Jesse and her frybread

Grandma Sally Rackliff

Jesse made Indian tacos for a school project tonight. She has to do a “how-to” speech and chose tacos as her subject. We were her test subjects as she made frybread and all the fixins for the first time. As the family’s resident food critic and gourmand (no, that isn’t Cherokee for “fat boy”), I must say that the Indian tacos were a rousing success. We used a recipe for frybread, Cherokee style from the tribal cookbook and made the toppings with vegetarian “hamburger” meat (Jesse is from the Cherokee counterculture movement…). The part that made me proudest was that Jesse used a cast-iron skillet that once belonged to her Great-Grandma Sally Rackliff, a proud Cherokee woman and wonderful cook.

* osda = good in Cherokee. Mmmm Mmmmm = Mmmmm Mmmmm in Cherokee

I'll show you a polar plunge, whale blubber boy

From News 8 in Austin, Texas:

The Polar Plunge is an annual tradition at Barton Springs Pool.  For some, New Year’s Day means making resolutions, watching parades or catching up on sleep they didn’t get the night before. But others were ready to plunge into 2009. Hundreds of Central Texans took a dip in Barton Springs Pool for the annual Polar Plunge. … The water remains about 70 degrees year-round. But, some kids were still a bit hesitant to take the plunge. “It’s pretty much hard and it really gets me tired,” young participant Andrew Smith said.

Note to our family and friends in Texas: If the water is 70 degrees year-round, that bear ain’t white…. Let us show you how we do it in Minnesota (note use of the royal “we”):

Now that's cold water....

From the St. Paul Pioneer Press:

Absolutely the craziest thing I’ve ever done,” says Nam Nguyen, of Apple Valley, who climbs out of Lake Minnetonka on an ice-encrusted ladder Thursday during the 19th annual On It & In It Lake Minnetonka Ice Dive in Excelsior, Minnesota. With morning temperatures in the teens, more than 900 brave souls — a world record, according to organizers — plunged into the icy waters to greet the new year and raise money for the American Lung Association.