I live in Maine.
We have terrible roads due to the high water content underneath and a never ending cycle of freezing and melting.
Frost heave is a separate season here….
And the potholes can be large enough to swallow your car.
So this made me chuckle the other day….
Mainers.
We’re an odd bunch.
With funny license plates.
I also ran across a strange product:
Are slipping nerd glasses really that much of a problem?
Apparently it is.
The eleventh day of our vacation started at our timeshare resort condo…
Where I found this:
A note from the grandchild of our hearts.
Sorry… but there’s no way better way to start the day than that.
Although biscuits and gravy with home fries comes close.
We had a full day of Christmas gift shopping ahead of us and needed hearty sustenance. And in the south?
That includes the options of scrapple, fried catfish, grits or bologna and eggs.
The husband’s utterly favorite breakfast is chipped beef on toast and he rarely finds it in Maine… so when we stumbled on the Southern Pancake and Waffle House in Williamsburg?
He wanted to go every morning…. which we pretty much did from then on.
But hey, there were chickens in every window so how could we lose?
Our first stop that day was a liquor store in anticipation of our upcoming Christmas Day in North Carolina.
For future reference…. the first way to tell you’re in a liquor store in the south?
There’s a still.
Still searching for that silly wine filter, I thought we could try Merchant’s Square…. which is the shopping section of Colonial Williamsburg I couldn’t get the husband to check out the previous week.
As with all areas there, it was lovely.
Filled with interesting high end shops… like this interior design place.
Giant double diamond ring light fixture anyone…?
We happily strolled aroiund, ducking in and out of the stores with all the other desperate Holy crap it’s Christmas Eve and I don’t have a gift! shoppers.
Naturally I had to buy a souvenir tee shirt –
Truer words were ne’er spoke.
And towards late afternoon when my stomach started grumbling?
This happened.
Someone saw the husband’s Marine Corps hat, said Semper Fi, and they were off….
On a 38 minute long conversation about who was stationed where, when and with whom.
Yes. I timed it….
While he talked?
I walked.
Agreed wholeheartedly with a sign.
And explored a little more…
Of the colonial town.
And hey, if you’re going to dress up in period costume and stand on the sidewalk?
Don’t give me the stink eye when I take your picture.
Turning back around hoping the other half had finished talking…
I saw snow.
Granted it wasn’t very much, but it surprised me to see any at all.
The ice skating rink surprised me as well.
In Maine we wait for ponds to freeze over.
In Virginia they just build one… and how they keep it frozen in 60 degree temperatures is a mystery to me.
Leaking roof saga continued.
Winter is the worst possible time in Maine for your roof to spring a leak … so of course, that’s exactly what’s happened.
Remember when I said I’d cringe every time it rains?
That’s the sound of me cringing.
It poured the other day… and so did our ceiling.
So much so I had to add another pan.
Which drove the husband nuts when he came home…. and because he’s a man and had to do something?
Yeah. He decided to climb up into the attic to see where it was leaking.
Naturally this isn’t as easy as climbing a set of stairs… because no.
Here at Casa River, we like a challenge.
The den closet, home to an overflow of the husband’s useless crap treasure.
(Yes, he collects old wooden hangers. Don’t you?)
Half of one side had to be emptied and strewn all over the room….
Because the only way to access the crawl space we call an attic is to remove all the shelving and climb up a hole at the top of the closet.
A design paradigm we curse the builders for quite often.
It’s a bit of a nightmare getting up there.
And no, the husband didn’t appreciate me making a Kodak moment out of the experience.
He wasn’t thrilled that I stuck my head up through the hole to offer advice either.
Men. There’s no pleasing you.
But look… I found an antenna from the 1970’s!
Did I mention there’s no actual floor up there? Just a few scattered pieces of particle board that break when you kneel on them.
