Archive for the ‘maine’ Tag
Believe it or not I’m a really a sensitive guy. You really can’t listen to rumor or the personal opinions of people who may be biased in some fashion. With that being said I need to remind everyone that it’s mid-October here in Maine, the warm weather is slowly fading away leaving us with crisp and cold nights and sunny days with chilly winds. Now that you’ve been given the official EveryUseLessThing weather report you understand it’s that time of the year for the anticipated “change of season”. We’ve now seen the return of football, new TV programming, and the soon to be migration of hundreds of thousands of senior citizens making their Fall pilgrimage to look at the freaking leaves. This is also the time of the year where my better-half and I begin our annual Fall battle over heating the house.
Those of you who heat with heating oil understand just how much money is spent on keeping the home fires burning through a long New England winter. With the costs of heating oil skyrocketing every year at this time, every drop you save is money in your pocket. As much as I agree with saving money there are times when I must disagree. This is one of those times.
In remodeling this home two years ago we required that it be "tight". That means as much heat as possible remains in the house and doesn’t escape through any uninsulated areas. We were very successful with that upgrade but it causes it’s own problems. When the house is that “tight” and the heat is not yet been turned on, the insulation keeps the cold night air inside the house. Our situation now is a little strange. For most of the morning our house is freezing cold and the cold air can’t escape. We’re forced to go outside to warm up once the sun comes out. It’s stupid but true.
That’s where the war starts every year. I try to explain to my better-half that it’s necessary to turn on the heat at a very low level to help eliminate the residual cold air from the previous night. She just doesn’t get it and refuses to turn on the heat at all. I’m being forced to wear three layers of clothing just to watch TV and then when I go outside I find myself removing a layer or two to be comfortable. I suppose I could just turn the heat on and disregard her feelings entirely but that would escalate the war and extend it for many weeks. The recriminations and potential revenge scenarios come into play with more arguing and mean spirited discussions expected. It’s a freaking conundrum.
Thank God for our industrial strength electric blanket. It’s the only thing keeping me from becoming highly disagreeable. A few days ago it was so cold I was forced to spend eight hours sitting in our bed with the blanket at a high level just to be comfortable. We’re at the breaking point with this issue now and I’m almost convinced that it’ll be worth fighting with her for another month or two if I can just get the heat on for a few hours in the morning. She may get a huge surprise when she gets home from work and finds the house warmer and more livable.
I’m not a heat fanatic by any means. We maintain our thermostats at no more than 62 degrees for most of the winter anyway. By taking the time to write this posting I’ve convinced myself to "grow a pair" and just turn the effing heat on. Enough of this nonsense. I’ve taken a vote and my better-half votes NO to heat but me and my “nuts” vote YES. That’s three to one and she loses. On comes the furnace tomorrow morning and let the “Great Heat War of 2013” begin.
I’ve been mentioning the Fryeburg Fair for a month now and today was the day. We were up at dawn and enroute to pickup the better-half’s daughter and one year old grandson. I’d pounded down two quick cups of coffee to get my heart started and to keep me alert during the fifty minute drive to Fryeburg, Maine. It was early, I hadn’t slept all that well, and I knew it was going to be a very long day.
I was looking forward to taking the grandson to his first Fair but everything else was up for grabs. As we entered the town of Fryeburg traffic was exactly as expected, grid lock. We moved very slowly through town to the area where the fairgrounds are located and parked in the front yard of a local resident for $5.00 bucks. Every house on the street approaching the fairgrounds has a sign up and a person waving a flag trying to entice idiots like us to park with them. Depending on the size of their yard they can turn a nice profit during Fair week. We unloaded the two hundred pounds of baby stuff, threw the little guy into his high-tech stroller and began walking the short distance to the main entrance of the fairgrounds.
When I say there were thousands of people swarming the area I’m not kidding. I have a minor phobia about large crowds and close quarters and I knew today was going to test me in a big way.
