Reason #4: Sweet Salamanders and Other Pets

The Story and Untimely Death of French Fry

When I was younger, I used to go with my grandparents to a campground a couple of miles from their house. They kept a trailer there and used it as a place to hang out on weekends and summers, a place for friends and family and fires and barbeques. One time, I went with my grandparents and my cousin, Sam, to spend the evening at the campground.

My cousin was a year younger than me then and probably could have been my identical twin. We decided to go out exploring through the woods and came upon a creek that flowed through the campground. With the brilliant idea of catching “fishes,” we traipsed back to the trailer to get a bucket to put them in. We couldn’t find a bucket, so instead we got plastic cups, which turned out to be a good thing because we needed something to catch the fishes with. We decided that the best technique was to scoop up random cupfuls of water and hope that we would catch something.

After only a few minutes of scooping, we actually did catch something, but it wasn’t a fish. It was a beautiful orange salamander! We showed it to our grandmother and kept it in the shade until it was time to go, at which point we snuck it into the car.

When we got home, we realized that we needed a place to keep it so we asked our grandmother for a bucket. Sighing, she dug through her cupboards in search of a big enough Tupperware container for our poor creature. We put it gingerly inside of the plastic dish and added some water and grass, named it “French Fry”, and walked away.

Sure enough, when we came back a few hours later, sweet old French Fry was belly-up. So we buried him in the middle of my grandma’s garden. RIP French Fry.

The Story and Untimely Death of “Birdie”

Playing in our backyard one day, my sister and I found a poor baby bird that had been knocked out of his nest and was lying on the ground. It took us quite a while to realize he was no longer breathing.

However, after we had made this discovery, we decided that “Birdie” needed a proper burial. So we grabbed a shovel and headed for the woods. Two feet off of our property line, we dug a hole and placed the small bird inside of it. After covering him with dirt, we realized that what he needed now was a headstone.

We poked around a bit and eventually found an old cinderblock, which we dragged on top of his grave. My sister painted the name “Birdie” upside down in green paint on the top of the block and we both said a few words about the bird’s life. I realized many years down the road, when my dad found the gravesite and asked what it was, that the letters e and d in Birdie’s inscription were backward. You were a good friend, Birdie. We’ll miss you dearly.

The Story and Untimely Death of the Little Red Fishies

My sister at one point owned her own fish tank, where she kept a zebra fish on one side, and another type of small red fish on the other side, separated by a plastic divider with extremely tiny holes in it. The small red fish was pregnant when my sister bought it. Eventually, the babies hatched. We all ogled at the teeny tiny baby fishies that morning. Then we went to school.

When we returned home that evening, the zebra fish had eaten all but one of the little baby fishes (which it finished off the next day). Who knew that zebra fish even ate other fish?! When, some time later, we did remove the plastic divider between the two fish, the zebra fish ate the momma red fish as well.  Good luck in the afterlife, little fishies.

I also unfortunately suffered the loss of a long-time family pet, a beautifully demented sheltie named Lady, who died earlier this summer of cancer. She was the best friend a gal could ask for. Comment and tell me about "the story and untimely death" of a pet you once owned, and don't forget to share about your truly loyal and loving pets too!



Lady and myself



Courtney

Reason #3: Trying New Foods

It was a weekend when my little brothers were all busy and my older sister was away. My dad told my mother and me that he was taking us out for dinner. We pulled up to a little tin building and got out of the car. The outside sported a simple wooden plaque that announced the name of the grange and a coat of arms. The inside smelled deliciously of ham and potatoes.

We stopped just inside the door to pay for what was advertised as that night’s dinner - “Dandelion greens served with baked ham, mashed potatoes, applesauce, devilled eggs, and dessert”. I was a little disgusted at the thought of eating dandelions, but not at all surprised that people here actually cooked them up and ate them; I grew up in an area where the name of our county was more commonly used as an adjective than a noun. Simply put, we were hicks, we were rednecks, we stood outside our houses amidst our Christmas lights in July and watched our toddlers streak naked across the yard, we were uneducated (and those of us who got an education never came back to stay), and we were way more familiar with the smell of cow and the putt-putt of a tractor than that of roses and the almost unnoticeable hum of a hybrid car.

