Mixing work and pleasure and a chain of events

I've been a bit on the busy side, like I haven't claimed that before - the monthly newsletters have been on the front burner since a week ago Wednesday. The town's is on the street now and the church's is nowhere near where it should be. I've had other things jump in ahead. Altogether though it's been a good busy.

A week ago Saturday after spending the earlier part of the day on the town newsletter, Carol and I went to my brother Dennis and his wife Barbara's for a family event we call the September Birthday get together. Of all the months of the year, September has the most of our family birthdays. Attending this gala event: sister Kathy (Sept. 26) and daughter Lindsey; brother David, Carolyn his wife and their son Danny; sister Doreen, husband Marc (Sept. 1) and their kids Harris and Deanna; Dennis and Barbara's kids Sarah, Eric and his girlfriend Karen; and Bert "Mom" (Sept. 16); Ian (away at college, Sept. 2) oh yeah, me (Sept. 21) also in September was our brother-in-law, Cal (sister Judi's husband), who passed away on his birthday last year.

Carol and David

Kathy

Deanna

After Doreen and her family had left someone realized we hadn't gone into our usual group picture taking frenzy so we did the best we could in Doreen's absent. I should have been a little more on the ball taking pictures but conversation ruled the day.

Here's the remainder of the gathering: me, Carol, Mom, Kathy,
Dennis, Barbara, Sarah, David, Carolyn , Danny, Eric and Lindsey.
Thanks to Karen for snapping the group pictures.

Lindsey and Sarah

Karen and Eric

Barbara and Dennis

Carol and I.

Kids missing were: Melissa (working), Jimmy (Iraq), Jenny and Ian (college).

Thanks Barbara and Dennis for having us all over - I think we were a rather well behaved group...this time.

52, just another number

Actually it's my birthday, I'm 52 today. I'd say I'm a little wiser but I seem to forget more than I learn. So all in all I'd call it a draw. Grabbing lunch at Marcy's while I write this, pastrami sandwich special, that's a treat any day. Carol gave me my birthday card and gift this morning before we left for work since supper will be on the fly tonight. The gift is a gift card at Borders. To me a visit to Borders is an event, a couple of hours of browsing books, listening to music samples, maybe a coffee and pastry. I expect to come out with a couple of CDs and sci-fi books. Ian has a gift for me which he'll give me when we meet up for Deerfield Fair next weekend.

As I've gotten older, measured by an increase of white hair, I've come to reflecting on my birthday of those things that I appreciate; Carol and Ian; our families; we have good jobs; great people amongst our associations; pets, past and present; and living in Maine in this great country. I hope everyone reading this has a terrific day on my birthday!

Home project weekend

This weekend Carol and I took on a home project, we've had some water damage around our shower enclosure and this was the weekend to take care of it. Saturday we took out the ceiling and started to prep it for finishing. This morning though Carol cleaned out a damaged spot at the base of the enclosure and discovered wood rot in the wall framing and subfloor. So our little project has grow into a bit bigger project. We closed up the ceiling area and waterproofed it in a temporary manner so we could use the shower but in a couple weeks we are going to rip out the enclosure, replace the damaged wood and buy and install a new enclosure. Carol will also redo the bathroom walls. Strip off the wallpaper and paint the walls instead. Ah, the joys of home ownership.

Happy Birthday Mom!

Yes, its my Mom's birthday, Saturday Sept 16th. Here's a picture of her and all her kids. The picture is from a get together 4 years ago. A rare occasion as it was the first time in a long while since all us siblings gathered together at once and haven't since, as oldest sister Judi (to Mom's right) lives in Florida.

(L-R) Doreen, Kathy, Judi, Mom, me, Dennis and David.

Here's a poem I found on the internet:

Mum has six kids, works hard all day
Undoing the damage of time, wind and clay
Makes the whole world want to stop, sigh and stay

by Nicholas Gordon (modern day poet)

Up coming holiday, are you ready?

Steve Irwin

Sad to hear of the death of the Crocodile Hunter, Steve Irwin. He personified the phrase living large, in that with his outraguos personality alone, plus his showmanship and his love of his family and his life work even Australia wasn't big enough to hold him.

I forgot to mention (thanks for the reminder Ian) how much Ian use to love watching the Chocodile Hunter on TV. Definately one of the best shows on for kids and adults.

