Snow!!! and other swear words

It snowed today and I’m ready to move away! The thought of another winter here is maddening, and there, dear reader, you have a clue to some of the posts in this blog. If some seem a bit disjointed or, at best, out of touch with reality, it is because as the approaching winter nears, my lunacy increases exponentially. Some of you may beg to differ with that analysis thinking that I’m always ‘off’, or odd, or unbalanced, or ‘different’, or sick, or whatever the euphemism is currently. Mai non, mon ami. It is the winter.

But, on a happier note, we attended an excellent concert Friday (December 5, 2008) in which Katie and the Hillcrest Choral sang with the Idaho Falls Symphony. The Choral was, as always, perfect and the Symphony sounded as good as any I’ve heard. All in all, it was an excellent evening.

You have to love the English language. Choral, pronounced like corral, which has a whole other meaning. Imagine listening to some one speaking saying "we let the cows out of the corral", and thinking they were talking about a choral.

"We’re going to let the cows out of the corral," John said, answering Aja’s question about what he was doing Saturday.
"You call them ‘cows’?" Aja said.
"Sure, that’s what they are."
"But, don’t they care?" Aja asked, aghast at John’ s cavalier attitude toward the women who sang in the choral. "Besides, do they not like being in the choral?"
"No, they hate it. They are always belly aching to get out." John answered.
"Then why did they get in there to begin with?" Aja asked.
"We put them in to keep them out of trouble," John explained.
"To keep them out of trouble?" Aja said, repeating John’s statement to try to make some sense of it all.
"You betcha," John said. "Just last week, one got out of the corral and wandered around in traffic for about a half hour. We finally threw a rope on her and towed her back to the corral behind a truck. She was mighty angry after that."
"Well, I would imagine so," Aja said, understandingly.
"And, we’re gonna be branding them so we have to let them out of the corral so we can get them in the branding chutes," John added.
"Branding? What is that?" Aja asked, not familiar with the term.
"That’s when you heat up an iron with a symbol on it, then place it on them so it burns your brand on them. That way you know they are yours," John explained.
Aja just stared at John for a moment. "We do not brand in India. Especially not those in the choral."
"Well, it would be hard in the corral. You get them out of the corral and put them in a branding chute first. That way, they can’t get away, or kick you, or what ever," John said.
"I would kick too if you did that to me," Aja said
"Sure you would, but we don’t do that to men, just the cows. We also milk them," John added.
"You milk the .....cows....in the choral?" Aja asked, stumbling over the word 'cows'. He wasn't accustomed to calling women 'cows'.
John shook his head. "Of course not, we let them out of the corral and put them in the barn. That way we can put their heads between the slats in the feed chute so they don't start jumping around when we attach the milker to them."
"A milker?" Aja asked, afraid to hear the answer.
"It's a machine that you attach to the cow and it sucks the milk out of 'em. Just slick as a whistle, and fast too," John explained.
"So, do you milk them by hand in India?"
"No, we do not milk them in India," Aja said.
"Oh yeah, that's right. I forgot they are special in India. Around here we don't treat 'em as nice as you do there," John said, smiling.
"America is too weird for me. I don’t think I will ever understand you here," Aja said, shaking his head and walking off.

Tune in next week, fans, to hear Aja say, "Does it smell like curry in here?"

Well, dear reader, you can see what happens to me when I have to go out and shovel snow, all my blood drains down into my feet in a hopeless attempt at keeping them warm, and therefore, not leaving enough for my brain. I should apologize, but ego compels me to move on and forget the apology. Well talk later.