennis shoes and white socks soaked.I thought about the pioneers, and knew I would make a lousy one. They endured frozen, bleeding feet to reach their goal. I was grateful for the warm temps. I debated how to kill two hours and get my feet warm.

. Half way down the hill I remembered I had a pair of dry socks for such emergencies at the barber shop, but getting back to them, even from a parking terrace, would mean sloshing through the slush. I brought change of clothes for the temple which included and extra pair of loafers I surmised walking to and from the temple parking lot car would have soaked them. I didn't want to sit through a two hour opera with wet, cold feet.

To solve the problem, I bought new socks at Smith's grocery store and drove back to campus where I parked in the fine arts parking lot. From there I sloshed to the library where I pulled my drenched socks and shoes off and rubbed my feet as I caught up on the Herald Journal. Avoid wearing dry socks at all costs when there's more sloshing to do. I returned to my car stuck the new socks and shoes in my back pack and sloshed to Morgan Theater. In the lobby, I stripped to bare feet again and changed to dry socks and shoes. Ah the warmth and comfort, I could now enjoy the next two hours.

I checked the weather during the "Magic Flute" intermission. still lightly snowing. AT the conclusion I walked arm in arm with a fellow Prestonite to the car. The leather shoes were more protective for the short distance. But I could feel my socks get damp as I walked around my car shoveling the snow off. Enroute home I was grateful for a warm heater and 30 minute drive to warm my ever cooling feet.

I Can't Repent Fast Enough

Magic Flute

I can’t repent fast enough. Refer to my blog July 17th “Barber Goes to Barber of Seville” where I said it would be two years before I attended another opera. I attended USU’s production of “The Magic Flute” because I love Mozart’;s music and the price was right. At the ticket booth the gal stated, $8.00. I wondered if my back pack fooled her into thinking I was a re-entry student. “This isn’t for a student,” I reiterated. She said nothing and took my 8.00 bucks. I pondered, Did she think I was faculty?

This is the second time I’ve seen the Magic Flute and my fourth opera. So I was familiar with the music and enjoyed the solos and ensembles. No assigned seats, I arrived early to sit in the middle of the middle, which is probably a $100.00 seat at Eccles Theater. I had plenty of leg room and a comfortable seat. There wasn’t a very big crowd probably due to poor publicity and all day bad weather.. I hadn’t any seen articles in the paper.

I took time to ready my ticket, which said “Senior.” I guess my backpack and wrinkles didn’t fool the ticket gal one bit. Maybe that’s why I got the discounted price.

I read the five paragraph explanation of the opera, It didn’t really make any sense, shy on plot I thought. Later, The lyric subtitles proved my point. The program stated: “ The power of Mozart’s music ensures that there is no sense of incongruity.” Yes, I fully agree with whatever that means. I got the part that Tamino and Pamina were in love. Ok maybe the plot was mystical, maybe it was fantasy the wicked queen mother was trying to stop her daughter from her true love. Why would a mother do this? Ok, so I’m a realist, I never liked Alice in Wonderland either.

I found the names very confusing. Tamino, Pamina , young romantic leads who had fantastic voices ( excellante) and Papageno and Papagena, the comic relief. Then there was Isis and Osiris which I can’t even pronounce.

True to operatic form, the Magic Flute lasted two hours but was split more evenly between first and second act. Did I get sleepy, No, it was on the cold side with air conditioning flowing and snow gently falling outside. I thought the cast did an excellent job and I liked the scenery and the biggness of the stage.

One suggestion start the opera at 7:00 instead of 7:30 pm. We didn’t get out until 9:45 which gave me just enough time to drive home before it was bedtime. Then turn around and drive back to Logan for work the next day. The disadvantage of attending a week night performance. Thank you for listening.

The Dirty Life

The Dirty Life
by Kristin Kimball

I have posted in my blog sub title that I do book
reviews so here goes. This isn't so much as a review
and quoting favorite parts. At he public library I was
attracted to this book on the shelf because of the barn photo. You know me and my love for old barns. It's a true story about Kristen Kimball, a free lance New York writer who was sent to interview a young farmer on a community organic farm in Pennsylvania. Members pay a yearly fee of 2,900 and can take as much food each week as they can eat.

This story is a romance plus it chronicles Kristen's first year on Essex Farm, all she learns, how difficult the work is and their wedding in the loft of a barn.

I'm not usually one for details and want the story to move along but I enjoyed the many details of farm life and learned from her. I liked her account about her first time to milk a cow, how to slaughter a pig, description of the compost pile. The difficulty of buying draft horses, description of Amish auction.

I wondered why would someone who had a great paying freelance job give it up for farming. I thought of Nanette and how she wants to leave a farming area, although she's not a farmer by any means and head to the big city. Kirsten describes her unfulfilled life in the big city.

Anyway here are some of my favorites passages:
"There is no better commitment than a cow. Her udder knows no exceptions or excuses. She must be milked or she'll suffer from her own fullness, and then she'll get sick and dry up. Morning and evening, on holidays, in good weather and in bad, from the day she gives birth to her calf until the day ten months later when you dry her off, your cow is the frame in which you must fit your days, the twelve-hour tether beyond which you may no longer travel."

Farm
"A farm is a manipulative creature. There is no such thing as finished. Work comes in a stream and has no end. There are only the things that must be done now and things that can be done later. The threat the farm has got on you, the one that keeps you running from can until can't, is this: do it now, or some living thing will wilt or suffer or die. It's blackmail, really."

Weed War
"My existence, from daybreak to dark, became focused on the assassination of weeds....Farming I discovered is a great and ongoing war. The farmers are continually fighting to keep nature behind the hedgerow, and nature is continually fighting to overtake the field......

"If you ever wonder why organic vegetable cost more, blame the weeds. The work on conventional farm that can be done with one pass of the sprayer must, on an organic farm be done continually, from germination to harvest, by physically disrupting the weeds.

Tranquility
A man we know bought up a big piece of good land nearby, a second home, and once, at dinner, I heard him say.'In my retirement, I just want to be a simple farmer. I want...tranquility.' "What you really want is a garden, I thought to myself. A very, very small one. In my experience a tranquil and simple are two things farming work is not. Nor is it lucrative, stable, safe, or easy. Sometimes the work is enough to make you weep. But most days I wake up grateful that I found it-- tripped over it, really -- and that I'm married to someone who feels the same way."

Kristen, there's plenty of cow patties in this book straight from the farm.
I loved listening to her impressions of the hard life of farming but it didn't changed my desire to plant a garden. I don't like playing in the dirt and have never understood those who do. Yet I'm grateful for those who provide food. I'm like the little Red Hen's animal friends. I love the fresh produce but I don't like the work. I have a big guilt complex for not liking gardening and being self sufficient. I would rather play with words than dirt.

I do think there is a trend for community gardens and small farms which raise produce for gardeners' market. Every small town from here to Caldwell has started a Farmers Market.

I highly recommend this book. Well written.

PS there's a lot about food, slathered in onions and butter and fresh herbs.