So after scuttling around like a crab and lying on his back…
And pointing his flashlight near the section of the roof of the addition you can’t access from the crawl space, he did find where the water was coming in. Halfway up the peak, and running down the beams…. which we can find absolutely no reason for.
Doesn’t this look like fun?
Especially since there’s not a damned thing you can do about it until spring when you can rip off the shingles to find the bad spot.
Meanwhile I’ll have this lovely and ever expanding wart to look at.
And every time I do?
I hear a cash register.
Ka-ching!
The driving tour of the Yorktown, Virginia battlefield was a strange one and meandered all over the place.
Through the woods.
And past open fields with miles of split rail fencing.
Seriously, it went on forever.
There were creeks and swamps.
And every now and then, a sign.
We saw plenty of fluffy white butts.
And they roamed at will.
We even made friends with a few.
This little beauty had no fear and sidled right up next to my window.
Up our way that would be dangerous.
But this was protected land and they knew it.
Near the end of the tour we saw something a bit odd.
A buck with a funky horn.
And while I can’t say I’ve ever had to tote a rack around (on my head anyway) this did look a little strange.
So this was December 23rd and the husband had spent the last 48 hours trying to talk me into driving down to North Carolina for Christmas Day. When we’re on a trip for the holidays? We usually let it pass without much fanfare. No exchange of gifts, maybe just a special meal. But since our daughter of the heart came to visit with us those few days… he was bound and determined we would celebrate with her this time.
While I normally would have agreed, she had a slew of family members staying the night in a one bathroom house and I didn’t want to stress her anymore than necessary. We checked a few hotels in the area but all of them were full. Husband wanted to go for the day…. but it was a 4+ hour ride down and a 4+ hour ride back. Almost 9 hours on the road is not my idea of a fun Christmas… but he wore me down. Which meant we had to spend the rest of that day (and night) shopping for gifts because I wouldn’t go empty handed.
And leave it to me to decide on the one gift that was utterly unfindable on the 23rd of December. And believe me we tried.
Yup.
I had to give her this.
Because she loves wine…. but can no longer drink it because it gives her headaches.
I was going to give her the gift of wine back! Or die trying.
Which we nearly did.
We tried every single freakin’ store for 150 miles. Large malls and small gift shops. Specialty stores and wine outlets. Big chains and obscure holes in the hall. We walked, we searched, we cursed. (Okay, maybe that was just me.) We shopped until we almost dropped. Everyone had heard of it… very few carried it. And if they did carry it? They were sold out by the time we got there.
Do you know how aggravating it is to look for something for 7 hours straight and then be told by a laughing salesclerk, “Oh, we just sold the last one 10 minutes ago. You should have been quicker.” That woman is lucky she still has her tongue…. because if I could have reached the butcher knife on the other side of the counter? She’d be laughing with a bloody stump right now.
And if that isn’t bad enough?
I didn’t find the perfect gift, but I did find this:
No.
No…
Noooo!
This is wrong on so many levels … I can’t even. What twisted soul thought, “How can I take a perfectly good candy and ruin it beyond all measure? I know… I’ll add Kale!”
All over the world children are weeping. I hope you’re satisfied Archie.
At 9:30 that night the husband was screaming Uncle…. and grumbling about food. We were both too exhausted to care at that point and stopped at the first place on the way back to the resort. An Outback Steakhouse.
I’m not a lover of chain restaurants and hadn’t been to one of these in 20 years.
But $5 Boozy Cherry Limeades sounded pretty good….
And for that price? I had 3.
Their Blue Cheese Wedge salad left a lot to be desired…. and the husband’s French Onion soup was only fair.
But his filet was blood rare and he made short work of it.
My grilled filet and shrimp skewer combo was filling…. and I’ll leave it at that.
There’s a reason we’re not chain restaurant fans, and if we don’t go back for another 20 years?
I’m okay with that.
The next stop on the driving tour was a solemn one.
Where I found it a sad statement on today’s society that this sign even needed to be posted.
Silence and respect is the very least we can give them.
