A while back, I landed in a tiny Maine town’s Grange Hall – or it once was that but now is all part of the town office. I forget the occasion and why or how I ended up here but there was a spaghetti supper. These used to be bean suppers but with the onset of a rapid lifestyle even among Mainers, we have turned to spaghetti.

If memory serves me correctly, I paid something like $3.00 to get into this supper – I’m sure the money was going to some worthwhile cause like, Aunt Mabel’s sister’s husband’s former wife’s daughter from a previous marriage, trip to the 4-H exhibit at the Oxford County Fair.

As is usually the case, I become a fly on the wall when I get into these community functions because I don’t like to socialize – eating is my thing. One of the good things about being in Maine with Mainers, most of the natives will leave you alone. It’s the damned implants from out of state that think they can be a Mainer if they act like one. But they don’t know how to act so they think if they try to be friendly and talk to you all the time, that will help. Ain’t no way! That’s one reason you can never be a Mainer if you wasn’t born here.

I slowly worked my way through the hoards of people – I’ll bet there was at least 14 people there – and located a vacant wall over to one side. Once I found my perch and position myself so that I could very easily hold up that section of wall, I realized I could now see directly into the back kitchen where the supper was being prepared.

I watched as one woman was almost constantly stirring a huge pot – held as much as 10 or 15 gallons of sauce. I could see the red stuff up on the handle of the big wooden spoon she used to stir.

Just to her right, was another big pot. I watched two women opening boxes of spaghetti and dumping them in. How exciting!

Soon the lady who was stirring the sauce – she may have been “in the sauce” the way she acted – lifted a big spoonful of sauce up to her mouth and took a big bite. Then the spoon went back into the pot and stirred some more.

After a few more stirs, she took another bite, tossed the spoon back into the pot and disappeared from my sight. She returned momentarily with another woman and the two of them taste tested the pot of sauce several more times with the same spoon.

Now I’ve drank raw milk before directly from a cow’s teet and watched eggs being laid by a hen and hell yes, I even let a cow lick my face once, but this was too much.

I began recalling every grange hall, pot-luck supper, fundraising dinner and what not I had ever attended and wondered.

I kind of lost my appetite but I watched more closely than ever. I convinced myself that the heat of the stove would kill any germs that got introduced into the sauce but with what I was seeing, I began to wonder where their hands had been too.

I remember watching a news story on TV once about hidden cameras in fast food restaurant and catching a fat woman sticking her hand down the back of her pants and digging around a bit and then handling someone’s quarter pounder. Yum! Yum!

I flushed all those thoughts out of my head and began thinking like a true Mainer would. Maine has been having these kinds of suppers for centuries and I never heard of anyone dying by eating the food. I imagined probably worse things had been done while processing the food and it has all be consumed without any major mishaps.

So, the next time you’re off to a pot-luck supper or a bean hole bean supper, don’t watch too closely as to the preparations.

We always hear about a woman’s intuition but almost never about a man’s. So, here’s a story about a man’s intuition.

I recently went into the Hannaford Bros. grocery story on Broadway in Bangor, Maine and while I was waiting in line to pay for my gallon of milk, I witnessed a man’s ability to intuitively decipher a woman’s problems.

At the next register to my left a woman who I would say was in her mid 30s was unloading her cart. This man, crusty as all get out (could have been a local select man in one of the outlying towns near Bangor or simply just a Maine Legislator)was standing right behind this woman watching every move she made. Whatever she took out of the cart and placed on the belt, he would carefully stare at each product. This was obviously disturbing the woman greatly.

She tried turning her back to him but it didn’t do much good. He just continued to watch.

Out of anger the woman asked the old bastard what he was doing. “Do you have a problem? Can’t you mind your own damned business?” she asked.

Finally, wiping the drool mixed with tobacco juice from the corner of his unshaven face, the man said to the woman, “You must be single.”

Needless to say the woman was outraged and as she turned to ignore him, in her mind she was trying to understand how this crusty old buzzard knew she was in fact single. She thought about it and wondered if this man was smart enough to have figured this out by seeing what she bought for groceries. So she turned and asked the man, “How did you know I was single simply by looking at what I bought for groceries?”

“Oh, I didn’t.” he said. “It’s because you’re so damned ugly!”

I was reading an article in the news this morning about hunting tips for hunters on how to get their deer out of the woods once they shoot one. I got laughing because the writer gave a tip that said if you can find someone to help you, you can each grab a hind leg and pull.

Well any half smart Mainer knows that don’t work too good because you’re dragging against the hair of the deer. Geez! But it reminded me of a story about to fellas from Lewiston, Maine.

They was up in Ketchum hunting and one fella up and shot himself a nice buck. Once they got the deer dressed (and for you hunting literates, I don’t mean they put clothes on the deer. It means they removed the innards.)the two men did as the reporter said and each grabbed a hind leg and commenced dragging.

