57 Chevy I'm not

Beginning today I am 57 years old though. Sneaking through my 50s and still having juvenile moments that eventually will be considered my senior moments. If it wasn't for aches and pains I'd have problems identifying myself as 57. Now that Carol and I have begun getting serious about preparing for retirement by getting in cahoots with a financial adviser I'm kind of looking forward to when that time comes, getting tired of working for a living. If the present government would stop screwing around with the economy maybe there'd be enough left of my savings to retire at 62. That's what I like, a 5-year plan.

September 9th, 2001 - Never forgotten

Thoughts and prayers to the family and friends of those who died by the tragic actions of the terrorists of 9-11. Also prayers to those who gave their lives or health to help in the aftermath.
God bless them all.

It's that time of year

Football, NFL at that. The only thing that curtails lamenting about the end of summer. The season began on Thursday night with my World Champion Green Bay Packers hosting the previous champion New Orleans Saints and winning the game on a potential game tying play at the goal line with no time left on the clock. The fun continued today with three games available to me this afternoon and one soon to start this evening. Two more tomorrow night. Crazy but this will dominant my random thoughts through to the Superbowl in February - then I'll awaken to the remainder of the long cold winter...

Can never get enough of Mt Desert Island

We returned from another Labor Day Weekend at Mt. Desert Island. Over the last several years we've been spending LDW or Memorial Day weekend there every other year or so and in spite of all the tourists, present company included, it's just a nice place to be. Lots to do or finding places you can sit quietly and enjoy the scenery. we managed to do some of both. Together with Lois and Jim we stayed at "Smugglers Den Campground" in Southwest Harbor.

We began Friday night with me grilling up some sausages to set the tone of what kind of meals we'd be imbibing and emptying several bottles of wine in the process. It just so happened that my brother David, wife Carolyn and son Danny were staying at the same campground with Friday being the last night of their visit to MDI so we were able to spend time with them. In the morning the four of us headed for Seal Cove Auto Museum, a wonderful special collection of vehicles of the Brass Era of automobiles. If you're interested visit the link for the complete collection list and I've provided a few of my own pictures here.

1927 Bugatti

1913 Stearns-Knight

1913 Peugeot

After visiting the auto museum we drove south to the Bass Harbor Head Lighthouse with it's great public access to the rocky coast line that surrounds it.

Later that afternoon we payed a visit to Carol and Lois' cousin John and wife Linda. John is a lobsterman and Linda a shop owner in Bar Harbor so of course supper there was a lobster bake with corn on the cob.

The view from John and Linda's lower deck as sunset approaches.

Linda, John and Jim dig in.

Sunday morning Lois and Jim got up and left at 4:20 am to go out on John's Lobster boat. After the returned we all meet up with John and Linda at the "Thirsty Whale" in Bar Harbor for lunch where they serve up some great fish sandwiches at a very reasonable price. Mine was the Blackened Haddock Sandwich with fries, wash down with a Guinness – life is good. Afterwards we stopped at Bar Harbor Cellars and after a little wine tasting we bought three bottles of wine then returned to the campground. Before settling down for the remainder of the day Carol and I took a bit of a bike ride to nearby Southwest Harbor

As usual time few by, a couple more days in the region would have been sweet but there's always more to do at another time.