The better-half has a few things during every Fair visit that have become a tradition for her such as immediately buying a stack of postcards, a giant plastic coffee mug, and chowing down on a box of french fries. It took just a few minutes for those three items to be scratched from her to-do list and the rest of us were finally permitted to find a freaking rest room.
The crowds continued to grow, the sun came out, and it turned into a beautiful yet sweltering day. During the drive to the Fair the temperature was in the low fifties but within an hour of our arrival it started climbing into the mid seventies. An absolute scorcher as it turned out.
We visited exhibits, nibbled at various food items and delivered the grandson to the petting zoo for an introduction to a few of Mother Natures favorite animals. He was curious for a moment as he and his mother were mobbed by a herd of small goats looking for the food they were carrying. His interests in the goats waned a bit but then he discovered the straw covering the floor. It held his interest almost as long as the goats. Maybe next year he’ll be more interested in the animals.
We sat for a time in the shade of a tree and listened to a local performer singing a selection of songs and making nice with the crowd. We were able to catch our breath, cool off a little, and change our damp little boy. He had some fun clapping with the music and trying to dance and smiling and giggling at everyone. It was pretty cool.
It was as expected a very long day. We visited more animals, barns, horses, oxen, cattle, chickens, and llamas than I ever want to see again. We ate more food, drank more water and made many more trips to the restrooms. That for me is the biggest racket of all at this Fair. They have an assigned attendant in each restroom who I was expected to tip after relieving myself. Of course I left no tip because I refuse to pay someone to stand there and direct me to a urinal and then watch me take a leak. Something is just wrong and a little creepy about that and I refused to participate. I’d love to see just how those folks would list that job on their resume. I won’t even try to guess.
It was finally four o’clock and we’d been roaming around for almost eight hours. My back hurt, my feet hurt, I was hot and sweaty, and the baby was getting a little cranky. The better-half and her daughter were exhausted as well and I couldn’t wait to get the hell out of there. So we did.
The soft seats of that car were the best part of the day. The baby instantly fell asleep and we made our way home. I was happy to be involved with his first official Fair visit and we were able to document it with hundreds of photographs. Next year he’ll be walking, talking, and be a little more aware of what’s going on around him. I’m already looking forward to that.
I’d really like to write more but I’m heading for the shower and then our nice soft bed. I am pooped.
There are a number of people both in my family and not who wonder why I live in Maine. Coming from the Pittsburgh area is a long, long way from Maine not just in distance but in the style of life. Pittsburgh was and remains a sort of blue collar community proud of it’s roots in the mines and mills that surrounded and supported the area. Second and third generations continue to be those hardworking, nose-to-the-grindstone individuals who made the area what it is. They play hard as well and raise their families with their good solid family values. It sounds great so why leave?
Even as a child I was drawn to places near water. I spent a lot of my childhood with friends hanging around the Allegheny River. We swam in it, we rode on things that floated on it, we jumped from bridges that crossed over it and it was all good. I just loved the three rivers but felt drawn to the ocean for some unknown reason.
Over the years we made quite a few family trips to Erie, Pennsylvania. I was fascinated by Lake Erie. It looked like an ocean to me but later after checking a world map I discovered it was only a mud puddle compared to the oceans. I attended college very near to Lake Erie and made dozens of trips to the lake to party and relax. It was about then I decided that being landlocked in Pittsburgh held no future for me.
Jump ahead six years and I’m still working in Pittsburgh at a job with a national company. I was offered a promotion which required a move to Boston and I jumped at it. The mere thought of living in Massachusetts and being near Cape Cod and the ocean made the decision for me.
Jump ahead ten more years and I found myself newly divorced and looking for a new place to live. I purchased a small cottage no more than fifty yards from the ocean in Kingston, Massachusetts and I was in heaven. For three years I was in the water every day except for winter of course and life was good. I’d swim far out into the ocean at night, float on my back for an hour, staring up at the stars. It was unbelievable.
