The Testicle Festival is back on. I know how eager my readers are to sink their teeth into some fine bull testicles, often referred to as Rocky Mountain oysters, calf fries, or huevos del toros (literally “bulls’ eggs), among other euphemisms, and here’s the opportunity.
The festival is scheduled for August 1st in one of my favorite places in Texas, the great town of Fredericksburg. “Go for the testicles, stay for the beer,” is what I always say.
I kid, but the festival looks like a lot of fun. If it weren’t for Covid-19, I might attend. And if you’ve never visited Fredericksburg, I suggest adding it to your “to do” list.
A couple of weeks ago I got a new pair of glasses. This style is radically different from my previous three pair, and I think I like it. The problem is, very few things seem to be in focus.
I can read stuff on my phone and my computer easily, but my eyes won’t focus on distances. It’s not like I’m as blind as I would be without glasses, but I certainly don’t have the distance vision I did with my last prescription. I can’t read a large green street sign until I’m within fifty feet or so. That’s no good!
I really wanted to avoid an in-office visit, but yesterday I finally broke down and called for an appointment.Fortunately they had an opening this morning, so I’m sitting outside the eye doctor’s office waiting until 9:10 to enter.
Studly Doright is a capable kind of man. He’s a combination of Mr. Fix-It and MacGyver wrapped up in one nice looking package. Seldom do I find something he doesn’t comprehend how to do. During our nearly 44 years of marriage I’ve only encountered a handful of things that stump my guy, but recently a new one popped up.
Since the pandemic, we’ve been performing personal maintenance tasks that we’ve paid others to do in the past. I’ve been giving myself (awful) pedicures and (even worse) manicures, and I’ve been keeping Studly’s hair trimmed. Studly doesn’t have much hair to trim these days, and by the time I finish shearing him, he has barely enough to notice.
After the last trim I discovered Studly in the bathroom, looking in the big mirror above our sinks and holding my hand mirror behind his head. He was trying to see if I’d cut his hair evenly.
“How do you do this? I can’t see anything,” he said.
“Wouldn’t it be easier if you turned around and used the small mirror to reflect the back of your head into the big mirror?
After several tries he made the magic happen, and I had the satisfaction of briefly knowing how to do something he did not. It’s not as rare an occurrence as a Halley’s Comet’s sighting, but it likely won’t happen again in my lifetime.
This pandemic is rotten, and it’s not going away anytime soon. I’m prone to dwelling on the heartaches. “There’s a Tear in My Beer” could’ve been my theme song, except it’d be a pity to water down a good beer.
Yesterday I was feeling low. Not depressed, just low. And then I made myself think of ordinary day-to-day good things about life right now, things that might NOT have come about had it not been for Covid-19.
One of the best is a group on Facebook called “Tallahassee Foodies.” It was started by a woman who wanted to call attention to good, locally owned eateries. It’s an overwhelmingly positive place for members to ask about specific types of foods available and to share information.
Here are a couple of sample posts from the site:
“This page makes my heart swell when I see it supporting people who need it (fried Oreos, peterbrooke) especially during these hard times of closure, lower capacity, etc. SO… If you own or know of a good business that is struggling to survive right now, please list them below so we can help them. So many restaurant, franchise, and bar owners put it all on the line to start their businesses, I want to do my tiny part to help… Thanks!”
“Y’all. This is probably 5000 Weight Watchers points, but I’ll eat soup the rest of the day so I can eat this. Bacon jam, avocado, and egg melt (added tomato)! Look at those layers of deliciousness! First time I’ve had bacon jam. It had a little kick and now I have to figure out how it’s made.”
From Freshroots Kitchen in Tallahassee
I absolutely love this site and all the good vibes the members are putting out. Any negativity gets shut down quickly. It’s a happy place for me.
What’s happening in your world that’s positive? Something that might only exist because of COVID? Maybe you’ve taken on a role that you’d never considered playing before. Tell me something good.
Lately when I write I’ve asked Alexa to play seventies music. Some days she selects pop, other days, country, and still others, folk. I can’t decide which genre I enjoy the most, but I do have some favorites: Bob Seger, Gordon Lightfoot, Linda Ronstadt, the Eagles, among others.
When Studly Doright chooses a station he always picks sixties music, and while I enjoy that decade’s offerings, there’s something about the 70’s tunes that speaks to me. Maybe it’s because I graduated high school in ‘75, and married Studly in ‘76. In the space of a year I went from childhood to adulthood with seventies music playing in the background.
The 63-year-old me often finds herself crying during certain songs. Today, John Denver’s Rocky Mountain High had me blubbering at my computer, and not long after that I completely lost it over Michael Martin Murphey’s Wildfire.
Am I mourning the loss of my youth? Surely not. That’s been gone for at least three decades. How about my close proximity to death. Naw. I’ve made my peace with the world.
Maybe it’s bigger than that. Maybe it’s the loss of our nation’s soul that’s gotten to me, and these songs remind me of a time that seemed so much simpler. Oh, I know the 70’s had their issues. They weren’t rosy by any means, but I was young enough to believe everything would turn out fine.
I sat down at the computer today intent on adding a few words to my new work in progress. My morning tea was steaming in a favorite cup beside me on the table where I work. My yummy Metamucil cinnamon flavored fiber crackers (I’m 63, you know) were arranged tastefully on a colorful plate. Let the words flow!
Instead, they trickled. Oh, there were a few bon mots exchanged between my main characters, but nothing that really drives the story. After a couple of frustrating hours I called it a day and tackled the laundry instead.
Perhaps I’ll have a glass of wine this evening and write something. Anything! But so far today I feel like the Three Stooges’ Curly who famously said, “I’m trying to think, but nothing happens!”
If 2020 were a football player it would have been kicked out of the game for multiple unnecessary roughness penalties.
Pandemic, murder hornets, visiting dust from Africa, wide-spread social unrest, rampant unemployment, a new swine flu in the news, Tom Brady traded to Tampa Bay, and now we have a brain-eating amoeba. WTF?
To be fair, the brain-eating amoeba isn’t a completely new hazard, and can be avoided by following a few simple activities, according to the CDC: Avoid putting your head under the water in hot springs and other untreated thermal waters. Avoid water-related activities in warm freshwater during periods of high water temperature. Avoid digging in, or stirring up, the sediment while taking part in water-related activities in shallow, warm freshwater areas.
Oh, and if you use a Neti-pot to clear your sinuses use distilled water.
As for all the other stuff 2020 has brought us, keep wearing masks, avoid stirring up hornets, be kind to one another, don’t give up, and hope for a Tom Brady sighting. He is in Florida now, after all.
Praying for Eyebrowz 