Yearly Archives: 2013

Santa and Me

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Santy Claus, Cyn and me poss. 1989…a really long time ago. This was the official shot you got in SantaLand at Macy’s Herald Square, avec “frame.” If you’ve never read David Sedaris’ Holidays on Ice, which includes his stint as an elf there, it’s a heartwarming holiday classic not to be missed.

This guy clearly wasn’t “Santa Santa” (read the book). I think he was more like “Hungover Santa” or “This Is My Lucky Day So Why Ain’t I Smiling Santa.” “Busted Femur Santa?”He may have been concentrating on the cameras or sensors in his beard.

The Home Stretch of Holiday Hell

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snowy xmas ballYou’re almost there, people. You are almost through the holiday gauntlet.

A gauntlet is an odious form of punishment wherein the victim is forced to run between two rows (the gauntlet) of soldiers that repeatedly smite him. The victim is slowed down by various means, preventing him from running the gauntlet—God forbid—too quickly. A magical holiday metaphor for you there.

Mercifully, the figurative holiday gauntlet is more varied and less severe. There’s the endless conveyor belt of cookies, booze, and dips that make you blow up like Santy Claus. There’s forced gaiety, perhaps—in, say, the workplace. Secret Santas you want no part of. Malfunctioning decorations. Fighty fights over tree placement. Hernias, ruptured disks, rocketing cholesterol. Concerts, pageants, fundraisers, and parties demanding special gifts, attire, or baking. Aversion to pine. Aversion to sugar plums.  Aversion to family. To holiday-themed newspaper columns. 2014, take me away! Not so fast, dear Reader. Remember:  you are not allowed to run the gauntlet too quickly.

Maybe your gauntlet has your kids driving you lunatic on one side, your parents on the other. Sadly, advances in technology are exacerbating the digital divide within families, amplifying holiday tensions. The grandparents just can’t seem to grab a hold of technology a lot of the time, and the kids are so much savvier than the parents (us) that it’s annoying.

Well, what is annoying is their annoyance with us. Teenagers since the dawn of time have considered their parents moronic. Only now, because of parents’ slimmer grasp of the technology their children have been wired with, parents really are dumber than their kids. This has never before been the case.  Kids didn’t know more about farming, sewing, war, factory work, finance…anything beyond pop culture fluff. Now they are more knowledgeable about something of consequence. As a friend put it, “My rocket geek son ‘helps’ me with my blog.  He’s rolling his eyes, ‘Mom, why’d you do it that way?’ like I‘m a complete idiot. When I explain I didn’t know there was another way, this fuels his irritation—and disdain. If I ever acted like him, my parents put the hammer down. I can’t.  Because he actually knows more than I do.”

Sigh! If you’ve had your fill of insults, exploding casseroles, manuals with miniscule print in 47 languages,  watching football teams do things you gave them no clearance to, the good news is you have only a few more games and New Year’s Eve left, and that’s not even a real holiday. Some call it “Amateur’s Night,” referring to those imbibing who rarely drink, an excellent reason to stay off snowy roads. Hell, even pros like Jethro or Granny manning the wheel of a poorly maintained jalopy after a couple pops of spiked nog coming at you in the oncoming lane, that’s just no fun at all. Stay home and, whatever you do, avoid those awful New Year’s Eve shows. They are worse than Honey Boo Boo, Toddlers and Tiaras, Kardashians singly or in groups, and Mafia Plumbers’ Wives combined. The exaggerated merriment of gussied-up commentators excitedly reciting numbers backwards can kill even the slenderest hope of a new and improved year coming your way.  Give yourself a fighting chance. Don’t watch. Ring in the New Year cozying up to your pet(s) or preferred person(s). Sing Auld Lang Syne (first a poem written in 1788 by Robert Burns) softly into their ears.  It’s nice like that.

And as a countermeasure to failed New Year’s resolutions kicking off the year badly, that important media outlet, the woman’s magazine, suggests an alternative: make instead a list of what you accomplished last year.  You’ll be amazed by what you did. Although I plan on more reading/less Candy Crushing with enough conviction to announce it here publicly to complete strangers, and strange completers (you know who you are). If you must resolve, pick something you can handle.