They were a huffing and a puffing trying to drag that deer against the hair when they came upon a fella from Upton. They chatted for a minute or two until the hunter from Upton gave them some advise.

“If you two fellas drag that deer from the other end it sure would drag easier.” he said.

They parted company and the two guys from Lewiston took the stranger’s advice and began dragging the deer the other way. After about an hour, they stopped for a rest. One hunter said to the other, “Well, that fella was right. This deer sure do drag easier this way than the other.”

Then the second hunter said, “Sure enough does but we are getting further and further away from our truck.”

Virgil and Florena left the confines of the thriving metropolis (46 people) of Andover and headed for the city – Portland, Maine. The trip was quite uneventful and when they got ready to come home, Virgil pulled his old beat-up pick-up truck into a gas station to get some gas for the long trip home.

Before Virgil could get his truck engine shut off, the attendant was right at his window, “What can I get you folks today?”

“What’d he say?” yelled Florena.

“He asked what he get for us today!” replied Virgil.

The attendant got the directions from Virgil to put in $5.00 worth of regular. Once he got the pump going, the attendant returned and asked Virgil, “Would you like me to check your oil?”

To which Florena pipes up again and asks, “What’d he say?”

“He wants to check the oil!”, yelled Virgil.

The attendant checked the oil and returned to Virgils side of the car. “Where you folks from?”

“Andover”, answered Virgil.

Again Florena butts in and asks, “What’d he say?”

Virgil getting quite angry now answers, “He wants to know where we’re from!”

The attendant said to Virgil, “I met some folks one day from Andover. Yeah, I remember them well. They were very rude to me.”

Before Virgil could respond to the attendant, Florena yells at Virgil and says, “What’d he say?”

Virgil yelled back at Florena and says, “He’s met you before!”

Gabby, now 85, took his wife Bea, now 84, to see the doctor. It was a long drive from Andover out over Roxbury Notch and down the backside to Rumford.

Bea went in to see the doctor and after a considerable long checkup, the doctor told her she needed to have sex at least 3 times a week. Bea told the doctor he better go tell Gabby.

The doctor went out into the waiting room and met Gabby. He told Gabby his wife needed to have sex at least three times a week.

Gabby asked the doctor, “Which three days?”

“Monday, Wednesday and Friday would be ideal,” said the doctor.

“Fine!” said Gabby. “I can get her here on Mondays and Wednesdays but on Friday she’s gonna have to find her own ride!”

I guess Maine’s blue ribbon classic is history for one more year. Did you get a chance to go and tread around the mud puddles and smell the exquisite aroma of someone’s nasty cigar?

What is it about a fair that attracts so many Mainers? Maybe it’s the animals – they can relate well you know. Perhaps the midway? Anytime I’m near one, I expect to see the ride come off its track or something.

More than anything, I think so many people go just so they can look at other people – you know people watch. After all, there certainly is a lot to see.

You know why the fairs are all in the fall of the year in Maine – when it’s cold outside? Well picture this. Imagine what the fair would look like if it was done in the middle of the summer when Mainers are wearing t-shirts, tank tops and terry cloth shorts.

Now you know and what about the odors. Forget the horse poop and cow poop. The people smells would shrivel up even a hogs nose.

I went to the fair one year and I made the mistake of going on senior citizen day. Have you ever stood in line with a bunch of seniors demanding a discount? If it isn’t that, they’re dumping their pocket books upside down looking for one more penny to pay for something because they don’t want to break a quarter.

It’s a pretty good time to go if you’re like me – always looking for joke material. The insults being passed between senior spouses are relentless. It’s sometime difficult to tell if the hearing loss is selective or actual.

I stopped over to the grandstands on the race track to hear a comedian perform and I’m not sure which was funnier – the comedian or the old farts piled into the grandstands. They only got to hear about a third of the jokes because the rest of the time they were yelling at the person sitting next to them saying, “What did he say?”

Maybe next year I’ll get a chance to go. If not there maybe one of the other fairs around Maine.

John lives over on the backside the river and walks about 3 miles to work and home everyday. John also has an uncontrollable desire for beans – you know them brown baked beans – but his problem comes after. His gas is gut wrenching and he sometimes has difficulty controlling just when he should release the back pressure.

Walking to work isn’t too bad for John but coming home is torturous because he passes one of them Ma and Pa Diners that specializes in home made baked beans. The aroma gets him most of the time.

As he was heading off to work one morning, his wife told him to make sure he didn’t eat anything on the way home from work cause she had a special dinner prepared for him – and most of all told him not to stop for any beans. It was John’s birthday.

