NYC In Black and White- Family April 2012

Poll- New Gallery Wall At The House.

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The Mrs just put up this great wall of frames. Over/under on the time before any pictures get placed in the frames is 2 months and I’ve got the over.

What cha got?

Sista Felicia and Amanda Make The Saint Joseph’s Pasta Slide Show

Ask Joey C- Concerned Mother Has Daughter Who Dates Losers – I Need Help On This One Folks

Concerned Mother writes-

My daughter really goes for the underdog (ie. losers). How can I gently encourage her to set her sights higher without seeming like the overbearing mother?

My advice?   Normally I can bang out relationship advice all day long but my two little girls aren’t to that dating stage yet and I really don’t know what to say.

Like I know you want to keep the lines of communication open between you and your daughter.  I know you could potentially say things to her, calling the guys she’s dating a loser when they have a fight and then they make up, she tells the guy what you said and then the guy spends the rest of his living days trying to convince your daughter what a terrible parent you’ve been.

I get all that but I just don’t know that I have what it takes to sit back and watch some douchebag take advantage of one of my girls.

So I’m throwing this one out there to our informed and brilliant readership.  What would you do?

2012 St Josph’s Novena Trolley

Special thanks to all of the beautiful families who welcomed us into their homes, Sefathia for organizing the Trolley, Bob Ryan from CATA and Eddie Salah who donated his time to drive the Novena Trolley and our trolley mates who did the 2012 Novena crawl.

The work put in by these families is truly astounding and we are all honored by the welcoming by each and every house and huge props go out to the women, men and children that keep this tradition alive.  You are what makes our community special.

Kim Smith will do her usual knock out job covering the entire thing in a much more refined manner than my stuff but it will take a bit for her to chew through all the footage.

In the mean time, I’ll be doing a separate post each day from each family, some had more coverage than other from me as while The Bean and Snoop Maddie Mad were still with us I wanted to spend that time with them.

First off, the Trolley-

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Click the slideshow below to see the larger sized pictures of the thumbnails-

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Video with Sefathia explaining what it’s all about-

Lessons for Children- The Squished Frog

While on vacation we took a walk with the girls and came across this squished frog which I think got run over by a golf cart as it was on the golf cart path.

A little later in the day the Bean hops out of the rented minivan and proceeds to walk across the pavement to get across the road to which I raised my voice and grabbed her by the arm before she got more than a step.

Reminding her yet again about looking both ways and waiting for me before she crosses I asked her to look me in the eyes.

Then I told her to remember the squished frog we saw earlier in the day and how I’d hate for her to get run over by a car and her get squished and how dead stuff is dead forever and how it would really make me sad to never be able to talk to her again.

Maybe it might have left a little impression on her.

In the mean time I’ll just keep reminding her to stick by my side while I help Snoop Maddie Mad out of her car seat.

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Mrs Violet At The Manchester Athletic Club Helps Snoop Maddie Mad Learn To Swim

Check Out The Programs at The MAC Here

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Sunday Dinner At Sista Felicia’s

Bracciolini

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The Mrs Prepares a Chop Salad

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Guccadaddis (I know I butchered the spelling on that but perhaps Sefatia will correct me)

Fig Cookies

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Mammaw crafting with Snoop Maddie Mad

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Iloveyousomach love Baeny.

Found this morning, created by The Bean.

My Favorite Valentine Card.

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Happy Valentines Day Y’all!

Video- New England Aquarium Sting Ray Touch Tank With Snoop Maddie Mad and The Bean

The History Channel Tapes Segment With Wives and Daughters of Gloucester Fishermen At The Lone Gull

On February 1st 2012 the History Channel was at the Lone Gull to tape segments talking about the fishing industry and how the wives and daughters of Gloucester fishermen remember the industry.

Here are some photos I took at the taping-

The Sinking Of The Ben and Josephine Account From The Gloucester Daily Times

The Infamous Fred Buck At The Cape Ann Museum found the article from the Times with the account of how our Grandfather’s boat was sunk by the German Sub  on June 11, 1942

Gloucester Daily Times, June 11, 1942
ENEMY SUB SENDS TWO LOCAL …
14 Fishermen Reach Shore Safely After Craft Are Shelled
Two Gloucester fishing draggers were shelled and sunk within a half hour of each other off the New England coast Wednesday afternoon, June 3, while the crews of both vessels were endangered by machine gun bullets, shrapnel from hurtling shells and even from direct shelling by an enemy submarine, a long dull grey craft without identification marks.

