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323 miles via I-90, I-87, I-88 and I-86 with a breakfast stop in West Springfield MA. Cumulative TS8 route miles: 323.
This was an easy trip to navigate, which is good as my cell phone GPS froze before getting to Albany. The weather was good and the traffic was light, so it was mostly an easy hop. Except for the miserable hour we spent trapped behind a “wide load” truck (with 38 tires!) hauling a very large shrouded object down I-88 at 30mph. Most of that trip was on sections of I-88 that were reduced to a single westbound lane by construction, The backup was massive. I was near the front so I can’t say how long the backup was, but judging by how quickly it built up behind the caravan (the massive truck and 6 escort vehicles) after it rejoined I-88 following a rest area break, it had to be at least 3 miles. And how did I know that? Because we pulled into that rest area after being trapped in the backup for 25 minutes and were not quick enough to get out before it. So we were the only vehicle that got trapped both before and after their break. Lucky us.
I didn’t think getting out in front was all that urgent as I knew the one-lane stretch that the rest area was on lasted just another mile. I figured I would be able to pass when the construction zone ended. But – surprise! – the state troopers escorting the truck blocked both lanes until another long construction zone started. So another maddening 30-minute delay on a 12-mile one-lane construction zone.
Well, we had some quiet days at “home” (the house loaned to us for the month by Jett’s brother, Ray, and his lovely and talented wife, Kim) which involved a lot of reading and Facebook time. Ooma did get out twice to get her hair and nails done. I did a solo trip to visit Jett’s grave in Rockport MA and 2 visits each with my son and my granddaughter. But we also did some fine dining:
Peppercorn’s Grille & Tavern. This was a random choice when we were out one day and needed a place for lunch. This turned out to be a fine choice: really tasty sandwiches and a large selection of craft beers.
Siam 9 Thai Cuisine. Ooma wanted scallion pancakes and this place has them. Very good ones, in Ooma’s opinion. This was a dinner out with Ray and Kim. Very good Thai food.
The menu board at Kimball Farm
The Sole Proprietor. This may be Worcester’s best restaurant. We dined out with Ray and Kim and Ooma and I agreed that it was some of the best seafood we have ever had.
John Brewer’s Tavern. This is a place for basic pub fare but is a convenient place to meet up with my son, Frank.
Kimball Farm. This was just for ice cream, but they make the best ice cream anywhere, IMHO.
Dinner at Ray and Kim’s cabin in New Salem MA. Kim is a fantasic cook and her meals are every bit as good as those served at 4-star restaurants. She served “lamburgers” – hamburgers made from chopped lamb. Delicious!
Our own cookouts. We are no slouches when it comes to grilling. We had at least 4 steak dinners, plus a ham steak cookout.
Kim and Ray and Ooma and Sparky at the Sole Proprietor
I had the honor of getting granddaughter Liliani’s ears re-pierced. She was a trouper and the new studs look very nice.
Liliani, getting her ears re-pierced
Bottom line: we were very busy during our month in Worcester. But none of it would have been possible without the generous assistance of Ray and Kim. Thank you!
The subtitle is “The Gospel According to Biff, Christ’s Childhood Pal.” That is a good capsule summary. Did you wonder what Christ did in those years between his appearance at the temple at 12 and the start of his ministry around age 30? There is no mention of those years in the Bible. Moore has filled the gap with a fanciful tale made up of whole cloth (including the cloth of the Shroud of Turin). In case you were wondering, he spent years traveling to Syria, Afghanistan, China and India in search of the three wise men and their wisdom (because he needs to learn how to be The Messiah). Along the way he learns to heal the sick, raise the dead and talk to the Abominable Snowman. Really. You have to suspend your disbelief to enjoy this, but if you do you will have a lovely time, thanks to his wise-cracking buddy, Biff, who has been brought back to life after being dead for 2,000 years, to write another Gospel, just so the record of Christ’s life can be complete.
The Shround of Turin episode is a good example. Christ is beaten up and his wounds are tended to by a couple of merchants from Turin. They are amused by the perfect image of his countenance that is left on the cloth that they use to dry the blood on his face and decide to take the cloth with them rather than discarding it. The rest, as they say, is history.