Helpful Reminder: As the highway notification boards proclaim, DUI. YOU WILL GET ARRESTED. Only the “D” is fat, so it looks like OUI, YOU WILL GET ARRESTED. (“But non, awf-ee-sair, I had nussing to dreenk zees evening! I am Canadienne. We drive feefty in ze left lane on ze intair-state, eet’s what we dewww! Alors, your dawg—does eet baht?”)

May you have enough coal in your stocking to keep you warm, and may the last few yards of your gauntlet be kind. Good New Year, good laffs, and good Boxing Day.

Have You Read a Ford Lately?

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nothing is realBehold the craftsmanship that went, letter by letter, into the spreading of this important message. Truer words were never, um, self-adhesived onto a bumper.

While each Ford has its own mystique, it’s not every Ford that serves as a reminder to dig out your cheery Floyd and Death Rattle CDs for family gatherings during this, the season of thanks. Oh and by the way, Peace to you, fellow motorists!

I Unheart Candy Crush

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candy crushMy niece was playing Candy Crush Saga and wouldn’t stop to explain how it works (Warning #1), so one terrible day I downloaded it.

With a Candy Land-ish footpath, sparkly explosions (of candy!), laudatory commentary in a soothing male voice (“Dee-licious!”), and otherworldly digital music that eats your brain, this malefic tease was designed by a bad person or evil entity to cripple mankind, likely the same devil who invented off-label opiate use.

After four days on level 23, lured there by e-z prior levels, I became admittedly obsessed (“Must. Crack. The. Code.”). With a ferocity normally reserved for those avenging the injury or shaming of a family member, I was determined to subjugate 23. But I noticed that while I did not want to stop, I was not actually enjoying playing. I was grinding my teeth and sweating and nervously checking the clock (10:30…11:00…midnight, uh-oh).  I YouTubed how to to win. There were crazed nutters in there that actually purchase tools (Lollipop Hammer, Coconut Wheel, Bomb Cooler, what?)  and time to keep going in a single game, courtesy of exploitative game mechanics. Too bad you can’t buy real time. The time you wasted playing.

I finally muscled through (“Candy crushhhhhhhhhhhhh!!!”) and whistled, That’s it — I’m done. Later I realized I had won on my phone. But not on my iPad, where I was still stuck on 23. So that’s where Sunday’s “extra hour of sleep” went.

Don’t do it.*  There are five HUNDRED levels and you will be trapped behind the candy curtain foreverrrr.

*Bet you didn’t know Sammy Davis. Jr. sang that theme song. Just one of many fakts you’ll learn if you don’t fritter away your life playing Candy Crush.

“Let it Snow!”

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first snow“But please, God, not too much. Snow tires eat gas and make it hard to hear my CDs.”

We drive a lot in rural America, so we put our snow tires on as late as we can push it. It’s kind of a game we play. So it’s best to stay off the roads during the first few blasts. Little tip fer ya there.

And yes, we still play CDs here.

Local Treasures

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carpet of leavesOur sunny foliage season was a hit; now for the private after-show for locals. As an artist friend noted with her specialized eyeballs, late foliage affords us remnants of red and gold with the twiggy lines of trees now bald mixed in. As another put it, the leaves on the ground provide a colorfully crunchy carpet before “November’s…dirt.”

Last week’s full moon (the hunter’s moon, traveling moon, or death moon, depending upon your tribe) offered us pagans good lighting for rituals wherein we place into a (lit. or fig.) caldron our wishes for our people and this krazy planet. I put into mine: clarity, love, creativity, strength.  You?

With short days, TV and radio and film become alluring alternatives to outdoor sports. If you podcast, Billy Crystal and Graham Nash crushed on Fresh Air on 10.17, as did the rerun of an April 20th Wait Wait…Don’t Tell Me’s “best of” celebrity callers episode (Melinda Gates! Jeff Bridges! A surprisingly hilarious Tony Danza! The Fonz!). Colbert’s on-air wedding for a couple gypped out of their nuptials at a (closed) national monument along with Jon Stewart’s Shutstorm 2013 made the government shut-down almost worthwhile. Randolph’s revamped Playhouse Theater, a local treasure (the oldest cinema in the state), is now rocking Gravity with national treasures Bullock and Clooney.

