White Out

7:00 

7:32

7:11 and the front yard trees are just now beginning to become visible, their arms reaching to the sky. All is white except their dark limbs. It's 18º out, and we can expect another 3-5 inches to snow to go with yesterday's 2-3 inches.  Slowly, we are climbing towards a 'real winter' of snow and cold.  No fishermen out yet but they will no doubt soon be out there, early morning, hoping for the best.  

Snow Covered Cairn

Yesterday was a strange day weatherwise, a white out when I was driving home from yoga and blue skies and puffy clouds in the mid afternoon, as striking as a summer sky.  My day was typical but Evie woke up not feeling well, stuffy and tired, so she spent most of the day taking it easy.  I drove to yoga at 9:30, a good class, as we worked on our backs mostly, something everyone has trouble with.  I did stop at Ryder's Cup for a coffee, hoping they would have their eggs but they were out.

Lunch was easy, the last of the ginger/carrot soup and leftover pizza from the previous night.  And I had lost my mojo by the end of lunch, so I just relaxed, along with Evie and did little of substance the rest of the afternoon.  When I looked out at the sunny, blue skies around 3:00, I knew I should be out cross country skiing in our Woodlawn/Victoria woods, but I just sat back down and went back to my book, a sloth for the rest of the day.  

4:14

4:48

Neither of us felt like fussing with dinner and we didn't.  I brought the pot roast in from the back porch around 3:00, to let it warm up and Evie put it in the oven for an hour.  She has saved mashed potatoes from a previous dinner, so she took them out of the freezer and warmed them up with the pot roast.  At the last minute, we realized we had Brussels sprouts, so she quickly cleaned them up and roasted them in the oven.  So dinner was literally a carbon copy of Saturday night, pot roast, mashed potatoes, salad along with Brussels sprouts.  We watched what we think is the final episode of The Affair; we are not crazy about Noah's new French lover, wondered how he ended up in Paris, but liked the way Noah and his daughter were reunited.  She really wowed us with her acting, realistic and not overdone.  We then struggled to find something to watch.  We started with a Turkish series called KACAK.  It was not the best of Turkish films, overacted and dramatic but the setting, in a small Turkish village was perfect and took us back to our seven years in the 1970's.  One episode was enough, so we switched to an Italian series called Merli, about an unorthodox philosophy teacher, bankrupt, homeless, and estranged from his son.  He is forced to live in his mother's home and gets a substitute job teaching at his son's high school.  I kind of liked it, Evie not so much.

I LET YOU GO: CLARE MACKINTOSH

The book opens with a mother witnessing the hit and run death of her five year old son. Detective Ray Stevens is charged with finding the driver, head of a three person team, including the veteran Stumpy and a trainee, Kate. The second chapter, interestingly, is told from the point of view what we assume is the boy's mother, Jenna Gray.  She is clearly devastated, wants nothing more than to get away from all the attention surrounding the hit and run, and is haunted by the image of the young boy on the windshield of the car.  She escapes to a seaside village without notifying Ray and his team, to a small cottage.  We learn about her and grow to like her in chapters alternating with Ray's search for the driver, his difficulties with his wife Maggs and their son Tom,  In fact, I found Jenna's chapters more interesting than those of the police.  

At the  end of the first part, Ray has a break through and identifies the driver.  The second half of the book deals with the questioning of the driver, a woman who admits her guilt and her trial.  We also learn about her life in chapters narrated by her husband.  I know it seems a bit strange to have her husband narrate the story of their falling in love and eventual marriage.  If you read the book, you will understand why this works. By the end, things get a little coincidental like most endings to a 'who done it' novel, but I liked it, an easy, fast read.  

17º And Snow...Winter's Back

Loving  The Return Of Winter

Me, Too

It's 7:30 and both Evie and I are up, listening to Morning Joe, occasionally screaming at the alternative reality of a guest.  I know it's not a healthy way to start our day, that we should be listening to a yoga or meditation station but, like heroin, we are hooked to the 'breaking news' each morning.  I was up at 6:00 and have enjoyed watching the sky become another painting worth photographing.

