Weekends are a wonderful thing - even for this "retired" person. I usually try to sleep late, 7:00 or so, AM that is. I actually got to ride on Sunday. A friend and I went to a BMW Picnic at White Rocks recreation area in Wallingford. It's quite pretty there, with a good view of a steep hillside with, surprise, white rocks. Big ones.

Riding a motorcycle means that you are all by yourself. There is not much that will penetrate the skin of leather, helmet, ear plugs and wind noise. Left to my own devices, I have a tendency to think music. It's a good chance for uninterrupted thought about tunes I'm trying to learn, refine or just get better at. Got to be careful though. While imagining what my fingers should be doing on a guitar I have to remember what my fingers should be doing on the handlebars. I can get lost in thought, but not too lost.

Fiddler Susan won't be at practice tomorrow, and Michael has a photo shoot and some kind of meeting to go to. Tuesday nights have been a regular music event for me for 11 years or so and this is the first time I can remember that it has not happened at all. There have been times when I have not been there, normally because I've been too far away, but no jam at all is rare. I surprised myself with my reaction. It's like my week is incomplete, a big hole in the middle. Think I must use the jam-turned-rehearsal as a release more than I thought. My plan is to sit in front of the computer tomorrow and practice for at least 2 ours. Maybe I'll get the 3-4 tunes I'm learning down. Maybe not. I find I have to play one tune at least 200 times before I'm comfortable with it and then another 200 or so to straighten out the final fingering, which is never really final.

Changing even one finger stroke is a major deal for me once the muscle memory is set, and this happens several times during the learning process. I suspect learning tunes is one of the reasons that I have dreams about trying to get somewhere but I can't because other things keep happening.

I learn by listening. No music reading here. The more I listen to a tune, the more I hear. I learn with a sort of instrumental Karaoke process. That is, I play the tune on my computer and play along with it. I use a program called Amazing Slow Downer. It slows, or increases, the speed of a tune without changing the key in which it is played. This is a great program and has improved my ability to hear the chording and timing I'm trying to learn, but I still need to hear it many times before it starts to come together. I am encouraged by the fact that Susan's ex, a world class pianist, goes through the same scenario, albeit with the advantage of reading the musical score. She remembers being driven nearly crazy by endless repetitions of the same line, the artist seeking perfection. I'm trying to avoid the Spousal Insanity Syndrome by practicing mostly while Charlotte is not here, but it must get pretty monotonous sometimes.

Tonight, I made about a gallon of apple sauce from some of the apples in the back yard. The turkeys, crows and deer have been busily eating them for about 2 weeks, so I decided it's my turn now. Just tasted the result. It is definitely worth the effort.

There isn't much to do besides steering when you are driving around your lawn on a mower. The brain power for this activity does not strain my capacity (although there are some who would disagree) so my mind has a tendency to wander elsewhere.

There has been such a concentration of high visibility death recently. A Jackson, two Kennedys, a soldier from St. Johnsbury in Afgahanastan, 2 bigwigs in the TV News community, Farrah Fawcett. One of the things said about all of these people is that they were, in some way, great people.

What is great? What must be done to attain greatness? Is it fame, fortune, infamy, the number of people who morn your passing or appreciate your life?

By all accounts, Sen. Kennedy did horrible things during his lifetime. We'll never know the truth about Mary Jo or the drunken rape scandal. His first wife divorced him, in part due to his philandering. He drank too much, frequently. But he achieved greatness in the minds of many, including mine.

Michael Jackson lived in a swirl of constant questions about his sexuality and yet half the world mourns his end of life.

The young soldier who died in vain in a foreign country's war had not enough life experience to attain greatness, until he was blown up by an IAD.

Farrah Fawcett was mostly just a very beautiful woman with great hair, and a pretty good actress.

Did these people have any common thread which contributed to their Great designation?

I don't think so. In fact, I don't think that greatness is all that special. Anyone can be great with perseverance and the right attitude. It happens to thousands of people all over the world every day. The only thing the people mentioned here had in common was fame, which has nothing to do with it. Fame only means that everyone is going to be told stuff about you whether or not you want it.

But people need to hear about it. There is an innate human desire to associate in some way with the perceived good in others, and to ignore the occasional, or frequent, strays into a less than perfect life. (As an aside, how much longer will we be hearing about Michael Jackson than Ted Kennedy?) After all, it's just who those people are and as long as the meandering doesn't become a permanent lifestyle----. In the end, we can forgive the famous for their indiscretions, as bad as they may be, but we have trouble offering the next door neighbor the same consideration when he backs in to our trash can by mistake.

