Shallow Water Catfish and a Baked Stuffed Catfish Recipe...

 To continue our recovery from covid it seemed like a fishing trip would be definitely the ticket. A little deep breathing exercise, some sun and a chance for a good heathy fresh caught supper seemed like just the ticket. 

There were signs of spring on big Lake Sam Rayburn. The boat ramp parking lot pretty full but still easy parking, the lake is up though rumors persist that the level will be dripped for construction work on the damn riprap, water temps in the shallows hitting that magic 65 degrees where everything where all fish in the lake get hungry and the sights of folks moving around and planting fish attractor spots. 

We hit the area called the Canyon for the first time since the water came up. It's a place of islands and shallow flats with an old submerged railroad tram crossing what was a hilltop before the lake came in and deep water near by. We caught mostly channel cats in about 4 feet if water as opposed to the mostly blue cats we had been catching across the lake at the spot known as the deer stand but I did take big fish with this blue. I experimenting with the saltwater popping corks, giving a little pop now and then to attract fish. He never took the big cork under instead just swimming off with it due south down the lake before I turned him back.  

Cathy swings one in. Usually I set up with the wind and it makes the corks lay out for better placement on the spot but I marked a deeper spot with a floating buoy, let the crosswind drift the baits till the reached a shallower spot and that's where the fish held, right at that change, less than a foot.   

News Flash! Dead bait on the bottom fisherman catches bass on lure. Since were were recovering from COVID I told Cathy I did not want to clean 30 or 40 fish but just a few cats for supper and maybe try to locate some white bass. No white bass but she caught one and I caught 3 of these.   

They were light colored from the muddy water but in the photos they look like Kentucky Spotted Bass. WE tossed them back but these are legal fish. If camping would have been a nice blackened fillet on the grill. 

We ended up with 10 catfish. We caught them between 1 and 3pm, a midday bite. As you may know Cathy is not an early riser. I don't think it has occurred to her that if  she fished early she could be home for a nap later. 

I took the big blue and the largest channel cat, four fillets to make a cream cheese bread crumb stuffed supper. 

Soften cream cheese and chop fresh spinach. Fry bacon and reserve stir fry celery, onion, peppers in the grease. Mix these veggies with cream cheese, spinach, a squeeze of fresh lemon and one cup of bread crumbs. Season Cajun, Italian, Greek, your pick. Place two fillets on greased cookie sheet on top of a bit of butter and top with stuffing. Top this with the other two fillets and a sprinkle of your seasoning choice. Top each with a slice of bacon. I baked for 15 minutes at 350 then broiled to brown a bit. Served with cheesy oven roasted potatoes topped with the reserved bacon crumbles.       

  The shallow bite is on. It will keep you healthy. I'm ordering more catfish bait today. 

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How Many Streams...

 Famed record producer Jim Dickinson who played with the Rolling Stones, his sons formed the band The North Mississippi All-stars had a metaphor for the music business. He said it's a long tube of money traveling overhead through the sky. With much difficulty you claw your way up into it where it's a dirty, crowded, hot and degrading effort to stay there and get the money. Folk singer Otis Gibbs, I have tickets to see Otis next month, added to this by saying that this tube of money has leaks. A DIY guy like Otis sets buckets under these leaks and makes a living by going around checking his buckets and therefore avoids the nasty business of getting in the tube and staying there. 

There was recently an article in the New Yorker Magazine about a famous record executive Lucian Grainge and the future of AI in the music industry. All that was interesting in it's own right but the article included this statistic from the research company Luminate. In 2023 there were 184 million tracks available on various streaming platforms. 86.2 % received fewer than a thousands plays. 24.8% or about 45 million songs received zero plays. There are 120,000 new tracks uploaded each day and many of these are not music at all but are "functional music" for a task such as meditating or exercising and are titled "Baby White Noise" and "Rain on Windshield." It's estimated they get 15 billion streams a month. A vacuum sound recently hit #7 on the Swiss Music Charts. The article pointed out that AI was likely to increase all this and there are agreements being signed so that artists cam make AI "functional" versions of their songs. 

I haven't listened to any of this. What I have done is analyze my own streaming. My YouTube "Reggae on Tuba Man" has had 12 plays. That puts me somewhere under the 86% but well above the 24% that got a big fat zero. 

My best upload of all time has 18,000 plays. "I am the Bread of Life" a classic Catholic favorite of which  this video was a rehearsal for Karl Dutt's funeral. Of course the comments are a bit mixed ranging from "the best version I have heard" to "you turned a classic hymn into a cheap dancehall number" so you mileage various with publication. Actually I was trying to make the tuba thing into a reggae dancehall number but but at least they are talking about me. 

My facebook uploads generally get 25 to 400 views and I didn't bother to count my plays on soundcloud or bandcamp but I am getting what I wanted. People, some my friends and some strangers listen to my music and I am not getting dirty, hot or degraded. Those buckets are not catching any drips from the big tube but my cigar box guitar building bucket caught a pretty steady stream a few years ago. 