I’ve always found cemeteries to be beautiful places.
And never fail to become emotional…. constantly close to tears.
It doesn’t matter that none of my people were here…..
They’re someone’s people.
Someone’s son, husband or father.
And they made the ultimate sacrifice for a country we all share.
Cemeteries are a perfect place for personal reflection.
And I made sure to give my veteran husband some time alone with memories of his war… and those he lost.
I have to admit I was ignorant of the tradition of coin laying. You don’t see this up our way, but almost every grave had coins on it in Yorktown.
According to legend, the coin left belongs on the gravestones of U.S. military veterans. Visitors who wish to show their respect leave coins on the headstones in different amounts. It shows their loved ones of the soldiers family that someone has come to visit the grave.
Leaving a penny means you visited and want to thank the veteran for their service. A nickel means you trained at boot camp with the deceased, while a dime suggests you served with him or her. Finally, a quarter signifies you were with the soldier when they passed away.
The origin of the tradition, like the meaning behind it, is still up for debate. But many people believe it started in America during the Vietnam War. America was having a crisis of conscience. Any discussion of the war usually devolved into a more significant discussion about politics. Leaving a coin was a way to say you appreciate the soldier’s service while avoiding an inevitable uncomfortable conversation.
I really wish I’d known this before our visit.
I would have broken my piggy bank and put a penny on each and every one.
So a blog friend of mine has time warped me back into the ’90’s.
No, not that far.
Although the hair is close….
He’s started an old fashioned chat room and we’ve been playing around with it for the past few days.
Damn.
Now that I think about it… he does have a Golden.
But if you have a minute and want some less than stimulating conversation, drop by and say hello!
We were beginning to discover a strange thing about the Historic Triangle area in Williamsburg ,Virginia…. everything is done in triplicate. National Parks, State Parks and tourist venues all cover the same history and it can be a bit confusing when choosing a place to visit. So after finishing the Revolutionary War Museum and the Yorktown re-creation, we headed to the actual Yorktown site and found a National Parks visitors center.
It had a small museum with most of the same information we had just seen… and a broken heating system which rendered the building slightly less cold than the Arctic tundra. Needless to say, we didn’t linger.
There was a ship.
A one fourth size replica of the one that sunk in the neighboring York River.
So we boarded her…
Explored… and then moved on.
To some tents.
But not just any old tents.
These were literally George Washington’s tents.
Delivered by Philadelphia upholsterer Plunket Fleeson in May 1776, Washington’s original set of campaign tents included a large dining tent — which also served as his headquarters and meeting room — and two additional tents that provided space for the general to sleep and store his baggage.
Though made of rugged worsted wool and linen, several of these tents succumbed to rough treatment during the war, requiring Washington to order replacements. Still more abuse took place after the deaths of the general and his wife, when their stepson — George Washington Parke Custis — began snipping off pieces of the historic fabric to give to guests at his celebrated outdoor parties.
Later, the tents accompanied the Marquis de Lafayette on his triumphant 1824 tour of the nation he helped create. Yet even at historic Fort McHenry, where they were reverently displayed under the original Star-Spangled Banner, the increasing fragile artifacts were handled with a recklessness that’s hard for curators to imagine today.
Greater still was the threat from Union Army pillagers who seized the Arlington estate of Custis’ heir — Mary Custis Lee — and her husband, Confederate Gen. Robert E. Lee, during the Civil War. Only a word of warning from a Lee family slave named Selina Gray persuaded federal officials to seize them for safekeeping, thus saving the irreplaceable relics.
Returned in 1901, the outer elements of both the dining and sleeping tents were quickly sold; they ended up in the collections of the Smithsonian Institution and what is now the American Revolution Center at Valley Forge, Sundberg said. The Park Service acquired the dining tent ceiling and sleeping tent chamber from the Lee family in 1955, putting both on display at what was then the new Yorktown Visitor Center.