After work, John headed home and just when he thought he’d gotten by Ma and Pa’s Diner, the aroma of hot, fresh baked, brown beans came wafting through the air and took complete control over John. He couldn’t resist and went in and got a plate before heading home.

When John got home, he was surprised when his wife met him at the door. She said she had a special supper planned for him and promptly blind folded him and walked him into the dining room.

As she sat him down, she told John to sit there and promise not to move and she would be back in a minute or two. His wife left the room.

John sat patiently and then the phone rang and his wife answered. John began to get just a bit uncomfortable as the beans were beginning to have an effect.

He tried desperately to hold it in but realizing his wife was on the phone he decided that she probably wouldn’t hear anything anyway. So he lifted up one leg and let one slip out kind of slow.

He continued to sit and wait and the gas was coming on like gang busters. He couldn’t hold it in any longer and lifted his leg again only this time he let it rip pretty good. He was afraid his wife would hear and be mad at him but he could help it.

While his wife continued talking on the phone, John let 6 or 7 more good ones go – a couple of them where real doozies.

Then he heard his wife hang up the phone and come walking back into the dining room. He hoped she wouldn’t smell anything either.

She walked in a stood beside John and asked him if he was ready for his surprise. He said he couldn’t wait and she quickly removed his blindfold.

Much to John’s surprise sitting in front of him all around the dining room table were 12 surprise dinner guests.

It’s hunting time again and the out of state leaf peepers are around and what’s worse, some of them come up to hunt in the Maine woods. Ayuh!

I don’t think they are getting any better at distinguishing between a cow and a deer so some Mainers are still painting the word “cow” on the side of their prized possessions.

Which reminds me of the story I’ve told before about the guy from New York comes up to Maine for a visit and heads out of Bar Harbor area towards Down East Maine.

When he gets out in the country a ways, you know Ellsworth ain’t the country. You got to go farther than that – even farther than Eastbrook. But anyways he gets out in the country driving his big Lincoln Continental and as he approaches old farmer Castonguay’s place, his prize cow stepped out into the road right in front of that New Yorker.

The New Yorker slammed on his brakes and come to a screeching halt but not before he run into Bessey.

He got out of his car and he looked that Jersey cow up one side and down the other but couldn’t see that he’d hurt it too much. By now old farm Castonguay had heard the commotion and come out to see what the matter was.

The New Yorker explained to the farmer what had happened and then said to the farmer, “I don’t think I hurt her any.”

To which farmer Castonguay answered, “Well, if you think you done her any good, I’d be happy to pay you for it.”

Peter Poor was a poor farmer who lived in Andover. He spent just about every waking moment tending to his fields and small crops and barely had time for anything else.

Well, Pastor Hefflefinger from over to the Baptist church was getting quite concerned cause Peter hadn’t been to church in some time. Pastor Hefflefinger decided he best take a ride out to the Poor farm and pay the poor farmer a visit.

When he arrived Peter was out at the far end of the pasture and so the Pastor decided to walk out and see him. Peter saw the Pastor but continued his hard work as he knew he had a lot to do.

As Pastor Hefflefinger approached he yelled out to Peter, “Helloooooo!”

Peter waved back with his straw hat and then wiped the sweat from his brow.

Pastor neared Peter even closer and said to Peter, “My I sure do love the job you and the Lord have done to this piece of land!”

Peter quickly replied, “Ayuh, you shoulda seen it when the Lord had it all by himself!”

A man from Massachusetts went to Maine hunting and got lost in the woods. After 4 days trying to find his way out, he came across another hunter in the woods.
“Oh, man! Am I glad to see you! I’ve been lost in these woods for 4 days. I thought I’d never find anyone and be able to get out of these god forsaken woods!” the lost hunter said.

“Well,” said the other hunter. “Don’t go getting your hopes up. I’m from New York!”

Just thought I’d be the first to ask. You know we are headin into that time of year again when those who don’t know anything, think the woods is going to be taken over with blood thirsty killers.

They don’t take over the woods. They just sort of…. are out there.

I always love the expressions used by those who think hunters are sick in the head and have lost all sense of logic when deer season rolls around.

This is one of my all time favorites: “I’ll sure be glad when hunting is over so we can get our woods back!” I have to ask myself, what in the hell does that mean. As a literal Mainer, it is easy to see that the woods don’t go nowhere during deer season and the person making the statement ain’t been out in the woods for 40 some years. So what does it mean?

Probably means no more than “Hot ’nuff faw ya?” or any of them other prize Maine expressions.

I gone big time! Got another job. Funniest job I ever did too. There’s this place called Maine Hunting Today and they asked me to come over there and do some talking. So I did.

They wanted me to talk about hunting stuff – I think they called them “tips”.

I just go over there when they ask me and read a short thing about hunting and they make a video of me and put it up on their web site.

Works wicked good, too!