IT'S NAPOWRIMO 2025!

 Tahitian Chicken Curry with Coconut 2025

 

She had a thing for Tahiti; 

that’s the hell of it. She’d no clue

what it was like. She’d seen photos

of beaches, figured that’d be

the life for her: endless sunshine. 

 

Not this dull place, this sullen place. 

She couldn’t have known. It doesn’t 

make her the moron that buddy 

boy suggests she is, hell-bent to

blow whatever popsicle stand.

 

Intellectual lacking, he says. Hers,

not his. He thrives on it, on the 

notion of devotionlessness, 

if that’s even a word. A lack 

of devotion to you, he means. 

 

According to him, she’d have picked 

anything: the Caymans, Fiji, 

New bloody Zealand. She wished to

be flighty. Less about her, more

about you. Luckless as ever. 

 

And that guy she admired, what’s

his name, the Route 66 guy

romanticising a bum who

was an intellectual, don’t

you know, scoffing at foppery.

 

Buddy boy doesn’t like this, though

we picture the two of them with 

bindles, living their best life. She’d

teach him. Can you help a fellow 

American down on his luck? 

Go leaf go!

 

Yep yep, another excerpt from TOO MINDFUL FOR YOU, and this one's all about ice cream and its peculiar grasp on nostalgia

  

We tell Stig about a Christmas that feels long ago and at the same time doesn’t – it’s the weather right now that calls up the memory: the early dark, not too cold, grey as December often is, the air filled with the jollity of approaching merriment. “We’re old enough to realise that the approach of merriment is sometimes jollier than the actual merriment itself. This is December… we don’t know, exactly, December 21, December 22. The time is not memorable for any reason other than approaching merriment and its promise of good food. Holiday food has abundance as well as festivity. Ruth was not jaded in regards to all things Christmas, not yet – she planned to make and to buy, with us – are you ready? - homemade cheesecake with nutmeg, Marks and Spencer black cherry cheesecake, eggnog, a Baker’s Oven plum pudding, brandy for flaming the plum pudding, tins of butter cookies, fancy Neuhaus chocolates, an abundance of ice cream, mince tarts, squares of tipsy cake, date squares from Simpsons, date turnovers from Dominion.

“Come and meet me at the office,” she said. “We’ll do a big shop before Christmas Day.”

We dressed in a festive outfit that featured every colour of the rainbow: bright green and black plaid trousers, a pink shirt, a red sweater, a tartan scarf. We jumped on the Ellesmere bus as dusk began to settle. There was nothing dismal about the dark and the cold. When we think of this, it is with great cosiness and a sense that all is well. Can we recreate the impending jollity if we keep the memory alive and well? 

Ruth was finishing work when we arrived. She had boxes of Laura Secord and Black Magic chocolates on her desk, little gifts from clients and her boss. We picked up Danish pastries at the Scandinavian bakery in the strip mall below her legal office. We stopped in at Franklin’s groceteria, buying pineapple-orange ice cream, Granny’s butter tarts and frozen vegetables. We went to Darrigo’s Italian market for big black winter grapes, salad fixings, potatoes, fresh ribs and a turkey. We bought a box of Paxo stuffing. 

When we returned home, we carried at least six great big bags of groceries. Food is the biggest part of this memory, Stig. If we really press our memory, we can draw up more and more of it, though we’re not exactly sure if the memory is truly attached to this holiday shopping, or of the festivity of food per se. We think of the big Coffee Crisps and KitKats she bought at Bi-Way along with Kjeldsen’s butter cookies – modest but splendid to a bourgeoise foodie with the sweet tooth of a child! Sure, we’ll pile up all the festive food memories we have and attribute them to Christmas week. Always a quart of Laura Secord ice cream. Dutchies, bear claws. Were we obsessed? Don’t answer that.”

“You were. Too late not to answer – I had no intention of hesitating. You were the most quietly obsessed foodie we’ve ever met. You’ve told me about gargantuan sundaes you virtually inhaled as a youth. You saved menus. You dated blokes who turned to you at an ice cream parlour and asked you, in deference, what they should order. And you replied! You responded! Have a banana split– one scoop peanut butter and chocolate, one scoop German chocolate cake, one scoop fudge brownie, hot caramel sauce, hot fudge sauce, marshmallow sauce, nuts, cherries, whipped cream. That’s f***ing insane, there, Badapple – first that someone should ask you something like that, and second that you should reply without batting an eye.”

