Monday, June 6, 2016.
The Little, Loud Frog
I love living in a place surrounded by woods and ponds. The animal life in and around the Cool Water Ranch is especially interesting this year. The woods thrushes (I call them the "queedle-deep" birds, for their two-part call) entertain us morning, noon, and evening. That is their actual schedule, with hours off in midmorning and afternoon. When darkness comes, the chuck-will's-widow birds start their distinctive call (like that of the related whippoorwill). The lightning bugs are still playing with their lights at the tops of the trees. We have a few black-and-white rabbits.
On wet evenings, we often find green tree frogs scaling the windows in the doors. They and many other amphibians kick up one hell of a racket after a rainstorm. No snakes this year so far.
A few weeks ago, something started playing its tunes inside the house. We would hear it around noon, and again at sunset, and finally when the Tonight Show comes on. It was a series of two-second-long, tenor croaks, repeated five or six times, then going away. When I try to find out where it was coming from, it stopped and wouldn't resume until I want away. It sounded almost mechanical. Neither MA nor I nor could locate the source. Neither could either of the two dogs or three cats. My only guess--one I doubted--was that it was a cicada. But this routine has gone on for at least a month--too long for an insect.
Today, while Mary Ann was excavating a basket of dining-table utensils, looking for a little baby spoon she wanted to send to grandson Jackson. She knew it was in there, but had to empty the whole thing before she found it. But when she reached into the basket to grab the spoon, she touched something soft, cold, and moving.
"What is this?" she shrieked. I looked inside the basket to see a green frog about the size of a Mardi Gras doubloon. "Is it poisonous?" MA wanted to know. No poisonous frogs in the part of the world, I said. I took the basket outside into the tall grass near some trees. I beat on the bottom, but the frog stayed put. He had to be dehydrated from all that time on the kitchen counter. I finally I grabbed him and put him into the wet leaves where he belongs.
It was only when it was too late to remember that we had not given Mr. Greenlegs a name that we did so. Another member of the Cool Water Ranch Fauna Hall of Fame, along with five dogs, eleven cats, five or six box turtles, one alligator snapping turtle, and some 800 bats.
Lunch today at Baco Bar, a recently opened restaurant in the Shopping Mall District of Covington. It took over the former Jamaican Jerk, which toiled for a few years with pretty good food but not strong enough an identity. Baco Bar's name wants to make you think of tacos and baos. The latter are the Asian counterparts of tacos, with meats and vegetables enclosed in the steamed buns people make into sandwiches throughout Southeast Asia and China. Many restaurants specializing in baos exist throughout that region of the world. Web-search the word "bao" and you will likely turn up lots of websites in Vietnamese. Our son Jude and his wife Suzanne met in a Los Angeles Asian-fusion place called "Take A Bao."
[caption id="attachment_51718" align="alignnone" width="480"]
A brisket bahn mi at Baco Bar.[/caption]
I got caught in traffic en route to Baco Bar, and Mary Ann was already working on a guacamole with texture issues and an unexpectedly high red pepper level. And two scoops of some kind of chicken salad. Further ordering brought forth fresh-cut French fries with a potato starch coating for added crispness. And a brisket-filled banh mi which she found a little too fatty. I saw and asked for a crabmeat bisque, a little on the creamy side. And a side dish of fresh corn and plenty of it, again with buttery-creamy sauce enclosing it. I thought the corn was the best thing on the table.
[caption id="attachment_51720" align="alignnone" width="480"]
"Street corn," a great appetizer or side. [/caption]
Baco Bar is a sharp-looking place, the dining room sort of circular, with tall ceilings and a general air of lightness. The server gave good explanations of everything and an air of friendliness. All the essentials are good and original enough that it draws a hip clientele. It remains to be seen whether enough with-it diners live the the area to support a restaurant that is mostly beyond category. But we'll be back. (In saying that, I am not claiming to be a hipster myself.)
