Tesla's Thoughts

"Hey lady, I thought you said it was going to snow! I don't see anything out this window but dark sky!" 

 Patience, Tesla, patience! 

A Tuesday Tidbit

 

 I'm afraid I may be rushing around a lot today, much like the water was rushing over this waterfall that I stopped to take pictures of last week.  With a potential snowstorm blowing in tomorrow with predicted significant snow totals, I've got errands galore today so will be away from the computer for most of the day.  One good thing about being stuck in the house on Wednesday, though, is that I'll be able to spend lots of time blogging then to make up for what I'm going to miss today! 

In the meantime, everyone have a great Tuesday and I'll catch up to ya later!

Take This Tune - Love of Place

This week's prompt at Take This Tune is for Love of Place or, as Fairweather put it, "Where is the place where your heart is rooted, no matter how far away you’ve roamed from there? Start writing." I had to think about this for all of about ten minutes before I decided that it wasn't that difficult of a decision which spot to pick, a decision which then led me to my photo archives and the following pictures.










What can I say? My heart feels right at home in the Lake Tahoe region of the Sierra Nevada mountains and it's a place that I can go back to over and over and over again and never tire of. These pictures were taken last May when my friend Cyndi and I went for "a little drive" to see if Carson Pass on Route 88 was open during my short trip to California.

Described as "one of the most visually dramatic of the trans-Sierra highways in California", the 58-mile drive along Route 88 starts in the Sacramento Valley in California and ends in the Carson Valley in Nevada. Along the way there are views of ragged volcanic skylines, cool green meadows, beautiful mountain lakes framed by timber-covered slopes, and distant mountain peaks.  Pretty much everything that anyone could ask for!










From Route 88 we drove to Lake Tahoe itself for a couple of pictures and then back out along California State Highway 50 and through Echo Summit - which at an elevation of 7,382 feet is the highest point on Route 50. Parts of Hightway 50 run parallel to the American River, as pictured above, and there are just way too many places along the way where one wants to stop and take pictures - or at least this one did!  Poor Cyndi was convinced I'd end up stopping every half-mile or so but I did my best to restrain myself! 

I've driven Highway 50 to and from Lake Tahoe more times than I can remember and it has always fascinated me - not just the beautiful scenery but also the history of the roadway as long ago it was used by many 49ers who came to California during the Gold Rush as well as by riders of the Pony Express. Who knows?  Maybe in another lifetime I was one of the pioneers who came across the Sierra Nevadas in a wagon train to make my home in California and that's why my heart will always have a love of Lake Tahoe and the Sierra Nevadas no matter how long it may be between visits.

I really do love that place!

Visiting Mount Holyoke College aka The Hogwarts of Massachusetts!

While Amanda and I were in Massachusetts last weekend visiting her friend Sami, I took the opportunity to drive over to the Mount Holyoke College campus and take a few pictures after dropping the girls off at the movies.  Unfortunately the weather gal I had listened to earlier in the day was wrong in her prediction of sunny skies so the lighting wasn't the best in the world (I seem to have really bad luck with lighting) but at least you can get an idea of what a really cool old campus it is.

 

Located in South Hadley, Massachusetts - just about smack in the middle of Massachusetts - Mount Holyoke College is one of the oldest women's colleges in the United States and the first member of The Seven Sisters.

  

For those not familiar with The Seven Sisters, they are seven prestigious liberal arts colleges founded between 1837 and 1889 that are historically women's colleges and were the equivalent of the male Ivy League colleges.  The other six colleges are Barnard College in New York, Bryn Mawr College in Pennsylvania,  Radcliffe College in Massachusetts, Smith College just up the road from Holyoke College in Northampton, Vassar College in New York, and Wellesley College also in Massachusetts.  Radcliffe (which merged with Harvard College) and Vassar (which is now coeducational) are no longer women's colleges but are still part of The Seven Sisters.

Mount Holyoke was originally named the Mount Holyoke Female Seminary after it was established by its founder, Mary Mason Lyon, who was a pioneer in women's education.  A remarkable woman who believed that women deserved the same opportunities in education as men, Miss Lyon served as the first president of the school for 12 years until her death in 1849.  If you'd like, you can read more about Mary Lyon here.

