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Alabama / Auburn / errands / iPhone / photo / Wednesday — Comments Off
30
Dec 10

Things and stuff

Five miles of footwork today, this being one of the scenic and lovely roads near my home that I shuffled down.

I received eight hellos and/or waves. Saw a dog, two squirrels, a horse and two raccoons. And since a quick Google Image search doesn’t show a horse and raccoon combination, I’ll share one here.

He wasn’t especially wild about the closeup, but knew he was cornered. I think he was hoping I hadn’t noticed him, intent on the branches.

More reading today. If I feel behind with all of this it is only because I am. But there’s a lot to do, too, and a great deal more to go. I have about 10 more pages of notes and analysis after today, though, so that’s something.

Replaced the battery in The Yankee’s car this evening. It left me stranded last week. Since she’ll soon be back in town it seems only reasonable to assume she might want to drive somewhere. So off to Walmart I went, where we picked up this battery on August 1st.

I was all ready to go to protective husband, angry customer mode, but the lady at the customer service desk simply pointed me to the automotive section. Pick up a new one and bring it back, she said. I did, and one of her colleagues pushed the buttons that denoted the change of battery ownership.

She asked for my license, and scanned it verily. I asked what that told her.

“Since you don’t have your receipt I needed to see when you bought it. It is to make sure you aren’t returning too much stuff.”

Next time I’ll ask about the definition of “too much.” Instead I simply said, July 30th.

She confirmed the date, but did not ask about my superior recollection. Shame, since I had a great speech. “Like your wedding day, or the birth of your child, you never forget the day you swap out a car battery on the same evening you move.”

Not that she would have cared … There was a product, a customer said it was faulty. She had buttons to push, keys to to turn and items to scan.

I had the new battery, picked up a commemorative Sports Illustrated, a picture frame and a handful of buttons.

Installed the car battery — and what do you know, it cranked on the first try! — and did a little sewing. A sports coat needs different buttons. I’m swapping out the plastic gold look for something a little more sedate.

The frame? I put this postcard behind a piece of plexiglass.

The note on the back details visiting family throughout the country. The postmark is from 1912.

history / iPhone / links / Monday / photo — Comments Off
27
Dec 10

Roadside hypothesis and a bridge to history

This was my yesterday evening. Made it back home by around 9 p.m. thinking “There’s no place like home from the holidays.”

Though I wish I could have stayed longer, there is work to be done. And, also, the vain hope that moving 170 miles to the south will improve the temperature. It is cold in north Alabama, where the snow still looks abnormal, but the bitter chill is setting into the bones.

So that’s looking west. I headed east, and then south, and then east again. And in all of that driving I began to tinker with an hypothesis about what you can learn about a reason by the tall things you see during your travels. Here’s a partial list of last night’s sites:

Neon catfish. They like their fried fish around here.

A giant cross. It is the Bible belt.

Vulcan, the god of the forge belongs in a steel city.

The big peach, in the fruit tree region.

Then, of course, that regrettable Confederate flag.

And on the last leg of the trip the dog track’s giant triple sevens.

You could write books from just those starting blocks.

Anyway, back to the above picture. If you look east, you’d see this:

I took that particular picture four years ago after it closed. Yesterday, when I drove by it was still covered in snow.

The bridge was built in 1924 and opened in 1925. My grandmother, at Thanksgiving, showed me a newspaper clipping of the first car that went over the bridge. There was an addition made in 1959, making it one of the last truss bridges built in the state.

When they closed the narrow little bridge it was supporting something like 15,000 cars a day. Now there’s a nice, wide six-lane expanse sitting nearby.

And we’re going to call that History Monday, because the rest of the day was indoors, trying to stay warm and reading. I did make it to the mailbox. We got a card from family in New England. The theme was “Let it snow.” I bet they’d like to take that back just now.

Very cold here in Auburn still. There was a wintry mix late on Christmas day. Snowmen were made. I saw photographs.

Later this week it’ll be in the 60s.

adventures / Alabama / family / iPhone / memories / photo / recipes / weekend — Comments Off
26
Dec 10

Catching up

And, now, the regular attempt to add more pictures that were somehow neglected over the course of the last week.

Studying. I’m doing it.

Lots of it.

This is the tree at the main entrance of St. John the Divine in New York, where we saw the Winter Solstice concert.

One of the nicer things about winter is that The Yankee sometimes wear scarves and I can take this picture.

I’m violating my food photography rule here, I know, but this is Pepe’s. This is serious. If you’re in Connecticut, or in Yonkers or anywhere in New England, really, you have to visit Pepe’s. This is one of the better pizza pies you’ve ever eaten.

Family photos are fun. These are my great-grandparents. That’s their youngest grandchild, which would put this picture in the early 1980s. They both look great here. She always looked great, though. And he was the very definition of a Southern gentleman and perhaps one of the finer men I’ve ever had the pleasure to know. We all miss him very much.

I don’t know that I’d ever seen the picture before. I took this on Christmas Eve at my aunt and uncle’s house, so this is a picture of a picture, and almost shooting from the hip, as it were.

Now I feel like I’m re-living my childhood. Punch and cookies, the staple food at my grandparents’ home.

Want the recipe? This is a delicious punch … but do cut back on the sugar.

iPhone / photo / weekend — Comments Off
25
Dec 10

Musical dream, realized – White Christmas

Just like the ones I used to know.

This is my third White Christmas in the South. Probably I’ve had one or two in the north, but most of that would be leftover snow, if I had to guess. They are infrequent enough here to be worth remembering, though.

For the record: Christmas as a 1-year-old, a 13-year-old and, now, at 34.

You want animals in snow? We’ve got animals in snow.

This was the perfect White Christmas. Pretty in the yard, dry on the road. The snow itself was a very white rain, really. As wet as possible, it melts if you look at it hard. For all of those readers not from the southeast, that’s normal here.

I go to Waffle House for a late bite on Christmas night. Mostly just to satisfy my curiosity about who goes to Waffle House on Christmas night. Besides me, I mean.

After several years of field study I can confidently observe this isn’t the regular Waffle House crowd. So where is the regular Waffle House crowd?

This particular store was packed after everyone got tired of crinkly paper, leftovers and family. People were waiting for seats when I arrived. That’s a condition usually reserved for after that other holy event in the South — high school football.

Fine Christmas all around, just dandy. Hope yours was even better!

family / Friday / iPhone / video — 1 Comment
24
Dec 10

Christmas Eve

The big kids in our family can’t wait. Christmas starts promptly at 9 a.m. on Christmas Eve.