If you are going to make something, make it. Stats show it will be better than 24% of what is out there but might not get as many plays as "A Dog, Snoring." That's a cultural thing it's not about you. . 

   

         

The Langston Hughes Project at The Pines Theater....

When I was a kid my brother and I often went to the movies on Saturday morning at the old Pines Theater in downtown Lufkin, Tx. The line for tickets snaked out the door, along the street and bent back into the ally just north up First Street from the entrance. I remember it being a big deal and a disappointment when I turned 13 years old and the price for entrance went to 50 cents. What should have been a big deal and a disappointment was at that time in my little southern town Black people couldn't drink out of the same water fountain as whites and if they had 50 cents to attend the Pines they could only sit separately in the balcony. This was such a "this is the way it is" moment in time that while I saw the drinking fountains with the white and colored labels I never noticed the location of the entrance where Black people bought their tickets and entered the theater.      

 The Pines is nicely redone after all these years and the Angelina Arts Alliance hosts some very nice shows there including last night's "Ask Your Mama, 12 Moods for Jazz" by the Langston Hughes Project. This was a great performance and jazz combo headed by Dr. Ron McCurdy, a music Professor at USC and a fine trumpet player. It's a multi media project of spoken word poetry, live music and visual projections to accompany poet Langston Hughes's epic early 1960s jazz poem detailing the struggle for artistic and social freedom. Hughes never saw this work performed. It's a good show. 

Dr. McCurdy also conducted a workshop at Angelina College earlier that day and as an opening several local poets, accompanied by the jazz trio of piano, bass and drums read their works. I am sorry I did not get their names.  

 My ticket for this show cost closer to $50 than 50 cents but it's was not a big deal. There were probably others in the audience that attended those same Saturday morning shows I did back in the day. We all sat together in the main part of the theater. I don't think any balcony seats sold. We've come a long way and I'm up to keep traveling.   

 

Usher, Brass Bands, Belly Dancing, It's All Short Steps...

 I went to a kids event. One of those drop by and trick or treat things with my grandkids. As I walked across the parking lot I passed someone's Pop-Pop sitting in his car, either too scared or too selfish to come in. I think maybe it was the latter as he was blasting the rock band Led Zeppelin from the tiny speakers in the family grandkid transporter. Have you heard this band? Some of the songs are "Whole Lot of Love" and "Dazed and Confused." I felt like saying "Hey man, there's kids here!" To be fair I do own one Led Zeppelin album. It's one that came out that summer when my wife, Cathy was a teenager and she spent every free moment at the beach cultivating future skin cancers so it's like a nostalgic favorite. These days she plays it while getting ready for appointments with her skin specialists. Yeah, Led Zeppelin equals trouble all these years later. 

Usher, a rap/R&B/neo soul singer who was born after that favorite Led Zeppelin album came out and recorded his first record in 1994 played the Super Bowl halftime show this year. I watched it. I thought it was good. Some comments I saw were "crappy" "ungodly" and "terrible." Since Usher has sold about 60 million albums worldwide and no telling how many streams on Spotify I'd guess there was a lot of people who enjoyed the show.

Just as Led Zeppelin has some musical roots in American blues music Usher showed some cultural roots to his music by having the Jackson State Marching Band, the Sonic Boom of the South on the field. I'm only an amateur musicologist but I will put forth the theory that the hip hop/R&B style dancing has some of it's roots in the drum majors and twirler routines and the half time shows of the Historically Black Colleges and University Bands. HBCU bands have a long history of appearances at Super Bowls. Usher was paying his dues and bringing culture, one you may not be familiar with to your living room. 

         

Once on a visit to New Orleans, our first one since Katrina, we had dinner at an Asian restaurant downstairs from the Dragon's Den club. It's no longer there but I had the best fish soup ever and afterwards we went upstairs to the club for the show. The opening act was belly dancers. Belly dancing if you are not a fan is the oldest form of dance, has been incorporated into some R&B dance routines and is considered a healthy weight bearing and strengthening exercise for all ages and abilities. Probably doesn't matter what sex you identify as either. After the belly dancers the Soul Rebels Brass Band performed. The Soul Rebels at the time were one of the modern New Orleans Brass Bands blending soul, funk, jazz, rock and the New Orleans tradition all into one blend. It was a good show and someone told me that night that all the band members had been drum majors at HBCUs. Band nerds. At break time during rehearsals they probably stand around and tell funny stories about what their music theory professor said during class when they were in college.  

   When you see a show like Usher's Super Bowl performance go a bit deeper. After all sometimes you see New Orleans Bands Performing rock covers including Led Zeppelin tunes. 

Don't be afraid, don't be selfish. Let everybody have their music. They are going to no matter what you think. 

 

Mardi Gras Galveston...

