9423 Breakfast at the Bethlehem Diner. Ham & cheese omelet, hash browns and wheat toast. But the high-light
that brings me here every time is the brown slab on the small plate, scrapple. It’s not as good as my grandmother’s but it’s still great. Diana can’t stand it and I have to admit she’s in the majority of non-PA Dutchmen. I love it.
9425 D and Jean with Fred’s 1963 Corvair Monza Spyder.
9428 Fred and I in the Corvair. When Fred’s beard is longer he could pass for Abe Lincoln. We spent a lot of time together when I was a kid.
May 12 – Emmaus, PA. Today we are going to the Bethlehem Diner so I can get an order of scrapple. I don’t know many people who like it but I love it. It’s all the parts of a pig that they couldn’t figure out what to do with, mixed with about 50% corn meal, spiced and formed into a loaf. You slice off a ½ to 2/3 of an inch slab and fry it on a very hot grill or pan until it’s crisp on the outside. It’s eaten by the PA Dutch as a breakfast meat, sometimes with Karo syrup and some people use ketchup. I eat it plain. The secret to scrapple is the spicing. My grandmother’s was really good. Most of the commercially available scrapple is too bland but it’s still got the basic flavor. D hates it. I guess it’s something you had to grow up with it to like it. Of course she doesn’t like Shoo Fly Pie either. What’s up with that?
After that we went to see my Cousin Freddy and his wife Jean. Freddy lived on the farm and I spent a lot of time down there as it was a short walk from my house. He’s been a motorcycle rider since 1960 and he’s owned all sorts of them since. His first one was ordered from Sears & Roebuck. He didn’t have that long. He replaced it with a Honda Dream Machine. I think it was a C70 but I’m not sure. The most recognizable feature of it was the squared off front fender. Very unique. His next bike was a Triumph Bonneville. Triumph is a British company but they named the bike Bonneville after the Bonneville Salt Flats where the bike set the speed record for production motorcycles. After that I was in the Air Force and lost track of his progression through the world of biking.
I was surprised to find out that at the age of 74 he gave up biking and bought a 1963 Corvair Monza Spyder. It’s a really nice car, very clean and classic car show ready. It’s white with red interior, just like the Chevy Impala Super Sport he had in the ‘60s. I like the car a lot. That fraud Ralph Nader wrote Unsafe At Any Speed proposing that the Corvair was badly designed and very likely to be involved in accidents. A 1972 study undertaken by Texas A & M showed that the book was entirely false and that the Corvair was no more likely than its contemporaries to be involved in a crash. The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration also did a study and came to the same conclusions as A & M. So Ralph Nader’s fame as a “consumer advocate” is based on a lie and yet there he was pontificating in his typically superior attitude for years as an expert. Expert idiot that is.
We had dinner this evening with my cousin Darrell, his wife Connie and his dad my Uncle Bob. He’s 90 and still working part time at a local grocery store. He and my Aunt Irma just keep chugging along.
May 13-15 – Driving Home. Today we are loading up the Ford Taurus and heading for home. Note about the Taurus. It drives very well, tracks nicely, not bothered by cross winds, fairly quiet, fair gas mileage (about 27mpg on average. I’ve got a lot of weight in the car, it would probably be better if it was just the two of us.), good seats, very comfortable. All in all, a very nice car.
On the way south we detoured to have lunch with a friend of mine from the early 60s. Ralph and I spent a lot of time together at church activities and Sunday afternoons. Last time we were together had to be in 1965 just before I went into the Air Force. Ouch, that’s 50 years. We had a nice lunch and reminisced about the old days and caught up on what we’re up to now. Hope it’s not another 50 years till we can get together again.
We had an uneventful 3-day drive home.
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