Davidson County, NC Style. . .

A quiet, very casual final-long-weekend-of-the-summer-season here at home, marked by the preparation of my late maternal grandfather's pulled pork BBQ and red slaw recipes. The Grand Duchess, bless her, always whips up a large batch of hush-puppies to go with the dish, which is authentic.

The tangy sauce is created with, more or less, equal parts ketchup, sugar, and white vinegar with course ground black pepper and Worcestershire sauce added to taste. I typically add another shot of white vinegar before kitchen clean-up to attenuate the tomato ketchup taste a wee bit.

We enjoyed the dinner last evening on our screened porch and will do so again this evening. Afterwards, we will freeze the remaining meat (from a huge pork shoulder) for a few more dinners at different points this fall. The slaw, thanks to the vinegar and sugar, keeps well for months and will live in several storage containers in the refrigerator. It works very nicely as a chutney of sorts with Indian dishes, which the Grand Duchess has become a dab hand at preparing during the cooler and cold months.

The Young Master is at that age where he simply will not cooperate with a pleasant smile when a camera or iPhones are produced. Needless to say, school photos are a challenge for the poor photographers brought in each autumn for the job. It is most vexing since -- we feel, at least -- TYM is a handsome young man when his face is in repose.

-- Heinz-Ulrich

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Up North Style. . .

Bad Dad makes a friend. YMP and Bad Dad on the shores of Lake Michigan. Or was that Crystal Lake? The Grand Duchess takes a selfie in her kayak. How NOT to impress the girls sunning themselves along the river. YMP and Bad Dad kayaking on the Platte River headed toward Loon Lake. J ust back from a week in Northern Michigan in a charming and spacious house on the banks of the Betsie River outside of Thompsonville. A largely pleasant seven days despite some challenging episodes with the Young Master, who has picked up some very questionable habits and language from his friends in the 8th Grade during the school year just ended. But otherwise, we enjoyed ourselves and contemplated remaining for a few days longer since the house was available. In the end, we decided to return home as planned originally since neither my wife, nor I wanted to spend the remaining days chained to our computers in Zoom meetings from our vacation destination. I actually managed to leave the laptop and ip

Mid-June Thursday Style. . .

A nother pretty typical variation on the theme for late spring, summer, and very early fall. I'm a huge fan of Madras and have several such shirts in the seasonal rotation. Lightweight, exceedingly comfortable, and even dressy when pressed and tucked in, which is the usual way of things here at Totleigh in the Wold. Now, if I had my druthers, I'd still rather be skiing the trails in the upper half of "The Mitten" (of Michigan), in the Upper Peninsula, or Ontario. But summers ain't so bad either, and I'd look pretty funny walking around in cross-country ski attire during June. -- Heinz-Ulrich

A Lazy Saturday at the End of June. . .

A sleepy first half of the weekend here at Totleigh. Warmer and quite humid ahead of an approaching cool front here in Mid-Michigan. Perfect for yet another pair of chino shorts an a seersucker shirt -- tucked in of course -- with the usual leather deck shoes and ribbon belt. Otherwise, not much accomplished beyond a page or so of writing and monkeying around with audio settings for an upcoming podcast episode. However, I was not completely useless yesterday! I made a huge fruit salad for dinner, which the Grand Duchess and I enjoyed a short while later at the table on the back porch. The Young Master, as is his wont on Saturday evenings, took his dinner on a tray in the TV room upstairs where he whiled away a couple of hours on Flight Simulator, flying some sort of commercial airliner to some destination across the Atlantic or Pacific. I would have loved that sort of technology at about nine or 10 way back during the late 1970s, aka The Stone Age. As it is, my sister and

Classic Style

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