Many will spend the holiday in their backyards for barbecues, cookouts or build fire pits where there’s a greater risk to sustain a burn injury. To avoid injury, Steven Sandoval, MD, Associate Professor of Surgery and Medical Director of the Suffolk County Volunteer Firefighters Burn Center at Stony Brook University Hospital, says “The best way to do this is to prevent the burn in the first place with safety tips and precautions to eliminate potential dangers.”
Fireworks are safe for viewing only when being used by professionals.
Sparklers are one of the most common ways children become burned this holiday, even with a parent’s supervision.
Do not have children around any fireworks, firepits, barbecues or hot coals. Teach them not to grab objects or play with items that can be hot. Go through a lesson where they learn to ask permission.
Limit the use of flammable liquids to start your fire pits and barbecues. Use only approved lighter fluids that are meant for cooking purposes. No gasoline or kerosene.
Don’t leave hot coals from fire pits and barbecues laying on the ground for people to step in.
When cleaning grills, the use of wire bristle brushes can result in ingestion of sharp bristle pieces requiring surgery.
If you are overly tired, and consumed alcohol, do not use the stovetop, fire pit or a fireplace.
Stay protected from the sun. Use hats and sunblock, and realize that sunblock needs to be reapplied after swimming or after sweating.
Use the back burners of the stove to prevent children from reaching up and touching hot pots and pans.
Always use oven mitts or potholders to remove hot items from the stove or microwave. Assume pots, pans and dishware are hot.
“If burned do not go anywhere but a facility that specializes in burn treatment,” says Dr. Sandoval.
As the only designated burn care facility for more than 1.5 million residents of Suffolk County, the Burn Center at Stony Brook University Hospital coordinates burn services throughout the county, and conducts training and research in burn care. The Burn Center also serves as a resource to neighboring community-based hospitals. Patients of all ages – from infants through geriatrics – are treated at the Burn Center.
To reach the Suffolk County Volunteer Firefighters Burn Center at Stony Brook University Hospital, call 631-444-4545.
For immediate help, call the burn unit directly at 631-444-BURN.
One of over a dozen derelict buildings that remain on the Lawrence Aviation Superfund site in Port Jefferson Station. File photo by Raymond Janis
UPDATE: The June 29 community availability session at the Port Jefferson Village Center for the Lawrence Aviation Industries Site is postponed. DEC will notify the public once a new community meeting date is scheduled.
To ensure careful and thorough cleanup efforts at the former Lawrence Aviation Industries Superfund Site in Port Jefferson Station, the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation scheduled a community availability session at the Port Jefferson Village Center, 101 East Broadway, tonight, June 29, from 6-8:30 p.m. This event has been postponed to a later date.
Experts from NYSDEC, the state Department of Health, NYSDEC-contracted engineering and demolition firms, the Suffolk County Landbank Corporation and the Suffolk County Department of Health Services will be available for one-on-one interactions with community members. Multiple stations will be set up at the Village Center, with representatives available to discuss specific areas of interest.
Participants can attend any time during the session.
The community availability session will present information about the planned demolition, cleanup activities and future use at the LAI Site. Handouts of the presentation materials will be made available during the session.
Eliminating possible exposure to site-related contamination in the local community will be a point of emphasis. The updates include the latest information regarding the planned demolition of derelict buildings and provide progress to address contaminated soils and groundwater on the property.
Donald Triplett. Photo from Wikimedia Commons/
Ylevental, CC BY-SA 4.0 , via Wikimedia Commons
By Daniel Dunaief
Daniel Dunaief
At a recent national meeting of experts in his field, Matthew Lerner said the gathering paused to toast the remarkable life of Donald Triplett.
Born and raised in Forest, Mississippi, Triplett died on Thursday, June 15 at the age of 89, after a full life in which his family, his community and a medical and research field around him learned about a condition he helped various communities understand.
Triplett was different from other children growing up, and in 1943, after his parents brought him to psychiatrist Dr. Leo Kanner, he became “Case 1” for a new diagnosis called autism.