We are all guilty of occasionally showing less consideration to the people around us than to strangers. It's one of those offbeat pieces of human nature that I just will never understand. What I do know is that in my world, I have a need to try and understand the opposing point of view. How can I understand my own opinion fully without that?

Charlotte tells me, fairly often, that I need to shave off my mustache. She says it makes me look old. She read an article somewhere, written by someone who has much to say about such things, that mentioned all the older men wondering around with mustaches, grey hair and ponytails and how they all look like they are still trying to live the 20 year old life of a Dead Head but no longer look the part. This is being used against me. Damn fashion writers. I happen to like my mustache, so it's still on my face. I think I have a solution though. I'll just grow a ponytail and let my sideburns get long. That should solve the problem!

I had to replace a hallway light bulb in an apartment building today. The light hangs from the ceiling with a glass bowl under the bulb. These bowls normally get a pretty good layer of bugs at the bottom which are easily visible when the light is on.

As I set up the ladder, I noticed that even though not lit, this light was obviously no exception. I unscrewed the hangers and lowered the bowl, careful to avoid dumping the contents in my face. Inside, there were the usual bugs, and a sheet of ripped up paper with printing on it.

Someone ripped up some unwanted thing and lofted the pieces into the light 7 feet off the floor! I've found light trash before in the form of gum wrappers and small wads of this or that, but this took effort and the necessary skill to throw 15 or 20 small paper pieces into one light bowl. What is that? What kind of brain fart does someone have that says "rip up this paper and put it in this light shade"?

Of course, not content with simply emptying out the trash, I've been thinking about this off and on all morning. It's no big deal, but it is a matter of curiosity. People indeed do strange things, but whatever one does, they generally don't do it thinking to themselves "this is stupid, but I'm doing it anyway." No! Whatever one is doing at any given moment is an action that the mind involved has somehow rationalized as being OK to do. In this instance, how did the perpetrator come to that conclusion? As an addendum, one floor down, there is an empty waste basket in the hall---"Better not use that, it's someone else's."?

Got up, went out to breakfast, came home, played on the web and Playa del Carmen site, vacuumed the house, cleaned the screen porch and back porch, practiced a new tune, played more on the web, washed the kitchen floor, went out to get corn for supper (realized that my per ear calculation was wrong half way home and had to go back to make up the difference in the money jar at the corn stand, whereupon the corn guy who was now there told me that someone stole $4.00 from the jar yesterday), came back home and am preparing to make supper and go to Tuesday night practice.

Casio tells me that my camera is fixed. They will send it back for about $89.00. That's better than the $415 it just cost me to have the septic tank pumped and cleaned. If we didn't have all this stuff-------

So - why did mother nature invent mosquitos and fruit flies? They seem to be equally useless and almost equally bothersome, except the mosquitos are worse.

Every year at about this time, fruit flies appear, brought in on bananas or some such. Whenever I throw something in the kitchen trash, a small cloud of them flies out, darting about in their impossible-to-smack way. They are so small that against anything but a white background they quickly disappear. Then, every so often, a tiny black speck meanders aimlessly across your line of sight - just long enough to bug you (no pun intended) and too fast to clap. For the duration, the kitchen trash has to be sealed and removed every day, or maybe twice, and all surfaces must be spotless. No leaving tomato juice on the cutting board during supper or they will congregate in hoards.

This year's corn crop has been pretty sketchy so far. The first ears I got at Legare's vegetable stand were small, irregular and not very sweet. This is unusual since their corn is usually one of the best around. I have decided to shop around and see what's up at other places. Passing a sign at Boulevard Gardens that said "Sweetest Corn in Vermont", I stopped and got some. It was good, but not as good as my memory of fresh corn. I tried Paquette's with the same result and today I went to the organic guy I mentioned above. Haven't had a chance to test it yet, but it looks good anyway. I did return to Legare's for another try and it was much better the second time around.

One of the ATT requirements when they bought Cellular One is that you have to order a new service, even though your contract with the previous company has not run out, if you want to retain the same phone number. This is a total pain in the you know what, but I took the opportunity to upgrade to a new more option riddled phone. They were free with a 2 year service agreement. After a few months, I know why they are free. It's a total piece of crap. The battery door fell off in the first 2 days and disappeared. A new one was $15.00, plus shipping, from the only place you can go in the US for service (TX) and battery doors are not included under any warranty since they are a removable part. Pretty convenient for Pantech, the phone manufacturer. I suspect a large part of their profit margin is due to this clause.

