The Return Trip

Coming back was a bit stressful to start with. Some of us wanted to get home ASAP, and the rest of us wanted to get home ALAP. We finally got off around 12:45, forty five minutes after our planned departure time. The person I came closest to getting in an argument was with Bria: she wanted to go home the usual way, and I wanted to go by the Mass Pike to avoid city traffic in Troy and Bennington (Calling it "city traffic almost caused an argument itself: Bria thinks "city traffic" is traffic coming from the city, and I think it's traffic in a city; to that Bria says Bennington isn't a city, but I say it's close enough; what else do you call stoplight after stoplight in rapid succession surrounded by buildings!?!?! Bria says the main street of a town, but I disagreed heartily; when I did, she decided I was too angry to drive safely and kept telling Mama so on the phone, which eased the atmosphere tremendously.). I gave in, however, and we zoomed off toward the Green Mountain State.

We zoomed all the way to Bennington were we got stuck in--by MY definition--city traffic! In fact, when we came to the first intersection in that lovely city, I got stuck in the middle of the intersection. The traffic in front of me was moving until I was in the intersection, and then it stopped short and I was left in the middle. I always hate it when others do that, so it was particularly mortifying for me to be the one I usually would have sighed and shook my head at. Fortunately, the drivers coming from the other ways were quite congenial about the whole thing, but I was still humiliated. The light finally changed ahead, but the cars ahead moved only enough to let me through; the cars behind me couldn't move for a whole light change! That should give you an idea of how bad the traffic was.

We crept along for the next half hour to forty-five minutes slooooooowwwwwly. Like, a car length at a time. The worst part was that we were on a hill, and the car I was driving has a manual transmission. I stalled twice, but I was in perpetual fear of rolling into the car behind me. He kept creeping up on me every time we stopped, but somehow I managed to get through the day bump-free. After about 1.5 miles and 0.75 hours, we came to the end of the line of traffic where a traffic director told us to turn around: a car accident ahead was going to block the road for two hours. Two hours!!!! @#$%&! I turned around and headed back the way we came. It was almost a bit relieving, because we could at last go at least 3o mph! I stopped at a full-serve gas station and got gas and directions. The pump attendant told us he heard that a car full of live ammo was on fire. He also gave us directions to get back home.

We set off on the hour-long detour the man at the gas station had outlined to us, but stopped at a Dunkin Donuts and got bagels and a donut and a bunch of other stuff and stopped at a park and ate them and so on.

The rest of the trip was pretty uneventful, but I was quite tired by the time we got home. This time the trip took at least seven hours (Bria is pretty sure that it was six and a quarter hours; but I say that's impossible: the regular time is five hours, and we spent an hour in Bennington at least, the detour took an hour, and we spent fifteen minutes at Fairwood; Bria says I am so exaggerating, but I'm not. Trust me.). We were going to time that trip too, but like the first one, it took a lot longer than expected. At least we came close to setting a record for a trip time going to or from The Hill! (The record was made this March, when Daddy tried to go to NY a new way with the GPS and took over eight hours with no car trouble.)

Inspiration Arrives in Droves

...or, more specifically, in drives. I'll start from the beginning:

Finally, events in my life have attained the slight absurdity that is so necessary for a successful "events" post. To start with, Bria, Cara, Ryan, and I went to the Holschers’ house in NY for the weekend. We had a wonderful time, and I’ll write more about that later. We had an interesting trip back, and I'll write about that later, too. For now I’ll just write about the trip going TO The Hills. Those of you who have been reading my blog for a long time may remember my post in late May or early June about the Mazda breaking down on the way to Cape Cod. To ensure that a breakdown of the same type did not recur, Daddy sent the Mazda to a transmission repair shop. There the car was worked on for a period of about one week, and came out good as new!