It is deeply irreverent, frequently scatological and thoroughly funny.
Ooma and I did a lot of traveling this week (what else is new?) to visit family in NH, CT and MA. First, on Friday, a trip to NH to visit Chuck, Ooma’s brother. The two highlights were lunch at the Mountainview Station Restaurant in Center Ossipee and meeting his hilariously entertaining kitten, Brody. The seafood at Mountainview Station is terrific – highly recommended! They also have some interesting T-shirts for sale that reek of double entendre.
Next, on Saturday, a second trip to CT to visit Ooma’s son and family. Wonderful people and always a joy. We did takeout from Pho Delight Thai Restaurant in Willimantic CT and it, too, was terrific. I can’t say I haven’t been eating well. Before dinner the kids had fun painting stuff. Nothing like paint to work up an appetite.
Dining on ThaiSophia painting a chairFarren painting herselfSophia painting a moose
The matriarch at rest
Then on Sunday, a trip to Wilmington MA to see Jett’s sister, Sybil, and her children, grandchildren and great-grandchildren. It was a beautiful, sunny day and catching up with all was a lot of fun.
Three trips in three days, all more than an hour’s drive away. Good food, good conversation, good times. But I think I will rest up now for the journey west which will begin Thursday.
Four geeks and their lovely ladies (the 5th geek took the photo)
In our continuing effort to take vacations-within-our-vacation, Ooma and I traveled to the Berkshires region of western Massachusetts this past weekend to stay with my college roommate, Hutch (the guy with the trees sprouting from his left ear in the photo), and his wife Linda. They also invited 3 other couples, all of the men being fraternity brothers from college, including the other roommate from my sophomore year. So a mini-reunion of sorts. And as all of the men were engineers of various sorts there was plenty of geek talk. But the women tempered the talk and made it seem like a group of nearly normal people.
On the dog walk
One highlight of the trip was the house and cabin where we all stayed. Not many people can accommodate 8 overnight guests, but Hutch and Linda made it look easy – two couples with them in their lovely new 3-bedroom house and the other two in the adjacent 2-bedroom “cabin” (which most people would be happy to call home). Ooma gushed over the kitchen in the new house, saying that it was her “dream kitchen.”
On the lawn, enjoying the concert
The buildings are situated on 48 wooded acres, which I had a chance to explore on the 8am dog walk Sunday morning. The land is steeply sloped, so there is no thought of doing much with the space. But it is a lovely plot of land that both people and dog enjoyed.
Dining al fresco at Tanglewood
The main event of the weekend was an afternoon at Tanglewood to hear some classical music from the Boston Symphony Orchestra and guest violinist Itzhak Perlman. We sat on the lawn under perfect blue skies and enjoyed some sandwiches and wine while listening to some lovely music. If you have never been to Tanglewood, you are missing a treat. We couldn’t actually see the musicians as they were in the concert shed, but it didin’t matter as we could hear them just fine. And, unlike the patrons in the high-priced seats in the shed, we could enjoy the perfect weather.
Another feature of the weekend was food. Good food and lots of it. A cookout Saturday night, bagel sandwiches at the concert (with potato chips and cookies), pasta (stuffed shells and lasagna) Sunday night and breakfast with homemade granola and breads both Sunday and Monday. My attempt to lose weight had to be temporarily abandoned.
The final – and most important – feature of the weekend was social discourse. We talked about everything – family, health, work, retirement, current events. But, thankfully, hardly any political talk. We were good friends 55 years ago and we remain good friends today.
We are now less than 2 weeks away from our planned departure from Worcester. That would be the start of my 8th trip south which I will designate ‘TS8’. This will be longer and more complex than the trip north (TN8) as it includes a trip west to Wisconsin before heading back to Florida. So I have broken the trip into two segments – TS8-1 (the trip to Wisconsin) and TS8-2 (the trip to Florida).
