Monthly Archives: March 2025

WINGSPREAD Ezine for March, 2025

Spreading wings in a perplexing world
March, 2025                                                    James P. Hurd

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Contents

  • Writer’s Corner
  • Blessed Unbeliever 
  • This month’s story: “Brave New World of Cooking”
  • This month’s puzzler
  • WINGSPREAD Ezine subscription information
  • Wisdom

Writer’s Corner

Word of the month: RECRUDESCENCE. The return of something terrible after a time of reprieve. E.g., the recrudescence of the polio virus. Remember Faulkner’s critique of Hemingway: “He refuses to use a word that would send a person to a dictionary.”

Task for you: If you’re stuck, try responding to a probe. Here’s one: What was the most embarrassing incident in your life? Another: Choose a memorable incident. How would that incident have unfolded if you were the opposite gender? Different age? Different ethnicity?

Book of the month: I write this WINGSPREAD on March 17, St. Patrick’s Day, the great saint who led a non-violent conversion in Ireland in the 5th century. Some of his writings have come down to us. Just Google “St. Patrick’s Confession” and you can read his Confessio where he recounts being hauled off to Ireland as a slave, his miraculous escape, and his years of service to the people of Ireland.

BLESSED UNBELIEVER novel

I confess I enjoy talking to atheists who seem honest about their doubts. Although my own doubts have been answered, they have not been quenched. Since I am a doubter, I find much in common with atheists. I believe we are all on a spiritual quest and I wish to know the quest of each person I meet. Unbeliever (below) is the story of one such quest. Much is autobiographical (I won’t tell you which parts!). But the names have been changed to protect the innocent.

Sean McIntosh left his Fundamentalist childhood and walked the road toward becoming an atheist—while attending Torrey Bible Institute! Spoiler alert: it didn’t work out very well. Blessed Unbeliever (paper or Kindle version) can be found at Wipf and Stock Publishers, Amazon https://a.co/d/9su5F3o or wherever good books are sold.

New story: “Brave New World of Cooking”

I was no stranger to cooking; It was what happened before Mom or Wife called you to the dinner table. Most people on the planet know how to cook. This story is for the rest of us.

After I left home at eighteen, I ate institutional food at Moody Bible Institute for two years. When I moved out to Wooddale Airport for flight training I boarded at Mrs. Volle’s house and ate her excellent cooking. Then back to dorm life at Cal State Fullerton and eating in the cafeteria. When I departed to fly in southern Mexico for Mission Aviation Fellowship, I roomed in a boarding house. Great food—refried beans, eggs, rice, tamales and tortillas, sliced papaya, fresh tropical fruit juices, café con leche. I used to sit in the kitchen smelling the simmering pots and watching the Indian women scraping the leftover refried beans back in.

Moving to Honduras, I lived with Mario who worked as an assistant to the MAF dentist. A maid cooked all our meals—until Mario spied her lover’s shoes under the closet curtain and dismissed her. . . .

To read more, click here:  https://tinyurl.com/4tu4rvd5

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This month’s puzzler (courtesy of “Car-Talk Archives”)

Many years ago, when I was vacationing in upstate New York in a sleepy little town called Cold Springs, I had occasion to go to an antiques auction.

One of the items that comes up was a child’s sled, a wooden sled that the auctioneer claims was made by George Washington himself.

The auctioneer turns the thing over and carved into the one of the wooden slats on the back is this:

“G Washington, September 10, 1752.”

Now I remember from sixth grade that the square root of 3 was George Washington’s birthday. The square root of 3 is 1.732. And George Washington’s birthday is in 1732. 

So, if this carving on the sled is accurate, that would make him 20 years old at the time. So it stands to reason that at the age of 20, before he started his military career, he might be making a sled for a niece or nephew or for his own kids. Who knows. 

So, I’m ready to bid 20 bucks on the thing, when someone in the crowd pipes up and says, “It’s a fake.”

He was right. It was a fake. But the puzzler is, how did he know that?

Good luck.
 

