This morning, I made chilled avocado soup - it's enough for about two servings, so I'll have it today and tomorrow for lunch. It takes all of three minutes to make and it's so delicious.
Ingredients: 2 Hass avocados - they're the bumpy blackish ones 2 cups of milk (I use 2% so it's not so heavy) salt to taste scattering of diced roma tomatoes and vidalias to top
Directions: This can be made in the blender or Cuisinart - peel and pit the avocados, scoop into the bowl:
Whirl until completely smooth (use a spatula and make sure any bits sticking to the side get blended), add milk in a stream so you can check for the consistency you like, then add salt to taste:
Here it is, ready for to be covered and put in the refrigerator until lunch. I'll just dice up a roma tomato and a bit of vidalia to top it with, and it'll be perfect.
A couple of weekends ago, we took a nice trip over to Tallassee. One of the first places we stopped was here at Sears Chapel Methodist Church in rural Coosa county on Highway 231, not too far from Rockford. The congregation was founded in 1860 and had first a log cabin building, but this pretty building was completed around 1895.
This sign further down the road is two miles from Rockford, just as it says. I don't think I've ever seen a marker like this before:
This is the old rock jail, circa 1842, in Rockford. It's a museum now:
...and behind it is the monument for Fred, the town dog. He was inducted into the Alabama Animal Hall of Fame and they describe him:
"Fred" the town dog lived to be about 13 years of age. He was a male, Airedale mix with a heart for all of Rockford, Alabama. He truly became Rockford's ambassador by welcoming visitors to town and he was invariably the first to welcome newcomers. He was steadfast in guarding the children at the elementary school, or guarding the bank, or local foodmart. He was adept at helping to raise funds for charity, and his likeness still sells souvenirs and other items for the city. He had served as grand marshall in numerous parades and he brought fame to the city through local newspaper and magazine articles, local television exposure and even national television coverage.
Downtown Rockford - the population is fewer than 500, but when we were there, Av remembered that Rockford had been in the news this past year because two of the football players in the Super Bowl, Adalius Thomas for the Patriots and Justin Tuck for the Giants, grew up here and played football at Coosa Central.
We decided since it was such a pretty day to just drive around and see what we could find. The more dirt roads, the better:
We stumbled upon this cemetery, Old Shiloh Cemetery, on County Road 63 in Coosa County. It was established in the late 1700s:
This monument is for Mary S., consort of A.J. Thomas:
We had to stop when we saw it just because we could tell it was so old:
We went further toward Lake Logan Martin and drove in to Camp Smile-A-Mile (oops! earlier I called it a different name here, but it it is Camp S-A-M). It is right on the banks of the lake.
Right when we got out, this mommy goose was tending to her sweet babies:
And right behind this chapel:
...there's a lighthouse!
This is the first lighthouse we've gotten to take Shug up close to:
Late that afternoon, we got to Hotel Talisi in downtown Tallassee - they serve fried chicken that's one of Av's favorites. Fried chicken, dressing, black-eyed peas, spinach, and squash casserole:
On April 15th, L.V. Hull, a famous artist from Kosciusko, Mississippi passed away and was buried at Bethlehem Church Cemetery. She was 65 years old.
L.V. started creating her art in 1975 - she said she didn't know exactly why - and eventually as the art overflowed her home and into her yard, visitors came from all over to 123 Allen Street to see her and her creations. In fact, the city of Kosciusko's chamber of commerce promotes it, as does the official Natchez Trace site.
A doctor in town wrote a piece about Miss L.V. that appeared in the Star-Herald:
“Jesus is coming to Kosciusko, Ms. 39090.” This was one of her favorite sayings to put on her gaily painted wooden crosses. And, indeed, Jesus came last week to Kosciusko, MS 39090 and took home one of his truly unique creations, L.V. Hull, THE Artist of Kosciusko. Although her unusual art style was often sadly underappreciated and misunderstood, it could never be ignored!
