Okay, here is a pop quiz for folks living in The Villages: while many houses here are similar in design and style, there are a few unique and innovative houses. Name the style of house seen here and its builder:
What, you don’t recognize this model? You’re saying that it’s not a typical Villages Florida house? But you can find it in the Village of Mallory Square… in Rod and Frances Rolph’s garage! In fact, here is Rod, the house’s builder, showing how to install a set of stairs… the house also has a complete set of working lights and beautiful wooden floors made of varnished Popsicle sticks. The shingles are in fact the cut-off ends of the sticks used for flooring.
Suzanne was visiting Frances, who heads the Edgar Cayce Group here in TV, AKA The Villages. Rod is a retired chemist who is also a master model builder. His workshop and laboratory take up his entire garage and would be the envy of any master woodworker and/or chemist. He has completed many projects, including a model of John F. Kennedy’s PT-109 and this beautiful patrol gunboat, USS Crockett (PG-88). This model has twin screws and electric motors to drive them at high speed. (Neighbors should not worry; the 3” gun forward is non-firing. However, Rod’s chemistry lab looks like one Dr. Strangelove might use for concocting those kinds of experiments… burglars beware!)
Readers from our Summer Tour Blog (www.messagesofhopetour.blogspot.com) may recall the incident at a sushi restaurant in Rochester, NY, which was the source for the piranha photo at the top of this blog. Well, Corvette Chick ordered a special gift for me, a new tee-shirt, to commemorate my association with the tiny toothy terror of the Amazon. I have already received some strange looks from passersby…
Word for the Day: catechism n. 1. Question and answer based teaching in the principles of Christianity; 2. A close and intense session of questioning or interrogation on a particular subject, especially forming a part of an examination; 3. A subject in Roman Catholic schools in the US in the 1940s and 1950s which often produced skinned knuckles, both of which were administered by enthusiastic nuns on less attentive (predominantly male) students. [Early 16th C. Via ecclesiastical Latin catechismus from ecclesiastical Greek katekhizein.]
Okay, for those readers who jumped to naughty conclusions, the “Are you horny?” in the title of this post has nothing to do with what you had hoped… instead, it refers to the Ankole-Watusi, African cattle that we observed on our visit to Disney’s Animal Kingdom. Their horns have a spread of 6 to 8 feet, although some specimens raised by the Tutsi tribe in Rwanda had horn spreads to 12 feet. The horns are quite effective for defense against predators. The herd sleeps together at night with the calves in the center for protection.
One particular strain, called Inyambo, was reserved for the king’s private herd, and is believed by members of the Tutsi tribe to be extinct. The photo is of the traditional Tutsi king’s palace. Today Watusi cattle are raised here in the USA in Texas (of course), Ohio, and California, as well as in Africa. (Note: the name Watusi is also the historical name of the Tutsi tribe itself, which was the victim of the brutal genocide by their neighbors the Hutus in Rwanda in 1994.)
Geo-Quiz Part 2: You have left your cruise ship in Africa and taken a plane to Rome for the New Year’s holiday. Fortunately, you passed up the cheap tickets on Aeroflot, the Russian airline with the highest vodka consumption by its pilots and the worst safety record in the (somewhat) civilized part of the world. Unfortunately, you have fallen in with a group of rowdy Australian tourists (actually, “rowdy Australian” is redundant.)
The folks from Oz want to attend a “pub crawl” at the Spanish Steps. You are staying a few miles away, and you ask the hotel concierge which metro line and stop is associated with the Spanish Steps. A. What is his answer?
Fortunately, you get lost looking for the Metro, missing the Aussies’ debauchery and beer swilling but saving you lots of money and a horrible hangover headache. You find yourself at the Church of Santa Maria del Popolo, earning you big points from the spirit of Sister Dolorosa Excruciata, your third grade Catechism teacher back at St. Anthony’s Catholic School. You spend two hours admiring and photographing the exhibits here. B. What holiday exhibit is the Church famous for? (Please be specific.)
(This was Part 2 of a 5-part Geo-Quiz; please hold your answers for a consolidated input at the end of the 5th day of the quiz. Then you can submit them to me at ftgiesemann@aol.com .) Good Luck!