FREE TYPING



Back in the days of high school English teaching, I took an idea from a writing teacher who used free writing as a technique. What it involved was having students write for 10 minutes not planning ahead at all. The only rule was that they had to keep writing.



No thinking or organizing--just pushing the pen or pencil across the page. If they couldn't think of anything to write, then they were to write, "I can't think of anything to write," and by the time that sentence was finished, a thought would have popped into their heads.



It was a warm up activity that sometimes generated a good sentence or two, a theme topic, even a well turned phrase. At worst, it allowed them 10 minutes of relative peace from a busy day. It also got the old blood pumping to the hand because in those days, writing was a somewhat physical activity. If you doubt that, then you're too young to remember having to shake your hand violently to awaken it from a cramped slumber.



Writing using word processors certainly made writing easier and easier to grade, but free writing then became free typing or free processing. It lost some of its luster.



Not having the time or space for 10 minutes, I shall attempt my first free composing in several years. You, fortunate reader(s), get to see what's up or what it was somewhat like for students back then.



I'll limit mine to three minutes, so here goes.



Weather, of course, is on my mind. It always is. Balmy without the wind. Now does that make sense? Lip balm. My goodness, I couldn't survive without Banana Boat Chap Stick--I think I probably mixed a consumer product metaphor there. I use it constantly. I suppose I'd have no lips at all if I couldn't use Banana Boat. When I was video taped teaching, I never would have imagined I licked my lips so frequently...OK time's up.

That's it. That's what I got overpaid to do. And those are the thought I had for 3 minutes.

Now where I'd go from there would have been for students to select something that they had written and write a brief paper on something in their free writing. For me, I suppose I would have written about my world without chap stick. A short description of dry, cracked lips. Kind of an Edward Scissor Lip.

THE PERFECT BURGER

Naturally must be cooked out under a beautiful Arizona sky within view of a saguaro cactus. By accident or as some of my students used to say, on accident, I placed my George Foreman gas grill in the perfect spot. It provides the best view in my yard of Camelback Mountain.

Of course, I've divulged the best way to cook a burger. Not charcoal even if left until nearly all the lighter fluid has burned off because there's still that charcoaled taste which I liked back in the day, but my buds no longer care for it. So it's gas for the perfect one. Before putting on the meat, use Pam Grilling spray to prevent sticking. Be sure to let it burn off before placing the meat on the grill.

Most I know cook too fast. Or they flip too much. Let the burger get a pretty good one side cook before flipping it over. Start with placing the burger on the highest rack and sprinkle garlic salt on it. For my taste, you need a good dose, but even if you aren't a garlic fan, use a few grains. They will leave no aftertaste and the flavor will be enhanced.

When you make your first flip, take it to the lowest level but cook with the lid up. I guess I forgot to tell you to lower the lid for the first 4 or so minute cook. This time should not exceed 3 minutes unless you're desiring a well done burger. If so, add a minute before removing the delicacy back to the top rack.

One more flip there before moving it to the bottom rack. This time close the cover but don't get carried away with how long it remains. Flip for the last time. Leave the lid up and watch as the remaining juices seep of the rack.

Before taking it up, place the top and lower sesame seed bun on the lower rack and toast gently. You really don't want toast or just warmth; somewhere in the middle.

When you take it up, you already have a beefsteak tomato or heirloom tomato to place next to the burger. Fresh, crisp lettuce on top of that. And that's it unless you want to add some alfalfa sprouts.

Nothing else. No cheese, no pickles, no ketchup or mustard. Certainly no onions. Not even mushrooms. And never add any steak sauce. A good hamburger never needs it if you've started with good, fresh--never frozen--meat

You're almost ready. Ask God to bless the food and thank Him for His provisions. You'll be glad you did.

DON'T TELL ANYONE ABOUT THIS

I'm going to tell you how to make a great burger. But, of course, there must be suspense before denouement.

Just a week ago I ate my first French fry of the new decade. Yes, it was good, but surprisingly not great.

You see, I'm in a constant losing battle with my weight. As 2010 rolled around, I vowed to take off some excess. I make progress. We have visitors or an outing of some kind and I gain. My last meal at Brio's, a great Italian restaurant saw me devour bread and crackers and fried tomatoes smothering in some tasty cheese sauce, 8 (I counted) lamb ribs topped with Gorgonzola, spinach soaked in some oil, and a small creme broulle for desert. Total caloric count--a zillion.

But back to my vow and fries. Potatoes and pizza are killers for me. So I decided to skip the fries. Until In-And-Out--nothing frozen; always made fresh--seduced me. As good as their burgers are, they're not perfect. Neither are their fries, but I don't know how to make/cook a perfect fry. So I keep tasting in search of that perfection. But having gone 6 weeks without one, I had sorta lost the desire. At least that's how I explain my satisfaction for the fries but not mouth water drooling.

Now about that burger. Well, I see I've run out of room and time for this entry. A friend called late last night (8:45 PM, if you can believe it) and cancelled a golf game for today. The rest of us are still playing, but I have to call the golf course and tell them so we don't get charged for Dave who will think of us all day and how his draw would have outdriven all of us on every hole where he connected.