7:02

7:16

Yesterday was a snowy Sunday morning, the kind we love.  We relaxed, listening to NPR, to Will Short's puzzle, then we decided to forgo our walk around the Chautauqua Institution in favor of cross country skiing on the Rails To Trails.  So, while Evie got ready, I went outside, shoveled our parking area and cleaned off both cars, getting them ready for the week.  It took about a half hour and by the time I was through, Evie was ready.  We packed our skis, poles, and backpack with selfie stick, water, and phone and were off to Mayville.  We skied the same trail as the day before except we headed towards Westfield and not Stockton at the V.  It was a glorious morning, a light snow falling most of the way, hitting our faces, blurring our vision, just the way we like it.  We were out for a good hour, taking our time, enjoying the moment, not worrying about getting to the end or getting back to the car.  We loved it and wished it was like this everyday.

Rails To Trails

Winter Again

We got home around 12:30 and Evie quickly made our Sunday breakfast of bacon, eggs, and bagels.  I made another pot of coffee and we watched CBS Sunday morning, as our Sunday routine rarely changes other than skiing rather than walking around the CI.  The rest of the afternoon was one of leisure, of reading, of watching TV or napping (moi).  Evie was particularly excited about dinner because we were ordering pizza, thus no prepping to do.  We relaxed with a glass of wine around 5:30 and I went over to Bemus Point to pick up a pizza from  Coppola's, our go to spot.  So we had another one of our favorite meals, straight out of youth, pizza, salad and a Pepsi.  We watched the SAG Awards Red carpet until 8:30, when we watch the SAG awards but fast forwarded through the commercials.  Once we got caught up with the awards, we switched to a disappointing Homeland.  As I mentioned last week, not enough plot, too much agonizing over Quinn's rehabilitation.  We get it...what's the plot, what's going on.  Finally, by the end, we are starting to see where this season is going.  By 10:30, bed sounded better than watching the SAG awards, too similar to the Golden Globes, so we went up to bed, happy to wait till this morning to find out who won best Director.

THE NIX:NATHAN HILL

This is a big book, over 600 pages, currently a hot read among the elites (like me).  I really liked the opening chapter as nine year old Samuel Anderson watches his Mom slowly take one piece of her personal belongings to work each day.  And one evening, she does not return home, leaving young Sam with his father, with no answers and he never hears from his Mom again.  Until he's a 34 year old frustrated professor at a university, having written one noteworthy book but since its success, nothing.  He opens the newspaper to see his mother's picture on the front page of the Chicago newspaper, after having been arrested for throwing rocks at the state's xenophobic Governor.

Thus begins Sam's quest to understand the past, his mother, his life.  It takes him back in time to the small town in Iowa where his parents grew up.  Meanwhile, he becomes  embroiled in a plagiarism case at the university.  He catches a privileged coed cheating to her dismay so she takes it to the Dean and wants to see Sam fired for accusing her of plagiarism .  At the same time, his literary agent wants the advance Samuel received for his second book returned but decides Sam could keep it he writes a quick biography about his crazy mother. This is why he ends up in Iowa.

As you can see, lots of subplots are going on and I only mentioned a couple.  This book has gotten rave reviews and I admit to liking it.  Hill is a gifted writer and story teller but he could have used a black sharpie more often.

A Blanket Of Snow

Photoshopped Cross Country Skier

I woke at 6:00, thinking it was perhaps 2:00 or 3:00 in the morning.  So I got up, made coffee and searched for something to listen to on Sonos.  I settled on a radio show called The Avid Reader which discussed their top books of the year.  I found myself listening to it rather than reading anything on the Internet, confirming what I always told my students: you cannot do two things at once...you either listen or read.  This morning I find it difficult to keep my vow to avoid politics on my blog but after the past week, especially after yesterday, I have to bite my tongue.

7:48

So other than the breaking news all day long, Saturday was normal for us.  No yoga or working out on the weekend, a long coffee and leisurely morning until I got enough energy to get the trash together, cleaned off the snow from my car, and drove to the Transfer Station, not very busy this time of the year.  We both wanted to cross country ski but were unsure of the conditions.  We worried that the trails might be wet underneath the snow, and our skis would ice up, making it impossible to ski. We decided to chance it and drove to the Rails To Trails path in Mayville.  We assumed that snowmobiles would be banned until the trails were groomed and we were right, the trail was untouched by skiers or snowmobiles.  We strapped on our skis and skied off into the open fields of the trail.  We skied this trail last week so we knew it was straight and flat.  We did take a right towards Stockton this time, however, and had some difficulty finding our way because there was no snowmobile path to follow.  We skied until we arrived at a house and a street and turned around and headed back.  Unfortunately, I found a wet spot and had to take up my skis and strip off the ice before I could continue.  And then I had difficulty getting my skis on because the bindings had froze as well.  That's why we worry about water beneath the snow.  Once I got my skies on, we headed back, into a bitter wind of course, so that as we skied, I felt like we were on the set of the movie Fargo; cold, bitter winds, and fields of snow as far as the eye could see.  We were happy to get back to the car and happy to have gotten in some cross country skiing despite the weather.  We felt righteous.

