Scout Moves

Last year about this time, I showed you a picture of a nasty looking spider I found floating in my pool. It gave me the chills. Well, it has nothing on what I found this evening. Take a look at this bastard, the black thing in the center with what appears to be an egg sack attached. I had the unpleasant job of emptying the filter basket of leaves, but it was so packed, I couldn't pull it up. There was no way I was going to reach in there and pull it out bare handed, so I went inside and grabbed the kitchen tongs. I pulled leaves out a few at a time, and flung them over on the side, and on one of the leaves was this spider, soaking wet but still living and still moving around in that unearthly way spiders move. That's about all it took for me to walk away from the job. I threw in the chlorine sticks in the still-full basket, snapped the cover back on, and ran inside. I went back later to take this picture because if I told you I found a spider the size of barn, you wouldn't

I stumbled on this thing at Dive's, which he evidently lifted from Maria. Since I didn't have much to say today anyway, here we go. Hi, my name is Robyn. But you can call me Scout. Please. I have been asking people to call me Scout since I was a kid and fell in love with To Kill A Mockingbird. Only two people have obliged. Never in my life have I smoked pot. I had a friend in art class my sophomore year who kept a joint in his wallet, and he showed it to me once. A couple of weeks later, he ran away to Florida with his pregnant girlfriend, so I never got a chance to do anything more than take a peak. When I am nervous I bite my nails. I usually plan on losing one nail for every orchestra concert, and sometimes one for every rehearsal depending on the music on tap. The last song I listened to was Seventy-Six Trombones from The Music Man. I was listening to the Broadway channel in my car. If I were to get married right now, it would be to Gregory Peck. It's a fantasy qu

Cash Cab. It's amazing. My new favorite show is Cash Cab on the Discovery Channel. A taxi in New York picks up passengers who think they're just climbing into a regular cab, but it's actually a game show on wheels. On the way to their destination, passengers/contestants have to answer a series of questions for cash. The questions start out relatively simple and increase in difficulty, as does the cash reward. They are allowed to miss just two questions, and if they miss a third they are kicked out no matter where they are in the city. They are also allowed to call a friend one time and to roll down the window and ask a passerby for help once. If they make it to their destination, they are given the choice of taking the money they have earned or choose a double-or-nothing video question. I am SO good at this game. I could SO easily win money, if only I lived in New York and if only I happened to hale the correct cab. You can test yourself with these sample quizzes. Good luc

These are my grandparents on what I have been told was their wedding day in 1907. I can't confirm that, but I wouldn't be surprised.

I am still reminiscing about the food of my youth. I suppose I am always reminiscing about the food of my youth, somewhere in the recesses of my mind. My new cookbook, The Lee Bros. Southern Cookbook, tells how to make barbecued pork shoulder, a dish no true southern cookbook would neglect to mention. I'm not sure I will try to make it, though. For me, barbecue isn't just a meal. It's part of something larger, a gathering of family, and something that must be eaten around the kitchen table in a room with a sloped floor and the smell of 80-year-old dust. Every June, for a week, my family would drive back down to Alabama to visit the relatives. All of my aunts, uncles, cousins, and surviving grandparents lived there. We would stay with my mother's parents out in the country, but for one day, we would drive into town to visit Granny, my father's mother. Granny was ancient in my eyes, stooped over with orthopedic black shoes and pure white hair that looked as if it had

Last week, when I stepped out to get the mail, I found a box from Amazon leaning against the door. A box from Amazon can only mean that someone has ordered a book, but I didn't recall placing an order. I ripped into the box and found The Lee Bros. Southern Cookbook, 589 pages of traditional Southern cooking and food talk. It was a gift from my sister who saw it and thought of me. As is customary when I get a new cookbook, I thumbed through the pages and dogeared the recipes that interested me. Here are a few of the pages I have dogeared for later: Country Ham Biscuits Pimento Cheese Blue Cheese Grits Jambalaya Crispy Fried Okra Gumbo Fried Chicken Barbecued Picnic Shoulder Sweet Potato Pie These are just a few things I remember from my childhood. I was raised in northwest Indiana amidst bologna and cheese on white bread, but because my parents were from Alabama, my childhood memories revolve around food from a different region, and in some cases from a different era--the cornbread