Jump ahead three more years, my company declares bankruptcy and I’m again forced to move to find work. Looking at my choices Maine was my only answer. I loved the style of life there, the lower population, and the anticipation of no traffic jams. I also would be within minutes of the ocean. I made the move, bought a new home and settled in. I was twenty minutes from the ocean but still was able to go there as often as I needed. Standing on the shore, listening to the water, had a calming effect on me like nothing else.
Jump ahead nine more years, I’ve met the love of my life, I sold my house, and we settled in to make a life together. Also, we now lived directly adjacent to the Nonesuch River, ten minutes from the Atlantic Ocean, and fifteen minutes from Sebago Lake and a number of local beaches. These days I’m able to walk the beach in the summer and winter to relax and take photographs. I can visit a nearby cove and watch the lobsterman loading up and going to work. I can then return later to watch them bringing in their catch and mooring their boats.
I think I was meant to be here. Many years ago my late grandmother suffering from dementia sent me many letters when I lived in Massachusetts that were always addressed to ME instead of MA. I kept telling her I lived in Massachusetts but she continued to send me letters until she passed away addressed to Maine with a Massachusetts Zip code. Maybe she knew something I didn’t.
You hear the term used here often and it still remains true. Maine is "the way life ought to be."
I’ve just about made myself cross-eyed today. I’ve been putting off for months what I’m in the middle of doing. I decided that I’ve procrastinated long enough and the review of almost fifteen thousand photographs has begun. Once all of them has been reviewed and the duplicates eliminated I can then do a complete backup which will go into safe storage at another location. It took me almost ten years of hard work to take these photos and I’m finding it difficult to discard any of them. It’s the perfect Fall season job where I can sit back, relax and do things properly.
I take everything in high resolution mode and as you know that requires a great deal of memory for storage. I thought three years ago that having a terabyte of hard drive memory would last me for many years. I underestimated a little and now find my drive almost fifty percent full. I may be forced into buying a large removable hard drive or signing up for one of those off-site backup systems through one of the those companies offering that service.
Winter is always the perfect time for such projects. A few years ago I spent a great deal of my winter converting my extensive music CD collection to MP3’s. It took a long time but was well worth the effort. I find doing time consuming projects very relaxing and the more difficult the better. I know it sounds stupid but it’s true none the less.
I’ve also decided that reindexing all of the photos is necessary because during my first years using an DSLR I was a newbie to digital photography and did what I consider to be a haphazard job. I’ll now spend a good portion of this Winter going back and redoing each and every one. If my estimate is correct it should take me well into January to get it done right once and for all.
It should go a long way to help me in the creation of a number of photo books I’ve been considering. I discovered that without a thorough indexing job it’s possible for me to lose photo’s I remember taking. It can frustrate the hell out of a person when your forced to manually search through thousands of pictures because you indexed one photo improperly.
Well, I have a lot to do over the next five months and I should get started. No idle hands for me this Winter.
Fall has officially arrived here in Maine and I can tell because it’s six in the morning, I’m sitting in the living room and I can see my breath. We normally wait until October to turn on the heat and this year will be no different. With the cost of heating oil being what it is we’re forced to suffer with some cold temperatures for a few more weeks. We actually covered what was left of our garden last night due to the anticipated frost that our expert weather people are calling for. For a change they were spot on.
I’ve always been adamant about not liking hot weather and that hasn’t changed much over the years. The worst part for me is the short periods of time between the seasons where I’m forced to adjust to the change. I’m sitting here this morning fresh from my bed where my ever so popular electric blanket continues to keep my better-half warm and toasty. I was finally forced to get it out one morning last week when I woke up at three AM with with my feet freezing and my teeth chattering. Transitions can be a large pain in the backside but what can you do?
In another week the garden will be finished and I’ll begin storing things away to prepare for the first snowfall. I’m looking forward to that as I usually do because believe it or not I enjoy the coziness of winter. It’s a quieter time that allows us to snuggle in and to enjoy each other’s company. It’s a time to take care of long delayed projects and for reflection on the past year and the beginning of expectations for the next.
