Where to Begin....

The Fall has always been our busy time. The time that the temperature starts going down from the oppressive heat of Summer, and Peggy and I start playing, road trippin', and just generally adventuring. Well, this Fall slipped by in a rush and winter came, and now with Christmas behind us we suddenly remembered we aint been blogging!! Oh NO!! Now we have this huge pile of stories, pictures and adventures to tell yall about and couldn't imagine how to get started again. It seemed a daunting task, but we decided: Oh! What the heck, and I dove in with this year's Christmas card for starters. All's I can say is: sorry we haven't been posting regulary. Now that things are slowing down a little and we actually sit at the computer every once in awhile, here we go again. I guess this is a good a place as any to begin anew, wishing you all had a very Merry Christmas.

Holmes Again, Holmes Again, Jiggety Jig

Well, what to say now. Since I brought MarkyBear home and kept him on his meds, he's really bounced back almost to his old self...not quite...but feeling much, much better. He was scheduled for surgery tomorrow, but I took him to the vet yesterday for more bloodwork and let them know about the major upheaval that his immediate surgery would create. In three days Dan and his family are descending from western NY to visit for a week before Cappy gets home. This place is so very tiny and Mark, even when he's feeling super, does not like little kids. Dan and Jennifer have little kids. (I don't know why the kids in our neighborhood love picking on him, but they just love to do it, and for that he deems all children guilty.)

But it's NICE to have him home again for now. Last night around three a.m. the dogs heard a noise on the patio, and MarkyBear was out the door like a shot, LOUDLY"yelling" at whoever it was who had disturbed his Mom's sleep, (....!!!) then stayed to snoop all around his perimeter in the dark, investigating. (And so, I call him Sherlock Holmes to add to the list of his knick-names.) Not finding anyone, and having completed his investigation, he climbed back up the doggy bed-stairs, lumbered across the bed and flopped heavily next to me. Awwwww.
Well, Dr. Crawford said yesterday that his bloodwork showed good improvement, and that the mass might be an abcess from his gall bladder that the ton of antibiotics, etc are taking care of, but we just don't know. We do know that MarkyBear is not in pain now, so she said a couple of weeks wait should not make too much of a difference. So we are going to wait...and continue to pray for the best results.

Meanwhile during his stay in the doggie hospital, he couldn't get a bath, feeling as miserable and lost as he did, so yesterady his regular groomer, Jamie came to our house and gave him one in our tub, because the place she works does not allow for sick doggies to come get groomed. (I understand that policy.)

Soooo.... Now he feels even better...and will...until the little kids get here in a couple of days. Uhm...yeah, the continued prayers would be a good thing...thank you all for inquiring, by phone, email, here, Face Book, etc. You are too sweet!

Update on Poor MarkyBear

MarkyBear, our bouncy, happy, chubby(!) dog; the much beloved warrior of our family is currently in doggie ICU with liver damage. We're not sure what he got into, but being the playful curious and forever hungry dog that he is, we're fairly certain he may have licked up some ant poison and insecticide that we were using to stop the invasion of a horde of red ants that were coming into the house from the recent heavy rains. Please think of our beloved 'friend', (who lights up our lives every time he comes bounding in through his dawgie door, all smiles) in your prayers, as Cappy and I worry, fret and pray for his recovery.

For those of you who don't know, he's the one with the big goofy grin on the right, with his pal, Rosco the "Peek".

We appreciate all the phone calls and emails, etc. asking about our boy. While doing an ultrasound to see whether or not he had pancreatitis and to have a good look at his organs, they learned that he does have fluid around his pancreas, for which I blamed myself...not watching his diet as closely as I thought I had been doing; however, if he hadn't gotten the ultrasound, they would not have also found...a 3" mass inside one of the lobes of his liver. He is scheduled for surgery next Wednesday to remove it. Because he finally began to eat a little, they were able to take him off IV's and send him home this last Wednesday until his surgery next week. He's home and still not feeling all that great. I knew he was in trouble last Friday when he wasn't eating, then when the "Oops" guy showed up, and he was just lying on the futon breathing hard, looked at Sparky like, "You'll have to git 'im on yer own this time"...then a little while later, I spied a miserable squirrel out the kitchen window eating one of our pecans, so I shrieked, "A ROTTEN squirrel guys!!" SparkyBear shot out the door, but MarkyBear just stayed glued to the futon panting hard in pain. That did it, I packed him up and rushed him to the vet...and now you know the rest of the story, ...until, the next rest of the story. We appreciate your continued prayers for our "Sweet boy". We'll also take prayers for the Brat, who needs to find a good doggie church. Since his brother has been ill, he's been looking for more attention and has found more darned ways to get into mischief. >:-\