There’s still time to squeak in a few holes at the Woodstock Inn or Montague Golf Club…fore! While the Bethel Ethels have hung up their rackets for the season, playing tennis on Bethel’s crevice-marred town courts adds an element of chance to a gentlewoman’s game for those with a taste for danger. Terrible players like me can WIN via unforeseen benevolent bounces.

Our weirdly warm foliage aside, two weather phenoms remain certain: (1) it will always be so hot on July 4th that overdressed marching band members faint—or as the boys put it, “pass out”—and (2) it will always be so cold on Halloween you cannot see the kids’ costumes. “Welcome, er, Tundra Fairy! Is that a wing poking out of your…fairy parka?”; “I see you are an Arctic Vampire, young man. Do you take your blood neat, or with iceberg cubes?” I myself hand out Snickers and warm hardboiled eggs, unsure of the effect of chemical handwarmers upon Earth’s mighty landfills.

It’s time to trade in our garden tools for musical instruments and knitting needles. Which for some reason you can take on a plane, but not a nail clipper (pretty sure I could do more damage with a saxophone). Kimball Public Library’s knitting group provides community in Randolph as do the Knitters (Knutters!) of the Round Table at the Whippletree in Woodstock. Get some laffs while banging out colorific holiday gifts.

It’s also time to eat. Which can be counteracted by memberships at VTC, killer MOVE Fitness, or at the Woodstock Inn. For fall dining, personal faves include the Harrington House, Barnard Inn, Big Fatty’s BBQ, Cockadoodle Pizza Café, and Five Olde. My gastronomic goal is both Worthy restaurants some time soon—wanna take me on a date? Ahahaha, that’s so funny. Dating: not a local treasure of the Upper Valley.

For beer I dig Burlington’s unfiltered ale, Switchback; for cocktails a nice Bloody Caesar (Bloody Mary with clam juice) using local Silo Vodka or Vermont Gold, a maple vodka. Crockpotting demands top vegetables from your farmers’ market or the Chef’s Market. And don’t put away the grill—the only time that’s no good is when it’s 20 below. Then the meat freezes on top while the bottom cooks, sort of. Don’t ask me how I know that. For dentistry: wicked old-school kindly Dr. McDonald in Woodstock. For knockout eyeglasses: Eyes on Elm; no competition for 150 miles. Pies? On the Edge Farm on Route 12. Dana wizards the fruits of the Land from apple to sour cherry.

Your monthly Useful Information is this: glucosamine makes you gassy. Your Good News for women is: there is a product for after shaving and waxing called finipil that feels like a York Peppermint Pattie; for men, the beauty industry is catering to aging male boomers with “special formulations” “just for men” (what’s in there?). Next up in the beauty aisle: eyebrow hair relaxant, for old Scottish weird curlicue eyebrow hair growers like me. I hope. Good day.

“20 Things 20-Year-Olds Don’t Get”

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Dig this Forbes contributor’s advice to 20-somethings in the workplace. A trifle condescending, but (1) he hires Jason Nazar20-somethings and (2) who among us “elders” didn’t endure a lifetime of condescension? There’s little to be gained from being treated like you know it all when you just don’t.

Wish I had read his thots about time, networks, & mentors eons ago, & I’m all for the plugs for PHONING and READING versus CHRONIC DEVICE USAGE…even if he was just a tiny little boy when I worked at Forbes.

Come to Vermont…Post-Peak

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later foliageWe’ve saved a few colored leaves for you, have oxygen in ample supply, and our inns and B&Bs with fireplaces wait to cozy you up now that the full-throttle foliage traffic has passed. Our book stores are not chains and our yard sales boast the prices of yesteryear.

Learn about our human leaf forecaster here. And while Vermont’s colors may not be at peak, I can assure you that her nutters are.