(Answer will appear in next month’s WINGSPREAD newsletter.)

Answer to last month’s puzzler: 

Recall Holmes told Watson he was 35 the day before yesterday and will be 38 next year. How is this possible? Tricky, right? Here is the answer. The conversation took place on January 1. Holmes’ birthday is December 31, when he turned 36. He was 35 the “day before yesterday.” Got it? Great, huh?

(Whoops! A careful reader reminded me I had used this puzzler last year.)

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Wisdom

When I was young, I was told that anyone could become President….
I’m beginning to believe it.

I didn’t realize how unsocial I was until there was a pandemic….
And my life didn’t really change all that much.

Don’t wear headphones while vacuuming; I’ve just finished the whole house before realizing the vacuum wasn’t plugged in.

I gave all my dead batteries away today—free of charge.

I just ordered a life alert bracelet. If I ever get a life I’ll be notified immediately

To the guy who invented “zero” … Thanks for nothing.

The Disappointment Club is pleased to announce that the Friday meeting is cancelled.

When telephones were tied with a wire—humans were free

Self-esteem is the feeling which makes us attribute our failures to bad luck, and our successes to good judgment.

A woman adopted two dogs and named them Timex and Rolex.
Her friend asked her how she came up with the names.
She replied, “They’re both watch dogs.”

Doctor: I’m afraid your condition is fairly advanced.
Patient: It was in its early stages when I first sat down in your waiting room.

How does my doctor expect me to lose weight, when every medication he prescribes says, ‘Take with food.’

Me: Doctor, I’ve swallowed a spoon.
Doctor: Sit there and don’t stir.

I was walking past a farm and a sign said: “Duck, eggs!”
I thought, “That’s an unnecessary comma. Then it hit me.”

If you’re not familiar with the work of Steven Wright, he’s the famous Erudite (comic) scientist, his mind sees things differently than most of us do. . . here are some of his gems:

1 – I’d kill for a Nobel Peace Prize.

2.- Borrow money from pessimists — they don’t expect it back.

3 – Half the people you know are below average.

4 – 99% of lawyers give the rest a bad name.

5 – 82.7% of all statistics are made up on the spot. 

6 – A conscience is what hurts when all your other parts feel so good.

7 – A clear conscience is usually the sign of a bad memory.

8 – If you want the rainbow, you got to put up with the rain.

9 – All those who believe in psycho kinesis, raise my hand.

10 – The early bird may get the worm, but the second mouse gets the cheese.

11 – I almost had a psychic girlfriend, …… But she left me before we met.

12 – OK, so what’s the speed of dark?

13 – How can you tell when you’re out of invisible ink?

14 – If everything seems to be going well, you have obviously overlooked something.

15 – Depression is merely anger without enthusiasm.

16 – When everything is coming your way, you’re in the wrong lane.

Brave New World of Cooking

I was no stranger to cooking; It was what happened before Mom or Wife called you to the dinner table. Most of the people on the planet know how to cook. But this story is for the rest of us.

After I left home at eighteen, I ate institutional food at Moody Bible Institute for two years. When I moved out to Wooddale Airport for flight training I boarded at Mrs. Volle’s house and ate her excellent cooking. Then back to dorm life at Cal State Fullerton and eating in the cafeteria. When I departed to fly in southern Mexico for Mission Aviation Fellowship, I roomed in a boarding house. Great food—refried beans, eggs, rice, tamales and tortillas, sliced papaya, fresh tropical fruit juices, café con leche. I used to sit in the kitchen smelling the simmering pots and watching the Indian women scraping the leftover refried beans back in.

Moving to Honduras, I lived with Mario who worked as an assistant to the MAF dentist. A maid cooked all our meals—until Mario spied her lover’s shoes under the closet curtain and dismissed her.