I did convince ATT to pay for the door, which promptly fell off again in a day. This time I outsmarted them though, so far. I taped the door on. Now, the battery comes loose about 1 or 2 times a month and the phone won't work at all until I remove the tape and door, take it out and reinstall it. Of course, you don't know that you are missing calls until you try to use the phone.

ATT will be happy to upgrade the phone to an iPhone for a mere $250 (refurbished) and a new 2 year contract. I plan to call them and speak my piece of mind.

James Byrd of Clarksville GA has bees that make the best honey I've ever tasted from Sourwood blossoms. I bought a jar on the Southern Tour one year and was so impressed that I looked him up on Yahoo when I got home and called for more. He sent me 6 pounds at $2.50 a pound. For a product that normally costs 3 times that, I thought it was a pretty good deal, so I sent him money and a quart of Morse Farm's best maple syrup with a CD of Meg's kitchen. The next time I called, he refused any payment and sent another 7 jars. I sent more syrup. Today when I called, he said "I was just going to send you some more - I thought you might be out by now." This is turning into an excellent relationship. I think I'll send him a set of Floons in thanks.

For those who don't know about Floons, they are home made wooden flipper/spoons that are quite handy for many things around the kitchen. My entire family has them, some more than one pair. They come in right and left hand configurations and flip eggs, stir stew or soup, turn wok contents and serve salad with equal ease.

Time to start cooking. See you on the flip side, so to speak.

Sunday AM - mostly spent slaving away over the hot blog. After realizing just how stiff my neck was becoming, we decided that it was time to go out somewhere. I called Matthias and Amy to see what's up and they were going blueberry picking at Owl's Head farm in Richmond, VT. This seemed like a good idea, so Charlotte and I started in that direction. I wasn't sure where it was, so I took the GPS. Gotta use that thing once and awhile.

Knowing that Richmond was the destination, and knowing how to get there, I left Rte. 89 before I was instructed to do so by the unaccented woman's voice. This caused a reconfiguration of the directions and we were now sent over all kinds of back dirt roads, including the one that goes past Huntington Gorge.

This is a rather famous place for a not so good reason. The gorge could be a spectacularly good spot for swimming, except that is is truly dangerous. It is a deep and narrow cut between solid rock ledges with one place where all the water goes through a fairly small hole. Anyone swimming above this hole is in danger of getting swept in and if this happens, they cannot get out. Extraction is only possible with block and tackle, and does not occur before drowning. There has even been an instance when a roped up rescuer drowned trying to extract a stuck swimmer because he could not be pulled out once he was in.

The beginning of the Gorge. Note the flat river very suddenly changes to a deep cut between jagged rocks. The current is quite swift and the probability of slamming into the rocks is high.

A closer view:

This is the small hole through which the entire flow of the river passes, and in which people have become stuck. The hole is not in a shape which will allow a human to pass through, and there is an instant cork effect if one gets stuck in it.

These are the outflow just below the hole and a pool a little further down.

The agony of all this is the number of needless deaths that have occurred over the years - mostly young and indestructible people having a fun day. There is a memorial sign warning of the danger

This is a place of both extreme beauty and sadness. I go there every couple of years to see it, but this visit was a surprise sprung on us by the GPS.

When we arrived at Owl's Head farm, Matthias and Amy were just returning to their car. It was 4:20, and they close at 4:00 on Sunday, so we didn't get any blueberries. We made arrangements to meet at their house for a little visit and went off to Burlington to find a house Charlotte wanted to look at.

At M&A's we were greeted by a sleepy Emmeline and tail wagging buddy, Keena (spelling?) Keena has one of those bull whip tails that cleans off a coffee table in seconds, and I feared for the safety of Emmeline, but she was fine.

The dear pooch has lost a front leg to cancer, but this has not slowed her down much. She still manages to chase rabbits and dig holes with the best of them.

Daddy and daughter:

Giving great ant Charlit the hairy eye:

Amy returns to work on Monday, so Emmaline needs to be weaned off of mommy only feedings. She warmed right up to Charlotte and sucked the bottle dry in about 2 mins, a good sign for the future.

We had fresh roasted green beans, taters, chicken and home made peach ice cream on the patio and managed to get everything all cleaned up before the day's rain started. This whole daily rain thing is becoming rather old at this point. Leave it in the Northwest, I say.

It didn't rain and we did play the farmer's market gig. As expected, there were many fascinated dancing children and it was a great time. It was also hot and muggy. I had trouble playing because my hands were so sticky I couldn't form chords or slide up and down the guitar neck. Things improved toward the end and our final set was better than the first.