Miss Lyon's vision for Mount Holyoke fused intellectual challenge and moral purpose as she strove to maintain high academic standards by setting rigorous entrance exams and admitting no students under the age of 16. In keeping with her social vision to make the seminary affordable for students of modest means, she limited the tuition to $60 a year and required students to perform domestic tasks — an early version of work/study - to keep costs low.  Just as an FYI, the current annual cost of attending Mount Holyoke is $50,576. 

Even though Mount Holyoke was founded as a women's seminary and Mary Lyon was a devout Christian, the school had no particular religious affiliation welcoming women of all faith or even no faith at all.  Students, however, were still required to attend church services, chapel talks, prayer meetings, and Bible study groups. Twice a day teachers and students spent time in private devotions and every dorm room had two large lighted closets to give roommates privacy during their devotions.

The 800-acre campus of Mount Holyoke was designed and landscaped between 1896 and 1922 by the landscape architecture firm of Olmsted and Sons which was founded by Frederick Olmsted, the man who also designed Central Park and many other well-known urban parks throughout the country. A native of Hartford, Connecticut, Olmsted established in 1833 what is considered to be the first full-time landscape architecture firm in Brookline, Massachusetts from where he designed the Mount Holyoke campus.

In addition to the Mount Holyoke College Botanic Garden, the campus includes two lakes, several waterfalls, tennis courts, stables and woodland riding trails - none of which I saw because it was too freakin' cold to really do much exploring at all except for some of the major buildings near the front entrance of the campus. I would love to have seen more but my fingers were turning into popsicles just from the short amount of time I spent walking around between Abbey Chapel, pictured above, and the Williston Library, below.

Named for A. Lyman Williston in 1917, Williston Memorial Library was built on the site of the original 1870 library. The main reading room, built in 1905, was designed to resemble Westminster Hall, an early English legal chamber.  These pictures are, I believe, actually the back of the library which face the main road.  I'm willing to bet it looks even nicer from the other side but I'm going to wait for warmer weather to go back and find out!

  

The first time we went up to visit Sami, Amanda and I drove past Mount Holyoke and she remarked that it looked like something out of Harry Potter.  Sami said that locally it's called "The Hogwarts of Massachusetts" so I guess Amanda wasn't wrong in her assessment!  It really is a very beautiful campus, though, and I hope to get a chance to go back and explore when the temperature is above 20 degrees!

Oh, and remember that coffee shop that I mentioned going to on Friday night that was complete with a singer strumming her guitar?  It's actually located across from the Mount Holyoke campus in the college-owned center of shoppes called Village Commons and is named the ThirstyMind Coffee and Wine Bar.

It's not just a coffee and wine bar, though, as they also make a mean cup of hot white chocolate that's guaranteed to melt the frost off the coldest of noses!  Trust me on that one, okay?

Before I end this post, I've got one more picture that I have to post as I was thinking about Miss Bee when I took it.

This monument is located on a small green across from the college campus and the inscription reads:  "This monument is erected to commemorate the loyalty and patriotism of our citizen soldiers who fought for liberty and the Union in the Great Rebellion 1861-1865"   I had to chuckle a little bit when I read the inscription as every time I read a Civil War monument these days I always hear Miss Bee's voice in my head calling it "The War of Northern Aggression" as she fondly refers to the War Between the States.  So there you are, Miss Bee, this picture is for you!

There's a New Kid in Town

A few months back I mentioned that we were trying to adopt one of the local outdoor cats who didn't seem to have a home.  Our elderly neighbor, Elizabeth, had been feeding the cat that Amanda dubbed "Rufus" for a couple of months and she was afraid that he was going to freeze to death when winter hit.  We tried to take over the feeding and to get Rufus into the house but apparently he had been an outdoor cat for too long to have any interest in being an indoor one so unfortunately, adopting him just wasn't in the cards.  Elizabeth went back to leaving food out for he and another neighborhood stray along with putting a comfy lined box on her back porch should they need somewhere to spend the night and Amanda went back to asking me to look for another cat.