Or so we hoped. With great faith and hope, we set out early Friday afternoon for the long journey out. We decided we would time and see how quickly we could make it to the Holschers’. Bria drove. The car drove fairly well, although it felt very under-powered and was shifting a little late. Still, its performance was adequate....until we were about halfway between Bennington and Brattleboro. We were roaring along Rte. 9 (the car was having trouble on the hills; the RPMs came quite close to redlining multiple times.) when suddenly Bria said something like, "Is that smoke coming out from under the hood?" We realized that it was, and began quickly looking for a place to stop. After about a mile, we finally found a place. It was called something like "The Spiral Shop" and was a nice little isolated shop that sold such things as garden signs, sun catchers, and chimes. Bria pulled into the small parking lot and shut of the car.

As soon as we stopped, Bria popped the hood, and I jumped out to open it. This proved to be easier said than done. The smoke was pouring out so fast that I was not able to see the latch. After about five minutes I finally found it by feel and propped the hood open. The smoke continued to pour out.

In the meantime, the man who was tending the shop came over to see what was going on. "What have we here? Fair damsels in distress?" (He hadn’t seen me or Ryan yet apparently) Upon receiving an affirmative answer from Cara, he immediately removed his shirt and sat down to wax glass sunflower petals. He let us use his phone, and was quite nice if a bit strange.

After about one hour of waiting for the engine to cool down (the apparent problem was that the radiator had overheated; the root of the problem we later found to be a broken belt that was supposed to run the pump for the radiator coolant), we set off up the road again hoping for the best. The best never came. For the next mile or so we watched the temperature gauge steadily move from left to right until it was past the "H." We pulled to the side of the road again, and were glad to find that we had cell phone service. (We didn’t at the Spiral Shop.) We called home to find that Daddy had already left with our Toyota Camry and was approximately 1.75 hours away. We settled down for a long and stressful wait.

Fortunately, however, the wait was nowhere near as stressful as we had anticipated. We actually had a rather fun time. The first twenty minutes were a bit tense, but after that I actually enjoyed myself. Cara and I played Catch Phrase while Bria and Ryan read books. Ryan joined in, too, after a while. We tried playing alphabet, but the only sign we could see said "Marlboro ® 1" and that only gave you two letters to start with. The rest of the time was passed just watching cars and their license plates and their passengers. One man stopped and asked if we were all right, and we told him we were, thank you, and he left. About an hour later, Cara cried, "Oh great, another car is sto—" and we all looked to see that Daddy had arrived. I didn’t even feel like he had taken a long time.

So off we drove—this time with me at the wheel ‘cause Bria can’t yet drive a standard—into the wild blue yonder. I stalled once while trying to get onto the road, but after that we were fine until Stamford, NY (where I drove over the curb at a gas station). From there we were fine the rest of the way. The entire trip took only seven and a half hours!!!!!

Just letting you know..

Nothing to write about today. That's just the worst, when you're up long hours--or just at the computer screen for long hours--just trying to think of something interesting to entertain the world with. I love it when during the course of my day something happens and I think, "What an awesome thing to blog about!!" But that hasn't happened in the last three days or so. I guess you'll just have to be long-suffering (I realize it causes suffering when I don't write... ;) and wait for the time when my inspiration is renewed.

What people drive in New Boston these days

I saw one of these today driving on Chestnut Hill Road. Less than a mile from my house! Unfortunately, I wasn't able to gape because I was driving and this car was going quite speedily in the opposite direction. In case you don't know, it's a Bentley Continental GT. Powered by a 12 cylinder engine, it has a base price of around $160,000. I didn't have enough time to check up on performance stats, but the info above should give a pretty basic idea.

My life (and near death)

As a side note: We had a Sandford gathering today. I had a really fun time. There's almost nothing better than a close-knit extended family.