“Everything we know about autism started with what was learned from Donald,” said Lerner, associate professor in Clinical Psychology at the Stony Brook Neurosciences Institute. “I’m still confident the field would have found its way to autism,” but the interaction between Triplett and Kanner helped establish some of the parameters that define a condition that researchers estimate affects about one in 36 children today.
As with people who have other diagnoses, the reaction people have to those with autism varies.
“There are two broad threads in the history of how we’ve understood, studied and treated autism since the 1940s,” said Lerner.
In one, people consider it a lifetime disability, in which the diagnosis is limiting and stigmatizing.
In the second, people see autism as a different way of being, in which individuals have an opportunity to develop a meaningful and happy life, as was the case with Triplett.
“The idea of autism as being so different and so impairing was the prototype,” Lerner said. Triplett’s life “didn’t follow that trajectory at all. He had a life filled with community in which he felt supported and accepted.”
This second model of autism, Lerner added, is achievable in “far more cases than we may have historically assumed.”
Triplett, who worked at the Bank of Forest for 65 years and traveled the world, had unusual cognitive abilities that set him apart from neurotypical people. He could multiply two three-digit numbers rapidly without a calculator. He also could look at the side of a building and could indicate the number of bricks without counting them one by one. He had perfect pitch.
As he was growing up, he didn’t interact socially in typical ways for children his age. His parents institutionalized him for a year, where he became withdrawn and disinterested. When they brought him back to their home, he became more engaged, earning a high school and bachelor’s degree in French from Millsaps College.
“He may have been the first, but he was far, far, far from the only autistic person who ended up exceeding the horizons set for him when he was young,” Lerner said.
Lerner believed people in the autistic community, like Triplett, have something to teach others about challenging circumstances.
“Kids are going to get where they are going at their own pace,” Lerner said. Being patient and kind and taking time to meet people where they are as individuals can help people grow. Lerner suggested that “we need to be okay with the idea that what that person is going to be is themselves and the best thing we can do is create a space” for that development to occur.
People will develop when they don’t feel like they are failing because people around them are setting expectations that don’t match them or are underestimating what they can do, he added.
“It’s important to feel validated and valued” through life, Lerner said.
Parents of children from a wide range of abilities sometimes hear what their offspring will never do.
People are frequently “proven wrong” by that child in that family, he added.
As for Triplett, Lerner encouraged people to watch the movie ’In a Different Key” about the person later known as Case 1.”
Renee Fondacaro of Old Field Apothecary with one of her scented candles, ‘Long Island Sound'. Photo by Julianne Mosher
'Long Island Sound' scented candle from Old Field Apothecary. Photo by Julianne Mosher
A variety of scented candles by Old Field Apothecary. Photo by Julianne Mosher
Renee Fondacaro in her candle making studio in Old Field. Photo by Julianne Mosher
Room and linen sprays by Old Field Apothecary. Photo by Julianne Mosher
Assorted scented candles by Old Field Apothecary. Photo by Julianne Mosher
One woman’s pandemic project brings local scents across Long Island
By Julianne Mosher
When the world shut down in 2020, Renee Fondacaro immediately knew she wanted to take on a hobby.
Always a fan of candles, Fondacaro would have them constantly burning in her Old Field home. She took on a hobby at the start of the COVID-19 pandemic by blending essential oil scents with a clean, healthier candle wax base that she would drop off at her friends’ homes.
“I had ordered a candle kit because the pandemic was boring,” she said. “I made a bunch of them and would drop them off to my friends because I felt like it was a little gift that could maybe bring happiness when everyone was so stressed out.”
And they did bring happiness — because they smelled great. Fondacaro’s friends and family began to ask her, “Why are you not selling these?”
So, just about six months later, the mom of three signed up for her first craft fair in October 2020 where she made her first official sale. She and her husband John, who is a veterinarian specialist, decided that instead of a hobby, this was going to be a business. Soon after, they formed an LLC, got insurance and trademarked, and settled on the name “Old Field Apothecary,” as she creates her mini masterpieces right inside her Old Field home.
