The Brownie Dilemma aka What I Do For Love

I am the baker in our house. When I make brownies there is a dilemma. Amy likes her brownies with nuts. I'm not a great fan of nuts in brownies. Last week Amy asked me to make brownies, and since they were her idea I added nuts. But I would have been much happier without them.

Mini-Vacation

Our house is not air-conditioned so hot, steamy nights are not welcome. We do have two window air-conditioners built into the walls. One in the living room and the other in the master bedroom. Both of these units scream 1970. When we, in desperation, turn them on normal conversation must cease. Sleeping with the constant, drone is nearly impossible.

The weather reports Monday were calling for extreme heat starting Tuesday night. Amy suggested that perhaps we should find a hotel room for Tuesday night. Normally this is not a big deal, there are three large hotels and several other smaller lodging establishments within 5 miles of our house. This is, however, not normal times for hotels in the greater Boston area. It's graduation season which means lots of out of town relatives descending to see their beloved children, grand-children, nieces and nephews walking across a stage to receive their degrees. These out of town relatives fill our roads (a story for another day) and hotels. Normally we could also have gone a little farther afield but I had to be home early Wednesday to meet the chimney sweep.

So it was with some trepidation that I began to look for a nice cool room for us to sleep in Tuesday night. Online searches were less than successful, unless I wanted to spend a lot more money than I felt I could. As a last resort I decided to call one of the larger hotels (the one whose loyalty card I have). It was late, so late it was almost Tuesday. The clerk who answered the phone mentioned that they only had one room left for Tuesday, and asked how much I'd be willing to pay. After I named a dollar amount we chatted while he looked up some information. During this I mentioned that I was a local who didn't have air-conditioning. He was then interrupted by an arrival (he was the only one working) and took my phone number so he could call me back.

A few minutes later he called back, and after a few more standard questions announced that since our air-conditioning had died (his interpretation) he could give me the bereavement rate for the room about 50% of the normal graduation season rate. (He also fessed up that he got a bonus if the hotel was sold out.)

So after a quick stop at home after work on Tuesday, we headed off to on our mini-vacation. The room was nice and cool. And we enjoyed a movie before bed. I was up in time for a swim Wednesday morning and then it was home for me and off to work for Amy.

Birdhouses

The past two Sundays my First Day School class has been working on birdhouses. To prepare I cut parts. The plan is pretty simple. You can find it here. The kids loved this project - they had a wonderful sense of accomplishment from this.

Week 1 was assembly.

First step was putting the screws into the front.

Step 2 Glue

Step 3 Nailing on the floor, back and top.

Finished


Week 2 Painting
I don't have a lot of pictures of the painting because I was busy working with children who weren't there last week to get their birdhouses together and trying to avoid getting coated in paint. We also had a full-house today - 5 children including one who was new to our Meeting.
Here's the some of the results.

Happy Birthday!

Happy Birthday, Mother!

Spring

Thunder of peepers*
welcomes me home -
spring night.

You can read about peepers here. Be sure to scroll down to the sound files on the right.

The back story: our yard backs up to wetlands, and at this time of year the night is filled with the sound of peepers.

New Orleans Day 2

We ended up being so busy in New Orleans that I didn't manage to post reports from the rest of our trip. I'm working on catching up.

At the recommendation of my college friend, Mary, we started off our second day with breakfast at Brennan's Restaurant, home of Banana's Foster, with Amy's niece Melissa. The building was originally built for Edgar Degas' great-grandfather, during the Spanish rule of New Orleans. It was yummy, though none of us tried the Banana's Foster. We highly recommend the strawberries with double cream.


After our sumptuous breakfast we headed to the French Market, and wandered through the flea market booths. An eccentric Cajun gentleman explained in more detail than we really wanted, how he crafts beautiful jewelry from scrap - making beauty from the destruction left behind by Katrina. And I added a bright pottery fish to my collection. After stopping to stock up on pralines for the folks at work, we stopped for a late morning snack of beignets at Cafe Du Monde.

From there we headed to St Louis Cathedral, stopping to admire the art displayed on the fence along the way.

The outside of St Louis Cathedral.

Looking down the main aisle.

The organ loft.

Then we headed to Uptown to meet my college friend, Mary, at her parent's house. I'd emailed Mary for recommendations on places to eat and things to see and discovered that she was going to be in New Orleans for the weekend too. After a quick tour of her parent's house we headed off to lunch at a local bar for lunch. We spent lunch talking and laughing.

The local drink.

After lunch Melissa took us over to the Lower Ninth Ward to show us two of the oldest houses in that part of the city. Mary kept up a running travelogue on the drive pointing out the sights and offering stories about the city. There are still signs of the destruction of the hurricane throughout the city, but there are also signs of recovery in most neighborhoods. The houses we went to see are called Pilot houses and sit on opposite corners near the levee. Mary enjoyed seeing these almost as much as we did. She'd seen pictures of them before, but didn't know where in New Orleans they were.

