Philip Spiess

Ann:  Obviously, I Flandred trying to find a pun on that dog (I was dog-tired at the time).

Laura:  That we can float from subject to subject on here and all of us still keep the train of these various thoughts going, suggests why we were all at Walnut Hills in the first place.  You may recall that Ernest Hemingway, mentioned above, ended his life by sticking a shotgun in his mouth and pulling the trigger.  That was scatterbrained!

Ann Shepard (Rueve)

OMG!!! Phil, the imagery is really disturbing!!!!!

Gail Weintraub (Stern)

To pull us back to another Phil Spiess thread: Before Hemingway pulled that trigger, he had many a drink. Many a drink. But not the classic martini. What is the literary work that conjures up that drink?

Larry Klein

Philip Spiess

I was going to let the conundrum ride until next Friday, when I, or someone else, could introduce another erudite riddle, but apparently anxiety to know the answer to this one is rising.  What well-known literary work is inevitably invoked by the bartender when you order a classic Martini?  The answer (and you'll kick yourselves):  "Olive-or Twist!"  (My meeting with Dickens' great-grandson, Cedric Dickens , in Philadelphia in 1986, added greatly to my knowledge of 19th-Century drinking.)

Philip Spiess

Uh, people, far be it for me to quibble, but SPIESS is spelled "'I' before "E," except after 'C.'"   There is no "C" in Spiess; it is a German spelling, where "ie" is pronounced like a long "e."  "Make a note of it."

Ann, I'm sorry; I knew that my last pun would be distasteful to some (perhaps to all).  The curious (and dreadful) thing about humor is that, while we may find things funny, most of humor is invariably a slap or retort at others -- satire is the worst of it (see Jonathan Swift's "A Modest Proposal").

Perhaps I should have invoked the true story of a lady, who, in the early 1950s, jumped off the top of Carew Tower in Cincinnati to commit suicide.  Unfortunately for her, she was not well versed in the architecture of skyscrapers, those built between, say, the 1880s and the early 1950s, which were "stepped back" from the top, to permit more sunlight to fall into the streets.  As a result, she only fell about 6 stories or so, landing on the next level of the building, which was sticking out further than the top; she broke her leg in several places and lay there moaning for several hours until someone heard her.  This was scatterbrained -- though not in the same sense as the previous story.  (If you don't want gory stories, don't ask me about the lady who stepped into an elevator on the second floor of Pogue's Department Store in the early 1950s -- with dire results.) 

David Buchholz

Welcome to my world, everyone. A 6.0 earthquake centered near Napa hit us at 3:20 am, the largest quake since Loma Prieta in 1989.  The fault had lain dormant for 1,600,000 years (give or take 22 minutes), and this morning we feel shaken, not stirred. 

BTW...let me add my $.02 to the discussion.  I'm glad to see the recipes, the literary questions, anything at all about drinking and everything else to the discussion, as I think that the forum is enhanced by the many contributions that we're all able to make, and the different directions that we can go.

And BTW (2)...much as I enjoy the fact that many have enjoyed the photographs, I think of them as trailers, previews, distractions, and the main feature should be something else.

Ann Shepard (Rueve)

 Beautiful segue David. You were literally rockin' and rollin'. 

Phil - I can relate to the difficulty of others misspelling of your German surname. Having studied only French and a bit of Spanish, when Ed Rueve moved next door to me in 1979, rather than ask him straight out how to pronounce his name (it was on the mailbox), I assumed it must have been French. I never had the occasion to call his last name until I wanted to introduce him to some friends. At that time, I said the name with my best,  Baron Wilson-ly trained French R, as Ed ROOVE.  He just stood there and grinned. Later he explained that in German, when two vowels are together, the first is silent and the second is long, and the name was pronounced REE-VEE.  He added that the name in Germany was originally RÜWE, but somewhere when his family came to America, someone must have written the name in cursive, thus the new spelling. I've tried that, and if your penmanship isn't perfect, it does look like rueve.  Since having this name, I've also been called Mrs. Roove, Mrs. Revue and Mrs. Ruwee. I love it when telemarketers call with one of those pronunciations. I honestly respond, "There's no one here by that name" and hang up. 

PS. My license plate is REEVEE. 

Jerry Ochs

Dave,

When I arrived in Japan in 1979 digital cameras weren't on the market yet.  I took a few million photos with a single lens reflex, and have a shoebox full of negatives to prove it.

Here is an impressionistic shot of the Vltava River in Prague. 

David Buchholz

Jerry, that's a lovely painterly image of Prague.  

Ann, knowing that the dogs in India brought tears to your eyes, I only wondered what these dogs, my last canine post, would do for you.  In honor of the Dog Days of Summer, these are rarely seen African wild dogs, which hunt in packs, and can bring down much larger animals.  The lead dogs leap to the throat of the kudus or impalas while the rest glom onto the legs, then begin ripping the prey apart.  The reason why this photograph is taken from a higher vantage point is that if I got out of the back of the truck and tried to make friends—'Give me your paw and shake" didn't seem like the thing to do—I would have been eaten.