“Well, now – that may be something that goes in the oubliette. It’s not something of which one should be inordinately proud, is it? And yet, yes, here we are, Stig, we’re getting misty-eyed at the recollection of it all. We felt if not revered in the world of ice-cream combinations, then certainly respected. Tell me what’s best. What do you recommend, o seer of knowledge? We suppose most would see it as ineffectual behaviour on the part of the bloke. But we knew our stuff. There was a restaurant downtown, in the Eaton Centre, that had a solid menu of typical 80s diner food, but the gargantuan sundaes you were mentioning earlier – never to be forgotten: (and here we close our eyes to think back, back, back.)

The Strawberry Blonde

Gobs of strawberry ice cream, smothered with honey and crunchy sponge toffee. Topped with whipped cream and some more of that super crunch. Have more fun. 

The Dutch Girl

Vanilla, chocolate and butter pecan or coffee ice creams, layered with chocolate sauce and hot fudge sauce. Topped with whipped cream and walnuts.

The Monte Cristo

Butter pecan ice cream, taffy syrup. And oodles of salted cashews topped with whipped cream.

Here Comes the Fudge

Mounds of chocolate ice cream and hunks of fudge nut brownie smothered in hot chocolate fudge sauce and chopped walnuts. Topped with whipped cream and one more brownie. (Hot!)

“Oh, Mr. Greenjeans. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Which one did you order? Did you try all of them?”

“If we had been as gastronomically independent as we are today, Stig, we’d have blasted through everything on that menu that sounded overwhelming and a bit unusual. Strawberry and sponge toffee. Here and now? We’d be all over that – and we’d mix it up with that cashew thing as well. We don’t know which of these we ordered, but we would have been likely to share with the bloke who could not make up his own mind, and we would have ordered something he liked for the pair of us. Yes, we know. Stop rolling your eyes like that. We learned our lesson. We made up some glorious concoctions on our own in years to follow, without any interference, maybe with a bit of that weak-will, which we saw as wistful admiration.”

“Was the admiration wistful, or you?”
“Eh, we were. We wouldn’t have known at the time that choosing someone’s ice cream sundae was going to be the last time anyone gave us something that had even a whiff of admiration to it. We’ve discussed opportunists to death, and the weak-willed bloke eventually envied our career success but did not feel we deserved or earned it. The ice cream sundae decision was the pinnacle of our success. And then there’s Banksy, who has resented, resents, and will resent. It’s tiring to stay one step ahead of insults, but it would be exhausting to run away and face punishment. Banksy is forever toeing a moral line, and it is this line upon which he wrests with the dilemma of controlling another’s destiny. One keeps one’s friends close, but one should keep one’s enemies closer. It is neither invigorating nor saddening to understand that he is an enemy. So many enemies in a lifetime thus far, Stig, though Banksy is the most dangerous one of the lot. It is no coincidence that the group of opportunists – and how many of these have we to date? – look at Banksy and consider him to be one of them, though less deserving, less clever – a lucky stiff who controlled his way into striking pay dirt.”

“That’s an expression you don’t hear every day, Badapple.”

“It’s a good one, though, like ‘Put that in your pipe and smoke it.’”

“After all this talk of ice cream sundaes, and of allowing another to choose one’s masterpiece, I believe – I am certain -  I could enjoy something like one of yours. I could easily conceive of it and design it in all its extravagance. I, however, do not have the means or the physiognomy to get up and make one – let alone buy one.”

So, this is the way Stig winds up having an ice cream sundae for his second birthday. He does not believe that he is acquiescing into a state of weak-will, the same way the other fellow did: “What should I have?”  but, ultimately, that’s what he does. When he is resting, or at play, or finishing up a meal, he is dreaming up lily-gilding confections.  We have a couple of months before the big day, plenty of time to google DOG ICE CREAM HOMEMADE HEALTHY and see what pops up. Or – we could take him to Baskin-Robbins and put something together that is both tasty and unlikely to hurt his delicate constitution. We have talked long enough about the gustatory pleasures of which we’ve obsessed. It is time that Stig enjoys a touch of obsession himself.  We like the notion that he recognises obsession; we’re sure he’s long considered tail-chasing and the scent of dead animals as his. He knows about Banksy’s hiding bags of cookies in the trunk of the car (“And he didn’t even share?”), though this he sees as selfishness and not obsession. For our part, we smile gently but don’t discuss it. “Banksy like to play his cards close to his chest,” is the flying nun of responses. Well, almost. Stig is our confidante, our mentor and our mentee all in one. “If we dared to analyse the fellow, it would have been in our best interest to do so long ago, when there was more to gain by it. We know nothing about him, never did know anything about him, was discouraged and thwarted from knowing anything about him. This leads us to believe that Banksy’s core is like an onion, layers upon layers, with only more onion in the heart of it. “How would you know?” he might say, and he’d be right. It would not be bothersome. We would reply, “We knew this all along... that we know nothing.”

