Nemo Sine Cruce Beatus – Baker
Thursday, August 3, 2006
Judah’s 28th and Uncle Balthasar’s 50th, jolly Uncle Balthasar… She wondered whether or not he had decided to fly Grandma to Cancun for Bristol’s wedding the following month. In light of the current hurricane season going on, Collette thought it was probably a better thing that they had refrained from performing the ceremony on Barbados.
As Collette prepared OLeif’s lunch of sausages and mustard (the good old Viennese way) that morning, she rather spontaneously decided that the worst torture she could fathom at the time, would be – forcing one to eat an entire tub of butter in one sitting. Why she thought of it, she couldn’t quite say.
Over angel food cake and impending doom in the stormclouds, Thursday was the sort of work-day that was so not exactly crazy but busy enough to make one forget most everything else. Collette liked it that way, mostly.
Word came that the trip on the boat for the youth had been successful, along with a brush-up storm. Nothing had sunk; no one had drowned. It was all good.
Meanwhile, Judah was leaving for his birthday dinner with Evangline, and the subject surfaced concerning people who leave a small bit of milk or orange juice in their classes and then leave them on the counter without rinsing them out.
“Why, why would you do that?” Judah asked, quite confounded. “Why would you not just finish the drink?”
“Back-wash,” Ivy suggested.
“Back-wash! You’re the only one drinking from it. It’s not like you have three year-olds spitting raisins in it.”
“Well, cats…”
“That’s right! The cats would drink from your glass.”
“Well…”
“They do! I’ve seen them do it!” Judah pointed at Ivy, laughing. “I’ve turned my head and half my water’s gone in my glass.”
“That’s my Joy baby,” Ivy sighed, as though she were almost disappointed with her feline charge.