I would like to think that L.V. considered me a friend. She loved company, and once you were allowed inside her humble house which was chocked full of the interpretations of her imagination, time seemed to stand still. Her no-holds-barred brand of homespun philosophy probably didn’t sit well with some visitors, but she certainly had an uncanny knack of telling it like it was.
Last year LV. was invited to display her art at a rather prestigious exhibit at Mississippi State University. Though some quirk of fate, it fell my responsibility to get The Artist and samples of her work there. Beth and I pulled up in front of L.V.’s house in our Ford Explorer which, as you know, does not sit low to the ground. Well, try as she might, L.V. was unable to get herself into the vehicle. I finally locked my hands like the stirrup on a saddle, leaned down and had L.V. put a foot in, then hoisted her in. “Don’t worry,” she reassured us. “If you can get me in, I can fall out!”
One of the last pieces she did for me was to be given to the president of our Mississippi State Medical Association when she spoke at our component society meeting here in Kosciusko this past December. The day of the meeting I received the following message taken by my office staff: “Your package is ready. When you come by to get it, bring me two pieces of Kentucky Fried Chicken (extra Crispy) and a biscuit.” Needless to say, we both ended up satisfied!
L.V.’s impact on our town will probably never be fully known, but suffice it to say, it has been considerable. Since her arrival in Heaven, I imagine that she’s probably already tried to personalize the Pearly Gates. I can just hear now. “St. Peter, ain’t that cobalt blue BAD?”
Stanley Hartness, M.D.
Lots of nice pics of Miss L.V.'s home and yard are here (I'm trying to find our pics of her yard, but I think the last time we were there I was still taking pics with film!).
We drove over to Oxford yesterday and had the *very* best time at the Double Decker Arts Festival! Ohmygoodness was it ever so great! It was right in the square, and it was as busy as game day in the Grove. Loved it.
I just wish I'd taken more pictures of everything! Besides all the great artists, we went into several of the shops and got Shug some books at Square Books Junior, which is the kids' version of our favorite bookshop anywhere, Square Books (and whether or not you get to Oxford much, Square Books puts out this great weekly email about books that are coming out, authors that are making appearances (and they can hold a signed copy & ship it) and lots more - the signup is here). Oh, and their signed first editions club is something we've thought about doing for a while and probably will soon.
Sooo...back to the festival. I'm going to start with what was really special - there were two or three artists there with bottle trees:
***But*** the most special one was this bottle tree arch by artist Stephanie Dwyer (her website is here):
Isn't that great!!?? Av's ready for us to start house-shopping again...so I think it would make a very nice addition to a new garden area...hmmm...
There were lots & lots of other great artists there - a full listing of them all is right here.
Double Decker is on our don't-miss list of festivals from now on...already can't wait for next year!
On Friday, Shug and I picked up Daddy from the office and went over to the Magic City Art Connection in B'ham. A lot of the artists are the same from year to year - our favorites this year were:
Av contacted Neal Boortz yesterday (he has a nationwide radio program - smaller than Rush, but still huge), and today Neal put the link to the Huntsville Times article about Mr. Wharton's art on his website! See here: http://boortz.com/nuze/index.html
The next Slotin Folk Art Auction is this weekend in Buford, Georgia - but for those of us who can't be there in person, the auction is also run online in real-time through eBay (I've bid on their auctions before through eBay, and it really is easy).
As usual, there are a lot of nice folk pottery pieces including face jugs by Lanier and Cheever Meaders, art by Sam Doyle, Sister Gertrude Morgan, Purvis Young, Howard Finster, Jimmy Lee Sudduth, B.F. Perkins, Mary T. Smith, Mose T, Son Thomas, and...think of somebody in that genre and they're probably included. A complete listing of all the auction lots is here.
Wade Wharton lives in Huntsville. He has an amazing art environment. And the city wants to get rid of it. (Update: this has all been resolved now - after he had to go to court, but it's been resolved)
He lives at 3100 Nassau Drive in Huntsville and is just tickled to give tours. He gets visitors all the time and is just really generous.
