Today was a busy day in our family, but all in a good way! First, we left town! Did you miss us? We went over to New Paltz, New York to the Ulster County Fairgrounds to a crafts fair of great distinction. We went last Labor Day, had such good time, we had to try it again. 

Some of the work there is just so amazing.....

I sort-of wish I could just walk into an event like this and buy something from everyone there. You know they all work so hard on their crafts to be able to be at a show like that. In the end, we only made a few small purchases but we are extremely happy with them.

It was indeed fun to be walking down one of the aisles and running into Sharon's own...Peter Hill of Pink Cloud Gallery! I got him to give us a smile between customers.

One of the eye-opening events of the day was seeing some of the results of Hurricane Irene. As you drive west out of New Paltz proper, you cross over the Walkill River., on a bridge about the length of the bridge at Great Falls in Falls Village, just two lanes wide instead of one (maybe a little longer, but not much). Once you cross the bridge, for the next two miles or so down to the fairgrounds, you pass through the center of beautiful farm land. The lands have, for the last two years anyways, been planted to corn, with about a twenty-five foot swath of sunflowers on the side of the road, on both sides of the road. Here is a pic from last year....

Here was todays view, in roughly the same area....

For those two miles or so, the water rose almost 5-6 feet! Five feet! The corn crop is totally gone. The sunflowers are totally gone, with few exceptions, which now actually act as measuring sticks as to the height of the water. A pumpkin crop is now gone, and pumpkins were seen here and there for the miles as well. This one farm has lost everything of this years crop. So very sad. Made my tree down, three days with no power and wash-out under my porch very, very trivial. The Walkill is not a big river by any means. But the amount of water that ran through it till it all receded must have been incredible. Cat took lots of photos of the damage, but they hardly tell the story..... Devastating losses for this farmer.

Old Glory was flapping with a nice wave as we passed under her on The Mid-Hudson River Bridge in Poughkeepsie. I wondered just how did they get it way up there, so high as it is. Whatever... Our flag is a beautiful flag. Long may it wave.

Upon getting back to Sharon, I went to hear Congressman Chris Murphy speak at a local gathering. Chris is running for The U.S. Senate seat which will be open when Senator Lieberman retires next November. He currently represents our Fifth Congressional District in Washington. Whom I endorse is my business, and I don't believe I will try to ever persuade anyone in my blog on how they should vote. I'll just say that I did enjoy listening to what he spoke of, and do find him to be a very caring and knowledgable man. I think that's fair without being overly political.


So, that was my busy day. I hope all you out there in cyber-land had a good day, and have a better day tomorrow.