Letting my Hippie Flag Fly

Yes, it's true, I have "hippie" tendencies. I like good tie-dye t-shirts. By "good" I mean good colors and designs not the type that you made at day-camp and the colors fade after one washing. I like my Birkenstock "Arizona" style sandals. The ones that are completely broken in and truly comfortable by now. I'll never buy another pair, I'll just have these resoled some day. Some of you know I shave (or don't) like a hippie. I put nutritional yeast (aka "hippie dust") on my whole wheat pasta and like it (almost) better than cheese.

But last week I crossed into new hippie territory... I made granola! It's true! I found a recipe in my Uprisings whole grain baking book (I told you I had hippie tendencies) and made "maple nut granola" and it was sooo good with soymilk, coconut and raisins! YUM!

When was the last time you let your hippie flag fly?

Back to Reality

I returned home on Monday after being away for 19 days to discover that my housemate is a slacker! This is nothing new to me. I feel no guilt in not giving her a thank-you gift for not taking care of my cat. Tiger Lily was still alive and kicking and oh-so-happy to see me but obviously had been surviving on mostly dry food and water for the whole time we were gone. My niece, Nora, fed her some wet food and cleaned her litter boxes while she and her dad (Ian, Trevor's brother) were here for a day prior to my nephew, Michael's wedding. But there were a mighty lot of cans left over when I got home. Tiger Lily is such a trooper!

I also learned that my PCP (that's Primary Care Physician in insurance speak) has decided to leave his practice. Not only is he leaving his practice but he's leaving medicine altogether. He's not retiring, just fed up with "modern medicine" and taking some time off. This disappoints me because, while I rarely see my PCP, I've come to really respect him and appreciate his "bed-side manner". I'm not the kind of person who runs to the doctor for every sniffle, ache and pain but the few times that I've been there I've come to really like Dr. Rechtschaffen. I'm bummed out that I have to pick a new PCP and can barely pronounce the names of the PCPs that were referred to me. Yes, it's worse than Rechtschaffen! I had planned to ask my chiropractor when I was there on Thursday for my usual back and neck cracking but her husband, the other Dr. Denny, was there instead. These kinds of decisions always leave me a bit paralyzed.

I'm still jobless and the clocking is ticking on the unemployment. Today when I filed my weekly claim I learned that I had exhausted my unemployment benefits. Oh joy. I'll be filing for extended benefits. In the meantime, I'm plugging away at the job search but nothing even remotely interesting has materialized in a long time.

Nature on the Saco River

We spotted this bird when we were quietly paddling along the Saco. We pulled up close to the bank of the river and I took some photos. I'm not sure what it is, but it's likely a juvenile.

Here's the bird from a distance. If anyone can ID it for me, I'd appreciate that.

Just when we were about to paddle away from visiting some birch trees on the river bank, I spotted this nest in a birch that was leaning out into the river.

Even More Highlights of Camp

The Saco River around 7am. It was about 6 feet higher than it normally is in August. No sand bar across the river this year.

Trevor and I went on a leisurely paddle down the Saco to Swan's Falls on the last Sunday after everyone had left. It was about a 2 hour trip. We don't do much paddling. We mostly just let the current carry us along.

Weston's Bridge in Fryeburg, just downstream from camp.

It was a perfect day for reflections on the water.

Trevor loves paddling down the Saco.

More Highlights of FNCA 2008

Polar Bears testing the water.

My dear friend, Beki and her sister Dawn, at Kezar Lake.

More crazy Polar Bears in the river before breakfast.

And they go in willingly!

Papa Bear, aka Trevor, goes in last.

Highlights of Camp 2008

We just returned from 2 weeks at camp in Fryeburg, Maine on the Saco River. While it rained for most of the first week and almost half of the second week, we still enjoyed our time there. All that extra water made the river almost 6 feet higher than it normally is in August. Public swimming was canceled but the brave and few (the Polar Bear Club) enjoyed the refreshing and invigorating water every morning. Above is a favorite evening activity - Sparks games - at 7pm every evening for the kids 12 and under. I think they were playing "fishy fishy" in this photo.

Jason, Trevor's son, in the center of the parachute during parachute games.

My sister, Wendy and her daughter, Chloe, didn't actually make it to camp this year but we got to see them on outing day. We met them and my SIL Amy, in Littleton, NH. Littles in Littleton, haha.

Group photo of most of the people who were at camp 2nd week. Trevor's parents are front and center. Pop, with Jillian, in a wheelchair. Mom, next to him on the left.

Silly Littles in Littleton, NH.

A fine example of poor grammar

On Saturday I walked over to the State Line Store in Conway, NH to get a sandwich for lunch. Camp hadn't officially started yet so I needed to supply my own lunch. There's a Subway sandwich shop in the State Line Store and on the glass "sneeze guard" was the finest example of poor grammar I've seen in a long time.
Trevor and I walked over there today so that he could see it for himself. I stuck my camera in the pocket of my Red Sox hoodie and put the hood up. It was noon and Subway was a bit busy but I did manage to take just one picture. Trevor said the guy behind the counter was looking at me kind of funny when I snapped the picture. Trevor suspects that he was the author of the sign and was wondering why I would want to take a picture of it. Trevor laughed out loud when he read it. I hope you enjoy it as much as we did.

Dogs do Understand English

I'm in Fryeburg, Maine and for the past 3 days I've been helping my friend, Lee, clean cabins at the Fryeburg New Church Assembly in preparation for camp opening today. I've been staying at her house in East Fryeburg on Stanley Hill Road. Yesterday morning she and her husband, Dan and I were sitting around the dining table with our dueling laptops and mugs of coffee, tea, etc, and their 2 year old dog, Lady, was lying on the floor behind Lee.

Lee's been trying to get together her religion class for camp. She's teaching the younger class for the first week. She was looking at a website of the New Church when she says, "I wish I could sing." And Lady (the dog), lying on the floor behind her, says, "HAHAHA".