Summer’s Gone, Bring It Awn: The Joys of Autumn

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Roosty says: “Scroll over photos for hilARious secret text.”

Foliage season (the tail that swings the bull of Vermont commerce), means time to reflect. With July’s hot rains there were reflecting pools (skeeter habitats) aplenty. Between that and August’s cool drought, who knows what colors our foliage will turn? It’s looking knockout.

Color me optimistic, but I feel a shift. Much terrible news notwithstanding, the People of the Land seem…hopeful! Energetic! We’re making music—beating drums, blowing horns, plucking strings with vigor—as squirrels scamper and crows caw. Hurricane-induced bridge repairs are complete. Fragrant apples fall with a thud while bears bang on the porch door. “Open up. I know you have product in there.”

The Tunbridge World’s Fair was better than ever. Kindly Ambassadors directed confused fairgoers and the Golf Cart Squad ferried the weary. The Year of the Swine theme provided natural hilarity; there’s just something funny about a pig, a nutty beast that keeps getting…larger. The revamped barns, nicely appointed with flora (kudos, Decorating Committee!), housed all manner of superb creatures basking in their creaturehood. Chickens with far-out hairdos, calves with soulful eyes, strutting peacocks, soft bunnies, a sow with 12 piglets (oof), and oxen with team names (Ben and Jerry) endured petting (and finger pokes) like pros. I asked my mother why she always walks outside of the cattle barn peering into windows, is she afraid of getting kicked inside? “I don’t want to be around if someone drops one,” she answered. A decades-old mystery solved.

Other quotes amused. Here now three: (1) My aunt has two sets of false teeth: her Smiling Teeth and her Eating Teeth. One year she lost the latter just as she was about to tuck into her fair fare (fried dough?).  My father observed in the retelling, “The timing could not have been less fortunate.”  (2) Upon leaving the heaving fairgrounds, I speculated how nearby houses cannot be a good place to live during the fair; you couldn’t stand the traffic so you’d sit at home for four days. Someone added after a moment, “The General Store is probably out of beer.”  (3) During the Livestock Cavalcade, a senior woman resembling Katharine Hepburn whistled so loudly with her fingers that I said, “You’re good whistler!” She replied somewhat cryptically, “I stopped the California Zephyr with that.”

The Applause-TWF costume classO-Meter fairly exploded at the Costume Class, wherein 4H children dress up themselves and their farm animals, this year’s winner being Tunbridge Fall Formal—two girls in gowns and wrist corsages, their yoked oxen in tuxedos and top hats. The fans went wild. Except for the Harringtons of Pomfret, who had settled deeply into seating inside the Larkin Dancers’ tent and could not be reached for comment.

NWF marionetteIf you love contra dancing, Randolph’s New World Festival on Labor Day Sunday (brainchild of madman Kevin Dunwoody) is where you want to be, despite this year’s wafting BO due to unusually high temps. Although Duck for the Oyster baffled the boisterous Boyce family, who simply do not give cNWF chick bagpiperontra dance instruction the attention it deserves, dance callers catered nicely to novices while allowing seasoned pros to peacock it with beskirted flourishes. The music enthralled, the marionettes entranced, and the hardworkin’ McMeekins held up…even if their hair didn’t in 100% humidity. The fans again went wild, as they did at the Tweed River and Bethel Forward festivals and the Festival of Fools. Things are looking UP.

Your monthly Useful Information is this: the 4 H’s in 4H Club are: head, heart, hands, and health. Your Good News is a quote from a dear friend my age: “I have a layer of cellulite over my entire body. But underneath that is a layer of muscle.”

TWF pickleThank you, festival organizers, for hours of unbridled joy just when summer’s departure tries so hard to make us melancholy. We switch out swim trunks for Carhartts, kiss macaroni salad goodbye, and say Hello! to apple pie. Setting a slice aside for the bears. Like the Whos down in Whoville, we are happy. We are hopeful. We cannot be subdued. We are the Upper VaTWF scarecrow piglley of the Connecticut River. Good day.TWF hostess w mostestTWF quilts

TWF creatures - make way forTWF dec veg 2013NWF whale