new year's libations 2008

Waukesha WI Jan. 1, 2008

The Sewer Raccoon District Dixes (Dee, Erin, Lee and I) had a lovely dinner of Hoppin' John this evening, a lucky dish to celebrate the new year, as we conked out last night way before midnight. We did not see the big ball drop in New York.

But tonight the stops were out: First, shrimp, and a glass of cold Rolling Rock. Then dinner, with the Hoppin" J and fluffy white basmati rice, and a salad of mixed greens + grapefruit chunks cut small, candied pecans broken up, kiwi,and pomegranate.

Fresh-baked muffins with Nelderberry jam, which is very hard to come by. We received the jam as a Christmas gift from Oregon Nel who visited us at the Maryland farm.

Assorted cookies and candies from home origins and from friends. With dinner we had a bottle of sparkling lingonberry juice. See label above. Topping all was a snippet of Yukon Jack from the china cabinet. Two snippets. Whenever I have Yukon Jack I think of the time around 1980 when Tom Light and I trekked north to the Marinette Co. Vollmer cabin in the dead of winter, to X-C ski.

We used the Yukon Jack as anti-freeze. Tom swears I saved his life by keeping the wood stove burning throughout the bitter, clear, starry, snow-crunching night, while our car battery and drained oil pan contents were brought inside at dusk to keep them warm and operational for the morning. I always muse about that weekend as I read the bottle label in these much later years in our warm house: "Yukon Jack is a taste born of hoary nights, when lonely men struggled to keep their fires lit and cabins warm."

That was the weekend when we stopped at a roadside cafe in Wausaukee, with our skis lashed to top of the car. The waitress mistook our equipment for flying skis, destined, with us, she assumed, for the world's highest jump in Iron Mountain. There was a competition of international flyers going on up there at the time, and the waitress was impressed by our supposed daring, for we allowed as how we WERE ski-jumpers, headed up for Iron Mountain. Autographs were requested, and free breakfasts were given. We did offer to pay.