Lila Perry Steinhoff Archives

September 28, 2018

Capaha Park Pool Rats

A bunch of the Class of ’66 folks who came to Cape for their 70th Birthday Party reunion (because lots of them turned 70 in 2018), were hardcore Capaha Park Pool Rats (a description coined by Terry Hopkins).

They thought they’d take advantage of being in town to congregate at Jack Rickard’s house at the base of what used to be the Mississippi River traffic bridge.

Pool Rat Memories

Just about the time the pool was razed, I asked some of the former lifeguards and swim instructors to tell me what they remembered of their swimming days in the middle and late 1960s.

Wife Lila, Bill Jackson and Terry Hopkins shared some touching memories you can read at this link.

Photos on exhibit

Many of the pictures in this gallery will be on exhibit at the Cape Girardeau County History Center across from the courthouse in Jackson. The museum is open Monday through Saturday from 10 to 4. The exhibit will be up until around the end of October.

Some of the prints are available for purchase there.

Click on any of the photos to make it larger, then use your arrow keys to move around.

September 23, 2018

Class of ’66’s 70th Birthday Party

© Ken Steinhoff – Class of 1966 70th Birthday Reunion

Wife Lila and some of her friends threw together an impromptu 50th class reunion in 2016. They realized that most of them are turning 70 years old in 2018, so it was a good time to have a 70th Birthday Party.

Marilyn Maevers Miller of Charleston and the Class of 66 Lunch Bunch handled the local logistics and provided excellent eats.

The classmates gathered at an outdoor pavilion in South County Park Friday night. The photo shows about 50 attendees, and even more might have missed being in the group shot. Click on the image to make it large enough to see faces. Anyone who appears in the group shot above has my express permission to reproduce it for personal use.

Singing broke out

Bill Jacqie Jackson brought his karaoke equipment from his South Florida post-retirement job, and attracted an active group of “singers” toward the end of the evening.

The good thing about attending a group 70s Birthday Party is that all of the people who would yell, “Turn that music down!” are AT the party.

A cold front moved through on Saturday, so Bob Ward offered up space in the Elk’s Club to get the group out of rain and cold winds.

Earlier posts about other CHS reunions

July 15, 2018

Bacon-Wrapped Shrimp

I saw a recipe for bacon-wrapped shrimp on the same day I spotted a Schnucks promotion for seafood. I love shrimp, and I love bacon, so this was a good reason for me to put on my pants and venture out into the 106-degree heat index.

The picture shows the result. You can click on it to make it larger and to whet your appetite.

I don’t follow directions well

You can read the website’s ingredients and directions here.

Like I said, I take liberties with what people tell me to do. Where the recipe called for maple syrup, I substituted honey. I don’t particularly like maple syrup, and I thought the honey might stick better when I basted it on the shrimp and bacon.

I usually buy a thick bacon at Sam’s, and I’ve learned that it works best when I leave it in my convection toaster oven for 14 minutes at 400 degrees. I poured off the excess grease at about the half-way mark, and I increased the broiler time by two minutes to make the bacon a little crispier.

Finally, I didn’t have any off-the-shelf chili powder, so I reached for Wife Lila’s favorite, Chimayo Chile Bros Hatch Medium. It added enough heat that it was interesting, but not so much it overpowered the main ingredients.

I ate half the 20 medium-sized shrimp for supper, and polished the rest off for brunch. It was good enough that I’m going to make some more in the next couple of days.

July 5, 2018

I Love Mangoes and Avocados

We’ve got two mango trees in our yard in West Palm Beach. Some years we have had so many that I had to dig holes to bury over-ripe ones that fall.

That makes it very painful to pay a buck or more for small ones in the Cape grocery stores. Fortunately, when I went on my Fourth of July strawberry soda quest, I found mangoes and avocados on sale for close to a reasonable price.

I didn’t realize I was going photograph this for a blog post, so I made the mistake of cutting the prettiest mango first.

How do I peel a mango?

Unfortunately, it has been do long since I’ve peeled a mango that I couldn’t quite remember the most efficient way of doing it.

Fortunately, Wife Lila is an expert, and she explained exactly how to get to the good part of the mango without cutting yourself or taking a bath in the juice.

Click on the photo to be taken to her blog where she’ll explain everything in simple enough terms that even I did a passable job on my first try.