Change #2

If you don't like something, change it. If you can't change it, change your attitude. 
Maya Angelou 

Change.

"For the past 33 years, I have looked in the mirror every morning and asked myself: 'If today were the last day of my life, would I want to do what I am about to do today?' And whenever the answer has been 'No' for too many days in a row, I know I need to change something." 
Steve Jobs 

One more day.....

The car is still in the garage. I never left the store. No story .

Tomorrow maybe!

Locked away

My camera has been locked away in Cat's car at the garage downtown. She swerved to save a squirrel but cut up her front tired on a culvert header on Friday. She now has my truck. I have my scooter. It will get repaired tomorrow, and I'll get my camera back and my blog can come to life again .

Probably just as we'll I didn't have it... Been working in the cellar way all weekend, and as Bob says.... Boring!

Still kicking....

Of Sharon's various "outlaws", one of recent times has been the son of the late, great Art Hall. His name? Tom. Tom Hall. Notoriously known in these parts as the former owner of the Snack Shack in Canaan, and the Country Corner and before that The Ironworks Restaurant in Sharon, Tom had disappeared from the radar but I caught upright him recently to grab this mug shot. Tom Hall. One of the only people I know who went thru the Clocktower intersection at 115mph! On a snowmobile @ 2:30 in the morning! And that was actually a mild maneuver for him!

Tom Hall. Still kicking!

Never under-estimate the quality of an iphone™ camera..

Today I heard a relatively loud chopper flying over, and I happened to have my iphone with me.....I walked out looked up, and snapped in the direction of the sound, as it was also looking into the sunlight. I just downloaded the pic, and not only did I get the chopper, I got a rather large bee or wasp who was flying thru at the same moment....! See it against the white cloud, to the right of the chopper?  :)

Is it Two-day?

Over Sharon last evening at dinner hour. I don't own photoshop™...this is how it was.

He huffed, and he...

So we had a bunch of rain yesterday, hard at times, and a bunch of wind in certain locations. Found these two down on South Main...

Certainly has been a year for "thinning out" the tree population in Sharon.....

Rip and tear..

This was the scene yesterday afternoon at the old Community Service on Gay Street as contractors started removing siding and the thin insulation which was underneath. I have no idea what is going on other than I heard they are planning on renovating the entire building, top to bottom. If so, wow! That will be a chunk of change in todays pricing.... I saw a very reputable local builder there so I bet if the above is true, it will certainly be a good job.

Anyone else remember when there used to be a gas pump out front, right in the middle? It's been a while. I know the mayor remembers.

On the level.

No story today

Church. Lunch. Amenia for joint compound: closed for inventory :( . Home and more trimming in the cellar way. Primed the bare wood. Sanded some of the thin areas of yesterday's joint compound. Washed up and had some supper. Bed. Oh ya....Tylenol.

...so it took a little while...

     I moved into my house about twenty-four years ago. Today I emptied all the brooms and dustpans, posters and white board, extra stock on facial tissue and paper towel and cat food to the cellar below, and went to work making the stairwell from the first floor to the cellar presentable. I say presentable as I am but an amateur at spreading joint compound and making walls look real nice is not exactly one of my strengths. I did a bunch of carpentry too, putting in some sheetrock and "trimming out" the end of the walls with pine and trying to make it look like something. I have a table saw down cellar that  I used to rip lots of old pieces of #2 pine to help clean things up. I had a two gallon pail of joint compound that was about half-full when I started, and its now empty.  I started at around 3, and I just stopped at 9:45! (so I'm not fast either!)

     But you know what? It's coming, if I do say so. Find some more joint compound and get second coat on tomorrow, and I should be ready to maybe sand on Monday night. Couple coats of priming, and a couple of finish, and then paint the stairs and I should be in good shape! Oh..gotta do some kind of baseboard for the landing yet...almost forgot.

     I must admit.....it was kinda fun, doing all the wood work and thinking that we can get this project off the list. Colors you ask? Thinking a colonial light yellow, with some light grey stairs.

Oh.... If anyone who is good at spreading joint compound has a desire to come help me out.....come on up! All help gratefully accepted!

Seasonal change

Another way to know the season is starting to change? Check your local wine shop, as the reds are suddenly starting to be in demand again. Personally, I like when the whites come in demand....

Slim pickin's (or should I say cuttings?)

 As we all know, there are a still a few working farms in the area, and of the ones that are left, there is one quite large, in terms of the number of head that they milk each day. That farm would be the Jacquier Farm, up in East Canaan.

 In order to keep all those girls fed, The Jacquier's acquire silage from all over our seven town area, and also from a number of towns in New York State as well. If you go back into last year in my blog, you can see them loading trucks and drawing from the old Austin Jackson land on Jackson Hill Road. On this particular morning, I found where they had laid down their last cutting (3rd?) farther up here on the hill, at the corner of Fairchild and Lucas. If my memory serves me correctly, this was not cut when I came home at night, yet done when I left for work early in the morning. They're working while we are sleeping!

 So, not much here, but every bite counts when it comes to feeding probably close to two thousand head ( I honestly don't know how many they have currently, but I do remember a few years back them saying they were at 1400 or so.) Not a lot compared to out west, but by far the largest in our immediate area. Good thing there are enough tracts of open land left so they can acquire what they need to meet their needs...

Bad start to the morning...

Ouch!

Sharon Crop Walk leading fund-raiser..

In Sharon , we are blessed to have many great people, who come from all walks of life, and do their part to help our small community in so many different ways. Pictured here today is Dorothy McWilliams, a super active member of St. Bernard's RC Church here in Sharon. One of the many things that Dorothy does is raise funds each year for her sponsorship of her walking in the annual Crop Walk. This year, as in years past, she sets up her little card table in front of the pharmacy, and quietly sits with her sign-up sheet and some signs which speak of stopping world hunger. She is not aggressive in any way when it comes to the seeking donations. She just sits quietly, and is ready to talk with anyone who approaches and may ask a question. She has been here but a week or so, and only comes for an hour here, an hour or two there. Thus far, she has amassed just over one thousand dollars to add to the totals from northwest Connecticut. I challenged her yesterday to get to a thousand dollars, and said she could go home early if she did. At the time she had around eight hundred or so. Today, by 2 pm she had gone over a thousand dollars! I told her to go home, and take the rest of the day off. She replied, 'maybe later"......

Well done Dorothy. You truly are a blessing to your community, and in your own quiet way, you SHOUT to what is really important in your life. Helping feed the needy, as Jesus would do. Keep it up. I think I need to challenge you to raise one thousand, five hundred....!   :)

Weddings happen around here too!

Today we had the pleasure of attending our daughter Catherine's life-long best-friend Linnea's wedding. It was held in Falls Village, at Music Mountain, which provided a lovely setting. Linnea Paton was so much a part of growing up in and around our family, and involved with so many sleep-overs, weekends, school projects, a vacation or two and many more events this feeble mind can't recall. I just wanted to wish her the absolute happiest of life's best, as she and her husband Guillaume start out into new territory; marriage.

Love never ends Linnea. You will always be our other little girl.

Guillaume & Linnea Marceau