So...like I said, we had a bike ride to join in on Sunday. We couldn't have planned more perfect weather--80 degrees and sunny with blue skies. It was enough to draw a real crowd, and we had about forty people riding about twenty-five bikes of all sorts--Harleys, Hondas, Yamahas, Suzukis, and our BMW. We all met at the Small Town high school and rumbled out of town on our way to a biker restaurant on a lake somewhere out in the country. I had never heard of the lake before, but it was lovely, about an hour and a half from our starting point. Because the place was packed and the kitchen was understaffed, the stop took twice as long as expected, but everyone had a nice sociable time, and then we rumbled on toward the next stop, a tiny town with an ice cream shop. At this next stop, I heard the motto that seemed to sum up the day: We ride to eat, and we eat to ride. That about says it all with this bunch. We stopped for ice cream, and because of the time of year, pumpkin ice cream was

I'm hardly a biker chick, but I will likely be going on a bike ride this Sunday. My husband recently bought a BMW touring bike, and we have been invited to join a group who will spend the afternoon snaking around on country roads and looking for biker food and ice cream. I did this same thing two years ago when I was trying to learn how to ride my own bike--a Honda Silver Wing scooter. Before you smirk at the "scooter" part, look it up. It's a big bike, for me anyway. In honor of this little adventure, here is the story of that ride, lifted from a post I wrote about a year ago: My friend SS had planned a ride for anyone even remotely connected to the high school--parents, grandparents, staff, the guy who works the lights in the auditorium--basically anyone who lives in Small Town, because in small towns, everyone can connect themselves to the high school if they try hard enough. I had been riding my Honda Silver Wing for about a year and had spent a solid week practic

Small Town is getting a Starbucks, technically Small Town Next Door, but the two towns are so close and so similar, they seem to form one big small town. I knew it would happen eventually. I am not generally opposed to Starbucks, and I don't mind their coffee or their presence in the world. But I do mind the loss of local character in the interest of a homogeneous market place. My Favorite Place for Joe has character that has evolved over time, character that is specific to us and can not be duplicated across the country. Get your own character. In my coffee shop, there are regulars who would never feel comfortable in a Starbucks. There are the old guys who monopolize a table for hours at a time, mumbling and sometimes shouting about current events, griping about their wives, rattling the newspaper as they read through the sections of local news--these guys would feel and look out of place in a Starbucks. Shortwave, a scruffy looking man who sits outside with an old radio, aiming t

There is a small feud building in my town. The curvy road I live a few yards from converges at a stop sign with another curvy road, both ending at an odd T-shaped intersection. You can turn right to head to points south, or you can turn left to head into Small Town and places like My Favorite Place for Joe and the disappearing yarn shop. Turning right isn't a problem, but as is true with most intersections like this, turning left can try the patience of the most emotionally balanced driver. One man in a dirty pick-up truck has solved the problem of waiting by going around the stop sign and driving on the grass, thumbing his nose or whatever at the established practice of waiting your turn in line, turning his back on organization and fairness. This spot of grass that he drives over seems to be easement, like a peninsula jutting out into the pavement, but the person who lives on the corner has taken action as if he owns the place. When the man on the corner has trees trimmed, he dra

Several years ago, when I was quite large and wanted to see less of myself in the mirror, my doctor suggested I try eating a low-carbohydrate/high protein diet, thinking it would not only help me shrink a bit but also level out my blood-sugar levels. He was right. The plan was to start the day with mainly protein--eggs, bacon, sausage and cheese in various moderate combinations. I started out happy with my breakfast plate and eager to prepare it every day, but after years and years and years of the same thing morning after morning, I am in need of an egg lift. I have had scrambled eggs. Boiled eggs. Omelets. Fried eggs over easy. Egg salad. Eggs with cheese. Eggs without cheese. Eggs in the form of crepes sprinkled with cinnamon. Eggs in the form of pancakes made with a bit of soy flour. Eggs in the form of crustless quiche. Eggs with a whole-grain cracker that is not unlike a cardboard wafer. I have tried them all. I have taken weeks off at a time, substituting high-protein cereals o

Yesterday, after reading my post about the demise of my local yarn shop, The Giggle Patch, two people emailed to suggest that I buy the store. Now, there is an interesting idea. It has occurred to me, I'll confess. It might be a problem, though, since I am no knitting expert. If someone were to walk in and ask me a question beyond the very basics of the craft, I would have to try to sell them an instruction book. But there are other ventures I could launch into if I had the store. While I could keep a selection of yarn on hand, I could add my own touch. Hmm. Let me think. The Cheesecake Patch: I have always wanted to have a cheesecake shop. Every time a store front becomes available in my little town, I think "what a great place for a cheesecake shop." I make a mean white chocolate cheesecake, and my raspberry marble cheesecake with a chocolate crust is amazing. The Brass Patch: I have struggled to find a time to take horn lessons this time of year, and driving the usual