All 14 men in the crews managed to reach shore after 36 hours of rowing through fog and drenching rain, with neither crew able to salvage an ounce of food.  Capt. John O. Johnson, owner-skipper of the second craft shelled, told a graphic story of the event, while Capt. Joseph Ciametaro [sic], 27 years, Washington Square, skipper of the other boat, described the machine gunning.  The only casualty was Capt. Johnson’s dog "Snooksie."

First Local Casualties
These are the first Gloucester fishermen to be sunk by subs since late summer of 1918, when the German submarines took a toll of Gloucester swordfishermen and market fishermen on Georges Bank.  News of the sinkings were learned here within two days of the tragedy.

In Capt. Ciametaro’s crew were Sam Frontiero, 45 years, 19 Mansfield Street, engineer; Tony Frontiero, 35 years, 17 Elm Street, cook; Sam Orlando, 23 years, 7 Washington Square; Dominic Montagnino, 27 years, 21 Riggs Street; William Mahoney, 49 years, 12 Locust Street; Peter Frontiero, 27 years, 42 Fort Square; James A. Sheaves, 42 years, 12 Marchant Street.

Their craft, costing some $80,000 a couple years ago when she was built, was on the fishing grounds in the late afternoon, and had already made one set, getting 1500 pounds redfish, when in steaming toward what they thought would be a better spot, Orlando on watch forward, saw the conning tower of a submarine off a distance from them.  At first, they thought she might be an American submarine on patrol, but when the raider came within 300 feet of their craft, they saw men on deck armed with machine guns, letting loose a barrage of tracer shots at their craft.

Machine Gun House
"Orlando called me on deck and when I realized they were firing at us, I knew very well she was an enemy," said Capt. Ciaramitaro.  "I ran into the pilot house to get the compass, and as I did, some of the machine gun bullets smashed away at the house.  Mahoney who was up nearby came within inches of getting killed.  They must have thought the firing would be a warning.
"Anyway, we made for the two dories aboard, and lost no time in launching them into the water.  We didn’t even bother to get our clothing or anything else and even left the compass behind.  I had planned to break the seal on the radio telephone in the engine house and notify the Coast Guard that a sub was attacking us, but the firing was too hot for us, and it would take too many precious minutes to get this done.

"Sheaves, Orlando, Montagnino and Tony Frontiero were in the first dory, while Sam Frontiero and myself made for the other.
"Within five minutes of the machine gunning, the sub crew started firing from a gun mounted on deck.  I don’t know what type it was or how big.  I know that those shells came thick and fast, and there must have been anywhere from 40 to 50 shells sent at our boat.  One of the shells must have banged into the foc’s’tle, because we saw the stove come hurtling out through a shellhole in the port side of the boat.

"The shell that did the trick was the last one, smashing into the engine room, causing an explosion, which set the boat afire.  However, it was a half hour later before she finally sunk.  We couldn’t see how good their aim was, because we were on the opposite side from where they were shelling.
"There was a lot of shrapnel from the shells flying around us, but none of us was hit.  None of the crew bothered to speak to us and we said nothing to them.  We don’t know whether they were Germans or Italians.  They certainly weren’t friends.  They were tall and slim.  There were several men on the deck of the sub.

Many Misses
Orlando and others of the crew declared there were more misses than hits as the shells screamed overhead and around them.  It looked like the battle of the Marne might have looked, they thought.  The weather was clear with visibility of at least six or seven miles, said the skipper.  The sea was fairly smooth.

As the two dories were rowing away from the craft in which they had made big money in the past couple years, they saw a short while later smoke rising in the distance and knew that the neighboring dragger had been sunk.

Fog set in on the long pull to shore.  Guided only by the direction of the wind which the skipper had sensed as he left the dragger, the reckoning proved correct and brought them to land 36 hours later.  They rowed in reliefs of two, and both dories kept together.  They had no food, but did have a small amount of water.  It was a long hard pull and when they finally made it, every man was exhausted.  They were given strong steaming coffee, bacon and eggs, and it all tasted mighty good.  Later the navy took charge of the men and took their accounts of what had happened.  They arrived about 4:30 o’clock in the morning.
Asked as to whether or not they were frightened when machine gunned, the skipper exclaimed, "Of course we were scared.  With those bullets flying all around us, there was no wonder we were scared."

"Every time they would fire a shell it would knock the boat around," the skipper added.  "The next shell would swing around the other way."  Said Peter Frontiero, "To tell you the truth, we were stunned.  The sub skipper gave us plenty of time to get off, but he did have a lot of shots fired in the pilot house.  When he let the shells go, we knew he meant business and we got going.  We are glad they never hit our dories."