I had an exciting little incident the other day. I was helping Daddy move his boat out for the road (for sale: 25' US Yacht; interested, call us) and I was driving the tractor while Daddy used a rope wrapped around the trailor hitch of the golf cart to keep the boat from rolling down the incline we were descending. I stopped for some reason, put the tractor's brake on, and started to get out of the tractor. Unfortunately, my shorts caught on the accelerator (a lever, not a pedal) and I was left partly hanging from the tractor and halfway hopping as the tractor roared down the drive pulling the boat--and the parked golf cart--behind it. I managed to stop the tractor before any damage was done, but the boat kept coming. I had to go a bit further or be smashed flat as a pancake, so I did, but Daddy got the boat under control pretty quickly once I stopped pulling it. Fun stuff, huh?

Insights on Divers Happenings in My Life

Well, folks, I guess I didn't have as many stories about the past few weeks as I thought I did. Or, if I did, I've forgotten most of them. It's back to good ol' blogging-about-the-present again, I guess. I'm kind of glad, although I don't get exciting stories like those below on a day-to-day basis. However, I needn't worry; if I can't remember the stories, they are sure to happen again: "Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it."
[George Santayana (1863 - 1952), The Life of Reason, Volume 1, 1905]

Today I drove a standard--again. I drove it a lot today, in fact. I went to the bank, the library, the dentist, Daddy's office twice, and to the grocery store. I guess you might say driving with a manual transmission is becoming my standard method of transportation. ;-) By the way, I only stalled four times the whole day (less than once per trip!) : once because I was accidentally starting in third, once because the emergency brake was on (oops), and twice *sigh* because I didn't give the engine enough RPM.

I made an apple crisp today. There's something about apple desserts--apple pie, apple crisp, apple cobbler, apple-cinnamon muffins--that simply cannot be matched by other treats. When I went to the grocery store (see above paragraph) it was to purchase the one treat that most deliciously complements almost any dessert: vanilla ice cream. Mmm, mmm, mmm.

I planted a maple tree the other day. Yes, I know, I'm copycatting Bria with her lemon trees; but I was out weeding our barkmulch and I came to this beautiful little maple shoot, and I said to myself, "Aaron, this tree needs a good home." We get buckets of chlorine tablets all the time for our pool, and I took one of the empty buckets and spray-painted it red. It's just the coolest thing. We'll see how the tree does in it. If it dies, I'll just settle for a spider plant.

You're probably wondering what all the above things have in common. The answer: they all involve me, and they all involve colors. (red bucket, white ice cream, black car, green tree...) That's pretty much all. Please pardon my lack of cohesiveness, and I hope you enjoyed this anyway.

L'Invasione dell'Orso

During the guys’ week, we went camping on a beautiful lake in the White Mountains called Russell Pond. It rained a fair amount while we were there, but this did not in any way spoil the incredible beauty of the spot. The water was warm, there was a nice view, and across the lake there was a rope swing and a large rock that was perfect for swimming from. On one side of it the lake was shallow and sandy, on another side it was a gradual drop-off from the rock, and on another side there was an immediate drop-off. (The fourth and final side was shallow and slimy, but we won’t dwell on that thought.) Only a short path through a stretch of woods divided the campsite from the lake. And it was on this path that we first saw.......the bear.

Dan was the first to spot him. We had just got back from getting our dinner at McDonald’s, and Adam was having a meeting. When he was about halfway through his message, Dan quietly announced, "There’s a bear by the lake." We glanced briefly over at the bear and then quietly turned and listened to the rest of Adam’s meeting. End of story.

Well, actually, that’s not quite what happened. After Dan mentioned the bear, we all—even Adam—were distracted. Gerry went to get the park ranger because he had heard they were trying to scare the bears into being afraid of humans (actually, we had all heard; they had been firing shotguns the better part of the afternoon). While he was gone the bear walked along the edge of the lake a couple times, and we yelled and barked and whistled at him. This didn’t bother him a bit. He began to ever so slowly saunter up the path toward our campsite. Dan, being the oldest and wisest person present, instructed us all to back up the path away from the campsite and the bear, and we complied. It crept nearer, we crept farther. Finally the bear reached the picnic table, and sniffing slowly along it, came to a McDonald’s bag that contained two cheeseburgers belonging to Andrew Bean. It then grabbed this bag in its mouth and ran into the woods with it. After a few minutes of excitement, and then a few minutes after that of repeated gunshots in the woods ("bear scare", the ranger called it), and then a few more minutes of excitement, we settled down by the fire again and Adam tried to finish his meeting. He did succeed, but without the rapt attention he had received in the first half. Talk about a distraction! How many other people do you know who have had their meetings interrupted by a bear?

