From the East Wing, With the Lions of March, Squanto on Maple Syrup, Hebrews Naming Turkeys, Visiting Detroit City

Greetings to all, and welcome new friends to the East Wing.

When people talk about March weather, someone always seems to mention this old weather saying: If March comes in like a lion, it will go out like a lamb. If March comes in like a lamb, it will go out like a lion. I’ve heard that all my life and used to wonder what that meant until I started stargazing.

Now those that gaze at stars see a heavenly connection in these lambs and lions. Ya see the constellation Leo, the lion, is rising in the east at the beginning of March and thus “comes in like a lion,” while Aries, the ram, sets in the west at the end of March and “will go out like a lamb.” That other part ‘bout coming in like a lamb and going out like a lion, I don’t have a clue where that one came from.

For everybody that didn’t start spring with me on March 1st, the 20th will be here before ya know it. But March is notoriously temperamental weather-wise. So enjoy these warm days as they come, with their fast-moving weather systems, record-breaking storms, and mud, always lots of mud in March. As the winter frost leaves the ground there will be places that are like walking on jello. So fling open your windows and let springtime blow into your life. I can hardly wait to open the windows of the East Wing.

As the cold of winter fades from the back grounds of our memory, I’m glad it’s spring. Saw a rabbit Friday morning on the way to work. Not sure if it was the Easter Bunny or maybe one of the helpers just checking out the route. I think the Easter Bunny is a lot like Santa Clause in the since they both gotta lot of work and a short time to get there.

Another neat thing ‘bout March, besides that spring starting stuff, is the running of the sap. Maple sugaring season starts ‘bout the first week of March. Did ya ever wonder how anybody figured out that maple syrup thing from tree sap? It for sure wasn’t the people who came over on the boat. It was those that met the boat that told us ‘bout it. Oh sure, ya remember those people, don’t ya, the same ones that, we white boys and girls, stole their land, lively hood and treasurers ‘cause we were civilized and they weren’t.

Well, not only did Squanto tell us ‘bout putting that fish in with the kernel of corn in the ground, he probably also told us ‘bout maple sap and what ya could get by cooking it a while. But what did those people know anyway, they were just dumb Indians. I can’t help but wonder who told Squanto ‘bout the sap. Maybe the Indians knew ‘bout the sap a long, long time before Squanto. Maybe it was Squanto’s great, great, great grand Indian that started it all. I wonder if they had pan cakes back then, ‘cause they had to put Maple Syrup on something. Come to think of it, I don’t even know what Indians ate back then.

One time I heard that Indians called March’s Full Moon the Sap Moon, ‘cause it marks the time when maple sap begins to flow and it’s time to tap the Maple Tree once again. Maybe those Indians weren’t as dumb as we thought, the difference was we had gun powder, they didn’t. It’s kinda ironic that when the conversation turns to ancestry, there’s never a shortage of people who claim to be part Indian. I’ve never noticed many people bragging the same claim for some of the other cultures blended into our society. I almost forgot to tell ya, I’m part Indian, I just don’t know which part.

Most everybody thinks the Maple Syrup comes from Vermont. It don’t. Most of the world supply comes from Quebec, Canada. We’re the largest consumer of the product though. Course that stands to reason, we have more IHOPs than anybody else, not to mention those Waffle House places.

Waffle House reminds me of the Waffle House from Hell that Johnny and I stopped at on our way to Atlanta a month ago. Now I’m not gona say anything bad ‘bout the place, but when ya order an egg over easy and ya can pick it up by the tip and bang the egg on a coffee cup and get someone’s attention by the sound of egg on cup, well, that’s just not right. It may have worked as a Frisbee, that egg over easy. Waffle House, enter at your own peril.

I mentioned that I saw a rabbit on the way to work the other morning, well the day before I saw a flock of wild turkeys and I got to thinking who named this ugly bird. A little turkey research turns up some pretty neat things ‘bout turkeys.

One story claims the Christopher Columbus heard some birds say "tuka, tuka", and his interpreter came up with the name tukki, which means "big bird" in Hebrew. I’m not buying into this one at all, ‘cause where in the world would Columbus find a Hebrew Interpreter. I was thinking those guys were all gone, but maybe when they got out of the Pyramid Building Business, they went into the explorer interpretering business. If these folks worked for Columbus, they should have charged by the mile. The round trip would have been worth a few bucks. I just don’t think Columbus needed an interpreter, after all, he’s Italian, he talks with his hands most of the time anyway.

Ben Franklin wanted the turkey as the symbol of the United States. Comparing it to the eagle, he called the turkey "a more respectable bird, a true original native of America." Now before ya get in tizzy ‘bout wanting to replace the eagle, Ben’s idea was because the wild turkey is quick to defend itself and fight against all predators. He just thought those attributes blended well with the new nation he was helping to create.