We did not get home until 1:30, so it was time for lunch, the vegetable soup Evie had made Friday morning and bagel with tomatoes and Kashkaval cheese.  I watched some basketball but soon got bored and went back to the living room to read and nap.  Evie, however, never able to take a nap and always busy, prepped out dinner, a pot roast with all the fixings, veggies, tomato paste, garlic, and red wine.  It slow cooked in the oven much of the afternoon, filling the house with its rich aroma. What a great way to spend the afternoon, reading, napping or watching TV and breathing in the aroma of dinner cooking.

We had our usual Saturday happy hour, enjoying a cocktail or two, a good cheese and crackers, and endaname, to keep us healthy.  We listened to the news until we could not stand it anymore and the groove on some great tunes.  We did not eat until around 8:00 and dinner was just as good as we hoped.  Nothing like a good pot roast, gravy, veggies and mashed potatoes.  We watched Real Time with Bill Maher, laughed and cried at the absurdity of our world.  We went to bed at our usual time, 11:00, wondering what news we would wake up to.

IQ: JOE IDE

Not your typical detective or crime novel as Sherlock is a black, ghetto kid named Isaiah Quintabe. Isaiah has been on his own since his older brother, Marcus, was killed by a hit and run driver when Isaiah was sixteen.  Forced to make it on his own, he uses his wiles, to help neighbors solve problems, eventually spending a few years burgling homes with a buddy until he realizes it will never end well.  So he develops a reputation as a problem solver and ends up being hired by rapper Cal Wright, known as Mac the Knife.  Cal's life has been threatened; he won't leave his mansion and his record producer and hanger-ons are panicked because the flow of money has stopped.  Thus, IQ becomes a detective story as Isaiah eventually through deduction, and avoiding violence. figures out who tried to take Cal's life.  The book is easy reading, things move fast and the reader will like Isaiah. I am sure this is the first of a series.

Finally, A Snowy Saturday Morning

7:44

It's just after 7:00 and Evie's up as well, as we wait patiently for the sky to lighten, the snowy front yard to appear.  We probably got five or six inches of snow yesterday, enough so I shoveled the parking area a couple of times.  And around 6:30, I heard Shane plowing out our road, making sure it was easy for everyone (two of us) to get out.  We may get another three inches today and a couple of inches a day for the next week.  I don't think the trails will be open for snowmobiles yet as it's a wet snow but the trails may be good for cross country skiing.  Current temperature: 23º

Yesterday we were under a lake effect snow watch, still are today.  So we were not sure whether we wanted to get out on the roads or not.  I wanted to go to yoga, so I drove off on slushy roads to Lakewood, taking my time.  Class was good, about ten of us.  On the way home, I hit a white out in Lakewood but by the time I got near Woodlawn, it was bright and the sun almost peaked out from behind the heavy clouds.  That's typical for this area; we may have little snow but other areas five to ten miles away may have a foot.

Evie wanted to take advantage of the seeming break in weather, so she drove to the Y earlier than usual, leaving me to make my own lunch, alas.  So I mixed a can of tuna with mayo, hot sauce, and dijon mustard and spread it on a bagel.  And there was still some carrot/ginger/cauliflower soup left so I heated that up.  Before Evie left, she asked if I would pressure cook a pound of white beans because earlier in the morning, she had made a pot of her vegetable soup and it needed more beans.  It's pretty easy, just throw the beans in the pressure cooker with water, turn it on for 25 minutes, and they are ready to use, either in a soup or a cold bean salad called piyaz in Turkish, just vinegar and oil and sliced hard boiled eggs.  Yum. I watched another Wallander, at least half of it and then went back to book and a nap.

Evie was home later than usual because she also made a stop at Wegmans to make sure we are well stocked for this snowy weekend.  It's pot roast Saturday, so I cannot wait for the afternoon filled with the aroma of a pot roast and veggies cooking in the oven.