The Huntsville Community Development Department wants this art gone because it does not fit within their black-and-white Code of Ordinances. The H'ville Times writes that the city sent Mr. Wharton a notice because "it is unlawful to keep or store any inoperable vehicle, auto parts, metals, tree limbs, litter, debris or similar items unless such items are stored in an approved, fully enclosed and covered structure."
That's a problem, because Mr. Wharton makes his art by recycling things that are cast-off. Whereas other Alabama artists like Charlie Lucas and Lonnie Holley and Joe Minter (and I could go on & on) who develop their art similarly are celebrated in museums, Mr. Wharton says that what the city is threatening "worries me to death".
All those gorgeous bottle trees in his back yard - the city wants them gone. In this clip, Mr. Wharton explains why, and at the end of the clip explains how he was told by the code enforcement supervisor that if his yard is art, that makes the landfill a museum:
He has such a wonderful sense of humor too. About these, he said he threw down a bunch of lugnuts and "just look at what sprouted up":
Mr. Wharton says he had a stroke when he was 36 and had always been right-brained, but after his stroke, he became "whole-brained" and gets "unique ideas". He had another stroke before all this business with the city began. Then he says, "this is my last fight, I guess. I'm going to fight".
It's hard to believe that the Huntsville Museum of Art or the BMA or the High hasn't heard of him before and put on an exhibit.
This is a sculpture he calls the cowboy - he's made out of VW Beetle parts:
This praying mantis even moves:
When I was invited in his home, he showed me some of the other things he made - lots of things with gourds, and lots of woodwork. He carved this bowl with a model of his hand in it - all one piece.
It's upsetting that this art and this artist is being threatened. I wonder what the Huntsville Museum of Art's position on this is, and if the mayor can be persuaded to step in (I'm writing emails).
All over Alabama we are blessed with genius artists - I remember Bill Arnett, who brought the world to Thornton Dial and the Gee's Bend quilters, was quoted as saying "Alabama is America's answer to Tuscany".
Rather than scaring Wade Wharton, we ought to be showering him with thanks and promoting his art environment.
John McCain was in Alabama yesterday and visited Selma, Thomasville, and Gee's Bend - Av says there's a pic of his campaign bus on the ferry to Gee's Bend in the B'ham News, and apparently some quilters rode over with him, singing Gospel songs. Before he left Alabama, John McCain bought three large quilts and paid $14,030 for them! Nice!
(oh, and (I don't know who I'm voting for yet, but...) thank you to John McCain for not coming down here and trying to put on some crazy-fake accent, or trying to speak colloquially to the crowd about "y'all got that cold Popeye's out for breakfast". Cringe. Really, thank you!!) ---
We went to the most *amazing* art environment yesterday, and I'll try to post pics later today or tomorrow...can't wait to show it!!
The other day, I was reading an article about different states and how tourism departments are really getting into designating trails to get people interested in driving around and seeing different places in a region (like the quilt trails and wine and bourbon trails). Alabama Mountain Lakes Tourist Association is promoting something they're calling the 'Hallelujah Trail' - it's a driving trail of 32 churches are each at least 100 years old, are on their original location, and still holding services. When we were coming home from Moulton last weekend, we decided to see the one that's on the map for Hartselle. It's called the Hartselle Tabernacle:
Isn't it something? It was built as the shelter for the annual 10-day camp meeting revival. On the raised area in the back of this pic are rocking chairs:
Cedar logs are what holds up everything. The little plaque next to it with the 'h' is the Hallelujah Trail designator.