Wandering Cajuns

Going down the Intracoastal Canal just west of Lafitte, LA one morning, I spied what appeared to be a shrimp boat tow-lining a houseboat down the canal. I grabbed my camera, zoomed in on it and sure enough, this is what I saw. It turned out to be a pretty nice-looking, homemade houseboat, and a welcome addition to my collection of pictures.

If you look at the far right of the picture you will see an airboat full of tourists on a swamp cruise. They were doing the same thing I was, taking pictures, smiling and waving. Enjoying the beautiful bayou morning and the sights to be seen in the land that I love.

Another Adventure At Lowes

Peggy and I went over to Houma, LA. yesterday running errands and stuff. While at Lowes, we ran into some folks we know, had a nice visit, checked on some stuff we need to order, and just browsed around the store. We love going around looking in the garden section and all the outdoor stuff. Looking and walking along, I barely noticed that a couple things jumped into the basket I was pushing down the aisles. When we decided to check out, I reached in the basket and put the 2(!) items Peggy had picked up on the counter. A new hummingbird feeder and a fly swatter. The nice young lady started checking us out while Peg dug in her purse for cash. As I stood there, I was suddenly struck with a thought, and das how some of my best B.S. lines are born; a sudden inspiration. As I waited, I had been chatting and exchanging pleasantries with the checkout gal, so with out missing a beat I straight-faced, calm-voiced told this tale:
"We can hardly wait to get home, we so excited!!" "Why?" she asked.
"I was surfing around on the web last night and I stumbled across a recipe for hummingbird gumbo". She looked up at that point somewhere between shocked and curious. I didn't skip a beat and continued, "yep, we gonna take this here feeder and hang it in a tree and stand real still behind the tree, when the hummingbirds come to drink, I'm gonna swat them with this here fly swatter, and in no time at all we gonna have hummingbird gumbo!"
1-hummingbird feeder-$11.00
1-flyswatter-$1.50
The expression on the face of the checkout gal; PRICELESS!! :-D

Udder-ly Refreshing

In the blistering humid heat of a South Louisiana summer, every time we pass a cow pasture, half the herd is usually "coolin' it" in the water. This bunch seemed to enjoy the waves of the wake that our boat made as we passed by and they never flinched. They seem to take turns, some grazin' and some chillin' in their own swimmin' hole. They even have a flock of Egrets sittin' on their backs, on "fly biting" patrol. So eat ya hearts out you prairie cows, these bayou bovine know how to "pass a good time" and beat the heat down here in Cajun country.

A Whale Of A Mistake

Last month at work we made half a dozen trips up and down the Mississippi River from New Orleans on down to below Venice, Louisiana. On every trip we kept passing by the HUGE ship, 'A Whale'. This ship is a specialized oil recovery vessel brought here to skim oil out of the Gulf. The mistake was that the ship is incapable of skimming oil that has been dispersed. The skimmers on board this massive vessel suck up too much water and can't seperate it out fast enough. Plus, the ship is so huge that it can't navigate quick enough to track down the narrow bands of oil that change with the currents and wind flow. The ship is currently anchored just north of Venice and has been for at least 5 weeks. It is fully crewed, 'cause we see the guys walking around on deck. The swabbies have a swinging scaffold hanging over the side and have been buffing and painting a stripe down the hull. It kinda makes ya wonder who is "footin' da bill" for this whale of a mistake don't it?

