Ela Orchard

Just looking to get out of the house on this rain-prone Sunday (and, admittedly, trying to tether ourselves to as much of fall as you can in early-late-September), we drove to Rochester, WI (which I wrote about back in August) to get apples & cider at Ela Orchard.

Ela is owned by author Jane Hamilton's husband's family, going back three generations.

The area where they sell the apples is far back from the road down a long, sloppy mud road. On the way in, there's a towering house that's falling apart in all the right ways. The "stand" itself is an old barn with a covered area where wooden crates filled with various kinds of apples. Lots of varieties I'd never heard of.

We walked away with a total of 5lbs; two kinds of hard, bitterish apples: Liberty & Wealthy.

We also got four Parker Pears. An even number, the woman working the stand said, so we didn't have to fight over who got more.

They have goats there who come when you clap, like dogs. Except today, I guess, because they refused to come out into the rain from under shelter.

You can sample apples straight from the crates before committing to a few pounds. The cores you toss into the fenced areas where the goats live. They eat your leftovers as snacks.

Wisconsin Folk Music Project

Really incredible collection of Wisconsin folk musician photos from the state Historical Society's Wisconsin Folk Music Project. Check out a bunch more.

It would be really great to visit the Mills Music Library at UW-Madison to check out their archives of recordings, photos, and documents.

Daytrip?

Honey Creek

The baby's getting anxious and cramped up there in A— womb. Figuring there are only a few weeks left to do whimmy things, we loaded up the car today with vague plans and ended up at the sprawl of cornfields, cow pastures, and unincorporated towns near Honey Creek.

Our only real goal was to wander around and check stuff out. See what was there.

We got a dizzying history lesson from Frank and Nancy down at Stir Crazy in Rochester. They spent a good half hour dropping names of the famous people who've been to their coffee "shoppe". Not bragging, just proud. Tony Romo and Jane Hamilton, like that. But more than anything, Frank seemed gladdest of the fact that he hangs his hat (a Yankees one, which you'd assume to be a punishable offense so close to Milwaukee) in the same town that sprung up Ginger Beaumont, the first guy to ever bat in a World Series game.

See, when my daughter asks me what I did for fun before she was born, I'm glad I'll be able to show her photos like these and just say, "Not a whole lot. Wondered around, checked things out. Saw what was there."

(View the rest of the photo set)

forward

Flatlanders (the Illini) would come up to help mine the southern part of Wisconsin. This was early on, the days of roadhouses, rolling uninterrupted farmland, ghosts, and trees grasping for the clouds.

Being of less hardy stock than those indigenous to our counties and towns, these feeble flatlanders would head back to where they were from at the peep of cold.

Our people, solid as steel and with icicles suspended in our blood, would rush in and take over the dwellings left abandoned by our southern neighbors. We'd inhabit them like badgers and continue mining throughout the brutality of winter. It had to be done. And we did it. Deep freeze or not.

That's how we became The Badger State.

Have you heard that story?

I love, love, love this land. How could you not?

(More photos from my weekend trip.)

What I Did On My Late Autumn Vacation

Seems doubtful that the kids latched onto the earnestness of my threats of making them pen their "What I Did On My Late Autumn Vacation" essays, which I guess makes me an unsatisfactory dole-r out-er of things. I'm use to disrespect. It costs nothing but hurt feelings.

So, between sniffles and snobs, I'll tell you, dearest, gentlest reader, that our little ensemble makes some horrific music. We lack mastery of our instruments and firelight does nothing to illuminate vocal talent of any stripe. But that didn't stop of from blanching the the hell out of the blues; it was so bad that I swore that I could almost see the genre's ghost flutter away, high over the forest, far past the lake. But during our disservice, we laughed and drank, and then fell asleep before the the new day got its bearings.

Of course this gave way to rising with the sun. A slow, rain-slogged morning. Lots of coffee, then tossing soggy tennis balls as far into the lake as the dogs' leashes would allow.

Once we got going, we mostly spent the day terrorizing the small town thrift stores. We tend to prefer the ones brimming with things, the ones with a woozy lack of order.

And so, with the car newly packed, we went cabin-bound. Soon, we were greeted by W&J. Then we began assembling a meal, a process during which I feel inordinately in love with how easy it so to make bread sticks. Bread sticks! Oh my fuck.

Lots of American music. Trivia from the 1990s. Beer, beer, beer. Bed, eventually. Haze entered the picture at some point, but I can't pinpoint where it crept in or how it managed to escape. Next thing I remembered was daylight, revitalized.

First thing that happened was that W&J were called away on a domestic emergency. Those of us left started early, tracking food and brewpubs. A lunch of Pizza, washed down samples at Old Hayward Eatery & Brew Pub. Their alt was great, so we had a pint.

After, we modeled our red and black flannel jackets in photos on the site of the Lumberjack World Championships, which was understandably shuttered for the season. But here's a photo of Amy and me, with the rest of our bunch filling the background:


Then, after turning down the exorbitant cost of getting within kissing distance of the world's largest muskie (one half-a-city- block long and four stories tall), we decided to stand in front of the "electric" fence that portioned off the behemoth and instead burn film at a distance.

Thirsty, and wanting to continue the aquatic theme, we stopped at the wonderfully well-restored Angry Minnow brewery for more samplers. The Imperial IPA was the standout for me, but everything was nurseable, so we did. We nursed under a bold stamp of late afternoon sunlight until there was nothing left.

Again, the haze entered. A good dose of haze should be the ubiquitous theme of the any good weekend, I'd argue.

Anyway, under the haze, we ran like banshees in the lakefront acreage. The dogs bounded every which way. Then we dumped damp leaves and twigs in the fire pit and kept waving the lighter over them until a fire took hold. The haze lifted a touch. Eventually, four of were us piled on a queen-sized bed for some (very platonic, thank you very much) atrocious misuse of Hollywood's bankroll.

In the middle of the night, I woke up to a tightness in the old growth forest above my...nethers. Apparently, the tone and timbre of my flesh appealed to a tick, who decided to seek asylum there. Amy, drowsy and squinting out the lamplight, clasped its body between her nails and tugged it out. I slept fitfully for the rest of the night, sore from the pickpick. I'm still nervous of a that a Lyme target might show up, but at the same time curious how the shape would manifest in that assemblage of parts. Uh-huh.

Anyway, I could tell you about Taco Juan's and the hours stuffed with talk radio on the way home, but I'll spare you that. You're likely already a cyber expat, camping out on some other digital continent by this time as it is.

But no harm. I just wanted to get this all down; to explain how it all went down. I aim to live by example, to keep my end of promises. This is what we saw & these are the things we did during our late autumn vacation.

In summary: Fuck the summertime. Viva Wisconsin!