One Henry et famille Hits Pennsylvania
October 8, 1997
Low-pro Hens
Dearth of Henmail lately? Well, there's a corresponding dearth of gigs at this end. Indeed it appears we're over the gig hill, washed up, gigless. (Though you'd never know it from reading the November issue of the high circ. U.S. guit-nerd mag Guitar Player. Next time you're standing around in front of a mag rack (or hangin' out at the reviews page), check out page 158.)
But for all intents, we're short-term toast.
So at least one Hen (et famille) took advantage of the interregnum and headed south, to marvel at the comings and goings of a certain type of northern Yankee, the Pennsylvania variety, countryfolk to that subclass known as the "Record Weasel of New Jersey." (We actually avoided New Jersey as a holiday destination for fear of uncovering some inner leaning toward ultra-violence.)
As we pulled out of Toronto, there should have been a sign on the highway saying "Last Edible Food and Final Cafe Lattes Until You Get Home." No kidding - among those Stateside emporia specializing in fried anything, butter-drenched enriched white-bread toast (we tipped our plate up and let it pool), limpid pasta and burnt Maxwell House coffee, one place alone actually offered cappuccino. Yes! we said, with a lingering dread of some tiny packet of chemicals and a mug of boiling water.
"Cappuccino?" we said to the waitstaff, eager for confirmation.
"Yes, we have two kinds of cappuccino."
"Really!"
"Fudge Vanilla and Chocolate Mint."
Back we sank, our withdrawal-induced depression suddenly clinical.
Order fish down there, as we once did, and you may find it still swimming. Swimming, however, in a melted kilo of butter; a pail-ette of pure-mayo tartar sauce comes on the side. And just in case you're still finding things a little on the dry side, there's a litre-boat of gravy on stand-by.
When they talk about the "Greatest country in the world," they're surely talkin' fat grams.
The vistas and the foliage were much healthier. Photo-ops abounded. There were vintage signs on every other storefront, giant offers to Join the Navy, Deer Hunter bars ... even the corporate home of the Zippo lighter. Chautauqua chats and Allegheny aerial views kept us conscious. There was a terrific Amish-run park north of Mayville NY, from whose lookout one can see Canada. And in Mt. Jewitt, Penn. they had a train-trestle built in 1882, at that time the highest bridge in the world. They used to take coal to Buffalo across that sucker. These days you can walk out onto the bridge and see for miles - we have a picture to prove it. But suddenly, if you're like us, you get so dang scared looking through the gaps under your feet straight down to the autumnal treetops 300 feet below, you end up crawling back to land.
And speaking of crawling, that'll soon be the Hens' posture if we decide to proactively scare up some work. In the meantime, recording plans for January are becoming as solid as the grease-hardened home fries at HoJo's in Bradford PA.
Cheers, y'all.