A Little Romance...

Stick season is upon us here on the Canadian Border. I was looking back at some of the pictures I took this summer (sigh) and found this one of a road on Shelburne Farms, once the home place of the Vanderbilts. If you haven't been, you should come up here and have your heart broken by the place.

You might want to wait til next summer at this point, though.

Cheers.

Today at the Old Farm and a Couple Shackletonisms

A day off today found me at the Last House. I emerged around 9 AM to buy eggs and bread and found a lovely October light hitting the barn. So.

Re: Shackleton

Just now, I was cleaning the kitchen when Shack got in my path. I squeezed his head like I do sometimes and said something like "Knowledge - get in there and stay!" He didn't have time to blink before he scurried away and said "Foreign objects - eject from ears! Eject!"

Sometime a few months ago when Maisy was barking or whimpering or something I barked back at her a little. Shack came running down the stairs - looking genuinely worried. "Don't do that! You don't know what you might be saying in dog language!"

That's my boy.

Who Said Penny Farthings Aren't Cool?

Not me!

Stopping By Woods

This is the Understudy walking around the woods at Jay Peak after she survived being ordered out of the car to take the picture in the banner today and the one below.


I made the Understudy hop out of the ancient Camry today to take some pictures of the leaves on North Hill in Westfield, Vermont. These particular leaves leaves adorn a lines of ancient maples that someone planted on both sides of the road at least a hundred years ago. Every spring someone hangs sap buckets from them.

The weather here in Vermont this weekend was like something ordered from the Southern California weather catalog. Also it is Columbus Day weekend and Canadian Thanksgiving which produced of perfect storm of Vermont tourism. I do believe that every human being with a motorcycle or a classic car for three states and two provinces around was driving in Vermont. So,adding to the fun for our little photo shoot was the frisson of cheating death by tourist. Well, at least the Understudy could claim that thrill. My fun was only in ordering my little teenager out of the car to take pictures while I stopped in the middle of the road with the flashers on. The back story here is that she got a smart phone this weekend (two and a half hours of the the four of us consulting with "Parker" at the Verizon store) which is at the pinnacle of smart phone-ness. So ... she had the good camera. (The rest of us got new phones too but ours are carved out of stone because we could only afford one really good one and guess which 13-year-old girl in the family had to have that.)

I hope you have the day off tomorrow. I wish I did.

Just a Little Note for Kate Bush Fans

You know how I worship at the altar of Kate Bush? (Still, after all these years).

She pretty much hides from the light - I don't think I have ever heard her speaking. I got an email from her new label "Fish People" the other day letting me know she has a new album coming out in November. There I learned she gave an interview in August on NPR. If you're interested - here's a link. She sounds positively accessible...

Feel Better...

I usually don't open emails that have been forwarded all over the place but this one came from the Panamanian girl who lived with us for a year when I was in high school and she has no track record of forwarding any kind of email junk to me. I opened it and loved it so I am sharing. It came to me labeled "My New Primary Care Physician" and featured a photo of a middle-aged Asian doctor (which you will just have to imagine for reading purposes now).


Q: Doctor, I've heard that cardiovascular exercise can prolong life. Is this true?

A: Heart only good for so many beats, and that it... Don't waste on exercise. Everything wear out eventually. Speeding up heart not make you live longer; it like saying you extend life of car by driving faster. Want to live longer? Take nap.

Q: Should I reduce my alcohol intake?

A: Oh no. Wine made from fruit. Brandy distilled wine, that mean they take water out of fruity bit so you get even more of goodness that way. Beer also made of grain. Bottom up!

Q: How can I calculate my body/fat ratio?

A: Well, if you have body and you have fat, your ratio one to one. If you have two body, your ratio two to one.

Q: What are some of the advantages of participating in a regular exercise program?

A: Can't think of single one, sorry. My philosophy: No pain...good!

Q: Aren't fried foods bad for you?

A: YOU NOT LISTENING! Food fried in vegetable oil. How getting more vegetable be bad?

Q : Will sit-ups help prevent me from getting a little soft around the middle?

A: Oh no! When you exercise muscle, it get bigger. You should only be doing sit-up if you want bigger stomach.

Q: Is chocolate bad for me?

A: You crazy?!? HEL-LO-O!! Cocoa bean! Another vegetable! It best feel-good food around!

Q: Is swimming good for your figure?

A: If swimming good for figure, explain whale to me.

Q: Is getting in shape important for my lifestyle?
A: Hey! 'Round' is shape!

Everything's Fine

I was watching BBC World News the other day and saw pictures of poor, inundated Vermont being beamed around the world. I am happy to be able to report that the Last House and our Stowe Weekday Abode escaped unscathed. Really, it's like nothing ever happened - except (and I am not making this up) the State office complex where I work was badly flooded and I and about 1700 other people have been forbidden to go to work. Maybe for months. (You know, I had been working extra hard this summer til Irene soooooo...)

As usual, I have been reading, that is, re-reading Middlemarch. I finished it (again) today. I got to the last lines, which always overpower me. I am sharing them here, though they are out of context and so I am not really being fair to you all or George Eliot but I feel compelled to type them out.

[T]he growing good of the world is partly dependent on unhistoric acts; and that things are not so ill with you and me as they might have been, is half owing to the number who lived faithfully a hidden life, and rest in unvisited tombs.

These lines refer to Dorothea Brooke Ladislaw - the Alpha and Omega character in a book that some wise critic referred to as "spacious." Here too is a link to the valentine that Rebecaa Mead wrote to Middlemarch in the February 14, 2011 issue of the New Yorker. (q.v.)

Also, the picture above is one I took during a walk in the woods on the sunny day after Irene... As I say, all is well in my grassy corner. Thanks to those who have inquired.