I admit that I stalled until after the holidays as I had heard way too many horror stories of cats trying to climb Christmas trees and knocking them over and that really sounded like an experience I'd rather miss.  Following the tree being removed, I half-heartedly looked through the CraigsList postings and the classifieds in the paper as well as some of the online listings but I just wasn't sure and none of the cats that I saw seemed to jump up and say "Me!  Me!  Pick me!" 

Finally Amanda had pretty much had enough of my dithering around and once again asked this week if we were ever going to go get a cat.  Having basically run out of excuses I made arrangements to go out to the Humane Society in Waterford on Friday afternoon with Amanda and our friend Amy who has several cats of her own and would be a good judge of character.  On the way out I told Amanda that she wasn't to just pick out any cat just because she really wanted one but that she needed to choose carefully and if there wasn't one there that she liked then we could continue looking another time.  She agreed but I've got no idea whether she had her fingers crossed or not as she was sitting in the backseat!

There were probably about 10 to 12 cats available for adoption at the Humane Society and the first one that caught Amanda's eye was a 5-year old tortoiseshell female named Ethel who was very friendly but had a major aversion to being picked up.  Following Ethel there was a big orange tabby named Caramel that Amanda spent some time scritching and then in the cage below she spotted Montana whom she really liked.

Montana's paperwork said that he was 1-1/2 years old and had been taken in by the Humane Society on February the 1st.  His intake reason said "Abandoned" and he had just been neutered the day before which could account for the reason that he seemed so laid back!  When Amanda picked him up he snuggled right into her jacket and I could just tell by the goofy grin on her face that her decision had been made.  

I will say one thing about adopting a cat from the Humane Society versus just finding one online or from a classified ad - they do a marvelous job making sure your new pet has everything that he or she may need.  Montana, now known as Tesla, has been micro-chipped, given all of his vaccinations to date, examined thoroughly by a veterinarian and then sent to his new home with a new collar (Amanda's choice of color), a bag of Science Diet dry food, more pain medication to be given to him tomorrow for that recent surgery, and several toys as well as all sorts of documentation and paperwork and discounts for future needs.  Not bad at all for an $80 adoption fee - some of the shelters that I was looking at online wanted $100 or more and that was just for the cat, never mind all those other things.

Once we got home, Amanda let Tesla out of his carrying box and he began exploring his new digs making sure he knew where the litterbox was, checking out the food and water dishes, and poking his nose into the various rooms.  Everything seemed to meet his approval though he gave me that "Who is this crazy woman with the camera in my face all the time" look!  I'm thinking he needs to get used to that though I have already told Amanda that Tesla is not getting his own blog unless he somehow manages to learn how to write one on his own!  I have trouble enough keeping up with my own blog never mind venturing out into the Cat Blogosphere!

So far girl and cat seem to be quite happy with each other and - as odd as it seems - Tesla likes to climb up onto the computer desk and snooze while Amanda either IMs her friends or does whatever it is that she spends so much time on a computer doing.  I'm really surprised the instant-messaging noises doesn't keep him awake but they don't seem to bother him at all.  Oh well, a cacophony to one can be a lullaby to another!

Oh, and as for the name change ... the ladies at the Humane Society said that the person who brought the cat in only called him "Kitty" and that he had no real name so they dubbed him "Montana" as that's what the side of the box that he was in read.  Amanda had been kicking around the names "Tesla" (after Nicolai Tesla who had discovered alternating currents and was a rival of Thomas Edison) and "Sherlock" (yes, after the movie!) and asked me which name I thought would be better.  After looking at her new pet's rather electric eyes I decided that Tesla would be a better choice than Sherlock and so Tesla he became.  The choice was elementary, my dear Watson! The trick is to not call him "Tessie" as even though he's been neutered that just seems too girly and I don't want to insult the guy!

Let's just hope this is the beginning of a beautiful relationship!  Oh, and Amanda?  About that litterbox ... !

