Droning Along

 The military flying drone is called, by those who love acronyms, an UCAV or unmanned combat aerial vehicle. On the field, it's usually just a UAV. There are other names as well. Most of us have known about this tiny craft for a long time and when it came on the scene, no one made a big deal of it. It rather just sneaked in. It's unlike the cell phone which costs a lot more in both dollars and wasted time.  The drone made a perfect toy for brats and big brats who like to snoop into their neighbours property, assess a real estate deal, hassle someone, spy and other nasty matters that shall remain what they are. But the good side of this equipment is its good side that doesn't include invading someone's privacy or dropping explosives. The real drone most of us thought of first when we heard the name, before the machine one came along, is a male insect who lives in a hive and does nothing much but visit the queen bee. This kind of drone, doesn't  work and doesn't have a stinger in case an enemy comes around. Some rude folk are pressed to  use the word drone in describing certain males whom they consider earn the title. But of course, that's their business and furthermore, name-calling went out long ago. The mechanical drone that I heard one day on my sun deck looks a lot like a toy helicopter and does pretty much the same things only more. If you have a good imagination you can fly without touching the ground once and get a view akin to its big cousin, the helicopter. The one I saw appeared as if from a great distance but was rather near by. Uncomfortably so. Any of my sun lovers may want to think twice about sunbathing in the altogether on their city sun decks. In fact, I know someone whose  grandson he gifted with one, learned rather quickly that it can be misused. The boy became quickly very unpopular in the neighbourhood.  It is discomforting to look up and see a drone looking down. These tiny fliers use their "eyes"  for  their owners, and some can produce excellent photography and adequate sound as well.  Film makers don't need gurneys and long poles now. They have the UAV. Fortunately, there are laws preventing issues concerning safety and security in the use of these things, especially anywhere that has airplanes, small and large in the air. Adults who, like my grandpa friend who gave it for Christmas one year, need to think about how it's going to be used. If the child can't be controlled with these "toys", it's not a good idea to give one. What I love about drones is the photography. When watching television, fiction or not, we feel we are flying. Truly. It is an irresistible desire to fly, one that almost all of us but aviophobians, harbour. Some of the nature photography of coast lines and overland scapes, involving historical or natural sites that we may not be able to go to ourselves, allows  us to enjoy views from far above. Scientists are overjoyed to use them in their research. The drone came in rather quietly for all that it does and affords us, to treasure. Watching African herds crossing, scanning Alpine peaks and following animals from on high for a few, is very exciting. I worry about some of the other other personal electronics that we spend far too much time on, but it can't compare to the overhead world out there that is now ours.

Earth Apple, The Potato

 Potatoes have always been my favorite and most used vegetable. Now that groceries have gone sky high in cost, the potato is your saviour. Our friends in many places in the world, use rice as their staple and here it seems that, along with rice, we love our potatoes. Canada does grow some wonderful ones. When I buy potatoes, I know that they are worry free. I can leave them in my fridge for long periods of time that few other veggies will tolerate. Potatoes don't appear to lose anything while sleeping in the cold. What I like most about them, is their versatility. You can pop them sliced up into your air fryer and twenty minutes later you are feasting on fries that when you add some nice herbs to, onion and garlic salt and  fluff up in a bit of oil, make them yummier than bought. And they haven't been immersed in fat to cook. One of the most nutritious ways to enjoy the potato is mashed. I eat potato salad any time of the year but I don't put eggs in it. Lots of people do, but I think they are more sincerely potato without an eggy taste. When my potatoes come out of the pot after boiling them, I drain, mash and toss in other fresh chopped vegetables such as radish (a must for me), sweet onion, green onion tops, and celery. You can pop in some carrot  but finely chopped if you do. Not a lot, please, you don't want to overwhelm the earthy taste of the potato. I use an old favorite mayo type that is unique for its flavour. I like its zing. Next I add dried herbs such as sage, thyme, basil, dill. If you have fresh, all the better. If no one likes garlic, use the salt. Same with celery salt if you haven't any celery. The taste is still there. Then add the mayo type but not too much and a squirt of mustard, the yellow cheap kind. It adds a bit of punch. Fork mix it all up into a pretty mash,  never using your mixer/blender machine that turns it into paste. Let it sit for hours or overnight and all the flavours will blend and taste like a picnic. I always make far too much of this concoction, but not to worry. If you made too much, put the remaining potato salad into a pot with water and slowly bring it from simmer to hot, but never boil. It is now, potato soup. If you feel the need for more protein, add some chopped crispy bacon and chopped green onion from the stack you keep in a glass of cold, fresh water by the sink. These greens look pretty and grow tall and are always there when you want something  fresh tasting and appearing in  your soup or on top of anything to eat. Great in melted cheese sandwiches. Another bit of easy nutrition, a dinner in itself, is baked stuffed potatoes. Bake the potatoes, remove the pulp and save the skin. In a bowl add to the hot potato, butter, sour cream, parmesan cheese drifted in,  onions, dried or fresh herbs, bacon bits if you like and top with some shredded cheddar.  Re-fill the potato skins and heat up again.  Ah the potato! It is easy to grow in a bag on your deck or planted out in the flower garden in a corner of its own. You can use old potatoes with eyes if you wish. You can't miss with potatoes. The tiny new ones make great smashed potatoes. You steam the little guys till done, add butter when they are hot ( I like shredded spinach in there, too) and some garlic salt, moosh them down flat, shake over some dried cheese or shredded, season and serve hot on the plate with whatever else you want there. Salmon is nice. 