Happy Meg's musicians:

Happier Meg's musicians:

Although the plan was to play with sand, bricks, septic tank and chipmunk destruction in the afternoon, all things change. I got up early and had the septic tank recovered before breakfast. Having gotten the worm, so to speak, Charlotte and I decided to go for a ride in the PM. I had lunch at the farmer's market, which was a plate of very tasty jerk chicken (I've been told it's appropriate for me to eat jerk food) and curried rice and we left soon after I returned home. We decided to go visit Queechee and maybe stop at a large antique mall there to do a little window shopping. We don't need anything, but it's fun to look.

I decided to take the back road from Bethel to Woodstock (Rte 12) instead of the interstate, which actually takes you about 10 miles south of Queechee Gorge where the mall is. A small detour on the way down took us down River Rd which is on the opposite side of the Ottouqueechee River from Woodstock. The Billings Farm is on this road, as well as several other beautiful and obviously well funded operations.

Billings Farm manager's house (Photo from web site):

The main house

Frederick Billings established the farm in 1871 and, as a conservationist who was concerned about the lack of forestation in VT, he planted over 10,000 trees in the Woodstock area. The billings farm, now a farm museum, is still run as a farming operation and is also a successful tourist attraction. There is more at Farm History

The Miller place, down the road.

Maplewood Farm further down the road - many horses, lots of white fencing:

Once in Woodstock, the rain was still holding off so we walked around for awhile and had ice cream at a local parlor where it is made in small batches. The downtown area of Woodstock is full of architecturally beautiful buildings and houses. Much of this is due the the influence of John D. Rockefeller and his grandson, Laurance. Laurance was responsible for burying all of the towns electric power lines underground, where they remain to this day, and he endowed 550 acres to the National Park Service for the new Marsh-Billings-Rockefeller Park which was opened in 1998. More at: Marsh-Billings-Rockefeller National Historical Park - History & Culture (U.S. National Park Service)

Downtown, there is a beautiful town square surrounded by equally beautiful buildings.

The Norman Williams Public Library:

The Woodstock Inn (taken in April - no leaves yet). This building was replaced in the late 1960s by Laurance Rockefeller who determined that the original 1889 building was no longer salvageable. I was in high school in South Woodstock at that time and seem to remember a fire at the original inn after which it was purchased and rebuilt by Mr. Rockefeller, but I could find no such information on the web in a brief search. The Inn now looks like it's been there forever and has a 6 foot wide fireplace opposite the front door which has huge 6 foot logs burning all winter. It's quite an inviting greeting on a cold day.

The front lawn:

Of course, there was a wedding:

After wandering around downtown,

we went on to Queechee Gorge.

The gorge is 165 feet deep at the bridge, upon which I stood to take these. As you can see it was by then pouring rain, and we decided to skip the antique mall.

The rain soon stopped, but by then we were on our way to West Lebanon for a quick stop to TJ Max, which we seem unable to avoid if we are within 100 miles of one. From there, it was a quick trip home.

All said and done, a very enjoyable day.

Muggy, hot, rainy at times. What's new??

Every time the washing machine dispenses it's effluent into the septic system, the bar sink in the kitchen gurgled and bubbled foul smelling air into the atmosphere. This was controllable by wedging the stopper in the drain, but I knew that a more serious solution was just around the corner. When the same belching putridness started with the mere washing of dishes in the big kitchen sink, it was time.

There is a brick patio off the back door, under which resides the septic tank. When I put the patio in, I marked the tank location with different colored bricks and installed a box over the tank cover, so accessing the cleanout is a simple 20 min task. I did the digging last night and the honey wagon arrived to pump it out today. The problem is solved, with the additional process of cleaning out the line to the drain field with a jet stream hose.

My wife is convinced that all this is the fault of my chipmunk buddy who has been furiously digging out winter habitat under the bricks all summer. They (the bricks) are now starting to collapse into the excavation and more work for me is imminent. I have tried to capture the miniature felon in a have-a-heart trap with no success. He does come to visit and chatter whenever I am outside on the patio, but I guess I need more tempting bait in the trap to lure him in. Peanut butter isn't doing it.

Tomorrow, if we're not washed away in the predicted storms, I plan patio work in the PM, both the refilling of the holes I dug and my buddy's tunneling.

The AM, pending dryness, will be filled with a gig at the local farmer's Market where Meg's Kitchen is scheduled to play from 10:00 to 1:00. I really enjoy this particular gig since we are simply background music and have the opportunity to say hi to friends who drop by. It's always a charge to see little kids dancing to the music, and there will be plenty of them there.

