I have a telephone! I am sitting at home checking in on the Mudcat. How lovely.

Yesterday morning, Saturday, I went to the regular meeting of the Traditional Seafarers. We were to meet at the canoe and work on carving new yahms for the outrigger float. Many was also going to teach us a chant for keeping away squalls while at sea. Larry had suggested that we include a lunch. When I got there at 10:00 one of the guys was cooking steaks on a wood fire while two others were busy at a work table.

Now, I want you to understand and picture the scene. We were gathered under a carport though the area under the roof was much larger than a regular carport. Built into the back wall was a BBQ grill for a wood fire, a set of propane burners, a work counter, shelves for cooking pots and utensils, and a sink made out of a bathtub. The bathtub is raised up to a working level and cemented into the wall. There is a working table, an old free standing bar, and an eating table knocked together with 2X4s and plywood. The trade winds find there way into one side of the shelter and out the other. Unfortunately they are not strong enough to blow away the house flies that swarm everywhere.

Pots of food began to fill up the eating table. I noticed the green fruit. They look like green orange no bigger than a pingpong ball. I asked and they told me the name but it was a Chomorro word and I cannot remember it. They gave me half on one to taste and it was similar to lemon. They were using it to make fine dene.

And that brings me to the differences in foods. Up till that morning I knew and liked fine dene. And I knew it was a brown sauce that included vinegar and soy sauce. This version of the sauce included neither of those items! This version was a golden color and tasted of the lemony green fruit and the peppers and spices that make fine dene so tasty. But it looks and tastes nothing like the fine dene I had gotten used to.

Then someone handed me a plastic container full of cut up raw mackeral, including the heads and fins. Others reached in and grabbed chunks and started to eat. I reached in and took a small piece. To my amazement it didn't taste like fish at all, but then it did. This was a form of fish kelaguen. As I have said elsewhere in this diary I don't like kelaguen. But this was excellent. Once more, a difference in recipe. Another plastic container came around with cut up chunks of raw octopus (octopus kelaguen), bright red and rubbery but delicious. There was another bucket full of taro and manioc. More familiar dishes included rice and the BBQ steaks. There was also some BBQ fish, skipjack they said. It was an awesome meal.

After I had eaten I was told to throw the food waste into the compost heap. I stepped down on to the wet concrete step. There was a slick coating of algae and I slipped. I put my other foot down on to the ground and hit the mud which gave me no traction at all. The next thing I knew I was rolling into the compost heap. The rest of the gang came running but the only ting injured was my dignity. Once we ascertained my lack of injury we all had a laugh at the dangers of composting. I had to rinse the mud off my leg and sneakers. When I drove home I had to remove my shirt because it was crusted with grime from the heap.

Unfortunately Manny was late and I had to leave. It is September and that means I cannot have my own weekends. I hate September. Some day I will retire and/or change jobs and I will learn to like September again. I used to love that month.

I went home to shower and change the headed to work. There I found the gang hard at it. When the locals heard I'd had octopus kelaguen they were jealous and impressed.

So that was my weekend. The only other thing to report was the little earthquake I noticed a few minutes ago. Like a big truck rumbling by.