monday's mulling: david vs. goliath

Ohio’s first Buc-ee’s opened April 6th in Huber Heights, Ohio.

The travel center is gargantuan…about 74,000 square feet, has more than 100 fueling positions, is open 24 hours a day, and has all the Buc-ee’s staples — brisket, jerky, Beaver Nuggets, and those famously clean bathrooms. The opening? It was absolutely massive. City officials said it brought in more than a million dollars in sales on opening day, with traffic backing up for miles and miles and miles and area hotels sold out.

But here’s where things get REALLY interesting.

Buc-ee's is suing a long ago established neighborhood establishment, Beaver’s Mini Mart, a convenience store in Beavercreek (12 miles away from its Huber Heights location) for having a cartoon beaver as its logo.  Needless to say, it's not gone over well.

Why is Bucc-ee’s doing this?

The beaver.

Buc-ee’s states Beaver’s Mini Mart’s cartoon beaver logo, including its eyes, smile and red coloring, could create confusion with the Buc-ee’s brand.

What do you think? Is this enough for trademark infringement?

Beaver’s Mini Mart has been around for decades, and its owner says the business was here before Buc-ee’s ever came to Ohio.

Buc-ee’s brings a beaver mascot to the Dayton area and then finds out there’s a Beavercreek whose mascot is a beaver ever since it was incorporated and wants to sue about the logo. Apparently, there’s room for 100 gas pumps but only one famous beaver? My money's on the little guy.

attitude of gratitude

Vacation was wonderful. It gave me a much-needed break from the stress of thinking about my car and having to buy a new one. But then we came home, and processing everything that happened put me right back into a tizzy.

Whatever the bigger plan was for my car to get rear-ended, it doesn’t make much sense. But it happened, and now it’s time to deal with it. I have to remind myself that it’s all about perspective. The pity party needs to end, and I need to turn this negative reaction into something positive or, at least, constructive.

 

neil armstrong's boyhood home is for sale

A piece of American history is for sale.

The childhood home of Neil Armstrong, the astronaut who commanded NASA’s Apollo 11 mission on his way to becoming the first man to walk on the moon, is for sale in Wapakoneta, Ohio. (Wapakoneta is about 60 miles north of Dayton on I-75).

Photo by WOW Video Tours, Lima, Ohio/Provided by Beverly Rex-Cook

Armstrong built planes out of balsa wood and glue in the dining room and constructed a basement wind tunnel to test his models. At the top of a creaky stairway is his bedroom where he launched model airplanes out of the window to measure how far they’d fly. Armstrong’s old bedroom is now decorated with photos and paintings of the moon landing. Hanging from the ceiling is a model of the Wright brothers’ first production airplane, the aviation pioneers who were from Dayton and an inspiration for Armstrong. 

Armstrong pedaled his bike from home to take flying lessons at an airstrip. At age 16, he made his first solo flight, got his pilot’s license, and 20 years later he rocketed into space for the first time.

An official historical marker was placed in the front yard in 2018, designating it as the boyhood home of the first person to walk on the moon.

A history teacher owned this house for 40 years and preserved the character and timeliness of the past, keeping it much like when the Armstrong family lived there. I  hope somehow the Armstrong Air and Space Museum will be able to purchase this property to keep its historical charm.

the friday feed: zucchini!

It's that time of year.

Zucchini...it's full-force producing! 

Last weekend, August 8, was Sneak Some Zucchini onto Your Neighbor’s Porch Day, a playful, unofficial holiday inspired by gardeners with an overabundance of summer squash. The idea is simple: covertly leave some of your extra zucchini on a neighbor’s doorstep and let them figure out what to do with it.

My neighbor has shared quite a bit of zucchini from her garden, and so far, I have managed to use every one she has gifted. We were traveling home from Ocean City on August 8, and she was kind enough not to leave any zucchini on our doorstep. But there was a plot twist waiting in my own garden. A small zucchini on my plant had grown into a huge squash during the week we were away.

Zucchini-zilla.

I put that enormous squash to good use, making three different dishes and freezing some for future meals. It was a delicious reminder of just how versatile zucchini can be.

Zucchini fritters: First, I salted the shredded zucchini and squeezed out as much moisture as possible. To help keep the fritters crispy and add a little extra flavor, I mixed in Parmesan cheese. They turned out really tasty.

Stir-fried vegetables: Next, I used some of the zucchini in a stir-fried vegetable medley seasoned with sun-dried tomato oil and a little salt. Stir-fries are quick, easy, and so flexible. Use whatever vegetables you have on hand, toss them into a pan, add a favorite sauce or flavored oil, and voilà!

