Aug. 16, 2005 - 12:22 MDT

A REVOLTIN' DEVELOPMENT

A Saturday and Sunday of pure heaven for this laddie. We had the chance to meet and work with Kate Harper of Caledonian Kitchens at the Scottish Festival at Highlands Ranch in the Denver Area.

Kate is a friend of a cyber-friend of mine, one of long standing. Kate and I have exchanged e-mails and have read each other's output too.

Funny how one can seem to figure out the character of a person by cyber communication. Seems to work for me.

Had my first taste of Haggis, to my delight. All the tales of it being so very disgusting appear to me to be false. Along with that her booth had three kinds of cake (canned), all very alcoholic, Chocolate Burbon, Barbados Rum, and Drambuie. If I were still a drinking man sampling the Drambuie cake would have been my choice. In my drinking days, when I could afford it a blessed nightcap of Drambuie over ice was a delight to my soul. That is before Ever-clear and orange juice became the breath of so-called life to me, ever diminishing orange juice and increasing Ever-clear almost finished me off. Beside the point, my apologies.

Our main duty was to keep the cake samples sliced and on the serving boards (under glass) but if Kate was busy then dishing out tastes of Haggis was also done.

In between we visited and found much common ground, all to great enjoyment. My mental picture of Kate I found to be accurate to the max. What a great lady and a dealer with reality with the attitude that anything can be surmounted.

Saturday was somewhat of a disaster as it began to rain before dawn and continued to be nasty pretty much the whole day. Much mopping up was done and taking care of the attendant problems caused by rain and attending to the folks who came by the booth regardless of the weather, and there were many.

Sunday was much better weather-wise so the people en-masse were astounding.

Being of West Virginia hill country people of Scotch descent, everything about the festival was fascinating. Folks in the full regalia of their clans were beautiful to say the least. Such color in so many different combinations is hard to imagine. Men in kilts, skeann dhu in sox, sporrans in front and a few sporting dirks and a sword or two. Long streaming banners from poles on high fluttering and at times almost horizontal added to the excitement.

The spirit shown by all was exceedingly great, their pride of ancestry and knowlege of clan history showing through. In between busy times I had the opportunity to talk with some of the folks and learn a lot of their clans and histories. Fascinating it was.

It was a great time of laughter and memories for all, which I was able to be a witness.

Makes me wish that all of our days could be spent thus.

Two days of work is about all this old man can handle. Came home Saturday night and hit the sack, up and at 'em again on Sunday. By Sunday night Heather and I were worn to nubbins, we stopped off for a bite and Heather had a form of quesadilla and I had a burrito supreme. By the time we got across town, I made it into the bathroom to toss cookies and everything else. Did this periodically until about three AM. Monday came and went without my permission or knowledge. Heather kept coming in taking my temperature and giving me ice water. Very late in the day she got me up to take my pills and eat a bit, which I did manage by an effort of will to hold down although my stomach didn't like the idea much.

Still waiting to hear that Kate made it home okay.

So, after the resounding good weekend comes the bad Sunday night A REVOLTIN' DEVELOPMENT . . . . . . . . . . .

Blog