Recipe For Your Grandchildren

This week's topic sprang from the fertile mind of the youngest member of the blogging group - our resident teenager Sanjana. Considering I have 2 grandchildren older than her, this topic is even more perplexing, but here goes anyway. I will attack the topic with a twist of sorts - my recipe is for a Saturday. A perfect Saturday like many of the ones I experienced as a kid.

Saturday AM

We will assume that you did not set an alarm to awaken early on this special Saturday. You did agree to call the gang upon rising so the first part of the days recipe is to call the "gang" and set in motion the events of the day. You might down a glass of OJ whilst calling the gang.  Arrange to meet at the local McDonalds for a quick breakfast - you will need some fuel for the day's activities. Meet ya at Mickey D's in an hour you excitedly say  - and after the calls are made, it is off to the kitchen to make your lunch, grab your stuff, and split.

A Healthy Lunch

Grab the bag of Cuties (Mandarin oranges), a couple of apples, the bags of chips from the pantry (healthy is in the eye of the young lunch maker) and a few bottles of Gatorade G2, the cooler and load it with ice and your ahem - healthy lunch selections. Just enough time to get dressed and hit the road. Mickey D's is only about 5 blocks away. You'll make it in plenty of time.

Dress for the ball game of the day - be it soccer, football, basketball or baseball. Gloves and bats - as necessary. While getting dressed you realize the cooler is overkill since you and your siblings all have backpacks. Load the backpacks and leave the cooler on the patio. You can clean it when you get back. Hop onto your chosen mode of transport - skateboard, bike or shank's mare (for the unenlightened, shank's mare was my grandmother's way of telling me to walk if the bike or board were not available). Within 10 minutes or so you meet up with the gang at Mickey D's ready to get some breakfast. Amazingly most of the gang had fries for breakfast. I had a sausage, egg and cheese McMuffin - well - 2 of them and a Coke. 

To the Park

Alright - fueled and ready, cross the street to get dibs on the baseball diamond at Gansberger School for the days activities. In my time 90% of those days were filled playing baseball or football, depending on the time of year. And yes - unlike my time, girls play. Some of the best ballplayers are girls - my niece Sammy got a scholarship to  college at Notre Dame  Demur. Her mom and sisters all played, my brother and sister were jocks. I suppose these days kids are more apt to be going out to play soccer than baseball but the Saturday concept does not give a darn about the game being played - as long as you get home in time for dinner. 

Let the Game Begin

Choose up sides and get the game going. You will only have 5 or so hours to play. Everyone will get 15 or so at bats or scoring chances. If another "gang" shows up, then it is your gang vs them for neighborhood bragging rights. And, if by chance a mud ball fight breaks out, open fire. Mudballs are best after a heavy rain - you grab a handful of grass (the fields were not mowed often) and pull straight up. Then shape the mud at the base like a ball and they will fly straight and true. In 7-10 years of mudball battles no gang members were hurt. 

Game Over

After 4 or 5 hours of serious fun the entire gang will be whupped. Time to head home and work on dinner plans. For me, that meant convincing the folks a trip to Ye Olde Pizza Joynt was in order. The recipe for that was convincing the folks it was more relaxing to head to there than cooking anything at home. Luckily, both parents  recognized the real value in an extra large confusion, a cold beverage and the sounds of the pipe organ blasting away. Confusion? Sausage, hamburger, multiple kinds of cheese, pepperoni, salami, mushrooms, green and black olives, bell peppers, onions, red pepper flakes and a liberal dosing of parmesan all excessively applied, and then baked to perfection so the center was not soggy. It was the perfect ending to a great day - a real recipe for success. And a loud belch.

Yes this is based upon my experience as a kid in Hayward, California. My summer days were very much like this as the neighborhood gang and I headed off to play baseball every day - an activity well documented in the 1993 film The Sandlot.

That's my take on this week's quirky topic courtesy of Sanjana. Please Be sure to check what the other 8-1 bloggers have to say.

"Sage" Advice

My editor suggested recipes for life - like always wear clean underwear, avoid  blind alleys and the like. We all have within us a sensible person and the idiot - unfortunately, we cannot often tell the difference. Lastly, people argue less on a full stomach. 

Maria

Sanjana

Ramanas Musings

Srinivas

Conrad

Padmun & Raju