During my language study in San Jose, Costa Rica, my landlady, Doña Maria Eugenia Odio de Esquivel, turned out wonderful meals which she served at her formal dining room table. While there I met Barbara Breneman. Just before we married I moved to Venezuela to live alone in the MAF house‑without a maid. I would buy a loaf of bread and have the storekeeper slice it, a big loaf of ham and have him slice it. Big loaf of cheese and have him slice it. I would freeze all this, then periodically buy onions and tomatoes to create sandwiches. I survived on sandwiches and rice until I married Barbara who cooked for me for the next fifty-four years.

But in December, 2024 when we were living in our Minneapolis apartment, Barbara died. I not only lost my greatest treasure, my loving and faithful companion; I also lost my cook. Kind friends thronged my door with soup, sympathy and casseroles, gifts of mercy which I stuffed into an already-full chest freezer. Today, months after Barbara’s death, I’m still eating out of the freezer.

I did not want to be a needy widower who orders Meals on Wheels and eats TV dinners so I began a timid foray into the world of cooking. I searched online for recipes—rice, fish, various kinds of eggs (scrambled, poached, omelet), chicken and salads (sweet or salty). This opened a new world of unfamiliar ingredients: paprika, cumin, parsley. And unfamiliar processes: sauté, simmer, dredge, mince. I would copy these recipes into a computer file and print them out when needed.

Turned out though, finding recipes were the easy part. The first time I opened the fridge door I was shocked. All I saw in there were ingredients. For some ingredients I had to search the whole house. I found that the spices, for instance, were stored in multiple containers placed in different locations around the house—laundry room, coat closet, random dining room, kitchen cupboards or under the sink. Some were in tiny unlabeled jars (chopped green stuff, mixed spices); some had lids with the wrong label. Mysterious, unmarked frozen somethings in the freezer.

I learned that before you cook you need to create a grocery list of stuff you need to go buy. First, you should verify that you really need all the items. Check recent mailings for store specials and check for other coupons on your phone. When you go shopping, remember to take along your cloth bags to avoid paper or plastic. If the list is long, it’s helpful to group the items based upon their location in the store.

Buy only stuff you can consume in one or two meals. Otherwise, you’ll be condemned to eat only things that are beginning to rot. Yes, rotting. Important to figure out how long things can last in the fridge before they rot. When shopping, pick up the frozen items last so they won’t melt on your way home. Remember to use your coupons at checkout. (The Ht-Vee guy scans a barcode on my cellphone for coupons and loads special gas discounts.) When you return home, immediately empty your bags and put stuff away. (You should really wipe stuff off like we did during Covid but life is too short for that.)

On those momentous occasion when you invite someone over, it gets much more complicated. Don’t forget to check with your guests for allergies and food preferences before selecting recipes. The night before the meal, print out the recipes you’re going to use. Thaw out the frozen stuff. You can even pre-prepare or pre-cook parts of the meal at this time. Then you need to set the scene. Pick up, clean and organize the dining room, living room, bathroom and kitchen. Set the table with placemats, plates, silverware, glasses and napkins. Can you find a centerpiece? Think about the lighting. Pick out appropriate music for the evening. If you really want to go crazy, plan an activity after dinner.

Do as much prep work as possible ahead of time. Warm the oven to heat the plates or keep foods warm. Organize all the ingredients on the counter, measuring them out. Put skillets on the stove, then get out bowls and serving plates and all utensils you’ll need. Combine all the dry ingredients in one bowl and all liquids in another bowl (unless you need to add these at different times).

Decide what needs to be cooked before it’s used as an ingredient (e.g., sauté the onions, brown the butter). Then cook the items that will take the longest (e.g., rice or potatoes). Mind the stove burner temperature. (It was a breakthrough when I discovered there were settings between “off” and “high.”) You can put some of these cooked foods in the oven to keep warm. Use a thermometer to check internal temperature of the meats. Use a timer for critical cooking times. When cooked, transfer the food into serving bowls or spoon directly onto the plates. Seat your guests. Sing a hymn, read a scripture, say a Celtic blessing. Then enjoy!

Dining together is one of the great joys of life. For the first 80 years of my life I took all of this for granted—it just happened. But these days, I’m scrambling to learn what I should have learned 70 years ago.