As a two-time cancer survivor, and retired nurse, Fondacaro is very health conscious. As an avid candle lover, sometimes it’s hard to know what exactly is being put into the air we breathe. That’s why she decided to make her candles at Old Field Apothecary 100% natural.
“It was really important for me to find ingredients that were very, very clean,” she said. “Candles can be very toxic if they’re not made with good, clean ingredients.”
Using clean coconut and apricot cream wax, she melts the mixture into jars that are heat safe for with woodburning wicks that make the perfect crackling sound. She would ask people what scents they were looking for, and now, nearly three years later, she has created over 80 different types, along with linen and room sprays and wax melts. She said the process is relatively simple, the longest part is melting the wax.
Fondacaro, who grew up in Setauket, would travel to local farmers markets and other craft fairs, along with making a website to sell her products. But she wanted to include the community even more. She started to approach local and other Long Island-based stores to start collaborating with including the Three Village Historical Society in Setauket and The Reboli Center for Art and History, The Long Island Museum, and The Jazz Loft in Stony Brook (where the candles are named after famous jazz musicians).
She began to venture out of the local Three Village area, too, including a collab with Kidd Squid Brewing Company in Sag Harbor and the Raynham Hall Museum in Oyster Bay. She is currently planning a scent for a shop on Block Island, too, and for some wineries on the North Fork.
But the Reboli Center is the place that has the most variety. Lois Reboli, president of the center, said that Fondacaro walked in one day and they talked about a collaboration. She couldn’t be happier with their partnership.
“Her candles are exceptional and we are very honored to have them at our place,” said Reboli. “They bring in a lot of foot traffic from people who may have not come into the Reboli Center before.”
Fondacaro said some of her most popular scents are the lavender candles because they’re calming and not overwhelming. She loves the more woodsy, earthy scents.
“Almost everyone who buys my candles always come back and tell me that they really can see the difference in the way they burn,” she said. “They don’t get headaches. They don’t get watery eyes. They don’t get side effects and symptoms from any toxins, so I love that.”
And there is a scent for everyone: blackberry and musk, coffee bean and cacao, strawberry cream truffle, or “after the rain” — just to name a few. Plus, they’re animal friendly so furry friends can enjoy these new smells, too.
Candles start at $27.95 and are hand-poured right in Old Field. To view the entire collection, visit www.oldfieldapothecary.com
This article originally appeared in Summer Times, a seasonal guide supplement by TBR News Media.
Dr. Sharon Nachman, chief of the Division of Pediatric Infectious Diseases at Stony Brook Children's Hospital. File photo from Stony Brook Medicine
With COVID-19 pandemic restrictions in the rearview mirror, residents have been returning to the open road and the open skies, visiting places and people.
In addition to packing sunscreen, bathing suits and cameras, local doctors urge people to check the vaccination status for themselves and their children, which may have lapsed.
“During COVID, many people did not keep up with their vaccines,” said Dr. Sharon Nachman, chief of the Division of Pediatric Infectious Diseases at Stony Brook Children’s Hospital. “That has led to a decrease in the amount of children who are vaccinated.”
Last week, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention issued a health advisory to remind doctors and public health officials for international travelers to be on the lookout for cases of measles, with cases rising in the country and world.
As of June 8, the CDC has learned of 16 confirmed cases of measles across 11 jurisdictions, with 14 cases arising from international travel.
Measles, which is highly contagious and can range from relatively mild symptoms to deadly infections, can arise in developed and developing nations.
Measles can be aerosolized about 60 feet away, which means that “you could be at a train station and someone two tracks over who is coughing and sneezing” can infect people if they are not protected.
The combination of increasing travel, decreasing vaccinations and climbing levels of measles in the background creates the “perfect mixture” for a potential spread of the disease, Nachman said.
Typical first symptoms include cough, runny nose and conjunctivitis.
Conjunctivitis, which includes red, watery eyes, can be a symptom of numerous other infections.
“Many other illnesses give you red eyes,” Nachman said, adding, “Only when you start seeing a rash” do doctors typically confirm that it’s measles.