And pardon my geekdom, but I think that’s pretty damned cool!
Heck, they even had Lord Cornwallis’s table he used during the war.
But by that time we were freezing and had to go outside to warm up. Wanting to see the actual Yorktown battlefield…. we started the driving tour with directions from the park rangers.
I’m not quite sure what I was expecting.
But what I got were a bunch of humps.
Humps here.
Humps there.
Humps everywhere.
Apparently they’re called redoubts.
|
Cornwallis had his men construct a main line of defense around Yorktown that consisted of ten small enclosed forts (called redoubts), batteries with artillery and connecting trenches. The Americans and French marched from Williamsburg to Yorktown on September 28 and began digging a trench 800 yards from the British defense line to begin a siege. By October 9, the allies’ trench was finished and their artillery had been moved up. Firing at the British continuously, they had virtually knocked the British guns out of action by October 11. Cornwallis had the additional misfortune to learn at that time that Clinton’s departure from New York had been delayed. During the night of October 11, the allies began a second trench 400 yards from the British. The next days were spent bringing up artillery and strengthening the new line. The new line could not be completed, however, without capturing British redoubts 9 and 10. On the night of October 14, 400 French stormed redoubt 9 and 400 Americans stormed redoubt 10, capturing them in less than 30 minutes. Nine Americans and 15 French died in this brief and heroic action. |
And not be outdone, we had humps as well.
I believe there were 10 of them on the tour, but come on. Once you’ve seen a few humps?
You’ve seen them all.
Though this one had cannons, which I photographed from the top of a hump……
Before realizing you weren’t supposed to climb to the top of the humps.
Oh, we weren’t talking about ice? Well, I am now.
We had ice this year.
Lots and lots of ice.
The shovel the snow off the driveway, watch your feet slide out from under you and land smack on your ass kind of ice.
Everything was covered in sheets of ice for weeks on end.
Of course this made for some pretty fabulous icicles.
On the garage, they started out small.
But then they grew.
Which made getting in and out of the garage rather perilous.
Did I mention this was the section of the garage I was nagging the husband to put a new gutter on all last summer and fall?
Maybe now he knows why.
The end of our living history tour was a typical Yorktown, Virginia farm of 18th century.
It re-creates the life of Edward Moss, and you can read a little about it here.
The house was simple, but comfortable enough for the time…
Or so Edward told us.
There was a separate building for cooking… where they were currently following old recipes and baking pies.
Apparently you used to be able to sample the food, but the health department put the kibosh on that and now you can only drool.
And although the pie smelled great, I can’t say I’d be too eager to try any of these recipes.
Calf’s head surprise…?
No.
Transmogrified pigeon?
Yeah… I’ll pass on that as well.
I did get a kick out of this spice jar stopper though.
As promised….
Some chickens.
Because no matter where I go, I tend to find fowl.
There was candle making.
And slave quarters.
Complete with….
You guessed it.
Shoes.
There was a tobacco drying shed, because back then tobacco equaled money.
And if you’ve never had occasion to be in one?
Trust me… it smells wonderful.
A few more buildings…
A lot more fencing…. and we were done.
Well…
After I said goodbye to the resident ducks.
I do love me some waterfowl.
Even with the milder winters we’re having, we still see our fair share of snow, ice, and sleet. But temperatures are warming and we’re not seeing those epic dumps of the white stuff like we used to.
This used to be a normal February.
Tunneling was a way of life.
Now? We get a few inches and it melts.
Then it freezes.
I am so done with ice.
Yes, it’s pretty.
But when walking to the mailbox means you might slip, fall and crack a rib?
You can have it.
Give me a foot of snow over pretty shining crystals any day.
And with all that snow, melting and ice?
This –
A leak in the roof.
And what looks like an expensive repair to the ceiling.
It’s the worst possible time of year for it.
So from now until spring, when we can get it fixed, I’m going to cringe every time it rains.
Good times.
River's world..... 