These little cabins must be what people stay overnight in:
Winding across the northernmost part of the state, the Hallelujah Trail will take you to elegant Gothic Revival buildings and hand-hewn log structures. You’ll hear stories of Cherokee Native Americans who organized their own Methodist congregation and of parishioners who heard the cannons of the Civil War’s Battle of Shiloh while at church more than 60 miles away. You’ll visit thriving cities, charming towns, and tiny dots on the map. Along with rich history and arresting architecture, the Hallelujah Trail offers glimpses into the spirit of the Deep South and its people.
I didn't see the trail brochure available online to download, but if you email your mailing address to info AT alabamamountainlakes DOT org they will send you one.
I blog a few minutes each day during one of Shug's naps, and today I'm going to experiment with a different blog design and different ways of publishing since Blogger's FTP upload problem is still not fixed. If things look totally wrong for a while, that's why!
This weekend we went to the Alabama Chicken and Egg Festival in Moulton. Shug had a big time seeing all the bantam chickens that were there (over 100) and if he had been just a little bit older, he could have enjoyed all the different activities in the children's section.
We got there in time to see the egg eating contest:
...which was funny but the thought of all those hard-boiled eggs was also a little yucky! The winner ate 22 eggs in five minutes. I wonder how many eggs Joey Chestnut could eat!?
Right after the egg eating contest was the Colonel Sanders look-alike contest (sponsored by Kentucky Fried Chicken, of course!):
The winner won a year's worth of chicken. Oh - and see the festival's mascots up there? The chicken's name is 'Nugget' and the egg's name is 'Scramble'.
If Av was a big athlete, I would beg him to be in the Flora-Bama Mullet Man Triathlon (mullet= the fish, not the hairstyle) this weekend. Tell me *who* would not be proud to say that their husband was the official Mullet Man!? hahaha!!
This weekend, we spent some time in the Bankhead National Forest (it's named after Tallulah's daddy, who served Alabama in the House of Representatives and became Speaker of the House).
The forest makes up over 180,000 acres and is just so pretty. There's lots of hiking, canoing that can be done on the Sipsey, and lots of things that we want to do when Shug gets a little older and can enjoy them. On this trip, we just drove all over - there are plenty of paved roads but we did a lot of backroads driving on dirt and gravel/dirt roads:
One thing we wanted to get to but didn't was the home of Aunt Jenny Brooks Johnson:
She is a local legend and has an amazing story - her husband and oldest son were killed during the War, and her other five sons got into all kinds of trouble. I read that she said she was proud because all her sons 'died like men, with their boots on'.
Carla Waldrep, a librarian in Haleyville, gets dressed up as Aunt Jenny and tells her story to schoolchildren and others:
One really great thing that we did find was Pine Torch. We were looking for the Pine Torch Schoolhouse and found the Pine Torch Church, which is one of the oldest remaining original log churches in Alabama.
The historic marker beside it reads:
Pine Torch Church In the early 1800s, settlers of Scots-Irish and Indian ancestry begin moving into this area. These mountain people homesteaded small tracts of property on public domain lands of poor sandy soil and rugged terrain. According to tradition, the old church was built as a house of worship for the local community which by 1915 was known as Europe. England, Bolan, Payne, and Nicholson families moved the building here from Holmes Chapel. The church consisted of one-room 24 by 27 feet logs hand-hewn by Bud Holmes, Josh England, Jim Nicholson, Dick Payne and others. The original floor was made of hand-hewn planks of poplar as wide as 48 inches. Beginning around 1920, the original flooring was stolen over a period of years; therefore, a new floor was built about 1940. The roof was made of hand split wooden shingles, which were later replaced with tin. The first pews where hewn from solid slabs of poplar trees. Pine Torch got its name from the blazing pine knots that were used to light the church services after dark. After services, the pine knots were used to light the way home. Some say the old building was also used as a one-room school. Today, Pine Torch is considered to be the oldest standing structure in Bankhead National Forest with decoration day the 4th Sunday in May.
My WPA book says that the school was .3 miles from the church, but maybe that's something different.