People are contagious for measles when they start to show these symptoms. Doctors, meanwhile, typically treat measles with Vitamin A, which can help ease the symptoms but is not an effective antiviral treatment.
As with illnesses like COVID, people with underlying medical conditions are at higher risk of developing more severe symptoms. Those with diabetes, hypertension, have organ transplants or have received anticancer drugs or therapies can have more problematic symptoms from measles.
In about one in 1,000 cases, measles can cause subacute sclerosing panencephalitis, or SSPE. About six to 10 years after contracting the virus, people can develop SSPE, which can lead to coma and death.
In addition to children who need two doses of the measles vaccine, which typically is part of the measles, mumps and rubella vaccine, or MMR, doctors urge people born between 1957 and 1985 to check on their vaccination status. People born during those years typically received one dose of the vaccine. Two doses provide greater protection.
Two doses of the MMR vaccine provide 97% protection from measles. One dose offers 93% immunity, explained Dr. David Galinkin, infectious disease specialist at Port Jefferson-based St. Charles Hospital.
People born before 1957 likely had some exposure to measles, which can provide lifelong immunological protection.
Nachman also urged people to speak with their doctor about their vaccination status for measles and other potential illnesses before traveling. People are protected against measles about two weeks after they receive their vaccine.
Doctors suggested that the MMR vaccine typically causes only mild reactions, if any.
Tetanus, Lyme
In addition to MMR vaccines, doctors urged residents to check on their tetanus vaccination, which protects for 10 years.
“The last thing you want to do is look for a tetanus vaccination in an international emergency room,” Nachman added.
During the summer months, doctors also urged people to check themselves and their children, especially if they are playing outside in the grass or near bushes, for ticks.
Intermediate hosts for Lyme disease, a tick typically takes between 36 to 48 hours from the time it attaches to a human host to transmit Lyme disease.
Nachman suggested parents use a phone flashlight to search for these unwelcome parasites.
Landscapers help to maintain the land around chamber of commerce signs, including at Route 347 and Nicolls Road. Photo by Mallie Jane Kim
“I like to see a man proud of the place in which he lives,” reads the quotation on garbage cans around Stony Brook village.
Carl Bongiorno & Sons added birdhouses to the land parcels they maintain. Photo by Mallie Jane Kim
The placement of the quote, attributed to Abraham Lincoln, couldn’t be clearer: If you are proud of where you live, help keep it clean.
Green Machine Landscaping in Stony Brook and Carl Bongiorno & Sons, an East Setauket landscape business, are volunteering to do just that, in conjunction with the Three Village Chamber of Commerce, for the main entrances to the community.
Jurisdiction over Long Island roadsides gets complicated, as some roads are the responsibility of the state, some of the county and others of the towns, so it’s easy for overgrowth to fall through the bureaucratic cracks.
“It gets to be a forgotten sister, and it needs somebody to take care of it,” said Bob Brown, a chamber board member.
According to Brown, the chamber’s arrangement with Carl Bongiorno & Sons started shortly after Sept. 11, 2001, when Bongiorno Sr. approached TVCC wanting to do something to contribute to his community that was still reeling from the terrorist attacks in New York City. Starting with the land around chamber signs on Route 347, at both Nicolls and Old Town roads, his firm added retaining walls, planters and even birdhouses handcrafted by Bongiorno Sr. himself.
“We really take pride in making them nice,” said Carl Bongiorno Jr., who has maintained the firm’s relationship with the chamber. “Having birds chirping and living there, just enhances those signs and those entrances to the community even more.”
Bongiorno Jr. said his landscaping business also created a retaining wall with planting beds where Belle Mead Road meets Upper Sheep Pasture Road at the request of the chamber.
“A lot of people were traveling both ways along that stretch,” Bongiorno Jr. said. “At the time it was really run down, and we wanted to do something to clean up and brighten up that corner a little bit.”
Now, Brown said, the area near the chamber’s third sign, at Nicolls Road and Route 25A, is the “forgotten sister” about to receive some attention. For that, Green Machine Landscaping has stepped up to help.
