The L.A. Report – Part 32
06-19-2023
Like my report in 2008, this one should be called
the Wisconsin Report. It’s about my trip
last week to Wisconsin.
Every six years, my college dormmates and I have a
reunion. Terry has a cottage on Muskellunge Lake near Rhinelander, Wisconsin. I can’t imagine any lodging that would have
been more perfect. The 3-year-old 4-bedroom
cottage is really nice, with everything about as good as you could ask for in
any house, much less an occasionally-visited cottage – wi-fi, vinyl floors, totally
up-to-date bath fixtures, high-end appliances (including a dishwasher with a
light in it and a bunch of specialty drawers for things like steak knives, etc.). It has all the latest kitchen accoutrements,
and the pantry was well-stocked.
Terry is a wiz in the kitchen and did a hell of a
lot of food prep. He grilled probably the best steak I’ve ever
had in my life and I was trying to remember what he did before he cooked
it. I remember he said he lets it get to
room temperature for about a hour beforehand and he covers them with salt and
pepper (and butter?). He also grilled
incredible hamburgers the previous night.
The cottage is stocked with tons of games,
including two Scrabble sets.
Unfortunately, nobody besides me is fond of Scrabble. That’s okay, we had lots of fun playing our
traditional cribbage, but also a few board games I had never heard of – A
Dominos variation called Chicken Foot, and card games Five Crowns and The Nine
Game.
About the only thing Terry screwed up is ordering
the weather, although it looks like that was just a timing oversight! It was 45 degrees, blustery and spritzing
when I did my run Sunday morning, but the sun came out about an hour before I
left to go home.
Speaking of running, that is my favorite kind of
running – well-maintained, rural asphalt roads with beautiful scenery on each
side. There wasn’t much of a shoulder
but that didn’t matter because I didn’t see a single vehicle either day!
Before I went out for my first run, Terry warned me
that bears have been spotted around there occasionally. Within my first half-mile, I saw something in
the middle of the road. It had four legs
but it obviously wasn’t a bear. As I got
closer, I saw that it was a deer. It slowly
sauntered back into the woods. On the
way back, there was another animal in the middle of the road. This one turned out to be a dog, then four
people appeared alongside it. Speaking
of deer, we saw probably close to 20 dead ones on the side of the highway on
our 2-hour drive there and back (I had flown into Appleton, the closest airport
to Rhinelander).
Terry likes to take his guests fishing in his
pontoon boat. The world record muskie was caught there in 1955 (since
surpassed) and I haven't been fishing in about 50 years so I thought this might
be my chance for glory.
Here was my glory (don’t look at my hair – it was
windy and I forgot my hat):
[Sorry, for some reason I can’t get the image to
display. The picture is in the slide
show at the bottom, though.]
Terry was the only one to catch a fish (a perch),
but it wasn't much bigger than the minnows we were using for bait!
[Sorry, for some reason I can’t get the image to
display. The picture is in the slide
show at the bottom, though.]
Being Wisconsin, the mosquitos were out in force
but not as bad as they can be. Also, he
had unscented Cutter! I never knew that
existed! It must be new – I don’t remember seeing it when I lived in
Wisconsin and Minnestota. One of the
reasons I hated using OFF! was the icky smell it has.
They said I swam across the lake a long time ago,
but I don’t remember being at the cottage ever before, much less swimming in
the lake. I kept asking them – are you SURE about
that? Because I have a very good memory
for things that happened decades ago.
We agreed not to wait six years for our next
get-together!
Here are all 22 of my photos:
https://jayblake.com/photos/places/brigman-four-2023/index.html
My next report will be about my “day” job again,
since the film and TV business is pretty quiet right now, with the writers’s
strike pretty much shutting down Hollywood.
Until then . . .
Take care,
Jay