The Caretaker's Concern can be blamed on Wreck-Loose Island Publishing.
Send all complaints to:
WLIPublishing P.O. Box 1521 Bolton Landing, N.Y. 12814

WreckLooseIsland@yahoo.com

Saturday, May 8, 2010

The Caretaker's Concern for 5/8/2010

TCC for 5/8/10

"New" 2007 post follows below.

The Caretaker is officially on hiatus from his blog until at least the end of this week but most likely through the end of next week. However, he will still have the e-mails from 2007 posted every night at 9 p.m. EST, they will be going out via the automated system. If the Caretaker happens to take some photos and has the time to post them he will do so. For those readers who have relied on the Caretaker's notifications of new posts via Facebook, while he is on hiatus from his blog he will not be sending out notifications via Facebook for the automated posts from 2007. If you'd like, you can sign up for e-mail notifications by entering your e-mail address at left, it is titled: "To receive E-mail notification of new posts:" It is just below the Caretaker's brief profile.

Before there was the blog the Caretaker sent out posts via e-mail, the following is from the Caretaker's second winter on the Island:

Island Ice Report for 2/24/07:

For much of the day the Caretaker worked on cleaning and organizing the Ghetto because he knew he would be having many guests on Sunday, and, it was high time he did it anyway. So, as far as the day went there isn't much to report on, although, L. and S. did make it out to the Island in the afternoon. They came just as the Caretaker was beginning to get his shower ready (how the Caretaker takes a shower will be revealed in an upcoming movie). Upon hearing of L. and S.'s arrival the Caretaker stopped his shower preparations and welcomed them into the Ghetto. Neither one of them had seen the Lake George Chicken "movie" so the Caretaker showed it to them on his computer, they laughed. Then they left to get ready for dinner. After they went the Caretaker went back to getting his shower ready so he would be clean for tonight's dinner in town. Being a special occasion the Caretaker went all out and took himself a shower with 5 gallons of water, usually he only uses 3 gallons of water but every once in a while you have to pamper yourself you know. So the Caretaker cleaned himself up and then skied over to the mainland to meet the Gang for dinner at the Lakeside Lodge in town. (For those who don't know, the Lakeside is the old House of Scotts only much improved, for those who know the Caretaker, the Lakeside would be the equivalent of Stasney's in Waldwick, N.J., and yes the Caretaker still calls it Stasney's but it is otherwise known as Nellie's Place, however, with regards to the Lakeside Lodge the Caretaker does not still insist on calling it the House of Scotts because the Lakeside is a far superior restaurant than the House of Scotts ever was, although the Caretaker does still have a few fond memories from childhood when his family would go there in the winter for some drinks and food after a day of snowmobiling. The long and short of this is that if you are ever in Bolton Landing and you are looking for a place to eat he highly recommends the Lakeside Lodge, overall it is one of the best restaurants in town. Though it is in the Stasney's class, it is not in the Spencer's class, now that was a great restaurant but no restaurant will probably ever be in the Spencer's class ever again, it was a sad day indeed when the Caretaker was home from the Netherlands for a visit, he went to go have dinner at Spencer's and it was closed! The Caretaker knew this day was coming because the owner had long since told his patron's that he was retiring and would be closing up. If you had never been to Spencer's it was the Marianne's bakery of restaurants, and if you had never been to Marianne's bakery of Midland Park, N.J. you have never been to a bakery. After having her doughnuts you are ruined for life, the difference between Marianne's doughnuts and those had elsewhere is vaster than the Universe. She also made the best banana cream pie, everything she made was excellent but the Caretaker would most often fatten himself up on her doughnuts, powdered cream filled doughnuts were his favorite. One of these days the Caretaker is going to try and track Marianne down and try to get some of her recipes from her, she too retired. If the Caretaker, or perhaps more accurate, when the Caretaker builds a time machine the only thing he will do is go back to when Spencer's and Marianne's were open and every day he would have doughnuts for breakfast then ride his bike over to Spencer's for lunch at the bar where he would have the open face sliced steak sandwich, with some gin and tonic's, after that he would go for a nice leisurely bike ride through out the Saddle River Park system following the path along the Saddle River and then return to Spencer's for dinner where he would have Beef Wellington and Martinis. One of the great things at Spencer's was that the bar did "buy backs" for the locals every third round, if you don't happen to know what a "buy back" is which is probably more than likely because less and less places do it, a "buy back" is when the bar buys you a round. The Caretaker couldn't tell you the most "buy backs" he has received in one night, but chances are there are a couple of times when it was up there. However, truth be told, "buy backs" were just a perk, if they charged double than the going rate for drinks the Caretaker would have still gone there, the food was excellent with a vast menu (about as many choices as you would find at a diner only everything was excellent from Burgers to Beef Wellington and everything in between), great staff (everyone was in black and whites but not a bit of pretentiousness), the clientele were great too, (low key, down to earth and personable), and a great jukebox also. When the Caretaker does build his time machine he will take you all back to Spencer's and Marianne's and there will be Schwinn Varsity 10 speeds with monkey hanger handle bars for all.
What on Earth am I going on about?
Oh, yeah, dinner at Lakeside.
So, we finish up our meal and all but the Caretaker head back to the hotel, the Caretaker goes to the bar and has a couple more drinks then heads back to the Island. It was a beautiful clear night, no wind, with a half moon in the sky, the Caretaker needed no flashlight the entire way back. Upon his return to the Island the Caretaker fixed himself another drink and tried his hand at some night photography, nothing was coming out so he decided to give up. Although he did take a photo of his tripod holding his drink, he figured he might as well put it to some good use. After the Caretaker put away his camera and tripod he fixed himself another drink and then went for a Cocktail Ski. The Cocktail Ski is much like the Cocktail Cruise in the summer only the Lake is frozen and you do it on skis. You leave your ski poles behind and leisurely ski about on the ice with drink in hand taking in the night sky, moon, stars and all.
Then the Caretaker went to bed.





--The Caretaker

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