According to owner Jason Witover, Green Machine is planning to clean and beautify the area, amid the busy early summer landscaping season.
Witover, a native Three Villager, said he is happy to help. “We take pride in the community, and they’ve done a lot for us,” he said. “Anything I can give back to the community that’s helped me personally, and where I have my business as well, it’s my honor to do so.”
For his part, Brown sees the arrangement as directly related to the chamber’s core mission. “The goal of the chamber was to bring people together and use the force of all those people to make a better community,” he said. “I think we’ve been reasonably successful in doing that.”
Local citizen chips in
This kind of benevolence is not limited to professional landscapers in the community. The Three Village Civic Association recently recognized photographer Michael Rosengard of East Setauket for taking it upon himself to beautify an area nobody was taking care of.
Civic association president Charles Tramontana told attendees at a recent meeting that one weekend he was driving past Patriots Hollow State Forest on 25A when he noticed Rosengard “working like a dog” with tools to clear the sidewalk of overgrown vegetation, leaves and litter. Tramontana couldn’t resist pulling over to say “thank you.” Rosengard told him, “You know what? It’s good exercise.”
Tramontana pointed out that since it’s not always clear which agency has jurisdiction to maintain areas like that sidewalk, he believes such behavior deserves recognition.
Maureen Manyasa-Zangrillo near the hole where children used to fetch drinking water before a well project.. Photo from Manyasa-Zangrillo
As a child in Kenya, Maureen Nabwire Manyasa-Zangrillo, now 35, loved learning about the world, but never dreamed she’d wind up living in the United States more than 7,000 miles away.
Maureen Nabwire Manyasa-Zangrillo with her husband, Joey. Photo from Manyasa-Zangrillo
She lived several different lifestyles moving around Kenya as a child, she said, following her father’s developing career as an agricultural scientist to cities and villages and back again, fostering her love of new places and different kinds of people. As she grew up, so did that passion, expanding outward from her region and continent to encompass the entire world atlas she loved to study.
So when a serendipitous meeting over a charity project gave her a chance to travel to the other side of the world to make a new life on the North Shore of Long Island, she was ready. Now married to Joey Zangrillo, owner of Joey Z’s Restaurant in Port Jefferson, she is in the perfect setting to keep learning. “My love for geography and reading maps really helps when I meet people,” she said. “I have a clue about almost every corner of the globe.”
Growing up in Kenya
Before she even started primary school, Manyasa-Zangrillo had lived in Nakuru, the fourth largest urban area in the nation; her family’s village in Busia near the Ugandan border; a remote agricultural field station outside of Kenya’s capital Nairobi; and finally the thriving urban capital itself.
When it was time to start school, Manyasa-Zangrillo’s parents moved her and her younger sisters back to the quieter Busia, where they stayed with an aunt in a circular mud hut built in the traditional manner of their ethnic group, the Luhya tribe, while her father started the long process of coordinating construction of a modern brick house.
It was common in Kenya for breadwinners to work in the cities but keep their families back home in the villages, and such was the case for Manyasa-Zangrillo’s father. So building the house was slow progress over the next four or five years, with her father coordinating the work whenever he could make time to be home from Nairobi. Her mother, a primary school teacher, was gone awhile also to advance her training at teachers college.
Both parents made sure to stay connected to the girls. The father would send letters and packages to his daughters through the local bus company’s courier service, and — since landlines were rare — would schedule times to talk. Manyasa-Zangrillo remembered friends with landline telephones in their offices coming to tell the family what time to wait at the local payphone booth. She and her sisters would crowd around. “You’d find all of us at the booth — he’d talk to us turn by turn,” she said. “That’s how we found ways to connect.” Once the house was finished, the family finally had a landline of their own.
At age 10, Manyasa-Zangrillo’s lifestyle changed yet again, when she went to a Catholic boarding school, run by a very strict nun. “She was tough on us,” Manyasa-Zangrillo said, recalling that after parents visited, the staff would check the students to make sure they weren’t bringing in any outside food, drinks or treats.
