Thursday, April 2, 2009

It's a good time to buy a used boat

I'm open to the idea of someone mooring their boat in our pond, if it's a picturesque one. They can even live aboard it for a nominal rent. And they can keep all the snapping turtles they catch in exchange for an occasional couple of bowls of snapper soup.

Hunters are always trying to give us venison which we don't like; but snapper soup is another thing entirely. I think our edition of The Joy of Cooking has a recipe starting with the necessary cutting off of the head of the snapper with an ax. I'll provide the chopping block and the ax.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/04/01/business/01boats.html?_r=3&hp

Meanwhile, in other news: Detroit is reverting to the wild and there's a wide awake fellow selling skinned raccoons for $12 each. Slick Willy took his woman in 1970; but apparently he didn't take the Coonman's hunting dogs or his down home skills. I like his little touch of leaving one paw on the carcass.

"The paw is old school," says Glemie Dean Beasley, a Detroit raccoon hunter and meat salesman. "It lets the customers know it's not a cat or dog."

During the seven or so minute video that accompanies the newspaper article the Coonman channels Julia Child with a nice raccoon cooking demonstration. And that's before he plays and sings a nice blues song that's got a tempo perfect for our level of West Coast Swing skill.

Unfortunately I've only seen raccoons two times since we bought our land in 1978; although there's no question that they're regularly around. Linda just pointed out a raccoon paw print to me down at the creek a few days ago. I may look into learning how to set a snare. That raccoon recipe looked mighty inviting; although I might be tempted to present it to Linda as rabbit if I ever get the chance to try it out.

The Coonman also sells rabbits and squirrels if you happen to be passing through Detroit and want to work up to the raccoon sort of sideways. I bet he would have a field day with the geese around here and up and down along the river drives in Philly.

The quotes from Beasley are priceless. An example - "Today people got no skill and things is getting worse," he laments. "What people gonna do? They gonna eat each other up is what they gonna do." That's a fellow I'd like to know.

http://www.detnews.com/article/20090402/METRO08/904020395/To+urban+hunter++next+meal+is+scampering+by

And, in yet other news, here's a nice, very reasonable, well spoken Arab fellow who wants to come and make an impact on a neighborhood near you.

http://www.tangle.com/view_video.php?viewkey=0861ff3eabea1ceb73e4

1 comment:

Jenny said...

A couple of things: Doug and I have been closely watching sailboat prices and docking fees. We are very interested in sailing as a winter hobby in years to come, if we can afford it. It's amazing how prices have gone down compared to last year at this time. Also, if you are offered venison, please take some a freeze it for me as I would be happy to take it off your hands!