The Feast of St. Nicholas

Pajamas and the Feast of St. Nicholas 

German St. Nicolaas

Over 40 years ago, when I was a club swimmer, I knew some kids who's parents were from Germany. And just before Christmas, they'd put their shoes outside and get candy and nuts for the Feast of St. Nicholas. I understood about Santa Claus, and might have even been aware of Ol' St. Nick, but the idea of candy in the shoe sounded, well, sounded sweet. I think I asked my Mom about it, but got some answer about how it was a German thing.

Hungarian St. Nicholas

In college years later, I had a Hungarian girlfriend, and her family did the same thing-Put out shoes and get candy and some small gift thing.

When I married and had children, I decided that my family was going to start the tradition. I don't know if my kids will someday continue it, but if anyone is interested, here's how the Feast of St. Nicholas morphed in my house. Since my wife's family doesn't celebrate it, I've been able to play with how Feast is done.

My children and wife don't know the exact day of the Feast of St. Nicholas-if you're interested it's Dec. 6. Since none of my children's friends celebrate the day, I have the option of having the kids leave their shoes out on the eve of December 6 (that's Dec. 5 if you couldn't figure it out) or the night of Dec. 6. I forgot one year, and we left our shoes out Dec. 7. Everyone leaves their shoes out by their bedroom door, and everyone gets pajamas and some candy in the morning.

Why pajamas? Usually, it's cold and everyone's grown out of last year's winter pj's. No one is really all that excited by receiving pj's in general, but everything is better when given by St. Nicholas, and so even my teenager is still moderately excited by the aspect of new jammies. The stores are always having sales on pj's at the beginning of December, so it doesn't break the bank. We've been doing this for as long as the kids can remember, so now they expect it.

Victorian

Modern

Next year, we might mix it up and add Krampus, St. Nicholas's dark sidekick, who threatens to take the bad kids away or beat them with birch branches. It's supposed to be positive to remind the kids to be good, however. I'll have to figure it out-the best part of no one knowing is that I can do it any way I want. Then again, maybe not-why mess with family tradition?




Family traditions start any way you want them to.

Harmony Canoe Ukulele

Harmony Canoe Ukulele

1950's

According to both Elderly and Lardy's  Ukulele Database, this is a 50's era Harmony Ukulele, made of birch and with a plastic fretboard. It came with a case, which you can see in the pictures, and the smell of moth balls, which you can't. It cost me $48, with $11 for shipping when I won it back in September.

When the uke arrived, it smelled like it had been in someone's basement for the last 30 years, and like the Fluke I bought a year and a half ago, which wreaked of cigarette smoke, I put a tennis shoe deodorant ball inside the case. After four months, the smell improved considerably.

           

The uke was dusty, missing a string and missing the head from a tuning machine. I rummaged through the various guitar and ukulele parts that I have until I found a a suitable replacement. Though it looks a bit different, it does the job and I don't have to replace all the tuning heads.

From there, I got out the usual array of cleaning materials. Mini shop vac with attachments to get the dustbunnies out of the body, and Dunlop guitar polish for the body. I sometimes use lemon oil, but didn't on this one. With some elbow grease, it shined up well. I've used Aquila Red Strings, and thought they sounded okay. This time I used the Kala Red strings. I like using the red strings against the  white plastic fretboards-snazzier, you know.

Since this uke was in pretty good shape when I got it, getting it to smell better was really the biggest concern. I cleaned, vacuumed, polished and tightened it, and with the new strings, it was good to go.

My initial take is that it's a bit quieter than the Fluke or the Kay, (which otherwise it closely resembles). It plays reasonably well, though. I think it will be the 'work' ukulele, since I have more than enough ukes here at home. It's pretty, too, so if I have it out at work, it at least looks interesting.

                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                         

Primo Hawaiian Shirt, Exotical Downey, and Patrick Pangan (and Portos, too)

I've written about Exotical once before, on 9/22/12. I was in Downey for the Downey-Oxnard Football game, which Downey won while on their way to a CIF title.

In it, I refer to a Primo Beer Hawaiian Shirt in chartreuse, which the kid in the store recommended over the blue that I was initially going to buy. I like the chartreuse, so don't get me wrong, but there was something about the blue that I really wanted, and I've been thinking of going back ever since to get it. Finally, I was back in Downey, and after a lunch at Portos, which opened in Downey a few years ago and was as delicious and inexpensive as 1,000 internet reviews say it is, I walked across the street to Exotical, and bought the blue Primo Beer shirt. The price had gone up since last year, but I wanted it.

And now, why did I want it? It all goes back to Patrick Pangan, a Hawaiian kid that I knew back in grade school. I attended St. Rose of Lima in Maywood in the 70's, and Patrick was in my class. On free dress days, which was a major event at a Catholic School, it seemed like he always wore a blue, Primo Beer Hawaiian shirt. I'm not quite sure what I liked about it even then, or why I wanted to look like Patrick Pangan.

