Some corn with your corn?

The Girl enjoyed her first session of 'Barn School' this morning. It seems that what we are paying handsomely for her to do is farm chores (mucking out and feeding animals) for three hours each day, thus saving the farm the trouble and expense of employing someone. It's fine by us, though, as she seemed to love every minute of it.

It's a very much nicer, more old-fashioned sort of farming than I've been reading about in a brilliant book, The Omnivore's Dilemma by Michael Pollan. My friend had it with her yesterday at Jiminy Peak and I picked up it up to pass the time when I wasn't filing my knees - and got completely hooked.

It's a compelling horror story, made the more scary because it's true. It explains how the post-war US economy and population have become addicted to corn. There is corn-derived product in just about every processed food (all those mystery items in the lists of ingredients? They come from corn.) Corn is having a devastating effect on the environment not least because of all the fossil fuel (in making fertilizer, transportation and processing) involved in its production and use. And a devasting effect on the health of a large (in both senses) proportion of people here. And abroad.

Read the book - it'll make you shudder. You'll never eat the same again.

On the ropes

We spent the better part of the day at Jiminy Peak adventure park, where we met up with friends. The kids immediately threw themselves into the activities and really got some money's worth from the (quite expensive) day passes - but you can do that if you spend nine hours at a place.

Although the Boy got most fun from the mountain coaster and Alpine slide, his real achievement was on the ropes course. On first getting on it he was assailed by doubt and very nearly gave up there and then. But he suddenly made the decision to keep on and have a go anyway, and having overcome his fears stayed on for ages and ended up going back twice more over the course of our visit.

I just did a couple of rides. The mountain (roller) coaster is not my favourite thing and once was enough on that (the Boy managed fifteen descents!). But I gave the Alpine slide a couple of goes. Unfortunately, on the last trip down (with the Boy) we took a corner too fast and tipped the sled over, and I ended up stopping us using my bare knee as a brake - not to be recommended, and I now have less skin on my knee than I started out with.

Injuries notwithstanding, it was an excellent day out.

Beaver scouts

It rained all night and most of the day, though it cleared up late afternoon so that the Man and I were able to take a stroll around Five Rivers. At one point we saw a beaver cross the path ahead of us, though unfortunately it was gone too fast for us to take its picture so you'll have to take our word for it.

The children, meanwhile, have been out visiting friends. I'm sure they were both glad of the change of scene and company, having mostly been stuck at home with me all week - quite a come-down after the excitement of seeing friends-a-plenty in England. Many people we know have been away this last full week of August, but we hope to start catching up with them again in the week ahead.

Out to lunch

The children and I took ourselves into town on foot/scooter today. We checked out an eatery we hadn't tried before - a delightfully named 'luncheonette'.

A luncheonette is essentially a diner, but with more of a daytime vibe. This one was clearly very popular, with tables full and a gently buzzing atmosphere. And the food was great, a real cut above our usual local (which excels at ice-cream but not much else).

We felt suitably revived for the journey home. The kids then had a brief swim which was so refreshing they had to wrap themselves in blankets and sleeping bags to recover from it. The pool is getting itself topped up tonight by yet another torrential downpour.

Chilling

The endless vacation continues. With various fair trade and Fall Festival-related plans to work on, I'm quite eager now for school to start again - but on account of a late-falling Labor Day this year there are still two weeks to go. Even the Girl seems to be getting restless, and today we signed her up for a week of 'Barn School' at Indian Ladder Farms, starting next Monday.

Encouraging the feeling that it's about time for school, the weather has begun to cool. It was still lovely and sunny during the day today, but morning and evening have been almost chilly. A letter has arrived reminding us to book the guy to come and close the pool soon (before it starts filling up with fallen leaves).

Meanwhile, up in the Adirondacks they've had their first frost warning for the season. Ahhh - before we know it the outside temperature will be colder than the interior of a mall in midsummer.

Wood you believe it?

The Man writes...the day before we left for our vacation in England, some surveyors turned up to inspect a small wood almost across the road from us. Two weeks later the wood looks like this...

Our neighbours all think this is "great" as the trees were a bit untidy looking. I'm not so sure, but it will be interesting watching the new house take shape.

Meanwhile, in our absence a bumper crop of cucumbers has appeared almost out of nowhere. So we may be living off cucumber sandwiches for the next couple of weeks (cheese optional). Unless anyone has any other bright ideas?

Early days

Another early start today. I think the Boy was first up, at around 4:30am, soon followed by me and the Girl. The Man did better and managed to squeeze in an extra couple of hours asleep - but he did have more catching up to do than the rest of us.