Looking at the Sky on Friday - The Frozen Version

It's been too long since I've participated in my friend Tisha's Looking at the Sky on Friday meme but while in Amherst, Massachusetts last Saturday I felt compelled to pull over next to (okay, I actually pulled onto!) this dead cornfield to take a picture of the cold sky overhead.  As you can see, the sun was trying hard to break through but it wasn't having any luck and the day was cold, cold, cold!  No Nikon-blue sky there at all, just the frozen gray steel of a late January day in Massachusetts.  Brrr!

Be sure to head over to Tisha's and check out the links to see if anyone else has posted a warm Friday sky!

A Thursday Thought

 

Oh sure, it's pretty to look at but right about now I have more than had enough of this thing we like to call winter!  You would think that as a New Englander I'd have a heartier disposition and ability to handle the cold better than I do but alas I think I spent too many years traveling around as an Air Force Brat and then on my own to have truly acclimated!  

I don't know about the rest of you but I'm more than ready to go from that above (yesterday's weather) to this below - and soon!

Please???

I've Got Mail!

It will never cease to delight me to get an email from out of the blue from a reader of my blog. (Well, it might if that person is writing to tell me that my blog stinks and I have no business trying to write or take pictures but I've got my fingers crossed that won't happen!)  Last week I got not one but two emails from readers who had apparently stumbled upon my blog via web searches.

The first email came from Wayne who wrote to me regarding a post that I had written last June about my then-recent trip to Santa Cruz to visit blogging buddy Katherine and take in some of the California seacoast.  In my post, Santa Cruz - Day Two I had made mention that I was curious about the odd-shaped cement breakers that surrounded the Walton Lighthouse as they all seemed to be numbered and yet placed helter-skelter on the breakwater.

An anonymous commenter on that post had left me the information that "The pieces are numbered to assist the engineers in how they wear in the pounding of the surf and if they fail what was the composition and date and shift they were formed".  That sounded like a great explanation to me as previously neither I nor Katherine knew why they were numbered like they were and I'd had no luck with an internet search I'd done while trying to find the answer.

In his email, Wayne wrote,

"I saw your article about the Santa Cruz Harbor and you were curious about the “odd-shaped cement breakers”. I found this article about how and when they were built and wanted to share it with you. This file is over 18Mb so it could take a while to download, but it is worth it.

You can click on the link, “Building the Santa Cruz Harbor by George N. Wagner, Branch Manager (retired), Granite Construction Company” located at this web site, http://www.santacruzharbor.org/education/."

Wayne was right, it did take awhile for it download but the article explained not just about the tetrapods - the official name of those odd-shaped cement pieces - but also just how the Santa Cruz Harbor was constructed.  The article was written by Mr. Wagner in response to questions from his grandson, Abe, who asked, "Grandpa, how was this harbor built?   Where did the stone come from? Where did the jacks (tetrapods) come from? Did you build them?"  In order to answer those questions, Mr. Wagner wrote a 152-page article - complete with pictures - detailing the building of the Santa Cruz Harbor and even though it's pretty technical in places, it's a very interesting read.

Turns out that there are a total of 900 tetrapods, each weighing 28 tons, that were constructed at the rate of 40 a week.  In addition to the time it took to pour the giant cement jacks and for them to set, it then took another 24 to 25 days for the cement to cure before the tetrapods could be placed around the jetty.  It took 2-1/2 months to properly place them all and even though they look like they've been laid out pell-mell they were carefully placed to keep the ocean waves at bay.  To us it may look like a giant child just got tired of playing with her jacks and tossed them down near the edge of the water but there's definitely a reason for them being the way they are.

Thank you so much, Wayne, for sending me the link to that article; I truly appreciate it!  In addition, Wayne also sent me a link to a photo that he had taken of the tetrapods as he, too, found them interesting.  You can check his picture out at this link and if you've got a little time and want to see some other lovely photos of California, I urge you to browse through Wayne's photo gallery as he's got some beautiful stuff there!  Some of them make me yearn for another trip West to take some pictures of my own - especially those of the ghost-town Bodie, a place I've always wanted to go.  Maybe someday ...