Hey ho - the world has gone wacky, but here's another section of TOO MINDFUL FOR YOU

 Stig is howling. The yard is full of bogles, he says. Sometimes this means he has torn apart enemies that are half-destroyed tennis balls. This time there’s a coyote in the neighbourhood, and it’s helping itself to small cats, dogs, rabbits, young raccoons, chipmunks, anything in its path – any animal in the vicinity. We ask that Stig be taken out on a leash in the nighttime. His instinct is to spring and to destroy perceived animal enemies but are not sure of his strength; we fear he is no match for a wily coyote. “Wile E. Coyote,” we say, to ourselves, as Stig hears nature taking its brutish course outside. He used to enjoy nighttime bunny-watching, but rabbits are in short supply lately. 

“And why do you suppose there’s a dearth of rabbits,” we ask, as we snap the leash onto his collar. “Last spring we saw a dozen a night.” We wouldn’t be surprised if we saw the lawns littered with bones and shreds. Even unlucky squirrels, squashed while running across the road, have been scraped up and eaten. Not a scrap left. The coyote population has doubled, trebled, and is unstoppable. 

“The rat population is burgeoning as well,” Stig notes. Last summer we saw two of them nosing carelessly on the back porch while Stig was asleep upstairs. We were horrified, and Banksy shrugged. “You can’t stop rats. Unless you want to put warfarin everywhere, and I can’t agree to that.”

“You can stop rats. Stop putting out garbage for them to feast upon.” Is this ironic? It sounds ironic, and we grin as soon as Banksy has left the room. 

TOO MINDFUL FOR YOU: cast of characters

 

Badapple: She was almost named something else, and whatever that name was, it was better. She's an artist who hangs around with composers and other artists, most of whom are more gifted, more accomplished, more successful, and more famous. She is envious of the Group of Seven, who owed their rise to national stardom to their independent wealth. If we can remember the name we were going to go with, we'll switch to it. 

Stig: Badapple's wonderful canine companion and mentor. He is a white bull terrier who is extremely fond of creature comfort and culinary luxury. 

Franz (or Banksy - in the first edition he was Banksy. He might still be named Banksy in the final edit.): Badapple's composer spouse. He introduced her to Calvinism, which she both embraces as neo-neo-Calvinism, and despises because of its smug implication of the superiority of its adherents. She knows nothing about him other than his readiness to dislike.

The Group of Seven: They don't appears as characters. But the book revolves around them. 

Sprinkles: An opportunist. Badapple attracts opportunists as liver attracts planaria.

Beetroot: offspring of Badapple.

Bimbo: Another opportunist.

Ruth and Owny: bogle parents of Badapple. 

Excerpt: TOO MINDFUL FOR YOU (context will appear in a subsequent post)

  

“Envy! We spent decades of life figuring out the difference between jealousy and envy, finally settling on the notion that envy is rooted in one’s have-not status: you have a Tiffany diamond, and we do not. We envy you that diamond, we are envious of you for owning the diamond. 

Jealousy, on the other hand, almost always involves a love triangle. For that, we’d have to bring in the person who should have taken you to Tiffany’s but brought a strumpet there instead, then led a wonderful and happy life with the tart, post-Tiffany’s, a life well-led, better than yours or ours, and probably undeserved. The diamond becomes ten diamonds, celebratory diamonds, a trip to Japan and Paris, dinners of tenderloin and designer clothes, all the things you dare not think of lest God frown upon thee and smite as is His will. Bear in mind that we’re not poking fun of the Almighty, we’re just laying out a gameplan of the awful things that envy can bring. Here’s a big thank-you to Franz for bringing this notion to us. We can’t escape.