It has been a muggy sort of day, and by late afternoon we could barely find the energy to drag ourselves out for a walk round the block. Unusually, it was the kids who suggested this activity - that couldn't possibly have been because they'd heard the distant tinkle of the ice-cream van, now could it?

Now we're here again I have a great long To Do list to attend to. I ticked a few items off yesterday (such as "buy new car tyre"). Today I've been on the phone and email trying to contact various people. Though I'm still slightly in a weird just-returned state of mind (did that trip to England really happen?), there should be enough going on in the next few weeks to distract me from it.

Time travellers

Yesterday was very long. We had some of it twice over of course, because of the direction we were travelling.

Our flight was an hour late departing, though we got randomly bumped up to Premium Economy which more than compensated for the hanging around. Our problems (for when we travel long distance there are always problems, oh yes) really began when we returned to our car in its long-stay Boston parking lot - and found we had a puncture.

Can you imagine finding yourself at dusk on a Sunday in the far reaches of a long-stay car-park at, say, Stansted Airport, with a disabled vehicle? A stressful situation indeed if, like us, you know nothing about changing wheels. But happily (the Man and I both independently thought) we were in America - somebody would help us. And in fact one of the parking lot's shuttle-bus drivers sorted us out very graciously.

So then, just the three hour drive back to Albany in the dark and the rain at what to our jet-lagged bodies felt like some ungodly hour in the morning. The Man took on the challenge of the whole journey with nothing but a five minute nap and a bottle of Coke to keep him going - heroic! The Boy, meanwhile, fell asleep as we left the parking lot and didn't wake up until we got home - or as he tells it, "I just closed my eyes, and two minutes later I was in my own garage!" In fact in a way we travelled even faster than that, given that we arrived back at 1am (local time) having left at 2am (body clock time).

In ruins

Another skipped blog last night as we were staying over with friends in Leamington Spa. Before getting to their house we visited Kenilworth Castle, which is in an excellent state of ruin. The children ran all over and around it exploring, and it was the perfect antidote to the severe case of the sillies they'd been suffering from (though it was the grown-ups who really did the suffering) during the car journey.

It was great to see our friends again after a two year gap, and we were also able to check up on the health of a stuffed coypu they are looking after for us. It looked as good as it ever did (which is not saying much: it always was a bit moth-eaten).

We've been back in Watford today, our last full day in England. I caught up with yet more old friends this afternoon, and this evening we've been packing up ready to go...home?...to America.

Mind the gap

We spent most of the day with the Man's family, and it was good to catch up with everyone again. In the course of proceedings the Boy announced that he had finally lost his remaining top front baby tooth - to his great relief as its wobbliness had been bothering him lately.

Here are a couple more photos from our trip to London yesterday. Can you tell where we took them?

Fishy business

We visited London today, mainly the Aquarium. It was very good - sharks, sting-rays, sea-horses and tropical fish - all you could want to see marine-wise bar penguins and an orca whale.

Because we travelled in by train, we qualified for the 2for1 discount you can get at various attractions on producing a valid rail ticket together with a voucher. It was a funny old business getting hold of the leaflet with the vouchers in though. Although widely advertised, they are not casually on display anywhere, and the ticket seller at the station in Watford slid one (only one) to us through his little window like it was something illicit. When we tried to pick up a second leaflet at Euston we had to search the whole station before I came across the correct booth, where I had to ask specially and have the man sneak one to me from under his desk. All very odd.

Roman holiday

We caught up with some more old friends this morning back in Watford, and my cousin and her two children (my, how they've grown) came to visit us from London. They brought two poodle puppies with them, which gave our kids much entertainment.

In the afternoon we felt like an outing, so went to explore Roman Verulamium at St Alban's. The Boy assured us as we set out that he would hate it, and he was right, although he managed to enjoy feeding the ducks, geese, swans and coots ('cutes') on the pond in the park.

Goodbye Linton, see you next time

The Man had people to see in Cambridge today, but I appreciated a final day of tea and Linton chat, and the kids packed in a few more hours of fun and play. In particular they enjoyed a lengthy wade in the River Granta, where they gathered an impressive pile of old bicycle parts and other odds and ends.

And then it was time to say farewell again to Linton. Thanks once more to everyone who welcomed us back, it really was lovely to see so many friends. Thanks especially to Royal Rockfish and family for having us to stay.

It's always hard for us to leave Linton, though it's reassuring to be reminded that it doesn't really change much, and that our friendships there remain as strong as ever.

Park life

These two have been friends since they were six months old - time and distance seem to make no difference.

Linton - the never ending party

A visit to old neighbours this morning was followed by quite a gathering - thanks to April Fool and family for hosting us all in their lovely garden. Many of the other guests have commented on this blog at one time or another - it was great to see you all!