Dandelion greens, it turns out, can be fixed in multiple ways. Ours were boiled, I believe, with a thin dressing and bacon tossed on them. Feeling braver than my usual self, I did try them that night. As I crunched and munched on the first forkful that I had shoved in my mouth, I thought, ‘These aren’t so bad’. They did, after all, taste like bacon. However, by the time that I had finished chewing, the bitterness of the weed seeped into my mouth, and it was all that I could do to swallow that one bite. My thoughts on the food quickly changed to ‘Eeech. Who eats these things?’ After that, I stuck to ham and mashed potatoes the rest of the night.

Just in case you get the itch to give dandelion greens a try someday, here's the recipe to "Dandelion Salad with Warm Bacon Dressing from epicurious.com.

Courtney

Feel free to comment and tell me about the most interesting food you’ve ever tried! Happy living!

Reason #2: Looong Days at Work

I worked three out of my four years of high school at an equine stable as a stable hand. My responsibilities mostly included cleaning stalls (that is, shoveling horse crap), feeding, throwing hay, taking general care of the horses and cat, and moving the horses from the barn to the pasture and back in again. ‘What a fun job!’ you say, ‘How on earth did you find such a lovely job at such an early age in your life?’ Well, let me tell you.

Since I was a little girl, I’ve wanted a horse. I took riding lessons for about five years and even showed (once) and won (second place). However, it was hard to continue my lessons knowing that I would not be able to put them to good use, seeing as I didn’t have a horse to show with or even to just ride for fun. Seeing that the lessons were going nowhere, my parents and I made an executive decision to quit the lessons (which also saved my parents a butt-load of money).

But don’t think I was deterred from my goal! I still asked constantly for the horse. And my parents still said no.

One fine summer day, our family was enjoying a pool party at the house of the brother of my dad’s boss (stick with me here), who’s wife owned a barn and horses. Seizing the opportunity, my father introduced me and declared that I was ready to work. He somehow seemed to think that working at a horse barn would quench my desire to own a horse. It did not.

It did, however, get me three years of demanding physical labor and a lot of good stories (most of which involve torture that the horses have inflicted on me). It was a long three years. ‘Tell me one of those stories!’ you say, and I will, of course, oblige you.

At the barn, we have multiply outdoor pastures along with a nice stable (which is not air-conditioned or heated, and makes for crappy working conditions year-round because it’s either super toasty, or I’m-wearing-seven-pairs-of-pants cold), which we move the horses in and out of with the weather. As I arrived at work on this particular summer day, the horses were all out in the pasture, and I was supposed to bring them in for the night.

I went out to the front field first, which held two newer horses that I had not had a lot of experience with yet. I grabbed the younger one first, a two-year-old named Amir*, figuring that the older gelding would wait patiently. Unfortunately, I was wrong. When I swung open the gate, the gelding, Estevan*, bolted out and took off. Cool as usual, I simply stood there and called his name until he came back… NOT.

“CODE RED, CODE RED!” My brain flashed. Trying to move quickly but without freaking him out, I decided that the best thing I could do would be to get Amir into the barn first and then chase after Estevan. As I was making my way towards the barn, I saw that Estevan had run off the property and was now trudging steadily though the neighbors sprouting cornfield. I whipped out my phone and clicked through my contacts as fast as I could, all the while still trying to hurry back to the barn with Amir.

I found my boss’s name and punch the Call button.

Stranger on phone: “Hello?”

Me: “Estevangotout!AndIhaveAmirandIcan’tchaseEstevanuntilIgetAmirinside!”

Stranger on phone: “… … …Who is Estevan?”

Me: “What?! Estevan! He got loose! He’s running down the hill!”

Stranger on phone: “I… what?!”

Me: “Ohmygod! Wrong number! Sorry!”

I quickly hung up and scrolled through my contacts again, not bothering to check who I had just called on accident. When I reached my boss, I relayed the same message. She calmly told me that she would be right down.