Envy! We recall issuing a thin trail of drool when we first saw the artists’ dwelling. The Group of Seven, or at least a number within the seven, were an independently wealthy lot. Old money. Two of the seven – Lawren Harris, we think, and, say, John E. MacDonald, because we can’t think of the guy’s real name, decided to design and construct a special building to house the groups’ meetings and goings-on; they’d paint there, create an enclave, live their ideal artists' lives there. Now it’s bothering us that we can’t think of the guy’s real name – we’re sure it wasn’t MacDonald. Was it A. J. Casson? Were we even right thinking the other one was Lawren Harris? 

And – grand pause here – they did it. They built the place of their artists’ dreams. Why did they do it?”

“That reminds me of the wonderfully tasteless joke that was rejected by the New Yorker,” says Stig. “There’s a dog wearing an Elizabethan collar, the cone of shame, and he approaches another dog who’s lounging in his doghouse and says, ‘I have an extremely important favour to ask you.’”

“I don’t… I don’t get it, Stig.”

“It’s coarse dog humour, and I promise that I’ll explain it to you by the by. But the tacit punchline is the answer to your question. They built it because they could.”

“We don’t envy the Group of Seven. That is – we do admire them, and who wouldn’t envy the achievement of becoming the archetype of Canadian art? They’re not exactly our peers in the art realm; that would certainly be elevating ourselves. They’re history: towering, majestic, historic figures in the world of art and in Canadiana. They were already quite old or dead when we were barely out of childhood, let alone young and potential artists. A good way to put it in context is to remember that our friend Leonardo used to shovel snow off A. Y. Jackson’s driveway in the winter. We will further drive our point into the ground by mention of our introduction to the Group of Seven in grade six.”

“Let me guess,” says Stig. “You had one of those paint-by-numbers kits.”

“No, it would have been too early in popular culture for that. Paint-by-numbers has always been low of brow and kitsch-oriented. We may be wrong about it now – the whole enterprise has become popular again. For our eighth? ninth? birthday, every kid who came to our party brought a paint-by-numbers kit as a present. It was fine with us; we were the school artist and the plethora of painting kits proved that. We can still smell those tiny pots of oil paint. Even Ruth and Auld Owny had a kit – we remember watching them working together on two of those paintings at the dinette table. The paintings were of black horses running across a landscape, with, we think, a waterfall in the background of one of them. They were very pleased with their work. They put the finished paintings in wooden frames and hung them in the dining room. We know, we know – don’t give me stink eye -  these kits were the latest thing. It’s a fond memory, Stig. The smell of the oil paint, watching what we thought were two artists collaborating at their magnum opus – it’s all part of a rare, golden, cornfed moment. We still have the pieces of those horse paintings somewhere. Eventually, they broke apart, but we saved the pieces. Is that ridiculous? What value is the elusive sweet memory from childhood? What would Proust say?”

“You’re giving me the Proustian version of an answer. What was your introduction to the Group of Seven?”

“Our grade six class went on a field trip to the McMichael Gallery in Kleinburg, which is home to the nation’s biggest collection of Group of Seven paintings. It was important that we, as eleven-year-olds, see the paintings that represented our culture, which in turn was represented by the country’s vast and unique landscape. We were not bowled over. We didn’t think much about the collection, but instead were taken by an installation that we watched being unboxed during our visit. We saw the paintings of a new Canadian talent, the nature painter and realist Glen Loates. Realism was something that impressed us more than creative expression. We ran straight home after the trip and began painstakingly detailed pencil sketches of our pet bunnies. Realism became an obsession. 

Later, we understood the significance of the Jack Pine as a symbol of everything culturally relevant north of Superior. That sums it up. We figured out what we were supposed to find important, and we did it.” 

“Did you get anything out of the experience other than doggedness?”

“Oh, sure – otherwise we wouldn’t be having this conversation. Eventually we realised that it was a pretty big thing to choose to paint snow in every colour except white.”

“Because they can, though.”

“It’s less burdensome to prove one’s creative mettle when one doesn’t fret about fuel bills and a new roof. The creative juices run freely, and all that, like a well-seared tenderloin on the frypan. We think you’ll like the simile.”

Anything with a tenderloin in it captures Stig’s attention! In the freezer we have a small one waiting for him, which we plan to thaw and pan-sear, shouting “Just for you!” at the moment of its perfection. The truth is we cannot bear to be parted from him, and that realisation alone is enough to make us want to ply him with treats and gifts of affection – though the tenderloins are usually shared. There is nothing that brings us more happiness than sharing a tidbit with him. He will get the lion’s share of the tenderloin.

Merry Kringle