Amid the rigid schedule and lack of comfort food, Manyasa-Zangrillo discovered bright spots: literature and geography. The curriculum included many storybooks, in both English and Swahili. For Manyasa-Zangrillo, reading was a beautiful escape. “It was a way of distracting myself from all the craziness and strictness that was going around,” she said.
Her beloved geography also gave her mind space to travel. “They would teach us about different areas — you learn about the geography, the weather of all these places, the planting, cultivation, commerce structures and all those things,” she said. “I was just curious about places.”
As she was growing up, she saw her parents rise in their education and careers. Her father obtained his university degree, a master’s and eventually a doctorate in plant breeding for arid and semi-arid regions, and her mother earned a bachelor’s in special education. “I’d see how strong willed they are,” the daughter said. “It was really motivating to see.”
Manyasa-Zangrillo, right, with her parents and a cousin in Kenya. Photo from Manyasa-Zangrillo
This motivation helped Manyasa-Zangrillo succeed in her own education, earning a government scholarship to university herself. She struggled, though, to know what to study. In the end, she settled on law. “I wasn’t crazy about it,” she said, remembering she looked into other options like English linguistics, but her dad was even less crazy about that idea. “You have good grades — a top performance,” he told her, encouraging her to choose a major he saw as more serious.
After completing her education, she was admitted to the Kenyan bar and landed a job at the firm where she had carried out her required internship. She found ways to enjoy it. Serving documents or filing petitions, for example, took her all around the region. “I liked it because I love traveling, and I love seeing and exploring,” she said. “It was fulfilling my adventurous self because I’m going to new towns, new places.”
Charitable deeds
Another thing that helped fulfill her curiosity were opportunities to serve. Along with her sisters and other neighbors in Nairobi, where her family had relocated, Manyasa-Zangrillo had started a group called Youth for Change as a means to serve underprivileged children. So when her close friend from law school, Annette Kawira, invited her to volunteer at Bethsaida Community Foundation’s home for orphans, vulnerable children and children who had been living on the streets, she was happy to go along.
By 2016, Kawira had moved to the United States and found herself, of all places, in Joey Zangrillo’s Port Jefferson restaurant, then called Z Pita. Zangrillo had started a nonprofit organization and apparel company promoting racial reconciliation, and he was also donating 10% of his profits to charity. When Kawira saw a sign about the restaurant owner’s philanthropy, she remembered the Bethsaida orphanage and made a fast friendship and partnership with Zangrillo.
As the two organized fundraising on Long Island, Manyasa-Zangrillo served as the woman on the ground in Kenya, liaising between them and the children’s home. Logistical texts and FaceTime interactions between her and Zangrillo blossomed into friendship — she enjoyed his sense of humor — then took on a flirtatious air. Interest sparked.
By the time he planned to take a trip to Kenya to visit Bethsaida and meet the children in 2017, he was also looking forward to meeting her. She remembered being nervous about what he would be like in person, but after she opened her door to him, she said, “he just busted in with so much energy, and I was like, OK, we’re going to get along.”
For his part, Zangrillo was drawn to her compassion. “What made me fall in love with my wife is when I saw the love in her eyes for the children in the orphanage,” he said. “That second, I knew.”
To Long Island and marriage
The trip was a success and plans to install a well at the orphanage moved forward, as did plans for Manyasa-Zangrillo to visit Long Island, which she did that fall. Joey Zangrillo sent Kawira and another Kenyan friend in a limo to pick her up from the airport, and she was charmed. Manhattan charmed her, too — it was larger than life, just like the movies. She even sat in the audience at “The Daily Show” to see the comic Trevor Noah she’d watched back in Africa.
Manyasa-Zangrillo found the Port Jefferson community and Zangrillo’s friends welcoming and warm, but the weather less so. “The drastic hot to cold — I felt like my ears were going to fall off,” she said.
The weather wasn’t enough to keep her away. After a couple months back in the more temperate climate of Kenya, she kept thinking about New York, Zangrillo and the possibilities. “In my legal profession, I was wallowing a bit,” she said. “Am I going to do this for the rest of my life, yet I’m feeling like this is not what I really wanted to do.”