Sophia, setting from her vantage point on the back of my chair, just whispered in my ear that if President Obama was to choose a national bird, she thinks he would go for the chicken. When asked why so, she said “It’s loved by most everybody ‘round the world. It fits his socialist agenda for America, and it looks so good in that little round bucket with them briskets.” Oh, the power of cat logic.

I read somewhere the average person in the United States will eat 15 pounds of turkey this year. Don’t know ‘bout you but somebody else eats ‘bout 14 pounds of my share. Eating turkey once a year is plenty for me.

Between the Cowboys and Indians and everybody else hunting the turkeys, by the 1930s, almost all of the wild turkeys in the U.S. had been hunted and ate. Today, thanks to conservation programs, there are plenty of wild turkeys. As a matter of fact, they even come to town. On the east side on North Judson, just at the town limits sign, ya can see several turkeys there ‘most every morning.

Boy and girl, tom and hen, baby is poult, young boy turkey is Jake, young girl turkey is, I guess, young hen, and that pretty well takes care of all the name calling in the turkey family.

A domestic tom can weigh up to 50 pounds, the domestic hen up to 16 pounds. The wild tom can weigh up to 20 pounds, the wild hen up to 12 pounds.

The average life span of a domestic turkey, from out of egg to into freezer, is 26 weeks. During this period of time, it will eat about 75 pounds of turkey feed. Now let’s say we’re talking a hen turkey here and it eats 75 pounds of feed and end up weighing 16 pounds. Now that’s 59 pounds of shoveling on somebody’s part. A bad job, shoveling used turkey food.

That wobbly little thing on the turkey’s chest is the turkey's beard and is made up of keratin bristles. Keratin is the same stuff that forms hair and horns on other animals. Rhino horns are made from keratin. And I always thought it was made from the same stuff as unicorns.

Only male turkeys, or toms, can gobble, and they gobble while looking for girls. Some things just never change, I’m sure you girls that read this know a lot of guys who gobble. I may have gobbled from time to time. This is way too much talk ‘bout turkeys and I don’t even like those things.

Did ya happen to read ‘bout the Detroit Public School System in the news last week? The Detroit Public School System has scored in the bottom ½ of 1% in national standardized testing of students for over 20 years.

Last week the president of the Detroit Public School System Board of Education announced he could not read. Further stated he could not write a coherent statement on paper. He then said he was proud to have obtained a degree from Wayne State University. Later that same day Wayne State University, in a press release said it took this fellow 14 years to get his degree because he kept flunking the tests.

Now instead of this idiot shutting up, he continued, said he should not step down from the job as board president rather he should remain as a role model for the students in the Detroit Public School System, showing them that having a handicap does not prevent you from doing what ya want to do in life.

Never think the ills of Detroit City are due in a major way to the demise of the automobile industry in America. I believe it is due in a most important element to stupid people. Many years ago I went to Detroit to interview for a job as a hospital administrator at Detroit General Hospital. They offered me a position which paid 4 times as much money as I was making at the time. The job also came with the use of an automobile and two body guards. Both car and drivers were 24/7.

After touring the hospital and surrounding neighborhoods, I met the body guards. It was in conversation with these body guards that I realized how out of place a hillbilly boy from Toto would be in Downtown Detroit. I couldn’t understand their language even though I was sure they were products of the Detroit Public School System. I could only surmise that these two men were speaking fluent Detroitese. I chose not to learn a second language at that point in my life. The job offer, I turned ‘em down. Arriving early one Monday morning, I left that town before the sun went down, I was afraid not to, no body guards and all, and not speaking the local language.

That was a long time ago, the city has only gotten worse since then. The decline could be due in a large part to people like the current president of the school board. I guess John Wayne was right when he said “Life’s tough, it even tougher when you’re stupid.

Such a pleasant hint of spring this 1st Sunday of March 2010. Just enough bright sunshine this morning as folks were getting out of church to let ya know that God didn’t forget to let the sun shine in. 55° temperatures have not felt so good for a long winter’s night. Took my mama to dinner this afternoon. Went to Ponderosa’s in Plymouth IN. Ya just know you’ll have a good day when ya take your mama to dinner. Me and Regina, Johnny and Jamie and my mama had a great Sunday afternoon.

As the 2girldogs sleep on their separate couches and Sophia reads the screen from the back of my chair, as Sarah plays floor hockey with a plastic bottle lid on the hardwood Oak Floor of the East Wing, silence is golden. Except for the occasional clatter of the floor hockey puck. Peaceful evening, quite night.

Thank you so much for stopping by this evening, as so often stated, your company is so much appreciated, we all look forward to your visits each and every time.

Stay safe in Iraq and Afghanistan.

From the East Wing, With the Lions of March, Squanto on Maple Syrup, Hebrews Naming Turkeys, Visiting Detroit City.

I wish you well,
BobbyRay