Seventy five years ago, Jack Milano was born.
The Milano sisters celebrated the evening with a handsome dinner, a traditional German Chocolate Cake, hide-and-seek with (baby) Jack, and pasta fagioli.
“How is that a German dessert became an Italian man’s favorite?” I asked.
In near unison, Christina and Andrea replied, “He married Betsy Milano.”
“So we get into the cab,” Joyce started.
“Wait -” Ryan interrupts. ”Not just a cab, but it is a pounding, throbbing cab. The radio is turned up and the bass is vibrating practically the entire earth.”
“And, we are sitting in the back,” Joyce continues. “‘You like music?’ he asks. Davis looks at him and says ‘What is it?”‘
“‘It’s Lady Caca!”
And so went the tale of the Karaoke Cab Driver – one of many entertaining tales of Joyce & Ryan’s adventure to Taiwan. A video of the Lady Caca moment and other interesting bits is available at motopoet.com.
“You know, you don’t have to live here,” I said when I arrived in northwestern Pennsylvania. ”You don’t have to live in 3 feet of snow for 6 months every year and huddle like football players because it is 10 degrees outside.” I stomped my shoes on the carpet, shaking the snow off while I unwound my scarf. My mom blinked, puzzled by my outburst. I hadn’t yet even greeted them, said hello, or hugged them. Instead, I had belted out my winter lament – the same lament I bellow each winter when visiting them in Warren.
In the winter, the wind whips across the Great Lakes scooping the moisture from the warmer-than-air surface and toss it into the air in a natural vortex of snow-making. The moisture laden air rises until it chills, condenses and then falls back to earth — actually, falls back to Warren — in the form of lake-effect-snow: blinding bands of fluffy snow that coats the hills, streets, and rooftops. From the day I arrived, for 6 days, the snow fell and fell. It never stopped. ”And it hasn’t stopped since Thanksgiving, practically,” my dad remarked.
My mom put her hands together in a perfect this-is-the-church-and-this-is-the-steeple fashion and asked, “Well, where would we live?”
With no hesitation, I replied, “Hawai’i, of course.”
New Year’s Eve is a holiday that has remained elusive to me over the years.
I have learned though, over the years, that New Year’s Eve is either best spent with friends quietly over dinner. Or in a brothel. Otherwise, when the good cheer ends and the clock turns and people pair off, someone is bound to be left in tears.
This year we crashed a party — a quiet diner at Benjamin and Alyssa’s. A truly fine way to ring in 2011.
The text message exchange was brief, but to the point.
“In the goose blinds Idaho. Bring one?”
I turned to Jim, “Billy is hunting in Idaho for goose. He wants to know if you want one?” James paused, thought, and then replied, “Sure, why not?”
I texted back: Shoot to kill; James will cook your goose.
Goose. And hen, too — Billy said the hen was from Romania or some other foreign and cold-sounding place. TSA didn’t know what to make of it stuffed deep into his luggage, wrapped carefully in his intimate garments.
It was the only thing that really could have happened. A group of people spending a couple of nights in the mountains blanketed by snow, supplied with good food, and sore from all day skiing, what else would we talk about other than ghost stories.
“You don’t have the guts,” Leland said, folding his arms.
“Yeah, right,” Fredi replied folding his arms, too. Then Shizuko stepped in and set them both straight.
“Okay, I’ll triple dog dare you,” she said.
“Someone has to take a picture,” Fredi said.
And then suddenly they sprang into the snow and made angels. In their swimsuits. Whatever.
First, we make the Timpano. It starts three days before Twelfth Night when James begins preparing ragu, pastry dough, and all sorts on ingredients. The next day, more food is prepared including appetizers, soup, and salad. Then the night before, the assembly of the Timpano begins.
The table is set.
Then come the guests at precisely two hours past sundown. There was Charlie Chan, Nancy Drew, George Smiley, Ian Fleming, Jane Marple, Wilkie Collins, Anna Katherine Green, Dorothy Sayers, Edgar Allen Poe, Shirley Jackson, Sam Spade and Mrs. Emily Polifax.
Then, comes the wine and champagne, and riddles.
Then the Timpano!
And finally, the King’s Cake!