My friend C's store is called The Giggle Patch, after an imaginary place her daughter toyed with as a child. The Giggle Patch is a yarn and bead shop where people buy fine yarn, learn to knit, and make jewelry. But it is so much more than that. Because my friend has such a giving and welcoming heart, it's a place where people can bring a cup of coffee, plop down on the little burnt-orange sofa, kick back, and relax. Someone in that restful situation might occasionally even giggle. When the shop opened two years ago, I found myself relaxed on that sofa quite often--in the afternoons while waiting for school to let out, early on Saturday mornings with a latte from My Favorite Place for Joe, on days when I taught remedial knitting classes, and on those odd occasions when I even manned the store for the day. I have loved The Giggle Patch, although of course I have loved my friend even more. She is a joy. She is also moving to Georgia, following her husband who has been transferred

This seems to be the year for "the last time" experience. Because my youngest child is a senior, this is the last time I will be part of a tennis season--the last time I will help with a tennis banquet, drive a child to the courts, wash uniforms, sit nervously during a match, chat with other parents between the courts. Because my youngest child is a senior, this is the last time I will be part of a marching band season and concert band, too--the last time I will attend a band picnic, volunteer at a band show, design the season's T-shirt, typeset the concert programs, attend concerts as a parent of someone on stage, pick up uniforms at the dry cleaners, shuttle a child to and from practices. Because my youngest child is a senior, this is the last time I will drive someone to school in the morning and pick them up in the afternoon. This is the last time I will have a child in my house for the school year. This is the last time I will have to nag in the morning because a chi

I had so much fun with the lyric melee the last time, that I will give it another try using lyrics from The Sound of Music. It isn't my favorite musical, by any stretch, but two people have mentioned it to me in one day, so here we go. 1. The Misanthtropic: Name something (about humanity) you absolutely hate. I hate that people are transient, and friends move away: There's a sad sort of clanging from the clock in the hall And the bells in the steeple too And up in the nursery an absurd little bird Is popping out to say "cuckoo" Cuckoo, cuckoo Regretfully they tell us Cuckoo, cuckoo But firmly they compel us Cuckoo, cuckoo To say goodbye . . . 2. The Meretricious: Expose something or someone that’s phony, fraudulent or bogus. Youthful arrogance is bogus, considering a seventeen-year-old boy is hardly capable of looking after a sixteen-year-old girl. Yikes. Totally unprepared are you To face a world of men Timid and shy and scared are you Of things beyond your ken You

Lynn's Auto Theater is the second oldest continuously operating drive-in theater in the country, and it is just ten minutes from my house. It was built in 1937, and although it has gone through quite a bit of updating over the years, it's a piece of history and a local treasure. I have to confess, I have never been, but every time I drive by it, I remember my first experience seeing a movie in a drive-in theater. I was just a kid, and my parents would not take me to theaters. Hollywood was nothing but trash, and nothing they ever produced was ever worth the money, or so they believed. In the 40s and 50s, my parents went to movies every week, when they could afford the tickets, and they loved movies. Hollywood stars were no less "trashy" than they were in the 60s and 70s, but they kept most of their adventures to themselves, and they didn't cuss on in public. You could blow up entire villages on screen or slaughter a field of native Americans, but you better not sa

Daughter No. 1 is getting ready to go back to college for another year of higher learning. This year she will be living in an apartment for the first time, and she will be feeding herself without the help of a campus food plan. In an effort to offer her guidance from two hours away, I have started a new blog where I will be posting recipes that are simple enough and quick enough for a busy student, or a group of busy students, to prepare. The way I see it, if you give them complicated recipes that take hours to prepare, they won't even pick up a wooden spoon for stirring. So, I'll keep it easy and fast but as fresh and balanced as possible. Go see for yourself here .

My orchestra is performing our annual pops concert in the park Sunday evening in honor of Labor Day. It is always fun and light and airy. While at rehearsal this morning, I sat on stage and liked feeling confident. It was a relief from that nagging feeling of inferiority that grips me on occasion. My years with the philharmonic have done more for my self-esteem and sense of accomplishment than any amount of therapy could have done. Below is lifted from a post I wrote about year ago, just to demonstrate how far a person can go when they set out to achieve a goal. I started playing horn when I was just 38, and later the next year I began taking lessons from a very good horn player who just happened to live in my town. We'll call him SS, when we aren't calling him Mr. Non-Observant. After a few months of lessons, which I approached with great apprehension and nervousness, almost to the point of contracting irritable bowel syndrome, SS suggested that I play in the local philharmoni