Ann Shepard (Rueve)

Jerry - I love your picture/painting. I seem to be able to hear Enya singing in the background. 

Dave - The Cincinnati Zoo just acquired several of those African Painted Dogs and are doing a big marketing promotion, comparing their markings to Jackson Pollock paintings. If you go to the website, http://cincinnatizoo.org/blog/animals/african-painted-dog/, it has a picture of one with the caption ADOPT ME.  After your description, as much as I love canines, I think I'll pass.  

BTW - I commend you for being that up close to one of those creatures. From a truck no less. AMAZING!!!

David Buchholz

Ann, no commendations needed.  I went to the Cincinnati Zoo site, and yes, those are the wild African painted dogs.  The ones we saw in Tanzania smelled awful, but I'm assuming that someone at the zoo hoses these guys down once in a while.

As far as being in a truck goes...on our first day on safari we came across a pride of lions, perhaps three or four females, a couple of males, and a number of young lions, all during the migration of the wildebeests in early January.  This was our first discovery, and we sat in the back of this totally open truck with benches along the sides.  The driver turned off the engine and began to snooze.  "Excuse me," I said to him, "but why aren't they eating us?"  He replied, "They don't think that you're prey.  If you step down from the truck it will be an entirely different story."  This was my favorite photograph from this scene, taken with a normal (not telephoto lens).  We were that close.

Nancy Messer

Dave - I now have my copy of those adorable little lion cubs. The fact that they're growing up into something a bit more dangerous is immaterial!

Stephen (Steve) Dixon

Gail,

Hemingway's drink, at least when he was in Key West, was the 'Papa Doble.' I think it was basically White Rum & Grapefruit Juice. Probably some lime and a couple of other things in there.

Gail Weintraub (Stern)

Steve, when he was in Florida, he also liked Mojitos. Sun Valley, Idaho is Hemingway country--he lived, wrote, drank and died here. He had several watering holes in the area where he drank and drank with his buddies--straight whiskey.

David Buchholz

Because of the thousands of you who have inquired about our safety and health after the 6.0 earthquake at 3:20 this morning I'm taking to this site to reassure all of you that we're okay.  Except for the entire demolition of the town of Mill Valley (so sorry, Gail!), the rest of us got through this just fine.  Thanks for your concern.

Stephen (Steve) Dixon

Si hoc legere scis nimium eruditionis habes.

Stephen Collett

I hope that we will continue to communicate over this website for the rest of our lives, sorry for mentioning it. I think there is a lot of territory here to uncover.

I am slow on the uptake, but I want to get behind Nelson’s suggestion that we move on from favorite teachers towards getting to the bottom of what concerns us today.

For example, does anyone else have this problem with the vanishing tush? I guess some of us have it the other way round, which must be equally a pain. But I have the s’no go, as illustrated in the photo. This was taken on a bright Easter walk with family. My daughter had thrown a bucket of very cold water on me, which I wanted to prove (she took the picture). Which also explains the kind of welts, or cramped skin look that resembles like elephant wrinkles on the back. It was cold, OK?

Is anyone else tussling with this sort of thing?

Ann Shepard (Rueve)

Well Steve Dixon - we did go to Walnut Hills. 

And Steve Collett - I have a traveling tush.  It first went to my chest now it's visiting my midsection. I will not post a picture.  

Stephen Collett

In checking back I see that Dick Winter has recommended I put my two questions, written way back in the spring (we are already into fall here at 59 degrees north) here in the message forum: They were, what was the name of our 7th grade shop teacher (he comes alphabetically first in a list of our teachers) and what was the "universal solvent" he kept mentioning?

Nancy Messer

Dave - you had told us early on you were OK so I didn't think to ask.  Did you have much damage to the house and property?  Do you have utilities?

Richard Murdock

I am certainly not in Dave's league of photo excellence, but I find that if I take 1,000 photos, one or two turn out OK.   Here is a photo of the river Arno in Florence taken late afternoon on the day I arrived for my first ever visit.  It was grey, chilly and overcast but I like this photo of the Arno and the Ponte Vecchio - and especially the guy in the river in a rubber rowboat with white balloons.

Dale Gieringer

 Earthquake update  -  No damage to report here in the East Bay;  the epicenter was 25 miles northwards.  It did wake me up at 3:20 in the morning, as have numerous weaker temblers closer to us.   What woke me wasn't the shaking, but the frantic scrambling of little footsteps on our roof.   I don't know for sure what animals   tread up there at that time of night - raccoons, rats, squirrels, cats, whatever - but they sure are sensitive to earthquakes.  We hear pattering footsteps most every night on our roof, but the earthquake set off a real ruckus.  Our wine bottles are all thankfully intact.

Gail Weintraub (Stern)

Contrary to David Buchholz's earlier remarks, the town of Mill Valley was not demolished! No damage to report in our vicinity. All is well.

Richard Montague

Steve C,.

An answer to your question, Paul Ahlert. Paul and I kept up a friendship after I graduated. About a year ago I tried to contact him. Talked to his son and found out his mom and dad had both passed away.

We had a lot of fun in his shop class and I was always in trouble.

Rick