They say as you age you may be faced with lower expectations. If Mardi Gras in Galveston or as planned for next weekend in Shreveport is lower expectations compared to the good old like when me and Cathy went on our second date to Mardi Gras in New Orleans I'll take it. It certainty is easier to keep up with a grandkid on the Seawall or the family viewing area in Shreveport than on Bourbon St. 

This past weekend is considered Mardi Gras for the locals in Galveston. My son in law Tim works for Galveston County and we found a spot to watch the parade right next to one of his co workers and family. You can pay to get in The Strand area where there are food booths and live music but standing on the Seawall is good free fun.     

A crazy Mardi Gras Lady waits patiently for the parade. 

We drove down to Rose and Tim's, put the camper in the driveway, spent two nights and then all drove to Galveston with lawn chairs and a picnic lunch. Warren and Coraline had actually made a Mardi Gras in New Orleans when they were young, It was a trip when they were the only grandkids, everyone went early in the season and there were lots of walking parades and tuba players. They don't remember it. Fortunately there is a blog. 

A look up the Seawall toward Pleasure Pier. I think next year we bring the camper as there were plenty of people who did. Apparently you can set up on Thursday morning for a fee of $2 an hour during business hours which works out to similar fees in campgrounds and pay by the license plates on truck and camper from an app on your phone. You could dry camp and the Academy Sporting Goods across the street was generous with bathrooms but I think with Cathy starts cashing the Social Security Checks in May which will double our income the purchase of a generator will be on the agenda. See the guy with the political sign running for city council? he was two spaces from our set up and he cooked jambalaya to serve 200 people in an iron pot. It's that kind of party.      

Lots of good bands in the style of Historically Black Colleges and Universities bands which have a big brassy sound with blaring tubas. I made many good photos for my tuba picture collection including this guy who creatively used duct tape to continue the gig. I wonder if this is temporary or it's been like that all season.   

We stayed on and caught a second night time parade. 

We collected lots of throws and my grandson Ezra already has a pack picked out to put his beads from Shreveport next weekend. All these beads will be reused for our church Fat Tuesday Party on Feb. 13th at 6pm. There will be the Krewe of Sri Lankus Parade led by Father D, catfish plates by the KoC and I'll cook gumbo. All for $5. 

This may be lowered expectations compared to some New Orleans extravaganzas of the past but I'll take  it. As the Neville Brothers say, Mardi Gras to the world!

 

 

All those cogs and wheels and secret arrangements of stars...

I was standing at the check out counter in the grocery store buying a mess of turnip greens and I had one of those visions where just for an instant you glimpse the interworking of the universe. All those cogs and wheels and secret arrangements of stars in unknown constellations spin right there in plain view and then they are gone again, at least till the next time. 

Once someone told me that if they were going somewhere they often wore a catchy slogan on a t-shirt as an ice breaker or conversation starter. As a Christmas present I got a t-shirt, actually a tank top that says, I like her butt. It will probably work well in situations where I need a conversation starter or ice breaker. 

Once a guy, a little older than me came to the physical therapy clinic where I was working and had on a Rolling Stones Tour 78 t- shirt, big old lips and everything. I've never seen that band but at a Ray Wylie Hubbard show I stood by Ian McLagan who was in the English rock band the Faces with Stone Ron Wood so theoretically I could have asked him to say hi for me. 

I asked my patient if he had seen the Stones and he said yes and a friend had recently asked him to go see them again. He said, "I told him, too rough for me, I'm too old for all that fighting and stuff." The friend replied, "Oh it's not like it was. Tickets are so expensive it's all people in suits and stuff."

  I'm pretty sure that these days you can get a Rolling Stones, Bob Marley or Pink Floyd T-shirt at any big box retailer. If I see you wearing one of these as a conversation starter I guess since the history of these bands include chapters on slightly more than recreational drug use we can talk about why there is mass availability of these garments to the public and the merits of how the the 1st world distribution system is about the same for shirts and recreational drugs. 

I'm 67 years old and I'm still wearing band t-shirts but I usually buy them from a guy in the band. I guess I could have bought one of McLagan's. I bought this New Orleans Flat Earth Friendship Society shirt from a guy calls himself drdaddyzwhodat.              

When I was checking out my turnip greens at the grocery store this shirt was a conversation starter. The sack boy at the grocery store noticed it but without the backing of a 1st world distribution system the conversation went no where. After all drdaddyzwhodat had made it in his garage, stuffed it in a bubble wrap packing envelope and mailed it to me. 

The young man instead turned to the turnip greens, something in his sphere of experience. He said, "I don't like them. I got a zero in school for not eating my greens." I asked where he went to school. He told me and I told him when I went to school during the last century eating turnip greens had not been on the curriculum but I still enjoyed them.  

It's certainly not like it was but if you like those glimpses cogs and wheels and secret arrangements of stars in unknown constellations hit the venmo below for a conversation starter.