I drove a standard again today. I’m getting better: I only stalled once, and that was when Daddy was telling me to play with the clutch or something. At any rate, the light in front of me was still red and I got the engine started before the light turned green.

My modem has stopped working again. I think I'll have to buy a new one. Sigh. I wrote out this whole post on my computer on MS Word, and then found that I couldn't connect to the web. Consequently, I had to copy this to CD and go ALL the way down to the kitchen and use that computer. There should be a law against fickle technology.

Mein Knie

On, I think, the Thursday in the guys’ week, Dan Murray was having the 9:00 meeting. He had an object lesson to illustrate one of his points. His point was (if I remember correctly) the values we place on different choices, and the object lesson was as follows: he would pull an item out of a small cardboard box he held in his hand and toss it into the middle of the room. We guys could choose individually whether we valued the item enough to dive for it and try to grab it first. The first item was a blue crayon. I chose not to dive for it, but some of the other guys did. Next was a piece of paper, and then a small stick of pink chalk. As at the first, several people dove for those things, but I refrained. Before Dan pulled out the fourth object, he mentioned that it was the last thing, so I prepared to jump. Seeing a flash of green as Dan pulled the item—a dollar bill—out of his little box, I made a decision to dive, and I did. It was a decision I would later regret. I did get the dollar, but being the first to the floor, I ended up at the bottom of a pile of young men that included Ben Holscher, Justin Lerra, and Andrew Bean, among others. Their collective weight ground me into the carpet in the Fellowship Room of the church, and I came away from the room a dollar richer but possibly scarred for life.

Well, although I was planning on limiting myself to one story per post, I may have to amend that to mean one old story per post. If I didn’t, I would constantly end up being about three weeks behind in what I wrote about. With that in mind, here’s a little update on the news here: The Holschers stayed here for the weekend and Uncle Dave went sailing with Daddy and one of our neighbors. I drove them down to Portsmouth, RI, and then drove back. This is news because the car I drove on this trip has a manual transmission, and it was about the second time I had driven it. It was certainly the first time I had driven it farther than the top of Chestnut Hill. I did fairly well, but this was only because of the lack of traffic. I didn’t have to shift out of fifth from as soon as I got on the highway in RI until I came to the big intersection where Rte. 101 meets Rte. 114 in Bedford! Naturally, starting from there I jerked and bobbed and screeched and felt very conspicuous. However, I went with Daddy on Monday to Portsmouth, NH, and back in the same car, and I did much better—and that time we DID have stop-and-go traffic.

I'M BAAAAAAAAAACK!!!

Well, my faithful readers (or should I say, faithful blog checkers), my title says it all. I am back, back I am. I've been off the web almost as long as Rush Limbaugh was off the air last year. And I have SOOOOO much to write about. Fortunately for you, I will not even try to write it all out in one long long long long long post. This way is good for me too, in that I have many many many many many subjects to write about. So, for story number one.....

As most of you know, one of the first weeks after I stopped posting was the guys' week at Fairwood. It was very hot the first couple of days there. And for some reason, the room Ben and I were sleeping in was the hottest room in the dorm. We tried everything: we opened the window all the way; we turned on a fan in the window; we left the door open to the hall for cross-ventilation; we didn't use any blankets (I didn't, anyway). Yet we were still sweltering. I was perplexed. The next morning I went over to the window to feel what the temperature was like outside. I pressed my hand against the screen and felt.....glass? Then it hit me: the storm window was closed! I slept comfortably for the rest of the week.