Last year

Unfortunately we've run out of CD's, they were so popular we sold all ten of them, so we can't put any out. This won't slow us up much though. We'll still have fun.

Fiddler Susan gave my wife Kahlua Chocolate Chip cookies for her birthday. These are amazing little desert snacks. It's time to go eat one.

Once again, it was a hot day - not particularly conducive to mowing lawns. So I cleaned hallway and porch areas instead. In hindsight, I don't think it was any cooler than mowing.

The Tuesday night jam session that I've been going to for 11 years as changed. The core three of us who attend virtually every Tuesday, and who call ourselves Meg's Kitchen on those occasions when we play "out", have decided to use Tuesdays as rehearsal time. We decided that if we are going to play in venues where people are actually listening, rather than as background music, we should probably work out a few arrangements and try to sound a little more together. THis seems to be working. Some arrangements are thought out first, and some just seem to happen by accident. It's different from just a session. The one thing I don' like so much is telling others, who come expecting a jam session, that it no longer is.

It was so hot tonight that I had to put a cloth over my guitar because it was getting all wet and I was sticking to it. At the end, I had a big guitar shaped wet spot on my shirt. The music was good though, and our fiddler brought cookies - Kaluah Chocolate Chip. It don't get much better than that.

Music is certainly a saving grace. Being able to play with good friends on a regular basis is a great way to relax and straighten out the week.

It's 11:15 now - time to hang it up for the day. I still need to mow lawns tomorrow, or sometime soon.

After sitting here doing bills and cleaning up my desk from the last month's accumulated nonsense, I am going to go and inspect furnaces and electrical boxes with a rep from my insurance company. This means hunching over in too short basements filled with spiderwebs on the third straight 90 degree day with a flashlight.

Well, at least the basements were cool. The ins. guy tells me that all electrical boxes need to be circuit breakers. one house isn't, so I expect to get a letter from the ins. Co. any day now. Boy does that make me happy!

I guess I'll go murder some grass with the lawn mower and pull out a few 6' tall goldenrods that are trying to take over my monk's hood. It's only 92 degrees F out there now-perfect timing for outdoor work.

So I was out mowing and I realized that my weed strewn lawn, filled with wild strawberries, dandelions, the infamous tall spiky things and wild blackberries, is green and lush looking. My neighbor's lawn, enhanced by professional treatment of some sort, is kinda brown and krispy looking. I'm thinkin "Hooray for the weeds." My "If it's green, mow it" philosophy seems to be working.

I've been coming back to this silly blog all day, and I still haven't come up with anything worth saying, so I guess I'll call time and go get corn for supper. It's beginning to sound too much like a loooong twitter.

Talk atcha later

Wow - I haven't written anything since July 6 ?!?! Where has my lazy butt been?

Oh yeah - in NH, where I spend my summers in a cottage on a lake. There is no computer access there, which some might view as heavy withdrawal-which I welcome with open arms. I enjoy the entertainment and communications options one has with a computer, but not having one is also nice. It's good to take a break now and then.

It must be a well known fact by now that the weather normally reserved for Seattle WA as, instead, been assigned to the Northeast. It has rained about 20 inches in NH this Summer, while raining only 1/2 inch in Seattle. The mean temp seems to have been about 68 degrees F and the lake water has only recently begun to warm up to it's usual 78 degrees F.

Essentially, it has been a Summer of fishing, sailing, swimming (brrr) and maintenance projects, with a good sprinkling of shopping included. No. Conway, NH is a shoppers mecca, with virtually every national clothing sales place amply represented in the vast malls. I stay away from all this as much as possible while my wife enjoys the experience.

Here's a few pics which will explain why NH is our Summer time place of residence:

The camp, outside

The camp, inside

The lake

The Loons

This is quite interesting. Somehow, the loons arrange fishing parties which include loons from other lakes who fly in for the occasion. I don't know how they let each other know about this party, but I have seen up to 14 loons partying on a lake that has only 6 loons in residence. They corral the fish and feast on them, all the while playing and calling to each other. I took a video of the 9 I found this summer at YouTube - Loon fishing party . If you watch the whole thing, the first loon to leave the party takes off, running across the lake to get air-born, it's feet whacking the water as it goes.

The Sunset

The moon rise

We are now home for 2 weeks, after which we will go back off and on through October. It's a 3 season house, so there is no heat or water in the winter and the camp is shuttered up.

Now, I have apartments to clean and rent, so it'll be busy for the next couple of weeks. Today, and yesterday, it finally turned hot, but of course we are no longer near the lake to cool off. It often happens that way----