Symbolic Seagulls

As most of yall know, I am a big fan of the TV show 'Deadliest Catch'. Last time I was home I watched a special as several of the boat captains paid tribute to their fallen comrade, Captain Phil Harris. Guys who work on boats are a close knit bunch, and I have seen over the years several different ways guys honor lost friends. I was touched by the crew of the Wizard as Captain Keith rang 8 bells and the crew slid a full crab pot over the side, in honor of their lost friend. The crew of the Time Bandit had a more rousing send off by shooting off a bunch of fireworks and whooped and waved their hats in the air. This really put a tear in my eye; it's more fitting in my book. Cajuns do mourn the loss of a friend but we always finish up by celebrating the person's life.The last tribute on the show showed Sig, the captain of the Northwestern, making a moving statement about a lone seagull that had perched on the bow of his boat. His thought was that the seagull was the spirit of the departed had come to say goodbye. This kinda struck me funny and I thought about it all month at work. Seagulls are fun to watch and all, but a seagull as the spirit of a lost sailor?? GIVE ME A BREAK!!

If seagulls are symbolic, I wonder who this squawkin', struttin' crappin' bunch represents. Certainly no friends of mine. :-)

Pop Rouge Ice Cream

I am not certain if it was 'cause it's hot summer, or if I was feeling nostalgic after Mom's passing, or feeling inspired by cousin Suzy's blog post on ice cream ( http://kitchenbouquet.blogspot.com/ ), or a combination of the three, but I decided to resurrect this childhood favorite: "Pop rouge Ice-cream". Right off the bat, we hadda do a strawberry tasting to determine which current strawberry- flavored soda met our two requirements. #1. They had to be gluten-free, and #2. have that burn ya throat strong flavor of ole fashioned pop. It was fun having a soda tasting, full of giggling, tasting and retasting for comparison and judging contest, punctuated with burps of contentment, complete with an accidental shower of warm soda, until we decided to use Welch's strwawberry POP for the "P" in this simple recipe from my youth.

When I was a kid, this ice cream went with us on most all of the picnic/car trips/ bank fishing kinda outings we went on. Often, we would all load up in the car and go on a family outing. More often than not, packed in the trunk of the family car, along with picnic supplies and fishing, or crawfishing, or kite flying, etc. gear, was our ole hand-crank ice cream churn. The most oft-made product of our churning was this very simple sherbert: Pop Rouge ice cream. The reason it was most often made is, not only is it delicious, but very simple and reaquires no preparation. We usta just dump the ingredients into the churn and start cranking. The way Mom taught us to remember the simple recipe is, she used this simple saying: "E.P. C. 1. 2. 3." I guess properly written, the recipe would be:

1. 12 oz. can of Evaporated milk

2. 12 oz. bottles of strawberry soda ("POP")

3. 14 oz cans of Condensed milk

Then churn, using the "churn, rest, repeat" method 'til ya get this:

I am not sure that these pictures does this simple, delicious ice-cream justice. It tastes like a hug from my Mom, and a childhood memory come to life. I think I better serve up another dish to make sure we got it right.

The Flamingo Gag 2.0

Ok, for those of you who don't know of, or remember our "Flamingo Gag", I include this link that I dug outa da archives of our blog to jog ya memories. After ya are refreshed in your memory of just how tacky Peg and I can be, return here for this year's version. http://cappyandpegody.blogspot.com/2009/04/flamingo-gag.html
Well, here we are in 2010, and not much has changed. Our beloved neighbor's yard is still the pristine, highly manicured carpet it always is, looking 'postcard perfect', like a "wish you were here in sunny South Louisiana" tourist thing in the local plantation gift shop.

Our yard, on the other hand .... well.... just isn't. Ours more resembles the slightly unkept, tacky, tall weeds merrily waving at everybody, messy, verging on totally unkept kinda place that would star in a trailor trash weekly, if'n there was that sorta thing. Our philosophy is: if it is green and grows, let it. Being "foodies", we plant mostly stuff that bears fruit, and when the hurricanes lean stuff over, we leave it that way figgurin' its God's way of adding a rakish angle to our unkept mess.

Well, after last year's gag, imagine the horn-blowing, yelling, hooting, good-natured laughing commotion that occured last night when they got home to see this glowing pink mess Peg and I had put right across the street from their kitchen window.

This morning's view from their window will change soon, and the flamingo is destined to be a traveling companion with us in our camper. We plan to use him as a sign post of sorts, to let folks know which trailor in da campground is ours, just in case the tacky party lights we are gonna have lit on da canopy, are hard to see from the road.

Looking at it from da flamingo's point of view, it's pretty obvious he don't belong there anyways.