What Is This? Ass Soup? Can I Get The Recipe?

If I could give my wife Emily one gift, it would be the abilty to not criticize herself so much. But when the following conversation goes down, there's not much I can do to help her.

We were in the kitchen together tonight and I was warming up some leftover soup for dinner. This soup was some corn chowder she made a few days ago. As I was putting the soup from the tupperware into my bowl we had a conversation that starts in typical fashion in this household.

Emily: Did you fart?

Mike: NO! (Incedulous that could suggest such a thing)

Emily: Then why do I smell something like ass?

Mike: I don't know. Is it this?

And I put my bowl of soup that she made under her nose for her to smell.

Emily: Yeah. That's what it is.

Fall Is The New Spring

Nothing says "Spring is here" like turkey.

A month ago I posted this bit about what signals Spring up here in the Land of 10,000 Lakes.

Well then Spring sprung. Baseball and track has started up at the high school a few blocks from us, the lower path on West River Road is clear of snow, and the running trails are once again packed with people training for the summer marathon season. So I've been busy with Pancho, letting him swim in Minnehaha Creek and he relishes going on long runs with me and trying to stop to sniff every new smell that Spring unearths.

So, no blogging has been done.

But I am happy to report, I have a true, new sign of Spring: wild turkeys.

Check this out. Almost a year ago to the day, I wrote about a wild turkey that landed on our neighbor's roof. Well, last week, right when it finally felt like Spring for more than 48 hours, the turkeys showed their feathers again.

I was riding my bike to work, through the Highland Park business district in St. Paul, right across from the Ford plant. And there I saw two turkeys walking down the sidewalk. They were walking past a Wells Fargo bank and a Lifetime Fitness Club branch. I assume they were walking back to the woods of the Mississippi River after working out at the gym and making a deposit at the bank.

So I pulled over to get a closer look. At the same time, a guy in a business suit started taking pictures of the birds with his cell phone and a tough guy from the Ford plant also came over to see Thanksgiving in April. And again, nothing brings a town together like Wild Turkey.

The three of us, a machinist, a suit, and a dork on a bike, struck up a friendly conversation. I got to tell them how a wild turkey swooped onto my neighbor's roof last year. It was deja vu all over again. Just like my wife said last year, Mr. Suit said "I don't think turkeys can fly." And then the machinist was happy to help me out and let him know that wild turkeys do indeed fly.

By that point the turkeys were on there way down the hill to the Mississippi River and I pointed my bike back up the Ford Parkway hill, and forgot to look back to see if they went into Haskell's to take advantage of their Spring wine sale. Maybe they bought some Wild Turkey and headed down to the banks of the river for a day-long bender, as those who loiter on the banks of the river are wont to do.

Tonight I was on my bike again, this time biking home. I was going along East River Road in St. Paul between the Ford Parkway and Highway 5, not too far from where I saw the turkeys last week, and, significantly, right next to the Mississippi River. And there, walking on someone's perfectly manicured lawn, as if he owned the place, was a wild turkey.

For those of you not familiar with River Road, it is lined with fancy houses with lawns nicer than Wrigley Field. I do not know enough about real estate to know if a wild turkey crapping in your yard raises or lowers property value.

But I do know that Spring is here. And just like last year, it was ushered in by the bird of Fall. Benjamin Franklin would be so proud.