Shug decided he wanted to pull one of his socks off for this pic:
This is the interior of the church - it's awfully dark inside so I can see why they would need those pine knot torches for light:
There's a sign at the church cemetery that says that the church dates from 1850. The cemetery is 'swept' meaning that the sand is raked so that no grass will grow.
One of my friends' mother is from Southeast Alabama, and she grew up with a 'swept' yard. The ground is pretty sandy down where her family lived, and the children were given the job of making sure that the yard was kept well-raked/swept so that no grass would grow and ruin the look. They grew up being told that nice people who kept up their homes didn't let grass grow in their yard!!
In 2005, I got my first digital camera - a Sony Cybershot - and since then I've just been taking pics of everything. Lucky (& happily!) for me, some of them have been published!
Av and I travel soooo much, and we really try to avoid most all chain restaurants.
Favorite Restaurants/Food:
1.Commander's Palace, New Orleans, LA - Don't Miss: every single thing there is *amazing*. Be sure to have Creole cream cheese cheesecake for dessert, too!
2.Antoine's, New Orleans, LA - Don't Miss: the fish, the soft shell crabs, and the baked Alaska...and the service is incredible.
3.Doe's Eat Place, Greenville, MS - Don't Miss: steaks (one steak serves two easily) and tamales.
4. Chez Fonfon, B'ham, AL - Don't Miss: everything here is great...even the hamburger is amazing!
5.Taylor Grocery, Taylor, MS - Don't Miss: catfish, catfish, catfish.
6. Lusco's, Greenwood, MS - Don't Miss: pompano, and the atmosphere - with the tables with curtains and the little buzzer.
7.Jacques-Imo's, New Orleans, LA - Don't Miss: 'Godzilla Meets Fried Green Tomatoes'. Oh yes.
8.Big Bob Gibson's, Decatur, AL - Don't Miss: barbecue and white chicken sauce. White sauce got started here.
10.Drago's, Metairie, LA - Don't Miss: charbroiled oysters.
11. Ninfa's, Houston, TX - Don't Miss: (the original Ninfa's on Navigation) ohmygosh this place makes me so happy I can't wait to go back and have the entire rest of the menu.
12.The Bright Star, Bessemer, AL - Don't Miss: trout almondine, snapper throats, prime rib.
13. Ezell's Fish Camp, Lavaca, AL - Don't Miss: Ezell's is a *real* fish camp - right on the water with excellent catfish (obviously), fried pickles, and hush puppies.
14. Duchess Bakery, Cullman, AL - Don't Miss: doughnuts early in the morning while they are still hot.
15.Gambino's Bakery, Metairie, LA - Don't Miss: the Doberge: it is six layers of yellow butter cake with custard between each layer and the whole production is covered in fondant.
16. Rabideaux's Sausage Kitchen, Iowa, LA - Don't Miss: anything and everything they have there is wonderful!! Bring a cooler.
17.The Dillard House, Dillard, GA - Don't Miss: the process: your table automatically gets everything on the menu that day, and you can ask for more of whatever you like. Expect three or four main dishes, six or so side dishes, and dessert.
18.McGuire's Irish Pub, Pensacola, FL - Don't Miss: Everything there is wonderful - especially the prime rib.
19.Wintzell's Oyster House, Mobile, AL - Don't Miss: Wintzell's is just fun! Go to the original - the one downtown on Dauphin Street. Obviously famous for their oysters.
20.The Dinner Bell, McComb, MS - Don't Miss: it's a revolving tables restaurant. Especially good dressing and eggplant.
21.Walnut Hills, Vicksburg, MS - Don't Miss: making friends with everyone at your table. Another revolving tables restaurant.
22. Niki's West, B'ham, AL - Don't Miss: whole fried flounder, and dozens of vegetables available, all of them excellent - when ordering, just think of your two or three favorite and chances are, they're available. Don't miss the rutabagas.
23.Bob's Clam Hut, Kittery, ME - Don't Miss: Bob's may be a clam hut, but they make the most *amazing* lobster rolls.
Posts
