Hilltown Families 
Just What is it Like to Live in New Orleans?
Notes from Nan
BY HF Contributing Writer, Nan Parat
First of all, I want to wonder aloud about the phenomenon of people in such a tiny and remote section of the country keeping as close a watch on a hurricane 1500 miles away in the Gulf of Mexico and reporting the latest coordinates as regularly as if they were packing up to evacuate themselves! I was truly touched by how closely people watched Gustav and worried about its effect on the old homestead! (Incidentally, for those who were afraid to ask, I sold my old homestead there in March so that I didn’t have a direct financial line to disaster—just a heartfelt one.) To all the people who asked as to the whereabouts of Tracy and Donnie C. and their family, they had evacuated to the east coast of Florida—now kind of in the path of Hurricane Hannah—but I imagine they’ll head back to the safety of spared New Orleans today or so.
I have to say (and I could certainly write whole pages on this) that it is a lot harder to watch a hurricane head to New Orleans from safe and remote New England than from the eye of the projected cone. When you’re there, you know what you’re going to do. When you’re all the way up here you feel far more helpless.
Thank you to all who worried, tracked, asked and cared so much over the last few days! And I imagine that with this, you may recognize more how it came to be that so many stayed for Katrina. You do this with every hurricane that comes your way, boarding up, evacuating, spending lots of time, money and worry on gas and lodging when you could have just stayed home; you do this for years and years and finally you think, “I ain’t doing this again!” So you stay home and the beast quits crying wolf, blows your house down and eats you!
Thank you again for your caring and vigilance! Let’s do this every week until December first (the end of hurricane season.) and you’ll be made an honorary Gulf-Coaster!
On to Dinner!
Friday night menu (09/05/08):
- Linguini tossed with shrimp, mussels, bay scallops, and sword fish in a garlic and tomato sauce with fresh basil
- And a Caesar salad on the side
For the vegetarians:
- Pasta Primavera: Linguini in a red sauced with mixed sautéed vegetables.
And now we remove our hats for:
Rob’s Grocery Talk with Rob
Longtime readers of this column will remember my ill-fated and controversial attempt to gauge my grocery performance with the so called “Whipple Rating”. At last count, I had never achieved more than a measly 2.8 Whipples (out of a possible ten). Sensing the futility of it all, plus a realization that my weekly self evaluation was eroding any shred of self esteem I had left, I abandoned the practice in favor of just trying to write funny stuff (which is even more futile and esteem-killing). Nan used to say she couldn’t wait for me to score three Whipples just so she could say “triple Whipple!” I told her she could say that any time she wanted, but she needed a legitimate reason, I guess.
So why am I revisiting my old friend today? Because, quite by accident, I discovered an alternative, yet very legitimate Whipple!
Ladies and Gentlemen: I present
Allen Oldfather Whipple (September 2, 1881–April 6, 1963) was an American surgeon who is known for the pancreatic cancer operation which bears his name (the Whipple procedure) as well as Whipple’s triad.
The Whipple procedure! Who knew? In fact, I’ll bet many of the surgeons under his tutelage were graded with a “Whipple Rating” similar to mine. Not to mention “Whipple’s Triad” which just HAS to be a triple Whipple.
So hats off to you, Dr. Whipple.
Grocery Talk
We sold out the first batch of Berkshire Blue Cheese, so I called the guy and he drove up on his BMW motorcycle and delivered us another wheel! That’s so European isn’t it? Next thing you know, we’ll all have baguettes strapped to our bicycle handlebars.
Coming this week: Barbara’s Puffins Cereal! Just in time for school, too. Start your child’s day off right with a delicious puffin breakfast.
That is all.
Rob
Wanted: Weekday breakfast cook at Elmer’s! If you know someone who thinks this would be fun (and it is!) please forward this e-mail to them and ask them to e-mail me back—calling if I’m not here doesn’t always result in message getting. So ask them to e-mail me and we’ll move from there!
This week the Farm Report has been temporarily suspended due to FAR too much excitement over at Little Donna Elwell’s house and I don’t want to call over there to ask her about produce when so much else is going on. So I’m sure we’ll have plenty of produce, so come on over and get some!
And that’s all in the world I have to say today!
Love,
Big E