At 5:30, we drove to Webb's restaurant and bar as one of our good friends, Jack, had invited us to sample the first keg of beer made with his hops that we helped harvest.  It's called All-4-One and we both really liked it as it was not too hoppy.

Picking Hops In August

Picked Hops, Ready To Be Dried

Mid summer the last two years, we spent afternoons in his yard with other friends picking hops off of the vines so they could be taken to the brewery.  I would say around twenty-five of his friends and family were there along with the regulars.  We spent an hour standing around talking with the group.  We enjoyed meeting his daughter's in laws, the Olson's, the owners of the construction firm that built the Roger Tory Peterson Institute as well as oversaw the rehabilitation of the Packard Manor on the Chautauqua Institution's grounds.  We also talked with the owners of both the pharmacy in Lakewood, and the Maple Inn in the CI.

Jim, Diane, Maureen

Diane, Jack The Hop Master, And Evie

So it was fun to see old acquaintances and new friends. We decided to stay for dinner, found two seats at the bar next to two women from Cleveland who were spending a girls' weekend here at the lake.  I ordered the special, an 8oz rib eye, with melted cheese, set in a bowl of onion soup.  Bizarre creation but darn good.  Evie had a chicken Thai wrap, also first rate. So, along with another All-4-One draft, we had a good night.

Hoppy Hour

We did not get home until 7:45.  We quickly put on our sweats or pajamas, got out some Trader Joe's chocolate and coconut cookies for dessert and finished up the NOBEL series on Netflix.  It's a great series and I am sorry it's over.  I highly recommend it.

LIVIA LONE: BARRY EISLER

My first thriller from Eisler and because of the subject matter, child trafficking, it was hard to read. Livia is a victim of child trafficking, having been sold by her parents and brought, by container ship to the US to be sold.  Her container, however, is raided by police and she is the adopted by a wealthy business man, Frederick Lone, in Oregon.  He, however, happens to be a pedophile as is his brother, a Senator. Nice.  Livia puts up with his attention until her mid teens when she is able to thwart his advances, to his bad luck.

As the novel opens, she's a police detective in the child sexual abuse department, a judo expert and able to take care of herself.  She cannot put her past behind her and finds that vigilantism is often more effective then the justice system.  The chapters alternate between the present, her quest to find the sister she lost on the container ship,  and her past, from being sold by her parents in Thailand, to the abuse she faced on the container ship, to that of her guardian.  Her goal over the years has been singular: to find her sister..  It leads her to many dead ends, some dead bad guys, but eventually she finds answers in Bangkok.  She is not a nice cop but her story I found interesting (Eisler has not lots of research on trafficking), scary and compelling. There's a certain kind of pleasure in seeing bad guys get what they deserve even if it's not in a courtroom.

Some Snow, More To Come

7:18

7:30

I slept in, a minute, until 5:39.  An inch layer of snow covers the ground, our car, the roofs, as the whiteness of winter returns.  It's colder, 28º, and the weather prognosticators say we are to get 3-5 inches of snow during the day.  We will see.

I forgot to mention that yesterday morning, around 7:00, I heard a huge thud outside.  I got up quickly and looked around our house to see if something had fallen but could not see anything.  Later in the morning, however, Evie noticed the cause.  A tree in our neighbors' front yard fell into the lake, causing no damage fortunately.  Evie called them to let them know and there's no hurry or need to get rid of it until it warms up some.

Also, yesterday we finally did get some snowflakes but it was too warm for it to stick,  so the roads were just wet much of the day.  It did not discourage either of us from our yoga or workout.  I left around 9:30, got home at 11:30, with no stops for groceries, coffee or money, just gas and brief stop at the village office, to drop off my real estate tax.  Yuck.  Not much was going on at home, as Evie had outdone herself on Wednesday, making the lasagna and pie, so for her, Thursday was a day of what I like to call 'large leisure.'  She did have enough mojo to put together a new soup, of carrots and cauliflower, coriander, and lemon.  Her mojo drained, she contemplated bagging her workout.
Her better angels, however, took over and she drove to Lakewood and worked out for an hour and came home in a much better mood than when she left.

While Evie was gone, I was having a bowl of her soup and a great 'tost' sandwich made with a cheese we loved in Turkey called Kashkaval which we bought at Cleveland's West Side market on Friday.  I had my customary afternoon, of watching a show, Wallander, then reading and taking a nap, waking just about the time Evie returned from the YMCA.

