Monthly Archives: May 2009

Don’t Stop the Carnival

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I am almost finished reading “Don’t Stop the Carnival” by Herman Wouk. Wouk also wrote the “Caine Mutiny” and so I was expecting a more serious exploration of life in the Caribbean. Boy, was I wrong! This book is hilarious! If you’ve never read it and you are at all interested in life in the tropics, owning a hotel or just want to laugh out loud, you should read this book. I definitely think I should add it to my list of favorite Tropical books.

Apparently Herman Wouk met a man in real life who told him some fantastic stories about life as a proprietor of a tropical hotel resort in the Caribbean. Wouk encouraged him to write a book about it, but the man declined. So, Wouk decides to go check out the Caribbean and falls in love with it himself. He goes and lives on one of the islands of the US Virgin Islands for some 6 or 7 years. “Don’t Stop the Carnival” is a mixing of the crazy stories both he and this man had while living in the Caribbean. He writes about a New York man with a mid-life crisis who buys a hotel resort in the fictional island of “Amerigo” or “Kinja”. From power outages to piles of ants climbing his body, from kooky toothless gondoliers to glamourous movie actresses, this book has it all. And Wouk does a great job of pulling you into each of the characters’ lives, especially that of Norman Paperman, the protagonist.  

I would strongly recommend it!

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Garlic, Strawberries and Lettuce

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The late-May early June harvests here in Greeley mainly consist of garlic, strawberries and lettuce, which is fine with me. We’ve been eating salads and putting the lettuce leaves on sandwiches, using the garlic scapes in all sorts of foods and eating strawberries from the vine.  We planted the seeds that have to have warm soil like watermelon, cucumbers, peppers and cantaloupe so we will look forward to their harvest as well. So far everything has been growing great using organic techniques. Here’s a few shots from the yard.

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Garlic Scape

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This garlic is huge! As thick as my thumb

lettuce-in-the-garden
Lettuce in our garden -mostly volunteers from last year

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Strawberries straight from the garden

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The girlies in the yard

We’ve seen a fox out back in the land behind our house and are a little bit worried for our chickens since they roam freely. So far the fox hasn’t seen them and I hope it stays that way. We also have eagles and hawks all around. I know why some people build chicken runs with chain link covers!

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A Backyard Salad in Greeley

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We are just starting to get our small harvests in, but it has been enough to net us a good lunch. We went out and weeded the garden, planted the summer seeds (like watermelon, cucumbers, cantaloupe and basil) and harvested the early summer bounty.

Raw Materials for salad

The Raw materials from the garden for our backyard salad included: eggs from the Leghorn, strawberries, radishes, spinach, lettuce (arugula, romaine and bibb), mint and garlic scapes.

Backyard Salad
The Prepared Lunch

I think lunch was about 90% from the backyard. We only added suntea, lemon and homemade dressing that included the scapes. The rest was washed, chopped up or, in the case of the eggs, boiled and served. It was very delicious and reminded us of why we spend so much of our time toiling in the soil. I love making these locavore meals. I can’t wait till I can do it year round in the tropics. You truly reap what you sow! Yum.

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Greeley Corleones plus Star Trek

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Last night Britton hung out with Clifton for a bit while Shana and I went out to the restaurant/bar Corleones in downtown Greeley. I didn’t know it until we were there, but apparently this was the last night of blues and serving drinks for Corleones! They are changing their business model from a blues bar and Italian restaurant to strictly catering which is a shame. It is kind of a neat place similar in style to the old New England pubs with the brick walls and the low ceilings. I took this video incognito from the tiny bathroom out to the bar where they were playing music. It’s not the greatest since I wasn’t watching what I was doing, but you get a feel for the place. There must have been 50 to 75 people at one point all crammed down there. There’s another video of the band playing as well.  Greeley has an annual Blues Festival on June 13 where some of these bands will be playing, but we will be coming back from a conference in Phoenix that day.


Hidden Camera Scene in Corleones 🙂

Because it was Corleone’s last night of serving alcohol in addition to their last night of Blues, they were giving everyone free “dirty bomb water” drinks in addition to cheap regular drinks. So Shana and I called Britton and Clifton to come pick us up downtown and went out to see Star Trek at the 10:30pm showing. It was ok. I was expecting much more after all that hype. I still like the old 60’s shows better and I thought they cheated a little with the whole time/alternate universe cop out.  Leonord Nimoy is the man, but I was disappointed William Shatner didn’t make a cameo. But overall, it was a fun night.

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Britton took this pic with his phone at the Theatre.

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