With the tourists out of the picture we can start visiting many of our favorite places that we’ve avoided for the last few months. No more ridiculous parking fees and never ending beach traffic. We can now bundle up and return to walking the beach to enjoy Mother Nature without gangs of visitors clogging up the area.
Hopefully within the next hour or two the sun will come out and warm things up a little. We’re anticipating temperatures today nearing seventy which is nice but not long after sundown the temperature will drop suddenly into the high thirties and low forties. We’ll eventually make the adjustment and in no time be ready to sit back for a few months and enjoy the season.
I know it’s really Fall since my arm is stiff and sore from that damn flu shot I got yesterday. I guess I’m ready for just about anything. We’ll be taking lots of photographs in the coming month which is always enjoyable and the Fryeburg Fair is just weeks away. It will be the last big get together for the state of Maine this year and my better-half loves reconnecting with all those farm animals she hasn’t seen since last year. She’s what you might call a closet farmer with a passion for piggies and a secret wish that she’d been born a hundred years ago on a farm.
I’m almost completely awake now and after one more cup of hot coffee I’ll be ready to face the day.
It’s time today for a little catch-up on my journal. In just a few short weeks the Maine weather has gone from extreme heat and humidity to extreme cold and a couple of nights with a fear of frost. It’s a little early for this temperature change but you have no choice but to adjust.
I spent a few hours yesterday beginning the process of clearing plants from the garden for removal to the compost pile. I was surprised by how many cucumbers and cherry tomatoes I was able to salvage. I ended up with almost a dozen good sized cucumbers that were hidden amongst the plants and a at least a hundred cherry tomatoes that were still green but will ripen over the next week or so. It’s never fun taking the garden down at the end of the season but it has to be done and can require a large time investment.
I removed the sprinkler systems and the hoses and all of the hot pepper and squash plants. I left the beans, lettuce, and snap peas alone because they don’t mind the cold weather too much and are are still producing. Another week or so and they’ll be gone too.
The leaves are falling from the trees already and you can’t walk through the yard without running into squirrels and chipmunks with their mouths stuffed with nuts and acorns. They aren’t even running from us anymore. Their primary interest right now is to store away as much as they can as quickly as they can. Funny, that’s exactly the same thing my better-half and I are doing as well.
Once all of the plant material has been removed from the frames I can begin the soil preparation for next year. I’ll first rototill the ground and then cover the entire garden with three or four inches of compost. Then I’ll spread a little lime into the soil with a generic fertilizer, rototill it a second time and call it a day. I’ll let it set all winter and in the spring it should be ready to go. I’m hoping to have everything finished by the end of September so I won’t get surprised by good old Mother Nature who loves nothing more than dropping an early snow storm on us.
We spent some time the other night discussing changes to next years garden and the choice of items we plan on planting. It’s an ever-changing process as we learn more about the plants and the amount of production we can expect. It’s all of this prep work that makes the garden a success year after year and it’s time well spent and worth the effort.
I’m standing at my kitchen window sipping on an extremely hot cup of coffee and watching my neighbors as they walk with their daughters out to the main road and the school bus that will start this new school year. Their younger daughter isn’t quite old enough for school but she’s there to see her sister off and seems very excited by the whole experience. They’re taking lots of photo’s to mark this special occasion as I’m sure they will do for many years to come.
The older daughter’s of another neighbor were seen packing their cars a few days ago and are now off to college to begin their school year. They also seemed excited to begin another year that moves them a little closer to independence and a life of their own.
For me this is the beginning-of-the-end of summer. I’m excited by the tourist season being over as I again watch them leaving the area in droves. By next week the population of many nearby coastal towns will drop almost ninety percent. Many of the beach businesses will close for the season and our lives can slowly get back to what we consider normal. My better-half and I are looking forward once again to visiting several bars and restaurants we’ve been avoiding all summer. Large crowds, high parking fees, and higher than normal prices have kept us away all summer long. It’s northing new just a normal transition we have to deal with every September. Caravans of vehicles heading north to return to Canadian soil and just as many heading south to Boston and beyond.