Around 4:30, Evie gave me a good shearing, my once a fortnight hair cut.  I always feel like a young boy afterwards, as I look in the mirror.  We both then got dressed up because we were going to dinner at Ye Hare 'n Hounds, a place that used to be one of the best restaurants around but it seemed to have lost its touch.  In fact, the last time we went, with my parents and sister and brother in law, we had an all time terrible meal, almost inedible main courses and a waitress who had no idea what she was doing, thus, a ten year hiatus.  It's been for sale for a couple of years and we wanted to try it once more before it is sold or closes.  We figured if the meals were bad, at least the Hounds had a great, tremendous, phenomenal, beautiful ambiance.

Enjoying A Night Out At Ye Hare 'n  Hounds

So Linda and Ron picked us up at 6:15 and we had reservations at 6:30.  It was kind of funny when we entered and said we had reservations because there was only one occupied table of four in the entire restaurant.  We decided to sit in the bar and people slowly dribbled in during our meal.  And the four of us were pleasantly surprised, with the fine service, the cosiness, and the food.  All four of our meals were great, three had chicken Gorgonzola over pasta and I had tasty seafood pasta, with shrimp, scallops and langustinos.  By the time we left, four or five tables were busy.  We will go back and the bar really looks inviting with a Small Bites menu.

We were home around 8:45, in time to watch one more episode of NOBEL before going up to bed to read and sleep.

THE AIR WE BREATHE: CHRISTA PARRISH

My first novel by Parrish begins with a young Molly Fisk going to a bank with her father.  Just as they are about to leave, robbers enter and kill her father.  They then kidnap Molly until she is saved two weeks later.  The ordeal, however, leads to her muteness, the core of the novel.  Unable to deal with life in their town, Molly and her mother move and become virtual recluses in a new town until Claire, a female friend from six years earlier, begins to develop a relationship with Molly, drawing her out of her quietness.  Molly's mother, however, is uncomfortable and jealous of the relationship between the two.  As a result, Claire finds Molly's house empty one day, the two having disappeared. I will leave the rest to your imagination... God acts in strange ways.

No White Yet

7:20

I woke again at 5:38 but did not get downstairs until 6:50, to turn on the coffee, settle down on the couch, get out my computer and turn on the radio.  As I start my blog, it is now 7:10, still too dark outside to take a morning photograph and the pundits finally have something else to talk about other than DT, the sad passing of Mary Tyler Moore.  I guess it's going to take someone dying to change the morning narrative.

Ice Skating Crow

Yesterday was another Chautauqua gray day, with a few momentary bursts of sunshine late afternoon, teasing us with hints of spring.  I like Wednesdays and Thursdays because I get an extra half hour to relax because yoga starts at 10:00, not 9:30.  A half hour makes a big difference.  Yoga was harder than usual because we had a substitute teacher but I liked it because it was different.  One of the woman brought along her husband for the first time, something we rarely see, a husband and wife at yoga.  I guess I can understand that as 95% of classes are usually filled with women at my studio.  I am the only regular male in the mornings.  After class, I stopped at the ATM to pick up some cash which seems to disappear quite easily, especially when we are sitting at the Viking Club bar!

Evie put together a mushroom and onion omelet for lunch, a nice change and the rest of the afternoon was the usual, lunch, Wallander, a book and a nap.  Evie went to the YMCA and had a good workout, mostly because she loves her Apple music which makes working out some what fun.  Around 3:30, I  drove over to the Smith Library to pick up a book I ordered;  I don't even remember the name, only that it was highly recommended.  O, yea, it's called A LITTLE LIFE.

A Dollop Of Sun At 4:30

Because it was Wednesday and gray, which fit our moods, we decided to have a Manhattan hour, with good cheese, crackers and cashews.  It was a  good choice as we finally put aside the politics and listened to music until it was time to eat.  Dinner was leftover chicken/ricotta/cheese lasagna from Tuesday night with a nice sour dough roll.  We watched two more tension filled episodes of NOBEL before it was time to go upstairs and read before falling asleep. I just finished LIVIA LONE and am now reading I LET YOU GO by Clare Macintosh, both new crime novels highly recommended by the NYTimes.  I did not think I would like I LET YOU GO because of the opening tragedy but I really like the two main characters.