So she took a risk and came back in early 2018, still unsure what the future would hold. Zangrillo was more certain. “He was like, ‘You know what? I would like you to stay.’”
They married that summer. “There’s no need to overthink something that is good,” she said of the quick timeline, adding that where immigration law is involved, “you date through the marriage because you don’t have a long courtship.”
She found her transition to New York easy, partly because of Kawira and other Kenyan connections, but also because of her new husband. He’d told so many people about her and about the orphanage that restaurantgoers and friends were thrilled to meet her, and to learn more about her. “It’s so refreshing because when I walk in, people say, ‘You must be Maureen,’” she said. “Through the restaurant, I’m meeting people every day.”
For Zangrillo, having her in town is “a godsend,” he said. “It changed my life — I’m a happy man, with a happy life.”
Careerwise, the future is still open for Manyasa-Zangrillo. She has taken a paralegal class and is studying the American legal system in case she wants to return to her original career path. She helps at the restaurant and has introduced a top-selling menu item — the lemon potatoes. The couple are continuing their charity work, as well, with hopes to install a school library for students in a Nairobi slum settlement.
Now living in Setauket, Manyasa-Zangrillo has come to appreciate the North Shore’s feel and location, not too close and not too far from the city. “My life dream when I was younger was just to be somewhere that is full of nature and very serene, and the environment is cool,” she said. “I’d say I got it here.”
Daisy, the mommy mallard protects her ducklings in a flowerpot at Bryant Funeral Home in East Setauket. Photo from Bryant Funeral Home
By Carole Ganzenmuller
At Bryant Funeral Home in East Setauket, we work hard caring for families. This past May we were not caring for a family but for a beautiful female mallard duck that became part of the Bryant family.
The duck family takes off for new adventures. Photo from Bryant Funeral Home
One morning in May, the staff came in the back door, where there is a large flowerpot and noticed a hole had been dug in the dirt; but we did not give it a second thought. The next day we noticed a duck sitting in the pot. She blended in so well with flowers that we hardly noticed her. She was there for a few days. Then one day she stood up and lo and behold there was one egg in this hole she had made a nest. Then there were three eggs, then finally six eggs. We were excited and yet nervous for the mommy mallard; we named her “Daisy.”
We did our research and read not to touch or move the eggs, what mallard ducks eat and how long before the eggs would hatch. Daisy loved the fruit and seeds we fed her; but she was always cautious if people came too close. To try to keep her protected we put a sign near the pot so families, florists and delivery companies would try to be considerate and not startle her and they would not be startled. Anyone who saw her became so invested in her: “Oh, she is still here?”
In addition, our families would all ask about Daisy. We even took the time to make a little homemade pond just in case Daisy and her soon-to-be ducklings needed a close water spot to make home.
Bryant Funeral Home is happy to say exactly 30 days after Daisy deposited her eggs, all six little ducklings were born. We were happy yet sad when Daisy and her sweet six little ducklings hopped out of the pot and went off for their new adventures as a family. We at Bryant Funeral Home were so proud to be part of the whole experience with such a happy ending.
Carole Ganzenmuller is a funeral assistant with Bryant Funeral Home.
An outdoor cooking oil container, above. Photo from Wikimedia Commons
By Aidan Johnson
Two men were arrested on June 5 by Suffolk County police for stealing cooking oil from three restaurants in the Patchogue-Medford area.
While the idea of people stealing used cooking oil may garner some confused looks and light chuckles, the ramifications of the crime are a lot bigger than expected.
Dimitris Assanis, an assistant professor in the Department of Mechanical Engineering at Stony Brook University, spoke about the greater use of cooking oil.
“There’s these cascading layers of what you can use oil products for, so in the cooking oil side, these are basically oil that comes from the fryers. That’s probably the largest use,” Assanis said.
Depending on the quality and type of oil, along with the price point of the restaurant, according to Assanis, factor in how often the oil is changed. More expensive restaurants may change their oil daily or every few days, while a mid- to lower-tier restaurant may change its oil around once every week or two.
