Category: Not Exactly Cape

When I worked at The Athens (OH) Messenger in the late 1960s, the other photographer and and I would make contact sheets of the film we shot, then we’d cut out the frames we were considering for layouts. That let us crop them and move them around on the layout sheet to figure out what would look best. When I was done with mine, I’d throw them in a box.

I happened to run across that box the other day and discovered these two boys who had created their own mobile phone network long before anyone thought of cell phones in general or iPhones in particular.

Unlimited voice and data plans

The boys were smart enough to find a communication system that had unlimited voice and data plans and that could be used from both fixed locations and on the road. They didn’t have to sign a contract and they didn’t need batteries. I wish I could find a deal like that today.

Son Adam and Wife Carly invited us over for a Thanksgiving mini-feast with their friends Eric and Laura.

I never was any good at studio photography. I particularly avoided taking food pictures as much as possible. I didn’t have the patience to arrange everything just so.

So, these photos didn’t have any fancy lighting or placement. What I saw is what I shot.

Steam poured out of turkey

The electric knife was a Christmas present to Lila from her father nearly 40 years ago. It’s a little balky, but it’ll still slice turkey.

The bird was soaked in brine overnight, then put on the grill until the internal temperature reached 170 degrees (based on a wireless probe Adam kept monitoring).

It was unbelievably moist, based on some pieces I snatched up before they fell on the floor.

Green beans

The meal was both tasty AND colorful. Lila tells me this green bean dish by Carly contained shallots, bacon, almonds and balsamic vinegar.

When Adam saw this picture, he was distressed by the odd green bean at the bottom of the frame. It offended his sense of order.

Sweet potatoes and marshmallows

Lila does not eat this, but makes it because it’s a Steinhoff family tradition. I whined last year when she “forgot” to make it. She calls it candy, not food. It contains sweet potatoes, crushed pineapple, brown sugar and a topping of melted, toasted miniature marshmallows.

Yeast rolls and cranberry relish

Lila provided the yeast rolls and cranberry relish. The relish is made of raw cranberries, oranges, cinnamon and sugar.

NY-style cheesecake

This was Carly’s first attempt at New York-style cheesecake. It was served naked (the cheesecake, not the server) with a topping of homemade whipped cream on the side.

If this is really her first cheesecake, she should retire now. I don’t think it’s possible to make one any better.

Recipes are available

If you’re interested in how to make any of this stuff, let me know and I’ll pass your request on to the cooks.

You can be assured that the information won’t come directly from me. My recipe book is the stack of carry-out menus under the kitchen telephone.

I figure y’all are too busy thinking about eating, eating, recovering from eating or watching sporting events to bother to stop by, so I’ll just toss up some photos of things I’m thankful for.

I’ve never been able to master that teenage girl trick of holding out my camera to shoot a self-portrait of me and my BFF, so I thought I’d try a mirror shot just before I pulled out of Cape headed for Florida. Looks like I haven’t mastered the old photo in a mirror trick, either. Mother, at least, looks good. She’s responsible for all the festive decorations and for making Cape still feel like home.

Healthy, happy, active family

I wrote earlier about the Steinhoff Family Triathlon in August. Adam asked Matt and his mother if they’d like to do a family Olympic distance relay at the 19th Annual Huntington’s Disease Triathlon in Miami on August 1, 2010. Each did a leg of their specialty: Matt rode his bike 40 kilometers, Lila swam 1.5K and Adam ran 10K.

They let me do my specialty: standing on the sidelines shooting photos.

Lila came home last night to report that she had bested her swimming goal for the year. She was aiming for 100 miles in 2010, but she’s ten miles over that, with another month to go.

A super grandson and his mother

We won the daughter-in-law lottery with Matt’s wife Sarah and Adam’s wife Carly. Matt and Sarah live close enough to Malcolm’s school that he can ride his bike. That’s Sarah shadowing him. There’s no occasion too trivial to wear special headgear when Sarah’s around.

A birthday surprise

Adam arranged to surprise Carly on her birthday by having a new tree planted in their yard while they were at brunch. The couple surprised us earlier in the year by announcing that we’re going to be grandparents again in February. They’re gonna make great parents.

Saving the best for last

Most importantly, there’s Wife Lila, who is the one who is largely responsible for the way our two boys turned out. She’s the one who steered the canoe while I was flailing wildly with the paddle. Yep, I’m a pretty lucky guy with a lot to be thankful for every day, not just on the one turkeys dread.

A number of images and events come to mind on Veterans Day. Watching the Vietnam War play out nightly on the family’s  Zenith television set in our basement is one.

Gary Schemel 1946 – 1965

Gary Schemel was one of Central High School’s first casualties in the Vietnam War.

A fellow vet posted this 1932 poem on The Wall in his memory:

Do not stand at my grave and weep.

I am not there; I do not sleep.

I am a thousand winds that blow,

I am the diamond glints on snow,

I am the sun on ripened grain,

I am the gentle autumn rain.

When you awaken in the morning’s hush

I am the swift uplifting rush

Of quiet birds in circled flight.

I am the soft stars that shine at night.

Do not stand at my grave and cry,

I am not there; I did not die.

Posthumous Medal Presentation

A father an mother leave the Athens County Courthouse with a box of medals awarded posthumously to their son in 1969.

Homemade memorial to this generation’s dead

Missing from this handmade memorial to this generation’s war dead was the name Liz Jacobson, my son’s 21-year-old former girlfriend, who was killed by an IED while on a convoy in support of Operation Iraqi Freedom. Adam got permission to add her “stone.” On it, he wrote some lines that she had sent him: “We’re only on this earth for a little while, so live life to the fullest and carry a smile.”

This photo was taken in 2007. I wonder how many more Liz Jacobsons there would be there in the picture today.

Support our boys in Vietnam

I don’t agree with all of the political sentiments this woman is wearing, but I can get behind the Support Our Boys in Vietnam button she sported at a pro-war march in Washington, D.C., in the fall of 1971.

Civil War Memorial Statue

Pigeons show no respect to this Civil War soldier in Washington, DC.