[caption id="attachment_51721" align="alignnone" width="480"]
Crab bisque.[/caption]
The post-radio show evening feels funny without having a chorus rehearsal. What will all of us NPASers do on Monday nights until August? I'm going to try to start a Monday night singer's dining club. Or cocktail time. If we could find someplace with a piano. . . hmm. . . is there a piano at the Southern Hotel's beautiful bar?
Bacobar. Covington: 70437 Highway 21. 985-893-2450.
On wet evenings, we often find green tree frogs scaling the windows in the doors. They and many other amphibians kick up one hell of a racket after a rainstorm. No snakes this year so far.
A few weeks ago, something started playing its tunes inside the house. We would hear it around noon, and again at sunset, and finally when the Tonight Show comes on. It was a series of two-second-long, tenor croaks, repeated five or six times, then going away. When I try to find out where it was coming from, it stopped and wouldn't resume until I want away. It sounded almost mechanical. Neither MA nor I nor could locate the source. Neither could either of the two dogs or three cats. My only guess--one I doubted--was that it was a cicada. But this routine has gone on for at least a month--too long for an insect.
Today, while Mary Ann was excavating a basket of dining-table utensils, looking for a little baby spoon she wanted to send to grandson Jackson. She knew it was in there, but had to empty the whole thing before she found it. But when she reached into the basket to grab the spoon, she touched something soft, cold, and moving.
"What is this?" she shrieked. I looked inside the basket to see a green frog about the size of a Mardi Gras doubloon. "Is it poisonous?" MA wanted to know. No poisonous frogs in the part of the world, I said. I took the basket outside into the tall grass near some trees. I beat on the bottom, but the frog stayed put. He had to be dehydrated from all that time on the kitchen counter. I finally I grabbed him and put him into the wet leaves where he belongs.
It was only when it was too late to remember that we had not given Mr. Greenlegs a name that we did so. Another member of the Cool Water Ranch Fauna Hall of Fame, along with five dogs, eleven cats, five or six box turtles, one alligator snapping turtle, and some 800 bats.
Lunch today at Baco Bar, a recently opened restaurant in the Shopping Mall District of Covington. It took over the former Jamaican Jerk, which toiled for a few years with pretty good food but not strong enough an identity. Baco Bar's name wants to make you think of tacos and baos. The latter are the Asian counterparts of tacos, with meats and vegetables enclosed in the steamed buns people make into sandwiches throughout Southeast Asia and China. Many restaurants specializing in baos exist throughout that region of the world. Web-search the word "bao" and you will likely turn up lots of websites in Vietnamese. Our son Jude and his wife Suzanne met in a Los Angeles Asian-fusion place called "Take A Bao."
[caption id="attachment_51718" align="alignnone" width="480"]
A brisket bahn mi at Baco Bar.[/caption]
I got caught in traffic en route to Baco Bar, and Mary Ann was already working on a guacamole with texture issues and an unexpectedly high red pepper level. And two scoops of some kind of chicken salad. Further ordering brought forth fresh-cut French fries with a potato starch coating for added crispness. And a brisket-filled banh mi which she found a little too fatty. I saw and asked for a crabmeat bisque, a little on the creamy side. And a side dish of fresh corn and plenty of it, again with buttery-creamy sauce enclosing it. I thought the corn was the best thing on the table.
[caption id="attachment_51720" align="alignnone" width="480"]
"Street corn," a great appetizer or side. [/caption]
Baco Bar is a sharp-looking place, the dining room sort of circular, with tall ceilings and a general air of lightness. The server gave good explanations of everything and an air of friendliness. All the essentials are good and original enough that it draws a hip clientele. It remains to be seen whether enough with-it diners live the the area to support a restaurant that is mostly beyond category. But we'll be back. (In saying that, I am not claiming to be a hipster myself.)
[caption id="attachment_51721" align="alignnone" width="480"]
Crab bisque.[/caption]
The post-radio show evening feels funny without having a chorus rehearsal. What will all of us NPASers do on Monday nights until August? I'm going to try to start a Monday night singer's dining club. Or cocktail time. If we could find someplace with a piano. . . hmm. . . is there a piano at the Southern Hotel's beautiful bar?