September 11, 2001

Never forget

We live in a great country, it's easy to take our freedom for granted. There are forces that want nothing more than to see our demise, we must be united to thwart their efforts. Ever vigilant.

God bless those who died needlessly on that fateful day and pray for their families and friends and our Armed Forces who have been put into play to defend our way of life.

Nesting habits of these college parents

We are getting a lot of the "how's the empty nest syndrome going" questions. This is not a problem so don't worry about asking but it has gotten both Carol and I thinking about the phrase. I'm starting to think the "empty nest" is more the beginning of the journey at this point. Though Ian is away, his base of operations is still here. He hasn't moved out, his room will remain his room. Life around the house will involve him coming home on college vacations/holidays and the occasional weekend. That doesn't seem to be the true criteria for the "empty nest" or am I splitting hairs here? The day will come when Ian does move out, into an apartment or house, heck maybe even a yurt (pictured right, Pacific Yurts, Inc.). Then I think we can say we have an empty nest, we're in no particular hurry for this journey to end. I'm sure there will be more thoughts on the subject in future blogs, let me know what your thoughts are.

I think Carol and I will be connecting in new ways, there is kind of a conversational void, much of our conversation before had to do with Ian's comings and goings. Now we should be talking more about what each other is up to and more "us" stuff. Airline prices to England is always a good subject.

Labor Day Weekend

Another get away, short though it may be. Great Bay Campground in Newfield, New Hampshire. Not too far from UNH and “you-know-who”. Nice place, well wooded, pretty noisy on Friday night as people coming in, getting together with their friend/relatives, kids going wild. By the next day things had settled down to “normal” campground sounds. They set us up so Lois and Jim and we had three tight campsites for the two campers and we could arrange them so we were faced out the same toward the fire ring, very cozy. Around 7am Saturday I drove over to the campus and picked up Ian and we returned to the campground and had breakfast. This is Ian’s 18th birthday, that and getting together after his first week of college was a double bonus. After breakfast we drove both vehicles into Portsmouth and stopped at “Strawbery Banke”, a living museum of a restored neighborhood. Still a work in progress in a few places the various structures, over 30 I think, were setup for different eras before most of it was torn down in the 1950’s – 60’s for the federal urban renewal programs. We took a break and ventured to nearby Geno’s Chowder House on the waterfront – I had the lobster chowder, it was alright. In spite of being a Mainer I’ve never acquired a taste for lobster, there’s still a chance I suppose so I have some occasionally. After lunch Lois and Jim wanted to continue around Strawbery Banke while Carol, Ian and I drove to in town Portsmouth for a look around there. Very nice, lots of shops, restaurants and bars. We cut it short though as we had all had enough of walking around and it was getting late in the afternoon and we wanted to get back to the campsite. We had a great campsite supper, grilled sausages, a ham steak for Lois, salad and corn on the cob. For celebrating Ian’s birthday we had angel food cake and ice cream for desert. Then we gave him his gifts, Carol had made a scrapbook styled picture display of Patches and Eoywn, I gave him a tool set and he also was given a ticket package for the Downeaster for those trips home. Sunday was a weather washout - again Ian spent the day with us as we hung out, reading, played some games, watching TV and talking. There was a strange sighting at the camper next door while it was raining. I had caught a glimpse of it while reading but Carol was napping as Ian was watching TV, then Lois dashed over to our camper to see if we had seen what she and Jim were watching – the lady from the neighboring camper, who was a bit on the heavy side, was outside in a one piece black swimsuit with a transparent raincoat over it was scrubbing their truck with an RV cleaning brush. It made a strange sight indeed, I don’t think I could have easily gotten off a picture without being obvious.

So in spite of the rain we had a terrific weekend and were very glad Ian was able to spend Saturday and Sunday with us. He’ll be home for a few minutes this weekend as he’ll be attending a OA Event in Belgrade.

Great Bay Campground office.

Campsite for two, campers that is.

Inside Strawbery Banke.

Ian showing us how to make a piece of blueberry pie
disappear at Geno's Chowder House.

Self-inflicted photography.

Scene of the chowder.

A stroll through the neighborhood back to Strawbery Banke.

Checking out downtown Portsmouth.

Hey, scaffording!

It's husking time.

Great Bay Campground is on a saltwater estuary.