Surprise package

[hrj]

So the package at the post office turns out to have been the whipping tops after all. I tried one out on the kitchen floor and found it a lot easier to work than I thought it would be. Cool. On the down side, I've tried several of the best butchers I know and haven't found a source of knucklebones yet. (They all say, "maybe in Chinatown", but we're upping the cost-benefit ratio at that point.) Between the one I picked up at the Beltane site and the two from The Sheep in the Attic, I could make do. But I'm not sure I want to risk something happening to bits and pieces of The Sheep in the Attic. (Hmm. It suddenly occurs to me that The Sheep in the Attic properly falls under the life-cleaning process. I really should find a good home for it.)

Comments

[klwilliams.livejournal.com]

Try the butchers at poor people places. Who eats meat that has knucklebones in it? Poor people.

Or try Cosentino's. They have everything.

[hrj.livejournal.com]

I already tried Berkeley Bowl -- which has a truly awesome butcher's counter -- and the odd little "strange creatures" butcher shop on San Pablo Blvd. It occurs to me that if I wanted to substitute pig knucklebones for the traditional sheep, I could buy a load of ham hocks. (And then have flavorings for the next five years worth of split pea soup.) But lamb carcasses evidently normally arrive already cut off above the ankle. Over the years, I've learned to sense when a specific task is likely to suck up time that could be spent on other things more productively. We've got over two dozen games on tap -- and I've already eliminated some items for playability reasons (e.g., potential for injury) or awkwardness of props (like the "balance on a barrel" game).

[klwilliams.livejournal.com]

It was my search for ham hock that led me to realize where to find things. If you want some, Cosentino's (right down the street from me) usually has them, and I can get you some. I haven't made black eyed peas in a while. :-)

[aastg.livejournal.com]

"The Sheep In the Attic"? Wouldn't that make a great title for a mystery novel...?

[hrj.livejournal.com]

I was wondering when/if someone would pick up on that!

[xrian.livejournal.com]

Er... you mean, you have an attic for a sheep to reside in?

The things you find out.....

[hrj.livejournal.com]

Yup. If you stand in front of the door to the bathroom and look directly up, you'll see the entrance to it. I don't use it for much -- storing shipping boxes (e.g., for computers I no longer own), boxes of archived paperwork (like every bill I've ever paid), and a few things that are too bulky to go anywhere else easily and that I both don't want to get rid of and have no everyday use for. The box with my mom's wedding dress is up there. So is the box with the skeleton of an unfortunate sheep that washed down Putah Creek one winter. When I went back a year after marking where the carcass fetched up, it was still undisturbed enough that I could retrive pretty much all of the bones ... including bits of the triplets it had been pregnant with. I'd always meant to mount it properly, but wanted to wait until I wouldn't have to move it around in an assembled state. And by then the urgency was lost. I keep having this fantasy that I'll run into some kid who is absolutely fascinated by bones on whom I could bestow it. The skull has long had a place of honor among various other boney bits on top of the cabinet in the bathroom.

knucklebones

[dame-cordelia.livejournal.com]

I'm wondering if some of the Halal markets might have what you are after. There's one in Fremont that sells fresh goat meat - the dismembered carcas sits on ice in the store. I go in occasionally for Middle Eastern ingredients.