I reached the barn with Amir and threw him into his stall as quickly as I could and ran back outside to meet my boss. “Where’d he go?” she asked. “He’s right over—“But when I turned to point to the field that Estevan had been frolicking in moments before, I saw that it was empty. I looked left. I looked right. My boss followed my gaze as my breathing became deeper and more panicky, and I started thinking things like “Oh shit, oh shit!” and “I’m going to have to buy my boss a new horse!”

We both continued to stare at the field where Estevan had been. My boss muttered that I should calm down, but I couldn’t. I spun in circles, noticing how melancholy the horse behind me looked. He was hanging out the large Dutch window, bobbing his head as he watched me. I did a double-take and then gave a feeble laugh. My boss turned too, and we stared, dumb-founded, at each other as the scene unfolded before us. “He must have snuck into the barn while you were with Amir.” my boss stated. In response, I gave another feeble laugh and marched back into the barn to close the door to the stall that Estevan stood in.

Thankfully, my boss is a good-humored woman and seemed to think the situation was more funny than anything else. Before she went in, she even helped bring in the rest of the horses as the clouds overhead darkened and the wind grew steadier. I had just shut the barn doors when it began to downpour, and I finally allowed myself to smile.

I laughed. I even started to dance. What a ridiculous day! All of that panic over a horse that had been safe in the barn the whole time! And now, I had escaped the rain in just the nick of time! Ha!

And then I got a text message from my boss. It stated simply,

“If rain is coming in Dutch windows, please close them.”

Sure enough, the rain was coming in sheets through the windows, and the only way to close them was from the outside. I ran around the outside of the barn, slamming window after window until they were all closed, gulping for air through the pounding rain. It took me less than thirty seconds, yet by the time I was back inside, I was soaked. My shirt was three pounds heavier and my boots were squishing with two inches of water.



Me, after the rain



Just when I had thought I’d outsmarted the universe, I was proven wrong. The whole situation does make for a wonderful story though. What’s your worst-day-of-work story? I’d love to hear about it!

Courtney

P.S. I later checked to see who I had called the first time I was attempting to reach my boss. It turned out to be my friend Mary, who thought my phone call was extremely funny.

*Indicates that names have been changed to protect the identity of the horse/horses

Reason #1: Lactaid is a Lifesaver

I grew up a small-town girl in southern Pennsylvania and was first introduced to ice cream by my grandfather, from whom I also inherited a love of the frozen treat. With all of the ice cream that I have eaten thus far in my life, it’s a wonder that I’m not obese and/or have not keeled over from a heart attack yet. I adore ice cream so much that I have even gone as far as to create an entire series of ice cream paintings and drawings for an art class that I was taking (which turned out to be a bad idea, since I couldn’t hang them on my walls without wanting to go out for an ice cream sundae).

And so, you can imagine my horror when, only a few weeks ago, I developed a lactose intolerance. My immediate reaction was to freak out. You would think that I had been diagnosed with a life-threatening disease or hair loss or something. I made my mom come to the grocery store with me, where we searched every nook and cranny of the ice cream freezers, looking for a lactose-free ice cream.

We found the Lactaid brand, which our store only carried three flavors of: vanilla, chocolate, and butter pecan. Not being a huge fan of either butter pecan or chocolate, I was forced to go with the plain vanilla. Not that I have anything against it, but after two weeks of ONLY being able to eat vanilla ice cream, I was going nuts and once again entered full freak-out mode, wondering if I would be doomed to eat vanilla ice cream for the rest of my life.

Calling upon my mother once again for help, we ventured through the medicine isle of our local Wegmans until we found Lactaid caplets. It was like an answer to my problem had fallen from the heavens! I could simply take a pill before I ate ice cream and then enjoy it to my heart’s content. I think I ate three bowls of ice cream that night… which definitely brings me back to my first point and trying to figure out how I’m not morbidly obese (or obese at all, for that matter).

My life over the past couple of weeks has definitely been a dairy long journey (haha). All I can say is, thank God for Lactaid! Has anyone else been in therapy since discovering your lactose intolerance? Feel free to comment or message me and tell me about your favorite ice cream flavor; I’d love to hear from you!

Courtney