If memory serves, though, for some reason I also liked his hair. It was kind of like the old Justin Bieber haircut, where there wasn't any real part, but the hair was combed in such a way that implied being parted. The hair wasn't combed into the face, Bieber style either. Anyway, that's how his was combed, and I remember liking that and trying to comb my hair the same way. In the 70's, it was a look that I could get away with, and it took me a while to perfect that style, but I finally got it.

Why did I want to look like Patrick Pangan? I don't really know. I liked the Primo Shirt, and I liked the hair. He was a nice enough kid, if memory serves, but I don't recall any hero worship type thing at that point in my life. The girls liked him better, but I don't think that was a big concern in the 5th, 6th, or 7th grade. He played basketball well for a grade schooler, but again, I can't believe that was a motivation.

So rather than go all Freudian, I'm just going to say that I liked the shirt, and the hairstyle was something that my dad would let me get away with.

The same kid helped me as helped me last year, and when I started talking, he said that he remembered me, but who knows. On this trip, they had some vintage ukulele's that I don't remember being out the last time I was there, a couple of Kamaka's and a Martin, as well as a couple of off brands, and of course I played them all. Then I found the blue Primo Beer Shirt! They still had one-several, actually, in a variety of colors. It was $69, but a quick internet shirts usually has them between $75 and $125, if you can find them at all.

Then, as I was looking through the clearance rack, I looked at a shirt that was so ugly it was cool. I pulled it out, and the salesguy said the same thing. Green, yellow and brown is not a color palette that I normally work with, but I know that I can pull off most anything. Exceptionally ugly can be a good thing in a Aloha shirt, and it was only $19, so I wore the ugly one out. It's a Jade Fashions Made in Hawaii, and checking their website, I noticed that they had several other ugly yet cool shirts that I might have to buy myself.

Exotical is not the Tommy Bahama store, but there's usually some interesting stuff.

Tacos La Placita, Oxnard

Tacos La Placita

437 C Street

Oxnard, CA

I had heard of Carnegie Libraries and had even seen one someplace in Arkansas, but I didn't realize that there were some in California. I grew up in Bell and Downey, and though both are old enough to have applied for Carnegie Libraries, Andrew Carnegie funding libraries from 1883 to 1929, neither did, and it wasn't until I got to college that I had ever heard of one.

Oxnard though, has a very impressive Carnegie Library, though it isn't a Carnegie Library any more. It sits on top of a small hill, by a park and across from one of my favorite lunch spots. It's now the Carnegie Museum, and sometimes has interesting art shows.

Tacos La Placita sits across the street from the Carnegie Museum, and is important to my personal taco history for one reason. It's the place where I had my first truly enjoyable "street taco." 

17 years ago, when I first moved to Oxnard, I would run by this place. They had a sign out for tacos for 75 cents, I think, and it would smell so good that I finally tried one. Before that time, I always wanted the big, crunchy tacos that my mom would make. My mom would fry corn tortillas to make a shell, and then fill them with ground beef, tomatoes, lettuce and cheddar cheese. Street tacos, those smaller ones with just meat, onion and cilantro, seemed so tiny and poor in comparison. 

But the smell coming from this stand was amazing. I wasn't very brave, and just had asada, but it was good. Eventually, I would try several of their tacos, and find them all to be quite tasty.

The same old couple have run the place the whole time, though occasionally one of the children will be working the stand. The tacos have gone up in price, to all of a $1.50, but they're still good.

And by good, what do I mean? The meat is always moist and full of flavor. Usually, I'll have an asada, a lengua (tongue), a cabeza (head), and a carnitas, along with a Pepsi, which came out to about $8. The tortillas are soft and warm. Onions and cilantro, of course, but they also add a moderately spicy red salsa, along with some chilis that are always too hot for me to do anything more than nibble, and some grilled onion. It looks to me like they keep big pots of meat on their stove, and with the lid on, it keeps the meat moist.

Orders are done quickly, and though I've noticed that they have several other things on their menu, including hamburgers, all I've ever had are the tacos. 

Why eat something else when I know tacos make me happy? A great, inexpensive place when you happen to be in Downtown Oxnard.

Musings Of A Muleskinner--Deke Dickerson's Blog: Why I am not a Punk Rocker

Musings Of A Muleskinner--Deke Dickerson's Blog: Why I am not a Punk Rocker

I posted a response to Deke Dickerson's post, and I agree with Deke-the Punk Rock scene did change, and I was glad to see it in it's early days.

Check out Deke's blog-he's a great guitar player and a great writer.

12/8/13 Update

When I wrote my response to Deke Dickerson, it was about 2 in the morning, and I was exhausted. If you go to read it, I hope it makes sense. I also had the link posted 3 times, 2 of them with nothing attached. For the same reason I shouldn't buy things on eBay after midnight, I shouldn't post blog entries after midnight. They don't make much sense.