09.06.07
Opening coconuts
The other day, after the gardeners picked coconuts for us, they immediately left to go to work, taking the only cutlass with them. Shedroy, or Sheddy as everyone calls him, had stayed behind to do some cleanup work around our house. I asked him to open a couple of the coconuts for me, which at first he didn’t think he could do without a cutlass to whack off the tops. But he was able to knock them against a sharp corner of our stone wall to make a split big enough for the water to be poured out into a glass. The next day, as I had neither a cutlass nor a man to wield it, I tried Sheddy’s method - and it worked! And it was rather therapeutic, too, as I imagined all sorts of heads in place of those coconuts I was whapping against the stone… Quite proud of myself, I have been opening all my own coconuts ever since. Next up will be figuring out exactly which water nuts are at their peak to be picked. I will likely need a cutlass for that to cut them off the palm trees, but, Hey!, who needs men? As Snowy said yesterday, when I mentioned my newly discovered skill: “A lot of times, I think women are much smarter than men…”
Yes! And don’t you forget it!
darcie of dilworth mountain said,
September 6, 2007 at 3:21 pm
You mean coconuts don’t come shredded in celophane baggies?!
islandeditions said,
September 6, 2007 at 3:42 pm
Well, they may only come that way in your paradisical corner of the world, but here, we grow ‘em fresh, and in two varieties - water and dry! Care to make an exchange?
darcie of dilworth mountain said,
September 6, 2007 at 4:39 pm
Okay. You Fedex me a fresh coconut and I’ll send you a package of extra-fancy.
baby sister said,
September 7, 2007 at 8:35 am
I always thought about half the fun of a Popsicle was finding a nice sharp corner of something to split it against.
islandeditions said,
September 7, 2007 at 8:40 am
And then, after finishing the Popsicle, you could use that same sharp corner to whittle the sticks into spears with which you would poke your older sister?
baby sister said,
September 7, 2007 at 8:59 am
No, but now that you mention it, hold still.
Actually, when we used to get the not-fresh, shrivelled up coconuts here (what did we know from coconuts?) and dad would split them in the basement with various sharp implments, I used to like to take the shell shards and sand down the surfaces. I never got as far as figuring out what to do with them afterwards but I bet you could make some cool crafty doo-dads with them.
paigemason said,
September 7, 2007 at 8:54 pm
Whose heads?
islandeditions said,
September 7, 2007 at 11:40 pm
No worries, Paige. Definitely not yours…