COMMONWEALTH: ANN PATCHETT

This is not an easy book to summarize so I will suggest only the bare bones of an outline.  The novel starts innocently enough with a kiss, after a birthday party in California.  This simple act leads to two shattered marriages, the separation of two families, the abandoned spouses and the fifty year story of the six kids, their bouncing back and forth between parents, their adult lives and finally, their secret, the differing accounts of the death of their thirteen year old brother, Calvin, which tears the families apart.  We listen to many points of views, of both kids and parents and the story of their family is eventually retold by Franny's lover, a failed novelist, to the dismay of all.   It sounds like a mess and it does not have much of a plot but it's readable and a few of the characters, like Franny come to life. The novel fuses both the present with past which Patchett understands we can never escape.  It was a National Book Award nominee.

Rain, Not Snow!

8:22

I have been waking up at 5:38 the last few mornings.  I wonder if there's any symbolism in it, also the name of prognosticator Nate Silver's website.  It's a gloomy morning here at the lake, gray, wet, and dismal outside, yet not as dour, as bleak as the news.   The lake in front of our house is still frozen but there are open sections to the north.

Well, yesterday was surprisingly busy day for Evie in the kitchen.  For me, it was more of the same, meaning a good yoga class at 9:30, a large class which was good to see.  Only one stop on the way home, to pick up some ricotta for Evie.  When I left for yoga at 9:00, Evie was already in the kitchen, baking a pie crust.  She would not tell what was up, so I had to wait until I got home at 11:30 to find out a lemon meringue pie sitting on the counter.  And not only a pie, she was half way into putting together a new recipe she found on the web, a chicken and spinach lasagna, the reason for my getting ricotta.   Evie left for the Y around 1:30 but before she left, she finished putting together the lasagna, the hard way, by making her own noodles.  After the chicken breasts were sauteed, the noodles made, she layered the lasagna with marinara sauce, spinach/ricotta, parmesean, chicken breasts and noodles. Once she put together three layers, she put it in the refrigerator, to bake later.

Lunch for me was more mushroom barley soup and a piece of toast as I was not particularly hungry.  I watched another Wallander, at least part of it before moving to the couch in the living room to read and take a nap.  After the nap, I felt energized and cleaned up the kitchen, then watched the rest of Wallander just before Evie returned up from her workout.

Long Point At Dusk

We were able to have a relaxing wine time because dinner was made, just pop the lasagna in the oven and make a salad.  We had an early dinner, around 6:15 because we were both hungry.  The lasagna was really good, a definite make again according to Evie but the highlight of the meal, however, was the lemon meringue pie, the lemon custard creamy.  We watched the first episode of a series called SENSITIVE SKIN, with Miranda, from SEX IN THE CITY.  It was just average, so we switched to a Norwegian/Czech series called NOBEL and we really liked it.  It's about a Norwegian Special Forces Ranger, just back from a tour in Afghanistan, who faces difficulties adjusting to home, especially its politics.  The film moves back and forth between previous military action in Afghanistan and his homecoming.  We cannot wait to continue watching it tonight.  The picture below reminds both of us of our son in law's Special Forces team picture from early 2002.

The Norwegian Cast From NOBEL

BORN TO RUN: BRUCE SPRINGSTEEN

If you are Boss fan, love his music, followed his life, know his lyrics, this is the book for you.  For me, however, too much of the work was spent on his song writing, his inspiration.  He works through his various albums, the process of writing, mixing in his autobiography.  I was most interested in his life, the difficulties he faced early on, with dysfunctional Italian/Irish family, a bipolar father.  By sixteen, he was on his own as his parents moved to California.  He started out in a number of bands, eventually deciding to make it on his own in the Bruce Springsteen band.  Despite early success, his face on the cover of Time and Newsweek, he lived a hardscrabble life, bunking in buddies spare bedrooms, spending money earned on studio time.  He did not really start making money until 1984 with his Born In The USA album and concert tour.  He is also candid about his battle with depression through most of his life, how going to therapy on and off for twenty five plus years enabled him to function, as father, husband, and friend.  It's a long ride but ultimately worth it.

It Will Come (snow)

7:40

It's 7:00, still dark out and we are both up unfortunately.  It's too, too early, nothing to see and only pundits to hear.  It's 31º out, rain or snow is forecast for the day.  At the moment, it looks like rain not snow.

We had our typical start to the week, nothing big happening, just another start to staying in shape.  I went to yoga, had my coffee, and stopped at Wegman's.  What else to do?  Yoga class was less attended than usual and I always wonder why?  Joyce, the barrista, and Dave, the regular, were at Ryder's and I was able to pick up a dozen eggs.  And Wegman's was quiet, probably because it was a Monday.  I was home just after 12:00.