Our summer gardening is also coming to an end and the Fall season will be upon us in no time. We’ll visit a few local fairs and festivals and of course the big Fryeburg Fair and I’ll be getting out the snow thrower and preparing it for the coming season. I’ve lined up a few winter projects and also collected a healthy stack of books to read during the next five months. Then we’ll settle in for what will hopefully be a quiet and thoughtful Winter with just enough snow to keep things fresh and clean until Spring.
I always look forward to Winter if for no other reason than the time it offers me to read, think, and write. This blog becomes a major priority once again and I’ll finally have the proper amount of time to research things I want to write about. That the best relaxation I can think of and I ‘m looking forward to it.
Since today is Sunday and a day of rest for many of you, I thought a few miscellaneous items and a little humor might be the thing to do. It’s a late Summer’s day on a holiday weekend that begins to prepare us for what’s coming, SNOW.
My better-half and I are looking forward to the upcoming Fryeburg Fair which we attend every year. It’s a huge gathering of every farmer and their livestock from across the country. This year will be the first visit for her new grandson and she can’t wait to drag his little butt there to look at the pigs. As I’ve mentioned previously my better-half has something of a pig fetish. We’ll spend between eight and ten hours eating terribly unhealthy food, walking miles and miles through huge crowds, and attending the Pig Scramble and Woodsman contests. I know it sounds a little lame but it really isn’t. It’s one of the few things we both enjoy a great deal.
We’re also looking forward to taking hundreds of photographs of the Fall season whose beauty never ceases to amaze. Actually Fall has slowly over the years become my favorite time of the year. We’ll have the harvest season, Fall foliage, and many small local fairs to visit on most weekends. You can say what you want but small local fairs are the best. It will again be a great time for our family and friends.
My first item today is a joke I stumbled on recently. It is laugh-out-loud funny and I hope you enjoy it.
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In 1986, Mkele Mbembe was on holiday in Kenya after graduating from Northwestern University.
On a hike through the bush, he came across a young bull elephant standing with one leg raised in the air. The elephant seemed distressed, so Mbembe approached it very carefully.
He got down on one knee and inspected the elephant’s foot and found a large piece of wood deeply embedded in it. As carefully and as gently as he could, Mbembe worked the wood out with his hunting knife, after which the elephant gingerly put down its foot.
The elephant turned to face the man, and with a rather curious look on its face, stared at him for several tense moments. Mbembe stood frozen, thinking of nothing else but being trampled. Eventually the elephant trumpeted loudly, turned, and walked away.
Mbembe never forgot that elephant or the events of that day.
Twenty years later, Mbembe was walking through the Chicago Zoo with his teenaged son. As they approached the elephant enclosure, one of the creatures turned and walked over to near where Mbembe and his son Tapu were standing.
The large bull elephant stared at Mbembe, lifted its front foot off the ground, then put it down. The elephant did that several times then trumpeted loudly, all the while staring at the man. Remembering the encounter in 1986, Mbembe couldn’t help wondering if this was the same elephant.
Mbembe summoned up his courage, climbed over the railing and made his way into the enclosure. He walked right up to the elephant and stared back in wonder. The elephant trumpeted again, wrapped its trunk around one of Mbembe’ s legs and slammed him against the railing, killing him instantly .
Probably wasn’t the same elephant.
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I would also like to take a few minutes to thank these new followers to this blog. I include their links as well and I hope you give their blogs a look-see and enjoy reading them as much as I do. Thanks to them all.
Eric Carlson, Karen Ellis, dmmd1983, L-Jay Health, What Happens to Us, mr688475, growupproper, mychangeviews, Nate Ollie, adoptingjames, Rein, jasminekeclipse, projectlighttolife, Gabriel Lucatero.
HAVE A GREAT LABOR DAY WEEKEND
I’m sticking with another journal entry today due in part to an incident that occurred yesterday. After having visitors for two days and really enjoying ourselves with them this incident gave us both a reality check we really didn’t need.
