In Memory of Paul Hemphill

Paul Hemphill -- newspaper columnist extraordinaire, novelist, raconteur --passed away yesterday. You can read the New York Times obit here.

Hemphill, a former minor league baseball player in Panhandle Florida back in the 1950s, wrote a novel based on those experiences -- LONG GONE. It contains one of my favorite jokes. I couldn't put my hands on LONG GONE to quote the joke exactly. But here it is. And if it makes you smile then smile in the memory of Paul Hemphill:

A husband and wife were concerned that their 12-year-old son had never spoken a word. They were a well-to-do couple and they were totally beside themselves because they had given their child everything he could ever possibly want.

They took their son to the world's best doctors. All of them examined the boy, but found nothing wrong with him.

One Sunday, the family sat down to dinner. And out of the blue, the boy piped up and said: "The peas are cold."

The parents were ecstatic. Their beloved child had finally spoken!

"This is wonderful," the father said to the boy. "But I have to ask, after all these years of not speaking, why on earth did you say: 'The peas are cold?'"

The boy shrugged.

"Everything else has been OK up until now," he said.

The Man with the Fish on His Foot

The last vestiges of the red tide had just about disappeared by the time we arrived at Boca Grande for our annual week at the beach. And while the breeze carried a tinge of acrid, fishy aroma, the shoreline was no longer the carpet of carcasses it had been just a couple of weeks earlier.

So I set out on an early morning walk just like I always do when I’m at the beach—barefoot. After all, to imprison feet in shoes while going on a beach walk is, to use a comparison oft applied to another, even-more-gratifying sensual experience, like wearing a raincoat in the shower. There’s something about that whole sand-between-the-toes thing that is essential to beachgoing.

I’d made it about a half mile when, flush with the vigor of an aging body finally beginning to warm up and deceived into thinking I was actually in shape, I thought: What the heck, why not jog for a while? I broke into a trot. It felt pretty good. My stride was long, my pace not bad. I figured I might have a future starring in those TV commercials where a middle-aged guy runs down a beach with a couple of golden retrievers bounding on either side, then arrives on the porch of his beach house as his wife pours him a big glass of lemonade and the voiceover talks about a prescription medicine that would put some bounce in his step and some lead in his pencil.

The next thing I knew there was a dagger in my right foot and I was tumbling onto the sand. I sat up. I reached for my foot. And there, stuck to it, was a catfish.

For the record, it was a Gafftopsail catfish, bagre marinus, most notable for its long curving dorsal fin, a dorsal fin with a barb like a fishhook, a dorsal fin now impaled just south of my big toe. The fish itself was a relatively recent arrival on shore and had washed up under some seaweed. But its freshness was of little solace.

The pain was fierce. I hollered. I cussed. I grabbed the fish and gave it a yank. It didn’t budge. It hurt even worse. I cussed some more. I yanked on the fish again. Nothing. Except excruciating, ungodly pain.

So I did the only thing I could do. I stood up and started gimping my way back to our condo, the catfish flapping against my sole. I felt like that guy in Carl Hiaasen’s Double Whammy, the one who is forced to walk around with a dead pit bull clamped onto his arm. These things happen in Florida.

And I am here to tell you that, should you ever feel lonely and want someone to talk to, then just attach a catfish to your foot. Or any other available body part. It is a real conversation starter. First, people’s mouths drop open. Then they start to say something, but, you know, what do you say to a man with a fish on his foot? Still, they try.

Said one woman, “Is that a shark?”
Said another: “Has this ever happened to you before?”
And one guy, a real smart aleck, actually said: “Hey, did you know there was a fish on your foot?”

Back at the condo, my devoted wife donned gloves and tried to separate me from my piscatorial companion. She yanked, she pulled. I yelled, I cussed. Finally, we found a hacksaw, cut the fish from its fin, and proceeded to the emergency clinic. Incisions were involved. I’ll spare you the details.

“Next time,” the doctor said, “wear shoes.”

No way. It’s still not worth it.