While I was gone, Evie was busy polishing up all the wood in our living room.  I could smell the Milsak polish when I walked in the house.  The wood, especially around the windows, tends to dry out so the polish really brings out the grain.  Evie always sees things that need attention that I don't, doing stuff I would never have thought to do around the house, like polishing the wood, dusting the blinds.  The difference between wife and husband?

Lunch was so easy that even I could make it, soup and a bagel with cream cheese.  I watched an episode of Wallender and as I was finishing my bagel, Evie drove off to work out at the gym.  She tried a new gym, in the strip mall next to Wegman's, free because we now belong to Silver Sneakers, and liked it.  So she now has a choice of three places to work out, two are free and the YMCA is only twenty bucks a month.  Heck, even I can visit the two that are free.  She came home enthused about the workout place which has a small workout room where you can put literally anything on a large screen TV, a yoga class, a spin class, whatever and follow it.  Sounds neat.

For dinner, we were going to cook burgers outside.  My grill is not always reliable so on Sunday, I tested it to make sure it was working fine...it was, the temperature rose to 600º.  Yesterday evening, however, it would not rise above 200º, so Evie grilled the burgers in the house.  I made up a Big Boy like sauce and Evie sauteed some mushrooms and onions for toppings.  The burgers were great and I think cooking them outside is overrated.  I know most restaurants just grill them like we did but it is messy.  We were at a loss for something to watch after the next episode of The Affair, so we watched the first episode of both The Young Pope and Victoria and were not taken with either of them.  I doubt if they give them another try.

NEWS OF THE WORLD: PAULETTE JILES

A good old fashion cowboy yarn, like Larry Mc Murtry's LONESOME DOVE.  Captain Jefferson Kyle Kidd has survived Indian wars, skirmishes with Mexico and the Civil War.  Now at seventy one, he's ready to take it easy, his kids grown, his wife dead.  So, despite his age, his sense of an ending, he agrees to return a ten year old white girl to her relatives after having been rescued from Indians. Their journey takes them from Wichita Falls to San Antonio.  Along the way, Captain Kidd must gain the young girl's confidence as well as deal with the vicissitudes they meet along the trail, thieves, cheats and liars.  The long trail rides our mixed with stops at a number of towns, where the two are either befriended of threatened.  The core of the book is the growing relationship between the girl and Captain Kidd.  His compassion, his understanding of this young girl and what she is going through after having lived for six years with Indians, slowly wins her over.  It's a  good read, a National Book Award Nominee in 2016.

A 48º January Monday Morning

7:13

It's just after 7:00, the darkness of early morning is taken over by threatening, dark gray clouds.  As the day progresses, the temperature will drop as it will during the week with snow predicted for Thursday.  Frailty, Thy Name Is Chautauqua (apologies to Hamlet). The lake remains frozen despite the warm weather and noone seems to be out fishing.

Long Point In The Fog

I was looking forward to Sunday because of the two big NFL playoff games, Evie less so.  The morning sky was overcast, with a light rain occasionally falling during the day and we took many photographs of the fog rising from the lake most of the day.  We decided early to get in a walk, regardless of the weather so we drove to the CI around 11:00.  Despite the unseasonably warm, even unhealthy weather, we enjoyed our walk.

Bell Tower At Chautauqua

It's a three and a quarter mile loop, takes us a little over an hour.  And each time we notice something different; this time, it was noticing things because of the barrenness of the plants and trees. And for once, we heard the rushing of water in the creek when we walked across Thunder Bridge.  After our walk, stopped in at the Lighthouse Grocery and picked up some ground chuck and sandwich buns because we were planning on cooking burgers out on the grill.

We were home by 1:00 and Evie quickly put together our second big breakfast this weekend, applewood bacon from Trader Joe's, eggs, and bagels and we watched CBS Sunday Morning after the opening of SNL.  The big game did not go on until 3:00, so Evie watched some TV while I read and fell asleep, not waking until 4:00.  I had the game saved, however, so I watched it fast forwarding through the commercials, the only way to watch a game as long as you don't find out the score ahead of time.  We had talked about getting tickets for the $12,000 Queen Of Hearts drawing at the Viking Club but did not know whether it made sense to drive over to the club just to buy tickets.  And we were cooking burgers outside.  We finally decided (I should say Evie) to go over around 6:00 for a beer, buy our tickets and then come home and make dinner.  Just as we walked outside to get in our car, the only two neighbors who live along Woodlawn/Victoria happened to walk by so we talked with them for 15 minutes, all of us bemoaning the absence of snow and cold weather.

