Earthy Realities about Food (and People)

Maybe you remember how my three girls were waiting eagerly for their quail to lay eggs.  Well, they waited and waited and waited and then....   Then Evelyn came to me and said, "Mom, we have eight males and one female."  They mail ordered their quail and had asked for chicks too young to sex, but the quail they got were a) not very cute anymore and b) plenty old enough to sex, except for the smallest and fluffiest which grew up to be the only female.

Now, they needn't, we discovered, have ordered these birds from across the country, when they are available all over the Bay Area.  Local quail farmers don't have much of a web presence, but you can find plenty of them on Craigslist.  

So I'm talking to a guy who is selling some quail and he says, "How do you know they are all males?"

Me: Kids, how do you know they are males?

Evelyn:  We vent sexed them.

Me: Uh, they vent sexed them.

Guy: How did they do it?

Me:  Yeah, how did you do it?

Evelyn: Well, you turn them over and squeeze the abdomen gently.  If foam comes out of their vent, they're a male.

I repeat what she said.

Guy: Well, that is how you do it.

I am raising some self-made farm girls!

But we have a problem.  We have too many males.  One morning Evelyn comes running in--Comma's head is all bloody.  The other quail have torn out all his head feathers and pecked a deep hole in his head.  We separate him.  It bleeds for the whole day.  His eye swells shut.  

We keep him in the house.  After two days of recovery his wounds are scabbed over and he is starting to open the eye.  And to crow.  All day.  And then, all night.  We bring the female in.  And get a good night's sleep.  But then the girls put her back out in the bachelor pad and in the ensuing frenzy they pluck her head, leaving a bald patch.  Attempts to reintroduce Comma are even more disastrous.  Our quail run is a gladiatorial arena.

It slowly dawns on the girls that they will have to get rid of some of the males.  I look on Craigslist and find that many people are trying to get rid of males.  And I find this:

Good home only. They are for pets only. It is OK that you eat quail eggs. But the quails are not for food or dog training  purpose.

Dog training? Yikes. Slowly the realities of farming are coming home to roost. Males are not wanted. Males are a problem. If you sell them you cannot be sure what will happen to them. We powwow and decide to ask a friend if she will give them a humane death and enjoy them for dinner. She says yes, and we are grateful.

When one of the quail, early in this process, was accidentally crushed we tried mouth to beak resuscitation and mourned with loud lamentation and buried it in the backyard.  Now, we're going to be packing up several for a friend's dinner, and grateful to have a friend brave enough to do the deed.

Meanwhile, Pastel, our one female, is dutifully laying one beautiful, speckled egg each day. Clementine, our in-house food stylist, set up this miniature tableau.  The plate is a saucer, and the silverware and cup are from a doll's set.  It is so neat and wholesome looking.  There is a lot of earthy reality behind it.

Day 1: Went to the Beach--Creative Writing on Vacation

We're back from Maui.  We were supposed to go trekking through Northern California in search of mammals but, well, it was chilly, and er I'm embarrassed to admit it, I just turned tail and bolted for the tropics.  

We always try to keep journals when we are on vacation, but they so often end up like this:

In case you're having trouble making it out, it says:

Day 1: Went to the beach.

Day 2: Went to the beach.

Day 3: Went to the beach.

Ok, I should say that this is Greta's idea of an awesome joke.  She loves this joke so much that she can't wait to write the next day into her journal.

But journal writing does tend to devolve into catalog.  Though lovely pictures go a long way.

I brought this book along for inspiration:

The subtitle is Writing Exercises That are Not Personal, Not Introspective and Not Boring.  I think the point of traveling is outrospection, not introspection, so I hoped it would help us get creative with our observations.  It did, and it also helped us drive away boredom on long drives. That was why I opened the book the first time--to direct the three kids in the backseat to something other than whose elbow was where.

The first exercise I didn't find promising:  1. Write a paragraph about a girl named Dot, but use no letters with dots.  I think I'd rather try to use lots of letters with dots, but not very much.

I flipped through and we settled on 114: Write 4 sentences made up of 4 four-letter words.  We modified it to 5 sentences with five five-letter words because there are five of us. 

Water moves along coral reefs.

Waves crash sandy beach tower.

Pines stand along windy roads.

Snail lives where water blows.

Trade wind's sweep dries suits.

Later we were waiting for the check at The Pineapple Grill and there was some flopping over in the chairs happening.  So I whipped out the book and found:

169: Describe a place to eat using every letter of the alphabet at least once.

The Pineapple Grill

Clem's french toast with macadamia nuts happily filled her stomach.  The Shirley Temple quenched her thirst. Mynah birds zoomed around screeching.  Evelyn's juice smoothie was bland.  The kids played with the sugar box.  

I think it is curious that even so small a push as using each letter of the alphabet has interesting results. It was only the need to get the z in there that prompted "Mynah birds zoomed around screeching."  But that is the most interesting and memorable part of the paragraph (and the lunch).

A few days later Evelyn had given up trying to net fish in a tidepool and was hunting sparrows, luring them with Greta's snack.  She was still basking in the glow of having caught one a few days earlier.  I guess I was the one who was bored this time.  I flipped open Unjournaling and landed on 

17. Create a much more interesting version of this sentence:
The dog barked.
What kind of dog was it?  Where was it?  Why was it barking?  How would you describe the barking?  Make the sentence as interesting as possible by choosing your words and details carefully.

This is not at all an original exercise, but a good one nonetheless.  We modified the exercise to suit our needs.

The sparrow ate.

Everyone threw out ideas (as Evelyn threw out her bait) and I took dictation:

The young house sparrow gobbled pieces of pirate booty, gulping down the little chips as fast as it could, hopping away and coming back for more, stretching its neck up to see where the best pieces were and sometimes even hopping very high and turning its head to eye the pieces.

Greta did this one:

She began with: We sit on the beach.
And ended up with: Mom and I sit and talk on the fine yellowy-tanny sand of Ka'anapali beach.

Doesn't that tell a better story than Day 4: Went to the beach?

I think so.  But if you want to know why Greta thinks Went to the beach is so funny, scroll through the pics below.

Swinging bridge.

Shave ice.

Greta's first time snorkeling.

Parasailing.

Above the clouds at Haleakala.

Sunset at Haleakala.

Trying out the water bounce house.

Hiking the Pipiwai trail.

Climbing banyan trees.

On the trail to the red sand beach I was too terrified to take pics, so here is the pic of the warning sign I took after we made it back.

Catching geckos.

Visiting waterfalls.

Climbing bridge supports.

Exploring a lava tube.

Sliding down the roots of a banyan tree into a lava tube cave.

Jumping into a freshwater pool in a cave.

Swimming in tidepools.  Turned out the kids were sharing one with the world's most venomous fish, but hey, it was fun anyway.

Clem and Greta conspired to paint their dad's toenails when he was distracted.

Snorkeling with sea turtles.

Red dirt shirts again!

Ev jumping off Black Rock.

Mike and Greta just before that big wave turned their tidepool into a jacuzzi.

Nakalele blowhole.

After a couple days like this, particularly the harrowing red sand beach trail, I was ready for a day worthy of no more mention than went to the beach.