TS8-1
This segment is planned out in considerable detail and the hotels have already been booked. Here is the route:
TS8-1 plan
This is a trip of over 1,100 miles in 4 segments:
Elmira NY: a 2-night stop where the main event will be a trip to the Corning Museum of Glass. Ooma is a big fan of glass art and I am intrigued by the technology of glassmaking, so there should be enough there to interest both of us.
Erie PA: a 3-day Labor Day weekend stay in a city that I have passed through but have never toured. We will visit some long-term friends of Ooma’s and take a look at the western end of the Erie Canal.
Fremont IN: an overnight stop. There is nothing in Fremont that interests me, but we do plan to stop in Port Clinton OH on our way there to have lunch with my Ft Myers neighbors.
Madison WI: the city where I was born and raised and, yes, went to high school. We will attend my 55th(!) high school reunion, visit with long-term friends and go to Circus World in Baraboo WI which is a Ringling Brothers museum. We will be in Madison for a full week. We might also take a trip to see Taliesin East, Frank Lloyd Wright’s Wisconsin home.
TS8-2
TS8-2 plan
The trip from Wisconsin to Florida is not completely planned. No hotels have been booked, so there is still considerable uncertainty in this plan. Nevertheless, we are pretty certain which cities we will visit. This will be a trip of over 1,500 miles in 6 hops:
Chicago IL (or a western suburb thereof): a 3-night stay which gives us 2 full days to visit the city (which Ooma has never visited). One day will be devoted to the Chicago Institute of Art. We also hope to catch some music at a blues club, but haven’t decided how to spend the other day. Lots of options.
Louisville KY: an overnight stay with my cousin Keith and his wife Debbie.
Asheville NC: 3 nights. One day will be devoted entirely to seeing the Biltmore mansion and gardens. The other day will likely feature a drive along a segment of the Blue Ridge Parkway.
Savannah GA: 2 nights. We will simply enjoy the ambiance of one of my favorite southern cities.
Lakeland FL: one night. Lakeland is home to the University of South Florida which has many buildings by Frank Lloyd Wright. We thought this might be a nice complement to our possible visit to Taliesin East.
Fort Myers FL. Home at last. Collect Rusty (and see if he remembers me), put our feet up and rest.
Ooma treated me to three nights at The Hotel Portsmouth – a “boutique” hotel in Portsmouth NH. It is a lovely old building with updated rooms and all the amenities that one would expect from a superior hotel – tile shower, newer fixtures, a large flat-screen TV and a very comfortable king-size bed. Our room also had something I wouldn’t expect – two very comfortable chairs (perfect for reading). The common area fixtures – most notably the smoky glass chandaliers, the ornate oak staircase and the very nice back patio – were also features that you won’t find in most fine hotels.
The accomodations came with daily breakfast featuring hardboiled eggs, English muffins and breads for toasting, fruit cups and other fruits, parfait, overnight oats and a variety of cereals including a very tasty granola. And, of course, coffee and tea.
Smoky glass chandalier
The other benefit… location. We could walk to most anyplace in Portsmouth. And we did, going to Prescott Park, lunch at Moe’s, River House and 5 Thai Bistro and dinners at Cafe Mediteraneo and Cure. We also dined at Robert’s Maine Grill, but that was in Kittery ME and we drove to that one. It was three days of very fine dining, They were all excellent. It is hard to find a bad meal in Portsmouth.
Most of this dining was done in the congenial company of some of Ooma’s oldest and dearest friends – Sharon, Nancy, Stella, Merrill and Russell. Meeting Ooma’s dearest friends for the first time could have been stressful, but it wasn’t. They were all charming and very accepting of me. I can see why Ooma values them so highly.
Hotel staircase
Me and my steamed lobster
Ooma and I, while traveling, usually share an entree as we often have no way to store leftovers. And we dine so well that we have no appetite for them. For the meal at Cafe Mediterraneo we shared a terrific osso bucco dish, with mashed potatos and summer vegetables, and at Cure shared some lamb. But for our final dinner, at Robert’s Maine Grill, we each had our own lobster entree – steamed lobster for me and Lobster Thermidore for Ooma. They were terrific. Expensive, but worth it. A fine and fitting end to our Portsmouth vacation-within-a-vacation.
