"your grandma wears combat boots"

Was an insult kids used to hurl at each other on the playground when I was young. Well maybe it was just me (shrugs). Anyone else ever hear that? I mean my granny did. She got the boots from the Army-Navy surplus store. She chewed tobacco too. And sometimes she used to use that old powder snuff.

When I asked her about the boots; she just said they were cheap and lasted a long time. Good footwear should suit what your are doing I suppose and liked to dig wigglers. That's an earthworm of a certain variety for those who don't know. Wigglers are good for fishin'. A past time I highly recommend. She was good at both too.

She knew where the biggest fattest wigglers were just by looking at a piece of ground and used a potato rake to get them. Once I helped her and my uncle clean a whole string of fish...and was proud we got it done. Then they showed me the number 3 washtub full. It was well after dark when we finally finished. We filled a chest freezer and ate fish many times over the next few months.

Granny filled my speech with a few choice phrases too. "Somebody bumped my elbow" If there was a bit too much spice. "Hunger makes the best sauce" So true. "Stuck my finger in it." Meant she added a bit of sugar (finger in because she was sweet).

Granny taught me to make biscuit too. She asked me "Why me?" when I asked her to show me how. "Your aunt makes them better doesn't she?" I replied "you taught her didn't ya?" I really think she liked that.

So what brought all this to mind? This story about an 87 year old woman who beat a snake to death. See my uncle once showed me a rattler and a button from a snake Granny killed "with one shot" he said. See Granny carried a snub-nosed nickel-plated .38 in her pocket book. Don't think she needed a permit when she first started. And she killed that snake at 81.

Maybe one day I'll show ya how to make a "hoe cake" Like Granny taught me. Hoe cake is not made with cornmeal either...it's flour and buttermilk pretty much. The cornmeal version still exists on many tables as a quick fried bread.

Now Nanna (my other grnadma) was a different story. She was a painter of many stills of wildlife and called Miami "My-am-muh"