Forbidden Fruit

My cousin in Miami, Edith, sent me a box big box of mangoes the other day, bless her heart. It cost her a ton in postage and I owe her big time because the box contained some of her precious Early Golds, quite possibly the best mangoes on the planet.
The way it is these days, you can go to the supermarket and find mangoes any time of year. In the fall, winter and spring, they ship them in from Mexico, Brazil or Thailand. They are passable, I suppose, better than no mangoes at all.
But anyone with real mango lust and no cousin Edith in Miami, should take a drive to Pine Island, along Charlotte Harbor. It's mango heaven. You can load up with a bushel or two of the local varieties—Tommie Adkins, Hayden or, my favorite, the Valenciana—and happily sate yourself for a week or so, enjoying mangoes in all their manifestations. Mango margueritas. Mango chutney. Sliced mangoes on vanilla ice cream. Or plain old sliced mangoes with maybe a squeeze of lime juice on them.
I make my Pine Island pilgrimage every summer and I always think of Jack Floweree, who used to farm mangoes near Bokeelia. Floweree was nothing less than a mango prophet. Stop by his place – he called it the Mango Factory—and he would preach the many healthful benefits of eating mangoes and share his unflinching belief that mangoes are indeed the Forbidden Fruit of the bible.
“Mangoes have both good and evil in them,” Floweree would say. “The skin is poison to some folks and can make them break out in the hives. But the fruit is heaven itself.”
In Floweree’s version of the Book of Genesis, Eve plucked a mango from the Tree of Knowledge and offered to share it with Adam.
“You know how it is when you peel a mango. You make a mess and get mango juice all over you,” Floweree said. “That’s the way it was for ol’ Eve. She peeled that mango and when she was done she was covered in mango juice. She gave some of the fruit to Adam and he devoured it, thought it was the best thing he’d ever eaten, just had to have some more. And so ol’ Adam he started licking that mango juice off of Eve and, well, the two of them got to carrying on.
“That’s when the heavens parted, God pointed down and told Adam he had to leave the Garden of Eden,” Floweree said. “His voice boomed out: ‘Man, go!’”
Which leads us directly, with a few groans, to the very best way to eat a mango.
First, select your mango and find a sharp knife. Carry knife and mango to the bathroom. Take off all your clothes. Then get into the shower with your mango and your knife.
Slice the skin into four sections and peel it off. If, like me, you are a complete mango addict, then you will risk getting a little “poison” from the skin on your lips just so you can gnaw the fruit from the peel. Once the peel is dispatched, sit down in the shower. Hold the fruit in your hand and go at it. Let that mango juice drip where it may.
And luxuriate in the goodness.
If the heavens part and a voice booms out, “Man, go!” then you are on your own. But I suggest you go get another mango, peel it, and offer the Big Guy a slice.

Bake a Cake for Obama, Make a Pie for McCain

So here we are, one week out from Election Day, and all this politicking has left me, well ... kinda hungry.

For the record, I'm a Democrat and an Obama supporter. Over the past year or so, I've enjoyed numerous encounters with friends who do not share my political beliefs. For the most part, these have been well-reasoned, reasonably sober, even-toned discussions where we respected each others' opinions and behaved as adults. But there have also been a few knock-down, drag-out confrontations that stopped just short of blood-letting ... and this was with people I'm related to.

For the life of me, I can't understand why these decent human beings can't see things as I do and vote the same as me, but that's what makes this world so interesting, eh?

We have a friend, Bob, a diehard Republican, who has been after my wife for months to bake him his favorite cake. It's a Portuguese honey-almond cake that comes from a 30-year-old recipe out of Bon Appetit. Debbie makes it for special occasions and, for my money, it's the best damn cake in the world. If ever there was a cake that could make someone re-think their political beliefs then this is it.

The other day, Debbie baked this most wonderful cake and we presented it to Bob and his wife, Darby, and said: "We've enjoyed our political discussions over the past year and respect your point of view. Please accept this cake as a symbol of our belief in our system of government and the good things that can come from civil discourse. Yes, this is a bribe to change your mind so you'll vote for Barack Obama. But if it doesn't work, then so be it. Enjoy the cake."

So why not have a little fun in these last few days before the Nov. 4 election and, at the same time, get rid of the acrimony that politics can create? Why not offer a respite from rhetoric and the freaking economy and attend to creature comforts? Why not let people on both sides of the political fence support their candidates and honor their differences with... pastry?

To that end, I introduce: Bake a Cake for Obama/Make a Pie for McCain.

Here's how it would work: Pick someone with whom you have been at political odds over the past year. This could be a friend, like my friend Bob, who has held fast to opinions that differ widely from your own, so widely that at times you might have wanted to bash him over the head. Or, it could be a neighbor who has stuck up a political sign in her yard and you've considered it a direct affront to your beliefs.

If you are a Democrat and an Obama supporter, you will give that person a cake. And if you are a Republican and a McCain supporter, you will make that person a pie. You will offer a few kind words, try one last time to change their minds and, done with that, tell them to enjoy the pie/cake.

Will this change the outcome of the election? No way. Will it go a long way toward easing some of the ill-will that has been floating around during this seemingly endless political campaign? I hope so.

And come Nov. 5, the world will be a better place. It has to be ...

You're Gonna Love MAMA

This is a plug for the debut novel by my friend and former newspaper colleague, Deborah Sharp. MAMA DOES TIME came out earlier this month and it is all the things a good book should be -- smart and fast-paced with a big, big heart. As you can tell by the cover, above, it's the first in a series of Florida-based mysteries, set in the area around Lake Okeechobee. The next one, MAMA RIDES SHOTGUN will come out in 2009.

Here's what you need to know: Deborah will be at Urban Think! in downtown Orlando on Saturday, Nov. 1 at noon. Stop by, say hi ... and buy her book. And if you can't make it, look for MAMA at bookstores everywhere...