Zucchini soup: The final dish was zucchini soup, and thanks to spinach and cilantro, it was very green. This was a hot soup, which I was actually glad about. Because of the cyclosporiasis outbreak, I wanted to make sure the spinach and cilantro were cooked to at least 160°F, so I used my candy thermometer to check the broth temperature. The soup was delicious, especially topped with shredded Parmesan and roasted cherry tomatoes.

From crispy fritters to a quick stir-fry to a bowl of very green soup, zucchini can take on an impressive number of roles in the kitchen. It can be shredded, sautéed, simmered, frozen, or added to countless other dishes. So if zucchini arrives anonymously on your porch or grows into a garden giant while you’re away, there are plenty of ways to put it to good use. Zucchini-zilla was enormous and its culinary possibilities were even bigger!

signs of autumn

It’s mid-August, and the first signs of fall are beginning to creep into the landscape. This tree is a perfect example, half red and half green. Both colors are vibrant, but soon the green will give way to brilliant shades of red, and the tree will be transformed to its autumn glory.

My coneflowers are also showing signs of the season changing. Their petals are fading and falling, leaving behind seeds that the goldfinches have discovered. I’ve tried many times to capture a photo of the little finches perched on top of the flowers, but they do have a sixth sense about my camera. Just as I get close enough for what I hope would be a perfect shot, they fly away.

There’s something beautiful about these small changes. Summer isn’t quite finished, but fall is quietly announcing its arrival with its subtle color changes.

wednesday's words and wanderings and wonderings

The last beach day in Ocean City. Both Owen and Hallie loved playing in the ocean. The bigger the wave, the bigger the smiles.

One last photo of the Cleveland crew before they headed to Somerset, PA to spend the night. With the weekend beach traffic, their drive took two hours longer than planned. 

It took us a while to reach the Bay Bridge, too. As we approached Annapolis, Todd said, "Let's stop somewhere for lunch." Yes! We ended up at McGarvey's in the Colonial Historic District and I couldn't leave Maryland without having one of McGarvey's jumbo-lump Chesapeake crab cakes. It was all crab meat and seasoning. So fresh and tasty. The real deal. Midwestern crab cakes have too much filling.

As we drove into the Historic District, we drove past the Naval Academy and saw a lot of young men and women in white uniforms with their parents. We found out that it was Plebe Parents' Weekend. The Naval Academy Plebes had been in their six-week indoctrination period and were now allowed off campus before the academic year begins.

We took a stroll around the neighborhood. The historic homes have been beautifully maintained. This is a place we would like to visit again. The East Coast is so full of history. It's where our country began.

Back home for a pumpkin update. Four nice-sized pumpkins are in my yard. These vines are on their way out, the pumpkins are ready to be picked, and a few new vines are showing up. Unexpected fun!

With my empty, clean refrigerator my first trip for filling it was out to the farm. In the week that we were away, the sunflower field burst into bloom. The first planting is on its way out and the second planting is filled with tall blooms reaching to the sky. 

Monarch butterflies are beginning their migration. The sunflower and zinnia gardens are the perfect place for them to find some nourishment and take a rest.

Severe storms are moving through Ohio and the Miami Valley this week. Yesterday Dayton received 2.07 inches of rain. According to the National Weather Service, this rainfall set a new daily record for the date, breaking the previous record of 1.86 inches set back in 1915. We're going to have a lot of rain all week long.

walk it out

Now that vacation is over, it's back to real life.

The car shopping has started, and I am overwhelmed. I am not a car person, and some of this car-speak is a foreign language to me. Todd keeps asking, “What do you think about this car?” or “What about this one?”

I DON’T KNOW!

Then, Monday morning, we had a new front door installed.

It was the wrong color.

Todd went round and round with the higher-ups, explaining that it was not the color the salesperson had represented to us. In the end, it worked out. We’re getting a new door in the correct color at no charge.

But in the meantime, the question, “Are you sure you don’t like this door?” kept coming up.

I DON’T LIKE IT!

After dinner, I was a ball of stress. Todd was cutting the grass, and I needed to get away from the house.

Time for a walk.

A couple of houses down from mine, I could already feel myself relaxing. The rhythm of one foot in front of the other. A four-count breath in time with my steps. I was physically walking away from the stress.

And then I began to notice.

The buzz of the cicadas.

The sounds of children playing on their next-to-last day before the new school year begins.

Cars accelerating as they made their way up the hill on David Road.

The cloud formations.

The occasional breeze.

Summer flowers beginning to lose their vibrancy from the heat and with the approach of autumn.

Car shopping and the color of the door disappeared from my mind.

And when I got home, those big thoughts that had taken over my brain didn’t come rushing back.

That one hour walk around the neighborhood was all the therapy I needed.