There’s also value in converting this oil into fuel oil by turning it into biodiesel, a net-zero or low-carbon fuel that is very similar to diesel. If done in a careful manner, the oil can be turned into high-quality biodiesel that can then be used as home heating oil or can be put in a car, Assanis said.
In the past, restaurants would have to pay to dispose of their used oil. However, restaurants are able to have it disposed for free or even get paid for their used oil, especially since there’s a secondary use for it.
“The issue is now if someone is going in and stealing their oil, they were using that additional revenue probably to discount some of the cost of running the restaurant,” Assanis said. “And usually that cost that’s lost there gets passed on to the customer because they can’t offset it.”
Jeff Yasinski is co-owner of D&W Alternative Energy, a New Jersey company that collects and recycles used cooking oil from restaurants in New Jersey, Pennsylvania and Delaware. For over a decade, D&W has had to struggle with cooking oil theft. Currently, Yasinski estimates that 30-35% of their cooking oil is being stolen per week.
Even with the outdoor cooking oil containers that restaurants use becoming more secure, thieves still find ways to steal it, usually with the help of oxyacetylene torches and angle grinders that leave the containers destroyed.
“We’ve personally reached out to the FBI, the State Commission of Investigation, pretty much every local police department in the New Jersey, Pennsylvania area,” Yasinski said. “Occasionally they’ll catch one little cargo van with two guys in it, but you got to cut the head off the snake, not the [tail],” he added.
The theft is fueled by the people who are willing to buy the stolen used oil, and according to Yasinski, it is no secret who they are.
“There’s three big outfits in New Jersey that [are] buying a lot of stolen oil, and pretty much all of that stolen oil that’s aggregated at those three places then gets sold on through one specific trading house,” Yasinski explained.
“That one specific trading house supplies one of the very biggest renewable diesel producers in the world, and they know it. Everybody down the chain knows it. It’s frustrating,” he further elaborated.
Yasinski suggests that restaurants move the oil containers inside, where thieves are less likely to steal it. He also recommends familiarizing yourself with the service provider.
“I can’t tell you how many times I’ve gone to a restaurant trying to pick up a new account, and they thought that they were being serviced by whoever’s container was out there, but in reality, their oil has just been stolen over and over and over again,” he said.
“And the company who dropped that container five years ago hasn’t been there in five years, because every time they go there, there’s no oil there,” Yasinski added.
It’s important to make sure that the service provider being used is legitimate by checking information such as the Department of Transportation numbers on the truck. Otherwise, instead of just the oil being taken, your money can be going along with it.
One winter day, I was on my way to deliver The Brooklyn Eagle. It was the early 1950s, when I lived in Brooklyn.
I was riding my homemade bike. It was only a green frame and tires. It had no chain guard, no fenders, no kickstand and no rubber hand grips. It had only one pedal. It was all that I could afford. I remember my grandmother gave me a shot of homemade dandelion wine to keep me warm.
When I reached the corner of my block with my canvas bag tied to my handlebars, I saw Zeke with his friends. He was the chief of the Indian motorcycle gang. They were headed my way.
So I yelled out, “Hi, Zeke,” and his friends burst out laughing. Zeke then came over to me, put his arm around me and said, “This is my good friend, and anyone who messes with him messes with me.” I was in my glory.
Zeke was my idol. He was a born leader, a philosopher-king, a warrior-poet and chose his battles wisely. He always wore jeans, a jean jacket, a garrison belt and motorcycle boots. Zeke was bold, wise, honest, kind and humble. He had the right swagger and governed with humility.
When I was a bit older — in the late 1950s — I was able to buy myself a Benelli motorcycle with money I had saved up. I wore jeans, a jean jacket, a garrison belt and motorcycle boots.
I don’t know what happened to Zeke, but he was special. I bet he was one of the best Ringolevio players in all of Brooklyn (“The game of life you play for keeps.”).
Whenever I’m in a jam and don’t know what to do, I ask myself: “What would Zeke have done?” He was my true friend and mentor.
Prev