Several days after getting Wayne's email, I received another email, this time from Bob who wrote:

"I've often visited Yantic Falls throughout the past 30 odd years. I understood a "Leaping" legend existed, but never quite got beyond my slack-jawed trance upon each visit following a particularly significant rainfall.  Wishing to get the legend straight in my mind, I happened upon your blog. WOW!  What a beautiful webpage! The images of the Falls are magnificent. Now I've got a link to send to my son away at college in VT.  He & I visited the Falls over his holiday break this month and were blown away yet again by the sheer force of the water, and majestic ice formations on the adjacent cliff. Thanks again for fleshing out this legend for me."

I'm going to guess that Bob was referring to my post The Legend of Chief Uncas and Indian Leap that I wrote in December of 2008 though I have written about and posted many pictures of the Indian Leap Falls area.  If you had something that looked like this practically in your backyard, I bet you'd go there a lot, too!

Unfortunately, the falls don't exactly look like they do in the picture above right now due to the fact that it's been colder than cold and there is obviously no foliage to be found unless it's of the brown & dead variety but you do have to admit, it still looks pretty in all of its frozen glory -

I like Bob's term of "majestic ice formations" so much better than mine of "very large pieces of frozen cauliflower" when it comes to describing the area around the falls in its winter splendor, don't you?

Thank you, Bob, for taking the time to send me an email and I am beyond delighted that I was able to tell you the story of Chief Uncas of the Mohegans and his leap across the chasm in his pursuit of rival Chief Miantonomo of the Narragansetts.  As someone who often finds herself wishing she had chosen to teach history rather than dispatch ambulances for a living, it means a lot to me to know that I told a story that someone wanted to learn.  I guess in some small way it sort of makes me a history teacher after all!

How To Feel Dumb in the Comfort of Your Own Home

I love game shows. No, let me amend that. I love intelligent game shows. Game shows where the contestant has to have at least a couple of brain cells to rub together in order to win a prize and not just jump up and down and act like they're about ready to have a seizure.  Those kind of game shows I don't love.

Those who are regular readers of this blog are probably aware of my futile attempts (groan!) to pass the audition test for Who Wants to Be a Millionaire - curses on Gwen Stefani and her b-a-n-a-n-a-s!  I've made the trip down to New York City three times in order to allow myself the chance to feel like a complete and total dolt and chances are, I'll try it again one of these days as it's now become a challenge to prove to myself that - given enough tries - I could actually pass the test.  Not that just passing the test gets you into the Hot Seat - there are several more hoops to jump through before that happens - but at least I could say I made it through the first hoop.  Someday.  Hopefully.

In the meantime, one of my other favorite game shows - the Crème de la crème of all intelligent game shows in my humble opinion - Jeopardy! just recently held their online contestant test so I figured why not?  I hadn't been made to feel like a complete and total idiot in awhile so why not give it a go?   I signed up online for the East Coast test and logged in last Tuesday evening as instructed where I was greeted by Alex Trebek -

 

You're given 50 answers and you have 15 seconds to respond to each one.  Unlike the actual show, your answer doesn't have to be in the form of a question and your spelling doesn't have to be perfect but it helps!  It also apparently helps if you're as smart as Albert Einstein as some of the questions seem like things that no common man or woman would ever know.  Well, at least not this common woman!  Questions like - 

 

Huh??

Oh hey - wait! I know that one! It's avocados!

Huh again??

I'm not sure if I even got half of the responses right so I'm certainly not going to hold my breath and wait for an invitation to attend the next round of the contestant search to be held in Boston, which would be the city closest to me.  As a matter of fact, I'll never know how well I did or didn't do on the test as Jeopardy! never notifies wanna-be contestants whether they actually passed the test or not. 

Instead one just gets to sit home and beat his/her head against the dining room table while muttering "I'm so dumb, I'm so dumb, I'm so dumb" over and over again - which I guess beats telling oneself that on the 2-hour drive back from Manhattan!  Ah well, hope springs eternal ... hmmm, I wonder when can I sign up to take the Millionaire test in New York City again??