I have to gush a bit about Prescott Park. We went there right after arriving, to eat our Moe’s Italian sandwiches (which were also delicious). I had been to that park before, years ago, to attend an outdoor play. I remembered it as being a very nice urban park. But Ooma showed me the gardens which were, in a word, spectacular. Portmouth has much more to offer than just this one park, but it justifies a visit all on its own.
The formal garden at Presccott ParkThe UNH test garden at Prescott Park
On our way home we took a small detour to visit York ME. We stopped by the Cape Neddick Light (aka Nubble Light), one of the most popular tourist attractions on the coast of Maine. Then we had a good, old-fashioned ice cream soda at The Goldenrod, a long-time fixture in York. I don’t think I have had an ice cream soda in over 40 years and this was a good one.
On Saturday Ooma and I traveled to CT (just an hour from Worcester) to visit with Ooma’s son Jeffrey, his wife Sarah and their family. I was eager to meet the people that I had heard so much about. I was not disappointed. It was a wonderful day – in perfect weather – with a wonderful family.
Jeffrey (feeding Janson), Sarah and Sophia Bella
Sophia putting on a flag show
Jeffrey cooked bratwurst and hot dogs for us on arrival and tacos before departure, so we were well fed. We also got a tour of their home – an 18th-century gem with lots of nooks and crannies, which I love – and lots of time to get to know the kids. It was Ooma’s introduction to the newborn and a chance to marvel at how much the other 3 had grown since her last visit. The two youngest ones were not yet old enough to talk, but the two oldest girls had plenty to say. And do.
Sophia Bella, who has a late fall birthday, decided that she wanted a summer birthday instead, so we had an “Alice in Wonderland” birthday for her.
I enjoyed every minute. Thank you, Jeffrey and Sarah, for making me feel so welcome. And thank you, Sophia Bella and Farren, for keeping me entertained.
Ooma would like me to point out that the Cheetos gift to Dennis was a request from his parents – his favorite “treat” food, apparently.
Sophia Bella, Farren and Dennis, each with the gifts we brought
John Grisham sure knows how to write. His books are always of the “can’t put it down” variety.
This one is described as the “first in the Rogue Lawyer series.” It appears to be a series of one at this point, but I can see why this could be a series.
The “rogue lawyer” is Sebastian Rudd, a maverick defense attorney who specializes in defending the indefensible – often at the risk of angering the police and the community. His office has been firebombed and his life has been threatened. He works out of a converted van. His chauffeur / bodyguard / paralegal is a black ex-con appropriately named Partner. He has a bitchy lesbian ex-wife and a son that he sees infrequently. He loves mixed martial arts “cage fights” – and financially backs a young fighter.
Rudd has several clients in this one, including the fighter he is backing who is arrested for going beserk and killing the referee, in the cage. He also takes on the police department who kill a woman in a botched SWAT raid. And a scumbag guy who is probably a serial killer or at least a serial kidnapper. Oh – and a drug lord on death row.
It is a busy life.
Grisham writes this story in the first person, using short sentences and minimal dialog. It is almost like you are in Rudd’s head, thinking what he is thinking. It is a different style from his other books, but an effective one for telling the story of the rogue lawyer.
This is the 14th book in the series of Preston and Child books that feature, as the protagonist, Aloysius Pendergast, the rich FBI agent extraordinaire, and the sixth that I have read. This one immediately succedes White Fire. As with many of the other books in the series, he is assisted in his efforts by Vincent D’Agosta, an NYPD detective, friend and botanist Margo Green and his ward, Constance Greene. His bodyguard and chauffeur, Proctor, is injured in a car crash early on and does not figure prominently in the plot.
The plot. SPOILER ALERT: the events begin when the corpse of his estranged son, Alban, shows up on the doorstep of his Riverside Drive mansion. The rest of the book is a search for Alban’s killer and a motive for dumping him on Pendergast’s doorstep. It takes Aloysius to California and Brazil, but much of the action occurs in New York City – mostly at the Museum of Natural History and the Brooklyn Botanical Garden. The plot is, as with all of the Preston and Child plots, ridiculous. But the book is also great fun to read and it moves quickly.
