Monday Meandering - 2;25.2019

May have to consider renaming this blog segment, in that I don't do much actual meandering as of late. Unless you count trips to the doctor, the dentist, and Central Market. Oh, and there's Chuy's, but that all has a certain sameness to it. No adventure.

Re-retiring from sound-desk activities has made a big difference; turns out that kept me a lot busier than I realized. So, I'm happy to stick around the house and record books and watch Longhorn sports, but it really lowers the Meandering quotient blog-wise.

That's not to say that people and critters have not meandered our way. Possums are regular visitors to our patio, as is the occasional raccoon. A couple of weeks ago 4 young  gray foxes made themselves quite at home on the patio and in the back yard. I got a bit of video of their visit and Rob's vet friend made a positive ID.

And then the cops come by fairly often.

Several days ago I saw that the Ring video doorbell had texted (in the middle of the night)  that "Someone is at your door." When I checked the video, it showed 3 police officers and a K9 dog walking through the front yard! Nothing seemed amiss when I checked the neighbor hood, and nothing ever showed up on the police report website.

Then Thursday night - no, make that 4am Friday morning - while up for other purposes, I noticed that there were a lot of blue and red lights flashing in front of the house. There were 3 patrol cats and a half-dozen cops in front of our house, and a big flat-bed towing rig in the middle of the street, loading an auto (that I did not recognize - not the one that the dude is parking across from our driveway, unfortunately).

Auto loaded, the tow truck drove off, as did the 3 patrol cars. A repo? With 3 patrol cars in attendance? Don't know. Didn't get any photos, but somebody will probably post about it on Nextdoor.  I'll let you know.

And then these guys dropped by Sunday morning.

Monday Meanderings - 2.18.2019

Did I ever tell you about my bear-skin rug?

Seriously. An honest-to-goodness, fresh-off-the-bear rug. You know, like the photo lay-outs of the rug in front of a fireplace with someone lounging on it? Well, maybe that's not the most appropriate way to describe it, since I didn't have a fireplace then, and certainly no one lounged on it.

Plus, it was rather small. At best 4 feet long. Perhaps better suited as a bathmat than a lounging rug.

I came to possess this rug as a gift from my Great-Uncle Jess - my Grandmother Anderson's brother. I have blogged about Uncle Jess before. He's the relative who went off to Canada with his daddy to seek fame and fortune in the gold fields of Canada. He found neither, but liked the place. married a nice Norwegian girl and settled down to live a back-country life in some of the more remote places of British Columbia, Canada.

The best story about Uncle Jess and his wife, Mariene concerns the killing of the moose. Here's a link to that story.

In Jess's later years, he and Mariene would venture down into the lower 48 during the winter months, avoiding BC's brutal cold. They always drove, visiting interesting places and people during their travels. After one trip south, they invited Grandmother Anderson to join them on the return trip and visit Washington state (her childhood home) and British Columbia.

When Grandmother returned, she brought me the bear skin as a gift from Uncle Jess. He  had shot the bear at some point, and tanned the skin, and it was an amazing link to an amazing relative. I proudly placed it beside my bed, so that on chilly mornings I could step out of bed onto my own, warm bear skin rug.

The was just one problem. It stank. It was odoriferous. Pungent. Malodorous. Rank. As a friend used to say, "It would gag a maggot."

I don't know if the odor was a result of a faulty or incomplete tanning process, or was unique to small black bears from British Columbia, or just what the deal was, but it certainly made me wonder about all the western novels and movies about the noble Indians clad in their bear skins and buffalo hides. I'm pretty sure there was no way a hide-wearing Indian could sneak up on an unsuspecting settler, so I'm not sure the history books are totally accurate.

As I recall, the bear-skin was quickly re-gifted to Grandmother Anderson. Where it went from there, I don't know, but I'm pretty sure it did not end up in front of a fireplace. In a fireplace, more likely.

Monday Meanderings - 2.4.2019

The Juarez Pizza Palace

Many, many years ago, back when I worked for Sweet Publishing Company, Barb and I - along with John Allen and Sue Chalk - were sent out to conduct a one-night teacher's workshop. Let me be clear. John Allen, Sue and Barb were the teachers. I was sent along to haul water.

Our host was a church in Killeen, Texas, a community about an hour north of Austin, home to one of the largest military bases in the world, Fort Hood.

We completed the workshop, packed up and started home, thinking that we should be able to find any number of places to grab a late supper on the way home. What we did not know was that at that time, Killeen rolled up the sidewalks about 9 PM on weekday nights, actively discouraging late-night visitation by any of the more than 150,000 soldiers stationed on the base.

So we circled a few blocks, looking for any establishment that looked like it might serve food, and came across a dump with a sign that read "Juarez Pizza Palace." There were no cars, and we weren't positive it was actually open, so John Allen hopped out to go in and check. In a minute, he motioned us to come on in and the 4 of us were soon seated inside with the owner, Morty Shapiro and his elderly mother.

We looked over a menu that listed every possible combination of pizza toppings known to be edible - some that I had never heard of - decided on some, and told Morty what we wanted and that we would share a couple of large pizzas.

"You can't eat 2 large pizzas," Morty said.

"We're pretty hungry," John Allen said.

"Doesn't matter. I'll fix you 2 medium pizzas, and you can take what you don't eat home," said Marty.

Morty was right. We didn't finish the 2 mediums. But part of that was because Marty kept bringing us samples of more exotic varieties. More about that in a minute.

While the pizzas were baking, Morty, an affable fellow, sat down with us to chat. Mama sat too, but she didn't have much to say. I'm pretty sure she was from "the old country" and probably didn't speak much English. We were the only people in the place, so it was only natural for all of us gather round the table.

We asked Morty about the name of the place - "Juarez Pizza Palace" - and he said that was the name when he bought it, and he couldn't afford a new sign, so he just left it. He said the previous owner was a Mexican, and the name probably reminded him of home.

He said he had owned several pizza places in Austin, where he heavily promoted himself as "Morty the Pizza King," but there were too many pizza places in Austin, so he moved north, thinking it to be greener pastures.

"Had it been," we asked?

"Nah, but I won't go hungry, so it's okay."

We asked about the endless list of toppings, and he said he wasn't sure there wasn't anything you couldn't put on a pizza. At least he didn't think so. He said once some guy said "You should try peanut butter," so he added it to the menu. Somebody else had said, "Ever put sauerkraut on a pizza?"

We all went "Ewww," but he hopped up and said, "You gotta try it. It's really interesting!" and he went back to the kitchen to fix a sampler sauerkraut pizza..

He was right. It was really... interesting. And no, that's not a picture I snapped back in the late '70's. Turns out, if you Google "sauerkraut pizza" you find that it's really pretty popular. Can't help but wonder if we were in on the beginning, at the Juarez Pizza Palace in Killeen, Texas.

And for the record, the July 1976 Texas Monthly "Best of Texas" column had the following entry:

Best Pizza
Morty’s Pizza King Number Three, Austin. The all-cheese (four cheeses with garlic-filled tomato sauce) pizza is Texas’ best. No kidding. For the de­mented, there are madcap flavors including peanut butter and lox.

And, I might add, sauerkraut.