Take This Tune - The Love Lost & Found Version

 

Take This Tune has been dabbling in love songs this month with this week's bend being towards love lost and then found again.  Truth be told, I haven't had much experience in this particular area of life as it seems like I've always managed to lose love rather than find it and have waited in vain for way too long for it come back asking for forgiveness and another chance.  That doesn't mean that I don't believe it can't happen as I'm sure it can but that particular fairy tale just seems to be more elusive than the others - least ways for me!

Anyhow, enough about my own misadventures in love - as someone once said "it's better to have loved and lost than to have hated and won" and even though my heart bears the scars, I'd rather have them then to have never known love at all.  To borrow another line of lyrics, "If I'd never loved, I never would have cried".  Of course, I'm not so sure that I'm either a rock or an island but I have survived!  

One of the things that impresses me the most about true love is that it can be enough for one person for a lifetime even if that love sometimes fatefully goes away forever.  Maybe it's not found again, per say, but it will always be found in the heart of those who carried it with them to wherever their life's journeys may have taken them.  I'd like to believe that love - once found - is never truly lost.  

As I was visiting Fairweather's Red Mud Inn today, I was reminded of how much the genre of bluegrass music deals with the topic of lost love and yet it always does it with a jaunty little tune behind it.  Fairweather's mention of Tim O'Brien and The Demon Lover reminded me of a song that I always enjoyed by a bluegrass group named "Hot Rize" - a favorite of my cousin Amy and one of the very few bluegrass groups that I ever listened to and could really say that I liked!  Matter of fact, I've actually seen them in concert a time or two and even though that "high, lonesome sound" that is prevalent in almost all bluegrass music takes some getting used to, it always tells a story that's more real life than fairy tale.  A song that tells the story of love lost and more or less found again is Colleen Malone - granted, it wasn't found again in that happy, fairy tale ending sort of way but it was found again - on the side of a hill.

It's been ten years and three since I first went to sea
Since I sailed from old Ireland and home
But those hills lush and green were a part of my dreams
When I dreamed of my Colleen Malone

On the day I returned to my sorrow I learned
That the angels had called her away
To a grave on a hill overlooking the mill
That's the place where she's sleeping today

As the soft breezes blow through the meadow I go
Past the mill with the moss covered stone
Up the pathway I climb through the woods and the vines
To be with my Colleen Malone

She was faithful each day as I sailed far away
There was no one but me that she loved
I remember those eyes soft and blue as the skies
And her heart was as pure as a dove

All the years of my life I will not take a wife
I will live in this valley above
Planting flowers around in this soft gentle ground
That is holding my Colleen Malone

As the soft breezes blow through the meadow I go
Past the mill with the moss covered stone
Up the pathway I climb through the woods and the vines
To be with my Colleen Malone

The singer did find his love again and he kept her in his heart for the rest of his life - just not in his arms. Sad song but happy little tune, eh? That's bluegrass for you! And sometimes that's love for you, too.

Three Sunday Shots

Just a few quick pictures from yesterday as it's off to work for 16 hours and no time to be on the computer. I'm a bit disappointed with a lot of the pictures because - believe it or not - the weather forecasters got it wrong and the blue skies that they had promised for the day fizzled out around 10:00 a.m. leaving me with some pretty lousy lighting.

Regardless, though, it was a nice little mini-break and Amanda had a wonderful time hanging out with her brain-twin Sami -

While I attempted to take some pictures at the Mount Holyoke College Campus- the place that most definitely looks like one would expect Hogwart's to look -

Then before leaving for the night, we stopped at a scenic overlook where I attempted to get a picture or two of the beautiful full moon that chose just that moment to go hide behind some clouds -

Sometimes it seems like the Photo Gods just like to sit back and laugh at we mere mortals!  Ah well, it just means I'm going to have to try again another day, right??

Anyhow, I'm off to work - everyone have a great Sunday and stay out of trouble!

Saturday in Massachusetts

The kid and I are in middle Massachusetts for the day - specifically the Holyoke/Amherst area - and even though it's still pretty darned cold out there, I've got plans to go take some pictures of the local area later.