The Pilot house closest to the levee. This was taken from the top of the levee.

The second Pilot house. Note the kumquat tree in the yard.

There are more pictures of the Pilot houses here.

Just a block away from the Pilot houses are these new houses. We're pretty sure these are part of Brad Pitt's efforts to rebuild New Orleans. If you click on the picture you can see what almost looks like a fourth house, but is actually a ship docked on the other side of the levee.

I'll save our first Mardi Gras parade for my next post.

New Orleans Day 1

Today was our first full day in New Orleans. We arrived yesterday afternoon after a slightly bumpy but mostly uneventful flight. Amy's niece, Melissa, picked us up at the airport, which was great. We had a chance to meet her pups before heading to our hotel. We had dinner at Babylon Cafe, a small meditteranean restaurant - no frills but great food. On the way back to our hotel we spent quite a while sitting at an intersection while tractors pulled empty Mardi Gras floats down the street. Back at our hotel we were getting ready for bed when we heard drumming outside. We looked out the window to see what was happening to discover klieg lights illuminating the night, and a small brass band accompanied by a band of revelers following a police car down the street below our window. They got to the end of the block then turned around and walked back to where they'd started. The big fuzzy microphones at the sides of the road were clear indication that they were being filmed. The walk under our windows was repeated 4 or 5 more times.

Sorry about the quality of the photo - this was taken on a rainy night, through a window without a tripod.

Today was rainy so we headed off to indoor sights. First up the Audubon Aquarium.

Detail of the waterfall in the entry hall of the Aquarium.

We arrived at feeding time in the Caribbean Reef exhibit. This ray decided that sucking the food out of the jar was the best way to go.

To me this sea star looks like it's doing the wave.

Lionfish

The aquarium has a few non-aquatic critters, including this owl.

From the aquarium we walked a short distance to the Riverwalk Mall. The mall itself was uninspiring (though we were able to score a superbowl t-shirt for a co-worker). After lunch in the food court, we checked out the Southern and Beverage Museum, before heading back to the hotel.

Melissa will be joining us for our adventures tomorrow which, as long as the sun comes out, will include heading to the French Quarter for gawking, shopping and beignets. Then she's promised to take us on a short driving tour.

See It Sunday: Italian

Gelati Sign in Boston's North End
taken January 2008

More See It Sunday here.

Thematic Photographic 84 - White

Willoughby Lake Store
I took this last summer on the way to my cousin Matt's house.

See more White here.

Thematic Photographic 83 - What I Did on Vacation

Kayaking on Rainbow Lake, August 2010

See more here.

See It Sunday: Tower

Galen Stone Tower at Wellesley College
taken this morning

See more See It Sunday here.

Two for Tuesday: Road-River

Looking across the Charles River toward Boston from Memorial Drive.

More Two for Tuesday here.

PhotoSunday: Round

Macro of mushroom found at Wakanda in the Adirondacks July 2008.

See more PhotoSunday here.

The String of Lights

It's a simple string of Christmas lights containing 50 all clear bulbs. We've never used it, preferring multi-colored lights, but it's still in our decoration box (or rather one of our decoration boxes). There is nothing special about this string. Strings like this are available at almost any store that sells decorations.

Each year as I pull out the lights to decorate our Christmas tree this set of lights makes me smile. Many years ago we belonged to a neighborhood gay and lesbian group (GLOW) which held potlucks each month. In December GLOW spiced up the potluck with a Yankee Swap.

For those who have never experienced a Yankee Swap let me explain. Each person brings a small wrapped gift. Each person participating is given a number. The person with number 1 selects and opens a gift. Then number 2 selects and opens a gift. At this point the person with number 2 can either keep the gift they opened or swap it for the gift number 1 has. This continues until everyone has opened a gift. As things get further along each person who has a gift taken away can choose to swap with another person, though not the one who just swapped with them, before moving to the next number. At that point the person with number 1 gets to select any of the gifts. There may be variations depending on the specifics of the particular swap - gag gifts vs. useful things. Some swaps require that number 2 decide whether to take number 1s gift or open another before actually opening another. I know of one group that requires the participants to bring the worst gift they received the year before- rumor has it that there is one gift that has been at each of their Yankee swaps each year. The Yankee swap which GLOW did was always a lot of fun - lots of laughing, though we rarely came away with anything we really wanted or needed.

Which brings me back to the string of white lights in our decoration box. At one of the last Yankee swaps that GLOW held our friend Robert ended up with this box of lights. Robert is Jewish and didn't have a use for the lights, so after the swap he gave them to us. I think Amy gave him the gift she'd ended up with. The lights got stowed away with our decorations and there they have stayed. Each time I open that box I think of Robert.