Just like last year we have the impression that life in Linton is an endless series of relaxed encounters with some of our favourite people, chewing over the local issues of the day with them and laughing a lot. That's about right isn't it? Or is there a load of existential angst that I'm not noticing?

Photos tomorrow, I need to go to bed and battle the jetlag some more.

Reflecting

Skipped a blog day yesterday because we were having too much fun with friends - what better reason could there be?

We're back in Linton, catching up with many old friends. Not much has changed here, though of course with our acquired US perspective everything looks rather small and 'quaint'. And none the worse for that.

Linton still feels like home, though our upcoming plans and commitments are all focused somewhere else, and that seems strange. It's odd, and not entirely easy, to feel you belong in two places at once.

Transported

All except the Man got up late this morning, and we took a while to get going. But in the afternoon the Boy set off to London with his Grandpa, while Grandma, the Girl and I went dolls-house accessory-shopping and then came home to do some miniature carpet-laying.

Meanwhile the Man booked a rental car on-line, and a couple of hours later we walked down to the collection point to pick it up. Amusingly enough, in those two short hours the entire office and all rental vehicles had relocated to the other side of town ('We're going to mention it on our website this evening,' explained the man left behind in the empty office suite), so we had to walk another mile and half across Watford, without the aid of a map, in the rain. The cheery young woman smiled as we dripped on her brand new carpet and thought it a 'shame' we'd been put to so much trouble, but not so much of a shame as to offer us a discount. Ah, it's great to be back in the homeland!

The Boy was pleased with his London visit - an all-transport tour taking in mainline trains, Docklands Light Railway, a double decker bus and a look at the Eurostar. He has revised his opinion, stated this morning, that London is a 'boring' place where there is 'nothing to do'.

Leap year

We spent the day waking up.

My brother and family came over for a visit, and we made a trip to the park to admire some spendid new play equipment which was getting a lot of use by about 500 other children. To our kids, now used to days out around quiet Albany where for the most part three actually does constitute a crowd, the numbers were a little overwhelming. But at least my five year-old nieces seemed to enjoy everything with gusto.

Apart from that outing, the children have mainly vegged in front of the telly in a state of semi-coma, while the adults have sat and chatted and kept going on caffeine.

Yesterday my other brother and his youngest child were here in Watford - only the 'child' is no more, she's has grown up so much since we last saw her. The small steps we all take day to day can look like giant leaps when run together and witnessed at intervals of a year.

Red-eye, Steady, Go.

Remembering last year's near disaster, I'm happy to report that so far this time our travel to the UK has gone smoothly. We arrived at Heathrow this morning slightly earlier than scheduled, and after the obligatory eight mile hike through the terminal retrieved our luggage safely and got on a bus to Watford without even having to wait.

So, no complaints except that we are all horrendously tired after no sleep overnight and very little since. I for one plan on having an early night, and tomorrow maybe I'll feel like I belong on this planet again.

Grate blog

So, a last day of errand-running for me, earth-shovelling for the Man, and all-day playdates for the kids. We're pretty much ready, though obviously not packed yet as that would be like having all the Christmas presents wrapped before Christmas Eve - just too unnerving.

There was an exciting moment this evening when I found myself with my hand stuck in the grating of the storm drain. This is the big drainage hole where our front yard meets the street and into which rain from our downpipes runs, along with rainwater from the road. I came to have my hand in the drain because a young visitor decided to drop a stick-shaped tool down there, just for the hell of it. The Man managed to half-fish the tool out with a small leaf-rake, but someone had to grab hold of it as it neared the grating, and having small hands, that someone was me.

Although everything turned out well and we eventually got both the stick-shaped thing and my hand safely out again, there was an awkward second or two when I wondered if I was going to end up missing our flight to the UK tomorrow and instead spend the next fortnight lying by the side of the road with my hand in a grate. Which, even I have to admit, would have been taking the pursuit of bloggable material a step too far.

Oh, Canada

Yet another day of seeing to one thing and another - filling out forms, paying bills, shifting earth, writing emails, tidying up. Just one more day and we'll be set to go.

There's a radio show we listen to most nights as we're going to bed, called As It Happens. Only, given that it reports the news out of Canada, it could just as well be called Not Much Happens. Seriously, for really quite a big country not much seems to happen there at all. And if by any chance something out of the ordinary does occur they keep on talking about it for weeks. As a consequence of the lack of Canadian news, they mostly end up reporting what's going on in the USA or Great Britain, but even then they pick up stories such as some scientist in Idaho researching giant earthworms which may or may not be entirely mythical - because compared to Canadian news that's headline-grabbing stuff.

