Monday, July 07, 2008

a short recap of my long weekend


If I can manage brevity. Let's go...


Friday : went with my mum & dad to buy fireworks. We bought from this friend of the family who has this big log cabin out in the wilds of Corinth VT. Totally gorgeous piece of land, but that family is wanting to sell & move to Kentucky. I do think it's a shame, but at the same time understand where they're coming from. They pay about 10X more $$ in property tax in VT. And it goes beyond taxes...the northeast is just a pricey place to live in general. Anyways I digress (fuck brevity, right?) they pick up these fireworks on the way back from KY in May and sell them when they get back home. I was suprised that in the short time we were there (1 1/2 hrs approx) they had 4 other customers pop in . I think they do big business. I mean it's not like they're on Main St...they're pretty well off the grid. It was mentioned that K drops 6 or 7 k on fireworks (though who knows if his father --who mentioned that--can be trusted for accurate info). I wonder what kind of profit he makes. He *must* make a profit. You don't spend that much on fireworks just because you're SUCH a Yankee Doodle Dandy.


Oh, Friday night we were going to get lobsters because Price Chopper had this sign out advertising "$6.99 per lb lobsters!!" But it was just a clever ruse-- their gargantuan 20 pounders were $6.99 per lb. but the normal lobsters were $9. per lb. I proposed getting tilapia instead. I dig tilapia, but had never cooked it. I scrounged up a recipe for Tilapia al Ajillo, which mainly appealed to me because it was not overly encrusted. I mean, I've had breaded tilapia and parmesan crusted tilapia before and enjoyed it, but I wanted a light summery meal. And tilapia is such a light fish...I didn't wanna overwhelm it, y'know. That recipe seemed ridiculously simple, and I didn't even have the fresh lemon (or even a little plastic squeezie lemon of lemon juice) it calls for. I thought it was going to come out very blandly. But it was MUY MUCHO DELICIOSO! I hate to brag but.. I cooked the shit out of that fish!! And I adlibbed a tomato-basil vinagrette-mozzarella salad.


After dinner we went to my cousin's casa for a bonfire.


Saturday-- Fourth of July party @ my sister's house. I made a tortellini salad (with grape tomatoes...forgetting entirely that tomatoes are making people nationwide..uhhhh.. projectile vomit? break out in hives? I'm not sure. Obviously I'm only 1/2 paying attention to the news. But I am aware --even if I temporarily forgot-- that people these days are afraid of tomatoes for some reason or another and it's not that Attack of the Killer Tomatoes movie either.*) and monkey cereal bars.

We set off the fireworks shortly after 9. There was a group of spectators sitting on this hill, then a gap of about 4 or 5 feet, and then a row of chairs at the edge of the driveway (I was in the row, approx in the middle) One of the fireworks (in the grand finale, as it happens) tipped over after being lit and shot right into the crowd. It zwoooshed through (that's right..it zwooshed) the gap between the 2 crowd sections at a height of about 6 ft. A very dramatic finish (unintentionally so...I think) to a mediocre fireworks show. We were all pretty spry sitting there in the row, but I think I mighta set the landspeed record for springing out of a camp chair. We were all in hysterics for a while...and by "in hysterics" I mean laughing, which is probably a good indication that we all had considerable buzzes goin'. Although, I don't think my cousin's wife Vicki was laughing all that much. Her hair got singed. Just a smidgen singed. They left shortly thereafter, ostensibly to put their kids to bed, but it woulda been understandable if V was fleeing in fear of further (more serious) personal injury.


Sunday-- went to Keene (there dwells my nearest Target...oh how I love thee ..not to mention a swell Borders in the very same plaza) spent $$ that I shouldn't have.

*longest parenthetical note ever? You decide!!

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