A Happy Glutton in Charm City

Far be it from me to give the impression that all I did in Baltimore was eat and drink. I also slept and walked and, when time allowed, attended some of the excellent panels at Bouchercon. But far and away my favorite place was Lexington Market, a two-block long warren of vendors selling all manner of food and, well, they may have been selling other things but I was concentrating mainly on food.

The market has been around since 1782 -- it's the self-proclaimed "longest continuously operating market in the world" -- and when no less a food authority than Ralph Waldo Emerson visited back in the 19th century he called it the "culinary center of the universe." Actually, I have no idea whether the famed transcendental poet knew anything about food, but my eating experience at the market was, let's say, transcendental.

I found my way to a joint called Faidley's which, judging by the lines, is the place one must go to sample seafood in B-more. First I polished off a plate of fat, meaty Chesapeake oysters. I'm a big fan of our Appalachicola oysters here in Florida, but these cold-water bivalves might tempt me to switch allegiance. I meant to sample one and then take a photo of the rest, but as you can see, my stomach got the better of me. The oysters were followed by a plate of cherrystone clams, so briny and flavorful that to drizzle sauce upon them would have been sinful. Sadly, I was in such a swoon by the time that I finished the clams that I have no photographic proof they ever existed.

Then came the crab cake. The folks at Faidley's are such crab cake purists that they give you three different choices -- cakes made from lump meat, back meat or the claw. I chose lump ($12.95 for a crab cake the size of a softball.) Let me put it this way: I've always been pretty darn proud of the crab cakes I make at home. But this Faidley crab cake shamed me in such a way that I don't know I can ever make crab cakes again.

If my hotel room had come with a full kitchen, I might have considered buying a bunch of soft-shell crabs to saute for dinner. (As you can tell by the photo, the vendors at Lexington Market are very protective of their soft-shells.) But that would have been overkill. Before the trip was over, I ventured to Little Italy for dinner at Sabatino's (killer eggplant parm and homemade gnocchi), then touched down at Bertha's in Fell's Point for a meal that included oyster stew and tons o' steamed mussels dipped in a variety of sauces like anchovy-tomato and garlic-basil. Bertha's also served three selections of the local brews from Oliver -- Oliver Pale Ale, Oliver Manchester Cream Ale and Oliver Pagan Porter. It would have been rude of me not to try them all. But the most revelatory item from the menu at Bertha's, amid all that seafood, was a plateful of saged chicken livers. Served alongside the mussels and, yes, more crab cakes, they were a most savory delight.

And now, if you'll kindly excuse me, I have to step away for a bit. I'm still walking off the trip to Baltimore...

Bouchercon Bound

I'm packing my bags, getting ready to head for Baltimore and Bouchercon 2008. For those of you not familiar with Bouchercon, it's the annual gathering of mystery writers and mystery fans, named after Anthony Boucher, a science fiction/mystery writer-critic and one of the founders of the Mystery Writers of America. It's expected to draw a couple-three thousand attendees, all of whom have murder on the brain. A lovely group, indeed.

This is my first-ever Bouchercon and I'll be on a 10 a.m. Saturday panel entitled "Yesterday's Newspapers," with authors Rebecca Drake, Jack Getze, Marion Moore Hill and LJ Sellers, moderated by Bryan Gilmer. We'll be talking about reporters and newspapers in mystery novels. A lot to work with here, and it should prove to be a lively discussion. I'm just hoping I can hold up my end of the deal. I've been receiving emails from other panelists who are DOING ACTUAL REASEARCH ABOUT THE TOPIC. So maybe I'll just nod a lot...

Mostly I'll be doing what everyone else comes to Bouchercon to do -- hang out around the hotel bar (there better be several of them) and trade stories with other mystery writers and readers. I'm looking forward to crossing paths with dozens of folks I've had the pleasure to meet through the mystery writing biz, including Jim Born, J.D. Rhoades, Joe Konrath, Tasha Alexander, Don Bruns, Lee Child, Jonathon King, Harry Hunsicker, NM Kelby, Linwood Barclay, Tom Cavanagh, Sean Chercover, and aw hell, if I list everyone then I won't get a lick of real work done today. I'm also looking forward to the Friday cocktail party thrown by my publisher, St. Martin's Minotaur. My editor, Mighty Marc Resnick will be there, along with my publicist, Hector DeJean, and Andrew Martin, the Minotaur publisher. And never one to miss a good time or a free drink, my agent, Jumping Joe Veltre, has also decided to take the train down from New York City. (Private, personal note to my lovely wife, who can't make the trip: I promise not to drink as many beers as the last time I was around Resnick and Veltre. Promise...)

One more thing -- if any of you know Baltimore, please tell me your favorite places downtown for eating oysters, clams, crab cakes and all manner of seafood. I'm turning this into a culinary mission, too. Stay tuned...