I don't have enough first-hand experience of Canada to judge, but a Canadian friend in the UK always used to quip 'Canada's a fine place - but you wouldn't want to go there for the whole weekend.'

Canadian readers, if you're out there, feel free to respond...

The bigger better bottle bill

The Man writes...hip dudes among you may think of Nickelback as a popular beat combo with some success in the hit parade. However, it also describes the deposit you get back on your plastic or glass bottle in New York: 5 cents. As long as the bottle contained beer or carbonated soft drinks or mineral water.

That's right. The deposit doesn't depend on the type of bottle, it depends on what was in it. And presumably, lawmakers in 1982 couldn't conceive of an America where people pay good money for bottled tap water.

So April this year, New York passed a bill which extended the scheme to all bottled water. This scheme should have started on 1 June, but with wearisome predictability Nestle and their fellow bottlers have applied for and achieved an injunction delaying the scheme for a year. Their suit claims the law’s (admittedly bizarre) failure to cover non-carbonated drinks containing sugar violates the equal-protection clause in the US Constitution. To the tune of 5 cents a bottle.

Kitten heels

Every few years I go mad and buy myself a pair of shoes. Today this madness reached new heights and I bought two pairs of shoes.

You see (call me Imelda) I'm one of these extravagant types who feels the need to wear alternative footwear in the summer. But I've had to mend my sandals twice this year, and though I love them for the good service they've shown me over the past three years, I have to admit it's time I replaced them. And my rest-of-the-year shoes, which I've had slightly longer than the sandals, let in water now - so with regret I'm saying goodbye to them as well.

In other news: our neighbourhood is being stalked by a cat. No-one knows where it comes from, but it has been visiting every house on the street, nipping indoors whenever it gets the chance. It made friends with the Girl and Boy on our doorstep this morning and has been calling back throughout the day, meowing in a winsome way. It's quite unusual to meet a free-range cat, as it seems to be the American way to keep them shut inside, so the consensus is that this one has escaped and may be looking for its old home - or a new one. Alas, pretty kitty though it is, it won't be moving in with us.

Powers of reduction

With a trip looming on the horizon, this is a week for tying up loose ends and getting some necessary jobs done. Today this has meant having the car serviced and running errands in town. There is still a pile of other 'matters to be dealt with', but it's reducing little by little.

The same goes for the pile of earth on the driveway, which the Man has been tackling again this evening. Who knows, by the end of the week we might actually be able to get the car back in the garage.

To sleep, perchance...

I laboured in the yard again this morning, pulling out more weeds and shifting earth around. The Boy was none too impressed with my exertions, as he thinks my chief function during vacations is to be available to help him find the end on rolls of sticky tape. Still, he gamely toted a couple of barrowfuls of soil for me so I'd get finished sooner.

I made an interesting discovery today. For as long as I can remember I've tended to wake up in the middle of the night, often for two or three hours at a time. I find this quite frustrating and have always regarded it as a bit of an abnormality on my part. But this morning on the radio they had an item on sleep patterns of the American Colonial era - and I fit right in! Those days, apparently, it was quite common to go to bed and have a bit of a sleep, then lie awake for a few hours (they even had a name for it - the 'watch') before sleeping some more in the morning.

I find this all quite reassuring. I may be historically out of context, but at least there's a precedent for my on-again off-again style of sleeping and that makes me feel so much better about it.

Making the grade

The Man and I spent the morning pulling weeds and shifting dirt. The pile of earth that arrived yesterday is for the purpose of 'grading' round the house, ie creating a slope so that the gallons of rain that fall every other day will run away from the house. Likewise the snow-melt next winter.

Strangely, although the Man wheeled barrowloads of earth to the sides of the house, the pile on the driveway didn't seem to get any smaller over the course of the morning. I guess we'll have to continue the process as the week goes on and see where that gets us.

With all the recent rain in mind, I'd like to propose a new source of alternative energy: forget solar panels and domestic windmills - can someone please develop gutter water-wheels?

Canoe believe it?

We spent the afternoon at the beach - not the seaside, but Grafton Lakes. It was a sunny day to make up for yesterday's deluge, so the place was packed with people enjoying the fine weather and ignoring the lifeguards who kept chastizing us over a tannoy system.

We were without the Girl, who is off on a mass sleepover with several of her classmates. But we met up with the Boy's best buddy and family, and they'd brought their canoe, so four of our party set off across the lake in it, while three of us stayed behind on the sand. The Boy had such fun he thinks we should get a canoe ourselves - quite a turnaround for the child who a couple of days ago was never going to travel by boat.

We got home at dusk to find this on the drive - not totally unexpected as the Man had ordered it this morning, but we didn't imagine they'd dump it right in front of the garage. I guess we know what we'll be doing tomorrow, rain or shine.