Neighbors

When we got to the Viking Club, we sat at the bar, had a beer and I noticed that a couple of the guys were oohing and aahing over their steak with onions and mushrooms.  When I suggested maybe we should share a steak, Evie quickly agreed, no doubt having this in mind even before we left.  So we enjoyed another beer, the ribeye was as good as they get and we talked with lots of new people, some regulars like us but we had never really gotten to know them.  We sat next to John,  from Chautauqua Ironworks, so we ended up talking to him quite a bit, along with a couple who always arrive in their snowmobiles if there is snow, and a fireman from Jamestown, who was waiting for  his wife who is a waitress at the Rod and Gun.  In other words, we had a great meal, a good time.

Dusk

We got home in time to watch the second half of the New England defeat Pittsburgh. We were  fed up with watching football by 9:00, so we watched the next episode of Homeland on Showtime, a bit disappointing because we are tired of watching Quinn get his mojo back.  It's taking too long and we want some action.

New word, compliments of Kellyanne Conway: "Alternative facts."

NUTSHELL: IAM MC EWAN

An interesting but not wholly satisfying text from Mc Ewan.  Yes, it's a novel point of view, told from the point of view of a fetus, resting inside of it's mother, able, however, to hear all the complications and problems facing his parents, especially the father's infidelity.  Mc Ewan allows us into not only into the consciousness of the child, but explores the world it will inhabit, both it's wonderful advances, like vaccines and the Internet, but also it's problems, racism, terrorism, nuclear proliferation and global warning. This enables Mc Ewan to vent all of his views of the world, the unborn child to question whether it wants to be born or not.  You will have read to find out what it eventually decides. Mc Ewan is prolific, loves to delve into various genres but ATONEMENT remains my favorite.

A Saturday For The Ages

6:34

6:40

6:52

6:53

It's overcast and foggy here at the lake, the naked tree limbs reaching up into the changing sky.  It's another unseasonable January morning, 39º, the high getting into the 50's.  We may do some planting of a mix of bulbs we purchased in November, thinking we still had time to plant. The lake is high but still frozen, almost overflowing the lip of the shoreline.  It's now 8:00 and I have witnessed the sky go through a number of transitions, from gray, to pink, to blue, and finally to a blinding sunrise.

6:58

8:04

Yesterday began in Euclid, with a great breakfast fixed by my brother-in-law, an enthusiastic and skilled short order chef.  It's one of the reasons we like to spend the night in Euclid.  It turned out to be a great morning on Lake Erie, as the sky cleared, turned blue, the air warmed up as we left.  When we are in the Cleveland area, we try to make one stop: Trader Joes.  No doubt lots of others had the same idea as the aisles in Joe's was packed with Saturday shoppers like us. We picked out our favorite cheeses, a case of wine, cashews, granola, chocolate bars, all the kinds of things we enjoy but cannot get here.  We then had a good hour before meeting a friend from college for lunch, so we went to Lucky Jeans and Evie found a couple of blouses she liked on sale.

Lunch With Our Finnish Friend, Vi

We then met Vi at the Manhattan Deli in Mentor and enjoyed a typical Jewish deli lunch, matzo ball soup and a corned beef sandwich. We had a good talk with Vi, a friend since college and we were one of the last of the lunch crowd to leave.  Just as we were paying, I noticed they had a Napoleon in the case, or as I call it, a Mille Feuille (a thousand leaves) which no one understands.  We could not pass it up, so we had it put in a box to take back to the lake for dessert.

We were home around 4:30, quickly unpacked the car, and were soon relaxed on our couches, with a plate of appetizers and a Manhattan, a good way to end a fun 24 hours in Cleveland.  We listened to the coverage of the amazing Women Marches, not only all of the the United States but the world.  It's what makes America great, our freedom to express our views.  Since we had a big breakfast and lunch, we decided on a light dinner, mushroom barley soup, a salad and a leftover corned beef sandwich, with a Napoleon for dessert.  Napoleons for dessert two nights in a row is almost too much of a good thing.  We watched a new Bill Maher last night, outrageous but right on as usual.  He is definitely a specific taste, loved by many, hated by many.  It was good to get into our own king size bed again.