Geezers collection

My work (tapering off during retirement) gets me in contact with a wide variety of people. This week I was at a cancer institute working on a system to catalog cancer tissue and make it available to researchers. Along the way I met the pathologist, a bit of an unusual character. He is the only guy I ever met with both a DVM and a MD. Part of the discussion was about an instrument data station. I have no respect for instrument manufacturers, at least for their data station development. So I was off on a rant, telling the group that they should find the designer of the data station and emasculate him. Dr. DVM pipes up and mentions that he has done plenty of emasculations, an unusual admission, in my experience.

Later on I asked him outright if he got the DVM so he could do emasculations. "No," he said, "by the time I was 10 I had done thousands of them. The surrounding farmers used to come by and ask me to come back with them to their farms and do the castrations. I was very good at it by the time I was 10."

When we got done I drove down to my Dad's house, on the way home. We drove down the local roads to dinner around 6 or so. He was recounting his winter adventures, hitting black ice and sliding off the road backwards. He told me a story of his truck ending up on its side one time. A passer-by stopped and asked Dad if he could help. Dad said "Sure, maybe you could hold that door open so it doesn't keep falling shut while I climb out." Then Dad walked home (about 5 or 6 miles).

On another occasion Dad tipped his tractor over on himself, pretty much destroying his knee. When he had extricated himself from the wreck, he slid backwards on his ass, dragging his bad leg a quarter mile down the hill into the yard. Then he politely asked Mom to get some help.

I get a lot of pleasure meeting people with unusual experiences. I envy them and appreciate their attitude that their experiences are just a normal activities for them. I'm not sure whether this attitude is a feature of individuals or understatement by people who live in the countryside. It sure makes a nice contrast to my normal day-to-day.

Sometimes we miss and it's still a hit

We set out for breakfast and a walk in Lambertville today. E had discovered a restaurant online that sounded good and had the added bonus of keeping her frequent flier account alive. Long story short, we couldn't find it! So we took our walk around Lambertville, looking for alternatives, then over the bridge to the New Hope side. Nothing but Eggs Benedict (not desired) and $15 omelettes were available. Back and forth constituted a decent walk, so, after ensuring that the ducks on the canal were OK, we were back in the car and headed south.

We ended up turning into the parking lot at the flea market that runs year around, the Golden Nuggest Antique Market.

In there we found an unlikely looking place called the Chicken Dog Family Diner. It was open and people were in there, so we joined them (we were pretty hungry by then). The food turned out to be quite good. E always says that breakfast is the same everywhere, but I don't agree. The home fries here were made as they should be, fresh potatoes fried in butter until they have a crispy crust. The eggs were tasty, as was the sausage. The coffee was also good. The place seems to have a following; it was busy the whole time we were inside.

Afterwards we wandered around the flea market, inspecting "One man's trash is another man's treasure."

There is an occasional bit of worthwhile junk here, but most of the fun is people watching. There is always a smell of cigars in the air. There seems to be a particular type of geezer that enjoys a cigar with his cell phone conversation or junk sales pitch.