Annual Family Day

 A holiday Monday called Family Day gives a time to think about family and what it means when families are scattered and far off, some not speaking to each other, some very close, some that are gangs, some struggling to be family, some, a family breaking apart and so forth. Family has so many meanings. What makes a family is usually somewhere along the way, children. On Family Day, there are those who respect the title and take time to be with their family or families if they are the extended kind. The may go out or stay in to dinner, perhaps go to an event or take in the sights somewhere lovely and have a picnic. There are others who mourn the loss of family, either as members or a single person and yet others who may be elderly and have no family other than in memory. Some families are large and revel in getting together, others are small and try to meet and tell family tales. Children need a family, no matter in what state. For nine months they have been very close to their mothers and when they emerge into the world, have a natural need to belong and be close. No "professional" needs to tell us that fact. A baby is held and cared for by a family, in a family and its needs become a pattern for its life ahead. What the family does and shows,  becomes part of the child's style. It's a style for its life plan, one that is engrained by what it sees and feels and receives as it is formed in the early years and what it most wants, is being close to someone who loves them. A forming child doesn't need fashionable items, the most recommended toys and activities to make them brilliant, the best house or furniture or pills taken daily to make all the adults around them happy or going to zoos or parks or playing sports or anything called the "best". Small children don't know what "best" is other than feeling secure that there is someone who is always there for them. The gift they love most is YOU. They don't want your monetary benefits, they want YOU. Being you, and there all the time, is, these days, a luxury. Parents are often wrapped up in work and say that they have to work so that they can provide the "best" for their kids. Best again? Best what? A hug, soft words, cuddles, listening aptly, tucking in, reading to, soothing hurts, understand behaviours that are telling you something, standing up for them, feeding them happy food, not expecting them to ace tests at school, being a happy family, and talking with them not at them and being there all the time, is best.  All these are the "best". Money making for a house, nice trips to some flashy neon park or tropical beach, owning elaborate toys and games, or the latest electronics, shopping for braggible clothes or sport clubs or birthday parties are not "the best". They are temporary moments that adults like to think are best. They want their child to be perfect. They already are. They are your children. That's the best.  You are their best when you are with them and the more "best" of that kind, makes the "best" kid. 

Sub-version

 Most of us who live in multi-residence buildings, live under someone else's place. The ones at the top pay heaps more for nothing much more other than the lack of feet on floors. I must admit that I live in a building close to my age but noise occurs in all of them. When you live on a floor under others, concrete or not, there isn't much about your lofty neighbours, you don't know. Our feet can't seem to keep secrets, especially the bare ones or those in socks only. High or hard heeled feet are the bad guys. I speak of adults here, not kids. Kids wearing anything or nothing on their feet create a din that only other parents can stand for long. I live in an all adult building, thankfully. Where I live, a five year old grandchild of the folks above, had the endurance to continue running on his banging little heels for over three hours. This does not include spates of jumping off the bed onto the hardwood. Fortunately, the little dear or deer,  was visiting only over night.  I paced the din since it was supposed to be my writing time, and furthermore, my muse was definitely not amused. I try to write in my den where my desk that is falling apart drawer by drawer, along with its pile of computer/printer/ phone/ ereader and others, sits under my messy tack board, coffee cup warmer, jar of assorted pencils, none which seem ever to be sharp, and my Rolodex that holds every password I can't remember. Now you have the picture. Anyone who lives above me becomes material in my writing. I can't avoid it. I fervently wish I could.  Hearing the bare footfalls of my Ups, as I call those above, tells me everything about their lives. It's hard to do, yet easy all at the same time. I know their bathroom habits: the showers and baths, the make-up hour, the night trots and flushes, the getting ready for parties and the toothbrushing habits. The Ups dance when they brush their teeth. I am guessing they sing, too, when they shower but fortunately, voices can't be heard over the waterfall gushing down the pipes. I love their work days because I can get some writing done and when they go on holiday, it's even better. For both of us. I know their short or long trips. When the Ups go on air travel, I hear them arising at four AM so that they can rush down to the airport and wait in line for another four hours before they leave. If they are late for work, the panic in their dashing heels tells me so. Meal times in our tiny kitchens is a kind of bongo drum affair since the steps are shorter and quicker and things drop on the floor. Also to add to the mix, is the stove fan that roars away echoing down mine, too. We are all very close in this building, but not voluntarily. Once in the middle of the night,  someone fell out of bed either trying to get into it or out of it. It did not seem to be an emergency. First I heard no siren outside. There is a difference in the sound of a body falling down in a faint and one that trips and falls. The former is one huge bang while the latter happens with a series of secondary knocks such as elbows and knees, possibly hips. Also, I have given up my alarm clock because precisely around five AM,  two heels hit the floor right above my bed and I know the day has begun. Why the Ups need to get up that early would bother some people. Perhaps they work in a bakery and need to get the dough going. I don't mind early.  I love going out onto my deck for a morning coffee before the construction around me begins at seven AM. It's a kind of contest, which is worse, the backing up beepers of the construction equipment or the heel stamps of the Ups prepping for the day. I think I prefer the equipment. It won't last as long. Then again, it goes on all day. But it's not as interesting.