This upcoming weekend I am looking forward to spending a little time with my son, Brad and my grandson, Dylan, Brad’s son. I am looking forward to this little adventure and spending time with both.
The other day I read something on the internet referring to Paul Bunyan, this made me think of when my sons were young. We were vacationing near Brainerd with our friends, Kenny and Georgette and their two kids. We went into and visited the amusement park. When we entered the park there was a big statue of Paul Bunyan that greeted the kids by name when they entered. They were amazed that Big Paul knew their name. I can’t recall if we ever told them how he knew their name but I’m pretty sure that we eventually, told them.
We stayed at a campground that week and used my small boat to go out on the lake to fish. This was the first time that I had encountered people who were rude and inconsiderate of a smaller vessel. When Kenny and I were fishing, this guy with gray hair, a tan and who was surrounded by four young girls. He, obviously, wanted to impress them by driving his big boat around and around our small boat, sending huge waves our way. We almost capsized and after letting the guy know my feelings, he roared past me one more time laughing while the girls giggled, and they went on their merry way.
Back at the campground the kids were having a blast catching sunfish right off the dock. They were using bobbers, split shot and gold hooks. They lost all of their bait but that didn’t keep the fish from biting. It seems like the fish liked those gold hooks as much as the worms, so they kept on catching fish. Me and Kenny cleaned the fish, and we wrapped them in aluminum foil and put them on the grill. Lemmon pepper and sliced onion did the trick.
This was at a time when campfires were a must for camping. We would roast hot dogs, hamburgers and s’mores almost every night. The kids had to eat something with food value before the s’mores could be broken out. Speaking of food value, most of the foods that we ate growing up are now considered about as toxic as nuclear waste. My mother would make sugar cookies and date filled sugar cookies. I loved those date filled ones, but I haven’t had one since she passed.
Once upon a time, we were allowed to eat cereal with the name sugar in it. There were cereals like Sugar Crisp with a jingle that said, “can’t get enough of those sugar crisps”, Later they changed their name to Honey Crisp, to make it a healthy sweet, I guess.
Then there were Sugar Corn Pops, which eventually became Corn Pops. Later the Honeycomb cereal came along. Wheaties was the Breakfast of Champions, but you had to add your own sugar. We didn’t have spoon sized Shredded Wheat; it was the “Big” biscuits. Once in a while, my mom would take those big biscuits which she would roll in a beaten egg batter and fry it in a pan with buttter. She would then put more butter on it and dark Karo syrup and we ate it like a pancake. I always liked that with the fried SPAM or wannabe BIF or MOR which were about the same as the popular brand, only cheaper.
If you go on the internet, you will find some doctor telling us what not to eat, which seems like a list of everything I have been eating and enjoying my whole life.
Until next time: We can still use some rain, but that should go without saying. The way that the weather has been, it is a good time to enjoy the outdoors. It is good to see people fishing from shore around Fountain Lake, we have a wonderful resource here and I am glad to see people using it.
Please show our support for the troops that are serving our country today. These servicemen and women are making that sacrifice so that we may have the many freedoms that we enjoy today.