We arrived yesterday evening around 5:30 and after checking into our hotel (which I was able to score a major deal at courtesy of Priceline!) we drove over to Hampshire College where we picked up Amanda's friend, Sami.  From there we made the short drive to South Hadley where we had a nice dinner at the what appeared to be the most happenin' place in town - Johnny's Bar & Grill.

Following that we popped into a cute little coffee shop that was very eclectic and even featured a singer strumming on her guitar who reminded me a bit of Alanis Morrisette.  I wish I could remember the name of the place but I think I was too busy being bemused by the whole experience!

From there it was across the courtyard to a small movie theater where we saw The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus, the last movie that Heath Ledger was working on before he died.  When Ledger died one-third of the way through filming, his role was recast with Johnny Depp, Jude Law, and Colin Farrell portraying transformations of Ledger's character Tony as he travels through a dream world.  To be honest, it was hard to tell where one character ended and the other began at times as the movie itself is pretty trippy.  Not bad, mind you, but a movie you have to pay close attention to or you'll be totally lost.  Definitely not one that you want to get up and go to the restroom or the concession stand during!  Amanda, of course, loved it!

Today the plan is to drop the girls off at the local mall so that they can see Sherlock Holmes together (they are both major fans of both the movie and Robert Downey, Jr.) while I see what I can find with the Nikon.  Mount Holyoke College is a definite target as it bears a striking resemblance to Harry Potter's Hogwart's and I was enchanted with the campus the first time we drove up here to see Sami.  Beyond that, I shall see what I shall see! Like I said, I just hope I don't freeze my fingers off in the process!

On the Road Again ...

Even though it's so cold  I'm shivering like a mobster in a tax office, the sun is still shining brightly so Amanda and I are throwing some stuff in the car and heading out on an impromptu road-trip to the State of Massachusetts. 

Not to worry, I'm taking along the camera and plan on doing some picture-taking while Amanda hangs out with her brain-twin, Sami, and gets some needed teenage-time doing whatever it is that teenage girls like to do these days.  I'm pretty sure that the zombie make-up is staying home, though!

Everyone stay warm wherever you are! 

Winging It On Thursday

"I pick the prettiest part of the sky and I melt into the wing and then into the air, till I'm just soul on a sunbeam." ~ Richard Bach, Jonathan Livingstone Seagull

"I think it is a pity to lose the romantic side of flying and simply to accept it as a common means of transport...."  ~ Amy Johnson

Tuesday Afternoon By the Thames

After getting a clean bill of health from my doctor yesterday afternoon, I took a drive south of Norwich to the Stoddard Hill State Park Boat Launch in Gales Ferry in search of train tracks with the hope of maybe catching an afternoon Providence & Worcester train making its way north. I found the perfect spot by the tracks but unfortunately, I didn't find any trains. I tell ya, freight trains are tricky buggers but I guess that's half the fun in trying to photograph them - you have to catch one first! It's turning out to be a great lesson in patience!

Still, it wasn't a wasted trip as I found something just as nice to photograph:

What with no trains clackety-clacking down the tracks for me to take pictures of, I decided that the two swans were would be perfect subjects for the afternoon:

In addition to having the company of the swans, as I was hanging around by the tracks another car pulled in next to mine and I was soon joined by a rather nice gentleman who had stopped by to take in the scenery after attending to some business he'd had in the local area. He was from Enfield, which is more towards the middle of the state, and said he enjoyed this part of the state whenever he had the chance to get down this way. We talked for awhile about trains and the river and photography before he decided that he had to head north for the day and bid me good luck with my photography. It was actually a rather nice way to spend the afternoon even though I suppose talking to strange men by the side of the river might seem a bit dangerous to some; he really didn't strike me as the serial killer type, though!

Before giving up on the trains for the afternoon I was rewarded with this beautiful view:

So ... no trains but it wasn't a total loss and perhaps next time I'll get lucky - though I'm seriously thinking of bringing along a lawn chair, a blanket, and a thermos of hot coffee just in case I'm going to be there for awhile waiting!