Tomorrow I'll get to the burger.

OLYMPIC TIME AGAIN

And I'm watching. Not much, but when they're not running umpteen commercials, the action is pretty good. Even though I don't like Winter or Winter sports very much. Well, except for curling. I think that's a Winter sport.

I've been blessed to visit several Olympic stadiums throughout the world. In fact I even jogged on the track at the one in Athens, I believe. I'd have to dig in the photo files for sure, and as most of my loyal readers know, I can't be confused by facts. Plus I'm a little too lazy to do much research other than ask my wife who would remember and wonder when the rest of my mind will depart.

But the one even that I would like to have been able to see in person was not the "miracle on ice", the 1980 US hockey victory over the Russians in the semi-finals on the way to the gold medal. At a time when our country was reeling from the Iran kidnapping of Americans and when the man in the White House preceding Ronald Reagan had no clue how to get them back after 444 days of captivity. At a time that The USSR was still in existence and thriving at the Olympics feeling that they were showing the world Russian superiority. Before they lost that game which according to our son was the beginning of the end of the USSR.

Well, anyhow the rest is history and that was by all standards a monumental Olympic achievement, but there's one event that I would have placed above it and that was Jesse Owens winning gold at the Berlin Olympics of 1936. The Hitler Olympics where he was going to show the world the dominance of the Aryan race. Except a Black guy from the US kicked their tails.

What that must have been like to see Jesse Owens there. I can't imagine what the look on Adolph's face would have been. But I know it had to be one of extreme embarrassment. Of hatred that would multiply million-fold over the next 8 or 9 years. And while Mr. Owens' feats didn't have quite the same favorable results, it was legendary and perhaps in some small way led the Allies in the belief that Hitler could be had.

A reason that I love sports is the competition. And sometimes, it's much more than that.

KUFE WAS BIG, BAD, SCARY, AND UGLY

And mean as you can imagine. An overgrown kid who got the old growth spurt early or either he was a lot older than the other kids, the Kufe towered.

In high school he had more fights than just about anyone. He won most of them, too. Because he was careful whom he picked on.

On the last day of school after the last bell rang, he walked up to a very small, quiet underclassman and hit him in the face. The kid had done nothing except be in the wrong place at the wrong time. Kufe had figured that he couldn't get in trouble because school was out for the Summer.

Another time, he was going to cream a lanky friend of our son's. He was in his face literally, when the friend said, "Kufe, you need to brush your teeth."

While had I witnessed it, I would have thought, "Whoa, there's gonna be a whupping up here now," instead the Kufe backed off and pondered the thought. For some reason, our son's buddy escaped. Few did.

I don't know what happened to Kufey other than a few run-ins with the police. But I still would advise anyone to avoid school's after the last bell and not ever in any circumstance tell someone ready to beat the tar out of you that their hygiene leaves something to be desired.

A LITTLE BEHIND THE TIMES

As almost always, I just joined Facebook. It must have been two years ago that a friend, a politico of mine, asked me to add him as a friend on FB I didn't know what he meant.

Today I have 83 friends who would do almost anything for me if I asked. Well, maybe I presume a little too much. But there they are with color photos proclaiming their allegiance to me as a Facebook friend.

Many of them are also my FarmVille friends which means we play a video game of sorts where we build farms. I'm currently at Level 22, which means I am an addict, but not as much as some of my FarmVille friends including my sister-in-law who is sitting there at Level 40. She's a pro.

Just today I was gifted with a pink cottage. To go along with my red barn, 2 dairy farms, a chicken coup, two small ponds, and acreage where I grow crops. I have to cultivate, fertilize, though usually my friends do that for points/coins, and harvest. I'm also in the process of buiding a horse barn or stable, again with the help of my friends.

It's fun, it's inexpensive (read free), and a stress reducer. Also as I said previously addictive. If you're a reader and a farmer--CQ, Joann, Brent's mom, and Linda--then you know what I'm talking about. If you're not, then sign up for FB and get caught up with old friends. And play FarmVille. I'll even let you be my friend and neighbor.

ONE HAND, ONE HEART

A friend from college sang at our wedding. Rather than some of the more traditional wedding tunes, he suggested a song from West Side Story. Where Tony and Maria are in the dress shop.

"Make of our hearts one heart/ make of our hands one hand/ make of our lives one life/ day after day..." well, you get the idea. I liked the idea though I remember it caused our piano accompanist some difficulty. And I still like the song and lyrics.

To me, that's what love is all about. Even if you're just "in like" as a high school girlfriend of our son's used to say. That is, she wasn't sure she loved him, but she liked him an awful lot. But being as a couple, being referred to in the plural form, yet with a single mindedness. Yet a one mindedness, where your thoughts of her are placed above your thoughts of you. And that, my friends as John McCain might say, takes years. At least for me. It was easy for me to think of her and want to please her, but more so on a give-and-take level. Until a more mature Christian attitude finally took over. May it never leave.

So if you need to put a little spice in the old Valentine's Day, just YouTube it. You won't be sorry you did.