My better-half left for work at 6:30 am leaving me lounging half asleep in bed. I was just dozing off again when my cell phone started singing to me. Since she has a strange habit of forgetting things I immediately thought I’d be forced to get dressed and deliver her glasses or work keys to her like usual. I couldn’t have been more wrong. She was on the line and sobbing and told me she had been in an accident, her car was smashed, and could I get there right away.
I dressed quickly, grabbed my car keys and was out the door in five minutes. Fortunately the location of the accident was only a mile from the house. I arrived even before the police got there. She was still sitting in the car and thank God she had no apparent serious injuries. She was badly shaken and the car was demolished. She was unable to stand due to the surge of adrenaline that occurred and was a little disoriented by being thrown around by the impact. The person who hit her broadside was there as well and was just as shaken. The other driver had been driving a huge SUV that suffered almost no damage except for a few large scratches on the front bumper.
It was a four way intersection with a flashing red light. As my better-half came to a stop, she allowed the car on the road to her right to cross first. As that car crossed the intersection she slowly started through herself. She was almost through the intersection when the SUV traveling the same direction as the first car sped through and stuck her on the passenger side spinning her vehicle completely around.
I spent an hour calling AAA, the cops, and the insurance companies. As the car was being towed away she had tears in her eyes. I brought her home and made an unsuccessful attempt to calm her down. We spent the day together but she remained totally distracted by what had occurred. It wasn’t until late last night that she started returning to normal but still adamantly refused to drive my car to work for her next shift. I knew it was important that she get back into any car to drive again as soon as possible but she fought me all the way.
I’m standing her now in the window watching her drive away in my car and I’ll probably hold my breath for the next ten minutes until she arrives at work. I really didn’t let her see just how upset I was because it would have freaked her out. All I can think about is that she could just as easily have been badly injured or killed. She was so very lucky. Now I can relax a little and try to put the whole damn thing out of my mind as best I can. I don’t know what I’d do if something happened to her.
Love is like that.
It’s time for a regular journal entry to help me to catch up on things as the summer moves along. The heat wave has finally broken and we’re having a few intermittent rain showers on some really beautiful and sunny days. For the past few days we’ve had family visitors from Rhode Island who needed a little Maine getaway to clear their heads and breath some clean fresh air.
The guests arrived late yesterday evening after a bout with car problems. It’s funny (or not) how and when batteries decide to die. It’s never in your driveway but always on the road, miles from anywhere, and raining. We were up chatting and catching up until 2am and and slept in the next morning since it was lightly raining. It gave us a chance to shop for a new battery and install it before the rain ended. That evening we decided a visit to the Old Orchard Beach amusement park was in order and we had a great time.
The rain stopped and the tourists and visitors were out in large numbers enjoying the cool evening air. We hit the arcades for a few games and after blowing ten bucks throwing bean bags at balloons I won an ugly green stuffed animal. My better-half was thrilled and I’ll probably be seeing that stupid thing for the rest of my life. She bonded with it immediately and gave it a cutsy name before we even returned home. Our group rode a few rides , took lots of photo’s, and had a really fun evening.
We were in bed at a reasonable hour in anticipation of an early start in the morning. We visited a local church fair the next day. It’s one we attend annually and really enjoy. My better-half loves the flea market and I’m there for the excellent french fries and hot sausage sandwiches. They have a huge tent filled with books at dirt cheap prices and I’m usually able to buy enough books to get me through the winter.
Our visitors left after a few hours to return home to Rhode Island. The better-half and I stayed a while longer after running into a few old friends. She loves the raffles and spent the last hour sitting at a table and filling out raffle tickets. The worst thing to happen last year was that she won one of the small raffles. Now she’s hooked and thinks she’s going o win every year. It’s all for a good cause though but I just wish she’d win something I could use.
All in all a good couple of days as we start our march towards the Fall season. I love the fact that there’s sure to be a small community fair almost every weekend from now until late October. Lots of fairs and lots of fun.
everyuselessthing.com 