collision mats

I wrote earlier about some breakfasts of overcooked fried eggs that grandad cooked at the shack. Those breakfasts were not very good. I was talking to my dad about that, and he remembered that the fried eggs would be cooked so much that the yolks somehow took on a green color and an unpleasant smell. The only way he could eat them would be to completely cover them with ketchup.
But not all breakfasts that grandad cooked at the shack were such a struggle to get down. I remember being quite pleased when grandad announced that there would be pancakes for breakfast. I like pancakes, and while they can be overcooked, or undercooked, there are usually lots of them, at least some of which are neither blackened nor soggy.
One thing I like about pancakes is their names. Pancakes have many names, and all of them seem to have a nice ring. Some people call them hotcakes, some call them flapjacks, others call them griddle cakes. Grandad told us that in the navy they were called collision mats. He asked us if we knew why they might be called collision mats. I tried to think of some clever answer, but nothing I came up with made any sense, so I answered no, and my brother did too.
Grandad explained that a collision mat was a large flexible mat with ropes attached to the corners that was lowered over the side of a ship if there was a hole below the water line, such as might be caused by a collision with another ship. The collision mat would be placed over the hole, and secured by means of the ropes attached to it. Hopefully the water pressure and ropes would keep the mat over the hole, and stop the water coming in, or at least reduce the flow enough to keep the ship afloat. It might work well enough to allow the ship to get to port, or to make some other more effective repairs.
Of course collision mats had to be made from extremely tough material in order to keep the sea from pouring in through a hole in the side of a ship. Sailors, dissatisfied with the lightness and fluffiness of navy pancakes, came to suppose that they were made out of the same material as collision mats, and could probably serve the same purpose, and share the same name.
It was always nice to have collision mats for breakfast at the cabin. If we were lucky, grandad would have remembered to bring a bottle of pure maple syrup which is a wonderful complement to a buttered hotcake. Sometimes we'd have to make due with a store brand pancake syrup left over from some previous expedition. Grandad would assure us that once we got rid of the mold from the surface of the syrup, the rest would be just fine. I was also fond of pouring a moderate amount of blackstrap molasses over my flapjacks.
After a tasty pancake breakfast, my brother and I would be assigned the task of cleaning up. To preempt any grumbling, grandad told us the story of the "pan cleaner."
It happened at a summer boy's camp, and I think he might have been one of the boys attending the camp, but I'm not sure. At any rate, they had pancakes for breakfast every morning at this camp. After breakfast, a couple of the boys were selected to help clean up. They would wash the pancake batter bowls, clear the table and wash the dishes, but they wouldn't bother washing the pancake pan. The next day, the cook would just make one huge pancake in the pancake pan. This pancake would soak up any left over grease and bake in any leftover burnt crumbs from the previous day's pancake making. This pan sized pancake would then be discarded and the normal pancake making would commence. This pancake was known as the pan cleaner.
When it was his turn, one of the boys refused to help clean up after breakfast. I think grandad said this boy was from a wealthy family and considered cleaning up to be beneath him. He was asked several times, but refused disdainfully.
The next day, everyone came to breakfast as usual. As a reward for refusing to clean up like everybody else, this boy was served first, and with the largest pancake. As the reader might have guessed, he got the pan cleaner. The rest of the pancakes were served directly to the plates of the other boys so he would not have to opportunity to get anything other than the unappetizing pan cleaner. He didn't eat the pan cleaner, so he ate nothing.
Perhaps he thought the pan cleaner was his punishment for not helping to clean up, and that he had paid for his crime by going hungry that morning, so he didn't bother to help with the clean up. Maybe he was surprised the next day when he got the pan cleaner again. The second time he got the message, and decided to help clean up after breakfast that morning, and hope for more pristine pancakes the next day.
Not that we would have considered refusing to help clean up, but we might have put it off until later in the day, to do something more fun, then accidentally forgotten about it. We understood the implications of this story though, and got right to the clean up, with a minimum of fiddle farting around.
When I came up to the cabin with Jörg and Paul, I told them about pan cleaners and collision mats as we were making pancakes for breakfast. We cooked up a nice stack of griddle cakes and took them outside to a large wooden cable spool that someone had set on its side in front of the cabin. It was the perfect height and size for a stand up table. It was a sunny but cool and breezy morning. We had a wonderful breakfast of hot collision mats and coffee as we stood around our makeshift table while the breeze rustled the leaves and spread ripples on the lake.