Pirate Gold

La cuisine in Lanse Bleue

Nonc Bob est La!

 

Et là, tu peux le suivre asteur sus l'Facebook!

C'est bien! 

Sur l'Facebook, Nonc Bob est là! 

Sur l'Facebook, c'est bien! 

Sur l'Facebook, Nonc Bob est là! 

Nonc Bob est là! Nonc Bob est là! 

Sur l'Facebook, c'est bien! 

Sur l'Facebook, Nonc Bob est là! 

Sur l'Facebook, Nonc Bob est là! 

Nonc Bon est là! C'est bien!

Nonc Bob's Auctions has a Facebook Asteur

Le Nonc Bob's Auction Barn 

12004 L'anse aux Pailles Road, 

Ça c'est là bas dans le cœur de l'anse aux Pailles 

et il y a toute sorte de marchandise qu'il vend à l'encan. 

Des vieilleries, des antiques, collectibles, 
des outils de tout qualité, primitive, glassware, 

en fin, j'vas dire quoi, 
Nonc Bob peux vendre toute sortes des articles à l'encan, 

et pis il après servir le public dans le business des encans 

il y a plus que quarante ans asteur 

et pis tu peux le suivre sure Facebook! 

C'est bien! 

Nonc Bob est sus Facebook asteur!

Nonc Bob's Facebook 

Nonc Bob's

Nonc Bob's Blogspot

Prehistory in Prairie des Femmes

In the camper

Me and Nonc Dav, circa 2004, Prairie des Femmes, Louisiana

Nonc Ferd Likes the Territory

Today I got a call from a former colleague, decorated veteran, teacher, carpenter, raconteur and octogenarian, Mister Ferdinand Isringhausen of Sunset. All of the students at Beau Chene High School called him Nonc Ferd or Uncle Ferd when he substituted, and they showed him real respect, even the toughest of the tough. He had substituted longer than he taught, and that was at least 30 years. He was a native Louisiana Francophone, but also studied French literature in college and had a keen memory.  He was forever stopping by to earnestly sing a song to me or my class, or sometimes he would teach me a word game. He taught me riddles like Voltaire's "G a" (G grand a petite, "J'ai grand appetit" or,  I am very hungry.) and songs like le Réveil de la Louisiane. We often traded licks on Les Maringouins Ont Tout Mangé Ma Belle.

Today, he called  for my address to send me the lyrics to J'Irais la 'Oir un Jour and the regulations and terms for Cajun card games like Bourée.

Here's what he said about La Prairie des Femmes:

 Prairie des Femmes. hmm, ça- c'est une très belle place; j'aime le terrotoire là...

Prairie of the Women? hmm, that- it's a very beautiful place; I like the area there...

                                      

Nonc Ferd at the Sunset Herb Festival

A Good Friday Story: Wild Mint

We had been working in the garden all of Holy Week as usual last year, but I kept on reminding my family not to dig on Good Friday. There is a belief that the ground will bleed the blood of Christ if you dig on the day he was crucified. The urge is strong as gravity to garden in the spring, but, resolved not to dig, so as not to disturb the sleeping blood of Jesus that lurks just below the surface on that day only, lest it burst forth under our toils and ruin our Easter completely, we abstained.

So, on Good Friday, we went to Pilette, a place between Lafayette and Broussard, to the newly emptied homestead of our grandparents who had just passed, both in the spring, less than a year apart. We went to see the empty house for the last time. There was certainty that the land would be sold and developed, as it was open land on a major thoroughfare in Lafayette. We did one last walk through the pasture to pick blackberries, gathering honeysuckle and dodging the other uncle's horses who were stalled at the barn. We reminisced about the drive-in theater that was on the property in the 1950's, and the Cajun bands who played there at the Bayou Jamboree. While we were walking, Nonc Dav guided us to the shady spot near the road where they used to find a wild mint growing. Mint is so hardy, it survived in rank competition of the blackberry bushes and tall goldenrod for all these years. We found it in many little patches, very small plants, a lovely spearmint. I imagined that it was in the yard of some homestead off of Pinhook Road 100 years ago, which was then open country, or else that Granny herself had planted it when she was a young bride. We decided to bring some home. So one of us ran back to the house to get a spoon and cup and we dug it up right there. It wasn't until late that night that, shocked, I realized what we had done. And though you think it would have, the ancestral land did not bleed.

Granny's Wild Pilette Mint

Update: After three years of encouragement, I could not get this mint to survive more than one season and it was lost in the garden.

The LaGrange House

The historic Lagrange House is the oldest structure on the prairie. The story I heard about this place is that it was built in the 1700 possibly early 1800s by a former soldier/general in Napoleon's army or his descendant. He was shipwrecked after leaving Egypt picked up with two comrades by a passing ship and left in New Orleans. They were in poor shape when a wealthy planter from les Opelousas recognized their fine French accents and shabby vêtements and knew they were in trouble. He offered to bring them back to his plantation, where, as luck would have it, he had three eligible daughters that each officer married. One of their homesteads was the older house in the photos, most recently inhabited into the 1980's by a family, then an elderly gentleman.

Nonc Dav looking at the LaGrange House, oldest building on the prairie. We were told that the writing on the main wall of the home was done to prevent trespassers.

The cypress foundations.

 

Wisteria in early March

 built-in bed and bousillage wall

 

the porch and foundations 

 

Decorative rafter ends- Carribean?

an interior room

bousillage and pegs in the garconierre