Robert has been a true blue friend over the years. We don't see him often - usually only at our Passover Seder and when we have parties. He does call every once in a while just to check in. We haven't seen Robert much in the last couple of years. He's been battling cancer and has been too tired for much socializing. He did do me a huge favor just over a year ago, and despite the ravages of the treatment he helped me buy my car (he makes his living helping people buy cars), but we only saw each other once during that process.

The other night as I pulled out the lights for our Christmas tree I came upon that box of clear lights, and smiled thinking of our friend. Before continuing on with the decorating I took a moment to think about Robert and all of the love he's given us over the years. We may never use those lights, but they'll stay in that box - a yearly reminder of our friendship with Robert.

Happy Holloween

No costumes at our house (except at the door), just pumpkin carving.

My sister-in-law, Barbara, and I carved these today.

You can see a few more pumpkin pictures here.

Cooperation

I've been teaching preschool in the First Day School (Quaker Sunday School) at my Meeting this fall. Our group of 8 is mostly almost 4 year olds. Our current topic is cooperation and working together. This morning we joined together to make a quilt.

Amy helped me cut a bunch of squares from fabric in our scrap basket a few weeks ago. I taped a length of paper to the table (mostly cause it kept curling up) and the children and adults added squares of fabric. Our masterpiece now graces the wall of our classroom (as long as the push pins haven't give way).
The children, even the one 2 year old in attendance this morning, were engaged by this project for a good 20 minutes and a few were actively working for 30 minutes. (By the way two of the arms in the above picture are those of one of the other adults.)

As an aside - if you must use glue sticks (I can go into a tirade about those another time) I highly recommend the colored ones, which dry clear. The color makes it much easier to see where the glue has been applied.

Birthday Girl

Yesterday was my grandmother's 99th birthday. My aunt hosted a party for her - tea, cake and conversation - and since we live close-by we joined the fun.

See my flickr account (there's a link in the sidebar) for more pictures.

Elephants in Cambridge

In my head I have an image of a circus parade full of acrobats, clowns, brightly colored wagons and animals decked out in sparkles. This is probably the result of movies like Toby Tyler, a childhood favorite. Circus parades like that are a thing of the past, but in Boston there is a small piece still happening. Each year when the circus comes to town, their train is parked along the tracks that run parallel to Vassar St on the MIT campus. The shows take place across the river at the Boston Garden. The elephants and horses walk through the streets to get from the train to the Garden. In all of the years that I have worked in Cambridge I have never seen the elephant walk.

This year one of the event emails I receive regularly included the dates for the circus shows. And that gave me not only a reminder but also the time to determine when the elephants were due to make their trek.

Tonight was the night. It was not the ideal weather to watch the elephants - it is cold here. And it was dark. But we were determined to see the elephants so we bundled up and walked down to Memorial Drive to watch the elephants. We saw elephants:



The lead elephant.



Bringing up the rear.

And horses:

There was also a duck boat full of clowns, but alas no clown pictures.

It wasn't a fancy parade but it was a lot of fun.

If you're in the Boston area you've got another opportunity to see the elephants. On Sunday at 5 they make the walk back to the train.

Two for Tuesday: City-Country

Boston at twilight and Barn in the Adirondacks.

See more here.

Kayaking Rainbow Lake, Part 3

In normal years we have to be out of our vacation cabin by 10am on Saturday, so that our hosts can get it cleaned and ready for the next renters. This was, however, not a normal year. With the economy struggling the vacation rental market is depressed, and Owl cabin (our favorite home away from home) was not rented for the week after our vacation. After trying to convince us to stay (oh how I wanted to!) Soozie and Noel encouraged us to take our time on Saturday. (This turned out to ve a very good thing when the water pump quit working Saturday morning. Noel did get it fixed quickly, though.)

This meant that there was time for one more kayak trip before we left. One of my favorite paddles on Rainbow Lake is that back into the Flow. So that was the choice for my last paddle.

The paddle starts by heading south around the tip of the esker. As I started out that morning I realized that I had never done this in the morning before.


The view looking north from the other side of the esker.


I've haven't seen a lot of turtles in the Adirondacks. That morning I saw 10, including this one.


This heron was alternately grooming and posing, while enjoying the morning sun.


Looking toward the Flow. At this point I had seen only one other boat.


As I head further into the Flow the lilies thicken. In spots this makes the paddle more challenging, since it requires maneuvering around the patches of lillies, and other water plants which thrive here because the water is so calm.


The calm water and the number of fallen trees offer lots of awsome reflections.


Evidence of the calm morning - the water was smooth as glass.


I've seen beavers in this section of the Flow before, but this morning I only saw reflections.


This stretch of the lake ends at this beaver dam. I was able to get close because of this summer's high water levels.


I love the colors of this bright grass.


More fallen tree reflections.


Back at Owl Dock and the end of our vacation.

It was a lovely paddle.