Bowl of Birthday Frosting

     This past weekend Lorraine and I were invited to College Place on the pretext of celebrating my birthday, which was on Monday. Now Sonia and Bruce, with of course the help of Cora and Adam, are in the process of moving from their house in town to their new place up on Mojonnier Drive

     The drive up was uneventful, except for the area between Madras and Biggs. The weather was such that any moisture had frozen on the short juniper trees, sagebrush, fences, and power lines. With bright sunshine for lighting it made for an interesting sight. (See picture at end of this blog)

     And then of course we had to make a stop at the C & D in Boardman to check out the quality of their milkshakes. I’m happy to report that the high quality is being maintained.  

     We had previously volunteered to come lend a hand with this move so we shouldn’t have been surprised at the following. The moving commenced Saturday evening, continued on Sunday, and Monday. What with my broken rib, I was not much help with the heavier stuff, but otherwise managed to be of some use.

     While Bruce and I were schlepping back and forth between houses, Lorraine and Cora were tasked with taking the ornaments and lights off the Christmas tree. Now this is a artificial tree and has been around for some time. The person who originally put the lights on this tree meant them to be permanent. The tree was about eight feet tall and each little limb and twig had a light wire not only twisted around it, but then run back inside the twist. So to take off these lights the whole string of lights had to be threaded back through each of these loops and there were hundreds of them. This tree must have had at least two dozen strings of lights. Cora and Lorraine worked on this project for hours. After they were about two-thirds done Sonia came along and with a scissors cut one of the strings that Lorraine was threading back through a loop and said, “We aren’t going to keep these light, so why don’t you just cut these light wires off the tree.” Well, that simplified the process by about ninety-nine percent. Sonia came away from that encounter with the idea that she was some kind of hero. She slipped back out to the kitchen before either Cora or Lorraine could get their hands on her.

     During the weekend I was asked what kind of birthday cake I wanted. I told them German Chocolate.

     Monday afternoon Bruce made a double batch cake and set it out on the counter. He then mixed a batch of frosting and left it in the kettle to cool. We went into Walla Walla to the Modern and had our fill of Chinese food.     Before continuing this I must explain Coda. Coda is a Labradoodle. He lives with Bruce and Sonia, is rather big, and seems at times rather intelligent, in a doggie sort of way, and actually rather well behaved most of the time. His name means - - well you all know what a coda is - - but how that relates to this dog is beyond me. If you will throw something for him to retrieve he will be your friend for life as well as bother the – ah – dickens out of you.

     We got home from eating Chinese food and what should we find. About two-thirds of the chocolate cake had been eaten and Coda was looking very guilty. Bruce salvaged what had not been molested by this curly gray dog, put that into six bowls, and spooned frosting over each serving. It ended up that there was at least as much frosting as cake. Just the way I like it.

     Coda was under a disciplinary cloud the rest of the evening, but in actuality he had done me a great favor. I finally had the cake the way it was meant to be, fifty percent frosting and fifty percent cake.  

     Tuesday morning we put ourselves together, made one stop in Walla Walla at the “Book and Game,” (which now carries my books), spent some time with my sister-in-law Wallalee Spady, and then drove home. Of course we had to stop at the C & D in Boardman to check the milkshakes again. Some projects just take constant vigilance.

 

 

 

 

This is part of the view we have to look at every time we leave the house.